john 8 32) Revelation 3:20 (King James Version) 3:1 And unto the angel of the church in Sardis write; These things saith he that hath the seven Spirits of God, and the seven stars; I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me." The Risen Christ advises Laodicea to buy gold refined in the fire. That though this church seemed to be wholly overrun and overcome with lukewarmness and self-confidence, yet it was possible that by the reproofs and counsels of Christ they might be inspired with fresh zeal and vigour, and might come off conquerors in their spiritual warfare. The Irvingites used to talk about the Lord having a little Zoar. There are so many more to be reached. We can rely on his words for he is the Amen. We must leave out the word "Amen" it is spurious, and only mars the sense. Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me. Trench makes a list of people in the Bible who lost their place to someone else because they had shown that they were not fit to hold it. Holy separateness and savour were gone. The error then is not in seeking the best supported text, but in allowing tradition to tie us to comparatively modern and certainly to corrupted readings. We have set these letters carefully against the local situations to which they were addressed; but their message is not local and temporary. Jesus doesn't care. If one accepts these seven letters as descriptive of the flow of church history, it does not require that we see them as exclusive, rigidly sequential ages. The percentages are down around fifty to sixty percent that don't believe in these things. As well, we must remember that every age has had some characteristics of all seven churches. This prepares us for the true meaning of the remarkable chancre in the Apocalypse as compared with the rest of the New Testament. And as this is the heart's outpouring of its own delight in Jesus, so the next verse gives a warning testimony suitable to the book, lest there should be any weakening of what Jesus will be to those who stand in no such nearness to Him. It was picked up by the Protestants. We fully respect if you want to refuse cookies but to avoid asking you again and again kindly allow us to store a cookie for that. (a) Christ is looking for something from us. This promise is a reversal of all that the Jews had expected; they had expected that all nations would kneel before them; but the day was to come when they with all nations would kneel before Christ. Amen is the word which is often put at the end of a solemn statement in order to guarantee its truth. The idea of Jesus' knocking on the door of our hearts is typically based on Revelation 3:20: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If a man will open the door, Jesus Christ will come in and linger long with him. In the ancient world to be stripped naked was the worst humiliation. In vain does Satan seek to cast down those who resting on Christ's love have Him as the loved object of their life and soul. Nothing can be simpler. They enjoy a place with the enthroned Jesus (as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne). If religion has not been genuine with us till now, or if we have been adding to it great lumps of shining stuff which we thought was gold and was not, let us now go to the heavenly mint and buy gold tried in the fire, that we may be really rich. There is an evident allusion to the manner in which the Lord presented Himself to the church in Ephesus. And they were naked, without house or harbour, for they were without God, and he has been the dwelling-place of his people in all ages; in him alone the soul of man can find rest, and safety, and all suitable accommodations. (vi) Nor must the Christian forget that, even as he must watch for Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ is watching him. He who has an ear, let him hear: Few want to identify themselves with the church of Laodicea. Oh, brethren, when the Lord is in a church, it is a happy church, a holy church, a mighty church, and a triumphant church; but we may grieve him till he will say, "I will go and return to my place, until they acknowledge their offence and seek my face." He was still willing to be gracious, though their conduct had been such as to be loathsome, Revelation 3:16. And having turned, I saw seven golden lampstands." Revelation 20:1-3. Even so, come, Lord Jesus (Revelation 22:20)." The Risen Christ speaks of "the shame of the nakedness of Laodicea.". As the King James Version has it, "I will come in and sup with him." He judges a church not merely by her external activities, but by her internal pieties; he searches the heart, and tries the reins of the children of men. Nothing can more demonstrate. It was founded with the deliberate intention that it might be a missionary of Greek culture and language to Lydia and Phrygia; and so well did it do its work that by A.D. 19 the Lydians had forgotten their own language and were all but Greeks. God gives a revelation of Jesus; and Jesus passes it on to His angel, or rather by His angel to His servant John; and then John at last sends it to other servants. "Repent; or else I am coming to thee quickly, and will war against them with the sword of my mouth." It is the indifferent Christian that the Lord urged to open his hearts door and to invite Jesus Christ in for intimate fellowship. To see the real force of this language, we must remember how disgusting and offensive their conduct had been to him. As long as we believe we can meet the need for wealth, clothing, or sight ourselves, we can never receive them from Jesus. ., p. 52; and McGee, 5:900-26. There were works, and labour, and endurance. It has been said that "eternal vigilance is the price of liberty" and eternal watchfulness is the price of salvation. It is here implied, (1.) Thus the Lord was no longer fighting in defence of His own people, nor was He employing the enemy's hatred and persecution to nip in the bud or prune evil excrescences. (ii) Sin is the death of the feelings. (ii) Laodicea prided itself on its clothing trade. How can it surprise those who are ever awaiting Him? This is not association with Christ in His public reign, but in that which is proper to Him above the world altogether. It is a setting aside of man altogether; and the reason is that Laodicea is the glorification of man and of man's resources in the church. People may not be true to their principles, and often are not. This seems taken up here, and applied in a far larger way for purposes suitable to the Apocalyptic prophecy. my beloved is knocking. So thoroughly does the Lord adhere to topics of the largest and most common import in the letter to the angel of the assembly in Ephesus. The first epistle, the message to the angel of the church in Ephesus, looks at the state of the Christian testimony on the earth in its most comprehensive form, and, as I suppose, from the days of the apostle John himself. Matthew 26:29; Mark 14:25; Luke 22:30). Tell them that this or that is to be found in the Bible, and they look amazed. We have taken them with the words which precede them. It was founded for a special purpose. New American Standard Version All must be and was measured according to God's own mind, and the place in which He set the assemblies. "I am the Lord, your Holy One, the creator of Israel, your King" ( Isaiah 43:15). the state of those that bore His own name was such that He was obliged to deal thus sternly with them. Ephesians 2:8-9; Romans 11:6)." Philadelphia had a great characteristic which has left its mark upon this letter. (a) It denotes the Holy Spirit with his sevenfold gifts, an idea founded on the description of the Spirit in Isaiah 11:2. I do not mean of course for Christians, who needed no such bulwark as this, but for Christendom. This would mean that Jesus Christ is the One whose promises are true beyond all doubt. He therefore "sent and signified this by his angel unto his servant John." In A.D. 17 it was destroyed by an earthquake which devasted the area. The Christian must live well and live in love because the judge is standing at the doors ( James 5:9). Does it not then stand in the place of Jezebel? Did He thus walk? The inscription, to whom, and from whom. This style of things is all too common, yet we are expected to hold our tongue, for the people are very respectable. Laodicea, The Christ Who Knocks ( Revelation 3:14-22 Continued). Flaccus, the governor of the province, became alarmed at the amount of currency which the Jews were exporting in payment of the Temple tax which every male Jew paid and put an embargo on the export of currency. And Christ waits--not for a committee or church business meeting resolution to decide whether to admit Him. - NIVZSB, Rather than allowing for the common interpretation of Christs knocking on a persons heart, the context demands that Christ was seeking to enter this church that bore His name but lacked a single true believer. Smyrna: Sweet and precious martyrdom, but a progression of clergy and laity distinctions and Judaizing tendencies, with an increasing departure from the simplicity of the gospel. John sees the Son of man with the qualities of the Ancient of days. We speak then of what Christ has put us in, not about nature and its wishes and feelings. If you refuse cookies we will remove all set cookies in our domain. And I don't feel that I have this great obligation to share the Gospel to the Jews. Thus the Lord speaks with exceeding tenderness of those that were true to His name. Because of their reliance on material things, they could not exercise genuine faith in God. Paul warns the Thessalonians of the terrible fate which awaits the disobedient and the unbelieving when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven and shall take swift and final vengeance on his enemies ( 2 Thessalonians 1:7-9). But no man knows when eternity will invade his life and God will bid him rise and come; and that must warn the careless to prepare to meet his God and cheer the oppressed with the thought of the coming glory of the faithful soul. There is an immense change in turning to the last three churches. It is the second meaning which is intended here. And the successive thought in the overcomers promises in the Book of Revelation is that of Christians ultimately ascending the throne-co-heirs, companions, exercising power with Christ. . "He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death." Here we have to remark that Christ is seen in a judicial point of view. They were naked, without clothing and without house and harbour for their souls. Thyatiran: 538 to 1520, the corrupt, political church of the Middle Ages. Thus he introduces himself here, not as a joint partaker of God's promise in Christ by the gospel, but in His kingdom and patience in Christ. There is alethes ( G227) , which means "true" in the sense that a true statement is different from a false statement. The unique new fact that Christianity brought into this world is that God is the seeker of men. Or chapters 2 and 3 are prophetic of the church age. Let us first take the word rebuke. The ancient Greek word zealous comes from the same word as hot in Revelation 3:16. "These seven messages cannot be read apart from the rest of the Apocalypse, nor does the rest of the book mean anything without these seven. The warnings and the overcomers promises both have the same end in view. Their nakedness both of guilt and pollution had no covering. I have known this text preached upon to sinners numbers of times as though Christ knocked at their door and they had to open it, and so on. (ii) It was a great centre of clothing manufacture. "So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate." We have a little strength. "To the angel of the church in Ephesus write; These things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right land, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden lampstands." Omit the opening clause and begin, "saying, What thou seest, write in a roll, and send it to the seven churches which are in Asia." This was that in the new age, all nations would do humble homage to the Jews. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief." As long as true apostles were on earth, Satan was never able to have Judaism recognized in the church of God. It is possible that when Jesus Christ is called the Amen it is a reminiscence of his own way of speaking. The remnant is here plain. I have the key of David. I stand at the door and knock. It is much better to take this saying of Christ as expressing the appeal of the lover of the souls of men. [3.] The correspondence is arbitrary and contrived as is clear from the differences in the limits of each period as expounded by various advocates of this view. And in this picture we see certain great truths of the Christian religion. That, as the reward of his conflict and victory, he has sat down with God the Father on his throne, possessed of that glory which he had with the Father from eternity, but which he was pleased very much to conceal on earth, leaving it as it were in the hands of the Father, as a pledge that he would fulfil the work of a Saviour before he reassumed that manifestative glory; and, having done so, then pignus reposcere--he demands the pledge, to appear in his divine glory equal to the Father. If one accepts these seven letters as descriptive of the flow of church . 1. I do not mean conflicts about the church, but about his soul, It is needless here to cite passages from his extant writings, which prove how sorely he was tried by inward conflicts of unbelief, which amply prove how far he was from the calm enjoyment of the peace of the gospel; but it is an error to impute them in themselves to any other cause than a lack of clear knowledge of grace. Thus it is not without example elsewhere; but it is not what we hear when we have fairly entered on the course of the visions. In the Christian life there must be unceasing vigilance against it. 321-23.] Philadelphos ( G5361) is the Greek for one who loves his brother. ", G. The letter to the church in Laodicea 3:14-22. Shebna lost his place to Eliakim ( Isaiah 22:15-25). There was considerable devotedness in the middle ages, spite of the darkness and ignorance that prevailed in point of doctrine.
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