Ephesus (cont.) October 2nd

Good evening. Welcome to voice in the Wilderness. I'm Don Noble of Pure

Heart Ministries, and I welcome you today with exceedingly abundantly and overflowing joy.

We are going to conclude the Church at Ephesus out of Revelation chapter two this

evening, so I want to start the evening by just giving us a refresher

of what Jesus said specifically to this church. Revelation chapter two, verses one

through seven. I am reading out of the New King James version to the

Angel of the Church of Ephesus. Right these things, says he who holds

the seven stars in his right hand, who walks in the midst of the

seven golden lambstands. I know your works, your labor, your patience,

and that you cannot bear those who are evil. And you have tested those

who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars.

And you have persevered and have patience, and have labored for my name's sake,

and have not become weary. Nevertheless, I have this against you,

that you have left your first love. Remember therefore, from where you have

fallen, repent and do the first works, or else I will come to

you quickly and remove your lambstand from its place unless you repent. But this

you have that you hate the deeds of the Nicolations, which I also hate.

He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to

the churches. To him who overcomes, I will give to eat from the

tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God.

So John is writing what Jesus is specifically saying to this church. Now,

Jesus knew their successes, their failures, their victories, their problems, their

difficulties. And more than that, Jesus knew exactly what each one needed.

And you'll notice when we go to all the churches, Jesus continually says this

to each church, I know your works. Now, clearly, the Ephesians

did not take their faith lightly. They understood that it made demands on them,

and they worked hard at being Christians. They were not gullible. They

tested and rejected false claims among professing Christians, which we would do well to

heed. This in today's church. To begin with, this was a serving

church. The Church of Ephesus was busy doing the works of the Lord.

No doubt, their weekly schedule was filled with activities. It was also a

sacrificing church. For the word labor when Jesus said, I know your labor,

it really means to toil to the point of exhaustion. So this was

a true sacrificial church. The Ephesian Christians paid a huge price to serve the

Lord. They were a steadfast assembly. For the word patience carries the meaning

of endurance under trial. This gang of people kept going when the going got

tough, and that says a lot about them. They were willing to stand

up against what was but as Jesus said, they were not to stand up

for love. These believers did not tolerate or put up with evil people.

The New Living Translation says, I know you don't tolerate evil people. Now

I want to share with you something out of the Book of Acts where Paul

warned the Ephesian elders about false ministers. And this is important because we know

that Paul spent three years in the city of Ephesus building a church, planting

a foundation there for this group of people. And he says in Acts chapter

twenty, verses twenty nine through thirty two, he says, for I know

this that after my departure, savage wolves will come in among you, not

sparing the flock. Also from among yourselves, men will rise up, speaking

perverse things to draw away the disciples after themselves. Therefore, Paul says,

therefore watch and remember that for three years I did not cease to warn everyone

night and day with tears. Now that's pretty profound that Paul is so concerned

about any kind of false teaching, false prophet coming in to this assembly of

people and deceiving them, and he is so concerned about it that he says,

in the three years that I spent Nephasis, I never ceased to warn

you day and night with tears. Now, I think when I share this

next benefit information, I think you're going to begin to understand why Paul said

what he said. Now I have already gone over talking about the city of

Ephesus, the Temple of Artemis or Diana, and being, you know,

a world class center of trade by land and by sea. The great library

that they had there, the Celsus Library, was the greatest in the world

and it is still The facade is still standing, and it is one of

the most marvelous things to see. If you ever get the opportunity to travel

to Ephesus. Now, the agora was the town market where all the action

happened. And a lot of these places, especially like in Greece, had

an agora. It's kind of like a mall on steroids. So goods from

all over the world were sold there, fragrant aromas, from spices, textiles

of all colors. It was a place of gathering socially, so you can

you can imagine, we can call it like a mall on steroids, but

it was. It was open and outside and so people could congregate easily.

You know, when I think about the High Valley Mall, it's kind of

one long, linear building, but and there are several places where people can

sit and gather and talk. But this was really a gathering place. Now,

the one challenge to end to the entrance of the agora was everyone who

entered on good terms had to put a pinch of incense in the incense burn

her as an act of loyalty to the emperor, who was God. Now

Christians struggled with this. To be shut out of the Agora was to be

shut out of everything, especially socially activities life in general. And I mentioned

last week about you know, cancel culture. Yeah, it's you know,

if you say something people don't like, they will cancel you. They'll cancel

your business, they'll try to put you out of business. And this is

a similar thing. And these Christians, you must give them great credit.

They had to navigate very difficult things. There were fourteen temples to pagan gods

in Ephesis, not just Diana the Great Temple, but fourteen other temples.

Now Diana or Artemists. She was the goddess of fertility and life. The

headquarters for her worship was Eis. The temple had hundreds of temple prostitutes,

both male and female, and festivals ended in orgies and rampant sexual immorality.

During these festivals, people would walk up holding up her picture, and little

silver statues of her were dipped in the harbor to revitalize her fertility. And

once a year in May was the massive celebration to Artemis or Diana, with

dancing in music, her priests or eunuchs, and late into the night during

orgies, some men would, in a frenzy castrate themselves and present their parts

to this goddess Artemis as an act of worship to be part of the priesthood.

Now that sounds pretty sick to me. I'm sure you would agree.

But this is the climate. This is the atmosphere where these Christians were surviving,

living, you know, worshiping God, the God. So this environment

was a great challenge for the early Church. And not only was there worship

to the different pagan gods and the goddess Artemis, but there was also worship

to the Emperor Domitian. And this was also headquartered in Ephesis. And there

was a temple built to him on the highest place in Ephesis, so all

could see it from the harbor, and his statue, on top of other

statues of gods, was fifty feet tall. Now, during festivals, he

made sure that everyone worshiped him, hence the persecution of Christians, including John.

When Paul, and let me stop there for the second. When I

say including John, remember that Demssion didn't like what John was doing in Ephesis

either, so he exiled him to the isle of Patmos. But when Paul

wrote the Book of Ephesians, in chapter six, he tells them to put

on the whole armor of God. Oh, let me tell you, they

knew what he meant about putting on the full armor of God, and they

took him seriously. Okay, now who were the Nickolations. Jesus said that

he knew that they hated the deeds of the Nicolations, this church at Ephesis,

and Jesus said he hated their deeds as well. Now who were they?

What exactly were these people about? Well, they were a sect who

absorbed Greek philosophy and gnosticism, and they taught that the body was insignificant and

the only thing valuable was the soul, So whatever was done to the body

was to no avail. So you could eat meat dedicated to idols, and

of course you could engage in all kinds of sexual immorality without thinking, without

being concerned, and that is what Jesus hated. And that's what the Church

of Ephesus hated. Okay, No, these this church, they were willing

to stand up against what was evil. And so let's let me. I've

got several pieces of paper here, trying to navigate all these papers. So

all right, we know that the Nicolations sinned in their flesh perversion, sexual

sin. They did not repent. And then we see that Jesus commands a

restoration of a goope love. But that didn't mean for them to abandon their

hate for evil behavior. They he just wanted them to repent that they had

lost their first love. And you know, their hatred for false doctrine was

admirable because even the glorified Christ himself expressed hatred for such a heretical teaching.

Love for what is good carries with it a corresponding hatred for what is evil.

Now, currently in our own nation, there is a very heretical doctrine

that has come from the Emergent Church, specifically started in Mars Hill, Michigan.

This teaching perverts the word of God and teaches that there is no Hell.

They emphasize the love of Christ, but they also emphasize that Hell is

actually here on earth. Now I want to turn to Second Peter. I

want us to hear what Peter has to say about some of these things.

So Second Peter, Chapter two, Verse one, Peter wrights, but there

were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers

among you who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying Lord who bought

them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. So I just shared that currently

this heresy is being taught, and it's being spread throughout America. So it

is a destructive heresy, and they're going to bring swift destruction on themselves.

And he goes on, he says it, he says, and many will

follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed

by covetousness. They will exploit you with deceptive words for a long time.

Their judgment has not been idle, and their destruction does not slumber. For

if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to

hell and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved for judgment, and

did not spare the ancient world, but save Noah, one of eight people,

a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the

ungodly and turning the cities of Sodom and go Morah into ashes, condemned them

to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly,

and delivered righteous Lot who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked.

For that righteous man dwelling among them tormented his righteous soul from day to day

by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds. Then the Lord knows how to deliver

the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day

of judgment. And especially those who walk according to the flesh in the lust

of uncleanness and despise. They they are presumptuous, self willed. They are

not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries, whereas angels who are greater and power

and might do not bring a reviling accusation against them before the Lord. I

think Peter is very clear. He is mincing no words here when he's talking

about people who are teaching destructive heresies, destructive teachings, bringing them into the

church and turning people's hearts to the lies of the enemy with deceptive words.

See, they talk about the emergent Church. You know, look it up.

Hey, you know, don't believe me. Look it up. They'll

talk about love, love, love, love, love, the love of

Christ. But when you deny hell, Jesus made it very clear, he

talked about it many times. And you say that there is no hell,

you really put the lives of people in peril. That means these people are

going to perish and go to hell because they're believing a lie. Okay,

now, this this teaching about love, Okay, this is important because love

for what is good carries with it a corresponding hatred for what is evil.

So we have to hate what is evil and love what is good. Now,

in the Book of Romans, Paul writes in chapter twelve, verse nine,

he says, love must be sincere hate what is evil. And I

think it's pretty obvious this culture that we live in, I mean, evil

is abounding at a rapid pace, and we want to hate what's evil.

What is what is it that we consider evil? Well, anything that's against

God's word is an abomination. Psalm ninety seven ten says you who love the

Lord hate evil. I mean this sounds simplistic, but it really is true.

And we really have to pay attention in knowing what the Lord loves and

knowing what the Lord hates. And one way to know that is to keep

reading the Bible, keep reading and seeing what the Bible says, because it's

it makes it very clear. Proverbs eight thirteen, the fear of the Lord

is to hate evil. And again that word fear really means a respect,

an awesome respect of the Lord. Not I'm scared to death of the Lord.

But an awesome respect of the Lord is to hate evil. Amos,

one of the prophets in the Old Testament, Amos five fifteen says hate evil,

love good. Hebrews chapter one, verse nine says you have loved righteousness

and hated lawlessness. So forty five seven you love righteousness. Speaking of God,

you love righteousness and hate wickedness. So it's pretty obvious from those scriptures,

and pretty obvious from what Jesus says to the church at Ephesus about the

Nicolations and the fact that they hated what was evil and the Lord hated it

as well. Now, the very last statement that Jesus makes to this church,

he says, he who has an ear, let him hear what the

spirit says to the churches. To him who over comes, I will give

to eat from the Tree of Life, which is in the midst of the

paradise of God. And this was a very motivating promise. Eternal life is

a motivating promise, and it's the same for every church. But it was

presented to the churches in a variety of different images. In this case,

it was the Tree of Life and the Tree of life had been denied to

Adam, but now is accessible to the conqueror, to the person, that

is, who obeys the message of the letter and overcomes in the conflict with

evil. After adam sin, the way to the Tree of life was cut

off and guarded by the Cherubim. Now it's given by Christ to his triumphant

follower, that's us. But it is not to be taken for granted.

Only some have the right to it, and it may be taken away.

In God's original Paradise we find the first tree of life. There, like

the Ephesian congregation, Adam and Eve forsook their first love and paid for the

consequences of their sin. Is there any better phoinition of Paradise and of Heaven

than to say that they are life forever in the presence and in the company

of our Lord. Paradise is equivalent to the heavenly Jerusalem, which is to

descend from heaven to earth at the consummation of God's kingdom, when God himself

takes up his dwelling among men. So to him who overcomes Jesus will grant

us to eat the fruit of the Tree of life. And the Greek word

here for overcome is the word nicaeo, and it's a military term that means

to conquer. It means victorious or have the victory over and it is a

Greek present tense participle that means keep on overcoming or conquering. The Christian life

is an unrelenting warfare against the powers of evil. I think you and I

know that that is why we need a life of daily surrender to our command

or in chief, to receive our marching orders and to increase our faith so

that we can stand when we have done all to stand. The church at

Ephesus reward was to receive the fruit of the Tree of Life in the paradise

of God, life forever, in the presence and in the company of our

Lord. I think that's a pretty good deal. Jesus doesn't men's words either.

He makes it very clear that if they didn't repent, he was going

to remove their lambstand. In other words, he was going to remove the

church from its place. And he said, I'm going to do it swiftly.

I'm not going to mess around you. Either repent or I'm going to

remove the church. And so, but he leaves us with this, I

will give you to eat of the tree of life in the midst of paradise

to him who overcomes. And it's that overcoming. It's that Ephesians six that

Paul writes to us about putting on the full armor and knowing that we have

all of these enemies, principalities, powers, rulers of darkness, spiritual wickedness,

and high places, and so we have been given victory over all of

Satan and his demonic kingdom. We just have to walk in faith and be

steadfast in our love and our great love for the Lord. So if you

need to repent, if there's things in your life that are not lining up

with the word of God, I would encourage you to repent because the day

is coming quickly when Jesus there's going to be a sound of the trumpet and

he's going to come for his church. So I encourage you repent before the

Lord. Ask Holy Spirit, is there anything in my heart that's dark,

unclean, perverse that I need to bring to the light. I assure you

Holy Spirit will show you and you will be happy that he did. Amen.

Well, this is down, noble. You can go to www.

Dot pureheart dot today and listen to this podcast again. You can download the

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can email me lowercase letters Dawn at Pureheart dot today. And of course I'm

always encouraged by your prayers, encouraged by your financial gifts. Please consider sending

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certainly do appreciate all your gifts and thank you for helping me to keep this

ministry on w WVa and Wheeling, West Virginia. Next week we start the

church at Smyrna, so I look forward to being with you next week.

This is Don Noble saying Shalom shalom, Peace be unto you.