The Seven Cities : Smyrna

Pt. Bernard Persichetti
IES South

Rev 2: 8-11
⁸"To the angel of the church in Smyrna write:
These are the words of him who is the First and the Last, who died and came to life again. ⁹ I know your afflictions and your poverty—yet you are rich! I know the slander of those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. ¹⁰Do not be afraid of what you are about to suffer. I tell you, the devil will put some of you in prison to test you, and you will suffer persecution for ten days. Be faithful, even to the point of death, and I will give you the crown of life. ¹¹He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes will not be hurt at all by the second death.

Smyrna was only second to Ephesus, the only city that is still remain until now.

v.8 The city was dead and now alive - used to be said to the city of Smyrna, that's why it clicks when Jesus that.

Then God said : "I am the First and the Last" - He is saying, He is in control, He knows everything.

v.9 I know what is going on.. [ i know about your suffering!]
situation : if you want to fit in socially and economically, you need to confess that ceaser is Lord.
Christians was pressed by the gentiles and also by the jews.
Jews got special treatment from Roman. Christians was seen as under the Jews. Later Jews was distancing themselves from the Christians.

Remember:
to be a Christians, Jesus didn't promise there will be no suffering.

2 Cor 1:8-9

⁸We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. ⁹Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead.

Everyone has been crushed and overwhelmed.
Has nothing to do with faith and trust to God - and by the way, this is Paul.

We are going through all of this, the same stuffs, to learn to stop relying on ourselves and start relying on God.

2 Cor 4:8-18

⁸We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; ⁹persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. ¹⁰We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. ¹¹For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. ¹²So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.

¹³It is written: "I believed; therefore I have spoken."With that same spirit of faith we also believe and therefore speak, ¹⁴because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you in his presence. ¹⁵All this is for your benefit, so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God.

¹⁶Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. ¹⁷For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. ¹⁸So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

v.8
Preplexed - these are all the experience in our Christian lives, and it has nothing to do with your faith.

v.9
v. 17 eternal perspective
v.18 To NOT look on the trouble that we can see, focus on the thing we can't see - it's a lfie long learning process.

Rev 2 : 9
I know your poverty - but you are rich

[define] poverty :

1. the state or condition of having little or no money, goods, or means of support; condition of being poor; indigence.

2. deficiency of necessary or desirable ingredients, qualities, etc.: poverty of the soil.

3. scantiness; insufficiency: Their efforts to stamp out disease were hampered by a poverty of Medical supplies.

They were rich in spiritual/faith in Jesus

2 Cor 6:10
sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.

James 2:5
Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him?

Money is a tool
Rich people is not evil and money is also not an evil.
But the love of money is!!

Rev 2:
i know the blasphemy..

about being Jew
Rom 2 : 28,29

²⁸A man is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. ²⁹ No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man's praise is not from men, but from God.

you can't be a Christian just because your parents are one.

v.10 "suffer for 10 days.." - means a short time.

Polycarp disciple of John, appointed bishop of the Church in Smyrna, was burned to death because he defuses to declare Caesar is God.

Jesus didn't ask us to do something like that. Just make sure we be faithful till the end!