MELVIN M. NEWLAND, MINISTER
RIDGE CHAPEL, KANSAS, OK
I'm going to read a passage of scripture that bothers me, & yet it has a tremendous message. It is part of one of the 7 letters to the churches in the Book of Revelation, & is found in chapter 2, vs's 1 5.
"To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: These are the words of Him who holds the 7 stars in His right hand & walks among the 7 golden lampstands: I know your deeds, your hard work & your perseverance.
“I know that you cannot tolerate wicked men, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, & have found them false. You have persevered & have endured hardships for my name, & have not grown weary.
"Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love. Remember the height from which you have fallen! Repent & do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you & remove your lampstand from its place."
A. One of the hardest things in life is watching someone's love disintegrate, & somehow not being able to do anything about it.
Over the years, I have occasionally gotten a call from someone who wants counseling. Sometimes they were from another church, but they didn't want to go to their own preacher, so they asked if they could talk with me.
ILL. Such a situation happened to a preacher friend of mine. A lady he had never seen before came to his office. She said, "Preacher, you'll be shocked by my story." He assured her that he wouldn't be because after 25 years of counseling, he had heard almost everything.
So she began, "I hate my husband. I hate the way he looks. He has gotten fat, & doesn't take care of himself. I hate the way he sounds. He slurps his food, & chews with his mouth open.
“I hate the way he brushes his teeth. He gulps the water in his mouth & swishes it around. He snores at night & makes all kinds of noises when he blows his nose. I just don't love him anymore!"
She went on with a long list of other reasons why she hated her husband.
The preacher was shocked. He had heard it all before, but never quite as bluntly as she was putting it.
Usually, after any kind of an unhappy tirade, he asks this question, "Has it always been that way?" Often there is a moment of silence, & he can almost hear the wheels turning as people think back over their lives.
As she thought it over, there came a slight little glimmer in her eyes, & a trace of a smile on her face. "No," she said, "It hasn't always been this way.
“He used to be kind & gentle & sensitive. I can remember our courtship, & how romantic he was. I remember intimate conversations & soft music & candlelight. I remember a wonderful wedding & honeymoon.
"I remember those early years of struggling together when we were having children & trying to find enough money to pay our bills. There were some good times. There was a time when we were very much in love."
Hearing this story causes us to wonder, doesn't it? "What happened?" This couple had been married 20 years. What happened in 20 years to change love to hate, to make someone say, "I hate my husband," or "I hate my wife?" Yet that was the situation love disintegrating, love evaporating & going away.
ILL. You know, I enjoy seeing newlyweds, couples who haven't lost the sparkle in their eyes, or the trace of a smile on their lips, who are still wondrously & hopelessly in love with each other. There is something refreshing about that.
But it is extremely difficult when you see the other side, when love begins to disintegrate.
Our modern society tells us that we ought to be happy. And if you're not happy, then walk away from whatever is making you unhappy. So there are thousands of people walking away from their marriages because they're not as happy as they think that they ought to be.
B. The same could be said about our jobs. Most of us began with high ideals about work & career & our future. We began with great enthusiasm & vigor.
ILL. George Washington Carver held a peanut in his hand & looked up to God & asked, "God, what is in the peanut?" Carver said, "God answered me, 'You've got a brain. Find out for yourself.'"
So Carver started searching for all the possibilities in the lowly peanut. He fell in love with his work, & gave his life to it. And all our lives are the better for it.
There is something tremendously fulfilling in doing something, & experiencing the satisfaction of doing it well.
But there is another side, isn't there, when work begins to be monotonous, just something we do to get a paycheck, & the feeling of satisfaction is gone?
PROP. But the saddest example of lost love is when an individual loses his or her love for God. That is why this passage in Revelation is so tragic. It describes a church that once was alive & enthusiastic about the things of God.
I. THEY HAD LOST THEIR FIRST LOVE
A. Long ago a few people met in Ephesus. They had heard the Apostle Paul, & had accepted Jesus as their Savior. They were very much a minority in Ephesus, but the church there started with them.
They met together in homes. They read God's Word together, & they prayed. They went out into their neighborhoods & among their friends & shared their faith with others. Soon, more had accepted Christ, & their number grew.
They were concerned about missions & shepherding & fellowship. They were known as an exciting, loving, & dynamic body of believers. They encouraged each other & built each other up in the faith.
B. Then, as the years passed, & it is hard to determine why or when, but somehow, sometime along the way, they lost their fervor & their excitement. Maybe it wasn't anything they decided to do. It was something that just happened. And their love for God lost its edge, its glow, & its excitement.
ILL. A man by the name of Shelburne wrote about a church in his home town. He said that it had always been there. He used to ride by it on his bicycle when he was a kid. He said that he never really noticed it all that much, except its sign was always there, announcing the name of the church & the times of its services.
He said that every time he drove by, even when he became an adult, he never gave it a 2nd thought. He had never gone inside the church building, but it had just always been there.
Until one day, he drove by & discovered that the sign was gone, & in its place was a sign for a clinic. A group of chiropractors had bought the property & started a clinic in the old church building.
Shelburne asked, "Why? What happened?" There once was a time when kids came there all dressed up in their Sunday best. There must have been times when people gathered & prayed & praised God, & the church building was filled. Great sermons were preached & hearts were touched. But now, it is a chiropractic clinic.
"What happened?" he asked. Probably not some scandal. The preacher hadn't run off with his secretary or absconded with all the church funds. If that had happened it would have made the headlines.
What happened was more than likely just a subtle thing where people who used to pray stopped praying, where people who used to give stopped giving, where people who used to witness stopped witnessing. And just gradually, a little bit at a time, the church died.
SUM. That is the picture we have here, a church that once was alive & vibrant, but it had lost its first love. And this passage both concerns me & encourages me because it goes a step farther & says, "See what is happening, & do something about it."
II. WHAT CAN BE DONE ABOUT IT?
A. Have you ever noticed that when love is alive & exciting, it is always described as something warm, or hot, or passionate? But on the other hand, when love begins to fade it is described as cold.
Jesus talks about this in Matthew, chapter 24.. He speaks of the destruction of Jerusalem, & persecution of Christians, & He warns them, "Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved." (Matthew 24:12-13)
B. David writes in Psalm 51:12, "Restore to me the joy of your salvation..." That verse tells us, first of all, that there ought to be joy in salvation. When you are saved from your sin, the result ought to be joy.
When we read the accounts of conversion in the book of Acts we find that the people went on their way rejoicing after they had repented & been baptized for the forgiveness of their sins. Over & over again the result was joy!
But that verse also tells us that joy can be lost. "Restore my joy," He said. In other words, "I've lost it. I need to get it back again."
3rdly, it teaches that restoring that joy is possible. That is why this letter was written, to say, "Put on the brakes before it is too late. Stop, before you have lost all your love, & here is what you need to do."
C. Vs. 5 goes on to say, "Remember the height from which you have fallen." (Revelation 2:5) We need to remember: Remember that you were lost & dying in your sin. But God reached down, & you reached up, & you met each other. "Remember that," He says.
Remember when you became a Christian. Remember the excitement & the fervor that grips the heart when love is new & fresh. Remember the wonder of the grace & mercy of God. Remember & treasure it. Hold it warm & glowing in your heart. Never forget what God has done for you.
"Remember the height from which you have fallen."
D. Then He says, "After you remember, then 'Repent & do the things you did at first.'" That's a strong word, "repent." We find it again & again in both the Old & New Testaments. The prophets constantly cried out to the nation of Israel, "Repent, repent!"
ILL. John the Baptist preached, "Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand!" When Jesus began His ministry, one of the first words in His sermons was also "Repent!" There is a need for people to repent, to change, to turn around, to start a different kind of life.
1. You repent of two things. You repent, first of all, of the sins that you have committed, sins that violate the law of God, pride, selfishness, greed, immorality, whatever they might be.
Those things that you know have impaired the relationship that you once had with God, & which have robbed you of the warm love that you once had for Him. Repent of those!
2. But also, & here is the problem at Ephesus, there was a need to repent of the things that they should have done but just did not do - the sins of omission.
ILL. Here is a young church, dreaming dreams & seeing visions. It has a child like faith. It believes that nothing is impossible with God.
So they do things. They build buildings. They evangelize the lost. They shepherd the saved. They are a caring, loving, sensitive community. They are accomplishing impossible feats for God.
But time passes, & they stop dreaming dreams. They stop seeing visions.
APPL. You know, when God places a new opportunity before us, He almost always makes it seem impossible. Maybe steps 1 & 2 are easy, but not step 3. Step 3 may seem impossible, because God wants us to learn to step out in faith & let Him provide.
E. So don't stop dreaming dreams. Don't stop seeing visions. Never start believing that God can't, because God can.
I think that is probably what happened at Ephesus. They finally came to the point where they fell out of love because they had stopped putting in the ingredients that were essential for a love that is real & growing.
Whether it is in marriage, or the job, or with God, when we stop putting in the things that make the relationship warm & real, it grows cold, & dies.
Oh, I know that the Bible says the gates of hades will never prevail against the church. I know that the church of Jesus Christ will live on, & that there is no power on earth strong enough to do her in.
CONCL. But it seems to me that God has given each of us a responsibility to keep this church alive & well, sensitive, warm, loving, a church that reaches out, a church that grows, a church that laughs, cries, & never, ever stops loving.
God's invitation is to all of us. If you don't know Jesus as your Savior, you can develop a love that is warm & real. You can get a sparkle in your eye & the trace of a smile on your face. Just come to Him.
Or maybe you fear that you have grown cold & indifferent in your faith, then remember & repent. The last words are these, "If you do not repent, I will come to you & remove your lampstand from its place." (Revelation 2:5)
The Lord's invitation is extended. We pray that you will respond as we stand & sing.
