Chapter 1.
Verse 10. “I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day.” No doubt, on that Lords day, the Spirit filled the soul of John with thoughts of the Lord. What a preparation for the right understanding of this revelation. “And heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, saying,” &c. May we not say this great voice demands our most earnest attention? It was the Lord that spoke to us in that great voice. He said to John: “What thou seest, write in a book, and send it to the seven churches.” (Ver. 11.) Thus John is used to communicate what the Lord shows him. He is the inspired instrument, he is to “write in a book.”
“And I turned to see the voice that spake with me.” How much we need turning to see the One that speaks to us. “And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks [or lamp bearers]. And in the midst of the seven candlesticks, one like unto the Son of man,” &c. (Vers. 12, 13.) Mark, John did not see Him as Jesus, Savior, but clothed in judicial robes, girt for judgment or government. And that in the midst of what He still regards as golden light-bearers in this world. There was the whole, complete state of the churches, and one in the midst like unto the Son of man. And is this the first revelation of Him we need to have? Behold the Lord in the midst of the churches, for discipline and government.
What purity, divine righteousness, penetration, burning judgment, against all evil! what majesty and glory! He is the worthy One to govern His assemblies. If we thus knew Him, should we run about amongst the assemblies seeking to put everybody right? What mischief has not been done by even real servants of Christ, through forgetfulness or ignorance of this revelation of the first and the last, in the midst of the assemblies. Even John, the beloved and aged apostle, may have needed this, judging from the sad state, of the assembly in his Third Epistle. Ah! this revelation should make us slow to judge our brethren. Will it not have the same effect on us that it had on John? He says, “And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead.” (Ver. 17.)
Do we not need this revelation of the Lord? We cannot either understand, or bear to look at the state of Christendom, unless we have thus been at the feet of the Holy and the True, in the midst of the seven candlesticks. “And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last.” (Ver. 17.) Have you ever felt the softness of that hand? Have you heard the sweetness of that voice? When overwhelmed with a sense of His judicial majesty, and our own utter unworthiness, then how sweet to hear Him say: Fear not. This is the much needed lesson, in order to be able to deal tenderly with others, and to understand the patient,, gracious dealings of the Lord with assemblies. Does He not say, as it were, I know what ye deserve, but I died for you? “I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.” (Ver. 18.) Thus was John prepared for the further revelation of Jesus Christ. Are we thus prepared to read and understand? Does our state of soul answer to that of John’s! Human pride and self-sufficiency will not do here. Lord, open our ears to hear, and prepare our hearts to meditate on this book in Thy presence as thus revealed.
Verse 19. John was not to forget what he had already seen—the Lord Himself in the midst of the churches, clothed in judicial majesty and glory. The Lord says: “Write the things which thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter” [or after these]. We often forget the first, but each of these three divisions of the book, or revelation, are equally important: the presence of the Lord as Judge in the midst of the churches; the things that are, during the whole history of the churches, or Christendom whilst owned of God; and then the things that shall take place after the close of Christendom as God’s testimony on earth. Remember it is the Lord that thus divides the Revelation into three parts.
Verse 20. “The mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in my right hand, and the seven golden candlesticks.” John may have been meditating that Lords day on this very matter. As the stars had been set in the heavens to give light, so the gifts of the ascended Christ had been set in the church to give light. But what a mystery it must have appeared to the aged and last apostle, that a kind of Episcopal clericalism was now coming in, and excluding the very true gifts of Christ. Yea, as he says, “I wrote unto the church: but Diotrephes, who loveth to have the pre-eminence among them, receiveth us not.” Yes, even the apostle was refused by this new clerical assumption. What a mystery is clericalism in its beginning, and its whole course. First it refused, and then for ages persecuted to death the true servants of Jesus Christ.
A careful study of the Third Epistle of John will greatly help us to understand the Revelation. What a comfort to see, however great this mystery, still the stars, the gifts of Christ for His church, are in His right hand! He is revealed as holding the administration, however outwardly clericalism may prevail, and however dreadful the outward state of Christendom may become. He sees the gold: He knows them that are His, and there are no other light-bearers in this dark world than the assemblies. He says: “The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches.” From much that follows, it is evident the word “angel” does not here mean a spirit. It is also used to mean a representative or messenger, as in Matt. 18:1010Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven. (Matthew 18:10): “In heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father,” &c. And Acts 12:1515And they said unto her, Thou art mad. But she constantly affirmed that it was even so. Then said they, It is his angel. (Acts 12:15): “Then said they, It is his angel.” l John will help us much to understand who the angels are. Look at the character of the aged Gaius, and then at the rise of the clerical spirit in Diotrephes, and then can we, in the light of the New Testament, doubt which of these are the stars or angels? Which represents the mind of the Lord as to the church? Yes, for the comfort of the aged apostle, the Lord thus instructs him. The mystery of iniquity would still work, enough to overwhelm the heart of John, but the Lord would still hold the administration in His right hand.
Chapters 2, 3.
We now come to the things that are—the complete history of the present period. The seven addresses, divide the history into seven divisions or epochs. We shall find this to be the case.
Verse 1. “Unto the angel of the church of Ephesus write.” Just as John wrote to such as represented the assembly, and not directly to the assembly (3 John), so the Lord does not directly address the assembly at Ephesus, but that or those which represent it—“The angel of the church.” It will be found also that He reveals Himself to each assembly as most suited to the state of that assembly.
And as clericalism was beginning to displace and refuse the gifts by Christ (3 John), He presents Himself as having the administration. “These things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks.” What a blessed revelation of Jesus this is. He is the same as from the beginning. Let us not forget this; and that at the close of the first century He thus had; to reveal Himself. He now gives His judgment of the first state of the church. Throughout He approves of all He can.
Verse 2. “I know thy works, and thy labor, and thy patience.” There was not the same freshness as forty years before at Thessalonica. Then there was “work of faith, and labor of love, and patience of hope.” We learn from 2. Timothy, 2 Peter, and Jude, how much evil had come in. And the Lord says to the angel: “And how thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars: and hast borne, and hast patience, and for my name’s sake hast labored, and hast not fainted.” (Vers. 2, 3.) What lessons still for us. And all this, and more may be, and yet the heart be declining from the Lord. “Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.” (Ver. 4.) The love of the bride waiting for the return of the bridegroom had begun to decline, and for long centuries that first love was almost lost. We may hold the doctrine of the Lord’s return to take the church, His bride, but oh! has He the place of the first love in our hearts?
Verse 5. “Remember, therefore, from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place,—except thou repent.”
These warnings have again a special voice to us in these last days, now that the Holy Spirit has again restored the privilege of knowing the Person and love of Christ, and the hope of His coming to take us to Himself, as the church had it in the beginning. Has He the same place in our hearts, or are we fallen? Can He say, “Thou hast left thy first love?” Yet they had this mark, there was not indifference to evil: “Thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitanes, which I also hate.” (Ver. 6.) We are not told what those deeds of evil were, so that the principle might stand good, whatever the form of evil. From 1 John we may conclude it was the practicing of sin; and this every true Christian must hate.
Now, though 3 John was not addressed to the assembly at Corinth, where Gaius lived, yet all the godly would no doubt receive it with thankfulness, though sent to Gaius. So here at Ephesus, and to all in the first stages of the church’s history, it is, “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.” (Ver. 7.) Thus the Spirit reveals the words of Jesus, not only to the angels, those who distinctly represent the churches, but to every one whose ear is open to hear, not the church, but what He saith unto the churches in this revelation. May He open the ear of every Christian who reads these few lines.
Now mark, the promise in each case is to one class only. “To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God.” (Ver. 7.) We shall find different circumstances at each stage of the church’s history, but faith is the evidence of life, and overcomes, whatever the circumstances. Evil had come in, false apostles and the like, but there were overcomers. And these should not be blest merely in an earthly paradise, but “eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God,” It would have been dreadful for man to have eaten, and lived on forever in a body of sin, even in paradise. This could not be. But the overcomer shall live on forever with Him, and in the paradise where sin can never come. Thus evil coming in, and false apostles, clericalism, and evil doers, and even the true believers declining from first love, marked the first stage of the church’s history. May the Lord write its lessons on our hearts.