On this date in 165 AD, Justin Martyr was scourged and then beheaded after he refused to sacrifice to the pagan gods. Justin was born in the biblical city of Shechem, and early in his life followed the philosophy of Plato. But his life was changed when he realized God was pursuing a relationship with him through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. In his first Apology, he took parts of the Bible that the pagans found hard to believe and observed that the pagan myths were much harder to accept and often contradicted each other. According to Lang’s Christian History Devotional:
Perhaps the most appealing statement in the Apology is “never was the crucifixion imitated in any of the so-called sons of Zeus.” Justin had hit upon the core of the gospel: a son of a god—rather, the one Son of the only God—gave himself up, the innocent suffering in place of the guilty.
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