They are found to fit into the need of the Church scattered throughout the world in every generation since then. Always there have been little groups that were faithful and true, always some suffering because of their faithfulness and remaining faithful in spite of suffering. And always those who have been formal, who have companioned with evil, who have been swamped by the evil with which they companioned, and those practically asleep or dead.
This Patmos message will be found to fit the Church of to-day with remarkable accuracy and faithfulness. And the whole probability is in favor of finding that it will fit peculiarly the future Church, the Church at the end of this present period.
This whole book of the Revelation is peculiarly a Church book. While it is full of instruction and plea for our individual lives, yet it is distinctively _the_ Church book. It stands out among the books of the New Testament as the one book addressed to the Church and to the whole Church.
It gives the great bulk of its s.p.a.ce to an awful time of persecution that is coming to the Church at some future time. This is spoken of elsewhere, notably by Jesus in His talk with the disciples on Mount Olivet, but it is the chief subject treated here. And it is treated with great detail. The name commonly applied to this coming persecution is the great tribulation.
It is significant that the book that clearly is distinctively a Church book is taken up chiefly with a description of that future persecution.
It leads to the deep conviction that this book of the Revelation so fitted to the need of the Church when spoken, and in every generation since, will be found to be peculiarly fitted to that generation of the Church that is to pa.s.s through this great coming persecution; that is, to the Tribulation Church.
It will probably be the mainstay and comfort of those who will insist on being true during those awful days, regardless of the suffering involved. No book has been more slighted and ignored. It has been called by some within the Church of our own generation "the joke of the Bible."
It will likely come to be the book most studied and loved for its light and help in the terribly troublous times ahead. There will be an eager, hungry searching for every sc.r.a.p of information, and for any fresh ray of light on its meaning.
The Seven-fold Message.
Now this seven-fold message lets us see things through Christ"s eyes. He is letting them and us see what He sees. The Scottish poet"s thoughtful lines might well be changed to get the yet better look: "Oh! wad some power the giftie gie us, to see oursel"s as" _G.o.d_ sees us. It would do more than free us from blunders and notions. And we are needing more.
Each one of these seven messages begins by our Lord drawing their eyes to Himself. This is the thing needed most. And this will give meaning and force to the message. They are to be looking at Him as they listen.
Then He speaks of all the good things He sees. Then of the faulty, weak, bad things, in a few simple but unmistakably plain words. No one could doubt what He meant.
Then is the pleading call to repent, with the faithful warning of what will surely happen if they don"t. Then the earnest plea that His words be listened to and taken to heart, and the wondrously gracious promise held out to those who steadily set themselves against the evil, and who get the victory.
Let us look for a moment at each of these Churches as seen by those searching eyes of flame.
_Ephesus_ is the centre of the group, the natural leader, the largest and most influential, perhaps the mother Church of the group, where Paul and John had put in so much time and strength, and whence they reached out to these others.
Christ reminds them of His presence in their midst and His control of the angel messengers that minister to them. Then he speaks of their good deeds, their tireless activity, steadfast endurance, intense zeal for the true faith, with special emphasis upon their unwearying steadfastness even under sore difficulties, and their hatred of those who made compromise with evil so hateful to Himself.
But there is something lacking, the tender personal love for Himself.
There"s intense loyalty to Church and to the faith, but a lack of personal love for Himself. And the startling thing is that this is said to quite outweight all these good things. They may have these things without the love, but they cannot have the love without having these things, and at a finer temperature.
And this defect is crucial. If persisted in it is fatal. It will actually mean their _rejection as His messenger_. This is the critical thing which we seem to have such a hard time getting hold of. The essential qualification for true service is the personal attachment to our Lord Jesus Himself, that warm heart love which the human heart longs for and gives to some one. He longs for this. This is _the_ essential; not Church organization nor creed, not zeal for orthodoxy, but warm love for a person. Service, witnessing, all the rest, are valuable to Him in reaching His world only as they grow out of a tender love for Himself.
And the startling thing is that this privilege and opportunity of service is to be taken away _not_ because displeasing to Him, but because it fails of the end in view. The candlestick is only removed because it is no longer serviceable; it is not giving out the light.
This earnest, aggressive, orthodox, patiently-enduring Church is to be rejected as a light-holder, because it is not holding out the light.
This is tremendous!
The group in _Smyrna_ is tenderly reminded of the suffering of their Lord, for they are filling up what is left behind of His suffering. This tells at once the depth of their personal love for Him, nothing could tell it more.
They are poor in money and so despised, but rich in faith and so precious to Him. They are suffering at the hands of the Jews, who were the outspoken, intense, fanatical enemy of the Christians. There is no reproach, only earnest encouragement to keep steady even through fiercer fires yet to come.
The description of Himself to the _Pergamum_ group is startling. He is the one with a sharp two-edged sword. There is something here He must fight against. They are frankly told that they have had a hard place to witness in, and earnestly commended for being true even in the midst of persecution.
But there"s something wrong, and it is very serious. It is as wrong and bad as it can be. There is actually compromise with evil, partnership with the world in its wickedness. The thing is put in the intensest way possible by characterizing it as adultery. No stronger language could be used to tell how He sees the evil they are guilty of. And they are plainly told that He will fight against them. They have made themselves His enemy by joining His enemies.
The _Thyatira_ group is reminded of the purity of their Lord, who cannot stand impurity but searches it relentlessly out, and pursues it to the death. There"s a faithful minority here. Their activity and love and faith and patience and increasing activity in service are all counted carefully over and warmly commended.
But the evil here is much worse. It is put into the gravest language.
"Thou sufferest the woman _Jezebel_." This is most significant. There is no worse character named in the whole Old Testament. She not only represented the worst adulterous uncleanness in herself, but she was the national leader energetically fostering unclean idolatrous practices among the people. Jezebel pulled G.o.d"s light-holder nation down to the lowest moral level it ever reached. She brazenly dominated king and people, and remained stubbornly obstinate to the terrible end.
Christ brings _her_ name in here. Again this is tremendous. No more terrific parallel could have been made. Here evil characterized as adulterous has actually come to a place of leadership in the Church.
With great longsuffering time has been given that all this might be changed, but with Jezebel-like obstinacy it was determined that there would be no change. And the inevitable result that will surely follow continued obstinacy will be a great tribulation or deadly persecution.
The _Sardis_ group is told that Christ is the centre of all life and help, in the control of the Holy Spirit and of the angel messengers.
There is nothing to commend here. There are some who insist on living true lives, but they are a scanty scattered few, not enough to count.
There are some ragged remnants of good, but even these are sickly and nearly dead. The Church is well organized, energetic, standing high among men, but with an utter absence of spiritual life. The personal lives of most are like dirty garments. And the warning is this: He will come as a thief, that is unexpectedly, disagreeably, to take away what they prize most and leave them stripped and naked.
The longest message is to the group in _Philadelphia_. Christ reminds them that He is holy in character, faithful to His promises, having full control, and giving opportunity of service as the highest reward of faithfulness. This candlestick is giving out light, for it is given yet further opportunity of shining.
The chief characteristic of this group is its steady plodding faithfulness. They are not spoken of as brilliant or talented, but faithful in the midst of opposition. He loves them with the sort of deep love drawn out by love freely given. And a special promise is given, a significant promise. A great persecution is coming, an awful testing time to all the earth. But He will keep them _through_ this unhurt because they have been keeping His word so faithfully.
The common reading here is, "I will keep thee _from_ the hour of trial."
It is quite as accurate to read "through" in place of "from." And there is good reason for taking this as the sense here. The word underneath here is translated by several different words in other pa.s.sages.
Where a word in one language may be translated by any one of several words the general sense of the pa.s.sage must decide which one correctly expresses the meaning. Here the meaning must be gotten from the whole trend of New Testament teaching. Like the Israelites during the plagues that came to Egypt these faithful ones will be kept untouched through this terrible time that is to come.
The _Laodicea_ group is to be talked to plainly by one who is a true, faithful witness in dealing with His people"s faults, and who has all the authority of G.o.d in doing so. This is the second group that actually has not one good thing to be commended. There is no false teaching, no compromise with evil; they are simply _asleep_. Rich, influential, self-satisfied, grown fat and sleek,--so they seem to their neighbours and themselves. Wretched, poor, blind, naked,--so they are. And the chastening threatened will be of the severe radical sort that strong love insists upon.
A Heart-breaking Sight.
Here then is the picture of the whole Church as seen by the eyes of searching flame. There is a mixture of bad and good, active bad, active good, and sleepy indifference. There is a Church within the Church. But the bad is bad enough and big enough to endanger seriously the usefulness of the whole as a light-bearer.
The gla.s.s of the lantern is so smoked and cobwebby that it is more useless than useful to the light inside, and the crowd outside in the dark. The uselessness threatens what usefulness is left. Smokiness is contagious. Cobwebs grow thicker and hold more dust.
Two Churches are true and pure in the midst of sore opposition. Two are corrupt in the very worst way. Three, including the leader, are orthodox in form, but indifferent to Jesus Himself, or asleep, or dead; three degrees of the same thing,--indifference, sleep, death.
In all of these five there are those who, like Ezekiel"s companions, "sigh and cry over the abominations that are going on," but they are helpless to stay the sweep of the tide. They are the salt that is saving the lump so far. Even Sodom would have been saved by ten righteous.
It is plainly said to the leader Church that it is no longer of use as a candlestick, except a change come. It fails to give out the light. It is being carried along, patiently borne with _for its own sake_. It is failing at this point in the mission. The smoking flax sending out its irritating smoke in place of clear light is not yet quenched. The Holy Spirit life within is being sorely grieved, but is not yet put entirely out.
And this is only one. Four others are plainly in much worse fix.
Five-sevenths are failing. That bit of preservative salt would seem to be working to its full capacity.
This is the picture given us here by our Lord Himself. John would never have dared make such a terrific arraignment of his own accord. It is a picture of the whole Church at the beginning of the First century.
How is it at the beginning of the Twentieth? A thousand million people, two-thirds of the race, pretty freely supplied with the light of western oil and of gunpowder, with the help of the western sewing machine, and with the guidance of western learning and skill, but to whom with minor exceptions no scant ray of this light has yet gotten, these make answer.
That smokiness would seem to be rather dense.
The non-Christian crowds in so-called Christian lands, the overwhelming majority, to whom the name of Jesus has no more practical meaning than other foreign names, Shanghai, or Tokyo, or Calcutta,--these make answer. The light doesn"t seem to have been able to get through and out much, even near the candlestick.
The Church itself, when it has sometimes forgotten its statistical tables long enough to look thoughtfully into this old Patmos looking-gla.s.s, has now and then made answer, in a few of its thoughtful leaders, while the rank and file push on absorbed in their Ephesian or Sardisian or Thyatiran way.
There"s a striking companion bit to this in Ezekiel"s vision.[66] That messenger to the exiled colony by the Chebar had first of all the vision of G.o.d that completely overwhelmed him. Then he is taken in spirit to Jerusalem, and shown things as they were, through G.o.d"s eyes. The heathen idols were set up in the very temple of G.o.d, so actually stimulating among the people the horribly gross, unnamable impurities connected with their worship. This was done in the open, with no pretence at concealment.
Then in the vision he digs "into the wall" to see the hidden things that are being done. There he sees every sort of creeping, crawling, slimy, repulsive animal pictured on the walls of this secret chamber, and the leaders of the people burning incense and worshipping.