7 - Week 5
March 8, 2009
Getting Off The Fence
Revelation 2:18 - 28

Good morning, take your Bibles and open them up to Revelation 2.18-29. We are in our study, SEVEN. When the book of Revelation opens up, Jesus is center stage. Here it is, after his resurrection, and we see him in all his glory! And he is standing among seven golden lamp stands. These lamp stands represent seven churches located in Asia Minor and he is dictating a letter to each one. You see, almost every church was doing something good, but there was always a problem. A spiritual virus they were fighting off – and if they didn’t deal with it, it would kill the church. Over the past few weeks we have been looking at what Jesus has to say to each one. We look at the church in Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, and today we are looking at the church in Thyatira.

So lets get started.

THE CITY OF PRESSURE

Thyatira is located about 40 miles south east of Pergamum. It is the smallest of all the seven cities mentioned, but it is the longest letter. It was a small church, but they had some big issues! The city was at first a fort, much like Fort Worth of course was a fort or military outpost. Thyatira was a fort on the outskirts of the kingdom of Permgamum (we studied last week), but it wasn’t positioned on a high point, it was located in a valley, so it was easily overcome – and historically it was ransacked and rebuilt multiple times. But when the Romans took it over in 190 BC it stabilized and developed into a manufacturing city. It was known for making stuff: dyes, wools, garments, linens, hides, leathers, pottery, metal works – you name it. Today, we look on the tag and see is say, "Made in China", but then the tag would have said "made in Thyatira". If Ephesus was the Wall Street and Pergamum was Washington D.C., then Thyatira would have been the Detroit. A busy, industrialized manufacturing city.

In fact, there is only one person in the Bible mentioned that was from Thyatira, her name was Lydia who the Apostle Paul leads to Christ in Philippi and ACTS 16.14 tells us that she was a seller of purple garments. So it was a manufacturing town. And the force that ran the city wasn’t the government, and it wasn’t the pagan temples, it was the powerful and highly organized labor unions. These unions would often have their own idols that represented their company- little patron saints if you will. [The bakers had the Pillsbury dough boy!] And they would gather to worship their deity, and worship would lead to drinking, and drinking would lead to sexual immorality. It was just common place. It was "just business". And so Christians, living there were put in a hard spot – "Do I do what needs to happen to keep my business going? Do I compromise my faith in Christ, my morals, my values to keep my job or do I take a stand for Christ knowing that it will cost me dearly?"

It’s not too unfamiliar today. People will tell me. "Craig, you don’t understand. If I don’t go out and have a few drinks with this client then I will loose that account." Or "If I don’t go to the strip club with the guys after work then I won’t get the promotion." Or "If I don’t drink and sleep with the boss, then I’m never going to climb up the corporate ladder." That same kind of pressure was on those early Christians. Get this: It was the pressure to compromise!

So Jesus has a message for them. He starts out reminding them of three things. You can circle them in your Bible. He is the "Son of God". He is the one whose "eyes are like fire". And he is the one whose feet are like "burnished bronze". What does that mean? Jesus is saying, "I’m am God. And I know what you are doing. I see through everything. There is nothing that hinders my gaze, nothing stands in the way of my penetrating, X-ray vision. I see what you do in secret, I hear what you say under your breath, I know what you are thinking, and I am examining your life right now! Don’t try to hide from me, don’t try to deny the truth or what you are doing – I see right through you! "Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must given account." Hebrew 4.13 You see, the Bible says that God knows everything. Theologians use the term omniscient. All knowing. And what that means practically for us is this - you can fool people, and you can even fool yourself, you can’t fool God. He knows the real you! And Jesus is about to weigh in on these believers who were playing church, but living a compromised life.

I KNOW YOUR DEEDS

He says "I know your deeds" (erga – workplace, erganomics-study of the workplace. Appropriate for this "work driven" city). The church had been doing some good stuff: Jesus mentions four things –love, faith, service, perseverance. They were making headway; they were progressing in these things! There was a side to them that was doing good stuff! On the weekends they were in church, they were loving each other, they were volunteering. But there was something wrong.

What was the problem? They had tolerated a woman who was a false teacher, false prophetess. The word "tolerate" doesn’t mean that you gave her freedom to speak, it means that you have embraced her message, adopted her lifestyle. And what did she teach? Her teaching was leading God’s people into all kinds of idol worship and sexual immorality. Her message was basically this, "It’s ok to bend your standers of morality. It’s ok to value other things more than God. It’s ok to do whatever you need to do to keep and even advance your job." At the core it is a message of compromise.

And Jesus calls this woman – Jezebel! Most likely this wasn’t her actual name, but you can be sure that everyone in that church knew exactly who he was talking about. Names have meaning. Just a few months ago it was national news that a couple from New Jersey, Heath and Deborah Campbell wanted a birthday cake made for their 2 year old son, and the bakery refused to make it. The reason is that their sons name was Adolph Hitler Campbell. And would it surprise you to know that their youngest daughter’s name is Joyce-Lynn Aryan Nation Campbell. Names have meaning. When you hear the name Adolph Hitler, you think of hatred, the killing of millions of Jews. His name is synonymous with racism. Well Jezebel was an actual person in the Old Testament. She was the wife of King Ahab, one of the worst kings in Israel’s history. And when they married, she brought with her into the marriage, and into the country, the worship of her pagan god Baal [Ruler] and the female counterpart Asherah. Baal was the god of fertility. And the worship of Baal included sexual immorality, perversion, and deviant behaviors, even to the point of sacrificing young children. It was a dark, twisted, godless season in Israel’s history. This woman redefined wickedness. She took godlessness to new heights. She hunted down as many prophets of God that she could find and had them quickly executed. And there was only one prophet of God that stood up to her – Elijah! More on that later. But when you hear the name Jezebel – it’s synonymous with sexual immorality, perversion, idolatry.

So Jesus saw this woman in the church at Thyatira doing the same thing. She was herself immoral, she was herself idolatrous, and she was using her leadership, her position, her influence, her power to persuade the Christians in that church to do the same thing! She was leading them to loosen their moral standards, to relax their devotion to Christ and to just "go with the flow" and compromise.

UNMASKING COMPROMISE

If you were to look up a definition of compromise, it would say something like this: compromise is the giving up of something to get something else. But if you want to know how God sees compromise – God sees it as not doing what you know is right. Compromise is not doing what is pleasing to God. Compromise is riding the fence with one foot in the world and one foot in Christ. And you can’t live like that! And no where in the Bible does compromise ever lead to anything good. It always leads to hurt, pain, to trouble – always! That what was happening here, there Christians were living with one foot in the world, playing around with worldly stuff and then they were doing the church thing. And Jesus was calling them out! And listen, that may be you today. Your living a life of compromise, and Jesus is calling you out too.

There are lots of opportunities for you and I to allow compromise to creep into our lives. Take integrity for example. You may say, "I’ve got to bend the truth a little bit to make this deal. If I don’t then I’ll loose the account." Or just not being honest about what you do, where you go, what you say. There is no such thing as a little white lie – God sees deception. Or how about sexual immorality? When you allow other people to crowd into your marriage, or you make the excuse that since you’ve been married before that sexual purity doesn’t matter anymore. Or the thoughts that you savor, the site that surf, the places you go in secret aren’t a big deal. Or lets talk about your finances. God says that all you have belongs to him, and yet it’s easy to make excuses not to give back to God what belong to him. Compromise is everywhere. And that virus of compromise still kills!

Let me share with you some things I know about compromise.

You think it’s sudden, but it is slow.

Often times you will hear about a person and how they have twisted off – left their wife, left their kids, flipped out, got into the drug scene, got pregnant, had an affair. And we think that just happened all of a sudden. But the truth is, that these things never happen suddenly. The crisis never happens suddenly. They are the natural progression of a long period of quiet compromise. The crisis is nothing more than a culmination of days, months, even years of compromise. You don’t become addicted to porn over night. You don’t become an alcoholic over night. You don’t walk away from your family over night. You don’t end up pregnant outside of marriage over night. Little by little. Playing with fire. Getting as close as you can without getting burned. This woman Jesus is talking about here, he had giving her plenty of warnings. We don’t know what that looked like. Maybe he had sent preachers to turn her away, show her the error of her ways. Maybe he had brought a sense of conviction in her heart. Maybe he had orchestrated circumstances to stop her from throwing her life away. But every time she hardened her heart. Jesus uses the word "unwilling." She was unwilling to yield to him. Unwilling to change. Unwilling to stop what she was doing. Unwilling. And so day after day, little by little, she faded from God and got pulled into the vortex of the world around her. There are some of you here, you are playing with fire. You are teetering on the abyss. You know what you are doing is wrong. You have been warned by God’s Word, by others, by your own conscience. But up to this point you have been unwilling to give up what you hands are holding on to. And the crisis hasn’t hit – yet. But it’s coming.

You think it only affects you, but it hurts other people.

People that are in compromise think that what they are doing is only affecting them. "It’s my choice", "I’ve got to live my own life." "I want to be happy" "I deserve this". "It’s no one else’s business but mine." And you think that your decision only affect you. But you are wrong. Your choices affect and hurt more people than you realize! Your life is like a stone dropped in a pond. And the decisions of your life ripple, and they affect other people for good or bad. This woman, she drew in other people into what she was doing. Her choices affected other people, and everyone around her got hurt. I have never seen a family strengthened because someone compromised on God’s plan for their life. Never. I have never seen a person more fulfilled and joyful because they walked away from God, or tolerated sin in their life, or bent the rules. Never. Other people get hurt.

 

You think God’s Word doesn’t apply to you, but it was written for you.

People that are in compromise, have convinced themselves that what God’s Word says about them isn’t relevant, because they have extenuating circumstances. "I just wish you understood the pressure I’m under at work, then you would realize that what I’m doing was the right thing." "If you just knew how bad my marriage is, then you would understand why I’m doing what I’m doing." Or "If you just understood how hard it is to be single, lonely" Or "If you just understood how tight money is right now" You see, Satan is the master at rationalizing away sin. This woman probably rationalized what she was doing. She rationalized it so well, she gathered a following, but Jesus wasn’t buying it! The truth is, God’s Word is a guard rail – it’s a protection – it’s a shield for you for moments like this! You are not the exception to God’s Word, you are the reason God’s Word was given!

You think it will make you happy, but it only brings pain.

The woman in Thyatira compromised her life, she hardened her heart and it led to suffering. Her compromise brought suffering for her, for those who participated with her, and her spiritual "children", the offspring of her teaching. Listen, if you are a Christian living a life of compromise, you are setting yourself up to experience God’s discipline. God will do whatever it takes to perfect his work in your life. Even if that means discipline. Even if that means suffering. You see, this is the big lie. You say, "If I compromise then I will finally be happy" but the truth is way to happiness is not down the road of compromise, it’s down the road of obedience. Because to those that didn’t compromise (v24-28) there was given blessing, favor, expanded use in the Kingdom of God. It wasn’t easy not to compromise – it was hard! Jesus had to tell them to "hold on"! But if they would just hold on through the difficult times now, God would reward them in the future! Don’t give away your long tem blessing for short term fix. Don’t forfeit what God wants to do in your life, for something that can’t ever really make you happy and will lead you away from the only sense of true happiness in Christ! And don’t think for a moment that God isn’t loving toward you and wanting you to turn back to him right now! But you have to make a choice.

GET OFF THE FENCE

So what do you do if you are caught in a compromise right now? Get off the fence. Make a choice. Resolve in your heart to obey God, follow God no matter what happens. That is how the Jezebel of the OT was finally defeated. She was ruling the nation with her idolatry and perversion until Elijah the prophet of God called her and her prophets to a showdown at Mount Carmel. And all the people of Israel gathered to see who was the real God, Jehovah or Baal. And I love what Elijah said to the people. These were people who had been walking the fence, living in compromise. Listen to what he said.

"How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is god, follow him." I Kings 18.21

 

How long will you (NIV) waiver – (NASV) hesitate – (NKJV) falter – (ESV) go limping (MSS) "sit on the fence"? Make a decision. Choose who is God and then follow him with all your heart. Chose who is God and give him your life. But don’t waste your life straddling the fence. Get off the fence!