the Church of The Holy Sepulcher

At first blush one may not realize how pitiful such a plun­der of the message of Christ is when accomplished at the hands of those to whom it was entrusted. Somehow, a slow bleed and loss of philosophical strength does not seem as real to people as a sudden amputation. One of Christendom's most revered buildings serves as a very painful illustration of how tragic such self-mutilation can be to the cause of Christ when the carriers of such division are within it. I refer to the Church of The Holy Sepulcher as it functions today in the city of Jerusalem. Let me quote the words of the English writer Arthur Leonard Griffith.

At the center of the old city [Jerusalem] stands the Church of The Holy Sepulcher, reputedly on the sight of the original Calvary and the original Garden of The Resurrection. It stands, but only be­cause ugly steel scaffolding permanently supports the walls in­side and out. This church is one of the dirtiest, most depressing buildings in all Christendom. It should be torn down and re­built. This is not possible, however, because the Church of The Holy Sepulcher belongs jointly to the Abyssinians, Armenians, Copts, Greeks, Syrians and Roman Catholics, and their priests will hardly speak to one another, let alone cooperate in a joint enterprise of rebuilding. Each communion preserves its own sepa­rate chapel, and conducts its own ceremonies; and to make the situation ludicrous, the keys of the church have been entrusted to a family of Muslims who in order to answer the call of Allah five times daily, have turned the entrance into a Muslim Mosque. Nowhere in all the world can you find a more tragic symbol of the mutilation of Christ's body than the Church of The Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem.

The only difference between the Church of The Holy Sepulcher and the self-defacing influence of those who at­tacked scriptural authority in Western Christendom is that the keys of the kingdom were handed over to secular powers as the voice of God in the Scriptures was silenced by those to whom it was entrusted.

Extracted from Ravi Zacharias’ Deliver Us From Evil.