Who Are The True Jews? (Revelation 2:8-11, Romans 2:28-29, Romans 10:1-13) Series

There was a time in the U.S. (and Canada) when white people could put on blackface, and people thought it was amusing. You could pretend to be Denzel Washington, or Will Smith, and people would laugh. There was a time when you could wear traditional Native American clothing on Halloween, and people would think it was a great costume.

Now, though, all of that is considered deeply offensive. Critics will call that "cultural appropriation," or "racist," or insensitive. If, at one point in the past, you did anything of those things and had your picture taken, you live in constant fear that someone will manage to dig up that old picture, put it online, and try to discredit you, and cancel you. And the more important you are, the more likely someone will go to the time and trouble of finding that picture.

We've reached the place as a society, where we've decided that only black people can have black faces. Only Native Americans can wear Native clothing. And actors can only play the roles of people who are the same skin color as themselves. You have to be true to your skin color, basically.

The other thing we've decided, as a society, is that you can't claim to be a minority, if you aren't. Rachel Dolezal can't be president of the Spokane Washington NAACP because she's white. Elizabeth Warren can't pretend to be Native American. You are what you are, regardless of how you want to self-identify. And if people try to claim to be a race that they aren't, we have society's permission to call them out on that.

At the same time, we have also decided, as a society, that things work differently with gender.

When it comes to gender, we are supposed to believe that you have the right to decide whether you are male, or female, or some exotic third category. You might have been born a male, have male body parts, and have an impressive beard, but if you say you are a woman, we are supposed to accept that. If a teenage boy wants to call himself a girl, and swim against my daughter, and change in her locker room, I'm supposed to be okay with that. If a 50 year old male wants to use the women's bathroom at a park at the same time as my 9 year old daughter, I'm supposed to let him in. Disagreeing with that is considered violence, and hate-speech.

We live in a time when people are really sensitive about their identities as men and women, black and white, "cisgender" and "transgender." The raging questions of our time revolve around identity. Who are you allowed to claim that you are? Can you claim to be black, if you were born white? Can you claim to be female, if you were born male? Can you claim to be an animal-- a "furry"-- if you were born human? And when you run across people who disagree with you, what protections do you have? What happens when their right to free speech runs into your feelings?

We tend to think of these types of debates as examples of modern stupidity, and maybe as illustrations of how useless many public universities have become. We probably also think about it as evidence of how hard satan is working to pervert God's created order.

But in today's little passage, Revelation 2:8-11, we will find ourselves reading something that shows that these kind of debates are not completely new. The question our passage pushes back against, is every bit as controversial. It's this: "Who is the true Jew?" Lots of people claim to be Jews. They say they belong to God's people. But what we will see today, is that it doesn't matter how people self-identify. Jesus gets the final word.

Let's read verses 8-10-- everything Jesus says to the angel in Smyrna, and the church he represents:

(8) and to the angel of the church in Smyrna write:

"These things are what he says-- the First and the Last, who was dead, and he came to life--

(9) 'I know your affliction/tribulation

and your poverty--

but you, rich, you are ["rich" is focused]--

and the slander/malicious talk of the ones calling themselves "Jews,"

and they aren't, but [are] a synagogue of satan.

(10) Don't fear what you are about to suffer.

LOOK! The devil is about to throw some of you into prison,

in order that you may be tested,

and you will have affliction/tribulation 10 days.

Be faithful up to death,

and I will give you to you the crown of life.

What we see in these verses, is that people who call themselves "Jews" are persecuting the church. They are doing this, primarily, through their speech. They are speaking lies ("slander"). They are speaking cruel things to Christians, and about Christians ("malicious").