(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Well, tonight I'm going to be continuing to talk about the seven churches in Asia, and we're going to be talking about the church in Thyatira. So if you would flip over to Revelation chapter number two. And of course, these messages are very relevant unto us today because here we are, we have a church, and we wish that Christ would tell us what we're doing right specifically. I mean, wouldn't it be nice to sit down with the Lord Jesus Christ and have him tell us exactly what we're doing well and exactly what we're doing poorly and what we should fix and so forth. But we don't have that, but what we have is the next best thing where we have Christ's messages to these seven churches because we can probably find ourselves somewhere in this list of seven churches. And all churches throughout time and in different geographies, they could find themselves at various stages being like the church at Ephesus or Smyrna or Pergamos or whatever. So these seven pattern churches are given, and this example can either be a good example or a bad example for us to follow depending on the situation. So let's jump in here with the church at Thyatira, the fourth out of seven. And the Bible starts there in verse 18 of Revelation chapter two, and unto the angel of the church in Thyatira write, These things saith the Son of God, who hath his eyes likened to a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brass. Now at the beginning of each of these messages to the seven churches, Jesus Christ is described in a different way, okay? And it's all referring to the same person, the Lord Jesus Christ, but if you remember some of the ways that we've seen him described in verse number one, He who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks, and then to the church at Smyrna, he said he was the first and the last, which was dead and is alive. And then with the church at Pergamos, he had the sharp sword with two edges. But here's the thing, typically this introduction connects to other things that he tells that church. It's not just random what that description is based on what he says later. Because if you remember, he says to the church at Smyrna that he was dead and is alive, and then at the end he says, he that overcometh should not be heard of the second death. So those things tie together, and of course they're going through great trials and tribulations and persecution, and so they're probably in a situation where they would fear death. And so he says, fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer. Be faithful unto death. And then the reference to I was dead and I'm alive is showing that Christ has conquered death. Oh death, where is thy sting? Oh grave, where is thy victory? And then when he introduced himself to the church at Pergamos, he talked about having the sharp sword with two edges, and then later in the message itself, he comes at them by saying I'm going to fight against them with the sword of my mouth, which he had just referenced. So again, these things are all connected, they're not coincidental. And so with the church at Thyatira, he introduced himself as the son of God, and then he says who hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brass. Now this description is found of Christ elsewhere in the book of Revelation, but also way back in the book of Daniel, this is also alluded to about Christ. And when we think about the eyes like a flame of fire, this is kind of a scary image. This is not necessarily an endearing image. You think of all the different artistic depictions of Christ, and I don't believe that we should make artistic depictions of Christ, we should focus on the word of God as our image of Christ, not some renaissance painter and what he thought Jesus should look like himself, basically, being an effeminate guy from the 16th century or whatever. But the point is that Christ is often depicted, you know, maybe as a shepherd or these really pastoral scenes and different things. He's depicted in different ways and different situations, and the Bible definitely depicts him that way as well as the good shepherd and so forth. But when we think of eyes like a flame of fire, that's not really the side of Christ that we're thinking of. This is more of a vengeful wrath of God kind of a view of Jesus Christ when we have the eyes like a flame of fire. Of course, that fits right in the book of Daniel, which has a lot of apocalyptic visions, as well as, of course, the book of Revelation, which is all about God pouring out his wrath on this earth. That's really the lion's share of the book. And so the eyes like a flame of fire and the feet like fine brass description is showing that he is not playing around. He means business. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. So that's what's being emphasized here. Of course, brass in the Bible pictures judgment and justice. And we think about the altar in the Old Testament that they used for the animal sacrifice, the brazen altar. It's made of brass, right? Recently we talked about the serpent on a pole that was made of brass. And so here we see the eyes like a flame of fire, the feet of fine brass showing that he's here for judgment. He is filled with wrath and he's ready to clean house on the church of Thyatira for their wickedness. Now let's move on now that we've seen that introduction of Christ here. It doesn't really bode very well for the church of Thyatira, that beginning. But it says in verse 19, I know thy works and charity and service and faith and thy patience and thy works. Notice the repetition of works. He started with the works and then he ends with works and then he says and the last to be more than the first. They're both work. But I believe what he's saying here is that they're a church who is doing more work today than they were doing yesterday, right? Their latter works are greater than their former works. They've not become lazy or slothful in their labor, but actually they've ramped up their works. They've ramped up their efforts. They're accomplishing more than they have in the past. They have charity, meaning that they have love, talks about service. So they're serving God. They have faith. They are patiently enduring. And so this church has a lot of good things going for it in verse 19, notwithstanding, I have a few things against thee. Now right away, just that word notwithstanding, okay, here's what the Bible is saying. No matter how much good you do, no matter how many good things you have going on, that does not cancel out the bad things that you're doing, right? You can't do a bunch of good works and then God's just going to turn a blind eye to your sins and say, well, you know, you did all these good works, so I'm just going to kind of look the other way while you can make grievous sin. No, because even if you have all these good things going for you, the works, the charity, the service, the faith, and even if you're increasing in works, God's not going to turn a blind eye to sin. Good deeds don't cancel out bad deeds, okay? And so even though they did these good things, in spite of that, he still has a few things against them, notwithstanding he has a few things against them. Because thou sufferest thou woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess, to teach and to seduce my servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. Now let me point out that the people that are involved in this particular sin are not all of the church members, right? In Pergamos, it wasn't everybody that was involved in sin, because if you remember, Christ was just going to fight against those specific people with the sword that proceeded out of his mouth. And so it's not everybody that's implicated, but people in the church that are not implicated, they are guilty as well because they are suffering that woman Jezebel, right? I have a few things against thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess. You know, we should not tolerate sin in the church, even if we're not involved in it, we can't just have fornication and idolatry running rampant in the church. Same problem that we saw with Pergamos this morning. Now of course, technically the message is to the angel of the church of Thyatira, which is basically referring to the preacher, because angel simply means messenger, the one who brings the message, the one who gives tidings. It's funny to read this in the Tyndale New Testament, of course, Tyndale was the first person to translate the Greek New Testament into modern English. And so obviously his work is a milestone in the English language, and it was the rough draft for the King James Bible. But it's funny because William Tyndale kind of has this habit of just wanting to use as many different words for the same thing as he possibly can. And the King James Bible does this a little bit, but Tyndale did it a lot, okay? And what I mean by that is that if you're reading in the King James Bible, it's the angel of the church of Ephesus, the angel of the church in Sardis, the angel and so forth. But in the, and of course that's how it reads in the original Greek as well, it's just the same word for angel every single time. But in the Tyndale New Testament, it's funny because it'll say like, to the messenger, to the angel, to the tidings bringer, like it gives all these different words. He's just getting real creative with his synonyms, you know, don't tell Patrick Boyle, but man, he was really going nuts with those synonyms, okay? And so what does he mean by angel here? He's talking about the messenger. So sometimes he'll say you and ye. And remember, whenever we have these second person pronouns in the New Testament that start with a Y, it's plural, ye, you, your is plural, thou, thee, thy is singular, okay? See in 10 seconds, I can fix everybody's problem with the King James, oh man, all the thes and thes. It's just like, do you know what thou means? Well, yeah, you know. Well then what's the problem? I just don't like it. You and your stinking pronouns. Take your, you know what, what do you prefer, the pronoun you instead of thee or whatever? But anyway, the point is that there is a little subtle difference between thou and ye because ye is plural and thou is singular. So actually the King James Bible is giving us a little bit more information than the modern versions which just kind of consolidate this all under just you and you don't really know is it singular or plural. So technically the thee, thou stuff is directed at the messenger, at the angel. But of course we want to be careful when we're interpreting the Bible that we don't just think like, oh, well that's just written to that person or to those people. We don't want to become like the dispensationalists where, you know, everything's just, well that's talking to the Jews. You know. Oh, don't read that. That's for Titus. You reading Timothy's mail again? I mean, it's stupid because the whole Bible is for all of our edification. And so when the Bible is speaking specifically to the angel, obviously everybody can take an admonition even though it's specifically talking to him. I mean, obviously as the preacher, as the guy who's getting up and doing the preaching, you know, obviously he has a lot of influence over the congregation and if he's turning a blind eye to sin, well then the church is probably going to turn a blind eye to sin in many cases. And so it's not just the people who are directly committing these wickednesses in the house of God that are guilty. It's also the church that tolerates these things, right? So if we just have people living in fornication in our church, we say, well, I'm not committing fornication. I'm married. I'm faithful to my wife. That's on them. Well, no, because the Bible specifically tells us that we are not supposed to allow fornication to go on in the church and we're not allowing idolatry in the church. And so therefore if people are doing it, we can't just say, oh, well, that's on them. It's like, well, no, it's our job to maintain the standards that God has set in his word. Obviously we're all sinners. Obviously none of us is perfect and there's always going to be sin to some degree, but there are certain grievous sins like drunkenness, adultery, idolatry, which God specifically tells us that these people must be put away from us. They must be put out of the church unless they repent. And so in this situation here, he says I have a few things against thee because thou sufferest. What does suffer mean? You allow, you tolerate, you put up with that woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophet to teach and to seduce my servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. Now this woman's got a lot of problems, okay? Where do we even begin with this woman? First of all, her parents gave her a stupid name, okay? Let's just start there. Why would you name your child after an Old Testament villain, okay? That's assuming that her name is literally Jezebel. Now another possible interpretation though is that Jesus Christ is just calling her Jezebel sort of like when he'll talk to Israel in the book of Isaiah and just call Israel Sodom. You know, they're not actually Sodom or referring to Rome as Babylon or something like that. So it's possible that her name's not really Jezebel and that she's just being called Jezebel, so I was kidding about the name. I have met someone named Jezebel and I had to shake my head a little bit about who would name their child after this Old Testament villainess, Jezebel. And so here we see this woman. She calls herself a prophetess and when Christ says, well, she calls herself that, he's saying she isn't one. She's self-styled as a prophetess and there are all kinds of prophets throughout the Old Testament where God says, I did not send these prophets. They did not hear any word from me. They are prophesying things out of their own heart. It's not the word of God. They're making things up, et cetera. But if you would, keep your finger here and go to 1 Timothy chapter 2 that we read right before the sermon because it's pretty hard to not think of 1 Timothy chapter 2 when you read this. I mean, if you know the Bible and you read Revelation 2, it's hard for your mind not to kind of have a little light bulb come on saying, wait a minute, this sounds familiar. This sounds a lot like 1 Timothy 2 because in 1 Timothy 2, the apostle Paul says in verse number 12, but I suffer not a woman to teach nor do you serve authority over the man, but to be in silence, okay? So this is consistent with what the apostle Paul taught over in 1 Corinthians when he said, let your women keep silence in the churches for it is not permitted unto them to speak, but if they will learn anything, let them ask their husband at home for it is a shame for a woman to speak in the church, right? So women are not supposed to be speaking in church. I suffer not a woman to teach. Obviously we're talking about teaching the Bible in church. It's not allowed, okay? Now with that in mind, if Paul says these words, I suffer not a woman to teach, then you look over at Revelation chapter 2 and it basically says, thou sufferest that woman to teach. I mean it literally uses those exact words. Now as other words mixed in as well, it says, thou sufferest that woman Jezebel which calleth herself a prophetess to teach, but does that interpolation of those words Jezebel which calleth herself a prophetess, does it really change the fact that the meat of that sentence is thou sufferest that woman to teach, okay? And you say, well, the problem is that, you know, it's what she's teaching that's the you know, because she's seducing the servants and whatever. Well here's the thing, you know, the New Testament says that women should not be teaching and preaching in church. Therefore, if a woman is teaching and preaching in a church, do you think that this woman has respect for the word of God or the will of God or is following the Bible? No, because she's proving that she's totally willing to ignore something that's crystal clear in the Bible that's stated in multiple places. So hmm, I wonder what other commandments she might ignore like maybe the prohibitions on fornication and idolatry. Why would it surprise you that some female preacher is also into fornication or adultery or idolatry? It shouldn't surprise you at all. See the mistake you made was suffering that woman to teach, period. Because there's no mention in 1 Timothy 2 of fornication, adultery, and idolatry in this context. It just says, you know, I suffer, not a woman to teach, period. And if we would follow that, we wouldn't have to worry about, you know, this other situation, okay? Now why are women not allowed to teach and preach in the house of God? Well this is because, well let's just keep reading. The Bible says right here, for Adam was first formed, then Eve, okay? So right away, the woman was created to be a help for the man, right? The woman is his support, not vice versa, right? And of course the Bible is very respectful toward women, it exalts women, and women are key characters in a lot of great Bible stories, and the Bible has a lot of wonderful positive things to say about women. There's nothing negative about women, it's just that when God created human beings, he created the man first, he created Adam, and then he created Eve to be his helper, okay? A help that is meet for him, or appropriate for him, or suitable for him, okay? And so Adam was first formed, then Eve. That's point number one. Point number one is that the woman was never created to be the main leader, she was created to be in a support role, and that's how it is in the home, right? I mean the husband's the head of the household, and his wife is a support unto him, she is a help unto him, and again, this has nothing to do with intelligence. You know I've heard some people get all carried away on their male chauvinism, or whatever you want to call it, MGTOWism, or the manosphere, or whatever it is, and I've heard these guys try to claim that men are smarter than women. I don't believe that. I do not believe that men are smarter than women at all. I believe that men and women are probably about equivalent in intelligence. I'm sure from case to case, a lot of women are smarter than men, a lot of men are smarter than women, but in general, that's just a stupid statement that doesn't really have any basis in the Bible, or in any phenomena that we see today in 2023 in the world. No, men are not smarter than women, that's not what, the Bible doesn't say, I suffer not to want to teach, because women just aren't as smart as men, and therefore they shouldn't be teaching. Because first of all, nowhere does the Bible say that it's the smartest people who should do the preaching. Where does the Bible say in the qualifications for the pastor, he better be one of the smartest people? Is it there? Now look, hey, I think it's great if pastors are smart, and the smarter the better as far as I'm concerned. Nobody wants to have an ignorant pastor or a dumb pastor, but is that even in the qualifications? No, that's not the point. And here's the thing, God can sometimes use men of a modest intelligence, of a modest intellect, not with some big IQ, not super educated. I'll bet you that if we could see through the eyes of God, we would see that there have been lots of unlearned men who've done great works for God throughout history as pastors of churches, that have done great things, and then other intellectual men, actual saved men who were pastors who weren't that effective, and weren't that greatly used by God. And I bet there will be a lot of guys getting rewarded with less intelligence, and a lot of guys with a lot of intelligence not getting as many rewards, and look, I'm for you being as smart as you can possibly be, and we should all seek to get smarter, and intelligent, and to learn. I'm not one of these people that exalts ignorance. And believe me, it's out there in the old IFP, and even in some fake new IFP types, where it's like, I just want people at the end of my life to just say that I was just an unlearned man. It's like, no, I don't want people to say that about me. Why would I want people to say that about me? Don't put that on my tombstone. Well, God bless Pastor Anderson, you know, he wasn't very smart, but we really liked him as our pastor. Oh, man, wow. But the point is, you know, it's not about intelligence, because first of all, intelligence is not even a big qualifier for even being a pastor in the first place. And men and women, I believe, and all the evidence points to the fact that men and women are of equal intelligence. That's not to say that men aren't smarter in certain areas and that women aren't smarter in certain areas, because we all have our specialties, but it's just a hateful thing to say to just try to just put down women and just act like women are just inferior in all these qualitative ways. It just isn't true, okay? And so the idea is that God created man and woman for different roles. It's not that one's better than the other, it's not that one's more important, it's not that one is smarter, it's just that they have different roles. You know, the man was not created for the woman, but the woman was created for the man. But then, you know, the Bible says, but, you know, the man is born of woman, you know, and man does not exist without the woman, man relies on woman. And so the Bible gives a balanced view on this subject, a correct view, the manosphere is going to be a highly imbalanced view. And so the point is that the reasons are given right here. Adam was first formed, then Eve, period. That's one point, that stands as a point right there, just different roles men are supposed to lead. If they're supposed to lead in the marriage, if they're supposed to lead in the family, if God told Adam and Eve after they had sinned, he said to Adam, or excuse me, he said to Eve, your husband will rule over you. You know, that's the order that God set up, and that also carries over into other areas of life, obviously in the church, women are not supposed to be the leaders, they're not supposed to be the bosses or the teachers or the preachers, okay. So it says, you know, Adam was first formed, then Eve. Then it gives another reason, it says, and Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. So he says, you know, also it was the woman who was deceived and was therefore in the transgression. And so if you remember, being obedient to her husband is part of the punishment for sinning, right, because she took and ate of that fruit. Part of the punishment is that her husband would rule over her, and he was going to multiply her sorrow and her conception, and in sorrow she would bring forth children, and her husband would rule over her, right. And the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 14 when it says the women should keep silence in the churches that they're commanded to be under obedience, as saith also the law, meaning Genesis, okay, says that they're commanded to be under obedience. And so that's why it's just because God has ordained the man to lead, and so I don't believe that our political leaders should be women either, okay, the country should not be led by women. In Isaiah 3, one of the curses that he mentions is that, you know, women rule over them, children are their princes. That's considered a negative thing, right. We want to have a man leading, and again, it's nothing against women, it's just the way the world is supposed to work. Husbands ahead of the household, wives are to obey and submit to their husbands. That's what the Bible teaches. And so here's the thing about that. The Bible clearly states this in 1 Timothy chapter 2 and in 1 Corinthians 14 because of the fact that men are the only ones who are qualified to preach and be a pastor by virtue of simply just God's commandments, saying this is how it is, okay. And I've heard some people try to make these excuses like, well, you know, if men would step up to the plate, then women wouldn't have to lead. It's like, really? Because please show me a town, city, or hamlet in the world where there's no man pastoring, so a woman is pastoring because there's literally no man. Well, just not at that particular church. Well, then go to a different church, right. Go to a church where there's a hair-legged man behind the pulpit preaching, okay. But you know, obviously we want to take this to an unbiblical extreme where I've heard some people say, you know, the women aren't even allowed to talk at all in the church building or something like that. And obviously this is usually just some kind of a straw man argument to try to make what we're saying look stupid. But obviously when the Bible says let them learn in silence, what we're seeing there is that during the preaching, during the teaching of God's word, they are to sit and learn silently not to question what is being taught, not to interject their opinions or their views or agree with anything or disagree with anything. They are commanded to be in silence and to learn in silence, not to speak in the church. Now obviously if we're singing a song, then obviously all the women are singing. Obviously in fellowship, before and after church, people are singing. And then also, you know, these bozos recently, somebody sent me a clip of this bozo that was claiming that my wife runs Faithful Word Baptist Church and that she's really the one like behind me, behind the scenes, like she's telling me what to preach, she's in control of the church. And she claimed that she was doing it through witchcraft and sorcery. Now first of all, accusing my wife of witchcraft and sorcery is a pretty serious accusation with no evidence. Of course, there can't be any evidence because my wife has no connection with witchcraft or sorcery of any kind. She doesn't do any of those things. You know, there's nary a Ouija board to be found in our house. Of course, my wife knows nothing about witchcraft, doesn't practice any witchcraft because they say, you know, she's doing sorcery, she's doing witchcraft, she's doing, it's like what? But here's the thing, I guess they would have to invoke sorcery and witchcraft to claim that my wife is running the church because she's clearly not doing it by any physical means because you clearly don't see her running anything. I mean, here's what my wife runs at our church, the Mother's Day tea party. You know, is that running the church because she does have, I don't have anything to do with that. You know, she takes care of that. But you know, the funny thing is that anybody who actually came to our church, you would expect them to realize how absurd that is and how not true it is. I mean, let me just, and look, I love my wife so much, she's gone in Germany so I can say stuff now. No, I'm just kidding. She'll listen to the recording. But here's the thing, you know, I love my wife and we talk a lot and we've obviously influenced each other a lot and iron sharpens iron and we've been married for 22 years. But let me tell you something, if my wife were running this church, it would not be the same as it is right now. My wife and I are not the same person at all. And the preaching would be different. And I'm not saying that's a bad thing, I don't want to be married to a clone of myself, okay. But the preaching would be different, the way that we spend money would be different, the activities would be different, you know, a lot of things would be different. Now, that's not to say that my wife doesn't influence me and obviously my wife is very smart, has a lot of wisdom that I draw from, but let's face it, my wife and I don't always agree on everything. And guess which way we do things at Faith Forward Baptist Church. Do we do it her way? Nope, we do it my way because I'm the one who God has appointed here as the leader and so I'm looking to the Word of God and leading the church to the best of my ability. But what a ridiculous accusation to claim that my wife is the one who's the mastermind and she's got all of her, you know, sorcery or whatever that they're accusing her of. But one of the things that they pointed out as evidence is that they said, you know, if you listen to Pastor Anderson's sermons, he'll even talk to her during the sermon. And he'll ask her stuff. And what's funny is that I've been preaching for 17 years and over the course of 17 years, I can literally think of at least three or four people who've made this accusation independently of one another. That I ask my wife for approval while I'm preaching to make sure that what I'm preaching is right. Because every once in a while, I'll give a fact or something and I'll be like, honey, is that what it was? You know, it'll be like a story or a fact. I'll just like verify a fact. Sort of like I did with Kevin this morning where I said, hey, Kevin, you know, what was that word that that guy used when we were out soul winning? And eventually he came through. It took him a while. What was that? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Kevin is the mastermind of Faithful Word. You know, meet him after the service because he's the brains behind the operation. But I thought when you did that symbol, I thought you meant, you know, you were using a thesaurus to remember that word. But anyway, on the computer. But the point is that obviously if I'm up here preaching, I'm leading, I'm speaking the Word of God as the Holy Spirit is leading me up here and I'm preaching and I verify a fact with someone. Okay. And let's say I verify a fact with my wife or with another woman and I ask a question. Like let's say there's some woman in the church and I ask her a question just about, hey, what's the name of so-and-so? Like if I said, hey, what's the name of that country where blah, blah, blah. And some woman knows the answer or something. It's not like, oh, you know, this, you know, she's usurping authority and teaching the Word. I mean, that's, you know, I feel like sometimes people just miss the point of what God is even saying. It's almost like the way the Jews interpret the Bible where they get this overly literal legalistic view and it's like they don't even remember the point anymore. I mean, what was the whole point of God saying, I suffer not a woman to teach nor do you serve authority over the man, but to be in silence. The whole point of keeping silence in the church is that they're not supposed to be leading. They're not supposed to be in charge. They're not supposed to be preaching and teaching the Word of God. Not like, oh, she said a word while he was preaching because he asked her what street they lived on or whatever. That's just stupid. But people can go overboard and, you know, maybe a woman laughs during the sermon. Oh, shut up. I mean, isn't that just overkill and it doesn't make any sense? It's just people missing the point of what God was actually commanding. But that being said, the Bible is clear that no, my wife should not be running. And by the way, I've preached a whole sermon about how my wife is not an officer of the church. She has literally no role in this church officially or formally or that she's somehow different than other women in the church. Guess what my wife is? See, to me, a pastor's wife is a pastor's wife. It's not like one word, a pastor's wife. It's like a pastor's wife. You know what her job is? Her job is to be my wife. Her job is to be the mother of my children. It's not her job to lead the women of Faithful Word Baptist Church or something like that. Now look, she is going to pitch in on certain activities, but guess what, so do other women. And there are, in fact, sometimes other women who do more organizing of activities than she does because she's kind of busy with her 12 children. So the point is that women are not allowed to teach in the church, period. And the church that allows it is wrong. Now of course, God is using a kind of extreme example here in Revelation chapter 2 because this woman who calls herself a prophetess is teaching, but she's also seducing Christ's servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. Now this is the same problem that Pergamos had, which is this permissive teaching that is teaching that these things are okay. Now you say, who would teach such a thing? There are teachers out there in what's known as the hyper-grace movement that say that sin doesn't even exist in the New Testament. Or that because we're not under the law and under grace, that all things are permissible. As long as we're led by the Spirit, we don't have to obey any commandments or anything. Now of course, I could do a whole sermon debunking that stupidity because there are lots of commandments that are specific to the New Testament. Christ has commandments. The Bible talks about being under the law of Christ and that Christ commands us to do these things and so forth. But trust me, there are millions of people out there who have these doctrines that just say basically anything goes in the New Testament, just as long as it's all done through love and charity and as long as you're a good person. And so you could see how these type of hyper-grace teachings could lead to someone thinking that fornication is okay or that eating things sacrificed unto idols is okay. And so this woman is teaching that and the people who tolerate it are in sin as well. And so it says she teaches them to seduce my servants and to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. Now at first you might read this and wonder, is she seducing them all to commit fornication with her specifically? Like I mean, is this woman just committing fornication with that many dudes? I don't think that that's what this is saying. I do think that there's an element of that in the next couple of verses, but I think that when we see the difference between the word fornication and adultery, now some people would use this scripture as a proof text that fornication and adultery are the same thing. But here's the thing, if we study the rest of the Bible, the Bible's really consistent about using these words as separate things. When it talks about fornication and adultery, it uses separate words really consistently. So you might look at this and at first glance think, oh, fornication, adultery, same thing. And there are some people who teach that, but I don't believe that for one second. The Bible uses these words distinctly, differently, separately. And so when it says that she is seducing my servants to commit fornication, I don't think that's saying necessarily with her, that she's just being with just dude after dude after dude in this church necessarily. But that rather that she is teaching them that it's okay to commit fornication, just like what's going on in Pergamos, that doctrine of Balaam that goes soft on fornication and idolatry. That calls herself a prophetess to teach and to seduce my servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. Again, I don't think that they're just all eating stuff sacrificed unto idols at her house. You know, hey, let's all come over and fornicate with me and eat stuff sacrificed unto idols. I think it's more like she's teaching a permissive doctrine that's allowing these things and teaching that they're okay and enticing them to partake in these sins in general, possibly with her, possibly with other people, okay, fornication. I gave her space to repent of her fornication and she repented not. Behold I will cast her into a bed and then commit adultery with her into great tribulation except they repent of their deeds. Now I could see how at first glance you would just want to just equate fornication and adultery. But again, I hesitate to interpret the Bible that way where the Bible's being really consistent with something for so many verses over and over again and then all of a sudden there's something like this. I'm not really quick to just redefine everything and just kind of like, oh, let me just change my definition of everything. I mean, you could make the case that, well, maybe, you know, this particular biblical author John is using the word synonymously, but, you know, again, I would hesitate to throw out everything I've learned in 1100 some chapters of the Bible, you know, getting up to this point and then all of a sudden just kind of changing the definitions. So let's just assume for a minute that fornication means fornication and that adultery means adultery. Okay. Meaning fornication being an unmarried person or specifically an unmarried woman having this type of relationship versus adultery being a married woman having this type of a relationship. Okay. Well, that interpretation is still possible here if we keep the words meaning what they mean because then the idea would be that she started out committing fornication and God gave her space to repent of her fornication. What does that mean space when he says I gave her space? What does it mean? Time. Right? When he says I gave her space to repent of her fornication, he's saying I gave her time to get this right and to repent of her fornication and she repented not. Well, then wouldn't it be a reasonable explanation to say, well, you know what, she was committing fornication and God tried to give her time and tried to chastise her or discipline her or get her back on the right track with that and that now perhaps she has graduated to adultery. Perhaps now she's married, you know, she was single and committed fornication as a single girl and now she's married and she still is doing this and she has graduated from fornication to adultery by getting married. And let me just tell you a really shocking fact that people who commit a lot of fornication before they're married are probably the same kind of people who commit adultery after they're married and people that are a virgin when they get married are probably the same type of people who remain faithful to their spouse. Now, again, obviously there are lots of people who when given space to repent of their fornication, they do repent of their fornication and that should not be brought up to them, they should be able to live it down, it should not be hung over their head, but beware of a very promiscuous woman and then you just assume she's going to be faithful to you, right? I mean the same girl that's easy when you're single is going to be the same one who is likely to commit adultery after you're married, right? The same dude who is constantly wanting to sleep with you before you're married is probably the same dude that will commit adultery after you're married, right? Because that's the type of person that he is. Now, obviously people can grow and change and repent, but these are warning signs, aren't they, you know, when people are not able to control themselves before they're married, this could lead to the same type of sin popping up again later in life. And it's just like any other sin, once you open the door to that sin, you know, it's easier to do it the second time, right? Once you've snorted cocaine once, right, you're more likely to do it than the guy who's never snorted cocaine. And so that's what I believe is going on in this passage is that she is teaching that it's okay to commit fornication. She of course, she's committing fornication as well. She is committing fornication with these dudes or other dudes or whoever, and he gave her space to repent of her fornication. She repented not. Now fast forward, she's married, behold, I will cast her into a bed and them that commit adultery with her into great tribulation except they repent of their deeds, right? So now God is really gonna come down on her like a ton of bricks because, you know, she already had the chance to repent in the past of fornication. Now she's committing adultery and so now God is gonna punish severely, okay? And by the way, the fact that God gave her space to repent of her fornication shows that even if you've committed fornication, it's not too late to get right with God and do things right from here on out. God will give you space to repent of your fornication, amen? And we are supposed to give people space to repent. So if people get right on that, you know, then they should be able to move forward and it should be let go, forgiven and forgotten. And so he says, I'll cast her into a bed and them that commit adultery with her into great tribulation except they repent of their deeds. So instead of a bed of pleasure, because obviously the bed is where fornication and adultery take place, you know, he's gonna cast her into a bed all right, but it's gonna be a bed of trouble, a bed of suffering, affliction, tribulation. It's sort of like, you know, you made your bed, now lay in it and this is that idea. And so it says, I'll cast her into a bed, I'll give her a bed all right and then they commit adultery with her into great tribulation except they repent of their deeds and I will kill her children with death. So apparently now she has children and again, this would seem to indicate that she's probably married because, you know, obviously, yeah, we have a lot of single mothers today, probably not as much in the ancient world though and probably not as much at around time of Christ. And so, you know, I'll kill her children with death and all the churches shall know that I and he would search at the reigns and hearts and I will give every one of you according to your works okay. So God is saying, I've got these eyes like a flame of fire and I see what's going on and I am searching the reigns and the hearts and again, what are the reigns? The reigns are technically the kidneys but the reigns are referring to a seat of emotion right because when you have kind of a gut feeling about something or when you are scared or when you're angry or when you're in love, you don't really feel anything in your head where your brain is, you feel it in your abdomen and so the heart is seen as a seat of consciousness and our inner being and our soul right and then the reigns are like even more visceral than the heart, you know, it's like a really, so God, it's like God not only reads our mind, God not only knows our thoughts but he also even knows how we feel, even our emotions and so he searches the reigns and hearts and he will give unto everyone according to their works. So even if you're saved, you will still get repaid according to your works in this lifetime and so obviously once you're saved, you can never lose your salvation. Once a person has believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, they are sealed by the Holy Ghost under the day of redemption, nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord who will never leave us nor forsake us, we have eternal life, on and on. You cannot lose your salvation but God will punish you on this earth whom the Lord loveth he chases and scourges every son and we receive it and he can also make us miss out on rewards in heaven, he can take away rewards in heaven that we would have gotten and so here he's willing to cast her into a bed, then they commit adultery with her into great tribulation except they repent of their deeds and again, this could be literally committing adultery with her, the people who actually committed adultery with her specifically and I do think that that is there, that obviously she did commit adultery with some of these specific people. It could also just mean that people that are going along with her teachings and committing adultery with her like along with her like doing the same thing as her. That could be a broadening of this so that even more people can go into that bed and get it smoked. But it says, I'll kill her children with death and all the church shall know that I am he which searched the reigns and hearts and I will give unto every one of you according to your works. And look, he says, don't miss this, I know we're getting toward the end of the sermon but perk up, he says, behold I come quickly and my reward is with me to give every man according as his work shall be. That's not just talking about unsaved people, that's talking about saved people. The Bible talks about God rewarding his servants small and great in Revelation chapter 11. And so when he says, I'll give unto every one of you according to your works, this could be saved people. Now here's my question, is Jezebel for sure unsaved? Okay well here's the thing, these people that she has seduced are certainly saved because God calls them his servants. He says, she is seducing my servants to commit fornication and to eat things, sacrifice some apples. Also, it would almost seem that Jezebel could be saved because God's giving her space to repent of her fornication and then he's bringing punishment and chastisement and still looking for repentance. This seems like she's just a really bad person but that she is a Christian, I mean that's what it seems like. And again, I wouldn't say that that's for sure but it's definitely possible, why not? But when it comes to the servants, I mean look, is it possible for a Christian to commit fornication? Is it possible for a Christian to commit adultery? Absolutely. And you know what, that's why the Bible says, let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. That's why the Bible says, make not provision for the flesh to fulfill the lust of. We are not immune to this by virtue of being saved. And so we as Christians need to be sober and vigilant knowing that our adversary, the devil, is walking about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. And you know what one of the devil's tools is, is that he will use doctrine that says, oh, this stuff's okay, hey, drinking's okay, fornication's okay, idolatry's okay, meat sacrificed unto idols, there's no issue. This permissive attitude that's just telling you everything's okay, you know, that can really influence people to think, oh, well, I mean, you know, if the prophetess over here is telling me that, well then, it must be true. Now it could be easy to be really hard on these people and say, what a bunch of idiots in Thyatira, like get out of that church, like what are you doing? You know, you need to just make the drive to the church of Smyrna, brother, you know. I don't care how many hours it is, because you guys are all in Asia, so figure out a way to get over to, you know, Philadelphia, for crying out loud. But here's the thing, we have to understand that it's easier for us because we actually have a written copy of the New Testament. These people don't have a written copy of the New Testament, all they have is the Old Testament, they might not necessarily know all the rules. Maybe they have some early scriptures, maybe they've got some epistles of Paul or something, but, you know, they're not necessarily, and I'm sure that they do have some epistles of Paul at this point, but they don't necessarily know everything yet. They probably don't have 1 and 2 Timothy, necessarily, you know. But the point is that they don't have as much information as we do. They don't have Revelation 2, you know, telling them about their own train wreck until they get it and it's like, oh, that's us, stink, you know. So wow, we're in the Bible now, forever, you know. When I get to heaven, I'm going to be like, okay, I want to meet all the members from Thyatira, you know. Did Jezebel make it up here? But he says in verse 24, unto you I say, and unto the rest in Thyatira, as many as have not this doctrine, and which have not known the depths of Satan as they speak, I would put upon you none of the burden but that which you have already, hold fast till I come. Now what's funny here, you know, here he's talking in the plural because he said, thou sufferest that woman Jezebel. But then he says, unto the rest in Thyatira, you know, I think that the thee of the angel of Thyatira is not off the hook because he really should have been doing something about this. But to just Joe, church member who didn't have anything to do about it, to do with it and maybe didn't even know about it because it says they haven't known the depths of Satan as they speak is sort of like our expression, like so to speak. I'll put upon you none of the burden. He's saying, look, you guys that aren't part of this junk, just, you know, keep doing what you're doing. You're doing great, you know. I'll put upon you none of the burden but that which you have already, hold fast till I come. And he that overcometh, which is talking about people being saved, of course, we've talked about that, and keepeth my works unto the end, that's in addition to being saved, not only are they saved but they're also keeping his works unto the end. He says, to him will I give power over the nations and he shall rule them with a rod of iron as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers even as I received of my father. Now notice that Christ is saying here that he will give power over the nations to the servants of God who keep his works unto the end, not the ones who get seduced into the fornication and get off track and stop serving God. But the ones who keep his works unto the end, man, he's going to give them power over the nations and they're going to rule them with a rod of iron. Now the Bible says that Christ is going to rule with a rod of iron, but now the Bible's even telling us that Christ's servants will also rule with a rod of iron, right? I'll give him power over the nations and he shall rule them with a rod of iron as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers. That means that the rod of iron is not just for looks, it actually breaks stuff. Even as I received of my father, you know, so as the father sent me, so send I you. That has to do with the gospel, right? The father sent Christ in the world to seek and to save the lost. Christ has sent us to seek and to save the lost. But just as the father has given Christ authority, Christ will dole out authority unto his servants and they will rule with a rod of iron. So does it sound like the millennial reign of Jesus Christ is a reign where anything goes? It sounds like there are going to be some rules, sounds like there's going to be some cracking of skulls with some rods of iron, okay? And so we need to understand that those eyes with the flame of fire are no joke and that Christ is going to rule with a rod of iron and so will his servants. And then he says, and I will give him the morning star, he that hath in the air, let him hear what the spirit saith unto the churches. Now that, you know, famously there was a certain guy who preached that, you know, the morning star is a weapon. But here's the thing. The problem with that idea is that the morning star as a weapon only goes back to like the middle age. Can you keep silence in the church, please? Because you're laughing. No, I'm just kidding. That was a joke. But the morning star as a weapon is a medieval weapon, okay? This is not something that we have any evidence existed at the time of Christ. And so that's so unlikely that it just, that just isn't what it is, okay? So but in the Bible, the morning star is a reference to Jesus in Revelation chapter 22 verse 16, right? I Jesus have sent my angel to testify to you these things in the churches on the root and the offspring of David and the bride and morning star. So Christ says I'm the morning star. Elsewhere Christ is called the day star, okay? Now what does this mean? Well there are actually two things that, and I'll close on this point, I'm just wrapping up, but there are really two things that could be pointed to as the morning star. One of them is the planet Venus. And the reason that the planet Venus is called the morning star is that when the sun, you know, for those of you who know that the sun comes up gradually, because you don't sleep in every single morning, but the sun actually does come up gradually, and when you are out really early in the morning, you will see just that one quote unquote star in the sky all by itself. But it's not really a star, it's the planet Venus. Now this is because the planet Venus, if you remember back to elementary school and you learned about the planets and you know the order of the planets, right, and you got Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, and so on, well notice that Venus is closer to the sun than we are, right? So if Venus is closer to the sun, then it makes sense that basically it would be near the sun in the sky. So therefore, let's say the sun has been down for like six hours and it's like midnight or one in the morning or something. Would you expect to see Venus high in the sky when you know that the sun is on the opposite side? I mean think about it, right? At midnight, the sun is on the opposite side of the Earth. So would we expect to see Venus in the sky if Venus and the sun are close? No we wouldn't, right? So this is, you know, I'm just making it real simple. Don't get all geeked out astronomically on me. The point is, what I'm saying is accurate by the way, the point is you see Venus either right after the sun goes down in the very early evening or in the early morning right before the sun comes up and even when the sun is just starting to kind of glow, you'll see, you'll still be able to see Venus. Who has been driving in the morning and you've seen the planet Venus in the morning, you're driving to work or whatever, yeah, so you'll see that. So that has sometimes been referred to as the morning star, okay? But the planet Venus has also been referred to as Lucifer, okay, throughout history as well in various cultures. So here's where this misunderstanding comes from where you have the modern versions calling Christ the morning star and then turning around and talking about the morning star being, you know, falling from heaven, which is obviously blasphemous, right? Whereas the King James Bible has Lucifer being thrown out of heaven and Christ the morning star. Well, here's what's going on is that basically the sun is the morning star because of the fact that the sun is a star, number one. Number two, the sun comes up in the morning. And think about this, the day star. Now, hmm, what do you think the day star is? I mean, there's no heavenly body that's visible in the daytime except the moon, of course, but you know, the day star, it's the sun, okay? And what you have to understand is that planets used to be called wandering stars. And that's what the word planet literally means, wandering, okay? But then it just got shortened to just planet, just wanderer, but they used to be called wandering stars. And the Bible talks about this as a reference to extremely wicked people in the book of Jude, reprobates that are called wandering stars. So these reprobates in Jude are called wandering stars to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever. And the symbolism there is that, you know, the stars are all doing their thing, they're all moving in a perfect pattern, and then the planets are doing like this other thing. And it's like, whoa, they're wandering all over the sky, what's going on? You know, obviously, now we understand the movements of the planets, but throughout history, astronomers spent many centuries trying to figure out the movements of the planets and trying to understand their movements, then they seem to be wandering. And so that's why they're called that, because they would go in one direction, then they would have some retrograde motion, and then they would move forward again. And that was pretty weird, okay, until people understood that. So here's the thing. We've got these two different bodies that could be called the morning star. We've got the planet Venus, and then we've got the sun itself. And basically, the way that you could look at this is that the sun is the real one, you know, the real morning star that really lights up the morning. And then you've got this kind of like cheap imitation, whatever, Lucifer, which is like an object of, of course, pagan worship. And here's the thing, the sun represents Jesus in the Bible. Jesus is literally called, in Malachi chapter 4, the son of righteousness, S-U-N, okay? So the Bible calls Jesus the son of righteousness in Malachi 4. Obviously, we shouldn't literally worship the sun, no more than we should literally worship a lamb, because Jesus is the lamb of God. But the sun represents Jesus, just like a lamb represents Jesus, okay? And Jesus is the day star rising in your hearts, right? And so one way that we could look at this, so again, the modern versions are wrong and misleading to translate Isaiah 14, 12 as morning star. The original Hebrew does not say the word morning and the word star, no, it doesn't, right? It's a single word that is a reference to the planet Venus, and it's called Lucifer in Latin and in English, that's how it gets translated over, because it's just a light bearer, a light bringer, that's just a name that it had as a nickname throughout history. Whereas the Bible calls Jesus the morning star, I mean, there's a Greek word for morning and a Greek word for star there, like it's literally saying morning star, okay? That's which, the bozos who don't even speak Hebrew or read Hebrew fluently or read Greek even fluently will try to come at you, well, if you go back to Hebrew it's morning star. They don't even know what they're talking about, okay? It's a word that's used one time, so there's no cross-referencing, it's not two words, it's not a word for morning and it's not a word for star, okay? So it gets a unique translation in English, Lucifer. And so it's a word that's used once in Hebrew and it's a word that's used once in the English Bible. So it sounds like a great match, sounds like a perfect apple for apple match up there. And so the King James is right once again for the 7,000th time. So when he says, I'll give him the morning star, that could either mean, you know, you could say, well, does that just mean I'll give him Jesus Christ? Well, obviously all of us are partakers of Christ. So that is one possible interpretation, right? Because we're all partakers of the Lord Jesus Christ. But you know, I don't think that's what it's necessarily saying because if you, like just think about the sun for a minute, right? Like the actual sun. If I said like, I'll give him the sun, I'm going to give you sun. If I said I'm going to give you the sun, does that mean I'm going to lasso the sun and bring it to you, give it to you? Or does it more mean like I'm going to make the sun shine on you, right? Like if I said, you know, God gives the sun or God gives the moon or God gives the stars, wouldn't you think that it means like God provides those things for like, you know, he provides the stars for navigation or he provides the sun for warmth and to help us and give us light? I think that makes a lot more sense. So I think when it says, you know, I'll give him the morning star, it's more referring to the fact, you know, I am going to give him this new day that's dawning, quote unquote, of the millennial reign of Christ so that he will bask in the glory of Jesus Christ. I think that makes a little more sense. Like I'll give him the morning star, meaning he will reap the benefits of the morning star or the shine from the morning star will shine on him. Christ's glory will shine upon him. I think that that's more what it means here. So I do think it's a reference to Jesus. And I think it's Jesus being pictured as the sun, like he also is when he's called the day star or when he's called the sun, S-U-N in Malachi chapter four. I'll give him the morning star, he that hath near let him hear where the spirits say it's unto the churches. And so with that, I'll close that Thyatira is a church that did a lot of things right. They were doing a lot of good work for the Lord, but they just allowed this female preacher, which was their first mistake. And then the other thing was that they were turning a blind eye to a doctrine that was permissive toward fornication, even adultery and idolatry. And look, this must not have been super uncommon since something kind of similar was going on in Pergamos. And in both Pergamos and Thyatira, it was only a few people that were involved. It wasn't the whole church. It was only just a few people. It was just a faction who'd gotten into this stupidity. And God is calling upon the entire church at Pergamos or Thyatira to clean house on these people and to fix it or I'll fix it, Christ is saying. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for our church, Lord, and Lord help us never to think that because we do a lot of work for you, that somehow it's okay to indulge in sin. Lord, help us to flee fornication, help us to be faithful to our spouses, Lord, and to keep the marriage bed pure and not defile it with adultery. And Lord God, I just pray that you would help us to be faithful and keep your works unto the end that we might rule and reign with you one day and bask in your glory in that millennial reign of Christ and it's in Christ's name we pray, amen.