“Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of Him. Even so, Amen.”—Rev. 1:5-75And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, 6And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen. 7Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen. (Revelation 1:5‑7).
THE first song that we read of in the Scriptures is in Exodus 15. It was sung by the children of Israel to Jehovah when they were out of Egypt and across the Red Sea; that is, when they were redeemed and knew it.
And that song was not about what they had done, it was all about what Jehovah had done. Listen to it: “The Lord hath triumphed gloriously, the horse and his rider hath He cast into the sea.” The Lord had done it all, and they celebrate His work in joyful strains of praise.
Now, “divine worship” can never be rendered to God by any but saved people.
Look at the three things that characterize the worshippers in the first half of our Scripture at the head of this paper. First, they are loved; secondly, they are washed; and thirdly, they are made kings and priests to God, and they knew it, were enjoying it, and could worship God for it.
This is not a song which we must wait until we get to heaven to sing. It is the song of the redeemed, composed by the Spirit of God to be sung to God the moment we know that we are redeemed, and all along the road to heaven. It is song, too, that would test all professing Christians, for none are saved, whatever their profession, but the of whom it is true. Suppose it were possible to read these words (“Unto Him that loveth us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood”) in the hearing of every congregation assembled for religious purposes next Lord’s day, and to challenge all of whom they were true to stand up, how many would answer to the challenge? Alas! I fear very few; and yet unless what is expressed in the song of the worshippers in Revelation 1 is true of them, they are not saved.
“Oh!” says somebody, “I am sure I do not love Him enough, and have not done enough, for Him to entitle me to sing such a blessed song as that.”
But, dear friend, if you will examine the song, you will not find one word in it about the worshipper’s love or works; it is all about the Lord’s love, the Lord’s work, and what He has made them to His God and Father.
Formal worshippers, whose worship is characterized by form without power, by routine without reality, may sing about their love and their works. But divine worshippers love to forget their little bit of love and work, and delight in remembering and celebrating, in their hymns of praise, their living, loving Lord’s love to them and work for them.
Our love to Him, when compared with His love to us, is like a taper before the sun. Yea; our taper has been lighted, if lighted at all, from the cloudless sun, rolling in the meridian splendor of His love to us. And whilst the sun eclipses the taper light, it never puts it out.
Our love to the Lord is like a drop of water in comparison with the ocean. His love is the ocean, shoreless and bottomless; and if we love Him at all, our drop of love has come from the fathomless ocean of His love to us
“O Love Divine, thou vast abyss,
My sins are swallowed up in Thee!
Covered is my unrighteousness;
From condemnation I am free:
While Jesus’ blood, through earth and skies,
Mercy! free, boundless mercy! cries.”
Come on, dear soul, thou who art satisfied with Christ’s love to thee, but rightly dissatisfied with thy love to Him, and give His heart joy by singing in satisfied strains of His everlasting love to thee. Remember He loves first, loves most, and loves forever, if He loves you at all. He loves you with all His heart, and can never love you more than He does, and will never love you less. “Having loved His own which were in the world, He loved them unto the end.”(John 13:11Now before the feast of the passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come that he should depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end. (John 13:1).) “The Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.” (Gal. 2:2020I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:20).) “Unto Him that loveth us... be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.” A word upon the second part of our son: “And washed us from our sins in His own blood.” What part had we in the Cross except the sins that brought Jesus there? Who ever heard of a sheep washing itself? The Saviour-shepherd is the one who washes us; it is from our sins He washes us, and it is in His own blood that He does it. But He does it all. The doctrine that the forgiveness of sins cannot be known on earth is nowhere taught in the Holy Scriptures! The saints at Ephesus knew it, and could sing, “In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace.” (Eph. 1:77In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace; (Ephesians 1:7).) And in our song that we are looking at, the “us” means all the forgiven people in this world, and the Lord expects such to praise Him, this side the glory, for having washed them from their sins in His own blood, As to the third part of our song, it distinctly states that we are made kings and priests unto God; that is, we are actually brought to God now through Christ, in Christ, and as Christ is in His presence, and are made meet to offer worship to God and our Father.
Peter, speaking by the Holy Ghost, says: “ye also, as lively (or living) stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” (1 Peter 2:55Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 2:5).) (And this is true of all believers, all saved persons.) Paul, speaking by the same Holy Ghost in his exhortation to this holy priesthood, says: “By Him (that is, Christ) let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to His name.” (Heb. 13:1515By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name. (Hebrews 13:15).)
God is the object of worship; Christ is the food and material for worship; the Holy Ghost in the believer is the power of worship; the holiest of all, by virtue of the blood of Jesus, is the place of worship, and all saved persons are the holy, worshipping priesthood, and one of the songs that they sing is the song we have been meditating upon. Are you one of the worshippers? He who came once to die is coming back again soon for His loved, bloodwashed, worshipping people. Would you be translated to glory if He were to come while you are reading this? If you are not washed from your sins in His own most precious blood, you would be left, and would find your place among the circle of wailers mentioned in the 7th verse of our chapter, whose wail set up on earth will merge into the everlasting wail of the lake of fire. Oh, where will you spend your ETERNITY? Among the WORSHIPPERS OR WAILERS?