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This is Undaunted Life of Man's Podcast.
1:11
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
1:13
Let's get into it.
1:14
All right, guys, as you know, by now, I love history.
1:17
I mean, I love stories about history.
1:19
I've talked a lot about Roman history and the things that I like from that.
1:22
I like period piece movies.
1:24
I even did a podcast episode early on in this podcast about Cincinnati, the Roman general
1:29
that basically came out of retirement to save the Republic and then to basically go back
1:33
into oblivion.
1:34
And so I love stories like that.
1:36
But here's the thing about history is most of the really cool stories and I mean, like
1:40
the really, really awesome stories, we all seem to know about them, right?
1:46
I mean, they've been written about in textbooks or maybe we were even taught them in elementary
1:50
school or whatever the case might be.
1:52
But as you dig deeper into different pockets of history, you get these incredibly overwhelming
1:58
stories and you never really know when you're going to get one of those, okay?
2:01
So a buddy of mine named Ryan Parsons, he's here and he and I go to the same church here
2:05
in Edmond, Oklahoma.
2:06
He sent me a text out of the blue was like late one night, like a Saturday or Sunday
2:10
90s like, Hey, I was down in Houston this weekend.
2:13
I heard this pastor give this sermon and I just wanted to kind of share it with you.
2:16
So this was a sermon.
2:19
I have video of it from back in 2014, so I don't know if he gave the talk again or whatever
2:23
the case may be, but either way, this was by a guy named Eric Stevens, which I think
2:28
he's part of something called life changing ministries in Sugar Land, Texas.
2:32
So they don't really have a big website or anything like that.
2:35
But anyway, it was this sermon that was, you know, 40, 45 minutes long and it's called
2:39
soldier.
2:40
That was the name of it.
2:42
And so the thing about this is, you know, I like Ryan and he sent me the thing and I was
2:47
like, okay, well, he doesn't normally send me content.
2:49
So if he sends me content, I'm sure it's pretty good.
2:51
But the first five or 10 minutes of it, I was like, God, this guy freaking sucks.
2:56
He's just got a weird cadence.
2:58
He's got a very weird delivery and kind of the, you know, the different things he does
3:02
with his voice is a little bit strange to me.
3:05
So fair warning to that here in a second, when we get into the clip, but he told an
3:09
unbelievable story and I'm so glad because I was very tempted to, you know, just turn
3:14
this thing off and move on to the next thing in my life.
3:16
I'm so glad that I hung on long enough for him to talk about Ligio 12 full monada.
3:22
Okay.
3:23
And he's going to go in and explain this.
3:24
So what I want to do is I want to play this story for you because I was going to go and
3:28
do the research myself and just kind of give you the story.
3:31
But again, this guy does a really good, good, you know, job, I guess of doing this story.
3:36
If you can kind of get past his voice, would you kind of get used to a couple of minutes
3:39
in, but it's going to be about 15 or 16 minutes or so of him telling you this story.
3:45
And then we're going to come back in.
3:46
So let's go ahead and go into the story of Ligio 12 full monada.
3:52
Many of you may not know where Sebastian is, but I was just an Istanbul and it turns out
3:59
that in Eastern Turkey, there was a town called Sabas.
4:04
And in about the year three hundred and twenty, there was an event there that men are still
4:11
writing and telling stories about to this day.
4:15
We're learning from a man named St. Basil, St. Basil lives from the year three hundred
4:21
and thirty to three hundred and seventy nine A.D.
4:24
He was a pastor then called Bishop in Caesarea.
4:32
He has a sermon on some events in 320 in Sabas that has survived to this day.
4:42
He was alive within 50 years and preaching within 50 to 60 years of the actual event.
4:50
It can be corroborated from several sources in history.
4:55
St. Basil, a man of God, preached a message recorded to this day and it is about a time
5:03
period where a man named Lucenius was ruling the eastern half of the Roman Empire.
5:11
Before we get into Lucenius, you need to know who was ruling the western half of the Roman
5:15
Empire, a man named Constantine who achieved the title of Pontificus Maximus on October
5:24
28, 312 A.D. had the other half of the Empire.
5:32
Rome was split during these days.
5:34
There was a battle at Malvern Bridge where it is said that Constantine looked into the
5:40
sky and saw the words in Latin in Hoxignio verses.
5:46
By this sign, you shall conquer.
5:50
He goes on to win his battle and in 313 he issues an edict of toleration.
5:57
The edict of toleration says this.
6:00
We have been killing Christians for three centuries and it has not stopped the growth
6:05
of Christianity.
6:06
There may be something to these people's religion.
6:11
My personal opinion is that Constantine was never a Christian but that is just my personal
6:16
opinion.
6:19
His rival in life was a man named Lucenius and he ruled all of the areas that Constantine
6:28
was unable to conquer but for a short time these two men agreed on the edict of toleration.
6:36
It would be best for Rome to stop oppressing these people.
6:41
We can move on to other things.
6:43
We have more pressing concerns.
6:46
Lucenius agreed and they had a compact between them.
6:53
The thing is is that Lucenius had no idea how many actual Christians there were.
7:00
See Christians had been meeting in underground places and when they were caught they were
7:04
flayed alive.
7:06
They were burned at the stake.
7:08
They were put in gloomy dungeons and they were fed to beasts and now that they were officially
7:16
protected in the sense that they were allowed to be tolerated they were coming out of the
7:22
woodworks and when Lucenius got an idea of their real numbers he broke his compact with
7:30
Constantine and he decided that he needed to persecute these people.
7:36
In the year 320 because of a fear of rebellion he appoints a man named Agricola to go to Turkey
7:45
and identify the Christians in the town of Sabas.
7:49
It turns out that as he is offering people the chance to renounce Christ most of the
7:57
legions had no problem doing so.
8:01
Their allegiance to Jesus was superficial and political but there was one legion, Ligio
8:08
the twelfth full manata, full manata is Latin for they come with lightning proudly stood
8:18
up and said we will not renounce our love for Jesus Christ.
8:25
The reason that we were named full manata we come with lightning is because we win and
8:31
the reason that we win is because we pray before we go into battle.
8:36
We call upon the king who has saved us and say Lord if this cause is just we are asking
8:43
that you would deliver us and we have fought many battles and he has delivered us many
8:47
times we cannot deny him now.
8:52
So they tried it first to bribe Ligio full manata and they were unable to get them to
9:07
compromise.
9:08
40 in particular of the most valiant soldiers stood and they gave this response when bribery
9:14
turned to torture.
9:18
These Christian soldiers were offered money and honors in order to induce them to join
9:23
the ranks of the heathen then came threats of indescribable tortures and here was the
9:29
answer the soldiers gave.
9:32
Do you have blessings of equal value to those you endeavor to deprive us of?
9:40
Can you give us what we would have to give up to choose you over our Jesus?
9:48
We hate your gift because it means our loss.
9:53
We do not accept honor which is the mother of dishonesty.
9:58
You offer us money which remains here glory which fades away.
10:03
We have despised the whole world those things we see in the world.
10:08
We do not have for us the value of the heavenly things which we hope and long for.
10:14
We are afraid of only one punishment the punishment of the fires of hell.
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We are ready for your torture.
10:25
You may twist our bodies and you may burn them.
10:30
We stand ready on themes of loyalty, perseverance, in adversity, unity, and reward.
10:42
Are you beginning to feel their inspiration?
10:46
The judge was infuriated by the courage of these brave Christians and so he devised
10:50
a slow and most painful way of putting them to death.
11:00
You see, agriculture had been a part of earlier times.
11:05
They had seized Christians in other places and they had lit them on fire.
11:10
And as the flesh fell off of the bones, they witnessed those Christians singing hymns.
11:17
They had burned them without irons and seen that that did not turn them away.
11:21
They had fed them to lions and seen that that did not discourage them.
11:28
So agriculture came up within a different idea.
11:32
There is a pond outside of this town and it was frozen over because it was winter.
11:39
Perhaps dying by fire is too quick.
11:43
Let's let the whole town watch these 40 go out onto the ice, stripped naked.
11:51
And as they one by one turn away from Jesus, then the whole town will be convinced because
11:55
it takes a lot longer to freeze to death than it does to burn to death.
12:01
Agriculture was inventive if nothing else.
12:04
I don't think he had planned on the response of the soldiers.
12:09
He had hoped to strip them.
12:12
He had hoped to have to forcibly drive them out onto the ice.
12:18
But as each soldier went, they took off their own garments, walked in unison and said we
12:25
are not merely putting off our clothes tonight.
12:29
We are putting off the old man, which is corrupt according to its deceitful lust.
12:35
Can you imagine how angry?
12:39
Magra Cola must have been.
12:42
When he not only heard somebody quote Ephesians 4, 22, he saw them living it out.
12:48
They encouraged each other.
12:51
One account says they held hands with these words.
12:56
Let us persevere a little longer and we shall be warmed in the bosom of Christ.
13:06
As they arrived in the center of the ice, their feet began to stick to it.
13:15
As they rocked back and forth, trying to keep warm from the cold, the skin on their feet
13:22
tore because it was stuck to the ice.
13:25
So now the blood covered the ice.
13:31
He's reported that a witness overheard one of the soldiers telling the others, friends
13:37
we were ordained to be friends in this life, this very temporary life.
13:43
Let's not let us now be separated for an eternity.
13:48
We must stand.
13:55
Magra Cola saw their courage and he got an idea.
13:59
He had large tubs of water brought to the edge of the ice and heated a jacuzzi of sorts.
14:10
And they built fires at the edge of the ice so that the soldiers in their suffering could
14:16
see the relief in the distance.
14:20
And then they brought out food and began to have a banquet.
14:31
One of the men in the 40 overcome by his desire to warm himself, overcome by his desire to
14:39
appease his own flesh, yielded and became reprobate.
14:46
As he left the center of the circle, venturing for the hot bath, trudging upon the ice to
14:54
get to the food in the warmth of the fire, he fell dead before he reached the shore.
15:02
And one of the soldiers remembered Matthew 10 and 22 to put it on the screen, please.
15:13
Old men will hate you because of me, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.
15:22
And the 39 began to pray together.
15:25
And as they began to pray, it said that they recited Psalm 53.
15:31
Let us read it together now.
15:39
The fool says in his heart, there is no God.
15:43
They are corrupt in their ways or vile.
15:47
There is no one who does good.
15:50
God looks down from heaven on the sons of men to see if there any who understand, any
15:55
who seek God, everyone has turned away.
16:00
They have together become corrupt.
16:04
There is no one who does good, no not even one.
16:09
Will the evil doers never learn?
16:12
Those who devour my people as men eat bread and do not call on God.
16:19
And with this very scripture, they began to call upon the Lord to help them stand.
16:26
They just saw their brother fall, fall eternally.
16:32
Fall in the flesh, yes, but fall in the spirit even more so.
16:35
They saw his life consumed like bread.
16:40
And they asked God that they would have the strength to stand.
16:45
I witness accounts say that two things began to happen.
16:51
As the 39 faithful remained in the center of the ice, freezing to death, a light appeared
16:57
above their heads and the men felt themselves strangely warm while they were dying.
17:09
But it's what the men saw on the shore that is really the most interesting.
17:17
When one of the Roman soldiers who was assigned to make sure that they did not leave the ice
17:23
saw that the men were overcoming their agony, when they saw that the cowardness of the man
17:29
who turned away and the courage of the men who stayed, convinced by the sincerity of
17:35
their position, he said he saw what appeared to be crowns on top of the 39 men's heads.
17:43
And he began to strip off his clothes and say I received Christ and he joined them as
17:49
they sang and they prayed on the ice that day.
17:54
All friends, will you be crowned?
18:02
Alleglius is what the man's name was that found Jesus hours from his death because he
18:12
was willing to be stripped and frozen to death because he admired the courage of those who
18:19
stood for their faith.
18:24
I wish I could tell you that there was a divine deliverance.
18:28
I can't.
18:29
I can say precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.
18:37
And Alleglius along with his 39 friends froze to the death on the ice that night.
18:46
But it was noted by Basil when preaching that God had ordained 40 martyrs.
18:55
And even when one fell away, he was big enough to replace him with a 40th and he got his offering
19:04
that night.
19:09
Turkey remains Christian despite Rome's best efforts until our times today, Turkey is Muslim
19:26
because Christians have often lost their courage.
19:32
I mean, what a powerful story again.
19:35
That was Eric Stevens with that Stevens with a pH with life changing ministries were there
19:40
with that story.
19:41
And again, there, there's more there after that.
19:43
And there was certainly some before that section, but I just wanted to share that story
19:46
with you guys because I don't know if that's a common story, like I don't really know what
19:50
circles I would have had to have rolled in to, you know, have heard that story before, but
19:54
I'd never heard that.
19:55
And it was just so overwhelming to hear about that group.
19:59
I mean, one of the cool things just right there at the beginning is that full manata
20:03
in Latin means they come with lightning.
20:05
I mean, if you're going to be in any type of military or any type of fighting group or
20:09
something like that, if your name means they come with lightning, that's pretty dope.
20:14
Okay, let's just establish that from the very beginning.
20:16
And I don't feel like this story needs a whole lot more.
20:19
I think you guys probably got a lot from it again.
20:22
I think he could have, you know, elucidated some other points a little bit further, but
20:26
I think he made his point in the context of a sermon.
20:29
But I want to kind of give you just four quick reasons of why I love this story and the first
20:34
one's easy.
20:35
It's a story of toughness.
20:36
Right.
20:37
I mean, you just have to think about the toughness to endure something like what those soldiers
20:41
did.
20:42
But again, you're thinking physically, probably whenever I said that, but also just to mentally
20:48
be there in that moment in front of a judge and to have the courage to say the things
20:53
that you said to that person who literally had life and death, your life and death in
20:59
his hands and those of your 39 brothers, it's an incredible story of toughness.
21:04
And then the second thing and the second reason why I love the story is because it's a story
21:08
of brotherhood.
21:10
I mean, for most of us in our lives, we will literally die alone.
21:14
And I don't mean that we're, you know, gonna die with no, no loved ones around or something
21:18
like that.
21:19
But it's just going to be us, right?
21:21
Our loved ones will still be there when we pass on more than likely, right?
21:26
But this was an opportunity for 40 soldiers to die together, but not in battle.
21:33
I mean, just think about how unique that was.
21:35
I mean, a Roman soldier dying was, was not exactly an uncommon thing at that time period
21:41
or really any time period during the, the Roman Empire, right?
21:46
But to have these 40 men and, you know, went down to 39 and then became 40 again, to have
21:51
them all die together in the same way, making the same declaration.
21:57
I mean, that's, that's something different.
22:00
And you know, most of us aren't going to have that opportunity.
22:02
I don't know that anybody listening to this would necessarily sign up for that.
22:06
But just think about how unique of a circumstance that was.
22:09
I guess the third reason why I love this story is it's a story of resilience.
22:14
Guys you know, we love talking about resilience here at Undaunted Life when we talk about
22:17
that all the time and all kinds of different contexts.
22:20
But you have to have a resilient mindset if you're going to do something like this.
22:26
Because it's one thing to say something, it's another thing to kind of act it out.
22:31
But these guys did not die slowly.
22:34
Now as Eric Steven said in this kind of recounting of the story, he said that they were basically
22:40
walking on top of frozen water.
22:43
But there are other places in history where it's actually described that these guys were
22:46
in freezing cold water, that it wasn't exactly frozen over completely.
22:50
So there's a little bit, it's a little bit up in the air, but either way, these people
22:54
froze to death.
22:57
And that is not a very quick process.
22:59
Again, I mean, you hear stories about people that are burned alive.
23:03
And as horrific as that would be, it's pretty well known in scientific and medical circles
23:08
that the nerve endings in your body, if you're burned alive, they burn off fairly quickly.
23:15
Again, I'm saying this, it's a horrific way to die, but it's not a prolonged way to die.
23:22
It can really consume you fairly quickly.
23:25
The cold is something entirely different.
23:29
And so for 39 of these men to endure what they endured physically and the tricks and
23:36
the games it had to play on them mentally, and you have to think Satan was all over this
23:39
as well.
23:41
And it looks like Satan got to one of them and that led to him basically trying to run
23:47
and save himself and that actually ended up killing him quicker than it did his brothers.
23:52
But it's absolutely a story of resilience.
23:53
But the last reason why I love this story is because obviously this is a story of Jesus.
23:58
This is a story of the gospel because Jesus was an unbelievably tough human being.
24:05
He was a tough person.
24:07
He also had his brotherhood, he had his apostles.
24:10
This is a very, very resilient man as well.
24:13
So when we think about in the context of undaunted life, spiritual, mental and physical resilience,
24:20
why do you think I say that?
24:22
Like where do you think that comes from?
24:24
Like I didn't just pull that out of my rear end, guys.
24:26
I mean, this is a story of Jesus.
24:30
I mean, has there ever been another human being that was as spiritually, mentally and
24:34
physically resilient as him?
24:36
Easy answer, guys, it's not a trick question.
24:39
It's no.
24:40
It's never been anyone even close.
24:42
And so for us, if we were going to be disciples of Jesus Christ, we have to be able to model
24:46
those same things.
24:48
Now, most of us are not going to die in this dramatic extreme way, right?
24:52
I think it's fairly safe to assume that the people listening to this.
24:55
That's not the experience that you're going to have, but you are going to have times in
24:58
your life where you need to be tough.
25:02
You're going to have times in your life where you need to depend on the brothers around
25:04
you.
25:05
Like a lot of my brothers are listening to this right now, right?
25:09
I'm talking to you guys.
25:11
I'm talking about you as it refers to me and I'm talking to me as it refers to you.
25:16
And guys, you have to be resilient.
25:18
There's going to be constant opportunities for you to work on that.
25:24
And so I know it might seem like we're a little bit of a broken record, but again, that's
25:27
the whole theme of this thing to cultivate manly resilience and specifically spiritual,
25:31
mental and physical resilience and toughness.
25:34
Those are the things that you're going to need to just get through life.
25:36
I mean, I'm not even just talking about your, your discipleship with Jesus Christ.
25:40
I'm just talking about life in general, resilience and toughness is one of those keys to living.
25:47
But again, if we're going to learn from the example of Jesus Christ, we have to live this
25:51
out and lead you to number 12 full manata.
25:55
They certainly did that.
25:56
All right, guys, before we let you out of here, we are going to do a quick resilience boost.
26:00
As you know, by now, we are a men's ministry and our mission is cultivating manly resilience.
26:04
And specifically, we do that by providing content like this podcast that we're just
26:08
spiritual, mental and physical toughness.
26:10
And so we're going to help you with the mental and spiritual resilience today.
26:12
So we're going to give you the audio and the video for this entire sermon.
26:16
So if you want to watch the entire sermon called soldier by Eric Stevens, that's going to be
26:20
in the show notes.
26:21
And then in addition to that, I thought you might want some other information on the 40
26:24
martyrs of Sebastian.
26:25
So I'm going to give you the Wikipedia page.
26:27
I know Wikipedia is not exactly a bastion of completely historically accurate content,
26:32
but there are a lot of footnotes here.
26:34
So you can kind of go search around and figure out all the things about the story of these
26:37
40 men.
26:38
Guys, thanks so much for listening to this podcast.
26:40
I really do appreciate it.
26:41
If you would please subscribe on iTunes, SoundCloud, Spotify or Google Play and refer your friends
26:46
to listen and share this on social media.
26:48
Guys, if we deserve a five star review, please leave us one and a few sentences letting us
26:51
know why you like the content.
26:53
I'm currently booking speaking engagements for the remainder of 2019.
26:56
So if you want me to come speak to your men's event, to your group, to your team, whatever
27:00
hit me up, info@undaunted.life again, that's INFO@undaunted.life.
27:06
The website is www.undaunted.life and you can follow us on Instagram and Twitter, @undauntedlife
27:11
or facebook.com/undauntedlife.
27:14
Check out our free devotionals on the U version Bible app.
27:16
Just search "undaunted life" under plans.
27:18
And as always, we want to thank the band August Burns Red for allowing us to use their entire
27:21
music library for our content.
27:23
The intro outro track on this podcast is our song "Kingdom Star," which is off their latest
27:27
record entitled "Phantom Anthem."
27:29
The links to all of this are in the description.
27:31
I'm your host, Kyle Thompson.
27:33
Remember, keep cultivating manly resilience, keep forging spiritual, mental and physical
27:39
toughness, keep seeking the Lion of Judah.