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A Sermon by The Reverend Allen Michel
Nelson Cathedral
Sunday, 17 August 2008
“To everyone who conquers I will give a white stone and on the white stone is written a new name”
The Revelation to John Chapter 2: vv12 – 17
The letter read as our second lesson tonight to the church in Pergamum is the third in a series of letters to the seven churches in Asia Minor.
This city is very different from the other two churches mentioned earlier.
Ephesus and Smyrna were great trading ports and on the great roads that led from the western world and culture to the east.
Ephesus was known as the greatest city in the Province of Asia and Smyrna the loveliest.
Pergamum was a totally different place. It was inland, built on conical hill dominating the surrounding country side. It was the administration centre of the province and had been since 282 BC when Alexander the Great had made it the capital city of that part of his Empire and in 133 BC the Romans had captured the area but Pergamum had still held on to it’s historic past as the capital city of Asia Minor.
If Ephesus is the Auckland and Smyrna the Christchurch of the Province then
Pergamum is the Wellington. It was where the political power base was and where the Roman Consul lived. Due to it’s geographical position Pergamum could never achieve the commercial greatness of Ephesus or Smyrna but it surpassed both as a centre of culture.
It was famous for it’s great library of more than two hundred thousand
parchment rolls, that attracted scholars from many countries. A library that was second only to the great library of Alexandria. Did you know that the word Parchment is derived from the word Pergamum Charta. This writing material made from treated animal skins that was developed in Pergamum after Ptolemy the Pharaoh of Egypt prohibited the export of papyrus.
Pergamum was a great religious centre. All the great pagan religions and cults of that time had temples in Pergamum., large and small. If you wanted to start up your own church this was the place to start.
As you approached the town the first thing you would see was a 12 metre high altar to the Greek God Zeus built on a rocky ledge above the town.
Pergamum was also known as the town of the god Asclepios, the god of healing and his temples were the nearest things to hospitals in the ancient world.
Healers and the sick came from all over the ancient world to worship at his temple in Pergamum, to be cured from their sickness and to learn new healing techniques.
Pergamum was also the centre of the state supported religion of Emperor worship. Temples had been built here as early as thirty BC to Augustus and Caesar . The worship of the Emperors was well established in Pergamum long before it took hold in the other cities of Asia Minor, and by the time John’s letter was written the city had many temples dedicated to the Emperor.
This then is the city of the third letter to the churches.
A city where the Christians would be a small minority surrounded by beliefs and temptations of other religions. A group that normally would go unnoticed, just another cult! But this city is called Satan’s Seat.
Can you imagine why?
The one religion that threatened the Christians was the state religion of emperor worship. This was compulsory for all people to the point of death. All were required on pain of death to take the name of Lord and give it to Caesar, which was of no consequence to the pagan worshippers, just another one to add to the long list of gods they worshipped; but to a Christian the name Lord belongs only to Christ, and to do otherwise is giving in to Satan.
This also explains the opening of the letter where Christ is again described by one of the phrases found in chapter one verse sixteen of the Revelations, “he who has the sharp two edged sword”.
In this city of Satan’s Seat lived the Roman Consul with the power of life or death over all citizens. The symbol of his power the sword;
But the letter starts off by reminding all Christians the real power even in a world that appears to be ruled by Satan is the Risen Christ who has the two edged sword. Not the symbolic sword of a Roman Consul but the two edged fighting sword of a soldier.
The power of Rome may be satanically powerful but the power of the Risen Christ is greater.
Under all this pressure the Christian community had held fast. They had stayed and witnessed in this city the place of temptations and dangers.
Persecution had begun here before anywhere else, and one of their number Antipas had been roasted alive inside a brazen bull but still the Church stayed and witnessed.
Even though the Church in this city has been steadfast under persecution there is something wrong. They are being seduced from within. Some of them are letting their standards drop. They are being influenced by some who believe the teachings of the prophet Balaam; who in the book of Numbers advise Balak the king of Moab that if he could persuade the Israelites to take part in the
worship of Idols they would lose God’s protection. And here in Pergamum, almost a thousand years later the same thing was happening.
Two similar groups, the followers of Balaam and the Nicolations, saw nothing wrong in partaking of pagan feasts and joining in the wild parties afterwards. After all they weren’t really worshipping the pagan gods only joining the feasting.
Everyone knows that all work and no play makes Jack a dull chap. If we want to do anything we know is wrong it’s often easy to find an excuse to ease our conscience isn’t it? So it was with some of the members of this Church.
They had yet to learn the discipline of Christian life.
They could stand up to persecution and Satan′s frontal attack but they were vulnerable when attacked from within.
It is so easy to compromise, and the distinction between the Church and world becomes blurred. There was too much tolerance and not enough discipline. The Church in Pergamum had become the opposite of the Church in Ephesus.
In Ephesus the Church had become intolerant and lost its love for people other than themselves. It had become a narrow inward looking Church.
Pergamum on the other hand was too tolerant compromising their beliefs and allowing false teachings to creep in. They had forgotten the teaching from the council in Jerusalem concerning food sacrificed to idols and fornication.
The call to those wayward Christians in this letter is Repent.
Realise that you have gone astray and get back on the path. Put those false teachings behind you or else!!
Or else the Risen Lord will come and make war with them with the sword of his mouth.
Those who have seduced the church, those who have joined the enemy these he will destroy. The word of Christ, his sword, is the power these people will have to reckon with. It’s not the Roman rulers or earthly powers but
Christ himself and his word which has the power to save or condemn.
This is the message given to the Church at Pergamum, they have been warned. The shepherd has pointed out their loss of direction and now they must return to the right path.
For those who withstand and overcome the temptations and seductions of Satan there is a reward and this sounds a bit obscure doesn’t it. They are promised some “hidden manna” and a “white stone” with a “new name” on it.
What is this that Christ promises to all who hold fast to their faith. First there is the hidden manna, the “grain or bread of heaven” as it is called in Psalm 78.
The reward for those who follow Christ and do not compromise their faith will be the blessings of heaven. But they will not only receive the blessings of heaven but also a white stone. What does that mean??
In those times a white stone was given as a sign to show you had entry to certain functions and entertainment. Just as today we would get a ticket entitling us to a place at a concert the people then would be issued with a white stone.
Here Christ is promising the ticket to eternal life, his special white stone. And it is not any old white stone for it has written on it a special new name.
Not a name as given by human parents but a special name give by Christ himself. As Abram became Abraham, Jacob - Israel, and Saul became Paul so they will get a new special name, a new self as they join Christ in Eternity.
Now what has this to do with us today here in New Zealand here in Nelson. The city of Pergamum has long disappeared and the ruins can be seen today a thousand feet up a hill in Asia Minor. Our cities are not the homes of pagan temples and I can imagine the answers you would get if you were ask to worship the Prime Minister. So where is the relevance?
I think the message for us is the thin line or narrow path we have to travel between tolerance and intolerance. The errors of the Churches in Ephesus and Pergamum!
I am sure the intolerant, unloving, inward looking church in Ephesus had no trouble in seeing the sins of the church in Pergamum and visa versa.
And so it is today. I am sure we all know examples of intolerant Christians and
Churches we would see as Ephesus and others who we see as too tolerant, liberal minded to excess, and straying from the scriptures as was happening in Pergamum.
But the question as always is- where do we see ourselves as we progress along the path of faith? .
If we are honest we probably see ourselves at different stages of our life straying into ground on either side of the path. It is only if we continue to walk off our path that we are heading for trouble. How easy it is to be seduced or to compromise. To criticise others as we become Pharisee like or tolerate others with false ideas as we become like the Nicolations.
We have no Temples with Idols and we are not surrounded by pagan worshippers and food that has been offered to their gods. But that is not to say that the things that seduced the Church of Pergamum are not here in other forms.
No one could deny that fornication is not present in our towns and cities and if we care to look I am sure we can see places of temptation and seduction that would like to draw us away from our faith. But we must remember to guard against not accepting those who have compromised and repented.
It is so easy to become “holier than thou”, we must never lose sight of the care and love of Christ.
As St Paul says “We are in this world but not of it” We are in this world, living in Nelson, but we must be different. We are not the same as a non-believer we are witnesses to the Gospel, that is what it means to be a Christian. The Church in Pergamum had members who wanted to be “in the world and of the world” they “wanted to have their cake and eat it” and still call themselves believers. This is impossible and as we read in this letter the answer for those who
compromise is and only can be Repent , come back to the Love of God or else face the judgement of Christ.
The path we must follow is narrow but it is safe and we know it leads to those promised rewards the hidden manna and the white stones, the blessings of heaven and the assurance of eternal life.
Amen.
The Reverend Allen Michel
This sermon was written and delivered by The Reverend Allen Michel at Nelson Cathedral, 17 August 2008
