Thank you, James. Let's open
our Bibles to Revelation chapter 2. Revelation chapter 2. Over the last several years,
many years really, God has given me lots of friends and many of
them I've never met face to face. I've met them on the internet,
correspond with them. There are some people that I
correspond with quite regularly. who have quite the physical infirmities. I have a dear lady in the south
of England. She's a very sweet lady. Her
husband, George, is her caregiver. He only has a bicycle to go get
some groceries for them. His wife, Rose, is pretty much
an invalid. She's confined to her bed, except
when she needs to go to the doctor and they'll call a taxi to take
her to the doctor. Lots of physical issues as she's
getting on up in years, and I have other friends and acquaintances
that have lots of issues, problems in life, lots of struggles, family issues, family divisions. I've got a dear brother who I
love in the Lord. He's got several things that
are going on all the time, it would seem. In all of God's people, we have
our struggles, don't we? We have our issues, things that
are going on, things that are happening. And as you observe, the things that are happening
in the world today, in our nation, deeply divided at this time. Sometimes we might be led to
be distressed and get down in the dumps, wonder what in the
world is going on. Well, I'll tell you this. I'll
tell you what's going on. God's working at His will. That's
what's going on. And you get to the book of the
revelation of Jesus Christ, the unveiling of Jesus Christ. This last book in the Bible,
and here's the theme of this book, and I want to say to my
dear friend in the south of England, And to my dear brother who has
several things going on, and to a host of God's people who
are going through struggles, problems, and things of that
nature in life, I want to say to you, we're more than conquerors
through Him who loved us. Our Lord Jesus has already, He's
got the victory. Victory is ours and really that's
what the book of the Revelation is about. It's about the victory
of Christ Jesus. God's Lamb, His victory and therefore
our victory because we're one with Christ Jesus. The victory
we have in the Lord Jesus over the dragon and over all of those
who follow Him. So I want to See if I can lift
your spirits. Maybe the scriptures will lift
your spirits and the Holy Ghost will lift your spirits through
the gospel of Christ Jesus. And I say to you, be encouraged.
Be one who rejoices in God's good providence for He who ordained
all things is directing all things to the end that he himself appointed
even before the world began. We are on the victory side. There are some other words that
I'm not too crazy about in that song, Oh Victory in Jesus. There's
a lot of good in that song. We have victory in the Lord Jesus
Christ. We're not a defeated people.
You can't be defeated because the Savior, He's defeated every
one of your foes. And I know we have struggles.
We have physical struggles. More than that, we have a struggle
against sin. But He's conquered that. as well. In fact, He put our sins away
by His substitutionary death on the cross. And we'll never
have to answer for them, never have to stand before God charged
with guilt. In fact, we read in Romans chapter
8, who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? No
charges are against us. God's law examines us and finds
us without guilt, without fault. Why is that? How can that be?
We're in Christ Jesus. We're one with Him. And in the
Savior, we're without spot, without blemish or any such thing. So, I say to all of you, this
book of the revelation of Jesus Christ is given to us by the
Spirit of God to refresh us, to encourage us, to admonish
us, to be faithful to the cause of Jesus Christ, and to say to
us, we are the victors in the Savior. Now, this victory in
the Lord Jesus is set forth in seven visions. In each of these
visions, the Spirit of God takes us from the first advent of our
Savior to the second advent of our Savior. The first vision
is our Lord in the midst of His churches. That's chapters 1,
2, and 3. We have the first advent and
the second advent set forth right in the first chapter. where he
says he's the one who loved us and washed us from our sins in
his own blood. When did he do that? His first
coming. His first advent. Redemption is an accomplished
fact. That's a once and forever sacrifice. We read in Hebrews by offering. He had sanctified, He had perfected
rather, them that are sanctified. One by one offering. He put away
our sins by one offering. He brought in everlasting righteousness. Does that encourage you? It sure
encourages me. It sure does lift my spirits. It sure does put some wind in
my sails. I look within and I see no good
thing. I look within, I see blackness
and darkness and filth. I see everything that I seek
to do is absolutely contaminated by sin. And yet in the Word of
God I read, in the Lord Jesus I made the righteousness of God
in the Savior. It's good news. Good news. I still struggle with
inward sin and you do as well. And we will till the day we die. But our Lord Jesus, He's already
taken accountability for our sin. Full responsibility. He said, Father, charge it to
my account. And He did. And Jesus paid it
all. All the debt that we owe. In
the first three chapters, we see our Lord Jesus in the midst
of His churches. The very first church that he
stands in the midst of is Ephesus. Now we know that all seven of
these churches, they picture, they portray all of the church
of God. These are not seven overlapping
or seven distinct eras or time periods of the church, but rather
these conditions that existed in these seven churches of Asia
Minor are conditions that exist in the assemblies of God in the
church of our Lord Jesus at all times. So that even here this
evening there may be some in here like those in the church
of Ephesus who had left their first love, There may be some
in here this evening as we, and I'll get to this in a little
bit, you may be like the church at Laodicea. You're not cold
or hot. And the Lord has a warning for
you. You better repent. Repent. See, we're not all at
the same stage. We're not all at the same level. I know we're all righteous in
the Lord Jesus. Please, make sure you don't misunderstand
me. I'm not saying we have different
levels of sanctification. or different levels of justification. We're justified by God's grace,
we're justified by the bloody death of the Lord Jesus, we're
justified by His righteousness, and we're all sanctified. We've
been set apart by God in old eternity, set apart by God when
Christ Jesus died for us, set apart by God the Spirit when
He convinced us of our sin, and of judgment, and of righteousness,
and then He revealed the Lord Jesus to us. But we all struggle
at different levels, we all have... our spiritual condition is not
the same. So I don't know which of these
churches might kind of... I'm not sure how you would be
lined up with these churches. That's not for me to say. But
I do know this, that all of us, we will fall into one or two
or maybe several categories here. And this is just because of the
struggles of the flesh. And the Lord speaks to His people
here. He speaks to the church at Ephesus. They had many things
that the Lord commended them for, but He said, this is what
I have against you. You've left your first love.
You've left your first love. There's a passage of Scripture,
if you're taking notes, you can jot it down. Jeremiah chapter
2, first four or five verses. And the Lord talks about the
love that Israel had for Him. And then that love cooled off. And He says, did I do something
to deserve that? That's what the Lord says, what
He asked Him. Did I do something for you? Did I do something against
you that causes your love to wane? What have I done?" the
Lord said. And obviously it isn't anything
that the Lord did that caused him to kind of wander away from
Him. And you know and I know for a
fact that our love isn't always blazing hot. Sometimes we lose
our first love. We get so involved in other things. The church at Ephesus had many
things that they were occupied with. And of course, the Lord
himself praises them. He commends them for so much
that they're doing that's right. But he said, this is what I have
against you. You've left your first love. And he says, repent
or else. Or else I'll take the candlestick
away from you. What is the candlestick? What
does that represent? The light. I'm going to take
the light away from you. So let's don't get apathetic about the
things of God. Let's don't get complacent about
the gospel. the Word of God, the study of
the Scriptures, and the not forsaking the assembly of ourselves together
as a manner of summing it. Let's ask God to make our love
again fervent. Love for Christ Jesus. And he
says, for those that overcome, he says, I'll give you to eat
of the tree of life in the midst of the paradise of God. That's
feeding on Christ Jesus. And that's how we wound up this
morning. Our first message or the message this morning concerning
this first church, we'll have the same diet in heaven as we
have on earth, the gospel of God's free grace. Well, then
the Lord presents to us a second church called the church at Smyrna. In this letter, the Lord begins
it with a statement concerning His substitutionary death and
resurrection. And I said that each of these
letters kind of follows this pattern. He speaks first to the
angel of the church, verse 8, to the angel of the church at
Smyrna, right, and then the Lord addresses himself to these individual
churches using different characteristics of himself. And so it says, these
things saith the first and the last which was dead and is alive. The one who speaks to us is the
Savior. This is the one who died for
us. This is the one who is first in all the, he's got all the
preeminence. And this is the one who is last. All things lead to His glory. This is the one who was dead.
but is alive. Why was He dead? In order to
save us. That's the only way God could
be just and justify the ungodly. He had to die on the cross, but
He's not dead now. We don't serve a dead Savior.
We serve a living Savior. He ever lives to make intercession
for us. Yes, He died. He really died. He really gave up the ghost. Because that was the penalty
of sin. death. Because He died, the people
of God will not die. We fall asleep in Jesus. But
He who died for us arose and He ever lives. And He says now
to the people in this church at Smyrna, He says in verse number
9, I know thy works in tribulation and poverty, but you're rich. You're rich. It's interesting, this church
receives no rebuke. There is no rebuke. There's nothing
negative said about them. Now, it wasn't a perfect church. Every local assembly, every God-gathered
group of sinners, we know that we're all imperfect people in
and of ourselves. And certainly, here we are, a
group of people tonight, and we have a congregation, we have
a body of believers that meets here on a regular basis. It is
a testimony to the grace of God and the goodness of God that
so many sinners can meet together, and we have a multitude of differences
of opinion on many other things, but on the gospel, we see eye
to eye. And that's the only thing that
matters. The Lord keeps us together. He has bound us together. Cords
of love. And He tells these people, He
says in verse 9, I know thy works. I know what you do. I know your
tribulation. I know your poverty. I'll tell
you one of the reasons they were poor. Now they were poor spiritually
by the grace of God, because the Spirit of God showed them
they needed the riches of God's grace in Christ Jesus. But they
were also financially poor. Such were the conditions back
in those days, and this happened in Smyrna. And you can read about
it in history. If you dared to confess your
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ in the waters of baptism, you'd
lose your job. You paid a price because of the
unions, all the unions of Smyrna that were controlled by the ungodly.
And if you took a stand for Christ Jesus, you went out into the
river, into the waters, One of God's preachers baptized you
in the name of the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit. And
by submitting to that baptism, you announced to everybody, I
love Christ Jesus. I love His Word. I love His Gospel. I love His preacher. I love His
people. And let come what may, I am identifying
myself with that Savior who died for me and who ever lives for
me. And your boss would say, you
lost your job. We don't have to pay that kind
of price today, do we? Really, we got it kind of easy
compared to how some of the other saints of God have had it. He tells these people, I know. I know. I know your works. I know your
tribulation. I know your poverty. I know. Sometimes we sing that song Jesus
knows all about our struggles. He will guide till the day is
through. There's not a friend like the
lowly Jesus. No, not one. He knows. He knows. They say, preacher, my heart
is so heavy, it's about to break. I've got this is going on. This
weighs heavily upon my mind. And Christ Jesus whispers to
you through his word and says, I know. I know. But you're victorious, the Savior
says through himself. You're victorious. This was a
very poor congregation. But though they were a poor church
physically, and though they had been made a poor church spiritually
in the sense that blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs
is the kingdom of heaven, yet they were rich in grace, they
were rich in mercy, they were rich in faith. We are rich. Don't tell me what you don't
have. I just don't want to hear it. We have all the blessings
of the covenant of grace in Christ Jesus Himself. Don't tell me
what you don't have. Tell me who you do have. You
have the great Savior. And in Christ Jesus, you've got
everything that God Almighty could ever give to a sinner.
You're rich. You're rich. That's what he says
here. You see, note those parentheses. He says in verse 9, I know thy
works and tribulation and poverty, parentheses, but thou art rich. Don't forget that. Be careful lest you bad mouth
God's providence. Talking about what you don't
have. Don't look to me like anybody in here has gone without food.
Don't look to me like anybody in here don't have a place to
lay their head at night. Don't tell me what you don't
have. Rejoice in Him in whom you have all things that God
can give you. We're so blessed. We're blessed
with all spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ
Jesus. He says also, I know the blasphemy
of them which say they're Jews and aren't. But they're the synagogue
of Satan. They say they're the people of
God. They say they're the true people of God. You go back to
Philippians chapter 3. Who are the true people of God?
Who are the true circumcision? Those that worship God in spirit,
rejoice in Christ Jesus, and don't have any confidence in
the flesh. Those are the true people of God. And everybody else is a member
of, watch it, the synagogue of Satan. The synagogue of Satan. And that is the truth, that's
just the way it is. So he says in verse number 10,
fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer. You think about what he just
said. Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer." He's
not saying now things are going to get better. No. He's saying things are going
to get worse. You've got some suffering to endure. In fact, he says, Behold, the
devil shall cast some of you into prison, that you may be
tried. And you'll have tribulation ten
days. Ten means, is a symbolic number
for absolute complete testing. That's what ten is. Complete
testing. Like the Ten Commandments. Ten of them. Like the plagues
that God sent to Egypt. Ten of them. That's complete
testing. God said you're going to have
utter and total complete testing. But don't be afraid of those
things that thou shalt suffer." Here's what he's preparing them
for. More hardships. That's just the opposite of health
and wealth religion today. He said, boy, I tell you, now
that you're saved, boy, it's going to be, whoo, it's going
to be, you'll have a three or four car garage and you'll have
all the money you want going to be healthy if you just believe. Well, these people believe the
gospel of God's grace and the Lord says nothing to them in
a negative way. But He says this, don't fear
the things that you're going to suffer because this is what's
going to happen. The devil is going to cast some
of you into prison. A little bit later, their pastor,
a man by the name of Polycarp, P-O-L-Y-C-A-R-P, Polycarp was
their pastor. You know who he learned the gospel
from? John. And they arrested him. And they said, say, Caesar is
Lord, you can go your way. He said, I'm not going to say
Caesar is Lord. Burned him at the stake, 86 years
old. Fear none of those things that
thou shalt suffer. Things are going to get tougher.
That's what the Lord is saying. They are going to get worse down
here before they get absolutely perfect in heaven. It's like
I said this morning, the Lord doesn't promise us a flower strewn
pathway. You think it's going to be smooth
all the way to glory? It might be smoother for some
than for others. But there are going to be some
people like these saints of God from Smyrna, who are going to
have a tough time. But we are more than conquerors.
through Him that loved us. I don't know what's going to
happen in this nation of ours. There's so much that is of great
concern to me and so much of great concern to you. Such perversion. Such immorality. Such crookedness. Lying. I don't know what's going to
happen. But I know what is going to happen off in the future will
be with Christ Jesus forever. So don't get too worried about
what's going on down here. The Lord's going to take care
of all these things. He says, be faithful unto death,
I'll give you the crown of life. We can't control what's going
on around us. God's working out his providence. God is fulfilling his will. It
is for us to just remain faithful to the gospel. Now that's our
duty right here, to remain faithful to the gospel of God's free and
sovereign grace of substitution and satisfaction. And he says,
you remain faithful unto death, you get a crown of life. The
crown of life. That's all of God's people. These
are not special crowns just for a few people. This belongs to
all of God's people. The crown of life. He that hath
an ear to hear. He that hath an ear. Let him
hear what the Spirit says to the churches. Will you hear?
Will I hear? Well, we'll hear if He gives
us ears to hear. And here's what he says, "...he
that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death." You're
not going to wind up in a lake of fire. That's what he said. You're not going to perish in
your sins. You believe this gospel, you lay hold of Jesus Christ,
you see His blood, His righteousness as the conditions that have already
been met for our salvation. You see that salvation is all
of God's grace from beginning to end. Hold the course! Believe
the truth! You don't have to worry about
the lake of fire. I was laying in bed last night
thinking about what a sinner I am. And I got to thinking about
how awful it would be to go to the lake of fire. And never get out. It's just,
there's no exit. I thought, oh my God, I don't
want to perish. And once again in my own heart,
I just fled to Jesus Christ. Oh Lord Jesus, You're my only
hope. You're the only hope this poor
sinner's got. I don't want to go to the lake
of fire. I don't want You to go. Well, we won't. Not if Christ
Jesus died for us. Not if He's redeemed us. Because
you see, twice payment God cannot demand. First at my bleeding
surety's hand and then again at mine. The death has already
been died. The penalty's already been met
and the price has been paid. Everything's alright. Let come what may. The third
church is Pergamos. Pergamos. Our Lord appears to
this church of Pergamos in verse 12 as one who's got the sharp
sword with two edges. Ah, Pergamos, like these other
churches, they were under the authority of and the threats
of the Roman sword. The Roman sword, it could come
down upon you like it did to brother Polycarp and burn him
at the stake. But let the people of God always
remember this. He who speaks to us, he has the
sharp sword with two edges. Don't worry about the sword of
Rome. Don't worry about the sword of evil. Don't worry about the
sword of the enemy. Bless the name of our Savior.
He's got the sword that's sharp. on both edges. It cuts for us
and it will cut against the enemy. Pergamos. Pergamos. The scripture says here, look,
it says in verse 13, I know thy works and where thou dwellest
even where Satan's seed is. Well, I tell you at Pergamos,
that's where the great altar was to Zeus. That's where the great altar
was to the medicine God, to the God of healing. There were multitudes of temples
built to various idols and various gods. And the Lord says, you're dwelling
where Satan's seat is. In other words, you're surrounded
by idolatry. You're surrounded by false religion. And you know what? It isn't any
different in our day. We're absolutely surrounded by
false religion. All the cathedrals and all the
chapels and all the churches, most all of them, they're just
synagogues of Satan, that's all they are. They're just goat pastures. where the goats go and feed,
and they're made happy, and they're delighted with what they hear.
Only here and there are there pastures for Christ's sheep,
the green pastures of the Word of God. Here at Pergamos, it's
an awful place. It's the seat of Satan. It's
where Satan's seat is. He says to them, you've held
fast to my name. You haven't denied the faith.
You haven't denied the gospel. Even those days in which Antipas
was my faithful martyr, he was killed among you where Satan
dwelleth. We don't know who this man was, but the enemy got him. The enemy
killed him. But he said, I've got a few things
against you. Verse 14, I have a few things against thee, because
thou hast there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught
Balak to cast a stumbling block before the children of Israel
to eat things sacrificed unto idols and to commit fornication. I think the simplest way to express
this, the doctrine of Balaam, and what Balak was doing as well,
was this. There were some within the church
at Pergamos who said, you know, false religion is wrong, but
we don't have to speak out against it. We can just peaceably coexist. And if you believe your way and
we'll believe our way, we're not going to take a stand against
you. That was the doctrine. The doctrine of Balaam. And then
he says, so in verse 15, so hast thou also them that hold the
doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate. And the doctrine
of the Nicolaitans was simply this. You know, if you're saved
by grace, it don't matter what you do. It don't matter what
kind of life you live. Just live any way you want to. After all, all your sins are
under the blood anyway. That's the doctrine of the Nicolaitans.
The Lord said, now you're putting up with this in this congregation
now. You just think, well, it's okay,
we just coexist peaceably. We can get along with false religions
of these churches. They're sincere after all. And
then, it don't matter how you live, don't matter what you do.
The more you sin, the more grace will be seen. The Apostle Paul
addresses that in Romans chapter 6. So it says in verse 16, he's
got one word for it, repent. Don't you dare think that you
can get along peaceably with false religion. We're talking
about darkness and light. That's right, we're talking about
wickedness, spiritual wickedness in high places, and we're talking
about the very truth of God. These cannot coexist peaceably. And I know that ours is not a
negative message. Ours is a very positive message
of grace and mercy in the Lord Jesus Christ. But in preaching
this very positive message, we must say that everything else
is absolutely wrong. It's a lie. You say, well, you're not going
to win friends and influence people preaching like that. I'm
not trying to win friends and influence people. I'm seeking
to magnify the name of our God. I'm seeking to preach the Word
of God. And the sheep of the Lord Jesus
will eat the food that I sent before them and rejoice in it. And the enemy will say, I'll
not have that man reign over me. I'm not going to have this
gospel. Too much grace for me. I've had
people leave the church on account of that. They come up to me and
say, it's just too much grace for me. Well, I'll tell you,
you can't preach too much grace to me. I just preach. That's all I want to hear is
grace. You see, if you stand for the
truth, there's going to be a division. There's got to be a division.
It will be. And the Lord says, now you repent
or else I'm going to come quickly. I'll fight against you with the
sword of my mouth. You want the Lord Jesus to come
as an enemy? Well, this is what you do. Compromise with error. He's coming
after you. You compromise with error. And
the Lord Jesus says, I'm coming. with the sword of my mouth. And
if you think you can live your life without any regard to the
glory of God, without any regard to bringing reproach upon the
name of the Lord, bringing reproach upon the name of His people,
bringing reproach upon His local church, if you think that can
go on without the Lord dealing with it, you got another thing
coming. God will take you away from here,
bring reproach upon His name. Look at verse 17. He that hath
an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
To him that overcomes will I give to eat of the hidden manna. Who
is that? Christ Jesus. I'll give him a
white stone, in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth,
saving he that receiveth it." Back then, whenever you went
to a trial, the judges cast in either a white stone or a black
stone. White in your favor, black's
against you. The Lord said, you love this
gospel. You believe this truth. I'm casting
the white stone for you. That's what he's saying is you're
accepted in me. So just stay the course. Stay
the course. Then verse 18, here's the church
at Thyatira. And this reveals more of the
methods of Satan to seduce those that believe the gospel of God's
grace. In verse 18, our Lord speaks
to the angel of the church in Thyatira. He speaks as the Son
of God. Who is our Savior? He's not some
weakling Jesus who needs you to do something for Him. He's
God Almighty. He's the Son of God. His eyes
are like a like a flame of fire, penetrating, burning their way
to see things as they are. His feeder is fine brass. He
says, I know your works, I know your charity, I know your service,
I know your faith. I know those things. I know your
patience. I know your works. You know why
He knows those things? Because He gave you grace to
do these things. That's right. If you do works
for the glory of Christ Jesus, it's by His grace because He
ordained them. If you have charity in your heart,
that's a gift of the Spirit. Love is. If you serve the Lord
Jesus, if you're involved in the ministry of the Word of God,
you're involved in setting forth the gospel of His grace, that's
due to the grace of God in Christ Jesus, due to His grace at work
in you. And faith is a gift of God. Your
patience, your patience to endure tribulations and all of your
works. The reason He knows them is because
these are gifts from Him. See, nothing originates with
us except sin. Except sin. But he says, notwithstanding,
I've got a few things against you because you allow the woman
Jezebel, which calls herself a prophetess, to teach and seduce
my servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed
to idols. I gave her space to repent of
her fornication and she repented not. Now you're allowing this
to go on. There was a woman in the church and she began to teach
and the elders in the church just Kind of let it go on. Maybe she was a woman of great
influence. We're not told much about her.
But first of all, it's not right for a woman to speak in the congregation
of the righteous anyway. Ladies, we appreciate you. We
love you. And you have gifts that are special
to you and unique to you. Make you to be a blessing to
all the men in the congregation? Well, one thing you can't do
is get up here and preach. And I know it goes against the
grain today of so many denominations. They've got their ordaining women
and everything. In about all denominations nowadays,
and somebody will come to me and say, you know, they've got
a woman preacher down there. And I say, well, that's not the
problem, really. They don't have any gospel that
leads to getting a woman to be a preacher. See? Right? That's
how stuff comes in, is when you depart from the gospel. But this
woman, he calls her Jezebel. She teaches. She's teaching things
contrary to the Word of God. And it may be literal fornication,
or maybe spiritual fornication. That's giving the love of your
heart to an idol. An idol doesn't deserve the love
of your heart. Only the Lord deserves the love
of your heart and the worship of your heart. The Lord said,
I gave her space to repent, but she repented not. Tell you something
about the judgment of God, and I guess I'll have to finish this.
I might finish it Wednesday night. I'll tell you something about
the judgment of God. Judgment never comes without
warning. You know that? Judgment, it never
comes without warning. The Lord says, I gave her space.
I think about those folks when Noah was building the ark. 120 years. He gave them some
space, didn't he? Sent him a preacher of righteousness. That's what the scripture said,
a preacher of righteousness. He gave him space. But you know what? God can give
us lots and lots of space, but unless the Lord himself gives
us the gift of repentance, we won't repent. That's the way
we are. Are we responsible to? Oh yes,
God now commanded all men everywhere to repent. Turn from your dead
works, you turn from your idols to the living God through Christ
Jesus the Lord. Repent. But, if He doesn't give the gift,
we won't repent. So He says in verse 22, Behold,
I'll cast her into a bed, and them that commit adultery with
her into great tribulation, except they repent of her deeds. I'll
kill her children. We're children there. If you
don't mind writing in the margin, by that it's meant disciples.
Those who follow, those who believe that false junk that she's spewing
out. I'll kill her disciples with
death. What kind of death? Second death.
It's a death that never ends. And all the churches shall know
that I am He which searches the hearts and the reins. Remember,
He's introduced Himself to this church as the one who's got eyes
as a flame of fire. And now He says, I'm the one
who searches the reins. I search the heart. I'll give
you, every one of you, according to your work. But I say unto
you and unto the rest in thy attire, as many as have not this
doctrine, which have not known the depths of Satan as they speak,
I'll put upon you none other burden." In other words, I'll take care
of my people. But that which you have already, hold fast. What have we been given? as a congregation, the gospel
of God's grace. And here's what he says, what
I've given you. Hold it fast. Hold it fast. No compromise. Don't let it go. And He said, He that overcometh
and keepeth My works unto the end, I'll give him power over
the nations. He'll rule them with a rod of
iron. As the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers.
Even as I received of My Father, I will give Him the morning star.
Who is the morning star? That's Christ Jesus Himself.
You see, He's always the reward. He's the one we want. He's the
one we long to see, we long to be with Him. He says, I'll give
him the morning star. Now, he that's got an ear, do
you have an ear? You better hear what the Spirit
says to the churches. God's speaking to His people
through these seven churches. Let us hear what He has to say.
Well, let's sing the closing song. I'll tell you, I'll finish
this message Wednesday.