Revelation 2:18-29 (NIV)
18 “To the angel of the church in Thyatira write: These are the words of the Son of God, whose eyes are like blazing fire and whose feet are like burnished bronze. 19 I know your deeds, your love and faith, your service and perseverance, and that you are now doing more than you did at first. 20 Nevertheless, I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophet. By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols. 21 I have given her time to repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling. 22 So I will cast her on a bed of suffering, and I will make those who commit adultery with her suffer intensely, unless they repent of her ways. 23 I will strike her children dead. Then all the churches will know that I am he who searches hearts and minds, and I will repay each of you according to your deeds. 24 Now I say to the rest of you in Thyatira, to you who do not hold to her teaching and have not learned Satan’s so-called deep secrets, ‘I will not impose any other burden on you, 25 except to hold on to what you have until I come.’ 26 To the one who is victorious and does my will to the end, I will give authority over the nations— 27 that one ‘will rule them with an iron scepter and will dash them to pieces like pottery’—just as I have received authority from my Father. 28 I will also give that one the morning star. 29 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
REFERENCES: Psalm 19:1-4, 1 Corinthians 10:16, John 17:15-19, Galatians 5:13, 1 Corinthians 8:12, Daniel 2:44, 7:13-14
Have you ever had to compromise your values for the sake of someone’s comfort? It can be difficult to stand firm in your beliefs and speak truth without coming off as intolerant. Yet Jesus models what it means to be passionately intolerant: to steward the truth in love and fight the enemy’s lies with perseverance.
Compromise tells us it's okay to do the wrong thing for the right reason.
The Jezebel spirit comes from a queen of the same name. In her heyday, Queen Jezebel used her influence to compromise the beliefs and behavior of King Ahab, which then trickled down to the people of Israel. There is a direct parallel regarding the serpent and how he deceived Eve, having her question, “did God really say?” Causing the downfall of humanity. Although the person of Jezebel is long gone, the spirit of her deceptive ways remains, threatening to not only dismantle the congregation of Thyatira, but the Church today.. When we allow ourselves to be corrupted by a “both/and” mentality when it comes to the Gospel and the world, we sustain painful injuries to our souls.
1 Kings 16:30-31 (NIV)
“Ahab son of Omri did more evil in the eyes of the Lord than any of those before him. (31) He not only considered it trivial to commit the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat [gnarly widespread idolatry] but he also married Jezebel daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and began to serve Baal and worship Him.”
As Christians we are called to not compromise who we are to the world around us. It’s easy as humans to relate to this world and love everything about it because we’re in it. Yet, Jesus wants us to have the understanding that though we are in this world we don’t belong to it, we belong to Him. The spirit of compromise or better yet of deceit, lies to us that for the sake of doing good deeds is weighty enough to spare us our sins.
2 Peter 3:8-9 (MSG)
Don’t overlook the obvious here, friends…He is restraining himself on account of you, holding back the End because he doesn’t want anyone lost. He’s giving everyone space and time to change.
The word of God is very clear and specific to our lives. As we study the book of Revelation, we receive this gift of Jesus, our morning star, to learn how to deal with tribulations and be disciples for our generation. There’s no doubt about His word, and as followers of Christ, our lives must be aligned with the Bible and not with the world. We can’t serve God and be bound by the world. We are new in Christ, and what we do with our body and life matters to God. Everything is significant to Jesus. This is the good news: He is a good father, slow to anger and abundant in love, and we must be aware that the world will try to deceive us. Remember that you were bought at a higher price, to be heirs of the Father’s love.
Take some time this week to read the References for this sermon. Write and reflect on areas of compromise in your life and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal His truth for your life.
Last CTA:
This week in your daily prayer and devotion time, identify 3 pressure points in your life and write them down. Challenge yourself to surrender your pressure points to God in prayer each day of the week.
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