The cosmic conflict between good and evil is one of the themes of the Bible and culminates in the book of Revelation. Scholars studying the struggle between good and evil mainly focus on Rev 12-14, which depicts the war in heaven. In this article, I show that the letters to the seven churches are an often-overlooked text describing the cosmic conflict (Rev 2-3). The letters contain a distinction between truth and deceit and between holiness and immorality. Also, both regional secular authorities and local members of religious communities are involved in this conflict. I focus on the letter to the church in Smyrna (Rev 2.8-11) and argue that the passage contains key characteristics of the cosmic conflict between Jesus and the devil. While the prevailing consensus within the scholarly community states that the theme of victory is based on a sports metaphor, I show that there is a military motif as well. John portrays the Christian life as a battlefield, where the devil brings spiritual and physical danger, and a second death, but Jesus instructs, guides to the true path and guarantees eternal life.