The letters to the seven churches

The book of Revelation includes seven letters to seven specific churches. What is the purpose of these letters, how are they arranged, and what is the overall message?

You may want to read before

• Historical background of the book
• What type of book is this
• The vision
• The angels of the churches

The vision behind the letters

Before writing the letters, John records a vision of how God envisions the Church. Its message is that the Church, pictured as stars and lampstands, is meant to be light — lampstands giving light within the Church, stars giving light to the world — but only through dependence on Jesus, never apart from him. This is exactly what the seven churches are being judged on.

At the beginning of this chapter, we already saw what Jesus did. Now we turn to the situation the churches are actually in, and to what God is doing to move them toward the calling that vision describes.

Why these seven, in this order

Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamon, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea: this is not a random list. It is the order of an actual Roman road — the route a courier carrying the letter (and the whole book of Revelation) would travel, starting at Ephesus, the province’s major port and hub, moving north along the coast to Smyrna and on to Pergamon, then turning southeast through the Hermus and Cogamus valleys through Thyatira, Sardis, and Philadelphia, before finishing at Laodicea in the southeastern interior. Whatever thematic patterns the arrangement also displays, the sequence itself follows a real, roughly circular postal route through the province of Asia.

The structure of the letters

In each letter, Jesus follows a broadly similar pattern: he addresses the church in a specific way — often drawing the description of himself from the vision in chapter 1 — commends what is praiseworthy, and gives a promise to “the one who conquers.” Not every letter has every part, though: Smyrna and Philadelphia receive no complaint at all, and Laodicea receives no commendation whatsoever.

Laid over this basic pattern, the seven letters are arranged like a ring:¹

• The first and the last are in danger of losing their very identity as churches. Ephesus, the first, is warned that its lampstand will be removed if it doesn’t change — in terms of the vision above, it has lost its purpose. Laodicea, the last, is the only church that receives no praise whatsoever.
• The second and second-to-last, Smyrna and Philadelphia, are the only two that receive no reproof at all, only praise — and they stand in the less prominent places, not at the start, the end or the centre.
• The three in the middle — Pergamon, Thyatira and Sardis — are mixed: some have stayed faithful, others compromise. At the very centre, in the middle of the middle letter, stands the one sentence addressed to all the churches besides the closing refrain: “all the churches will know that I am he who searches hearts and minds” (2:23).

Comparing the paired churches brings out some striking points:

• Ephesus and Laodicea. Ephesus does everything right but has lost its first love. Laodicea, by contrast, does nothing right and lives in a fog of self-deception. The lesson cuts both ways: without love, you can get everything else right and still be no better off than Laodicea — a church without love has lost its purpose.
• Smyrna and Philadelphia. Both face outside opposition, and in both cases the pressure comes from Jewish opposition. Smyrna faces both poverty and the threat of imprisonment (2:9-10); Philadelphia has “little strength” — limited numbers or standing in the city (3:8). Philadelphia is given the promise that these opponents will eventually be made to acknowledge God’s love for the church; Smyrna is given no such promise. Yet in both cases, the churches are simply told to keep the faith and continue their work. Jesus promises to see them through, not that everything they attempt will succeed.
• Pergamon and Sardis. They stand on either side of the centre and fail in opposite ways. Pergamon holds fast to Jesus’ name under pressure, but its leaders let false teaching in (2:13–15), the failure that Thyatira shows in full. Sardis has no false teaching to answer for; it has a name for being alive and is dead (3:1). One lets the wrong thing in, the other has let its life run out, and both are called to repent.
• Thyatira. Standing at the centre, Thyatira’s letter is about false teaching that had found a place within the church itself — perhaps through one of its own recognised teachers. Jesus will judge both the teacher and her followers, and the other churches are meant to take note: “all the churches will know” (2:23).

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