8: The Letters To The Seven Churches.

Chapter 8: The Letters To The Seven Churches.

Revelation 2 and 3
The question at issue in this article is, How should we rightly interpret these letters to the seven churches? It is clear and indisputable that John was inspired to write them to seven then existing churches in Asia concerning their own spiritual standing and condition at the time of writing. In this respect they differ in no way from the letters to seven Gentile churches that were written by Paul, and it is my deep conviction that they should be interpreted on the same principle. It is true that they contain much prophetic teaching: so also do Paul’s epistles, some of which are almost entirely prophetic. In like manner too, they contain truth which, while written specifically to these first century churches, bears influentially on every church. "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches." "And all the churches shall know that I am He which searcheth the reins and hearts."

If we strictly adhere to the three-fold division of the book of Revelation marked out by our Lord—"Write therefore the things which thou sawest, and the things which are, and the things which shall come to pass hereafter" (1:19)—the first is the vision recorded in chapter 1, the second must be the letters to seven then existing churches, the third, the visions from chapter 4. It is agreed that the method of instruction in this divine book is the same as in the book of Daniel, its Old Testament counterpart. Adhering closely to this point of view we remember how repeatedly Daniel saw a vision and received instruction regarding events coming near to his own time—(then comes a gap)—followed by instruction regarding the last three and a half years of this age. For example, Daniel 8 records prophetically, events up to the four-fold division of Alexander’s kingdom—then, both in the vision and in the angel’s interpretation, it leaps over the centuries and continues with instructions concerning the time of the end. Even so, John saw the vision (ch. 1)—received seven letters relating to local churches of his own time—then comes the gap—chapter 4 and onward giving the Final scenes. The question between us and those who hold the panorama theory concerns "the things which are." Transporting ourselves in mind to the side of the apostle John as he heard those words would we have understood, and can we think that he understood them as meaning the things that will commence when the apostles are dead, and that will run on through untold centuries? By trying to fit these seven letters into all the centuries of Christendom’s history we should have to leave the Lord’s simple word "are" and transfer His present tense into the future; for the whole of these letters are interpreted by writers like Win. Lincoln (Lectures on Revelation, p. 52) as concerning events running from post-apostolic days on to the coming again of our Lord. This is the more remarkable in view of the fact that in this very verse our Lord distinctly used the words "the things which are" in designed contrast to "the things which shall be hereafter." It goes without saying that when the apostle John received these instructions concerning "the things which are," the post-apostolic history of the church was of necessity, every bit of it in the future. Beside this, there is no hint in all the letters of them being a continuous panorama of Christendom’s history. Nor is there any gradual decline portrayed as we should expect if such were the true interpretation. The second and sixth, namely, those to Smyrna and Philadelphia, contain commendation from the Lord and have no word of censure: while the condition of the church in Thyatira is surely as bad as that of Sardis. And it is wonderful how anyone can see a reference to the so-called rapture of the church in the solemn and awful words "I will spue thee out of My mouth." When first I heard this panorama theory as a young Christian, it seemed to me very wonderful, especially as a running parallel was supposed to exist with the seven parables of Matthew 13. But as years rolled on I gradually became convinced that the whole idea was forced and strained.

Lamps of Gold and Stars.
The panorama theory collides with the Lord’s plain symbols and with His own statements about those symbols. John beheld Him walking amidst the seven golden candlesticks (Gk. Lampstands). All appeared together. They did not come into view consecutively as if successive scenes of church history were depicted. Likewise the seven stars were all observed Together in the right hand of the Lord. According to His symbolism each candlestick represented a church and in the letters He addresses each as a church. But if we declare that Ephesus represents the church, Thyatira, Romanism, Sardis describes Protestantism at the Reformation, and Laodicea the last stages of Christendom, we alter the meaning of the Lord’s symbol all the time to fit the exigencies of a theory, although He has explained in simplest language what His symbol means. The seven golden candlesticks are the seven churches.

The Lord calls each a church, and uses for each of the seven the symbol of the lampstand of gold. But is it not a fearful error to imagine that our Lord depicted Romanism as a lamp of gold? Is Romanism a lamp? Is it a lamp of gold? As one who has laboured for many years in a Romanist land, I protest that it is a fearful error to imagine that the Lord depicted Romanism or the Roman church as a lamp of gold tended by the great High Priest whom John saw walking amidst the seven golden candlesticks!

An angel is a messenger: whether human or otherwise is to be gathered from the context. According to Win. Lincoln, one of the chief exponents of the theory we are considering, the angel in each assembly was the product of departure from the divine pattern as taught in Paul’s epistles. Some gifted person was leaned on as the pastor, and this, according to him, is incipient Nicolaitanism, the full development of which is Romanism. But how is it that the angel in each church is the one specially recognized by the Lord Himself, the one to whom the aged exiled apostle was told to send the letters, and to whose care we may almost say, the Book of Revelation was first committed? Moreover, our Lord symbolized them as stars—indicative of heavenly lightbearing—held in His own right hand. That is very different from being leaders in declension from the Word of God and from the divine pattern as given in the Epistles of Paul! Many persons have graciously been delivered from clericalism and have run to the other extreme.
A Day for Twenty Years?

I speak in restrained language and in the fear of the Lord. It is my deep desire not to be hurtful to any of God’s children, but must we not think that the system abounds in gross absurdities when, for example, Mr. Lincoln imagined he could see a celibate clergy hinted at in the name of the married woman Jezebel, and the Arian controversy in the name of the Lord’s faithful martyr Antipas? Again, the idea that in speaking prophetically, God says a day when He means a year, is justly rejected by the many of those who hold the theory we are considering; but in total collision with their own view of the matter they—in one verse in the whole Bible—interpret our Lord’s simple words "ye shall have tribulation ten days" to represent the period of persecution endured by God’s people from the close of the apostle’s life unto the reign of Constantine. This would be ten days for over two hundred years, or a day for about twenty years.

"Because Thou Hast Kept... I Also Will Keep Thee."

Even Mr. Lincoln admits that in the first instance these letters were addressed to seven local churches of the Apostle’s own time and concerned their own then present condition. It is, therefore, impossible to disregard the fact that the local church in Philadelphia had kept the word of Christ’s patience and that He did expressly on that account give them this promise of preservation. Theirs was the faithful keeping of the word when such faithfulness had meant endurance, and to them specially, as a local church, did the Lord give this promise, and did, we believe, keep it. If even it is said that we do not now know the special hour of trial to which our Lord referred, that would not invalidate His knowledge and theirs of it. In like manner the Lord said to the church in Smyrna "ye shall have tribulation ten days" and perhaps we cannot now place our finger on the special ten days of trouble of which He spoke, but we believe those ten days of particular trouble took place. I have often wondered whether they had to do with the martyrdom of the blessed Polycarp (friend and disciple of the apostle John) who was an elder in the church in Smyrna about that time, and was in all probability the very angel of the church in Smyrna to whom the apostle wrote the letter. Whether the hour of universal trial from which the local church in Philadelphia was promised deliverance or preservation, occurred at that time we do not know, but the fact remains that to her the Lord gave this particular promise, recorded in Revelation 3:10; and did, we believe, keep it.

But to them it did not involve their translation to heaven before that hour of trial. And if even the superimposed panorama theory were permissible—which it is not—or if in any way there is to be a future application of the promise, on the same lines it could not necessitate the translation of God’s people to heaven before the event that is thus supposed to be specified as the "hour of trial." All this is quite independent of the solid fact that an hour of universal temptation is not in any sense the equivalent of the three years and a half great tribulation.