10,000 Testimonies from the Catacombs

My Dear Shepherds,

Jesus’ resurrection propels believers upward from the dismal dungeons of death to the bright realm of everlasting life. Pastors, like big brothers, lift our spiritual siblings on our shoulders so they can see through the windows of Scripture what God has prepared for us.

The resurrection guarantees us multifaceted hope, the gleaming promises of Christ’s triumphant return and reign, reunions with Jesus and beloved believers, new hearts and bodies, life and work in the kingdom to come, and the splendors of the new heavens and earth.

There is another benefit we might overlook—God’s deliverance. Beginning about 100 AD, 150,000 poor and powerless Christians were interred in the “sleeping spaces” (dormir) of the Roman catacombs. Christian gravediggers (who were held in honor by the Roman Christians second only to pastors) carved well over one hundred miles of tunnels out of the rock beneath Rome. Over 10,000 of those tombs were inscribed with epitaphs and very simple drawings capturing the exultant faith of Christians who had lived under constant threats for their faith. At least 15% of them had been violently martyred.

Professor Greg Athnos began a life-long study of Christ’s resurrection when, as a young scholar, he was given access to the catacombs where he saw the illustrations of how triumphantly these saints died thanks to Christ’s great victory. In one of his lectures, the first of four on the resurrection, he shows what he found.

Interestingly, in all those 10,000 images there is not one cross. The first cross doesn’t appear until 340 AD, after Christianity had become the official religion of Rome. What completely dominated the thinking of our early brothers and sisters were other images of God’s deliverance drawn from Scripture.

Several Old Testament stories are common, like Noah and the Ark, Abraham’s near-sacrifice of Isaac, and the three Hebrews in the fiery furnace. Three hundred images depict Daniel standing with upraised hands, two meek lions at his feet. This in the era when they’d seen fellow believers thrown to the lions! “Perhaps the most loved and most often told story in catacomb art,” Athnos writes, “is the story of Jonah and the Sea Serpent, appearing nearly 500 times. As the clearest allegory of Jesus’ conquering of death it fostered the hope of resurrection more than any other work.”

Of course, there are many images of Jesus Christ along with the stories and symbols of his life. Athnos writes, “The Christians who painted in the catacombs knew the promise of abundant life. They surrounded themselves with reminders and memorials of God’s deliverance in the miracles of Jesus.” Jesus raising Lazarus appears about 50 times. Bread (Jesus’ meal with Cleopas) and fish (which Jesus served his disciples by the sea) are pictured 58 times, about half of them with wine as well; a resurrection Eucharist.

Death for the believer is deliverance. Christian funerals celebrate overcomers. Peter, who was well-acquainted with the persecution faced by believers, praised God because,

In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you …. (1 Peter 1:3-4)

For believers, death should never be met with dirges but with songs of triumph. Aristides, in his Apology to the Roman emperor Hadrian around 125 AD, wrote, “And if any righteous man among them [Christians] passes from the world, they rejoice and offer thanks to God; and they escort his body as if he were setting out from one place to another nearby.” Like that!

Be ye glad!

Pastor Lee

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