The Seven Churches
Open Your Bible
Revelation 2:1-29, Revelation 3:1-22, Matthew 22:34-39
BY Sharon Hodde Miller
“Things are getting worse and worse.”
When we look at the news, the culture, the entertainment, and even the Church today, it’s easy to feel as if everything is slowly getting worse. It’s tempting to believe that the world is gradually unraveling, and that we are moving further away from truth, instead of toward it.
Whenever we feel this cynicism begin to creep in, the temptation is to idealize the generations that have gone before us. We think, Our parents’ generation, our grandparents’ generation, the earliest Christians—they had it all together. Things weren’t as bad back then!
I struggle with this mentality often. There are days when I feel jaded about Christians and about the Church. I log onto social media and see division and in-fighting, or I read about a pastor failing his congregation and his family. I see name-calling and judgment and the drawing of big, deep lines, and my heart wants to harden toward it all.
On those days when we are tempted to dismiss the world with a flick of the wrist, when we find ourselves looking down on other Christians who “aren’t doing it right,” and when we despair that the Church’s reputation is hopelessly smeared, Revelation 2–3 has a word for us.
In these chapters, written just a generation after Jesus’s resurrection, many churches are distracted and lost. Although they are working hard and striving to be faithful, God also levels the following charges against them:
They had forsaken their first love (2:4).
They participated in pagan rituals (2:14).
They were sexually immoral (2:14).
They embraced false teaching (2:15, 20).
They had a reputation of being alive, but they were dead (3:1).
They were lukewarm, neither hot nor cold (3:16).
All this, only sixty years after Jesus walked the earth.
What this tells us is that the world is not simply getting worse, and neither is the Church. Following Jesus has always been hard. Faithfulness to God has always come unnaturally. Ever since sin entered the world, human nature has found it difficult to obey.
And that is exactly why we need a Savior.
The good news of Jesus Christ begins with the bad news that we are broken. We have always been distracted. We have always resisted the truth. It was true two thousand years ago, and it is just as true today. Therefore, these letters to the seven churches in Asia minor are important for us as well. “Let anyone who has ears to hear listen to what the Spirit says to the churches” (Revelation 2:29).
But our brokenness has never stopped God. Our division, our fighting, our apathy, our immorality, even our bad theology—none of it has ever stopped God. So when we read Revelation 2–3, we can do three things. First, we can remember that humanity is not getting worse, and neither is the Church—the temptation to turn away from God and His ways has always been there. Second, we can welcome this list of rebukes as an opportunity to identify our own areas of need.
And finally, we can hope. In Revelation 3:19, God says, “Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline” (NIV). When we see darkness in the world—no matter how great—we don’t have to despair, and our hearts don’t have to grow hard. Instead, we can consider the possibility that God is allowing us to see these things, so that He can redeem them.
78 thoughts on "The Seven Churches"
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This is exactly what I needed to read. Thank you.
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@ Debra Henn
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. I love the author’s last sentence… it’s an inversion of that old country phrase. Can you realize/appreciate/ or even allow God’s healing, restoration, salvation, and redemption of something if you never knew it was broken or sinful? -
Relevant study. Thank you ladies!
Starting it late but nonetheless. Love – “Don’t be afraid. I am the First and the Last, am and the Living One and I was dead, but look—I am alive forever and ever” – Praise God!!
On “Things are not getting worse” – May I disagree, according to:
Genesis 6: 5-7, 2 Timothy 3:1-17 and Matthew 24:6-13?
Remember that since Adam and Eve’s disobedience the world has never been the same. Things went from bad to worst – Cain killed Abel. And progressed in a worst condition that God sent the flood, cleansed the earth, but man’s heart continued to be against God up to now.
But thanks be to the our great and awesome God for His grace and mercy in Jesus our Savior!Therefore, through Jesus – alone – we who are trusting in Him have the blessed hope.
Grace and peace to you all..
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Exactly what i needed! I always thought that the world is getting worse but sin has always entered the world sense adam and eve. There is hope and his name is God. Thank you for this message!!
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All of this occurred just 60 years after Jesus walked the earth! This line is truly mind-blowing to me. All this time, I have always assumed generations before us somehow had it better or easier. But following Jesus has always been hard! What a welcome relief that we have always been living in a broken world and have always been trying desperately to be free. Our brokenness has never stopped God! Our division, fighting, apathy, immorality— even our bad theology— has never stopped God. Which gives me great hope!
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Can you please explain what you mean by “God is allowing us to see these things so He can redeem them”
Thank you
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Churchmouse… I love you closing words… it’s all because of Jesus…
Yes… yes… yes.. everything points to Jesus.. Amen…Xx
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So good!
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