Wednesday, July 13, 2022

Revelation 2 (III) Seven Churches: Smyrna

We pick up from where we left off in Revelation 2 (II) Seven Churches: Ephesus, and we are diving right into the second letter, the letter to the church in Smyrna:

Rev. 2:8 “And to the angel of the church in Smyrna write: The first and the last, who was dead, and has come to life, says this: 

Rev. 2:9 ‘I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you were rich), and the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. 

Rev. 2:10 Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to cast some of you into prison, so that you will be tested, and you will have tribulation for ten days. Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life. 

Rev. 2:11 He who has an ear, let him hear what the spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death.’ 

And that’s our second letter. Now, remember, when we opened up with the letter to Ephesus, we realized how structured these letters are. They have little piece parts, and these parts are similar across all the letters that help us break them down and make sense of them. And it always starts with the name. The name of each of these cities has meaning, and the meaning relates to what's said about that church. So in this case, the name of the city, Smyrna, is a transliteration of a Greek word, Smyrna. And that word is simply the word for myrrh - the spice, myrrh. Myrrh ‘s a natural gum resin, it is used typically in the Middle East, historically, as a fragrant ointment. In the time of Christ, it was most commonly associated with burial and death because it was the primary embalming substance for a dead body. So today, Smyrna is called Izmir, in the nation of Turkey, and it's a thriving city. But in Jesus’ day it was just another Roman city in the province full of pagan temples, most notably a temple to the Emperor Tiberius, and that made this town the heart of emperor worship in Asia Minor, and as such, it became a place of early persecution for Christians. 

Roman law at the time prohibited any other religion other than Emperor worship. They only made one exception. The only exception was for the Jewish religion, because Jews were famous for being stubborn and unable to be controlled or forced to do anything they didn't want to do. And so, rather than put up with Jewish rebellion at all times, they just gave an exception to the Jews. The Jews could retain their unique form of worship, but everyone else had to worship the emperor. Now, for a time in the first century, the Romans considered Christianity just an offshoot of Judaism. So Christianity enjoyed that same protection, at least for a time. But by the end of the first century, the church had become predominantly Gentile. And as a result, the Romans had come to see the church as distinct from Jewish religion and, therefore, a threat to the Roman Empire. Furthermore, you have the Jews themselves rejecting Christians and persecuting Christians. So they allied with the Romans against Christianity and persecution became a normal thing in the church. 

So Smyrna, it would seem, was on the forefront of this shift toward persecution, a transition from tolerating Christianity to going after and persecuting believers. Looking at the letter, we see Smyrna’s record of persecution reflected here in Jesus' words to the church. And He begins right up front with the description of Himself. He says He is the first, the last, the one who was dead and has come to life. What an appropriate aspect of His description to attribute to this particular church. 

Remember that in each of the letters, Jesus takes an element of His description from chapter 1 and assigns it to each of the seven churches, and the one that He picks for each church is meaningful to what's going on in that church. And here you see the connection obviously. You have a church destined for persecution in martyrdom, and so it only makes sense that Jesus would point out to them that death will not be the end of them. That is to say, Jesus died also. So He knows what it feels like to face physical death. But He says, “I also rose again. So I know that death does not have power over you. It did not have power over me. And as one of mine, it will not have power over you either, that is, death is not the end of you.” And so He  promises those who believe in Him that they will have the same transformation He had. So just as He faced death obediently, so should Christians know that death should not be an impediment to our obedience. 

And then from there Jesus moves to acknowledging that the church is suffering. He says, “I know you have tribulation, I know you have poverty.” Now the tribulation that they're suffering through here is probably as a result of Jewish persecution at this point in history when this letter was written. There had been persecution by the Romans, certainly, but historically - to that point at the end of the first century - the Jews had primarily been the ones bringing suffering and poverty to the church there.

Now, most manual labor trades in Rome were tightly controlled by powerful trade unions, and the way it would work is a membership in a union was a requirement if you want to work in your trade in a given region, for example. And the unions that were formed in Rome under Roman authority would have pagan gods that they worshipped as a part of their trade.

And if you were in that union and part of that trade, you were expected to engage in ritual religious sacrifice for that god, eat the meat sacrifice to that idol, do whatever their rituals required. And if you were a Christian who was in that trade and you refused to participate in that pagan worship, then you would usually be set out of the union. And if you weren't in the union, you couldn't work. And if you can't work, that's a recipe for poverty. 

So poverty in the early church was common as a result of this, and Christ, acknowledging their troubles, blames this on the Jews, who, He says, are not really Jews, but were rather instruments of the devil. A synagogue of Satan, He calls them.

Jesus’ words give us a clear indication of how He views those who are of Jewish background and yet have not recognized Him as Messiah. That is to say, they are Jewish by birth - as Jesus says, they are Jews in name only. In Romans 2:28 Paul said: 

Rom. 2:28 “For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh. 

Rom.2:29 But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not for men, but from God.” 

In other words, they may have been born of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and they may have Jewish roots - that much is true - but as Jesus said to the pharisees, they may call Abraham their father, but they're not doing the deeds of Abraham. Abraham believed in the promise of a coming Messiah, sight unseen, and here these Jews of Jesus’ day did not even believe in the Messiah when He stood before them in person. They didn't do the deeds of Abraham in that respect.

So the Lord says He knows these people for who they truly are. That is, they may be Jewish physically, but they're not His spiritually. And, truly, there are really only two kinds of people in the world - you are either of God by faith in Christ, or you are of your father, the devil. You are either Christian, or you're not. There's no in between, and there's no third choice.

And so these Jews, who call themselves the people of God by birth, He says, they are a synagogue of Satan. Why? Because every unbeliever is of their father, the devil, until such a day as they're born again into the family of God.

The Bible says that children of God is a term for the believer, not for humanity. It's kind of vogue to say we're all children of God, but that's an unbiblical statement. We're all children of Adam. We're all children of the devil until such days we are born again. And then we become part of the family of God by faith. So, as John says, in 1 John 2: 22: 

1 John 2:22 Who is a liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. 

1 John 2:23 Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also. 

It all comes down to what you believe about Jesus. So Jesus says He knows the true heart of those who persecute them. And that was probably meant as an encouragement, in a way, because as the church might have been persecuted by Jews, if they knew their Bible, they would have understood how He viewed the people of God, how He viewed Israel in general, and they might have questioned how God's own people, that is the nation of Israel, could be persecuting those who were following after Messiah. And He says it is because these Jews don't have Him truly in them.

So Jesus says He knows that they have this persecution and He knows that they have this poverty. But notice what He did not say though. He didn't say He’s going to take it away from them.

Isn’t that interesting? He actually says at one point that they are rich, denying their poverty.

But then again, how is that true?

He says that they're suffering and tribulation is not something He’s going to remove because it is earning for them Christ’s approval, and as a result of His approval, treasure in heaven.

In that sense, Jesus’ saying, they are actually rich. They may be poor on earth, they may be enduring trials, it might end badly in terms of martyrdom, but if they turn it into a good witness, if they put it to work for the sake of Christ glory, then He says they will be rewarded.

And that's based not only on what He's saying here, but also on the Scriptures generally. 

When the Bible talks about the reward for the believer, that is, being rich, as Jesus puts it here, it's not about something that you'll find on earth, because the rewards that come to the believer do not come in this life. They are given to us after we resurrect, and that is far preferable to receiving it here and now. If we receive it now, it's very short lived and a rather skimpy reward.

What you expect to see on the other side of your resurrection, though, is eternal and weighty, Paul says. So what Christ is reminding this church is to have eyes for eternity. That is, see your life and the circumstances under which you are experiencing it right now, from an eternal perspective.

What is the eternal perspective?

Well, don't get caught up in what you have here, or what you're losing here, be that physical thing, comfort things or even your own life. Those who want to save their lives will lose it. You can't have it all. If you're caught up in what you can obtain here, or in avoiding some unpleasant experience here and now, then you're sacrificing something. On the other hand, if you endure them, if you turn them to a witness, if you let God use it as ministry as He will, then you're earning treasure in heaven. Matthew in 5:11 reports Jesus’ words this way: 

Matt. 5:11 “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. 

Matt.5:12 “Rejoice and be glad for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you”. 

Notice in verse 10, Jesus tells the church how to make the most of these circumstances. In other words, if they want to turn this persecution and poverty into a reward, here's what they ought to do. They should not fear the situation, that is, even as they face death for their faith, they should not let fear take hold. Fearing death is an impediment to pleasing Christ. Fearing death, that is, having an unnatural, overriding fear of death as a Christian gets in the way of obedience. Fear of death causes you to make bad choices, selfish choices, choices that are the opposite of faith.

Think for a moment about the time and effort we put in trying to look like we're not dying. Who are we fooling? That fear is ultimately pointless, since, of course, we know that death is coming and it's not a bad thing. Do you realize if someone dies, let's say, sooner than you expected, they cut in line for the Kingdom? Most of us certainly don't think of death that way - it's certainly a painful experience - but a Christian understanding of death should change your attitude leading into it. Doesn't mean you have to embrace it, but it certainly does mean you should not fear it such that it would become an impediment to doing what Christ asks of you. 

So in this case, the church in Smyrna could not let fear drive that response to their circumstances. But instead, Jesus says, “Enter into your suffering with confidence.” And this is so contrary to modern preaching. You keep waiting for Jesus to say, “I'll stop it, I'll solve it, I won't let it happen. Far be it for me to let anything bad happen to a Christian!” And that is nonsense. Right?  

Martyrdom is a high honor in the church, and it brings a great reward. Now martyrdom is not something you seek. It's something that comes to you. But the point is that it is a false teaching to suggest that God's primary concern for the believer now on earth is your happiness. No, it’s your holiness.

And often what brings greatest holiness is trial, tribulation, suffering, deprivation, things that bring you to the end of yourself. And in that moment, you discover who you are in Christ.

So they are going to endure tribulation. They're going to endure poverty. But the Lord isn't going to remove these things. Instead, He tells them, “Endure them with your witness intact.”

Jesus' goal for the church was not their earthly comfort or lengthening their life. His goal was that they would have a good witness in the face of those things, and as such, they would maximize their eternal reward. That was His goal. And He warns them in advance of what's going to happen. He says, prison awaits, and then, after a short time, death is going to come.

Now Roman prisons in that day were not a place of confinement. The Romans had no incentive to house prisoners for long periods of time. After all, why would you want to give free food and clothing to criminals? It didn’t make sense to the Romans. So they would conduct swift trials, and usually the punishment would follow immediately afterward. Now, if it was a lesser sentence or a lesser crime, then you'd be fined, or scourged or some other torture, and then they let you go. And if it was a serious crime, they just killed you. And that was the end of it.

Therefore, the deadline of 10 days that Jesus gives them here, this idea that they'll only be in prison a short time, that's very consistent with the Roman justice system. It might have been the time necessary for a verdict to be rendered for sentence to be carried out, maybe the time it took for them to be transported to some amphitheater to be fed to the lions. This is about what the time would have been.

But the number 10 has a symbolic meaning in the Scriptures, and Jesus is using the number 10 here probably to hint at the opportunity for testimony. Because the number 10 is the number in the Bible for testimony. 

And so He's indicating through that number, “You're going to have a time of testimony, 10 days. And in that time of testimony, make the most of it.” The coming persecution is going to lead to death, but Jesus is telling them, make the most of that. Be blessed as a result of it. Jesus Himself promised this in Matthew 5:10 when He said: 

Matt.5:10 “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven”. 

So, the key Jesus says to these believers in Smyrna, is face your trial faithfully. Now here's where we get a moment of understanding that may not have been something you've heard in the past. Sometimes we hear this ‘be faithful’ comment, and we think of it in the simplest terms. Faith, that is, be someone who has faith in Jesus, as opposed to perhaps someone who does not have faith in Jesus. And we move it into a salvatic context before we even think about it.

But salvation is not the issue here. Faith in this context doesn't refer to whether you're saved or not. These believers are saved. That's why He's talking to them about being faithful. Nothing can change their eternal destiny. Paul said in Romans 8 verse 38: 

Rom. 8:38 “I'm convinced that neither death nor life nor angels “

And he goes on from there. And if you look at the list he gives in Romans 8:38 and 39. Nothing is not there. Anything that could happen in your life is there. Life, he says, cannot cut you off from Christ. Anything that could happen in death - because of an angel or a demon or because of some power - death cannot touch you. All those things are all on the list. None of those things can separate you from the love of Christ. Nothing in your life, nothing in your death, that pretty much covers it.

And so the point is, there is nothing here that's going to interrupt your relationship with Christ. Being faithful in this context means your behavior, your holding to your witness, because we're all humans, and if I put you in enough pressure under enough harm, and your mind is not focused on what the Scriptures have to say about your eternal reward, about what's at risk, about what you're dying for, if that's not on the top of your mind as Scripture wants it to be, then I can get you to say anything.

I can get you to recant Christ, I can get you to pledge your allegiance to some pagan god if it gets you out of immense torture. But none of those things mean that you have been severed from Christ. If our connection to Christ was that tenuous, God help all of us. A bad day, and where are we then?  

What you experienced coming to faith is being born again. Your spirit changed. You can't go backward from that. No more than a butterfly can go back into a cocoon. Now the issue is how do you live in that newness of life. John through Jesus' words here says in this context: “I want you to remain faithful. I want you to consider how this affects your eternal reward. I don't want you to think in short term.” And that’s probably why He said they had 10 days. If they didn't know how long it might last, they might have a harder time holding out in their faithfulness. That was designed to help them understand 10 days versus eternity.

If they made the right choices, they would receive an eternal reward. And He says that reward would be the crown of life. Now, naturally, we wonder what the crown of life is.

If you're tempted to conclude that the crown of life means salvation itself, well, the only reason you might even make that assumption is because of the word ‘life’ there. But if you make that assumption, first of all, you're not following the rules of interpretation that we discussed at the very onset of this study, and secondly, as a result of that bad interpretation, you paint yourself into an unbiblical corner that can't be supported by Scripture generally. 

First of all, the rules of interpretation. The crown here is obviously a symbol. It's a symbol and we, in order to understand the symbol, need to go to how that symbol is used in the Bible. Remember that was the rule. You go look at it in its context. If it's not defined in the context, you go out of the context to the rest of the book. If it's not defined elsewhere in the book, you go backward in the Bible till you find other instances of that same symbol. And if you do that, what you find is there are numbers of mentions of crowns in the New Testament.  And in every single case, the mention of the word crowns, “Stefanos” in Greek, is always in reference to an award or a reward that you receive because you EARNED it.

So, a crown is something you get from God for good performance every time it's mentioned. And the use of the crown symbol then, in this case, means that it's being associated with something that comes out of good works that takes it completely out of a salvatic context because we all know or should know that the Bible is consistent from the beginning all the way to the end that salvation is not of works, but by faith alone.

So knowing that we know He cannot be saying to them, “Hold the line in your behavior so that you can keep your salvation” - that is an unbiblical mindset. In 2 Timothy, Paul talks about this same thing. This is one of those examples of prior uses of the word ‘crown’. In 2 Timothy 4:7, he says:

2Tim.4:7 I have fought the good fight. I have fought the good fight. I finished the course. I've kept the faith; 

Now there you go, there's the same word again in the same sense, "I have kept faith" meaning, "I have kept my behavior in the right place. I have kept the work up. I've done what He's asked me to do, kept the faith." Then, he says this:

2Tim 4:8 And in the future there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day;  but also to all who have loved His appearing”. 

He's referencing a crown, a reward for his faithful service, having run the course to the end. So the consistent meaning of this symbol is one of reward for service that precludes us from saying this is about salvation. So Jesus is saying to them, “Stay with this for 10 days and you have a reward coming.”

Furthermore, we know the Bible says salvation can never be earned. So then when you say that this is not salvation, this has got to be rewards for work, and it comes as a function of service.

The next thing you might ask is, “Well, what good is a crown?”

Well, crowns are symbolic representations of your eternal reward, not the substance of it. Your reward in heaven, according to Scripture, is not a crown. It will be an inheritance in the land on earth when you return with Christ, and it'll be a role in the government.

But those things are not yours at first because you're not on earth at first. To die now, is to be absent in the body and present with the Lord in Heaven. You're up there. You're not down here for a while. While you're up there, what does your reward look like up there? A crown. It is a token. It is representative of what you will have when you return.

And the crown of life is the symbolic reward for any who suffer persecution or martyrdom faithfully. How do we know that? Well, James confirms that for us. In James 1: 12 he says:

James 1:12 Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial; for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him”. 

So Paul tells us that our performance and serving Christ determines which crown we receive. He says in 1 Corinthians 9:24: 

1Cor.9:24 Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but only one receives the prize? Run in a way that you may win. 

1Cor.9:25 Everyone who competes in the games exercises self-control in all things. They then do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable” 

That analogy about only one person winning – that doesn't mean only one of us will win the crown or that we’re competing with each other. No, you are competing with yourself. Yourself, that is your fleshly desires, for what this world offers is competing with your spiritual appreciation of what Christ wants, and they will always be the opposite. So you're running a race. Run it well to the end, but run in such a way so that you might win.

So Smyrna was told this is what they would face. 

Finally, the letter ends with a promise that those who overcome will not be hurt by the second death. Remember, we said that each letter ends with an assurance or an encouragement to the believers in that church that tells them that no matter what is going on in that church, no matter what else was said, and no matter whatever future that church might have, nonetheless, they will always be with Christ.

Jesus says, “You've overcome and you will be with me in paradise.” Or in this case, as He says, that they will have this opportunity for salvation. It's not going to be dependent on their behavior. So He says, they will be overcomers. 1 John 5:4 says:

1John 5:4 Whatever is born of God. “Whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world - our faith”, (notice, not your behavior, but your faith.) 

1John 5:5 Who is the one who overcomes the world? He who believes that Jesus is the son of God”. 

So those who were saved will not be harmed.

We’ll finish this letter with the prophetic content, that is, we need to understand how to fill this out now for the Church of Smyrna.

What is the prophetic value of the letter?

Well, we know that Smyrna is the church of persecution or death. And we know that's reflective of the history of the church after the first century.

Following the first century, the church entered a period of persecution under Roman opposition.

That systematic persecution of the church waxed and waned for about 200 years. And that was the normative experience of the church in the second period of its existence. It begins more or less with Emperor Domitian, around AD 96, continuing till the fourth century.

Interestingly, in those 200 years, there were 10 Roman Caesars who engaged in persecution against the church. 

So prophetically it would seem as though the 10 days of waiting might be also an illusion to the 10 periods of Roman persecution.

And then the history of the church following the Apostolic Age just mirrors everything we've learned in this letter. And so it makes perfect sense to see this letter as a continuation of this pattern.

So what are the dates?

For Smyrna we started at around AD 96, and we’ll round up to 100, and we go to the next defining moment.

And what would we pick as our next defining moment? Where would Smyrna end as a period in church history?

Well, it only makes sense that you'd look at the next letter and see what's true about that next period and see what's changed and then look in history to see where that change took place.

The date, upfront, is AD 313, but we’ll find out what that date’s about in Revelation 2: 12, and we’ll cover that in Revelation 2 (IV)

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