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The Crown of Life (Smyrna) |
Revelation 2: 8-11
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© John Ewing Roberts |
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INTRODUCTION Today we come to letter number two in the series of seven letters to seven churches in Asia Minor, the part of the world which today we know as western Turkey, the region along the coast of the Aegean Sea. Found in Revelation 2-3 these texts spoke to the church of their own day, and still speak to us today. Smyrna is the only place to receive a letter where there is a city today. Ancient Smyrna is modern Izmir, Turkey's second largest port after Istanbul and third largest city with over one and a half million inhabitants. Revelation 2: 8-11 contains what we call the letter to the church at Smyrna. It was a beautiful resort city in ancient times, "the fairest of the eleven cities" of its province. The mountains ringed Smyrna like a crown. Remember that word "crown," since it is the key picture word in the promise to this church. The buildings on the Smyrna acropolis, the high place of the city, were its crowning glory, a circlet of beautiful structures. Ephesus had streets of marble, but Smyrna had a street of gold! It curved around the mountain like a golden crown around a royal head. The city was one of many who claimed that the greatest of poets, Homer, had been born there. The harbor was excellent. A visitor sailing in would see the crown of buildings on the hills ringing the city. The city had been dead, until it was brought back to life by Alexander the Great who had refounded it in a kind of urban resurrection (think Harbor Place times ten!). Remember this back from the dead experience when we come to the characteristics of the Christ who addresses this church. Romans loved Smyrna for its faithfulness. Cicero said, "Smyrna is a city of our most faithful and ancient allies."[1] Hold the thought on faithfulness for the promise to the church. We know no names of pastors or congregants. Ephesus could claim Paul and Apollos, Aquila and Priscilla, and according to traditions, John, Mary the mother of Jesus and maybe even Luke, but there is no such pantheon of New Testament leaders in Smyrna. No one knows who founded the church. Of the members we can only deduce that they suffered poverty and may have had a large slave membership. CHARACTERISTICS OF CHRIST The Christ who speaks to that church and to our church is, according to verse 8 "the first and the last, who died and came to life." A city can die and be reborn under a visionary leader like Alexander the Great, but now someone greater even than Alexander was at hand, the crucified and risen Lord. COMMENDATION TO CHURCH Christ commends the church in verse 9 for its perseverance amid tribulation and poverty. It apparently was rich in spiritual things. It had endured slander from those who were of the assembly of the adversary, the synagogue of Satan. Give me a moment to "unpack" three things: what the slander was, the meaning of "synagogue of Satan," and the significance of Satan. (1) Slander William Barclay lists at least six points where early Christians were slandered: 1. The Lord's Supper with its language about the body and blood of the Lord was twisted into slanderous charges of cannibalism. 2. The great emphasis on love was turned into the slander that the Christians were given over to lust and immorality. 3. When a person became a Christian and had to make hard choices about existing family relationships where paganism held sway, Christians were vulnerable to the slanderous accusation that they were breaking up homes. 4. With the emphasis on one God in a polytheistic culture, Christians were liable to the slanderous distortion that they were atheists. 5. Since Jesus was Lord, Christians could not call Caesar lord, a position subjecting them to the slanderous allegation of political disloyalty. 6. Nero slandered the Christians with the charge of incendiarism to cover his burning of Rome.[2] (2) The Synagogue of Satan The term "synagogue of Satan" refers not to all Jews for all time, and must not be used to justify anti-Semitism. The term does not even refer to all Jews in Smyrna. There was to be sure competition between Jews and Christians, as the Jesus movement within Judaism emerged as a distinct religion. The destruction of the temple in Jerusalem and shifting Roman attitudes added to the turmoil. But the author of Revelation in speaking of the synagogue of Satan is condemning only those few Jews who had departed from their core value in the Ten Commandments and were bearing false witness. In fact, "Jew" here is a positive term - the problem is with people who had departed from Jewish core values and were bearing false witness.[3] (3) The Significance of Satan Satan is the Adversary, the one who is against us, the adversarial force in our lives and in our world. Satan is evil made personally adversarial. Satan is personal, adversarial evil working purposefully. Satan is personal, adversarial evil working powerfully. CONDEMNATION OF CHURCH The church at Smyrna receives no condemnation. Only one other church, Philadelphia, found itself in such a favorable position. Can you imagine such a wonderful church? I have never been a part of any church, including this wonderful congregation, which was not beyond reproach. Smyrna was. CALL/CHALLENGE TO CHURCH The call or challenge to Smyrna comes in verse 10: "Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Behold, the Devil is about to throw some of you into prison, that you may be tested, and for ten days you will have tribulation." There's the "t" word again, tribulation. The Smyrna Christians had received commendation in verse 9 for knowing tribulation. Tribulation is the crushing burden[4] mentioned in the carol, "And ye beneath life's crushing load, whose forms are being low, who toil along the climbing way With painful steps and slow."[5] The crushing load, the tribulation, was the double weight of persecution and poverty.[6] John had a right to speak of such things, suffering tribulation himself in prison on Patmos. He speaks lightly as of familiar things, not minimizing peril, but with simple understated frankness to encourage.[7] The persecution led to the poverty in some cases. It can be hard to make a living in a pagan culture when one follows Christian values. Many of you know about that first hand. In Asia Minor in the 90's a pagan mob could loot a Christian home and business; jealous and envious pagans could denounce Christians and confiscate their property. Perhaps they found comfort in what another epistle records: "God has chosen the poor in the world to be rich in faith."[8] The tribulation will last for ten days? What do the ten days mean? (1) Ten days are not a lengthy period. They are a comparatively short time, as in, "I'll take care of that matter in a week or ten days." (2) Ten days is the period of testing Daniel asked for his all-vegetable and water diet in Babylon.[9] In declining the king's defiling royal rations of rich food and wine, Daniel told the guard that after ten days of a lean cuisine, he and his friends would look better than the other young men in the palace. Before you jump on the Daniel diet bandwagon, I should tell you that the Bible says it made them look "better and fatter than all the young men who had been eating the royal rations."[10] (3) Ten days represent completion, ten fingers, ten toes, ten commandments - no more, no less. Completeness to the point of exhaustion may be implied. The Christians will endure until their adversaries, be they Roman or Jewish, have completely exhausted themselves in persecution and slander. EXHORTATION TO CHURCH The exhortation is a familiar one and comes in verse 11: "Let the one who has ears to hear what the Spirit says to the churches." This refrain reassures with his familiar message that God still has more truth to break forth from his word. God is not finished with us yet. Spirit has more to say if we have ears to hear. PROMISE TO CHURCH The promise to this church comes at the end of verse 11 and is one of the greatest words of assurance in the Bible: "The one who conquers shall not be hurt by the second death and will receive the crown of life." What is the second death? The final condemnation of sinners. Revelation 20: 14 mentions a time when all are judged according to what they had done. "This is the second death, the lake of fire, and anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire." Jesus spoke of those who can kill the body but not the soul. But he warned that there could be the destruction of both the body and soul in hell in Matthew 10: 28. As a boy I heard a hellfire and brimstone sermon. The preacher was making the point that we will all die once, but if we have not been born again, we will die twice, once on earth and then this second death in the lake of fire. But, he pointed out, if we have been born twice, once at birth and a second time when we are born again, we will only die once (at the end of our earthly lives), and maybe not even then, if Jesus comes again before we die. The evangelist put it succinctly with a staccato delivery: If a man's been born once, he'll die twice;if a man's been born twice, he'll only die once, and maybe not even then. The attitude of these early Christians was like that of zealous warriors who believed that if they died in battle, they would go straight to Valhalla or to whatever paradise their religion believed in. A martyr would go to the New Jerusalem, infinitely preferable to the lake of fire. What's a few minutes of agony compared to an eternity of joy? The message "took." The story has been handed down across the centuries from sources such as John Foxe's Book of Martyrs. It tells how the pastor of the church in Smyrna about 50 years after this letter was written was a man named "Polycarp," which in Greek means "much fruit." His ministry apparently did bear much fruit. But when Polycarp was required to take a pinch of incense and burn it in the flame of the altar of the emperor and declare that "Caesar is lord," he refused to swear by Caesar. "I am a Christian, and I swear allegiance only to Christ." "Eighty and six years have I served Him and He has done me no ill; how then can I blaspheme my King who has served me?" "Say `Caesar is Lord' or you will be thrown to the beasts." "Bring on the beasts!" "If you scorn the beasts, you will be burned." "You are trying to frighten me with the fire that burns for an hour, and you forget the fire of hell that never goes out." As the flames leapt higher, Polycarp's final prayer was, "Lord Jesus Christ, I bless you that you deemed me worthy of this hour...May I be an acceptable sacrifice...through Jesus Christ. Amen." MESSAGE FOR TODAY Revelation 3: 10 is the ringing promise to the early church, to our church, to you and to me: "Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give you a crown of life." That promise had a special connection in Smyrna with its mountains ringing it like a crown, with its acropolis as its crowning glory, with its gold street circling the mountain like a golden crown. "Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give you a crown of life." - not "Be thou faithful until a business setback, and I will give you a crown of life." - not "Be thou faithful until you suffer a disappointment with your children, and I will give you a crown of life." - not "Be thou faithful until you a have a bitter experience with a friend, and I will give you a crown of life." - not "Be thou faithful until you have a run-in with an irritating church member, and I will give you a crown of life." - not "Be thou faithful until you are under a heavy work load, and I will give you a crown of life." - not "Be thou faithful until you have a chronic illness, and I will give you a crown of life." - but "Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give you a crown of life." One preacher found this message to the individual Christian under a crushing load: a. the Lord knows all about your circumstances; b. if things stay the same, Christ will be your fortress; c. if things get worse, the Lord will see you through.[11] Only a firm belief in the worth of the sacrifice and faith in triumph over death will see us through. The God who inspired the author of Revelation has confidence that we can have such a faith. A parent offering encouragement to a child under pressure said, "I know you. I love you. I believe in you. I know who you are. I know you can handle it." The letter to Smyrna and to us is God's message, "You can handle it." When I was a first year divinity student, I was sure I was in over my head in a rigorous academic setting. In despair I went to my faculty advisor, who listened patiently and then said, "Look, we have a virtually infallible admissions committee, the closest thing to papal infallibility you'll ever run into. And that committee admitted you. That committee knows you can do the work. So, go do it, knowing that we know you can do it." The letter to Smyrna is God's message to them and to us that he knows we can do it! A college football coach believed he should never ask his team to do in a game what they had not successfully and repeatedly done in practice. I saw a game film in which I could just about read the coach's lips when he called the quarterback to the sidelines in a tough situation, put his arm around the boy, and appeared to say, "We've practiced this. I know you can do it." The letter to Smyrna is God's message to them and to us that God has been with us in the practice of the Christian faith, in our prayer, Bible study, and worship, and he will not ask us to do what we are not able to do with his presence and power in our lives.[12] CONCLUSION James 1: 12 says, "Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial; for once that one has been approved, that person will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised those who love him." The crown offered the Smyrna Christians and you and me is not the royal diadem of the emperor or the one with which we crown Christ, the real Lord, as Lord of all. The crown mentioned here is a wreath or garland (stephanos in Greek - the source of the name "Stephen"). It is the crown for a victor in games, who runs the race, the crown for a magistrate when his work is done and term is over, the crown that one wore to a banquet to show to all passersby that the wearer was anticipating great joy, the crown a pagan wore approaching temple as a sign that the wearer was worthy to entry to worship, the crown that hinted of a halo or nimbus on divine beings. Victory, work well done, the expectation of joy, the anticipation of worship, the presence of a godly glow - who would not want such a crown? [This sermon is for circulation within the Woodbrook congregation and may not be reproduced without permission.] Notes: [1] James L. Blevins, Revelation as Drama, [Nashville: Broadman Press] 1984, p. 31 [2] William Barclay, The Revelation of John, Vol. I. [Philadelphia: Westminster Press] 1960, p. 98 [3] Leander E. Keck, Senior New Testament Editor, The New Interpreter's Bible, Volume XII, "Revelation," [Nashville: Abingdon Press] 1998, Christopher C. Rowland, p. 577 [4] Robert H. Mounce, The Book of Revelation [Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdman's Publishing Co.], 1977,p. 92 [5] Baptist Hymnal, Wesley L. Forbis, editor [Nashville: Convention Press] 1991, "It Came upon the Midnight Clear," by Richard Storrs Willis, No. 93 [6] Martin Kiddle, The Revelation of St. John [New York: Harper and Brothers] 1940, p. 27 [7] Ibid. [8] James 2: 5 [9] Daniel 1: 12 [10] Daniel 1: 15 (NRSV) [11] Charles R. Swindoll, Letters to Churches...Then and Now [Fullerton, California: Insight for Living Ministries], p. 17 [12] I Corinthians 10: 13 |