Seven Letters, One Church

Chapters

• 0:44 Welcome And New Year Greetings
• 1:20 Listener Support And Bonus Episodes
• 2:29 The Rule: Context Is Key
• 3:37 Framing Revelation’s Structure
• 6:05 Why Seven Churches And What They Mean
• 8:23 Church Ages From Ephesus To Laodicea
• 12:20 Where The Churches Were And Their Cultures
• 17:18 Promises To Overcomers Explained
• 22:14 Closing, Next Steps, And Blessing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:22

Hello, everybody, and welcome to today's episode of Walk With Me. I am your host, JJ. It's so good to have each and every one of you here. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday, a wonderful Christmas, and moving on forward into a great, wonderful, happy new year. So good to see each and every one of you and interact with every one of you. And as you follow us along on these journey of walking through the Bible and getting our roadmap to get to heaven. Love each and every one of you. Thank you all so much. Thank you, quick thank you to our sponsors, True Barsa Lyricist on Spotify and Apple Podcasts and things of that nature. And he does the intro and the outro of music for us and exquisite creations. She's doing a revamp of everything now. She's going to be coming back stronger than ever. But she is still going to be making a merch for us. So when we do launch that, she will be the primary sponsor for that. I am so excited for that. Thank you all. Thank you, thank you for your questions and comments on the YouTube channel and uh the iHeartRadio channel. And because of that, we are they're allowing us extra time. So what I'm gonna try to do is fit in a bonus episode. Uh, we're gonna do a bonus episode today, but I'm trying to see about how we can get a bonus episode every 30 days. So thank you all so much. It's all because of you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Uh, for your if you have questions or anything, be sure to uh text me or send me an email at walkwithme bible study at gmail. Walk with me bible study at gmail.com. That's exactly why we're doing this particular Bible study, uh, the end times, because someone sent a question and and it was just a timely question because of what was going on in the world, and and a lot of people every so often get kind of scammed by social media or or some guy comes along and says he's the risen savior and all that kind of stuff. But thank you all so much for your questions, and that does bring us to our number one rule of the podcast. Yes, I like it when you interact with the with the post, I like it when you share it, I like it when you tell other people about it. But this is the only rule of this podcast. When we talk about a scripture, we kind of keep it brief for the time being, for time's sake, but you want to read a verse or two above or the verse or two below, but preferably the whole chapter. All right, because context is key. Context is key. So that being said, we're gonna go ahead and jump into today's episode. Now, if you've been following this end time Bible study, which a lot of people are always interested in the end time Bible study with good with good reason, you know, it's not because they're crackpots or or you know, tin foil hat, because Jesus says to watch, Jesus says to make sure we pay attention to the end times, because even though it's gonna come as a thief tonight, uh, he wants us to be ready, he wants us to be able to gauge the time and gauge the the signs of the the coming because the apostles asked it, and Jesus just laid it out there. So we are going to talk about today the letter to the churches. We're gonna start talking about it because I I have a feeling I'm not gonna be able to cover it all. Alright, and what is the the letter to the churches? Now, we talked about Daniel, and we talked about how Daniel has a uh a sister book or brother book, however you want to put it, a companion book in the book of Revelation. These two books are companion books, all right. So, and because of that, you are going to see some stuff that's not in Revelation, that's in Daniel, and stuff that is in Daniel in Revelation, and these letters to the churches is one of the things that you will see in Revelation that you won't see in Daniel, because in Daniel's day there was no such thing as a church. Yeah, you had a tabernacle, you had the people of God, but there was no church. Alright, so for the scriptural reference, we're going to be talking about today, but we're going to mainly stay in uh Revelation 2 and 3. I may diverge and run off into the field like I normally do, and I hope you like that part. But if not, uh I have to always keep myself kind of chained up with kind of stick, stay on topic here. So Revelation 2 and 3, but we're going to start out just recapping Revelation 1 and 19. Now in Revelation 1 and 19, God was instructed to write 1, the things he had seen in Revelation 1, 2, the things that are, which is in Revelation 2 and 3, and then the things that shall come after that, which is um Revelations 4 through 22. And by that I mean chapters. Chapter 1, chapter 2, and 3, and then chapters 4 through 22. So being that we're going to stay in primarily Revelation 2 and 3 today, we have these letters that were sent to the seven churches of Asia. Now, keep in mind, there were more than seven churches in Asia when John wrote the book of Revelation in AD 96. So to think that these were all just seven buildings that John was writing to is not actually a good way of thinking about it. For example, I believe there was a church in Colossae that was not included in these seven churches. But it was the number seven, it was always the number uh perfection and completion. And so you would end up getting a lot of overlap if you just started kept writing the different churches. Now we also know that there's also one church, one church only. Not this is not denominations, this is not uh you know different ideologies. This is only one church. There is only one church, and that happened the day of Pentecost. That's when uh that's when the whole church came into existence before then. Jesus spoke as of church as it would be, and after that, it was this is what happened to the church. So the church was already present, and I I just we have to always make sure we we talk about that because we don't want to be out of context. Um, now we also know that these quote unquote seven churches in Asia are the things that are now that means they these seven churches represent the one body of Christ, and we find descriptions of uh but like spiritual history uh in that church in those churches and all the way up until the second coming of Jesus Christ. So let's talk about these seven churches. Now, these seven churches are more or less representative not only of spiritual conditions but also represent different periods of world history. For instance, the church of Ephesus. Now, that was the um embodiment of the first century church, like from the day of Pentecost to AD 96, um, when John wrote the book of Revelation, and it was often referred to as the Apostolic Church because they quickly um disseminated the information from the apostles, and they their doctrines all followed the apostles' doctrine. Then you had the Church of Smyrna. Now this was a period where it was the same apostolic church, but now you have the there was a huge persecution going on, and this was between like the first, I'm sorry, the second and third centuries is when you started seeing a huge persecution. 96 to say 312. Now, now here's the thing, and I wanted to point this out 312, AD 312 was a very important year. How many of you could figure out without Googling it right now what happened in AD 312? Yes, Constantine professed being converted to Christianity, however, what also was born in AD 300 was the Catholic Church, which basically only changed the persecution from a we hate you to we're going to assimilate you and then force you to assimilate our pagan gods. Not going to get into that now. We will at a later time, but this was this was very pivotal in uh the church history. But then you had the church of Pergama. Now, this was called the Imperial Church between 8312 and 500. Uh, then you had the Dark Age Church, which was uh 80, 500 to 1520, which is it ends up showing up as the beginning of the Reformation, um, and it's also considered in the world as the Dark Ages. You had the Sardis Church, which is the Church of the Protestant Reformation, you have Philadelphia, the Church of the Revival and Brotherly Love, and then we we see here that it's is considered the church that would be raptured because of different characteristics in it, and then you have the Laodicea Church, which is ironically enough, the end-time church that is suffering from a terminal case of apostasy, and it is really sad to think about how bad or how widespread the Laodicea Church is. Now, it should be noted we have to make sure we note that church history altogether should cover a period of about two millennia. And if you've gone through any of these previous episodes where we talked about dispensationalism, this is why it will only be the church will only be around for about two millennia. Throughout um God's history, uh throughout history, God has always had a few people who will keep his word and not deny his name. So no matter how bad the persecution was, no matter how wonderful everything was, no matter how apostate the church is, there will always be a few faithful witnesses. And when the church lost um its main step in the Pergamus and Thyatira periods, was sort of restored to the Philadelphia period. So it's kind of like an ebb in the flow, but this is all one church history. Now, where were these seven churches? No, the church of Philadelphia was not in Pennsylvania, and it's not in your neighborhood. Use the thing, Ephesus um was located in the mouth of the Casa River in Ephesus, and you please understand that Ephesus was a very popular trading port, and then something happened, and then the economy crashed, and it was pretty much um, it was pretty much a whole problem with the locals had this thing about worshiping Diana, which was the uh fertility goddess, and they made this huge temple in the first century, and it was a dying city, and they would rather pray to Diana because she was a quote-unquote goddess of fertility than to go to Jesus Christ. So, and they started was leaning more and more to get their their idolatry worship and and and religious souvenirs, which you know God spoke about extensively in the old testament, and we even know of the temp one of the temples of Diana, and they called it one of the seven wonders of the world. So this was not just some big um, this wasn't just some some in the corner sort of deal. It was a this is the whole Diana worship is probably what killed Ephesus, to be honest with you. Then you had Smyrna. Now, Smyrna was also situated on a harbor, and it was also very profitable, and it was but the difference between Smyrna and Ephesus is that Smyrna had a lot of secular learning, you know, they had science schools and they had medicine and they had architecture that that rivaled anything else the Romans were putting out that day, which was considered state of the art. And there was a bishop by the name of Polycarp, um, and that bishop Polycarp, who John Tudored, John mentored, was actually martyred in A.D. 156. So and and even though these places considered themselves so advanced at the time, they were quick to martyr Christians. They were quick to martyr Christians, which leads us into Pergamous. Now, Pergamous was also a capital, and it was the chief one of the chief towns of the biggest provinces of Asia, and it was like where um there was a a cult built for Caesar, and in that city they built this huge temple, and that was Pergamus, and then there was a um and they had this huge library and they dedicated it to the cult of Caesar, whichever that temple was. I can't I'm trying to remember what the name of it was called, but it they also went after Christians because hey, anything that was that speaks out against idol worship, the devil's gonna get mad. Now, real quick, because we're moving along time, Diatira was also a center of commerce. Um, Lydia, which we read about in uh in Acts, was converted in Philippi, and Lydia was from Diatira. Uh Sardis. You had uh a lot of art, crafts, it would be like considered your your midtown Manhattan or your off-Broadway place. That would be Sardis. And it was actually Sardis. Interesting uh historical fact, they were the first, the first city, the first second city in that area to actually mint gold and silver coins. Before they had bronze, they had copper, they had nickel, but gold and silver, that was where they were the first in that area to start minting those coins. Now we get down to the wonderful and often talked about and often misaligned Philadelphia. Now, Philadelphia is different from any of the previous ones we mentioned because Philadelphia was not really considered a commerce center. But Philadelphia, the city, was known for grape growing and it was named after Attalas II Philadelphia. So basically, it was a big vineyard and a big winery uh location, but it wasn't really a center of commerce like the other cities that we talked about that were built on ports. But now we're gonna get to the seventh church, also known as the apostate church, otherwise known as Laodicea. Now, Laodicea follows the pattern of a lot of the other churches that we talked about. It was built in a wealthy city, it had great commercial prosperity, it had a leading baking center. It was literally like when I we just talked about the other city, it was like midtown Manhattan. Laodicea was like Wall Street, it literally had all the financial uh information and and trading going on in that city. It was rich enough, it was so rich that when they had a huge earthquake in Laodicea, uh they offered the money to help rebuild the city, and they were like, nah, we got it, we got it. We can just rebuild it ourselves. And they also built medical schools there, and they were they were manufacturing um an eye solve, and I'm gonna I'm gonna butcher this, but it's it was called uh colyrium, and basically the eye solve palyrium is kind of like what we would use for um for red and itchy eyes right now. So that's what Laodicea. Now, please understand that each one of these churches had a cyclical sort of um uh importance. So, what the letters were for to send to these churches, they first had a lot of promises that was sent to them. For instance, there were in Ephesus, it was in Revelation 2 7, one of the promise was will I give the eat of the tree of life, which is in the middle of the paradise of God. So you're going you're being told in the church of Ephesus, you will live, you will uh have knowledge, and you will have, I'm going to give these things to you. Smyrna, the promise is shall not be hurt by the second death. Revelation 2 11. One of the things, let me just stop right here, because it's very important to understand that if we um study what these rev what these letters are for, and the overcoming promises, the overcoming messages of those letters, we have to end up, it should help us be thankful for the trials that we go through. Because we all go through these trials. Just because you suddenly become a Christian, you get born again, you get the Holy Ghost speaking of the tongues, you get repentant of your sins, you get baptized in Jesus' name. That doesn't mean that everything goes away. You're still gonna have to overcome trials and tribulations, and you're gonna have to fight the flesh every day. Yes, this is just part of the trip. However, that's where you need these promises to kind of keep you steady. In Pergamus, in Revelation 2:17, will I give either the hidden manna? And I will give him a white stone, and on that stone a new name is written. Now, hidden manna is generally found to be meaning heavenly food, like in God's word. We usually call that the bread of life. Now, the overcomer would have to be able to consume these. Deep um truths in the word as it's revealed to him or her. So when you have what's called the hidden manner, is when you when you can make sure you keep the Bible scripture in context and understand exactly what God is saying to you. Understand what God is saying to me, understand what God is saying to all of us, and in so doing, you will get that stone where that new name would be written, and no one's gonna know that name but you and God. Now, what is the white stone? And we're probably gonna wrap it up here. That white stone is a symbol of what's called eternal equivalent. Um, in the days of the pirates, a lot of the uh governors would write what's called a letter of mark. In other words, you were a pirate before, you were a huge criminal, you you did some dastardly things, but as long as you have this letter of mark, you are innocent and cannot be arrested. This is the white stone of the letter of mark, which is God saying, Yeah, you did some stuff and you were lost, but now you have a symbol of eternal acquittal. You will never ever have to deal with the things you did before you repented. You you did everything you repented of has been forgiven, the washing of the blood. As a matter of fact, in ancient trials, jurors would vote for acquittal by laying down a white stone. So this is not just come out of nowhere. There were a lot of things that were done in the physical world had spiritual implications, and vice versa. Um, in Diatara, Revelation 2, 26 and 28, to him I will give power over the nation, and I will give him the morning star. Now, Jesus himself declared him to be the bright and morning star, not to be confused with the other morning star, which thought he was going to ascend to God, ascend to God's level. So this is the promise that you, as long as you are in Jesus Christ, you can be the overcomer and have that presence of Jesus Christ with you. Now, because I I'm not going, I don't want to have just one church on an episode. I'm going to stop here. I'm going to stop here because we we've done four churches, we still have three churches left. And we're going to go into deep to more of a detail into what those letters were on the next episode. But I do thank each and every one of you. I love each and every one of you. Please comment, like, and if you have access to my social media, go ahead and hit me up. Hey, um, I still, this is to that one person that I spoke to extensively about three days ago. I'm still working on your question. Um, and I'm going to um perhaps post the answer next week. Well, maybe next week, uh, week after next. So, listen, I love each and every one of you. I love talking about the word of God. Thank you all so much for being with us on this journey. And I hope you have a great new year. I hope God delivers you and us for all the things that we need to be delivered from. God bless you. Take care. Bye bye.