2 Peter 1: 2-7
May grace and peace be yours in abundance in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.
His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Thus he has given us, through these things, his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of lust, and may become participants of the divine nature. For this very reason, you must make every effort to support your faith with goodness, and goodness with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with endurance, and endurance with godliness, and godliness with mutual affection, and mutual affection with love.
New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989, by the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. USCCB approved.
Commitment to God
Who was Justin the Martyr? In a time when Christians were suspect of disloyalty to the Roman Empire, Justin argued the opposite to be true. A philosopher and orator who studied Plato and other great thinkers, Justin was born around 100 A.D., converted to Christianity around 130 A.D. He was martyred in 165 A.D. after refusing to renounce his Christianity to the Roman Prefect, Rusticus, saying, “No one in their right mind gives up truth for falsehood.”
We can reflect on his profound words as we consider our own commitment to God in our world today. We might ask ourselves the question Ignatius poses in this excerpt from Spiritual Exercise 135, “While I continue to contemplate Jesus’s life, let me begin to examine myself and ask, ‘to what state of life or to what style of living is our loving, provident God leading me?’”
—Donna K. Becher, M.S. is a certified spiritual director with the West Virginia Institute for Spirituality in Charleston, West Virginia. Her training is rooted in the Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola.
Prayer
O God, who through the folly of the Cross wondrously taught Saint Justin the Martyr the surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ, grant us, through his intercession, that, having rejected deception and error, we may become steadfast in the faith. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever.
—Collect Prayer for the Memorial of St. Justin, Martyr