It is hard to speak about martyrdom for a few reasons. First, we don’t want to sugar coat it or make it something to necessarily strive for. Second, we don’t want to avoid it and act as if it is not a real thing that Christians have been and are being disemboweled just because they are Christians. Third, it is tough to speak about martyrdom because very few of us have any idea what it entails; we haven’t the foggiest idea the soul-fight that it would take to confess Christ even when a knife pierces our kidneys.
This being said, it is something we should speak about from time to time, and of course we need to pray for those who are being persecuted today for naming Jesus. These things have been on my mind as I’ve been reading some epistles of Caecilius Cyprian (who was himself martyred around 258 AD). Some of these epistles that Cyprian wrote while fleeing persecution, holed up and hidden, are an amazing testimony to Christ’s persevering love. In fact, Cyprian said it this way: “It is not martyrs that make the gospel, but…martyrs are made by the gospel” (ANF V.301).
Cyprian wrote to several presbyters and other churchmen concerning their terrible suffering, commending them for their faith, and encouraging them to continue to confess Jesus. They (namely, Maximus, Moyses, Nicostratus, and others) wrote back:
“Your letter has shone upon us as a calm in the midst of a tempest, and as the longed-for tranquility in the midst of a troubled sea…. What more glorious, or what more blessed, can happen to any man from the divine condescension than to confess the Lord God, in death itself, before his very executioners? Than among the raging and varied and exquisite tortures of worldly power, even when the body is racked and torn and cut to pieces, to confess Christ the Son of God with a spirit still free, although departing?” (Ibid., 303).
One thing these men also struggled with was what to do with those who did profess faith, but when tortured, denied Christ. What do we do with the lapsed, in other words, if they come back to a church after denying Jesus? Many of Cyprian’s (and the other church leaders) letters deal with this. Basically, Cyprian says: if they repent of their horrible sin, give them some time (with lots of Christian charity) and then readmit them to the church and to the Holy Supper. It seems as if there was some sort of “paperwork” or something that the bishops would use so the “lapsed” and then restored believer could be admitted to the Supper (but that’s another topic). In summary, there is much to learn from these fathers of ours. It is a fruitful study (for polity, church discipline, being a soldier of the cross, and so forth) – and it is an edifying study that teaches Jesus’ words, the gates of hell shall not prevail against the church.
Here are some good OT/NT commentaries with selections from the church fathers that some of you may be familiar with.
shane lems
sunnyside wa
