Revelation Chapter Two, Balaam

 Revelation 2:14 “But I have a few things against you, because you have there those who hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality.

In this verse we learn that Pergamos is not without its own faults. They have persevered and kept the name of Christ and His faith in the place where Satan’s throne resided; they even continued their works after the martyrdom of Antipas. But they had permitted other things to happen, as well.

James once wrote, “Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin,” James 4:17. The Christian is to resist the divisive man; that is, the man that brings heterodoxical doctrine into the church, Titus 3:10, 11. Paul is clear in his admonition to Titus, that a man preaching doctrine incongruent to what is true and Biblical must be rejected after being admonished. Not excommunicated, but silenced in terms of entertaining the teachings he propagates. Why? Because orthodoxy is the lifeblood of the church; that does not make it stilted, outdated or boring; it makes it stable, reliable, and pure. Today the church has been invaded by Darwinian Evolution, New Age relativism, abortion and LGBTQ+ advocacy, and a felt needs gospel that dismisses Christ and the cross in place of making people feel good. These are just a few of the many heresies the professing church has embraced in the last century.

Pergamos stands as a cautionary tale as to why we must strenuously test and reject false teachers. Ephesus tested supposed apostles and found their teaching incongruent with Scriptural truth. The result? They cannot abide such evil practices, likewise rejecting the Nicolaitans’ deeds, which was apparently a small sect in Ephesus that failed to gain traction or infiltrate the church. Today Christian doctrine is sorely challenged and maligned by legions of professing saints. Many protest the truth of the eternal security of the believer. Many protest that Christ alone, apart from works or effort, provides salvation. Others say that God appointed some to salvation and others to wrath apart from human choice; that indeed humanity does not have choice or even free will. Pergamos permitted two things into their church body. While the second is discussed in the next verse, the Lord is not remiss to share what evil they have first committed.

Balaam is a tragic and mysterious figure in Scripture. Balaam, to put it simply, was a man renowned for cursing people. The Ammonites and Moabites hired him to curse Israel, Nehemiah 13:2, Micah 6:5. Peter likens Balaam to, “those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority…presumptuous, self-willed. They are not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries,” 2 Peter 2:10. What follows in Peter's epistle is a litany of descriptors of the unjust, typified by what Peter refers later to as, “the way of Balaam,” 2 Peter 2:15, see also Jude 11. While Balaam appeared to have known God and conversed with Him on several occasions, we must recall that Cain likewise spoke to God and it is heavily implied that Cain went to Hell, 1 John 3:12, again Jude 11. Balaam was later killed by Israel for the practices he taught Moab to seduce the people with, Numbers 31:8. Balaam was a false prophet who prophesied for money because he loved money; money was his god. Was he ever once a true prophet? Scripture only gives us small pieces of his career, and that at the end of his life. We know that Balak paid him to spiritually assassinate a nation; Balaam tried several times and failed. Refusing to yield to the Lord’s counsel and going to Balak’s aid enraged God, and it was Balaam’s donkey that spared him from an even even quicker death than he eventually received. Peter speaks of him in the most unflattering of terms; likening those who engage in carnal, worldly ambition to the false prophet, inevitably sharing that false prophet’s recorded doom.

The fruit of the doctrine of Balaam was idol sacrifice and sexual immorality. Though Jesus uses this specific example, the idea here is that moral compromise with false religion and pagan idolatry is what the church was exposed to. Balaam sought to undermine Israel from within by sabotaging their blessings. He did this by luring men away to pagan wives, who introduced them to pagan gods; soon enough the people were worshiping at pagan altars (eating things sacrificed to idols) and taking wives forbidden by God to take. The moral (and by extension the spiritual and doctrinal) integrity of the congregation was compromised. The little leaven of error had leavened the lump, and now their witness and blessing were likewise compromised. The spiritual hedge of the Lord’s blessing dropped for Israel when they succumbed to Balaam’s wiles, and from within itself zealous men had to rise up and purge the idolatry. Likewise, Christ is calling to the faithful who kept His name to remember their place and purpose, and to purge the leaven of heresy and immorality from the church, where neither should ever be given a proper foothold.