Grace Baptist Church - Nashville

Grace Baptist Church - Nashville

The suffering church in Smyrna (2:8-11) was told by the Lord of the Church that they would “have tribulation ten days” (2:10). There was a Church in Smyrna in the first century that suffered great persecution. There are churches like Smyrna today that suffer terrible persecution for their faithfulness to Christ and the Gospel in places like the Sudan, China or North Korea.

The Smyrna church era clearly mirrors the well documented ten seasons of persecution from Emperor Nero to Emperor Diocletian, which culminated in the conversion of the Emperor Constantine and the cessation of these persecutions declared by the Edict of Milan in 316 A.D. Clearly also, today we are in the general Laodicean Church age of “lukewarm-ness,” smugness, self-centered and love of prosperity with Christ standing outside the Church knocking to gain entrance to any who would open the door. “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me” (Revelation 3:20).

The suffering church in Smyrna (2:8-11) was told by the Lord of the Church that they would “have tribulation ten days” (2:10). There was a Church in Smyrna in the first century that suffered great persecution. There are churches like Smyrna today that suffer terrible persecution for their faithfulness to Christ and the Gospel in places like the Sudan, China or North Korea.

The Smyrna church era clearly mirrors the well documented ten seasons of persecution from Emperor Nero to Emperor Diocletian, which culminated in the conversion of the Emperor Constantine and the cessation of these persecutions declared by the Edict of Milan in 316 A.D. Clearly also, today we are in the general Laodicean Church age of “lukewarm-ness,” smugness, self-centered and love of prosperity with Christ standing outside the Church knocking to gain entrance to any who would open the door. “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me” (Revelation 3:20).

Grace Baptist Church - Nashville

Grace Baptist Church - Nashville

We enter the second major division of “The Blessing Book,” the Book of Revelation. This second division is the record of the Letters to the Seven Churches, the first being the Ephesus, the doctrinally correct church that lost its “first love” of Christ and the Gospel.

The Seven Churches of Asia should be viewed in three dimensions. First, each church was a real church whose existence and condition was present when John wrote. Secondly, each church exists today with similar, if not, identical spiritual conditions today somewhere in the world near us all. Thirdly, those seven churches are a general panorama of church history from Pentecost to the Rapture with the broad condition of the particular mirroring an era in church history.

The Church at Ephesus…Imagine the Sunday morning when the great Apostle John’s book of Revelation was read to the Church! The Seven Churches were in a circle of cities each some 40 miles from the other. The Book of Revelation was a circular letter to those seven churches.

Each letter is brief, pointed, and follows a similar pattern. What did the Lord of the Church say to Ephesus?

We enter the second major division of “The Blessing Book,” the Book of Revelation. This second division is the record of the Letters to the Seven Churches, the first being the Ephesus, the doctrinally correct church that lost its “first love” of Christ and the Gospel.

The Seven Churches of Asia should be viewed in three dimensions. First, each church was a real church whose existence and condition was present when John wrote. Secondly, each church exists today with similar, if not, identical spiritual conditions today somewhere in the world near us all. Thirdly, those seven churches are a general panorama of church history from Pentecost to the Rapture with the broad condition of the particular mirroring an era in church history.

The Church at Ephesus…Imagine the Sunday morning when the great Apostle John’s book of Revelation was read to the Church! The Seven Churches were in a circle of cities each some 40 miles from the other. The Book of Revelation was a circular letter to those seven churches.

Each letter is brief, pointed, and follows a similar pattern. What did the Lord of the Church say to Ephesus?

Grace Baptist Church, Nashville Morning Worship

Grace Baptist Church, Nashville Morning Worship