I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, saying, “What thou seest, write in a book, and send it to the seven churches: unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Pergamum, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea.”
And I turned to see the voice which spake with me. And having turned, I saw seven golden lampstands; and in the midst of the seven lampstands One like unto a son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about at the breasts with a golden girdle.
His head and His hair were white as white wool, white as snow; and His eyes were as a flame of fire; and His feet like unto burnished brass, as if it had been refined in a furnace; and His voice as the voice of many waters.
And He had in His right hand seven stars; and out of His mouth proceeded a sharp two-edged sword; and His countenance was as the sun shineth in His strength.
And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as one dead. And He laid His right hand upon me, saying, “Fear not; I am the first and the last, and the Living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive for evermore, and I have the keys of death and of Hades.
“Write therefore the things which thou sawest, and the things which are, and the things which shall come to pass hereafter; the mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in My right hand, and the seven golden lampstands. The seven stars are the angels, or messengers, of the seven churches; and the seven lampstands are seven churches.”
And I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride adorned for her husband.
And I heard a great voice out of the throne saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He shall dwell with them, and they shall be His peoples, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God.
“And He shall wipe away every tear from their eyes; and death shall be no more; neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain, any more: the first things are passed away.”
And He that sitteth on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.”
And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God the Almighty, and the Lamb, are the temple thereof.
And the city hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine upon it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the lamp thereof is the Lamb.
And the nations shall walk amidst the light thereof: and the kings of the earth bring their glory into it.
We have been considering together this matter of the golden lampstand. It is a representation of what the church is and what the function of the church is.
We find in the book of Exodus, when God commanded Moses to build that golden lampstand, it was all of gold. It was of a beautiful shape. It was made of beaten work, and it was for the sole purpose of upholding light.
So, dear brothers and sisters, this is what the church is in God’s original design. The church is a beautiful work of God. This is much more beautiful than the creation. It is a masterpiece of God’s work, and it is all of gold—all of Christ and none of man. It is the fullness of Christ.
It is the work of the Holy Spirit, patiently working upon us. And it is for the sole purpose of upholding light—that is, the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Then we find, about a thousand years later, the prophet Zechariah again saw this vision of the lampstand, all of gold. But here you find there was some addition.
On the lampstand there was the bowl, and two olive trees standing, one on the right and one on the left. They poured out into the bowl gold, and then many pipes came out of the bowl to the seven lamps, so that the lamps would be filled with oil and the light would shine brilliantly.
There you find that the Lord seems to show us the supply of the light. How is the church to fulfill its work of bearing the testimony of Jesus?
“Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord.”
— Zechariah 4:6
It is by the power of the Holy Spirit that the church is able to fulfill its function on this earth.
This morning we would like to continue on. After the remnant returned from the land of captivity, they finished building the temple. Of course, in the temple you find the golden lampstand. The light was lighted, and a priesthood was there serving in the temple.
More than that, you find Nehemiah returned to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem. So, when you come to that period, you find that it was as if the house of God was rebuilt, the testimony of God was restored, and everything seemed to be in a good condition.
But, as we know, whenever God entrusts something to our hands, sooner or later we spoil it.
Within a hundred years of the rebuilding of the temple and the restoration of the testimony of God upon this earth, you come to the latter chapters of Nehemiah, and especially to the prophet Malachi, who worked together with Nehemiah in the later period.
You find that the spiritual condition of the remnant had degenerated so greatly that God had to reason with His people. God said, “I love you,” but they said, “Wherein hast Thou loved us?”
They became so insensitive. They became hard of heart, hard of hearing. They were blind. They were obstinate. They were rebellious. There you find the condition of God’s people.
Malachi was the last voice of God in Old Testament times. As God spoke to His people for the last time, God stopped speaking. For four hundred years, He was silent.
We often say our God is a God who speaks. He loves to speak to His people. He loves to communicate with His people. He loves to tell His people His heart and to draw His people into union with Him in life and in purpose.
But the spiritual condition of the remnant at that time was such that God was forced to keep His silence.
During those four hundred years, the temple was there. Every evening, priests would go into the holy place to light the lamp. Outwardly, everything went on as usual. You may think that these were a very godly people. You may think that God was in their midst, that the testimony was there, and that the light was there.
But, dear brothers and sisters, in spiritual reality it was just the opposite. In that temple, in the holiest of all, there was no ark, no mercy seat, no glory of God. It was empty.
Even though in the holy place the light was lighted, yet you find that the name of God was being blasphemed because of His people. Everything was just the opposite from what the temple and the lampstand represented.
But thank God, God never gives up. He is the Eternal One. Once He sets His mind, He will never change. He will get what He desires in spite of man, in spite of our condition.
As a matter of fact, it seems as if the lower we become, the worse we become, the higher and better God appears to be. So here you find God began to react against this terrible condition of His people.
After four hundred years, you find God’s greatest reaction: He sent His only begotten Son into this world. The Word became flesh and tabernacled among men, full of grace and truth.
The temple that stood in Jerusalem was empty. The glory of God was not there. God was not there. But here you find a Man by the name of Jesus, and the glory of God rested upon that Man.
He was the tabernacle of God. He was the temple of God, because the Word became flesh and tabernacled among men. God was in Him, and through Him God was able to declare Himself.
As the Scriptures say, no one has ever seen the Father, but the Son, Who is in the bosom of the Father, He declares Him. What a perfect declaration our Lord Jesus made for His Father.
For thirty-three years or so, He walked upon this earth as the tabernacle of God. He faithfully bore the testimony of God—a perfect testimony. He was obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the cross.
On that cross, He accomplished the work of redemption, the work that God His Father had sent Him to accomplish.
Then, of course, historically we know that He rose from the dead on the third day. For forty days He appeared to His disciples, speaking to them of the kingdom of God. Then He ascended, and now He is seated at the right hand of the Almighty, waiting for His enemies to be made His footstool.
But in the meanwhile, on the day of Pentecost, He sent the Holy Spirit upon this earth. There in Jerusalem, the one hundred and twenty believers were praying with one accord and waiting before the Lord. The Holy Spirit came upon them, and in one Spirit, in that one instant, these one hundred and twenty people were baptized into one body.
In other words, when our Lord Jesus was on earth, He was God’s tabernacle. He was that vessel of the testimony of God. Now He is in heaven, but He has prepared for Himself a body, a corporate body.
In that corporate body He dwells. Through that corporate body He is being magnified, and His testimony is being kept on this earth.
You find that the book of Acts covers about thirty-three years, just as the Gospels cover the thirty-three years of the life of our Lord Jesus. There you find the history of the early church. It is about thirty-three years, and God is building His church from Jerusalem to Judea, to Samaria, and to the end of the earth.
At that time Rome was the center, as well as the end of the earth. Within thirty-some years, the gospel was preached to the whole world. That is the book of Acts.
Then, after another thirty-some years, we come to the time when the Apostle John wrote this book of Revelation.
The Apostle John was exiled to the island of Patmos for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus. Evidently, before he was exiled, he was laboring or ministering in Asia—not Asia as a continent, but Asia as a Roman province, Asia Minor.
There he was ministering to these churches. He was taken away from them and exiled to a barren island, probably as a slave laborer working in the mines.
But on the Lord’s day, probably he was sitting on a rock by the sea, facing Asia. We are told that on a clear day, you may be able to see the outline of Asia from the island of Patmos.
So, on that Lord’s day, as he was looking over the sea, he must have been thinking about these churches that he loved and to which he ministered. He was wondering what had happened to them.
Probably a sense of despair came upon him, because he knew that while he was there with these brothers and sisters in the various churches in Asia, he was doing his best, working as the Lord gave him grace, as much as he could.
But somehow the situation was not very beautiful. He wondered, “What will happen to them? Since I am no longer there, will the situation get worse? Will the testimony of Jesus completely vanish?”
As he was there, meditating and communing with God, he heard a voice behind him saying, “Write what thou hast seen, and send it to the seven churches in Asia.” So he turned around and looked, and he was given what we call the Patmos vision.
As a matter of fact, the Patmos vision covers the whole book of Revelation. It is not just chapters 1 through 3; it covers the whole book of Revelation. It is a series of visions.
But here you find the first vision he saw: he turned back and saw seven golden lampstands.
Hundreds of years had passed, and here you find God revealed to His servant again that golden lampstand. God had not forgotten. He saw seven golden lampstands, and he saw One like unto a son of man in the midst of the seven.
Now, brothers and sisters, we say that in the pattern God gave to Moses on the mount concerning the golden lampstand, He reveals to us the original design of God concerning His church and the main purpose and function of the church.
When God revealed that vision to Zechariah—the lampstand all of gold—the emphasis was on the supply, the spiritual principle of supply. How is the church supplied to fulfill its function? It is by the supply of the Holy Spirit.
Here you find another vision given of the lampstand, all of gold. No description is given of the lampstand because it is not necessary. It is the same as in the tabernacle in the wilderness. It is the same as Zechariah saw in that night vision. It is the same lampstand.
God’s original design never changes. As we mentioned yesterday, He will never change His design to suit our condition. On the contrary, He will bring our condition to His level, that we may be suitable to His design. That is the work of God.
But we do find some variations. Instead of one lampstand with seven branches, you find that these seven branches became seven golden lampstands. That is the first variation.
The second addition is that, in addition to the seven lampstands, you see One Who is like unto a son of man standing and walking in the midst of the seven.
Why? Because in this vision, the emphasis is on the spiritual responsibility of each church and on the relationship of our Lord Jesus with His church today. Or, to put it another way, the emphasis of the vision is to see how our Lord is building His church.
You remember in Matthew 16, the Lord said:
“I will build My church; and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.”
— Matthew 16:18
How is He building His church? This is what you find in this vision. How is He recovering the function of the church, that the church may become that light-bearer, that vessel of light?
When we see one lampstand with seven branches, the idea is the oneness of the church, with seven branches representing fullness. The church is one. The body is one, as the Head is one, and the Lord is one.
The Lord said, “I will build My church.” It is singular—one. God has only one church. Christ has only one body. It is the oneness of the church that is in view. Even though it is one, yet there is fullness there.
The church is the body of Christ, the fullness of Him Who filleth all in all. That is the idea. How important it is for us to see this.
We need to see that the church is one. Christ is building one church, and we are all in that one church. That one church is universal. It spans over two thousand years.
It includes all those who are the Lord’s, from the first one who was redeemed and washed by the blood of the Lamb, to the last one who comes to believe in the Lord Jesus.
There is no distinction of race, nation, tongue, culture, social background, or anything of the sort. In Christ Jesus, we are one.
How important it is for us always to keep that in view. Why? Because we need to diligently keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace.
Naturally speaking, we are all divided. After sin entered into this world, separation became the result of sin. You find that when sin entered into this world, even Adam and Eve were separated. They were one flesh, but when sin entered, Adam blamed Eve, and he blamed something else. There was some kind of separation.
Humanly speaking, brothers and sisters, separation is in our natural blood. No two persons can really be one. It is a miracle that out of every nation, every tribe, every people, and every tongue, God could make us all one—and one indeed.
That is the reason why the Lord Jesus said:
“That they may be perfected into one; that the world may know that Thou didst send Me.”
— John 17:23
There is a testimony there.
How important it is for us, who are the Lord’s, to diligently keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace.
In spite of all the outward differences, thank God, we are one in the Triune God. We have one Spirit, one body, one hope of our calling. We have one Lord, one faith, one baptism. We have one God, Who is Father of us all, and through us all, and in us all.
In these seven ones, we are one. We need to diligently keep this unity and not allow anything to move us away from this ground of unity, this ground of the oneness of the church. This is one lampstand with seven branches, manifesting the fullness of Christ.
But here in the book of Revelation there is a variation. Instead of one lampstand with seven branches, you find that the lampstand seems to change its form into seven individual lampstands.
Why? Because the Lord wants to show us how the church is built. He wants to show us how this one universal church is to be built in its practical dealings and practical workings.
Brothers and sisters, even though by the grace of God we are saved—thank God for that—yet we are still in this physical body. How good it would be if, the moment we were saved, we were raptured! But God has a better plan for us. He knows better.
We are still in this human body, and being in a human body, we are limited. We are limited by time. We are limited by space. We are here in Santa Barbara; we are not in Los Angeles, Richmond, Davis, San Francisco, Arizona, or anywhere else. We are limited.
We are now here, so we were not there yesterday, nor will we be there tomorrow somewhere else. We are limited by time and space.
When God begins to work with us, in a sense He has to reduce us to a local ground, because that is where we are. He cannot work with the universal church in that practical sense, because the universal church is eternal and spiritual. It is beyond time and space.
When you come to the practical working of “I will build My church,” you have to come down into this earth, into this limited time and space. That is the reason why, in this vision, you find the seven golden lampstands.
These seven golden lampstands represent the seven churches in Asia, because it is explained to us: the seven lampstands are the seven churches in Asia.
Another thing that may be important to notice is this: when we talk about the lampstand in the tabernacle in the wilderness, or the lampstand in the vision of Zechariah, these lampstands serve as representations or types of a spiritual reality.
But when you come to this vision, you find that the reverse is true. The reality has already come, because the reality is the church. The church has already come, and it is represented by the golden lampstand before God.
At the time when John wrote these letters—or when the Lord used him as His secretary to write these letters—there were actually more than seven churches in Asia. We think of the church in Colossae and Hierapolis. There were more than seven churches in Asia at that time.
But the Holy Spirit takes seven churches. Why? Because these seven churches prophetically represent the churches throughout the centuries, from the first century to the time when Christ shall return.
Spiritually, they represent the spiritual condition of all the churches on this earth throughout all ages and generations. You can find the conditions of the churches being described in one, two, or more of these seven churches.
So these seven churches are representative in a sense. It is not just these seven churches in Asia at the end of the first century; they represent the churches throughout the whole world, throughout all the centuries and generations, even up to our time.
On the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came down, and we say historically that the church was born on that day. Even though we know that the church was born out of the side of Christ, historically the church was born on the day of Pentecost.
When it was born, it was born in Jerusalem. Then the gospel began to spread to the other cities of Judea, to Samaria, to Antioch, to Ephesus, and to Rome.
In the building of the church, it is through the building of the local churches. The local churches are none other than the practice of all the principles of the universal church.
By putting all these principles into practice, then you come into the consummation of the manifestation of the universal church. So we are now dealing with this matter of the practical outworking of things.
Here you find these seven lampstands, and One like unto a son of man in the midst of them. As a matter of fact, even though there are seven lampstands, yet they are united. They are united by the Son of Man. The Lord unites them together.
Governmentally and administratively, each local church is independent. In other words, each is directly responsible to the Lord. There is no so-called mother church, sister church, or daughter church.
Every local church is directly responsible to the Lord, to the Head. Yet spiritually they are united. They have fellowship one with another through our Lord Jesus. He is the One Who is in the midst of them and walks among them. He unites them together.
In spiritual fellowship, all these churches are in fellowship one with another. They can learn from one another and enrich one another.
John was not given a description of the lampstand because he had already been given that. But John was given a detailed description of the One Who is like unto a son of man.
We may think this was unnecessary for John, because he was the one who lay upon the bosom of Christ. In other words, he was closest to Christ when Christ was on earth. If anyone knew Jesus, surely it must have been John.
He was the first disciple of our Lord Jesus, and he was the last of the original twelve apostles remaining in the first century. We may think it was not necessary for John to have a description of the Son of Man. Surely he knew Him.
But no. Here you find a detailed description of the One Who is like unto a son of man. Why? Because our Lord Jesus is seen in a very different picture.
Instead of the One Who walked humbly upon this earth, instead of the One Who was the Apostle sent by God on a mission, Who said, “It is finished,” and whose mission was accomplished, here you find He is risen, He is ascended, and He is in glory.
There is a Man in glory, and He is the Head of the church, the Lord over His house. He is a royal High Priest.
When He was on earth, He was our Apostle, the Apostle of our confession. Now He is in heaven; He is our High Priest, the High Priest of our confession.
He ministers in the true sanctuary—not a temple made of stone, material things made by hand, of this creation—but He is now ministering in the true sanctuary, in that reality that God had in mind even before the foundation of the world.
Dear brothers and sisters, do you know that we are now living in reality? We are not now living in shadow anymore. The shadow has passed. Christ has come. Because Christ has come, today He has brought us into reality. Everything now is in reality.
John was probably worrying about the churches in Asia. What would happen to them without him? Probably they would die out.
But here the Lord showed him: “It is not you.” Maybe outwardly it was John who was ministering to these seven churches, trying to recover them and restore that testimony. He was not very successful either.
But the Lord said, “I have been doing that all along. I am the One Who is building My church. Make no mistake about it.”
Brothers and sisters, sometimes we think we are the ones who build the church, and if we are absent, everything will fall to pieces. Well, perhaps it is better that you are absent; then the Lord is able to do all He wants to do.
Throughout the centuries, since the church began, the Lord has been building His church. He is building His church as a royal High Priest. He is building His church as the One Who has all power and authority in earth and in heaven.
He is building His church as the High Priest Who ministers night and day to His church, to see that it becomes what it should be and serves the purpose it should serve.
Oh, brothers and sisters, what a comfort that is. That is awesome—truly awesome.
The vision of the One Who is like unto a son of man given to John was so awesome. John had never seen this before. Almost, he could not recognize Him.
Here you find the Son of Man in glory: powerful, majestic, and yet full of love and tender mercies.
There He was with His church. Never for a moment was He absent. He was there with His church. He walks among them. He examines them, inspects them, scrutinizes them, judges them, cuts them, and pierces them, dividing the soul and the spirit.
There you find He was the High Priest.
Dear brothers and sisters, do you know our Lord Jesus today? He is your High Priest. If you do not know the Lord as your High Priest, how can you live even a day as a Christian?
It is because He ever lives, making intercession for us, that He saves us to the uttermost. Brothers and sisters, daily we are alive because He is ministering to us as a High Priest.
On our own, we cannot stand. Peter could not stand. Peter said to the Lord, “Even if all the others forsake You, I will be faithful to You to the end. I am even willing to die with You.”
But the Lord said, “Before the cock crow twice, you will deny Me thrice. But, Peter, I have prayed for you. Satan is trying to sift you as wheat, but I have prayed for you. When you are restored, strengthen your brethren.”
Dear brothers and sisters, thank God that our Lord Jesus, even after He finished the work of redemption on earth, is still working. He is still ministering. He is our High Priest.
He is praying and interceding for you. He is there dispensing, distributing, supporting, and supplying the Holy Spirit to you, in order that we may live and be saved to the uttermost.
Oftentimes we think of Christ as High Priest in personal ways. Surely we should. But, dear brothers and sisters, does it ever occur to you that our Lord Jesus is the High Priest of the church?
He ministers in the true sanctuary. That is what His real ministry is today. He ministers to the church.
He does not bring forth a church and then have nothing to do with it anymore, leaving it to struggle on its own to see whether it can fulfill its function. No, never for a moment does He forget His church.
How can He forget? He loved the church and gave Himself for her. How can He forget that which is the travail of His soul? Certainly He could not.
He is watching over His church. Brothers and sisters, because of His love for His church, He is using that golden snuffer.
You know, the priests in the evening would go into the holy place to trim the lamp. They would look and see whether the wick in the lamp was burned and scorched. Because of this, it might not be able to draw the oil, and the light might become dim, or even die, or even smoke.
So the priest would go in and use the golden snuffer to snuff off the scorched part. He would watch to see whether the oil needed to be replenished, and he would pour more oil into it so that the lampstand would shine bright in the holy place.
That is the work of the priest. He would look at it from morning till night so that the light would never go out—not only never go out, but always shine bright. That is the purpose of the lampstand.
Brothers and sisters, if this is true in the type, how much more true is it in the reality? You find that our Lord Jesus is daily and unceasingly, night and day, walking among these churches. He is examining their conditions.
Sad to say, the conditions are not very pleasing.
Of the seven churches, you find that some light has dimmed. Some light has become darkness; it is smoking. Some light is almost gone. What a sad picture it is.
Of the seven churches, only one—Philadelphia—has light burning bright. Another one, Smyrna, is shining, but perhaps flickering and wavering a little. All the rest, you find, are still smoking.
Such conditions! But the Priest will not give up. You find that our Lord Jesus is there applying that golden snuffer: divine discipline, divine chastening, divine child-training.
He may have to cut off something. He may have to add more. But He is there trying to recover the church to what it should be, that it may be a vessel of the testimony of Jesus.
If the lights are shining, they shine upon the One Who is like the Son of Man. That is what it should be. The church is never the end; it is a means to an end.
If it is shining, what you see is Christ, because it shines upon the One Who walks among the seven lampstands. Think of that: all these lampstands and their light shine upon that one Person. He is magnified through the church.
But if the light is gone, then you find the vision of Christ is gone. You do not see Christ.
Brothers and sisters, in Ephesians 5—I love that chapter—even though he is talking about the relationship of husband and wife, actually husband and wife is only a small representation of that great mystery of Christ and His church.
It is said that Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it. But that is not the end. He says that He sanctifies it, purifying it by the washing of water with the word, that He may present it to Himself a glorious church, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing—holy and without blemish.
This is the same picture, expressed in different ways. Here you find our Lord Jesus gave Himself for His church to bring this church into being. As this church is brought into being, you find He is sanctifying it. It is a continuous process.
He is purifying it because He discovers that in the church there are many spots and wrinkles and such things.
What is a spot? A spot in Scripture represents the manifestation of the flesh. The flesh within us, when it bursts out, becomes spots.
What is a wrinkle? We all know that as you get old, wrinkles come in aging. In other words, something has aged; something has lost its freshness and its livingness.
It becomes a tradition that can be carried on, but there is not that freshness and livingness there.
Brothers and sisters, throughout twenty centuries, as our Lord is ministering to His church, you find many spots and many wrinkles. Unfortunately, we do not see them.
We are so blind and so in darkness. We think that we have no spot and no wrinkle. But, as a matter of fact, with those burning eyes, He sees it through and through. He sees spots here, spots there, wrinkles here, wrinkles there.
To illustrate, consider the church in Ephesus. Ephesus is the church of first love. If you review the history of Ephesus, we have no time for that. But when you come to the church at Ephesus, everything goes on as usual. Outwardly, nothing changes.
But inwardly, that power, that love, is gone. There is not the first love—that undivided love, that pure love, that absolute love. It is gone. Now, what is that? Just a wrinkle, right?
Or consider the church in Pergamum. Yes, things are still going on, but you find spots beginning to come up. You find the doctrine of Balaam. You find the doctrine of the Nicolaitans. These are spots.
Balaam is one who enticed the children of Israel into union with the Midianites. In other words, they defiled themselves by union with the world. There was no separation.
The Nicolaitans, we know, represent that religious system of clergy and laity—mediatorship—instead of recognizing that we are all priests to God.
So, brothers and sisters, you find spots appearing. Our Lord Jesus is there using that golden snuffer, trying to straighten the wrinkles and cut off the spots. His work is there.
You know, this gives me great hope. It is awesome. It is difficult, but it is hopeful, because it is Christ Who is ministering.
He ministers not in the sense of judging us unto death. He ministers in the sense of restoring us, recovering us to what God has originally designed for us.
Throughout the twenty centuries, our Lord Jesus has ministered to His church. Unfortunately, the whole church does not respond. But thank God, there are some who do respond.
“He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches. To him that overcometh…”
— Revelation 2:7
Thank God, He is able to get some response from the church. Those who respond to His call, His call to repent, become the overcomers of the church.
The overcomers of the church are none other than those who bear the burden of the function of the church for the whole church. What they do represents what the whole church should be doing.
We have no time; I have to jump. The first vision on the island of Patmos is this vision of seven lampstands with the Son of Man in the midst of them.
Then from the fourth chapter to the twentieth chapter, you do not find the word “church” mentioned anymore. Some people say the church is raptured because the word “church” is no longer mentioned. But anyway, even though the church is not mentioned, what do you find in these chapters?
You find tremendous spiritual battle and conflict there. The Lord said, “I will build My church upon this rock”—that is, upon Himself—“and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.”
The gates of Hades are all open. Satan is trying his very best, making his last effort, trying to frustrate God’s purpose and trying to delay God’s purpose. Tremendous conflict is going on.
But thank God, what do you find at the end—in chapters 21 and 22? Out of such tremendous conflict, here you find the end of the Patmos vision.
The end of the Patmos vision is not another issue. The first vision you see in the beginning of the book of Revelation and the final vision in the book of Revelation are one vision. One is the beginning; the other is the end.
Here you find, in the beginning, our Lord Jesus ministering to His church. Thank God, He knows He can never fail. We miss Him, and we do fail. We frustrate Him. We can do nothing but fail. But He can never fail.
When you come to the end of that vision, what do you see? You do not see seven golden lampstands. You see one giant lampstand.
The holy city, the New Jerusalem, is a huge lampstand.
The base is the twelve foundations—precious stones. These twelve foundations are probably one upon another. The twelve foundations of precious stones form the base of that giant lampstand.
The wall forms the stand of that lampstand. Then you find that the city of New Jerusalem is made out of gold—all of gold—the golden lampstand.
There is only one street, but it has twelve gates. How can you figure that out? Only one street and twelve gates. If you enter in one of the east gates, how are you going to get on the street? If you come from the west gate, how are you going to get on the street?
Well, I think probably it is in a spiral shape. That one street is a spiral street. It goes through all the twelve gates. It begins ascending, ascending, ascending, and ascending. When they come to the highest point of the city, that is where the throne of God is.
The length, the breadth, and the height of the city are equal: fifteen hundred miles. Not only are the length and width fifteen hundred miles; the height is fifteen hundred miles.
You add the foundation, you add the wall—the wall is a hundred and forty-four cubits—and it adds up to fifteen hundred miles, to the throne.
What do you find there at the top? That city does not need any sun or moon to shine upon it. Why? Because the glory of God enlightens that city, and the Lamb is the lamp thereof.
So, brothers and sisters, you see a giant lampstand there. It is the consummation of the work of God—a new creation.
God said, “I make all things new.” The tabernacle of God is now with men. Here you find the glory of God is the light, and the Lamb is the lamp.
The city is a lampstand. It is made of gold, so it magnifies the light. Oh, that the name of God is magnified! God is glorified in the church in Christ Jesus. That is what it is.
All the nations shall walk in the light of the city. So, brothers and sisters, what God has originally designed, He will get in the end. God never fails. Thank God for that.
Dear heavenly Father, how we praise and thank Thee. Thou art the beginning and the end, the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last. Thou hast made all things new.
We thank Thee that by the power of Thy Spirit, because of Thy faithful ministry as our Apostle and High Priest, we know that the day is coming when Thou shalt have that giant lampstand to glorify Thy name.
Hold our eyes not on our own glory, but on the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Amen.