EPISODE 256 REVELATION CHAPTER 2 "Hear What the Spirit Says to the Churches"

Welcome to Share the Word. Well, you know, I can't believe that we are now on episode 256, covering the big idea of the book of Revelation, chapter 2. So what does Asia Minor, Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, and Thyatira have to do with this chapter? Well, you're about to find out. Revelation chapter 2. Hear what the Spirit says to the churches.

Language interests me, as you know by now. I'm always curious where common phrases and idioms come from, like an exhortation that recurs throughout Revelation chapters 2 and 3: He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. You know the author, the now elderly apostle John, probably used that line because he heard Jesus use similar so many times as he taught in the towns and villages of Galilee. Remember him saying, He who has ears to hear, let him hear. So check the size of your cranium right now. If you have ears, especially if you have a desire to hear and understand God's Word, listen up to these messages God used John to pass on to some real Christian churches long ago.

The Roman province of Asia was heavily populated. This is what is today the western third of Turkey. There were more than 500 cities, towns, and villages in that province at the end of the first century, many of which had Christian congregations by that time. The apostle Paul had spent lots of time there planting churches 40 years earlier. After him, Timothy did the same and oversaw their growth. Apollos, who we mentioned last time, also labored there.

And in his old age now, the apostle John, both before and after his exile, lived in Ephesus and oversaw the Christian churches in that province. As Margie mentioned in her introduction, at some point, when the Romans determined to curtail Christianity's growth if they could, John was taken away, exiled to a small Mediterranean island called Patmos. And it was while he was there that God gave him this final writing of the New Testament. Most of Revelation is about the end times, and we'll soon get to that. But interestingly, before all of that information was shown to John, the Holy Spirit gave him some very specific messages for several churches under his oversight. And if you look at a map of the province of Asia in Roman times, the locations of these seven churches kind of follow a circuit.

I mean, geographically, they were in a pattern that John himself may well have followed as he traveled among them in his supervisory role. The seven are not all large cities. Some were, but some were smaller towns. But Christ saw and was concerned with what was going on in each of these places. What messages was John told to pass along to them, and what should they mean for churches that claim to be Christian today? In John's first vision in chapter one, the churches were represented as lampstands, remember?

And Jesus was walking among them. Lampstands are for giving off light, obviously, and that's exactly how a real church of Jesus Christ should function in its community, wherever it's located. That is, bright lights in a dark world. We'll consider three of the messages in this episode and the other four next time. The first message was for his home church at Ephesus. This is what the one who holds the seven stars in his right hand, the one who walks among the seven golden lampstands, says.

I know your deeds and your toil and your perseverance, and that you cannot bear with those who are evil, and you put to the test those who call themselves apostles who are not. You have perseverance and you have endured for my name's sake. You have not grown weary. But I have this against you: you have left your first love. Therefore, remember from where you have fallen and repent and do the deeds you did at first. But if not, I am coming and will remove your lampstand out of its place.

It's been about forty years now since Paul and his team had planted a church in Ephesus, and it was still doctrinally sound, it sounds like. It had faithfully persevered through times of pressure and opposition. The people in that church were rooted in their faith, and they recognized and they did not tolerate false teachers or false apostles who showed up there with strange ideas. By strange, remember our lesson from Hebrews 13, foreign ideas, foreign to sound doctrine. That is what Paul and Timothy, Apollos, and John had taught them. Specifically, he calls out in this message the Nicolaitans.

During the last episode of Hebrews, I called out several quasi-Christian groups around today that have twisted or added to the fundamental ideas taught by Jesus and the apostles, and so have in one way or another perverted the faith that was once for all handed down to God's holy people. Why would I call out people by name and groups by name? Well, for one reason, to be clear, and for another, because the scripture writers, as here in this message from Jesus himself, did not hesitate to do that, that is, to name false teachers and movements like the Nicolaitans. I can't tell you for sure all that group was about, but I'll give you the best guess of scholars in a minute, as they are mentioned more than once in these messages from Jesus. What's important to see is that the Ephesian church is commended by Christ for not tolerating them, giving them and their ideas any place.

Christ says in this message, You hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. If Christ hates something, so should we. But on the negative side of that ledger, you heard Jesus had a bone to pick with the Ephesian church. What was it? I have this against you, he said. You've left your first love.

Remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first. Mood change. Isn't it fun to see a young couple in love? How they look at each other and treat each other. You even remember that magical feeling. Don't ask me why I remember this, but once when I was in college, strolling slowly along, walking a girl I really liked home after dinner at the dining common, coming toward us was a professor of mine and his wife, arm in arm, couple in their late sixties, maybe early seventies at the time.

I could tell by the way they both looked at us with a sort of knowing smile and then at each other, they got a kick out of seeing two young people who looked like they were in love. Being in love, especially when you're young, it's fun, it's exciting, yes. What is actually more significant was in seeing that couple, who had been together forty or fifty years, still in love, still wanting to take the long slow walk together home after dinner, arm in arm. The message to the Ephesian church was, Remember how you embraced the gospel long ago, how it made you feel. Remember how you used to act. How excited you were to share it, how amazed you were to understand all its benefits.

You've lost that. You're still doctrinally solid, yes. You haven't moved off course at all in your commitment to the Word, and you have persevered through the storms. But remember the early years. Remember how warm your love was toward one another. Remember how anxious you were to share your faith.

Remember how sincere and heartfelt your worship was. Remember how much you valued my sacrifice to save you. I remember, and I miss that. So you remember where you were and how you have fallen and do those things you did at first. What strikes me as the big idea, the idea I most need to stress from Revelation chapters 2 and 3, is how in John's vision, Jesus is walking among the candlestands, representing the churches that call themselves by his name, and how concerned he is about their faithfulness to him and to his Word, and also about how well they were living it out as lights in a dark world. Christ was gratified to see the Ephesian church standing solid in the faith just as they had received it, but at the same time disappointed they had grown somewhat cold in their fervor to live it out, to show their love for Christ and others by their actions.

They had a great history, but something was now missing in their love. Do you think there are still churches around like that? Doctrinally sound, but too comfortable in routines, too used to things we should never grow used to. Then John got to a message for the church at Smyrna, city about 35 miles up the coast from Ephesus, and it said, This is the message from the one who is the first and the last, who was dead but is now alive. I know about your suffering and your poverty, but you're rich. I also know the blasphemy of those opposing you who say they are Jews but are not because their synagogue belongs to Satan.

Don't be afraid of what you're about to suffer. The devil will throw some of you into prison to test you. You will suffer for ten days, but if you remain faithful even when facing death, I will give you the crown of life. Anyone with ears to hear must listen to the Spirit and understand what he is saying to the churches. Whoever is victorious will never be harmed by the second death. Coincidentally, there's a town up the coast from me about an hour north of where I live called Smyrna.

It was first called by settlers in these parts Duck Creek Crossroads, but leaders of the town changed the name to Smyrna after hearing the traveling Methodist missionary Francis Asbury deliver a powerful sermon on this very text of Scripture. The original city is called Izmir today in Turkey and is the third largest city in that country. But the ruins of the ancient Smyrna at Izmir, where John would have walked, are still there. The message to Smyrna is one of encouragement in suffering and persecution, persecution that was often economic. And that's why it says, I know your suffering and I know your poverty. We've talked about this several times before.

Persecution was not theoretical to many early Christians late in the first century. After the great fire of Rome, which maliciously got blamed on Christians, persecution became real. Not a constant thing, but it came in waves sporadically, depending on who was the emperor then and what province governor was in charge. But in reality, and this message from Jesus says as much, it was all instigated by Satan. The message to this church was in no sense corrective; it was all encouragement. If you're still following Christ after real persecution has battered you for a while, you don't need correction; you deserve accolades and encouragement.

Those who were not sincere in their faith had fallen away by now. Those who remained at Smyrna were for real. Like how Jesus self-identifies to them, this message is from the one who is the first and the last, who was dead but is now alive. Jesus is the eternal second person of the Godhead, who always was and always will be, but for a time he had to become a man, and he suffered too, and died at the hands of satanically inspired enemies. His message to these early Christians was, Remember me, and fear none of these difficulties you face right now. We're in this together for the long haul.

Your suffering and impoverishment for my sake are only for a little while. Remember, you are really rich in the things that matter most. Stay faithful, because ahead of you is the crown, the reward of eternal life and all that God has promised you. Nothing and no one will take that away from you. At Smyrna, and this was true in many places in the second half of the first century, persecution was often stirred up by influential Jews who saw Christianity as a growing and threatening heresy, just as the apostle Paul once did. This is the meaning of the line, I know the blasphemy of those opposing you, referring to how they spoke against Jesus, called him a deceiver, a magician, a false Messiah, and so on.

Such opponents, although ethnically Jews, were not really God's people, he's saying, and they were being used, even if unwittingly, by Satan as he tried to destroy Christianity. Interestingly, one of John's young disciples at this time, a fellow named Polycarp, became the leader of the church in Smyrna by the second century, and he, as an old man during another wave of persecution in the middle of that century, was arrested and publicly burned when he refused to renounce Christ. How pertinent this message was. Whoever, like Polycarp, like John himself, and like many other faithful Christians then and even now, whoever is victorious will not be harmed by the second death. The second death is a reference to eternal separation from God and all that is good. As Jesus had taught, do not be afraid of those who can kill your body but who cannot touch your souls.

Tell me, is there anything like the church at Smyrna today? Unfortunately, yes. There are many under persecution for their faith in Christ today. In several places around the globe, believers are still in poverty and suffering, and some, more than you would imagine, are still being martyred. To them, Christ still comforts and assures, Stay faithful. The trials here only last for a little while.

Eternity is ahead of you. The crown of life awaits you. Oh boy. And then we come to the third message to the church at Pergamum. This is what the one who has the sharp two-edged sword says. I know you dwell where Satan's throne is.

You hold fast my name and did not deny my faith even in the days of Antipas, my faithful witness who was killed. But I have a few things against you, that you have there some who hold the teaching of Balaam, who kept teaching Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality. You also have some who hold the teaching of the Nicolaitans. Therefore repent. If not, I am coming to you quickly, and I will make war against them with the sword of my mouth. The message for the church at Pergamum was sharp.

The one who has the two-edged sword says, I know you're in an evil place, and one of your faithful leaders was martyred, but there are very unacceptable things going on in your church, and if those involved do not repent, judgment is coming. The reference to the two-edged sword is a reference to the Word of God, eternal standard of truth. It's pictured in the vision John had in chapter one as coming out of Jesus' mouth. Hebrews chapter 4, verse 12 says, The Word of God is like a sharp two-edged sword because it penetrates to the heart of matters. The heart of the matter in Pergamum was that stuff very offensive to God was being tolerated in that church, namely idolatry and immorality. The reference to Balaam and Balak, if you're not familiar, is from the Old Testament book of Numbers.

I won't explain the whole account, but Balaam was supposed to be a prophet of God, and he led the people of Israel into idolatry and immorality. Get this: for money, paid him by a pagan king named Balak. Now apparently, something akin to that was going on in Pergamum, as some leader or leaders were influencing members to think it was okay to participate in the pagan idol festivals and immorality that city was known for. The reference to the place as where the throne of Satan is probably had to do with the fact that on the Acropolis at Pergamum was a temple with a huge altar to Zeus, supposedly the king of the gods. That whole altar, by the way, as discovered by Europeans archaeologists, I think it was late in the 19th century, they dismantled it and took it to Berlin, Germany. It's been reconstructed there and is housed in its own museum since 1930.

You can Google up some pictures of that. Christians participating in pagan rituals and the accompanying immoral orgies and so on seems obviously crazy, like way out of line. But at Pergamum, and this must be at least part of what the Nicolaitans were about, some fraudulent Christian leaders were saying, Synthesizing Christianity with our neighbors' practices is fine. After all, we're saved by God's grace apart from works. Spiritual things are far more consequential than physical things, so what's wrong with some revelry every now and again and a little free love on the side? God understands we're just humans with human appetites.

Why would any Christian buy into that? Well, what if an early Christian leader straight from Jerusalem came there and taught them that? That's exactly what Irenaeus, a trusted early church father, said happened. Specifically, that one of the first seven deacons named in Acts, chosen in the Jerusalem church, a man named Nicholas, went off the rails for some reason and that his followers became known as Nicolaitans. How clever of Satan to use prophets who could be compromised like Balaam in the Old Testament, or one-time trusted church leaders like this Nicholas guy to lead young Christians astray. He twisted the doctrine of grace into a license for any kind of self-indulgence and sinful practice.

And apparently, the church did nothing about him or his teaching. Tell me, are there churches today that do not confront immorality and pagan practices among their members and even leaders? My word, this kind of compromise is everywhere, and is not only making us look like foolish hypocrites in the eyes of the world, but begging for the judgment of God. I was encouraged to see Josh Howerton, a young pastor of a large, rapidly growing church in Texas, recently address immorality frontally in a series of sermons. And the upshot was that over 60 couples in his large church, people who had been living together but not married, something now common in our increasingly pagan culture, responded to God's word in repentance. And now they're planning a big wedding ceremony for all of these couples.

But that's a rarity. Modern Christianity is, for the most part, far too lax, too accommodating to our sinful culture. We do not want to engage in church discipline. We don't want to address unpopular topics in the Bible. We don't want to come across as too holy to fit into our culture comfortably. Friends, as the apostle Peter once wrote, the time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God.

Not everyone in Pergamum was deceived by the wrong ideas, though. The promise to those who remained faithful was, To him who overcomes, to him I will give some of the hidden manna, and give him a white stone, and a new name written on the stone that no one knows but he who receives it. I'm not totally sure what that means, to be honest, but I'm pretty sure the gist of it is, those of you who are overcomers. Who stay faithful to Christ, Jesus sees you. He knows you, and you will be welcomed by Him into heaven one day. You know, listening to these messages from Jesus to the churches in Roman Asia long ago, I can't help but wonder if He wrote a message to my church or to your church today, what would it say?

Remember, Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So, what do you think He would say? He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. Thanks for listening. This is Paul for Share the Word. Thanks, Paul.

Truly, what would that message say? These letters commend their endurance and warn against false teachings from those like the Nicolaitans and urge repentance. Ephesus commended for their hard work and exposing false apostles. Smyrna commended for their faithfulness in the middle of poverty and persecution. Pergamum praised for holding their faith even among Satan's throne. In Thyatira, commended for increasing love and service, but criticized for allowing Jezebel to lead into sexual immorality.

As we bring these teachings into modern day, the questions that we need to ask is, who are the Nicolaitans, and would there be commendation or criticism?