Loyal Community (Part 3 of 3)

Moral compromise in our lives or in a church is like a poisonous weed.

It quickly and thoroughly messes up everyone and everything it touches. Today on Truth for Life, Alistair Begg explains how to deal with temptations to compromise in a way that protects your reputation and your testimony. We're in Revelation chapter 2 looking at verses 12 through 19. Are you okay for Thyatira? Forty miles southeast of Pergamum.

The longest letter, funnily enough, is written to the least politically influential city of the group. Part of the opportunistic entrepreneurial environment of Thyatira was seen in its manufacturing base, which it then matched with a marketing ability, so much so that it drew people from all around. And folks would be going there for a good day shopping. And it was here in the midst of all of this activity that Jesus had set his church in an environment that was peculiarly challenging, as we're about to see. Jesus had prayed to his father that they would not be removed from the world, but that we would be kept from the evil one. These believers were, as we this morning, both in Christ and in Thyatira. We are placed in Christ, but we also live in Cleethorps. Or we're in Christ, and we also live in Bolton. And one day, our in-Christness will be caught up as we are in heaven with Christ. But for the time being, our experience of being in Christ is also mitigated and impinged upon by the fact that we're living in this very real world with all of the challenges and changes that it represents. Jesus identifies himself, as in every other message, here, interestingly, as the Son of God, the only place in the whole book that I've been able to find the phrase.

You can check for your homework if you're that kind of person. Jesus says, I am the Son of God. My eyes are like the blazing fire. Nobody can escape my gaze. My feet are burnished bronze. I am powerful. I am able to come and crush to powder all who stand against me. Now he says, let me give you your report card, verse 19. I know your deeds, the courses that you've taken, love, faith, service, perseverance. I want you to know that I'm giving you an A in every course.

Not only that, I want to add to your report card this P.S., this added commendation, so that others may know when you take this home for others to see that you're now working harder than when you began the course. And so there were signs among them of definite, clear and wonderful progress. But verse 20, we've grown used to coming to this, and sadly, here we are again. But why would we be surprised? Because if you think about Jesus taking the lid off our local churches and finding things that he can say that are commendatory, no matter how long the list might be or how long we may imagine it to be, it would only be a relatively short period of time before he introduced the word nevertheless, however, but, or yet.

And he would have to lay his finger on the things that we are confronting here. I trust in none of our circumstances the particular issues that we see here in Thyatira. All of the qualities, all of the areas in which they have received an A have now been marred by one thing, by moral compromise. Among all these lovely flowers of love and faith and service and perseverance, a poisonous weed has been allowed to establish a base, and it has begun to wrap itself around absolutely everything. Unlike Ephesus, where you will recall they had no toleration at all for wicked men, verse 2 of chapter 2, Thyatira apparently was prepared to pussy-food around with idolatry and with immorality. And the leader of this clan was none other than a woman designated Jezebel, who had strong ties back to a thousand years before her existence in her model for activity, if you like, the Jezebel of King Ahab, who was involved in disastrous activities of which you can read in 1 and 2 Kings, again, for your homework.

Let me get you started. When you get back there, you will discover that she contaminated Israel with a system of thought that divorced religion from morality, that divorced belief from behavior. And she suggested to the people of her time that it was okay to live with that dichotomy.

Indeed, that was really the way ahead. They could still maintain spiritual progress, despite the fact that they were embracing this dreadful immorality. Ahab, you will find when you do your homework, had neither the moral backbone nor the stamina to stand against her. And here in Thyatira, nothing much was different. This woman claimed to speak with inspired authority.

They always do. What this woman in Thyatira was saying is this, that you can indulge in immorality while still maintaining your spiritual life, and it won't damage your souls, which obviously was a welcome message to those who wanted somehow or another to live a compromised life. The guilds were all over the place in Thyatira, more discovered archaeologically than in other cities, even of a larger size. These guilds operated apparently a bit like the Masonic Lodge. And you had to be initiated into certain things if you were going to be able to trade and do business. The tragedy of it was that their association meetings were directly tied to idolatry and to the dreadful, licentious immorality that was part of it.

It was apparently impossible to be involved in this way without somehow or another being contaminated by this influence. And so the average young man setting out in business, trying to figure out where his lines of demarcation lie, where he is able to go, and with whom he is able to associate, thus holding to the testimony of Christ, holding firm to his word. It's just the same issues that confront men and women today.

The exact same issues that involve men. In the golf club, I participate as a relatively normal man and listen to the conversation across the other side of the lockers as they come to an end. Some of the most influential and financially well-heeled businessmen talking about some of the worst rubbish you ever heard in your life and preparing to spend the evening apart from all that represents moral fortitude and rectitude and that which would be pleasing to their children. And here comes the young Christian businessman into the middle of this, wanting to get on and wanting to make progress and finding himself sucked into this vortex. Are you prepared to stand? See how important it is that we pray for one another in our fellowships and that we have prayer partners and we have comrades in the faith and we have those who are standing with us and undergirding us and calling us and saying, How did it go, and how will it go, and how can I help you?

Because the downward pull of this kind of thing is real. Sin, says Poitras of Westminster Seminary, can always come up with excuses to do what it wants, to do what is convenient, to do what is comfortable. And the Christians of Thyatira either had a very poor conscience or they had a very feeble courage, but they were as weak and spineless towards the new Jezebel as they have had been to the old, as you'll find when you do your homework. Now, one doesn't have to search hard to recognize that already in these days, we are confronted again and again and again by the fact that spiritual maturity and effectiveness and the idolatry which worships self and gods that are no gods and the immorality that accompanies it do not go hand in hand. The devil, when you think about it, two thousand years on, really has no more bullets in his gun. He is still plying the same message. He is still sowing the same poisonous weeds in the hearts and minds of people, suggesting to us that we don't have to take seriously all these things that the Bible says about moral purity. That's the kind of stuff that you get from legalists, we hear people say.

You don't have to do that. Listen, my dear friends, the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. Titus 2 11. It teaches us to say no to ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age while we wait for the blessed hope, the glorious appearing of our God and Savior Jesus Christ. The grace of God that has appeared to us in Jesus is a teaching grace. It is an empowering grace. It is a law-abiding, law-framed grace. Don't fall foul of the nonsense that tells you that once you come to Christ, He sets you free to do whatever you feel.

No, He doesn't. He sets you free to do exactly what He demands. Now, in verses 21 to 23, and I'll give you the outline of this and we're done, He provides a word of judgment. The word of judgment, despite the fact that Jezebel has been given time and opportunity to repent—we don't know exactly how that has happened, but we take it as absolutely clear that she had the opportunity to repent—the word is, at the end of verse 21, she doesn't want to repent. She shows contempt for the kindness and tolerance of God. And so verse 22 is a staggering, dreadful, awesome verse.

The punishment is made to fit the crime. He says, you have profaned the bed of love, so you will be pinned to a bed of sickness. Apparently, Jezebel, you and your followers like to spend a lot of time in bed, good, because you're going to. And it won't be any fun at all. You say, well, that is dramatic.

It is. It's concurrent with what we find Paul saying to the Corinthians concerning the immorality that impacted the Corinthian believers. Some of you, he said, are weak, and some are ill, and some of you have died. What a staggering thing to say, that your children, I will strike dead. We recoil from that. Is this expressive of her actual physical children?

I think probably not. I think that your children is synonymous with those who commit adultery with her. In other words, your team, the product of your own spiritual adultery, the children of your evil practices, those who share your defiant commitment to go on your own way and resist every evidence of God's kindness and goodness to you, those who have so unreservedly embraced this antinomian doctrine, which has been given to them by their spiritual mother. Now, this is right in accord with the impact that took place on the church. It says that then the churches will wake up. He says, if they won't listen to my word as I bring it to them, then I'm sure they will be awakened by the drama of this judgment.

You remember Ananias and Sapphira, and how that made a staggering impact on the church there in Acts chapter 5. A word of judgment, and then a word of encouragement. Look at verse 24. Now I say to the rest of you, not everyone in Thyatira had gone down Jezebel's road. They had resisted the temptation to get sucked into the vortex of Satan's so-called deep secrets. Let me tell you, every time somebody wants to take you aside, especially if you're a young person with a zeal for God, they want to take you aside and tell you, you know, I can take you into the deep things. This is a nice place, and I know you've been enjoying coming here and so on, but if you would just listen to me, I can take you into the deep places. Be careful, lest the deep place they're taking you is the cavern of Satan's evil domain. Now, the encouragement is that when they came to them and they said, Come on, we can take you into the deep secrets, they decided that they weren't going to dance with the devil in the pale moonlight.

And he encourages them. He says, I'm not going to ask you to do anything else other than simply to hold on to what you have. Verse 25, only hold on to what you have until I come.

That's a cue for a song with a refrain, hold on to what you've got. Leave that aside. But what do we have? What did they have?

They had the life that was truly life. You see, the great danger in resisting immorality is that we introduce into our thinking and perhaps into our practices and then offer it to those who come behind us some form of weird asceticism. So the extreme of immorality is met by the extreme of asceticism.

That's not where we're supposed to go. There's no new burden that is being placed on us, no new rules and regulations, no preparedness to listen to those who come to us, suggesting that they would forbid marriage and so on. Because the marriage bed is a wonderful place and it is undefiled. And the gift of sex, along with the gifts that God has given us in life, are given as all things richly to enjoy when we take them at the right time and in the right proportion.

You remember in Screwtape letters, Screwtape sends one of them and he says, what we need to do is to get our enemy to take the good gifts that our enemy has given to them at the wrong time and in the wrong quantity. And the answer to that is not to take the gifts at all, but it is to take them and to use them as God has provided them. Therefore, we have to be able to lead the world when it comes to the issue of enjoyment. We are to lead the world when it comes to the matter of contentment. We are to be able to speak with great clarity and power when it comes to the issues of sexual purity before marriage and fidelity within marriage. But to the degree that we are prepared to tolerate this Jezebel within our minds or within our actions or within our fellowships, our voice of commanding power is totally silenced.

And that's the issue. So be encouraged, even though you feel you're the last voice, even though you feel you're the last virgin in your university, even though you feel you're the last guy that's going to stay true to his wife when everybody finds some secretary whose body has not yet been ravaged by 50 years of gravity. When you feel yourself tempted, then get on your bike and get up the street like Joseph. Run out of the house. Leave your kilt behind.

Leave whatever you've got on behind. Get up and out the road. Deal with it immediately. Deal with it ruthlessly. Deal with it consistently.

Deal with it unequivocally. For we are marginalized and neutralized by the impurity of our own sordid, sullied Christian testimony. And that is what makes this message so powerful, that Christ who comes in judgment comes also in encouragement. I know where you live. I know the pressures that you have.

I know the temptations that you feel. You may feel that no one understands you but standing somewhere in the shadows, you'll find Jesus, because He's the only one who cares and understands and standing somewhere in the shadows, you will find Him and you'll know Him by the nail prints in His hands. Don't let anybody lay upon you the burdens that the Pharisees gave.

Just go with the royal law of God. Keep your eyes on the top and walk the striding edge. A word of judgment, a word of encouragement, and finally, a word of promise.

Look there, just in a phrase. To those who overcome, who do so by doing his will to the end, you will notice the ground of our salvation is the atoning work of Christ. The evidence of our salvation is our continuance.

The perseverance of the saints is really the perseverance of God, who perseveres with us, thereby enabling us to continue to the end, He bringing to completion the work which He has begun. To them who overcomes, I will give authority over the nations. What an amazing—can you imagine that being read out in the congregation in Thyatira? These little people are sitting there, woolen merchants and leather workers, and their fingers all full of needles and big lumps and stuff, and sitting, holding his wife's hand and wrapping his son over the back of the head, trying to keep control over the operation, the normal kind of Sunday experience, wondering if he's going to have enough to make ends meet, wondering if he can continue to function despite all of the challenges of the guilds that are represented by all of this immorality and idolatry, thinking to himself, you know, I am beleaguered and hopeless and helpless, and the word is read out. And if you continue and you are an overcomer, you will rule the nations. It's Psalm 2, ask of me and I will give the nations for your inheritance. Those who have died with Christ will also reign with Him, and I will also give Him the Morning Star. What is that?

Well, it's not a newspaper, I can tell you that for sure. And you can get a PhD finding out what it is. I don't think we need to go further than staying in the book of Revelation. Jesus describes Himself as the Bright and Morning Star in Revelation 22, 16.

After all, what more could He save for us in heaven than Himself? I mean, the older you get, what do you want for your birthday? My wife is bugging me all the time. What do you want for your birthday? I said, I don't know. I said, nothing. I don't know. A book. She said a book. A book.

Are you crazy? I said, no, I like books. She said, well, I know.

And so we have this big dialogue going on, and eventually I hit on it. She said, give me a picture of you and each of my children. She said, that's it?

I said, that's it. Really on earth, there's nothing I desire more than you, after Christ. And in heaven, He'll be all our gaze.

When Cousins, the wife of the Presbyterian minister, who was a colleague of Samuel Rutherford, took Rutherford's memoirs and wrote a big long poem, which became a five stanza hymn, she made this point with clarity, a little bit Victoriana, a wee bit archaic, slightly sentimental, but good, and this is the end. You remember she wrote, thinking of the idea of being given the Morning Star, being given Christ Himself, she says, the bright eye is not her garment, but her dear bridegroom's face. And I will not gaze on glory, but on the King of grace, not on the crown he giveth, but on his nail-pierced hand. For the Lamb is all the glory in Immanuel's land. And our journey along the way, under the vision of the exalted Christ, is to get us ready for the park, when he comes over and slips as a wee white stone, and whispers our new name in our ears, takes our hand and walks off down one of those big golden avenues with us. Do not be weary in well-doing.

Let's keep on, let's keep clean, let's keep watching, let's keep helping each other. It is impossible for spiritual maturity and effective Christian living to go hand in hand with self-idolatry and immorality. You're listening to Truth for Life with Alistair Begg.

Alistair will be back in just a minute to close today's program. In order to persevere in our faith, we have to deal ruthlessly with temptation, as Alistair just taught. And to do that, we need to be able to recognize false teaching. That's why it's our pattern at Truth for Life to teach the Bible verse by verse. We trust when God's word is faithfully proclaimed, God's Spirit will work through this teaching to convert unbelievers, to deepen the relationship between Jesus and those who already believe, and to strengthen local churches.

When you donate to Truth for Life, that's the mission you're supporting. Now, in addition to the daily teaching you hear on Truth for Life, we also recommend books to you to help you and your family grow in your faith. And today we're recommending a book called Mere Evangelism, 10 Insights from C.S. Lewis to help you share your faith. I think most of us feel inadequate when it comes to the task of evangelism. Well, this is a book that helps equip us to talk about our faith with confidence. You can request the book Mere Evangelism when you make a donation of any amount.

Click the image you see on the mobile app or visit us online at truthforlife.org slash donate. Now, here's Alistair to close with prayer. Father, in a multitude of words, we're fearful.

Even as I hear my own voice, it unsettles in so many ways. I pray that because you love to honor above all things your name and your word, that you will bring your word home to our hearts and minds with clarity, with conviction, with judgment, warning, encouragement, everything that is necessary in order that we might become the people that you desire for us to be. For we pray in the strong and powerful name of Jesus. Amen. I'm Bob Lapine. Thanks for listening. Tomorrow we'll find out how God produces usefulness out of weakness and how he brings riches out of poverty. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.