Status update - Revelation 2:1-7
To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven golden lampstands:
I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked men, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary.
Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love. Remember the height from which you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place.
But you have this in your favour: You hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
To him who overcomes, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.
What is your relationship status - with Jesus?
There are times in every relationship when you have to remind yourself where you are and why.
I have a relationship with Leeds United. Why? Because I am proud of being from Leeds and I have always followed them. I didn’t get to watch them play live much until we moved back to Leeds in 1997 but I used to keep an eye on their results and story. Latterly the relationship has ebbed a little! They haven’t done well and the last time I went to see them it was a cold, dark, wet evening, the beer tasted off, the pie wasn’t as described on the packet and we lost 1-0 to Sunderland. Not great entertainment or a great use of £30.
Many of you have a relationship with a boss or an employer. That will have gone through phases and you will also have had times when reviewed that decision. Do I still want to work for this firm or organisation?
What about romantic relationships? They will inevitably come under scrutiny at some point. You will doubt and ask questions and the relationship may go through a bad patch.
Relationships usually start with some sort of catalyst, perhaps a first love. Then we make a decision to be part of the relationship, or maybe it just sort of happens.
And then it gets formalised – we buy a Leeds United scarf and update our Facebook status.
We sign an employment contract and update our Facebook status
We get married and update our Facebook status.
It is inevitable that our relationship with Jesus should go through phases as well. We find out about him, we are wowed by who he is and what he has done and we make a decision to follow him. We demonstrate it by baptism or confirmation. And we update our Facebook status.
And what happens next?
In this passage in Revelation – one of seven similar passages – John writes down a vision that he has seen in which Jesus is speaking to seven different churches in the Roman province of Asia Minor. Written just before the end of the 1st century AD from his exile on the Island of Patmos. Revelation isn't history or biography it is somewhere between a letter and a prophecy.
The message we are reading about is to Ephesus, a major trading port off the west coast of Asia Minor.
What does this say to us?
- It is a reminder that Jesus is speaking to us and caring for us as one of his churches. As part of his universal church. We may be a small community of people in Leeds but we are recognised as a church and walked amongst by our Lord Jesus.
- We are commended for doing things well, for pursuing the truth, for giving time and energy and money in a generous way. Whilst being a welcoming community we are not afraid to confront falsehood and sin.
- But we hear Jesus calling us back to our first love and are warned that we need to attend to this.
- We are promised that we can eat from the tree of life.
I want to reflect on this phrase “our first love”.
Our strap line is, love God, love people, love in action – and I have been thinking about what that means in the course of a life time or at least a long time of following Jesus.
First love is rather intimate language and is overlaid with romantic meanings for us. It is particularly difficult for men to negotiate sometimes. So let me ask you the question in a slightly different way.
When you first set off on this relationship with Jesus - whether it was 40 years ago or 4 years ago or 4 weeks ago or maybe you have only started thinking about it whilst I have been talking – what was it about Jesus that drew you to him? What did that first love look and feel like? Or what impressed you about him? What was compelling enough for you to start making decisions which took you toward him rather than to carry on in your own way?
Was it:
- the experience of the love of the Father
- the way he treated poor people
- the experience of his forgiveness and grace
- the elimation of the power of death
- his teaching
- his healing
The fact of the matter is that we go through phases in our relationships and most importantly so in our relationship with Jesus. We will all go through seasons but not necessarily in an ordered way. There are parts of us at different stages, we spend a long time in some and less in others. We re-visit one or more at different points in our lives. Here is one way of looking at it.
1. First Love
Some of you are in this phase of relationship. You have become entranced by this extraordinary person of Jesus and compelled by the gospel story of forgiveness and new and eternal life. It is a spiritual awakening in which we encounter God and in which we encounter ourselves.
Some of you are in this phase of relationship. You have become entranced by this extraordinary person of Jesus and compelled by the gospel story of forgiveness and new and eternal life. It is a spiritual awakening in which we encounter God and in which we encounter ourselves.
The characteristic of this stage is joy in your salvation whilst becoming aware of behaviours and attitudes that need to change. It is a time of life change.You will get stuck here if you don’t turn from certain things in your life. Repent.
God will bring you back here often – to refresh you and renew you.
The way to the next stage is to join a spiritual community – the church.
2. Learning and Belonging
In order to move on and grow it is crucial we become fully integrated into a local community. In this season we are eager to learn about God and about our faith. Careful not to become dependant upon charismatic leaders with black & white views. Not perpetual students.
We have just launched a discipleship structure for our housegroups in particular to use which takes us through a cycle of the three themes and eight traits of people who are following after Jesus. You can see it on the website under
following Jesus.
It is healthy to practice the spiritual disciplines at this stage, reading the bible, praying, fasting, giving – particularly learning contemplative prayer. We develop a teachable spirit and learn to be followers.
God will also bring you back here often – to learn about him and to learn how to live.
The next stage to maturity is to give out – to serve.
3. Serving
This is the “doing” bit of our faith. Rolling up our sleeves and becoming responsible and contributing members of the family. We discover our natural and spiritual gifts and find ways to use them.
Stewardship develops at this stage – knowing how to use money and time and energy.
It is crucially important to learn balance at this point. Being active in church but also resting. Spending time in ministry to others but also in ministering to yourself in solitude.
If we don’t get the balance right, if we don’t attend to the inner person, if we don’t maintain our first love and keep learning and listening – if all we do is do, do, do, if all we are is what we do, do, do … we will eventually become empty, resentful and exhausted and usually we then hit the wall.
You can call it the dark night of the soul or a crisis point. It is often triggered by an external event – losing your job, bereavement, serious illness, a crisis of faith or being let down by a trusted leader. We hit the wall.
Often at this point we discover our own inadequacy. We have been doing this in our own strength.
What happens next?
- Some battle on in stage three – cos this is what we are “meant to do”.
- Some go back to stage one and two and then end up back at three.
- Some do this several times.
- Some just check out emotionally. You may be with us but you are really miles away.
- Some leave one church to enter another at stage one.
- Some drop out all together.
To get to the next stage you need to go inwards. This is perhaps the hardest stage of all, it takes the most work and the most courage.
4. We surrender to the love of God
When you are in danger of hitting the wall the best thing is to choose to move into the next season of surrender before a crisis forces that stage. Indeed if we truly surrender to the love of God we may find it leads us through crisis. If this season isn’t handled right it sometimes means you need to withdraw almost entirely whilst you learn about God’s love for you and what surrender to his grace looks like.
This stage of our journey requires us to be willing to let God take away our layers – the faces we put on to present ourselves to other faces. Learn that our relationship is based on who we are not what we do. For that first love to get past the outside and become a part of who we are, our identity.
Often this period can feel quite dark as the stripping away of illusions and ego patterns forces us to create a temporary space.
I would love this church to be a place where you can move through stage four with less trauma than that. A place where you can continue to play a full part, joyful in your salvation, learning and following, serving and giving – but in balance, with time to contemplate, rest, walk and the inner journey.
This season leads you to a mature faith and radical trust in God. It is like a grown-up version of the “First Love” stage. There is a deep shift in our relationship with Jesus from one where that relationship is in our control to one where it is in his control.
Being part of a housegroup is essential and having a spiritual director or life coach is really helpful. It is also good to develop contemplative practices – learning to spend time reflecting on who God is, who you are and on your relationship.
5. Convergence
In some ways this is like stage 3 (service) in that Jesus turns us to face outward again. A journey of following Jesus always takes us inward and then outward again.
The difference with stage 3 is not in what we do, in our outer activity but in our inner motivation. We may continue to serve and lead in the same way but out of a more grounded centre – less frantic activity and compulsiveness and more of an inner stillness and being centred. We have learned to rest even as we work.
When we come together to worship we do so as an expression of the time we spend in worship alone.
This can be a wonderful time of fruitfulness as we give and serve but without an agenda – our inner journey with Jesus has cleaned us up from much of our mixed motivation and ego. We have learnt that we are inadequate without him – and that’s OK.
6. Integration
In time this happens as a natural development from stage 5. We know the presence of the Holy Spirit in our own life and we become more like Jesus daily – we worry little about our reputation, personal success and comfort. We love the unlovely, are kind to the rude and pray for our enemies.
We are not perfect and we are very aware of our sin, we still live in tough humanness but there is joy amongst the pain, Christlikeness in our daily lives.
Going back to Revelation 2 and the message to the church in Ephesus.
Jesus loves this church, he loves the way you are involved.
He loves that we do good things and do them well and seek to love one another. He loves the way you serve and pray and give.
But he doesn’t want you to stop there - in a place full of activity. He calls you to turn to walk humbly with him in a deep and inner journey, rediscovering his love and surrendering to him.
Over August there is still plenty going on in the life of the church but with no Sundays and no housegroups there is extra time in which to undertake some of the inner journey too.
I don’t know which season of your relationship with him you are in but I would urge you to keep your status as “one who follows Jesus”. Let me remind you why from statements of truth from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians written some 30 years before the message in Revelation.
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding.
Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance
His power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.
Because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions, it is by grace you have been saved, through faith and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God not by works, so that no-one can boast.
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.
Through him you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow-citizens with God's people and members of God's household.
In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.]
The reason I follow Jesus is because:
- He is the mighty Lord
- He is the shepherd of the sheep
- He is the light of the world
- He is father to all his children
- He is grace
- Jesus keeps his promises and does what he says
- He is compassionate and consistent
- He has beaten the power of death
- He brings judgement to put right what is wrong
- He brings mercy to forgive
- He is my rescuer
- He is my redeemer
- He is the lover of my soul
- He forgives me and lifts me up
- He is my companion and confidant
- He gives me strength to live a meaningful life
- He gives me a future and a hope
I would like to ask you to stop and contemplate for a few minutes. Here is another passage from Ephesians - Paul's prayer for the people in that church. Read it through as a prayer of your own out loud two or three times. Then spend some time meditating on one or two words or phrases that the Lord brings to your attention. And then finish by reading it slowly again a a closing prayer.
For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name.
I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen me with power through his Spirit in my inner being, so that Christ may dwell in my heart through faith. And I pray that I, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge that I may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within me, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.
David Flowers, 20/07/2011