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Medical Lake Community Church
What would Jesus say if He evaluated our church today? In the book of Revelation, the first letter to the seven churches reveals a congregation that excelled in hard work, sound teaching, and rejecting false teachers, but still received a serious warning. Their strengths were real, but something essential had faded, and the consequences were severe enough that Jesus threatened to reject them entirely. Does His dire warning describe us, and will we heed His reproof before it’s too late?

📝 Study Notes, Scripture List, Transcript, and more: https://medicallake.church/sermons/our-performance-evaluation

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Transcript
00:00Have you ever had a job evaluation or a performance report, as I've said?
00:04I think we probably all had, one time or another, a performance report, a job evaluation.
00:09Hopefully, they were not like one of these.
00:13Ross Kober talked about these are true quotes from personal evaluations of employees in
00:19a large corporation.
00:21Granted, true quotes.
00:23First, since my last report, this employee has reached rock bottom and has started to
00:28dig deeper.
00:30Works well when under constraints, constant supervision, and cornered like a rat in a
00:36trap.
00:36These are real evaluations.
00:39He sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them.
00:45This employee is depriving a village somewhere of an idiot.
00:48That's a tough one.
00:49Yeah, that's a tough one.
00:50Okay.
00:51Now, these are actual evaluations.
00:54This employee should go far, and the sooner he starts, the better.
00:59If you give him a penny for his, if you gave him a penny for his thoughts, you get change.
01:04And then he brings a lot of joy whenever he leaves the room.
01:07These are personal evaluations.
01:10A job evaluation is supposed to let you know how well you were doing in a job, right?
01:14Someone on the outside is evaluating your work and then giving you some sort of report.
01:19I mean, we understand a job evaluation.
01:21But the question for us this morning, if someone were on the outside and was given an evaluation
01:27of how well Medical Lake Community Church is doing what God has asked us to do, what kind
01:31of an evaluation would we get?
01:35In the text today, we're beginning a series about evaluations.
01:39There are seven churches that are listed in the Revelation.
01:41We're not going to go through the whole book of the Revelation.
01:43We're going to look at the seven churches of the Revelation.
01:45And Jesus is given a personal evaluation of each church.
01:49So, we're going to look at these churches.
01:51He's evaluating these.
01:53These seven churches represent churches throughout church history.
01:57They're characteristic of churches you'll see throughout all time.
02:01Churches that exhibit characteristics in one form or another, you'll find throughout all
02:06church history in these seven churches right here.
02:08In the next few weeks, we're about to have an evaluation by Jesus Christ himself of Medical
02:15Lake Community Church.
02:17So, we want to take it seriously.
02:18We want to look at this and say, what is Jesus saying about the church?
02:21And there's seven of them listed there.
02:22And so, we're going to say, are we doing the good things that he's praising the church about?
02:26Or are we doing the things he condemned the church about?
02:29I mean, we ought to evaluate where we are since God has placed us here in Medical Lake to
02:34be a witness and a light to this community.
02:37So, this next few weeks about evaluation, we must have an ear to hear what the Spirit is
02:42saying to Medical Lake Community Church.
02:45So, in the Revelation, look to me with chapter two, as we're going to begin chapter two, verse
02:49one, when we get there.
02:51So, what we're going to see in the first church, Ephesus, and this is one we've probably most
02:56common.
02:56Once we get past Ephesus, people kind of forget the order of the churches and forget.
02:59Ephesus is pretty well known.
03:01So, we're going to look at something that you're probably familiar with.
03:04We're going to see here that faithful orthodoxy must be united with love for God and fellow
03:09believers.
03:10It's not enough to be faithful in the orthodox, but love must be prominent within the church
03:14body as well.
03:16It's important.
03:18Orthodoxy is easier than love.
03:20I can hold a value in my mind, the orthodox value, and still choose not to love you.
03:26I mean, orthodoxy is easier.
03:28Loving is harder.
03:28You know why?
03:29Because people are difficult.
03:31It's hard to love sometimes.
03:34It's easier just to be orthodox in our teaching and not love.
03:38So, the churches in the Revelation, as I mentioned, are seven churches that represent characteristics
03:42of all churches throughout all church history.
03:46The representation, so he's going to evaluate these churches, good qualities he commends
03:51and bad qualities he condemns, Jesus that is.
03:55So, here is our self-evaluation today with the church of Ephesus.
04:00So, there's not many verses, just seven.
04:02So, if Revelation chapter two, hopefully you're already there.
04:04We're just going to kind of set the stage and walk through it.
04:07So, we're going to look at verses basically almost individual, not quite, but individual.
04:11So, the first section is, where is this particular letter going to?
04:17What's a destination here?
04:19Look at verse number one.
04:20To the angel of the church in Ephesus write, the words of him who holds the seven stars in
04:27his right hand who walks among the seven golden lampstands.
04:30So, this is designated for the church in Ephesus.
04:34So, it's to go to them.
04:35They're to hear this.
04:36They're to read this.
04:37Now, you'll notice in Ephesus, Patmos is where John finds himself as he's writing the
04:42Revelation, as Jesus gives him the Revelation.
04:44The first church one is Ephesus.
04:46And you kind of see it goes into a clockwise pattern, one, two, three, four, five, six,
04:50seven.
04:51You can see how they kind of go.
04:52So, we're on the first one.
04:53It's about 60 miles from Patmos.
04:55If a person who is delivering these letters left, he would go and deliver them along that
05:01line right there.
05:03So, John was in Ephesus when he was arrested by the emperor domination, probably around
05:0895, 96 A.D. toward the end, almost 100 A.D.
05:12And you'll notice that as we go through these, in the introduction of each one of the churches,
05:16there's a characteristic of the one who is evaluating in each of the seven churches.
05:21There's a characteristic there.
05:22You'll see it.
05:22The one who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks among the seven golden candlesticks.
05:29You say, well, where's that designation?
05:30Who is this one we're talking about?
05:32Well, go back to chapter one.
05:34Go back to chapter one.
05:35Who's this one we're talking about that holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks
05:38among the seven golden lampstands.
05:41If you look in verse number 12 of chapter one, this is the one.
05:44So, John is on the Isle of Patmos.
05:46So, then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me.
05:50And on turning, I saw seven golden lampstands.
05:53And in the midst of the seven lampstands, the lampstand was one like the Son of Man, clothed at
05:57the long road with a golden sash around his chest.
06:00The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow.
06:04His eyes were like a flame of fire, and his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace.
06:10And his voice was like the roar of many waters.
06:13In his right hand, he held seven stars, and from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword,
06:17and his face was like the sun shining in full strength.
06:21And John's reaction in verse 17,
06:23When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead.
06:26I would imagine that would be a shocker.
06:29But he laid his right hand on me, saying,
06:31Fear not, I am the first and the last and the living one.
06:35I died, and behold, I am alive forevermore.
06:38I have the keys of death and Hades.
06:40Write there for the things that you have seen,
06:43those that are, and those that are to take place after this.
06:46As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand,
06:49the seven golden lampstand, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches,
06:53and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.
06:56So when you hear lampstand, think church.
06:58When you hear angel, think about a representation of the church.
07:02So here's the one who is holding the seven stars, the angels in his right hand,
07:06and is walking in the midst of the church.
07:08It is a resurrected, exalted Christ.
07:12It comes from him.
07:14He's the one who knows his churches completely.
07:16He knows us so well.
07:18He has omniscience.
07:19He knows all things.
07:20He knows his churches.
07:21He can make a proper evaluation of his churches.
07:26So it says here, the angel holds the seven stars, the angels,
07:30the angels, or the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches.
07:33You say, well, is there an angel over this church?
07:36Well, the word angel is used at other places in the New Testament for messenger.
07:40Look with me, look with me in Matthew 11, 10.
07:43Same word.
07:44This is he of whom it is written,
07:45and behold, I send my messenger, and in that text in Greek,
07:48it would be angel before your face, who will prepare your way before you.
07:52So the idea is that the angel is a messenger.
07:55That would be the elder or the pastor,
07:57the person that's speaking for God to the church,
08:01the representative.
08:03And Christ holds the pastors of his churches in his right hand.
08:07Do you understand what that means?
08:08He holds me and us elders in his right hand to guide us to lead this church.
08:16We're in his hand.
08:17He's not let us go.
08:18He's not saying, well, you just go do your own thing.
08:20No, he's got us in his hand holding us to guide his church.
08:25The seven churches of the seven lampstands.
08:28Here in verse one, we see Jesus walking in the midst of the church at Ephesus.
08:32That's any church that belongs to him.
08:34It's not just Ephesus, not just medical aid commission.
08:35Any church that belongs to Jesus, he's walking in the midst of it.
08:38And you say, well, are there churches that don't belong to Jesus?
08:42Yeah.
08:42Yeah, there are.
08:44There are a lot of churches that don't belong to Jesus.
08:47But the ones that he belonged to him, he's walking in the midst.
08:50It's Jesus in the midst of his churches, he is concerned about and caring for his people.
08:55He's overseeing them.
08:56He's making, he's a good shepherd, the chief shepherd.
09:00He's the one that cares for his people.
09:02So if you think about this, this letter was written, like I said, about 90, about 98 AD,
09:08right around there.
09:09At this point, the church in Ephesus, which was founded by Paul early on in his ministry,
09:15we have second generation Christians at this point.
09:19So somehow, almost like the children of Israel and the judges, when that generation that
09:24knew the Lord and Joshua died, the next generation forgot about God.
09:29And I'm not saying they forgot about God, but maybe they forgot about all the things that
09:32their parents experienced as first generation Christians.
09:35And now it's just, ho-hum.
09:36It just is.
09:38This is the way we always do it.
09:39They don't have any thought into it at all.
09:41It's just, they're going along with emotions.
09:43Happens with second generation Christians.
09:46Christians, we cannot expect the next generation of Christians to simply get it.
09:50We have to disciple them.
09:52We have to train them so that they can carry on the mission after we're gone.
09:58So Jesus knows what's going on in his church.
10:00Look at verses two and three.
10:22So he's commending them.
10:26There's some good things that they're doing here.
10:28I know Jesus knows the church at Ephesus better than they know themselves.
10:33They can take this evaluation and say, yes, this is true.
10:36This really is our state.
10:38This is the state of our hearts in this church right now.
10:42He has absolute knowledge of every church that belongs to him.
10:46Every church that belongs to him.
10:48That's us too.
10:49He knows.
10:50He knows all of our hearts in here.
10:52He knows exactly where we're at.
10:53He knows our desires.
10:54He knows the direction we're going with our life.
10:56He knows everything.
10:58It's all knowledge.
10:59He knows their works, their toils, their patient endurance, and they cannot bear with wicked people.
11:04He gets that.
11:05They were labeling to the point of weariness.
11:08In other words, they were working really hard to the point of being weary.
11:13And then there are these wicked people, these evil people that were calling themselves apostles, but they weren't apostles.
11:20It's very possible that John at this time is the last living of the 12 apostles.
11:25All of the other ones are dead.
11:26This is like 98 AD.
11:27The rest of them are all dead.
11:28He's the last living of the 12 apostles.
11:31And the word apostle, though, that is used here is not in the sense of the 12.
11:35Those that were with Jesus from the baptism of John and saw his resurrection and ascension.
11:39That's the 12.
11:40So, it's a little bit different.
11:42You remember that Barnabas was called an apostle.
11:45And he was a missionary sent out by the church of Antioch to carry the gospel message around.
11:50He's also called an apostle in Acts 14.
11:53But when the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard of it, they tore their garments and rushed out into the crowd
11:58crying out.
11:58So, it is a representation of a church sent out with a message, an apostle, a messenger, to give a
12:04message to the church on behalf of God, this idea.
12:09They're traveling missionaries, teachers, claiming to represent some church body somewhere.
12:14In 2 John, John talks about these people.
12:18He said,
12:45It says,
12:53These people were traveling around, claiming to have a message of God that were not sent by God.
13:01They came from the outside, claiming to have a word of the Lord, but God didn't send them.
13:07For they were false prophets, false messenger.
13:11Their messenger did not abide in the teaching.
13:13In other words, that which has been revealed.
13:14Of course, they had the Old Testament at that time and some of the early letters on.
13:18Actually, most of the letters are written by this point.
13:21They came from the outside.
13:23They caused problems within the church, saying,
13:26I have a word of the Lord.
13:27Listen to me.
13:30But that message didn't abide by what was written in the text or what the apostles taught.
13:35It was a message contrary to what that was already been delivered.
13:38That faith once for all delivered to the saints.
13:42Today in churches, there are people that are claiming to have a word from God, a word of the Lord.
13:46And you need to listen, but they're not abiding in the teachings of Christ.
13:49So what are we supposed to do with stuff like that?
13:52Someone claims to have a word of the Lord.
13:53How do we evaluate?
13:55Should we evaluate that?
13:57Second Peter says this, warning us.
14:00But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you,
14:06who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the master who bought them,
14:11bringing upon themselves swift destruction.
14:14He even warned us.
14:15People are going to come in claiming to have a message from God that doesn't abide by the teaching of
14:19Christ.
14:19And what are we supposed to do with something like that?
14:22They tested these apostles.
14:24And that testing had took place in the past at some point.
14:26We're not sure when, but they'd already done that.
14:28They'd already did the testing part.
14:30But are we supposed to do stuff like that?
14:32I mean, are we supposed to test the messages that people claim to have from God?
14:37I say, yes.
14:38And actually, the Bible tells us yes.
14:401 John 4.1.
14:42Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they're from God.
14:47For many false prophets have gone out into the world.
14:50And in 1 Thessalonians 5, do not despise prophecies, but test everything.
14:56Hold fast, that was just good.
14:58Someone claims to speak a word.
14:59Even I'm claiming to speak God's word today.
15:03Test me as well.
15:05Evaluate me according to this revealed word right here.
15:08That's how we do it.
15:10Just because someone claims I have a word from the Lord does not mean that God sent them or that
15:14God is speaking through them.
15:15We must test their message to see if it aligns itself with the teaching of Christ, always.
15:20And in testing these false apostles, imagine now, you've got these false apostles in the church of Ephesus.
15:26They're gaining a hearing, all right?
15:28Because they got a message.
15:30It's interesting.
15:31They're gaining a hearing.
15:31All of a sudden, they test them.
15:33They throw out these false apostles.
15:35What happened to all the people that were on their side in the church?
15:39I bet you they got their feelings hurt.
15:42How could you kick out our teachers?
15:44How could you possibly do that?
15:46And you could see that this schism could happen in a church like that.
15:51Their team lost.
15:54Those false teachers got kicked out.
15:56And that in itself could cause division.
15:59I'm not saying, I don't know.
16:00However, that would cause division.
16:02My team lost.
16:04The other team won.
16:05I'm not happy about that.
16:09We read about the Nicolaitans here later.
16:11These are not these wicked people because the Nicolaitans was still a constant threat to them.
16:16The false teachers that have already been judged.
16:19So, they're enduring patiently.
16:21They're doing it every day.
16:23They're bearing up.
16:24They've done it all their life.
16:25Bearing up.
16:25They've not grown weary, which is a perfect, which means they've not grown weary.
16:29And they're still not weary in doing stuff.
16:32Doing stuff.
16:34So, after praising them for what they were doing right, Jesus rebukes them for what they were doing wrong.
16:39Look at verse number four.
16:42But I have this against you.
16:45Here's the Lord of the church himself.
16:47The one who walks in the midst of the churches, holds the leaders of the church in his right hand,
16:52who knows everything about us.
16:54I have this against you.
16:56That you have abandoned the love you had at first.
17:00All this great stuff listed about them in this verse number four is, I have this against you.
17:06You have forgotten something that is extremely important.
17:11Their warm love chilled to a lifeless orthodoxy.
17:16They were very strong on teaching, but they had abandoned love.
17:21Actually, it's easier to be orthodox because I don't have to actually serve you or care for you or be
17:26involved in your life.
17:27I don't have to love you at all.
17:28It's easy to be orthodox.
17:30It's harder to love.
17:33It's important what we do for God, yes, but it's also important why we do it.
17:37Why we do it.
17:39So, this verse has always perplexed people.
17:41And if you go to 100 commentaries, they have different ideas of what, what does it mean that they abandoned
17:47the love that they had at first?
17:49What does that mean?
17:50It doesn't say love of God and it doesn't say love of other believers.
17:54But those are the two basic views.
17:55It's either they've abandoned their love for God or they've abandoned their love for believers.
18:00Well, let me give you a third option.
18:02How about if they abandoned their love for God and abandoned their love for other believers at the same time?
18:10It's really both.
18:12We cannot love God if we don't love our brother.
18:171 John 4 says this,
18:19If anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he's a liar.
18:23For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.
18:28We can't claim to love God if we don't love our brothers.
18:30We can't.
18:31We're lying.
18:34It's a weird statement.
18:35It's actually in the Greek, it's written like,
18:36The love of you, the first abandoned.
18:39Okay, that's Greek and it's not a good English sentence.
18:42But it's the love of you, your love, the first they abandon, is the idea.
18:48So what does it mean to abandon the love, the first love that they have?
18:52Well, I was pondering this as I was going through the text.
18:54Now, this is one of those coincidences that God does all the time.
18:57It's not a coincidence.
18:58You've got my coincidence.
18:59I should have air quotes up there.
19:00It's not a coincidence.
19:01So I'm studying this and I've got all my exegesis done.
19:04And I come later on, about Wednesday, I think, of the week.
19:08And I'm in my devotions.
19:10And I'm constantly, what does it mean to love God and to love our fellow brother?
19:14What does that look like?
19:15So I'm reading in 1 John.
19:18And all of a sudden, this word love just started popping up all over the place.
19:23And I thought, what?
19:25What is that?
19:26And I counted, 46 times in 1 John, the word love is used.
19:3046 times, just five chapters.
19:32It's just full of this idea of love.
19:39John wrote 1 John.
19:41Got it?
19:41John, 1 John, okay.
19:43It's not a trick quiz.
19:45John wrote 1 John.
19:46He wrote it about 88 AD.
19:48So about 10 years or seven years, eight years before he wrote the Revelation.
19:53And he wrote 1 John from Ephesus.
19:59Now, I'm not claiming this letter of 1 John is directed to the church at Ephesus.
20:02I'm not claiming that whatsoever.
20:04However, I am claiming as soon as Jesus started talking about them losing their first love,
20:08John knew exactly what Jesus was talking about because he had penned 1 John talking about love
20:13for God and love for the brothers.
20:17So let me just quickly go through an overview of 1 John.
20:20I'm not going to spend a lot of time on it.
20:21If you want this stuff, I mean, you could just basically, I'll summarize it at the end.
20:26Let me just tell you what it means to love God and to love your brothers.
20:30So chapter 1 starts about with fellowship with God and other believers through the work of Jesus Christ.
20:35Without love, there can be no fellowship.
20:42So fellowship means we're together, working together.
20:45Divisions mean we're separated.
20:47If there's no fellowship, there's divisions is the idea.
20:52Chapter 2, we're reconciled to God.
20:54He unites us together in Christ.
20:56So not only are we brought back to God, we're brought to God, but we're united together as one another.
21:01So we're together as one body.
21:03We belong to each other.
21:06And hate, of course, is something that pops up in chapter 2 all over.
21:09A strong dislike or aversion towards someone that results in a separation between the one hates and the one who
21:15is hated.
21:17So separation is a result of hating.
21:20So the question is, do we purposely try to separate ourselves from people in this church because we don't like
21:24them?
21:25That's what he's basically asking.
21:28And then he ends the chapter with, the love of the world is compatible, incompatible with the love for God.
21:32If we love the world, we cannot love God.
21:34It's just one or the other.
21:35You can't love the world and love God at the same time.
21:37Now, chapter 3, the Father has given us his love.
21:43Love one another indeed in truth.
21:45So God has given us his love and love is the fruit of the Spirit.
21:48In other words, we do not lack the opportunity or the ability to love each other.
21:55Romans 5 says this,
21:56And hope does not put us to shame because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy
22:01Spirit who has been given to us.
22:03We have the means and ability to love because God has poured his love into our heart.
22:07We can't say, I can't love.
22:08Yes, we can all love.
22:10We can all love.
22:13So practicing that kind of love with each other that looks like helping brothers in need is also in chapter
22:183, Philippians 2,
22:20Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.
22:26Let each of you look not only to his own interests, also to the interests of others.
22:31Chapter 4, we demonstrate our love for other Christians by sacrificially serving them.
22:36Chapter 4, we demonstrate our love for God by loving other Christians.
22:401 John 4, 21,
22:42And this commandment we have from him, whoever loves God must also love his brother.
22:47Chapter 5, chapter 5, we show our love for God by obeying his commandments.
22:521 John 5,
22:53By this we know that we love the children of God when we love God and obey his commandments.
22:58For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments, and his commandments are not burdensome.
23:02How do I demonstrate that I love God?
23:05I keep his word.
23:07I keep his word.
23:09That demonstrates I love God by obeying his commandments.
23:12And they're not burdensome.
23:13They're not burdensome.
23:15And when we love God, we will love his children also.
23:17That's the end of chapter 5.
23:20So, let me see if I can summarize that.
23:22That's on your sheet.
23:22Let me see if I can summarize what does it mean to love God and to love our fellow brother.
23:27Okay.
23:28First thing is this.
23:29We have to walk in the light.
23:31We have to walk in, which means walk in truth.
23:35Reject lies and error and walk in what we know is truth.
23:39Walk in truth.
23:41Second, repent often.
23:43Being a kind of, we have to keep a short list of sins.
23:47So, repent often.
23:48Don't carry them along.
23:49Repent often.
23:51Keep his commandment or keep his word is another way of saying it.
23:55Keep his commandments.
23:56Keep his word.
23:58Walk in the same way of Christ.
24:00How did he walk?
24:01He walked in love.
24:03That's how he loved as he walked.
24:05He walked in love.
24:06Walk the same way as Christ.
24:07Do not love the world.
24:09Reject what the world is offering you.
24:11It cannot.
24:11Why gain the whole world and lose your soul?
24:13Jesus said it doesn't have anything to offer.
24:17And then remember what you were taught from the biblical authors.
24:20Remember the scriptures.
24:21Remember what God has said here.
24:24Abide in God.
24:25That means make your home in him.
24:27That he makes his home in you and you abide in him.
24:31Take up residence.
24:32Keep pure.
24:34Keep pure.
24:35Make sure your life is clean.
24:37Practice what is right.
24:38Do the right thing.
24:39Always do the right thing.
24:40Even when it costs you.
24:42Do the right thing.
24:43Do the right thing.
24:45Self-sacrificial giving to meet the needs of fellow believers.
24:48I have to be involved in your life to care about that.
24:50If I see a need, I only see a need if I'm involved in your life.
24:53I got to be involved in your life to see your needs.
24:56Be discerning with spiritual truths.
24:59Not everything that people claim is a word of the Lord is a word of the Lord.
25:02Make sure we test it by the scriptures.
25:05Always.
25:07Know that you have eternal life.
25:08You say, whoa, that's kind of interesting.
25:09Yes.
25:10No.
25:10You're supposed to know that you have eternal life.
25:11How do we know?
25:12Because the word of God promises us.
25:15All who believe the Lord Jesus Christ, that God has raised him from the dead.
25:19Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, that God has raised him from the dead.
25:21And believe in our heart.
25:23We can be saved.
25:25Know that you're saved.
25:26And lastly, pray for one another.
25:28These are evidences that we love God and we love other people.
25:32That's perhaps what they were not doing.
25:35Maybe that's why John wrote 1 John.
25:37Or at least he says, I recognize the church at Ephesus because this church is behaving just
25:41like that.
25:42So what do we do?
25:43It's time now to remember.
25:45It's time to remember.
25:46Look at verse number five.
25:48Remember, therefore, from where you have fallen.
25:51Repent and do the works you did at first.
25:54If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place unless you repent.
26:00So what are we supposed to do?
26:03Remember that moral and spiritual state you once enjoyed, but now you have abandoned is
26:08what he's saying to the church at Ephesus.
26:10You were in this good spot, but you've abandoned that spot.
26:13Get back to that good spot.
26:14Remember, remember.
26:16He tells us often in the Bible to remember because we forget so often.
26:21Remember.
26:21Remember, it says they were fallen, haven't fallen, which is something that happened in
26:26the past and they're in that state right now.
26:28We're not talking about falling away from grace and losing their salvation.
26:31They've just forgotten their love.
26:34But he told them to remember.
26:35That's a present.
26:36They need to remember every day.
26:38It's actually a command.
26:40Remember.
26:41A church cannot live a loveless existence.
26:44Without love, a church ceases from being Jesus' church.
26:47If we're not loving one another, I'm not sure Jesus is walking in our midst.
26:541 Corinthians.
26:56If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels and have not love, I'm a noisy gong or
27:01a clanging
27:02cymbal.
27:02If I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have
27:06all faith so as to remove mountains but have not love, I am nothing.
27:13Do you realize this unity, this body of believers that we have, we have this connection that's
27:21closer to people that even in your own family who do not know Jesus, we belong to each other.
27:28His body.
27:30Then he gives a very chilling statement.
27:32If you don't repent, I'm going to take your church away.
27:37Does Jesus do that?
27:38Yeah.
27:39He does do that.
27:41He takes, he just lifts, he lifts his presence from the church.
27:46And then the question is, would a church even recognize that Jesus' presence has left them?
27:51If that's the way they're behaving anyway.
27:54A.W. Tozer, author and pastor said, if the Holy Spirit was withdrawn from the church today,
27:5995% of what we do would go on and no one would know the difference.
28:02I hope that's not true.
28:07A Jesus' church can cease to be a Jesus' church.
28:12You understand?
28:13He takes away the lampstand.
28:14It's no longer.
28:16But if they change their course of action, there's not going to be any judgment that will come to them.
28:22Not going to have any judgments that will come to them.
28:25Look at verse number six.
28:27Yet this you have, you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.
28:33So there's something else that they're doing well.
28:35There's something about this group of the Nicolaitans.
28:37We don't really know a lot about them.
28:39We don't know a lot about them.
28:40They were a minority group in the church.
28:42They came maybe from inside or outside.
28:44We're unsure.
28:44But they were in the church at the time.
28:48So these were the enemies on the inside of the church.
28:51They're not outside knocking to get in.
28:52They're inside the church.
28:54Look at Acts chapter 20 up here on the screen.
28:57Paul's talking to the church at Ephesus.
29:00Interesting.
29:02For I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.
29:05Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers
29:10to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.
29:13I know that after my departure, fierce wolves will come in among you from the outside, not sparing the flock.
29:20And from among your own selves, from the inside, will arise men speaking twisted things to draw away the disciples
29:26after them.
29:27Paul told them that was going to happen.
29:28And it did.
29:30It did happen.
29:32These Nicolaitans came from the outside or they're from the inside.
29:35We're not quite sure.
29:36They're there in the church.
29:37We know that.
29:38And they perverted the gospel of grace into a license to sin, basically.
29:44We'll look at more about the Nicolaitans later in some other churches.
29:47Some think that this group of people is the one who brought in the division between the clarity, clergy, and
29:54the laity.
29:54The division in the church, which Jesus never, ever spoke about.
29:58We are one body.
29:59We're all equal.
30:00There's no laity and clergy division whatsoever.
30:03We're all one at the foot of the cross.
30:05Maybe that's what they, we're not sure.
30:07I can't confirm that one.
30:08But we know it's the practice of the Nicolaitans that they hate, that's to be hated, not the people, but
30:13the practices.
30:15Okay, now they need to listen to God.
30:17Verse number seven.
30:18He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
30:22To the one who conquers, I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise
30:27of God.
30:29He that has an ear is repeated in all seven of the churches.
30:32In other words, if we have ears as a church, we need to listen.
30:36We need to pay attention to what the Spirit is saying.
30:38And today, you and I need to pay attention.
30:40What is the Spirit saying to Medical Aid Community Church?
30:42Are we loving God and loving other people?
30:45I think our orthodoxy is pretty sound.
30:47I think we stay to the Word of God.
30:49However, are we loving each other?
30:51Are we loving God?
30:53We have a self-evaluation to take place.
30:57He that has an ear, listen.
30:59It's not just for the Ephesian Christians.
31:01It's for Christians of all times.
31:03Any church can do this.
31:06And he who overcomes, the overcoming one, I like the statement, can eat from the tree of life.
31:10You remember the story in the Garden of Eden?
31:12Adam and Eve were rebelled against God and disobeyed him, ate of the fruit that was forbidden to them.
31:18God exiles them out of the garden.
31:20And what's he do?
31:21He places a cherubim in front of them with a sword, not allowing people to come into the...
31:25So he exiles them so they don't eat from the tree of life.
31:29So now what's God offering us?
31:31Tree of life.
31:34That which mankind was exiled from, he says,
31:36Now you believers, because you've been washed in my blood, I will give you access to this tree.
31:43To eat of the tree of life is to enjoy all that the life of the world to come has
31:48in store for redeemed humanity.
31:51And the one who overcomes, it's not a doubt.
31:54Oh, maybe, maybe not.
31:55No, no, no.
31:55It's actually the overcoming one.
31:57It's a participle.
31:58It means you will overcome.
32:00If you're in Christ Jesus, you will overcome.
32:04God has made us overcomers.
32:061 John 5.
32:08For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world.
32:11And this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith.
32:15Who is it that overcomes the world?
32:16Except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.
32:19We are already overcomers in Christ.
32:21He promises that we will have access to the tree of life, that which mankind was exiled from in the
32:26garden.
32:27Now, through Christ, we have access.
32:31The paradise of God is the joy and blessing of being in the eternal presence of God throughout the eternal
32:38ages.
32:41Here's what we take away.
32:43This is what the church, us, and Ephesus needs to evaluate.
32:49Maintain faithful orthodoxy, but it must be seasoned with love.
32:53We cannot abandon love.
32:56We must love God and we must love each other.
32:58We must, not only is it a command to do that, it is something that benefits all when we love
33:04each other.
33:07Two, love God and other believers.
33:09Say, okay, I think I kind of got how I'm supposed to do that now because 1 John kind of
33:13told me so.
33:13But love God and other believers.
33:15Purpose in your heart.
33:18And the last one.
33:19When we get off track in our Christian walk, remember, repent, and return.
33:26Remember, simple three things.
33:28Remember where we fell from, repent, and return back to the walk that we walked before.
33:35How well are we doing?
33:38You evaluate yourself, our church.
33:41And if you think we're doing really poorly, I guess let me know.
33:44I'd like to hear that.
33:44However, I think you guys do love each other.
33:47I do.
33:48I see it all the time.
33:49You serving one another, caring for one another.
33:51I think you do love one another.
33:53However, we must never let love wane.
33:56Never.
33:57It is a characteristic of a church of Jesus is that we love God and we love each other.
34:02Let's pray.
34:03Father, thank you.
34:04Thank you for this first church that we're going to look at and an evaluation that you made of them.
34:09They had so many good things that you said about them.
34:11However, one very important thing that they had forgotten, they had forgotten to love.
34:18They had forgotten that in love, you sent your son into the world, that we may have life.
34:25In love, you sent your son into the world to be the propitiation for our sins, to be the atoning
34:29sacrifice, the appeasement of your wrath against sin.
34:32It was love that did that.
34:34And may we be a people characterized by love.
34:38And may our love grow.
34:40And I know it can.
34:42We are told in the scriptures that love can grow.
34:44It can increase.
34:45May our love for one another and our love for you increase day by day.
34:50For we want to be a church that is both orthodox, but also full of love.
34:55Your love that you've given to our hearts.
34:57We thank you.
34:58We pray in Jesus' name.
34:59Amen.
35:00Would you stand with me, please?
35:03I know that was kind of fast.
35:04Move through 1 John.
35:07But here's what he wants us to know.
35:09Love God and love the brethren.
35:11And the church says, amen.
35:13God bless you.

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