In the Light of the Martyrs: A New Way of Looking at the World

About a year ago, I discovered the Voice of the Martyrs (VOM), a ministry geared to helping persecuted Christians all over the world in addition to spreading their message and providing for the loved ones of martyrs. I did this after discovering the amazing book "Jesus Freaks" by DC Talk and VOM. In that book I had first discovered the stories of many, many martyrs throughout history. I found that book about a year ago and it was instrumental in me coming to the conclusion that I was in need of heartfelt faith in Jesus' resurrection, which led to my salvation. This was after relying on Christian apologetics for years to provide the reason I put faith in Jesus the Christ.

After reading lots of literature on the martyrs, as well as persecuted Christians all over the world, I began to see the news in a whole new light. I am trained in international relations primarily. I began to see the world news in a whole new light. I knew at last what tyranny looked like all over the world, and I experienced deep pain at the stories of persecuted Christians and the martyrs for Jesus all over the world. I had grown familiar with this kind of pain in international relations as the world stage is a terrible place. That pain had led to a series of evil things I committed myself to back in the day, but I will brush over this.

That said, I was shocked by how so many "friendly" nations or even "allies" to America were terrible persecutors, torturers, and murderers of Christians. Northern Africa is a hellish realm to be a believer, India is a hellish place to be a believer, the Middle East is a terrible place to be a Christian no matter the country, China is the most demonic nation I have ever heard of given the stories of how they treat believers, Southeast Asia is a horrible place to be a believer, Japan is a bad place to be a believer, Indonesia is a horrible place to be a believer. The list goes on. This shocked me to no end, how could we trade with and befriend and even ally with (you know send our boys and girls to die for if need be) such evil governments to believers in Jesus?

This reality forced me into a deep funk or the blues for days. I was reminded of the times in the bible people had been so grieved they just became depressed (and usually fasted) for days or weeks. I eventually understood from Revelation 6:9-11 that the martyrs would have their day of justice when Jesus returns. However, the world stage would never be the same again now that I knew the truth about Christian persecution. It was around this time that I asked myself one basic question that changed the whole course of my life to date: Why do we study so much in church history about the great thinkers of the church, the great rulers and conquerors of the church, and then skip over so many times the martyrs of the church and the persecuted? Then, I must add: why is their perspective not the primary and most important perspective of understanding church history on the earth, since they seem to deserve such a reversal of status better than the rest of us? However, I also began to ask a basic question that I ask to this day: How can we be friendly or allies with anyone who murders and rapes and tortures and beats and imprisons on bad charges our family? When sadness gripped me over all of this, I would simply remember Matthew 5:4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted”

So again I must summate: We tend to look at the great thinkers and rulers of the world, those who made the world around them after their own image, but what if history was written with the martyrs being the central figures of history, what if we make the most lowly saints the highest of the saints?