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(c. 210-260)
"The Wonder Worker"

Parents today sometimes worry that their children will go off to college and return as converts to some strange new religion. That's exactly what happened 1,700 years ago to Gregory of Pontus, only the strange new religion was Christianity.

Born into an affluent pagan family in Neocaesarea (modern Turkey), Gregory studied law and the traditional Greek and Roman classics. Then he and his brother were sent for further study to Caesarea in Palestine, where they enrolled in the school of the great Christian thinker Origen. His teacher converted him (and his brother, Athenodorus) to Christianity.

When Gregory returned home, he found a Christian community of 17 people waiting for him. Soon afterward, Gregory was elected bishop. Although his training was in speculative theology, Gregory's pastoral work was concerned with practical applications of the faith. His pastoral skills were such that some of his flock soon attributed miracles to him—hence his nickname, "The Wonder Worker."

One legend (from a generation later) described the Virgin Mary directing the apostle John to instruct Gregory about the Trinity so the bishop could teach his catechumens. Another legend tells how two brothers quarreled over possession of a lake and asked Gregory to arbitrate between them: Gregory is said to have divided the lake into two bodies of water, giving one to each brother.

Legends or no, Gregory's leadership must have been great, because during his ministry most of the city of Pontus converted to Christianity.

Doctrinal conflicts required him to participate in several church councils that condemned false teaching. In 253 and 254, he watched Goths sack his beloved home city. Roman rule survived for only another century, but the church Gregory built continues today.

(c. 200-258)
Despairing pagan, sensible bishop

The conversion of Thascius Cyprianus was one of the best things to happen to the North African church—and to the Christian church as a whole.

He was born into the Roman upper class in North Africa. As an accomplished rhetorician, he was deeply versed in the pagan literature of the late Roman age. But Cyprian became friends with an elderly priest named Caecilius, who welcomed the young aristocrat and introduced him to his family—and to Christianity.

While Cyprian accepted the Christian God as true, he found Christian morality difficult. In light of the stubbornness of human nature and bad habits, he wondered, "How is such a conversion possible?" In particular, he questioned if he could do without public honors and wine.

Cyprian finally converted, and he discovered during his baptism that the power of God, and not his own efforts, made the Christian life possible:

"In a wondrous manner, doubtful things at once began to assure themselves in me, hidden things to be revealed, dark things to be enlightened, and what before seemed difficult began to suggest a means of accomplishment, and what had been thought impossible, to be capable of being achieved."

With the zeal of a convert, Cyprian quickly mastered the Christian Scriptures and the writings of Christian theologians. Two years after his conversion, he was ordained a priest, and in spite of his own resistance, was then chosen to be bishop of Carthage.

Within a few months of his election, Emperor Decius began persecuting Christians in North Africa, and the new bishop was forced to flee. When he returned, he found his congregation in tatters. Some had lapsed from the faith making sacrifices to the pagan gods. Others still had kept their faith in Christ but had handed over precious copies of the Scriptures and sacred vessels to the Roman authorities. Still others had left the fellowship of the church to join the schismatic church of Novatian, a rigorist sect that disdained Christians who were too tolerant in forgiving those who had lapsed under the pressure of persecution.

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