Introduction: Questions

Do you want to be persecuted? Do you respond with joy and gladness to such an opportunity? Perhaps you think those are strange questions for me to ask. Since July we have been studying the “Be Happy Attitudes” - the secrets to true happiness. One paraphrase of this beatitude reads: "Happy are those who are persecuted because they do what God requires." I confess that while I want to do what God requires, I am not excited about being persecuted. Having studied the Scriptures and some history, however, I am excited about what eventually results from persecution.

Don Anderson writes, "To the casual reader, this statement of the teacher must sound like the motto for masochists. What healthy person would line up for reviling, persecution, and false accusations to be made against them?

Robert Schuller suggests three reactions to suffering:

1. Some are Cinders ... They get burned out.
Common negative reaction, give up, accept defeat.

2. Some are Sinners ... They get burned up.
Choose not to believe, get angry at God & everyone else.

3. Some are Senders ... They just burn brighter and shine like gold.
They burn brightly and send out a light in the darkness that says, "Watch me world! I may be tested! Tried! Persecuted! But I still trust God. They send out a message to the world that you can believe in God even when He is silent. The amazing thing is this: The darker the suffering, the brighter the message that the sender shares with everyone.

These words were found scrawled in the basement of a German home:
I believe in the sun even when it is not shining.
I believe in love even when I do not feel it.
I believe in God even when He is silent.

How do you understand persecution? It is another beatitude that seems to present a paradox, perhaps the most puzzling as we come to the last one. Could it be as some have suggested that Jesus saves His toughest teaching for last? "Only those who have gone through all the previous classes are qualified for admittance to this final lesson. "Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake."

Yes, my friends, this is a difficult lesson Jesus gave us. How are we to experience the blessedness of persecution?

I. Remember the Past

For this eighth Beatitude Jesus elaborates a bit more. The others were stated very briefly. At the end of this one Jesus said, 'for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you."

I believe that Jesus is telling us to remember the past. Even before the prophets were persecuted, Abel was persecuted to the point of being killed by his brother. Note that this was not for doing something wrong, but for doing what was right. Years later Noah was persecuted and ridiculed by the evil people of his day as he obediently built an ark many miles for m any large body of water. Joseph suffered persecution from his brothers as he was sold into slavery. They did not appreciate his prophetic dreams. In spite of this God brought success to Joseph in the household of Potiphar, that is, until Potiphar's wife tried to seduce him. One day after repeated attempts to have him engage in sexual relations with her she unjustly accused him of trying to rape her. Because he remained true to God and his moral standards he landed in prison.

The prophet Jeremiah spent some time in prison, too, as other prophets have. Consider the plight of Daniel and his friends seeking to be true to God. Grieve with the prophet Hosea whose unfaithful wife symbolized the infidelity of God's people. Habakkuk felt humiliated when the unrighteous Chaldeons were used to punish the Judeans.

Remember a few New Testament Stories of persecution. Peter and John were arrested for teaching others about Jesus and being used by God to heal a lame beggar. Stephen was stoned as he spoke God's convicting words. After a fortune telling slave girl was delivered from an evil spirit Paul and Silas were beaten, cast into prison, and placed in stocks.

William Barclay helps us remember the past, the persecution of early Christians, disrupting their work, their social lives, and their home life.

Consider the stone mason. What was he to do if his company received a contract to build a temple to one of the heathen gods?

What was the tailor to do when asked to make robes for heathen priests?

A Christian came to Tertullian centuries ago with such a problem and told of business difficulties and ended by saying, "What can I do? I must live."

Tertullian asked, "Must you?"

Barclay also tells about what he refers to as kindly deaths; of Christians being fed to lions and being burned at the stake.

While these do not sound very kindly, compared to some of the torture of Nero they were less terrible. Nero wrapped Christians in pitch and set them on fire, using them as living torches to light his gardens. He had them sewed in skins of wild animals and set his dogs to tear them to death. Molten lead was poured on them, red hot brass plates were attached to the most tender parts of their bodies, parts of their bodies were cut off and roasted before their very eyes, that is, if they had not already torn out their eyes. This list could go on.

These early Christians understood these words of Jesus. The language of this beatitude speaks of those who have already been persecuted and those who will be. In the light of this persecution how are we to respond?

II. Rejoice in the Present

According to verse 12 Jesus said, "Rejoice and be glad." I'm not pulling your leg or putting you on, that is what our Lord said.

After being released from prison, beaten, and told not to speak the name of Jesus, Peter and John rejoiced that they were counted worthy to suffer for Jesus. Acts 5:41, 42. Later Peter wrote, "And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish, and strengthen you." I Peter 5:10

When Paul and Silas were unjustly imprisoned at Philippi for delivering a servant girl from demon possession, we find them praying and singing hymns to God. Paul went on to write to the Romans, "We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit which has been given to us." Romans 5:3-5

James wrote, "Count it all joy, my brethren, when you meet various trials."

Is this how you respond to persecution, or have ever faced real persecution for living for Christ? We have all faced some problems, difficulties, tragedies, illness and these may be in our thoughts. Is this what Jesus is referring to here? Perhaps in some passages, but the persecution in this beatitude is not merely the sickness or trouble anyone might have, but that which comes for the sake of righteousness, specifically because we are boldly taking a stand, living as Jesus wants us to live.

One day John Wesley was riding along a road when it dawned upon him that three whole days had passed in which he had suffered no persecution. Not a brick or an egg had been thrown at him for three days. Alarmed, he stopped his horse, and exclaimed, "Can it be that I have sinned and am backslidden?"

Slipping from his horse Wesley went down on his knees and began interceding with God to show him where, if any, there had been a fault.

A rough fellow, on the other side of the hedge, hearing the prayer, looked across and recognized the preacher. "I'll fix that Methodist preacher," he said taking a brick and tossing it over at him. It missed its mark and fell harmlessly beside John.

Whereupon Wesley leaped to his feet joyfully exclaiming, "Thank God, it's all right. I still have His presence."

III. Realize the Promise

I want to reread this final beatitude in another paraphrase: "You're blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. The persecution drives you deeper into God's kingdom.'

"Not only that - count yourselves blessed every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit Me. What it means is that the truth is too close for comfort and they are uncomfortable. We can be glad when that happens - give a cheer, even! - for they don't like it, I do! And all heaven applauds. And know that you are in good company. My prophets and witnesses have always gotten into this kind of trouble."

We have the promise of being blessed

We have the promise of the kingdom of heaven

We have the promise of great reward in heaven.

In his book Tortured for His Faith, Harlan Popov wrote about what happened to the church as a result of Communist persecution.

As the fires of persecution grew, they burned away the chaff and stubble and left only the golden wheat. The suffering purified the church and united believers in a wonderful spirit of brotherly love such as must have existed in the early church. Petty differences were put aside. Brethren loved and cared for one another and carried one another's burdens. There were no nominal or "lukewarm" believers. It made no sense to be a halfhearted Christian when the price for faith was so great. There came a spiritual depth and richness in Christ I had never seen in the times before when we were free. Every man, woman, and youth was forced to "count the cost" and decide if serving Christ was worth the suffering. And to the Communist's great regret, this was the healthiest thing they could have done for the church, for the insincere gave up, but the true Christians became aware of what Christ meant to them and they became more dedicated than ever before.

While it may be to a much, much lesser degree some of us may have received some persecution for our faith. I anticipate that persecution may well increase in our country in the months and years ahead for those who boldly stand for Christ and His truth. Should we fear that? The followers of the Lord in the Old Testament even recognized that suffering prepared them for glory. Toward the end of the great list of people of faith in Hebrews 11:35 we read, ... and others were tortured, not for accepting their release, in order that they might obtain a better resurrection." We should not run from suffering, as it prepares us for the kingdom of God.

Conclusion: 3 r's

I. Remember the Past
II. Rejoice in the Present
III. Realize the Promise

The story is told of the first convert of a missionary that was tortured to death for his faith. Then years later the missionary died. In heaven he met that first convert and asked him how it felt to be tortured to death for his faith. "You know, the man replied with a shrug and looking a bit bewildered, "I can't even remember."

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