Text: Revelation 3:7-13
A few weeks ago California was rocked by some pretty significant earthquakes. News clips showed store owners with all their merchandise shaken off the shelves and shattered on the floor. One owner had just cleaned up only to have the area shaken a second time by an even stronger quake. It’s quite literally a terrifying and unexpected disruption of life. But it also is a parable of so much else in life that also shakes and disrupts and undoes us: sickness, unemployment, betrayal, disappointment, death, and an uncertain future. I know many feel a general concern about our country and society, regardless of what side of the aisle you sit on. It seems like we are tearing apart no less than the ground around those quakes in California.
In A.D. 17, the ancient city of Philadelphia was briefly re-named Neocaesarea (“Caesar’s New City”) in appreciation for imperial reconstruction aid after an earthquake. Like others of these letters in Revelation, Jesus seems to tap into themes that would be familiar to his audience. In this letter to the shaken city, he promises his suffering church an infinitely more stable future – a “pillar in the temple of God” – and a greater name – “the city of My God, the new Jerusalem.” (v.12)
Today we’ll look briefly at what the believers in Philadelphia were doing well and where they were challenged. And I’d like to do an exercise with you out of their story and Jesus’ challenge to them.
Philadelphia
The Christians in Philadelphia were not in the cultural majority. They were likely still seen as a minor offshoot of Judaism, and neither recognized yet by the surrounding culture, nor welcomed by the Jews in the city. They indeed had little earthly power or influence, but Jesus identifies what they do have and it is the main thing. They have held fast to God’s Word and to Jesus’ name. Let me repeat those because that’s our focus today: they held fast to God’s Word and to Jesus’ name.
Because of those two anchor points, Jesus promises to protect them in the trials yet to come. Along with that, he claims the power to hold the door open to them. Whatever they will face, Jesus holds the key and is the door into the presence of God, in that new Promised Land, the New Jerusalem. It’s reminiscent of the language in chapter 14 of the Gospel of John, when Jesus tells his disciples that he goes to prepare a place for them that where he is they will also be.
His charge to the believers in Philadelphia who have held fast to God’s Word and to Jesus’ name: keep holding fast! I picture the person fallen overboard to whom the life preserver has been thrown. Those on board are shouting, “Keep holding on!” That life preserver of God’s Word and Jesus’ name will continue to provide rescue and salvation.
Holding Fast to God’s Word
So what do we do with that? How do we appropriate this letter to ancient Greeks for our 21st century selves? I think the lesson is remarkably consistent and close: we too are facing and will face trial, disruption, and uncertainty. And it is still God’s Word and Jesus’ name that serve as our anchor point, our life preserver, our hope for getting through. And Jesus message to us is, “Keep holding on!”
Last week Bob Simes preached an inspiring sermon around the importance of reading and studying God’s Word, the Bible. I’d like to do an exercise that I hope will both demonstrate the importance of this and also convict us of our need to keep on and to go deeper.
What I’d like you to do is think of a verse or phrase from the Bible that has encouraged you or helped you or otherwise inspired you. If you can remember the verse number, add it; but if you can’t, don’t worry. You can either text it to me right now or write it in the white space in your bulletin at the bottom of the first page where there is some white space. Please print so I can read it. If you want to put more than one, that’s fine, too, but just 2-3 at the most. But I want the words, not just a reference like “Psalm 23.
