Space to Repent Revelation 2:21

John the apostle saw the vision of Jesus in chapter one of “Revelation” and afterward began to write to the “seven churches in Asia”. He started with the church located in “Ephesus”, then the “church of Smyrna”, the “church in Pergamos” and the “church in Thyatira” where He told them, “I know your works, and charity, and service, and faith, and your patience, and your works; and the last to be more than the first”, and he added, “Notwithstanding I have a few things against you, because you suffer that woman Jezebel, which calls herself a prophetess, to teach and to seduce my servants to commit fornication, and to eat things sacrificed unto idols”. In chapter two and verse twenty-one of Revelation, John shared how Jesus told “the church in Thyratira”, “I gave her space to repent of her fornication” where we read:

And I gave her space to repent of her fornication; and she repented not.

The verse begins, “And I gave her space to repent of her fornication;” John began with the words, “and I gave her space” which means “and Jesus granted, bestowed and delivered time whether short or long” “to repent” or “to change one's mind for the better and heartily amend with abhorrence one's past sins” “of her fornication” which means “pertaining to the church in Thyatira's worship of idols and defilement of idolatry as incurred by eating the sacrifices offered to idols”. Jesus allowed “time” for the “church in Thyatira” to “change their mind” and ways toward “idolatry”.

The verse goes on to say, “and she repented not.” John added the words, “and she” or “and the church in Thyatira” “repented not” which means “did not “change their mind” and ways toward “idolatry”. Though Jesus “granted” them “time” to “change their minds and ways”, the “church in Thyatira” refused.

When we consider John's words in this verse, we note the stubbornness of the “church in Thyatira”. Jesus pointed out their “flaw”, gave them “time” to change and alter their minds, and still they continued in their “idol worship”. God alone through His Son Jesus is to be worshiped, and no other object in this world is to be “bowed down to or submitted before”. Those within the “church of Thyatira” refused to change their “minds”, and they continued not only to have “idols” in their lives, but also to “cling to them” in worship. May all who read these words take heed to the misdirection of the “church in Thyatira” and put away any other object that is not God.

Next time John writes how Jesus tells the “church of “I gave her space to repent of her fornication, and she repented not”, so read ahead, and we shall join together then.

Until tomorrow…there is more…

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