The Revelation of Jesus Christ

John to the seven churches

Grace be unto you, and peace, from him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven Spirits which are before his throne; And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth.

“Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, … to Thyatira…

“Fear not, I am the first and the last, and the living one.

 I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades. 

19 Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this. As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.

Christ, our risen Lord and Savior holds in His right hand the angels of the churches. Christ, our returning Lord and Savior stands in the presence of His golden churches – the believers to be taken-up along with those who have gone before us.

Yet each letter to the churches is specific to a group of believers: praise for faithfulness and call to continued faith.

For not all who say, “Lord, lord,” will be taken-up.

Not all who say, “Lord, lord,” will stand as a light of witness as a lampstand on His right.

For some will be separated to the King’s left and He will say of those who did not glimmer with the light of Jesus, “I never knew you.”

And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal. – Matthew 25:46 KJV

Therefore: The warnings for the seven churches are addressed to the saints of every generation until the last.

You with ears to hear, let the scripture of Revelation speak to your eternal soul.

“And to the angel of the church in Thyatira write:

‘The words of the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and whose feet are like burnished bronze.

Why would the risen and returning Christ Jesus speak so severely to a small church far from Jerusalem or Rome, far from Athens and Ephesus on a road between other cities of much more importance?

Thyatira lay on the road that connected Pergamum with Sardis and went on to Philadelphia and to Laodicea, linking up with both Smyrna and Byzantium. That was the road by which the imperial post traveled; and it was crowded with the commerce of Asia and the east. Therefore, first and foremost Thyatira was a great commercial town.

Strategically the importance of Thyatira was that it was the gateway to Pergamum, the capital of the province. The first we hear of Thyatira is that it is an armed garrison, manned by a company of Macedonian troops, placed there as an outpost to protect Pergamos. The difficulty was that Thyatira was not capable of any prolonged defense. It lay in an open valley. There was no height that could be fortified; and all that Thyatira could ever hope to do was to fight a delaying action until Pergamos could prepare to meet the invaders.

Jesus appears in a vision to the Apostle John an speaks to Thyatira with awesome imagery of threat. It would not be unlike the Angel of the Lord standing on the hill overlooking the valley of Sodom.

Genesis 19:28: And he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and toward all the land of the valley, and he looked and, behold, the smoke of the land went up like the smoke of a furnace.

The same description of awe is described by Ezekiel, who has great difficulty describing the appearing of God:

The Glory of the Lord

4 As I looked, behold, a stormy wind came out of the north, and a great cloud, with brightness around it, and fire flashing forth continually, and in the midst of the fire, as it were gleaming metal.[b] 5 And from the midst of it came the likeness of four living creatures. And this was their appearance: they had a human likeness, 6 but each had four faces, and each of them had four wings. 7 Their legs were straight, and the soles of their feet were like the sole of a calf’s foot. And they sparkled like burnished bronze.

This same description of burnished bronze is John’s description of the feet of the returning Christ on the clouds… and He looks toward Thyatira with eyes of fire.

If you have never been within eyesight of a great furnace for iron or steel or bronze, picture the furnace of Daniel.  In fact, it takes a furnace with such great fire of temperature to melt hard metals for the forming of idols.

Daniel 3:19 

Then Nebuchadnezzar was filled with fury, and the expression of his face was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He ordered the furnace heated seven times more than it was usually heated. 20 And he ordered some of the mighty men of his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and to cast them into the burning fiery furnace. 21 Then these men were bound in their cloaks, their tunics, their hats, and their other garments, and they were thrown into the burning fiery furnace. 22 Because the king’s order was urgent and the furnace overheated, the flame of the fire killed those men who took up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. 23 And these three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, fell bound into the burning fiery furnace.

And from within the fiery furnace, a witness of unexpected awe:

“But I see four men unbound, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods.”

26 Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the door of the burning fiery furnace; he declared, “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out, and come here!”

Now picture this same Jesus returning with eyes like a flame of fire staring down your church!

Revelation 2:19 “‘I know your works, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your latter works exceed the first.

20 But I have this against you, that you tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess and is teaching and seducing my servants to practice sexual immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols. 21 I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her sexual immorality.

Your tolerance is for everything EXCEPT the Truth.

Does the church tolerate Jezebel?  Do we follow any prophesy and seducing spirit?  Do we coexist with those who sacrifice to idols?

• Dare you preach prosperity, when the poor will inherit the Kingdom? [Luke 6:20]
• Why do christians run to the casino, to the lottery, to glitter of false promise?
• Why do christians stand alongside followers of false prophets and idols?
• Dare you preach universal acceptance into Heaven, when Jesus has preached to souls in Hell after going to the cross for our sins? [1 Peter 4:6]

Christ Jesus, King and Lord, has (thus far) given us 2000 years to REPENT and come to God the Father ONLY through Him.

The Lord sends His Holy Spirit to believers to guide us in the Gospel. We need no other spirit or guide.  Yet the seducing spirits of some pulpits broadcast in His Name the message of the Anti-Christ.

Why does the church listen to Jezebel, when time is so short and the Lord IS so near?

Jezebel of Thyatira

• a self-proclaimed “prophetess”
• Jezebel is a Phoenician name, and by this time the Phoenicians had disappeared as a separate ethnic identity and had become part of the Greek-speaking world.  (Jezebel seems no different from the faithful of the church. She blends in with you and me and the church.)

Presumably Jezebel argued that a Christian might join a guild and participate in its feasts without thereby compromising his faith. He was initiated into a superior wisdom. he knew the idol was nothing and he could not be defiled by that which did not exist. . . . The local situation favored the accommodation of incompatible beliefs and practices: the letter insists on individual devotion to a Lord who searches the hearts of men and demands a consistency of life. The love and faith commended in the church might easily be corrupted by compromise with pagan society: the guilds themselves were devoted to good works.

•  Queen of King Ahab in the OT. A woman in the church at Thyatira in the NT who also represents the apostate church of the Tribulation. See Jezebel. (IF gentle teaching from pulpits has hidden true meaning of this:

Matthew 13

The Parable of the Weeds Explained

36 Then he left the crowds and went into the house. And his disciples came to him, saying, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.”

37 He answered, “The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.

38 The field is the world, and the good seed is the sons of the kingdom.

The weeds are the sons of the evil one, 39 and the enemy who sowed them is the devil.

The harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels.

40 Just as the weeds are gathered and burned with fire, so will it be at the end of the age.

41 The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all law-breakers, 42 and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear.

Revelation 2:

22 Behold, I will throw her onto a sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her I will throw into great tribulation, unless they repent of her works, 23 and I will strike her children dead.

And all the churches will know that I am he who searches mind and heart, and I will give to each of you according to your works.

24 But to the rest of you in Thyatira, who do not hold this teaching, who have not learned what some call the deep things of Satan, to you I say, I do not lay on you any other burden.

25 Only hold fast what you have until I come.

26 The one who conquers and who keeps my works until the end, to him I will give authority over the nations, 27 and he will rule them with a rod of iron, as when earthen pots are broken in pieces, even as I myself have received authority from my Father. 28 And I will give him the morning star.

29 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’

NEXT: Sardis