And to the angel, divine messenger of the church in Thyatira write.
These are the words of the Son of God. Who has eyes that flash like a flame of fire in righteous judgment, and whose feet are like burnished, white-hot bronze:
“I know your deeds, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your last deeds are more numerous and greater than the first. But I have this charge against you. You tolerate the woman Jezebel who calls herself a prophetess. Claiming to be inspired, and she teaches and misleads My bond-servants so that they commit acts of sexual immorality and eat food sacrificed to idols. I gave her time to repent— to change her inner self and her sinful way of thinking, but she has no desire to repent of her immorality and refuses to do so.
Listen carefully. I will throw her on a bed of sickness. Those who commit adultery with her. I will bring into great anguish, unless they repent of her deeds. I will kill her children, followers with pestilence. Thoroughly annihilating them, and all the churches will know without any doubt that I am He who searches the minds and hearts— the innermost thoughts, purposes. I will give to each one of you a reward or punishment according to your deeds. But to the rest of you in Thyatira who do not hold this teaching. Who have not explored and known the depths of satan. As they call them, I place no other burden on you except to hold tightly to what you have until I come.
He who overcomes the world through believing that Jesus is the Son of God, and he who keeps My deeds and doing things that please Me until the very end. To him I will give authority and power over the nations, and he shall shepherd and rule them with a rod of iron. As the earthen pots are broken in pieces. As I also have received authority and power to rule them from My Father. I will give him the Morning Star.
He who has an ear, let him hear and heed what the Spirit says to the churches.”
As a commercial hub, Thyatira’s crafts were exceptional, garnering worldwide admiration. Each craft was represented by a guild. As the social, industrial and religious epicenter of Thyatira, guilds were powerful. All workers were required to join and participate in the festivities held in the temple of Apollo. For Christians this was problematic . Unless you ate, fellowshipped and committed immoral sexual acts in the temple, you risked losing your job.
Like the Christians in Thyatira, Christians today must navigate the politically correct and humanistic philosophies prevalent in the culture. Nonetheless, as a Christian you are to boldly proclaim Jesus and His teachings as truth, no matter the cost. Watering down His teachings to make them less offensive or dressing them up to make them more attractive is unacceptable.
Only Papa’s truth can shattered the chains that have enslaved the world.
Truth that transcends denominational and secular boundaries.
Truth that exemplifies the God worthy of worship— the God of the bible.
The God of love and relationship, not a god of rules and rituals.
The God of faith, not the politically correct humanistic god of the culture.
The God of eternity, not a god who promises a false sense of temporal peace and prosperity.
For the Samaritan woman at the well, a single encounter with Jesus was what her tortured soul was seeking. Truth that sets the captives free.
Now He had to go through Samaria. He arrived at a Samaritan town called Sychar, near the tract of land that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there. So Jesus, tired as He was from His journey, sat down by the well. It was then about the sixth hour, noon.
Then a woman from Samaria came to draw water.
Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink”
For His disciples had gone off into the city to buy food.
The Samaritan woman asked Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?”
For Jews have nothing to do with Samaritans.
Jesus answered her, “If you knew God’s gift of eternal life, and who it is who says, ‘Give Me a drink.’ You would have asked Him instead, and He would have given you living water— eternal life.”
She said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with— no bucket and rope, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? Are You greater than our father Jacob who gave us the well? Who used to drink from it himself and his sons and his cattle also?”
Jesus answered her, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again. But whoever drinks the water that I give him will never be thirsty again. But the water that I give him will become in him a spring of water. Satisfying his thirst for God. Welling up continually flowing, bubbling within him to eternal life.”
The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water so that I will not get thirsty nor have to continually come all the way here to draw.”
At this Jesus said, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
The woman answered, “I do not have a husband.”
Jesus said to her, “You have correctly said, ‘I do not have a husband’. For you have had five husbands, and the man you are now living with is not your husband. You have said this truthfully.”
The woman said to Him, “Sir, I see that You are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews say that the place where one ought to worship is in Jerusalem at the temple.”
Jesus replied, “Woman, believe Me. A time is coming when God’s kingdom comes when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans do not know what you worship. We Jews do know what we worship, for salvation is from the Jews. But a time is coming and is already here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit— from the heart, the inner self and in truth. For the Father seeks such people to be His worshipers. God is spirit, the Source of life. Yet invisible to mankind, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”
The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming. He who is called Christ— the Anointed. When that One comes, He will tell us everything we need to know.”
Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He— the Messiah.” John 4:4-26
The early Christians turned the world upside down because they internalized their heavenly Father’s truth. You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a consecrated nation, a special people for God’s own possession. So that you may proclaim the excellencies, the wonderful deeds and virtues and perfections of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. Once you were not a people at all, but now you are God’s people. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers in this world to abstain from the sensual urges. Those dishonorable desires that wage war against the soul. Keep your behavior excellent among the unsaved Gentiles. Conduct yourself honorably, with graciousness and integrity, so that for whatever reason they may slander you as evildoers. Yet by observing your good deeds they may instead come to glorify God in the day of visitation when He looks upon them with mercy. 1 Peter 2:9-12
Disciples of Christ refuse to worship anyone or anything other than Jesus, the Son of the living God. God has given us His Spirit as proof that we live in Him and He in us. Furthermore, we have seen with our own eyes and now testify that the Father sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. All who declare that Jesus is the Son of God have God living in them, and they live in God. We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love. 1 John 4:13-16
Disciples of Christ refuse to embrace the culture’s definition of reality. Values, priorities and dreams that contradict Papa’s truth. Therefore, do not love this world nor the things it offers you. When you love the world you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father but are from this world. This world is fading away, along with everything that people crave. But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever. 1 John 2:15-17
Disciples of Christ have no illusions of grandeur They understand that Papa’s Kingdom isn’t a democracy. He alone decides the whos, whats, whens and whys of His Kingdom.
Be wise. Work hard to enter the narrow door to God’s Kingdom. For many will try to enter but will fail. When the Master of the house has locked the door. It will be too late.
You will stand outside knocking and pleading, “Lord, open the door for us!”
But He will reply, “I don’t know you, or where you come from.”
Then you will say, “But we ate and drank with You, and You taught in our streets.”
And He will reply, “I tell you. I don’t know you, or where you come from. Get away from Me all you who do evil.”
There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, For you will see Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and all the prophets in the Kingdom of God, but you will be thrown out. People will come from all over the world— from east and west, north and south— to take their places in the Kingdom of God. Note this. Some who seem least important now will be the greatest then, and some who are the greatest now will be least important then. Luke 13:24-30
Disciples of Christ come from every walk of life. Distinctions of rank and social class are irrelevant and unimportant. In His grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well. So if God has given you the ability to prophesy, speak out with as much faith as God has given you. If your gift is serving others, serve them well. If you are a teacher, teach well. If your gift is to encourage others, be encouraging. If it is giving, give generously. If God has given you leadership ability, take the responsibility seriously. If you have a gift for showing kindness to others, do it gladly. Romans 12:6-8
Today, take a long deep drink of Living Water. Jesus alone can quench the thirst of unrighteousness.
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