Ever wonder what happened to the men who followed Christ? Did they live lives of monetary prosperity? Live in mansions? Church history tells us that they all met their deaths because they followed Christ, with the exception of John, who survived being thrown into boiling oil and lived out his days in exile upon the island of Patmos.
James
James, the Apostle of the Lord, was the second recorded martyr after
Christ’s death (Stephen was the first). His death is recorded in Acts 12:2
where it is told that Herod Agrippa killed him with a sword. Clemens
Alexandrinus and Eusebius (Ecclesiastical History II.2) both tell how
the executioner witnessed the courage and un-recanting spirit of James
and was then convinced of Christ resurrection and was executed along
with James.
Date of Martyrdom: 44-45 A.D.
Peter
Although, just before the crucifixion, Peter denied three times that
he even knew Christ, after the resurrection he did not do so again.
Peter, just as Jesus told him in John 21:18-19,
was crucified by Roman executioners because he could not deny his
master again. According to Eusebius, he thought himself unworthy to be
crucified as his Master, and, therefore, he asked to be crucified “head
downward.”
Date of Martyrdom: ca. 64 A.D.
Andrew
Andrew, who introduced his brother Peter to Christ, went to join
Peter with Christ in eternity six years after Peter’s death. After
preaching Christ’s resurrection to the Scythians and Thracians, he too
was crucified for his faith. As Hippolytus tells us, Andrew was hanged
on an olive tree at Patrae, a town in Achaia.
Date of Martyrdom: 70 A.D.
Thomas
Thomas is known as “doubting Thomas” because of his reluctance to
believe the other Apostles’ witness of the resurrection. After they told
him that Christ was alive, he stated “Except I shall see in his hands
the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails,
and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe” (John 20:25).
After this, Christ did appear to him and Thomas believed unto death.
Thomas sealed his testimony as he was thrust through with pine spears,
tormented with red-hot plates, and burned alive.
Date of Martyrdom: 70 A.D.
Philip
Philip was corrected by Christ when he asked Christ to “show us the Father, then this will be enough for us” (John 14:8).
Christ responded, “Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not
come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can
you say, ‘Show us the Father ‘?” (John 14:9).
Philip later saw the glory of Christ after the resurrection and
undoubtedly reflected with amazement on Christ’s response to his
request. Philip evangelized in Phrygia where hostile Jews had him
tortured and then crucified.
Date of Martyrdom: 54 A.D.
Matthew
Matthew, the tax collector, so desperately wanted the Jews to accept
Christ. He wrote The Gospel According to Matthew about ten years before
his death. Because of this, one can see, contained within his Gospel,
the faith for which he spilled his blood. Matthew surely remembered his
resurrected Savior’s words, “Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end
of the world” (Matt. 28:20), when he professed the resurrected Christ unto his death by beheading at Nad-Davar.
Date of Martyrdom: 60-70 A.D.
Nathanael (Bartholomew)
Nathanael, whose name means “gift of God” was truly given as a gift
to the Church through his martyrdom. Nathanael was the first to profess,
early in Christ’s ministry, that Christ was the Son of God (
John 1:49).
He later paid for this profession through a hideous death. Unwilling to
recant of his proclamation of a risen Christ, he was flayed and then
crucified.
Date of Martyrdom: 70 A.D.
James the Lesser
James was appointed to be the head of the Jerusalem church for many
years after Christ’s death. In this, he undoubtedly came in contact with
many hostile Jews (the same ones who killed Christ and stated “His
[Christ's] blood be on us and our children” (
Matt. 27:25).
In order to make James deny Christ’s resurrection, these men positioned
him at the top of the Temple for all to see and hear. James, unwilling
to deny what he knew to be true, was cast down from the Temple and
finally beaten to death with a fuller’s club to the head.
Date of Martyrdom: 63 A.D.
Simon the ZealotSimon was a Jewish zealot who strived to set his people free from
Roman oppression. After he saw with his own eyes that Christ had been
resurrected, he became a zealot of the Gospel. Historians tell of the
many different places that Simon proclaimed the good news of Christ’s
resurrection: Egypt, Cyrene, Africa, Mauritania, Britain, Lybia, and
Persia. His rest finally came when he verified his testimony and went to
be with Christ, being crucified by a governor in Syria.
Date of Martyrdom: 74 A.D.
Judas Thaddeus
Judas questioned the Lord: “Judas said to him (not Iscariot), Lord,
how is it that you will show yourself to us, and not unto the world?” (
John 14:22).
After he witnessed Christ’s resurrection, Judas then knew the answer to
his question. Preaching the risen Christ to those in Mesopotamia in the
midst of pagan priests, Judas was beaten to death with sticks, showing
to the world that Christ was indeed Lord and God.
Date of Martyrdom: 72 A.D.
Matthias
Matthias replaced Judas Iscariot (the betrayer of Christ who hanged himself) as the twelfth Apostle of Christ (
Acts 1:26). It is believed by most that Matthias was one of the seventy that Christ sent out during his earthly ministry (
Luke 10:1).
This qualifies him to be an apostle. Matthias, of which the least is
known, is said by Eusebius to have preached in Ethiopia. He was later
stoned while hanging upon a cross.
Date of Martyrdom: 70 A.D.
John
John is the only one of the twelve Apostles to have died a natural
death. Although he did not die a martyr’s death, he did live a martyr’s
life. He was exiled to the Island of Patmos under the Emperor Domitian
for his proclamation of the risen Christ. It was there that he wrote the
last book in the Bible, Revelation. Some traditions tell us that he was
thrown into boiling oil before the Latin Gate, where he was not killed
but undoubtedly scarred for the rest of his life.
Date of Martyrdom: 95 A.D.
Paul
Paul, himself a persecutor of the Christian faith (Galatians 1:13),
was brought to repentance on his way to Damascus by an appearance of
the risen Christ. Ironically, Paul was heading for Damascus to arrest
those who held to Christ’s resurrection. Paul was the greatest skeptic
there was until he saw the truth of the resurrection. He then devoted
his life to the proclamation of the living Christ. Writing to the
Corinthians, defending his ministry, Paul tells of his sufferings for
the name of Christ: “In labors more abundant, in beatings above measure,
in prisons more frequent, in deaths often. Of the Jews five times
received I forty stripes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods,
once was I stoned, three times I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I
have been in the deep; In journeys often, in storms on the water, in
danger of robbers, in danger by mine own countrymen, in danger by the
heathen, in danger in the city, in danger in the wilderness, in the sea,
among false brethren; In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often,
in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness “(2 Cor. 11:23-27). Finally, Paul met his death at the hands of the Roman Emperor Nero when he was beheaded in Rome.
Date of Martyrdom: ca. 67 A.D.
Information taken from article found at this address:http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2009/04/what-happened-to-the-twelve-apostles-how-their-deaths-evidence-easter/
