Day 344: Revelation 2:10–11

Look, the Devil is about to throw some of you into prison to test you, and you will have tribulation for 10 days. Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life (v. 10).

Smyrna stands out among the churches as one of two that received no rebuke. As Christ walked beside this lampstand, He found no fault in her.

Impressively, she didn’t pass her tests because her exams were easy. To the contrary, no other church is characterized by greater depths of suffering. Christ didn’t mince words when He described her afflictions and poverty. Christians were despised and terribly mistreated in Smyrna primarily because no other city in Asia Minor held more allegiance to Rome. The obsessive allegiance of the people of Smyrna became deadly for Christians under the rule of emperors like Nero (ad 54–68) and Domitian (ad 81–96). Anything the emperor reviled, the people of Smyrna reviled. For these two emperors and others that followed, Christians were on the top of the hate list.

How are people like the believers in Smyrna able to be faithful through such terrible suffering? As resistant as we are to absorb it, 1 Peter 1:7 indicates one primary reason: “. . . so that the genuineness of your faith—more valuable than gold, which perishes though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (hcsb).

Those who are faithful in the midst of immense suffering somehow allow their fiery trials to purify them rather than destroy them. If we’ve never suffered like some of the saints we know or have read about, we tend to indict ourselves with failure before our trials ever come. We must remember that God grants us grace and mercy according to our need. No, I do not have the strength or character to be faithful under such heart-shattering conditions. But when my time comes, the Holy Spirit will impart a power and grace I’ve never experienced. The challenge is whether or not to accept it.

The tragedy is that in our pride and anger we sometimes refuse the grace of God during our times of suffering. The believers in Smyrna did not refuse the grace. They inhaled it like air because they were desperate. As much as the church in Smyrna had suffered, Christ warned them of more to come. He wanted them to be aware, but He did not want them to be afraid. I believe much of the book of Revelation was written to believers for the same purpose.

Mind you, imprisonment and death awaited some of those among the church of Smyrna. We don’t know what Christ meant by the time segment of “10 days” in verse 10. Some scholars believe it was literal. Others think it represented ten years. Still others assume it is a figure of speech for a segment of time known only to God. Whatever the length of trial, Christ called the church of Smyrna to be faithful unto death. His self-identification as the one who died and came to life again reminded them of the absolute assurance of resurrection life. He also promised to reward them with a stephanos or victor’s crown. They would not be touched by “the second death,” a term for the final judgment for all unbelievers.

Sometimes Jesus defines “overcoming” not as living well but dying well. In other words, dying with faith and spiritual dignity. Beloved, dying is the one thing each of us is going to do unless we’re the chosen generation to “meet the Lord in the air” without tasting death (1 Thess. 4:17 hcsb).

At least one of the saints in Smyrna to which Christ addressed His letter left us a profound and wonderful example of an overcoming death. His name was Polycarp. He studied directly under the apostle John’s tutelage and was alive at the time the Revelation was penned. He became the bishop of the church in Smyrna and served the generation that followed John’s heavenly departure. Foxe’s Book of Martyrs shares the following account of Polycarp’s trial and martyrdom.

He was, however, carried before the proconsul, condemned. . . . The proconsul then urged him, saying, ‘Swear, and I will release thee;—reproach Christ.’ Polycarp answered, ‘Eighty and six years have I served Him, and He has done me no wrong. How then can I blaspheme my King who has saved me?’ At the stake to which he was only tied, not nailed as usual, as he assured them he should stand immovable, the flames, on their kindling the fagots, encircled his body, like an arch, without touching him; and the executioner, on seeing this, was ordered to pierce him with a sword, when so great a quantity of blood flowed out as extinguished the fire.78

He had overcome. As long as those moments must have been, nothing could have prepared Polycarp for the sight he beheld when death gave way to life and faith gave way to sight. The only Jesus he had ever seen was in the face and heart of John the Beloved. But that day the old bishop of Smyrna saw the One he loved and had served for eighty and six years. Face to face. With a victor’s crown in His hand.

When I get to heaven and meet him, I’m going to try to remember to ask Polycarp if he thought his suffering was worth it. Oh, I already know the answer . . . but I want to see his expression.