Did the disciples make it all up?
A common attack on Christianity is that the disciples simply made up Jesus, the miracles, and the Bible. While at first it seems like a plausible scenario, it doesn’t hold up when you learn what happened to all of the disciples, and how they persevered despite the immense suffering the endured.
James: Betrayed by his own “Judas”. His accuser repented and told the tribunal that he was testifying falsely and had become a Christian. Both the accuser and James were beheaded.
Thomas: Martyred in Calamina, India.
Simon: Crucified in Egypt.
Bartholomew: Preached in India, translated the Gospel of Matthew into their tongue. He was then beaten, crucified, and beheaded.
Andrew: Crucified in Rome. He is recorded as saying, “Oh cross, most welcome and longed for, with a willing mind, joyfully and desirously I come to you being the scholar of him which did hang on you because I have always been your lover and yearn to embrace you.”
Matthew: Matthew wrote his gospel to the Jews in the Hebrew tongue after he had converted Ethiopia and all Egypt. Hircanius, the king, sent someone to kill him with a spear.
Philip: After years of preaching to the barbarous nations, Philip was stoned, crucified, and buried with his daughter.
Peter: Crucified, upside down at his own request because he felt he was not worthy to die the same was as Jesus.
John: Domitian exiled John to the island of Patmos. John was allowed to return to Ephesus in the year A.D. 70. Before he was exiled, he was boiled alive.
These men had the opportunity to deny Jesus and save their lives, but they didn’t. They persevered to the end because they saw the miracles of Jesus, and believed that He was the Messiah. I pray we all continue with the same Christ-like determination and run the race before us with boldness.
For further reading, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs can be found here.
Just reading that book gives you a glimpse of the persecution and suffering promised in this life (Phil. 1:29), and how God is still more to be desired and wanted and needed than a safe life.
The first Martyr of the Church, Stephen, preaches a gut-wrenching sermon right before he dies, and then he asks God not to hold the sin against those who were murdering him. As Liv and I were reading in Acts last night, one verse stood out:
Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus.
The chapter goes on to describe how after they leave the Sanhedrin, the Apostles all pray for boldness to proclaim the Gospel. That’s my prayer for all of you, today: Be bold in your proclamation of who Jesus Christ is and the freedom He has won for us on the Cross.
(via hereiamgod)
