Mat 5:10 "Blessed are those who have borne persecution in the cause of Righteousness, for to them belongs the Kingdom of the Heavens.
Mat 5:11 "Blessed are you when they have insulted and persecuted you, and have said every cruel thing about you falsely for my sake.
Mat 5:12 Be joyful and triumphant, because your reward is great in the Heavens; for so were the Prophets before you persecuted.
Blessed are they which are persecuted - To persecute means literally to pursue; follow after, as one does a flying enemy. Here it means to vex, or oppress one, on account of his religion. They persecute others who injure their names, reputation, property, or who endanger or take their life, on account of their religious opinions.Barnes
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| Fleeing in the DRC |
in the cause of Righteousness - for the sake of Righteousness
δικαιοσύνη dikaiosunē Thayer Definition:
1) in a broad sense: state of him who is as he ought to be, righteousness, the condition acceptable to God
1a) the doctrine concerning the way in which man may attain a state approved of God
1b) integrity, virtue, purity of life, rightness, correctness of thinking feeling, and acting
2) in a narrower sense, justice or the virtue which gives each his due
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| Christian couple Beaten and Burnt alive see Below |
The worldlings hate integrity and virtue because it shows them up for what they are and the way they live and think. To live right is a testimony to the world and they don’t want to know the truth and the right way.
JFB Commentary says But how, it may be asked, could such beautiful features of character provoke persecution? To this the following answers should suffice: “Every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.” “The world cannot hate you; but Me it hateth, because I testify of it, that the works thereof are evil.” “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.”
Poverty of spirit runs counter to the pride of men’s heart; a pensive disposition, in the view of one’s universal deficiencies before God, is ill relished by the callous, indifferent, laughing, self-satisfied world;
a meek and quiet spirit, taking wrong, is regarded as pusillanimous, [cowardly,timid, faint-hearted,mean-spirited] and rasps against the proud, resentful spirit of the world;
that craving after spiritual blessings rebukes but too unpleasantly the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life;
so does a merciful spirit, the hard-heartedness of the world;
purity of heart contrasts painfully with painted hypocrisy;
and the peacemaker cannot easily be endured by the contentious, quarrelsome world. Thus does “righteousness” come to be “persecuted.”
But blessed are they who, in spite of this, dare to be righteous. JFB
Mat 5:11 "Blessed are you when they have insulted and persecuted you, and have said every cruel thing about you falsely for my sake.
Insulted:ὀνειδέζω
oneidezō
Thayer Definition: 1) to reproach, upbraid, revile 1a) of deserved reproach 1b) of undeserved reproach, to revile 1c) to upbraid, cast (favours received) in one’s teeth Part of Speech: verb
and have said every cruel thing about you falsely for my sake.
Observe this. He had before said, “for righteousness’ sake.”v.10 Here He identifies Himself and His cause with that of righteousness, binding up the cause of righteousness in the world with the reception of Himself. Would Moses, or David, or Isaiah, or Paul have so expressed themselves? Never. Doubtless they suffered for righteousness’ sake. But to have called this “their sake,” would, as every one feels, have been very unbecoming.
Whereas He that speaks, being Righteousness incarnate (see Mar_1:24; Act_3:14; Rev_3:7), when He so speaks, speaks only like Himself.JFB
Mar 1:24 "What have you to do with us, Jesus the Nazarene? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are--God's Holy One."
Act 3:14 Yes, you disowned the holy and righteous One, and asked as a favour the release of a murderer.
Rev 3:7 "To the minister of the Church at Philadelphia write as follows: "'This is what the holy One and the True says--He who has the key of David--He who opens and no one shall shut, and shuts and no one shall open.
The true Reaction to Persecution
Mat 5:12 Be joyful and triumphant, because your reward is great in the Heavens; for so were the Prophets before you persecuted.
Be joyful and triumphant WNT Rejoice and be exceedingly glad,MKJV
Be joyful G5463 χαίρω chairō
Thayer Definition:
1) to rejoice, be glad
2) to rejoice exceedingly
3) to be well, thrive
4) in salutations, hail!
5) at the beginning of letters: to give one greeting, salute Part of Speech: verb
and Triumphant G21 ἀγαλλιάω agalliaō Thayer Definition:
1) to exult, rejoice exceedingly, be exceeding glad
because your reward is great in the Heavens
for great is your reward in heaven; not of debt, but of grace; for there is no proportion or comparison between what the saints suffer for Christ, and the glory that shall be revealed in them by him; not in earth, but in heaven. Saints must not expect their reward here, but hereafter, when God himself will be their reward; he will be all in all; Christ and all his glory, glory and all the riches of it will be the reward of the inheritance, and which must needs be a "great" one.
1Pe 1:5 while ye are kept, by the power of God and by faith, for the life that is prepared and will be revealed in the last times;
kept :φρουρέω phroureō Thayer Definition:
1) to guard, protect by a military guard, either to prevent hostile invasion, or to keep the inhabitants of a besieged city from flight
2) metaphorically
2a) under the control of the Mosaic law, that he might not escape from its power
2b) to protect by guarding, to keep
2c) by watching and guarding to preserve one for the attainment of something
1Pe 1:6 wherein ye will rejoice for ever, notwithstanding ye at the present time are pressed a little, by the various trials that pass over you;
1Pe 1:7 so that the proof of your faith may appear more precious than refined gold that is tested by fire, unto glory and honor and praise, at the manifestation of Jesus the Messiah:
Kot Radha Kishan - Elite commandoes are patrolling the streets of four small towns where almost all the male villagers have vanished as the police launched a massive crackdown after brutal killing of a Christian couple in Lahore’s Kot Radha Kishan suburb.
Twenty-eight-year old Shahzad Masih and his five-month-pregnant wife Shama Masih, 24, were brutally tortured by an enraged mob before they were set ablaze at a brick kiln near Chak No 59 early Tuesday.
“The entire episode took place in the presence of policemen and on the orders of a local Panchayat comprising notables and clerics of the area,” said Javed Shahbaz, a close relative of the deceased couple.
Only five policemen reached the spot to handle hundreds of people as the Panchayat sat down to decide the fate of the couple early Tuesday. Soon after the pre-dawn prayers on Tuesday, the prayer leader at the mosque of Chak No 59 switched on the loudspeaker and made incendiary announcement, urging all the male members of the village to gather at a brick kiln in the area. The Nation
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| Relatives and Friends mourning their death |
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