Chapter 3
Ephesus: The Distracted Church
Revelation 2:1-7
These seven churches existed when John received his vision.
They were the first recipients of Revelation; however, just as the book of
Revelation is for the church of all ages and places, so the seven letters are
for the church of all ages and places. The individual letters, although
originally meant for specific congregations of more than 1900 years ago,
contain instruction for the church today. This is not because we can make a
direct identification between, for example,
A few introductory remarks about the structure of these
letters are in order. In general, they all have the same basic arrangement.
First the Lord Jesus Christ called himself by a certain name that recalled some
aspect of the vision John had of Christ in chapter 1. Then the Lord mentioned
the specific situation of the church, both positive and negative aspects. Next
Christ gave a relevant message of encouragement or of warning, or of both.
Finally, he uttered a promise for those who overcome in triumph against sin and
temptation.
While there is this basic structure to each of the seven
letters, each has its own specific message for the church of yesterday and of
today.
Commendation for loyalty
The Lord began each letter by referring to himself with a
specific name drawn from John’s original vision of the exalted Christ related
in chapter 1. These self-designations of Christ are important for understanding
the message of the various letters.
In the letter to the church at
From the last verse of Revelation 1, we learned that the
seven “stars” are the angels of the seven churches. The word “angel” means
“messenger.” We should think of the church itself as a messenger of God with a
message for the world.
He also called himself, “The one who walks among the seven
golden lampstands.” From 1:20 we learn that the seven lampstands are the seven
churches. They represent the churches of Christ as they are visible in the
world. The Lord Jesus is walking among these churches, carefully watching their
activities and their struggles. He intimately knows their strengths and
weaknesses and how they are viewed by the world.
Both stars and lamps give light. They have that in common.
If you are far away from the city and look upward on a moonless night, you will
see the amazing sight of the heavens, full of stars. Stars also give direction.
One who knows the night sky well can find his way home using the stars as a
guide.
A lampstand also gives light. Of course it is not the
lampstand that gives light but the lamp placed upon the lampstand. When a light
is put on it, the light will fill the room.
The Lord Jesus addressed this guiding and revealing light,
the church as it was heard and seen in the world.
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| Artemis |
Loyal to God, the church pierced the darkness of the world with its message and lifestyle. The church was not light in itself; rather, it was light only through its relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. The church drew its light from him. In chapter 1, John saw a vision of Christ whose face was like the sun shining in full strength. Have you ever tried to look at the sun? I think everyone tries it at least once. When the sun is shining in full strength, it is impossible to look at it for more than a split second. Involuntarily, you will close your eyes and you will see spots for a good half minute.
That is what it was like for John. He had one glimpse of the
bright shining face of Jesus Christ and he fell to the ground as though dead.
The Lord imparted that powerful and awesome light to his
church. As Christ was the light of God that came into the dark world revealing
sin and showing the way to the Father, so the
Ephesus was one of
the more important cities in the province of Asia Minor, with a population of about
300,000. It was a harbour city intersected by three major trade routes. Thus it
was a centre of trade and commerce, but more importantly, it was a religious
centre.
Emperor worship was firmly established in
But
Artemis was a fertility goddess. If one paid homage to her,
then, supposedly, he would receive good crops and many children. As all
fertility cults, this one was replete with the depravity of temple prostitutes
and other perversions. Immorality was common, accepted and expected in this
city.
The
The Ephesians believers rejected, and witnessed against, the
enemy outside the church. They also rebuffed the enemy inside the church. They
fought against the teachings of false apostles and refused to listen to
teachers who brought them something other than the pure word of God.
The Lord Christ commended them for this rejection of evil
and for their loyalty to him. He said, “I know your deeds, your hard work and
your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked men, that you have
tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false.”
The Lord Jesus had said in Matthew 7, “Beware of false prophets, who come to
you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.” His disciples would
be able to identify the wolves. As Jesus said in Matthew 7, “You will know them
by their fruits.”
Paul had also warned the elders of the church in
They were on their guard. They were on the lookout. When the
false apostles, wolves in sheep’s clothing, had come into the sheepfold and
begun to propagate false doctrine, the elders had said, “That is heresy.” They,
together with the congregation, had tested what the false teachers said and
discovered it was not in accord with what they had learned in the past. The
church at
They also rejected, even hated, the works of the
Nicolaitans. We do not know very much about the Nicolaitans, who are mentioned
again in the letter to
The Nicolaitans were like secular Christians who come to
church on Sunday but live in the thick of the world the rest of the week. They
made a complete separation between the body and the soul and said that as long
as the soul was pure, it did not matter what one did with the body. The typical
attitude of a Nicolaitan was, “As long as my soul is okay as far as Christ is
concerned, I can get drunk and gamble and party and visit the prostitutes all I
want. What I believe with my soul and do with my body have nothing to do with
each other.”
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| The coliseum in Ephesus |
They tried to combine the religion of Artemis with the religion of Jesus Christ. “You can have both!” they argued. “Let Christ have your soul; let Artemis have your body!”
The loyal Christians said, “No way!” They wanted nothing to
do with this unchristian way of thinking. In fact, they rejected this
compromise and excommunicated those who propagated it. All those who attempted
to wed the darkness of the world with the light of the church had no place in
the congregation of
What do we think about such an attitude? Were they too
radical? Were they too strict, too ultra-conservative? We should think not.
Please notice that the Lord Jesus commended them for this. He said that he too
hated the works of the Nicolaitans. The church was in a situation where the
darkness of the world was pressing against it from the outside and the
pitch-black of false doctrine and compromise was infiltrating from the inside.
Such times called for decisive action, and the church was loyal to its Lord. It
let the true message be heard and was not afraid to be seen doing right. The
church, as angel messenger, continued to speak the truth and let the lamp
shine.
In this way the
Warning about lack of love
Although the Lord had high praise for the church at
In the commentaries there are different opinions about
whether the “love” mentioned here refers to love for God or love for the
brotherhood. It must refer to the latter.
Had they abandoned love for God, they would not have
maintained so zealously and loyally purity of doctrine and holy lives but would
have given up long before. The teachings of the false apostles would have taken
control of the church and the congregation would have fallen into the trap of
compromise espoused by the Nicolaitans.
It was precisely their love and zeal for God that gave them
the energy to maintain these principles. The Lord Jesus was warning them that
he knew they did not love each other like they had at first. They had abandoned
the mutual love that had carried them along in the days the gospel had first
broken into their lives. Love for the brotherhood had died out. The church was
strong on doctrinal precision and obedience but weak on mutual and brotherly
love. This is what they had forsaken.
We can imagine how it happened. The church was into its
second generation, being about forty years old. The council of elders was made
up of men who had been taught from their youth to be on the lookout for wolves
dressed as sheep. Each member took seriously the warning of the Lord Jesus, and
later of Paul, to be on the alert for false doctrine. No worldliness was
allowed to enter from outside. Any false teaching that tried to rear its head
from within the church was quickly squashed. This was good.
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| Domitian |
However, the people had become edgy and nervous, and another deadly attitude had taken control. Always being on the alert for false teachers had filled the Ephesian Christians with mistrust and suspicion, even for each other. When one brother stood up in a meeting to say something, the other brothers turned deaf ears, because, well, “We know what he’s going to say anyway.” When one wrote an article in the church magazine, the others said, “I’m not reading it. He never knows what he’s talking about.”
“Come now,” said the Lord Jesus, “think about the height
from which you have fallen.” He had said in John 13, “By this all men will know
that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” This is the
hallmark of Christians, mutual love. The Lord called them to repentance and
back to the love they had for each other at the beginning. Without love, a
church ceases to be the church. Christ warned the congregation that if they
would not repent from their lovelessness, he would remove their lampstand.
As Paul said, without love, we are noisy gongs and clanging
cymbals (1 Cor 13). Even though the church was thoroughly orthodox with
faithful preaching and church discipline, yet it was in danger of becoming
something grotesque because the congregation had abandoned love.
Return to that, said the Lord. It was critical. Regaining
this love would not be done through emotional outbursts, nor by talking and
theorizing about it; rather, as verse 5 says, they were to do the things they did at first. It would be a matter of deeds, of
lending a helping hand to someone who needed help, of visiting that lonely
person or inviting him over. The return to which the Lord called them would be
seen in their being open to each other, and not prejudging or being suspicious.
It would be a matter of speaking well about each other and not murdering each
other with gossip and slander.
This is what it had been like when the gospel had first won
over their parents. They had loved God most of all and their neighbours as
themselves. The church needed to recapture this attitude. It needed to avoid
not only the temptations of the world and the corrosion of false doctrine but
also the emptiness of abandoned love. The church was to be doctrinally precise,
loyally obedient, and filled with mutual love for the brotherhood. That is the
church. Those are Christians.
Promise of eternal life
If the church were to recapture the love it had at first by
doing the works of love, then the Lord would not remove the lampstand. That is
the first promise the church received. If they would be faithful to their Lord
and King and obey his command to love the brotherhood, then he would establish
them more and more. Then the Lord would continue to allow them to be his
messenger to the world.
We know from history that the church at
The second promise is in the last verse of the letter. There
the Lord Jesus said, “To him who overcomes, I will give the right to eat from
the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.”
One of the sacred symbols of the goddess Artemis was a palm
tree. Many of the coins struck in
The last chapter of Revelation mentions once again the tree
of life which will be in the paradise of God. Adam and Eve were shut out of the
first paradise so that they could not eat of the tree of life after they had
fallen into sin. Because the Lord Jesus has paid for that sin, and for all the
sins of those who love him, we will be allowed to eat of that tree of life in
the new paradise. That tree will give immortality and eternal life. That is the
promise.
This blessing of the tree of life is given to “him who
overcomes,” that is, to him who triumphs over lovelessness. It is given to him
who remains loyal to God in the face of secularism and false doctrine, and who
loves his neighbour. This promise was for every member of the congregation just
as the command to regain the love which had been abandoned was for every
member.
All of this–encouragement, warning, promise and
command–comes to the church of today. Every congregation and every individual
member of the congregation has a responsibility to make the communion of saints
work as the Lord Jesus Christ created it to work. We are to be loyal to God and
to show true Christian love to each other.
He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the
churches.
Scripture reading: Acts 19:23-41
Songs: Psalms 16, 115,
133
