How do we follow Jesus in our modern pluralistic society where Christians are increasingly told to get with the
times? It wasn’t much different for the early church. They lived in a world with competing beliefs and different
gods. Christians didn’t get into trouble for believing in Jesus but for making absolute truth claims that Jesus is
the only way to be saved. This makes the letter to the church in Thyatira in Revelation 2:18–29 incredibly
relevant today. While Jesus’ earlier message to Ephesus warned against a cold and loveless orthodoxy, His
message to Thyatira warns against the opposite extreme: adopting a soft, compromising love that tolerates
everything and stands for nothing.
But first, a little context. Thyatira was a bustling economic hub known for its merchants, crafts, and trade
guilds. Making a living required guild membership. The catch? Guild meetings always included a meal
dedicated to a patron god. Feasts routinely spiralled into wild, immoral parties. For a Christian, this created
an agonising dilemma: do you join the guild’s pagan parties to keep your business afloat, or do you stand firm
and risk losing your livelihood?
We face similar pressures today. Relativism is so popular, that the exclusivity of Christ remains ‘the single most
socially offensive aspect of Christian theology’. Sometimes the pressure can be the subtle urge to nod along
with a coworker’s gossip to fit in, or the pressure to compromise our ethics because ‘that’s just how the
industry operates’. At times it can be allowing worldly standards of romance and entertainment to slowly
redefine our morals. Like the Christians in Thyatira, we are constantly tempted to accept a little bit of
compromise under the guise of tolerance.
However, Jesus’ rebuke of the church in Thyatira – which He praised for their love, faith and service – is
unambiguously clear. He rejects their tolerance of false and misleading teaching that suggests they can live a
‘both/and’ lifestyle. As Paul warned Timothy: ‘Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because
if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers’ (1 Timothy 4:16). Our beliefs and lifestyle are joined at
the hips. Jesus is full of grace and truth (John 1:14). When He spoke the truth, He never lacked grace but when
He showed grace, He was never wishy-washy about the truth out of fear of causing offense.
Modern workplaces can feel incredibly isolating for this reason but we are not alone in this fight. I don’t just
mean we have God with us. We can stand firm by building supportive networks with like-minded Christians,
praying together over tricky ethical dilemmas at work. While pluralism demands silence and conformity, Christ
calls for us to speak the truth in love and wisely, whether that is at the school gate, during lunch breaks or over
work drinks. The pressure to yield is great but Christ’s command to us remains simple: hold fast to what you
have until I come (Rev 2:25).
Mark
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