Coronation: The Suffering Church

Transcript

JRNT 504
The Suffering Church
Revelation 2:8-11
03/09/2025
Jesse Randolph

If you’ve done any study of church history, you likely come across the name Polycarp. Polycarp was an early church father, born in the year 69 A.D., just a few decades after the resurrection of Jesus in the city of Smyrna. Polycarp was a direct disciple of the Apostle John, the human author of the book of Revelation, the book that we’re studying now on Sunday evenings. And Polycarp would go on to influence many other early Christian witnesses as he brought them up and instructed them in the truth. Well, by the mid-second century A.D., meaning somewhere around the mid-150s A.D., the fires of persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire were raging. It was a difficult and dangerous time to be a Christian. And at some point, in the midst of the widespread persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire at this time, Polycarp, who by that point was an old man in his mid-80s, was flagged as being a Christian and a warrant went out for his arrest. And then He was apprehended and arrested in the house in the country just outside the city of Smyrna where he was from. And the Roman officials arrested him and they threw him into a chariot, and they did so to haul him back to Smyrna to face the authorities. The Roman official who was sitting next to Polycarp as this chariot rode back to Smyrna, urged the old man to renounce his allegiance to Christ and to instead pledge his worshipful allegiance to the Emperor. Polycarp refused.

So then in frustration the Roman official took Polycarp, age 85, 86 or so, and he threw him out of the chariot, and Polycarp dislocated his leg. Polycarp was then forced back into the chariot. And then when the chariot arrived in Smyrna, Polycarp, old, frail, hobbled, was brought before the Roman proconsul there. And the Roman proconsul questioned Polycarp and he argued with him that the only logical thing to do was to worship Caesar and spare his life. But again, Polycarp refused to do so. He refused to say the words that would have saved his life, “Caesar is Lord,” and he instead held to his faith, stuck to his guns.

This comes from an ancient work known as “The Martyrdom of Polycarp.” You can find this in the public domain in pdf format. But He said this, “Eighty and six years have I served Christ, and He did me no harm: how then can I blaspheme my King and my Savior?” Irritated, the Roman proconsul then threatened Polycarp with these words, he said “I have wild beasts at hand; I will cast you to these, unless you repent.” Meaning renounce Christ and now worship Caesar. Again, Polycarp refused. Then, the Roman official threatened him again and said “I will cause you to be consumed by fire, seeing you despise the wild beasts, if you will not repent.” To which Polycarp replied, “You threaten me with fire which burns for an hour, and after a little while is extinguished, but are ignorant of the fire of the coming judgment and of eternal punishment, reserved for the ungodly. But why do you tarry? Bring forth what you will.”

At that point, a great pile of wood was gathered and Polycarp was led to the stake to be burned. But as his captors prepared to nail him to the wood so he wouldn’t move while the fire was burning around him, Polycarp was recorded as saying this. “Leave me as I am,” meaning you don’t need to nail me, “for He that gives me strength to endure the fire, will also enable me, without your securing me by nails, to remain without moving in the fire.” Then Polycarp cried out to God in prayer, with these, his last known words, he said, “I give Thee thanks that Thou hast counted me worthy of this day and this hour, that I should have a part in the number of Thy martyrs, in the cup of Thy Christ, to the resurrection of eternal life, both of soul and body, through the incorruption imparted by the Holy Ghost.” Soon the fire was lit. And though the flames were licking fiercely all around him, the fire did not come close enough to him to harm Polycarp. And so seeing that his execution attempt had failed, the executioner then approached Polycarp with a spear, stabbed him and killed him. Polycarp’s crime was that he had confessed himself to be a Christian. That was it. That was the charge.

As I mentioned at the outset, Polycarp was from Smyrna. Smyrna was a city in first century Asia Minor. And there was a church there, a church that was founded in the fires of suffering. A church full of people, like their native son Polycarp, who knew only suffering. And they were faithful in suffering, faithful even for some unto death. And some 70 years before Polycarp was martyred, this suffering church received a letter. A letter from the risen and ascended and glorified Christ which has been preserved for us on the pages of Scripture in Revelation chapter 2:8-11.

Please go ahead and turn with me if you would to Revelation 2:8-11. Last time in our study of the Book of Revelation of course we worked our way through Jesus’ letter to the first of the seven churches on His mailing list, the church at Ephesus, and we saw last time that that church, the church of Ephesus, was very much like many Bible- believing churches in our day. A church that was diligent in its service. A church that was discerning in its beliefs. But a church which had drifted from its first love for Jesus. That church at Ephesus had everything going on for it on the outside, but inside, they were weak and they were compromised.

Well, tonight, as we work our way through the second of the Lord’s 7 letters to the church at Smyrna, Polycarp’s hometown, we’re going to see that the situation in this church was the opposite. It was the inverse of what was happening at Ephesus. At Smyrna, this church had nothing going on for it on the outside, but inside they were spiritually strong. This church knew what it meant to be persecuted for Christ. This church knew what it meant to suffer for the Savior. Again Revelation 2:8-11, where we’re going to see Jesus’ words to the suffering saints at Smyrna. God’s Word reads, “And to the angel of the church in Smyrna write: This is what The First and The Last, who was dead, and has come to life, says: ‘I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you are rich), and the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to cast some of you into prison, so that you will be tested, and you will have tribulation for ten days. Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes will never be hurt by the second death.’”

As we saw in our last study of Christ’s letter to the church at Ephesus, and as we’re going to see over these next several Sunday evenings in the spring as we work through these other letters to these churches, each of the Lord Jesus’ letters to these churches in different cities were written to churches where there was a whole different background. A whole different setting in comparison to the other churches on this mailing route. So we need to go through the background every time we go through one of these churches and these letters and these cities, to get a sense of what was going on in this city in this church in the late first century at the time Christ addressed His followers there.

As it relates to Smyrna, Smyrna was this coastal city. It sat some 35 miles north of Ephesus. To put it in our Lincoln context if Ephesus was Lincoln, Gretna would be Smyrna. It was a large city, was Smyrna. Much larger than Gretna by ancient standards especially. It had a population of about 200,000 people at this time. The city of Smyrna sat at the mouth of an enclosed harbor, and because of its harbor, it was a safe city and it played a significant role in commerce in ancient Asia Minor. It was not only commercially significant though. It was also a city with a rich and a proud historical heritage. Smyrna was founded sometime around 1,000 B.C. Meaning by the time that Jesus sent His letter to this church, this city was over twice as old as Boston, Massachusetts. This was an established city, not some new village that had recently popped up on the map.

Smyrna was the home of the great Greek poet Homer, who around the eighth century B.C., wrote “The Odyssey” and “The Iliad.” It was a major hub of learning in this part of the world and especially prominent in the fields of science and medicine. Politically speaking, Smyrna was a strong city, it was in a strong position. See, right at the time of the birth of Christ, there was this competition among 11 different cities in the Roman Empire, to see who would win the prize and the privilege of erecting a statue to the great civilization of Rome. Which city would be able to erect a statue to Rome in their boundary. And Smyrna beat out the other cities, all 10 other cities. And so it was given the privilege of building a temple to Rome in its city. And so there’s this massive temple honoring Rome that was constructed right in the heart of Smyrna. Smyrna was also a beautiful city. It had impressive public buildings all throughout. It had a famous stadium, a decorated library, a public theater which was the largest in Asia Minor, well-paved, tree-lined streets. Naturally speaking it was the most beautiful of the 7 cities where the 7 churches sat.

And we also know that there was a Christian church in Smyrna. Hence, the letter Christ is sending to this city. And while we don’t have an exact date that the church at Smyrna was founded, it’s reasonable to estimate that it was sometime in the 50s to 60s A.D. while Paul was living and ministering nearby at Ephesus. In other words, Smyrna had a lot going on for it. It was a commercially significant city, a culturally diverse city, a politically favored city, a naturally beautiful city and it also had a church.

But note that while the city of Smyrna had so much going on for it, the reality was there was not a more dangerous place to be a Christian at this time in the Roman Empire. And there were two main reasons for that. The first one I already alluded to is that this city, the political entity of the city of Smyrna, was fiercely loyal to Rome. And Rome in these days was under the thumb and the rule of an emperor named Domitian. And Domitian demanded that its citizens worship the emperor, namely him. All in the empire were required by this point in Roman history to declare that “Caesar,” the emperor, “is Lord.” And that was a real big problem for the Christians in Smyrna because the only confession they could make as believers was “Jesus is Lord.”

Well, the second reason it was a dangerous place to be a Christian in Smyrna had to do with this very large and very aggressive, very ungodly, Jewish population in this time. And this Jewish population in Smyrna was actively hostile to Christians. They were willing to do whatever was needed to cooperate with the Roman authorities, to stop this spread of this new sect called “Christianity” any further within Smyrna. So, it was exceptionally difficult to be a Christian in Smyrna in these days. The Christians in Smyrna, and there are accounts and accounts after accounts about this, they knew what it was like to be hated in their area, their territory. They knew what it was like to be sneered at and shunned. They knew what is was like to have neighbors laughing at them and friends and family turning their backs at them and then ultimately be turned over to the authorities. And for no other reason than that they had put their faith in Jesus Christ.

So that’s all background to what the Lord here is going to say to them, what the Lord of the church would say to the suffering church at Smyrna. And as we’re going to see, what Jesus is going to do here in this letter in just a few verses, is He’s first going to credit this church for their faithfulness. He’s going to comfort this church and then He is going to give them a charge. He’s going to credit them, comfort them, and give them a charge.

Let’s take it from the top, starting with verse 8 where Jesus says, “And to the angel of the church in Smyrna write.” And you’ve already heard me say a few times now, I’ll say it a few times more in weeks to come, but that word “angel” there, “angelo,” is better translated messenger. Which in context of this local church would primarily refer to the local, earthly messenger, the primary herald of truth in this church context, meaning its pastor.

And note that this individual is identified as the angel of the church, a messenger of the church, a pastor of the church. And that’s really significant because what it tells us is that this messenger or this pastor of this church at Smyrna was one of them. He himself was going through whatever the people under his care in this town, in this church, were going through. Though he was their overseer, he wasn’t above the fray. He wasn’t distant or removed from their life or their situations. Rather, he was in the midst of his people, the people there in Smyrna as he suffered. He would have been one of them suffering, too.

I mean, I got to say, I thank the Lord for the privilege I have here of serving alongside pastors and elders who share that same commitment and that same heart, whether they are laymen who do other things Monday through Friday, or whether they are full-time members of our staff. We have shepherds here who do a lot more than just preaching and teaching. The shepherds of Indian Hills are committed to and do personally minister to our people, praying with people, and rejoicing with people, and serving alongside people, grieving with our people, and yes, suffering with our people. And I’d ask you to pray not just for me but for all of our pastors, all of our elders, that we would always be such men, invested to such a degree in the lives of this precious flock, that our people know that we care about them and love them and that we would lay our lives down for them.

Let’s look next at how Christ addresses Himself to the church at Smyrna. As he says “This is what The First and The Last, who was dead, and has come to life, says.” Now, those words, “The First and The Last,” are significant. That language is borrowed from the book of Isaiah where three different times, God Himself, Yahweh, is described in similar terms. You can jot this one down. Isaiah 44:6 says, “Thus says Yahweh, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, Yahweh of hosts: ‘I am the first and I am the last, and there is no God besides Me.’”

So what Jesus is doing here by importing that language over from the book of Isaiah, in His letter to Smyrna, is he’s openly equating Himself with God. He is affirming here that He is the self-existent One. He is the Creator. He is the One who has existed eternally as the divine Second Person of the Trinity. He is perfect and infinite Deity. He is the One who has declared the beginning from the end. He is the One who knows and has ordained all things, including all the things that this church is about to go through. And by highlighting His Deity here, He’s assuring this precious church at Smyrna that no matter what His Bride was going through in their context, whether it was a search or a seizure or a stare or a scornful word or a beating or an act of torture, or even all the way up to the point of death, it was all happening in accordance with His perfect purposes and plans. It was all happening according to the One who had designed it to happen as He sat forever eternally upon His throne at the right hand of the Father. That’s what He means here when He says that He is “The First and The Last.”

Now look at the next few words where He says, he was the One “who was dead, and has come to life.” So just as Jesus referring to Himself as “The First and The Last” is pointing to His deity, those next words where it says, “who was dead has come to life,” are pointing to His humanity. See, because Jesus not only is perfectly divine but perfectly human, He is saying here that He has the ability to identify in His case perfectly with His people there in Smyrna. He was perfectly positioned to empathize with them in their poverty, in their suffering, in their tribulation, and the slander that they were facing. And that’s because He Himself during His earthly ministry had experienced poverty, and suffering, and tribulation, and slander!

Think about, did Jesus experience poverty during His life here on earth? He sure did. Matthew 8:20, Jesus here is saying, “The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” Did Jesus experience suffering, and tribulation, and slander in His life here on earth? He sure did. Our Scripture is from 1 Peter 2:21, “Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in His steps, who did no sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth; who being reviled, was not reviling in return; while suffering, He was uttering no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously. Who Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that having died to sin, we might live to righteousness; by His wounds you were healed.” See, Jesus was many steps ahead of the saints at Smyrna in suffering. And to know these truths about their Savior, to know that their Savior had previously walked the road that they themselves were now walking on, had suffered the way they were now suffering, that He could and truly was sympathizing with them, that must have been tremendously encouraging for this dear church. And that ought to be a source of encouragement for us here as well. Knowing that, as it says in Hebrews 4:15, “we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses.” And knowing as we just read in 1 Peter 2:21 that “Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in His steps.”

Moving on to verse 9, the Lord continues. He says, “‘I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you are rich) and the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan.” As He addressed this letter to the church at Smyrna, Christ was saying here that not only could He sympathize with them, He’s saying that He knew them. I won’t belabor this one, I covered it last week. But the Greek verb there is “oida,” meaning He has fully, competent, perfect knowledge of what they were going through. He knew perfectly the tribulation they were enduring. He knew perfectly their poverty. He knew perfectly the slander they were facing.

We’ll go through those one by one. First, He says, “I know your tribulation.” That word “tribulation,” “thlipsis,” remember that fun little word, it conveys this idea of severe pressure. The pressure one feels when they’re going through some sort of distressing event, like war or childbirth. Those events by definition are distracting and distressing, dominating. They take all of your attention. We don’t ignore those events or take them casually. You know, no soldier goes skipping through a foxhole. No laboring mother is thinking through complex algebraic equations as she’s breathing through her contractions. No. Those events are dominating.

And when Christ here spoke of the “tribulation” that the church at Smyrna was facing, He was describing specifically the pressure they were facing from the Roman rulers of the day. I’ve already mentioned that the city of Smyrna had this deep allegiance to Rome. And I’ve already mentioned that worship of the Roman emperor was mandatory at this time. And there’s a bit more to that story. See, at this point as Christ is writing this letter to Smyrna, the Roman emperor, again was named Domitian. And we came across him I believe in our first sermon in this series where we were looking at the dating of Revelation at being a late date during his reign. But under his reign, emperor worship had migrated from being something that you should do, to something you had to do. Under Domitian, if you didn’t worship the Roman emperor as god, it was a capital offense. You faced the death penalty. And what happened was to enforce this law, each and every year citizens of Smyrna were required to burn incense in honor of the emperor. And when they would do so they were given a certificate to show they met their annual requirement. So if you had that certificate, you were clear. You could show it to the authorities and say, “I did my deed, I worshipped the emperor, I paid homage to the emperor this year.” But if you didn’t have that certificate, you were in trouble, you faced arrest and ultimately execution.

Now think of this situation that the Christians there in Smyrna are finding themselves in. Think of this great pressure, tribulation, “thlipsis,” they had in making their choice. They could either pay homage to and worship Caesar. They could get that pinch of incest and burn it and get their certificate and live. But in doing so, betray Christ. Or they could worship Christ alone and honor Him in doing so, and not burn incense to the emperor and not get their certificate, but now be prepared to die. The Christians in Smyrna made their choice. They couldn’t comply, they wouldn’t comply with Domitian’s edict. They couldn’t deny, they wouldn’t deny the Master who had bought them. And so they refused to worship Caesar. They remained firm in their resolve to worship Christ. And they paid the price, many of them, to the point of giving their lives.

But it wasn’t just tribulation. Still in verse 9, Christ says He knew that many were suffering “poverty.” The tribulation and the pressure they were experiencing, was only compounded by the fact that they were poor. And when he says they’re poor, He means like really, really poor. There were 2 possible Greek words He could have chosen to express the idea of poverty here. And one would be more like what we think of as poverty, first world poverty, struggling to meet certain basic needs, not having much that’s superfluous, having 2 TVs in your house, not 3. That kind of poverty. The other type of poverty is third world poverty. That’s the other Greek word for poverty. And that describes being a beggar, living by the good graces of others to meet basic needs, having nothing at all, clothes falling off your body. That kind of poverty. It’s that second term that Jesus uses here to describe the Christians at Smyrna, meaning they were completely impoverished. They were living from hand to mouth.

But Smyrna as we’ve seen -- now this is where it gets so interesting and somewhat confusing -- it was this otherwise prosperous city, it was a wealthy city. So how was it that the Christians in this town were living in such squalid conditions? Well, the answer is for no other reason but that they were followers of Christ. And for no other reason that they were open in their devotion to Christ. And for that reason they were now being blacklisted from business deals and employment opportunities and any legitimate means of making a living. And so they no longer could put food on the table. They were literally starving in light of their allegiance to Christ, ironically who is the Bread of Life.

But then note this here, the Lord inserts this comment, it’s in parenthetical form in our text in verse 9 that we don’t want to miss. He says “(but you are rich).” So though the Christians in Smyrna were dirt poor economically, Jesus here is reminding them that they were abundantly rich in other ways. They might have had tattered clothing on the outside, but they had these rich storehouses and treasures of spiritual wealth to look forward to one day in glory. They might never own anything in this life. They might not have a roof over their head. Their stomachs might have been growling. There might have been nights when they were shivering out in the cold without proper covering. But they already had all that they needed. In the words of Jesus prior in the Sermon on the Mount, they were storing up for themselves treasures in heaven. In the words of James in James 2:5 they were poor of this world but they were rich in faith, rich in things of eternity, rich in things that will last.

And what a great lesson that is for all of us to be reminded of from time to time. That for those of us who have put our faith in Jesus Christ, it really is foolishness to place our concept of richness or wealth, to tie our concept of wealth or success, to the fleeting possessions of this life. It really is senseless to measure ourselves against somebody who has heated seats in their car or that auto-start feature, or a pool in their back yard or a boat or a cabin or an RV, or seats at half court or on the 50 yard line. It really is foolish, because if we put our trust in Jesus Christ the reality is we already have all that we need. Even if we’re not independently wealthy, even if we don’t have a giant nest egg, even if we’re just barely getting by month to month, we are already eminently rich in what matters. 2 Corinthians 8:9 says, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though being rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty you might become rich.” It’s not a prosperity verse. It’s a spiritual verse.

So anyway Jesus here is telling the church at Smyrna that He knew they’re facing tribulation. He knew they were facing this crippling poverty. Now next look at verse 9 where He says He knows that they are experiencing “blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan.” The Christians in Smyrna like Christians all over the ancient world, were facing blasphemy charges or slander. They were being slandered. There were the slanderous allegations that they were atheists. And not because they worshipped Yahweh but because they refused to worship the Roman gods. They were called cannibals, not because they were, like Jeffery Dahmer types, but because they partook of the Lord’s body and they drank His blood in communion. They were called incestuous because Christian husbands and wives were referring to each other as brother and sister (of course, in the faith).

But in Smyrna there was this one charge especially that was sure to get Christians locked up and to get him or her killed. And that was the charge of political disloyalty, not being loyal to, not being obedient to Rome. And while the Christians in Smyrna were generally submissive in their posture to the Roman government, like we’re all called to be to governing authorities, the truth is there were times they couldn’t be obedient. There were some rules of the Roman government that these Christians in Smyrna simply couldn’t obey. And one law they couldn’t obey, and I’ve mentioned it a couple of times already, was Domitian’s law that mandated the worship of the emperor. The Christians in this city could not obey that law because to do so would mean violating prohibitions on idolatry and they would be committing spiritual adultery. They would be worshipping a mere man and betraying the one living God.

Well, lurking in the shadows in this community of Smyrna, I’ve already alluded to this group, too, was this large Jewish community this large Jewish community which was well aware of Domitian’s law and the Christians disobedience of Domitian’s law. And so with this already built-in hostility toward the Christians in this community, the Jews in Smyrna joined forces with the civil authorities in Rome by becoming informants against these Christians. So just as the Jews in Jerusalem had done in the events leading up to the crucifixion of Christ, the Jews in Smyrna were now aiding and abetting the authorities, the civil authorities, to persecute these early believers. These were totally shameful acts. And as we’re about to see, Christ has these very strong words for them. Look at what He says in verse 9, He says… He’s speaking of those who say they are Jews and are not. The persecutors of the Christians here were Jews, racially speaking. They were physical descendants of Abraham. They were like those “sons of Abraham” that we saw in this morning’s message from Luke 3. But they were not true Jews. We see this phenomenon described in Romans 2:28 which says, “For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter.” I also sited this morning Romans 9:6-7 which says, “For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel; nor are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants.”

Here in His letter to Smyrna though, Jesus goes even further. Look at what He calls the Jewish people who were taking part in this persecution of Christians there at Smyrna. He says, you see it there at the end of verse 9, “a synagogue of Satan.” Now those are shocking words. Those are rousing words. Provocative words. Inflammatory words. But they’re true words, seeing that they came across the lips of our Savior and the Lord of the universe, Jesus Christ. And they were true not only of this group at this time, but they’re true today as well.

It is the pure truth that there are just 2 types of religious assemblies in our world today. There are those that are assemblies of Christ, who worship Christ as revealed in Scripture, worshiping Him in spirit and in truth. And then there are assemblies of Satan. And to be an assembly of Satan you don’t have to just be obsessed with blood and the occult. No, you can be as just as much a synagogue of Satan by being a Jewish synagogue, or a Muslim mosque, or a Hindu temple, or a Buddhist temple, or a Kingdom Hall, or sadly when there has been an abandonment of biblical truth, a church. You heard that right. There are places that call themselves churches today which, in fact, are synagogues of Satan. Some have rainbow flags draped over their marquee signs. Some have become glorified soup kitchens or social clubs. In any church where there has been an abandonment of biblical truth, Christ left that place a long time ago. It may have a steeple, and it may have pews, and people may wear robes, but if it doesn’t have a pulpit that’s anchored in the Word of God, it is a synagogue of Satan. A false church, a dead church, a church whose wick was snuffed out by the Lord a long long time ago.

Back to our text. Jesus here is encouraging the church at Smyrna by telling them “I know.” He’s saying I know your tribulation, I know your poverty, I know that you have been slandered. And for the church at Smyrna, this must have given them some comfort. But at the same time, and we don’t want to miss this, Jesus is now back in His heavenly abode, He’s at the Father’s right hand. And yet they are still, the Smyrna Christians, are still on earth.

So what could they anticipate would happen next? He tells them in verse 10, He says, “Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to cast some of you into prison, so that you will be tested, and you will have tribulation for ten days. Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life.” So after crediting this church for their faithfulness and their perseverance in the midst of suffering which we just saw in verses 8 and 9, Christ now comforts this church in verse 10. This church had already been through so much tribulation, poverty, and slander. But as we’re going to see here in verse 10, they were about to go through even more, even more difficulties were coming their way. It wasn’t a sunny forecast. It was a cloudy forecast. And with the clouds now forming, Jesus says to them in verse 10, “Do not fear what you are about to suffer.” This has some echoes of what the Lord would tell His disciples during His earthly ministry, in Matthew 10:28 where He said to His disciples, not to fear those who will “kill the body but are unable to kill the soul.” Have no fear.

He then provides this church in Smyrna with some of the details of the suffering they were about to go through. First, he told them where their persecution would come from. He says, “Behold, the devil is about to cast some of you into prison.” So on an earthly plane it was the Roman authorities who would be putting the shackles on their wrists and throwing them into prison. But pulling the curtain back on a spiritual plane, the devil was behind it all. Satan was behind it all. That constant ongoing enemy of the Lord’s true followers, the father of lies, has been at it for a long time.

We think of the book of Job, those first 2 chapters, where Satan is the one who takes Job’s family, and Job’s possessions, and Job’s physical health. We go to Paul in the New Testament in 2 Corinthians 12:7 and his “thorn in the flesh” is referred to as a “messenger of Satan.” We think of Ephesians 6:12, which teaches us that “our struggle is not against flesh and blood.” Instead, we wrestle “against the rulers, against the authorities, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” In Smyrna, Satan and his forces of evil were attempting to do all that they could to stamp out the advance of the gospel to bring light into this dark pocket of the world. And he’s also testing the faith of these suffering Christians in this city, to see if they would break under pressure.

And as we see in the next part of the verse, Satan had this specific plan about where that pressure would be applied. He says, “the devil is about to cast some of you into prison.” Now, we think of that prison, we think highway 2 and the state pen over there. That’s not what’s happening here. And certainly not like the country-club-type federal prisons that we hear about like the white collar executives go to. No, this is a small room, a dark room, no restroom, no windows, no ventilation, flies, rats, heat. You are going back and forth between feelings of wanting to vomit and wanting to pass out in this kind of room.

And why “prison”? Well, He tells them, “so that you will be tested.” The Smyrnan Christians were about to be sifted. They were going to be tested. Which is a good reminder again for us today that suffering as a Christian, whether you are suffering there in Smyrna in the first century, or you’re Polycarp’s, Symrna’s son 70 years later, or living here in the Great Plains 2000 years later -- suffering for Christ is never meaningless. Suffering as a Christian is never purposeless. Rather God always has a purpose in testing us as He allows us to go through testing this side of heaven. And that is to purify us, to refine us, to prepare us for glory with Him. 1 Peter 1:6, “In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and honor and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”

Back to our text. The Lord next says, verse 10, “that you will have tribulation for ten days.” What is that “ten days” referring to? Is it symbolic of a shorter period of time? I don’t take it that way. Just as I take Genesis 1 to be referring to a literal 6 day creation, And just like I take Revelation 20 to be speaking of a literal 1,000-year reign on earth, I take the reference here to ten days to be referring to 10 literal days that certain Christians in literal Smyrna would be imprisoned. Likely so that they would be tortured, so then they would give away more names and locations of other Christians as an interrogation tactic. But don’t miss the bigger point that’s being made here, which is that though the Christians here in Smyrna would face this intense 10 day period of persecution, it would be brief. It wasn’t going to last forever.

It now feeds into the last part of this letter which is His charge to the church to remain faithful. So we’ve looked at the credit Christ gives this church. We’ve looked at the comfort he provides this church. Now is the charge. Look at the last part of verse 10 where He says, “Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life.” “Be faithful until death.” A more literal reading would be, “Be faithful even up to the point of death.” Christ here was charging the church at Smyrna to be faithful even to the point of death in the face of persecution and suffering. To be willing to give their very lives as proof of their loyalty to their Savior. For those who were willing to do so, for those who were willing to be faithful to the very end, they’re promised something here, the crown of life. The victor’s crown, the imperishable wreath as it’s called in 1 Corinthians 9:25; the “crown of righteousness” as Paul calls it in 2 Timothy 4:8. In other words, heavenly rewards await those who faithfully run the race for Christ.

And Smyrna was just such a church, a church that was faithful to the end. And their faithfulness teaches us such an important lesson again which is that as followers of Christ as we grow in maturity, we ought to be thinking progressively less about this life and progressively more about the life to come. We think of the words of Paul in Philippians 1:21, for me “to live is Christ and to die is gain.” Meaning we shouldn’t be living for the accolades, and the decorations, and the crowns of this world, but instead should be wholly, and single-mindedly devoted to pursuing the crown that comes later.

We’ll wrap our time in our text up, by looking at these closing words in verse 11 where the Lord says, “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” That sentence is familiar. We saw it last time in the Lord’s letter to Ephesus. We’ll see it again in each successive letter. And as I mentioned last time, this language is telling us that these letters were meant to be read not only to these individual churches at the time they were addressed, but instead were to be read by a wider audience. Christ is saying, “Listen up,” not just to the church at Smyrna, but to all churches of all time, including ours.

And in this second and final sentence of verse 11, He says “He who overcomes will never be hurt by the second death.” So He’s saying, “Yeah, you may suffer on this earth even to the point of death. But if you are an overcomer, if you are a conqueror,” remember a conqueror, 1 John 5:5, simply means He who believes that Jesus is the Son of God, “you can lay your head on the pillow tonight and every night and sleep soundly, knowing that your salvation is secure.” You can rest knowing that, as Jesus said before he raised Lazarus, “everyone who lives and believes in [Him[ will never die.

But we can’t ignore His final words here. At the very end of verse 11 which are written about people who apparently will be “hurt by the second death.” And what is that referring to, the second death? Well, everyone here tonight is going to experience a first death, that’s referring to our physical death. The moment we breathe our last breath and our lungs stop working and our heart stops beating and our brain waves stop functioning. That date of our first death has already been etched in heaven by the finger of God and one day it’s going to be physically etched on a piece of limestone in a cemetery or on an urn somewhere. Maybe that date’s going to be caused by some freak accident that we suffer next month, or maybe that date’s going to be linked to us dying 30 years from now, when we have cancer ravaging every one of our internal organs. Only the Lord knows the “how” and the “when” of when that first death will take place.

That second death though, that refers to something far more fearful than our physical bodies perishing. That refers to unending punishment, eternal conscious torment in a lake of fire. In fact, look with me if you would over at Revelation 20:14 so you can see exactly what this second death is. Revelation 20:14 says, “Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.” Or look down the page at Revelation 21:8 where it says, “But for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and sexually immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”

I hope you will hear me loud and clear when I say this. That you either know Christ and will not experience the horrific realities of the second death, or you don’t know Christ, and you will. If you have any concerns this evening about your soul, your status before God, and whether or not you risk facing this second death, please make very sure before you leave here tonight that you are right with God. Please make sure that you truly believe that Jesus is the Son of God. Make sure that you understand His saving gospel and have believed in its power. Don’t exit the doors here this evening without understanding first and foremost that you are a sinner and that your sin merits punishment by an eminently holy God. Don’t leave here this evening without affirming that you cannot save yourself. You cannot save yourself by trying to be a good person, or a better person, or trying to clean up your life, or becoming a new reinvented better version of yourself. Instead, what you need to do is throw yourself completely on the mercy of God in heaven above. Cry out to Him for forgiveness for your sins. Turn away, repent from your old way of living, and trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross to save your soul.

Charles Spurgeon said this, just a good reminder of the universality of the gospel, meaning it is available to anyone; he says, “Remember it is the same Christ for big sinners as for little sinners. For gray heads as for babies. For the poor as for the rich. For chimney sweeps as for monarchs. It is the same Christ for prostitutes as for saints.”

[pray] Our great and mighty God, we thank Your for the shed blood of Your Son. We thank You, as we were just listening, to the fact that our salvation is found in the blood that came out of the veins of our Savior. There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Immanuel’s veins, and sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains. God, we rejoice in that truth. We marvel at the great cost of our salvation, the purchase price of our redemption, and we simply say thank You. Thank You for sending Your Son the Lord Jesus Christ into the world. Thank You that He was willing to go to the cross in our behalf though we don’t deserve it. Thank You that we have had salvation purchased for us as a great act of love because of what He did for us on the cross. And thank You that now we can go out now as His representatives in the world proclaiming that any who would listen, that there is salvation found in the name of Jesus Christ, and in His name alone. Help us to be faithful ambassadors, help us to be faithful witnesses, a truly faithful blood-bought people, for Your glory. In Christ’s name, amen.