“Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution” (2 Tim. 3:12).
The Word of God is filled with exceedingly precious assurances for believers. We have eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord and His divine power has given us all things concerning life and godliness. We have exceeding great and precious promises. He desires us to have a richly furnished entrance into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. And while in this world, He will never leave nor forsake us. His final recorded promise in Revelation 22:20 is, “Surely I come quickly.” May we respond in ardent desire, “Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus”!
However, while assured of such an abundance of divine blessings, saints are also assured of trials and conflict in the life of faith. So the beloved Apostle writes in 2 Timothy 3:12; so the blessed Saviour assures His own in John 16:33.
Even as the prophets of old (James 5:10-11), Paul was an example of suffering for Christ. Thus, even in heavy affliction, divine love—shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit (Rom. 5:5)—is to unceasingly flow forth, bearing, enduring and never failing (1 Cor. 13:78).
In 2 Timothy 3:11 Paul wrote that he endured persecutions and afflictions at Antioch, at Iconium and at Lystra. This account, recorded in Acts 13:14-14:25 provides wonderful encouragement and instruction for times when we suffer persecution for the Lord.
When Paul and his company had come to Pisidian Antioch, all seemed well, for the Jews told him, “If ye have any word of exhortation for the people, say on” (Acts 13:15). However, after the Gentiles gladly received the gospel, the Jews “stirred up the devout and honorable women, and the chief men of the city, and raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them out of their coasts” (Acts 13:50).
The world made it plain that Paul and his companions were not socially or politically acceptable. Such persecution is still felt even in “Christian” lands. Those who seek to live godly soon feel the loathing and censure—a very real and painful kind of persecution—of respectable society.
After their rejection at Antioch, Paul’s company visited Iconium. Violence against them increased, as the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles against them. Religious prejudice generated terrible persecution, both in Christian and in heathen lands.
Fleeing next to Lystra, the gospel was confirmed by God through the healing of the crippled man (Acts 14:8-10). The apostles, made the objects of idolatrous worship, found a different—but still very real—form of persecution.
At times, believers are offered similar adulation and respect because of what Christianity provides the world in material blessing. Sadly, we often find this deceitful flattery more comfortable than persecution. Yet, as with Paul in Lystra, whenever faithfulness to Christ spurns such accolades, a far more violent persecution is sure to result.
It was so with the Lord Jesus in Luke 4:16-29. He spoke, and all in the synagogue wondered at the gracious words that came from His lips. Yet, a short time later, those same people angrily thrust out the Lord, intending, in their hatred, to cast Him over the brow of the hill. “If the world hate you, ye know that it hated Me before it hated you” (John 15:18).
Will Paul, having been so ruthlessly treated—left for dead—at Lystra, call for righteous vengeance on his evil persecutors? Ah no! So far from such a thought, he is animated by the spirit of our blessed Saviour, who in the midst of unfathomable suffering uttered divine words of love and forgiveness: “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).
Energized by this love and guided by the Spirit, Paul went back to the scene of his persecutions. There the grace of God shone yet brighter, for he began the return journey at the place of his most violent treatment! “And . . . they returned again to Lystra, and to Iconium, and Antioch” (Acts 14:21).
Thus were the new believers in those three cities given, through Paul’s example, an unforgettable lesson that “we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.”
What comfort (and guidance, too) to see that we are to expect persecution, are given courage by faith to face persecution, and have divine love to overcome persecution. Let us walk in faithfulness to Him who loved us and gave Himself for us (Gal. 2:20).
Ed.