The seven churches of Revelation

by lovelylil 15 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  lovelylil

  Hi all, I gave some information on another thread about one belief of the church of the end times but, this got me to look again at the letters to the 7 churches in Revelation and see if I can organize my thoughts on this a little better to see what they can mean for us today. I had a headache when I posted on the other thread and now going back it is written a little sloppy and I like things clean. Anyway, I took some of that information, added some other thoughts and decided to give it a new thread as I am having trouble editing the old one. This is the finished result as of a few minutes ago Lilly

  This is only one view on this topic.

  The Seven Churches of Revelation

  There are varying views today about what the meaning is of the 7 churches mentioned in Revelation chapters 2 and 3 and what meaning the letters written to them can have for us in our time. There are some religious groups today that interpret the 7 churches that are mentioned here as being 7 different church types we have seen on the earth during different time periods running from the early church in John’s day to the last church during the end times. These types they say show the progression of the church in a downward spiral towards the lukewarm church of Laodicia. This is why some claim they are the church of the end times.

  The seven churches of Revelation were actual churches in the Apostle John’s time. They were located in Ephesus, Smyrna, Perganum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia and Laodicea and were listed in their geographical order along an ancient triangular highway route in what is today eastern Turkey, touching on the Aegean Sea. The Island of Patmos, where John was when he wrote Revelation was just off the coast. Beginning at Ephesus, it was about 100 miles (160 kilometers) north through Smyrna, up to Pergamum, and then about another 100 miles back southeast through Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, to Laodicea, which was about 100 miles east of Ephesus. (See Revelation 2 & 3)

  Each of these churches was given a letter with commendations from our resurrected Lord and council for what he felt they were lacking. The letters all ended with a strong exhortation by Christ that the church should strive to be over comers and thus they will receive the reward promised to them. We know that the letters to these churches did have a real significance to the actual churches on earth in John’s day.

  But, it is harder to say what the significance is for us today. And it is even harder to prove that each of these churches represent only one church type which moved progressively downward from John’s day to our current time. One view that seems to make more sense is that these churches and their letters have meaning today if we view them as being representational only of the conditions we see in all the churches of our day. This makes sense for two reasons, the first being that all these churches when they were actual churches in John’s day were in operation simultaneously and not one at a time. Therefore it would make sense that they would all be in operation simultaneously today. The second reason is that while we do see the attitude of Luke warmness prevalent in Christ’s church today, we also see the other characteristics mentioned in John’s day, prevalent in the different churches (body of believers) today.

  So it would make sense to say that the significance in the 7 churches and their letters for us today is that they are representative of all the different types of churches we are currently seeing in the world. Some of these churches back in John’s time allowed false teachings, some worshiped idols, some were strong in faith, and others were just going through the motions of being in Christ. We can definitely see all these types of behaviors in our time in our churches. And within the individual churches today some of the members have these different characteristics mentioned here. Some are stronger than others in their faith, some are weaker, some have lost the love they had at first, some have not, etc.

  So while the 7 churches were actual churches in John’s day, the letters written to them still hold value to us in that we can learn from the council that they are given and if we are displaying any of the qualities that they were counseled on, we need to make corrections in this area. Some of the warnings we can heed from them are to not loose our love we had at first (Ephesus), not have fear of suffering for Christ (Smyrna), do not compromise doctrinally (Pergamum), not to compromise morally (Thyatira), not to become spiritually dead (Sardis), not to fail to hold onto the faith (Philadelphia), and beware of becoming lukewarm (Laodicea) For if we overcome all these things, we will be given the crown of life.

  Lilly Cruz 2006 - [email protected]
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  Sad emo

  Good post Lilly

  I was just looking at the summary in your last paragraph and noticed that the way they are set out (to me) they represent a possible progression of events within the whole body of the church too.

  not loose our love we had at first (Ephesus), not have fear of suffering for Christ (Smyrna), do not compromise doctrinally (Pergamum), not to compromise morally (Thyatira), not to become spiritually dead (Sardis), not to fail to hold onto the faith (Philadelphia), and beware of becoming lukewarm (Laodicea) For if we overcome all these things, we will be given the crown of life.

  So someone you truly love, you would be prepared to die for - you lose your love and your devotion isn't as great, then you stop following the 'rules', then your morals slip so you become spiritually dead and lose the faith - then, you still think you're ok and act it outwardly when things are really far from ok.

  The last church of Laodicea actually got no commendations from Christ - at that point, there is nothing left to commend.

  Just my thoughts
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  lovelylil

  Sad emo,

  Thank you for your thoughts they are very much appreciated. I love learning new ways to look at scriptures! God bless, Lilly
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  gumby

  Not to rain on anyones parade here, but there is some thoughts to be considered about the number 7

  Civilisations older than the hebrews regarded the number 7 as sacred.

  From ancient times there were only 7 main heavenly bodies seen with the eye and all of these were worshipped as diety or influenced the way ones believed.

  The Egyptians had 7 gods, the Parsees 7 angels, the Muslims 7 heavens, the Persians 7 sacred horses, the phoenicians 7 mysterious gods.

  By the time modern telescopes revealed many more main celestial bodies...the stage was set and beliefs were already glued in place in various cultures.

  The Hebrews had their own ideas of 7 and hence added it to their holy book like all the rest did.

  People need to read more.

  Gumbythescrooge
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  lovelylil

  gumby,

  Thanks for bringing out that information. You are correct that numbers always had significance with ancient people and the Jews were included in this. The number 7 in our bible represents completeness. 777 - would be totally complete. The number 6 represents falling short of God. 666 - represents a man's number which is not complete and falls short.

  So, you are not raining on my parade for bringing this out.

  I would like to now point this out to you: Historically it has been proven by Bible Scholars and the early Church Fathers as well as by early historians that these 7 Churches absolutely did exist. If you read my research above you will find out where they were located. The location also had significance in what the issues where in each church but I will leave that one for another time.

  The only point of this research was twofold - to show they were real churches in John's time that he would have been familiar with, secondly - to see if the messages they were given could contain any useful information for us in the church (body of Christ) today.

  Thanks for your input. Lilly
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  lovelylil

  one more thought: most Christians do recognize that Revelation is highly symbolic and much of it is not to be taken as literal that is why when some say today that they are THE church of the end times - we need to take this with a grain of salt. However, since we see the same problems in all the churches on earth in our time, we can learn something from the councel that our Lord gives to them.

  Whether you believe these to be real churches (although they were once) or symbolic writing only - the overall message still has meaning for Christians today.
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  Leolaia

  The seven churches were located in Asia Minor where the Imperial Cult (worship of the Emperor) had a particularly strong presence, and this was a problem in many of the churches where Christians compromised and participated in this idolatry; idolatry is mentioned as a problem for the churches of Pergamum and Thyatira (as promoted by the Nicolaitans), and the majority of the Christians in Sardis are described as having "soiled themselves" as well. In the Imperial cult, offerings were usually given to an idol of the Emperor but particularly in Asia Minor there was a cult of the goddess Roma, who represented the city of Rome and its power. There were temples of Roma in Smyrna, Ephesus, and other nearby cities. Roma was represented iconographically as a woman sitting enthroned on the seven hills of Rome and she was believed to have a secret mystery name known only to her priests. In Revelation, John of Patmos parodied this by portraying "the city that rules over all the nations of the earth" as a drunken harlot sitting on a Beast of seven heads (= seven hills). As for the Imperial Cult, the author construed the Caesars as a Beast placed in power by Satan (i.e. the heads of the Beast were identified as a line of "seven kings") and the people compelled by the Caesars to participate in the Imperial Cult were described as worshipping the image of the Beast. The purpose of the book is to explain to Christians that there is no compromise between Christ and Caesar... all those who worship the Beast would be destroyed when Christ comes, and his coming is fast approaching. Even though participation in the Imperial Cult is mandated by the government, a loyal Christian should refuse even if this means persecution and death. In fact, the book foresees a time in the near future when all Christians will face this test when one of the former kings of Rome returns (i.e. Nero redivivus) and unleashes a reign of terror, compelling all to accept his name (i.e. Nero Caesar = 666). Since his power would be universal on the earth, this book was not just intended for the seven churches but for all to read so they can heed the warning.
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  gumby

  Leolaia....where's them damn paragraphs!!!??? Excellent material btw
  

  would like to now point this out to you: Historically it has been proven by Bible Scholars and the early Church Fathers as well as by early historians that these 7 Churches absolutely did exist

  Not every 'un-believer' feels all the information in the bible is bogus. Much true history is contained in the bible.....most do not doubt this.

  However....was there only 7 churches........or only 7 'mentioned'? I'm sure if you looked into let's say 15 churches in existence at that time in a given area...you'd STILL find all the good or bad traits mentioned in the 7 churches. The testimony may have well been true of the actions described in the 7 churches, but this doesn't absolve the fact that jews regarded 7 as important...yet it wasn't really from god, but from older pagan beliefs.

  If you want some real interesting stuff....look up the word AMEN...and see where it came from. All through the NT the authors heavily use amen ....yet this was Amen ALSO came from them pagan bastards...the Egyptians. Ra was the sun god...and AMEN was "from him" though not him....but later became elevated even higher and worshiped an honored. The name evolutionised to the christians.....and they even included it as one of Jesus own names...."the amen".

  There is debate on this fact, but reading the history concerning it makes it obvious in my book.

  Gumamen...offers peace-pipe to lovelylil
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  Leolaia

  It is also interesting to compare the letters to the seven churches in Revelation with the letters written by Ignatius of Antioch a little more than a decade later (going by traditional dates) to many of the same churches, i.e. Smyrna, Ephesus, and Philadelphia, and other churches in the same general area (i.e. Magnesia, Tralles). There are some interesting coincidences that suggest that Ignatius either knew Revelation, or addressed concerns in a rather similar way. For instance, John of Patmos writes to the Christians in Philadelphia about his concerns about "the synagogue of Satan, who claim to be Jews though they are not, but are liars" (3:9), and likens the faithful Christians in Philadelphia to "a pillar (stulon) in the temple of my God" on which the name (onoma) of God is written (grapsó) (v. 12). Ignatius wrote to the Philadelphians warning them of "those expounding Judaism to you" and likens the Judaizers as "tombstones (stélai) and graves of the dead, upon which only the names (onomata) of men are inscribed (gegraptai)" (Ignatius, Philadelphians 6:1).

  gumby....The letters of Ignatius (and those of Paul too) also show that there were more churches in the area than those addressed by John of Patmos. As for the number, seven is of course a leitmotif in Revelation. On the other hand, it has been suggested that this was also in imitation of Paul whose letters possibly circulated first in a corpus of seven epistles (i.e. 1 Thessalonians, Romans, Galatians, 1 Corinthians, Philippians, Colossians, and the personal epistle Philemon). This was apparently imitated by Ignatius of Antioch who similarly wrote a series of seven letters, i.e. Smyrnaeans, Ephesians, Magnesians, Philadelphians, Trallians, and the personal epistle Polycarp. The Pauline corpus would then later have been rounded out by the addition of 2 Corinthians (which was not public in the AD 90s as 1 Clement, addressed to the church at Corinth, suggests...it copiously quotes 1 Corinthians but knows nothing of 2 Corinthians), 2 Thessalonians, the deutero-Pauline Ephesians, and finally the Pastorals. John of Patmos, writing in the AD 90s, is then thought to have also imitated the early collection of the "seven letters" of Paul. Of course, this theory is very speculative owing to the lack of concrete information about the early period.
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  lovelylil

  gumby,

  I realize that there were more than 7 churches during the time, The number 7 has symbolic meaning in the bible. I was simply showing that these 7 did exist as I thought you were saying they did not and were totally made up by John. Sorry if that was not your point.

  Leolaia,

  Thanks so much for giving some excellent points on the churches. That is what I meant when I said that the location of them had to do with the councel for them as you said idolatry was a big problem. I was going to leave that for another time but am glad that you brought it out. As you provided historical information to fill in the details of what was going on around them.

  I agree with everything you said and I also believe that the book of Revelation has meaning for us today also. I believe in the test that all Christians will face in not compromising in their faith. This book definately has parallel accounts for modern christians and I can see a lot of usefullness in the advice given to the churches at that time, for us in our current day.