Ephesus was the most important city in the region of Asia Minor in the first century. That is probably why Paul went there as part of his mission strategy to reach the population centers. He stayed longer in Ephesus than in any other city, approximately two and half years (Acts 19:8-10).

   The city of Ephesus was located at the mouth of the Cayster River and was a seaport city, serving as the primary commercial center of the region. It was a beautiful city. One of the seven wonders of the ancient world was located in Ephesus, the temple of Artemis (or as it was called in Latin, the temple of Diana). Artemis or Diana was the goddess of fertility, depicted as a female with many breasts. The people of Ephesus were really proud of this beautiful temple, and many made their living off the idolatrous trade associated with the temple. When Paul's preaching of the gospel began to impinge upon their trade, a silversmith named Demetrius organized a protest that started a riot and led to Paul's departure from the city (Acts 19:24­20:1). Religion was a powerful force in Ephesus!

   The church in Ephesus was apparently founded by Paul when he visited there on both his second and third missionary journeys (Acts 18:18-21; 19:1­20:1). As usual, Paul clearly differentiated between the dynamic gospel of the indwelling life of the Spirit of Christ and the legalistic performances of religion. Paul's younger disciple, Timothy, later ministered in Ephesus (I Tim. 1:3). The apostle John lived and ministered there in the latter decades of the first century.

   What is the message that Jesus had for the church in Ephesus? He identified Himself as "the One who holds the seven stars in His right hand, the One who walks among the seven golden lampstands" (2:1). The risen Lord Jesus is indicating that He is the One who has divine authority. "All authority is given to Me in heaven and in earth" (Matt. 28:18). He is the One who controls the Church. "He is the head of the Body, the church" (Col. 1:18). "He put all things in subjection under His feet, and gave Him as Head over all things to the church, which is His Body, the fulness of Him who fills all in all" (Eph. 1:22,23). The work of the Holy Spirit in the church is the work of the Spirit of Christ. He walks among the churches. In the old covenant God had said, "I will walk among you and be your God, and you shall be My People" (Lev. 26:12). The living presence of the Lord Jesus is to be the dynamic action of God in the churches. He is not just an object of belief or assent.

   Why does Jesus identify Himself like this to the Ephesians? Because religion has this haughty tendency to think that they are in control, that authority is invested in their hierarchical leaders, that they are the ones who "run the business," and that they will do whatever is necessary to be successful in such "churchy busyness" (despite how contrary it might be to God's business).

   Jesus makes His observation of the church in Ephesus in verses two and three. "I know..." In His gospel record John writes that Jesus "knew all men" (John 2:24), and records Peter saying to Jesus during his being questioned about his love, "You know all things..." (John 21:17). Jesus knew that the Ephesian Christians had "tested the spirits to see if they were from God" (I John 4:1), and had detected false prophets and apostles who were "wolves in sheep's clothing" (Matt. 7:15). Paul had warned the Ephesian elders that "savage wolves will come in among you not sparing the flock" (Acts 20:29). They had been on the lookout for these "false teachers...secretly introducing destructive heresies" (II Peter 2:1), "false prophets" representing "the spirit of the anti-Christ already in the world" (I John 4:1-3). They had persevered and endured and not grown weary. Jesus knew this about them.

   "BUT..." the charge against them is in verse four. "I have this against you...you have left, you have forsaken, your first love." The honeymoon is over!

   The Ephesian Christians had been commended for their love when Paul wrote to them explaining that he had heard of their "love for all the saints" (Eph. 1:15). What had happened? Apparently their love for Jesus Christ and subsequently for one another had waned. "We love because Christ first loved us" (I John 4:19), and because the "love of Christ is shed abroad in our heart by the Holy Spirit whom He has given us" (Rom. 5:5). The "fruit of the Spirit is love..." (Gal. 5:22). John, the apostle of love, had recorded in his gospel the words of Jesus when He said, "By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another" (John 13:35). But the Ephesian Christians had lost the fervent devotion of their early Christian experience (cf. Jere. 2:2-5). The passion, the zeal, the intimacy had faded.

   How does that happen? Perhaps the previous observation of verses two and three gives us the clue to why the Ephesian Christians are guilty as charged. Heresy-hunting can put you in a religious frame of mind very quickly. If you are constantly on the lookout for ideological falsehood, you usually become critical and suspicious. You are looking for heretical aberration under every bush (or idea). You set out on an inquisition, and everyone is a suspect. This can definitely kill your love for Christ and for one another. Enthusiasm for orthodoxy can dull all desire for intimacy with Jesus Christ and with others.

   Then when you think you have developed good skills at this kind of doctrinal discernment, it breeds pride and arrogance. Religion boasts of having everything figured out. "We know what is right and what is wrong." "We can do this detective work." Success in discernment and perseverance can lead to an attitude of self-sufficiency and superiority. The "father of lies" (John 8:44) is so deceptive as he attempts to cause sincere, loving Christians to lapse into religion, which inevitably turns one's love to something or someone other than Jesus Christ, and those in whom Jesus lives, i.e. Christians. Religion will create a primary love for orthodoxy and correct doctrine, for good feelings and entertainment, for productivity and the success factors of buildings, budgets and baptisms, for prestige, position, and power. Religion will make you critical and suspicious and judgmental of others, even other Christians, because religion has lost any connection with the dynamic love of Jesus Christ.

   What does Jesus command the Ephesians to do? In verse five He commands them to (1) remember, (2) repent, and (3) re-enact.

   First, "remember from where you have fallen." Remember all that has been provided to you in Jesus Christ when He came to dwell in you and to be your life. The prodigal son in Jesus' parable remembered all that he had back at his father's house.

   Second, the Ephesians are commanded to "repent." Repentance is a "change of mind that leads to a change of action." The "change of mind" is the recognition that "I cannot, only Christ can live the Christian life." The "change of action" is the receptivity of Christ's activity that allows Christ to function in our behavior in accord with His character.

   Thirdly, the Ephesians were to "re-enact." "Do the deeds you did at first." They were to re-engage in the first-deeds that issued out of their first-love. We were "created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them" (Eph. 2:10). "Faith without works is dead" (James 2:26). "God is able to make all grace abound to you, that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed" (II Cor. 9:8). "God... will equip us in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight" (Heb. 13:20,21). This was not a command like that so prevalent in religion, "Get to work for Jesus!" or "Do these deeds and you will be righteous." Not at all. The deeds that Jesus demands are always derived from the dynamic of His own deity! It was such divinely energized "good deeds" that Christ wants them to re-enact.

   The failure to thus live out of the dynamic of Christ's life and activity can result in the "removal of the lampstand from its place." That does not mean that the church universal will be overcome. Jesus said, "Upon this rock (of faith in Jesus Christ), I will build My church, and the gates of Hades will not overpower it" (Matt. 16:18). But local churches have been and are removed for their misrepresentation. Exhibit #1: There is no church in Ephesus today!

   Religion fails to recognize that permanency is only in Jesus Christ; when we are deriving from Christ by faith. This is true both individually, as well as ecclesiastically. Religion operates on the premise that permanency is achieved by prolonged programs, by historical heritage, or by perpetual endowments and entitlements.

   The attitude of Jesus Christ is that it is better to have no church, no group calling itself the "church of Jesus Christ," than to have an aberration, a misrepresentation, a religion which has no love, a religion that does not manifest His character and activity.

   Jesus makes one more observation of the Ephesian church in verse six, noting that they have "hated the deeds of the Nicolaitans." Who were these Nicolaitans? We shall observe that they were in Pergamum also (2:15). Some have suggested that the Nicolaitans were somehow identified with one of the seven servers mentioned in Acts 6:5 - "Nicolas, a proselyte from Antioch." This is very doubtful, and has no evidence to substantiate such. The Nicolaitans can probably better be identified by the etymology of the name. Two Greek words are joined together: nike meaning "victory" (such is the basis of Nike brand shoes), and laos meaning "people" (from which we get the word "laity"). The Nicolaitans are those who "conquer the people." This is indicative of religion. It is an organized attempt to manipulate and control the people, to make them into unthinking pawns and followers who will do whatever they are told to do by the religious leaders (especially to give up their money and time). Religion is afraid of Christians who live by the freedom of God's grace, allowing the Spirit of Christ to direct their lives and manifest His character. You cannot control those kind of people. They believe that Jesus Christ is their Priest and their Lord, and they will not bow down to any other, or be controlled or conquered by any other.

   At least the Ephesians had rejected the religion of the Nicolaitans which "conquered people." They still needed to be discerning to what the Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, was saying to the churches, especially in the avoidance of all kinds of religion by depending upon Jesus Christ alone. "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches" (2:7).

   The promise to those who would overcome the temptation to revert to religion by deriving all from Christ the Overcomer (John 16:33), was that they could "eat of the tree of life, which is in the Paradise of God" (2:7). To understand this promise we have to go all the way back to the first book of the Bible, to Genesis. In the garden of Eden God placed the "tree of life" right in the middle (Gen. 2:9), encouraging free access to eat from it (Gen. 2:16) while Adam and Eve were still in their sinless state. What did that "tree of life" represent? It represented the choice that the first man had to allow for the divine outworking of the divinely inbreathed life of God in man. God had breathed into man the divine breath (spirit) of His life (Gen. 2:7). As man partook of the "tree of life" he would have been functioning as God intended in the sanctification process, allowing the life of God to be expressed in the behavior of man, to the glory of God. After the first pair sinned by eating of the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil," they were denied access to the "tree of life" (Gen. 3:24), lest they become perpetual sinners.

   In the Proverbs, the "tree of life" is identified with wisdom (3:18), righteousness (11:30), fulfilled desire (13:12) and gracious speech (15:4). Jesus Christ in the Christian is our wisdom and righteousness (I Cor. 1:30), the fulfillment of all our God-given desires, and the basis of all gracious speech (Eph. 4:29). There is a sense in which Christians presently partake of the "tree of life" in the sanctification process whereby we allow the life of Christ to be expressed through us.

   Later in the last chapter of the Revelation, Jesus pronounces the last of the beatitudes, saying, "Blessed are those who wash their robes, that they might have the right to the tree of life, and may enter by the gates of the city" (Rev. 22:14). Some have seen in that verse the sequence of justification (sins washed away and made righteous), sanctification (tree of life), and glorification (entering the glorious city). The final reference to the "tree of life" in Revelation 22:19 cautions that anyone who does heed the words of this Revelation, and instead "takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city..." This seems to imply that Christians who will not learn from the exhortations against religion in the Revelation are in jeopardy of losing sanctification and glorification. It may indicate that there is a "not yet" participation in the "tree of life" as well as the present participation which the Christian "already" enjoys.

   There is much that every Christian in every age and every location can learn from what Jesus speaks to the church in Ephesus. We are to "hear what the Spirit says to all the churches," and not lapse into the diabolical counterfeit of religion.