Alright brethren, let's turn
to Revelation chapter 2. Revelation chapter 2. Our text is going to be found
in verses 8 through 11. Revelation 2 verses 8 through
11. Let's read this together. And unto the angel of the church
in Smyrna write, These things saith the first and the last,
which was dead and is alive. I know thy works and tribulation
and poverty, but thou art rich. And I know the blasphemy of them
which say they are Jews and are not, but are the synagogue of
Satan. Fear none of those things which
thou shalt suffer. Behold, the devil shall cast
some of you into prison, that you may be tried. and ye shall
have tribulation ten days. Be thou faithful unto death,
and I will give thee a crown of life. He that hath an ear,
let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. He that
overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death." Now, this
letter was written to Smyrna. They were up the coast from Ephesus
on the Aegean Sea, 20-30 miles, something like that. And they
were, it was a pagan rich city given to idolatry, but God established
a church there. And he probably used Paul whenever
Acts 19.10 says in those two years that Paul preached at Ephesus,
it says, all they which dwelt in Asia, All they which dwelt
in Asia heard the word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks."
That's probably when this church was founded by the Lord. Now
the Lord doesn't give any correction here like he did to the church
in Ephesus. Here the Lord is encouraging
the believer to persevere in the faith. Persevere. This is our subject. Perseverance.
Continuing. Steadfast. Believing on Christ
unto death. And what the Lord promises here
is He says that though the Lord Jesus promises a crown of life
to all who persevere in faith unto death. Persevere in faith
unto death. Believe in Christ unto death.
And the Lord promises a crown of life. That's the crown. Life. Now let's look at our divisions. We'll read the text here one
more time. First of all, Christ encourages
us to persevere by reminding us who He is. Who He is. Verse 8, He says, These things
saith the first and the last, which was dead and is alive. And then secondly, Christ encourages
us to persevere by reminding us that He knows us and He knows
our enemies. Look at verse 9. I know thy works
and tribulation and poverty, but thou art rich. And I know
the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews and are not, but
are the synagogue of Satan. That's encouraging to know. He
knows us and he knows our enemies. Thirdly, Christ encourages us
to persevere by telling us not to fear the things that we shall
suffer. Verse 10, He says, Fear none
of those things which thou shalt suffer. Behold, the devil shall
cast some of you into prison that you may be tried, and you
shall have tribulation ten days. He tells us don't fear those
things. Fear none of those things you'll suffer. And then fourthly,
Christ encourages us to persevere, reminding us of what awaits us. Look at Revelation 2 verse 10. He says there in the middle of
the verse, Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a
crown of life. He that hath an ear, let him
hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. He that overcometh
shall not be hurt of the second death. Now let's look at this
for a moment. First of all, Christ encourages
us to persevere by reminding us of who He is. He says there,
these things saith the first and the last, which was dead
and is alive. What does it mean when it says
He's the first and the last? He's telling us that He's the
Alpha and Omega. He's the beginning and the end.
We would say A to Z. He's A to Z. That means He's
the whole of everything. That's what it means. Christ
is our eternal God and Savior. He's the whole of everything. The Alpha and Omega. The beginning
and the end. Concerning the covenant of grace,
the everlasting covenant of grace, Christ is the first and the last. He is the mediator of it between
God and His people, the surety of it. He's the ratifier of it. He's the one who came and ratified
it, confirmed it in His own blood, wrote it in His own blood. He
says, this is my blood. the blood of the New Testament,
this blood that shed for many for the remission of sins. He
ratified it. He is the covenant itself. All the promises in the everlasting
covenant are yea and amen in Christ, and He is the substance
of all the promises. He is salvation. That's what
He is. And concerning salvation, He's
the whole of salvation. He's the beginning and the end.
He's the first and the last of salvation. He's the author and
finisher of faith. That means our justification,
our righteousness, our sanctification, our adoption, our eternal glorification,
all spiritual blessings are in Christ Jesus, by Christ Jesus,
through Christ Jesus. He's salvation. He is salvation. He's the beginning. He's the
first and the last. Concerning the scriptures, all
the scriptures speak of Him. All the scriptures. The book
begins in the beginning God. There He is. The book ends in
Revelation 22, 21, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with
you all. Amen. There He is. And He is
the sum and substance of every page in between the first page
and the last page. He's the end of the law for righteousness
to everyone that believes. And He is the gospel itself.
That's who we're talking about. That's who's talking to us here.
Concerning all providence, everything that takes place around us. everything,
every little minute detail to the largest thing, from kings
and nations to ants crawling around on the ground. everything
that takes place. Christ is the first cause, and
He's the last end of everything that comes to pass, whether it's
good or evil. And all of it is to glorify God,
and all of it is to turn for the good of His people. Every
bit of it. When it says in Isaiah 45, 7,
when it says, I form the light, Create darkness. I make peace
and create evil. I the Lord do all these things. That's God Jesus God our Savior
talking you realize he's God I love I like to I like to tell
you that Jesus Christ that man Is God he's God He rules everything. Everything. So it means Christ
is perfect. He's the fullness of the Godhead. He's perfect God. He's perfect
man in one body. He has all fullness of all power,
of all wisdom, of all grace, of all righteousness as our mediator
and we're complete in Him. Colossians 1.16 says, By Him
were all things created. that are in heaven and that are
in earth, visible and invisible. Whether they be thrones or dominions
or principalities or powers, all things were created by him
and for him. And he's before all things. And
by him all things consist. And he's the head of the body,
the church. I like how it tells us about all this power he has,
all this creative power, all this ruling power, all this governing
power, and then it says, and he's your head. He's the one
governing you. He's the one holding you in his
hand. He's the one taking care of you. The firstborn from the
dead, that in all things, he might have the preeminence. in
all things, because it pleased the Father that all fullness
dwell in Him. So whatever takes place, whatever happens in our
lives as believers, the first thing we're going to do is we're
going to give Him the glory, because He has all preeminence
in it. But I lost my loved one. I lost this one I love so dearly.
Oh, thank Him. Somehow, that's going to turn
to God's glory and you're good. He's going to show you somehow
through that. Maybe He's taking the loved one
away to show you that He's your chief love. He's your first love.
And maybe the others come in between you and Him. Whatever.
Whatever it is that takes place, He's going to show it. I'm the
first and the last. The Alpha and the Omega. And
it says here that He was dead and He's alive. He's dead and
He's alive. Look at Revelation 1 and look
at verse 8. Look at Revelation 1 verse 8.
He says, I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending,
saith the Lord, which is and which was and which is to come,
the Almighty. That means He's eternal. We can't
say that about any of us. I'm somebody who is and was and
is to come. That's somebody that's eternal.
That's what He said. That's what He said, the Almighty. That's who He is. He's the first
one we see when we behold Him by His grace, when He's regenerated
us and given us faith, and He's going to be the last one into
whose arms we're going to end up when we leave this world.
He's the beginning, He's the end. You see how He encourages
us? He's encouraging us by showing
us how He has all power, how He is God Almighty, the eternal
God and Savior. Now look, He says, and I was
dead, which was dead and is alive. Now He's about to tell us that
everybody that remains faithful unto death, He's going to give
a crown of life. But before He tells us that,
He encourages us here to remind us that He's our forerunner.
He already went into death for us. So, that means He took our
sins, He took our punishment, He took our eternal death, and
has conquered death and hell for everyone for whom He died. He's done that completely, and
now Christ, our forerunner, is alive. He's gone through. He's gone through death. And
He not only just passed through death, He conquered death as
He passed through it for His people. That second death. He
conquered that everlasting punishment for His people being forsaken
of God on the cross. And so now He's entered into
glory and there He is, this One who's writing this to us, alive
forevermore. Never to see death again. Alive
forevermore. We're described as a house. As
a house, a habitation of God through the Spirit. Christ is
the foundation of that house. He's all our righteousness, all
our holiness. He's the very foundation on which
this house is built. He's the builder of the house.
When the Lord spoke about Solomon and told David, after you're
gone, I'm going to raise up a son after you, and he's going to
build my house, and his kingdom's going to be forever. He was talking
about the Lord Jesus Christ. He was picturing Christ and Solomon.
So He's the foundation of the house. He's the builder of the
house. And then in, I believe it's Zechariah,
he says, He's the top cornerstone. He's the headstone of the house. So you see, we're in him, he
is the builder and the foundation and the top stone of the whole
house. The next time your hands are hanging down and your weary
steps are faltering and you're about to turn out of the way
because you're weary, and feeble and unbelieving and
doubting. Remember this one who is the
first and the last, who was dead as our substitute and is now
alive as our representative, our high priest, our advocate,
our prophet, our priest, our king with the Father. There he
is. Listen to Romans 5. Let's turn over there. Let's
read Romans 5, 8. Romans 5, 8. There we were, just these rotten,
rotten, putrid, stinking sinners. But verse 8 says, Romans 5, but
God commendeth His love toward us in that while we were yet
sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, much more then,
being now justified by His blood. That means all our sins gone
now. Now we're not sinners. Now those
that He's called by His grace to see this glorious good news,
we're not sinners anymore. He did that for us when we were
sinners. He died for us. Much more than being now justified,
we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if, when we
were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son,
much more being reconciled, being friends, being the beloved of
our God, we shall be saved by His life. You get that last part? We shall be saved by His life. By His life. He died to put away
our death, but now He lives to ensure we're going to live. Because
I live, you shall live also, He said. You see? Because He died, we die. Because
He lives, we live. We live. Alright? That's the
first thing. Secondly, Christ encourages us
to persevere by reminding us that He knows us and He knows
our enemies. Look at verse 9. I know thy works,
He said. I know thy works. Whatever our
trouble, whatever our pathway, wherever it leads, whoever we
encounter along the way, Christ Jesus, our Lord and our Savior,
knows. He knows. He knows. And He says, I know
thy works. Let this world boast of their
works. Let this world go around telling everybody about their
works and boasting about all the works that they've done.
We'll keep our mouth shut. Because Christ knows, and that's
all that matters. Christ knows. He knows. And then
He says, I know thy tribulations. Christ assures every believer
of two things. Every believer He assures of
two things. First thing He assures us is, you're going to have tribulations. He says, all that will live godly
in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. Now, your neighbor
starts talking to you and starts saying to you, well, I believe
that, you know, we got to do our good works because that together
with what Christ is, how we're going to be saved. Keep your
mouth shut. Don't say anything. You won't
suffer a thing. But if you say, no, that's not
true. Let me tell you about how we're
saved. Christ does all the work. He finishes the work. and your
neighbor might throw their dishwater out the window at you next time
you walk by. But you're going to suffer. If you tell the truth,
you're going to suffer for it in some way. And the Lord said,
in this world you shall have tribulation. But now here's the
second thing He promises us. He promises this. Have you found
the first thing to be true? Found it to be true. So we know
it's true to His Word. Well, that gives us confidence
that this second thing He says is true too. Be of good cheer,
I've overcome the world. Be of good cheer, I've overcome
the world. Look at Isaiah 43. Isaiah 43. This is that favorite
chapter that we like to read. Look at Isaiah 43, 1. Now thus
saith the Lord that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee,
O Israel, fear not, for I have redeemed thee. I've called thee
by thy name, thou art mine. When thou passest through the
waters, I will be with thee. and through the rivers, they
shall not overflow thee. When thou walkest through the
fire, thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle
upon thee. For I'm the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel,
thy Savior. I gave Egypt for thy ransom,
Ethiopia and Saba for thee, since thou wast precious in my sight.
Thou hast been honorable and I've loved thee, therefore I'll
give men for thee and people for thy life. Fear not, for I'm
with thee. You see that? He says, I'm with
you. I'm with you. Look back now at our text, Revelation
2, and look there again at verse 9. He says, and I know thy poverty. I know thy poverty. I know thy
poverty. One day, we're going to once
again, the church will once again face what early believers faced.
How many of the young people here, do you, does this kind
of Is it considered a hard thing to have to get up and come here
and sit and hear the gospel preached week in, week out? You know what
believers faced in days past? In days past, if you were caught
confessing Christ and believing on Christ, they would cast you
out of the synagogue. And what that meant was you lost
all standing in the community. You lost every privilege a person
could have. You were an outcast. You lost
your job, you lost your income, you lost everything. The whole
community was shunned. When I was home, I was talking
with my grandmother and And trying to get the story on this, I had
remembered it from years ago, but my grandfather was being
groomed to be the next big pastor for the American Baptist Association. And he was preaching free will
works religion. And, and I was about to be a
pastor of a huge church. And he started preaching predestination
and election. He started preaching limited
atonement. And they put out a banner whenever my mother was Emma's
age and my uncle Brad was Will's age. They put out a banner in
the newspaper and in their church banner. They put it out and put
it all over town, have no communication with him ever again. He's a heretic. He's preaching heresy, have nothing
else to do with him. And I thought about that. I thought,
what would that be like to be eight or nine, 10 years old,
And to have your father's name scattered all over town, that
he's a heretic. Don't have anything to do with
it. And everybody shunned him. The whole church shunned him.
They had to move from the community. They had to leave. And now they
got a church right there in that community. I went preach to a
funeral there a few years ago. And I could just hear people
whispering, you know, that's James Watson's grandson, that's
James Watson. Some guy come up to me after I got through preaching.
But before I preached, he came up to me and he said, I knew
your grandfather. I knew him before he went bad. When I got
through preaching, he walked by, I grabbed his hand and pulled
him into me. And I said, I went bad too. I
went bad too. Persecution. Listen to this.
Some were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might
obtain a better resurrection. Others had trial of cruel mockings
and scourgings, yea, moreover, of bonds and imprisonment. They
were stoned. They were sewn asunder. They
were tempted. They were slain with a sword.
They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute,
afflicted, tormented, of whom the world was not worthy. They
wandered in deserts and in mountains and in dens and in caves of the
earth. That don't make it sound so bad if the neighbor throws
a dishwater at you, does it? I believe I can handle that.
You see, it's going to get worse again though. That's what Revelation
11 tells us. But the Lord says here, but though
poor temporal things, thou art rich. Thou art rich. He looked
at one time, he lifted up his eyes on his disciples and he
said, Blessed be ye poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.
He said, You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though
He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through
His poverty might be made rich. I just looked up riches, and
here's what I found. The unsearchable riches of Christ.
The riches of His glory. The riches of His grace. Riches
of the full assurance of understanding of the mystery of God and of
the Father and of Christ. Treasures in heaven where neither
moth nor rust doth corrupt, where thieves do not break through
nor steal. We're rich. We're rich. That's what we're
rich, brethren. Unsearchable riches. And then
look here, he says, and I know the blasphemy of them which say
they're Jews and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan. The
Lord knows those who are truly His people and those who are
fakes. He knows. We don't have to trouble
our minds about it. We don't have to give it a second
thought. We don't have to go around wondering, well, I just
wonder if that... That's self-righteousness. We
need to turn from that. We need to leave that mess alone
and keep looking to Christ. And as Paul said, receive one
another not to doubt... with doubtful disputation, not
doubtfully disputing with one another. A man may come in and
a man may have some grave clothes on from his days of being in
death, and he may think that he ought to eat certain things,
and he may think he ought to drink certain things, and he
ought to wear certain things, and he might think that he still
has to do this and that under the law. But as long as he keeps
sitting in here in the gospel priest, leave him alone. Encourage
him. Help him. to look to Christ and
the Lord will instruct him in his heart and the Lord will just
take all those little rags off of him one by one and just completely
clean him up to where he's free from all that death. But us trying
to fix it, you know what'll happen? We'll all get dirty. We'll end
up dirty. So just leave them, leave them
alone. The church that teaches that sinners are saved by their
morality, that's the synagogue of Satan. The church that teaches
sinners that God has done all He can do, now it's up to the
sinner. That's the synagogue of Satan.
The church that preaches works for salvation, that's the synagogue
of Satan. That's what it is. Christ knows
them that are His. God our Father wrote our names
in the Lamb's Book of Life before the foundation of the world.
Christ said, I know my sheep. I know them. I call them by name. And his fan is in his hand. And he will throughly purge his
floor. And he will gather the wheat,
his people, into his garden. But the chaff he'll burn with
fire unquenchable. But let him do that. Let him
do that. So believer, when you feel like
you're surrounded, you feel like you're surrounded by a host of
wheel workers, and they're all talking about you and how you
ought to join with them. And you know how you get to feeling
like the minority, don't you? I feel like a minority. I feel like I'm a remnant just
here in the middle of a bunch of folks who either don't care
and just kicking up their heels and having a big grand old time
or those who are just running around having a party in religion.
and thinking of all they've done and how they've practically built
a church for God, helped Him out, done all these things for
Him. But when you feel that way, you just remember the Lord knows. The Lord knows. The Lord knoweth
the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall
perish. The Lord knoweth the days of the upright, and their
inheritance shall be forever. Now here's the third thing He
said. He says, He encourages us to persevere by telling us
not to fear. Verse 10, Fear none of those
things which thou shalt suffer. Behold, the devil shall cast
some of you into prison, that you may be tried, and you shall
have tribulation ten days. There's something confident to
me to hear that the Lord knows what we're going to suffer before
we ever suffer it. And He tells you beforehand.
That's comforting to me. He says here, fear none of those
things which thou shalt suffer. You know, we try to talk to our
friends and our loved ones and we say, oh, it's going to be
okay. You know, it's going to work
out fine. The Lord don't tell you stuff like that. He says,
no, it's not going to work out fine. You're going to suffer.
But he tells you beforehand. But he says that men who are
under the power of the devil, who are going to try to treat
you evil and bind you, and there's more prisons than just the jailhouse
down here. There's all kinds of prisons
where they try to hinder you and bind you and put you in bondage
and keep that word from getting out. But he says those men that
are under the power of Satan, they're all under Christ's power.
Christ has got to rule over all of them. So just remember that. And when they tried to silence
the Word and put John Bunyan in prison, did it work? They
furnished him an office and a place where he could just write some
of the best works that had ever been written for God. And fed
him every day. And kept him clothed. And kept
a roof over his head. And furnished the whole thing.
And just kept him in an office so he could write. They didn't
hinder the Word of God at all. And we're still reading those
works today. But notice here too, notice here too, it's for
a reason. He says, verse 10, that you may
be tried. That you may be tried. So follow
the example of our Savior. When He was tried, it says when
He was reviled, He didn't revile again. When He suffered, He threatened
not, but He committed Himself to Him that judges righteously.
I'm going to give you something. If you were taking a hard test,
And you didn't know the answer. And somebody said, here, I'm
going to give you the answer to the test. I'll just give you
the answer to the test. Every trial God brings us into,
you know what the answer to the test is? Commit it to Him that
judgeth righteously. That's the answer. Cast all your
care into His hands for He cares for you. Every time a trial comes,
the Lord is testing you to see, are you going to take off running
into Egypt and hurriedly try to figure out some way that you
can fix everything? Or are you going to quietly turn
to Him and say, Lord, this is of You. It's in Your hand. You can provide for me. I trust
you. I'm waiting on you. Lead my steps. Show me which way to go. That's
what the trial's for. That's what they're for. That's
what they're for. And he reminds us this, too. A definite time
is set to them. Ten days. That don't mean every
trial you have is going to last exactly ten days. That just means
there's a set time to it. God's got a time set. And when
that time's in, it's going to end. And he's going to bring
it to its end. And if you're his child, you
know where you're going to end up every time, committing it
to him that judges righteously. Now, to get to that point, you
may wander from Egypt all down through the desert and the wilderness
and go in circles and circles like a jackrabbit. But you're
going to end up committing it to him that judges righteously
if you're his child, because that's where he's going to bring
you every time. He tells us, are not five sparrows
sold for two farthings, and not one of them is forgotten before
God? But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.
Fear not, therefore, you're more value than many sparrows, many
sparrows. Christ has redeemed us. He's
purchased us with his blood. We belong to him for eternity. And so none shall pluck us from
his hand. The worst thing a man can do
to us will be the best thing for us. If they kill us, they
just open up the door to eternal bliss with our Savior. That is
the worst a man can do to you, and it's the best thing a man
can do to you. So we don't have anything to fear. We really don't.
Here's the fourth thing. Christ encourages us to persevere
in faith, telling us what awaits us. Verse 10. Be thou faithful
unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life. He that hath
an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.
He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death.
Now this is just simple. He says, be thou faithful unto
death. He says, cast all your care upon
Christ right up until death. Never cease trusting Christ.
Never look away from Him. Trust Him right until death. And He says, and I will give
thee a crown of life. That sounds like a mighty good
bargain to me. Don't it to you? All I have to
do is trust somebody else to do everything for me and he's
gonna give me eternal life. That, what a bargain. You ever
had anybody give you that? If we had that kind of bargain
down here at the grocery store, we'd be jumping over one another
trying to get to it. This is a, trust me to do everything
for you to bring you to myself perfect, spotless, without blame,
unreprovable in my sight. And I'll give you eternal life. Oh boy. That's the crown for
every believer is eternal life. Eternal life. eternal life. That's how it's going to be proven
that we're truly chosen, proven that we've truly been redeemed,
proven that we've truly been regenerated. We'll be trusting
Him right until we draw our last breath. Last breath. Take heed,
brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief
in departing from the living God, but exhort one another daily
while it's called today. Lest any of you be hardened through
the deceitfulness of sin, for we're made partakers of Christ,
if We hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end. Now look here, he says in the
last verse there, he says, He that overcomes shall not be hurt
of the second death. Now, that separation from God
that Christ suffered on the cross, that's the second death. Now
if you think this bargain is too hard and you say, I'm not
going to trust Him. I don't believe I can trust God.
I'm not sure. I'm going to go through life
calling Him a liar. Well, when you pass through death,
you draw your last breath, physical death will not be the end. That'll
be the beginning. Then you will suffer an eternal,
never-ending, never-dying death, a living death, the second death,
and it will hurt. It says the hurt of the second
death. It'll be a hurtful death. All
it will be will be hurt. That's all it will be, will be
hurt. but for those who trust Him. When you die in faith, He
says, He that overcometh, we only overcome by faith. That's
the only way John tells us that. Overcome by faith. He shall not
be hurt of the second death. He won't be. Because we've been
ordained to eternal life, we've been purchased to eternal life,
and we have eternal life right now. Now, you come back in the
second hour, And we're going to talk about our eternal inheritance. We're going to see what we can
learn about that eternal inheritance once we enter into that eternal
life. So you see, don't worry. Christ
is the first and the last. He knows. He knows. And He says,
fear not. The trial has a purpose. And
He says, He that overcomes, I'll give you the crown of life. Amen.