The church at Smyrna was a church that was going through the fires of pain and persecution. It is noteworthy that this church received no words of criticism from the One who knew them thoroughly, Christ Himself.

Suffering and hardship are hard to bear but they have a way of purifying God's people. Perhaps that explains why we are never very far from life's trials. The English scholar John Selden realized this when he wrote: “Pleasure is nothing else but the intermission of pain.” The first-century church at Smyrna speaks volumes to our 21st-century times. Let's listen well.

Revelation 2:8-11

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