Do You Suffer for Jesus?

A brother in Nigeria reported a recent attack of Muslims against Christians. Fifty-two people were slaughtered, including children as young as three years old. While many in the West deny the violence inherent in this movement, people in Nigeria and other countries live in the real world and witness it firsthand. These Christians deserve our respect and need our prayers.

Almost a thousand years ago the Roman Catholic Church persecuted believers who disagreed with their unbiblical teaching and practices. The Council of Toloufe in 1119 ordered: “We condemn and turn out of the church of God as heretics those who under pretense of religion reject the sacrament of the body and blood of Jesus Christ, infant baptism, priesthood, holy orders, and lawful marriages. We enjoin that they be suppressed by the secular powers. We subject their defenders, under the same condemnation, if they do not repent” (DuPin, Ecclesiastical History, vol. 10, pp. 89-90). An assembly of bishops in 1160 persuaded King Henry II of England to condemn those they labeled as heretics. The King accordingly ordered the despised resistors to be branded with a red-hot iron on their cheek, whipped publicly, driven out of the city half-naked and left to starve to death (p. 90). Many, however, faced a more sudden death by being burned.

Long before these persecutions, authorities who were supposed to represent God tormented faithful men and women of God. In the Old Testament, they were “tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. Still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented—of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth” (Heb. 11:35-38).

And what about our Lord and His disciples? Before Jesus was crucified, He warned them, “If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you” (John 15:20). This happened just as Jesus said. His disciples suffered imprisonment, ridicule, beatings and death.

This brings the question down to us. Are we willing to suffer for the cause of Christ? In some form or another, it will happen. “Yes, and all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution” (II Tim. 3:12). Let us stand with Him and let come what may.

Kerry

West End church of Christ • April 27, 2025