Issue 23 - Day 4

Philippians 1

Philippians 1:20-21
20)  According to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life, or by death.
21)  For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.

Is this your genuine experience in life? Do you really live for Christ, and would death be gain. There have been many martyrs over the centuries. Foxes book of martyrs records one Laurence Saunders in 1554.

In the afternoon of Sunday, October 15, 1554, as he was reading in his church to exhort his people, the bishop of London interrupted him, by sending an officer for him, a heretic he meant to prove him. After much talk concerning this matter, the bishop desired him to write what he believed of transubstantiation. Lawrence Saunders did so, saying, "My Lord, you seek my blood, and you shall have it: I pray God that you may be so baptized in it that you may ever after loathe blood-sucking, and become a better man."
After this good and faithful martyr had been kept in prison one year and a quarter, the bishops at length called him to the city of Coventry, there to be burnt. Told if he would recant, there was pardon for him. "Not I," replied the holy martyr, "but such as you have injured the realm. The blessed Gospel of Christ is what I hold; that do I believe, that have I taught, and that will I never revoke!" Mr. Saunders then embraced the stake, and frequently said, "Welcome, thou cross of Christ! welcome everlasting life!" Fire was then put to the wood, and, he was overwhelmed by the dreadful flames, and sweetly slept in the Lord Jesus.

Is death gain? Would you burn like Laurence, glad to stay true to God’s word to the end?