Faith Chronicles: Discover the Deep Conviction of Polycarp
Polycarp is a second-century Christian, he was the bishop of Smyrna and a close pal of John the Beloved.
He spent his life following Jesus, he was among the very few whose writing survived during the great persecution.
During those days when Christians were being persecuted, this great man of God was captured and imprisoned.
To serve as a warning to anyone who may want to become a Christian, the Great Bishop of Smyrna, the last one ordained by the very last apostle who was with Jesus was brought to the amphitheater.
While thousands were watching he was asked to deny his faith in Jesus or die.
Looking around him, he saw carcasses of other believers, he looked at hundreds of thousands in the amphitheater, and he looked into the heavens.
Some accounts said one of his eyes had been removed before this period, with tattered cloth, bruised body, broken bones, and thousands of people watching.
He cleared his voice so that others may hear him, he said for these 86 years I have had a one-on-one walk with Jesus, I have seen my Lord lead me daily, and I have enjoyed all of heaven on earth.
I have served Him and he has done no wrong against me. How can I blaspheme against my king and savior?
What a beauty incomparable to every pain on earth, how can I deny this faithfulness of my Lord?
I will not deny Him, no I will not deny my Lord.
The angry emperor ordered that he be set on fire, and as they did, he kept shouting I will not deny Jesus, He is ever faithful.
The fire burnt him but his voice kept vibrating in the amphitheater, when the soldiers saw that He didn't die, one of them went to the stake and pierced him with his sword.
That very day, thousands turned to Jesus, and his conviction made many accept the Lordship of Jesus.
In a time like this, your conviction shall speak more than a thousand sermons.
For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. Rom 8:18
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Rom 8:37
Shalom.
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