Such a blessing to me the scripture
reading and the prayer so blessed by the prayer Revelations 2 and
I'm gonna deal with the third Church tonight Pergamos Pergamos
and verse 12 And to the angel of the church in Pergamos, right?
these things saith he which hath the sharp sword with two edges
and I know thy works, and where thou dwellest, even where Satan's
seed is. And thou holdest fast my name,
and hast not denied my faith. Even those days were in Antipas,
was my faithful martyr, who was slain among you, where Satan
dwelt. But I have a few things against
thee. Because there hath them there 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. So also hast thou them that hold
the doctrine of the Nicoletaeans, which I think I hate, repent,
or else I will come quickly unto thee, and will fight against
thee with the sword of my mouth. He that hath an ear to hear,
let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. To him
that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and
will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written,
which no man knoweth, saving he that receiveth." It's the
third of the seven letters to the churches in Asia. In Asia,
and I've told you Asia is where Turkey is now. And this particular
city here where Pergamos was located, it was the capital of
that province of Rome when Rome ruled the world in Asia at that
time. And this city, just like every other city, had a multiplicity
of gods. That means they had lots and
lots of gods. And they had lots of them. They
had a God of healing. It's like Paul, when he stood
on Mars Hill, he seen an altar to all these different gods.
He seen an altar to all the gods of rain, the god of thunder,
the god of hate, and oh my, the god of fertility, and all these
different gods. And he said, and then he looked
at one, he said, there's an altar over there that says to the unknown
God. And just in case we missed one,
we put up an altar that said the unknown God. Paul said, that
one you don't know, that's the one I'm going to tell you about.
And that's what these folks were going through right here. They
had all kinds of gods over there. They had one that's called Assyriops. He is worshipped under the emblem
of a serpent. And to believers, the very symbol
of Satan is a serpent. First time you see a serpent
mentioned in the scriptures, it was the devil. And he deceived
our mother Eve, and we became sinners by that one act. And
so here being the capital of Roman province, they also had
emperor worship. They built a great big temple
dedicated to the Caesars. No matter what their first name
was, it was all called Caesar. Just like Pharaoh was the title
given to all the kings over Egypt. And so they had this emperor
worship. And those temples dedicated to the worship of Caesar. And
believers were threatened with death unless they offered incense
to that image of that emperor and say, Caesar is Lord, Caesar
is Lord. And when our Lord said here the
seed of Satan, Satan had complete reign and power and sat on a
seat and ruled this place. Ruled over all these people with
their false gods, ruled over them with their images, ruled
over them. And I tell you, Satan I know
he's God's devil. But I'll tell you one thing,
I do know this, that he's out to lie, steal, kill, and destroy
and deceive. And he deceived this whole city.
And the only people that's not deceived is the Lord Jesus Christ
people. And he said, if it were possible,
if it were possible, they would even deceive the very elect.
Ain't you thankful you're one of God's elect? God said, you
won't be deceived. You know why you won't be deceived?
I won't let you. I brought you the truth and I'm
going to keep you in the truth. I taught you the truth and I'm
going to keep you believing the truth. He read tonight somewhere
did, you know, Steve did, he said there's a sin unto death. What would that sin unto death
be? There's only one sin in the scripture that's unto death.
No, no remedy for and that's the sin of blaspheming the Holy
Ghost That's the only sin I know of in the scriptures that a man
could commit and can never be forgiven of it And I'll tell
you then so these people here you are you got a bunch of believers
down here And they got God's everywhere everywhere And you know when we come to
services you got crosses everywhere Stars everywhere. Manger scenes everywhere. Now who's doing that? And so
they had this great altar. They also had a great altar to
Zeus. He's one of the Greek gods. And
no wonder our Lord said, I know where the seat of Satan dwells. And I'll tell you what, who sent
this message? Let's get into this thing and say, who sent
this message? Well, it tells us does. Our Lord Jesus Christ
did there in verse 12. He which hath the sharp sword
with two edges. He that hath the sharp sword
with two edges. Now every one of these churches,
our Lord designates himself in a different way. And the reason
he does that is because whatever how he designates himself to
that particular church, that's the way they need to be designated
to. When he talked to the church
of Ephesus. He was the one who held the golden
candlesticks and walked in the midst of the churches. When he
talked to Smyrna, he talked to the Smyrna church and they had
no sin. They was a church that our Lord
knew about very, very well. And what he called himself, he
said, you're a living church. You're a living church. Nothing
wrong with you. So what did he say? What did
he reveal himself? I'm alive. You're a living church.
I'm alive. I'm alive. You're dead, just
like I was, but I gave you life and you're a living church. So
ever how he addressed the churches, he addressed them as the way
that it was particular to that particular congregation. And
I tell you what, in Pergamos, they were infected with men of
corrupt minds, also corrupt minds. And they labored to corrupt the
mind of God's people, the manners and faith of Christ our Lord
Jesus Church. And what did our Lord say down
there in verse 16? He said, I'll fight against them
with the sword of my mouth. These people want to deceive
my people, want to mistreat my people. Want my people to worship
false gods and bow down before Pharaoh, I mean Caesar. He said, listen, he said, I'll
fight against them. I'll fight against them. We don't
have to fight our battles. Christ doesn't win them for us.
And I tell you, He means what He means by saying that He'll
fight against them with His sword. He means I'll destroy them. I'll
destroy them. And God's Word is a weapon. You
know this blessed book is a weapon? You know how God conquered the
world? He never used a sword. Our Lord conquered the world
and went all over this world with the gospel. And there's
people all over this world who believe Christ and trust Christ.
How did God do it? How did He use His disciples
to start preaching to God? What did He do? The only thing,
weapon that God ever uses is the Word of God itself. He conquered
the... How did He save you? We don't
have to use a sword. We don't have to use a club.
We don't have to use threats. And God didn't either. Whenever
they got these men up there and they started saying, He said,
every time they got an opportunity, even when they were standing
before their enemies, they preached the Word. And when he preached
to 3,000, they said, men and brethren, what must we do? That's
the Word. And that's why Christ said, I'll
destroy them with the Word. And that's how He's going to
destroy everybody, and that's how He saves everybody, with
His Word. And so when He talks about using
His Word, He uses that as a weapon. It's an offensive weapon and
a defensive weapon. In God's hands, it's able to
slay sin, It's able to slay sinners. It's able to slay everything
in us that's not right and true and just. I want you to look
with me over here in Hebrews chapter 4. Look in Hebrews chapter
4. Back to your left just a little.
Look here, talking about the Word. Our Lord said, you know,
I'll come with sharp, two-edged sword. It's a weapon. The Word's a weapon.
Being born again, not a corruptible, seen incorruptible by the Word
of God, by His own will, with the Word. He begat us again with
the Word of Truth. But look what He said here in
Hebrews 4.12. Talking about Christ as a sharp two-edged sword. For
the Word of God is quick. That means it's living. That
means it's living. It's living. It's alive, ain't
it? It comes and speaks to us with
life. And it's powerful. Oh, how powerful
is God's Word. Oh, it's powerful. And it's sharp. Oh, how sharp it is. Sharper
than any two-edged sword. And this Word pierces even to
the divining of the soul and spirit. It comes right down and
lays us right down the middle. And of the joints, he gets into
the joints and the marrows. It's like butchering somebody. And he said, but he'll take this
word and does that. And listen to this, and it discerns
the thoughts and intents of the heart. I mean the word comes
and it gets in your brain, tells you what you're thinking and
what you intend to do. And I'll tell you what, I don't
know how many times over the years people say, boy, I'll tell
you, I come and I wanted an answer to something. Some of us talking
about something you got there and you preached on that very
thing. And then our Lord said, this sharp sword. He said, this
sharp sword back over here in Revelations 2. It's sharp. And I'm going to tell you something,
when our Lord uses that sword, no one's too tough. No heart's
too hard. No knot that it can't cut. And
it's got two edges to it. It turns every way and gets in
every way and no place that it can't reach. Christ has that
sharp sword. And then look what he says about
this church. He takes notice of this church
and its trials. And he says down there in verse
13, He said, I know your words. That's
the first thing He says, I know your words. I know your words. You know, I talked about this
morning, our Lord drew near to those fellows and said, what
is it that's making you, what are you talking about that's
making you so sad? And our Lord looked at these people, and I
mean they're in an awful, awful circumstances, and the first
thing He says to them, I know your words. I know your words. I want you to look in Hebrews
6 with me again. Hebrews 6, you know our Lord
Jesus, our Lord Jesus, He takes notice of everything. He said
if you give a cup of cold water to a disciple, He said you'll
receive a disciple as well. Just give a cup of cold water.
He watches everything that we do. You give somebody a cup of
cold water. Here, they bring me cold water for every service. Sometimes I drink the whole glass.
And I'm thankful that it's cold. But whoever gives me that and
puts that there, Christ said He notices that. If you give
a cup of cold water to one of my disciples, to one of my people,
They say well, that's just a given a cup of cold water anybody do
that Christ says when you do it as a believer. How does it?
He said I know your works look what he said here in Hebrews
chapter 6 in verse 10 For God is not unrighteous to
forget your work and listen to this and labor of love and Oh,
why did you do it? Because you showed it toward
His name. How did you do that? Because you ministered to the
saints. That's the difference. That's
just a labor of love when you do it toward your saints. And we desire that every one
of you do show the same diligence to the full assurance of the
hope until the end. You do this all the way to the
end. And then I also want you to do
this. I see your works. Don't be slothful, but followers
of them through faith and patience inherit the promises. So our
Lord talked about. He saw their works. There was
a time they took up a Over in Romans 15, they took up a big
offering to send down to the poor saints that were in Jerusalem.
And God took notice of that. You know, they gathered up the
money to take to the poor saints in Jerusalem. And they were under
all awful, awful circumstances. And our Lord says this again
about them over here in Revelations 2. He said this about them. Let me get back over there. He said this about them, I know
your works, I know your works, and I know in all the awful circumstances
you're under, and I know where you dwell in. I know where you
dwell. I know where you dwell. I know
where you dwellest at. And he said, I even know where
Satan's seat is. And oh my, he watches, he says,
I know where you dwell and I know what you're going through at
any one given time. And then look what he says. Oh,
you talk about a condom. Something that's really, really,
I read this to Shirley tonight. She says, that's above our pay
grade. But look what it says here. And
thou holdest fast my name. He commends their steadfastness.
And you have not denied the faith." Now boy, what a commendation
of Christ. He said, you hold fast my name. And what he's talking about,
he holds fast, we hold fast to who Christ is. We hold fast to
what he's done. We hold fast, name stands for
his character. And I tell you he had a character
as a man, a sinless man, a holy man, a perfect man, righteous
man. And then he had a glorious, glorious
work that he accomplished. And He washed us from our sins
in His own blood. And He went to the cross and
put all of our sins away. And I tell you what, we call
Him Jesus in His manhood. We call Him Savior as God our
Savior. And I'm the Lord Jesus Christ.
And I tell you what, holding steadfast unto the very end. And He said, you're not ashamed
of your relationship to Me. You're not ashamed. When you're
standing in front of Caesar, you hold fast my name. When you're standing in front
of all them idols and temples, you hold fast my name. Who do you believe? I believe
Jesus Christ. When you go to worship Caesar
or else, I believe Jesus Christ. Not ashamed of your relationship
to me? And what he is telling us, you're
not ashamed of who I am. Who I am. We read that there
tonight, Brad did, he said, oh he said he took the scriptures
and started in Moses. I'll tell you, I'm going to bring
a message. I'm going to take those three things, I'm going
to go to Moses, deal with Christ through the three things there,
and then I'm going to go to the prophets, deal with four or five
things there, and then I'm going to go to the Psalms, and deal
three or four things there, and I tell you what, we'll get the
gospel out of every one of them. Because you can't go no place
in this blessed book and not find Christ, and as old Doc said
this morning, he said, if we don't find Him, it's because
we can't see it. But our Lord said, you held fast
to my name. Remember when we first started
here, people called us a cult. They said, Donnie Bell started
his own religion. People called me on the phone
and said, you went off the deep end on predestination. And nobody would even call me
after that. I couldn't get nobody to give
me a good name anywhere. But I held fast to the name of
Christ and what He taught me. And that's what we're going to
do. God helping us, we're going to hold fast to who He is, what
He did. And I tell you what, not only
what He did, but who He did it for. There's no business telling
what He did if you don't tell who He did it for. He didn't
do it for the world, He done it for His elect. He didn't, when Christ died and
He loved people, He didn't love everybody, He loved only His
people. And that's what they're saying,
oh listen, you've held fast my name. Stand fast in the liberty wherewith
Christ has made you free. Don't budge from that blessed
name. Don't budge from that precious
person. Don't budge from the Lord Jesus
Christ. Hold fast that name. Stand on
that name. That's the only name God will
let us speak to Him in. He won't let us speak to Him
except in this blessed man's name. Oh my, and I'll tell you what,
you're not ashamed of the fact that not only am I the savior
of the world, but you're not ashamed of the fact that everybody's
going to be judged by me some of these days. Not ashamed of
that. And look what else he says now.
And you've not denied my faith. My faith, did you hear that?
My faith? Now what in the world is he talking
about? You know, I'll tell you what this faith he's
talking about, my faith. Paul said, I'm crucified with
Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I that liveth, but the
life I now live, I live by the faith of the Son of God. The faith of the Son of God.
Faith has to be perfect. And you and I ain't got that.
But he does. And that's whose faith we live
by. His faithfulness. And that's what he talks about.
It's my faith. You've not denied my faith. Not
denied who I am and what I do. And then when he talks about
my faith, he's talking about, beloved, the blessed truths of
the gospel. The blessed truths of the gospel.
What we rejoice in and what we believe in. And what we believe. You ask people what faith they
are. Oh, I'm a Lutheran. I'm of the
Lutheran faith. I'm of the Pentecostal faith.
I'm of the Baptist faith. I'm a Southern Baptist. A guy
told me the other day. He said, I've been a Southern
Baptist all my life. Southern Baptist, you know, and
they got all these different faiths. Nazarene faith, Netherland
Reformed faith, Foursquare faith, Church of God faith, Assembly
of God faith, I'm of this faith, I'm the whole in this faith.
But when Christ talks about faith, He's talking about the gospel.
And everything that's in that gospel. And you find that gospel
in one place, in this blessed book, and it concerns a person.
It's not just what you believe, it's who you believe. Huh? It's who you believe. And I've
said it before, look over here in Jude. You just go back to,
it's the last book before the book of Revelation. Oh listen, with these blessed
truths of the gospel. And Christ is the one that's
faithful, keeps us faithful. And that's why we believe Him,
that's why we trust Him. We rejoice in Him and we believe
Him. Look what He says there in verse
3. Beloved, when I gave all diligence
to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for
me to write unto you and exhort you that you should earnestly
contend, listen to this, now, for the faith which was delivered
unto the saints. God, He brought it to us. He
upholds it and He keeps it. And I know this much about every
believer in this building. Every believer in this building,
you do not look to your faith or your faithfulness. You look
to Him and His faithfulness. Everybody in this building tonight
does that, that knows Christ. Not one of you is going to look
around and say, boy, I tell you what, I sure got a lot of faith,
look where I'm sitting at. No, not one of you says that.
You say, oh no, well I'm here because he's faithful. I'm here because he gave me the
faith to be here. I mean, he did it all, that's
what we're talking about here. Oh my. And I'll tell you something
else, our faith, that what we actually believe, will influence
how we act in this world. If Christ being faithful to us
and what he's taught us in the gospel, if that don't affect
how we conduct ourselves in this world and conduct ourselves to
one another, then we ain't got any faith. I mean, it dramatically
changes how you act toward other people. That's it, it does. It does. And then look what he
goes on here and says. He said, oh listen, you've not
denied my faith even in those days where in Antipas was my
faithful martyr. Oh my. Who was slain among you
were the devil, where Satan dwells. He called him his faithful martyr.
Called him his faithful martyr. this saint sealed his faith his
testimony with his blood they saw it and they still they saw
these people being martyred they saw these people being slain
and they still held to the name of Christ and they still held
to and did not deny his faith and oh my and then he reproves
them for their sins and their failures and he goes in verse
14 and says but I have a few things against you A few things. A few things. Over in Ephesians
he said I have somewhat against you. One thing. Here he said
I got a few things. But what are these things? They
are them that hold the doctrine of Balaam who taught Balaam to
cast a stumbling block before the children of Israel to eat
the things sacrificed unto idols and to commit fornication. And
he removes them, reproves them for their sinless failures. And
when he talks about Balaam, now let me tell you about Balaam.
You can read it in Numbers 23 through 25 and then in Numbers
31. What Balaam did, remember how
Balaam was going to go, Balak, this Moabite king, said hire
Balaam, a prophet, to go and curse Israel. Well, he'd go to
curse Israel and God wouldn't let him. But he kept going back,
going back, going back. He kept going back to Balak,
because Balak kept on offering him all my sin, and God wouldn't
let him curse him. So here's what he taught him.
He said, I'll tell you what you do. You let your daughters, let
your sons marry those Jewish daughters. and let those sons
marry them Moabitish women. And he said, you start mixing
and mingling them and the next thing you know they'll be worshipping
idols. And that's what happened. When
he talks about fornication, he's talking about spiritual fornication
offering sacrifices to idols. And you can look at that in Numbers
25, 1 and 2. And that's what he did. He taught Balak. He said,
Balak, since God won't curse Israel, he said, I'll tell you
how you can do it. And that's why he says, be not only together
with unbelievers. And that's what he's talking
about here. He said, oh listen, just let them mix and mingle,
let them mix and mingle. Next thing you know, they'll
forget God. They'll go after their gods.
They'll go to their altars. And that's the way it is. I've
seen it happen too many times. I won't marry this person who's
a Catholic, but I'll win him over. No, you won't. No you won't. I'll marry that fella that's
a Pentecostal. I'll win him over. No you won't.
No you won't. Don't do that. And now he reproves
him. Remember when Balaam was on his
way one time to go to Balak to curse him. And God stopped him. You know how he stopped him?
An angel stood in front of his donkey. And he stood in front of that.
And that donkey wouldn't go anywhere. And it started backing up. And it got back to such a narrow
place that finally he bumped up against the wall and that
thing just slid down. And he started beating it. Just
beating a hound out of that. And then that donkey spoke to
him. He said, I've been to a donkey for years. I haven't done anything
to you. And then God opened his eyes
and he saw that angel and God said, now Balaam. Now I'll tell you what the scripture
said, God forbade the madness of the prophet through the voice
of his donkey. Now ain't that right? He said,
he's a mad. So that's why that happened.
And you can go over there and read about it. And so I tell
you, you have them that hold the doctrine of Balaam. What's
the doctrine of Balaam? You keep paying me and I'll keep
coming. And I'll go over there and tell, I'll go over there
and do what you want me to do. But every time he'd get paid,
he'd go over there and God'd say, nope, you're not going to
curse him. He'd go over there again and he took him all over.
He took him I don't know how many different places. and said
oh look down here and look down there and look down here and
he paid him and I tell you what that's what he said and so he
holds those that hold the doctrine and he called it the doctrine
of Balaam the doctrine the teaching of Balaam cast a stumbling block
before the children of Israel to eat things sacrificed unto
idols and to marry Moabites and everything else
and then he said also thou hast him That hold the dr. Nickel tears and things which
I also hate And I tell you they taught them Jews to eat lawful
unlawful things as a sacrifice to idols And I'll tell you what
And all they was filthiness of the flesh and filth into the
spirit go together And our Lord calls them doctrines. They followed
them. They allowed them and And it's one thing to believe the
truth, but you gotta also reject a lie. And then look what he
done down there now. Verse 16. He calls them to repentance,
all of them. Repent, or else I'll come unto
thee quickly, and will fight against them with the sword of
my mouth. Those who hold the doctrine of
Balaam, those who the Nicoletaeans, he said, calls them to repentance.
warns them to hear what He said. And I tell you what, then look
what He says here, now down there. You know, a whole church, this whole church
and a whole bunch of people can suffer over sins of one person
if their sin is grievous enough. But look what He said here. In
verse 17, a word for the conqueror, a word for them that overcome.
He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto
the churches. To him that overcometh. Oh my. A word for the conqueror here.
We're more than conquerors through Christ. To him that overcometh
will I give to eat of the hidden manna. Oh my. And I'll give him
a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no
man knoweth, saving he that receiveth. And he says, you know, I'll give
him that hidden manna. You know when Christ is called
the manna, and you know why he says I'll give him the hidden
manna? Because Christ is hid from the world. It's hidden from
those Nicoletaans and those Balaamites and that where Satan's seed is,
they're hidden from them. He said, but all him that overcome
it, I'm going to give him that hidden manna. I'm going to feed
you myself, is what he's saying. I'll feed you myself. I'll give
you to eat of the hidden manna. And I tell you, he's hidden from
the world. He's hidden from false religion. And he said, I'll feed
you myself, those that overcome. And then he said, I'm going to
give you a white stone. A white stone. And in that stone
there's going to be a new name written. Nobody's going to know
that name but the person who I give it to. And that stone,
that stone, that white stone represents the person who receives
it. It's like the High Priest of
Israel. He had the 12 names of the tribes
of Israel on each stone. Every stone had a name on it.
Christ said, I'm going to give you a stone with a name on it. It's going to be a new name.
And you know why it's called white? It represents holiness. It represents beauty. It represents
glory. You know why it's called a stone?
A stone lasts. A stone endures. A stone's got
durability to it. And it won't perish. So he gives
us a new stone. And then look what he says here.
And then that white stone, it represents one who's free from
guilt, cleansed from all sins. They used to have trials back
in those days and they had, when the people who'd be the jury
there, they'd have white stones and black stones. And when they
try somebody, if they're found innocent, they'd lay a white
stone there. If they're found guilty, they'd
lay a black stone. And if you got more black stones
than you did white stones, you're guilty. If you got more white
stones than you did... So that's how they would do the... in trials. And then he says this
new name that's written. And that new name represents
a new man. Created in Christ Jesus. And
they're the only one who really knows what it is to have a new
name and have a new nature. And a new name that stands for
our character. We have a new character. A new
name. We've been adopted into Christ's
family. And when you adopt somebody,
they take the name of the family. They take the name of the family.
Let me show you something in Isaiah 62. And I'm going to wind
this thing up. Isaiah 62. You know, and this is a white stone. It was
for festive days. Black stones represented days
of calamity. And every once in a while a big
host would have a supper for somebody and they'd have a special
guest and they'd have a white stone sitting there where they
would sit with their name written on it and a message written to
them on it. Christ said, I'm going to have a stone with your
name written on it and you're going to be the only one that
knows that name. The only one that knows that name. Look what
he said here in verse 62. Isaiah 62 and verse 2. And the Gentiles shall see thy
righteousness, and all kings thy glory, and thou shalt be
called by a new name with the mouth of the Lord. It's the mouth
of the Lord, it's a name. He said, I'm going to give you
a new name and the mouth of the Lord is going to be the one that names
it. It's going to come out of his mouth. He's going to give
you a new name. A new name. I tell you what, there's just
more than I can get to. Just more than I can get to. I get
off on too many things. But I tell you, this is a new
name. Wonder what name I'll have. Wonder
what name you'll have. I tell you, he'll go tell us.
Christ is when we get there. It don't make no difference what
it is right now. We don't need to know it until
we get there and he puts our name