Philip. 4:21?22
Greet all the saints in Christ Jesus.  All the saints send you greetings, especially those who belong to Caesar’s household.

When our Lord was born, Augustus was the Caesar of Rome.  He was followed by Tiberias (about whom it was said that he liked not one single human being and that not one single human being liked him).  Tiberius was followed by the depraved Gaius Caesar, better known as Caligula – Little Boots.  He ruled for 4 years and was a monster of cruelty and vice.  He was finally assassinated in the year A.D. 41.  The Praetorian Guard, fearful of a return to a republic, forcibly made Claudius (officially Tiberius Claudius Drusus Nero Germanicus) the emperor.  And for the next 13 years this strange man of handicapped body and slow speech was the monarch of the Roman world.  Claudius was followed, in turn, by Nero who ruled for 14 years until his suicide in A.D. 68.  All these decades were splotched with immorality, depravity and insanity such as the world has rarely witnessed.

But think of it!  In those years between A.D. 40 and 60, there were men and women who were followers of Jesus Christ who managed to thrive while working in the very palace of Caligula, Claudius and Nero!  Paul, who was under house arrest in Rome, testified of this reality in the letter he sent to the church at Philippi, “Those precious saints of God who reside in Caesar’s household send their greetings….”

Today we sometimes find professing saints who complain about the pressures of serving God in the free world.  How do they think they would have fared in ancient Rome where their witness for Christ could have made them fodder for the lions?  But on the other hand, some of the most courageous saints ever are serving God this very day.  Are you one of them?

Prayer:  O God, let me by Thy Spirit serve Thee well this day!   May there be no pressure or circumstance that would cause me to grieve Thee.  Let my thoughts, words and actions please Thee!  Amen.