The Book of Revelation: Revelation 2:12-17

Speaker: Greg Sanders

Passage: Revelation 2:12-17

Beware Of the Accuser

Last week, Pastor Gary shared the message to the church of Smyrna. There was a part of it that jumped out to me, and it says, “They say they’re Jews, but they aren’t, because there’s a synagogue of Satan.” The word there in Greek is the idea of the synagogue of the accuser.

What’s been driving through my mind all week is that we sometimes partner with the enemy through accusation. Without knowing it, as a people, we tend to allow something to be said of him, that he’s the accuser of the brethren, so we always know that accusation is rooted in the demonic. 

I want to challenge it. I don’t want to teach on it because I feel like Pastor Gary did a great job teaching last week. But I want to challenge us as a people to ask the question, where in my life am I allowing myself to partner with the demonic by using accusation? The accuser of the brethren. 

If you think about what the enemy does, he comes before the Lord and says, Look at what they did. Look at your son, look at your daughter, and look at what they did. What he’s mistaking when he does this is the reality that that son or that daughter is covered by grace. And his constant effort is to try to undermine our character through that accusation.

A lot of times, he’ll whisper to us, “Well, if you’re such a believer, if you’re such a good follower of God, why do you do this?” I just want to challenge us to two aspects. Don’t listen to what the enemy whispers to you about yourself. You’re crazy if you don’t believe that the enemy would love to whisper things to lead you in the wrong direction.

He loves to do that towards other people, dropping thoughts and ideas. Sometimes, he uses other people to whisper gossip or slander; we grab onto it, and it starts to shape how we view others. The statement in the scriptures is really clear: our communication with one another should be covered in love. Kingdom love has to cover what we say and how we say it.

If Kingdom love isn’t covering what we say and how we say it, there’s one of two things driving it. It’s either our own sinful nature, or we’ve chosen partnership with hell. If you’re like, “Well, I was blessed with a critical spirit,” nobody is blessed with a critical spirit. You choose a critical spirit.

I had an incredibly strong sense all week long that the Lord wants to push on this for us as a family. We’re to root out a spirit of accusations in our life, and instead choose to just be a people who partner with the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, within the boundary of love. Do you know that Paul says a statement in Ephesians that’s amazing? “Speak the truth in love.” 

If you want to break that down, what Paul says is if you can’t say it in love, don’t say it, because its truth doesn’t validate what’s spoken. Truth has to be spoken with love. What is love? Agape lives for the benefit of another, which means this: if you can’t say what you’re saying for the actual purpose of helping and building the other person, shut up. Especially when we partner with the spirit of accusation, we’re helping the enemy and that should not be so.

The Letter To Pergamum

Revelation chapter two. We’ll look at the letter to the church and Pergamum. We’re going to break this into three different teachings. I don’t know if those three will be three weeks, or maybe one teaching this week for sure. We’re just going to deal with one thing where Jesus begins to whisper and speak directly to the successes of this church and we’re going to take a look at those because I think there’s some awesome stuff in there.

Revelation 2:12-17, “Write this letter to the angel of the church of Pergamum. This is the message from the one who has the sharp two-edged sword. I know that you live in the city where the great throne of Satan is located. And yet you’ve remained loyal to Me, and you refused to deny Me even when Antipas, My faithful witness, was martyred among you by Satan’s followers. And yet, I have a few complaints against you. You tolerate some among you who are like Balaam, who showed Balak how to trip up the people of Israel. He taught them to worship idols by eating food offered to idols and by committing sexual sin in the same way. You have some Nicolaitans among you, people who follow the same teaching and commit the same sin. So repent, or I will come to you suddenly and fight against them with the sword in My mouth. Anyone who’s willing to hear should listen to the Spirit and understand what the Spirit is saying to the churches. Everyone who’s victorious will eat of the manner that has been hidden away in heaven and will give to each one a white stone. On the stone will be engraved a new name so that no one knows except the one who receives it.”

Pergamum’s Culture

There’s a lot in there, so we’re going to break it up and make it a little bit more digestible.

The first aspect I want to look at is just the successes that Jesus speaks for the church of Pergamum. The word Pergamum means height or elevation. There was a 1000-foot mountain just behind where the city was. And what that mountain was known for was it was covered from base to top with pagan temples and shrines. So it was just this cascading mountain of pagan worship, all these different temples. If you understand the Greek system, if you understand the system of that day, it was what we call a pantheistic system. There were a bunch of different gods. Every piece of terra firma was covered with some type of worship to a different god.

The city was historically the capital of the region. Augustus shifts the capital, moves it to Ephesus, but this city, Pergamum, remains the number one place for medicine. Number one place for education. It’s a city of influence. It’s a city that has a lot of pride. It may be similar to Boulder in our region.

I’m not picking on Boulder. Although when you drive into Boulder, you’re like, “It feels different.”

When I first moved here about 22 years ago, I grew up being a Buffs fan. I was a football fan. I had two teams. I had a team at Florida State and Colorado Buffs. How do you grow up in Washington State with those as your teams? I don’t know, they weren’t my teams.

I was super excited to go to Boulder. So we took the kids and went to Boulder. We get into Boulder, and Belinda and I look at each other. She’s like, “Do you feel that?” “Yeah, this place is creepy.” You can feel the spiritual oppression when you go there. If you’re like, “Yeah, our city is way better,” I would just argue you don’t feel the oppression here because you’re used to it.

Pergamos remained the center of law, religious groups, and medicine. How many have ever seen an EMT truck and you see that symbol with the snake wrapped around a pole, kind of star-looking thing? That picture is called the Star of Life. It came out of this city. This city was the headquarters of medicine. Asclepius presented this. He’s this guy who has a download, has a spiritual encounter, and learns healing arts from a serpent.

Why does that matter? How many have heard of the Hippocratic Oath? It comes out of this region. This is where it’s developed. So what’s going on for this church? I want you to consider this. If you get sick and you’ve got to go to urgent care and you go to urgent care and upon arriving in urgent care, instead of asking for your insurance card, they hand you a document that says, “I hereby renounce all faith in Jesus Christ. And I agree to worship Asclepius,” otherwise you don’t get medical treatment. That’s what was going on in this city.

There was a connection between their spiritual worship and medicine. So the early church that is here was denied medicine unless they were willing to worship this god. It’s a different picture than what we read just in English. All of a sudden, your faith gets real. You’ve got an enduring sinus infection, you’re like, I need those antibiotics and get over this thing. And the answer is, “Do you want to renounce God?” You’re like, “I don’t know if my head hurts bad.” The right answer is no case anybody’s curious.

But those healing temples and Pergamos were wholly integrated with the local pagan cults. It was inaccessible for them. Some scholars believe that at the end of verse 17, there’s this phrase about hidden manna. They believe that it’s a promise for the Lord to say, I will supernaturally provide for you, the healing you can’t get. I love that idea. The promise of the Lord is that anything in life that we’re missing out on because of our faith in Him, He will backfill supernaturally. I think that’s a word to bank on. I think it tracks through the scriptures. But that’s not what I want to talk about today.

Pergamum’s Successes

I want to talk about their successes. Jesus opens up this statement with, “This is the message from the one who has the sharp two-edged sword.” So we’ll just make some observations that Jesus presenting the two-edged sword is important. Jesus doesn’t show up and reveal Himself with a phrase like the one with a sharp two-edged sword just because. It’s not like He’s bored with how He introduces Himself so He keeps changing it. 

When we go through these messages to the seven churches, He reveals Himself differently to each church. I would give us the submission that the way He is presenting Himself is tied to who they are and to what they need. Why the two-edged sword? In this city, there’s a common cult, and the cult was an offshoot of Christianity. That cult believed that because of Jesus, the old covenant–the Old Testament–was gone.

Because the old covenant was gone, now all of a sudden, the Ten Commandments are gone. Now, all of a sudden, the law of God is gone. Now, all of a sudden, all the ways God taught His people to live are gone. So it’s a free-for-all. They live however they want to live because of grace.

Push pause for a second, and ask yourself, have I heard anything like that? There are bizarre, weird teachings out there that want to say, it’s just all here, or it’s just all here. And the truth is, Jesus makes a statement saying, I didn’t come to abolish that covenant, I came to complete it.

I came to wrap it up in a nice bow and reveal who I am and why I’m the solution and the answer to it.

Here’s my belief. There’s no way for us to know exactly what He means when He says this. Here’s what I think it means. I think He’s trying to cut through the confusion in the culture because of bad theology. Your theology creates your worldview. What you have learned and know and believe about God changes how you live. 

I think He’s coming to bring a very clear declaration to them. The imagery He’s talking about is a Roman sword. If you’ve ever studied the Roman military, they had a short sword that they would keep behind their shield. It was sharpened on two edges. And so they could push in, cut up, cut down, and it was their hand-to-hand combat thing. So He’s using the language of that image.

Does it mean that He is saying, I am the one who can cut through the chaos and the deception? Yes, I think that’s clear. But more than likely, what He’s dealing with is this wrong perspective that the Old Testament doesn’t matter.

Can I challenge us to be a people who understand the scriptures are the scriptures for a reason? The New Testament gives you phenomenal theology about who Jesus is. The Old Testament gives incredible practical advice about what it looked like to live out the way of God. Both are necessary. Both reveal who He is. 

I think what was going on is that the church of Pergamum was tolerating sin patterns because of this teaching about the old ways being done away with. I think what’s worth noting is that regardless of what this church and Pergamum were facing, Jesus was clearly presenting a weaponized posture. Swords are offensive weapons. He’s preparing to combat something with force in His next address. The question is, what is He preparing to combat?

He says, I know that you live in the city with a great throne of Satan is located. And yet you’ve remained loyal to Me. And you refused to deny Me, even when Antipas, My faithful witness, was martyred among you by Satan’s followers. 

Observations About The Followers In Pergamum

Some observations. The great throne of Satan is located in Pergamum. It’s easy for us on this side, as Western believers, to read that and just assume what it means is it was a bad city, and there was a lot of demonic activity. That’s not what Jesus says. And I think it’s important to break apart what He’s saying and why He’s saying it.

While I think it’s fair to say the great throne of satan is largely considered to be a recognition of the vast extent of pagan temple culture in the city, I think the question that we have to answer is whether this is figurative or factual.

Pergamum was founded in honor of Zeus. In the original founding of the city, it was founded, connected, committed, and consecrated to Zeus, the savior. There’s a bunch of other gods because of this wonderful idea where they wanted to make sure that everybody could worship so they gave you a list of Gods you could replace if your God is Zeus. Here’s the complementary god. It’s called syncretism, which means that we can just plug and play the gods as we need.

There was an altar in this city that was incredibly important in the region, and it was where most of the pagan sacrifices that were for broad stroke that would be over all of the cultic temples were offered. There are some that would say maybe the throne of Satan deals with this medical thing, because this guy, Asclepius, receives this from a serpent. I think the early Christians there probably saw a clear parallel between the serpent in the myth and the identification in Genesis and Adam and Eve. That’s a pretty easy parallel.

There was a cult, what’s called an imperial cult, which means it was the sanctioned cult of Rome. Here’s what’s important: Rome sanctioned a cult. When Rome sanctioned a cult and said, this was going to be state worship, not to be part of that worship was treason. It would be like the United States creating a religion saying, this is a religion in the United States, and if you do not participate in this, you can go to prison on account of treason.

Now, in Roman culture, how many know what the penalty was for treason? Immediate death. A Roman soldier could kill you on the streets if you were found to be treasonous, and it can be proven. It was a big deal, something to be concerned about. 

The theologian Robert Charles will outline what I think is the most probable understanding of this throne of Satan idea. Behind the city in the first century arose a huge conical mountain 1000 feet high, covered with heathen temples and altars, which would be held in contrast to the mountain of God we find in Isaiah. God’s people would call it the throne of God, so there’ll be a parallel, and here’s what is seen as the throne of Satan. It was the home of many idolatrous cults, but above all, the Imperial Cult, which menaced with annihilation the existence of the church because refusal to take part in this cult constituted high treason of the state.

I found a quote that came through one of our Bible studies. It was a guy who had been in the Middle East who said, “I had a conversation with an Islamic mom who got radically saved, and the mom said that the entire Middle Eastern world knows the throne of Satan is located in Turkey.”

It’s not just a geopolitical stronghold, but it’s where Satan’s throne is and from which his authority flows into the earth. If you think that’s conjecture, great, go on your fact-finding mission. I would submit that what Jesus is making here is a very real declaration about this city. It is actually where the enemy lived.

Challenging Theology

So consider with me for a second that statement, where satan lives, because I want to challenge and coach our theology on the demonic realm a little bit. First thing, Satan is not omniscient, nor omnipresent. He’s not all-knowing. He’s not capable of being everywhere at once. He’s a created being.

In Job 1:12, the enemy comes in and leaves God’s presence. He came and went because he was not capable of being everywhere. He can’t be in two places at once. That is unique to God.

Why is that important? Because, by and large, most people believe he’s everywhere at all times. And we treat him like he’s everywhere at all times. And when we start ascribing to him value sets that he’s not capable of, that is, in my opinion, a form of worship. He cannot read your thoughts. Thoughts are unique to God’s Spirit.

1 Samuel 16 says that men or created order look on the outside, but God sees the heart. Our enemy cannot know our thoughts and know our hearts until we do what we show it or speak. A Bible college professor used to say it this way: “You can think about it in your mind, you can let it sit in your mind because, in your mind, you’re protected because you’re told by God to take every thought captive under the obedience of Christ.” 

This is where we deal with our thought process, where we deal with temptations, where we deal with all these things, but the moment we begin to speak it or act, it roots in our spirit, and it becomes known to the demonic.

Third thing, Satan does not have unlimited freedom and liberty to do as he pleases. Colossians 2:15 says that Jesus disarmed the rulers and authorities. In the Greek, it’s a picture of what was called a victory parade, where the prisoners of war were paraded through town in chains. That is the imagery Paul’s using.

This can only mean that the demonic realm no longer has carte blanche authority, nor uninhibited supernatural power over you. The demonic realm can only operate through permissions given. How does that work? They can get permission from God.

In Luke 22:31, the enemy asks permission to sift Peter like wheat. It’s a really interesting statement because if you’ve ever watched wheat be sifted, it’s crushed, it’s pressed, and it’s ground down until what matters separates from what doesn’t matter. And the Lord says to Peter — it’s crazy to me. Jesus and I would have had a timeout conversation because He says to Peter, Satan has requested to sift you like wheat. And I’ve prayed for you.

I’d have been like, timeout. What happened to the word no? Okay, why would Jesus say, “I prayed for you?” Because maybe it’s important to Him that we get ground down enough so that what doesn’t matter and what does matter get separated.

The second way the demonic gets permission is when we open ourselves through a willing partnership with sin. When we step into sinful patterns, it’s like raising the flags. Here I am. I’m not sure I want to be in His Kingdom. I think I still want to be in yours.

I’m not talking about making mistakes. Mistakes happen. I’m talking about unrepented habitual sin, where we’ve decided we’re putting back on darkness. And we’re going to stay in darkness because we love what that darkness does for us. It’s like waving a flag saying, I want to be part of your kingdom, you have access.

The place that happens most often is through our mouth. We start making declarations and partnerships that align with the heart of the enemy, not the heart of God. A great rule to live by is just because you think it, doesn’t mean you have to say it. And when you think it, you have to take it captive under the obedience of the Lord before you let it come out your mouth or partnership with the demonic establishes a place for the enemy to dwell. In other words, this invites him. 

I want to remind you of a supernatural principle. We began the gathering with it. God has been enthroned on the praises of His people. Pergamum, as a city, had partnered with pagan cultic practices, and it created a throne for the enemy to dwell. They had so partnered with the enemy that it gave him access to live there.

We would do well to consider where in our lives we have partnered with the demonic and shut it down. That might be an addiction. That might be a habit. That might be a mindset. Maybe it’s a relationship. If you’re willingly partnering with things you know the Lord stands against, you are fighting for the other kingdom. You have to stop it.

In the same book of Philippians, Paul says because of Christ, you have the ability to choose righteousness. You’re not stuck in your sin. If you, for five seconds, believe I’m stuck in my sin, you have bought a lie. You are a fish on the hook. So spit the hook out, and turn back around to the Lord and say, “I’ve been partnering with something, please forgive me. Let’s move forward.”

Jesus Knows Who They Are

Jesus says, “I know that you live in a city where a great throne of Satan is located, and yet you’ve remained loyal to Me. And you refuse to deny Me even when Antipas, my faithful witness, was martyred among you by Satan’s followers.” What I love here is that Jesus knows the details of who He’s addressing. It tells me He knows us.

There are three things that jump out. He knows where they live, how they live, and who they are.

He says, I know where you live. In the city where Satan’s throne was, it strikes me because he doesn’t say, “Get out.” Nowhere in this address does He say, the city you live in is where the throne of satan is. You got to run, move away, go to Kansas. He just tells them very simply, I know your daily life. I know what and where you are. And it matters because if we trust His watch over our lives, we now, because of this, have to trust His placement of where we are.

If you’re under the illusion that you need to go someplace else to serve God, that’s the wrong answer. Serving God is about the submission of your will to Him, and it can happen wherever you are. I’m just not strong enough. Yes, I agree. But because of Christ and our faith in Him, we can come fearlessly before the throne of grace, guaranteed a glad welcome, and cry out, “I need You to strengthen me. I need You to give me the grace and the mercy to say no to this thing. Because, Lord, I let myself get trapped in sin. Please forgive me.”

I can create accountability systems that say, “Here’s my struggle. Here are the places I’m weak. I gave myself willingly to this sin, and I created a habit. Will you partner with me and help me break it?” 

I don’t want people to know my stuff. Great, then you don’t want to get free? Have you considered that Jesus wants you where you are? And have you considered that His placement of you wasn’t accidental? Maybe you considered He’s counting on you? He’s counting on your walk to change the region He put you in to change and reach the people He brought into your life. To shape the lives of those He’s allowed to cross paths with you so that He puts you where you are. So you could be the difference.

He tells them, “Yet you’ve remained loyal to Me.” What’s crazy to me is His description of loyalty is incredibly clear. He expects His followers to stay true to Him, regardless of what’s happening around them. They’re in the city where Satan’s throne is. His statement is, I expect loyalty,

suffering, death, difficult work, and rough marital moments. He expects loyalty in all of it.

Whatever we are willing to superimpose over our loyalty is wrong because loyalty means we never leave our allegiance to Him, His way, or 

His life. I want to just stress a point. Our lives are not our own. We gave them to Him, so how we live them is now under His control and His authority. And the moment we remove ourselves from that position, we are a wall to our nature.

I love that He’s honoring their loyalty because it tells me He expects loyalty from us. He calls Antipas His faithful witness, which I think is easy to bypass and miss in this text. But there’s something that happens here that’s incredibly important. We were in our Study Team. And I know you can’t imagine this, Pastor Dustin was reading it in Greek.

I’ll give you my definition of it because it’s way easier to understand, but there’s an interplay that’s happening in the Greek, and it comes out of Revelation chapter one where Jesus is revealed as faithful and true. Here in chapter two, there’s gross butchering of the Greek grammatically.

“Antipas, my faithful witness,” shows up in a wrong grammatical case. It shows him what’s called nominative, and it shouldn’t be that way. If this was happening in English, we would look at it like, that person didn’t go to school very well. It’s done intentionally. The writer does it because it’s a direct link that shows Antipas and Jesus being faithful and true. It’s written the same way. 

So it’s hearkening back. And I love what that teaches us. Jesus never misses our faithfulness to Him. It’s written just to highlight. I know Antipas was faithful to me, because He equates Himself and Antipas in the way it’s written. I’d say it this way: Your faithfulness might miss the eyes of others, but it will never miss the eyes of your King.

Sometimes we want so badly to be noticed by others for our faithfulness that we forfeit our faithfulness, instead of just sitting and resting in the fact that You, who see the end from the beginning, see my faithfulness. And I trust You. You will reward my faithfulness.

Putting It All Together

So, let me put it all together. Can you and I consider that He is fully aware of our lives, our city, and our region? He knows where we’re at. He knows what we’re facing. And He expects loyalty.

Can we consider the extent of His rule, His reign, and His authority? He says to this church, you’re seated, and you’re housed next to the throne of Satan, and I’m cool with it. You be you there. Why? Because greater is He who’s in us than he has in the world.

You can put a healthy, vibrant church of people who love Jesus and are consumed by Jesus, and put them next door to the throne of Satan and they still win. I don’t know that we always believe that because we think the world’s just going so dark. Who cares? Greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world. All you have to do is rise. Let the King of Glory be revealed in you, and it works. Can we work to remember who He is? Worshiping Him in the revelation of His strength? Just know that regardless of what we face, He plans to overcome what we face through our faithfulness.

Psalm 24:8-9 says, “Who is this King of Glory? It’s the Lord strong and mighty. It’s the Lord invincible in battle. So open up ancient gates. Open up ancient doors and let the King of Glory enter.” You are the gates. You are the doors. He enters through faithfulness. He enters through loyalty.

God hasn’t given us a spirit of fear but of power and love and a sound mind. Do we face darkness in our current day? Yes. But guess what wins Him? We have to put away a partnership with hell. Quit worshiping; it could have given him more credit than he’s worth. Don’t watch stupid movies about him. Let me restate that one. It could be feeding on things that honor his power and quit partnering with things that elevate his agenda. Come away. Be a people that are wholly set apart, because you’ve aligned yourself with the King of Glory. And you said, “I let that kingdom go. Here’s my King.” 

Closing Thoughts

If you’re in here and you’re like, “You know what, I have been partnered with hell, with some areas where I have not been walking clean.” Maybe you’ve been partnered with addiction. Whatever it is, you’re like, “I need to confess it.” Corinthians says to confess your faults one to another and be healed.

We have an authority in the spirit realm to declare over each other healing, forgiveness, and grace. Don’t walk out of here hiding it because you’re like, “I don’t want to tell people.” My question to you is, do you want to get clean or not? Do you want to get free or not?

Maybe you’re in here, and you’re ready to divorce. You need to come repent. We’re ready to call it quits. We need to repent. We know the Lord is against divorce. I don’t know what it is meant to be a myriad of things. Let’s do business and get it done correctly today. Walk out the other side free, unencumbered.

Jesus, we love You. Holy Spirit, would You not just in this moment, come and rest on this concept? Would You just chew on it? Help us chew on it. Pour into us understanding and love for every place where we’ve honored the enemy and made partnerships with hell. We ask You for forgiveness for every place we’ve doubted Your placement of us, and we’ve started to distrust where You’ve brought us to. We ask for forgiveness.

Holy Spirit teach us, lead us, guide us. Show us what it looks like to change the region you’ve put us in, regardless of what we face. Show us what it looks like to change the marketplace regardless of what we face, to change our neighborhoods regardless of what we face.

We love You, we honor You. In Jesus’ name, amen.