Nancy Damas Walgumuth encourages us to show concern for persecuted Christians.

They are part of our family and we need to care and to pray and to ask God to have mercy

on their persecutors,

but also to pray for God's grace to be poured out

on those who are being faithful to the fight

and faithful to the finish.

This is the Reviver Hearts Podcast with Nancy DeMasse Walgimmuth, co-author of True Woman 201.

For August 25, 2023, I'm Danaagresh. Jesus dictated seven letters to seven churches

at the beginning of the Book of Revelation.

You'll find the letters to be intriguing

and practical as Nancy teaches through them.

She'll do that in several series here on Revive Our Hearts into September in October.

Today she'll wrap up a series on the letter to the church at Smyrna.

In the last session I told you the story about the martyrdom of Polycarp who was

the Bishop of Smyrna and was martyred for his faith in Christ, burned at the stake in about 156 AD.

He would have been a member of the Church of Smyrna perhaps at the time when the Book of

Revelation was written 60 years earlier and would have been encouraged with the words

to hold fast to his faith for the sake of Christ.

The reason we know so much about that story is we still have today an account that was written in the first century

detailing you can find it on the internet it's called the Martyrdom of Polycarp and you can actually

read the details of that story.

The Count draws to a close with these words.

...