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The Martyr's Mindset: Ignatius of Antioch and Death as Worship
How many modern Christians consider dying to be the worst thing that can happen to them? We pray for safety, healing, and protection, and rightly so. However, do we live in the truth that death has tr... -
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It was this…intention that made the primitive Christians such eminent instances of piety, that made the goodly fellowship of the Saints and all the glorious army of martyrs and confessors. And if you ... -
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The Faithfulness of a Few
Pliny, a Roman Governor serving around 112 AD, faced a challenging situation regarding Christianity. Many Church historians believe that by his time, it had become illegal to profess the Christian fai... -
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In the days of the early church,
In the days of the early church, believers affirmed their faith by saying, “Jesus is Lord.” We give lip-service to that same affirmation, but find it difficult to surrender control of our lives. Inste... -
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This Intention
It was this…intention that made the primitive Christians such eminent instances of piety, that made the goodly fellowship of the Saints and all the glorious army of martyrs and confessors. And if you ... -
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Christian Persecution & The Real Power
What is the witness of the church in times of persecution? The historical record demonstrates that persecutions of Christians were regular and prolific in the first centuries of the church, especially... -
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[The] earliest name for Christianity was the Way, suggesting that it was not a set of doctrines to master but a path to travel. Suggesting that each step was a deepening of the familiar and a discover... -
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In the beginning the church was a fellowship of men and women centered on the living Christ. Then the church moved to Greece, where it became a philosophy. Then it moved to Rome, where it became an in... -
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Simon of Cyrene an Archetype for Carrying our Cross
The Dolorous Passion described Simon of Cyrene as a “stout-looking man,” and a fourth-century sarcophagus (stone coffin) from Rome supports this description – The Passion Sarcophagus, probably from th... -
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The Power of Miracles in the Early Church
One key difference between much of the early church vs. the church of today (at least in the West) was the belief in, and regular experience of, miracles. As Joel Green, the noted professor and writer... -
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Every one of the disciples faced the test of torture, and all but the apostle John were martyred for their teachings and beliefs. People will die for what they believe to be true, though it may actual... -
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Haters of Humanity?
Most of us are aware of various persecutions that took place during the first few centuries of the church’s existence. One particularly brutal local persecution took place during the reign of Nero, wh... -
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The Courage of the First Disciples
These disciples turned the world upside down because they saw a dead man come back to life by the power of God. And whatever that “knowing” and “seeing” did in them, it did it at a deep level because ... -
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Play the Man
Like a scene straight out of Gladiator, Polycarp was dragged into the Roman Colosseum. Discipled by the apostle John himself, the aged bishop faithfully and selflessly led the church at Smyrna through... -
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The Centrality of the Cross
The fact that a cross became the Christian symbol, and that Christians stubbornly refused, in spite of the ridicule, to discard it in favour of something less offensive, can have only one explanation.... -
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Name a Day and Give me a Hearing
One of the great leaders of the first generation after the apostles was a man named Polycarp. Polycarp, it is believed, was discipled by the apostle John and carried out a long and fruitful ministry i... -
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New Testament theology is ‘inherently self-involving as it summons the reader to believe, confess, obey, and understand the entirety of one’s existence—both her or his thinking and willing—in light of... -
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These Impious Galileans
A passage often referred to in order to describe the sacrificial, countercultural quality of the early church comes to us interestingly enough, from one of its strongest critics, known later to histor... -
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How Do You Recognize a Christian?
A friend sat down in a small London restaurant and picked up a menu. “What will it be?” the waiter asked. Studying the puzzling selections, my friend said, “Uhh …” The waiter smiled. “Oh, a Yank. What... -
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The Diversity of the Early Church
So if we want to get the church right, we have to learn to see it as a salad in a bowl, made the Right Way of course. For a good salad is a fellowship of different tastes, all mixed together with the ... -
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If the Holy Spirit was withdrawn from the church today, 95 percent of what we do would go on and no one would know the difference. If the Holy Spirit had been withdrawn from the New Testament church, ...
![[The] earliest name for Christianity](https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1535856326707-98d0b5dbe639?ixid=M3w1NzU0OTZ8MHwxfHNlYXJjaHwxfHxKb3VybmV5c3xlbnwxfDJ8fHwxNzEwNTM0MTcxfDA&ixlib=rb-4.0.3&q=80&auto=compress&fit=crop&w=200&h=200)
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