JUDGES, THE CHURCH AND FORESHADOWING: PART 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BgIUU2gzVc
As we discuss Judges and the parallels with the Church, recall last time we suggested you keep your heart focused on your position in Christ and the mission. I get easily side tracked by my own misadventures and some words from one of the Torchbearers books come to mind in it's presentation on Ephesians 4, the passage we stopped at concerning gifts and fruit:
18 for their [moral] understanding is darkened and their reasoning is clouded; [they are] alienated and self-banished from the life of God [with no share in it; this is] because of the [willful] ignorance and spiritual blindness that is [deep-seated] within them, because of the hardness and insensitivity of their heart
Amplified version
"This hardened heart id the essence of the 'old man' within us (Ephesians 4:22), our flesh. The soul of the unregenerate is sold out to the flesh, and that person' behavior is subject to the demands f a rebel regime that denies to God His right to be God.
"The human soul, dominated by the flesh, becomes party, however unwittingly, to every carnal ambition that would silence the will of God and resist the claims of his Holy Spirit.
"The Lord Jesus Christ wants so very much to replace, by his presence within you, all your inherent potential for evil under the flesh. He offers you instead all his limitless potential for good through the energy and power of His indwelling Spirit.
...
"If that which is born of the flesh is flesh, you can be equally certain that that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit-that God is God! What is so completely amazing is that God is prepared to be God in you not just figuratively but factually! You can actually share his Life and be transformed into His likeness."
Major W. Ian Thomas
The Indwelling Life of Christ
What we have is Christ in us, the physical reflection of God. Which is picky, but the other way ends up kind of Mormon.
Something else comes into the discussion as well:
https://dannyslavich.wordpress.com/2008/02/08/some-thoughts-on-hudson-taylors-spiritual-secret/
I spend time on this for a reason. I've spent time on it off and on since the beginning of my blogs, all of them, for a reason. A conflict exists between Christians over that word: "works". You read that conflict above. Be still in the Spirit versus working out your sanctification. We all agree we are justified by Christ's sacrifice, by the blood. We just can't agree on what goes on after that.
Do we sit idly by? Or do we "make an effort" as the second writer suggested?
Well, monks sometimes sit idly by in deep prayer for years, getting lost in the depth of their meditations and nothing going on in their life safely behind hallowed walls. .
Well, some very work oriented Christians get into politics convinced they are there to make a difference and end up backing liars in their run for high offices forgetting SATAN is "the father of ALL lies". Even the ones they want to hear.
Let's go back to the very verse the last author uses to describe his position on "making effort".
A Sabbath rest remains therefore for God’s people. For the person who has entered his rest has rested from his own works, just as God did from His. Let us then make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall into the same pattern of disobedience (Hebrews 4:9-11).
Look at it again.
For the person who has entered his rest has rested from his own works, just as God did from His.
"The person who has entered his rest has rested from his works just as God rested from His."
We are to be like Christ, like God in the flesh, a servant to God, entering our rest, being like Him in rest. So we seem to have a disagreement in what entering His rest means. Not on what wrok is but what our efforts are to enter his rest. Or, more like, what efforts we make to rest.
Our effort is to rest for OUR works. Not from God's work IN us.
Oh, like this:
Philippians 1:4 And in all my prayers for you all, making my request with joy,
5 Because of your help in giving the good news from the first day till now;
6 For I am certain of this very thing, that he by whom the good work was started in you will make it complete till the day of Jesus Christ:
7 So it is right for me to take thought for you all in this way, because I have you in my heart; for in my chains, and in my arguments before the judges in support of the good news, making clear that it is true, you all have your part with me in grace.
(BBE)
God began the good work in you. He is working on you every day from the start to the finish. He chose you to be saved and you chose to accept his choice which was your work. He gifted you and gave you a place in His being to accomplish HIS will by letting Him work THROUGH you in obedience to the direction given by the Spirit, that is, by Him. And your work in sanctification:
Because of your help in giving the good news from the first day till now. Your work is the study of the word, prayer and all the armor of God done in obedience to the Spirit to strengthen the power of the Spirit in you and sensitize you to the Spirit's leading. We rest in Him that he may work through us in the things that will make him stronger in us every day. Our work is to rest and that rest is our work.
This was the life of the Apostles and the Judges. It was not the life of the followers of the judges because the Spirit was not apportioned to them.
We see instead a different dependence in the judges and one even in the churches. One we can see reflected even today and so one worth spending the post on: the dependence on men to power the Church. It derives directly from a quick look at the next Church and its' era:
8 And unto the angel of the church in Smyrna write; These things saith the first and the last, which was dead, and is alive;
9 I know thy works, and tribulation, and poverty, (but thou art rich) and I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan.
10 Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.
11 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death.
The era of martyrdom arose. Martyrs have it right. They rest in Him.
David Jeremiah:
http://www.jeremiahstudybible.com/Revelation/how-overcome-satan/
The martyrs overcame Satan, even in their death. In other words, they were willing to die for their faith in Christ. The way they overcame the devil is the same way we must overcome him today. Overcoming is mentioned seven times in Revelation 2-3 where Christ addressed the churches. We are still responsible today for overcoming the attacks and slanders and temptations of the devil. We overcome three ways:
By the blood of the Lamb.The animal that was dangerous enough when he roamed through the whole forest is now limited to a stockade, where, mad with the restrictions which he sees around him, and raging because he feels the end near, he throws the insane strength of the death struggle into all his movements.
By the word of our testimony. The martyrs in Revelation, indeed martyrs throughout history, have been killed because they wouldn't keep quiet about their faith. Those who are bold enough and faithful enough to testify for Christ will overcome the devil.
By loving God more than life itself. No one can say they have overcome the devil if they deny Christ in order not to be killed. The promise of eternal life means little to one who would fight to keep hold of earthly life. History is filled with the accounts of those who did not love their lives to the death: The Bohemian Reformer Jan Hus, the church father Jerome, the Swiss Reformer Felix Manz, the writer and preacher John Bunyan, and the five young missionaries who were murdered in Ecuador by the very Auca Indians they were trying to reach with the Gospel. All of these, and many more, have lived their lives not fearing death or the devil.
Satan cannot overcome people who have no fear of death. They are free to live their lives in complete obedience to the Lord because Satan has no power to separate them from the love of Christ (Romans 8:38-39).
Smyrna is related to the word myrrh which was the bitter herb used in preserving a corpse and one of the gifts given to Jesus at birth, creating an ephemeral tie with Him. They were a suffering Church in an area of strong Jewish worshipers and idol worshipers and idol makers. people who were among those most wanting Christians dead because they didn't buy idols, wanted them dead because they were bad for business. It was in a commercial city then and Izmir, the modern name of the city, is still that today. It is interesting, as J Vernon McGee notes, that this church still has followers in hiding there in it's modern city and the it and Philadelphia are the only ones who can make that statement. It represents the Church from about 100 A.D. to 313 A.D. when Constantine issued The Edict of Toleration. Jesus calls them poor and in tribulation but rich in Spirit. He offers no condemnation.
They are following Him faithfully to the death.
Who were the people in Judges following?
Jg 1:3 Then Judah said to Simeon his brother, Come up with me into my heritage, so that we may make war against the Canaanites; and I will then go with you into your heritage. So Simeon went with him.
(BBE)
Judges 3:5 Now the children of Israel were living among the Canaanites, the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites:
6 And they took as wives the daughters of these nations and gave their daughters to their sons, and became servants to their gods.
7 And the children of Israel did evil in the eyes of the Lord, and put out of their minds the Lord their God, and became servants to the Baals and the Astartes.
8 So the wrath of the Lord was burning against Israel, and he gave them up into the hands of Cushan-rishathaim, king of Mesopotamia; and the children of Israel were his servants for eight years.
9 And when the children of Israel made prayer to the Lord, he gave them a saviour, Othniel, the son of Kenaz, Caleb's younger brother.
10 And the spirit of the Lord came on him and he became judge of Israel, and went out to war, and the Lord gave up Cushan-rishathaim, king of Mesopotamia, into his hands and he overcame him.
11 Then for forty years the land had peace, till the death of Othniel, the son of Kenaz.
12 Then the children of Israel again did evil in the eyes of the Lord; and the Lord made Eglon, king of Moab, strong against Israel, because they had done evil in the Lord's eyes.
26 But Ehud had got away while they were waiting and had gone past the stone images and got away to Seirah.
27 And when he came there, he had a horn sounded in the hill-country of Ephraim, and all the children of Israel went down with him from the hill-country, and he at their head.
28 And he said to them, Come after me; for the Lord has given the Moabites, your haters, into your hands. So they went down after him and took the crossing-places of Jordan against Moab, and let no one go across
Jg 4:1 And the children of Israel again did evil in the eyes of the Lord when Ehud was dead.
(BBE)
Jg 4:3 Then the children of Israel made prayer to the Lord; for he had nine hundred iron war-carriages, and for twenty years he was very cruel to the children of Israel.
4 Now Deborah, a woman prophet, the wife of Lapidoth, was judge of Israel at that time.
5 (And she had her seat under the palm-tree of Deborah between Ramah and Beth-el in the hill-country of Ephraim; and the children of Israel came up to her to be judged.)
6 And she sent for Barak, the son of Abinoam, from Kedesh-naphtali, and said to him, Has not the Lord, the God of Israel, given orders saying, Go and get your force into line in Mount Tabor, and take with you ten thousand men of the children of Naphtali and of the children of Zebulun?
7 And I will make Sisera, the captain of Jabin's army, with his war-carriages and his forces, come against you at the river Kishon, where I will give him into your hands.
8 And Barak said to her, If you will go with me then I will go; but if you will not go with me I will not go.
9 And she said, I will certainly go with you: though you will get no honour in your undertaking, for the Lord will give Sisera into the hands of a woman. So Deborah got up and went with Barak to Kedesh.
(BBE)
Easy pattern to see. The tribe of Judah calls to its' bordering tribe and they come to help, listening to their brothers. The tribes all begin to listen to the idol worshipers and getting into trouble, The judges arise and the tribes listen to them. They again listen to the idol worshipers, intermarry again and then a new judge and they listen to her. She has to call out another judge and he listens to her. Everyone is listening to everyone else except they aren't listening to one person. it all culminates in them going to the last Judge, Samuel when he has aged and has had sons who do not follow in his way. And then Samuel is angry and petitions god in prayer. in that moment we see the truth:
1Samuel 8:6 But Samuel was not pleased when they said to him, Give us a king to be our judge. And Samuel made prayer to the Lord.
7 And the Lord said to Samuel, Give ear to the voice of the people and what they say to you: they have not been turned away from you, but they have been turned away from me, not desiring me to be king over them.
8 As they have done from the first, from the day when I took them out of Egypt till this day, turning away from me and worshipping other gods, so now they are acting in the same way to you.
9 Give ear now to their voice: but make a serious protest to them, and give them a picture of the sort of king who will be their ruler.
10 And Samuel said all these words of the Lord to the people who were desiring a king.
(BBE)
They were not listening to GOD. When they rejected His judges, they rejected Him. Then they went back to idols. They were not listening to His counsel and His rules. They were rejecting that which was their salvation every time the leader left. Each time they rejected him.
The early church was different. From Pagan Christianity?:
">The early Christians were intensely Christ centered. Jesus Christ was their pulse-best. He was their life, their breath, and their central point of reference. he was the object of their worship, and the content of their discussion and vocabulary." (Page 246-7)
Except, of course, we see Corinth was falling back to wrong practices. Ephesus was growing luke warm but not there yet. They were in the first stages, wandering about out of first love with Christ. I know what they mean by first love. When I was first saved, I walked about totally immersed in the Spirit and it was everything. I read the Bible and discovered part of my gift was understanding it or knowing where to go to learn to understand it. My wife knew I was different though I took time telling her. When she was saved later that week, she said the experience was closest to her feelings when we made love, only deeper. I have found I can lose that and regain it. It is a matter of concentration and taking up the armor, of learning to yield and give things over, something I understood that first time when I said, "All right, I give up." I knew I had been fighting and working to be good and get away from Him. I had come forward at a Billy Graham revival when I was very young, but this was when I was in my 30's and had two children. I felt the return of the love I first felt way back as a child but more, a feeling of filling, a completion.
The martyr church carried that feeling with them throughout the martyrdom. The constant threat of death seemed then, seems now to keep those who are in the faith more firmly in it and those who are weak fleeing the area so it acts as a kind of "supernatural selection" "evolving" a stronger church.
In the USA today however, where Christians chose to follow political power as opposed to the real mission, we see they developed the imagined constant threat of being out of power and being persecuted and so they felt the need to gain power and maintain it by any means possible, choosing not to be supple as the serpent, but to be supple LIKE the serpent, rigging elections by gerrymandering once they were in power and even finally supporting a man who has shown himself to be a constant liar as their leader. The false threat came from false worship of materials and power which the true God will endure for only so long, perhaps as long as it takes for their misguided already disproven economic policy to crash the economy or until a seemingly trigger happy leader opens the door to a nuclear disaster. He has already given us the warning of 9/11 which we refused to understand.
Smyrna means suffering and they at least chose to suffer FOR their God by human hands. This is a very Eastern turn to Christianity: that losing is really winning. Jesus referral to himself as first and last, seems to beg his reference to His return from death and a promise underpinning his admonition and commendation that they remain faithful unto death. He wanted them to die for Him as an example to others that they might be saved. he may yet make that demand of us today as well. It will be most odd if it is a death from a Pergomas-type church.
http://www.torchbearers.org/about/about
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BgIUU2gzVc
Why do the nations rage?
Why do they plot and scheme?
Their bullets can't stop the prayers we pray
In the name of the Prince of Peace
We walk in faith and remember long ago
How they killed Him and then how on the third day He arose
Well, things may look bad and things may look grim
But all these things must pass except the things that are of Him
Where are the nails that pierced His hands?
Well, the nails have turned to rust but behold the Man
He is risen and He reigns
In the hearts of the children, rising up in His name
Where are the thorns that drew His blood?
Well, the thorns have turned to dust but not so the love
He has given, no, it remains
In the hearts of the children who will love while the nations rage
The Lord in Heaven laughs
He knows what is to come
While all the Chiefs Of State plan their big attacks
Against His anointed One
The Church of God she will not bend her knees
To the Gods of this world though they promise her peace
She stands her ground, stands firm on the Rock
Watch their walls tumble down when she lives out His love
Where are the nails that pierced His hands?
Well, the nails have turned to rust but not so the Man
He is risen and He reigns
In the hearts of the children, rising up in His name
Where are the thorns that drew His blood?
Well, the thorns have turned to dust but behold the love
He has given, no, it remains
In the hearts of the children who will love while the nations rage
While the nations rage
Well, where are the nails that pierced His hands?
Well, the nails have turned to rust but behold the Man
He is risen and He reigns
In the hearts of the children, rising up in His name
Where are the thorns that drew His blood?
Well, the thorns have turned to dust but not so the love
He has given, no, it remains
In the hearts of the children who will love while the nations rage
Why do they plot and scheme?
Their bullets can't stop the prayers we pray
In the name of the Prince of Peace
We walk in faith and remember long ago
How they killed Him and then how on the third day He arose
Well, things may look bad and things may look grim
But all these things must pass except the things that are of Him
Where are the nails that pierced His hands?
Well, the nails have turned to rust but behold the Man
He is risen and He reigns
In the hearts of the children, rising up in His name
Where are the thorns that drew His blood?
Well, the thorns have turned to dust but not so the love
He has given, no, it remains
In the hearts of the children who will love while the nations rage
The Lord in Heaven laughs
He knows what is to come
While all the Chiefs Of State plan their big attacks
Against His anointed One
The Church of God she will not bend her knees
To the Gods of this world though they promise her peace
She stands her ground, stands firm on the Rock
Watch their walls tumble down when she lives out His love
Where are the nails that pierced His hands?
Well, the nails have turned to rust but not so the Man
He is risen and He reigns
In the hearts of the children, rising up in His name
Where are the thorns that drew His blood?
Well, the thorns have turned to dust but behold the love
He has given, no, it remains
In the hearts of the children who will love while the nations rage
While the nations rage
Well, where are the nails that pierced His hands?
Well, the nails have turned to rust but behold the Man
He is risen and He reigns
In the hearts of the children, rising up in His name
Where are the thorns that drew His blood?
Well, the thorns have turned to dust but not so the love
He has given, no, it remains
In the hearts of the children who will love while the nations rage
As we discuss Judges and the parallels with the Church, recall last time we suggested you keep your heart focused on your position in Christ and the mission. I get easily side tracked by my own misadventures and some words from one of the Torchbearers books come to mind in it's presentation on Ephesians 4, the passage we stopped at concerning gifts and fruit:
18 for their [moral] understanding is darkened and their reasoning is clouded; [they are] alienated and self-banished from the life of God [with no share in it; this is] because of the [willful] ignorance and spiritual blindness that is [deep-seated] within them, because of the hardness and insensitivity of their heart
Amplified version
"This hardened heart id the essence of the 'old man' within us (Ephesians 4:22), our flesh. The soul of the unregenerate is sold out to the flesh, and that person' behavior is subject to the demands f a rebel regime that denies to God His right to be God.
"The human soul, dominated by the flesh, becomes party, however unwittingly, to every carnal ambition that would silence the will of God and resist the claims of his Holy Spirit.
"The Lord Jesus Christ wants so very much to replace, by his presence within you, all your inherent potential for evil under the flesh. He offers you instead all his limitless potential for good through the energy and power of His indwelling Spirit.
...
"If that which is born of the flesh is flesh, you can be equally certain that that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit-that God is God! What is so completely amazing is that God is prepared to be God in you not just figuratively but factually! You can actually share his Life and be transformed into His likeness."
Major W. Ian Thomas
The Indwelling Life of Christ
What we have is Christ in us, the physical reflection of God. Which is picky, but the other way ends up kind of Mormon.
Something else comes into the discussion as well:
https://dannyslavich.wordpress.com/2008/02/08/some-thoughts-on-hudson-taylors-spiritual-secret/
I was talking to my friend Massimo the other day about this book, and he mentioned something of this element of Hudson’s theology. I had not read far enough yet, but I was on the look-out after our conversation. And, as you can see, there it is. Maybe you do not see the problem with what Hudson says above. It is a teaching of the Higher Life/Keswick theology movement. (I’m not going to get into a long background, but you can read about the roots of the kind of theology Hudson promotes here).
What’s wrong with Hudson’s spiritual secret? Well, it’s unbiblical and impractical.
I know from experience. I went to a school that had such roots called Capernwray Harbour. Capernwray is a part of the Torchbearers International, which was founded by Major Ian Thomas. Major Thomas wrote a book called The Saving Life of Christ, which is founded on the same type of idea that Hudson talks about. I read it at Capernwray. Now, I had a great time at Capernwray. I learned a lot. It is a school and organization that loves Jesus and loves his Word. They teach it expositionally. Though I disagree with some important points of their theology, I believe God is using the school in the lives of many people, mostly for good.
However, their theology of sanctification is flawed, just like Hudson Taylor’s.
First, it is impractical. I have tried to live my life like they talk about. It sounds good in theory — letting Christ live through me. But I wrestled with this at Capernwray.
“What does this kind of holiness look like?”
“How can I let go and let Christ live his life through me?”
“What is my part?”
“How do passively let Christ reign in my life?”
I never figured it out. Because it is impossible to not do anything. You cannot put feet on a theology that has no legs.
This type of theology gets it partly right: Christ does live in us. But we are not merely passive human flesh suits which the Spirit of Christ wears around like a costume. We are people. God has imbued us with true responsibility; and he has called us to do something. Yes we are to strive in Christ’s power. We are to rely upon him. But that does not make us passive. Instead it enables our activity.
Second of all, Hudson’s/Capernwray/Keswick theology is unbiblical. As the quote above shows, this theology appropriates the doctrine of union with Christ as seen in the New Testament. But it misses the point and mis-appropriates the doctrine because union with Christ throughout the New Testament is an impetus to strive after holiness. New Testament holiness is not passive holiness. Paul says in Philippians 2 to “work out your own salvation.” He talks to Timothy of “fighting the good fight.” In fact, look at Galatians 2:20, one of the favorite verses of this movement:
I have been crucified with Christ and it is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me; the life that I now life in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself up for me.
Now, at first blush, it might seem like Paul supports the whole passive notion of “life in Christ.” He says, “I no longer live,” doesn’t he? But what does this mean? He defines it further: “the life that I now live in the flesh I live by faith.” So, whatever “I no longer live” means, it cannot mean that we do nothing or that we ourselves do not actually live. Because Paul in the next clause says he (Paul) lives. The difference is that he lives “by faith”. Being crucified and risen with Christ does not mean that Paul ceases to work out his salvation or fight the good fight. It means that he actually can do these things.
The Christian life is an empowered life, not a passive life. We do not live an impotent life of failure. We live by faith in the Son of God, whose life and death and resurrection and intercession are ours. But we live, looking to him.
Similarly, consider Hudson’s verdict: “I have striven in vain to rest in him. I’ll strive no more.” Scripture contradicts this idea:
A Sabbath rest remains therefore for God’s people. For the person who has entered his rest has rested from his own works, just as God did from His. Let us then make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall into the same pattern of disobedience (Hebrews 4:9-11).
That says it clearly. Entering God’s rest is somehow connected to “making effort.”
Overall this teaching on passive sanctification hurts the church and prevents her members from truly seeking holiness. I have been there, trying not to try — to “let Christ live through me” as the saying goes. Even while at Capernwray I would come to sections of the New Testament (like those above) where I began to see that the Christian life does require effort. It is an empowered effort. A dependent effort. A God-glorifying effort, but true effort all the same. We trust in Christ alone. We are not saved by our effort. It does not, however, mean that we do not strive simply because our striving does not provide us righteousness before God. We must not cut a false dichotomy — salvation by faith in Christ alone does not remove our responsibility. It gives us the ability to obey.
Do we sit idly by? Or do we "make an effort" as the second writer suggested?
Well, monks sometimes sit idly by in deep prayer for years, getting lost in the depth of their meditations and nothing going on in their life safely behind hallowed walls. .
Well, some very work oriented Christians get into politics convinced they are there to make a difference and end up backing liars in their run for high offices forgetting SATAN is "the father of ALL lies". Even the ones they want to hear.
Let's go back to the very verse the last author uses to describe his position on "making effort".
A Sabbath rest remains therefore for God’s people. For the person who has entered his rest has rested from his own works, just as God did from His. Let us then make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall into the same pattern of disobedience (Hebrews 4:9-11).
Look at it again.
"The person who has entered his rest has rested from his works just as God rested from His."
We are to be like Christ, like God in the flesh, a servant to God, entering our rest, being like Him in rest. So we seem to have a disagreement in what entering His rest means. Not on what wrok is but what our efforts are to enter his rest. Or, more like, what efforts we make to rest.
Our effort is to rest for OUR works. Not from God's work IN us.
Oh, like this:
Philippians 1:4 And in all my prayers for you all, making my request with joy,
5 Because of your help in giving the good news from the first day till now;
6 For I am certain of this very thing, that he by whom the good work was started in you will make it complete till the day of Jesus Christ:
7 So it is right for me to take thought for you all in this way, because I have you in my heart; for in my chains, and in my arguments before the judges in support of the good news, making clear that it is true, you all have your part with me in grace.
(BBE)
God began the good work in you. He is working on you every day from the start to the finish. He chose you to be saved and you chose to accept his choice which was your work. He gifted you and gave you a place in His being to accomplish HIS will by letting Him work THROUGH you in obedience to the direction given by the Spirit, that is, by Him. And your work in sanctification:
Because of your help in giving the good news from the first day till now. Your work is the study of the word, prayer and all the armor of God done in obedience to the Spirit to strengthen the power of the Spirit in you and sensitize you to the Spirit's leading. We rest in Him that he may work through us in the things that will make him stronger in us every day. Our work is to rest and that rest is our work.
This was the life of the Apostles and the Judges. It was not the life of the followers of the judges because the Spirit was not apportioned to them.
We see instead a different dependence in the judges and one even in the churches. One we can see reflected even today and so one worth spending the post on: the dependence on men to power the Church. It derives directly from a quick look at the next Church and its' era:
8 And unto the angel of the church in Smyrna write; These things saith the first and the last, which was dead, and is alive;
9 I know thy works, and tribulation, and poverty, (but thou art rich) and I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan.
10 Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.
11 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death.
The era of martyrdom arose. Martyrs have it right. They rest in Him.
David Jeremiah:
http://www.jeremiahstudybible.com/Revelation/how-overcome-satan/
The martyrs overcame Satan, even in their death. In other words, they were willing to die for their faith in Christ. The way they overcame the devil is the same way we must overcome him today. Overcoming is mentioned seven times in Revelation 2-3 where Christ addressed the churches. We are still responsible today for overcoming the attacks and slanders and temptations of the devil. We overcome three ways:
By the blood of the Lamb.The animal that was dangerous enough when he roamed through the whole forest is now limited to a stockade, where, mad with the restrictions which he sees around him, and raging because he feels the end near, he throws the insane strength of the death struggle into all his movements.
By the word of our testimony. The martyrs in Revelation, indeed martyrs throughout history, have been killed because they wouldn't keep quiet about their faith. Those who are bold enough and faithful enough to testify for Christ will overcome the devil.
By loving God more than life itself. No one can say they have overcome the devil if they deny Christ in order not to be killed. The promise of eternal life means little to one who would fight to keep hold of earthly life. History is filled with the accounts of those who did not love their lives to the death: The Bohemian Reformer Jan Hus, the church father Jerome, the Swiss Reformer Felix Manz, the writer and preacher John Bunyan, and the five young missionaries who were murdered in Ecuador by the very Auca Indians they were trying to reach with the Gospel. All of these, and many more, have lived their lives not fearing death or the devil.
Satan cannot overcome people who have no fear of death. They are free to live their lives in complete obedience to the Lord because Satan has no power to separate them from the love of Christ (Romans 8:38-39).
Smyrna is related to the word myrrh which was the bitter herb used in preserving a corpse and one of the gifts given to Jesus at birth, creating an ephemeral tie with Him. They were a suffering Church in an area of strong Jewish worshipers and idol worshipers and idol makers. people who were among those most wanting Christians dead because they didn't buy idols, wanted them dead because they were bad for business. It was in a commercial city then and Izmir, the modern name of the city, is still that today. It is interesting, as J Vernon McGee notes, that this church still has followers in hiding there in it's modern city and the it and Philadelphia are the only ones who can make that statement. It represents the Church from about 100 A.D. to 313 A.D. when Constantine issued The Edict of Toleration. Jesus calls them poor and in tribulation but rich in Spirit. He offers no condemnation.
They are following Him faithfully to the death.
Who were the people in Judges following?
Jg 1:3 Then Judah said to Simeon his brother, Come up with me into my heritage, so that we may make war against the Canaanites; and I will then go with you into your heritage. So Simeon went with him.
(BBE)
Judges 3:5 Now the children of Israel were living among the Canaanites, the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites:
6 And they took as wives the daughters of these nations and gave their daughters to their sons, and became servants to their gods.
7 And the children of Israel did evil in the eyes of the Lord, and put out of their minds the Lord their God, and became servants to the Baals and the Astartes.
8 So the wrath of the Lord was burning against Israel, and he gave them up into the hands of Cushan-rishathaim, king of Mesopotamia; and the children of Israel were his servants for eight years.
9 And when the children of Israel made prayer to the Lord, he gave them a saviour, Othniel, the son of Kenaz, Caleb's younger brother.
10 And the spirit of the Lord came on him and he became judge of Israel, and went out to war, and the Lord gave up Cushan-rishathaim, king of Mesopotamia, into his hands and he overcame him.
11 Then for forty years the land had peace, till the death of Othniel, the son of Kenaz.
12 Then the children of Israel again did evil in the eyes of the Lord; and the Lord made Eglon, king of Moab, strong against Israel, because they had done evil in the Lord's eyes.
26 But Ehud had got away while they were waiting and had gone past the stone images and got away to Seirah.
27 And when he came there, he had a horn sounded in the hill-country of Ephraim, and all the children of Israel went down with him from the hill-country, and he at their head.
28 And he said to them, Come after me; for the Lord has given the Moabites, your haters, into your hands. So they went down after him and took the crossing-places of Jordan against Moab, and let no one go across
Jg 4:1 And the children of Israel again did evil in the eyes of the Lord when Ehud was dead.
(BBE)
Jg 4:3 Then the children of Israel made prayer to the Lord; for he had nine hundred iron war-carriages, and for twenty years he was very cruel to the children of Israel.
4 Now Deborah, a woman prophet, the wife of Lapidoth, was judge of Israel at that time.
5 (And she had her seat under the palm-tree of Deborah between Ramah and Beth-el in the hill-country of Ephraim; and the children of Israel came up to her to be judged.)
6 And she sent for Barak, the son of Abinoam, from Kedesh-naphtali, and said to him, Has not the Lord, the God of Israel, given orders saying, Go and get your force into line in Mount Tabor, and take with you ten thousand men of the children of Naphtali and of the children of Zebulun?
7 And I will make Sisera, the captain of Jabin's army, with his war-carriages and his forces, come against you at the river Kishon, where I will give him into your hands.
8 And Barak said to her, If you will go with me then I will go; but if you will not go with me I will not go.
9 And she said, I will certainly go with you: though you will get no honour in your undertaking, for the Lord will give Sisera into the hands of a woman. So Deborah got up and went with Barak to Kedesh.
(BBE)
Easy pattern to see. The tribe of Judah calls to its' bordering tribe and they come to help, listening to their brothers. The tribes all begin to listen to the idol worshipers and getting into trouble, The judges arise and the tribes listen to them. They again listen to the idol worshipers, intermarry again and then a new judge and they listen to her. She has to call out another judge and he listens to her. Everyone is listening to everyone else except they aren't listening to one person. it all culminates in them going to the last Judge, Samuel when he has aged and has had sons who do not follow in his way. And then Samuel is angry and petitions god in prayer. in that moment we see the truth:
1Samuel 8:6 But Samuel was not pleased when they said to him, Give us a king to be our judge. And Samuel made prayer to the Lord.
7 And the Lord said to Samuel, Give ear to the voice of the people and what they say to you: they have not been turned away from you, but they have been turned away from me, not desiring me to be king over them.
8 As they have done from the first, from the day when I took them out of Egypt till this day, turning away from me and worshipping other gods, so now they are acting in the same way to you.
9 Give ear now to their voice: but make a serious protest to them, and give them a picture of the sort of king who will be their ruler.
10 And Samuel said all these words of the Lord to the people who were desiring a king.
(BBE)
They were not listening to GOD. When they rejected His judges, they rejected Him. Then they went back to idols. They were not listening to His counsel and His rules. They were rejecting that which was their salvation every time the leader left. Each time they rejected him.
The early church was different. From Pagan Christianity?:
">The early Christians were intensely Christ centered. Jesus Christ was their pulse-best. He was their life, their breath, and their central point of reference. he was the object of their worship, and the content of their discussion and vocabulary." (Page 246-7)
Except, of course, we see Corinth was falling back to wrong practices. Ephesus was growing luke warm but not there yet. They were in the first stages, wandering about out of first love with Christ. I know what they mean by first love. When I was first saved, I walked about totally immersed in the Spirit and it was everything. I read the Bible and discovered part of my gift was understanding it or knowing where to go to learn to understand it. My wife knew I was different though I took time telling her. When she was saved later that week, she said the experience was closest to her feelings when we made love, only deeper. I have found I can lose that and regain it. It is a matter of concentration and taking up the armor, of learning to yield and give things over, something I understood that first time when I said, "All right, I give up." I knew I had been fighting and working to be good and get away from Him. I had come forward at a Billy Graham revival when I was very young, but this was when I was in my 30's and had two children. I felt the return of the love I first felt way back as a child but more, a feeling of filling, a completion.
The martyr church carried that feeling with them throughout the martyrdom. The constant threat of death seemed then, seems now to keep those who are in the faith more firmly in it and those who are weak fleeing the area so it acts as a kind of "supernatural selection" "evolving" a stronger church.
In the USA today however, where Christians chose to follow political power as opposed to the real mission, we see they developed the imagined constant threat of being out of power and being persecuted and so they felt the need to gain power and maintain it by any means possible, choosing not to be supple as the serpent, but to be supple LIKE the serpent, rigging elections by gerrymandering once they were in power and even finally supporting a man who has shown himself to be a constant liar as their leader. The false threat came from false worship of materials and power which the true God will endure for only so long, perhaps as long as it takes for their misguided already disproven economic policy to crash the economy or until a seemingly trigger happy leader opens the door to a nuclear disaster. He has already given us the warning of 9/11 which we refused to understand.
Smyrna means suffering and they at least chose to suffer FOR their God by human hands. This is a very Eastern turn to Christianity: that losing is really winning. Jesus referral to himself as first and last, seems to beg his reference to His return from death and a promise underpinning his admonition and commendation that they remain faithful unto death. He wanted them to die for Him as an example to others that they might be saved. he may yet make that demand of us today as well. It will be most odd if it is a death from a Pergomas-type church.
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