His Sufferings Were Before Your Eyes: Part I
Part I: Introduction, Clement of Rome, & Ignatius of Antioch
I will be starting a series of posts here on Substack titled, “His Sufferings Were Before Your Eyes: Selections from The Church Fathers on The Passion of Christ.” This is part one. Subscribe to receive the upcoming installments to your inbox!
“Content with the provision which God had made for you, and carefully attending to His words, you were inwardly filled with His doctrine, and His sufferings were before your eyes” -Clement of Rome
Introduction
This quotation, written by Clement of Rome to the church at Corinth around 100 Anno Domini, epitomizes the heart of the early church: thankful hearts, careful attention to the words of Christ, and a fiery love for His sufferings.
I am grateful to have encountered the writings of the early church early in my Christian life. I am especially grateful to my friends Daniel,
, and Luke, with whom I have shared many hours of edifying conversation. These brothers introduced me to the writings of the early church, most famously compiled together in church historian Phillip Schaff’s work, The Ante Nicene Fathers, Volumes 1-10. If I had to pick between those ten volumes and the top 10 Christian books written last year, the Ante Nicene Fathers would be my obvious pick.So what are these writings? They are mostly letters, just as the New Testament is mostly composed of letters. They are letters to churches, letters to other disciples, letters to pagan philosophers, and letters to Roman politicians. These are some of the most important documents in the history of the church of Christ, but the everyday Christian sitting in a Sunday pew has never heard of them. Many Christian bookstores have hundreds of copies of last year’s best-selling celebrity pastor, but do not have one word penned by Ignatius, the disciple of the Apostle John, or by Clement, the first-century bishop of the church at Rome, or by the famous apologist Justin Martyr. These writings can be found here from Christian Classics Ethereal Library. The introductions to each author provide a helpful introduction.
While these works are of great historical and theological importance, they are also great for devotional use. I have found the simplicity of these writings compelling and powerful. I have found the writings of some of the earliest Church Fathers of equal merit to popular devotions like Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening, and Bennet’s Valley of Vision.
The purpose of this series of posts is to place afresh the sufferings of Christ before our eyes. The Christian is transformed by beholding the glory of his Lord: “glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:13). I encourage you to appreciate this selections devotionally, and behold Christ crucified along with your brothers and sisters of the early church. The magnificent thing is the person of Christ; through these words, that magnificence is powerfully proclaimed.
Another reason for the dissemination of these selections are the modern attacks on the doctrine of the atonement. Many attacks have been raised in recent years against this doctrine. There are those that deny the atonement was a substitution. There are those that deny Christ’s expiation of sin through his blood. I hope that these selections help, along with magnifying the work of Christ in the atonement, to defend that important doctrine.
Clement of Rome (96 A.D.)
Content with the provision which God had made for you, and carefully attending to His words, you were inwardly filled with His doctrine, and His sufferings were before your eyes. Thus a profound and abundant peace was given to you all, and you had an insatiable desire for doing good, while a full outpouring of the Holy Spirit was upon you all. Full of holy designs, and with true earnestness of mind and a godly confidence, you stretched forth your hands to God Almighty, beseeching Him to be merciful to you, if you had been guilty of any involuntary transgression. Day and night you were anxious for the whole brotherhood, that the number of God's elect might be saved with mercy and a good conscience. You were sincere and uncorrupted, and forgetful of injuries between one another. Every kind of faction and schism was abominable in your sight. You mourned over the transgressions of your neighbors: their deficiencies you deemed your own. You never grudged any act of kindness, being "ready to every good work." Adorned by a thoroughly virtuous and religious life, you did all things in the fear of God. The commandments and ordinances of the Lord were written upon the tablets of your hearts. (First Letter of Clement to the Corinthians)
Let him who has love in Christ keep the commandments of Christ. Who can describe the [blessed] bond of the love of God? What man is able to tell the excellence of its beauty, as it ought to be told? The height to which love exalts is unspeakable. Love unites us to God. Love covers a multitude of sins. Love bears all things, is long-suffering in all things. There is nothing base, nothing arrogant in love. Love admits of no schisms: love gives rise to no seditions: love does all things in harmony. By love have all the elect of God been made perfect; without love nothing is well-pleasing to God. In love has the Lord taken us to Himself. On account of the Love he bore us, Jesus Christ our Lord gave His blood for us by the will of God; His flesh for our flesh, and His soul for our souls. (Ibid)
These things, beloved, we write to you, not merely to admonish you of your duty, but also to remind ourselves. For we are struggling in the same arena, and the same conflict is assigned to both of us. So let us give up vain and fruitless cares, and approach to the glorious and venerable rule of our holy calling. Let us attend to what is good, pleasing, and acceptable in the sight of Him who formed us. Let us look steadfastly to the blood of Christ, and see how precious that blood is to God, which, having been shed for our salvation, has set the grace of repentance before the whole world. Let us turn to every age that has passed, and learn that, from generation to generation, the Lord has granted a place of repentance to all who would be converted to Him. Noah preached repentance, and as many as listened to him were saved. Jonah proclaimed destruction to the Ninevites; but they, repenting of their sins, propitiated God by prayer, and obtained salvation, although they were aliens [to the covenant] of God. (Ibid)
Moreover, they gave Rahab a sign to this effect, that she should hang forth from her house a scarlet thread. And thus they made it manifest that redemption should flow through the blood of the Lord to all those who believe and hope in God. You see, beloved, that there was not only faith, but prophecy, in this woman. (Ibid)
Ignatius of Antioch (~100 A.D.)
I glorify God, even Jesus Christ, who has given you such wisdom. For I have observed that ye are perfected in an immoveable faith, as if ye were nailed to the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, both in the flesh and in the spirit, and are established in love through the blood of Christ, being fully persuaded with respect to our Lord, that He was truly of the seed of David according to the flesh, and the Son of God according to the will and power of God; that He was truly born of a virgin, was baptized by John, in order that all righteousness might be fulfilled by Him; and was truly, under Pontius Pilate and Herod the tetrarch, nailed[to the cross] for us in His flesh. Of this fruit we are by His divinely-blessed passion, that He might set up a standard for all ages, through His resurrection, to all His holy and faithful [followers], whether among Jews or Gentiles, in the one body of His Church. (Ignatius to the Smyrnaeans)
Let no man deceive himself. Both the things which are in heaven, and the glorious angels, and rulers, both visible and invisible, if they believe not in the blood of Christ, shall, in consequence, incur condemnation. "He that is able to receive it, let him receive it." Let not [high] place puff any one up: for that which is worth all is a faith and love, to which nothing is to be preferred. But consider those who are of a different opinion with respect to the grace of Christ which has come unto us, how opposed they are to the will of God. They have no regard for love; no care for the widow, or the orphan, or the oppressed; of the bond, or of the free; of the hungry, or of the thirsty. (Ibid)
But foreseeing the snares of the wicked one, I arm you beforehand by my admonitions, as my beloved and faithful children in Christ, furnishing you with the means of protection against the deadly disease of unruly men, by which do ye flee from the disease [referred to] by the good-will of Christ our Lord. Do ye therefore, clothing yourselves with meekness, become the imitators of His sufferings, and of His love, wherewith He loved us when He gave Himself a ransom for us, that He might cleanse us by His blood from our old ungodliness, and bestow life on us when we were almost on the point of perishing through the depravity that was in us. (Ignatius to the Trallians)
May we look steadfastly to the blood of Christ.
In Christ,
Until Part II…