If we are honest, none of us know how we would respond to a violent assault by terrorists who challenge us to “convert or die.”  We may think we know, but we don’t really know.  People have done astonishing things when threatened with death as an alternative.  But Jesus knew that the desperate urge to preserve our physical life is driven by a distorted understanding of reality.  He said:

“Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 10:39)

This saying of Jesus is the most quoted in the New Testament.  It is a “Truth” that sets us free, free from the death grip of physical life.  Clinging to physical life at all costs is a sure loser.  No one gets out physically alive.  Finding eternal life in Christ is a sure winner.  No one can take that away.

Here’s how Jim Elliott, a man who was murdered for following Jesus, said it:  

“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”