Messages to the Church Revealed (Smyrna) ...

John continues relaying the messages revealed to him for the church of Jesus in chapter 2 of Revelations and verse 8 … “And unto the angel of the church in Smyrna write; These things saith the first and the last, which was dead, and is alive;”.  Again the author is identified as Christ.  This time the revelation is centered around our concept of time.  Christ says of Himself, that He is “the first and the last”.  In this Christ reminds us that He pre-dates our existence, and will last beyond it.  In this sense, time is not measured in earthly consecutive days and hours, but in the vastness of eternity.  This perspective on the reality of our God, should inspire us to think and believe that our earthly lives are NOT the end game God has in mind for us.  There is an existence outside of how we measure time here that is of far more importance.  That existence is not bound by the limitations of this one, and is only possible through the mechanism of Jesus Christ.

Next Christ again describes Himself as one who “was dead and is alive”.  Death itself could not hold our creator in its grasp, nor will it have any power over those who the Creator extends the gift of salvation to.  Should we lose our mortal lives, there is hope beyond our sleep.  There will be an awakening like Christ was awakened and through His power, we will live again, in an existence where time has no meaning and decay is a thing of our long distant past.  But our resurrection has more meaning than just from our physical condition of death, it also has relevance in our spiritual existence.  When we embrace sin, we embrace the pain and death that comes with sin.  They are inseparable.   But the power of Christ and His redemptive love, can resurrect us from our current spiritual condition of death, and show us what it means to truly live, now and after.  We need not wait for the final resurrection to be raised unto life today.  We can experience what it truly means to love others, as Christ loves them, and in so doing, know the bliss and perfection of the gift He offers in the here and now.  This resurrection is possible ahead of our physical graves, and carries immediacy and relevance to us today.

John continues in verse 9 … “I know thy works, and tribulation, and poverty, (but thou art rich) and I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan.”  Jesus begins His message to Smyrna to once again remind them that He is engaged and aware of what is happening in that church.  He knows what works His Spirit has inspired among the believers there and what the results of that outpouring has been.  He praises the patience and forbearance in tribulation.  He notes the perceived poverty, but reveals that the lack of earthly wealth has not diminished in any way the treasure of wealth that has been laid up in heaven.  It was common practice in the early church that upon joining, a member would sell everything they owned, and donate the entire amount to the church, to be shared with anyone who had need.  This was way beyond the concept of tithing.  It was literally a 100% commitment to God, with nothing held back for ourselves.  But the end result of course, was a complete lack of personal finances, position, or earthly wealth.  Here Christ endorses this practice and reminds us that our sharing of our means is aligned with heaven and is more important than any hoarding of our means.

Then Christ addresses the topic of blasphemy.  He does not state that the false claim of these blasphemers is that they claim to be God, but rather they claim to be Jews, when in fact they are of the synagogue of Satan.  While Christ Himself setup the original religion and practices the Jewish people followed since the days of Creation (the Sabbath), Adam (sacrifice), Abraham (dedication and circumcision), Moses (the Law on the tables of stone), Solomon (the construction of the Temple), Nehemiah (the restoration of the Temple).  Christ had also come as the Messiah, and was the fulfillment of all the prophecies that pointed forward to His work of our redemption.  Upon rejecting Him, what was once His own religion; rejected now its own God.  To claim that salvation exists outside of Christ, or to claim that control and self-actions can lead to salvation, is to blaspheme the reality of our God.  It is Satan who values control.  It is Satan who tells us we need no one but ourselves to live as we choose and be the authors of our own ideas of salvation.  It is Satan who tempts us to see the forms and practices of our religion supplant the Christ of our religion.  His synagogue is not some dark place where believers wear red robes and do blood rituals.  Instead they masquerade as fine Christian chapels and mega churches with believers dressed in full business attire, but whose hearts have never been submitted to anything outside of themselves.  Those who claim to be Jews but are not, follow every idea and variation that keeps Christ out of the center stage of our salvation and instead “self” located there.  When we trust to our own strength, whether in “partnership” with God, or completely because of our own actions, we deny the reality of the need of our Messiah, and join with those who are labeled of the synagogue of Satan.

John proceeds in verse 10 … “Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.”  The message to Smyrna is not a happy one.  There is no message of peace and prosperity, of earthly wealth and ease, of blessings and happiness in this world to the church of Smyrna or to us.  There is after all, a war raging all around us, one of Good and of Evil.  This war will inflict casualties, and evil is aimed fully at hurting God, by hurting the thing He cares most about … us.  The devil will throw us into prison.  In those days, the prisons were no clean, cable-TV, three meal a day institutions.  They were dark, dank, disease ridden dungeons, where food was a luxury and isolation could be the norm.  The devil intends both then and now, to offer us the contrast of earthly poverty and suffering for the sake of our belief in Christ, as compared to the wealth and ease of trusting to ourselves.  If the members of the Smyrna church would but deny their Lord, they could live long happy lives of self-indulgence and ease.  But if not, they would be made to suffer, and be tested in courts of law and outside of any justice, for the beliefs they clung to.  The message says they would have tribulation for ten days.  Perhaps this was literal and meaningful to them at the time they received this message.  Or perhaps this would be interpreted as prophetic, meaning they would have 10 years of tribulation.  Perhaps both. 

But what was most interesting about this message, was the hope offered with it.  Christ begins by saying “Fear none of those things”.  He begins by telling His faithful followers, that Satan has no real power over any of them.  Prison is not something we should fear or worry about.  In fact, death itself is not something we should fear or worry about.  After all He has just said, He Himself was dead and is now alive.  There was a reason He began His message with that greeting.  For if we continue to submit our will and our lives and our very existence unto Christ, He will grant us a “crown” of life.  Crowns symbolize royalty and kingship.  They are rare.  They are not intended for everyone in general.  But in this, everyone who clings to Christ and values His ideas of our existence over what we can see and experience in the here and now, will in fact be considered His royalty.  A status which we do NOT deserve; we are NOT kings and queens, yet He values us this much.  He has served us, as if we were.  He has done for us what is normally only done for kings and queens, yet He did it for us when we were but slaves to our sin and our selfishness.  He freed us from being slaves.  And now He elevates us to being considered royalty, a royalty that is not based in receiving praise but in serving others.  We are to be made kings and queens of service, as He is the God of service and love to others.  It is barely within our comprehension to be so treated by the God of the universe, who had to die in order that we might truly live.  This promise, and these ideas reflect the level to which God loves us and His church.

John relays the conclusion of this message as he pens in verse 11 … “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death.”  Again the message is joined by words from the Holy Spirit of Christ.  It is intended for we who believe, for it is we who have an ear.  Again what must be overcome is self, the desire to rely on control, or the forms of religion instead of the Messiah of our religion, the blasphemy of thinking there is salvation outside of the gift of Christ.  And how will these ideas be overcome?  Only as we submit our will, our desires, and our very lives to the will of Christ.  When we do this, we are promised that the hurt of the second death will not come our way.  We will not know the sleep of eternal non-existence that comes at the final destruction of all that is evil.  Instead we will know the crown of life that He has given to us despite what we had earned.  We will know the gift of life He has given us though we deserve the second sleep that remains upon those who refused His gift and denied His salvation, preferring to trust to themselves and their own ideas about salvation.

The message to the church at Smyrna reminds us that bliss in this world is not on the menu.  Our gospel is not one based in the ideas of happiness, wealth, and fulfillment in this world, but in the next one.  Our treasure is not found in our monetary acquisition, but in its full distribution to those in need.  These ideas are at complete war with most of American society and social values.  Indeed the early Christian church followed an extreme version of communism, not capitalism.  They prized giving away everything they owned, not hoarding it.  They were truly persecuted for their stubborn belief in His gift of our salvation, not merely suffering “perceived” slights or dispersions.  They were cast into prisons and killed for what they believed, not just ridiculed for having faith.  The message for Smyrna reminds us of the reality of the war that continues to rage between Satan who is bent on our destruction, and God who is bent on our redemption.  And it offers us hope, that while we submit ourselves fully to Christ, there is life worth living.  It begins here, and but it is intended for an existence that well beyond anything we will know in this world of pain, sin and self-obsession.

And the messages would continue …