Unto the angel of the church of Ephesus write; These things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks;
I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars:
And hast borne, and hast patience, and for my name's sake hast laboured, and hast not fainted.
Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.
Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent.
But this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.
He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God.--Revelation 2:1-7
The message to the church at Ephesus was a “good news - bad news” message. This church was very busy, actively exposing liars and heretics and making everyone aware of the hateful works of the Nicholaitans which the Lord states in His letter to them that He also hates (their deeds). But while they are so busy exposing the false they have lost sight of the most important thing, love.
Just yesterday I was in a conversation with a woman that is extremely busy and tirelessly exposes the “heretics” of today, but it is very obvious that something very important is very lacking in her messages, although I fully admit it is good to be aware of these false teachers and to expose them. I tried to get that across to her but it only caused her to do to me what she complains the followers of these false teachers do to her. Not only that but she accused me and my husband of all sorts of things that are not only damaging, but untrue. I posted the entire conversation between us last night but it is so caustic that I decided against doing so, but pray that the Lord reveals to her that although she is right in exposing the false, she has definitely lost sight of the more important thing. It is glaringly obvious that her passion for Christ, a passion for sharing her love in a way that ignites such a love in others, is missing from her rants.
The Bible warns us that we are to be careful when we correct others because we might fall back into such errors ourselves if we are so boastful. Such was the case with Ephesus. In exposing the terrible sins of others they themselves were guilty of a greater sin. When exposing and correcting others our main hearts desire should still be one of reclamation and restoration. If we cannot reach them with that it should still be our hope that the Lord will one day bring them to repentance, ever mindful that we ourselves were rescued from even greater sins, remaining humble before Christ. This woman showed her lack of humility and even felt emboldened to make untrue accusations to prop up her own errors.
I hope and pray that she, and others like her, realize what they (like Ephesus) are lacking in, and come humbly before the throne making their number one passion to win others to Christ Jesus, which is an even more important work than the continuous pointing out of others faults.
Apologies, I tried about a dozen times to get the typeface of this post to be larger but to no avail.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the link, Lyn, and I sincerely do hope you one day will truly have a heart for others to come to true repentance, which is something ranting and raving never accomplish, only the power of God, which forgave even horrible sinners such as you and I. Take care.
ReplyDeleteDear Susan,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the excellent post! As the apostle Paul writes, even the most eloquent, truthful and well-reasoned speech is no more than a clanging cymbal unless it is spoken in love. Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. My husband likes to quote a saying he learned in the Navy: "When you point a finger at someone, you have 3 more pointing back at you."
Love in Christ,
Laurie
We are all guilty, and even now in our flesh we continue to make mistakes until our mortality is swallowed up in immortality.God have mercy on us for without Him we all deserve hell. Thank you Laurie. :o)
DeleteI want to add that when we talk of the sins of pastors it should break our hearts and that sorrow should be evident in how we speak about it. I know there are many pastors who are putting on a charade, it’s a business to them, they have mansions and yachts and their own private jet planes, and rub elbows with popes and kings and presidents, but they have their reward, they are building their mansions on dust that will fade away with time. They only have this short time of their mortality and then “poof” it’s gone. Jesus cried over the hard heartedness of Jerusalem, should we not also have broken hearts that so many choose this empty life over and above the riches of God’s glory, and prefer to hear the empty words of false teachers over the fullness of the truth of God’s word to us? We cannot change them, but if God in His mercy desires to do it, He will!! Hallelujah!! Our prayers and our hearts need to be turned to Him and not on the filth, the false, and the temporary.
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