I am a Jesus pusher!!! “Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake” (Matthew 5:11). This is a DECLARATION OF YOUR LIFE AS A PLATFORM of labor. I realize a martyr’s attitude might develop within us. We are always seeing ourselves as sufferers. This is not healthy. But here is a Biblical fact. “And according to the law almost all things are purified with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no remission” (Hebrews 9:22). We consider the suffering and persecution of Jesus as the means by which we are saved. “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (Ephesians 1:7). While the suffering of Jesus for us was the Divine plan, we know God used the suffering of persecution as a platform for redemption. Peter preached, “Him, being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death” (Acts 2:23).
Is He not asking us to join Him is this same redemptive flow? “And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death” (Revelation 12:11). History reveals the growth of the church is greatest during days of persecution. Can ministry flow through our lives without the cost of persecution? Is this not a great privilege? Would we not be honored to be an extension of His suffering? I am a Jesus pusher!!!