ZENOBIUS AND ZENOBIA, Aegea, Cilicia (near Kalamaki-Aydin, Turkey) 30 Oct, A.D. 285.

 'Let Christ help you'!

'I love Jesus more than all the riches and honour of this word. Death and the torments which you threaten me, I do not consider a disadvantage, but my greatest gain'. Having said that, Zenobius, the bishop of the Church of Aegea, looked steadily at Lysias, the Roman proconsul.
Lysias had offered Zenobius great wealth, honour, and position if he would follow the command of the Emperor and serve the Roman gods, but threatened him torture if he did not. On a tour through the provinces of Cilicia, Lysias had been holding criminal court against Christians in town after town. He had been in Aegea only for a short time, but had already tortured five Christians to death. Now he looked forward to tormenting the bishop himself.
"Put him on a rack'! the proconsul ordered. 'We will see how much pain he can stand".

While the executioners were busy withe Zenobius, his sister Zenobia, having heard what was happening, came running in. She cried with a loud voice, 'You tyrant! What evil thing has my brother done, that you torture him like this?" She too was seized by the servants, stripped naked, stretched out, and roasted beside her brother on a red-hot iron bed.
The tyrant mocking the martyrs said, 'Now let Christ come and help you, seeing you suffer these torments for Him'.
Zenobius replied :'See, He is already with us, and cools, with His heavenly dew, the flames of fire on our bodies ; though you, surrounded as you are with the thick darkness of wickedness, cannot see it' ( Like other martyrs before and after them, Zenobius and Zenobia experienced the reality of God's presence).

Thas made Lysias furious. 'Throw them into boiling pots of water!' he hollered. Miraculously, the boiling water did not killed the two believers, and they continued to praise the Lord Jesus. Lysias was almost beside himself. None of the other Christians had survided his torments like the two had.
'Take them out of the city and behead them'. Their bodies were buried in a cave near the place where they were executed (The voice of the martyrs).

• < Prev
• Next >