Revelation 2:12-17
This sermon is the third part in a series looking at the letters to the seven Churches of Revelation. Pergamos was a city distinguished as being one of the chief centres of religious worship, its landscape littered with shrines and altars to the false gods and goddesses of the Greek/Roman world. In the words of Jesus Christ, the seat of Satan himself!! As a Church under intense persecution from the dragon Satan, it was bearing up faithfully under severe trial and holding fast the name of Jesus Christ. However, that said, whilst our Lord praised them for their faithfulness, He rebuked those within Pergamos for allowing and holding to the doctrine of Balaam who cast a stumbling block before God’s people to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit fornication.
This sermon is a warning and a challenge to the body of Christ to be on guard against false teachers, who secretly bring in false and damnable heresies, even denying the Lord Himself. How will the body of Christ discern such false prophets? By their fruits you shall know them; for such are they that draw away after themselves unstable souls, alluring them through the lusts of the flesh. Is there a root of covetousness in your heart? Are you still enamoured by the love of this world? Are you prepared so as to resist the strategies of the serpent, who even now is deceiving many, turning the grace of God into lasciviousness?
