December 15, 2015

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup, so that the outside also may become clean. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and of all kinds of filth. So you also on the outside look righteous to others, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.” Matthew 23:25 – 28

“…there was a great tumult on hearing that Polycarp had been arrested. Therefore, when he was brought before him, the proconsul asked him if he were Polycarp. And when he confessed that he was, he tried to persuade him to deny (the faith), saying, “Have respect for your age” – and other things that customarily follow this, such as “Swear by the fortune of Caesar; change your mind; say ‘Away with the atheists!’” But Polycarp looked with earnest face at the whole crowd of lawless heathen in the arena, and motioned to them with his hand. Then groaning and looking up to heaven he said “Away with the atheists!”

But the Proconsul was insistent and said: “Curse Christ.”

Polycarp said: “Eighty-six years I have served him, and he never did me any wrong. How can I blaspheme my King who saved me?…If you vainly suppose that I shall swear by the fortune of Caesar, as you say, and pretend that you do not know who I am, listen plainly: I am a Christian. But if you desire to learn the teaching of Christianity, appoint a day and give me a hearing.” The Proconsul said, “Try to persuade the people”. (Martyrdom of Polycarp, Polycarp (69 – 155), “For All The Saints” volume III, p. 60 – 61)

Polycarp’s martyrdom: He died for one reason – his unyielding faith in Jesus Christ. Yet Polycarp’s well-recorded death is only one of many lives that were given to proclaim the truth of Jesus Christ. In light of the cruel and torturous deaths of the first and second generation Christians, all theories that Christianity is just a myth need to be examined. Even today, many will die for something or someone they believe, but few will die for a lie. God allows the deaths of His saints not because He is a helpless or indifferent Lord, but because their deaths are powerful declarations of the free gift of life that is offered to us through the Person of Jesus Christ. Polycarp, like many other Christians to this day, was only able to die for Christ because he lived for Christ. His life was radically transformed by the work of the Holy Spirit — the desires, worries, pains and fears of this world no longer bound him. Polycarp’s life and death provides an inspirational example for all Christians. He gave his earthly life for Christ, and in the midst of his sacrifice, he gained eternal life.

Pastor Dave