Thyatira: The Badly Infected Church

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this morning let’s take our Bibles and turn to Revelation Chapter 2 and we’re continuing to go through this incredible book as I’ve been saying more up to date than tomorrow and tells us really that Satan um his tactics have not changed from the beginning of time he just uses different people in different circumstances uh to be able to do the same exact things and so we should be aware of that as Christians so this morning Revelation chap 2 and we’ll be looking at verse number 18 through 29 the largest message of the churches uh the Church of thura let’s pray Lord this morning as we again look at your word and the privilege to be able to see with our own eyes to open our Bibles and see the text that I’m going to be preaching on this morning so I pray Lord that you would engage our minds um engage our Wills that we lord would be gripped by the word of God and that we be guided by its very principles and that we would be moved away from the things the world wants to press upon us knowing Lord that you will make very clear in the word of God what things actually please you and what things actually don’t and I pray Lord we would have that same kind of clarity in every decision we make in every circumstance we find ourselves that looks confusing give us Clarity so Lord we can do the right thing and we can know that we honored you and um so Lord I pray we know we can change sometimes our circumstances but we sure can respond to them in a way that honors you and I pray this in Christ’s name amen Revelation 2: 18 before I get there this is really a church that is badly infected not everybody’s infected but a church that’s badly infected it was Steve Green who sang six years with Bill in Gloria gai if you know anything about Christian music and they would on their time off get to know the crews that uh put all the the the speakers up in the large auditoriums and they were they would be called riggers they would rig everything up and um Steve Green was saying that one day he was talking to one of the riggers and he says what what was your fear when you’re up there so high hundreds of feet in the air uh walking on these 4in beams they said oh we’re not afraid of that we’re afraid when there is a false ceiling underneath that we think we’re being safe but we can easily fall through it and fall hundreds of feet and die he that’s what we fear and he he kind of that kind of took him back because what he what they said is that it it lured us into carelessness we would be careless when our mind played tricks on us uh and so he says that that’s what we fear um Satan’s business is not so much in scaring us to death as persuading us that the danger of a spiritual fall is minimal see that’s the danger the danger is when we are getting numb to the things of God and we become careless to what the Lord really wants us to do and so we we get the sense here the reason why this church got infected is because we’re going to find out in a little bit why but it it came into the church and the people stopped holding fast the word of Truth and they began to become careless and so you know even with your own health if you become careless with your health well disease something’s going to follow that’s not good right it’s the same thing in every area of your life but especially in the spiritual area when we have so much going on around us everywhere we go and we’re getting bombarded every day with all kinds of stuff all kinds of information and how do you know if it’s true or not some things you read say wow that sounds pretty true then you find out that’s not true at all everybody is going through that but I tell you what when we come to the word of God we know this is the truth and when you know the truth you can discern the error all right so the point is we have to hold to the truth so we don’t become careless and so we know what pleases God all right so now was just keep that in mind and remember that Revelation is a book where the Bible is telling us in the first teaching Us in the first three chapters that Christ is walking amongst his church he is evaluating his church he is coming along his church he calls his church the lampstands because the lampstand is of everything that holds up the light the light of the Gospel which the world needs and if the church doesn’t hold that up no one’s going to hold that up so we have to hold it up but if we let infection get in the church The Gospel Light gets a bit dim and sometimes it even goes out and the Lord is the one I mentioned in the first message he’s the one who removes churches and starts another one over there because they give up on the truth they let the world get in they let other things get in and it becomes infected and sometimes to the point there’s no recovery so here the lampstand represents the church and the Bible tells us that the Lord has in his hands the angels of the church or The Messengers of the church and we know those are the elders and the pastors uh of the leaders of those churches and the Lord is concerned about them that they stay uh in the truth and preaching the truth so Jesus gives a message to each of the churches and the first warning we saw in Ephesians that the church was a declining church the church at Ephesus because the church became Loveless they they let fell out of love uh in the sense of they weren’t loving Christ as they ought to secondly we were warned of the Church of at pergamum uh allowing truth to slip tolerating bad Doctrine and influenced by the culture and so that is another thing that happened and then we had a good church that we mention and I’ll mention that when I get to the uh Church of Philadelphia so some of the churches were influenced by their culture resulting in becoming indifferent to holding tightly to the truth and declining in their relationship to Christ so that means that the current message of false teachers became louder and more persistent than the word of God itself and often the result of this downward spiral was following false teachers following something that was not true playing ultimately with immorality because it seems like idolatry and immorality are hand and glove they go together and Satan uses both of them and he does it very effectively so that means the standard of spiritual integrity and impurity and Purity was downplayed in the church it’s kind of like the the false ceiling that played tricks on the mind of the riggers some just stopped holding fast to the truth and became careless now this church is different than the church at pergamum thra was 40 miles Southeast of pergamum it was called the lydian city and the reason for that is because Lydia who was a dire of purple mentioned in Acts chapter 16 was from thara right so in that City there were many things going on uh the Bible does say that the gospel went to her uh and she heard the message she received the message God opened her heart and she believed so she she was a believer in thra and so that City kind of was named uh as a lydian city because she was a prominent member of the church a wealthy member of the church and often possibly had the church in her house not being the leader of the church but opening her what she had giving it to the Lord so the word of God can be preached in the church it was the smallest of the Seven Cities the smallest church but the longest message and because of its position in a valley it was richly agricultural but lacked really necessary features to protect itself from Invasion it often was armies would run over it because it was a a road to the other place they were going so many times it was taken over and overrun and destroyed it had a healthy com Commerce which in turn produced a multitude of worker guilds uh examples like linen workers and wool workers and Dyers of wool and fabric leather workers and people who made out Outer garments uh potters and Bakers and bronze Smiths were part of the church and became significant really on really what the Lord’s going to say to the church but one thing that really was important is that there were these guilds in in the community and so everybody in some way became a member of these guilds like our unions and they would unionize everything and get everything together so people have all the work and they were Distributing work and and so it was kind of like listen you help us we’ll help you but what happened is that in these meetings that they would have these Guild festivals they called it they would uh eat food that had been offered to one of the Gods and in this case it was the god of Zeus and of course to part if you didn’t participate in that you wouldn’t get business and if you didn’t participate you could have lost your job so this was a lot of pressure on this community to be able to have some connection to the guilds without compromising and without being careless with what they knew to be as Christians also these gilds participated in grossly immoral activities that often followed these feasts so these trade gills were something like our unions as I mentioned and each trade Guild had its own God and members of The Guild were pressured into participating into the Pagan feast and often often these feasts uh just become a an immoral Gathering so consequently Christians faced a real problem they could not buy or sell unless they were in some way participating with trade business guilds if they refused to participate then they would be shut out and therefore could not make an income to support their families and would have to move away to someone other place so they were left left with the choice of having to leave their homes and families for somewhere else to make a living or somehow give into these Guild practices now just keep that in mind it’s it’s important for the background and let’s look at Christ’s character that is highlighted in verse number 18 of chapter 2 it says and the angel of the church in th write these are the words of the Son of God who has eyes like a fire of flame and whose feet are like burnest bronze now the church was facing a sobering examination by Christ Jesus by King Jesus and in this case the church was toying with sin as a ro result the clear lines of what pleases God and what does not please him was blurred and became very cloudy but we see here the Lord’s understanding and clarity has no cloudiness to it in fact if you notice it says these are the words of the Son of God why is that term used Son of God really is is a clear title of the Eternal and the only begotten Son of God but the Son of God emphasized Christ’s Divine character as opposed to Apollos son of Zeus see so this is like an inyour face type of thing of the present gods in the land so Jesus is the true Son of God not Apollos and this surely is true of the deity and the sovereignty and the authority of Jesus Christ that must always be reestablished in the minds of God’s people if sinful practices are to be dealt with in a scriptural manner as God intended Christ must be Lord in our life he must be the master not sin not the culture not of circumstances not trade guilds or unions or people trying to press on us things that are we know are not right to do and so it it leaves us in a very tough position but one that we must make a choice and then notice it says here that Jesus is the one with pure judgment in verse number 18 it says that he is not only the Son of God but he has eyes like a flame of fire no one can hide from the Discerning Eye of the Lord the car characteristic Des description here denoting his piercing his penetrating and perfect knowledge that is Christ has a thorough insight into all persons and all things all circumstances that he sees all actions he sees all thoughts he sees all emotions his penetrating eyes sees all the deceptions of the false prophets and false teachers in fact in verse number 23 of chapter 2 he says I will kill her children with pestilence and all the churches will know that I am he who searches the mind and hearts see that’s what the who the Lord is he searches our mind and heart he can he can know he knows exactly what’s going on in the Deep recesses of your mind he knows that and sometimes you may even hear people say you know what the people will say to me or any preacher boy you were talking just just to me today did you know something about my life for you before You Preach Today I said no I don’t I don’t know but God knows and he knows exactly what you need and he know knows how to press it upon the heart that’s who Jesus is he has piercing and penetrating eyes and knows everything that going on now that’s of course practically I need to be living that way I need to know that God knows everything that’s going on he knows what I’m thinking right now he knows what goes on in my private uh closet he knows everything that’s going on on my job and in relationships with people how could I hide that from him I cannot hide it from him and the Lord will not allow you to hide it if you’re a True Believer he will not allow you to hide it he’s going to bring it to the surface he’s going to bring it out and that may be tough for a person when they are they come under God’s scrutiny because they can’t get away with it he hems them in and for good purpose because you’re you are a child of God you are to to live for him you’re you’re the light and the salt in your face family on your job you’re the go places and represent Jesus Christ and then notice in verse number 18 too Jesus is the one with purifying judgment vers the latter part of Verse 18 and whose feet are like burnish bronze see this characteristic attribute signifies that the ongoings of his Providence are steady they’re awful they’re all pure they’re all holy and as he just judges with perfect wisdom he acts with perfect strength and steadiness that the Judgment of the Lord exposes all the impurities that would be in our hearts like when metals are heated causing the impurities to rise to the top so they can be scooped away and the pure metal could be left that’s what the Lord does when he judges us as remember this he’s talking about the church here he’s talking about Believers here he’s talking about those who claim to know him here so the Lord is about to evaluate this church and its spiritual condition and he’s to do it quite accurately but Jesus first sees something commendable in this congregation let’s look at what he sees Christ’s Commendation of this church in verse number 19 many admirable qualities right there listed in one verse in chapter 19 so as I before I read that the Lord has a a comp comprehensive knowledge of what people do that is admirable to him he knows all the good things you do he knows the little things that you do every single day of your life and so Jesus is always fair and his evaluation of people he sees some good things going on in this church and these things every Christian should should do and look what he says there’s two inner motives he comes up with he says I I know your Deeds I know your Deeds that they were busy in sacrificial Ministry to others they were doing things to build the church also he says I know you’re love it’s it’s quite amazing uh that this church is commended for love but it is especially when we discover the Terrible Things That Go on among some of the professed members so nonetheless the church had a disposition of doing good to men doing good to the Brotherhood especially those of the household of faith they had love and then he says I know your faith that they were committed to the right message love motivated their service Faith enabled their endurance to keep on and to display it with thankfulness with humility with willingness and with availability and then he says I know your service these people were focused on the needs of people they cared and looked at out for one another and verse 19 he says then I know your perseverance that they they were a group of people that beared up under the heavy load of trials they were tough they had their minds set that no matter what happens we are not going to quit and then he says in verse number 19 notice what he says at the end and that your Deeds are of late are greater than the first now that’s that’s an incredible compliment that means that they were progressing these were advancing spiritually and growing in Ministry growing in love and good works were on the increase in this local church they were better than when they first started off Bo that’s a great compliment are are you better than when you first started more mature than when you first started and trusted Christ are you more ready to have love and faith and service and perseverance in your life is that growing in your life or is it not there in your life these were advancing and Lord saw that very clearly and he commended them for it so with these admirable qualities everything though was not as it ought to be and let me remind you that those believers who hear and apply correct biblical Doctrine will understand that God is serious about his children living in Purity he’s serious about that and Satan got this church to tolerate become careless in not only a teaching that was against the word of God but practices in their daily life that was against God’s character and what a Christian ought to be so let’s look thirdly at Christ’s complaint and condemnation of this church and verse number 20 of Revelation 2 but I have this against you you tolerate the woman Jezebel who calls herself a propheus and she teaches and leads my bond servants astray so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrifice to Idols whoa the state of this church was that they were being infected from within not from without from within of course without had something to do with it but the danger was that this false propheus within the church was being tolerated by the church they were permitting her to do those things maybe it could be that she was very popular person a wealthy person some even suggested I was reading in church history that she could have been the wife of one of the leaders of the church that was hard to substantiate but it’s not too far-fetched see this the penetrating eye of God sees all this and he says you tolerate this woman Jezebel she was a self-proclaimed Propst that means she was not called by God she was a self-proclaimed teacher that means that she shouldn’t have been teaching in the church for one thing she wasn’t male if she was because it says she’s also a self-proclaimed leader in the church and then what does she do she leads her bond servants astray she leads a Christ Bond servants astray so that means she’s not handling God’s word accurately probably not using the word of God at all she is a prominent woman who claimed the gift of divine prophecy and leading God’s people into Pagan worship and Pagan feasts which often lead to sexual promiscuity so she is moving people away from true worship to false worship so in other words we could say it like this some people were looking the other way because they didn’t want to lose their jobs they didn’t want to lose their businesses so the church was allowing this woman Jezebel to teach in the church she was teaching that immorality was not a serious issue and not a serious sin issue and the participation in the Pagan Feast of the the cult trade gilds where Idol meat was sacrificed to pagan gods and eaten was also not sinful now she’s called Jezebel now whether that is her name or not we don’t know but I believe what John is doing it says he’s just like the old test and Jezebel now I know that you don’t usually name your dog Jezebel nor do you name your children that sometimes you name your cat that sorry about cat meaning that some people of course they may not know anything about the name Jezebel but anybody who at one time people did know what Jezebel meant that’s why they didn’t name uh give that name to people that they knew and loved and by John’s use the name Jezebel we can really get an Old Testament picture of her extremely Wicked and twisted character Jezebel is really literally evil personified but with makeup on she looks good she presents herself well she’s able to get people to listen to her so she’s probably very good and have a m has a Mastery of the language and the culture she knows how how to weave things in and out and who was Jezebel in the Old Testament she was the wife of King Ahab that we read that passage this morning that was the scripture reading who was Notorious for promoting idolatry and adultery in Israel so Jezebel is really used symbolically as a powerful influential evil in the church at the theat that Jezebel the daughter of King sidon was the great Seducer of I of Israel by idolatry and like her father she was Swift to violence and Murder She was dedicated to bail worship as her father was and his name was B eth Bell expresses his idolatry and then also Jezebel seduced the weak Ahab her husband the king of Israel Beyond calf worship to that of Bale worship which was a violation of the first and second commandments to have no other gods before me and you shall not make any Graven IM image and you shall not bow down nor serve them and then she was also a propheus of Baal now the passage we read uh in second in First Kings chapter 21 you notice that in that passage of scripture it says that her husband was doing evil in the sight of the Lord as his wife was instigating him so must had some kind of power over him to do the wrong thing and once he realized he was doing the wrong thing you know what the Bible says this is what it says surely there was no one like Ahab Who Sold himself to do evil in the sight of the Lord because Jezebel his wife incited him and then it says this he acted very abominably in following Idols according to all the amorites had done whom the Lord cast out before the sons of Israel and it came about when Ahab heard these words that he tore his clothes and put on sackcloth and fasted and laid in sackcloth and went about despondently then the word of the Lord came to Elijah the tishbite saying do you see how Ahab has humbled himself before him and because he humbled himself before me I will not bring evil in his day see even evil King Ahad when he repented of his sin and repentance becomes the key for it becomes the cure to the disease is when we turn from what we know and recognize that is wrong and evil and do it God’s way right even he did that and God responded to repentance that’s amazing passage of scripture so really no the whatever a person falls into as a Believer they can be rescued by God by repentance by turning genuine repentance putting off the sin confessing the sin coming to God humbling yourself saying Lord I have sinned against you and whom I was supposed to love and I want to turn from it I want to put on righteousness I want to put on truth I want to put on the garments that are pleasing to you and leave aside the sin so the spiritual enemy at TH ATA lured God’s servants in the same way as the bites in pergamum the church before this and the nicians which led people into immorality and Pagan worship so by false Spirit spiritualism Jezebel’s false teaching led her victims into the darkest of fleshly sins as though things done in the flesh in her mind Were Somehow outside the true person and therefore of no consequence she separated some people say this is a a sense of a bit of gnosticism she separated what goes on in your flesh has nothing to do with your relationship with God what goes on in your mind has nothing to do you can separate the two they you can’t separate who you are what you think is what you are right and people say well it’s really if Jesus says if you love me you’ll do what I say what we do we show our love to Christ so this church was tolerating a habitual sinful person they are tolerating crooked Doctrine they are tolerating her sinful practices so Satan who’s behind all this within a whole new group of Christians in a different Geographic iCal place under entirely different circumstances can lead people into the sin of immorality idolatry greed and idolatry and loose living under this propheus would actually defile the church and make it unhealthy infect it with these things so it was a badly infected Church see the Rune of sin has not left Humanity irreligious people are very religious everywhere you look bumper stickers t-shirts bookstores talk shows give evidence that people are created for a relationship with God now of course sin has not removed spirituality it has simply warped it and this is a very this is very dangerous for us because it is easy to think that if you are religious then you must know God see that is a lie right out the pit of Hell and has been the destruction of many because they have formulated their own religious system and their own God so it could accommodate the way they live that’s a liee and Satan of course remember is a liar from the beginning and he’s good at it so Brethren immorality is always sin and displeases the Lord and leads all to all kinds of other sins this woman Jezebel was encouraging acceptance and participation with the seemingly harmless and culturally accepted practices already being done all around them as normal so the habitual practice of that which God opposes is a failure to take sin seriously and we live in a very promiscuous promiscuous Society with many Temptations we have more sexual sins going on today than ever before and each one has a title each one has a letter and people have become numb to what is right to what is wrong what is wrong is right what is right is wrong what is acceptable but the Bible still calls us to be different even if we live in that time at in that place and most people have a moral and ethical standard they do but when they do not acknowledge God’s standard for Morality they are Guided by their own decra degrading passions to make their own standard and when people live by their own standard their own desires instead of God’s word it is evidence that either they’re spiritually careless or they do not know God at all it was the Lord who said through the Prophet Jeremiah that when people move away from God’s word then they live according to their own desires and this is what the Lord said in Jeremiah because you have forsaken my law which I set before them and have not obeyed my voice and walked according to it but have walked after the stubbornness of their heart and after the Bales the idols as their fathers taught them so God does not accommodate himself to our lifestyle but demands that we confirm our ways by his ways and of course this really should not the case with a real Born Again Blood Bought Spirit indwelt believer because they know God they’re Kingdom children and therefore their standard for living is not their own but the Lord’s it was Reverend Henry skugal in his very good little Trea called True Religion small little book titled the life of God and the soul of man he wrote something that that’s worth quoting here he says it is the highest Folly to regulate our an actions by any other standard than by that which we must be judged if ever we would cleanse our way it must be by taking heed that therefore according to God’s word end quote so to summarize that quote with this passage from Colossians s it’s a Spirit-filled empowered person rules his body and is not caught in the grip of uncontrolled sexual desire where it says therefore consider your members the members of your Earthly body as dead dead to what to immorality to impurity to Passion to evil desire to Greed which all amounts to idolatry no one can be involved with this kind of lifestyle without sinning against God cheating his fellow human beings and then of course even his own Brothers and Sisters in Christ that ignorance of God’s demonstration itself uh leads to idolatry not the ugly obvious idolatry of statues and shrines but a subtle idolatry of refashioning the true God into an image that fits our lives in other words we profess to know the god of the Bible but in fact we know only the god of our own imagination so religious people religious people’s thinking is often rooted in a wrong view of God when they form in their minds such a God as suits their own desires and passions and think that God to be such a one as favors and agrees with them when in fact they do not know God at all and are far from loving our great God and savior that Reigns in heaven and does whatever he pleases see people may have a right Bible they may have right words but in reality living under the influence of a god they’ve invented and they fashion a God that thinks and looks like them a God who is just fine with their lifestyle and choices and in their deception and believe me it is self-deception they worship man-made gods in their own hearts and then they think like this well I’ll just repent of my sin and God will forgive me now that may be the case if it’s a real repentance but sometimes it’s not real repentance sometimes it’s it’s saying I’ll sin and repent so God forgives me God’s a forgiven God but that’s presumptuous sin you’re committing another sin now and presumptuous sin is you think God is going to make a decision based on your way of doing things and it’s completely opposite and Many religious people have mistaken ideas of God that they are form that are formulated outside what we find in scripture and why is that because as the psalmist wrote these things you have done and I kept silence you thought I was just like you and then it says this I will repr reprove you and state the case in order before your eyes let me tell you how it really is God will say to them see so when we think of that realize that in this point that the Lord condemns this church because they were doing all these good things but there was a portion of some of them not all of them in the church that were allowing the church to be infected and if you allow the infection to start and you don’t do anything about it what happens it takes over and it kills that’s what it does it’s a cancer this is cancerous sin that enters the church now look number four Christ’s counsel and correction to this church look what it says in verse number 21 and this does display before us the patience of god notice what it says I gave her time to repent verse 21 I gave her time so in other words the Lord extends time to us even while we’re caught in a sin he’s saying listen I’m going to give you time to see what you’re doing that is evil and wrong so you can repent of it genuinely and come back and serve me and do the right thing the patience of God the longsuffering of God giving God time for this woman who’s already leading people to stray to repent but what does she do notice in verse number 21 I gave her time to repent and she does not want to repent of her immorality so the L Lord gives her time to repent of her teaching to repent of her deeds and idolatry and immorality and to repent of following and the people who are following her to uh repent of that so God in in his long suffering gives Sinners time to repent to get right with him because repentance is when you say I’m done going my way I’m turning around and I’m going God’s way and if one does not repent if one does not repent then God God’s patience must be replaced with his Justice and judgment will come so in this case that we have here in scripture there is no will or desire to repent and it’s a sad thing when people dig in against what is true and what is right in their life it’s actually a very ugly thing to see that when a person knows the right thing to do and and because of the pleasure they’re receiving from the situation they’re in and and Satan always tempts for pleasure they they say oh I’m having more fun now than serving the lord so I’m just going to keep going on this but when Grace ends and it will Judgment follows see God’s extending Grace to people longsuffering to people and then what do we see in verse verse 22 the powerful Judgment of God it says behold I will throw her on the bed of sickness and Those who commit adultery with her into Great Tribulation unless they repent of her her deeds and I will kill her children with pestilence and all the churches will know that I am he who searches the mind and hearts and will give to each one of you according to your Deeds so he’s saying to them listen I will do this I will even get her followers who will not repent and this is the Judgment that’s going to come upon them because I know everything that’s going on I search the mind and I search the kidneys you say wow what kidneys the word heart can be translated kidneys because people thought back then that your heart was more of thinking and and will that your kidneys were your Deep Emotions and some have translated that in in certain Bibles which is not a bad translation because God has to reach down and squeeze your kidneys or some people call I don’t know if a gizzard it’s a kidney but I heard the old some old preacher saying and God reaches down and squeezes your gizzard and he squeezes it till it hurts so you repent because he knows that’s the right choice and that’s what will be helpful for you and that’s will stop the infection so his righteous judgment brings back into view an accurate understanding of who the Incarnate God has reveal himself to be and that is Christ the one who searches the minds and the hearts that’s what he does and then number five verse 24- 29 it says this that Christ com his Christ’s command and challenge to this church what is it now what is so great about this passage of scripture we started out with all the good things the church was doing right but not everybody got caught up in this sin and these sins some people definitely held to truth and didn’t get caught up in it and they were called the Overcomers they’re called the conquerors they’re they’re the ones who who defeated in their own heart and mind The Temptations of this particular teaching and this particular woman and notice in verse number 24 there’s one command that God gives and notice what he says in verse 24 chapter 2 but I say to you the rest who are in thra who do not hold the te this teaching who have not known the Deep things of Satan as they call them I place no other burden on you and then no notice in verse 25 NE nevertheless what you have hold fast until the end so this group of conquerors who who who are they really well there are those who have the Lord’s word and hold fast to it in true faith and obedience they did not give in they knew it was right it was clear to them no matter what the consequence were they were willing to be that tough people secondly those who did not get to know the Deep things of Satan they did not practice the false teaching and give into to the license for fornication and adultery and eating at idol Feast Satan always wants to get people to worship what is false and things that are not true but you know what if you think about it to study the shallow depth of Satan is deadly to study the Deep things of Satan is deadlier still so Satan will always lead one to destruction and usually through the door of some kind of pleasure Promise by worshiping a God who approves of everything you want and by satisfying the sinful CRA Cravings of your heart that’s what he does so these people the these conquerors did not give in to the Deep things of Satan I think that that also refers to the the power of this message that was coming to them through this woman it was from the pit of Hell and it had had all the force of Hell coming against him to grap grapple with them and and pull them in and some thought to prove the depths of Satan one must plunge into them to understand them well that that’s just foolish foolishness that’s just deceptive reasoning to know what is murder to know what murder is you don’t need to kill some person especially when you know God’s command on the matter Thou shalt not murder you don’t know you don’t to know know what the Deep things of Satan is you you don’t need to plunder into his depths especially when you know from scripture he’s a liar he’s a roaring lying seeking who he may devour and then we find in Revelation 12 verse number n it says that and the Great Dragon who was thrown down the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan who deceives the whole world he’s he’s a Deceiver once we know that why would we listen to him when we know the truth we’ll identify him quickly and also these conquerors to realize fornica what fornication is you don’t need to commit fornication especially when you know God’s will on the matter and what is God’s will on the matter Thessalonians says for this is the will of God your sanctification that is that you abstain from sexual immorality so that means that young men and young women if you want to know and do God’s will will abstinence until marriage that’s it that’s what God’s will is but that’s not the message you’re getting out there matter of fact marriage doesn’t even come into the conversation very much anymore marriage is too complicated too many things go that no we’re going to be separate and if we don’t like ourselves down the road we’re just going to go our separate ways with everything intact it’s my stuff it’s your stuff so it’s abstinence in fact the Bible says in Hebrews 134 marriage is to be held in in honor among all and the marriage bed is to be undefiled for fornicators those who are not married who committing sexual acts and adulterers though who are those who are married and con uh commit sexual acts apart from their their marriage partner God will judge so why would anybody expect that God’s not going to do anything when that’s what he said he would do because it’s false teaching it’s deceptive teaching it’s teaching that is infected your life will infect your family will will infect you for a long time and it’s very hard to recover from it unless you repent right now so the Holy Spirit has has given you the ability to be in control of your body and its passions that’s what it says God is working in US Purity and we are to work out that Purity in our thought life and in our daily relationships and in our activities so so it is God’s will that every Christian is to know how to act in the manner of sex as it is pleasing to God and not only that Thessalonians tells us that sexual impurity without repentance actually rejects God for it says in 1 Thessalonians 4:8 consequently he who rejects this is not rejecting man but God who gave his holy spirit to you anyone who treats sexual sin as no big deal is actually treating God and His word of no account see whoever despises the teaching about Holiness is not just despising some human rule but despises God himself and those who justify loose living do not hesitate to set God aside and sin against God who is present at the moment to go on to live in impurity is a direct insult to the Divine giver and a sin against the Holy Spirit who is the power of God unto Holiness so someone who is a Christian who falls into sexual sin they’re already in the flesh they’re already somewhat ignorant of what God says in the word of God they have grieved God’s spirit and quenched God’s spirit so that they have no power to overcome what they’re getting involved with and now God is against them and God will judge their activity see that’s not a good place to be but God wants us to know that if we get in that place we can repent of our sin and get back to walking with him again but I want you to notice something at the end of verse number 24 it says says this at the end of verse number 24 chapter 2 it says but I say to you the rest of you who are in thra who do not hold this teaching who have not known the Deep things of Satan as they call them I place no other burden on you that little phrase no other burden on you I said wow what does that actually mean what does that actually mean those who know they do have a soul burden and there’s no other burden that God’s going to give them once they know their soul burden and what’s their soul burden as you’ve been teaching Us in the word of God to hold fast the word of God that’s their soul burden that means to hold fast the true word of God against all wrong Doctrine and all dangerous practices of sin and the Lord says hold to that that and I’ll will give you no other burden that is the burden that we have the Lord’s not going to Heap upon us more than that and then notice what he does he says okay those who are conquerors I have two promises for you I have two promises for you verse number 26 I will give you power over the Nations it says he who overcomes and he who keeps my Deeds until the end to him I will give Authority over the Nations and he shall rule them with a rod of iron as the vessels of the Potter are broken to Pieces as I also have received Authority from my father he is saying to the Overcomers Christ promises privileges similar to those of that himself because it says in Revelation 19:1 15 that Christ will strike down the Nations and he will rule them with a rod of iron and he says listen all you who are conquerors you’re going to be with me doing the same thing so it’s talking about the rule of Christ on Earth and that when Christ rules that those who overcame those who held fast to his word you have a promise when that time comes when that end time comes you will be with me my Saints will participate in the destruction of the evil forces in the ruling Nation and Christ speaks here with authority that his word has force and finality to it it has a command about it and therefore it is better to listen to than any false teaching so that means the whole point of the rod of iron ruling with the rod of iron that means there’s still going to be evil in the world when Christ rules you don’t rule with a rod of iron unless there’s evil so the image here is Christ shepherding these nations with an iron scepter a shepherd’s Club in other words which kills the enemies of the sheep that the shepherding is is not the care of the sheep here but the destruction of their predatory foes so here it describes the Furious wrath of God Almighty who overcomes his enemies with ease and establishes his government on Earth Messiah will destroy the unlawful nations with the word of his mouth and he will rule with absolute Authority and we will rule with him that’s what Revelation 20 verse4 says that’s the privilege that we have the privilege to judge the privilege to Reign we will reign with him a thousand years the privilege of being priests and rulers where it says in Revelation 26 but they will be Priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years so we will join Christ in ruling the Earth that’s the promise that is given to the Saints who live in a situation where there’s infection all around them but they hold forth the truth and they’re not pulled down by it they’re not deceived by it they just keep serving the lord and stepping putting one step in front of the other breathing in and out and doing the Lord’s will and then notice one last thing what it says God promises I said the first promise is that we’ll rule with him second promise notice in verse number 28 he says I will give you the Morning Star he who has an ear let him hear what the spirit says to the churches who is the Morning Star well look at Revelation 22:6 who’s the Morning Star Revelation 22:16 look for yourself see it in your own Bible Revelation 22:16 it says I Jesus have sent my angel to testify to you these things for the churches I am the root and the descendant of David the bright and Morning Star so what does the Lord promise US himself that he will be our God we will be his people and there will be no more separation between us and him forever and ever it’s hard to your mind around it but that’s what the Bible says but until then it’s going to be a battle to hold a line to be faithful so the remaining believers who did not fall under the spell of this apostasy were Bright Lights of faithfulness and Doctrine who would continue as a lampstand in the church to uphold the light of the Gospel until Christ comes so what are we to do we’re to hold fast Christ’s word and works till the end that means we need to know the word of God secondly we need to flee temptation to live a holy life that should be our ultimate desire to live a holy separate life different from everybody else around us different from the world different from the one we used to live also we are to look to the Future when we will rule and reign with Jesus on Earth that will happen happen and then we need to learn to love Jesus and be quick to repent of sin when we fall into it because it shows you love Jesus when you do that the one who died in your place the one who took the wrath of God for you the one who shed his blood unto death to wash away your sin the one who rose again to give you eternal life the one who is seated in heaven right now praying for us so we don’t fall the one who seated in heaven right now preparing a place for us that where he is we may be the one who’s seated in heaven who is PR PR preparing to come back and get his church his bride and take it back with him where we will have the great beam of seed judgment where Christians will be judged from the time they trust to Christ to the end of their life how are you Liv living your life that should all be in our mind matter of fact we should be telling ourselves that every single day you say well I understand that well tell it to yourself preach it to yourself every day until nothing else can get in and that you know where you stand and you become strong you hold hold to the truth I’m not letting go on this no matter what you do that’s how you should feel and I should feel amen amen let’s pray Lord thank you this morning for the word of God it is the most awesome book on this Earth because it contains your mind it is written by your spirit it’s been protected over the ages it has been scrutinized burned banished and yet lord it’s still here and it still has the truth and thank you Lord that we have the proof of that that every single day of Our Lives we can read it grow in our understanding put the things into practice because we have the power of the spirit of God to do that and then to live for you so our congregation can continue to uphold as a lampstand to uphold the light so other people have not heard the gospel yet can hear it and believe and those who have heard it and come to the church can grow in their faith and become strong and realize the deception that’s all around them and the affection that can easily come into our spiritual life and to know the truth to be able to repent of their sin and head off that infection so they become healthy productive Christians in Christ Church I pray for this and for all of us in Jes Jesus name amen