Chemalang, kan, chisu.
He heard that. Let us turn to Revelation chapter 2.
We will read two letters today: Thyatira and Sardis. We shall read from Revelation 2:18 through Revelation 3:6. We shall do as we did yesterday. I shall read the letter to Thyatira, and my brother shall read the Sardis letter.
Revelation 2:18.
Revelation 3:1.
And to the angel of the church in Sardis write:
These things saith He that hath the seven Spirits of God, and the seven stars:
I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou livest, and thou art dead.
Be thou watchful, and stablish the things that remain, which were ready to die:
for I have found no works of thine perfected before My God.
Remember therefore how thou hast received and didst hear; and keep it, and repent.
If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee.
But thou hast a few names in Sardis that did not defile their garments:
and they shall walk with Me in white; for they are worthy.
He that overcometh shall thus be arrayed in white garments; and I will in no wise blot his name out of the book of life, and I will confess his name before My Father, and before His angels.
He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches.
Amen. Let us bow down in prayer.
Lord, we have to prostrate ourselves before You from our hearts. We thank You and praise You because You are the Lord who walks among the churches.
We thank You and praise You because Your Spirit is still speaking to the churches. We ask You to pierce our ears so that we can hear Your voice, so that we can respond to Your words.
We pray that Your word may fall into our hearts and turn us back to You. This morning, we look to You.
You know the condition of each of us before You. You also know the hindrances within us. We ask that You take away the veil from our faces, that we may see You face to face and be transformed according to Your image.
Lord, we have only one desire: we want Your heart to be satisfied. We want You to be pleased with Your own people.
We desire that Your glory may appear. Lord, let us see Your glory. We worship You. In the name of the Lord Jesus, amen.
The seven letters in Revelation 2 and 3 are letters that our risen Lord wrote to the seven churches in the province of Asia at the end of the first century.
Although this was at the end of the first century, we can see from these seven letters that the conditions of the churches at that time contained many things that did not satisfy the heart of our Lord.
Even so, our Lord still walks among the seven lampstands. He speaks words of recovery, expecting that these churches may be restored to that which pleases His heart.
In other words, the Lord wants to bring the church back to the vision of Revelation 1. In that chapter, the Lord appears to John. We call this the vision of the Isle of Patmos.
The seven churches are there, but the seven lampstands are not described in detail in Revelation 1. The descriptions come in Revelation 2 and 3. Yet in Revelation 1, the One like the Son of Man among the seven lampstands is very clearly described.
At the beginning of each letter to each church, a particular part of the description of the risen Lord is given. Each letter is written according to that particular part of the vision.
In other words, the Lord uses Himself to measure each church. He uses Himself to weigh them and measure them, to see whether they are consistent with Him and in union with Him.
If they are in union with Him, then He is satisfied, and the testimony of that church is complete. But if the condition of that church is different from Him and is not consistent with Him, the Lord calls them to repent.
What does repentance mean? Repentance is to return to the vision of the Lord.
Brothers and sisters, we know that this is the end of the twentieth century, when our Lord is about to return. In reality, He is at the door.
Here we see that the recovery work of the Lord is more intense now. The Lord is still walking among the churches. No matter what our condition may be today, He has not forsaken us.
He still uses Himself to measure us. But we have to admit that when He measures us with Himself, we find that there are many things in which we are not like Him.
In many places we have gone astray. In many things we have only the outward appearance, but not the inner reality. We admit that today we have saddened the heart of our Lord even more than in the first century.
But we thank and praise our Lord: He has not forsaken us. He is still calling us to return and to be restored back to Him.
To restore is not to restore a certain method. To return is to be restored to the Lord Himself.
In this work of recovery, His truth has to be restored, and His way has to be restored. But, brothers and sisters, the way and the truth that are restored must not be merely way and truth as things apart from Him.
The way and the truth that are restored have to be our Lord Himself, because He is the truth and He is the way. If we say that we have discovered a truth, but we have not met our Lord, this is not recovery.
If we say that we have found a way, but that way is not the Lord Himself, then that way is not recovery.
Yes, when the Lord is doing His recovery, He recovers us back into His truth and into His way. But, brothers and sisters, let us remember: whether it is truth or way, it is not something outside the Lord. It has to be the Lord Himself.
God wants to restore us individually, and restore us as a church, back to His Son, until the glory of His Son shines forth from us and from His church. This is the recovery work of God on earth.
We see in the first letter that the recovery work of God is to recover the first love. It is for us to love the Lord our God with our whole heart, full soul, understanding, and strength.
This is how He loves us. It is only when we love Him in this way that His glory can shine.
If there is one who loves God wholeheartedly, forgetting everything else and loving God, this one is known to God. The glory of God is upon this person. This is true individually and as a church.
In the church, if there is that excellent love toward God, then we see the glory of God in that church, because He is satisfied and overjoyed.
In the second letter, we see that what the Lord wants to recover is faithfulness unto death. He wants us to be faithful to Him.
In the world today, there are too few who are faithful. Even when we find faithful people, often what they are faithful to is not our Lord. But our God is faithful, and our Lord is a faithful Lord.
He is faithful to His Father unto death. Now the Lord is also asking His church to be loyal to Him and faithful to Him unto death. Then His glory can be manifested.
This morning, we want to look at letters number four and five: the letters of our Lord to the church at Thyatira and to Sardis.
I would like brothers and sisters to look at two Scriptures: 2 Corinthians 1:12 and 2 Corinthians 11:3.
2 Corinthians 1:12 says:
For our glorying is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in holiness and sincerity of God, not in fleshly wisdom but in the grace of God, we behaved ourselves in the world, and more abundantly to you-ward.
I want brothers and sisters to pay attention to these words. In the Chinese translation, it says, “according to God’s holiness.” But in the Darby translation, I think it is closer to the original meaning, though the significance of holiness is still there.
Here it says, “in simplicity and sincerity of God.” Simplicity means purity, and sincerity means truthfulness and honesty.
In the original language, it does not merely say that toward God there is this condition. Rather, it says, “the simplicity and sincerity of God.” The simplicity and sincerity of God have become my simplicity and sincerity toward God.
Now let us turn to 2 Corinthians 11:3.
But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve in his craftiness, your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity and the purity that is toward Christ.
Here it says, “the simplicity toward Christ.” When we read these two letters, we feel that what the Spirit says to the church is for the church to have the simplicity and sincerity that are in Christ and in God.
From the standpoint of prophecy, we said yesterday that the church at Ephesus represents the condition of the church at the end of the first century. That was the end of apostolic time.
From the standpoint of prophecy, the church in Smyrna represents the church in the second and third centuries. At the end of the first century, the church had left the first love.
If we read Acts, we see very clearly the first love that the church had toward the Lord. But toward the end of the first century, this first love gradually diminished.
Because God loves His church, He allowed the world to persecute the church. Through persecution, He wanted the church to be restored to love for Him. Thus, the church in the second and third centuries was persecuted; it was the suffering church.
But in affliction, the heart for the Lord was cleansed. The Lord asked them to be faithful to Him unto death.
Now, what does the church in Thyatira mean in terms of prophecy? The church in Thyatira represents the condition of the church from the sixth century to the sixteenth century.
Here we see that Christianity developed on earth, but it lost many truths before God.
The Lord is presented as the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire and feet like fine brass. The eyes of our Lord are like a flame of fire: He sees the condition of the church.
His feet are like fine brass. Fine brass in the Bible represents judgment. He is the Son of God, and this is His position.
The church at that time was in such a condition that it did not give Him the sole position as the Son of God.
The Lord said, “I know thy works, and thy love and faith and ministry and patience, and that thy last works are more than the first.”
We see that Christianity at that time had many activities and works. They had many services. If you read church history, you see that the Roman Catholics did many works and many services. Their last works were more than the first.
They did many good works and works of alms. But these things were outward; they were not coming out of the life of Christ. They were the works of men.
They tried to work the work of God by the ability of men. The Lord says, “I have against thee.”
Why does He oppose them? Because He said, “Thou sufferest the woman Jezebel, who calleth herself a prophetess; and she teacheth and seduceth My servants.”
We have seen this Jezebel in the Old Testament. We know that there was a king of Israel by the name of Ahab. He married a daughter of the king of Sidon by the name of Jezebel.
Because Ahab married Jezebel, she controlled him. She tempted Ahab to worship the god of Sidon, which was Baal.
She tempted the whole nation to leave the Lord and to worship Baal. Not only that, because they worshipped idols, evil deeds followed. She led Ahab to do many unlawful things.
Thus the nation of Israel fell before the eyes of God. We particularly remember the story of Elijah.
In 1 Kings, we see that Elijah seemed to be the only prophet of the Lord left, because Jezebel wanted to kill off all the prophets of God.
Then Elijah challenged Ahab on Mount Carmel. He gathered all the Israelites together.
Elijah said, “How long go ye limping between the two sides? If the Lord be God, follow Him: but if Baal, then follow him.”
We remember how they sacrificed. The priests of Baal built an altar and placed a sacrifice upon it. They asked their god to send down fire to burn up the sacrifice.
This was because their so-called god, Baal, was the sun god. They wanted fire to come down from heaven to burn up the sacrifice.
From morning until night, they shouted, cried, and cut themselves, but the fire did not come down. Elijah said, “Your god does not work.”
Then Elijah built an altar and placed the sacrifice upon it. He had water poured over it until the water filled and overflowed the trench. Then he prayed to God.
God sent down fire to burn up the sacrifice, even the water and the stones. All Israel said, “The Lord, He is God.”
This is the story we see in the Old Testament. In the New Testament, in Revelation, we see again this woman Jezebel. She called herself a prophetess.
That means she thought she had revelation and could tell other people things about God. Yet in the New Testament, we cannot find an actual woman by the name of Jezebel. Therefore, we know this is a figure.
What does she represent? She represents the point at which the world enters into the church and controls the church. It brings into the church those things which are not of God.
We know that Baal is a sun god, and he is a fierce one. In fact, all the nations surrounding Israel worshipped Baal. Every nation had its own Baal.
The meaning of Baal is “lord” or “possessor.” This god was fierce. He demanded that human beings be offered as sacrifices. This is the nature of Baal.
But what is the nature of the Lord? We remember in Exodus that Moses said, “Lord, if I have found grace in Thy sight, show me Thy glory.”
God said, “Thou canst not see My face,” but He allowed Moses to see His back. In Exodus 34:5, the Lord descended in the cloud.
And the Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord.
And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abundant in lovingkindness and truth;
keeping lovingkindness for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin;
and that will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation.
We see that the Lord is a God of mercy and grace, slow to anger, abundant in goodness and truth, and pleased to forgive. Though He is righteous, He has mercy and grace. This is the nature of the Lord.
If you compare these two—the nature of Baal and the nature of the Lord—you see that they are totally opposite. Our God is a God of mercy and love, and He wants us to draw near to Him and love Him.
Baal is a fierce god. When men thought of him, they trembled inside.
At that time, they not only introduced Baal worship into the nation of Israel, but they also changed the nature of the God whom they worshipped. Their feeling toward their own God was no longer fear mixed with love, but trembling.
We remember Hosea 2:16. God said that the time would come when, “Thou shalt call Me Ishi; and shalt call Me no more Baali.”
In other words, “You shall no longer call Me lord; you shall call Me, ‘My Husband.’” God loves His people. He wants us to love Him as a wife loves her husband.
He does not want us to be afraid of Him with the fear of punishment. Of course, when we fear God, we respect God, and there is fear there. But that fear is not fear of punishment.
That fear is being afraid that we may not please Him. Because we love Him, we want to please Him in all things. We are afraid of doing something that is not pleasing to Him. This does not come out of terror.
I know that some brothers and sisters feel that our God is so terrible. Sometimes people have told me, “God is punishing me.”
I tell them, “God is not punishing you. God is disciplining you. He disciplines you because He loves you. He is not punishing you because He wants you to die.”
But oftentimes our concept of God is so different.
When we read the story of the church from the sixth century to the sixteenth century, the people at that time had a different concept of God because they did not allow people to read the Bible.
All the Bibles were chained together. God’s people did not know what the truth was. Therefore, they could only depend upon what the pope and the councils decided.
We also see many images. They said that God is so glorious and so majestic that you cannot go to Him directly. You have to go through mediators indirectly.
Therefore, the system of priesthood existed. They said that if you wanted to pray to the Lord, the Lord might not listen to you. But the heart of Mary was softer, so you had to pray to Mary.
Then Mary would speak for you, and your sin could be forgiven. You see, the whole truth became superstition.
They taught purgatory: when you died, you would go to purgatory. They said that only very few were saints, and these saints had sufficient virtue.
When these saints died, they went to heaven. Because their virtue was more than sufficient, you could pray to them, and they could spare some virtue to you. Then your days in purgatory could be reduced.
By the sixteenth century, they sold indulgences. If you were willing to pay, if you bought indulgences, they said your sins were forgiven.
The pope at that time wanted to build his cathedral and fill his own treasury. So he sent people throughout Europe to sell indulgences.
Some people said, “When your money drops into the box with a good sound, a soul comes out from purgatory.” Not only that, they said that when you bought an indulgence, not only were your past sins forgiven, but you could also purchase forgiveness for sins you had not yet committed.
There was a joke about a man who wanted to rob the box from the person selling indulgences. So he bought an indulgence first. He said, “I have this indulgence. God will forgive me. You cannot punish me.”
If you had a greater sin, you spent more money. If you were richer, they charged you more.
At that time, the nature of God was changed. It was like worshipping idols. It was all superstition. This was a dark age.
For this reason, Martin Luther and others rose up and called for reform.
Brothers and sisters, we know that the truth of God is pure, the way of God is single, and our God is a pure God.
But today, through the complexity of men, we have complicated these things. Men have been complicated from the beginning. This complexity started in the Garden of Eden.
God was simple. He created man because He loved man. He told man not to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because He loved him.
His command was simple. There was only one command: “You can eat everything, but not the fruit of that tree.”
If our first parents had been simple toward God, if they had had no other thoughts and had not thought about themselves, they would have been happy in paradise.
But the serpent was complicated. Because of his complexity, he became Satan, and he transferred complexity into the heart of Eve.
He caused her to doubt the love of God and to think for herself. The result was that men became complicated. Everyone is complicated because of the complexity of man.
That is why today we see that the church has become a very complicated thing. Men step in, and the children of God fight one another. We have lost the simplicity of God.
At the beginning, the church was very simple. If we use one verse in the Bible to describe it, it is Acts 2:42.
And they continued stedfastly in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and the prayers.
The church life consisted of only four things: the teaching of the apostles, the fellowship of the apostles, the breaking of bread, and prayers. This is the life of the church.
What is the teaching of the apostles? The teaching of the apostles is not the teaching of the apostles themselves. It is not that this is Peter’s teaching and that is Paul’s teaching.
Today, some say that Paul’s teaching and James’s teaching are contradictory. Even Martin Luther had that thought. He loved the letter to the Galatians and said that it was his wife. He called the letter written by James an epistle of straw.
But what is the teaching of the apostles? It does not mean that every apostle has his own teaching.
The teaching of the apostles is what they received from the Lord. No matter which apostle it is, their teaching is one. Their teaching is the teaching of Christ.
As the Lord taught, they taught the same. They did not invent their own teaching. Why do we call it the teaching of the apostles?
Because the revelation of God was given through the Holy Spirit to the prophets and apostles. Today, our knowledge of Christ is according to the teaching of the apostles, and that is our New Testament Bible.
Therefore, we call it the teaching of the apostles, but actually it is the teaching of Christ. What did they teach? They taught nothing else but Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
They did not put in their own interpretation. It was all Christ. They said of themselves, “He must increase, but I must decrease.” This is their teaching.
Brothers and sisters, what is the condition of the church today? The word of God is pure.
If we read Psalm 19, we see that the word of God is pure. If we read 2 Timothy 3, we see that Scripture is inspired by the Holy Spirit. It is breathed by God; it is not the breath of men, but the breath of the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, all teaching and instruction are beneficial to perfect the man of God so that he may be prepared for every good work.
The word of God is pure. It is not something seemingly right or seemingly wrong. It is not a fable that cannot be understood and then interpreted this way or that way according to what men want.
The word of God is pure because God Himself is pure. But today we have complicated the word of God. We have many interpretations.
It is like the Jews in the past. God gave them the law, and they had generations of rabbis who interpreted the law of God in every single matter.
For example, on the Sabbath they were not to work. They interpreted what it meant to work.
You remember when the Lord was on earth and was walking with the disciples through a cornfield. The disciples were hungry, so they took grain from the field and ate it.
The Pharisees said that they had violated the Sabbath. They said that taking the grain was not work, but rubbing it to remove the husk was work.
From generation to generation, traditions accumulated. The traditions buried the word of God. The Lord said, “Ye leave the commandment of God, and hold fast the tradition of men.”
Brothers and sisters, we see the same condition in the church. Men have complicated the teaching of God. We do not know whom to listen to.
We listen to this one and to that one. Everyone quotes the Bible, but they take it out of context, and we become confused.
Many teachings cannot be found in the Bible. Perhaps you find more outside the Bible than in the Bible. This is the complexity of mankind, and this is the work of Satan.
Dear brothers and sisters, what is the fellowship of the apostles? Does it mean that each apostle has his own fellowship?
Do the twelve apostles come together and have their fellowship, while Paul, being outside, has his own fellowship with his co-workers? Does every apostle have his own realm of fellowship and create his own fellowship? No.
The fellowship of the apostles is the fellowship of the Lord.
In 1 Corinthians 1:9, it says:
God is faithful, through whom ye were called into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
In the original language, it says that we are called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Where does He call us? He calls us into the fellowship of His Son, our Lord Jesus.
If you read 1 John 1:3, it says:
That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you also, that ye also may have fellowship with us:
yea, and our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.
This is the fellowship of the apostles. The apostles fellowship with Christ and with God and His Son, Jesus Christ.
They find what they have seen and heard in this fellowship, and they report it to us so that we also may have fellowship with them.
To fellowship is to share. It means that what I have, you have also. We are the same. This is fellowship.
The apostles share with us the Christ whom they know, and then we have the Christ that they have. In this way, we not only have fellowship with the Son of God, but we have fellowship with each other.
In the whole universe, there is one fellowship: the fellowship of God. Before the creation of the world, there was this fellowship within the Godhead.
The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were in that fellowship. They shared everything. They had the same in everything, and they were equal in everything.
That fellowship is the most glorious fellowship. There is no personal opinion there. They have one accord, and they have no self.
The Son is for the Father, and the Spirit is for the Son. We see this beautiful and glorious fellowship.
On the one hand, this fellowship is the most exclusive fellowship, because there are only three Persons. Apart from these three Persons, others cannot join.
But because God loves man, and because our Lord has completed redemption on the cross, God opened His own fellowship and called all who believe in Him to enter into the fellowship of His Son.
Thus we may inherit everything that He has given His Son. Dear brothers and sisters, this is the fellowship of the apostles: the fellowship of the apostles is the fellowship of the Son of God.
Today, in the whole universe, there is only one fellowship. Yet on earth we have many fellowships.
Some are like clubs, some are like fraternities, and some are like gatherings. You have your fellowship, and I have my fellowship. If you want to partake, you must satisfy certain conditions.
Even in the United States, there is this problem. Some clubs are for men only, and people say this is not equal, that women should be allowed to become members.
On earth there are all kinds of so-called fellowships, even in the church. You have one circle, another has another circle, and another has another circle.
Christ is not the center of the fellowship. The life of Christ is not the basis of the fellowship.
Some make doctrine the center of fellowship. Some make a particular experience the center of fellowship. Some make a system the center of fellowship. Some make a man the basis of fellowship.
We see that the children of God are so divided today. We have forgotten that our God is simple.
The fellowship of the apostles is simple. All those who are saved by grace are in the same fellowship.
Whomever Christ has received, we receive—no matter what background he comes from, no matter what interpretation he has, and no matter what experience he has.
As long as we are in Christ, we are one. Therefore, we have to maintain the unity in Christ.
Dear brothers and sisters, the children of God today are so complicated. The children of God cannot fellowship together. We do not fellowship; we do not even see each other.
When you stretch out your right hand, your brothers and sisters draw their hands back. We cannot have fellowship because you are not in my circle.
Brothers and sisters, we are so complicated. God calls us to go back to His simplicity.
The breaking of bread was what the Lord established on the night in which He was betrayed. Because the Lord loves His church, He left this for us.
“This is My body, which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.” “This cup is the new covenant in My blood. Drink it in remembrance of Me.”
It is very simple. This is the expression of love. He wants His children to remember Him. He wants His children to be united. He wants His children to wait for His return.
We see that the condition on that night was really simple. But today, the so-called Lord’s Table has become so complicated.
We even say, “This is my table,” and, “That is your table.” “This is my bread, and that is your bread.” We cannot break bread at the same table.
Brothers and sisters, we have made the breaking of bread complicated.
I attended some meetings, but I could not join their breaking of bread. They said I had to have the same interpretation in all things and in all doctrines before they would receive me.
Did our Lord give us any such conditions that night? He did not. He simply ordered us to remember Him.
Not only so, we have turned the breaking of bread into what we call today communion. If you go to the Catholic Church, the priest comes to say the Mass.
He has to remember hundreds of movements. Every movement has a rule. If you are thinking about every movement, how can you think of the Lord?
Today we have complicated the breaking of bread.
Prayer is the same. The Lord wants us to pray. This prayer does not refer only to ourselves.
It means that when we come together to pray before Him, we pray in one accord. But today we cannot come together to pray because we do not have the same heart.
We cannot even pray together.