me to Revelation chapters 2 and 3. Now, before
I get into the content of our lesson tonight,
I want us to go back to overhead class 101. And
I just want to show you some information on the
overhead that may help you put what we're looking
at into a context that will aid your understanding
of it. This particular overhead talks about the
historical setting of Revelation. You will notice
this line gives to us the dates in the first
century that relate to certain events in the
church. the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ
in approximately 30 A .D. It talks about the
evangelization of Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria,
those chapters in the book of Acts. Here is the
ministry of the Apostle Paul as it begins. And
here we have the local churches in Asia and so
on. This talks about the opposition to Christians
that increased. And you find here a list of the
Roman emperors. And down at the very bottom,
I think it's still on there, although a little
bit out of focus because of the angle we're doing
this with, you see John's ministry. He was a
leader of the Jerusalem church. And exactly when
he made his move out of Jerusalem, we don't know.
But obviously he did leave and his ministry was
focused on Asia Minor. in the last part of his
life. And so Paul was killed about right here.
John lived on until about 100 A .D. and had the
longest ministry of any of the apostles. The
next overhead I want to show you is an outline
of the book of the Revelation. I can't quite
get all of this on there, so I'm going to start
over here on this side, because that's where
we're really dealing tonight. You will see this
phrase, the things which are, you remember in
chapter 1 there are those phrases, the things
which you've seen, the things which are, the
things which shall be, the things that you've
seen as chapter 1, the appearance of Christ to
John on the Isle of Patmos, the things which
are describe the first three chapters of the
book, the messages to the seven churches, and
that's where we're studying right now. And then
the things which shall be hereafter begin in
chapter four when John is told, come up here.
And then he has this great vision laid out before
him of heaven and then the judgment of God upon
the Christ -rejecting earth. And all this culminates
with Christ's second coming and then the new
heavens and the new earth. Now we'll be pulling
that overhead out again as we work through the
book, but I'm going to give you another view
of just the early chapters, chapters one to five,
which form something of an introduction to the
book of the Revelation. Chapter one again we
have the vision with Christ in the midst of the
churches, and then chapters two and three, the
letters to the seven churches which are listed
here. You will notice that the content to the
churches is listed this way. There is a warning
of complete extinction. Jesus warns the church,
I'll remove your lamp stand, to Ephesus and to
Laodicea, the first and the last of the letters.
The second and the sixth, there is unqualified
praise. There is no word of condemnation or correction.
to those churches. And then three, four, and
five in the middle there's a mixture of good
and bad. I think you have in your hands an outline
that we're going to be using not only tonight
but also the next two times that we talk about
Revelation. I'm hoping that you will keep this
with you, although we'll try to have extra copies
each Sunday night, because we want to be filling
this in and also using the back of the page.
Let me throw this up here once more too, just
giving you a geographical setting for the churches
that we're now going to talk about. The first
letter is written to Ephesus, the second to Smyrna,
and you'll notice that the route of the the Lord's
dictation goes north and then loops back south.
It's sort of a circuit there. He is dictating
to John here on the Isle of Patmos, which is
off the coast of Asia Minor, about 25 miles.
This part of the world has been in the news the
last few days because it was here in the Aegean
Sea that we were having the joint exercise under
NATO with the Turkish Navy and one of our ships
fired missiles. had a destroyer of the Turkish
Navy and you remember it killed some men and
there were others who were taken to a hospital
and the hospital was in the city of Izmir which
is the city of Smyrna. So it's one of those churches
that receives a letter. Its modern name though
is Izmir. I believe this is the form that you
have. You need not wait, by the way, till the
Sunday nights when we talk about the churches
to fill this out. If you'd like to do some Bible
study on your own, I'd encourage you to do so.
And to work your way through these two chapters
and write in here the verses that are appropriate
to each of these titles. Here we have the names
of the seven churches and here the description
of Christ, the commendation, the condemnation,
the correction and the challenge. that is given
to each of the churches. The letters basically
follow the same format, although there is no
commendation, I'll just give you a little hint,
to the church at Sardis or the church at Laodicea.
So those will be blank. You won't find any verses
where commendation is given to those two churches.
It's all negative. There are two churches that
don't receive condemnation and they are Smyrna
Philadelphia, so you won't find any verses to
put in there. Other than that, you should have
some verses in each of those squares, and I'll
just give you the hint. Tonight we're going to
be looking at something about these seven churches
and the description of Christ. We find the first
description of Christ in 2 1, the second in 2
8, the third in 2 12, the fourth in 2 18, the
fifth... in 3 -1, the first part of the verse,
1a, the sixth in chapter 3 verse 7, and the final
one in chapter 3 verse 14. So what I would encourage
you to do on your own is simply go through the
chart and find out which verses relate to each
of these topics, and that way you'll be well
ahead in our study because we'll not be going
through this chart just exactly as you see it
here, but it will serve as our guide to keep
us on track. Let's talk first about the church
at Ephesus, and you can see that it is the first
seven verses of chapter 2 where the Lord Jesus
says to the angel of the church of Ephesus, right,
these things says He who holds the seven stars
in His right hand, who walks in the midst of
the seven golden lampstands. And that's as far
as I'm going to read tonight. I want us to think
about the church at Ephesus, and you may want
to simply turn this sheet that you have now over.
and write some things down on the back of it
about each of these seven cities where the churches
are located. I'm going to say more than you're
going to have time to write, but just some thoughts
that you may want to remember would be good to
record. Ephesus is the most important of the
seven cities that are addressed. It was a commercial
center located on the Keister River. There were
three roads which terminated there, including
one that came all the way from the Euphrates
River. Now our map doesn't go that far, but here
the city of Ephesus was a port city, a port city
in the sense that it had this magnificent river
that flowed into it, and there were roads from
all over Asia Minor that came to the city of
Ephesus, and so it became quite a commercial
center. By the way, today the ruins of the city
of Ephesus are miles from the ocean because through
the centuries silt has caused the harbor that
used to be there to be entirely filled in. Ephesus
was also a religious center. It was noted for
the Temple of Diana, which was one of the seven
wonders of the ancient world. If you have a VCR
in your home, you may want to go to the Ramsey
County Library and find there a VCR that they
have, or a tape rather, cassette tape, on the
seven wonders of the ancient world. It'll take
you about an hour to see it. There's a fabulous
hour -long presentation of these seven wonders,
only one of which is still around. Does anybody
know what it is? The what? The pyramids, that's
right, the pyramids. The others have all been
destroyed through the centuries. But one of the
things they talk about in that videotape is the
Temple of Diana. It was 418 feet long and 239
feet wide and had 130 columns to it. Now this
is before the day of mass manufacturing. These
were hand -hewn. 130 of these columns and each
of the columns was 60 feet high. Imagine that.
Six stories high. This temple was built on marshy
land and therefore they made an artificial foundation
that was made out of skins and charcoal layered.
The purpose of that was to protect this magnificent
temple to their goddess against earthquakes which
are still very common. in Turkey. Some of the
worst earthquakes that happened in the world
happened over there. And so to try to protect
this temple that they were erecting, they laid
down layers of charcoal and skins in order to
build a foundation. And on that then, they put
the marble and erected this magnificent structure.
Inside the temple, there were housed crude and
lewd images to the goddess of fertility. which
is what Diana or Artemis stood for. Ephesus is
also noted as a center of black magic, that is
of occultic kinds of activities, and we see evidence
of that in the book of Acts. It was also a cultural
center. There was a museum that was known all
over the world at that time, and one of the things
they had in it was a representation of Alexander
the Great. So much for the city of Ephesus. We'll
come back to Christ's appearance and address
to them in just a moment. Let's talk about the
city of Smyrna. Smyrna is located about 40 miles
to the northwest of Ephesus. It was a rival city
of Ephesus. It had a population, it is estimated,
of 200 ,000 in that day. including many Jews.
It came to be one of the few planned cities of
the ancient world. That's because the original
city was destroyed by a massive earthquake, and
then they planned the city as it was rebuilt
and reconstructed. So it was one of the few like
that. It had an even more excellent harbor than
Ephesus did. It was famous for its trade. and
especially its trade of myrrh, which is a bitter
resin, a bitter gum kind of resin from shrubby
trees that are found in Yemen and in Africa.
The myrrh was one of its principal exports. And
you can see in its name Smyrna that it got its
name from this export of myrrh. It boasted of
a large stadium and a library and a public theater,
which was the largest in all of Asia. And when
I say Asia, I don't mean China and India, that
kind of Asia. I'm talking about this Asia, which
was the name for it in the Roman world. It's
now called Turkey, the largest theater in that
whole area. It was among the first... city to
worship the Roman emperor as deity. In fact,
Smyrna was famous for a temple that was in honor
of Tiberius Caesar, which was constructed in
26 A .D. They entered into a contest with several
other cities and won the honors for that. And
as I've already suggested to you, Smyrna is today
called Izmir, Turkey. Smyrna is best known in
church history besides this letter for one of
its pastors, a man who was one of the early church
fathers as he was called, an elderly man who
was martyred whose name was Polycarp. A godly
man, he was arrested without making any attempt
to flee. In fact, it is said that he offered
food and drink to his captors. and asked permission
to retire for prayer, which he did for a couple
of hours, and then they drove into the city with
him. The officer who was in charge urged him
to recant of his worship of Christ. You see,
he was to worship Caesar as God, and he refused
to do that. What harm can it do, the man asked
him, to sacrifice to the emperor. Yet, Polycarp
refused. On arrival, he was roughly... pushed
out of the carriage and brought before the proconsul
in the amphitheater, which we just talked about,
who addressed him this way, have respect to your
old age, swear by the genius of Caesar. And again
he said, swear that is to Caesar that he's God
and I will release you, revile Christ. Polycarp
replied, 80 and six years have I served him and
he has done me no wrong. How then can I blaspheme
my king who saved me? The proconsul persisted,
swear by the genius of Caesar, I have wild beasts
if you will not change your mind. I'll throw
you to them. Polycarp said, bring them on. The
proconsul said, as you despise the beasts unless
you change your mind, I'll make you to be destroyed
by fire. Polycarp stood his ground. Jews and
Gentiles who were infuriated. gathered wood for
the pile. Polycarp stood by his stake, asking
not to be fastened to it, and he prayed, O Lord,
Almighty God, the Father of Thy beloved Son,
Jesus Christ, through whom we have received knowledge
of Thee. And he said, I thank Thee that Thou
hast thought me worthy this day and this hour
to share of Thy Christ among the number of Thy
witnesses. And then the fire was kindled, and
as the wind drove the flames away from him, one
of the soldiers put forth a sword and killed
Polycarp for his faith. Well, all of that happened
in the city of Smyrna. And so in the early church,
this was a place of much suffering. part of the
embalming process of some of the peoples of that
day. All of that speaks of suffering. Let's go
on to the city of Pergamum. One writer at that
time said it was by far the most distinguished
city in Asia. Pergamum was built on a high cone
-shaped hill that jutted a thousand feet into
the air. The name Pergamum means citadel. And
that's what it looked like as you approached
it. It was 15 miles inland, and so it was not
a transportation center, but it was the capital
of the province of Asia, and therefore it was
an administrative center. It was famous for its
library. It is said that it had 200 ,000 parchment
scrolls in its library. Imagine that. Some public
libraries today are not that large. But they
had 200 ,000 parchment scrolls. And in fact,
parchment was created here in the city of Pergamum.
Parchment, by the way, was writing material that
was made from animal skins. There were many temples
in the city of Pergamum. One of them was to Asclepius,
who is the god of healing to the pagans. And
he was worshiped in his temple by living serpents.
being bowed to. The city was also famous for
an altar at the very zenith of its hill that
was to the god Zeus. It was 90 feet square and
40 feet high and stood at the very pinnacle of
the city and was to the leader of the Greek pantheon,
Zeus. One of the famous physicians in the ancient
world was born and studied medicine here in the
city of Pergamum. And I note him because his
name was Galen. Pergamum was the center of Caesar
worship, and like some of the other cities, an
annual declaration of loyalty was evidenced by
worship of Caesar, and it was required of all
the citizens of the city to do that, to prove
that they were loyal. Now, let's move ahead to
Thyatira, and we're going to come back now and
relate Christ to each of these churches. But
I want to just give you a picture of what the
cities are like. Thyatira was the smallest of
all of the seven cities addressed and the least
important of them. And yet, it is interesting
that it received the longest of the letters.
It's also the letter that is the most difficult
to understand. So little is left from that city.
that some of the phrases and words and ideas
that are in the letter are hard to understand.
We don't have archaeological evidence telling
us what was meant by some of the things Jesus
said to the city of Thyatira. It was a commercial
center that was located between two major valleys.
There were many trade unions in Thyatira. And
they included wool workers, linen workers, makers
of outer garments. dyers, leather workers, tanners,
potters, bakers, slave dealers, and bronze smiths.
It is interesting that Thyatira was the home
of a lady who was the first woman saved in Europe.
Can anybody give me her name? Lydia. Lydia, who
was a seller of purple dye and cloth. So she
was undoubtedly a merchant and a member of one
of these gills that I've just mentioned. Thyatira
especially worshipped Apollos, the sun god. It
appears that there was a local cult in that city
that worshipped another smaller, less important
god by the name of Apollos, and they combined
these two religions so that these two Apolloses
were called the sons of Zeus. Now, I point that
out because Jesus identifies Himself here by
a particular name, and we'll come back to that.
Then the city of Sardis, and now we come to chapter
3. Sardis was located at the junction of five
roads. Five roads came together in this city.
It was a very wealthy city, and perhaps partly
because of that, its citizens were characterized
by slackness. But they also may have been a bit
careless because their city was built on a hill
with 1 ,500 foot cliffs. And so they thought
themselves to be absolutely impregnable. And
yet history records that twice the city was captured.
Sardis was capital of the ancient kingdom of
Lydia, if any of you are familiar with ancient
history. The religion of Sardis was focused on
the worship of Cybele, a local goddess who was
believed able to restore life to the dead. Now
that's interesting too in light of what Jesus
says to the city of Sardis, the church rather
at Sardis. And then let's move ahead to the city
of Philadelphia. We're not talking about Pennsylvania.
This city was at the junction of the approach
to three of the provinces, right here in this
area, the provinces of Missia, Lydia, and Phrygia.
And therefore, because of its position, it was
called the Gateway to the East, this way. It
was built by a man, and I'm just going to give
you his name, not that it's significant, other
than you'll see why. His name was Attalus II,
Philadelphus. And so that's where the city gets
its name. Its founder was named Philadelphus,
therefore it was called the City of Brotherly
Love. This man was from Pergamum. And he intended
for Philadelphia, this gateway to the east, to
be a missionary center, not for Christianity,
which hadn't even come yet, or for Judaism, but
for Hellenism, that is for Greek culture. He
wanted it to be the center of Greek culture and
for that Greek culture then to influence all
of the area around it. So Philadelphia was intended
to be a missionary center long before there was
Christianity. Some of you know that Philadelphia
is called the missionary church. It's interesting
how that relates. Philadelphia was especially
vulnerable to earthquakes. and was completely
destroyed in 17 AD, although it was rebuilt by
Tiberius Caesar. And it had many temples, including
the most prominent of which was to Dionysius,
or Tobacchus, not Tobacchus, but Tobacchus, who
was the god of wine and of drama in the Greek
pantheon. In fact, his image was stamped on the
coins made in that city. Drunkenness was a major
problem. in the city. And finally, we come to
the city of Laodicea. We've made the entire circuit
now. Laodicea was located at the junction of
two rivers and three major roads. So again, it
was a commercial center, as you might expect.
It was a very wealthy city, perhaps the richest
of its day. It had been destroyed in an earthquake
in 60 AD. And without the aid of the Roman government,
it completely rebuilt itself by its own finances.
It is noted for its banking and its manufacturing
of clothing, especially from a local black wool.
It was also known for literature and for science.
Laodicea was recognized for medicine. It had
a medical school as well as places which manufactured
a particular kind of medicine that they made
there, an ointment that was used for ear problems
and a salve that was used for the eye. Now again,
if you are familiar with the letter that Jesus
gave to the city, you'll see all kinds of significance
in what I just told you. Laodicea was a large
Jewish colony. It had over 7 ,000 males. in addition
to children and females, so it was a very large
Jewish colony. But the pagans in the city worship
Zeus. The problem with Laodicea, and again you're
going to see immediately the significance to
what Jesus said, the problem that this city had
was that it had no convenient water supply, despite
the fact that it was located on a couple of rivers.
The water was apparently not good, and so they
had to bring the water six miles from some springs
And the water flowed through stone pipes that
formed an aqueduct. And so the water as it left
the springs was cold. But as it arrived in the
city, what do you suppose it was? Lukewarm, that's
right. And you may remember Jesus had something
to say about the spiritual condition of the city,
of the church in that city, about its lukewarmness.
the description of Christ as He writes to these
seven churches. In some of them, it's very easy
to see why He described Himself the way He did
as He began to dictate the letter to them. In
others, it's a little more difficult to see.
We have said that Ephesus was the most important
city, the commercial center, religious center,
or cultural center. And we see Jesus describing
Himself in verse 1 of chapter 2. Saying, these
things says He who holds the seven stars in His
right hand who walks in the midst of the seven
golden lampstands. We see the Lord Jesus describing
Himself here as the one who is in complete authority.
He says He is holding the seven stars. Now we
said last week in looking at chapter 1 that the
seven stars represent the seven angels of the
seven churches. And people debate as to whether
those angels are the pastors of the church or
whether they are literally angels that were assigned
to the church. The stronger argument seems to
be toward the latter because every other time
the word angel is used in the book of Revelation,
it's used of heavenly beings. It seems a little
awkward to say, well, in this one instance it
refers to human beings. And so he has in his
hands complete control over these angels of the
seven churches. And he is walking in the midst
of these seven lampstands, each one representing
one of the churches. And so Jesus, as he begins
now to address not only the church at Ephesus,
but us. wants us to know that he is the one who
is in charge. All authority in the church is
committed to him. That's why he is called the
head of the body. Everything in the church relates
to him. He is the one who is supreme and preeminent
above all. That is the picture that he gives
of himself as he begins his dictation. Now, let's
look in chapter 2 and verse 8 and see how he
describes himself to the church at Smyrna. You
will notice that he begins in chapter 2 verse
1 by relating back to the vision John had had
in chapter 1, and he does something similar here.
The city of Smyrna was famous as for its worship
of the Roman Emperor as deity. As I told you,
it was famous for a temple that it built in honor
of Tiberius Caesar. Who is Tiberius Caesar? He's
the most powerful man in the world. Notice how
Jesus begins to address the people. He says,
these things says the first and the last who
was dead and came to life. And so He identifies
Himself as one who is sovereign even over such
a person as Tiberius. He is over the Caesars.
He is the final disposer of all matters. Why?
Because He's the first and the last. As we said
in chapter 1, He's A and Z, Alpha and Omega and
everything in between. He is even over the persecutors.
who are causing the church at Smyrna to suffer.
As the first and the last, He is unchanging,
even though they themselves were in the midst
of constant turmoil and change. And He says to
these suffering people, to whom He has no word
of condemnation, He says, I am the first and
the last. And He says, I was dead. and I came
to life." Can you imagine the comfort that was
to these suffering people? These same people
who a few years later would see their pastor
burned at the stake? To know that Jesus Christ
knew them, that He was the one that they worshiped,
and that He had died and had come to life again.
Someone has pointed out that of men, we say,
He lived and died. But of Christ, we say, He
died and lived. The resurrection of Jesus Christ
undoubtedly was a great comfort to these who
were facing martyrdom. He said, I died and I
am alive again. And so He addresses Himself to
them as the living sovereign. Now the city of
Pergamum, the citadel. the city famous for its
temple to Asclepius, the god of healing. Jesus
says to them, chapter 2 and verse 12, these things
says he who has the sharp two -edged sword. Remember
in chapter 1 when John saw Jesus, one of the
last things he describes was Jesus' mouth, and
he said that out of it came a sharp two -edged
sword, not a little tiny sword, referring to
a big sword that was used in that day. Now what
John saw was literal. He records what he saw,
but it had a symbolic meaning. It meant that
the word of this one was all -powerful. And so
Jesus uses that part. of the vision to describe
himself to the church at Pergamum. We are told
by secular historians that the proconsul, the
chief guy in Pergamum, had what was called the
power or rather the right of the sword. The right
of the sword. What that meant was that he had
the power to execute anyone at will. All he had
to do was speak it and they were dead. And so
Jesus picks up on that sword concept, and he
says that ultimately all authority resides with
him and his word, and his word. He is the one
with the sharp two -edged sword. Well, that would
have meant something to these people at Pergamum
who knew that the guy in charge of their city
had the right of the sword, but Christ is over
him. Well, in verse 18 we have Christ's description
of Himself to the church at Thyatira, the smallest,
the least important of the cities. Who worshiped
two Apollosus whom they called the sons of Zeus,
the chief of their pantheon, the sons of their
God? Notice how Jesus describes Himself. These
things says the Son of God. who has eyes like
a flame of fire and his feet like fine brass."
Again, going back to the vision of John in chapter
1. Only here in the whole book of Revelation
do you find this name for Jesus, the Son of God.
It is a name that John employs freely in his
epistles and in the Gospel. But not so in the
book of Revelation. Only here, and it's Jesus,
who uses this name undoubtedly because of that
particular religious quirk in the city of Pergamum,
or rather the city of Thyatira, where they worship
the sons of Zeus. And he says, these things says
the Son of God, whose eyes are like a flame of
fire, talking about His penetration in His look,
His ability to see through deception. The church
at Thyatira was struggling with seductive compromises
that were being offered by a person who's called
here in this letter Jezebel, a woman, most probably
a literal woman who was in that city, whether
her name was Jezebel or not. That's what Jesus
calls her. Perhaps he's drawing upon Jezebel
in the Old Testament who was married to Ahab
and who brought terrible idolatry and compromise
to the people of God in her day. And that's what
this false teacher was doing in the city of Thyatira.
She was bringing in compromise and she was seducing
this church away from the truth. So, Jesus says
that He has eyes that penetrate through the deception.
He sees what is going on, and His feet, in their
description, tell of His power to judge. Now
let's move ahead to chapter 3 verse 1 where we
have Jesus describing Himself to the church at
Sardis. And He uses these phrases. spirits of
God and the seven stars." So again, he refers
back to the stars and he also mentions the seven
spirits of God, which again comes out of the
first chapter. As we explained when we talked
about that phrase then, it refers to the perfect
and complete ministry of the Holy Spirit. The
number seven has symbolic value, meaning that
which is complete. that which is perfect. And
so it seems here to refer to the perfect, complete
ministry of the Holy Spirit in the hands of Jesus
Christ. Here was a church, as Jesus goes on to
describe it, that had a name that they were alive,
but they were dead. In other words, all the things
were in place in the exterior, but there was
no life in the church. Remember who they worshipped?
Sibylle. The people in this city worship Sibylle,
and they believe that she was able to restore
life to the dead. Jesus seems to pick up on that
thinking that's in the minds of these people
converted out of paganism, and He says, you have
a name, but in fact you are dead. They had completely
compromised their faith. This church is the most
severely denounced of all of them. Someone has
said, This was a perfect model of inoffensive
Christianity. God forbid we should ever follow
that kind of a model. They had learned to get
along quite well in their culture without offending
anyone, and therefore they died. Well, we come
now to the sixth church, Philadelphia, into chapter
three, verse seven, where Jesus says, these things
says, he who is holy, He who is true, He who
has the key of David and He who opens and no
one shuts and shuts and no one opens. Jesus is
looking beyond Revelation 1 now as He identifies
Himself to this church and going all the way
back to Isaiah 22. Would you just look back there
a moment and let's read the 22nd verse of Isaiah
22. Isaiah's prophecy here is regarding the coming
Messiah and he says, the key of the house of
David I will lay on His Messiah's shoulder. So
He shall open and no one shall shut, and He shall
shut and no one shall open. So there is the allusion
that Jesus is referring to all the way back to
what Isaiah had said regarding Him as Messiah.
He says, he who is holy, that is he who is set
apart to be Messiah, he who is true, who can
be trusted, who is faithful, who is in complete
control over his royal household, who has complete
authority over his coming kingdom, who has the
keys to control access to his kingdom. You say,
well why is all of this of note to the people
in Philadelphia? they had apparently been excommunicated
from their synagogue because of their faith in
Jesus. The door was slammed shut in their faces
and they were told, you are no longer a part
of us. You're no longer welcome here. And Jesus
says, I'm the one who has the key, not the leaders
of the synagogue. And I open the door and no
one can shut it. When I close the door, no one
can open it. He is the one who controls access
to His kingdom. And that was undoubtedly a comforting
word to these people who are still feeling the
sting of being excommunicated from their synagogues.
And then, finally, the Church of Laodicea and
Jesus' identification to them. So verse 14, these
things says the amen. The faithful and true witness,
the beginning of the creation of God. Here Jesus
identifies Himself by this term, amen. You know
when the last time was I heard an amen in this
church? I'll tell you when it was. It was at
a funeral this last week in which there were
about a hundred bikers sitting right here in
this section from the warlords. You say, what
were they doing here? I don't have time to tell
you the story. But they were there, and when
I finished, one of them said, amen. I turned
and said, thank you, sir. That's the last time
I heard amen in this church. Not that I haven't
heard it before, that from some of you. But this
term, amen, what does it mean? He probably didn't
know when he said amen, but he was using a Hebrew
term that means, so be it. It is an acknowledgement.
of what is binding and valid. When you say amen
at the end of a prayer, you are saying, and that
is bound. I put that together as a volume, as
it were, and offer it to God. This validates
this prayer as being mine. Amen. And we send
it off. Jesus says, I am the amen. I am the trustworthy
one. Quite in contrast to the church here, which
was not trustworthy and which was unfaithful
He is the one who validates all of the promises
of God And notice this last title that he uses
which has no reference at all to chapter 1 Where
he describes himself as the beginning of the
creation of God Let me tell you that Jehovah's
Witnesses have a wonderful time with that phrase
They say you see here. He's the first thing that
God created He's the beginning of the creation
of God. The only problem is that's not what it
means. The word beginning means that He's the
source of it. It means that all of the creation
of God comes back to Him as the Creator, and
it ties together perfectly with what Paul wrote
to the Colossians in describing Jesus there as
the firstborn. of all creation, the preeminent
one of all creation. You say, well, why did Jesus
use this term? Well, it's only speculation, but
Jesus, or rather Paul used that phrase, the firstborn
of all creation, when he wrote to Colossae, which
was only a few miles from Laodicea. And probably
that letter written to Colossae had been passed
along to the church at Laodicea, and they were
used to that phrase from Colossians, the firstborn
of all creation. And so Jesus in addressing them
wants them to know He's the same one that Paul
was talking about. He's the beginning, that is
the source of all of the creation of God. So
I'm going to stop there tonight so that we can
come to the Lord's table before we go, then we'll
be on our way. But I want us to notice this before
we close here. The same Lord Jesus Christ who
identified Himself with all of these descriptions
and titles and who stood that day in the midst
of the seven golden lampstands stands right here
tonight. He is in the midst of this church as
much as He was in the midst of the church at
Ephesus or Sardis or any of the other of them.
He is present. And when we come to His table,
it is an act of memoriam. We remember what He
did for us, but let us remember that He is here
with us and that we are fellowshipping with Him
as we come to His table. We cannot see Him as
John saw Him, but the same Lord Jesus Christ
is with us tonight and so as we partake. Let's
partake worshiping Him and realizing that as
He inspected that church, so He inspects us as
a church and as individuals. And if there is
in fact some area of our life that needs to be
confessed so that we can come to the table in
a worthy manner, we better do that. It's serious
because He's here and He knows and He loves us
and invites us to come. If you're walking in
obedience to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, we
invite you to partake of this table with us.
If you're not, please do not partake lest you
eat and drink. judgment to yourself. But assuming
that you are His and you're walking in obedience,
we invite you to come to His table as we remember
Him together. Let's bow together as we give thanks
for the Savior and for these elements representing
His sacrifice on our behalf. Our Heavenly Father,
we thank you for your wonderful Son, the Son
of God. We thank you that in Him we have been
given life. We thank you that our life is made
possible by His death. And we come this evening
to remember the sacrifice. We come to remember
the cross. We come to remember His body, His
blood. And as we partake of the bread, we do
so remembering that 2 ,000 years ago he offered
his body, and that we now as his spiritual body
join our hearts in fellowship in eating this
bread, remembering what Jesus did for us. Amen.