Well turn back to Revelation
with me, to Revelation chapter 3 and to verse 7. We're going
to look this morning at the sixth of the seven letters to the churches. In Revelation chapters 1 to 3
we have the first vision of Revelation, the first of the seven visions
that make up the book of Revelation. And it gives a picture, it gives
a clear vision of God. God who is true, God who is even
now ruling over all things, God who is in heaven, God who is
in glory, God who rules in the affairs of men, God who is over
all, the creator, the giver of life. It gives a vision of God. What is God like? Show us what
is God like? We have that vision. in Revelation
chapters 1 to 3. A vision of God as He is now,
and how is He known? He's manifest, He's made known
in the glorified Lord Jesus Christ, His Son. This is my beloved Son
in whom I'm well-praised. And that Son of God, that God
manifesting the truth of God, is in the midst of His churches.
As His people, seeking His heaven, seeking His glory, are gathered
together In wherever they may be around this world, Christ
says He is in the midst. Where two or three are gathered
together in my name, He said, I am in the midst. And it's like
that until He returns at the end of time. The church, as I
keep saying, is the earthly representation of God's kingdom, in the midst
of Satan's worldly kingdom. The kingdom of this world all
around us, you know, I know it's nations, but there is one kingdom
of this world, because they're all united in their opposition
to God. And the kingdom of this world, the kingdom of Satan,
the kingdom of Antichrist, it's all the same thing. It aspires,
it hopes, are for eternal comfort of some sort without the need
for God's righteousness and justice. Whether it be annihilation that
they look forward to, no need for God's justice and righteousness
there because that's the end of you. Do what you want now
and that's the end of you. It might be a false heaven where
everybody goes and we all have a good time together, but it's
without God's righteousness and God's justice. It's a delusion. They have, as the scripture says,
believed a lie. The kingdom of Satan rejects
the rule of God. This world all around us rejects
the rule of God. It denies the existence of God,
doesn't it? Look at all the programs and
documentaries, the education of our children in the schools,
all denies the existence of God. It ridicules the power of God
and the works of God. And in chapter 1 of Revelation,
we have a revelation of the heavenly reality of the truth of God. the glorified Lord Jesus Christ. This is our God who is true.
He is true, supreme in majesty, supreme in power, absolutely
pure in holiness, grace. He's a God of grace, of mercy,
and of justice. He's a just God and justifier
of sinners. And this majestic God who dwells
in unapproachable light, Paul says to the Athenians nearly
2,000 years ago, he says, he is not far from each one of us. Can you get an impression of
that? God who rules everything, who
upholds all things by the word of his power is not far from
each one of us, from you and me. What a comfort it is. that He is ruling, that He is
sovereign over all things. Isn't it? What a comfort to the
believer. God is the one on the throne of the universe. Everything
that unfolds, you know what it says? All things work together
for good to those who love God, who are called according to His
purpose. How do they all work for good? Because He orders all
things according to the counsel of His own will. And what a sharp
contrast in the days in which we live. I don't think in my
lifetime I have ever seen such confusion, such incompetence,
such absolutely wielding power with utter stupidity in the governments
of this world. He not only rules in heaven,
our Lord Jesus Christ, our great God and Savior, but moves among
His churches on earth, and He is the Sovereign. Not these governments
that think they can do this, that, and the other. No, He rules. He directs the pastors of the
churches. He has the seven stars in His
hand. He says, these are the messengers,
the angels, the pastors of the churches. And He speaks His message,
and He gives them His message to speak to His churches. And
these were real letters written to seven real, historical, geographical
churches in what today we call Western Turkey in about AD 95,
so about 1925 years ago. And they were real churches with
a message specific to each one, but nevertheless they're symbolical
of all churches in the New Testament age until Christ comes back in
glory and judgment. The message covers all situations
at different times, but it's certainly all of them speak in
some measure to us today. And so we need to know what is
our God saying to us as he walks amongst us, as he walks among
the seven golden candlesticks. The candlesticks that are there,
what does a candlestick do? it holds a candle, and the candle
is what gives light. That's the idea. The truth of
God is light, and the churches are the candlesticks, the holders
of that light to shine into the world. In verse 7, let's look,
as we have done with the others, who is the speaker? Verse 7,
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 shutteth
and no man openeth. He's holy and true. Holy and
true. This is our God. Of all the other
characteristics that we've seen, which are so glorious, He is
holy and He is true. There is no unrighteousness with
God. There is no unfairness with God. This is what His word declares.
You may think, Things are unfair, but God is not unfair. God is
holy and true. Compare that with the world today.
Have you ever known an age in which governments, without scrutiny,
are making such rash and Just utterly irrational judgments
as to what we ought to do and what we should not do. And what
we're allowed to do and where we're allowed to go and what
we're not allowed. I've never ever experienced anything like
it. Just incredible. but the one who rules in the
affairs of men, our God, is holy and true. And he has the key
of David. The key of David refers back
to a portion in Isaiah chapter 22, where There was a ruler over
the house of Jerusalem who was acting unjustly and his name
was Shebna. And if you read the account in
Isaiah 22, you'll see that Shebna is removed and replaced with
a man called Eliakim. And Eliakim has the key of David. He's given the key of David.
In other words, he is given the authority of God to rule in the
affairs of God in Jerusalem, in the temple, in the things
of God there in Judah, which was the kingdom of God manifest
on earth in those days. And he replaced Shebna, whose
corrupt and unjust rule had caused such problems. And Eliakim is
given the key of David. It's a symbol of who is coming
into and going out of the kingdom of God. The way that the place
is governed, he has the key of David. The key over the kingdom
of God. Authority over who comes into
and goes out of the kingdom of God, as it was there represented
in Jerusalem. God is sovereign over salvation,
yet perfectly holy and true and just in all his ways. He is the
one who has the key of David. Our glorified Lord Jesus Christ,
who is our glorified God, you know he's the Ancient of Days,
how do I know chapter 1 of Revelation? White hair, it's like the picture
of the Ancient of Days. to whom the Son of Man came,
but because Christ has accomplished His works. Christ is the Ancient
of Days. Our God is manifested to us in
Him. He's sovereign over salvation.
He has the key of David. It is not of Him who wills, nor
of Him who runs, but of God who shows mercy. God is gracious
to whom He will be gracious. You know, it's not of us. It's
not of lines of descent. It's not in families. It just
isn't. It's according to the sovereign grace of God. He rules
over whom he will save and whom he won't. He is the one who chose
a multitude in Christ before the foundation of the world.
Jesus said to his disciples, you haven't chosen me, I have
chosen you. I have chosen you that you should
go and bear much fruit. He has chosen his people. that
we might walk in His ways. You say, well that's unfair.
No, look, He is holy and He is true. Let God be true and every
man a liar, because every man in his own opinion, with his
own opinion to express, is a liar compared with God, who declares
that He is holy and true in His word, in all His ways. What a
glorious God. We have. Believer, this morning,
what a glorious God you have. You know in the Song of Solomon,
the daughters of Jerusalem come and ask the Beloved, what is
thy Beloved more than another? They ask the Shulamite, what
is thy Beloved more than another? Oh my Beloved is, and the poetry
flows. And this is the God that we worship.
We don't worship some impotent, tin God, idol, who can do nothing,
who is subject to the will of man. We worship God who is sovereign. Do you know Him? Do I know Him? Do I trust Him? Do I trust Him
as I should, given who He is, given what His Word declares
of Him? Do I follow Him? Do I heed His Word? When His
Word directs my life, when His Word speaks and informs my judgments
and my philosophy of life. Do I hear what he says and do
I do his will and his word? I should, shouldn't I? Look who
it is. The one that is holy and true,
that has the key of David. This is our God. Now then, let's
see, again as we have, the situation at Philadelphia. Now Philadelphia
was the sixth of the seven churches in the Ark in Western Turkey. So if there is Western Turkey,
I don't know if you can see, I'm not sure. This is really
funny because when you try to do things like this backwards
and I'm looking at the monitor, it doesn't go the way you want
it to. But there's Ephesus down on the coast. This is the Adriatic
Sea. There's Ephesus and it goes up to Smyrna, and then it goes
up to Pergamos and then it goes across to Thyatira. Did you notice
in Acts 16 that that was where Lydia was a seller of purple,
was Thyatira, and she had moved to Macedonia. She had moved to,
well that was Philippi, wasn't it, where that took place. And
then from Thyatira to, what comes next, Sardis. Sardis, we saw
that dead church, a name, a reputation, but dead. And now we come to
Philadelphia and the last one that, God willing, we'll look
at next week is Laodicea. which is right near where Galatia
is. Galatia is this bit of Turkey. But that's the arc of the seven
churches. And the thing that's interesting
among the seven about Philadelphia, like Smyrna, there is not a word
of criticism or rebuke. The other five all have varying
degrees of criticism from the Lord Jesus Christ. But Philadelphia
has none. Look in verse 8. He says to them,
I know your works. You know, this is it. Our God
sees all things. He knows their works. He says,
Behold, I have set before you an open door, and no man can
shut it, for thou hast a little strength, and has kept my word,
and has not denied my name. This is a small church. It has
a little strength. It's of little strength in this
world. It isn't large and influential. It doesn't have an embassy. It
doesn't interact with world governments. It has little strength. It's
a small church in a hostile world situation. And why is the world
hostile to it? Because the world that will not
believe God, that will not have Christ, this man, to rule over
them, the world hates the Gospel message. Why does the world hate
the Gospel message? Because it highlights, the Gospel
message highlights the deficiency of the world's message of hope.
The world's message of broken cisterns. That's not their message,
but that's what it amounts to. I tried the broken cisterns,
Lord, but all the waters failed. And even as I stooped to drink,
they mocked me as I wailed. Broken cisterns instead of the
fountain of living waters, which is God. It highlights, the Gospel
highlights the deficiency of it. The Gospel shows that you
cannot be righteous outside of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Gospel
shows that you are not the good person that you claim to be in
society. No, there is none righteous,
no not one. It highlights, it pulls the rug
from underneath the world's message of peace when there is no peace.
Peace, peace is what they preach when there is no peace. And the
world opposes the true Church of God. Oh, the world embraces
that which calls itself Christian, but makes no offence whatsoever,
that doesn't preach the true Gospel. The world can't stand,
despises the message of the true Gospel, because it says that
God is God. God is on the throne. God is
sovereign. Not you, arrogant man. No, God
is on the throne. And so the world opposes. The
world seeks to silence the true church with its message, to disrupt
their meetings. We've experienced it ourselves,
haven't we, in trying to rent places to meet and all of the,
you know, sometimes it comes very subtly and very, very, with
a very soft glove on it, but the net effect is exactly the
same. It makes it practically impossible for you to meet where
the opposition lies. But this church at Philadelphia
had kept going in the face of opposition. Doesn't it say they
had not denied my name? The implication being that the
world around, the authorities around, the society around, had
tried to get them to deny. the true gospel of grace. If
we were to ask anybody around here, and especially those that
call themselves religious, about us and our message, I've experienced
it firsthand. They want nothing to do with
it. They say we're hyper-Calvinists, they say we're antinomians, they
say that we're not fit to have anything to do with, because
it's the message of the truth that's in the Scriptures of God.
But the church at Philadelphia had not bowed to that pressure. They had not denied the name
of Christ, the name of God. They had, verse 10, kept the
word of my patience. They kept it. They stuck to the
gospel of grace. Why had they believed? Why do
true believers believe and continue to believe and keep going in
the face of opposition? Let me give you some reasons
why the true church carries on in the face of opposition. whether
it's physical persecution, whether it's psychological persecution,
whether it's just attempts to disrupt the meetings and all
of those other things. I'll tell you why believers keep
going, why these Philadelphian Christians kept going, why we,
if we're true, keep going. It's because Christ answers the
soul's every need. You know, there's that little
twee hymn, but nevertheless it's true. Christ is the answer to
my every need. He answers every need of my soul. I need nothing other than Jesus
Christ. He is my soul's need. That's
the first thing. Christ answers the need of his
people's souls. Secondly, whereas it says in
Ecclesiastes, he has set the world in the hearts of the people
of the world. that they shouldn't follow Him.
He set the world, they've got their hearts set on everything
this world does. For the people of God, He has
set heaven in their hearts. He has set eternity in their
hearts. There is a sense of eternity,
of the kingdom of God, of the bliss of eternity without sin.
He has set that in the hearts of His people. Thirdly, The true
people of God have, as the Scripture says, tasted and seen that the
Lord is good. We've tasted and seen the grace
of God. We've tasted and seen the forgiveness
of God for our sins. What a blessing to taste and
to see. It's something where, like the
finest of food, once you've tasted it, You can't forget the flavour,
and you want more of it, and it gives such satisfaction to
the body, but how much more does this taste of God give satisfaction
to the soul of the believer? Taste and see that the Lord is
good. And then, fourthly, where else can they go? Where else
can they go? Once you've tasted and seen,
where can you go? Only our God has the words of
eternal life. That's what the disciple, that's
what Peter said to Jesus at the end of John chapter 6. He said
when lots of them went away and lots of the supposed disciples
went away because Jesus was preaching sovereign grace. No man can come
to me except the Father, draw him. You have no will of your
own to follow me. You can only be right with God
if you eat my flesh and drink my blood, in a spiritual sense.
But they said, this is a hard saying. Who can take this? And
they went away. Many of them left him and walked no longer
with him. Will you also go away, he said to the twelve? Peter
said, speaking for them, to whom shall we go? You have the words
of eternal life. There's nowhere else that we
can go. And that's what we believe, isn't it? That's what we feel.
That's what we sense. Where else can we go? Oh, if
only you'll conform to this world and renounce your faith and don't
keep his name any longer. How much easier things will be
for you in this world. How well you'll get on. Your
business will thrive. Your business will prosper. No,
where else can we go? I can't leave him. I've tasted
how good he is. But mostly why do they keep going?
Because God keeps them. No man can pluck them out of
the Father's hand. He is the one who made them willing in
the day of His power to believe Him and to follow Him. He is
the one who called them with a holy calling. Called with a
holy calling. Called out of darkness into His
marvelous light. He's the one who applied by His
Spirit His irresistible grace. And if it's irresistible, what
can't you do to it? Resist it. We couldn't resist
it, could we? Because He called us. He has
loved us with an everlasting love, says Jeremiah, and with
loving kindness I have drawn you. He drew us to Him and we
couldn't resist it. Can we identify with that? you
know, we can't leave him, we must keep his name. A small church,
Philadelphia, we are too, despised by the world, given no status
or any reputation or anything of any, just hated by religion,
despised, not a proper church, just all those things, you don't
meet in a proper building, you haven't got a proper minister,
you haven't got this, that, as far as the world's concerned,
despised, that was Philadelphia, and like so many other places
too. but we just simply seek to proclaim the message that
God has given in His Word. And He gives a message of encouragement
to them there. You see, the natural man, flesh,
would think that this little church at Philadelphia is going
to be crushed out of existence. Wouldn't you? You'd say, look,
all the forces of this world, they're going to make it, as
it says in Revelation 13, they're going to start making it impossible
for the believers at Philadelphia to do business. They're not going
to trade with them. They're going to say, no, no,
we're not dealing with them. When it comes to contracts for a new
building, no, no, any builder in that church, he's not going
to get it because he believes this stuff, we hate this stuff.
They're going to make it increasingly hard for those believers to operate
in this world. And so you would say they're
going to be crushed out of existence because in their own strength
they'll give up. Oh indeed, in their own strength they will
give up. But do you know what Paul says to the Romans? He says,
if God before us, who can be against us? Is there anybody
that can be against you if God is on your side? Is there anybody? No, of course there isn't. God
rules over all. God is powerful. It may look
for a while. It may look, may seem, it may,
that the experience may be grievous for a time, as God tells his
people in Hebrews. But if God before us, nobody
can be against us. Here are these people, this little
church, in this godless, prosperous, worldly city, the world in which
we live today, exactly that world, and they are maintaining a witness
for Christ and the Gospel, and they're seeking to proclaim God's
truth to sinners, and they're looking for sinners to be called
out of worldly darkness into the marvellous light of God,
as their pastor preaches the Gospel, as they, the members,
witness then they're looking for sinners whose hearts are
hard and closed to believe that gospel and to come over to them. And there's Satan's kingdom against
them, seeking to silence and eliminate them. Do you know how
Satan tries to eliminate the church? He doesn't, very rarely,
he doesn't seek to destroy and to crush it. What he does, This
is on the strength of the Word of God, Revelation chapter 12.
The woman, which represents the church, is given great wings
of an eagle to fly into wilderness separation from the world. That's
faith. The wings of the eagle represent
faith. The believing people of God are given faith, and that
faith doesn't physically move them to a wilderness, it mentally,
spiritually, psychologically, philosophically moves them into
a wilderness separation from the loves and the joys and the
pleasures and the desires of this world into that of the Kingdom
of God. And Satan's furious with it.
Revelation chapter 12, second half, and Satan sends out a flood
from his mouth. And the intention of the flood
is not to drown the woman and to destroy her, the intention
of the flood is... Have you seen when a river's
in flood and people are trying to walk in it, and they can't
stay upright, and the river sweeps them off their feet, and once
their feet have parted company with the bed of the river, because
the current is so strong, then they can't stand up again. They're
swept along. into conformance with the world.
That's what Satan seeks to do, to sweep his people out of their
wilderness separation from this world into conformance. But Christ
has the key of David. He determines who will enter
and who will not enter the kingdom of heaven. When he opens a door,
nobody can shut it. And when he closes a door, nobody
can open it. What is the open door he's talking
about? What is it in reality? What is
it? It's the door into the hearts of men and women. That door into
the hearts of men and women in their natural state is shut up
tight under the rule of Satan, Adam. Adam ceded his authority
over the kingdom of this world, which God had given to him, and
he gave it to Satan, and everyone in it, by nature, is locked up.
Satan is in the castle, in the keep, in the center, and it's
shut up. The ears, the eyes, you think
of friends that you know, who would regard this message as
the most blatant nonsense, and it's because their hearts and
minds are shut. He has blinded the minds of them
that don't believe. Their eyes are blinded, their
ears are stopped by unbelief. Instead they believe a lie. They're
like the natural man is depicted, you know Bunyan's other book,
he might have, well he did write more, but you know, everybody
thinks of Pilgrim's Progress, but there's also the Holy War.
And in the Holy War, the natural man is pictured as a fortified
city, a walled city. And it's fortified by the forces
of Satan. The gates are locked up, the
eye gate, the ear gate, and in the center is Satan himself,
sitting in the keep, in the center of the thing. It's fortified
and sealed against the spiritual truth of God. That's the natural
man as we find him. The natural man does not receive
the things of the Spirit of God. They're foolishness to him. Neither
can he know them. Why? Because they're spiritually
discerned. And they don't have spiritual
discernment, because naturally you don't. It is the gift of
God. Spiritual discernment, spiritual revelation is the gift of God.
But here at Philadelphia, Christ promises where they look out
and they see all of these holy war fortified cities of the people
around them, hating them, hating their message, trying to shut
them down, trying to make life difficult for them. How on earth
are they ever going to be converted? Oh well, we must try this trick
and that trick and that gimmick and that, the other gimmick.
No, just preach the truth of the gospel because the one who
has the key of David promises an open door right in front of
them there. Almost as God said to Paul about
Corinth. In Acts chapter 18, Acts chapter
18 and verse 9, Then spake the Lord to Paul in the night by
a vision, Be not afraid, but speak, and hold not thy peace,
for I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee,
for I have much people in this city, the city of Corinth. That's
what God said to Paul. Don't be afraid to preach. How
is Paul going to start a church there? Preach! Well, they're
closed up and shut against the truth of God. No, God has much
people. As he says in chapter 13 and
verse 48 of Acts, they preached the gospel of God's grace in
Christ, and those that were ordained to eternal life from eternity
by God's sovereign grace, They're the ones who believed, and we
don't know who they are until they believe. For as he said
to the Thessalonians, it's by sanctification and the spirit
of the truth that I know that you are chosen of God from before
the beginning of time. You see, God is the one who opens
doors of the hearts of men and women. In chapter 16 and verse
6, We read earlier, when they had gone throughout Phrygia and
the region of Galatia, listen, God had closed a door. They were
forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia. What?
Yes, yes. The word of God says that God's
Holy Spirit stopped Paul going and preaching the word in Asia.
Why? Because God is a God of sovereign
grace. It is not of him who wills, nor
of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy. And who, the corollary
of that is obviously God who doesn't show mercy to some. It is His prerogative, for He
is God. They were forbidden to go and
preach in Asia. And after they were come to Mycenae,
they essayed, they tried to go to Bithynia. But the Spirit suffered
them, allowed them, not. The Spirit of God wouldn't let
them go there, because the Spirit of God had other designs for
the Apostle Paul. Not to go and preach in Asia,
but then, in verse 14 of chapter 16, as we read, They went as
that man of Macedonia called them to go across and help them.
No, don't go into Asia, come into Europe, into Greece, into
Macedonia. And there they were in Philippi
by the river on the Sabbath day and went down by the riverside
where prayer was wont to be made. And a certain woman named Lydia,
a seller of purple of the city of Thyatira, the church two weeks
ago that we were looking at in central Turkey, a place where
expensive cloths were made, high quality, and she'd come here
to Philippi, and she sought to worship God. She didn't know,
but she sought to worship God. How is she going to believe in
the right God if she hasn't heard Him preached, as Romans 10 says? And when Paul came, they preached,
and she heard us. And listen, does Paul say, my
speech was so convincing that Lydia immediately, no, God opened
her heart. The door, the Lord opens doors. I have set before you, he said,
in Philadelphia, he says, yes, in Philadelphia, he says, I have
set before you an open door, an open door of people's hearts.
The Lord opened her heart and she believed the gospel message. That's how it is. Lydia's heart
was open to preaching. God says to his church, you keep
preaching the true gospel and I will open hard hearts. I will,
as he says in Ezekiel 36-37, he says I'll take away the stony
hearts, those hard, flint, stony hearts, and I'll replace them
with hearts of flesh, soft hearts, to hear the message. Those who
oppose you are unable to stop you because if God opens the
door, no man can shut it. And if God closes a door, no
man can open it. Look how it worked with Paul's
ministry. If we go back to Acts chapter
14 and verse 27, This is coming together at the
Council of Jerusalem, when they'd been on their first missionary
journey. And when they would come, this
is all of them gathered together in Jerusalem, and gathered the
church together, they rehearsed, they told them all that God had
done with them. This is Paul and Barnabas. They said all that God had done
with them. And how he had, look, look, look, look, what does it
say? How God had opened a door of faith into the Gentiles. God
had done it. by his sovereign grace. And there
they abode a long time with the disciples. This is what God did.
This is how it worked with Paul's ministry. Look in 2 Corinthians
chapter 2 and verse 12. Furthermore, says Paul, when
I came to Troas to preach Christ's gospel, Furthermore, when I came to Troas
to preach Christ's gospel, and a door was opened unto me of
the Lord, I had no rest in my spirit. But the point is, it
was the Lord that opened the door. It was the Lord that gave
the guidance. God does not let his word return
to him void. but it accomplishes the purpose
for which he sends it. What is the purpose for which
God sends his word? It's two purposes. Did you know
that? God sends his word for two purposes.
One, obviously, he sends his word for the salvation of his
elect, that his elect might hear the gospel of grace and believe
it and embrace it to the salvation of their souls, to the experience
of salvation. And it's also to the judgment
of those that will not believe and to condemnation. That's what
God's Word says. A saver of life to some and a
saver of death to others. And he asked prayer of the churches.
He says in Colossians 4 verse 3, pray for us that God would
open unto us a door of utterance to speak the mystery of Christ.
And God did. And how do we know? Because with
the Thessalonians, 1 Thessalonians chapter 1 verse 9, he says, they
themselves, people around, show of us what manner of entering
in we had unto you. They preached the gospel to hard-hearted,
sealed up, holy war fortresses against the truth of God. and
they had an entering in. Why? The Lord said, I have opened
a door before you and no man can shut it. And other doors
have been shut and no man can open them. And you turn to God
from idols to serve the living and true God. This is what God
is saying. This is what he encourages his
weak little churches. Paul sowed, another watered,
but always God gives the increase. God says to his church, especially
those of little strength like Philadelphia in the world's eyes,
remain faithful to my message. Don't fear their opposition.
I will open locked doors for you. You don't need riches, you
don't need buildings, you don't need all sorts of resources.
God will do it. I will open the locked doors.
The doors for you to recover territory taken by the enemy. Mankind is territory taken by
the enemy. And the Lord Jesus Christ says
He will open the doors that you might take it back. And He promises,
as He does to all in these letters, for faithfulness, a victory. We're assured of victory because
it is God that has promised. He says in verse 9, 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. Much of the opposition was religious, and it was especially
in those days, opposition from Jews who had spread throughout
the civilized world around the Mediterranean. Those who professed
that they were God's people, but who in fact hate the Gospel. We've got plenty of them today.
They've got a name that they live, but they're dead. They
profess to be the true Church of God, but they're not because
they hate the Gospel of God's grace. There's a promise. They will be subdued in judgment.
They claim that the kingdom of God is theirs, but they're not. They're a synagogue of Satan.
Synagogue of Satan. They say they're Jews, but they're
not. The Jews representing the true people of God, the Israel
of God, but they're not. We're often surrounded by religion
with strength, aren't we? You know, you think that the
situation in the United States is absolutely thriving, and compared
with here it is, but compared with big religion, very, very
small churches on the whole, you know these multi-thousand
churches? No, no, no, no, no. Very small churches. persecuted
and isolated little congregations. No, maybe they find it easier
because of the extra land and the way money is there to have
buildings that we don't. But no, the true church is not
marked by great buildings and riches and financial empires
and status and worldly reputation and all of these other things.
What they count as signs of God's favor show only that they are
the synagogue of Satan. Do you know severe persecution
is coming? I'm sure. Smyrna was warned that
they were going to face severe persecution from this world in
AD 95. And the Church is warned throughout
history, and it comes from time to time, persecution in the days
of the Reformation, the martyrs being burned at the stake, and
dreadful things done in the name of those that claimed to be the
true Jews, the true people of God, but weren't, were a synagogue
of Satan. And we have warnings that it
will become more intense towards the end, because when you read
Revelation 13, it sends a shudder down the spine of most who read
it, I would think. The man of sin of 2 Thessalonians
2 and verse 3 has yet to be revealed. Do we shudder at the thought
of what might yet be? I'm sure in the flesh we do,
but look at verse 10. Because thou hast kept the word
of my patience, listen, look, Children of God, I will also
keep thee from the hour of temptation which shall come upon the world.
I'll keep you from the worst of it. I will keep you from the
evil. God promises to keep his people
from its worst impact. He says in another place, in
Matthew 24 and verse 22, how dreadful the days will be before
the end. But he said those days will be
shortened. Do you know why? for the elect's
sake. For the sake of his people in
this world, he will shorten those days. And he promises, verse
11, Behold, I come quickly. Hold that fast which thou hast,
hold on to it tightly, the truth that you have, that no man take
thy crown. You know, all believers are promised
a crown. The crown is that presence of
God, that communion with God. The crowning of the creation
of God is that communion between man made in the image of God
and God in eternal glory. He promises to come quickly.
Things are going to get worse before the end comes, but he's
coming quickly. Hold tightly to the truth. Verse
12. To him that overcometh, I will
make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go out no
more. And I will write upon him the
name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which
is New Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God.
And I will write upon him my new name, This is all stamped
with the seal of God. Pillars in the temple of God,
it's that which is solid and unmovable. This is what God will
make His people in His eternal glory. Because you know the heaven
of God is the temple of God. There is no temple there because
God is the temple. And His people with Him is that
intimate communion of which the temple in Jerusalem was simply
a picture. There's the certainty promised.
Just keep going of God's heaven. all marked with the seal of God's
kingdom, and not with the mark of the beast of this world. Has
he given you ears to hear, verse 13? He that hath an ear to hear,
let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. If he has,
then hear it and act upon it. Seek the Lord while he may be
found. Seek to remain true to God's
Word, kept by his Spirit, trusting in his promises. And look, see
his strength made perfect in our weakness. Amen.