Note: Devotion taken from last Sunday's sermon on Matthew 5:7-12.
Blessed are they which
are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven
(Matt 5:10).
In John 15:20 Christ told his disciples, “The servant is not greater
than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you.”
This
truth has been proven over and again throughout church history.
Peter
and John were arrested in the temple, beaten, and commanded not to speak in the
name of Jesus (Acts 5:40), to which Luke adds that they departed “rejoicing
that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name” (v. 41).
The
story continued in the protomartyr Stephen (Acts 7), and in the death of James,
the first apostle to lay down his life for Christ (Acts 12:1-2).
It is
there in the multiple imprisonments, beatings, shipwrecks, and trials of the
apostle Paul (cf. 2 Cor 11:21-30).
It
continued in those mentioned in Hebrews 10, who were made a “gazingstock both
by reproaches and afflictions (v. 33) and who “took joyfully” the spoiling of
their goods, knowing in themselves that they had “in heaven a better and an
enduring substance” (v. 34).
Beyond
the time of the apostles, it was there in early men who suffered, including
Ignatius of Antioch, who wrote letters to his fellow believers in the churches
as he was being carried off to Rome to be fed to the lions. Or, in Polycarp of
Smyrna who refused to deny Christ when he was 86 years old and was put to death
for his faithfulness.
The
more the church was persecuted the more it grew. As Tertullian of Carthage put
it, “The blood of the martyrs is the seedbed of the church.”
It
continued in the sufferings of believers under various Roman emperors,
including during the “Great Persecution” under Diocletian when Bibles were
burned and ministers put to death.
It
continued at the time of the Protestant Reformation when the “Marian martyrs”
were burned at the stake for preaching the Gospel.
It
was there when men like the Particular Baptist Benjamin Keach was pilloried for
teaching believer’s baptism.
And
when John Bunyan was put in prison for preaching outside of state sanction,
making shoe-laces from his prison cell to support his family, which included a
daughter who was bind.
It
continued in the persecuted church in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe
during communism.
And
it continues today among brethren all over the world who continue to suffer
shame and even death for the name of Christ. In my experiences those who have
suffered most for Christ are usually those who desire least to talk of this.
They wish instead to speak of Christ.
If
you were to visit the grounds of the little hospital in Jibla, Yemen, you’d
find the graves of William Koehn (administrator of the hospital) and Dr. Martha
Myers (who for over 25 years served there as an obstetrician and surgeon). They
were martyred by a fanatical Muslim on December 30, 2002. On Koehn’s grave
marker in crude handwritten English and Arabic it says, “God’s tool; loving
husband; father to many”; and on Myers’ it simply states in broken English,
“She love God” (for a picture of the grave markers, see R. W. Yarbrough’s Clash
of Visions, p. 68).
Christ announces the reward for the
persecuted: “for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (v. 10b). In v. 12 he adds an
additional promise: “for great is your reward in heaven.”
Skeptics sometimes mock believers for
the hope of heaven. They call it “pie in the sky.” Marx called it an opiate for
the masses.
But the hope of heaven has proven the
very thing through the years that has led ordinary men and women to live in
extra-ordinary ways. For many, it has been that which was needed to stiffen the
spine and brace the courage when facing persecution and even death for the sake
of their Lord.
Men will do much for Christ if they
believe this: To die for Christ in this life is to wake with Christ in the life
to come.
May we be found faithful in this generation.
Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle
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