The letter to the church in Ephesus
The Church of Ephesus is a good example of a church. But its appearance is deceptive. Jesus’ judgment is devastating.
Historical background
Ephesus is one of the largest and most important cities in the Roman Empire. Its large port is the entrance to Asia Minor.
Ephesus is an economic center and had many Diaspora Jews (Jews who live outside of Israel) who had Ephesian citizenship.
It was an imp1rtant tourist center because of the Temple of Artemis and had probably the largest church of the seven.
Jesus’ view
Jesus approaches the church as the one who holds the stars and walks among the lampstands referring to the key message of chapter 1: to be a light and to depend on Him. If the church does not take this to heart, it will lose its calling!
But before Jesus addresses the problem he pours out a lot of appraisal:
- He knows their deeds, their hard work and their perseverance. They have been working hard with the temple of Artemis around the corner, which has already caused an uproar in Ephesus.
- They were not deceived by false teaching or false apostles, which was the problem for some of the other churches.
- They are enduring hardship in Jesus’ name.
The problem
But there is one thing wrong: They have lost their first love. What does that mean? Is it that romantic feeling when they first met Jesus and would do anything for Him?
In Matthew it says that love will grow cold and the gospel will be preached to all nations as a witness to them. But what does love have to do with witnessing to the gospel? A great deal.
- If we love Jesus, we will share His message and love our brothers and sisters and the outside world.
- If we love our brothers and sisters, we will love Jesus as we see Him in them and preach the gospel to share with the whole world.
- If we love the world, Jesus and the Church is the best we can offer them.
Sharing the gospel is therefore an act of love, and if one of them grows cold, the other will diminish.
Ephesus may be an established church if they have their way of dealing with spiritual challenges, but they have probably forgotten why they are doing it and are focusing too much on themselves to make everything right.
The solution
The promise is to eat of the tree of life, which brings them back to the untroubled relationship with God in the garden. If they want to go on and not be a church that God has no use for, they have to start there.
And they have a promise in the New Jerusalem.