Revelation 2:18b
“The Words of…”
As this church is dealt with by Jesus, it is important to know that these are the very Words of Christ, ones that flow from His perfection in nature and divine wisdom. This is one of His great gifts to the church then and today - that we have His Words in the exact way in which we need them.
As He speaks, one of the key connections to His speaking is that when He speaks, it is designed so we can learn of more of His nature, which then leads to knowing more of His will. He knew/knows what every church needs and so with Thyatira, we get to see keen revelation that is needful for a church wrestling with the troubling danger of compromise.
They needed a picture of Jesus that addressed their condition, so that vision would convict and cultivate the change needed for them to head straight back to the truth. In this light, Jesus shows them and us 3 vital pieces of His glorious nature.
First of all, Jesus says He is the…
Son of God – 2:18b
Revelation 2:18b ‘The words of the Son of God,
They needed to be reminded of His Deity, so Jesus immediately reminds them He is God’s Son, equal to His Father and the one who came in flesh to reveal the Father. They are supposed to be worshiping Him alone and the emphasis from Christ is that “I am God talking to you, so you need to heed every Word I am about to say to you!”
Shortly, we will clearly behold that this church had greatly corrupted their worship in a really bad way, so the Son of God is recalling to their minds He is their Savior and worthy of their worship in all ways. They had slipped and needed sure footing again.
This is the only place in the entire book of Revelation where Jesus is called the Son of God.
As He sets forth this reminder that He is the Son, there are two more vital aspects of His nature & deity that Jesus speaks of now…
Eyes with Flames of Fire – 2:19c – The One who Searches
Revelation 2:19c who has eyes like a flame of fire,
The look of His eyes that are aflame, reveal that He is going to deal with them in a severe manner as a judge. They are not seen as tender doves, rather they are burning and purifying. His eyes are alive with flames of fire, burning, thereby revealing that nothing will be hidden from Him for He sees through everything they are doing, both the good and bad.
The fire of His eyes will also, just like fire, burn away everything that is false and untrue in the church. He is not going to allow them to pretend any longer for they deeply needed His purifying gaze.
It is at this point we should be reminded of this verse affirming what we are reading here...
Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. 13 And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.
Hebrews 4:13 is a key - coming out of writing about the power of the Word of God, the writer of Hebrews affirms that nothing gets to remain hidden from the Lord.
2 powerful and clear instruments do this revealing of our condition...
(1) The Word of Christ
(2) The Eyes of Christ
Feet with Burnished Bronze – 2:18d
Revelation 2:18d and whose feet are like burnished bronze.
A study of both the OT and NT reveals that there is only one other place these Sacred Words are used and that is also Revelation 1:15a his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace. This image is used again now in the next chapter to Thyatira.
In the pages of the Scripture, bronze or brass is a symbol of judgment so the fact that Christ’s feet are like bronze refined in a furnace indicate that He is ready to bring judgment upon this church as He walks among her.
Both Symbols Together
Jesus not only is able to see everything right, indicating He will judge correctly, but with His feet being bronze, He will bring this judgment as He walks among this church, purifying them as He walks in their midst. His holiness and purity will bring about results with each step. He is not going to just let them continue on in their current state without stepping in and doing His work of cleansing toward purity.
When He returns to the earth at His second coming and sets up His Kingdom, He will use a sword from His mouth to deal with the nations and then He will rule them with a rod of iron.
Revelation 19:15 From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.
We will examine in the next post on this church, that they had a woman preacher (Jezebel) who likely was communicating to the people that they could hold onto all of their false pagan beliefs and still serve the Lord at the same time – it was not a big deal to Jesus for He did not mind it at all. She more than likely preached and modeled that they could willfully choose to continue to sin and it was not an indication that they did not love Jesus.
As they embraced her teaching and practices by compromising Biblical truth and righteousness, they did so likely just as today, to make the church more pleasing in its attraction the lost world around them. This message of not having to give up the worldly sinful pleasures has never been Biblical and honestly does not take a lot of discernment to figure out how wrong this practice truly is for people. The church was allowing it by ignoring that clear instruction.
They were saying something along these lines and they are around still in our day…
Come as you are and don’t worry about changing a thing.
You can keep living as you’ve always lived - you can just add Jesus to your life.
We’ll accept you just like you are and let you stay that way.
God loves you and we do too, plus we will not pressure you to change anything.
As we all know, yes, we want those truly wrestling with sin to be around, but we never want them to stay in their sinful condition without coming alongside as we use the chiseling tool of the Gospel for the remedy of what is not God-honoring in their lives. The Gospel is always about life transformation.
Implication of these 3 Characteristics of Christ
Jesus is Holy, Powerful and Uncompromising in His demand for a holy bride, yet in a culture like ours, that kind of Jesus is not very appealing. Our American culture does not want a mighty and eyes full of fire Jesus, for they want a weak and timid Jesus who pats them on the back and says it is all okay and says “bless your soul”.
He is Strong & Mighty though, and in His holiness He will expose the darkness of sin that so degrades a life and a church. Of this we can be sure, when Jesus arrives at a church or at a life, He will expose it for what it truly is made of by His eyes of fire.
If a life, church or denomination wants to continue in sin, then in time He will let them have just what they want and remove their candle.
Assessment of Jesus – Revelation 2:19
Revelation 2:19 “‘I know your works, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your latter works exceed the first.
As we stated in the first post on this church, Jesus had his longest and strongest Words to this church, but until we get to those Words in the next post, let’s see what He does affirm about them.
His Affirmation of Thyatira
Works – 4 of
Works – This word means “deeds”. It points to the things they were faithful in living as they reached out to the lost in the city.
(1) Love
Some of them were strongly maintaining a deep love for God and for one another. Incidentally, they are the one church of the seven who are affirmed for their love. With Ephesus, they had lost their first love, but this was not the case in Thyatira, as their love was still alive and moving and did not need any correction.
I will note this though – just because a church loves well does not in turn allow the people to ignore the sin in their midst that is destructive to everyone. Yes, love covers a multitude of sins (1 Peter 4:8), but that has never meant one gets to ignore blatant open sin.
(2) Faith
The 2nd godly characteristic of this church was their faith. In the Greek, faith is “pistis” – meaning “fidelity and faithfulness”. Faithful Christ-followers in the church are just that - faithful. This word points to “faithfulness”, leading us to see that some of these believers were trusted to carry things out and remain at the task until completion.
(3) Service
Service here carries the idea of “ministry” and it is the same word we translate “Deacon” in the New Testament. The Greek means “those who kick up dust”, indicating they were faithful in the task of “kicking up dust” in their ministry work of the church.
A church should be faithfully ministering to others and if it does not, then it has stepped away from their calling as a body of believers.
(4) Patient Endurance
Thyatira was not an easy place to live out one’s faith, so as Jesus says these Words, He is pointing to some of those who had not compromised and were maintaining a thriving walk with Christ in spite of opposition and so much sin.
The word “patience” in the Greek means “to remain under”, so patience in this context means they were “remaining the course of their faith”. For some of them, as the heat upon their faith increased, they did not walk away, but stayed faithful.
Understanding the Lord’s Sovereignty
When we understand God’s Sovereignty, we see the days of difficulty or days of great faith pressure with fresh eyes and it moves us deeper into a life of a stronger and more pure walk with Christ.
When our confidence rests in the knowledge that God is control, we will in more freedom and confidence move on in our faithfulness to Christ. The reason so many do this as they know God blesses obedience and will work everything out in His perfect timing.
“that your latter works exceeded the first”
A quick glance at this church from a distance and we would have been moved by what we saw, for they were hanging in there and active in ministry. For many in our day, that is the measuring stick for whether a church is effective, but more needs to be examined.
For example, a church may be out in the community and very active, but inside the church it could tolerate things that Christ does not approve of and that is what we find with Thyatira. That church may be teaching bad doctrine and ignoring immorality.
They looked really good, but underneath it all, their structure and leadership was allowing something very immoral and ungodly to thrive.
We will look at that in detail next time.
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