Abhorring the "Deep Things of Satan"

ABOUT 40 miles southeast of Bergama (Pergamum) is the thriving Turkish town of Akhisar. Some 1,900 years ago, this town was the site of Thyatira by an inland road from Pergamum and then move in a circuit to the remaining congregations of Revelation chapter 3-Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.  Unlike Pergamum, Thyatira does not seem to have been an important center of emperor worship, but it did have shrines and temples dedicated to pagan gods.  Thyatira was noteworthy  as a commercial trading center.

When Paul was preaching in Macedonia he  met up with a Thyatiran  woman named Lydia, a seller of purple.  Lydia and all her household gladly accepted the message Paul was preaching and showed extraordinary hospitality.  (Acts 16:14, 15)  She became the first Thyatiran on record to accept Christianity.  In course of time, the city itself came to have a congregation of Christians.  Jesus directs his longest message there:  "And to the angel of the congregation in Thyatira write: These are the things that the Son of God says, he who has his eyes like a fiery flame, and his feet are like fine copper." - Revelation 2:18.

This is the only time the expression "Son of God" appears in Revelation, although in  other places Jesus does not refer to Jehovah as "my father."  (Revelation 2:27; 3:5, 21) the use of the title here likely reminds the Thyatiran Christians  of Jesus'  intimacy with Jehovah.  This Son "has his eyes like a fiery flame" -warning to the Christians in Thyatira that his judgment will blaze against  anything that he sees to the defiling in the congregation.  By referring for a second time to his glowing, copper like feet, he emphasizes  his own shining example of faithfulness while walking the earth.  The Christian in Thyatira no doubt heeded his counsel, and so must we today! - 1 Peter 2:21.

Happily, Jesus can commend those in Thyatira.  He says: "I know your deeds, and your love and faith and ministry and endurance, and that your deeds of late are more than those formerly."  (Revelation 2:19)   Unlike the Ephesians the anointed Christians there have not lost their first love for Jehovah.  Their faith is strong.  Furthermore, their deeds are more than those formerly, and like the three preceding congregations, the Christians in Thyatira are enduring.  How typical of the 54,000 and more congregations of Jehovah's Witnesses throughout the earth today!  Love for Jehovah shines through as a  spirit of zeal in the ministry permeates the organization, stimulating young and old.  An increasing number expend themselves as pioneers, thus using wisely the yet remaining time to proclaim the glorious hope of God's incoming Kingdom! -Matthew 24:14; Mark 13:10.

For decades, many faithful ones, both of the anointed remnant and of the great crowd, have been showing exemplary endurance in God's service, while the world around them has been plunging deeper and deeper into a hopeless gloom.  But let us be of good courage!  Revelation confirms the testimony of God's earlier prophets.  "The great day of Jehovah is near.  it is near, and there is a hurrying of it very much." -Zephaniah 1:14; Joel 2:1; Habakkuk 2:3; Revelation 7:9; 22"12, 13.

Next time: Abhorring the "Deep Things of Satan" -  "That Woman Jezebel"

From the Book of Revelation