When love grows cold, that's today's message from Dr. Don Wilton as we open God's encouraging Word together. The Encouraging Word. While we study, know that we're available for you online at www.tewonline.org and this phone number 866-899-WORD. Let's connect at 866-899-9673. The Encouraging Word.
And now today's teaching with Dr. Don Wilton. I'm going to ask you to take your Bibles. You've got to get your Bibles for this. As always, we're going to be in Revelation chapter 2, the book of Revelation chapter 2.
This is a humdinger. I'm telling you, God is going to speak so loudly and I'm praying for you. We're praying for one another because God has got a special word for us today. So let me read this passage to you in Revelation chapter 2. Now remember, this is Jesus.
It's his words. Jesus is saying this and he's saying it to believers. He's saying this to the church. So in the book of Revelation, you've got seven churches. And these seven churches, seven is that perfect number. And the seven churches of Asia are you and me. It's the church, it's believers.
So I want you to just get this. Now I'm going to read one or two verses and then I want to just explain something to you quickly, okay? So we're in Revelation chapter 2. To the angel of the church in Ephesus, write these things. These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven golden lampstands.
All right, just a couple of things. The word angel to the angel. That word there's angelos or messenger. So God sends one of his messengers to bring God's word to his believers. And he says these are the words of him.
He tells us who he is, Jesus. In fact, in my Bible, it's written in red. Jesus said this. Everything I'm saying to you right now, reading to you, Jesus said it. It's very important, guys, it's not a denomination. It's not me saying this, not your church. Jesus, very important here.
And what does he say? These are the words of him who holds the seven stars. That word in Revelation in the scripture, the seven stars, stars, refers to those who are the leaders of the church. So you're going to look at me and you're going to say, well, pastor, you're a leader of the church.
Yeah. He's talking about leaders, those who know Christ, who have influence. So that's you, mom and dad, over your children, your sons and daughters. In the church, it's that life group leader, that D group leader, those pastors, those elders, those overseers, preachers, teachers. And he says what he says to us, he says, I'm going to say something to the church and I'm speaking this through those who have influence and I have them in my right hand. That word means those over which and over whom I have authority because they are mine.
You belong to me. And he says, I am walking among the seven golden lampstands. That's how he talks about the church.
Can you imagine? Did you know that the church is one of God's golden lampstands, golden purity, lampstand, a lampstand gives light. The church, which is the authority of God, led by spiritual leaders, gives light, has influence over. So what does he say to the church?
Here it is. I'm going to go through the rest of this passage now. I know your deeds, your hard work. I know your perseverance. I know that you do not tolerate wicked people.
I know that you have tested those who claim to be apostles, leaders, teachers and are not and have found them to be false. I know you have persevered and endured hardships for my name. I know that you've not grown weary. And yet I hold this against you. You have forsaken your first love.
Remember the height from which you have fallen. Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you. I'll remove your lampstand, your lampstand from its place. But you have this in your favor.
You hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. So he who has an ear to hear, let him hear what the Spirit is saying to you, to the churches. To him who overcomes, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is the paradise of God. So this is Jesus speaking to the church and he's speaking to the church in a place called Ephesus. Just very quickly, I've been to Ephesus quite a number of times and many of you have been with me.
We'll go back. It's quite a place. By the way, back in Paul's time, probably the population around about 300,000.
Some people say a little less, some people say a little more. So Ephesus today, I've sailed in there many times, okay. Ephesus today, back in Paul's day, was at a crossroads. Very critical for the Roman Empire, which was so dominant because of the trade routes, has a great harbor so ships could come and bring all the merchandise and help businesses.
All those kinds of things, very strategic place. Probably one of the first churches that Paul encountered, he went there on his second missionary journey. Went back in Acts chapter 19 on his second missionary journey and he spent a long time there. By the way, you'd be interested to know Timothy. Timothy became the pastor of the first Baptist church, I mean of the church in Ephesus. Timothy, just connecting all the dots for you in the Bible, okay.
Because he tells us that, reminds us of that in his letter. So here's this place called Ephesus. It was a lively, happening place. And in the middle of Ephesus, there's this temple. And the temple was there for the goddess Artemis, A-R-T-E-M-I-S. The Greeks called that goddess, the goddess Diana. She wasn't good, she was pagan.
Everything about the goddess Diana or Artemis was paganism. It was people going, getting besotted, blowing their minds out. Excessive drinking, debauchery, immorality of all kinds that you could possibly imagine. And temple worship and the artisans and the businesses all kind of cooperated together.
They all influenced each other. So once a year, especially around about springtime, best illustration would be Mardi Gras that you have in New Orleans. In springtime, they would have a festival all centered around the temple and all the merchants would come.
Now on a human level, pretty neat, pretty cool stuff. Put up all their little wares and flea markets and they would sell stuff, but they would also mix it in with all their arrangements. I mean, people were sliding each other money under the table. They were all scratching each other's backs. They were allowing certain things to happen and not others. And I mean, money flowed. So can you imagine, here comes Paul, here comes the preacher, here comes the church and he says, Jesus died for you and he loves you.
He wants you to give your heart to him and when you do, he'll change you. You'll know what sin is. And so right there in the heart of Ephesus, in the middle of all their political and social and all the stuff going on and the money making and the businesses and their stock market. By the way, athletics, boy, they were big time into athletics.
There's nothing wrong with any of these things. But it was all connected into the paganism of their day. They worshiped it. They worshiped their athletics and they worshiped their gods and they worshiped their money. They worshiped their drinking and their debauchery and their immorality. Paul came and told them about Jesus and a group of people began to spring up inside.
Christian people, you know what I'm talking about. They gave their hearts to Jesus and their lives were changed and they began to be filled with the love of God. They understood what sin is. They saw God for who he is. They became filled with passion and compassion. They served others, loved others.
They rejected the world's ways. They saw the sinfulness of paganism and of idol worship right in the middle of them. So why would Jesus have written a letter like this to a church like that?
So watch this, guys. Jesus had seven great things to tell them. See, that little group of believers, they were being squeezed. They were being pulled by the world. Some of them were losing their businesses. Some of them were going into the lunchroom at lunchtime and nobody wanted to sit with them because they were Christians. They were having big parties and debauchery and drunkenness and immorality. And because Christ had come into their hearts, all of a sudden said, no, I'm going to love my wife.
No, I'm going to do this God's way. All of a sudden they were marching according to a different standards. So Jesus writes this letter in the midst of all this turmoil to this group of Christians. And he's got seven wonderful things to say to them right there in the Bible.
Did you see them? He tells them seven unbelievable things. Let me just give them to you. Number one, he commends them. He says, I commend you for your deeds, for the things that you're doing for me. There it is in verse two. Number two, I commend you for your hard work.
It's right there. Look at verse two. I commend you for your hard work. By the way, that word hard work means you're all out effort for Jesus. Just like so many of you, you just all out.
You just never seem to know the end. And I watch all these folks, folks who operate the cameras, people who serve at the bridge, people who go on mission trips, people who walk across the road for others, you're all out effort. People who make phone calls, people who bake a loaf of bread just because they care about, people who just love on others just because of Jesus. He commanded them for their deeds, for their hard work. He commended them for their perseverance. That word there is fantastic.
Love the word perseverance for their willingness to keep on. You know, a good friend of mine sent me a wonderful text saying he was praying for us this week. And I sent him a text back in our church and I said to him, hey, thanks for your word of encouragement. And I said, you're such a faithful brother. He's so faithful, man. Thank you.
You're not up ready to run off. Thank you. Jesus said, thank you for your perseverance. Number four, he commanded them for their intolerance. Here it is for their intolerance. He says, look in verse two, I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people. Isn't that incredible? Jesus commands these believers in Ephesus for being intolerant of the wickedness of these pagan people saying, no, we don't tolerate that. Not going to do it.
Nope. He commanded them. Number five, he commanded them for their testing. Jesus takes it one step further and he says, you know, I command you for the way you put to the test those who lead you.
Can I just say something, guys? That is so commendable in churches. Whether it be the pastor, the deacons, the elders, the Sunday school teachers, the life group teachers, the leader, D groups, you don't just do something.
You've got to be tested. You know, I'm just talking about one church. I know you do the same if you're not from First Baptist.
Many wonderful churches around. I mean, you know, in this church, we got scores of deacons. You don't just become a deacon because maybe you've got a great business or maybe because your mama gave this piece of land to the church because you're a great athlete. You know, you played major league ball, therefore you should be a deacon.
No, no, no. You've got to be tested. Our church, you've got to go through studying God's word. You've got to be in the church for at least two years. You've got to prove yourself, your giving, your faithfulness. You've got to pass the test. You know, we have the church council in our church. It's a stringent test, the church council.
You've got to be a member for 10 years in good standing. You've got to be proven that you're tired. You can't be on the church council and not be a tither and then tell everybody else to do it. It's like me. I can't get up and tell you to give to the church and I'm not doing it.
Can you feel that? That's like hypocrisy. You've got enough hypocrisy in the world. And Jesus commanded them for their testing. And then he commanded them for their endurance in verse three. It's a very similar word to perseverance, for keeping on. And then finally, number seven, he commanded them for their hate.
Can you imagine that? It's there. I didn't use that word. Jesus said it.
He said you have this in your favor. You hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I hate also. I'm not going to unpack the meaning of the Nicolaitans right now.
We'll get onto that when we get to the church at Pergamum. All I'm going to tell you is the Nicolaitans were people who led others to do bad things. You ever been around people like that? Those were the Nicolaitans. Jesus said, I hate what they do.
And I commend you because you hate what they do too. So what did Jesus, if he commanded them, what did Jesus have to say to them? What did he tell them?
Come on, I'm going to put, okay, I'm going to put that on you. So what am I supposed, what would I say? How do you say something to a people that you really love?
Jesus did. You know, it's like moms and dads, you know, you love your kids so much, but you see those one or two things you say, sweetheart, I'm just going to tell you, this is not going to happen. You do it because you love them. You're listening to Dr. Don Wilton, our teacher on the encouraging word, and we'll be back with the rest of today's message when love grows cold in just a moment.
But perhaps you are a parent that has said that before and realize that when we do things for our children, with our children, sometimes to our children, it's because we love them. And our Heavenly Father does that as well. Are you open to what the Lord is ready to do in and through and for and to you in this brand new year? As we look ahead in the month of January for 2021, we have a wonderful series of opportunities to grow in Christ through some resources of the encouraging word.
One of those is the I Give Up book by Laura Storey, and another, it's a series from Dr. Wilton about giants and how you can walk with giants. The details are on our website at tewonline.org. That's tewonline.org. Let's connect today. Now back to today's message with Dr. Don Wilton. So what happened here? What did Jesus tell them?
Let's look at this. First of all, he told them one scary fact in verse four, one scary fact. What's the scary fact? Jesus said, I've got something against you. That's scary.
Wow. Jesus said that to the church? I've got this against you.
I know you're doing all these things fantastic, but I've got this against you. And he followed that up with one hard truth. What was the hard truth? You have forsaken your first love. You're not loving me like you once did.
Is that you when it comes to Jesus, his church? You know, probably the best analogy or comparison is in marriage. I know not everybody's married, but there's a bunch of us that are. Look, we all identify with your love growing cold. You don't stop loving, but you meet that significant person and you fall in love and you get married and the months and the years go by and you have ups and downs and you travel the road of life and your love begins to diminish for each other.
You know what I'm talking about? You all of a sudden stop holding hands. Stop talking to each other in a civilized manner.
Start getting angry with each other. It happens to all of us. It happens to me. It happens to you. Start pulling back. You stop spending time with each other. You stop hurrying home from work.
You start putting everybody else ahead of the person you love most, right? He gives one scary fact. He said, I've got this against you. This is one hard truth. He said, you've lost your first love for me.
You don't love me. Then he gives one factual reminder. He puts it in perspective in verse five. He says, remember the height from which you've fallen.
What does that mean? He said, go back to the height of your love. Go back to that pinnacle, to that top point. When you first came to know me, I met a lady and she walked up to me and she said to me, Doc, she said, you baptized me two weeks ago and her face was just glowing. It was like so fresh.
She was so excited to be in worship. Remember that time? What's happened? What's going on? Where have you gone? Can you feel what Jesus is saying?
Remember the height from which you've come, the height from which you've fallen. Why are you no longer holding hands with me? Why are you no longer spending time? Why are you no longer prioritizing me? Why are you no longer talking to me? Why are you no longer reading about me? Why are you no longer serving me? Why do you just show up like this and you love me? Why does it not bother you?
Why does everything else? Why would you rather do everything else but get together and worship me? Why am I on a list when you should love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind? Can you hear what Jesus is saying here? It's right here in this passage, man.
It is so powerful. Remember the height from which you've fallen. He's saying, listen, when you lose your first love, here's what is going to happen to you. You're going to become spiritually apathetic. You're going to become indifferent to the things of God. You're going to lose your fire and your love to serve others and to love people with no strings attached.
You're going to start shopping around for the best show in town. You're going to argue with God. I mean, he puts us all out here. He said, when you lose your first love, when your first love grows cold, you're going to become a compromiser. Anything that comes along, you're going to excuse yourself.
I've got this against you, one scary fact, one hard truth, you've forsaken your first love. One factual reminder, remember the height from which you've fallen. Then he gives only one acceptable solution. One acceptable solution, you know what it is? Repent.
Here it is. Okay, I want all married couples, look at me for a minute, all of you. Okay, look up from your sofa, tell your kids just to hold it for a second, just a second. Listen, man, I've been married for a long time too.
Some people think Noah was my best man. It happens to me and Karen. Our love grows cold. So you're in your marriage right now and you're sitting there and it's a little awkward, isn't it? Because you both know. You ever had those awkward moments?
You know, she knows. So what you do is you say, oh, let's make another cup of coffee. Or maybe when this came up just a minute ago, you immediately began to get yourself busy with the kids. It's awkward. It's like, give me a break. I'm just going to take a seat.
I don't need this. You know it's true. You know it. You know it.
Can you feel it? And Jesus says there's only one acceptable solution. Repent. Okay, married couples, I'm almost through, you can get back to it.
You've got to go to each other, say, I'm so sorry. That's it. And the final thing he tells them is one serious consequence. He says, look, if you don't repent of your forsaken love, here's what's going to happen.
I'm going to remove your candlestick. Now, what does that mean? It doesn't mean you're going to lose your salvation. It doesn't mean you're not going to go to heaven. Here's what it does mean.
It means you're going to lose your influence. God will give you a fireball and a freshness in your life and your marriage. He will give us that freshness in every aspect of our life if we're walking with him. You've heard Dr. Wilton from the pulpit. And as he's been preaching, perhaps you've heard the Lord stir your heart as well.
Now let's listen to Dr. Don as he comes into the studio with perhaps the most important 60 seconds of today. Are you ready to give your heart and life to the Lord Jesus Christ? Why don't you pray this prayer with me right now? Dear God, I know that I'm a sinner, and I know that Jesus died for me on the cross. Today I repent of my sin, and by faith I receive you into my heart. In Jesus' name, my friend, I welcome you today into the family of God.
This is exciting news. If you've given your life to Jesus Christ, welcome. Welcome to the family of God, and welcome to The Next Steps.
We would love to walk alongside you. We have resources, free resources for you. If you've given your life to Christ, call us at 866-899-WORD. That's the phone number, 866-899-9673, or meet us online at www.tewonline.org. I mentioned the Laura storybook.
Here's Liz with all the details about what's online at www.tewonline.org. Discovering the paradoxical peace and joy of surrendering your will and giving God control. In this four-part study, Laura uses her own story to explain why giving up is important, whom we are submitting to, how to go about doing it, and the effects of this decision on the lives of the people around us. I Give Up! The Secret Joy of a Surrendered Life by Laura Story is available for your gift of $18 in support to The Encouraging Word this month.
Limited quantities available. The Encouraging Word is a viewer and listener-supported ministry. Thank you for listening today. It's been a great day with The Encouraging Word and Dr. Don Wilton. Tomorrow Dr. Don's message is on incredibly godly people. I hope you'll join us. That's tomorrow at the same time here with The Encouraging Word.
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