Protector of the Church’s Treasures
In AD 258 the newborn Christian Church began to face severe persecution as hostility against the earliest Christians was growing by the day. Deacon Lawrence, one of the seven deacons of the Roman church under Pope Sixtus II, became a victim of this hostility when he was killed under the orders of Roman emperor Valerian on August 10th, just four days after the execution of his fellow deacons and his Pope.
Issuing an edict that all Christian clergy (including bishops, priests, and deacons) were to be arrested and killed, Valerian essentially signed Lawrence’s death warrant. Knowing that he would soon be put to death, Deacon Lawrence began to give the Church’s property away, distributing the money and treasures of Rome to the city’s poor. Yet according to Christian tradition, Valerian heard of these actions and offered the deacon a trade: if Lawrence would show the emperor where the Church’s treasures were located, Valerian would spare his life.
Lawrence indicated that he would comply with the emperor’s request, responding that he needed three days to gather all these treasures into one central place. For those three days, he went throughout the city and invited the poor, the widowed, and the sick to gather together.
When Valerian arrived to meet Lawrence, the deacon presented the emperor with the true treasures of the Church: God’s especially blessed and beloved people! Filled with rage, Valerian ordered the deacon to be roasted to death publicly over an open fire. Lawrence went confidently and even joyfully to his death for Christ’s sake, even being said to have told his captors as he roasted on the fire, “I’m done on this side; turn me over!”
A Brief History
Tradition holds that there was a massive conversion to the Christian faith throughout the city of Rome as a result of Lawrence’s brave and principled actions. Although the era of persecution was not yet over, it is said that Lawrence nevertheless led all of Rome to Christ. After all, the torture and execution of a respected clergyman by Roman authorities made a deep impression on the young church.
Consequently, the day of Lawrence’s death has been commemorated by the Western Church since at least the fourth century, likely beginning in the years following his martyrdom. His feast was subsequently celebrated throughout Christendom, both East and West, as it is to the present day.
St. Lawrence was particularly beloved in many of the lands that were historically Lutheran, especially in modern-day Germany. For this reason, he is one of the relatively few saints outside the New Testament whose feast day was maintained in many Lutheran churches, including the early Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, whose German-language hymnal of the late nineteenth century provided an Epistle and Gospel for the day.
Collect
Grant to us, we beseech Thee, Almighty God: to extinguish within us the flames of our vices, even as Thou didst grant to Blessed Lawrence to overcome the fires of his torments; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost: ever one God, world without end. Amen.
Lessons
First Lesson
Gospel
Resources
Issues, Etc. interview with the Rev. Dr. Joel Elowsky on St. Laurence
Gottesdienst article by the Rev. Dr. Burnell Eckardt
Propers found in Daily Divine Service Book: A Lutheran Daily Missal, edited by the Rev. Heath Curtis
References:
1. Dickinson, William Leeson. The Lives Of The Saints: Or Notes Ecclesiological And Historical On The Holy Days Of The English Church. The Church Printing Company. 1865.
3. Pfatteicher, Philip H., Festivals and Commemorations: Handbook to the Calendar in Lutheran Book of Worship. Augsburg Publishing House. 1980.
Images:
1. Martyrdom of St. Lawrence, Hans Baldung Grien, Germany, 1505
2. Saint Lawrence Giving the Treasures of the Church to the Poor, Bernardo Strozzi, Italy, 1635-1640.
