Satan's Attack on the Spirit-Filled Church (Includes Rev. 2-3) B

Listen, you know how Satan attacks the church?

First, it's very subtle. We lose our first love, and then all of a sudden we begin to compromise with the world, because the easiest thing to lead you into compromise is a lack of love for God. If you really love God and you love the Lord Jesus Christ with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, your desire above all things will be to maintain His absolute honor.

And to do that, you can't compromise with the system. Welcome to Grace to You with John MacArthur. I'm your host, Phil Johnson. Maybe your parents taught you never to look for a fight, but if need be, to defend yourself against a bully. Well, if you're a Christian, you've got more than some immature bully making trouble for you. You face a powerful, dangerous enemy, and to defend yourself, you need to understand your enemy's tactics, and you need the right equipment. John MacArthur shows you the defenses God gives you on this edition of Grace to You. It's part of a series titled The Believer's Armor, one of John's most popular studies through the years. It can show you how to overcome even Satan's fiercest attacks. So let's get to it.

With the lesson, here's John MacArthur. How does Satan attack us? Well, for the answer to that, I want you to turn to Revelation chapter 1. I believe the Lord shows us in the letters of Revelation 2 and 3. I believe in the letters to the churches, the seven churches of Asia Minor, the first of which is Ephesus, and then the others that were literally born out of the Ephesian church, the other six being also in Asia Minor. I believe the Lord gives us insight into how Satan attacks the church. So what do we need to be warned about?

Let's look and see. First of all, the thing that hit the church at Ephesus, they left their first love. They left their first love. This is one of the greatest churches in all history, and yet the Lord's penetrating eyes found this fatal flaw. They had turned in their hot hearts for cold orthodoxy. They were becoming those who simply carried out a very biblical ministry.

There just wasn't any passion there. There's a second thing to be aware of. Verse 12 of chapter 2, we skip the church at Smyrna because that was the persecuted church and it isn't warned. But to the angel of the church at Pergamum write, These things saith he who has the sharp sword with two edges. That's the Lord and the sword is the sword of judgment coming out of his mouth, as in Revelation 19, Hebrews chapter 4. He says, I know thy works, verse 13, and where thou dwellest, even where Satan's throne is. And thou holdest fast my name and hast not denied my faith, even in those days in which Antipas was my faithful martyr, who was slain among you where Satan dwells.

Stop right there. He says, Pergamos, I know everything about you. My searching, penetrating gaze reveals all these things. I know your works. I know you're involved. I know you're active. I know there's something going on and I know that you are where Satan's throne is.

You're in a tough place. And man, Pergamos was a tough city. Do you know that Pergamos was the center of emperor worship, the center of the worship of Caesar? Do you know that it was the center of the worship of Zeus, the great god, some say the greatest god of all that system of deities? And that in the city of Pergamos, they had built a huge altar to Zeus in the shape of a throne.

And so some feel that the throne of Satan, as mentioned in verse 13, is a reference to the altar of Zeus, the greatest, most famous, largest altar in the world. On the other hand, Pergamos had its own god by the name of Asclepius. He was the Pergamese god who was associated with healing, the god of healing, and he's always been associated with snakes. And in Pergamos, they had a temple and a medical school. You still see a snake on the symbol of a physician. And that really comes from Greek mythology, from this Asclepius, the god of healing.

And in the temple, they had non-poisonous snakes all over the floor and people who were ill would come and lie there so that those snakes could crawl over them and everywhere they touched them, they would be healed. Listen, it was tough being in Pergamos. It was tough being a little group of Christians in the midst of a terrible pagan society. So he says, I know where you dwell, where Satan's throne is.

And I know you hold fast my name and you have not denied the faith even to the point where some of you died, namely one dear brother, Antipas, whose life was taken away in that place where Satan dwells. Boy, you know, it's tough. But let me tell you something, folks, to live in a tough city, to be in a tough environment, to live in a tough time of the world and name the name of Jesus Christ, listen, there's no reason to lower the standards even then. God doesn't change them. Even then, they're the same. God says, I know it's tough there. That doesn't change the standards.

I know it's hard. That doesn't change anything. Even though you've endured and even though you've been martyred and even though you've worked on for the Lord, even though you've upheld His name, verse 14, I have a few things against you. And what is it? Because you have them there that hold the doctrine of Balaam who taught Balak to cast a stumbling block before the children of Israel to eat things sacrificed to idols and to commit fornication.

Let me tell you what that is. Balaam got the children of Israel to intermarry with the pagans and to get into their idolatry. And what he's saying here is that's compromised with pagan systems. And the problem in the church at Pergamos was they were compromising with the world. They were intermarrying. I don't know whether that actually was going on, whether they were actually Christians intermarrying with non-Christians.

Very likely that was happening. But the church at Pergamos began to court the world. They began to indulge themselves in worldly things. They were violating 2 Corinthians 6. What fellowship hath light with darkness?

What concord has Christ with Balaam? They were to come out from among them and be separate and touch not the unclean thing. But they were the worldly church. They had let the world come in. They were doing what the world wanted them to do. They were aping the world. It's amazing to me how the church of Christ in America today is going all out whole hog to ape the world.

They do it in so many ways. If the world's view of the family changes, the church accommodates it. If the world's view of the woman changes, the church accommodates it. If the world's view of the homosexual changes, the church accommodates it. And we get on the bandwagon with everything the world does. We want to identify with it. It's shocking.

Just shocking. The church becomes materialistic because the world is materialistic. The church becomes preoccupied with entertainment because the world is preoccupied with entertainment.

And you know, just to give you an illustration of that, the rise of what is known as the electronic church, there are many who feel is the number one reason people don't identify with a local church. They sit at home behind their little television and the church comes to them. They don't have to get dressed.

They don't have to leave the house. Everything is all perfect. It's another part, watch this one, of the fantasy. You know, TV is a fantasy and our world wants to live in that fantasy. And you go home and you sit there and that church is a perfect church. I mean, the music is unbelievable.

It's unbelievable. Orchestras and people with flowing gowns and great singers and the parade goes on and lights and camera angles and all of this. And the preacher is perfectly in order and he gives his message and there it is, the fantasy church. And you never sit next to anybody you don't like and nobody ever talks to disturb you.

And you don't have to find a place to park. It's glorious. And you just send them a little conscience money now and then and they'll tell you you're winning the world for doing that. And they'll send you a thing you can plaster on your wall to prove how sacrificial you are. Really, it's a sad thing.

And you know what happens? One writer said that the electronic church is built on entertainment and the electronic church apes the very things in the world the church has always condemned. The electronic church inevitably comes through as a mere expression of cultural religion, aping the values and the glitter and the trappings of the very values and kinds of success that we profess as Christians to reject.

Let's live in a real world, people, huh? This is a real world and a real church. But the church is so smug and so comfortable and it's compromised with the world that it falls into the fantasy. And then in verse 15 he says you have them there that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans. What happened in Pergamos? Pergamos decided they could waltz the world.

Pergamos decided they could court the world. They could draw the world in a little bit and do a little of the world's thing in the world's way and allow some immorality in verse 15 and they'll be all right. And so he says in verse 16, repent or else I'll come unto thee quickly and fight against them with the sword of my mouth. Listen, you know how Satan attacks the church?

First it's very subtle. We lose our first love. And then all of a sudden we begin to compromise with the world because the easiest thing to lead you into compromise is a lack of love for God. If you really love God and you love the Lord Jesus Christ with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, your desire above all things will be to maintain His absolute honor, right?

And to do that you can't compromise with the system. But as soon as you cool in your love, then it becomes easier to fall into the trap of the system. By the way, you're going to love something and if it isn't God, you'll wind up loving what's around you. There's a third church that I want to mention to you, a church at Thyatira, verse 18. Under the angel of the church in Thyatira write, These things saith the Son of God who hath His eyes like a flame of fire and His feet are like fine bronze. He's searching, penetrating and coming in judgment. And this sounds so good. I know Thy works and love and service and faith and Thy patience and Thy works and the last to be more than the first.

You're even getting better at this stuff. Now here's a church that's really working. Boy, they're active and they really got it all going. If the church in Pergamos married the world, the church in Thyatira is celebrating their anniversaries. This is the church that tolerates sin. Ephesus, loss of first love.

Pergamos, compromise of the world. Thyatira, tolerant of sin. The flood gate was open and sin is there. Verse 20, in spite of all your works, all your love, all your service, all your faith and patience and all this stuff, and that it's even increasing.

I have a few things, by the way, as not in the Greek manuscripts. I have this against thee, because thou allowest that woman Jezebel who calls herself a prophetess to teach and seduce my servants to commit fornication and eat things sacrificed unto idols. You know what that church did? They had all those good things, love and service and faith, but they let the church become a victim of a false teacher. They just allowed sin to come in, have its heyday. There were people committing fornication. It sounds like the Corinthian church, doesn't it?

And by the way, that went out of existence too. But here came this woman and she was seducing and involving them in the idol worship of the day. And I've told you this before, but the idolatry of those eras of history involved sexual activity.

And so here were these people just having a great time getting involved in the filth and the rot of the world. It's a rare day when you have a couple come in for premarital counseling and you ask them, have you gone to bed together? And they say no. That's becoming a rare thing. And it's shocking to you?

It's becoming a rare thing. This is a very vile and evil world we live in and people are drawn into sin if they're not aware of what's going on and they don't build their defenses and walk in the Spirit. But I'll tell you, we have a lot more of evil around us by virtue of volumes of people. But this church began to allow it. And God was even patient. Verse 21, I gave her space to repent. God even gave her a little time for repentance.

And she repented not. And then He says, Behold, I'll cast her into a bed. Boy, she likes bed so much. I'll put her in a bed. She wants to commit fornication. I'll put her into a fornicating situation. And verse 23 says it'll be a bed of death. I'll kill her children with death.

That's what I'll do. Whoever those people are who have listened to this Jezebel are designated as her children. And He says, I'll kill her children with death. It'll be a bed of death. I'll put them in bed, deathbed. And the churches will look and say, I am He that searches the minds and hearts.

And I'll give every one of you according to your works. Listen, the Lord will judge His church, beloved. Don't you think you can be a believer and get away from God and His chastening?

Not at all. The bed of vice will be exchanged for a deathbed because they've committed adultery. They've committed adultery, verse 22 says.

Why? Because a believer is married to Christ and fooling around with idols and sexual activity is a form of adultery. I'll tell you, He says to the church that tolerates sin, you better repent. You better turn around. And if you don't repent, end of verse 22, I'll kill you with death. Now for those of you who aren't involved in verse 24, He says, I'm not going to put any other burden on you.

Just hang on to what you've got until I get there. But to those that are evil, I'm going to bring a judgment. Here's the church that tolerates sin. Beloved, there's so many churches that do this. They just don't want to deal with sin.

They just don't want to confront anybody. They say, you mean you discipline people in your church? We do because the Bible says to them, oh, you know, we don't want to get into any of that because, you know, we might make problems. You see, tolerating sin, compromising with the world, and it just descends. You start with a loss of love and then pretty soon when you don't love the Lord anymore, you're willing to compromise. You compromise a little bit and pretty soon your compromise becomes a tolerance and sin floods the church. And you go right from that kind of a situation in Thyatira to the next chapter, verse 1. You're in the Sardis church and this is a church that is content with programs.

All of a sudden the life is gone. A church that tolerates sin becomes a degenerate, dead church. And he says, I know Thy works, verse 1, that Thou hast a name that Thou livest but are dead.

A dead church, a corpse. Do you know that Sardis was one of the greatest cities in the ancient world? In fact, its greatest king was named Croesus.

And when we want to say somebody is really rich, we say they're as rich as Croesus. That church, or rather that city was literally synonymous with wealth. That city went out of existence. That church went out of existence. The church, because it was a degenerate, dead church.

Just a few things kicking a little bit. Verse 2, be watchful, strengthen the things that remain that are ready to die. They were either dead or ready to die. All they had left was form, like the rhyme of the ancient mariner. Corpses manned the ship, dead men pulled the oars, and dead men steered the vessel. The thing was going, functioning, just everybody was dead. This is when the church becomes a group of activities, a series of programs.

You have your classes and you have your little groups and you have your activities for the kids and for the young people and for the adults and everybody is very busy and the fleet's rolling and the people are coming. It's just that there's no life there. God's not there. Ichabod is written, the glory is departed.

And the sequence is easy to see. You lose the first love. A loss of that first consuming, passionate love and you begin to compromise with the world. You compromise with the world and sin floods in and you begin to give in to sin and tolerate it. And when sin completely takes over the church, then the spiritual life is choked out and what you have is a dead church. And like Samson, you're moving around, you just don't have any strength.

You're a victim. And so he says in verse 3, remember therefore how thou hast received and heard and hold fast and repent, if therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee. Oh, he says, there are a few names in Sardis that have not defiled their garments and they shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy. There were still a few. This church is just barely hanging on. A few things that are dying and a few people that are left started in Ephesus, tremendous church, begun to lose its first love and now we're down, just a few are left and this is the way it goes, a few hanging on whose garments are white, just a few.

You know the next step? The next step in the descent of the church comes as Satan attacks in his final blow in verse 14 of chapter 3, the church of Laodicea. Our Lord warns the church that leaves its first love, the church that compromises with the world, the church that tolerates sin, the church that is content with its forms and its rituals and its organization and its programs. And lastly, He warns the church that is the apostate church, the church that is no church at all, Laodicea.

To the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write, these things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God, I know thy works that thou art neither cold nor hot. I would thou art cold or hot. And what our Lord means there is this, cold means indifferent to the gospel, unsaved and not interested, just not even concerned, not hypocritical, no pretense at all, unsaved, unmoved, uninterested. I wish you were like that, or that you were hot, believing, saved, redeemed, but you are neither hot or cold.

You are lukewarm and that is the worst of all. That is playing Christianity. That's the hypocrisy that nauseates Christ and He says, because you are lukewarm and neither cold or hot, I'll spew you out of My mouth.

The cold He preaches to through His messengers, the hot He embraces in His bosom, the lukewarm He spits out of His mouth. They are the hypocrites. And this is the hypocritical church, the phony church, the church that is no church.

And this is liberalism today. This is what we have in the world today under the guise of Christianity that deny the Bible, deny the deity of Jesus Christ, deny all of the great tenets of the Christian faith and yet say they're Christian churches. This is the church of the humanists. And when you ask them, tell me about your church, what they say is not, well, we are seeing God's Word prevail. We are seeing people redeemed. We are seeing God touching lives. No, they say, I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing.

Look at us, we're successful. We've got a big organization and we've got a lot of money and there are huge churches around the world, great denominations, massive religious systems that fall into this category. They've got all the money and all the trappings and all the paraphernalia, but they are apostate and they will be spewed out of the Lord's mouth. He says to them in verse 17, you don't know that you're wretched, miserable, poor, blind and naked. And I counsel you to buy of me gold tried in the fire that thou mayest be rich and white raiment that thou mayest be clothed that the shame of thy nakedness doth not appear and anoint thine eyes with salve that thou mayest see, that thou mayest see.

And so you're really saying to them, I don't think you've got your evaluation right. And he says, as many as I phileo, as many as I phileo, as many as I reach out to in deep concern, I rebuke and chasten, be zealous therefore and repent. Now do you see what our Lord Jesus Christ warns us about? The church can descend into the pit of apostasy.

The church at Ephesus went out of existence because it lost its first love. And then the church so easily becomes a compromiser with the world. You know, sometimes it bothers me that people won't come just to study the Word of God or just to pray.

You've got to entertain people, you know, and I feel that, boy. And so what the church does so many times is it begins to pick up on that tack and we start entertaining the saints and aping the world, and that's a compromise. And then there's the church that tolerated sin, the church that wed the world, the church that was satisfied with the material riches and really had nothing, the dead church. All of these things are Satan's attacks.

And beloved, there are preservatives here also. One is to be the Philadelphia church. This is the Philadelphia church, verse 7 of chapter 3. "'These things saith He that is holy, that hath...He that is true, that hath the key of David. He that openeth and no man shutteth, and shutteth and no man openeth. I know thy works. Behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it.'"

Boy, I love that. He says, I opened the door for you to reach the world. This is the door that's wide open. And as long as the church is committed to go through that door and take Jesus Christ to the world, no matter what happens, even if the synagogue of Satan is there, even if the time of trouble comes, it isn't going to affect the church. Listen, beloved, evangelism is a preservative. It throws us out of ourselves.

It helps us step beyond our inhibitions. It crucifies pride. And then there's that little church early in chapter 2, the Smyrna church. "'I know thy works in tribulation and poverty.'" A poor, troubled church.

They were being blasphemed. He says, don't be afraid. The devil will cast some of you in prison that you may be tried. You'll have tribulation in ten days. But be faithful, and I'll give you a crown of life. Beloved, if we will be confronted in the world and take what comes, and if we'll be aggressive to win people to Christ, we can stand with Smyrna in Philadelphia and not fall into the trap of those other five churches.

God help us to be warned as to how Satan attacks. That's John MacArthur, chancellor of the Masters University and Seminary. Today's lesson is from John's current study here on Grace to You, titled The Believer's Armor. John, in the lesson today and yesterday, you talked about some of the problems in those first-century churches in Asia Minor—Ephesus, Pergamum, Thyatira—and you talked quite a bit about the background, the historical and geographical background of those churches, and you've been saying recently that those are important details. The historical context is part of the context that we need to understand.

Well, absolutely. This is basic to all accurate Bible interpretation. You don't put a Bible in front of you and read it and then say, OK, Lord, show me what this means.

It's not going to come out of nothing. You say, OK, how can I go back in time and history and maybe other parts of Scripture and find what is the context in which this was said? That's what makes the text come alive, and we have the resources to do that.

Obviously, commentaries do that. Even a study Bible, the MacArthur Study Bible, has so much of that in the footnotes there. But we want to give you a tool that goes along with series like these, and we're just starting this series on The Believer's Armor.

It's going to be a long series, and if you haven't gotten a copy of the study guide that goes with the series, order one today, the study guide, The Believer's Armor. Over the years, we've produced about 150 of these study guides, and they deal with a subject, a topic that's in a text of Scripture. So their titles relate to some doctrinal theme tied to the text of a Scripture. So instead of just looking at a commentary and flowing through a text, this approaches the study of the Word of God on a topical basis. These are soft cover books corresponding, as I said, to our sermon series.

We're in the process of sprucing up the study guides and relaunching them for a new generation. And this one on The Believer's Armor is taken from Ephesians 6, that familiar passage that identifies how the Christian finds victory in the battle against sin and Satan. And this is going to make a dramatic change in your Christian life. You're going to learn about the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes of the gospel, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit. Yes, this practical book helps you understand the nature of the spiritual warfare that Christians face, and it shows you how to take hold of the powerful defenses that God provides for your spiritual battles. To order The Believer's Armor study guide, it's brand new.

Just contact us today. Call 800-55-GRACE or go to gty.org. This book could be especially beneficial to go through with a new Christian.

The questions at the end of each chapter will reinforce what you're learning and encourage practical discussions. Again, to purchase The Believer's Armor study guide, the price is $11. Call 800-55-GRACE or go to gty.org. And friend, just a reminder that we are able to broadcast on this station and distribute free books and other resources every month and basically do everything we do because of the support of listeners like you. People are benefitting from our verse-by-verse teaching in large cities, small towns, even remote villages because friends like you are standing with us. To express your support, mail your tax-deductible gift to GRACE2U, Box 4000, Panorama City, California, 91412, or call us at 800-55-GRACE, or you can donate online at gty.org. Now for John MacArthur, I'm Phil Johnson, inviting you back tomorrow when John shows you how to resist temptation no matter when it strikes. It's all part of John's continuing look at The Believer's Armor. Join us for another 30 minutes of unleashing God's truth, one verse at a time, on Grace to You.