Sermon Title: The Compromising Church
Sermon Text: Revelation 2:12-17
Sermon Purpose: To call the hearer to repent from a life of perverted compromise with worldliness.
Sermon Proposition: There are 5 exhortations given to the compromising church.
12 And to the angel of the church in Pergamos write, ‘These things says He who has the sharp two-edged sword: 13 "I know your works, and where you dwell, where Satan’s throne is. And you hold fast to My name, and did not deny My faith even in the days in which Antipas was My faithful martyr, who was killed among you, where Satan dwells. 14 But I have a few things against you, because you have there those who hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality. 15 Thus you also have those who hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate. 16 Repent, or else I will come to you quickly and will fight against them with the sword of My mouth. 17 "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives it.'" Revelation 2:12-17 (NKJV)
Introduction:
THE CORRESPONDENT
The One who has the sharp two-edged sword says this:
The holder of the sharp two-edged sword is the risen, glorified Lord Jesus Christ, as indicated in 1:16. He, through the inspired apostle John, is the author of this letter. In this letter, like those to Ephesus and Smyrna, Christ identifies Himself using one of the descriptive phrases from John's vision in 1:12-17.
The sharp two-edged sword refers to the Word of God. Hebrews 4:12 notes that "the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrows, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart." The apostle Paul also uses the metaphor of a sword to describe the Word (Eph. 6:17). That the sword is two-edged depicts the Word's potency and power in exposing and judging the innermost thoughts of the human heart. The Word never wields a dull edge.
This description of the Lord Jesus Christ pictures Him as judge and executioner. Describing His appearnace at the Second Coming, John writes that "from His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty" (19:15). This is not a positive, promising introduction; it is a threatening one. It is the first negative introduction of Christ because the Pergamum church faced imminent judgment. Disaster loomed on the horizon for this worldly church; it was and is but a short step from compromising with the world to forsaking God altogether and facing His wrath.
The church at Pergamum is symbolic of the many churches throughout history that have compromised with the world. That spirit of compromise was especially evident during the period from the fourth to the seventh centuries. In A.D. 313 the emperor Constantine issued the Edict of Milan, granting religious freedom to the Christians and ending two and a half centuries of savage persecution. He adopted Christianity and made it the favored religion of the empire. That began the process by which Christianity merged with the Roman state. Heathen priest became Christian priests; heathen temples became Christian churches; heathen feasts became Christian festivals. Christianity was no longer a personal matter, but a national identity. The church married the political system, so that worldliness was synonymous with the church.
Today, in some ways, worldliness is still rampant in the church. Churches, even entire denominations, have departed from the true faith and embraced the world philosophically and morally. And in some places, states churches still exist in spiritually impotent forms. Like the church at Pergamum, they fall under judgment by the Lord of the true church.
THE CHURCH
The book of Acts does not record the founding of the church at Pergamum. According to Acts 16:7-8, Paul passed through Mysia (the region in which Pergamum was located) on his second missionary journey, but there is no record that the apostle either preached the gospel or founded a church there at that time. Most likely, the church at Pergamum was founded during Paul's ministry in Ephesus, when the gospel went out from there to be preached throughout the province of Asia (Acts 19:10). Because the church was surrounded by the pagan culture, it was exposed continually to its allurements, strengthened by familiar sins. It also faced severe animosity from the persecuting emperor worshipers.
THE CITY
The Church in Pergamum (2:12a)
Pergamum was about one hundred miles north of Ephesus, with Smyrna located about halfway in between. Unlike Ephesus and Smyrna, Pergamum was not a port city but was located about fifteen miles inland from the Aegean Sea. Nor was it on any of the major trade routes. Yet, as its ancient capital, Pergamum was considered Asia's greatest city. The Roman writer Pliny called it "by far the most distinguished city in Asia" (CITED IN Robert H. Mounce, The Book of Revelation, The New International Commentary on the New Testament [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1977], 95). By the time John penned Revelation, Pergamum had been Asia's capital for almost 250 years (since 133 B.C., when its last king bequeathed his kingdom to Rome). Pergamum survives today as the Turkish city of Bergama.
Much of Pergamum was built on a large, conical hill towering some one thousand feet above the plain. So impressive is the site even in modern times that the famed nineteenth-century archaeologist Sir William Ramsay commented, "Beyond all other sites in Asia Minor it gives the traveler the impression of a royal city, the home of authority: the rocky hill on which it stands is so huge, and dominates the broad plain of the Caicus [River valley] so proudly and boldy" (The Letters to the Seven Churches of Asia [Albany, Oreg.: AGES Software; reprint of the 1904 edition], 226).
Pergamum's huge library (200,000 handwritten volumes) was second only to that of Alexandria. So impressive was Pergamum's library that Mark Anthony later sent it to his lover, Queen Cleopatra of Egypt. According to legend, parchment (or vellum) was invented by the Pergamenes to provide writing material for their library. Seeking to build a library rivaling the one in Alexandria, a third-centruy B.C. Pergamene king attempted to lure the librarian of the Alexandrian library to his city. Unfortunately, the Egyptian ruler got wind of the plan, refused to allow the librarian to leave, and in retaliation prohibited the further export of papyrus to Pergamum. Out of necessity, the Pergamenes developed parchment, made of treated animal skins, for use as writing material. Though parchment was actually known from a thousand years earlier in Egypt, the Pergamenes were responsible for its widespread use in the ancient world. In fact, the word parchment may derive from a form of the word Pergamum.
Because of its library, Pergamum was an important center of culture and learning. The physician Galen, second only in prominence to Hippocrates, was born and studied in Pergamum. The city saw itself as the defender of Greek culture in Asia Minor. A large frieze around the base of the altar of Zeus commemorates the victory of the Pergamenes over the invading barbarian Gauls.
Pergamum was an important center of worship for four of the main deities of the Greco-Roman world, and temples dedicated to Athena, Asklepios, Dionysos, and Zeus were located there. But overshadowing the worship of all those deities was Pergamum's devotion to the cult of emperor worship. Pergamum built the first temple devoted to emperor worship in Asia (29 B.C.), in honor of Emperor Augustus. Later, the city would build two more such temples, honoring the emperors Trajan and Septimus Severus. The city thus became the center of emperor worship in the province, and there, more than in any other city in Asia, where, Christians were primarily in danger of harm from the emperor worship cult. Elsewhere, Christians were primarily in danger on the one day per year they were required to offer sacrifices to the emperor; in Pergamum they were in danger every day. It is likely that the martyr Antipas (2:13) was executed, at least in part, for refusing to worship the emperor.
Taken from: "The MacArthur New Testament Commentary: Revelation 1-11, Moody Press/Chicago, 1999, pp.82-25 ???