Martyrdom, Suffering and God's Plan

THE NATURE OF GOD IN RELATION TO EVIL
According to Genesis 1:1-4, God created everything, and from his speech the light entered the darkness such that God saw that this was good. The fact that God separated the light from the darkness says that God made a division between what was good and what was evil. The point to be made is that God did not make the darkness, but instead the darkness existed as an absence of God's creativity at work.

John 1 reflects upon Genesis 1:1-4 by describing the light as being both the person of Christ and as being the Word of God. The darkness has never overcome the light according to John 1:5, and as a result the work of God the Father to separate the light from the darkness has never been overcome in the person of Jesus Christ. As a result of the light coming into the world with the birth of Jesus Christ, God the Father thus used the person of Jesus Christ to shine the light into the world. The death of Jesus Christ would have appeared to cause the darkness to overcome the light, but the resurrection of Christ proved that through this creative process of God the darkness was forever fleeting (note Colossians 2:15). The point of the birth, death, and resurrection of Christ thus was to bring light into the world through the Word of God and thus make goodness out of nothingness (the nothingness otherwise known as evil).

The question arises that if God created everything according to his will (as this was expressed in his word), then can man truly identify the will of God through investigating the relationship between created objects? Consider what the Bible has to say, "For God, who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ" - 2 Corinthians 4:6 (NIV) In other words Christ has to be born into our hearts in order to receive the special revelation that is necessary for understanding the knowledge of the glory of God.

Just as the glory of God was established as like the tent of meeting that would separate the Israelites from God so that they would not be destroyed (Exodus 33), thus God has a partition or clothing that separates his goodness and creativity from the world. The charity (or love of God) is thus dependent upon God's choice to show himself, or to tare open the curtain, (like the crucifixion of Christ). Both Exodus 33:19 and Romans 9:18 both agree that God administers a choice in distributing his special revelation of the charity of his love. The crucifixion tore the skin of Christ and the curtain around the Holy Place in a demonstration of God's choice to administer the charity of his blood (this is why Christians partake of communion today).

Job Design for Christians
Effective action on the part of Christians thus involves bringing the light into the darkness as lights of the world (Matthew 5:14), and this introduces Jesus as the Word of God into situations. Christians are thus crucified with Christ (see Galatians 2:20) when the outpouring of God's love is introduced through the martyrs. Consider what scripture says about the issue in Zechariah 13:7, "'Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who is close to me!' declares the LORD Almighty. 'Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered, and I will turn my hand against the little ones.'" (NIV) The point is that not only does God the Father predestine Christ to be crucified, be he also sets his hand against the saints so that they too in one way or another will have to carry their cross and be crucified with Christ. Jesus Christ makes this point firm as he says, "And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple." Luke 14:27 (NIV)

The Job Design for the Christian has been put together by God the Father in order to cause incredible hardship, torture, and suffering with the promise of eternal salvation. The joy of the martyrs being martyred (see James 1:2) is that they become united with Christ in crucifixion, and the love of God pours onto others through their sacrifice. Jesus makes this point incredibly clear, "I tell you the truth, you will weep and mourn while the world rejoices. You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy. A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world." John 16:20-21 (NIV) Thus just ask yourself, "how many disciples of Christ have been born through the suffering of the blood of the martyrs?"

Just as the New Jerusalem is the bride of the lamb (signifying the union of Christ and the church in Revelation 21:9), the anguish of God's people is incredible as the martyrs shed their blood on crosses in order to give birth to disciples. From the environment of evangelists being tormented by heathens crucifying them (like in the example of Paul's missionary travels), what emerges is true disciples. The perception of the evangelists in viewing God and the perception of God viewing the evangelists is most passionate and loving when both parties are griped with suffering and anguish in giving birth to genuine disciples.

God Organizes People
Some people driven by pleasure and earthly desires may live their entire lives obtaining wealth while always being in deep anguish. Everything on the outside of the wealthy may give the appearance of prosperity and happiness, but on the inside things can be much different. Jesus thus makes the case that cleaning a cup on the outside only is futile and brings spiritual death (Matthew 23:25-26).

The point is that a structure as, "a system or organization made up of interrelated parts functioning as an orderly whole" (Mitchell, 9) must exist for cleaning the inside of the cup that Jesus talks about in Matthew 23. This structure is responsible for cleaning the inside of the cup in Matthew 23 and depositing the treasure in jars of clay as seen in 2 Corinthians 4. Paul goes on to describe this structure clearly as just like a pregnancy mentioned earlier as he says, "But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you." - 2 Corinthians 4:7-12 (NIV) Paul puts martyrs suffering on the cross together with the crucifixion of Christ as he also shows the resurrected lord as living through death. He describes something like a process of bringing Christ out of the martyr (bringing the treasure out of the jar of clay) as the observers are being made alive as new Christians through the 'death' of the martyr.

In human history no god of any people has ever condoned abortion, but at the same time many Christians live as if God is either dead or asleep. The crucifixion of Christ then becomes a story told that people are to put their trust in so that they will be saved no matter how wicked they are. Today, even more opportunity exists to stand up for the cause of Christ and be crucified for it than ever before noted in history, and this gives the disciples of Christ not only lots of work to do but also lots of opportunity for 'giving birth' to true disciples.

The point is that God organizes people through the birth, death, and resurrection of Christ in a continual way, but on the other hand Christ was only crucified once. The disciple of Christ is thus called to rise to the occasion of carrying the cross of Christ in order to demonstrate the crucifixion of Christ in the world and the power of God as a result. The church thus is intended to be a structure as it functions as a whole in facilitating the work of the disciples to carry their crosses to arrive at the goal of becoming martyrs.

BIBLOGRAPHY

Mitchell, Michael. On Job Design... from
Hardy, Lee. 1990. The fabic of this world: inquiries into calling, career, choice, and the design of human work. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. pp. 123, 127.