Ecclesiastical
Evaluation Summary
Probably nothing tests our stability and our mental attitude more than
being the recipients of injustice. The more extreme the injustice the more
difficult it is for us because we all have a certain sense of fair play and we
believe that things ought to be done in a certain manner. But living in the
devil’s world we often face injustice, evil, victimization, betrayal,
maltreatment, and these are among the most difficult, the most challenging of
circumstances for us as believers to handle. Too often we see believers go
through life and if they are mistreated by other believers, if they are
betrayed, of they are maltreated, if they become victims, there it is parents,
whether it is children, whether it is business partners, whatever it may be, it
is easy for too many to cave in to cynicism, bitterness, anger and resentment.
And often, directly or indirectly, God is the one who is blamed. When we face
injustice in life, when things don’t go the way we think they should, or when
we are betrayed by those we trust, if we don’t see some sort of immediate
response by God we often think that God is just asleep at the switch or that
somehow people are getting away with evil. But what we learn as we come to the
last book in Scripture is that no one gets away with anything. There is
accountability.
Throughout the centuries people struggle with the same problem of
accountability. The Psalmist asked: “Why do the wicked prosper?” The unstated
question is: “God if you are really just, if you are really fair, how can they
be getting away with it?” However, one of the things we learn from Scripture is
that God is just, and God is righteous. In the book of Revelation a major theme
is that of accountability, that there is justice from the throne room of God,
either in time or in eternity future. No one gets away with anything, and that
is one of the themes of the book of Revelation, that there will be judgment,
there will be evaluation for everyone. For the unbeliever, they look forward to
the great white throne judgment. The issue there is not sin because the penalty
for sin was paid for by Christ on the cross. The issue is their own
righteousness. Do they have righteousness that qualifies to get them into
heaven? No matter what they have done all their works are evaluated and if they
do not have the proper righteousness then they are not admitted into haven and
there is eternal condemnation in the lake of fire. For the believer the issues
are different. Sin is paid for, heaven is a certain destiny, we have a secure
and certain salvation, our sins have been completely and totally paid for, and
we have an eternal position in the royal family of God. However, there is still
an evaluation judgment coming. This evaluation judgment is the judgment of the
judgment seat of Christ.
This lies in the background of what we have studied for the last several
lessons. We have been though Revelation chapters two and three studying these
seven letters to the seven churches in
As we go through this one thing that stands out is this principle of
eventual evaluation, eventual judgment. And what we need to remember is that no
matter what we see, what we experience in life, whenever there is injustice,
whatever happens, whenever there is evil in the world, whenever we are the
unfair victim of whatever happens, we must remember what was said by Abraham in
Genesis 18:25: “Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?” We know that
God will eventually make all things right. 2 Corinthians 5:10 says that we must
all appear before the judgment seat of Christ that each one may receive the
things done [practiced/prassw] in the body, according to
what he has done, whether good or bad.
When we come to these seven letters they represent trends in the church
age, strengths and weaknesses that are present in every generation. Each one of
these churches is promised incentives, rewards, to the overcomer, to the
victorious believer. This happens after the Rapture of the church, 1
Thessalonians 4:13-17. As we look at these evaluation reports they fit a
pattern. Each one has a commission, an opening address, a character citation
referencing an attribute of the Lord Jesus Christ. Usually this attribute has
something to do with the commendation or the condemnation within the
evaluation. There is a commendation, a praise for what they are doing right in
their spiritual growth and spiritual advance. Of the seven there are two that
have no commendation whatsoever, they are congregations that are in spiritual
failure. There is a section of condemnation, a warning about a spiritual flaw
or spiritual flaws within each of these congregations. There are two that have
no condemnation, they are only commended for their spiritual advance. For those
who have a spiritual flaw there is a prescription for recovery, a correction
that is given, usually in the vocabulary of “repent” or “watch.” It has the
idea of changing something. There is a certain mentality or vocabulary or
carnal practice that needs to be changed. Then there is a call, that is, a
command to listen—“Those who have ears to hear, let them hear.” That is, those
who are really responsive to the Word, who care about the Bible, then listen to
what it says and then make application. Then there is a challenge, a personal
promise of a reward. This is addressed to a category of a believer called an
overcomer, a victorious believer.
The first report that we studied was to the church in
Under condemnation, they had lost their priority love for God. When we
read in the text that they had lost their first love, this is not first in
terms of beginning, it is first in terms of priority. Love for God comes into
full bloom as we grow to maturity, but if we fail to grow to maturity, if we
fail to press on, then we lost that love for God. Love for God indicates a
depth to that personal relationship we have with God through the Lord Jesus
Christ. It is not just that simple relationship that an immature believer has
with God, but as we grow and mature, as we learn the Word, as we learn more
about who God is, it develops a quality of love that is related to our maturity
and our understanding of who God is. You can’t love someone you don’t know, and
you can’t know God unless you study His Word. This priority love has to do with
maturity, and because they had failed in the Ephesian church to grow to
maturity they were being challenged with regard to the incentive in 2:7: “To
him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the
Paradise of God.” Eating throughout Scripture is used with reference to
fellowship and rapport. So eating of the tree of life indicates a special
intimacy, a special level of fellowship with God.
In Revelation 2:8 we came to our second letter, that to the church in
Then we came to the church in
The fourth congregation was Thyatira. Here the Lord Jesus Christ is
presented as the Son of God who has eyes like a flame of fire and feet like
fine brass. This indicates purification and judgment. Thyatira is another
church which has compromised with paganism, with the pagan ways of thinking.
They are commended for various things. Even in congregations where there are
problems there are those who are advancing to spiritual maturity, those who are
demonstrating true Christian love for one another. So they are commended for
love. They are commended for Christian service. They have grown to maturity,
they are involved in the local church serving in various capacities. Remember,
Christian service is not a means of spiritual growth, it is a result of
spiritual growth. There are those who exhibit faith, i.e. the faith-rest drill,
they are trusting in God and growing to maturity. They have patience
(endurance), they are sticking with the Word in times of testing and trial, and
their works are increasing, i.e. their divine good is increasing. This
indicates that there are those who are truly pressing forward toward spiritual
maturity. However, there are failures and there are condemnations. They have
compromised with pressure to conform to paganism. This is so often the problem
that we have today with too many believers, that in order to get by at work, in
order to make it in the university, in order to be accepted by a certain social
crowd, they have to compromise their Christian, biblical standards. This was
the case in Thyatira, but God gave them time to repent of these things. The
incentive is to hold fast, to keep pressing to maturity, and the victor is
promised that he will receive eventually power over the nations. When the Lord
Jesus Christ returns to establish His kingdom, then He will rule over them with
a rod of iron, and we will be co-rulers and co-reigners with Him in His
kingdom, and will also receive the morning star which is some kind of
entitlement, some kind of recognition giving us special privilege.
Next is the congregation at
Next is the church at Philadelphia, and there the Lord is referred to as
the one who is holy and true, the one who has the key of David, a reference to
the Davidic covenant: “who opens and no one will shut, and who shuts and no one
opens.” Because He is the Davidic messiah He is the one who is the source of
eternal life and is the only one who gives life. This church has no negatives,
no condemnations, only commendations, like the earlier church at
Then we come to the oast church, the lukewarm church of whom nothing
good is said. They are neither hot nor cold, and because they are neither hot
nor cold but lukewarm the Lord Jesus Christ says he will vomit them out of His
mouth. This is because they are not usable, not serviceable. Because they are
operating in carnality they are not usable by the Lord. The idea of hot or cold
isn’t hot being positive an cold being negative, but the idea that hot water is
usable and cold water is usable but lukewarm water just makes one bilious. Here
the Lord is referred to as the stable one, “The Amen, the faithful and true
Witness, the Beginning of the creation of God.” A lukewarm believer is
undependable, unstable, vacillating, and their emphasis is on their own
efforts. They are self-sufficient. They are condemned for being lukewarm, for
having compromised with the pagan system around them, and for being
self-sufficient. They think they are rich, that they have no need of anything
spiritually, but the Lord says, “you do not know that you are wretched and
miserable and poor and blind and naked.” Because of their arrogance they have
nothing. Therefore they are challenged to repent, i.e. to change. The problem
is that the Lord has been excluded from the life of the church and they need to
let the Lord be the centrepiece of their lives again. That is why the Lord
says, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and
opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.”
That is not a salvation verse, it is a verse for fellowship. To those who
respond positively to the message there are incentives, and the incentive here
is to be a co-ruler with the Lord Jesus Christ. “He who overcomes, I will grant
to him to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with
My Father on His throne.”
The challenge to us as we go through these seven letters is to recognize
that this isn’t just written to first-century Christians, but it is written to
every congregation, every believer down through the centuries. As we go through
the positive traits here we see some of our positive traits. As we go through
the negative traits we also realise some of our negative traits. And the
challenge is the same for us, that is, to repent, to change what we need to
change, to respond to the message of the Scriptures and to apply these truths
in our lives so that we, too, can be victorious believers. The promise is just
as much for us as it was for them: that if we are victorious in our spiritual
life there are special rewards, privileges and positions in the eternal kingdom
that will be ours because we have matured and have the capacity, the
righteousness, to handle those positions. But it depends on our volition; it
depends on whether or not we are truly interested in serving the Lord. What is
demanded here is an eternal perspective, the recognition that what is going on
in these forty, fifty, sixty, seventy or eighty years that we have in this life
is going to determine what is going to happen when we arrive in heaven. That is
why each one of these letters closes with the admonition: “He who has an ear,
let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches”—not just to listen, not just
to know, but to respond with application. As James says, “Don’t be a nearer of
the Word only, but a hearer and an applier.”