But before this time of force and terror, there comes one milder in character, but yet Satanic—'the Hour of Temptation'—which is our subject. It is temptation or trial; but if called trial, it is so in the sense of temptation or testing, not affliction. It must not, however, be under-estimated on this account: for it is a vast prophetic event; the whole world will be subject to it, and that must be a serious thing which affects the whole world. It is most interesting to us; from its being closely connected with the Lord's coming. One naturally asks, Does Scripture give any clue 'to the nature of this world-wide temptation? Obviously the temptation must be in the line of the great prophetic events which are to follow, indeed leading towards them; probably the first definite and overt movement after the rapture of the Church. Now Scripture is clear as to what the end and goal of those events is: it is the direct and definite worship of Satan. “They worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the Beast” (Rev. 13:22And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority. (Revelation 13:2)). “And power was given him over all kindreds and tongues and nations, and all that dwell upon the Earth shall worship him” (vers. 7, 8),
This was Satan's object in the temptation of the Lord Jesus, “If thou wilt do homage before me, all shall be thine” (Luke 4:6-86And the devil said unto him, All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it. 7If thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be thine. 8And Jesus answered and said unto him, Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. (Luke 4:6‑8)). He had succeeded with the first man; and now tempted the Second Man, but was foiled. He has not yet, however, given up his purpose, which for a brief moment is to be accomplished in a day that is approaching. There are two indications to guide us as to the nature of the coming temptation; one, the ultimate result as just shown; and the other, the character of the testimony given by God during that awful period, viz: “And I saw another angel fly in the, midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation and kindred and tongue and people, saying with a loud voice, Fear God and give glory to him, for the hour of his judgment is come; and WORSHIP HIM THAT MADE HEAVEN AND EARTH AND THE SEA AND THE FOUNTAINS OF WATERS” (Rev. 14:7, 87Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. 8And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. (Revelation 14:7‑8)).
May we not gather from these two data that the temptation is to apostatize from God; not merely from the revelation of Himself which He has given in Christianity, but to abandon the very notion of a Creator-God, as hitherto held—at least within the area of Christendom. Hence the gospel of that time is a loud call from heaven to the whole world to worship God in His Creator-character.
To this it may perhaps be answered: 'You have just said that Satan will be worshipped, how then can the notion of God be given up?' This may at first seem contradictory, but the two ideas are not necessarily incompatible. The whole Earth wonders after the Beast, and they worship the dragon because he gives power to the Beast, and they worship the Beast. Satan is recognized as the power behind the throne, and is worshipped as such. Further, Satan's imitation Trinity is completed by the man of sin, sitting down. in the temple of God and showing himself that he is God (2 Thess. 2:44Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. (2 Thessalonians 2:4)); but the true idea of God, the Almighty Creator, has been abandoned, and is lost, before this could be possible; and the Temptation to come, is to do this, to relinquish both Christianity and the idea of a Creator-god. This last is indeed already the case with many leaders of thought and of science to-day. Matter is regarded as eternal; there is no creation, and therefore no Creator; and worse still, no God to whom men owe a moral responsibility; God in that sense is abolished from men's minds. The Hour of Temptation is preliminary to the Great Tribulation. It is an education, a preparation of men's Minds, and when this has proceeded far enough, Satan will burst upon the scene, with his great master-piece, the Roman Beast, after which the whole earth wonders; the man of sin, the antichrist, and, completing Satan's trinity, himself the dragon behind all, each and all of which the world worships.
It has been said, and often truly, that “Coming events cast their shadows before.” An hour is coming upon the whole world to try them that dwell upon the earth. This cannot be until the Church has been caught away (Rev. 3:1010Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth. (Revelation 3:10)); but are not its shadows already upon us? Is not what is called “Evolution” a denial of creation? Man, according to that theory, is evolved from an ape; an ape from something lower, and so on until we come to atoms. A leading Review speaks of “the discoveries of modern science, which, in demolishing the legends of the creation of the world and man, have also uprooted in the educated mind the faith in the Divine inspiration of the books and traditions which taught these legends, and which were the basis of all the accepted religious beliefs.” So like is this to what is coming, that one might almost inquire whether we are not now entered upon that time; we might indeed suppose that we were, but that Rev. 3:1010Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth. (Revelation 3:10) tells us that the Church is to be kept out of that hour. If, however, we are in the shadow of that “Hour of temptation;” the thing itself cannot be far off. But there is something which is to precede even that; to intervene between the shadow which we are now in, and the substance which seems to be so near: IT IS THE COMING OF THE LORD; the sudden descent of the Lord into the air, and our blissful rising to meet Him, passing into heaven without death, “changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye” (1 Cor. 15:51, 5251Behold, I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. (1 Corinthians 15:51‑52)). Reader, it may be your privilege and mine to be a partaker in that scene, to pass into glory without dying. However this may be, the Lord follows verse 10 with the striking words, “I come quickly; hold fast what thou hast that no one take thy crown” (Rev. 3:22Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die: for I have not found thy works perfect before God. (Revelation 3:2))
The titles which the Lord takes in addressing. Philadelphia must be noticed. “These things saith the holy, the true; he that has the key of David, he who opens and no one shall shut, and shuts and no one shall open” (chap. 3:7). On this nothing better, nothing so good, can be offered to the reader as the following by Mr. Darby: “Christ is known as the Holy One. Then outward ecclesiastical associations or pretensions will not do. There must be what suits His nature, and faithful consistency with that word which He will certainly make good. With this He has the administration; and opens and no man shuts, and shuts and no man opens. See what His path was on earth; only then graciously dependent, as we should be. He was holy and true, to man's view had a little strength, kept the word, lived by every word that proceeded out of God's lips, waited patiently for the Lord, and to Him the porter opened. He lived in the last days of a dispensation, the holy and true One, rejected, and, to human eye, failing in success with those who said they were Jews, but were the synagogue of Satan. So the saints here; they walk in a place like His; they keep His word, have a little strength, are not marked by a Pauline energy of the Spirit, but do not deny His name. This is the character and motive of all their conduct. It is openly confessed, the word kept, the Name not denied. It seems little; but in universal decline, much pretension and ecclesiastical claim, and many falling away to man's reasonings, keeping the word of Him that is holy and true, and not denying His name is everything."
And what is to be the end of the path of the Philadelphian? He has been nobody here; he will be a pillar up there. “I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God.” Of course this is figurative; but a pillar of a temple gives the idea of permanence, strength and perfect beauty. He was not such on earth; among Thyatira, Sardis, Laodicea—scarcely recognized. Their architecture, their numbers, their affluence attest their position, and might offer a career of wealth and distinction. Of these things he had none, nor desired them; to keep Christ's word was his sole ambition and his holy aim; now he has an eminent position in the glory, one of honor and permanence, “He shall go no more out at all.”
The special character of this epistle is shown even in the Promises to the Overcomer. There is a tenderness in the expressions; almost a familiarity in the repetitions of the word “my “; the temple in which the overcomer is to be a pillar is not merely the temple of God, but “of my God.” The Lord here takes His place with us as man; “He that overcometh, him will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and be shall go out no more at all; and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from my God and my new name” (chap. 3:12). It is like a prospective bridegroom impressing on the loved one that she is to share everything that is his.
“Yet it must be; thy love had not its rest
Were Thy redeemed not with Thee fully blest;
The love that gives not as the world but shares
All it possesses with its loved co-heirs.”
A survey of the epistle would not be complete without some notice of the name. “Philadelphia” is a Greek word, meaning brotherly love—the words “brotherly kindness” or “brotherly love” in Scripture are represented in the original by the one word “philadelphia.” It can scarcely be without special significance that the name occurs in the title of this epistle. To force a typical meaning from every name in Scripture would be a serious mistake—but Scripture itself recognizes the spiritual significance of some names, and here it would seem to indicate that there was, along with the general keeping of Christ's word, a recognition of the brotherhood of true believers. In Apostolic times, “brethren” was the name by which Christians were generally known amongst themselves, thus—
“put the brethren in remembrance of these things”....... I Tim. 4:6.
This brotherhood is not like the conventional agreement of a human society to regard and call one another brethren, as is the case with—say—Freemasons. All true believers are brethren as being born of the Spirit (and “except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God"). Being born of God, they have become partakers of a new nature, and the brotherhood of such is a reality, not mere, name. “The brethren” now, alas, instead of being together, are to be found in every sect of Christendom. Everyone united to Christ is a brother in Christ, however little he may acknowledge, it. With all true believers there is some recognition of this, however faint, for everyone “that loveth Him that begat, loveth him also that is begotten of Him” (1 John 5:11Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God: and every one that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him. (1 John 5:1)). Indeed this love in the heart is an evidence of the new birth in the soul, for “we know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren” (1 John 3:1414We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. (1 John 3:14)). This is evidence to ourselves; but it is also a testimony to the world: “By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one to another” (John 13:3535By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. (John 13:35)). However, in the closing period of the dispensation, amid all the confusion of Christendom, here is brotherly love! Precious to the heart of Christ, beautiful in the eye of heaven Let us cherish it wherever we find it, and cultivate it all we can.
“Blessed are their eyes that see Him,
Him the holy and the true;
Gathered round Him, He amongst them,
His despised rejected few;
He who hath the key of David,
God of resurrection power;
He hath opened heaven before them,
Shut them in for evermore.
“Feeblest works, yet dear to Jesus,
Weary hearts that wait for Him,
Eyes that look upon the glory,
Till all else is dark and dim;
Midst the wreck, the desolation,
Where the glorious city stood,
Called to raise the lonely altar,
One last witness for their God.
“He the golden door has opened
Of His temple's holiest place,
Midst these latter days of darkness
Called them in to see His face;
None can shut where He has opened,
None that ‘little strength' withstand,
Which He gave amidst their weakness,
By the touch of His right hand.
“Precious to the heart of Jesus,
Love that keeps the word He spake,
Knowing somewhat of the sweetness
Of rejection for His sake;
Yet so little of the glory,
Of His scorn, and cross, and shame,
That His love can witness only
Thou hast not denied my name.'
“He their Lord is coming quickly—
Brethren, yet awhile hold fast;
In His God's eternal temple
They as pillars stand at last.
Here to be cast out, rejected—
Here to bear the brand of shame;
There go out no more forever,
Bear in light His God's own name.
“He will write that name upon them,
His God evermore their own,
And the name of His bright city,
Of the bride who shares His throne;
And His own new name of triumph
Then shall shine upon their brow—
Shall they not rejoice in bearing
His reproach, rejection now?”
(Extract)
(Concluded from page 175)
E. J.T.