Turn to Revelation chapter 2.
This is the fourth letter. It's to the church, to the pastor
and to the church in Thyatira. Thyatira was a very prosperous
city. Very prosperous. A lot of commerce
going through that city. A lot of worldliness going through
that city. This church had to deal with
a lot of that. In my readings, I learned that in Thyatira, they
had what we know as trade unions. what they called the trade guilds.
And every one of them had a god for their craft, for what their
trade was. And they would have festivities
to worship that god. And of course, they would usually
turn into orgies and paganism. You know how paganism is. And
if you do not belong to any of these trade unions, You couldn't
hardly do business there. It was very difficult to do business
there. Who do you know from Thyatira?
Lydia, a businesswoman, a seller of purple. Now we have some idea
of what she had to put up with when the Lord opened her heart
and saved her and she had to go back to that place. She had
to go back to that place and this is what she dealt with. Now, Christ, in verse 1, or it's
not verse 1, it's verse 18, He reveals Himself as the Son of
God. You know, in the first letter,
He revealed Himself as the One who holdeth the seven stars in
His right hand, the seven pastors. When I read
that again this week, I thought of myself and all those who pastor,
I'm in his hand. He's holding me in his hand.
That's a lot of comfort, but that's also a very sobering thought,
the responsibility of that. And he walks in the midst of
the seven golden candlesticks. He walks in the midst of these
churches. He's not a distant observer. He's in our midst. He's not watching
from a far country. He walks. If we are his church,
if Hurricane Road Grace Church is his, he walks. in the midst of this church. That's sobering. Comforting,
but sobering. And then the second time he reveals
himself to the church in Samaritan, he reveals himself as the first
and the last, the one that was dead and is alive forevermore,
the first God and the last. He's the sovereign, but he's
also the Savior. The sovereign is the Savior.
Scripture says, David says over in the Psalm, God is become my
salvation. He doesn't just say God has saved
me, though he has, but God himself, the sovereign of the universe,
the sovereign over all, is become my salvation. He is my salvation. And then to the church in Pergamos,
he revealed himself as the one who hath the sharp sword with
two edges, piercing as a man of war. Our God is a God of war. Says
that over in Old Testament. And then here he reveals himself
as the Son of God. The Son of God. That means we
can trust this letter. We can trust this letter. This
letter that's given to this church was dictated by the God of heaven
and earth to John, and John gave it to them. They had the first
copy. given by the Son of God, and
you can trust it. You can take what's written here
and trust it. Take him at his word. But since it's being from the
Son of God, we can not only trust it, but do it. Do it. What he says to do, what
was it Mary said? What he says do, do it. Well, that's a powerful message,
isn't it? I mean, we can go home on that. But he says to do, do
it. Don't argue with it. Do not try
to logically reason it out, because you will reason it completely
out. It will go completely out the door. Just do it. I don't want to sound
like a Nike commercial, but just do it. They picked up on it, didn't
they? Will gain. We can trust him and then do
what he says, but notice here, he says his eyes. His eyes like
a flame of fire. Piercing, that's the first thing
I thought of piercing. Looking straight into the heart,
looking past the outward appearance, you know, we make a good show,
you know, we can do that, but he looks on the heart. I can't
see the heart. I watch the television, just
half the time Vicki will start clinging and she'll get in front
of the television. And I tell her, I said, you make
a better door than you do a window. Move. I can't see through you. He does. He has eyes like a flame
of fire, piercing, all seeing. on knowing and feet like fine
brass." Now, in my readings, most of them talked about his
power to reign and his rule, but you know what? What I do
know about foundry, if you're going to get fine brass, you're
going to have to put it through the fire. His feet and that fine brass
tell me that he came through much affliction, much affliction,
and survived. and survived. His feet are like
fine brass. He does have the power to rain.
He does rain. But he came through much affliction.
He came through hell, the torment of God's wrath. There he stands,
eyes like flame and fire, feet like fine brass. And he says,
I know thy works, He knows them to be true and not false. He knows them to be from the
heart, genuine. Peter, do you love me? Lord,
you know all things. You know, I love you. You know, I love you. He knows this morning every heart
that's worshiping Him and every heart that's not. He knows it. He knows it. He knows if it's
from the heart or lip service. Tell those Pharisees, you worship
me with, you know, with your lips. That's all it is, is lip service. Turn to Jeremiah 23. Look in verse 23. Am I a God at hand, saith the
Lord, and not a God afar off? Can any hide himself in secret
places that I shall not see him, saith the Lord? Do not I feel
heaven and earth? Don't get this picture in your
head that God is a zillion miles away. He said, I feel. I feel up heaven and earth, saith
the Lord. Can any hide himself from me?
No, that's not even possible. It can't happen, God. No one, let me tell you this,
no one ever gets away with anything. You think, you say, and I remember
when O.J. Simpson had that trial and everybody,
he got away with murder. If he murdered, he's not getting
away with it. I promise you, no one gets away
with anything. God said, no one hides from me.
He has eyes like a flame of fire, piercing, knowing. He knows all
things. And he said, I know thy works.
I know your charity. I know your love. Someone asked
me one time, what is love? Now, don't go off and try to
explain that because I've done this before. Don't go off and
try to explain that love is some kind of mystical... Just turn
to 1 Corinthians 13. Look over there. If you're ever
asked what love is, just say, well, I can tell you
from the Word of God what love is. Well, love is God. God is
love. That's where it starts. You know,
love is a person. It starts with God. If you don't
know him, you don't know love. But now listen, here's another
explanation of it here in the Word of God, in verse four. Charity,
which is love, suffers long. And he's telling this church,
I know your long suffering with where you are, with one another,
and with the people you have to be around. And it's kind. You're kind. He's saying to this
church, you're kind. I know this. about you. And you're
not envious. You're not saying, oh, I wish
I had that house or I wish you're not like Lot's wife who turned
back because her heart was back there beside him and all that
she had back there and all her friends and all the all the stuff
she had. She just her heart was there. You're not envious. Solomon said, don't be envious
of the wicked. Only a fool would be envious
of the wicked. And you're not rash. Charity vaunteth not itself. It's not rash. It's not puffed
up. They didn't have pride of grace
and pride of grace. You're not puffed up. They're
broken. True repentance. That's what true repentance is.
It's a true brokenness of heart. And does not behave itself unseemly
or rudely. You're not a bunch of rude people.
It seeks not her own. You're out helping one another. It's not easily provoked. Rejoice
is not in iniquity. You don't rejoice in iniquity
or in anyone's fallen iniquity. You rejoice in the truth. You
rejoice when the gospel is preached, you're happy. You rejoice. You
give thanks. And you bear all things. People talk about you. They misrepresent
you. And you bear it. And you believe
all things. You believe all things that are
of God. You believe the gospel. And you believe the best of others. You hope all things and do all
things. I know your charity. That's exactly
what he's saying. What I just read to you. I know
it. He's not just saying, I know
you just like one another. You'd learn to get along. Oh,
I know all these things about you. That's what goes along with
love. That's love. I know your service. They were diligent. They didn't just show up on the
Lord's day. And then go home, forget about
it. They were diligent. In the gospel, they were consistent.
They were diligent in spreading the gospel. They were diligent.
The scripture teaches diligence. I know your faith. I know you
believe me. I know you believe me. You know when someone believes
you or not, don't you? You know when they believe you.
If they go off and say, well, I believe what you're saying,
then they go off and do something else. Or go another direction? No, they didn't believe you.
They didn't believe you at all. I know you believe me by your
service and your love. It's evidenced. Of course, the
Lord's seen the heart. He knows what's in there. I know
your patience. Now, how do you get patience?
You study a book. I tell you what, just reading
the Word of God won't give you patience. Not just reading it. Tribulation. Work with patience. That's how it comes. That's how
it comes. And I know your patience because
I know the tribulations you've gone through. And you've kept
my name. You've kept the faith. You've
kept faithful. You've not denied me. And I know
your works. That is, all that you've done,
I recognize. I recognize it. And the last
will be more than the first. Now, brethren, this is the way
we want to go out, the last to be more than the first, to go
out stronger than when we started. You know, in this life, naturally,
we go like this up, then we go down, and we head for retirement,
and then we wait. To tell you the truth, we kill
and retire, and then we wait to die. That's what we're waiting on.
That's what we're waiting on. He says, here, you have to slow
down a little. They just go like this. That's
just up and up and up until the Lord takes them home. The last
will be more than the first. This is how you and I want to
leave. You know the reason, if you want
to talk to the bottom line, the reason these big companies do
these buyouts and make people retire early, I can tell you
from a business standpoint, the asset became a liability. But here, he said, your last is far greater
now than when you began. That's the way to go. That's
the way to be. But there's a problem. In this
place there always will be. There's a problem. You suffer. That word means to let be, allow,
or to tolerate that woman Jezebel. Notwithstanding verse 20, I have
a few things against thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel.
All right, who's Jezebel? Turn over to 1 Kings 16. There's
two people that you don't want to hear someone call you, that's
Judas and Jezebel. I mean, if someone's going to
really slam you, it's going to be one of those two, Judas or Jezebel. First Kings, let me see here.
What'd I say? 16? First Kings 16, look in verse
31. We're going to look at several
verses here. Look at verse 30. And Ahab, he's
the king, he's the king, the son of Amra did evil in the sight
of the Lord. Above all that were before him,
and if you read those before him, you wouldn't think that
it would be possible, but he did. And it came to pass as if
it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam,
the son of Nebat, that he took to wife Jezebel, the daughter
of Ethelbel, king of the Zidonians, and went and served Baal and
worshipped him. Jezebel, an idolatrous woman,
just soaked in idolatry, and he follows after her. Now, look
over in chapter 18. Who is this Jezebel? In 18, look in verse 4. Let me see if I've got it written
down right. 18, verse 4. For it was so when
Jezebel cut off the prophets of the Lord, having them killed,
that Obadiah took a hundred prophets and hid them by fifty in a cave
and fed them with bread and water." She turned against God's prophets. Called them liars. She hated
them. Hated them. Why did she hate
them? Because they stood against her. They stood against her.
They told the truth which was totally against what she held.
Look in verse 19. Now, therefore, send and gather
to me all Israel unto Mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal four
hundred and fifty, and the prophets of the groves four hundred, which
eat at Jezebel's table. And you know this story here,
how they all get burned up, and it makes her so mad she wants
to kill Elijah. to chapter 21. Now, before I go to the verse
I want to read, there's something here I want to point out. I just
saw this while sitting up here. She writes a letter, and she's going to have Naboth.
Let me give you this little story here. Ahab wanted this field
that was close to him. And Nabal said, no, that's my
inheritance. I don't want to sell it. I want
to keep it. Well, it made Ahab sad, upset, and Jezebel asked
him about it. And he told her, and she said,
oh, okay, I'll get you that field. And notice what she does in verse
8. So she wrote letters in Ahab's name. The Lord says over in Revelation
2, Jezebel, which calls herself a prophetess, a preacher, called
of God to preach the gospel. That's what she's saying. I don't
know what that woman's real name was over in Revelation 2, but
the Lord does. He says, Jezebel. That's who
she is. So she wrote letters in Hab's
name and sealed him with his seal, pretending, I wrote out
by that verse, pretender. Pretending to be called of God.
Pretending that God has anointed them, given them power. No way. No way. But now look in verse 25. In
verse 25, But there was none like unto
Ahab, which did sell himself to work wickedness in the sight
of the Lord, whom Jezebel, his wife, I mean, she was behind all the
wretchedness and evilness that was going on, especially in this
false religion and idolatry. He may have actually built a
temple in Samaria to Baal so that it would be close by so
his wife wouldn't have to go so far. And that's why he did. But I
want to show you her end, and then we'll see what our Lord
says in the rest of that chapter concerning Jezebel. Turn to 2
Kings chapter 9. 2 Kings chapter 9, let me find
my verse. Look at verse 7. He said, And
thou shalt smite the house of Ahab thy master, that I may avenge
the blood of my servants, the prophets, the ones whom she had
killed, and the blood of all the servants of the Lord at the
hand of Jezebel. Look in verse 10. And the dog
shall eat Jezebel and the portion of Jezreel, and there shall be
none to bury her. And he opened the door and he
fled. This is what God thinks of false religion. Now don't
think that he's going to deal with it easily or mildly. We'll see here what he does to
her. Look in verse 22. And it came
to pass when Joram saw Jehu, that he said, Is it peace, Jehu? And he answered, What peace,
so long as the whoredoms of thy mother Jezebel and her witchcrafts
are so many? Now go to verse 30. And when
Jehu was come to Jizreel, Jezebel heard of it and she painted her
face and tired her head and looked out the window. And as Jehu entered
in at the gate, she said, had Zimriah peace. Isn't that what
these false religionists say, these false preachers? Peace,
peace. There's no peace in this woman's heart, no peace with
her and God. She says, peace. who slew his master. And, gee,
you lifted up his face to the window. And he said, and I want
you to notice how God deals with false religion. And this is how
serious this matter is. He said, you've got a prophetess,
you've got a woman there, Jezebel, in your midst that you are allowing
to bring in damnable doctrine. You know, she goes out there
to the with the false religions and comes back and intermingles
with the Church of God and spreads her poison. She spreads her poison. But anyway, he lifted up his
eyes to the window and said, Who is on my side? Who? And there
looked out to him two or three eunuchs, and he said, Throw her
down. That's taking care of the problem,
isn't it? Throw her down. So they threw her down and some
of her blood was sprinkled on the wall and on the horses and
throwed her underfoot. You say, that's severe. Hell
is even more severe. There you don't die. You just
suffer. And when he was come in, he did
eat, drink, and he did the Lord's, you know, we do the Lord's work
with a good conscience. When he said, throw her down,
he was doing exactly what the Lord told him to do. And he moved
on. And he said, go, see now this
cursed woman, and bury her, for she is a king's daughter. And
they went to bury her, but they found no more of her than the
skull and the feet and the palms of her hands. Wherefore they
came again and told him, and he said, This is the word of
the Lord, which he spake by his servant Elijah the Tishbite,
saying, In the portion of Jezreel shall dogs eat the flesh of Jezebel,
and the carcass of Jezebel shall be as dung upon the face of the
field in the portion of Jezreel, so that they shall not say, This
is Jezebel." Totally annihilator. And that's what God's going to
do with false religion. He's going to totally annihilate it
one day. Now go back and read that. Now go back and read that. Notwithstanding, I have a few
things against thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel,
which calls herself a prophetess, a preacher of the gospel. She
is saying that God called her to preach, and that she calls herself a
prophetess. God didn't call her that. God
called her Jezebel. You know, the Scriptures plainly
teach that a woman is not to usurp authority in the church
in teaching. Now, if that makes anyone mad,
take it up with God. He's the one who wrote it. He's
the one who set that order. He set the order in the home,
in the workplace, in this church, in heaven. If you don't like
the authority, just take it up with Him, and it won't change. She calls herself a prophetess
to teach. and to seduce my servants to commit fornication, spiritual
and actual. But they committed spiritual
fornication. In other words, they received these people and
they hugged them up. And it's like, and this woman
was saying this, you've got to get along. Nobody's going to
listen to you if you're that dogmatic. If you're that dogmatic,
no one will listen to you. Oh, yes, they will. God's sheep
will. My sheep hear my voice. And I don't care what you do,
the others not. They're not going to hear. It's not going to happen. The dead don't hear. She said, teach and seduce my
servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed
unto idols. She was mixing works and grace.
She's mixing, let's all just get along out here. And they
were actually committing fornication. She thought that there was nothing
wrong with that. But my soul, look here at the
mercy of the Lord. I gave her space to repent. Can
you imagine that? She is lying on God, and there's
nothing that will make you madder and more upset than someone lying
on you. I gave her space to repent of
her lying, of her fornication, Going around saying, God has
called me to preach, listen to me, and then spread all these
lies. I gave her space to repent of her fornication and she repented
not. She loved what she was doing.
She loved her position. She was a self-made prophet. She loved the following she was
getting. The attention that it gave her. And she repented not
because repentance is a gift of God. Listen, listen to me. We are
at the sovereign mercy of God. If you have ever truly repented
and I have truly repented, we can thank God for it. Because
we weren't born with that kind of heart. If you love Christ, if you love to hear his gospel,
you love being around his people, that's of God. You hate what
you once did and what you were and still are by nature, that's
of God. He gave her space to repent, but she didn't do it. She couldn't
do it. She didn't want to do it, but he was merciful. He gave
her space to stop, turn. She had no heart to repent, saw
nothing wrong with what she's doing. And notice here, he says in verse
22, this is what he's going to do with false religion, false
preachers, everyone who's a pretender. Behold, I will cast her into
a bed and then to commit adultery with her into great tribulation. Great tribulation. Except they
repent. There's another act of mercy.
Except they repent of their deeds. See, he's writing this. to the
pastor of that church, but now his church is not involved in
this, but they're allowing it. They are allowing this to come
in, and then she'd go to her other places of worship and come
back here. And he said, no, that don't happen.
You've got to stop that. As I said last time, little Lev
and Lev was a whole lot. And he's telling this pastor
to deal with it. He says, you deal with this. You stop this
problem before it affects everything. I'll kill her children with death
and all the churches shall know that I am he which searches the
reins and the hearts. Let's do a head count here. It's
a heart count. It's a heart count, not a head
count. And I'll give unto every one of you according to your
works. But unto you I say, and unto the rest in Thyatira, as
many as have not this doctrine and which have not known the
depths of Satan." Not just the depths of fleshly depravity, but spiritual
depravity, spiritual deadness, the depths of lies, twisting
the Scriptures. Lying on God? He said, I will put upon you
none other burden than to deal with this problem. Deal with
this problem. But that which you have already,
hold fast till I come. What do you and I have right
now already to hold fast? The gospel. That which you have already,
you hold it fast. And what we have is the gospel
of the grace of God. And you hold it fast. Don't you
compromise. Don't compromise. This seemed
to be a problem throughout. I tell you what, that's a problem
throughout history. It's a problem throughout history
because they can put so much pressure. Satan is so subtle.
Still, Frank, he can come in through any crack. He didn't
walk in the door and say, I'm the devil. I was telling him I can't remember
the portion of scripture that says they will look, narrowly
look upon him and say, is that the one that deceived the nations?
Are you serious? That's the one that deceived
everybody? And he says, you hold fast the
gospel of God's sovereignty and salvation? God saves whom he
will. Thank God he saves. But you and
I, he says, will not come to me that you might have life if
he leaves us alone. Don't think that anyone will
naturally come to Christ. Don't think that you just throw
the gospel out there. preach the gospel out there and
men just naturally, some of them are going to naturally be drawn
to Christ. No. No. Then that's to be drawn to
religion, being religious, but not Christ. We hold to the redemptive work
of Christ, the effectual redemptive work of Christ. He got the job
done. Everyone for whom he died shall
be saved. Now, he's not going to lose one
of them. He said that. You think, I know the answer. But you think, he said, I'll
not lose one of them. What is hard to understand about
that? You know, there's nothing hard to understand about that.
That's why the Jews got so mad at him. Because they understood
what he was saying. They didn't like it. They did
not like it. Because they received not what? the love of the truth. They didn't
receive the love of the fact that God is sovereign. They didn't
receive the love of the fact that Christ actually redeemed.
They didn't receive love for that. They had no love for it.
We preach the regeneration by the Holy Spirit, the regenerating
work of the Holy Spirit. Hold to that. Don't let that
go. Creation of a new nature. a new
man in Christ, and the perseverance of the saints. You're His, you'll
make it. You may feel like you're crawling
across the finish line, but you'll make it. You might feel like
some of those marathon runners who stagger and fall and try
to drag. It's all right, you're going
to make it. That's all right. That deal's done. It's a done
deal. You may be languishing on a bed
in much pain. You'll make it. You'll make it. He lives to see
that you make it. Because I live, you shall live
also. You'll make it. And he, in verse 26, I've got
to close here. And he that overcometh and keepeth my works, By whose
works are you saved? That's what he's talking about.
You keep my works. My hope is in the works, the
work, the works. He says here works. But my hope
is in what he did for me. My hope is in him keeping the
law for me. My hope is in his obedience on
my behalf. He that keepeth my works, it's
not a mixture of my works and his works, it's his works. I
don't have any, but I wish God will save me. The works that
I do have, he works in me. It is he that worketh in you
both the will and do of his good pleasure. And he that overcometh and keepeth
my works until the end does not quit. And God's people don't
quit. They may fall down, and they
will. You'll fall. I assure you, you're
going to fall, scrape your knees. I asked Madison here the other
day. She had a boo-boo on her knee, a big red spot. I said,
what did you do? She said, I fell down on the concrete. We do fall down on concrete,
and it hurts, and we get scratched. But one of the old writers, one
of the old prophets said, Rejoice not over me, O my enemy, for
though I fall, yet shall I rise again. Yeah, don't laugh. I'll get the last laugh. Because
God said, I'll laugh when your calamity comes. And we'll be
there when it does. And he shall rule over them with
a rod of iron, as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken.
Just shivers. This is how he's going to... Take your imagination back to
Jezebel. She hit that ground. She hit
that hard place. What happened? Splattered. Shivers. Shivers. And he said, that's
what I'm going to do with every false religion, every false teacher,
every false preacher, every false professor. This is how I'm going
to deal with them. Serious business. But as far
as his children, he says, his children shall rule over them
with a rod of iron as a vessel of a potter, shall they be broken
to shivers, even as I received my father, and I'll give him
the morning star. We will reign, the scripture
says, as kings and priests with him. There are several scriptures,
but I've gone too long here. But talk about us reigning with
him on the throne. And we will do this, I know this,
we'll be witnesses and judgment. When the great judge of the earth
judges everybody, we'll be witnesses to it. And he said, you'll judge
angels. I'm not going to go into all
that, because as over my head, I wouldn't like to get there.
And then you won't have to ask, what does this mean? We'll have
the mind of Christ and we'll know. We won't be asking anybody
what something means. And I'll give him the morning
star. Again, that's Himself. We cannot be given anything greater
than Christ. He's it. That's over in Revelations
22, 16. But I want to turn there right
now. He that hath an ear, let him
hear what the Spirit saith through the churches. Did you hear anything
this morning? Did you hear anything this morning? Did you hear Him
this morning? Not anything, but did you hear
Him? As I was reading this, I was
thinking, my first thought was, if he wrote a letter to us, what
would he be writing to me? What would he be saying to me
as a pastor? Then I thought, well, he has. He wrote seven letters.
Which one of them would apply? And I sat and I thought about
that. I thought, because at one time or another, something here
is going to apply. One of these letters and situations will apply.
And it's my responsibility to keep my eye open. Let me show
you one scripture. I've got to show you this one. I don't know why I preach too
long. I'll tell you when I get there. Proverbs 27. I think I'm going to put this
one, I may put it right here on this pulpit. In Proverbs 27
verse 23, Be thou diligent to know the
state of thy flocks, and look well to thy herds. That
needs to be imprinted right here on this pulpit. Okay, Mike.