Last time we were in Great Britain visiting with Charles Hadn't Spurgeon.

Let's stay in England for a while, but let's go back a little further than the 19th century.

Let's go all the way back to the 300s. We need to go to the county of Dorset to a charming named place,

Hinton St Mary's. Actually, we need to go back to London to the British Museum, because it is there in that

massive Treasury of Antiquity in the early Britain room that we will find a mosaic, the Hinton St Mary mosaic.

It was unearthed in 1963.

The full mosaic is 17 feet by 15 feet and right in the middle is what they call a roundal or a circular

mosaic. It is believed to be the earliest extent image of Christ.

And it is flanked by the ancient Christian symbol of the Kyro, two Greek letters that are the

first two letters of Christ's name.

Three in English, because the Chai, which is the X in Greek, is transliterated as a C.

in English, and the row is the R. This symbol goes back to

Constantine. Historians aren't sure of the purpose of the original building that this mosaic was a part of.

Some think it was the dining room of a villa.

Others think it may have been a church.

We're not exactly sure what the room was for, but here's the significance.

Christ is the center of the mosaic.

In our terms, we would say, the focal point.

Now traditionally, a pagan God or a goddess would hold that

place in Roman mosaics and the four corners of the Hinton St Mary

mosaic are given to the four Gospel writers.

Typical Roman mosaics had the four winds or the four elements.

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