Introduction:

A woman named Shirley from Beverly Hills had a heart attack and was taken to Cedars Sinai Medical hospital. While on the operating table, she had a near-death experience. She saw God and asked, “Is this it?” God said, “No, you have another 30 to 40 years to live”. Upon her recovery, she decided to stay in the hospital and have collagen injections, cheek implants, liposuction and a face lift. She even had someone dye her hair. She figured since she had another 30 to 40 years, she might as well make the most of it. When she walked out of Cedars Sinai lobby an ambulance speeding up to the hospital hit her and she died. Meeting God in heaven she said, “I thought you said I had another 30 to 40 years to live? “God response, “Shirley is that you! I didn’t recognize you!

God doesn’t look on the outward appearance but on the heart. The spiritual condition of one’s heart is paramount for a wholesome Christian life and Church. If we lose ‘heart’ for Christ then all we are doing in worship is rote and mechanical. The condition of a person’s heart is the real issue. Isaiah 29:13 Wherefore the Lord said, For as much as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me…

In chapters two and three of Revelation we have an address from the Lord to the seven churches of Asia. These letters deal with the good, the bad, and the ugly. Those seven churches are listed back in verse 11, starting with Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea. Those are actual cities in Asia Minor, modern day Turkey. The Ephesian church was the first and the strongest and the mother church having planted the rest. Everything was there. Faithfulness was there, duty was there, responsibility was there. No loss of resources financial or human. However, the church at Ephesus had left its first love. The passion was gone. The enthusiasm was gone. The marriage between Christ and His Church was fading much like human marriages do today.
According to research done by Dr. Scott Stanley is co-director of the University of Denver’s center for marital and family studies. “Sacrifice is a currency of relationships,” Stanley says. “Show her that you’re committed and that you care about her by putting the relationship and not yourself first.” The good news is that when you sacrifice, the effort stands out. “It’s a positive that’s really salient,” Stanley says.

If you feel your relationship may be in peril, try this strategy: Fall back in love. It can be done. In fact, 64 percent of couples who were close to breaking up but stuck with their marriages found their way back to matrimonial happiness within a few years, according to an Institute of American Values study. They had to identify why their relationship went off course. The same is true for any church. The Church of Ephesus was asked to remember, repent and restore.

Before we exposit the letter to Ephesus I want to give a brief stat about these churches. Four received both commendation and condemnation and the church in Laodicea receives only condemnation or reprimand. Christ had a direct message to these seven literal churches existing at that time. However these messages are meant to be applied by all churches existing in all ages. The characteristics of these churches serve as a prophetical preview of the seven great periods in Christendom from Pentecost to the rapture.
Many churches today would be represented by the Laodicea church, for which Christ had the most contempt but not all…

1. The Church in Ephesus: 30-100 AD

1. At the time this letter was written, Ephesus was a flourishing city with a population of about 225,000 and possessed a huge harbor. The harbor could accommodate the largest ships in the world. Ephesus grew to become one of the largest and wealthiest cities in the world. The temple of Diana was there, which was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, being the largest Greek temple ever constructed. Diana was believed to be the mother goddess of the world by the Greeks. Diana was a fertility goddess of life and reproduction. The worship of Diana was immoral beyond description. The worship consisted of temple priestess preforming sexual orgies and sexual mutilation. The Church at Ephesus had much to contend with but it stood faithful.

II. The Commendation: Vv.2 &3

1. This verses relates Christ telling John what to write to the Church of Ephesus. The word angel means messenger and in this sense refers to the pastor. The seven stars refer to the seven angels / pastors. The seven golden lampstands refer to the seven churches. This also tells us that Christ walks among his churches.
2. Christ tells the church that He knows of their “work and labor from the Greek “kopos” intense labour united with trouble and toil. They were in an area that bound in sin degradation. There were the sexual sins of the worship of the goddess Diana. There was the making of graven images of Diana. With Ephesus being one of the wealthiest cities in the world, there was the obvious sin of the love of money. The saints of Ephesus had over- come all of this. They hated all that was evil and could not tolerate wicked men. They even tested false apostles who came into their church with a doctrine other than what Paul had taught them.
Application: Can we say this about our church? Would Christ tell us the same as what He told the Church at Ephesus? Do we hate the sin that is in our world today? Christ commended the church at Ephesus for their hard work against the wicked and also for their “toil to the point of exhaustion” for their service to Christ. Are we toiling to reach the lost and to bring them into the fold of the church?
III The Condemnation: vv. 4, 5

1. Paul had visited Ephesus about 40 years before the book of Revelation was written and had stayed there for about 3 years. During his ministry a revival broke out. (Acts 19:20)
They were on fire for the Lord. Their hearts were in the right place. They praised and worshipped God with all their heart. Their love for Christ was greater than their love for anything else.

When Christ dictated the letter for Ephesus to John, it was about 40 years after Paul had left Ephesus. This means that these people had 40 years to cool down from the revival that Paul had started there. They were like many churches today. Outwardly we see their good deeds.
Application: —- Do you remember when you were first saved? You loved the Lord so much that He was on your mind constantly and all you wanted to talk about was the love that He has for you. Is it still that way today or is it like what happened to the church in Ephesus?

If we still had our first love, we would be praising and worshipping God with a joyful noise instead of a ritual and rote worship. Without love our lives will be miserable. Let’s return to our first love the love for each other and for the Lord. Too many churches have also left their first love of spreading the gospel … they are hard at good works, social services, helping the sick but never is the gospel of Christ mention. We have left the first love of reaching the lost. There will always be good people to do good humanitarian acts but there is a need for courageous people who love Christ to preach message of salvation. Jesus never abandon his first love…Mark 1:34-39

IV The Command and Counsel
1. The Lord’s counsel is to remember! So often spiritual decline comes from forgetting. This is a new generation in Ephesus. The first generation, for the most part, is gone. They still had the strong tradition but not the intense love.
2. Repent and do the first works, v.5. They were to remember where they once were and return to that place. Repentance is more that declaring ones error, it is a change in attitude and action. Repentance and heart felt sorrow work together in God’s plan of salvation. Change or else! The Lord would remove their candlestick, or lampstand.

3. The word “Nicolaitans” is the product of combining the word “Laos” (people), with the word ‘Niklam” (to conquer). The identity of the Nicolaitans is not certain. Some believe they were a sect of the Gnostics, who taught impure doctrines and followed impure practices. It was the practice of the clergy lording it over the laity. Others supposed they derived their origin from Nicolas, one of the seven deacons mentioned in Acts 6:5. The Nicolaitanes taught the community of wives, that adultery and fornication were things indifferent, that eating meats offered to idols was quite lawful; and mixed several pagan rites with the Christian ceremonies. From secular writing of this time we find that Augustine, Clemens Alexandrinus, and Tertullian, have spoken largely concerning the Nicolaitans. Again we see that the Ephesians were doing good works and were good in testing the teachers of the church.

Conclusion:
Rev 2:7 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.

In this verse Christ is giving us a warning. We had better hear his word and follow his commands. In this verse we also see that the letters to the seven churches also applies to all Christians from when the book of Revelation was written until today and even into the future. If we will overcome and return to our first love then we will be given eternal life.
If you have truly accepted Christ has your Lord and Savior then your love for Him should still be greater than anything in your life.

We have a great history behind us. However, I do know that the warning of Scripture is that you can be doing all the right things, and believe in all of the right things, and have your heart grow cold. The things that concern me have to do with the heart. It has to do with you becoming indifferent to Christ, and therefore compromising and falling into sin, and bringing destruction into your own life and your own family, and eventually into the church. It has to do with where I can’t go, what I can’t see, and neither can anybody else, except the Lord.