Good Morning Friends,
“I have a few things against you: You have
people there who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to entire the
Israelites to sin by eating food sacrificed to idols and by committing sexual
immorality. Likewise you also have those who hold to the teaching of the Nicolaitans.
Repent therefore! Otherwise, I will soon come to you and will fight against
them with the sword of my mouth.” (Revelation 2:14-16)
The church at Pergamum was plagued by false
teachers. Every church is. That isn’t something that can be avoided, especially
in a pluralistic society like the one in which we live. All Christians are
subject to hearing false teachings in their workplace, where they go to school,
among their friends, and within their families.
But here is the problem Jesus was upset about
with Pergamum – the false teachings were not ones that plagued the Christians
there in their interactions with a pagan culture. Rather, the false teachings
Jesus was concerned about were allowed to happen within the church itself. Did
the church tolerate false teaching from their pulpit? Did they allow those who
held to false teachings to be involved in teaching in other capacities in the
church? We don’t know the details of how they allowed the false teachings –
just that they did.
I know our tendency is to be tolerant and
tolerance has some very good applications. Without tolerance we would never be
able to live in the kind of society we live in and would never be able to help
draw our non-Christian friends and neighbors toward Christ. But there is no
place for tolerating false teaching within the church. Such tolerance is sin
and Jesus calls for the church at Pergamum to repent of that sin. He would call
us to repent if we are guilty of the same sin.
The leaders of the church – and that’s who
the letter to Pergamum was written to – are
responsible for protecting the rest of the
church from false teaching that threatens to infiltrate the church.
His, by Grace,
Steve
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