Transcription of the Video: Where Satan Lives

Ray Vander Laan: One of Jesus' disciples, John, wrote a letter to Christians who lived in Pergamum, a great city in Asia Minor in the first century. He said, "I know where you live, where Satan has his throne. Yet you remain true to my name. You did not renounce your faith in me even in the days of Antipas who was put to death in your city, where Satan lives."

What was it about Pergamum that led John to refer to it as the place where Satan had his throne, as the place where Satan lived? What would it have been like for one of those early believers in Jesus to live in a city that could be described as Satan's home or Satan's throne?

Welcome, this morning, to another stop on our journey, trying to walk in the footsteps of those early Christians, who took the Gospel from the land of Israel where it had originated in the person of Jesus, in the Galilee, and brought it to this awesome place which was the province of Asia Minor. We're sitting part way up the acropolis of an ancient city. The name of this city was Pergamum. It's a city that really had its origin, its roots in the conquest of Alexander the Great. Alexander conquered this area. 

So for about 200 or 250 years, this was a Hellenistic city, and the kings decided to turn this into one of the jewels of all Asia. And so, they built on this acropolis particularly. But also, even down below here, some of the most spectacular constructions that you can see anywhere in the ancient world - all in the Hellenistic style. 

At the end of that Hellenistic period, this city of Pergamum had become part of the Roman empire - the capital of the province of Asia. And that meant the whole of Asia was ruled from here. And the governor here had what the Roman world called the Right of the Sword. That is, of all the Roman governors, of all the cities, this one had the right to decide whether a prisoner or an accused person lived or died. And John, with that typical Jewish passion and intensity, starts out his letter to this small community of Christians and says to them, "These are the words of the one who holds the sword with two edges."

It's not the governor up here. He may think so. He doesn't have the real power of life and death. Don't you ever forget who does. It's God and his son, Messiah Jesus. And even more, he has the power of real life - meaningful life now that goes on forever. 

It must have been an incredibly tough place to be a Christian. And yet, to our amazement I think, we've discovered that these people were not only here, but they had a remarkable impact on this powerful pagan city. Now how did that come about?

John refers to this city as the place where Satan lives, where Satan's throne is. When the readers first got his letter, what did they think he was talking about? What was Satan's seat? Why did Satan live here? Maybe we ought to start with where we are right now. We're sitting about two-thirds of the way up the acropolis next to a magnificent, huge, huge theater - the steepest theater in the ancient world, they say. It seats about 10,000 people. It has more than 80 rows. And in front of it, an 800-foot long stoa - a colonnaded walkway that led to the end of this little plateau. And on the end of it stood this beautiful temple.

This was the main temple in the city to the god Dionysus. His father was Zeus, the king of the gods. And his mother was a woman named Semele. So he was the son of a god, born by a god and a woman. And that must have sounded, to those early believers, like a counterfeit. Because after all, Jesus was the one who was born of God through the woman Mary. 

But this god was a god who promised them life after death and who promised them meaningful life now. And he did that by his control of wine. And it was believed that by drinking that wine, particularly drinking it to excess, as one became drunk, you literally were united with Dionysus and became one with him. 

If you walk around the side of the hill on that ancient road where you come to a little Dionysus cult center, it's a fascinating little place. It's next to the wine shop appropriately. You climb the steps to a second floor, and then you walk in the door. And right in front of you in the middle of the room is the base of the Dionysus altar. And around the outside, a flat platform area with a tray along the front edge that was originally made of marble. And people would lay on those benches and they would put raw meat in front them - meat that had been offered to Dionysus on that altar. And the people would gorge themselves on that raw meat and then drink until they were intoxicated.

Women, during the festival time, would go out in mountains and drink wine and run through the hills screaming and dancing in frenzy. All kinds of sexual immorality accompanied the thing so much so that in Rome for a while, they outlawed it. Imagine in Rome - you think of Rome as immoral - they outlawed the Dionysus practice because it was considered too immoral even for Rome.

So maybe Satan's seed was Dionysus. Is there anything in the text that would suggest that? Well, John writes, "You have those who practice Baalism." The Nicolaitans apparently - people who committed sins by eating meat, food that was offered to idols and committing sexual immorality. That sounds a lot like Dionysus. 

If that was Satan's seat, John could have answered, "Listen. It's not Dionysus. I stood with Jesus as a young boy, an early disciple. And I watched Jesus turn water into wine." This is a miracle by the way that Dionysus, himself, was supposed to perform in his temples during certain festivals. And John knew that Dionysus was a fake. He didn't provide meaning. He didn't provide intimacy from God. That came alone from Jesus, and John had seen it with his eyes. So he was prepared.

There are other candidates. If you look down below here just across the valley, you see a colonnaded street. Part of it has been excavated. It probably was more than a mile long originally. It's called the Sacred Way that led to the temple shrine area of Aesculapius. 

Now Aesculapius was the god of healing. And you begin to walk down that street, and you come to a colonnaded entrance area. As you walk in, there in the middle is a pillar on which an altar originally stood. And that pillar has the Aesculapius symbol on it (the snake).

So you walked in, and in a sense you were testifying, "If I'm healed here, it's going to be due to the snake god." Then you were interviewed by the priests of Aesculapius to determine whether your disease would be treated, would be healed by the god. I found it very intriguing that they turned away anybody who was mortally ill, dying. They turned away pregnant women who were near delivery. They didn't want the possibility of a still birth. 

I thought to myself, "What kind of a culture would take an old, dying person and say they're of no value, send them away. What kind of a culture would have no concern for a fetus?" It sounds like the culture I live in.

Once you were interviewed, you were allowed into the hospital. It was more than five acres of a spectacular, open stoa area. And then you were sent to the treatment room. The treatment room was a fascinating place. It was probably done at night. The patient is not feeling well. They're tired. They're nervous about whether the god is going to heal them or not. You go down the stairs into this long tunnel. There's water running down the sides, so there's this eerie echo of water. It's a long distance - about 100 meters or even a little bit more - and you come out into the treatment room. 

Now the treatment room was a huge, round room - almost 300 feet in diameter. There were two floors. Only one remains so we don't know for sure what was on the second floor. But on that lower floor are all little chambers. And in the middle, several large fountains which must have been spouting water. So even there, imagine being underground in this cave-like, huge building and hearing the echoing of this water. 

The patients would be given various drugs or substances. Probably, some of them, opium, which made them slightly high or at least not completely normal. And they would go into these treatment rooms and sleep. Now hopefully, while they slept, Aesculapius would come and give them a vision of treatment. Once the vision had come, then you climbed the stairs and went out and met with the priest or the priests and they would interpret what treatments you should have. 

And treatments involved diet, exercise, getting plenty of rest and sun. There was a huge library there in one corner where you could read either recreationally or about your particular problem. It had a theater where you could go to praise and celebrate Aesculapius or just to see a play to relax. 

But the main part of the treatment are the various water systems. Over on one side is the rock pool, which was used to make mud baths to cover yourselves with sacred mud. There's another sacred spring where you could drink Aesculapius's water. This was all designed to help you be healed. And at the end when you were finally healed, you climbed the steps to this huge, round, Aesculapius temple. It was a magnificent temple, shaped after the Pantheon in Rome. You got to the top and on the far side, in a niche, the statue of Aesculapius with that serpent in his hand.

In the middle, there's a big chest - a huge box with a large snake in it representing Aesculapius. And around the side Aesculapius's children like Hygieia (the goddess of health) and Panacea (the goddess of relief of pain). You got on your knees and said, "Thank you, Aesculapius, for your gift of healing." 

And then outside, there are large white stones standing in rows. It's amazing how many of them. And after you had thanked Aesculapius and given him a gift, you'd inscribe your name to say, "This is my name, and here's what I was healed from. Thank you, Aesculapius."

Was that Satan's seat? Every Jew, and certainly those early Christians knew that the snake the symbol of evil from the beginning, from the Garden of Eden, and represented everything sinful and satanic. How can you get on your knees to a snake even if it heals you? How dare you? 

And you know, it struck me how well Jesus had prepared John and those early believers. Because the second and third miracle in John's book had to do with Aesculapius. 

The second miracle was the raising of a dead child. The third miracle was Jesus going to the Pool of Bethesda next to the Temple in Jerusalem where a man laid next to what scholars believe, by the way, was also an Aesculapius temple and waited for the moving waters so that he could be healed. Thirty-eight years, that man laid there, and it never happened. And Jesus walked up in one instant and said, "Man, get up and walk." And that invalid got up and walked.

And John could walk in here and say, "It's not Aesculapius. That snake god doesn't heal you. That's a fake. That's a phony. It's Jesus. I saw it myself. Don't buy into that. So maybe that's Satan's seat. 

There are other candidates. If you walk, again, around the side on that wonderful road. I love that road that goes around the back side. You come to the shrine of Demeter. There's a beautiful enclosure area. It had a stoa on the south side. On the north side, a partial stoa and a series of what looked like bleacher seats or theater seats where the celebrants could sit and watch the ceremonies. On one end, the base of a rather significant temple, and out in front of it, a fairly large altar that's been reconstructed. It's really a powerful scene.

Now Demeter was a popular god, particularly with the middle and lower classes, and especially the women. Demeter was the goddess of grain. You could call her the grocery god. She would ask her celebrants to immerse themselves in bulls' blood to wash away their sins. That's pretty strange. Early Christians may have thought that was sort of counterfeit too, because we claim to be washed in the blood of the Messiah. 

Outside is a large pit, which may have been the place where the celebrant went, either to pour the blood or some have suggested to lie in the bottom as the blood was drained out of the animal over them to symbolize their initiation. But besides that, she was a gentle goddess who put groceries on the table.

Is there anything in the text that would suggest that that was Satan's seat. Well, maybe John, when saying, "To him who overcomes, I will give some of the hidden manna." 

"It's not Demeter who puts groceries on the table. It's Jesus." And John had been prepared again. John could recall, "I stood next to him one day when this man with a few loaves and a few fish fed 5,000 people. Don't you guys buy Demeter. She's not the grocery goddess. It's Jesus. That's a fake."

Other candidates - above here is the Zeus altar. It's a gigantic altar, one of the oldest. It's 110 feet long and 105 feet wide. There are three levels. It's 40 feet high, out in the open. The lower level has a podium. The next level is carved with a frieze more than 300 feet wide, 10 feet high of what sculptors consider some of the most beautiful artwork in the world. And on the top, an altar. Maybe that was Satan's seat. 

Or maybe-- look up above here. If we go to the Athena temple in this direction, in the middle, you see a round podium. Because Pergamum was given the honor of being the first city where an emperor cult was established, where they declared not only is Caesar-- in this case, Caesar Augustus-- was divine but our god and our king. 

Later, on top, a spectacular Trajan temple built by his son Hadrian right after the year 100, all testifying again to the power of the emperor. That, too, was fake. John begins, "He doesn't have a sword. Jesus does."

But even more, John could say, "Don't buy it. I stood on the Mount of Olives outside of Jerusalem, and I watched Jesus ascend to Heaven to be seated at the right hand of God. He is God, not Augustus or Trajan or Hadrian or Domitian or anybody else."

There were temples everywhere. Hera, Heracles, Hermes, Demeter, all kinds of gods and goddesses. So what was Satan's seat? I think it's all. Because it seems to me what all of it - all of the gods, all of the temples, all of the water fountains, all the healing and the wine drinking and the groceries, what it all was saying is, "You get what you need from life somewhere other than God."

And that, people, is the devil's trap to any culture. No matter what the culture. The devil wants people to think that the way to meaning in life and to eternal life is in you or in the world around you. And the moment you think that, you've lost sight of the power of God. 

And goodness knows our culture and our society is desperately seeking after meaning and significance. Do you have the courage to identify the lie and to both live and speak the truth?

Down below here in the Aesculapian, there are white stones. One thought I had from the Jewish context is this. John says, "If you commit yourself to Jesus, I will give you one of these white stones, and I'll inscribe a name on it. But there's a twist. It's a name, a description that only you know." Which means that God places us along the Sacred Way of the world we live in. 

And God says, "You stand there as a testimony to my power and work in your life." Just the stone isn't enough. Because you're the only one who knows the name. You've got to have the courage to find a way to say it as people notice what God has done in you. 

You have to find the courage to be a witness to say, "Yes. He has. Let me tell you about God."

Male speaker: I think as healthcare workers, we have to be especially careful because we're often thanked for what we do in response to what we've done for our patient. We have to be especially careful to be able to transmit or to return that thanks to God and to let those people know that what we've done is nothing of our own but is all from the grace of God.

 Ray Vander Laan: Amen. Maybe what would be a good idea is for every one of you the next time you go to a physician or a hospital is to write them a little note and say, "I'm so thankful that God chose to use you to heal me." It might be a blessing to the physician, it might be a testimony to Jesus and it might be great to your faith. 

And if I could just, again-- I work with kids, students, high school students. And I so seldom hear from them or from their environment, people who praise God for ordinary things. We praise God for the big things like, "I was delivered from some huge problem."

But it's so seldom that we hear Christians testifying to young people and children, "Thank you God for little things." And especially you guys, you could be a great testimony in your schools, in your work, to simply be someone who publicly acknowledges that what you have and who you are comes from God and that you believe that. 

That puts huge pressure, which is why John is so adamant about not committing immorality of any kind, because you need to live as if that's true. It would have done no good to come to a Dionysus place and be drinking and then testify that it's Jesus who gives meaning to life. It doesn't work that way. Our life needs to express it.

Female Speaker: Ray, you said in devotions this morning that God gave his truth to children. That was the passage that you read. When our second son was healed from epilepsy, shortly afterwards, our first son was at a friend's house talking with his mother. And she said, "Wasn't that wonderful that the doctors could heal your brother?"

And he said, "Well, we believe that it was an answer to prayer." 

And the mother was so impressed by that statement from him that she called me and she said, "You've got to hear what your son said." I just think he was such an encouragement to her, and he was so bold about his faith.

Ray Vander Laan: Amen. The world needs to see us as white stones with new names, and we need to speak the truth.