Day 350: Revelation 3:9–13

I will make them come and bow down at your feet, and they will know that I have loved you (v. 9).

One of the meanest tricks Satan ever plays on us is to try convincing us God doesn’t love us and that we’re exerting all this energy and exercising all this faith for nothing: “Look at all you’ve done, and He doesn’t even care! It’s all a big joke!” Detect the smell of devil breath in a statement like that?

Drawn from this passage in Revelation 3, we discover that Satan used the Jews in Philadelphia to demoralize this small church, just as he uses countless puppets in our own lives and times to demoralize us. But Christ promised the church in this city that one day the very people who sneered at them would acknowledge something they would never have confessed on their own. In the end, they would be forced to admit just how much He loves them.

Beloved, you and I are not to be motivated by spite. At the same time, Jesus wants you to know that one day everyone will know how much He loves you. You have been unashamed of Him, and He most assuredly will prove unashamed of you.

What a show of His love, then, that Christ promised to make these overcomers pillars in the temple of God (v. 12). Philadelphia was a city under constant threat of earthquakes. The threat was especially vivid after a devastating earthquake in ad 17. Decades later, some historians say the church had already rebuilt their small sanctuary several times because of tremors. Often the only things left standing in a city lying in ruins are the pillars.

Hebrews 12:26–27 says God will shake both the heavens and the earth so that only that which cannot be shaken will remain. “Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us hold on to grace. By it, we may serve God acceptably, with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire” (Heb. 12:28–29 hcsb).

Christ’s promise to the overcomers was that they would be kept from the hour of trial coming upon the whole world, and they would stand like pillars in a kingdom that can never be shaken. Why? Because they were loved and, contrary to popular opinion, they chose to believe it. You, too, are loved, dear one. Let no one take your crown by convincing you otherwise.