The Seven Churches of RevelationMinta

I was there when Peter Scholtes’ song “They’ll Know We Are Christians by Our Love” permeated evangelical churches in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. Our high school youth group, I can say without exaggeration, could belt this song out when we got going. Which we did nearly every week for a year or more. I was also there when the 2010s got underway with unmasking the hypocrisies of Christian leaders and churches in how they have unlovingly treated people of color, women, and LGBTQ+ people. If the ‘60s and ‘70s helped the church’s witness, the 2010s definitely wounded the church’s witness.

Just like Ephesus.

And just like Ephesus, we will need to reflect on this passage to see if and where we have lost our first love. And then listen to the wisdom of Jesus on what we can do to restore that love.

Colossus Christ and His Commendation

Jesus, the Colossus in the “harbor” of Revelation, speaks to the church in Ephesus as the one who “holds the seven stars in his right hand” and as the one who “walks among the seven golden lampstands” (2:1). Jesus presents himself as the sovereign power over the guardian angels of each church, and Jesus is the one always present among all the churches. He’s here, he’s there, and he’s watching.

By the time John sent this message to Ephesus, the city had experienced two major, and a variety of not-as-major, influences in the early church: the apostle Paul, the apostle John, and perhaps Mary the mother of Jesus, along with Priscilla, Aquila, and Apollos. On top of that, the church went through some difficult times with false teachers according to the Pastoral Epistles. The church was the setting for John’s Gospel and three letters; and today’s passage mentions Nicolaitans at work in Ephesus. The church had experienced challenges to accommodate itself to the ways of Rome, and the church had at times experienced the presence of wealthy Christians. The church had organized church leadership positions, and they were at the forefront of sorting out the ministry of women (for this paragraph, I rely on Paul Trebilco, The Early Christians in Ephesus from Paul to Ignatius).

With that history, Jesus has much good to say about the church in Ephesus (2:2–3). The church at Ephesus, which surely by then was more than one house church, was marked by good works (NIV has “deeds”), their labor (NIV: “hard work”), and their “perseverance.” The NIV’s choice of perseverance for some readers will suggest a Reformation understanding of genuine believers persevering. But John has the notion of resilience in mind. Furthermore, the more perseverance takes on its major theological sense, the less reason for the complaint and correction that follows.

And the Ephesians have resisted “wicked people,” that is, people connected to the church who are corrupted in character and teachings. In several decades of itinerants stopping in to speak and remaining overnight at Ephesus, some came in as “apostles,” and the Ephesians wisely evaluated and discerned their character. Jesus again affirms their resilience in that “they carried the load because of my name and have not become labored” (McKnight, The Second Testament). Overall, the church at Ephesus remained brilliantly orthodox to the gospel and early Christian theology. Jesus will again emphasize their orthodox faithfulness, with different words, in 2:6 in that they have resisted the Nicolaitans. These commendations seem so strong one is surprised by the depth of Jesus’ complaint that follows.

Orthodoxy without love kills because lacking love deconstructs whatever one believes.

Babylon Creep and Correction

The complaint is both simple and penetrating: “You have forsaken the love you had at first” (2:4). The traditional author of Revelation is the apostle John, and he was known eventually as the apostle of love for two reasons. First, his amazing chapter thirteen in his Gospel is where we got the “They’ll Know We Are Christians by Our Love” lyrics, and 1 John, which somehow manages to get the word “love” in seemingly most verses in the entire letter. Love for John begins with a God who is love, with God loving humans, with God sending his Son for our redemption, with humans responding to God’s love by loving God back, and with humans loving one another. John has a theology of love that is nothing less than a cycle of love generating love. Somehow, and we don’t know for sure, that cycle has been broken like a bad link.

What caused the breaking of this link of love? We can surmise that at least in part the pressure of local authorities in Ephesus turned these believers more inward, and stiff-armed them from being able to form into the kind of fellowship of love they previously had. Perhaps fear of persecution set in, perhaps stress over economic hardships had formed in their hearts, and perhaps the pressure to participate in public acts of allegiance to Rome had de-throned the lordship of Christ. We can’t be sure of the details, but we do know the problem John discerned in the churches was Babylon “creep” that was reshaping how the believers lived.

So Jesus offers three steps of correction: (1) to remember how far they have fallen (NIV’s “consider” could be sharpened with “remember”), (2) to turn around, to convert back, and (3) to “do the first works” they had done in an earlier phase of their Christian faith (Rev 2:5). We would be wise not to turn this into some kind of trusty formula for regaining one’s passions and affections in Christ. Yet, the cognitive and the behavioral are combined here in a way that makes sense to many of us even today. Perhaps the Ephesians heard this being read aloud and immediately returned in their imaginations to their early days in the faith and remember what it was like—and then perhaps they returned to those ways.

Consequences

Jesus spells out the consequences for these believers in Ephesus. If they fail to repent, he will “remove your lampstand.” The image could at least suggest that the church will collapse from its role as one of the two or three major churches of the time (Rome, Ephesus, Antioch of Syria). It may also suggest the elimination of the Ephesian church altogether. No one knows for sure. What we do know is that this kind of language grabbed the attention of the believers. If they do remember, turn back, and do the first practices, they will be “victorious” and get to nibble on the fruits of the tree of life in New Jerusalem, the “paradise of God” (cf. 2:7 and 22:2, 14, 19).

Unhealthy churches are exposed by Jesus to his scrutiny, but unhealthy churches are offered the opportunity to repent and return, which leads to victory and blessings.

Questions for Reflection and Application

1. What commendations does Jesus offer the church in Ephesus through John?

2. How does Jesus, through John, criticize the church in Ephesus?

3. What course corrections are the Ephesian Christians told to make?

4. How would you evaluate your love for Jesus?

5. What would you like the Holy Spirit to do in your heart to help you be more loving?