smyrna

Our church is currently doing a series on the 7 churches in Revelation. This coming Sunday will be the letter to the church that met at Smyrna. I looked up some history concerning the city of Smyrna, to shed light on the culture and issues the church must have faced.

Smyrna is an ancient city; Old Smyrna dates back as far as the 11th millenium B.C. New Smyrna began as a Hellinistic city in the 3rd century, but then appealed to Rome in 197 B.C. and created a cult of the goddess Roma (deifying the city of Rome), essentially creating the goddess herself.

Smyrna fought with Ephesus and Pergamum for the title “First City of Asia” and was a leading commercial/port city during Roman times.

Apart from the worship of Roma, the city had a large Jewish constituent and the Christians in the city felt considerable opposition from the Jews.

Jesus, through John, encouraged the church to stand strong through the coming persecution and warned that some would face imprisonment and even death (Rev 2:10). Polycarp, a bishop at Smyrna and possibly the apostle John’s disciple, was martyred there ca. A.D. 155.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smyrna; bibleplaces.com/smyrna.htm.