An Exposition of Revelation .pdf

the same evils exist, and that which would keep the church as a chaste virgin espoused to Christ is
gone, no wonder that these warnings are misunderstood. Worldliness had got in, as it still remains,
and, alas! is palliated most by those who owe their professional status to its corrupt and corrupting
influence. The unbelief which let in the mischief keeps it in, decrying the true application of the two
edged sword now as then. Christians were dazzled by the world's power and glory, which was put
forth doubtless in protecting, not themselves only, but the public faith of Christendom in that day. But
none the less did they fatally compromise Christ by alliance with the world, followed by practical
return to the circle, out of which grace had taken the saints in order to union with Christ in glory.
"So hast thou also [men] holding the doctrine of Nicolaitans in like manner." To the angel of the
church in Ephesus the Lord had denounced "the deeds of the Nicolaitans"; but now the iniquity in
question (antinomianism, we conceive) had become a. doctrine; so that it seems compared with the
iniquitous doctrine of the Balaamites. "Repent therefore; or else I am coming to thee quickly, and will
war against them with the sword of my mouth." 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. We have seen this just before: a greater trial now appears. Alas! the state of
those that bore His own name was such that He was obliged to deal thus sternly with them. Enemies
were within. But His coming here as to the Ephesian angel does not mean His personal presence, but
His judicial visitation while unseen.
"He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches: to him that overcometh,
to him will I give to eat of the hidden manna." When the church was snared by the bait of public glory,
the encouragement to faith was the hidden manna. Let there be at least individual, even if here
unvalued, faithfulness to the Lord Jesus. Some saints might be true to His name, though it was not the
time when they were led or forced into the position of a remnant. There was not yet the fidelity that
came out from the public body, corrupt as it was. Energy of faith failed for, this; but individual fidelity
to Christ was not lacking; where this was, "to him," says the Lord, "will I give to eat of the hidden
manna, and I will give him a white stone, and upon the stone a new name written, which none
knoweth save the receiver." To the true heart His approval is enough, nearer and dearer than any
triumph before the universe.
Then follows the last of these four churches, but the first where the call to hear is changed. "And
to the angel of the church in Thyatira write." One cannot doubt that this letter contains an apt
adumbration, as far as could be there in present facts, of what was found in mediaeval times. "These
things saith the Son of God, he that hath his eyes as a flame of fire, and his feet [are] like fine brass."
Christ is revealed now, not only in the all-discerning power of moral judgment, but also judicially
prepared to act against evil: "His feet are like fine brass." "I know thy works, and the love, and the
faith, and the service, and thy patience, and thy last works [to be] more than the first." There was here
and there devotedness in the middle ages, spite of the darkness and ignorance that prevailed in point of
doctrine. But those who loved the Lord showed their love then, not so much by intelligence in His
ways as by unsparing and habitual self-denial. One does not surely speak of superstition, either as to
Mary or the church when each was made a sort of bona Dea, but of the fruit of looking to Christ
however simply.
"But I have against thee, that thou sufferest the woman (perhaps 'thy wife') Jezebel." This was a
new kind of evil altogether. It is not clericalism now, nor persons holding the doctrine of Nicolaitans
or that of Balaam, but a formed state as the symbol of a woman regularly represents. Examine the use
of woman symbolically, and this will be found true. The man is the agent who goes forward; the
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