Conformed to His Death

Where does the long walk of falling and rising, of milk and solid food and wrestling, finally lead? At the top of the growth toward Messiah’s stature stands something no one would choose for himself. The one who has grown into His likeness suffers as He suffered, not for wrongdoing, but for doing good. Peter says this is not an accident of history but a calling.

1 Peter 2:20-21 For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is charis χάρις khar'-ece(grace) before God. For to this you have been called, because Messiah also suffered for us, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in His steps —

“An example” is hypogrammos ὑπογραμμός hoop-og-ram-mos', the line of letters a teacher writes at the top of the page for a child to trace over. “In His steps” means in His footprints. The believer is not asked to invent a new road. He is asked to set his feet where Messiah set His, and those steps lead through suffering for doing good.

The Same Form, First in Death

Paul put it in a single line of longing.

Philippians 3:10 that I may know Him and the dynamis δύναμις doo'-nam-is(power) of His resurrection and the koinonia κοινωνία koy-nohn-ee'-ah(fellowship) of His sufferings, being conformed to His death;

“That I may know Him” uses gnonai, the knowing that has run through this whole book. And the last phrase, “being conformed to His death,” uses symmorphoumenos, a form of symmorphoo, from the same family of words as “conformed to the image of His Son” (Romans 8:29) and “conformity with the body of His glory” (Philippians 3:21). The one who will be conformed to His glory is first conformed to His death. Paul wanted both, in that order.

Peter and Paul both return to this. Believers “koinoneo κοινωνέω koy-no-neh'-o(share, participate) in Messiah’s sufferings” and rejoice (1 Peter 4:13). Paul rejoiced in his sufferings and did his share “on behalf of His body, which is the ekklesia ἐκκλησία ek-klay-see'-ah(called-out community)” (Colossians 1:24). Yeshua had told them to expect it.

John 15:20 Remember the logos λόγος log'-os(word) that I said to you, 'A servant is not greater than his master.' If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My logos(word), they will keep yours also.

The Normal Road

In the first century this was not a rare road. It was the ordinary one.

2 Timothy 3:12 Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Messiah Yeshua will be persecuted.

Acts 14:22 strengthening the psyche ψυχή psoo-khay'(soul)s of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying, "Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God."

The word for tribulation is thlipsis, pressure or crushing, and the record bears it out. On the day Stephen died, “a great persecution began against the ekklesia(called-out community) in Jerusalem” (Acts 8:1). Herod “had James the brother of John put to death with a sword” (Acts 12:2). The Hebrew believers “endured a great struggle with sufferings” and joyfully accepted the plundering of their property (Hebrews 10:32-34). Hebrews 11 remembers those who “were tortured, not accepting release, so that they might rise again to a better resurrection,” who “were stoned,” “sawn in two,” “killed with the sword,” “of whom the world was not worthy” (Hebrews 11:35-38).

The New Testament records the deaths of Stephen, James and Antipas, and it foretells the death of Peter. Beyond the New Testament, the church’s long-held tradition says that nearly all the apostles died as martyrs. Not every believer of that age died a martyr’s death, but suffering was the common road, and for many it ended in martyrdom.

From Nero to Constantine

That road did not end with the first century. From Nero’s persecution in Rome in AD 64 until the edicts of toleration in 311 and 313, persecution of the believers came and went for about two and a half centuries. The last and fiercest wave began under Diocletian in 303. It ended only when the emperors themselves changed course. Under Constantine the church gained legal freedom and the emperor’s favor, and in 380, under Theodosius, the faith of the church was made the religion of the state.

In that same fourth century, as Book 1 showed, church councils began to forbid resting on the Sabbath and keeping the feasts. As long as the ekklesia stood apart from Rome, the world persecuted it. When the church and the empire joined hands, the persecution by Rome stopped. These facts show the truth of what Yeshua said: “If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you.”

Witnesses

At the end of the road, for some, is martyrdom. The Greek word for witness is martys, the word from which “martyr” comes. Yeshua told His disciples, “you will be My witnesses” (Acts 1:8), and Paul later confessed his part in the death of Stephen: “when the blood of Your witness Stephen was being shed, I also was standing by” (Acts 22:20).

Acts 7:59-60 And they went on stoning Stephen as he called out and said, "Lord Yeshua, receive my pneuma πνεῦμα pnyoo'-mah(spirit)." And falling on his knees, he cried out with a loud voice, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them!" And having said this, he fell asleep.

Luke 23:34 But Yeshua was saying, "Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing." And they cast lots, dividing up His garments among themselves.

Yeshua said, “Father, forgive them.” Stephen cried, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them!” Yeshua said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My pneuma(spirit)” (Luke 23:46). Stephen said, “Lord Yeshua, receive my pneuma(spirit).” The servant had grown into the likeness of his Master even in the way he died.

Yeshua foretold Peter’s death, and John explains that He said it “signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God” (John 21:18-19). At the end of his life Paul wrote this.

2 Timothy 4:6 For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the kairos καιρός kahee-ros'(appointed-time) of my departure has come.

“Poured out as a drink offering” is spendomai, the verb for pouring out a libation. The picture is the drink offering of the Torah, the wine poured out with the burnt offering for each lamb (Numbers 15:5). Paul sees his own life poured out like that wine beside the sacrifice. Isaiah’s Servant “poured out his soul (nephesh נֶפֶשׁ neh'-fesh) to death” (Isaiah 53:12), and the apostle is poured out after Him. The risen Lord named another: “Antipas my faithful witness” (Revelation 2:13), and the word for witness there is again martys. In Revelation that witness reaches its height, and “testimony” there is martyria, from the same root.

Revelation 12:11 And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the logos(word, message) of their testimony, and they did not agapao ἀγαπάω ag-ap-ah'-o(love) their psyche(soul) even unto death.

The Shepherd laid down His psyche for the sheep (John 10:11), and these did not love their own. Agape at its height is a soul laid down.

Enoch and Elijah

Not every saint ends in the ranks of the martyrs. Scripture shows another end as well.

Genesis 5:24 And Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him.

Hebrews 11:5 By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him; for before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God.

Enoch “walked with God,” and God “took” him. The Hebrew verb is laqach, to take. Hebrews says he “was taken up so that he should not see death,” using metatithemi, to carry across. Elijah went up another way.

2 Kings 2:11 And it came to pass, as they went on, going and speaking, that behold, a chariot of fire and horses of fire, and they separated between the two of them; and Elijah went up in the whirlwind to the heavens.

The same Elijah is the one God promises to send before “the day of the LORD, the great and the dreadful” (Malachi 3:23). And at the coming of the Lord, the living saints will be like these two.

1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Messiah will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord.

1 Corinthians 15:51-52 Behold, I tell you a mysterion μυστήριον moos-tay'-ree-on(mystery); we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.

“Caught up” is harpazo, to seize and carry off, and “changed” is allasso.

The Same Steps

The words carry this reading. A believer keeps the commandments as one who falls and rises, nails the old nature to the cross again and again, grows from a newborn toward the stature of Messiah, and wrestles against the spiritual powers. Some saints, grown to that stature, go on into the ranks of the martyrs. They suffer without guilt as their Lord did, they are conformed to His death, they are poured out like a drink offering, and they do not love their own soul even unto death. Others, like Enoch and Elijah, walk with God until God takes them, and at His coming the living are changed and caught up.

The two ends look very different, but the road to them is the same: the daily walk of faith that keeps His commandments, in the same steps, as far as the Master leads. And both end in the same place: “so we shall always be with the Lord.” And Scripture says plainly what the children of God will be when they arrive there.