Indeed, those words you're just saying, Jesus cast a look on me, give me sweet simplicity and make me poor and keep me low, seeking only thee to know and we know him in his word. And so I'm gonna ask you to please remain standing and to take God's word, their Bibles, turn to Revelation chapter two. It's the book of Revelation chapter two. Scripture reading is gonna begin in Verse 18, and I'll read to the end of the chapter. Verse 29, that's 12 verses. This is the longest of the messages to the churches. We are now in the fourth church of the seven churches of Revelation. This is the message to the church in Thyatira. And beginning in verse 18, God's word says this, and to the angel of the church in Thyatira, Right, the son of God who has eyes like a flame of fire and his feet are like burnished bronze says this, I know your deeds and your love and faith and service and perseverance and that your deeds of late are greater than at first. But I have this against you, that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and she teaches and leads my bondservants astray, so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols. I gave her time to repent, and she does not want to repent of her immorality. Behold, I will throw her on a bed of sickness, and those who commit adultery with her into great tribulation, unless they repent of her deeds. And I will kill her children with pestilence, and all the churches will know that I am He who searches the minds and hearts. And I will give to each one of you according to your deeds. But I say to you, the rest who are in Thyatira, 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. Nevertheless, what you have, hold fast until I come. 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 and I will give him the morning star. He who has an ear, let him hear. what the Spirit says to the churches. Let's pray. Father in heaven, how grateful we are to have your word before us. Lord, we thank you for your word because we know your word is truth. And so, Lord, we ask now as your word is preached, we ask, Lord, that your Holy Spirit would give us understanding. We ask, Lord, if I say things here that are incorrect to your word, we pray your Holy Spirit would make that known to these people. And yet, Lord, if what I say is according to your revealed word, we ask that your Holy Spirit would convict us of these great truths for your glory and for the good of your church, we pray in Jesus' name, amen. You may please be seated. I think as many of you know, this last Thursday was the 80th anniversary of the D-Day invasion, and sometimes we forget just how involved, how detailed that invasion was. It was still to this day the largest amphibious invasion in history. Nothing has come close since. It took 15 hours for 150,000 Allied soldiers to land in occupied France. Just the planning for D-Day took almost two years. And I want you just to imagine all the details that they had to take in place to pull that off. Just feeding 150,000, you know, how do you feed that many people? All the details that they had to think of. The planning itself must have been a nightmare. And one part of the plan was the night before the invasion to have bombers fly over the beach and drop bombs on the beach that would create these craters. So when the soldiers arrived on the beach, they could run and jump in these craters and miss all the machine gun fire. Unfortunately, though, the planes were flying at night in the fog, And they missed the beach with all the bombs that they dropped. They didn't hit the beach at all. So when the soldiers landed, when the troops landed and they came on the beach, there's no protection for them at all from all that machine gun fire. 7,000 Allied ships brought the soldiers across the English Channel. And when the soldiers arrived in those landing crafts, and those gates would go down, What they found on the beach was just total, total chaos. One soldier described it this way, said, with men's bodies everywhere, with wounded men crying, both in the water and on the shingle, I'm assuming the shingle is that gate that comes down on those landing crafts, but he said the beach sounded like a beehive with bullets flying everywhere. Can you imagine that? I mean, what a vivid description that is. The buzzing of bullets all over the place sounded like a beehive, he said. Another said it was cold. Even though it was June, the water temperature was probably 45 or 50 degrees. That's colder than if you've ever been in the ocean over here. I mean, that's colder than our beach. Another said, I saw men sinking all around me. There were bodies floating everywhere, face down in the water with packs still on their backs. Another said, I thought I was the last man in hell. A journalist named Ernie Pyle was there after the invasion. And he wrote about just all the bodies floating in the water and so forth. And he said that he witnessed the awful taste and destruction of war. A week after the invasion, the same reporter walked along the beach. All the bodies, of course, had been taken away. But he walked along the beach. Here's what he wrote. He said, here in a jumbled row for mile on mile are soldiers' packs. Here are socks and shoe polish, sewing kits, diaries, Bibles, and hand grenades. Here are the latest letters from home. Here are toothbrushes and razors and snapshots of families back home staring up at you from the sand. Men and women on that one day, 4,000 414 soldiers died, and countless more were wounded. I've said it to you before, I have no idea how they did it. I really don't know if I could have got on one of those troop ships. When that gate came down, I don't know if I could have run out onto that beach with the bullets sounding like a beehive. I don't know that I could do it. I don't know that I could have my son do it. And yet they did. And for what? Why'd they do it? I think you know the answer. President Roosevelt said it in a famous prayer on that day. He said this, our sons, pride of our nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. There's your answer. That's why they did it. That's why they were willing to risk their life and suffer. And all of that was for freedom, because we Americans love freedom. And spiritually, we Christians love freedom as well. Jesus said in John 8, 32, he said, if you continue in my word, then you are truly disciples of mine, and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free. Apostle Paul said this, it was for freedom that Christ set us free and therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery. But what does that mean? What does it mean that we as Christians are free? Does it mean that we're now free to sin all we want? Does it mean like that little saying that goes, oh, the grace of God, oh, blessed condition, I can sin all I want and still have remission? Is that what it means? Is that what it means that we're free in Christ? Does it mean we're now free from the demands of the law? Well, today there are many who teach basically a form of that very thing. It's called antinomianism. From namas, from the Greek word namas, which is law, and anti, the Greek word for against. They're against the idea that there is any law that we have to keep. Oh, don't point to the law, don't tell me I need to do this or that. I'm free in Christ, they say. Well, the church in Thyatira, there were some who were basically teaching that very thing as well. And in Christ's message to the church of Thyatira, you're going to see not only the problem of antinomianism, but you see here also the problem of false teachers and just how serious Christ takes that issue. of false teachers in the church. And therefore, as we look at this text, I hope you will understand the importance of examining teachers in light of the word of God and in seeking to live in a way that is pleasing to God. We have, what, 12 verses before us? We're going to divide this up the same way that we have been dividing it up for all the churches. God's Word basically gives us the outline because we have first a description to each church. Christ describes himself in a different way to each church. Then we have a commendation. Here's what the church is doing well. Then there's this rebuke, but here's what you're not doing well. Here's what you need to repent of. Then there's the charge. And here's what I want you to do. And then there's a promise. There's great promise. If you do what I'm telling you to do, here's the promise. And so we begin with the description. And we are now in Thyatira. And what is unique about this church is that of the seven churches mentioned in Revelation, Thyatira was the least significant. Of the seven cities that are mentioned, Thyatira, boy, it was the least significant. And yet the church there received the longest letter. I like that. I might be reading into it something that's not there, but I like that. And the reason is because ever since I went into the ministry 42 years ago, as a youth pastor, I've always been at small churches. My whole ministry has been at small churches. I actually have no desire to be at one of those big megachurches. I live here in Southern California. I think we have more megachurches in Southern California than anywhere else in the U.S., maybe except Texas or something. But you need to realize that, what I read once, 85% of the churches in the world are 200 members or less. Most churches are little churches, and certainly Reformed Baptist churches are usually little churches. And I like that. Here's this insignificant city and therefore this insignificant little church and yet they get the longest letter and if i may read into this something that's probably not there but it shows me that christ considers this church significant you know you might be insignificant in the world's eyes but to me you're significant and i have much to say to you. One thing we know about Thyatira is that it had many trade guilds. And to be a Christian in that city would be very, very difficult because those trade guilds often practiced idolatry, which a Christian couldn't participate in. And therefore, Kind of like, as James has told us about Pakistan, kind of like being a Christian in Pakistan, it's very hard for a Christian to make a living there. It's very hard to make a living without compromising in some way with idolatry. And so now to this church, Christ describes himself this way, verse 18. the son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and his feet are like burnished bronze." That's how he describes himself to this church. Remember, people, we already said this city was full of idolatry. And on top of that, there was also the worship of Caesar. Remember, and the Caesars claim to be gods and to be worshiped as God. And sometimes even said that they were the son of God. And so the first thing that Christ says to this church is that he alone is the son of God. And notice this one true son of God. Notice it says he has eyes like a flame of fire and feet like burnished bronze. Both of those images point to impending judgment. His eyes see all. His feet are of great strength. And then remember, later in chapter 14, we're going to see that he will tread, you know, with his feet, he will tread upon the wicked in the winepress of God's wrath. That's Christ's description of himself to this church. Now the commendation. Look at verse 19. Verse 19 says, I know your deeds and your love and faith and service and perseverance, and that your deeds of late are greater than at first. In other words, Christ commends this church for several things. In many ways, people, this church in Ziotero was a very good church. There was lots of works. There was love and service. By the way, that's why I read the reading from James for the law. There was love in this church. There was good works. There was faith and perseverance in this church. And not only that, notice their works were increasing. Your deeds of late are greater than at first. But there was a huge problem, wasn't there? And that takes us to the rebuke, it's verse 20. Verse 20 says this, but I have this against you, that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and she teaches and leads my bond servants astray so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols. People think of the contrast between the church, this church, and the church in Ephesus. Look at the contrast. Thyatira was not defective in love, whereas the church in Ephesus, remember, they had abandoned their first love. But Ephesus had no toleration for error and false messages. They had no toleration for that, and yet Thyatira's problem was just that. There was a willingness to tolerate, as we were told, the woman Jezebel. Well, who's that? Who's this woman Jezebel? Well, her name isn't really Jezebel, that's symbolic. Christ is calling this heresy by a symbolic name. He identifies this teaching with Jezebel, the wicked queen from the ninth century BC, who, remember what she did? She led God's people into idolatry and immorality. Well, here, the Jezebel of this church in Thyatira is advocating a compromise with paganism. Apparently. Men and women, we need, I think, to pause here for a moment, because this really hits home to the day in which we live today here in America. I like what David Chilton said in his commentary. He said this, just like the Jezebel of the Old Testament, the Jezebel of Thyatira, of the Thyatirian church, similarly advocated compromise with paganism. Of course, very pious-sounding terminology would have accompanied this, perhaps to the effect that, well, you know, after all, there is only one God, so any worship rendered to false gods is really offered to the true God. Or that by joining pagans in their religious services, one might be able to witness for Christianity. Or that going along with the heathen will enable Christians to survive rather than be wiped out by persecution. Or perhaps that all religions have something to teach each other. All of those things that we hear of today. Men and women, I said we need to pause here. Because again, we hear this type of thing in the church today. How many times have we been told God doesn't care how you come to Him in worship as long as you come to Him. How many times have you heard that? Steve and I hear it all the time because we're, Steve and I and the elders of this church are trying to be very faithful in our form of worship. And I hear all the time from friends and people saying, oh, God doesn't care. He doesn't care how we come to Him in worship as long as we come to Him. Well, yes, He does care. Nadab and Abihu would disagree with that comment. They brought, they sincerely brought the strange incense before God. And what did he do? He struck them dead. He said, I'll be treated as holy. You know, God, the second commandment, God cares how we approach him in worship. Or years ago, being raised in the liberal church in San Francisco Bay Area, this is very familiar to me, but years ago, there was that real push for the ecumenical movement. It's not so talked about anymore, but it's still around. Do you remember, though, the big emphasis on the ecumenical movement? I sure do. The idea is that there's so many churches out there How are we going to get united? And the way to become united was to compromise. Each church, each religion has to just compromise main points of the religion and therefore we'll all be united, we'll all get along. I went online and looked up a definition of the ecumenical movement and here's what I found. Online it said this, members of the Protestant or Orthodox Roman Catholic and Mormon churches all call themselves Christians, and yet they also maintain theologies and practices that diverge in significant ways. Ecumenical organizations such as the World Council of Churches and the National Association of Evangelicals attempt to bridge those differences, although such efforts remain controversial. You bet it's controversial. Because the ecumenical movement wants churches to compromise significant doctrinal beliefs. Now certainly there are doctrines which we hold, which we would consider in-house disagreements. Baptism for example. Some of our brethren baptize infants and they say we're wrong not to. We baptize only believers and say you're wrong not to. But we're brothers and sisters. That's an in-house debate. Views of end times. The various views on end times. That's an in-house debate. We don't divide over that. Or formal or informal worship. Some pastors I know wear jeans and a t-shirt when they preach. I wear, I'm old, so I gotta wear a coat and a tie. I just can't not do it. But those are issues that we need to be tolerant. of one another. But if you ask the Protestant, will you give up, will you give up sola scriptura, scripture alone, so that you can get along with the Greek Orthodox? We would say no. If you ask the Roman Catholic, will you give up belief in the one true triune God, so that you can get along with the Mormons, which believe in trillions of gods, will you give that up? Rightfully, they would say no, we won't. And men and women, I was confronted with this 30 years ago when I came to this church. And I was just this young guy, my second senior pastorate, and I came to this church and I kept hearing, only about five of you are gonna even know what I'm talking about, but I kept hearing over and over again about this church that a former associate pastor had started to reach out to the Jews And I know this former pastor, he's with the Lord now, but he was a great guy, loved the Lord. Brilliant guy as well, he really knew Hebrew and so forth. But he started a church with the idea that we're gonna reach the Jews by putting Christianity in a Jewish format. Well, I visited the church, it met on Saturdays, not Sundays, because that's the Jewish day of worship. They wore Jewish prayer cloths and so forth. They kept the dietary laws. One of the members was my secretary's daughter and her husband that lived with my secretary. And they made her keep a kosher kitchen. When Passover came, she had to open up all the cupboards and they had to sweep the cupboards for any leaven that might be in there and so forth. And when I visited the church, I started to think, where have, When have you left Christianity and become just simply Jewish? The only thing that they, when they would refer to Christ, they would call him Yeshua. But I don't know that they ever preached from Galatians. I don't know that they would have ever preached what we saw here just a few weeks ago, where Jesus Christ calls the Jews the synagogue of Satan. I don't know that they would have mentioned that part. My point is this, when have we thrown the baby out with the bathwater? I think this issue here in Thyatira is very timely for the church in America today. Notice something else about this Jezebel. Look at verse 24, look ahead at verse 24. But I say to you, the rest who are in Thyatira, who do not hold this teaching, who have not known the deep things of Satan as they call them, perhaps this false teacher, and by the way, She might have been a woman. She might have been the wife of one of the pastors. She might have been a man, we don't know. But notice, Christ refers to the deep things as they call them. Perhaps this false teacher said, which we hear so often today as well, oh, you know, the Bible is good. Read the Bible. It can take you only so far, though. What you need is the deep things that I can offer. You need the revelation knowledge that I can give you. Didn't we hear that with Benny Hinn years ago? Remember when he famously said, you know, there's nine persons to the Trinity and everybody was kind of aghast. And he said, well, you didn't come here to hear what you already know, did he? You came here for real revelation knowledge. Perhaps something similar to that is going on at this church in Thyatira. And by the way, perhaps in verse 24, Jesus is making a point by calling it actually the deep things of Satan. You know, she calls it the deep things of God. They're actually the deep things of Satan. Now people, this is a very important issue. Once again, let me refer to Chilton. I can't say it better than this. He says, this must be clearly understood. Orthodox biblical Christianity is intolerant. A church that tolerates evil, and false doctrine is a church under judgment. God will not tolerate her. This is not to say that Christians should be intolerant of each other's mistakes or idiosyncrasies and differences over non-essentials. But when it comes to clear violations of biblical law and orthodox doctrine, the government of the church is required by scripture to put a stop to it before it destroys the church. And apparently they didn't do that here at the church in Thyatira. And so that takes us now to the charge or the command. Verses 21 through 23. Verse 21. I gave her time to repent, and she does not want to repent of her immorality. Behold, I will throw her on a bed of sickness, and those who commit adultery with her into great tribulation, unless they repent of her deeds. And I will kill her children with pestilence, and all the churches will know that I am He who searches the minds and hearts, and I will give to each one of you according to your deeds." People, obviously this problem, this false teaching had been going on for some time. But Christ in his mercy was giving her or them time to repent. But she did not repent. And so there was nothing left except for Christ to act. And he says, I will cast her into a sickbed. And that sickbed may not be a literal illness, but instead a reference to the tribulation which he is going to bring upon her. And notice, and her children. In other words, those who follow her. Men and women, I think you can see the application in our own day right here. In many ways, the church today is a mess, isn't it? I certainly know that, having grown up in a liberal church. We have seen false doctrine come into the church. And it is tolerated. And how long will the church last before God brings judgment? I don't know. But I want you to notice again, verse 24. Verse 24, but I say to you, the rest who are in Thyatira, 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. When God judges, when God brings down his judgment, the righteous have nothing to fear. Each man will receive what his deeds warrant. And Christ has no other instruction to place upon those who have remained undefiled by the false teaching of Jezebel other than this, hold fast until I come. Verse 25, verse 25, nevertheless, Nevertheless, what you have, hold fast until I come. Once again, just as we've said in the past, is that the second coming of Christ that he's referring to? Or until I come in judgment upon this church? I think in the context, it is the latter part, that he's gonna come in judgment upon them. Hold fast until that happens. But either way, Christ tells you to hold fast. And that takes us to the last point. It's the promise. Verses 26 and 27. 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 have also received authority from my father. That, of course, is a reference to Psalm 2, a messianic psalm, where the father promises the son rule over the world. Rule over the world and of all the nations. And the point here is that the Christian who overcomes, they're promised a share in the reign of Jesus Christ. But that's not all. Look at verses 28 and 29. Verse 28, and I will give him the morning star. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. I will give him the morning star. What does that mean? Well, later in chapter 22, Jesus will identify himself as the bright and morning star. And so just as he was the hidden manna that was promised to the overcomers in the church in Pergamum, here we see that he's the morning star that will be given to the overcomers of the church in Thyatira. The promise may simply be that those who persevere through this dark time that they are living in right now, those who persevere through it, they'll live to see the dawning of a new day. In other words, hang in there. Saying, hang in there. Don't give up. I liked our responsive reading this morning for this reason. Isaiah 21, verse 11 says this, Watchman, how long the night? How long the night? Watchman says, morning comes. Sometimes we think that very thing, how long the night? How long do we have to go through this? And what God's word says is, mourning comes. And he says to them, hang in there. Hang in there, mourning comes. Be faithful. Those are his words to a suffering church. Hang in there, mourning comes. Men and women at that time in history, there were lots of Christians who were famously martyred for their faith. One of them was Polycarp that we mentioned, what, two weeks ago, I think, the Bishop of Smyrna that we referred to before. He was famously martyred there. Another was a woman named Perpetua. I think many of you have heard of Perpetua. She lived and died in Carthage in North Africa. Today that's Tunisia, by the way. But Perpetual was converted to Christ, and therefore would not put a pinch of incense on the altar for the Caesars. And because of that, she was sentenced to death in the Colosseum in Carthage. And the Colosseum in Carthage was the second biggest Colosseum. The one in Rome was the biggest, and then the one in Carthage. And they had started to develop all these different ways that they could kill Christians to the dazzle, the dazzlement of the crowd. And she was sentenced to that. Her father begged her. You know, she had a little baby. Hey, for the sake of your baby, don't do this. Don't, just put a little pinch on the altar, just renounce Christ and live. Her father just couldn't understand why she would do such a thing. And fortunately for us, just like with Anne Frank. Fortunately for us, Perpetua kept a diary. And I want you to listen to one entry from her diary. She says this, while we were still under arrest, my father, out of love for me, was trying to persuade me and shake my resolution. Father, said I, do you see this vase here? Yes, I do, he said. And I told him, could it be called by any other name than what it is? He said, no. Well, so too, I cannot be called anything other than what I am, a Christian. I mentioned Perpetua because she was a famous martyr. But Chilton reminds us of this great fact about these believers here in Thyatira. He says this, to be a faithful Christian in Thyatira meant hardship and suffering, and not necessarily a very glorious headline-making sort of suffering either. Just the day-to-day grind of faithfulness to Christ's word, just the fact of being unemployed and unemployable in the midst of a booming economy. when everyone around could get work for the mere price of burning a little incense or eating a little meat from a pagan altar. There was no opportunity for a great moral crusade. Everyone just thought you were weird, and night after night your children would cry for food. No, this kind of martyrdom was not very glorious at all. But those who remained faithful were promised that they would overcome and that they would rule with Christ. The situation would be reversed. The tables were about to be turned. Christ was coming to save and to judge. And for Christians, The night was just ending. The redeemed and liberated universe was rushing headlong into a bright day. Christ was about to give these overcomers the morning star. And men and women, the promise is to you as well. The one who overcomes, the one who keeps his deeds, who hangs in there until the end, Christ will give. The Morning Star. Let's pray. Father in heaven, how grateful we are for these words here. How grateful we are for this church in Thyatira. And Lord, what an example they are to us. What an example they are to us of some of the very mistakes that we are making yet today. But also what an example some of them are. To standing and being faithful. To looking toward the end. to being ready to endure, to go through the dark times and looking to that morning star. Lord, how we thank you for this great promise. And we pray, Lord, that you would strengthen your church. We pray, Lord, that we'd take these words to heart. And we thank you when we pray this. In Jesus Christ's name, amen.