Well, it is past eleven, so let’s get back together and really give the time to the Lord. I usually have a little longer sharing, so hopefully we will finish by twelve and you will not miss your lunch. We do not have to wait so long for lunch.
Let’s pray.
Lord Jesus, we worship You. We are so blessed, Lord, that You gather us together at the Lord’s table, that we may come here with You and worship You.
Lord, as I come to share Your Word, I just feel: who is adequate to share the Word of God? None of us is able to do so. But indeed, it is only through the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
So, Lord, we do want to pray today that there may be Your presence, as well as the anointing of the Holy Spirit, with us in the speaking and hearing. Lord, I do trust that there are some things in the fellowship and in the sharing that are dear to Your heart.
So we want to commit ourselves back to You. Lord, have this hour; use it as You please. Lord, we do thank You that, in these last days, You still have words for Your people. Lord, that is Your mercy.
We thank You, and we pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
I actually have many Bible verses, but I will read only two. The rest, I think, are Bible words with which we are all very familiar. When I read them, they should come up in your hearts.
The first is from Revelation 2:4-5a, words in the letter written to the church in Ephesus:
But I have this against thee, that thou didst leave thy first love.
Remember therefore whence thou art fallen, and repent and do the first works.
The main focus is really on these two expressions: first love and first works.
The second passage is Acts 2:42, referring to the early church after Peter’s preaching, when three thousand were saved. What did their daily life look like?
And they continued stedfastly in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and the prayers.
What is in my heart is this: at the end of Matthew, the disciples asked the Lord about the signs of the end of the age. That is in Matthew 24:3-13. We all know the time in which we are living. We see wars, famines, hurricanes, fires, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions. We know what time we are in.
We are in such a time as the Lord told His disciples about. Oftentimes we say that the Lord’s return is imminent, and that is a true statement. Brothers often encourage us to be ready, because the Lord can return at any moment.
Yet it is really in my heart today to ask this question: yes, the Lord can return; He is coming soon; be ready. But what is the one thing that He must have in His church before He can close out this age and bring in the kingdom age?
I am convinced in my heart that it is first love. It is first love.
The expression first love occurs only once in the Bible, in Revelation 2:4. There is not a direct definition given for it. Yet I believe that, in the seven letters of Revelation 2 and 3, the Lord Himself shows us the nature of first love.
The Lord spoke personally, in the first person, to the churches. Therefore, He shows us the nature of first love, and that is important.
In this time that we have, I want to share something of the nature of first love. Then we need to go back to the history of the church in Ephesus. The first letter is addressed to the church in Ephesus, and we want to see from its history what first love means and what happened to it.
The Lord said, “I have this against thee, that thou didst leave thy first love.” We want to get some sense of the time span between when they were truly in the way of first love and when, later, they had left it. It was not a long period of time. We are talking about years, and there is a lesson to be learned there.
Then, in Revelation 2:5, the Lord said:
Remember therefore whence thou art fallen, and repent and do the first works.
If we return to first love, the Lord says, “Do the first works.” Again, first works occurs only once, in Revelation 2:5. How do we understand what the first works are?
That is why I have taken up the passage in Acts 2:42. What did the early church in Jerusalem do? Can we learn from that something that will impress upon our hearts what first works are?
We often say that we are in the condition of the church in Laodicea. Declension has set in. Indeed, the church has left first love, and the church is not doing the first works. If we stop there, we will all become very depressed and despairing. But that is not the Lord’s way.
Recently, a book was published called The Glory as Seen by Ezekiel. I think we all should read it if we have not already done so. There are encouragements there for our time. I will share some thoughts from it later.
First, I need to give some background. You may have noticed that in red-letter Bibles it is easy to see what the Lord said because it is printed in red letters. At the end of the Bible, in the final chapter of Revelation, chapter 22, the Lord says in Revelation 22:20, “Yea: I come quickly.”
That is the last word in the Bible spoken by the Lord. Actually, He says it three times in that chapter—in verses 7, 12, and 20.
We know that the Lord’s heart is to return. He is coming quickly. He told us that two thousand years ago. But He is coming quickly for a reason: He is coming to receive His bride, the church.
Sometimes we use the term the Lord’s coming. The Greek word is parousia. It is not a single event at one point in time; it is a sequence of events, multiple events over a period of time.
In the book of Revelation, we see many events: the opening of the seven seals, the dragon, and many other things. These may distract us. What is the main thing?
There is one verse that tells us the key matter in the time we refer to as the parousia. It is Revelation 19:7b:
For the marriage of the Lamb is come, and His wife hath made herself ready.
We may see many things happening in this world. Indeed, the Lord is coming. But only when the wife, or the bride, has made herself ready is there the closing of this age.
This is very important. When we see all the events in the world, we do not know how long it will be before the end of this age. But if the bride has made herself ready, then we know that the next thing is the thousand-year wedding feast, or the thousand-year kingdom.
What does it mean that the bride has made herself ready? What is in the Lord’s heart? I believe that Ephesians 5:27 gives us the character of the church in the heart of the Lord Jesus:
That He might present the church to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.
In Revelation, the bride makes herself ready; and in Ephesians 5:27, we see the condition the church must be in for the Lord to close out this age.
Sometimes we think that there is not much we can do about the Lord’s return because the time itself is in the Father’s hand. Yet that may not be entirely true. In Revelation 19:7, the bride made herself ready.
We also have a word from Peter in 2 Peter 3:11-12a:
What manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy living and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God.
We may say there is nothing we can do, but Peter says it depends on how we live. It depends on the bride. We can hasten His coming—or, looking at it the other way, we can delay His coming.
Everything is in the Father’s hand, but something depends on our response. It is all grace, but it depends on our response.
Two thousand years have passed since the Lord spoke these words to John on the island of Patmos. Since the Lord said, “I come quickly,” we have to ask a question today: Does the church answer to the Lord’s heart today? Does the character of the church today correspond to the character of the Lord Himself?
Is the return of the Lord Jesus delayed because of the unreadiness of the church? Those are very serious questions.
Man may be unfaithful, but the Lord Himself is always faithful. It is wonderful that we find those seven letters in Revelation 2 and 3. They are seven personal letters written to seven churches.
Those seven churches were seven local assemblies, but the letters were not written only to them. They are also love letters to us.
After the seven letters in Revelation 2 and 3, the next words of the Lord in red letters occur in Revelation 16:15:
Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.
After that, the next time we see the Lord speaking directly is when He speaks concerning eternity. Therefore, the seven letters in Revelation 2 and 3 are really His last spoken word to the church, and we must pay attention to them.
The first letter is to the church in Ephesus. What stands out in that letter is first love—first love.
There are different interpretations of the seven letters, which we will not go into today. But if the Lord is speaking to His church and speaks of first love in the first letter, would He not show us the nature of first love in the other six letters? We cannot take one letter by itself; we need to take all seven letters together.
A brother has a book called His Great Love. If you have not read it, go and read it. There is much encouragement in it. He shared a message on these seven letters and said that for years he could not find one word that would give him the key to all seven letters. Then, one time, he saw it: first love. The other six letters speak of the nature of first love.
What is first love? Most of the time, we use the word first to mean earliest. But the Bible uses first to mean something more than that.
In Romans 8:29, the Lord Jesus is the firstborn among many brethren. This does not mean only that He was the first one born; it also means that everyone who comes after Him is destined to be conformed to His image and likeness. That is what firstborn means—not merely earliest.
Then, in 1 Corinthians 15, speaking of resurrection, Christ is the firstfruits. It does not only mean that He was the first One raised from the dead. It also speaks of us, implying that all who believe in Him will be raised from the dead.
Therefore, we need to see that first love is more than merely the love we had at the beginning. That is the point here.
Among the seven letters, the Lord did not tell Smyrna and Philadelphia to repent. The Lord approved them. Those letters show us something of the love that they had.
Smyrna shows us suffering love. For the Lord’s sake, that church experienced tribulation, poverty, accusation from religious people, and imprisonment. Yet they remained faithful unto death. That is found in Revelation 2:9-10.
We see a church in suffering. Something in love is wholehearted devotion to the Lord Jesus, prepared to go through anything for the Lord, even suffering and persecution. It does not matter what people say. Love is stronger than all hindrances. First love is suffering love.
Pergamum had false teachings in the church: the teaching of Balaam, eating things sacrificed to idols, committing acts of immorality, and the teaching of the Nicolaitans.
The teaching of the Nicolaitans brought authority and hierarchical separation among God’s people—special class and second class. All these are false teachings, but the false teachings had come into the church.
They could not discern what was of the Lord and what was not of the Lord. They could not discern the things that differ. What were they lacking? They were lacking discernment.
First love is shown in love that is able to tell the difference. We may say that love is bright; love is not blind.
If we are consumed with a burning love for the Lord Jesus, we will be quick to sense what is doubtful and questionable. We will know, if we are in first love, because we will have godly discernment. We will know what teaching is of the Lord and what is not.
Thyatira is, in some ways, worse than Pergamum. It was not only false teaching; the Bible speaks of the woman Jezebel.
When we go back to the books of Kings, Jezebel led the people of Israel into the worship of Baal—idol worship. So it was no longer merely teaching. It was the worship of idols in the church.
The church had become compromised. First love admits no compromise. There cannot be compromise between idols and God, between self and the Spirit, or between the world and Christ.
First love is uncompromising love: no mixture and no compromise.
Sardis was in a very bad condition. When you read about it, they thought they were alive, but only in name. The Lord Jesus said that they were dead. This is in Revelation 3:1.
The Lord Jesus had not found their works complete before God. In that condition, they were not standing for the Lord, and they were not standing for what is of the Lord. There was nothing definite about them.
They did not stand out as Christians or believers. They did not have one object in their hearts, one thought, or one intent. Therefore, they lacked distinctive love.
First love is distinctive love.
When we come to Philadelphia, in Revelation 3:10, the Lord said that they had kept the word of His patience. That word can be translated as steadfastness: remaining, not changing.
First love means that we can go on. Whatever we encounter, whatever we suffer, we can go on and endure steadfastly. First love is steadfast love.
The last church is Laodicea. We all know that the Lord said, “Thou art neither cold nor hot.” They were lukewarm.
The worst part, to me, is that the Lord Himself said, “I am outside.” Not only, “I am outside,” but, “I am outside of My own house, knocking.” Can you imagine that? The Lord is outside His own house.
The believers there were Christians, but there was little good that could be said about them. They had become very ordinary. Everything had become routine.
The church in Laodicea was characterized by lukewarmness. What is the other side of lukewarmness? Fiery, fervent love. First love is fervent love.
First love is all-inclusive in nature. All these six aspects are included in first love. Everything we can say about love is included: it is selfless, self-forgetting, uncalculated, fiery, hot, strong, and faithful.
Let me repeat it: first love is suffering love, discerning love, uncompromising love, distinctive love, steadfast love, and fervent love.
Before the Lord closes out this age, what must He have in His church? The Lord must have in His church this all-inclusive love—love in all its features—the first love.
I want to share a little about the history of the church in Ephesus. We all know the letter to the Ephesians. They had spiritual understanding and spiritual maturity.
What they did in those early years was that they loved the Lord. They showed first love in those early years. Then something happened: they went astray and departed from the way of first love.
Revelation 2:4 says:
But I have this against thee, that thou didst leave thy first love.
That means they had first love at some point in time. Otherwise, they could not have left it.
As far as history is concerned, it was during Paul’s second missionary journey, around A.D. 52, that Paul came to Ephesus. As was his custom, he went to the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews there.
Paul came back on his third missionary journey, around A.D. 54 to 56. This time he spent much more time there—over two years—reasoning and persuading people in Ephesus concerning the kingdom of God. You can find that in Acts 19:8-10.
I want to describe something that touched my heart: how the Ephesians showed first love. At that time, the people of Ephesus practiced magic.
We may ask, “What is the big deal about magic?” Sometimes we think of modern-day magic as tricks of the hand, where the hand is faster than the eye. But we are not talking about that kind of magic.
In the city of Ephesus, magic had to do with demons, evil spirits, and the underworld. Ephesus also had the temple of the great Artemis. Magic and mythology went hand in hand.
The people believed in magical powers, magical items, and even magical words. Magic was a way of life in Ephesus, and people made a great deal of money through it.
Paul spent two years there, and many people were saved. Here is what they did: they publicly confessed that the things they had practiced were evil deeds.
In magic, it was believed that if you disclosed the spells and words, they lost their power. So they made public the spells and words they possessed, rendering them ineffective.
More than that, they gathered their magic books together and burned them publicly. In Acts 19:18-19, we are told that those books were worth fifty thousand pieces of silver.
Roughly speaking, one piece of silver was a day’s wage for labor. So that was the value of fifty thousand days of labor.
The believers at that time, because they had been saved and loved the Lord, had their first love. They did not care about the cost. They gave up magic and the books they possessed. They made a total break with their former way of life and with others in the city. As far as they were concerned, there was no turning back.
A little later, there was a riot in Ephesus, and Paul had to leave the city and go to Macedonia. Yet Paul loved the church in Ephesus. He had spent two or three years there. The Bible says he admonished each one night and day with tears.
That is how Paul loved the saints—the believers. In Acts 20:27, Paul said that he had declared the whole purpose of God to them. Think about that.
Paul could not have shared this with them if they were still spiritual babies. To me, that means that the believers at Ephesus had hearts so tender toward the Lord that Paul could open his heart and his understanding to them. They had first love.
Of course, we also have the letter to the Ephesians. Some believe it was written during Paul’s first imprisonment in Rome, around A.D. 60 to 62, about three to five years after Paul said farewell to the elders of the church.
If you read Ephesians, you find the eternal purpose of God, the mystery of Christ, the mystery of the gospel, and the mystery of God’s will. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians is sometimes called the high-water mark of the New Testament.
It was written to the people at Ephesus. They had such hearts that they were able to receive all this. They had such first love for the Lord Himself.
So we see the evidence that the Ephesians once had first love. Then we must ask, what happened? Something happened, though we do not know exactly what.
We do have words from the Bible. Timothy later served the Lord in Ephesus. When Paul wrote his last letter, 2 Timothy, to Timothy, there are two matters that especially catch my attention.
Paul wrote this letter only one to three years after he wrote Ephesians. In 2 Timothy 2:20, he says:
Now in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth; and some unto honor, and some unto dishonor.
The house of God is meant to be a great house. Yet Paul uses the expression “a great house,” and we find wood and earthen vessels as well as gold and silver vessels.
The wood and earthen vessels are earthly and dishonorable vessels. The gold and silver vessels are honorable vessels. By that time, there was mixture. There was mixture only one to three years after Paul wrote Ephesians. Declension had set in.
We have already seen that first love is discerning love. They were lacking the ability to discern and to tell the difference.
Furthermore, in 2 Timothy 3:5, Paul speaks of men “holding a form of godliness, but having denied the power thereof.” There were men in the church who had an outward form of godliness but denied its power.
The believers had only external things. They became religious—that is the form—but there was no reality, no spiritual reality. They lacked distinctive love.
From the history of the church at Ephesus, we can see that drifting away from first love can happen very quickly—within one to three years. It must grieve the Lord’s heart. This is a serious matter: they had left their first love.
The church in Ephesus had come so far in spiritual understanding, yet went astray in such a short time. May we have tender hearts toward the Lord and be quick to respond to His correction.
The Lord, in His great mercy, did not stop there. He had not given up on the church in Ephesus. He called them to remember, repent, and do the first works. That is found in Revelation 2:5.
“Remember therefore whence thou art fallen.” That is important. Sometimes we say, “Oh, I repent,” and we try to go on. But that is not the case here.
I think we have all experienced the days before GPS. You drive down the road, miss a turn, and end up nowhere. How do you get back? You have to figure out where you took the wrong turn, come back to that point, and then continue. That is remembering, and that is also repentance.
So remember from where you have fallen, and repent. Repentance is not merely being sorry. It is not merely remorse, a strong feeling of sadness, or regret over something wrong we have done. It is more than that.
Repentance is an action word. It must be translated into something. One translation says it involves a change of mind. It is the realization that we are going down the wrong path, stopping, and making a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree turn. That is repentance.
This matter of returning to where we drifted off is, I think, very difficult for many of us—for me. The Lord says that we remember, repent, and turn.
If there is a place where we have a broken relationship with the Lord Himself—perhaps we are not living in first love, or not loving one another with first love—we have to go back to the place where we offended one another or offended the Lord Himself, and there be reconciled.
Reconciled with God, but also reconciled with one another because of the love of God. Reconciliation is so important—so important for our life. I do not think we are doing enough in this matter.
Then the Lord said, “Do the first works.” In the letter to Ephesus, the Lord mentioned many works that they had done, and He even commended them for certain works. Yet the Lord said that those works were not from first love.
We see the sequence here: unless they returned to first love, there could be no first works. First works are works out of first love. They are not merely works; they are works out of first love.
The other side is also true: without first love, there will be no first works.
What are first works? Again, we cannot find a direct definition of first works in the Bible. The expression occurs only once, in Revelation 2:5. But we can have a glimpse of it in the life of the early church in Jerusalem in Acts 2.
Before we return to Acts 2:42, what is the work of God? The question in John 6:28 was:
What must we do, that we may work the works of God?
Jesus answered in John 6:29:
This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent.
What is doing the work of God? Believing in Him. Everything must come out of that. It is not that you simply go and do a work; it comes from believing in Him. It comes from being in first love.
Let us look again at Acts 2:42:
And they continued stedfastly in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and the prayers.
Pay attention to who “they” were. It was not merely the one hundred and twenty in the upper room. It was the one hundred and twenty plus the three thousand. It was not only those who had long experience with the Lord; it included the newly saved three thousand. There were three thousand one hundred and twenty believers together.
They were together because they had that sense of first love in them. Then we have the word continued. It means unceasingly and uninterruptedly. When we are in first love, time does not matter so much. Time is no longer the main concern.
Then, they were devoting themselves. This means giving oneself, whether in time or resources. Again, when we are in first love, we give our all to the Lord Jesus. We give all; we are devoted.
First, they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ teaching. Of course, we know that the apostles’ teaching is the teaching of the Lord Himself; it is the Word of God.
What did they do in those early days? Because they were in first love, they wanted to know more of the Lord Himself and of God’s Word. They shared the Word of God with one another and with people in Jerusalem. They taught each other.
This teaching was not only for the apostles or the one hundred and twenty who knew the Lord. It included the young believers and the newly saved. They were in His Word.
Then they continued steadfastly in fellowship. Fellowship means sharing something in common.
Think about those three thousand one hundred and twenty believers. They had something in common: the Lord’s life in them. Naturally, when you have something in common, you are in fellowship. You seek one another out in order to maintain fellowship.
In fellowship, they encouraged one another, edified one another, and built one another up.
Then they continued steadfastly in the breaking of bread. They loved the Lord; they remembered the Lord. They came together daily to break bread in remembrance of the Lord.
When they broke bread, they also came to the table—the table of communion. This is not only precious to the Lord Himself; it is also very precious to the Father.
Lastly, they continued steadfastly in prayers. Prayer is important. Prayer inquires into the heart of the Father in heaven so that, through prayer, His will may be done on earth as it is in heaven.
To engage in prayer means that they were engaging in the business of the heavenly Father. These four things are so vital.
That was the life of the early church in Jerusalem among those three thousand one hundred and twenty believers. But we need to ask, what about today? We cannot live in the past.
What is the condition of the church today? We have to ask the question. Fellowship, breaking bread, and prayers are greatly neglected. Even the teaching of the Lord Jesus—the Word of God—is inadequate in many churches. That is the reality today.
So we must ask: has the church left her first love? The Lord knew that the church at Ephesus had left its first love, but we need to know ourselves: has the church left her first love?
Many say that we are in the state of the church in Laodicea. The Lord Jesus is outside His own house. That is very far from a church that is in first love. It is very far from what the church ought to be according to Ephesians 5:27: glorious, without spot or wrinkle, holy and without blemish.
Should we despair? When we come to the point of asking whether His bride will ever be ready for the Lord to return, should we despair?
I want to mention the book The Glory as Seen by Ezekiel. Ezekiel was a priest; he trained to be a priest, and then he was exiled to Babylon.
Yet in those conditions, God came in and showed him a vision of the glory of the Lord. The glory of the Lord endures forever. No matter what Ezekiel saw, God gave him these visions to show him that he could turn his eyes and look at God Himself, look at the glory of God, and that glory endures forever.
Even though man’s condition is so degraded, the purpose of God cannot be undermined.
In the visions, Ezekiel saw all the abominations of the leaders, the priests, the people, and the nations occurring at the temple. That temple no longer answered to God’s heart. God had to withdraw His glory from the temple.
The glory of God left the temple and the city of Jerusalem very reluctantly. Soon after that, physically, the temple and the city of Jerusalem were destroyed.
If God had allowed them to stand, they would have been a false representation of God on earth. That is a very true statement.
Fourteen years passed, and we may think that God was doing nothing. Yet He was working in the hearts of the exiles. He was bringing about repentance, even where people could not see it. They were not aware of it, but He was working in their hearts.
Fourteen years after the destruction of the temple and Jerusalem, God showed Ezekiel other visions of the house of God—not only the house, but also the return of glory to the house of God.
Ezekiel was brought back to a high mountain. The immensity of the scene was like a city built upon the top of a mountain and could not be hidden.
The pattern of this house was very different from the tabernacle built by Moses. It was different from the temple built by Solomon, from the temple built by the returned exiles, and from the temple in the time of Jesus. We have not seen this temple yet on earth.
I want to show you something of this matter of the house of God, especially from the inside out. In the old temple or tabernacle, the glory of God dwelt in the holy of holies. That is true.
But in this temple, there is no division between the holy of holies and the holy place. The glory of God shines through the whole inside of the house. The holy of holies is filled with glory, and the holy place is filled with the glory of God.
Even outside, in the inner court, the house, the outer court, and throughout the whole region, the glory is seen. This gives us reason for encouragement. Even though we may see the church today in the state of Laodicea, God is working behind the scenes, and He is going to have His bride. The Lord is going to make His wife ready for His return.
One particular thing I want to mention is that in the holy place there is only one piece of furniture. This is very different from the tabernacle and the temple.
In Ezekiel 41:22, it is called a table, and it is also called an altar. It is one piece of furniture: a table-altar.
We have already mentioned the table: breaking bread and table communion. We know what the altar means: incense, the altar of incense, and prayer.
So we see that in the heart of God, in the heart of the Lord, He wants His people to serve Him in such a way: communion with God and prayer.
Outside, there is still the bronze altar, the inner court, and the outer court. There, they serve one another, and they allow the Lord to serve them.
That is the house shown to Ezekiel, and that is a vision we need to see.
What we have shared today is this: we must know that the Lord is coming quickly. He says, “I come quickly.” We cannot miss those words.
We have also seen that the bride has made herself ready. We cannot simply hold onto those words; we must ask what they mean. In Ephesians 5, we see the character and nature of the bride.
We have also shared that first love is so important in God’s heart. In the Lord’s letters to the churches in Revelation 2 and 3, we see the nature of first love: suffering love, discerning love, uncompromising love, distinctive love, steadfast love, and fervent love.
As we get closer to the end, the Lord Himself cannot be satisfied with anything less. We may be satisfied with something less, but He cannot. The only thing that satisfies His heart is first love—nothing less.
So the question is: is everything in our life prompted by first love? Or do we do things because of duty, obligation, necessity, some other motive, or other interests? Everything that satisfies the Lord has to be in first love.
The Ephesians had a glorious beginning, but within a few years they went astray. That should be a lesson to us.
We have seen the first works and what they involved in the early church. Everyone was involved—not only a few who had known and loved the Lord for a long time. Everyone, when they had first love, worked out the first works.
These first works involved the Word of God, fellowship, breaking bread, and prayers. These four things are so lacking today, and they need to be recovered.
Are we despairing over our own condition and the condition of His church? The Lord’s word to Laodicea is that they thought they were rich and could see, but they did not know their true condition.
The Lord told them to buy eye salve from Him, to anoint their eyes so that they might see. We need to see. We need to see the vision. We need to buy that eye salve from the Lord Himself.
Today He is preparing His church for His return. Have we seen that we have left the first love? May the Lord search our hearts, whether as individuals or as an assembly together.
If we find that we are no longer in the way of first love, remember the word to Ephesus. Let us remember where we left the first love, repent, return to the way of first love, and do the first works.
Are we doing the first works?
Do we minister to God in communion and prayers? Do we minister to one another in the Word of God and fellowship? Do we minister Christ to the people of this world?
If we find that we are not in the first works, I think we should humble ourselves and ask the Lord to bring us back to first love and adjust our lives so that we may be doing the first works.
Lastly, all seven love letters to the churches end with this phrase:
He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches.
I want to end this sharing with the title of the hymn we sang last time: “There Is a Whisper from the Glory of the Coming of the Lord.”
There is a whisper from the glory of the coming of the Lord. It is a whisper, so it is not loud. Yet it is still a whisper from the glory of the coming of the Lord.
There is much hope as more and more brothers and sisters hear the whisper and their hearts are captured. They repent, return to their first love, and do the first works.
Have we heard the whisper from the glory of the coming of the Lord?
Let’s pray.
Lord Jesus, we give thanks to You for this hour. I confess that I am just an unprofitable servant.
Lord, we do pray concerning this matter of first love and first works. We bring all this back to You. We ask You, Lord, to anoint it. Speak to each one of us.
Lord, I do trust and am convinced that this is what You are after in the time before the end of this age. Lord, we pray, even though we see signs of brothers and sisters waking up to this matter of first love, to return to first love and do the first works.
Lord, we pray for the church. We pray for the brothers and sisters. Lord, take hold of us. Lord, touch our hearts.
Help us to sense Your first love—the first love You have for Your church—so that we may also respond with first love from You, and so that we may also do the first works.
Lord, we ask You to have mercy on our condition. But, Lord, we do trust You. You told Peter that You are building Your church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.
Nothing can undermine Your purpose. Lord, the day shall come when the bride shall make herself ready, and You will bring this age to its end. Then there will be the thousand-year wedding feast, the thousand-year kingdom age.
Lord, we look forward to that. Lord, give us an ear. Truly, there is only a whisper from the glory of the coming of the Lord. Give everyone an ear to hear what the Holy Spirit says to the churches.
So we bring all this back to You, Lord. It is Your work; it is truly Your work. Lord, may You do such a work among Your people today.
Lord, we want to hear. We want to know our condition. We want to return to first love and the first works. Thank You, Lord.
In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.