Sometimes things mean more than it seems.
In my Christian experience Acts 1:8 is considered the Great Promise.
“You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
From my earliest remembrance I have asked God to empower me to be his witness. My deepest longing is to be an effective witness for Jesus and of Jesus.
The word translated, in Acts 1:8, as “witnesses” is μάρτυρες. “And you will be my martyrs” is precisely what Acts 1:8 declares. Etymologically, at the time Acts 1:8 was penned, μάρτυρες meant witness or witnesses. In particular the meaning of a witness was someone who testified to a fact of which she has knowledge from personal observation.
However, within the life time of the Apostles, a witness was not simply one who testified to a fact, but one who suffered death rather than deny the Christian faith. Thus, six chapters after Acts 1 we have Christianity’s first witness/martyr who suffered death rather than deny the Christian faith.
The heart of the witness is identical to the heart of the martyr.