Revelation 3:14-22 And to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things said the Amen, the faithful and true witness… What, then, is the meaning of this sacred word? It means truth; it means reality. I want to bring before you the awfulness of truth — that is, of reality, of sincerity, of guileless simplicity, both as regards our conduct in the life that now is and as regards the eternal life of man's spirit. First, as regards our earthly life. We may each of us spend our lives either in the world or in God. If we live in God — "if that life which we now live in the flesh is lived by faith in the Son of God" — then we are living in the world of reality. If we are living for the world — if we are setting our affections on the things of the earth — we are living in the midst of fatal delusions and fading shadows. Let a man but once catch a glimpse of the true light, and he learns utterly to despise the dim rushlights of this earth's tinselled stage; let but one ray out of eternity shine down into his heart, and for him the world and the things of the world shrivel into insignificance. God is the Amen, and all His laws are eternal: they abide for ever; they are laws not only of reality, not only of righteousness, but of pleasantness and peace. Earnestly, then, would I invite you all to base yourselves on the "Amen," on the solid and ultimate reality of life, by denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, and living soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. And no less earnestly would I invite you to base your unshaken lives on the Amen of true religion, without which the house of your life will only be built upon sand. The Church depends solely on the presence of Christ. Religious partisans show their greatest zeal always not for God's eternal verities, but for what is doubtful and questionable and valueless, and often they pass over the whole essential message and meaning of the gospel of Christ in order to insist on the grossest misinterpretation of some single text. But God is the God of Amen, that is, of truth. Let us then look to the basis of our faith and the basis of our conduct. "Will ye, by hypocrisy in conduct, will ye, by petty unreality in faith, offer to the God of Truth the unclean sacrifice of a lie?" Reality, sincerity, holiness — the elementary Christian graces, faith, hope, love — the primary Christian duties, soberness, temperance, chastity — these are the things and these are the tests of a true religion; apart from these all else is fringes and phylacteries. (Dean Farrar.) Parallel Verses KJV: And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God; |
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