14 Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you.
15 Henceforth call I you not servants: for the servant knoweth not what his master doeth: but I have called you friends: for all things that I have heard of my Father, have I made known to you.
16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye go and bring forth fruits, and that your fruit remain, that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my Name, he may give it you. 17 These things command I you, that ye love one another.18 If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before you.19 If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. John 15:14-19 (1599 Geneva Bible)
A study of the book of Acts reveals that as Christianity spread as the Apostles obediently made disciples wherever they went, it was always accompanied by persecution. The hotter the persecution the more encouraged the brethren became….
While that is not logical to the fallen mind, that is exactly how God grew His church. In the early 2nd century the bishop of Smyrna, Polycarp who was a disciple of the Apostle John, was brought to the Roman authorities and ordered to confess that Caesar is lord. Polycarp was eighty-six years old at this point. All he had to do was utter that statement as he offered a pinch of incense to Caesar, but he refused. He was martyred by fire. <Continue reading post>