“And to the angel of the church in Pergamos write, ‘These things says He who has the sharp two-edged sword…’” Revelation 2:12.

The name Pergamos means thoroughly married it represents the period in the church age from 312 to about 590 A.D. and should be considered a period of disastrous change in the history of the visible church.

After murdering an estimated five million innocent human beings during the Roman persecution, Satan realized that torturing and killing Christians was not going to work to destroy the church of Jesus Christ, in fact, it only grew.

Much as Satan and his legions of fallen angels love inflicting pain and causing misery, he knew that he had to come up with a better plan, which he did by using an old one that had worked with the children of Israel.

Pergamos was the capital city of Mysia in Asia Minor and a Roman province, noted for its wealth, fashion and particularly its religion.

The city was filled with temples to the various gods of the day, Zeus, Aphrodite and the god of medicine Aesculapius which is represented by the symbol of a serpent.

Satan, by the way is known as, “…that serpent of old, who is the Devil and Satan…” Revelation 20:2. Little wonder as to why the Lord refers to this place as “where Satan’s throne is”. The two-edged sword as discussed earlier is the word of God and will be examined further on in this article.

“I know your works, and where you dwell, where Satan’s throne is. And you hold fast to My name, and did not deny My faith [your faith in Me] even in the days in which Antipas was My faithful martyr, who was killed among you, where Satan dwells.” Revelation 2:13.

It has been pointed out, and rightfully so, that Satan’s throne is not in hell, in fact I doubt that he has even visited his future home, Satan is known in Scripture as the god of this world, and the prince of the power of the air. The Bible refers to him and his government in the following way.

“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 6:12.

A number of commentators have said that Satan has had three thrones, or seats of power; the first was in Babylon (Genesis 10:6-12 and 11:1-9) because that is the starting point of many, if not all of the gods.

Idolatry began in Babylon with Nimrod and his wife Semiramis, who after his death became pregnant and claimed to have given birth to him once again, naming him Tammuz.

The rite of weeping for Tammuz originated from this cult and this unholy thing was actually practiced about two thousand years later in the temple in Jerusalem.

“So He brought me to the door of the north gate of the Lord’s house; and to my dismay, women were sitting there weeping for Tammuz. Then He said to Me, ‘Have you seen this, O son of man? Turn again, you will see greater abominations than these.’” Ezekiel 8:14-15.

Semiramis who was also called Queen of Heaven is the origin of the mother of god heresy which is repeated under different names such as Diana, Astarte, Aphrodite, Ceres, and Isis (the goddess, not the murderous ISIS of today) throughout the world.

For those who would like to pursue the study of gods and their origins, “The Two Babylons” by Alexander Hislop, published by Loizeaux Brothers; is like seeing ancient history as one big library.

Caution the book was written in the mid-eighteen hundreds, so it is not an easy read, and the intent is to trace many of the pagan practices from Babylon to the extra-Biblical practices in the Roman Catholic Church.

The second throne of Satan is in Pergamos, “where you dwell, where Satan’s throne is”.

The third location is in Rome; Revelation chapter seventeen describes a woman who rides on a scarlet beast. The woman riding the beast represents the murderous apostate worldwide church which controls world government for the first half of the tribulation.

“And on her forehead a name was written: MYSTERY BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.” Revelation 17:5.

The woman is described in the last verse of Revelation 17.

“And the woman whom you saw is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth.” Revelation 17:18.

At the time this was written Rome was the capital of the earth. Then by the second half of the tribulation Satan will have come full circle, for he will again reside in Babylon.

Little is known about Antipas mentioned in verse 13 but he is called the Lord’s faithful martyr, not too surprising in a city so filled with idolatry that it is called Satan’s throne.

There is one clue though as to what happened, Antipas means, against every man. One man stood up against the pagan pressure for the Christian church to conform to their standards.

These pagans seem to have been able to live together even though some religious beliefs may have differed, even so, men’s sinful nature guarantees some friction among them, yet they would all agree that the Christian church needs to lighten up and wink at sin.

To further illustrate, the Shiite and Sunni Muslims slaughter each other without mercy, but they are united when it comes to the destruction of Israel or Christianity.

Islam is in every point absolutely opposed to what atheists believe yet the two would join to destroy Christianity. The reason is given to us by the Lord Jesus as follows.

“If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” John 15:18-19.

And in John’s first epistle the warning is given again.

“Do not marvel, my brethren, if the world hates you.” 1 John 3:13.

They may say that they hate the church because they are a bunch of self-righteous hypocrites, which is true in some cases, unfortunately. Often those “hypocrites” are unsaved people who appear to be Christians in the church.

The tragedy here is that folks who reject Christ because of the hypocrites will join them in hell for eternity; eternity with the very people who disgust and offend them.

However, the church that properly reflects the teachings of Jesus Christ is hated by those who reject Him because it convicts them of their sin and their need of a savior.

“But I have a few things against you, because you have there those who hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality. Thus you also have those who hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which things I hate” Revelation 2:14-15.

Antipas may well have been alone in his fight for the purity of the Christian church, for in spite of the fact that they were true to their faith in Jesus, they were evidently lax in their fight against demonic doctrine mixing itself with the Lord’s teachings.

This is the idea of the two-edged sword which is the word of God. Had this sword been used rather than abandoned, the church at Pergamos may have kept a strong witness for Christ rather than becoming polluted with false doctrine.

“For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” Hebrews 4:12.

The Scriptures are living and powerful and they are capable of shining a blinding light into the darkest recesses of the soul and examining the most hidden motivations of the heart. This is why the word of God is essential to reasoning with the lost, because it can speak to them where they are.

You lose this when men abandon Scripture and mix Christianity with the world’s ideas on how to reach the lost or how the church should be run. Because when they accept worldly ideas as equal to biblical principles, the word of God is always diluted to nothing or done away with altogether, always.

Let us examine the historical aspect of Pergamos, as stated earlier this period extends from 312 to 590 A.D. And it began in this manner.

After the death of Diocletian and the death of his successor Galerius in 311, Constantine contended with Maxentius for the throne and the night before the battle at Milvian Bridge, Constantine had a vision of a cross and the words, “by this sign conquer”. At this he promised to become a Christian if he won the battle.

Having won the battle and ascending to the throne of the Roman Empire he not only proclaimed himself a Christian but he did the unthinkable, he made Christianity the state religion and married church and state.

The persecutions were now not only officially over, but the church was enjoying a new freedom, the downside was that the church now began prostituting itself to the world.

Just as Balaam the prophet (see “Jude” posted 9-7-16) had caused the Israelites to sin by getting Moabite and Midianite women to seduce the Israelites, have sex with them, and introduce them to idolatrous practices.

These same methods were again used by Satan to pervert the church by having ungodly men worm their way into the church leadership and bring in pagan practices to make the church more acceptable to its pagan constituents.

Some of these changes are as follows:
Worship of saints and angels 375 A.D.
Worship of Mary began 431 A.D.
Priests begin dressing differently from laymen 500 A.D.
Purgatory introduced as doctrine 593 A.D.

These and more traditions are pagan in origin and without question not Biblical.

There is a saying:

“Once the camel gets his nose in the door of the tent, soon the whole camel is inside”.

This should be written over the door of every church on earth because there is no truer statement, as we are beginning to see.

The Nicolaitans are again mentioned, while the church at Ephesus was commended for their hatred of the deeds of the Nicolaitans, Pergamos is seen as not resisting this pernicious doctrine.

While little is known of the Nicolaitans it is pretty easy to guess what their offense was, for the name means, “conquerors of the laity”. That coupled with the fact that the division between clergy and laity (common man) was instituted about this time, thus beginning the ponderous church machine which is designed to dull the senses.

The hierarchy of Pope, cardinal, bishop, most reverent, father, priest, and other nabobs was also instituted to lead the ignorant masses in whatever way seemed best, all the while keeping them ignorant.

And what is the will of Christ?

“And He Himself [Christ] gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness by which they lie in wait to deceive, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head – Christ – from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.” Ephesians 4:11-16.

Christ wants the entire body to function, not to spend their time looking up to some man. If the church had remained focused on Christ and maintained their course, the world would be an entirely different place today.

“Repent, or else I will come to you quickly and will fight against them with the sword of My mouth.” Revelation 2:6.

It is interesting that the Lord says that He, “will fight against them”, you see the Lord is not against those who overcome, though they were poor stewards of the church; he was against those who would destroy the church, the ungodly ones in it.

By the way, have you noticed that when an unprincipled man gets in a position of authority he soon surrounds himself with other unprincipled men, be they friends or co-workers?

This is how the church was hijacked, a man is brought into leadership because he was baptized, or uses a bunch of God words, yet there was no real conversion.

In time he has enough seniority to bring in some other ungodly person who was baptized or says Jesus things.

Over a very long period the votes of the ungodly outweigh those of the true Christians, or the Christians themselves may not be alert enough to recognize error, Satan wins.

I ran across a prayer spoken in church by Adolph Hitler once. It was amazing, you had to look closely to see it was counterfeit, he was, after all, praying to himself.

Below is a quote from Hitler’s Mein Kampf to give you an idea of just how devious godless men can be.

“The folkish-minded man, in particular, has the sacred duty, each in his own denomination, of making people stop just talking superficially of God’s will, and actually fulfill God’s will, and not let God’s word be desecrated. For God’s will gave men their form, their essence and their abilities. Anyone who destroys His work is declaring war on the Lord’s creation, the divine will.” “Mein Kampf” vol. 2, chapter 10. Adolph Hitler, atheist, secularist.

Hitler’s interpretation of the “divine will” was for the Aryan race to exterminate all of the Jews and dominate all of the other inferior races for a thousand years (forever). His actions proved that without a doubt.

Jesus said, “Therefore by their fruits you will know them.” Matthew 7:20. It is important that every man and woman not only listen to what people say, but to watch and see if their actions confirm their words.

“For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light.” 2 Corinthians 11:13-14.

In time the barbarians (Germanic tribes) to the north began to break through the borders of the Roman Empire, Rome itself was soon sacked and shortly thereafter the Roman Empire fell apart. Bear in mind she was never conquered, just fell apart, this is significant to prophecy.

Obviously one paragraph does not tell all of how it happened and it is interesting so you might want to look up the fall of the Roman Empire. This vacuum was filled with a thousand years of darkness better known as the dark ages.

“He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives it.” Revelation 2:17.

Manna being the food that God fed the children of Israel in the wilderness is a good symbol for feeding on the word of God. Each person was responsible for gathering the manna for himself or for his family, so too are you responsible for your own spiritual well-being by feeding on Scripture daily.

“Then Jesus said to them, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread [manna] from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.’” John 6:32-33.

The white stone is possibly a reference to the white stone given to the defendant in a court case when they are found innocent. They will be declared innocent and their name will be written thereon forever.

It should be remarked that this time period was not a waste for the body of Christ for many important things were accomplished.

The formation of the canon of Scripture was complete by the Council of Carthage in 397 A.D.

The Council of Nicea in 325 A.D. condemned the heresy of Arius who maintained that Christ was a created being, not uncreated and co-equal with God the Father as taught in Scripture.

This teaching waxed and waned in popularity until finally put to rest at the First Council of Constantinople in 381. Constantine also ordered the bishop of Rome, Eusebius to organize the drafting of fifty copies of the Bible for use in churches.

“Contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints.” Jude 3b.

Revelation 2:12-17 taken from godisrevealed.com updated on 9-29-16 part 5.

Scripture taken from the New King James version. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.