Our lesson this morning is found
in Revelation 2. Revelation 2 and verse 9. Last week, I gave you the first
part of this verse. And I thought I would be able
to give you verses 9 and 10 this week, but as it turns out, I
can't get it all in 30 minutes. So I'm going to give you the
rest of verse 9, and then next week, Lord willing, we'll deal
with what He says next. The lesson here in the second
part of Revelation 2 verse 9 is about the enemy of our soul and
the professing church of this world, which is his spawn. And I chose that word on purpose. I don't know if you know what
the word spawn means, but it means an offspring occurring
in great numbers. Like the salmon, they go upstream
and they spawn and they lay thousands and thousands and thousands of
eggs. The title of the message this
morning is The Synagogue of Satan. It's my experience that most
people have only a superstitious knowledge of the devil and they
charge everything wicked and evil to him. Now, hear what I'm
saying. I'm not saying that everything
wicked and evil is not in him. I'm saying that we charge everything
that we do as human beings. Every wrong thing we do, we charge
it off to the devil. One comedian, old Flip Wilson,
he used to say when he got caught doing something, he'd say, the
devil made me do it. And everybody would laugh, you
know, and cut up. During the prohibition days,
they used to call alcohol the devil's drink, the demon drink. And similar statements have been
made about prostitutes, murderers, And on and on the list goes.
We were watching a series of kind of mobster-like movies,
and in that thing they called Las Vegas the devil's playground. So people have what I'm trying
to get across to you this morning, especially you young boys and
young girls here today, Men and women have a superstitious knowledge
about the devil. It's not a true knowledge. It's
just a superstitious knowledge. And they pick it up out of conversations
that they hear on TV and that they hear among their friends
and their friends' parents and at the schools and different
things. These things that I just mentioned
to you are all the result of our fallen nature and comes forth
from our heart. Now listen to what the Lord said. Out of the heart proceed evil
thoughts, murderers, adulteries, fornication, thefts, blasphemies,
All of these things come forth from the heart of man, and that's
what defiles him. So when we're talking about the
devil's playground, we're just talking about men and women going
there to feed the appetites of this flesh. The devil's got nothing
to do with it. Satan's work, when we talk about
Satan's work, it's primarily in religious deception. Now,
I challenge you, go through the scriptures, just get your concordance
and look up devil, look up Satan, go through the scriptures, everywhere
where his name is mentioned and see if what I'm telling you is
not so. Almost every time his name appears, it appears in relationship
to religious deception, deceiving men. Back in the book of Job,
in Job 1, verse 6, it said, when the sons of God came to present
themselves before the Lord, Satan came also with them. Why would
he go to church? Why would he go to a worship
service? Why would the devil come in here this morning among
the children of God? Why would he come in here? To
deceive. To deceive. When the Lord came
of age, that he should begin to preach, what's the first thing
that happened? He was tempted of Satan. Huh? Look it up. The very first thing
that happened, he was tempted of Satan. When it was time for
him to go to the cross, Satan entered into the heart of Judas
Iscariot to betray the Lord. He looked at his disciples at
the last supper. He said, if not I've chosen you
twelve and one of you is a devil. When the church began to bloom
in its early days and men and women sold everything that they
had so they could all have things in common so that nobody had
a big bounty while somebody else over here suffered and had to
beg for food. So they sold their possessions,
and everybody had things in common, and everybody was selling their
possessions in Ananias and Sapphira. They vowed to sell all their
stuff, too, and they did. But after they sold it, they
said, boy, this is a lot of money. Why don't we keep some of it
back? If we just give part of what we vowed, it would be more
than what everybody else had given. We'll just hold some back.
Peter said, why has Satan filled thine heart to lie against the
Holy Ghost? You see what I'm saying? This
is Satan's. You want to talk about the devil's
playground? It's church. That's his playground. That's
where he goes, and he goes there to deceive, to deceive. You know, when I'm trying to
remember exactly where it is, I think it's in Matthew 7. Verse 22 and 23, I believe, is
where it is. But anyway, he's talking about
the sower went forth to sow. And he sowed some seeds fell
by the wayside. By the wayside. The ground wasn't
prepared. It wasn't the place to plant.
It wasn't prepared to plant. But the seed fell there. What
happened to the seed? The devil came along and took
it away. Paul said to the Corinthians,
we are not ignorant of His devices. Now here's my text for this morning's
lesson. Revelation 2, the last half of
verse 9. Our Lord says to this church,
I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews and are
not. but are the synagogue of Satan. This is one of those subjects
that requires a whole lot more than 30 minutes to present, but
I'll do the best I can with the time we have allotted. I've got
two things in my outline this morning that we need to see and
consider concerning what our Lord says to His beloved churches
about the enemy of our souls and those who follow after Him.
First of all, I want you to see that Christ is talking here about
the professing church of this world, and He's talking about
it in every generation until the end of the world. What do you mean, professing
churches of this world? Well, I'm talking about Baptists,
Methodists, Presbyterians, Reformed, Nazarenes, Church of Christ,
Pentecostals, Catholics, and whatever else goes by the name
Christian. That's the professing church
of this world. They've made in some way or another,
they've made a public profession that they're disciples of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lord identifies the professing
church of this world as them which say They are Jews. Now, first of all, I want you
to understand that what he's saying to this church here at
Smyrna, its first application is to the Jews whose confession
was that they were Jews. But he tells us over in Romans
chapter 9 that not all who are of Israel are Israel. Neither
because they are the children of Abraham are they all that
seed. But the believer is the true
Jew. Now the Jews, by natural descent,
believed themselves to be under that covenant that God made with
Abraham way back in the beginning. He's going to raise up a seed
unto him like the stars in the heavens and the sands of the
sea. And they believed because of their blood heritage that
they were under that covenant. So there's the first application.
But these words in the book of Revelation, as we go on, I'll
show you more and more, they're figuratively spoken. And so this
thing about confessing to be a Jew is figurative. And it's
figurative of all those who make a profession of faith and say
that they are the children of God. I call them professing churches
because it's how they're identified in the Scriptures. How many times
does our Lord and His Apostles talk about men who say this and
who profess this? Our Lord said, not everyone which
saith, Lord, Lord, shall enter into heaven, but he that doeth
the will of my Father. John tells us that God is light.
In Him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship
with Him, if that's our profession, we have fellowship with God.
That was the Jewish profession. We have fellowship with God.
If we say we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness,
we lie. We lie. If we say, that is, make
the profession that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves. And the truth is not in us. If
we say we have not sinned, we make God a liar. We make God a liar and His Word
is not in us. He goes on in the book of 1 John. He goes on and says this, He
that saith he is in the light and hateth his brother is in
darkness. You follow what I'm saying? Here's
a Jew, this man stands up and he says, I'm a Jew. Publicly,
before men, he makes the profession. I'm a Jew. I'm a Jew. But the Lord said he's not. He's
not. Many shall say unto me in that
day, have not we preached in thy name? Have not we cast out
devils in thy name? Have not we done many wonderful
works in thy name? Depart from me, you workers of
iniquity. I never knew you. And then in Titus chapter 1,
verse 16, it's again talking about these men who pretend,
have religious pretensions. Listen to this. Titus 1.16, they
profess that they know God. But in works, they deny him being
abominable and disobedient, and to every good work, reprobate. There is in this world a professing
church. They profess to be Christians.
They profess to be children of God. They profess to be believers.
They profess to be born again. I don't know how many times I've
heard that phrase on television, so many million born-again Christians. Well, they're no other kind of
Christian. You have to be born again. But there is, in this world,
a professing church, a great multitude of men and women, and
all, in one way or another, have made a public profession of religion. They're all taken in, all considered
in this statement. They say they are Jews. But you say, Preacher, I don't
know anybody who made a public profession that he is a Jew. I don't know anybody. Well, as
I said to you at the beginning of our lesson, what's written
in this book is said in figurative language. So in what way does
a public profession of being a Christian equate with the saying
that we are Jews? Well, what is a Jew? What is a Jew? Who are the Jews? What relationship does the Jew
have with God? To say we are Jews is to say
that we're the chosen people of God. So he's talking about men and
women here who said, I'm one of his elect. I've been chosen
of God. The Jews were God's elect. Ask
anybody, they'll tell you, the average person on the street.
He'll tell you about the Jews. That's God's chosen people. Secondly,
to say we're Jews is to say that we're God's covenant people.
Now that's something that you won't hear from the average person,
but it's true nonetheless. David said, although it be not
so with my house, yet hath the Lord made with me an everlasting
covenant, ordered in all things and sure. This is all my salvation
and all my desire. The Jew believed that he was
taken in under that old covenant that God made with Abraham. And then God confirms this over
in Psalm 89 verse 3. This is pretty plain right here. I
have made a covenant with my chosen. That's pretty clear,
isn't it? I have sworn unto David my servant,
saying, thy seed will I establish forever and build up thy throne
to all generations. Of course, he's talking about
Christ. in that statement. And then Paul,
defining his kinsmen, the Israelites, over in Romans 9, verse 4, says,
to whom pertaineth the adoption and the glory, now listen, and
the covenants. And then in Ephesians 2, when
he's reminding the Gentiles of their stake before regeneration
and before conversion, he defines that heathen. He tells us what
we lacked. He said, we were aliens from
the commonwealth of Israel, strangers from the covenants of promise.
So when you say I'm a Jew, you're saying I'm one of God's covenant
people. I'm one of God's covenant people. Thirdly, if I say I'm a Jew,
I'm saying that I'm a child of God. And as Paul says, If I'm a child
of God, then I'm an heir of God. And if I'm an heir of God, I'm
a joint heir with Jesus Christ. So when I say I'm a believer,
I'm saying that I'm a Jew in this sense. I'm a child of God. By covenant promise, by covenant
relationship, I'm a child. Listen to this. Our Lord began
to talk to the Jews, and they said, we have God our Father.
And He said, if God was your Father, you'd love Me. I proceeded
forth and came from God. I'm God manifested in the flesh.
I'm deity incarnate standing before you. And if you were of
God, you'd love Me. He said, you're not of God. Oh,
they said, we'd be not born of fornication. We're not a heathen.
We have one Father, even God. God's our Father. He said, you
are of your Father. Now listen, the devil. The devil. And then, fourthly, when a man
professes to be a Jew, he's saying that he has God's ever-abiding
presence. God's with me. The Lord looked
His disciples in the eye, and my, oh my, I see a thousand more
faults in myself than I've seen in them, but I see some great
faults in them. But He said, I'll never leave
you. I'll never leave you. I may leave Him, and He may allow
me to think I've left Him entirely, but He doesn't leave me, not
if I'm a child of God. I have His ever-abiding presence." Now, let me tell you this. God's
presence was never manifested anywhere else in this world except
where the Jews were. Is that right? You men that have
studied the Old Testament, is that right? That's where God
manifested Himself, right there. All right, here's the next thing.
Look closely at verse 9 again. Now, our first point was this. I know those who say they are
Jews. We're talking about the professing
church of this world. We're Jews, but are not. Now, I want you to listen to
this. I know the blasphemy of them
which say they are Jews and are not. Blasphemy, as it's used
here and in most other places, means to say something which
is dishonoring to God and contrary to His character. So whatever this professing church
has said by their profession is contrary to the glory of God,
and therefore it's blasphemy. Are you with me? Now the question
is, when does a person's profession become blasphemous? When they say they are children
of God by some other way than what God has revealed in His
Word and in His Gospel, then it becomes blasphemous. Know this, there's only one way. There's only one way. If you
come up any other way, you're as a thief and a robber, John
chapter 2. You're going to come up and pretend like those are your
brethren and those are your fellow laborers and so on inside that
sheepfold. If you don't come through the
door, if you don't come to the door, before the porter, then
you're a thief and a robber. All right? When they say they're children
of God by some other way than what God has revealed in His
Word and in His Gospel, think about this. Salvation is by the
grace of God. I don't care what part of it
you're talking about. It doesn't make any difference. Oh, yeah,
we're saved by the grace of God, but then we're sanctified by
the law. I don't think so. Not what it says. I find in there
men praying to have grace that they might serve God acceptably
in Christ. Salvation is by the grace of
God. And to be honest with you, there's
only two religions in the world, works and grace. Did you ever
notice that there's any time, I don't care in what kind of
a picture he's making, he always just talks about two. Wheat and
tares. He didn't say there's wheat and
then there's some clover and there's some thistles. No, there's
wheat and tares. Lumps them all into two groups.
He said there's sheep and there's goats. There's the false and the true.
There's the synagogue of Christ, the church of Christ, and there's
the church of the devil. Two groups, grace or works. Now, if it's not one, it's the
other. This is not something that God pictures up here and
then kind of goes into a gray area here in the middle and then
goes over here. No, there's a line there. When you leave grace, you're
in the works. The Scriptures are quite clear
that saving faith is by the grace of God, being justified freely
by His grace. That's Romans 3, verse 24, through
the redemption that's in Christ Jesus. By grace are you saved through
faith, and that not of yourself. When God quickened us together,
He said, by grace ye are saved. And you can go on and on. Our
election is an election of grace, and if by grace, then is it no
more works, otherwise grace is no more grace. Romans 11, verse
6. Our quickening is by grace, Ephesians
2, 5. And Paul said in Hebrews 12,
28, wherefore we, receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us
have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence
and godly fear. The scripture said over and over,
not of works. Does it not? Now if it's of works,
he's not going to say that. God's not a fool. The Holy Spirit's
not a fool. He's not going to say things
that he don't mean. And over and over and over, he
said it's not of works. lest any man should boast, not
of works of righteousness which we have done, but according to
His mercy He saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing
of the Holy Ghost, which He shed on us abundantly through Jesus
Christ our Savior, that being justified by His grace we should
be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. And any person who professes
to be God's elect by any other means than the grace of God blasphemes
God with his profession. You see what our Lord is saying?
I think this is one of the clearest verses I've ever read on the
subject. Christ said, I am the way, the
truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. Paul tells us in Romans 10 verse
4, Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believeth. And all the rest are like those
who say they are Jews and are not. Ignorantly, Paul said, going
about to establish their own righteousness. Jesus Christ crucified is the
only way that our sins can be forgiven. Paul said, in whom
we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins
according to the riches of His grace. And then over in Hebrews
9.26, but now wanting the end of the world, hath He appeared
to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. Christ came, as was
declared in the whole volume of the book of God, to accomplish
the redemptive will of God by the witch will were sanctified
through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. So God's holy character and name
is declared in His obedience and sacrifice and there's no
other way to come unto God except by Him. Now hear what Peter says to the
Jews. This is the stone which you builders
set aside. You called him out of your religion. The one that God made head of
the corner, you took that stone and you set him aside. And you
put your stone in his place. That's blasphemy. And listen
to what Peter follows up with. God made him the head of the
corner, neither is there salvation in any other. For there is none
other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be
saved. So salvation is plainly declared
to be by the will of God. The will of God. Any man who
professes anything else blasphemes God with his profession. The
Scripture said, of his own will begat he us. with the word of
truth, of his own will, having predestinated us unto the adoption
of children by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good
pleasure of his will. In Christ also we have obtained
an inheritance being predestinated according to the purpose of him
who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will. He gave us power to become sons
of God, John said, and to believe on His name, which were born
not of blood, now listen, nor of the will of the flesh, nor
of the will of man, but of God. God said, My people are My people
by My will. The false church says his people
are his people by their will. And they blaspheme God in their
profession. So what are you saying, preacher?
I'm saying that any church that equates morality with righteousness,
promotes or practices will worship, and puts salvation in the hands
of man, and substitutes ceremonialism and substitutes ritualism for
worship is the synagogue of Satan. And they blaspheme God with their
professions. That's what I'm saying. And that's
what I believe this is saying here in Revelation chapter 2,
verse 9. The synagogue of Satan is the
assembly of Satan, the church of Satan, and the disciples of
Satan. And they're his sons, and the
lusts of their father they will do. You can read that for yourself
in John 8, 44. Satan's children meet just as
we do. Huh? I passed some coming up
here this morning. They're driving in the parking
lot, getting out, shaking hands, talking to one another. Satan's
children read their Bibles. They carry Bibles, same as we
do. They talk about God's promises.
They talk about sin and salvation. They sing hymns and they pray.
Satan's synagogue is where his spawn are made and where they're
nourished and where they're indoctrinated.
And our Lord tells the church at Smyrna that He knows the blasphemy
of them which say they are Jews and are not. But here's what
they are in reality. They're the synagogue of Satan.
And because He does, He's made provision to deliver us from
their lying ways and from the power of their ruler and from
the influence of their multitudes. And we'll get into that next
week in verse 10. Thank you.