Returning to My First Love: Why Revelation 2:4 Is About Jesus, Not Heaven
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Losing and Finding My First Love
This past Sunday, I visited a new church. It was small and welcoming — the kind of place where people smile when you walk in. The preacher spoke from Revelation 2:4, where Jesus says to the church in Ephesus:
“Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love.”
He said the “first love” meant wanting to go to heaven.
But I couldn’t shake the feeling that wasn’t right.
The First Love Is Jesus
When I read that verse and the ones that follow, I see something much deeper. Jesus isn’t saying they lost their desire for heaven — He’s saying they lost Him.
He is the first love.
In 1 John 4:19, it says,
“We love because He first loved us.”
That’s the foundation. Jesus loved us first — and our love for Him is supposed to be the response that fuels everything else.
In John 14:15, He said,
“If you love Me, keep My commandments.”
The obedience comes after the love. The Ephesians were still doing good works, but Jesus saw that their hearts had grown cold. They were serving without affection.
And in Matthew 22:37, Jesus said the greatest commandment is this:
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.”
That’s the first love — not a place, but a Person.
When Works Replace Worship
Jesus told the church in Ephesus, “I know your works, your labor, your patience” (Revelation 2:2). They weren’t lazy. They stood for truth. They even resisted false teachers.
But still — something was missing.
It reminds me of 1 Corinthians 13:2, where Paul says,
“Though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge … but have not love, I am nothing.”
You can have right doctrine, discipline, and devotion to church — but if your heart isn’t burning with love for Jesus, He notices.
Remember, Repent, Return
Jesus gives the solution in Revelation 2:5:
“Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the works you did at first.”
That’s an invitation — not condemnation. He’s saying, “Come back to Me.”
It echoes Jeremiah 2:2, where God said to Israel,
“I remember the devotion of your youth, how as a bride you loved Me and followed Me through the wilderness.”
God still desires that same closeness — that pure, early love where nothing else competes with Him.
Coming Back to the Fire
I left church that day thinking how easy it is to confuse activity with intimacy. You can serve God faithfully and still drift emotionally.
But Jesus is calling us back to that first spark — the awe, the gratitude, the passion that once filled us when we realized what He’d done.
So this week I’ve been asking myself:
Do I love Jesus more than the things I do for Him?
Am I still in awe of who He is, or just busy doing “good things”?
Have I left my first love without even realizing it?
Because heaven isn’t the goal — Heaven’s King is.
And the “first love” isn’t about going somewhere.
It’s about knowing Someone.
His name is Jesus.