Persecution of Christians Continues

The Apostle John writes that he was exiled to the island of Patmos because of his witness to Christ. The Lord Jesus had predicted that his disciples would be persecuted.

You will be delivered up even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and some of you they will put to death. You will be hated by all for my name's sake. - Luk 21:16-17 ESV

Again, the Apostle Paul wrote,

For I think that God has exhibited us apostles as last of all, like men sentenced to death, because we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels, and to men. We are fools for Christ's sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honor, but we in disrepute. To the present hour we hunger and thirst, we are poorly dressed and buffeted and homeless, and we labor, working with our own hands. When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we entreat. We have become, and are still, like the scum of the world, the refuse of all things. - 1Co 4:9-13 ESV

The Bible only mentions the death of two apostles,  James, son of Zebedee, put to death by Harod Agrippa shortly before Passover in year 44 (Acts 12:1-2), and Judas Iscariot who committed suicide. According to tradition or early historians, eight of them died as martyrs. John, as noted earlier, was exiled for a time to the island of Patmos. Various dates for his death were given by early writers, some saying it occurred around 100, some as late as 120 A.D. One tradition says that after his exile ended, he lived in Ephesus as the pastor of the church there and that Jesus' mother was with him (John 19:26).

Christians are still persecuted to the present. We read of various beheadings and other atrocities by members of ISIS in the Middle East. This is horrible and these brothers and sisters in the faith need our prayers. A new form of persecution is becoming the norm in the 21st century in Western countries and in the United States. Such concepts as 'true marriage' and 'natural family' are being attacked by the law in many Western countries. Rev. Franklin Graham of the Samaritan's Purse says that while the  type of bloody persecution of Christians in the Middle East has not yet reached America, the threat of Christian persecution on American soil is imminent. Graham claims there are radical Islamists advising the Obama administration, and that it is getting worse.

Rick Santorum, CEO of EchoLight Studios, and now announced presidential candidate, thanks God that the type of persecution occurring in the Middle East is not happening here, "but things weren't always that way in other parts of the world either. It starts with a gradual erosion."