Caesar’s Household
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as they thus seal their faith with their blood. From the martyr’s ashes
springs an abundant harvest for the garner of God.
Let no one feel that because he is no longer able to labor openly
and actively for God and his truth, he has no service to render, no
reward to secure. A true Christian is never laid aside. God will use
him effectually in health and in sickness, in life and in death. It is in
the darkness of affliction, bereavement, trial, and persecution, that the
light of Christian faith shines brightest, and the Lord’s promises are
found most precious. And when the grave receives the child of God, he
being dead yet speaketh. His works do follow him. The memory of his
words of admonition and encouragement, of his steadfast adherence to
the truth under all circumstances, speaks more powerfully than even
his living example.
Patience as well as courage has its victories. Converts may be
made by meekness in trial, no less than by boldness in enterprise. If
Christians would be reconciled to the apparent suspension of their
usefulness, and would cheerfully rest from the strife, and lay off the
burden of labor, they would learn sweet lessons at the feet of Jesus,
and would see that their Master is using them as effectively when they
seem to be withdrawn from employment, as when in more active labor.
When the Christian churches first learned that Paul contemplated a
visit to Rome, they looked forward to a signal triumph of the gospel.
Paul had borne the truth to many lands; he had proclaimed it in great
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cities. Might not this champion of the faith succeed in winning souls
to Christ, even in the court of Nero? But their anticipations were
crushed by the tidings that Paul had gone to Rome as a prisoner.
They had confidently hoped to see the gospel, once established at this
great center, extend rapidly to all nations, until it should become a
prevailing power in the earth. How great their disappointment! Human
calculations had failed, but not the purpose of God. Paul could not labor
as he had hoped, yet before the close of that two years’ imprisonment
he was able to say, “My bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace,
and in all other places;” and among those who send greetings to the
Philippians, he mentions chiefly them that are of Caesar’s household.
The zeal and fidelity of Paul and his fellow-workers, no less than
the faith and obedience of those converts to Christianity, under circum-
stances so forbidding, should be a rebuke to slothfulness and unbelief
in the followers of Christ. Never let us, by our human, short-sighted