'Persecuted' in the Bible

For you have heard of my early career in Judaism--how I furiously persecuted the Church of God, and made havoc of it;

Yet just as, at that time, the child born in the common course of nature persecuted the one whose birth was due to the power of the Spirit, so it is now.

All who desire to display their zeal for external observances try to compel you to receive circumcision, but their real object is simply to escape being persecuted for the Cross of Christ.