Like the Ephesian church (2:1–7), the Pergamum church received praise from Jesus for aspects of its faithfulness (2:13). It even held fast in the face of a persecution in which one of its members was martyred. Like Ephesus, it seems to have been a faithful church, living as citizens of God’s New Jerusalem in the midst of the pressures of their fallen Babylon world. The Christians of Pergamum had not only been resistant to denying their faith in Jesus as Messiah and Lord, they had been manifesting