without a love relationship, the church isn't even worth having

I know every single time we meet we say we’re going to go through more than one church…and then we never do.  So we’ll take it one at a time on the blog too : ) 

Sooooo the first is Ephesus!  Revelation 2 opens with the letter to the Ephesians church (remember Carrie made the link that the people in Ephesus were the Ephesians just like Paul wrote to the Ephesians).  Jesus tells John that He has a message for the church there, so John needs to write it down and give it to them.  He reminds them that it’s from Jesus, who is in control.  Remember, Jesus identifies Himself as the author of each of the letters, but He tells them each something different about Himself.  To the Ephesians, He says that He is the One who walks among the seven golden lampstands.  Now you remember in first chapter, we found out that the seven golden lampstands were the seven churches.  So, Jesus is telling us that He walks amongst the churches.  He is among the churches; they’re always in His presence.  He is in the room with us and knows what’s going on at all times!

So, we know that Jesus knows us and all that we do.  When Jesus says He knows about their deeds, the work for know indicates complete knowledge.  Jesus is telling them that He knows their life and what their church is all about.  He sees that they serve to the point of exhaustion.  He knows that they persevere and serve even when it’s hard and not convenient.  This sounds a little different than our American churches, huh?  Too often we serve and give our time when it’s convenient or when we’re not otherwise too busy. 

Jesus praises them for not tolerating since and wickedness; they can’t call themselves Christians unless they’re going to live the life.  Also, they have tested the false apostles and identified them for what they really are…false.  “Apostle” means “sent one,” or someone who is sent by God to deliver a message.  there were phonies but the Ephesians did not listen to them.  They tested their words, just like God wants us to test the words that we hear in church.  We should be looking to see if we what we hear matches what God says in His Word.

Jesus also says He’s glad that they hate what the Nicolaitans do.  We talked about how in Acts 6, seven deacons were chosen to be in charge of the distribution to the widows and orphans, one of which was Nicolas of Antioch.  Tradition holds that the Nicolaitans came from him.   They seem to love God and to serve Him but after a while they part from the faith and begin to teach things contrary to God’s word.  They started a sect or cult against God’s word.   In the church, we are not supposed to tolerate all beliefs, practices, and teachings. 

Ephesus was the biggest city in Asia and the church was one of the first churches.  It was a very powerful church.  (See acts 19).  In Ephesus, they would worship the goddess Diana, and everyone had idols of Diana.  In fact, making these idols was a big source of income for many in the city.  So, the apostles come in and preach Jesus’ words to people, then the people are turning from the idols and are tossing them.  Obviously, this makes the people whose livelihood depends on the sale of these idols pretty angry.  In fact, they started a riot and later a lot of physical persecution against the church. 

Jesus holds it against them that they have forsaken their first love.  In fact, He will DESTROY them over it.  They’re doing the right things in that they obey and respect Him, but they lack love; they’ve walked away from a relationship with Him and Jesus says that without having that relationship, the church is not even worth having!  It’s that CRITICAL to God—He would remove the entire church over it; God wants our obedience, but He really wants to have a LOVE RELATIONSHIP and for our actions and obedience to come from our overflow in our love relationship.  It’s the WHOLE POINT.   God isn’t saying you CAN maintain a love for God; He’s saying you BETTER.  He says to repent—do something about it, go back to that love!!  Godly sorrow leads to repentance.  Throughout the day, you should allow thoughts of God to come into your mind and tell Him that you love Him. 

On a scary note, several years after this letter was written to the church in Ephesus, the church was REMOVED.  For the last 1800-1900 years there hasn’t been a lampstand in Ephesus.  There is little to no Christian influence in modern day Turkey.   In fact, it is Islamic and blatantly anti-Christian.  Why?  They lost their love and God doesn’t want a church that doesn’t love Him.  God wants witnesses to His love and isn’t interested in the type of religion that is just obedient.

Whoever is in a relationship with Him will spend eternity with Him.  God went through all of this because of His passionate love for us.  He sacrificed His life in pursuit of a love relationship with us.

Church Letters

Ok girlies!  I know we’re going super slowly through these churches but that’s okay.  I want to give you a quick recap of the structure of the letters to the churches. 

The letters each open in the same way; “To the angel of the church in ______, write:”  We talked about how the word angel in Revelation, though it can mean ethereal, heavenly beings, can be used other ways.  We discussed how the word angel could also be used to talk about messengers to the church, or the pastors to the church, and how the letter would be read aloud to the church (really, the whole book of Revelation would be read aloud). 

For each church, we talk about who the speaker is to each of the churches—Jesus.   We also talk about how we know this, because in each of the letters to the churches we see some identifier of Jesus, and most of them link back to how Jesus is described/describes Himself in the very beginning of Revelation.  (NOT because the words are written in red or because there are quotation marks…J)

Jesus praises the churches for the things that they are doing that He likes.   He commends the churches for the good things and encourages them to continue in the good.  Even if there are just a few good in the church, He still recognizes whomever is making an effort to truly follow Him and will distinguish them from the rest.

Jesus usually rebukes the church that He is writing to as well (except for Smyrna and Philadelphia).  He points out what they’re doing wrong and what He doesn’t like about the church and tells them that they need to repent and instead follow God.

They all end with “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”  This means to ANYONE who will listen, even to us now.  This is followed by the reward that the person who is able to overcome what Jesus has warned against. 

Look for more on the churches soon!