I believe your Bible's open there
to Revelation chapter two. It's going to be our text this
morning. I've titled the message, Don't
Leave Your First Love. Recently, I've been reading these
letters to the seven churches that the Lord sent to them, and
I felt led to bring a message on the first of these letters
to the church at Ephesus. are very few things in this life
that are as dear to me as this congregation and this work. It is my every single day prayer
that this work would continue, that the gospel would continue
to be preached here to you, to your children, to your grandchildren,
long after I'm gone. And if that is going to happen
by the Lord's mercy and grace, much like I said in the Sunday
school lesson this morning, we're gonna have to be an active participant
in that, in that happening. And this study has been a great,
great blessing to me this week. I pray that it will be to you
this morning too. Now the seven churches that the
Lord writes these letters to, they represent every local church. So these letters are written
to us today, just as much as they were written to those congregations
2,000 years ago. Yet one time or another, every
local church finds itself in all seven of these different
local churches. It's just a cycle. It's unfortunate,
but it's just a cycle that we go through because of the dead
carcass, the flesh that believers have to carry around with us.
And Lord gives warnings. on each of these different situations
and gives us instruction on each of these different states that
the different churches find themselves in. If you would read these letters,
you'll find there were very, very serious errors going on
in these different seven churches. The church at Pergamos compromised
with false religion. They compromised the gospel to
kind of match up with false religion and get along with false religion,
And then they ultimately said, and this is where compromise
always goes, well, it doesn't matter how a believer lives. We're saved by grace, and since
we're saved by grace, our conduct doesn't matter. Let's just say
that grace may abound. It doesn't really matter how
much of the gospel we preach, or if we compromise it, the Lord's
still gonna save his people by his grace. Now, that's a very
serious error. That was going on. The church
at Thyatira, They made friends with false prophets and idolaters. They made friends with those
who openly hated God's service. The church of Sardis, they were
living on their past glory. You know, they weren't seeking
Christ like the congregation did when it first started. They
weren't seeking to serve Christ now. They were living off the
past glory of the church. What great things that the Lord
done there in the past. They still appeared fine on the
outside, but inside they were dead. They were just going through
the motions of religion as religious hypocrites. That's a serious
error. The Lord looks on the heart.
He knew that was going on. The church at Laodicea, they'd
become lukewarm. They weren't hot or cold. And
God says, that's disgusting. I'll spew you out of my mouth.
They had just become apathetic. They just didn't feel their need
of Christ or his gospel. like they used to. It's just
like, yeah, I can take it or leave it. You know, I'll go this
week and attend the worship service as long as I don't have something
better to do. They're just apathetic about it. That's a serious, serious
error. But of all the errors going on
in these seven churches, there's just one of them that the Lord
threatened to remove the local church from that town. Just one
of them. It's the church at Ephesus. Look
at verse five, we'll see what this error was that caused the
Lord to say he would take the local church out of that town.
He says, remember therefore from whence thou art fallen and repent
and do the first works or else I will come unto thee quickly
and will remove thy candlestick out of his place. Accept, thou
repent. Now the church at Ephesus, this
church was formed by the Apostle Paul. The Apostle Paul came to
town and preached there And the Lord calls to a very large church,
a very large congregation to grow up. And that church was
blessed of God. The preaching of the gospel,
God's people being saved, the congregation all being together,
being fed and growing in grace and knowledge of Christ. At one time, Timothy, Paul's
young protege, Timothy had became the pastor there. Remember the
Ephesian elders that Paul thought so highly of? his famous last
words to them before he went to Rome. That was the elders
from this church, the Ephesian church. At the time of the writing
of this letter, the Ephesian church had been established over
40 years ago. And they're still preaching the
gospel. They're still going. Timothy was no longer the pastor,
but the church was still going well by everything anybody could
see, you know, with their eyes. In verse one of chapter two,
The Lord says, under the angel of the church at Ephesus, write,
these things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right
hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks.
Now, the last chapter told us the seven candlesticks are the
seven churches. The seven stars are the seven
pastors. The Lord's holding those pastors in his hand, and the
Lord's walking in the midst of his people. He's walking in the
midst of those candlesticks, in public worship, where two
or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the
midst of them. He was walking in their midst. He knows what's
going on in these different congregations. In verse two, the Lord tells
this church, I know thy works, and thy labor, and thy patience,
and how thou canst not bear them which are evil. And thou hast
tried them which say they are apostles and are not, and hast
found them liars. The Lord says, I know your works
and your labor. I know what you're doing. I know
your labors of love. I know your acts of faith. I
see them. They don't go unnoticed. The folks here at Ephesus, their
faith was not idle faith. It wasn't just in word only,
which is a good thing because faith without works is dead,
isn't it? Isn't that what James told us? These folks put their
faith into action by serving the Lord and serving each other
in whatever way that they could. They were not lazy people. in
these spiritual matters, they walked in these things, they
walked in good works. That's commendable. And the Lord
says, I know your patience. These folks persevered in the
faith. They kept going, they kept trusting
Christ, they kept preaching Christ through many different trials,
all the different dangers, toils and snares that would have been
in the world today. You know, this was a, Ephesus
was a church or was a city where the goddess Diana This was a
central place in all the earth that this goddess was worshiped
And here's this great church in the midst of you can imagine
the persecution they suffered But they didn't quit The Lord
says I know you can't bear them that are evil You know the truth
of the gospel and you can't bear somebody that doesn't preach
it. They just would not tolerate false doctrine They would not
compromise with false religion just in order to get along. They
would say with David, I hate every false way. It's not just,
I hate it. Commendable, isn't it? Then the
Lord says, I know you've tried them. You've tried the spirits.
You've tried the preachers, whether or not they be of God. They used
the word of God to try the preachers to know the difference between
truth and error. They could tell the difference
between true prophet and a false prophet by using the word of
God. That's very commendable. The
Lord goes on in verse three. He said, you has born and has
patience for my namesake have labored and you have not fainted. These folks bore the reproach
of Christ with patience. They endured persecution for
Christ's sake, for the gospel sake, and they endured. Trials
and afflictions and hatred of the world did not make them quit.
That's commendable. Verse six, the Lord says, but
this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans,
which I also hate. Now, the Nicolaitans were wicked,
wicked people. They were what we call today
antinomians. They would say, we're saved by
grace. Since we're saved by grace, that's
all you guys preach. You guys can just keep preaching.
We're saved by grace, by grace, by grace, without our works.
Christ, by his sacrifice, took away all of our sins, then we
can just live a lawless life. It doesn't matter how we live.
You know, since we're saved by grace, no matter how much we
sin, God's still gonna save us. I mean, he's not gonna cast us
out, because we're saved by grace. And what they did is they used
God's grace as an excuse to commit every kind of open sin you can
think of. Sexual sin, immorality, dishonesty, lying and cheating
and hating one another. And the church at Ephesus hated
that doctrine. And it's a good thing they did.
It's a good thing they hate that doctrine. Now Christ has made
his people free from the law, hasn't he? He kept the law for
us. We don't have to keep the law as a matter of righteousness.
Christ did that for us. We don't look to the law to see
how we ought to live. Christ is the end of the law
for righteousness to everyone which believeth. But the believer's
conduct is directed by something a whole lot more powerful than
the law of God. The believer Our actions, our
lives are directed by a motive of love. Love for Christ, love
for his people. And when our conduct is motivated
by love, we will make every effort not to hurt others by our sin
and our bad attitude and our selfishness. You don't need the
law to tell you thou shall not commit murder. If you love somebody,
you ain't gonna kill them. Love is a whole lot more powerful,
motivating. because of love for Christ, wants
our walk, wants our conduct to reflect the grace that God's
put in our heart. That's what the Ephesian church
loved. I guess from what I read, that's what they did. Well then,
what's the problem? This sounds like a pretty good
deal, doesn't it? What's the problem? This congregation seems
as solid as can be. It doesn't look like anything's
wrong. So what is the Lord saying here?
Well, look at verse four, let's see. Nevertheless, the Lord says,
I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first
love. The charge that was against them, a charge that's so serious
that the Lord says, I'm gonna take the local church out of
this town and put in a different one, is that they've left their
first love. Now remember, This letter's to
us too. This letter's to all the local
churches, and it's quite possible for us to leave our first love. And it's so serious. You know,
that doesn't sound near as serious as compromising with idolaters
and compromising with false religion and making friends with those
people who hate God's servants. But this charge is so serious,
God said, I'm gonna remove the candlestick from you if you don't
repent. Take the local church out of this town. Now, leaving
your first love, this is not a believer who has quit, or a
congregation has quit loving God. If you're a believer, that's
not possible. A child of God cannot stop loving
God because he won't let us, because he'll never stop loving
us. We love him because he first loved us. Well, he's always gonna
love us, so his people can't quit loving him. But if we're
honest, We can say this, our love can diminish. Our love can
lose some of its warmth. It can lose some of its passion,
can it? Sure can. And I tell you how that happens.
It's through neglect. That's what happened here after
40 years of good, solid preaching. My guess is they just took that
preaching for granted. There are folks there in that
church just like here. who were raised under the sound
of gospel, never heard anything else. It's just always been there. And they took it for granted
and neglected it. And their love diminished. You
know, I can illustrate that with an example of natural love. A
husband and a wife, when they're first married, they're newlyweds,
oh, oh, they love each other. I mean, they love each other.
They just never part. They're always just smooching
and holding hands and just, oh, that love, oh. But now some years go by, and
they just don't treat each other like they did when they were
dating, like they did when they were first married. And you know
what happens? They still love each other. They
love each other, but they ignore their relationship. so many things
going on in their lives, and they become less warm to each
other. They become less, is it polite
or whatever, just less of a needy to each other. And you know why?
They've been together so long, they take each other for granted.
And the relationship suffers, doesn't it? They love each other,
but it's not that first love. It's not that love that is so
committed to each other. It's not that sweetheart love.
anymore, that sweetheart love. I remember Brother Henry saying,
don't ever lose that sweetheart love for Christ. And a couple
can lose that sweetheart love, and it's just through neglect.
It's just taking each other and their relationship for granted.
Well, the same thing happens spiritually. It can. You who
believe, especially those of you who's been around a while, I know this. You remember a time
when you could not wait for Sunday and Wednesday to roll around.
You could not wait to get to the worship service. You couldn't
wait to get there and hear what does the Lord have for me today.
I can't wait to get to the worship service because I know this.
I know this. The Lord's got something for
me today. He's going to teach me something new today. I could
remember a time every single service I was learning something.
It was so exciting. You remember a time when all
through the week, just all the time, you thought about the Lord. You thought about the upcoming
services through the week. You took time to pray for your
pastor. You know, well, I'm here at work. I'm in a salt mine, or I'm in
the office, or I'm out doing whatever. My pastor's in the
study. He's in over his head. no man sufficient for these things.
I'm gonna pray for him. And you just thought about that
and thought about that. You remember a time when you
just wanted to read your Bible. I just wanna hear God's word. I may not understand it as much
as when the preacher's unfolding it to me, but I just wanna read
God's word. I like to hear from God. Then, do you remember a time
when you still liked all those things but it wasn't as fervent
as it once was. It wasn't as warm. It wasn't
as necessary as it once was. That's losing our first love.
And this happens at different times to every believer and even
different local churches. Well, what's happened? We've
lost our first love. The warmth and fervor of our
love has just declined. over time, and I know that can
happen for a whole variety of reasons, but a church that's
been around a long time, like this one has, usually it happens
because we take the preaching of the gospel for granted. We
just think, well, the pastor's gonna be there every Sunday and
every Wednesday, he's gonna have something, and it'll always be
there, it'll always be there. Now, this congregation in Ephesus,
They were still working, doing good things. Everything that
the Lord commended them for, that was real. Every one of those
things are good things. But the Lord says they've left
their first love. Christ himself was not the priority
anymore. It was not a sweetheart love
for Christ anymore. And this is so subtle. Nobody
knows it's happening. From what this makes it sound
like, even the pastor didn't know it was happening. That's
why the Lord had to send him a letter, wasn't it? The pastor
didn't even know it happened. See, now, now we still love Christ.
No, we still love Christ. We preach the gospel. We wouldn't
sit under a false gospel. We're not doing that. But now,
baby, our first love is look how many years we've been faithful.
I mean, we have really, we've been faithful. and we're focused
on that instead of Christ. Maybe we've forgotten how quickly
we could fall away not believing Him. We still believe Christ,
we still love Christ, we still trust Him. We wouldn't trust
our salvation to our works and to our hands in any way, but
now maybe our first love is we can take credit that all these
trials and these tribulations, they made others quit, but they
didn't make us quit. I like taking some credit for
that. That's our first love now. Now maybe our first love is this. This is a dangerous one. I know
a false preacher when I hear him. And I won't tolerate it. Look at me. Now I mean, I'm well
taught. I recognize these false preachers. And I just make fun of them.
I just point them out. and that's become so important
to us to be able to look down our noses at other people in
false religion, we forget I was there once too. The issue in our salvation is
not so much as looking down our nose at false prophets as in
looking up to Christ. See, we've lost our first love.
See what I'm saying? I still love Christ, but it's
not first anymore. See that? Maybe our first love
is this. I'm working so hard. I'm doing
so much for the cause of Christ. This place would fall apart without
me. I just do the right thing. I
don't care what other people, I'm doing the right thing. Now our first
love has become my service to Christ and service to others
instead of Christ himself. See how subtle that can be? All
these things are good things. I mean, we're not gutting our
focus off on something bad. You know, some evil that's hurting
other people. These are good things for us
to care about. We had better be found faithful. We'd better
not quit. I mean, the only people that
are going to be crowned are those who finish the race. We'd better
not quit. We'd better not compromise with false religion. God forbid
that we would do that. We compromise false religion.
And these little ones here, are gonna cease here in the gospel.
We better not compromise. We had better be careful about
our walk and our conduct through this world. Now we better, we
better be careful that we serve the church, that we serve one
another and love one another. But if any of those things become
our first goal, our main goal, now they're good things. But
if we make those things our main goal, we've left our first love
and we've taken Christ the Son of God, Christ our Savior, we've
taken Him for granted. We've made something that's good
more important than Him that is best. That's what I'm saying. We've taken something that's
good and making it more important than someone who's best. I still
love Christ. But I really want to be seen
as somebody that doesn't compromise. Somebody that knows the difference
between truth and error. Somebody that battles false doctrine
everywhere I see it. I still love Christ. But I tell
you what I'm really focused on is fellowship and social interaction
with other believers. See how subtle that is? The outward
still being done right. But the motive is wrong. And
that's where God looks. on the heart, on the motive.
I'm telling you, the Lord cares a whole lot more about our motives
than he does our outward acts. He looks on the heart. And I
can tell you how we can lose our first love. We can be aware
of this thing. We lose our first love by willful
neglect of the Lord and of his gospel. How easy it is for us
to become like the bride in Song of Solomon 5. Remember, she'd
taken off her coat and her shoes. She's washed her feet. She's
all snuggled up in her bed, and the Lord comes knocking on the
door. And she said, oh, I can't get up right now. I'll get cold. I've taken off my slippers. I'm
just under here getting warm under my pajamas, and I'm just
too tired. If I get up, I've got to wash
my feet again. The fervor of her love for Christ was gone.
She didn't feel her need of Him like she did before. And then
when she finally did go to the door, the Lord was gone. The
Lord was gone. There are just too many other
things for me to do to really give up to go to the worship
service all the time. It's willful neglect. Second,
we can lose our first love by the care of this world. Look
at Matthew chapter 13. It's by desiring the things of
this world, by getting so busy with the things of this world,
it never ceases to amaze me that with all these modern conveniences
and technology that makes things so much easier to do, and we
can accomplish tasks so much faster than we ever could before,
that people are busier than they've ever been before. Our time is
just all taken up, isn't it? With the things of this world.
But look at Matthew 13 verse 22. The Lord says he also that receives
seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word and the care
of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word and
he become unfruitful. Now we all have jobs and we all
have responsibilities in this life and you better take care
of them. And I know from time to time they stop us from coming
to the surface and all these things. You know, you better
be doing them. Wayne, when they got to shut
down out there at the refinery, you better be there. I mean, you
got to take care of your job. Those things happen. But when
those things start to become a habit, you know what's happened? We've lost our first love. We've
lost our first love. That's what happened to Demas,
didn't it? The things of this world became
more important to him. I can tell you this, a young
girl who's dating a young man, And he finds every excuse in
this world not to be with her, not to go do girly things, go
see a musical, or go do whatever. He makes every excuse in this
world not to be with her. She ain't gonna be with him for
long. He's lost his first love. And then, just plain old presumption
on God's grace, like we deserve it or something, will cause us
to lose our first love. Self and self-righteousness,
self-dependence are the worst enemy that a believer has. King
Uzziah, you know the story, went in to offer incense before the
Lord and all those priests were telling him, don't do it, because
they said, King, this doesn't pertain to you. Only the priest
can do this. King Uzziah presumed that he
could go in and offer incense to the Lord and the Lord would
bless him. It'd be all right. I know other kings can't do it.
I know other people need the priest to do this, but I don't.
And he went into offering sins before the Lord, and the Lord
struck him down with leprosy. You know why King Uzziah thought
he could do that? The Lord had made him strong. The Lord had
blessed him and blessed him and blessed him, and he presumed
on God's grace, thinking, this is what I deserve. He's not gonna
take his blessing from me. I don't need a priest to go into
God's presence for me. I can do it my own self. and
God struck him down. He lost his first love. Self-righteousness
and self-dependence will destroy a love for Christ faster than
anything else in this world because it destroys our need of Christ,
our need of Christ. Well, no one in our flesh, that
can happen to all of us very, very easily, can it? Well, what
can be done? What can be done to keep me from
losing my first love? What can be done if I have lost
my first love? What can be done to get it back?
Well, it's very simple. It's all the same things that
a believer ought to be doing all the time anyway. I'll show
you what I mean here by that, by showing you four things that
the Lord tells us to do to correct this error of losing our first
love, by making something good more important than Christ, who's
the best of everything. And these are four things Every
believer ought to be doing all of the time. Number one is this. Remember. Remember from whence
thou art fallen. That's what he says in verse
five. Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen. Remember.
Remember the pit from whence you were dig. Remember how far
down in that miry pit that you were that you could not get out.
And the Lord said, deliver him from going down in the pit. Deliver
him from staying down in that pit. I found a ransom. God took you out of that pit
by sacrificing his son, using his blood to pay the ransom to
dig you out of that pit. You never could have got out
of there by your own self. God took you out. Remember how he
took you out of that pit? It's by the blood of his son. The son of God willingly became
flesh to be made under the law, to be slaughtered to save you. That'll fan the flames of love
in your heart, won't it? Don't forget this. Let's always
remember who and what we are by nature. We're dead, helpless
sinners who can't do one blessed thing for ourselves. Let's always
remember where we were when God found us and where we'd be if
he left us there. Let's always remember where we'd be if God
gave us what we deserve, even after conversion. Oh, my prayers,
God, do not give me what I deserve. Don't give me what I deserve.
Don't make this congregation suffer because you give me what
I deserve. Don't do that. Oh, God, be merciful,
be gracious to us. Don't let your name suffer by
giving me what I deserve. Just always remember how much
you need the Lord to save you. How much do you need Christ to
save you? You need Him to do it all, don't you? Well, remember
that. Remember how much you need Christ
to keep you saved. What do you need Christ to do
to keep you saved? All of it. I need Him. And remember this. Remember the joy of His presence
in your heart. And remember the lack of joy
when He's not there. That'll make you seek the Lord
Great need, just like the bride did in Song of Solomon 5. See,
she lost her first love, but the Lord didn't let her stay
there, did he? No, he made her feel her need of him, so she
sought him with everything she had. If we remember who he is
and who we are, we'll seek him, we won't lose our first love.
Second, in verse five, the Lord says, repent, repent. Accept thou repentance. I'm gonna
take the candlestick. I'm gonna take the local church
out of your city. You don't have it anymore. Repentance
is not a one-time thing. Repentance is a lifelong experience
for the believer. Your repentance is not being
sorry. You know, people think, oh, if I'm just sorry enough.
Well, I mean, I reckon sorrow is part of repentance. I'm sorry
that I started trusting these idols and looking to myself.
I mean, there's a sorrow involved there, but that's not what repentance
is. Repentance is a turning. I turn to Christ from my idols. I'm constantly, constantly, constantly
turning to Christ. Peter said, to whom coming. Coming
is a constant thing. I'm constantly looking away from
myself and looking to Christ. I'm constantly coming away from
this world and the things of this world, the trinkets of this
life, that so easily fascinate us and constantly turning to
Christ. I'll tell you how we can rekindle
our need, our love for Christ. Is turn to Him and look at Him.
Or if I see Him by faith, now if I see Him lifted up in His
word, lifted up in His gospel, I'm gonna turn to Him. I'm gonna
turn to Him. Then the Lord says, do the first
works. In verse five, he said, repent
and do the first works. Now, what are the first works?
Well, the first works, those are the things that you did when
you first came to Christ, with the motive that you had in your
heart when you first came to Christ. Remember when you first
came to Christ? Oh, how gladly you repented. how gladly you turned away from
all that junk that you weren't trusting in, and you turned to
trust Christ. Oh, so glad to turn to Christ.
I trusted Christ. I trusted Him with everything.
I didn't understand near as much about the Scriptures as I do
now, but I tell you this, I was still mighty glad to trust Christ.
I trusted Him gladly. I gladly cast everything on Him
I was so glad that I'm accepted in the Beloved. Not because of
anything I do, but all in Him. I was so glad. I was so glad
not to trust in my own works anymore. I mean, good as people
might have said they are, I'm sure glad I didn't have to trust
Him anymore. Now I trust Christ. Such a relief in my soul. Oh,
when I first trusted Christ, when He first revealed Himself
to me, I'm telling you, I would Never miss an opportunity to
be in the public worship service. This is my opportunity to hear
from God. I need the gospel. I'm a newborn babe that needs
that milk, the sincere milk of the word so bad. If it's being
handed out, buddy, I'm gonna be there. And I was excited. It wasn't a duty. It was an excitement. It was an excitement. Miracle
of miracles to go to a place where I can hear from God. Oh
my soul. I could learn more of the Savior.
Do you want to not lose your first love? Keep doing that. Keep doing that. Come to the
Lord right now. Just like you did the very first
time. Come as a needy beggar who needs everything from the
Lord. And you won't lose your first
love. I need mercy, I need grace, I need God's love, I need cleansing
from my sin, I need God to give me the gift of repentance and
faith. That makes me seek the Lord with all my heart, just
like I sought Him the very first time. And if you seek the Lord
like that, God's promise to you is, you'll find Him. And if the
Lord finds you, you'll say, oh, I found the Lord. But really,
the Lord found you. You'll not lose your first love. You'll
find that He won't abandon us, He won't desert us, and He'll
still hear our cries, even though we deserve for Him to cast us
away. And when you experience that, the overwhelming grace
of that, you won't lose your first love. It'll be rekindled.
And then here's the fourth thing. Hear. Hear. In verse seven, the
Lord says, he that hath an ear to hear, Let him hear what the
Spirit saith unto the churches. If you would not lose your first
love, tell you what to do. Be here when the gospel is preached,
not taking pride that you sacrificed out of your week to come here,
but be here to hear the gospel preached, begging God to give
you an ear of faith to hear. Seek to hear from Christ. Seek to hear from his word. And
you know what? You will. You absolutely will. The Lord speaks in mercy to every
sinner who's seeking a word from Him. I'm telling you nothing
will keep you loving the Lord and needing the Lord and trusting
the Lord like hearing Him preached as often as you possibly can. When we preach the gospel, we're
not saying anything new. I'm not saying anything different
than y'all ever heard before. But you know what? We need to
be reminded. To write the same things to you,
to me indeed is not grievous, but for you it's safe. That's
what the Apostle Paul said. You know what, the more we're
reminded of Christ, the more we'll need him. The more we'll
need him. And it's no wonder that a person
grows cold when they willingly absent themselves from the public
worship service. So you come to hear Christ and
your love will be rekindled. Yeah, that first love will be
rekindled by feeding on Christ. It is my prayer that God would
give us that love for Him, that love for Him that needs Him,
that needs Christ, so that we'll lovingly serve Him and worship
Him. Otherwise, the Lord may remove
the candlestick. He may take the gospel from here
to someplace else, and it won't be in our town anymore. And like
I told you at the beginning of the message, that's one of the great, fears
of my life, that God would keep the gospel here. Now in closing,
I want you to look over at chapter three. I want you to see what
simple faith in Christ does for a congregation. Revelations three,
verse seven. And to the angel of the church
in Philadelphia write, these things saith he that is holy,
he that is true, he that hath the key of David, he that openeth
and no man shutteth, and shut it that no man open it. I know
thy works. Behold, I have set before thee
an open door and no man can shut it. For thou hast little strength
and has kept my word and has not denied my name. Behold, I
will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are
Jews and are not, but do lie. Behold, I will make them to come
and worship before thy feet and to know that I have loved thee
because thou has kept the word of my patience. I also will keep
thee from the hour of temptation, which will come upon all the
world to try them that dwell upon the earth. Now the church
at Philadelphia was a very, very small congregation. That's what
the Lord meant there in chapter eight when he says, for thou
hast little strength. He means there were very few of them,
just a very small congregation. They couldn't do much financially,
the different, you know, other things like that because they
were just so small. But the church at Philadelphia was faithful. Even though they're so small,
there's not a hint here that congregation's gonna die out
in that town. There's not a hint that the candlestick is gonna
be removed. They are so small, and here's why there's no hint
that the gospel will be taken from that town, is because the
church at Philadelphia was faithful. They had faith in Christ. They didn't have a lot of people,
but they had faith in Christ. They didn't have a lot of money.
They didn't have a lot of resources. They felt like they didn't have
a lot of influence in the town in which they lived, but they
had faith in Christ. They looked to Christ alone.
They didn't have anything else to do, but keep preaching Christ. Because they believed. Because
they believed. And Lord said, even though your
numbers are so small, I'm gonna bless you. And the Lord did not
have one rebuke for this little teeny tiny church in this town
of Philadelphia. For the simple reason, they had
faith in Christ. Nothing came between them and
Christ. And my prayer for you and me
is that Lord make us faithful like that. I hope I'll be a blessing
to you. I hope you all stay and enjoy
a dinner as we celebrate, I guess I can say the numbers, the 50th
birthdays of Tara Kendall, Sabrina Kazee, Stacey and Jonathan Tate,
and the 20th. One of these things, not like
the other Kendons, 20. We got zero birthdays for all of them.
These five folks are very, very, very precious. to me in this
congregation and I thank God for you and I look forward to
this opportunity to celebrate and I hope y'all can stay and
do the same. All right. You know the drill,
by the way. After we sing, you watch phase
five and y'all fight over who goes first. They'll go first
and after them, we'll all follow. Get some D, okay? Let's bow together. Our Father, we thank you for
your word. We thank you for how tenderly that you deal with us
knowing our frame and remembering that we're dust. Father, I beg
of you that you give us faith to look to and trust our Lord
Jesus Christ, that we would be stayed on him and him alone. Father, I pray that you'd make
us faithful to serve our generation by making us our faith, our hope,
our priority always on Christ and Christ alone. Bless us, Father,
for your great namesake, because of your mercy and because of
your grace. And Father, I thank you for these five dear brothers
and sisters that we honor with their birthdays today. Father,
I thank you for them. I thank you for what they mean
to this congregation, the blessing that they are to us. Father,
I thank you. Pray your continued blessing be upon thee. Father,
bless this food that we're about to eat, bless it to our bodies,
and I pray that you give us a good time, an enjoyable time together,
fellowshipping with one another. And all these things we ask in
that name which is above every name, the name of Christ our
Savior, amen. All right, Sean.