Revelation 3

Revelation 3:1

These things are worthy to be always had in remembrance For they are not cunningly devised fables - Like those common among the heathens. While we made known to you the power and coming - That is, the powerful coming of Christ in glory. But if what they advanced of Christ was not true, if it was of their own invention, then to impose such a lie on the world as it was, in the very nature of things, above all human power to defend, and to do this at the expense of life and all things only to enrage the whole world, Jews and gentiles, against them, was no cunning, but was the greatest folly that men could have been guilty of. But were eyewitnesses of his majesty - At his transfiguration, which was a specimen of his glory at the last day.

Revelation 3:2

For he received divine honour and inexpressible glory - Shining from heaven above the brightness of the sun. When there came such a voice from the excellent glory - That is, from God the Father. Matthew 17:5.

Revelation 3:3

And we - Peter, James, and John. St. John was still alive. Being with him in the holy mount - Made so by that glorious manifestation, as mount Horeb was of old, Exodus 3:4,5.

Revelation 3:4

And we - St. Peter here speaks in the name of all Christians. Have the word of prophecy - The words of Moses, Isaiah, and all the prophets, are one and the same word, every way consistent with itself. St. Peter does not cite any particular passage, but speaks of their entire testimony. More confirmed - By that display of his glorious majesty.

To which word ye do well that ye take heed, as to a lamp which shone in a dark place - Wherein there was neither light nor window. Such anciently was the whole world, except that little spot where this lamp shone. Till the day should dawn - Till the full light of the gospel should break through the darkness. As is the difference between the light of a lamp and that of the day, such is that between the light of the Old Testament and of the New. And the morning star - Jesus Christ, Revelation 22:16. Arise in your hearts - Be revealed in you.

Revelation 3:5

Ye do well, as knowing this, that no scripture prophecy is of private interpretation - It is not any man’s own word. It is God, not the prophet himself, who thereby interprets things till then unknown.

Revelation 3:6

For prophecy came not of old by the will of man - Of any mere man whatever. But the holy men of God - Devoted to him, and set apart by him for that purpose, spake and wrote. Being moved - Literally, carried. They were purely passive therein.

Revelation 3:8

But there were false prophets also - As well as true. Among the people - Of Israel. Those that spake even the truth, when God had not sent them; and also those that were truly sent of him, and yet corrupted or softened their message, were false prophets. As there shall be false - As well as true. Teachers among you, who will privately briny in - Into the church. Destructive heresies - They first, by denying the Lord, introduced destructive heresies, that is, divisions; or they occasioned first these divisions, and then were given up to a reprobate mind, even to deny the Lord that bought them.

Either the heresies are the effect of denying the Lord, or the denying the Lord was the consequence of the heresies. Even denying - Both by their doctrine and their works. The Lord that bought them - With his own blood. Yet these very men perish everlastingly. Therefore Christ bought even them that perish.

Revelation 3:9

The way of truth will be evil spoken of - By those who blend all false and true Christians together.

Revelation 3:10

They will make merchandise of you - Only use you to gain by you, as merchants do their wares. Whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not - Was long ago determined, and will be executed speedily. All sinners are adjudged to destruction; and God’s punishing some proves he will punish the rest.

Revelation 3:11

Cast them down to hell - The bottomless pit, a place of unknown misery. Delivered them - Like condemned criminals to safe custody, as if bound with the strongest chains in a dungeon of darkness, to be reserved unto the judgment of the great day. Though still those chains do not hinder their often walking up and down seeking whom they may devour.

Revelation 3:12

And spared not the old, the antediluvian, world, but he preserved Noah the eighth person - that is, Noah and seven others, a preacher as well as practiser, of righteousness. Bringing a flood on the world of the ungodly - Whose numbers stood them in no stead.

Revelation 3:16

It plainly appears, from these instances, that the Lord knoweth, hath both wisdom and power and will, to deliver the godly out of all temptations, and to punish the ungodly.

Revelation 3:17

Chiefly them that walk after the flesh - Corrupt nature; particularly in the lust of uncleanness. And despise government - The authority of their governors. Dignities - Persons in authority.

Revelation 3:18

Whereas angels - When they appear before the Lord, Job 1:6, Job 2:1, to give an account of what they have seen and done on the earth.

Revelation 3:19

Savage as brute beasts - Several of which in the present disordered state of the world, seem born to be taken and destroyed.

Revelation 3:20

They count it pleasure to riot in the day time - They glory in doing it in the face of the sun. They are spots in themselves, blemishes to any church. Sporting themselves with their own deceivings - Making a jest of those whom they deceive and even jesting while they are deceiving their own souls.

Revelation 3:22

The way of Balaam the son of Bosor - So the Chaldeans pronounced what the Jews termed Beor; namely, the way of covetousness. Who loved - Earnestly desired, though he did not dare to take, the reward of unrighteousness - The money which Balak would have given him for cursing Israel.