Sermon series: BEHAVING LIKE A CHRISTIAN
Subject: Responding to Unkindness

Romans 12:14
"Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse."

John 16:33 (The words of Jesus)
"These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."

Matthew 5:11-12
"Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake.
Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you."

Hebrews 11:32-40
"And what more shall I say? For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon and Barak and Samson and Jephthah, also of David and Samuel and the prophets:
who through faith subdued kingdoms, worked righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,
quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, became valiant in battle, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.
Women received their dead raised to life again. Others 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.
And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise,
God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us."

Inevitably the Christian will experience suffering and tribulation. Jesus predicted it, the apostles and early believers experienced it, and the long history of the church gives agonizing testimony to this reality. Like a buzz saw that hits the heartwood of a log, Christian witness cuts to the core

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of a corrupted society, and that results in the world's dislike and disdain of the Christian faith.
The passion of Christ set for all time the example of suffering for the early church. The scandal of the Cross formed the heart of apostolic preaching, and predictably, it provoked persecution. And it was through the historic reality of Christ's triumphant resurrection that perseverance and tenacious hope has characterized common believers and martyrs alike.
A New Testament theology of the church ought to include a theology of suffering. The New Testament writers wrote about it so that congregations of faithful believers would be better prepared to face all kinds of trials.
The apostle Peter gave extensive attention to it. Had he been like so many evangelical populists today, hungry to sell a book, he might have titled his first epistle TEN EASY STEPS ON HOW TO SUFFER FOR JESUS. Then again, today's generation might consider the topic irrelevant. Quite fortunately for us, Peter considered it relevant! His words grace the text of Scriptures with balance and divine insight:
"Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. If you suffer, it should not be as a murderer or thief or any other kind of criminal, or even as a meddler. However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name. For it is time for judgment to begin with the family of God; and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God? And, "If it is hard for the righteous to be saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?" So then, those who suffer according to God's will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good." (1 Peter 4:12-19)
One of my favorite authors is Michael S. Horton. He has written a book titled MADE IN AMERICA, in which he examines the impact of American culture on Christianity, especially evangelical Christianity. The impact comes from a variety of cultural sources, he says, but one of these is our consumerism.

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In America everything is sold—from toothpaste to politicians—and the way it is sold is by appealing to the dreams and desires of the people. Nothing bad is ever faced. Disappointments are ruled out. This has its effect on Christianity. In order to sell Christianity—and selling it is big business today—anything unpleasant or demanding is suppressed, and the gospel is commended rather as a cure for failure and low-esteem, as well as a path to power.
Mr. Horton writes: "In consumer religion, Christianity becomes trivialized. Its great mysteries become cheap slogans. Its majestic hymns are traded in for shallow jingles...And its parishioners, now unashamedly called audiences, have come to expect dazzling testimonies, happy anecdotes, and fail proof schemes for successful living that will satiate spiritual consumption."
Ah! How different is biblical Christianity. In the Gospels Jesus spoke often of the cost of following after Him in faithful discipleship, without which there is no salvation and no Christianity. What is more--and here the situation becomes even more impossible for today's marketers of religion--He warned that those who identify with Him would be hated. Instead of being popular and successful, Christians would be hated. "All men will hate you because of Me, he who stands firm to the end will be saved." (Mark 13:13)
"If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated Me first." (John 15:18)
"Remember the words I spoke to you: "No servant is greater than his master. If they persecuted Me, they will persecute you also." (John 15:20)
Peddlers of cheap grace offer a painless, bland brand of faith. Ascetics, on the other hand, want to make it more painful than it should be. Legalists institutionalize faith, like a system calling for conformity to human rules. But missing from all these is the voice of reality.
The Bible provides that reality, that wise and sensible word that lays out life as it really is, with all its agony and ecstasy. For Christians, suffering is more normative than we care to admit. Jesus was not the causal victim of random violence; He suffered for a cause. Christians, in similar fashion, have been called to suffer in Jesus' name. Our suffering, when and if it comes, links us to our Lord. As He bore His suffering and learned obedience through it, as Hebrews 5:8 attests, so may we bear our suffering and learn from it.

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Suffering is part of the believer’s identification with Christ. It is no isolated theme; it permeates the Bible. Nowhere is this more clear than in 1 Peter 2:21: "To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow His steps."
Suffering, even persecution, follows as a result of this imitation of Christ. Paul made this clear to Timothy by preparing him for the reality of suffering: "In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil men and imposters will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived." (2 Timothy 3:12-13)
Normal Christianity, then, includes suffer! No witness to the truth of the gospel can ever be far from the Cross or from suffering.
The passage we quoted in the opening of our lesson from Hebrews 11 states that some affliction is inescapable; sometimes it is not. To the person of faith, no affliction is escapable that requires denial or compromise of God’s Word. What is easily escaped for the worldly person is not for the faithful. When it is suffered because of God’s Word and standing for Him, God’s people will take torture, not accepting their release, in order that they might obtain a better resurrection (Hebrews 11:35).
The many kinds of suffering mentioned in these verses, apply generally to the faithful saints. They are a summary of the many and varied kinds of affliction God’s people face and are often called to endure for Him. Whether they were killed or made outcasts, the point is the same--they courageously and uncompromisingly suffered for the Lord because of their faith.
God does not promise His saints deliverance from all suffering. To the contrary, Jesus told us to take up our crosses and to follow Him (Mark 8:34), and that "If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you.
Our text in Romans 12:14 states: "Bless those who persecute you...do not curse them:" The New Testament bears witness to various forms of persecution and some instances of the methods used to torture Christians. First, there is reference to the Roman arena. Condemnation to the arena was reserved for the worst offenders against Roman law. Under the Roman emperor Caligula (A.D. 37-41), Christians may have been forced to face starved beasts, even lions, in the arena. He had erected a gilded statue of himself inside the temple, forcing compliance of his severe rule. The text in 1 Corinth-

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ians 4:9 probably refers both to a victory march of a conquering emperor and death in the arena: "For it seems to me that God has put apostles on display at the end of the procession, like men condemned to die in the arena. We have been made a spectacle to the whole universe, to angels as well as to men."
Another form of persecution in New Testament times was stoning. This was a form of execution reserved under Jewish law for blasphemers or those caught in adultery. Usually, stoning was more a phenomenon of mob violence than the result of legal sentencing. The stoning of Stephen (Acts 5:57-60) and of Paul (Acts 14:19) are examples of this method used either to intimidate Christians or to hold back the inevitable advance of the church.
"But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God, and said, "Look! I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!"
Then they cried out with a loud voice, stopped their ears, and ran at him with one accord; and they cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul. And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, "Lord, do not charge them with this sin." And when he had said this, he fell asleep." (Acts 7:55-60)
Remember our text: "Bless them that persecute you, bless and curse not."
Crucifixion was a common Roman form of execution for criminals. To Christians, the cross, a despised symbol of torture, became the focal point not of criminal guilt, but of redemption. Ample evidence comes from historians and writers of early centuries of the church that many early Christians, both Jews and Gentiles, died by this method. Deuteronomy 21:22-33 and Galatians 3:13 give insight into the despised nature of death by crucifixion. Death by hanging on a tree may have been a Jewish method of execution and became linked to the uniquely Roman method of constructing a cross of wooden beams.
"And when they had come to the place called Calvary, there they crucified Him, and the criminals, one on the right hand and the other on the left.
Then Jesus said, "Father, forgive them for they do not know what they do." And they divided His garments and cast lots." (Luke 23:33-34)

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Fire was used as a means of persecution in New Testament times. Death by burning became legal in Greek and Roman cultures. Under Nero, Christians were burned at the stake, possibly serving as convenient scapegoats for his own crime of burning Rome in July, A.D. 64. The eighteenth-century hymn "How Firm a Foundation" poetically illustrates death by burning fire. The third stanza portrays persecution, God’s protection, and its spiritual meaning for the good of the church. Its words recall the words of the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 43:2:
"When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie, My grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply: The flame shall not hurt thee; I only design, thy dross to consume and thy gold to refine."
Imprisonment, another form of punishment, was used extensively to persecute Christians, as well as flogging, scourging, and the driving of an actual spike into the hands of a devout believer which served to identify the Christian with the stigma of the cross of Christ.
Remember the scripture verse from Paul to Timothy..."In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted..."
Let us not forget the cost of following Jesus as His disciples! FOX’S BOOK OF MARTYRS gives us a brief history of the deaths of the men Jesus selected to be His disciples, also known as apostles.
James, the son of Zebedee, the older brother of John, and a relative of the Lord was the first to die for his Master. Herod Agrippa had been appointed as governor of Judea. With the view to ingratiate himself with the Jews, he raised a sharp persecution against the Christians, striking at their leadership. James was targeted! The account given us by an eminent primitive writer, Clemens Alexandrinus, tells us that as James was led to the place of martyrdom, his accuser was brought to repent of his conduct by the apostle’s extraordinary courage and undauntedness, and fell down at his feet to request his pardon, professing himself a Christian, and resolving that James should not receive the crown of martyrdom alone. Hence they were both beheaded at the same time.
The record of this event is recorded in Acts 12:1-2: "Now about that time Herod the king stretched out his hand to harass some from the church. Then he killed James the brother of John with the sword."
Philip was born at Bethsaida in Galilee and was first called by the name of "disciple." He labored diligently in Upper Asia, and

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suffered martyrdom at Heliopolis, In Phrygia. He was scourged, thrown into prison, and afterwards crucified in A.D. 54.
Matthew, whose occupation was that of a toll-gatherer, was born at Nazareth. He wrote his gospel in Hebrew, which was afterward translated into Greek by James the Less. The scene of his labors was Parthia, and Ethiopia, in which latter country he suffered martyrdom, being slain with a halberd in the city of Nadabah in A.D 60. (A halberd is a spear with an axe blade.)
James the Less is supposed by some to have been the brother of our Lord. He was selected to the oversight of the churches of Jerusalem; and was the author of the Epistle ascribed to James in our Bible. At the age of ninety-four he was beat and stone by the Jews; and finally had his brains dashed out with a fuller’s club.
Matthias, of whom less is known than of most of the other disciples, was elected to fill the vacant place of Judas. He was stoned at Jerusalem and then beheaded.
Andrew was the brother of Peter. He preached the gospel to many Asiatic nations; but on his arrival at Edessa he was taken and crucified on a cross, the two ends of which were fixed transversely in the ground, hence the derivation of the term, St. Andrew's Cross.
Mark was born of Jewish parents of the tribe of Levi. He is supposed to have been converted to Christianity by Peter, whom he served as an amanuensis, and under whose inspection he wrote his Gospel in the Greek language. Mark was dragged to pieces by the people of Alexandria, at the great solemnity of Serapis, the idol, ending his life under their merciless hands.
Peter, among many others, was condemned to death, and crucified upside down. Jerome wrote: "Peter was hanged with his head down and his feet upward, himself so requiring, because he said he was unworthy to be crucified after the manner and same form as the Lord was."
Paul, the apostle, who before was called Saul, after his great travail and unspeakable labors in promoting the Gospel of Christ, suffered also in this first persecution under Nero. Abdias, declared that under his execution Nero sent two of his esquires, Ferega and Parthemius, to bring him word of his death. They, coming to Paul instructing the people, desired him to pray for them, that they might believe; who told them that shortly after they should believe and be baptized at his sepulcher. This done, the soldiers came and led him out of the city to the place

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of execution, where he, after his prayers made, gave his neck to the sword.
Jude, the brother of James, was commonly called Thaddeus. He was crucified at Edessa in the year of A.D. 72.
Bartholomew preached in several countries, and having translated the Gospel of Matthew into the language of India, he propagated it in that country. He was at length cruelly beaten and then crucified by impatient idolaters.
Thomas, called Didymus, preached the Gospel in Parthia and India, where exciting the rage of the pagan priests, was martyred by being thrust through with a sword.
Luke, the evangelist, was the author of the Gospel which goes under his name. He traveled with Paul through various countries, and is supposed to have been hanged on an olive tree, by the idolatrous priests of Greece.
Simon, surnamed Zelotes, preached the Gospel in Mauitania, Africa, and even in Britain, in which he was crucified in the year 74 A.D.
John, the "beloved disciple," was brother to James the Great. The churches of Smyrna, Pergamos, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea, and Thyatira, were founded by him. From Ephesus he was ordered to be sent to Rome, where it is affirmed he was cast into a cauldron of boiling oil. He escaped by a miracle, without injury. Domitian afterwards banished him to the isle of Patmos, where he wrote the Book of Revelation. Nerva, the successor of Domitian, recalled him. He was the only apostle who escaped a violent death!
Barnabas was of Cyprus, but of Jewish descent. His death is supposed to have taken place about A.D. 73.
With all these continual persecutions and horrible punishments, the Church daily increased, deeply rooted in the doctrine of the apostles and of men apostolical, and watered plenteously with the blood of saints!
Remember our text!
"Bless them that persecute you, bless, and curse not."
How does this text relate to us today?
In an age of increasing religious pluralism, twenty-first century apologists need a well-informed faith to do battle with ideas unfriendly to faith. There is much at stake today! We may be living in a time when the most politically incorrect thing to do is to be a witnessing Christian. Facing this increasing unpopularity, the Christian has a choice...either to accommodate his testimony to the times or hold true to Christ and the Word! In all this discussion about persecution and suffering, consolation comes from Paul: "For God did not appoint us to suffer but to receive salvation."