Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God. To the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. [Ephesians 1:1-2 ESV]
This is how Paul began his letter to the Ephesians which is a beautiful letter. Paul writes to a church which he knew well and with whom he had spent a considerable amount of time and effort when the church was being established. The Book of the Acts describes the formation of the church there. And the message to the church at Ephesus is the first of the seven letters in the book of Revelation. Why was the message to Ephesus first in the list of letters to the seven lampstands? There are two reasons. Firstly, Ephesus was a very important city and it was considered the 'light of Asia' and the 'first city of Asia.' Just to remind ourselves that Asia was a province of the Roman Empire in what is now Turkey.
Secondly , Ephesus was a prominent church. Paul had spent 18 months there establishing this church. Timothy had been a pastor there too. Also, the apostle John was probably a prominent member or maybe a pastor of that church. So it is not surprising that Ephesus is the first church to receive a letter from the old apostle in the island of Patmos.
Also, if we look at a map we can see that the seven churches are listed in the order that a messenger would travel after crossing from the island of Patmos to the mainland.
I intend to spend longer on Ephesus than on the other letters. That is partly because there is so much more material available to us to build up a picture of this Church in its location. There is a much more important reason, however. The lesson that the Holy Spirit is teaching us from the message to the first of the seven churches is powerful and challenging. Despite the heavy investment in this church and regardless of all the positive commendations which the Spirit makes about the church, there was a serious problem. This was a fully functioning church - very active in every respect. BUT and it is a big but, they had lost the love they had at first. This is such a serious situation that the risen Lord is threatening action against the church. He is going to 'remove their lampstand.' The Christian witness at Ephesus would cease.
Alarm bells are ringing loudly. Could that happen to my church? Is it possible that as a church we are doing the right things from the wrong motive? I think of many towns and villages in my home county of Ayrshire where the candlesticks or lampstands appear to have been removed. I am distressed by the symptoms we are witnessing in our churches throughout Scotland - apathy, materialism, division, complacency and a general lack of love for the Lord.
And so I feel the Lord is guiding me to focus considerable attention on Ephesus. We will try to build up a picture of the city of Ephesus in the first century and the establishment of a Christian Church there. We will briefly look at Paul's letter to the church and then the message or letter from the risen Lord to this strategic Church with a great history and reputation. We will ask ourselves the two related questions.
Firstly, what went wrong? Secondly, what lessons do we need to learn from the history of the church at Ephesus?
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