The Riot in Ephesus (c. 54-57 AD)

The First Century House Churches Saga (Book 7)

In a city ruled by a goddess of silver, one man’s message ignites a fire that threatens to consume the Roman world.

The Apostle Paul’s ministry in Ephesus has reached its zenith. In the school of Tyrannus, the Word of God grows mightily and prevails, culminating in a great bonfire of magic books that shakes the city to its spiritual foundations. But this triumph of faith casts a long and dangerous shadow.

Demetrius, a master silversmith whose fortune is forged in the worship of the goddess Diana, sees his livelihood collapsing. With his craft in peril and the city’s devotion threatened, he gathers the guilds and unleashes a torrent of civic and religious fury, turning a metropolis into a mob and plunging Ephesus into chaos.

Meanwhile, in Rome, the patriarchs of the house church network rejoice at the news from Asia. Yet, their own sons—torn between faith and fear, ambition and honor—see Paul’s path of suffering not as a victory, but as a foolish and dangerous liability. And in the shadows of Alexandria, the dark apostle Simon Magus dispatches his most cunning disciple, Cerinthus, to sow a subtle, Gnostic heresy designed to corrupt the church from within.

Book 7 of the 1st Century House Churches series, The Riot in Ephesus is a sweeping narrative of spiritual warfare on three fronts: a city at the flashpoint of pagan rage, a family wrestling with the cost of discipleship, and a church facing the insidious threat of false apostles who appear as angels of light. When faith and finance collide, and truth is put on trial in the court of public opinion, a sorrowful farewell will set the stage for the greatest challenges the early church has yet to face.