Why was the early church's survival so unlikely?
The early church's survival was unlikely because new believers came out of deep idolatry or Judaism, and Paul established churches in only weeks before moving on. Without long-term apostolic presence, humanly speaking, the odds were impossible; only God's miraculous working power could sustain and spread Christianity through the Roman Empire.
Les teaches that Christianity would never have gotten off the ground without the miraculous working power of God. It faced an impossible set of odds: the people were steeped in idolatry, and the Jewish element was just as steeped in Judaism. Paul never stayed long in any place. The Jerusalem church could prosper because the eleven, later the twelve, remained year in and year out among the Jews in Israel. But where Paul established churches, it was only for a week or two—Antioch about a year and a half, Thessalonica only a couple of weeks—and he moved on. New believers fresh out of paganism had to survive; Les says he cannot understand it except that it was the miraculous power of God that Christianity now took off and began permeating the whole Roman Empire.