Revelation
Philadelphia . . .
.Continued
And who can measure the loss even now? and who then can
measure the eternal loss, when we thus let slip communion with Himself? And how
many are trying to win it back, or make up for its absence by filling their
hands with work for Him, as if they were almost persuaded that "to obey" is not
"better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams." How plainly
perceptible it is when a soul reaches the barrier line beyond which he will not
go! Activities may go on, and the whole outward man be no other than it was,
yet there is something gone from the soul which at once one with God will
discern as hindering fellowship. How sorrowful to lose one another’s
company this way, while yet perhaps the feet go on together! But if we lose
Christ’s companionship, what shall replace it?
Naturally and
necessarily connected, then, with "Thou hast kept My word," is this: "and hast
not denied My name." Christ’s name expresses what He is. "They shall call
His name ‘Emmanuel,’ which being interpreted is, ‘God with us."
And to fulfill this, He is named "Jesus" - "Jehovah saving;" for save He must,
that God may dwell among us. Thus, again, He is "Christ," the Anointed One, to
fill the Mediator’s place, - with God for us, with us for God. Who that
knows it would deny this blessed name?
What does it express, what does
it emphasize for us but communion with God? He hath come out after us, left His
place and glory, to let the light of that glory in upon our hearts. It is in
Him, this glory, in -
"The person of the Christ,
Enfolding every
grace."
Justified we must be, to be able to draw nigh; and without
sanctification "no man shall see the Lord;" but the Lord Himself is thus the
end and sum of all. "Christ is all," says one whose life spake with his lips;
and "I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ
Jesus my Lord; for whom 1 have suffered the loss of all things, and do count
them but dung, that I may win Christ, and be found in Him."
It is, as
often said, what gives the peculiar glow to the picture of Philadelphia here,
that it is Christ personally who fills the scene of their vision, and who
associates them with Himself. This is what gives them their name, surely, in
its spiritual power and value; for never was Christ welcomed into a heart but
He made room in it for all His people. This is true linking with one another
when we are united by the Centre, - when our association is first of all with
Christ, and this determines the measure and character of all other
associations. For indeed there is much, even among the people of God, that is
not Philadelphian, but only a corrupt and evil counterfeit. If our "part" is
first of all to be with Christ, let us hear Him say, "Except I wash thee, thou
hast no part with Me." And this is not spoken of the first general "washing"
when we are born anew, which the Lord expressly distinguishes from this washing
of the feet, the cleansing from all defilement by the way. If He washes, there
can be no compromise with defilement; our feet must be in His hand; there must
be surrender to Him at all points, so that He may be able to show us all that
is evil in His sight. Thus alone can we have part with Him; and therefore in
this way only can we have rightly part with one another.
To this such
union as can be obtained by compromise is in essential contradiction. It is
mere confederacy, whatever may be the end proposed. God has one method for us
by which we may walk together according to His mind, and only one. We are to
"follow righteousness, faith, love, peace, with those who call on the Lord out
of a pure heart." By taking the same road, we are necessarily brought together.
The road is guaranteed to us by its four decisive marks; and here there can be
no compromise, we must not give up any one of these. Moreover, it is thus by a
path in the strictest sense individual that we find our company; yet it is wide
enough to contain "all that call upon the Lord out of a pure heart." Its
characters are, first of all, "righteousness," and this must be maintained
before we can properly speak of "faith" at all. But then "faith" marks the
conscience in the presence of a living Lord, as well as a heart confiding in
Him; and so it is only that we can have this restful, practical confidence, as
we walk in conscious recognition of and obedience to His will. Here "love" then
comes in due place, - we can now let our hearts out; and in this atmosphere
love will develop itself. While lastly, "peace" characterizes it in view of
opposition and conflict and trouble: the Lord is over all the uprising of the
waterfloods. In all this, it may be said, there is nothing but the most
complete individualism; yet here it is we find the divine law of association.
There is no confederation, no agreement, no prescription of terms to one
another. One Master prescribes to every one his place, and in accepting that
place we find the true law of co-operation with one another. United to Him as
members of His body, we are, to begin with, "members one of another." This is
not a question submitted to us, whether we shall be one; and to form other
unions, while it may be ignorance, is none the less complete opposition to His
will. Alas! in our day it is not "union is obedience" that is the motto, but
"union is strength ;" and for whatever purpose men may have, they combine.
Strength of a certain sort is found, no doubt; but it is not where he found it
who says, "When I am weak, then am I strong;" "I can do all things through
Christ, who strengtheneth me."
Individuality is thus lost, a majority
decides for the remainder; for the advantage gained, certain things which we do
not approve must be acquiesced in. Conscience, at first uneasy, becomes more
tolerant. More demands made upon it find less and less the power of resistance.
Christ’s word is given up, and what is due to His name forgotten. How many
have thus lost in their souls the sensitiveness to sin they once had; yet the
apostle insists, "Let him that nameth the name of the Lord depart from
iniquity." Blessed, thrice blessed are they who, if they have but a little
strength, yet have kept His word, and do not deny His name.
The next
verse seems somewhat strangely to connect Philadelphia with Smyrna: "Behold, I
will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews and are not,
but do lie; behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and
to know that I have loved thee." Here again comes before us that class through
which Satan had wrought the downfall of the already declining Church. Judaism,
set aside by God, is now one of Satan’s best weapons and most subtle
snares. Great Babylon has built her superstructure upon this foundation, and
displaced with the ritualism, the sacerdotalism, and the legalism of an earlier
time, the simplicity and open speech, the equal priesthood and completed
sacrifice, the free grace and full salvation, of Christianity. It is not after
all so strange, therefore, that if in Philadelphia we find the heart fresh
awakened after Christ, His Word preached with fresh energy and held with more
appreciation, on the other hand Satan’s old attempt should be renewed. And
this the words here seem to indicate. They assure us also, no doubt, that for
the true Philadelphian it will end only in defeat, and the acknowledgment of
their enemies that they are objects of Christ’s special love, yet this
does not assume that the onset will have no success. God permits these things
for the trial of His own, and there was only One who could say, "The prince of
this world cometh, and bath nothing in Me."
In fact, if we look at the
history of the movement which has been for years going on, we shall find that
along with revived study of the Word, and energetic evangelizing, and the
drawing of Christians to one another, there has been an undoubted revival of
ritualism also, and that not in Rome where it never had slept, but in
Protestantism. The Puseyite or Tractarian movement, as it used to be called,
had all the freshness and energy of a revival, and its success was marked. At
the present time, it is less noted only because its influence is become a thing
of course; and Protestant Episcopalianism is largely leavened with it.
This may be thought outside Philadelphia, according to our definition of it,
but it is one of the things it is called to meet. Nearer home, however, in less
developed forms, the same spirit is manifesting itself. The fruits of many a
revival and separation from the church-establishments of Protestantism have
been blighted by a spirit of conformity to that which had been left. The
chapels have become churches, the ministry a priesthood, the congregations
multitudinous and indiscriminate under this influence; and the desire for
Christian union has been perverted into a desire for denominational union, a
more or less ignoring of differences which were once matters of conscience for
the soul, but have become rather matters of dispute left to the champions of
conflicting creeds.
Even for those most widely removed (as it might
seem) from all this, the same influences are at work, and should be no less
dreaded. Ecclesiasticism, clerisy, the substitution of corporate for individual
conscience, - these are all elements of a returnmovement, the ebb of the
tide which once seemed as if it could not so soon fail. But they are elements
also of that Judaism with which man’s mind, if it slip away from God, so
readily assimilates. In fact it is all that is natural to man, and of himself
he never gets beyond it.
Let us take heed, then, that we be true
Philadelphians. Tested we shall be assuredly all round, and in different forms
if the spirit be not different. The Word here is the assurance, is it not? for
the faith that might quail and question as the results of the trial become
apparent. Not now, but by and by, things shall be manifested, and where
Christ’s heart is shall come out openly.
Meanwhile there is
another promise: "Because thou hast kept the word of My patience, I also will
keep thee out of the hour of temptation which shall come upon all the world, to
try them that dwell upon the earth."
Here is still the keeping of
Christ’s word: all blessing lies in the track of obedience; but it is now
a peculiar character of that Word, and as manifesting a character of Christ
Himself, - His patience, or endurance. It was of course a character of His on
earth; it is also a character that He is manifesting where He sits now, upon
the throne of heaven. He has but to ask, and the rod of iron shall be His to
dash to pieces all opposition, like a potter’s vessel. Yet He waits; not
unobservant of the trials of His saints, not surely as unsympathetic with them.
But He waits, that God’s purpose may be fully wrought and the discipline
of His people fully accomplished. It seems to me another mark of Philadelphia
herself being tested by that of which the previous verse has spoken. They have
needed patience: they have learnt it in the apprehension of that patience of
His who Himself exercises it, with power in His hands which could change the
face of things as in a moment. They have kept that word of His patience, -
feeling the trial, but learn. ing the consolation. Then, when the hour of trial
for the dwellers upon earth shall come, they shall be out of it! Suited all
this is, surely. And that word even, "dwellers upon earth," suits exactly the
Judaized synagogue of Satan of which the Lord has spoken. For the expression
has a moral force, like that where Pergamos is described as "dwelling where
Satan’s throne is." The hour is the hour of terrible tribulation, which,
involving Israel first (Matt. xxiv. 21), will extend also to the Gentiles (Rev.
vii. 14, R. V.), and reap with its scythe of destruction the tarefield of
Christendom; God’s wheat having been removed from it.
Into this
time of judgment no saint, indeed, of the present time can come. And this has
been with some an objection to such an interpretation of the words before us.
But it would only be that, if they were to be confined to Philadelphia, which
is not the case. The promise to Smyrna is equally such to every child of God
that ever was. Will any of these be hurt of the second death? Assuredly not;
and yet not the less suited to the sufferers in Smyrna was that word of
comfort. So here: doubtless God’s people have all been in various ways
made to apprehend the word of Christ’s patience, and will be kept out of
the hour of trial for apostate Christendom.
But the word is suited
especially here, because that which separates the saints from it, and from the
possibility of sharing its judgments, is at hand. More decisively now He
announces, "I come quickly." The day of grace is running out with the day of
patience. Soon it shall be Christ’s presence and glory. The centuries of
delay have come to years, the years are soon to be months, the months days, the
days moments. "I come quickly:" this is to be shown in its power for the soul
by its keeping the exhortation, "Hold that fast which thou kast, that no man
take thy crown." But all shows it to be a time of drift, - a time of
declensions as well as revivals: overcomer is he only who holds fast. The
Spirit of God moving, the Word manifesting its power, conscience responding;
yet every where the ebb after the flow, the trial which sifts, separates,
individualizes. By and by comes the terrible back-flow of Laodicea. Think not
Philadelphia is a haven of refuge where we may lie at anchor and never feel it.
Not so, - oh, not so: this is the fatal delusion of Laodicea itself: "Hold that
fast which thou hast!" The tug, if it has not come, is coming: hold thou
fast!
But to what? - hold what fast? The word, and the name, and the
patience of Christ. Not the word of even the leaders of God’s raising up.
The truth must ever commend the man, never the man the truth. One great danger
is, lest, having begun with the former principle, we slip into the latter. Even
the truth they teach is not truth received till it has been gotten at the
Master’s feet and in communion with Himself, - till you can hold it, not
with the eyes shut, but with eyes open, - till you can maintain it for
truth against the very instrument used of God to give it you, if need be. "If
WE, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have
received, let him be accursed."
Then, HOLD FAST! When it is no longer a
question if it be the truth, but only of its consequences. Hold fast: though
those who have held it with you, or before you, give it up; though it separate
you from all else whomsoever; though it be worse dishonored by the evil
of those who profess it; though it seem utterly useless to hope of any good
from it: in the face of the world, in the face of the devil, in the face of the
saints, - " hold fast that which thou hast, that no man take thy
crown!"
For many a crown has been lost, and many a crown will be lost,
if the Lord should tarry. Yet he who will hold fast shall find Christ’s
arms underneath him, Christ’s hands upon his hands. He shall not only
keep, he shall be kept; in the might of Christ’s victory he shall stand,
and the crown given he shall cast before the Giver of it as a trophy of His own
conquest, and the fruit of His grace.
"Him that overcometh will I make
a pillar in the temple of My God; and he shall go no more out. And I will write
upon him the name of My God, and the name of the city of My God, which is New
Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from My God, and I will write upon
him My new name." A fixed eternal place in the sanctuary of God; identification
with the display of God as revealed in Christ forever; identification with the
abiding-place of His affections, in which heaven and earth shall meet at last
in an eternal embrace of love; identification with the manifestation of Christ
in His new eternal relationship to this whole scene this is what seems to be
expressed in the promise here. But who shall give it proper utterance? What an
end for the weak one who under trial still holds fast to Christ and His word!
How blessed the stability of this scene by which He would establish our hearts
amid the perpetual flux by which we are surrounded. How sweet the
identification with Himself of the feeble one who has but owned on earth the
authority of Him whom heaven and earth will own in joy in but a moment! It is a
text to be expounded by the Holy Ghost to the heart of the overcomer, rather
than to be spread out upon the page here. It is a sanctuary word, and the ear
receives but a little thereof.
Laodicea:
What Brings the Time of Christ’s Patience to an End
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