[Seven Churches] The Letter of the Lord to the Church in Ephesus (2)
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May 29, 2011 |
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 "But I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place—unless you repent. Yet this you do have, that you hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, 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 grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the Paradise of God." (Revelation 2:4-7)
The church in Ephesus was full of fervent prayers and passionate love for the Lord in its early days, but as time passed they forsook the love for the Lord and they had to be reprimanded by the Lord. In our times there are many churches that fail to restore their first love for the Lord.
The lessons of the Lord for the seven churches were written in the book of Revelation Chapters 2 and 3. The seven churches refer to churches in Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea. The message embeds the love of the Lord, who wants to awaken believers as well as churches that are in slumber today.
Last edition, we talked about the Lord's praise given to the church of Ephesus. It was praised for 'enduring and toiling to practice the truth, not tolerating the evil men, revealing false apostles, persevering for the Lord's name's sake and not having grown weary in their efforts'. Then, the Lord rebuked them.
1. But I have this against you, that you have left your first love
The Church of Ephesus received commendation from the Lord, but they later heard the stern warning that the Lord would remove their lampstand out of its place if they forsook the first love and lost their first deeds. Why was the Church of Ephesus rebuked?
The pastor and the members of the Church of Ephesus loved God, struggled against sin and evil, and tried hard to dwell in the Word of God. But as time passed by they fell farther away from the truth. At some point, they stopped gathering, praying, and trying to live in the truth. They even befriended the world.
Over time God wants His children to become more fervent in casting off the worldly things, living in the truth, trying to have greater faith, and becoming holy. However, they will be put under the temptation and trials of Satan from time to time until they fully accomplish what God wants them to do. Thus, they should bear in their mind that if they are not on the alert, they might fall into trials and lose their first love.
If you are stuck at the same level, you have to pray more fervently before God in order to receive grace and power from above and receive the help of the Holy Spirit. To do so, you should remember from where you have fallen and repent. It's because only when you destroy the wall of sin before God, that was built by forsaking the first love and losing the first deeds can you receive strength and grace with which you can run filled with the Holy Spirit. You must not repent with just some effort applied, but you must rend your heart and bear fruit in keeping with repentance. By doing so, you will be filled with the first grace, the truth, and the Holy Spirit and recover the fervent believing life that you led in the beginning.
2. Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first
A man and a woman love each other so much, and they become united as one in marriage. But as time passes their minds begin to change. That is to say that they 'forsake their first love'. If they just keep the first love that they had, their relationship will remain good all the time, and there would be no problems.
It's the same with our love for God and the Lord. Some say they have fallen into tests because of the actions of other brothers in faith. Others say that they started missing the services a couple of times in order to earn money on Sunday and now it has become difficult for them to keep the Lord's Day holy. Still others say they had a problem with the pastor, or they have fallen into tests because they doubted the message preached.
According to 1 John 2:15-16, the most fundamental reason that we lose our first love is that we again take in the untruths that we have been casting off. Even if we are full of the Spirit now, if we look at the world again and take in worldly things, we may fall into the world again.
A person may have been circumcising his heart diligently with the fullness of the first love, but after a couple of years, he may find that he is staying in the same state and has been making no spiritual improvement. Similar kinds of trials are repeatedly given to overcome, or a person may see forms of evil reappear that he thinks he has already cast off.
Then, he may think he needs to take a rest from the effort. He even tries to gain comfort or rest in the fleshly things of this world. He may think he wants to gain just a little bit of that comfort and rest, but as he follows the trends of the world a couple of times here and a couple of times there, he may well fall back to the ways of the world completely.
3. I will remove your lampstand out of its place—unless you repent
The Lord rebuked the Church of Ephesus that forsook its first love and He tells them to repent. He added that, otherwise, He will remove the lampstand from its place. This phrase has two primary meanings.
The first meaning of the phrase 'To remove your lampstand out of its place' is that 'God will remove the Holy Spirit from the heart of each individual.' The 'lampstand' here refers to the Church, the body of the Lord. And the body of individual believers is a temple of God and the Holy Spirit dwells in their hearts as recorded in 1 Corinthians 6:19. In this sense, 'to remove your lampstand out of its place' means that God will remove a temple from them, in other words, that the Holy Spirit cannot accept their heart as a holy temple and cannot dwell within them. The Holy Spirit will depart from their hearts when they lose the first love and dwell in sins befriending the world after having received the Holy Spirit.
If we repent and turn away before the Holy Spirit is quenched, God gives us His grace and another chance. But if we do not repent and turn back, the Holy Spirit will be taken away. The Lord will eventually remove the lampstand out of its place.
The second meaning of the phrase 'to remove your lampstand out of its place' is that the Holy Spirit will be taken away from a church in which the first love cools down, the works of the Holy Spirit disappear, and the revival also stops. Once the works of the Holy Spirit stop, the church falls into spiritual slumber, and it is not easy to rekindle the fiery prayers and recover the fullness of the Holy Spirit again. Since they have lost the first love and God removed the lampstand, the Holy Spirit does not hover over the church anymore.
Then, Satan soon begins to work to cause divisions and quarrels in the church, and the situation may get to the point that the church is destroyed. Though not as serious as this situation, if the Holy Spirit cannot work in a certain church any more, it means that the church has already abandoned its duty.
Therefore, bearing in mind that the end of the ages is drawing nearer, as recorded in 1 Peter 4:7, the church and believers that have lost the first love have to quickly repent and turn away so that God will not remove the lampstand out of its place.
4. To him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the Paradise of God.
Nicolas, one of the selected deacons in the early church argued, "The spirit is clean, sinless, and sanctified. Men commit sins because their visible body has sins. Sin has no relation with the spirit inside men. Therefore, when God calls our spirit, the body will go back to a handful of dust, and therefore, no matter how many sins the body commits, our spirit will be saved."
But the Word of God tells us that even after we accept Jesus Christ as our Savior, if we keep on committing sins, the Holy Spirit will be quenched. If we commit the sin of crucifying the Lord all over again, we will not even be able to repent. (Hebrews 6:4-6)
The argument of Nicolas was a distortion of the Word of God. To practice His Word requires for believers to have toil and endurance. If you teach that they can be saved even with sinning, people who love the world and are living in darkness are easily tempted. Even those who were trying to cast off sins could be deceived and go back to the world again.
If anybody teaches this kind of theory and people agree to it in a church, the whole church will soon be stained with sins. Today, any kind of work that cunningly distorts the Word of God to deceive the believers can be considered to be accomplishing the deeds of the Nicolaitans.
Even if a man has a high position or a title in the church and is full of the Spirit to be praised by many, until he has completely changed into spirit he may receive the work of Satan and leave the truth. Therefore, we should always be awake not to fall into the test and temptation.
We should be cautious about one thing as well. It is of course right to hate what is against God's will like the deeds of Nicolaitans. But we should discern with the Word of God very well so that we will not disturb the Holy Spirit with arrogance. It's because, if we judge and condemn a church or a pastor that is followed by the works of the Holy Spirit we are building up a great wall of sin against God.
Therefore, after we listen to the Word, we should not just keep it as knowledge. In order to overcome, we have to plant it in our heart, let it bud, and reap the fruit with the help of the Holy Spirit. Here, to overcome means to recover the first love and to live in the truth again. When we listen to the Word of God, engrave it on our hearts and practice it by the help of the Holy Spirit, we will overcome the world that is full of sins.
'Those who overcome' refers to those who recover the first love. The Lord promises to these people, "I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the Paradise of God."
The fruit of the tree of life is present not only in Paradise but in every place of the heavenly kingdom including New Jerusalem, and why did the Lord promise that He would let them eat from the tree of life in Paradise? Here, 'to eat of the tree of life which is in the Paradise of God' has two meanings.
First, it means that they would go into Paradise, the lowest dwelling place in the heavenly kingdom. The heavenly kingdom has categorized and distinguished dwelling places that will be given to each one according to each one's measure of faith. (Refer to Heaven) Paradise is the place given to one of the criminals who repented at the side of Jesus' cross.
Because the believers in the Church of Ephesus had lost their first love, when they repented and turned away, they would be at the state of barely receiving salvation.
The second meaning of Paradise is in reference to the whole heavenly kingdom in general. This message was not only for the Church of Ephesus but for all the churches that recover the first love and go into the heavenly kingdom, and everyone who enters into Heaven will be able to eat from the tree of life.
Dear brothers and sisters,
It is time to check if you have what the Lord rebuked the Church about in you. If you have lost your first love, remember from where you have fallen, repent, and lead a fervent Christian life. I hope you will be filled with the love for God more and more over time and please Him by living in the Word of God earnestly in a bid to work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
Dr. Jaerock Lee's New York Crusade 2006 held in the most world-renowned arena Madison Square Garden was featured with true repentance and amazing healing miracles, and live-broadcast to 200 nations.
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