The website merriam-webster.com lists several possible definitions of the word martyr:
1: a person who voluntarily suffers death as the penalty of witnessing to and refusing to renounce a religion
2: a person who sacrifices something of great value and especially life itself for the sake of principle; a martyr to the cause of freedom
3: victim; especially: a great or constant sufferer
Martyr is a Christian word, at least in origin, with the basic meaning in Greek of “witness.” It became used to describe a life that is a witness to Christ—that death is chosen rather than giving up faith in Christ. There is no stronger way to give witness—not with words only, but by valuing the confession of Christ more than our life in this world. Our life in Christ is beyond this world and cannot be taken from us. This strictest sense of martyrdom is binary in the sense that death can be avoided if Christ is denied.
The confession of Jesus Christ as Lord of all and Savior is explicitly the external motivation in this narrowest understanding of the word. The implication is that death could be avoided by denying Christ verbally. Christ links our words to our salvation so that our public witness is tied to the belief in our heart: “For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved” (Rom. 10:10). Christ confesses us as we confess Him, but to deny Christ in words to save our bodies is unfaithfulness. So there is no simple way out for the believer facing persecution. Being a martyr is a glory for the Christian, to be accounted worthy of being Christ’s own witness. It gives glory to Christ. There is no other earthly benefit—since the martyr leaves this world forcibly and violently, it seems—but this becomes a small, trifling thing compared to the glory of Christ entered into by the believer. To die for Christ becomes a positive, rather than a mere worldly tragedy.
In recent times, our world has made the definition of martyr worldly. In the widest sense, a person with moderate allergies is a martyr, perhaps in their own words. In a slightly stricter definition, it has become a secular word for dying for a higher cause or principle than oneself. An environmentalist can be a martyr, and we understand that as an ultimate sacrifice. But these sorts of sacrificial deaths are self-chosen. They are not demanded by Christ, nor do they honor Him.
So being a Christian personally who is murdered is not enough to be a Christian martyr in the strictest sense of the word. It is the precise cause and motivation of death, not merely an incidental fact of religious belief, that makes a martyr. In other words, to deny Christ would be to remove the possibility of death.
Some have said Charlie Kirk is a martyr. That is hard to say without knowing why he was killed. Was it jealousy, political motivation, or merely superfan obsession that moved the shooter? At the time of writing this, no facts about the murder have been made known. It seems no one knows yet, though it may become clear. Evidently, hard-hitting and potentially offensive cultural dogma was a big part of Kirk’s reputation.
Unfortunately, the rhetoric at the moment is trying to uplift him as a Martin Luther King, Jr. type of martyr. That is not the compliment it seems to be. Though nominally a Christian (with some serious doctrinal and personal moral problems) and an important figure politically in the civil rights movement, it is not his religious confession that got him assassinated—unless you define religion as an aspect of the political. MLK, Jr. is a secular martyr; he died for a worldly cause, and despite our world’s and reason’s opinions, not one that Christ commanded in Scripture. Christians are nowhere told to fight for outward equality under civil law or in society.
Mr. Kirk was a political figure first and foremost—his brand was established before he said he was Christian. He was murdered at a debate centered on U.S. politics, which has become more and more divisive. It seems civil debate is now just settled by gunshots, which is very sad indeed for our country. Wikipedia states, “Prior to the early 2020s, Kirk was described as secular and a critic of religious influence on politics and the state.” It seems that a turn to Christianity was recent, though it did not seem to change his politics radically. That conversion is laudable, even if it served a political purpose in his speaking. President Trump has asked for U.S. flags to be lowered, showing his importance in the civil realm.
Would Kirk have been murdered if he had denied Christ but kept his conservative, pro-Trump political agenda intact (which is not hard to do)? That is a theoretical question without an answer. He was not asked to recant his faith in Jesus or deny the universal atonement and grace of Christ. It was a cowardly assassination.
Sadly, everything in our country is political and seems to be fodder for political means. Politics, with the goal of earthly change and control, has become the religion for many. Being a public figure, political commentator, and social provocateur has its downsides, for sure, in these troubled and tense times. Was Kirk fulfilling Christ’s call and command to preach the Gospel? That particular affirmation would demean the pastors faithfully preaching Christ under the cross. There must be a difference between a secular martyr like MLK and a Christian one.
Despite the evil and murder in Satan’s domain, Christ reigns victorious over this world and His Church. The external motive of this slaying may be mixed or even muddied in sin to the extreme, but the important thing is not why a life is taken but who receives it. Jesus knows who are His, and we have nothing to fear in Him. We know that not all who claim to be Christian actually are—we don’t get to choose our identity in Christ by brute force; we must be chosen. It is idolatry to care more about a sinner’s death than Christ’s—by whom heaven is opened to us. Christians should not be ruled by the emotion of the moment. Would Kirk be mourned as much if he were only known for his religious beliefs?
We do not get to choose our death. Man’s attempts to lionize or downplay tragedy do not change the world or Christ’s verdict at the Last Day for the slain. We have our own cross to carry—the dead cannot carry it for us. We can, though, prepare ourselves to face death by resting in the Lord, who submitted to death for us who are sinners that never have pure, untainted motives. —ed.
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