Ephesus - Was This The Most Blessed Church In History?

Hello and welcome back to Van Life Devotions. Today we are in Ephesus and in our last devotions we looked at the influence of this city during the days of Christ and how the Apostle Paul planted the church here and spent three years evangelizing, teaching, and building up the congregation that met in this very place. As I walk these paths and enter places, I am staggered to think that my brothers and sisters in Christ were walking and entering the same paths and places nearly 2000 years earlier.

Some of Paul’s last words to the elders of the Ephesian church are found in Acts 20:28-30 where he told them to be shepherds of God’s flock because he knew that after he left, savage wolves will come and distort the truth of Jesus Christ.

Whatever happened to the church in this city after Paul’s years of ministry ended here? About ten years later, in 62 AD Paul was arrested and put into house detention in Rome. From there he wrote letters, one was to the church at Ephesus. In the letter he commended them for their faith and love. A careful reading of this letter also shows that they had done well. They appeared well organized and busy. During these early years they had been growing, expanding, and doing the will of God. Paul also shared the great foundational truths the Lord had taught him about Christ and the church and in the next few devotionals, we will look at some of these teachings. Paul also wrote to Timothy, encouraging him to stay in Ephesus and pastor the church here, watching out for false teachers (1 Timothy 1:3). Other church leaders like Aquila and Priscilla (Acts 18:25), and Apollos had all spent time teaching the Ephesian church and debating with the Jews that Jesus is the Messiah. A few years later, tradition says that the city became the home of the Apostle John. This may or may not be true, but circumstances make it possible, if not probable. He was supposed to have taken Mary, the mother of Jesus, here to live (cf. John 19:26-27). If John had moved here, no doubt the church would have been blessed to have him. Sadly, sometime later John was banished to the Island of Patmos as part of the persecutions of Christians by the Roman Emperor.

We don’t hear much about the church at Ephesus until around 40 years later when John wrote the Book of Revelation from Patmos which included a message from Jesus to the church at Ephesus. Jesus praises them for their hard work and perseverance and how they have not allowed false teachings to creep into the church. Timothy, John, and the elders must had done a good job because Jesus praised the church for not putting up with such rot.

However, Jesus tells the church at Ephesus that they have lost their love for Him. He tells them to repent and return to their love that originally had. Forty years earlier Paul commended the church for its love for God and others (Ephesians 1:15), but many of the church founders had since died, Timothy had moved on, John was in exile, and many of the second-generation believers didn’t have the same zeal for God. They were told to repent and return to their original love for God, and if they didn’t, He would remove their light – their witness.

The history books tell us that the church at Ephesus lasted for a few hundred years but just as Jesus warned them, their light and witness went out.

With evangelists like Paul, Pastors like Timothy and John, leaders like Apollos, Aquila and Priscilla, and a special message from Jesus Himself, this was one of the most blessed churches and yet they forgot their fundamentals.

What a message for us today. You might had come to the Lord by a famous evangelist, you may have been discipled by a wonderful pastor, and attended a church steeped in great history, but all this counts for little if you don’t love the Lord our God with all you heart, soul, and mind. In the very last words (that we know of) Paul says to the church at Ephesus: “Grace to all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with an undying love” (Ephesians 6:24 NIV). I must admit, I’m feeling quite moved that within a kilometer or two, may even be a metre or two from here that this was read to a group of first Christians that what’s really important in life is to love our Lord Jesus with an undying love. Do you love the Lord Jesus Christ with an undying love?

Let’s pray

Dear God. Help me to love you with an undying love in every aspect of my life. O God, preserve us who travel; surround us with your loving care; protect us from every danger; and bring us in safety to our journey’s end; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

David Moyes