Revelation: - Knights of Columbus, Supreme Council

of Jews, they have kept the faith. Hence the Lord has caused a door to be opened,
an expression which appears in Colossians 4:6, meaning a great future thing
that is to occur in evitably. Here two things are promised the Philadelphians,
first ly that their persecutors will be humbled; secondly that in the gen eral
tribulation that is coming upon the earth they will be spared.
The Church at Laodicea
The letter to the church at Laodicea (3:14-22) is perhaps the most famous,
because of the lines in vv. 15-16. Laodicea is generally condemned, though
their case is not hopeless. John has apparently taken the figure of his address
from the hot springs for which Laodicea was noted. The Laodiceans are neither
hot nor cold, says the Apocalypse, neither faithful nor faithless. They must
make a decision to be fol lowers of Christ with all that is implied in this, or quit
pretending to the Christian name. In verses 17-18 also local color has been used
to determine the language of the mes sage to Laodicea. The city was famous
commercially, which is probably connected with its citizens’ lukewarmness.
Buy gold refined by fire, commands the Lord, that is to say, pure gold, the gold
of spiritual wealth, not the wealth of this earth; only thus can they be clad in
white garments. Buy of Him also salve to anoint your eyes, He continues. There
was a famous medical school at Laodicea. The eye salve that the Laodiceans
need, however, is spiritual, that you may see with spiritual sight. They must
recognize in their tribulations the efforts of the Lord to bring them to
repentance. He does not say that these efforts have necessarily been in vain.
The Message of the Apocalypse
Having thus run through the first three chapters of the Apocalypse, we
have really a picture of the whole story that is to be unfolded in the subsequent
chapters. Under different images what is basically the same message will be
revealed, not once but several times. We have seen how in these chapters the
various parts are tied together by allusions to what has already gone before and
by what is to fol low. So it is throughout the whole book and such, indeed, is
the method of Semitic writing general ly. There is perfectly exemplified in this
writing what John means in speaking of God as the One Who is, Who was,
and Who is coming. His close adherence to the Old Testa ment tradition, his
reference to contemporary events, his prediction of the future which is coming
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