Section I. To the Angel of the Ecclesia in Sardis
1\. Also to the angel of the ecclesia in Sardis write: These things saith he having the Seven Spirits of the Deity and the Seven Stars: I have known thy works, that thou hast the name that thou livest, but thou art dead. 2\. Become thou vigilant, and strengthen the things remaining which are about to die: for I have not found thy works perfected in the sight of the Deity. 3\. Be mindful therefore what thou hast received, and heard, and strictly keep it, and be changed. If then thou have not been vigilant, I shall be come upon thee as a thief, and thou mayest not at all have known at what hour I shall be come upon thee. 4\. Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments: and they shall walk with me in white robes, because they are worthy. 5\. The victor, he shall be clothed in white garments; and I will not at all obliterate his name from the scroll of the life, and I will openly confess his name in the presence of my Father, and in the presence of his angels. 6\. He that hath an ear let him hearken to what the Spirit saith to the ecclesias.
p. 352 In this writing the Revelator introduces himself to the Star-Angel, or Eldership, of the ecclesia in Sardis as “HE having the Seven Spirits of the Deity and the Seven Stars.” He that hath these spirits and stars in possession and at his absolute disposal is the resurrected, exalted, and glorified Jesus, who at his last interview with the apostles said, “All authority hath been given to me in heaven, and upon earth.” This was not so before his crucifixion, for he was not then “in the right places of the power divine,” or “on the right of the Majesty in high places;” or, as it is also expressed by Paul, “sitting on the right of the throne of the Deity;” all of which are kindred to that of Stephen’s who said, when the heavens were opened to him, and he saw God’s glory, and Jesus who had stood out from the right (or heavenly places—Eph. i. 20) of the Deity (εστωτα εκ δεξιων του Θεου)—“I see the heavens opened, and the “Son of Man who has stood out from the right places of the Deity”—Acts vii. 55, 56; Mat. xxvi. 64; Heb. i. 3; xii. 2.
“All authority hath been given to him,” although “the power” of the Deity, or Theos, has not yet been exerted to put all things in the heavens and earth political in subjection under him. This was very plainly taught by Paul some thirty years after Jesus declared that all authority was given to him, in Heb. ii. 6-9, where, in commenting upon part of the eight Psalm, he says, “We see not yet all things put under the Son of Man; but we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of the death, crowned with glory and honor.”
The possession of all authority and power (εξουσια and δυναμις) though not necessarily exercised because possessed, is intimated in the writing before us by the declaration that “he hath the Seven Spirits of the Deity” at his command. As we have seen elsewhere, “seven” is the symbol of perfection; and consequently expressive of the omniscience, omnipresence, and omnipotence of the Spirit—the Holy Spirit—in inseparable combination with the exalted Jesus; who has thereby become “the Image of the invisible Theos;” the Image, in whom “all the fulness dwells;” “the Anointed in the Theos,” or Deity; the “Theos manifested in Flesh “by the Effluent Logos; and the “King of kings and Lord of lords.” All these sayings are apocalyptically represented by “the Lamb that had been slain, having Seven Horns, and Seven Eyes;” which are interpreted as representing “the Seven Spirits of the Deity sent forth into all the earth.”
The exalted Jesus then, is now the embodiment of the Seven Spirits, also represented by “Seven Lamps of Fire burning before the throne”—Apoc. iv. 5. Hence also, “he holds the Seven Stars in his right hand.” These seven stars, the reader will not need to be informed, p. 353 are no longer upon earth. The Embodied Seven, in present individual development, has exercised his authority, and withdrawn them from the corrupt and faithless constituents of the defunct presbyteries of the ecclesias. The starry fires have been extinguished, as threatened in the epistle to the Star-Angel of Ephesus, “Be changed, and do the first works,” said the Spirit; “but if not, I come to thee speedily, and will remove the lightstand out of its place except thou alter”—ch. ii. 5. But instead of an alteration for the better, the pre-Constantinian Christendom became worse and worse, until it attained the condition typified in that of the ecclesia in Sardis, which had only “a few names who had not defiled their garments.” There are now no presbyterial stars in Asia, nor elsewhere. “The Spirits,” or gifts, have been withdrawn by him who gave them, when he had ascended and received gifts for men; and will be withheld until “christendom” arises from the death into which it has sunk to the life of the coming Aion.
The Spirit still shone in the angel of the ecclesia in Sardis, to which John was ordered to write. But, though “the Angel” had the gifts, these did not perfect the works of the members of “the Angel,” nor preserve them from death in trespasses and sins. The Angel-Presbytery had “the name,” or reputation, among its contemporaries, of being alive, but, in the estimation of the Eternal Spirit they were pronounced to be “dead.” There must have been a very general corruption, and departure from first principles, at the close of the first century, for the Eldership of the ecclesia in Sardis, which was really in a dying state, to be regarded as living in health and power. This was, doubtless, the opinion of Nikolaitanes, false apostles, Baalamites, and the children of Jezebel, constituents all of the synagogue of the Satan, whose “depths,” “teaching,” and seductions, had swamped the truth in Sardis. They proclaimed “the Angel” there to be a star of living brightness; for had not they of the angel the gifts; and if they had not a living name before the Deity, would he not withdraw them? But these spiritual gifts only remained because of “the few names which had not defiled their garments;” with these exceptions, “the Angel” was dead. The presence of this few constituted it a body “about to die,” or a dying body, so that in their absence, it was “dead.” They were the only living element in it, and when they should be removed, the extinction of the Spirit-Light in their midst would come upon them “as a thief.”
How different is the Deity’s judgment of men and things from that of the thinking of the flesh. The case of the Star-Angel in Sardis proves it. The general christian public regarded it as flourishing in spiritual life, while the Spirit pronounced it to be actually dead. This diversity has obtained ever since. In our day, the dead bodies of “the religious p. 354 world,” styled “names and denominations of christians,” all consider themselves to be in the enjoyment of the health and vigor of spiritual existence, and high in the favor of the Most High. They call themselves “the churches of the living God,” and their temples, the houses of God. They glorify themselves as the especial favorites of heaven, and their clergies as the ambassadors and ministers of the Lord. But, were the Spirit to write to them as he did to Sardis, he would say, “I know thy works, that thou hast the name that thou livest, but art dead.” They do, however, differ from “the Angel” in Sardis in this, that whereas the Sardian body was once alive, they never were. However, so much the worse for the Sardians, for, as Peter says, “It had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them.” They “had received and heard” what the clergies and peoples of the pious world of this day have no conception of. They had “received” “the things of the kingdom of the Deity, and the name of Jesus Anointed;” and had heard them to “the obedience of the faith” in immersion into and for the name of the Holy Ones. But “it had happened unto them according to the true proverb, The dog is turned to his own vomit again, and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire”—2 Pet. ii. 21. The moderns are “dogs” that have never turned from their vomit, and “sows” that have never been “washed” from their native mire. Their end will therefore be less bitter than that of “the Angel” in Sardis. This body has passed away, and so will our contemporary names and denominations, by the judgments of the Lord; but the professors constituting “the Angel” must rise again, and stand in the presence of the Deity, who will condemn their works as “not perfect,” and expel them from his presence, to be “hurt of the Second Death”—ch. ii. 11. Not so, however, the constituent members of the sects and parties of this day. These have never lived. They have always been “dead in trespasses and sins,” and, however pious, have been always hopelessly ignorant of the truth. The people and the “reverend” Sin-spirituals who “guide” them, are a region of the shadow of death, into which the light cannot shine, so as to dispel the darkness, until “the Lord the Spirit” is revealed in his glory. Like the helpless heathen in Paul’s day, who found the God of Israel without seeking after him, because he forced himself upon their attention, the moderns are living under “times of ignorance,” which “God winks at.” They have the scriptures, it is true, but the traditions of the schools, dogmas and institutions, imposed upon our generation by its dark-minded progenitors, have enslaved the minds of clergy and people, so that they cannot and dare not think in opposition to established opinions; p. 355 and being so thoroughly imbued with these, the scriptures to them have become sealed and unintelligible. They are dead, and consequently “alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them.” The Angel in Sardis was “twice dead,” and since “plucked up by the roots;” but the moderns, never having had spiritual existence in God, will be less sorely dealt with; yet will they not rise to life, the primary sentence upon our race binding them hard and fast with chains of darkness in the dust—Gen. iii. 19; Isa. xxvi. 14; xxxviii. 18, 19.
Sardis was once a great and splendid city, but now as dead as “the Angel-Presbytery” through which the light of the Seven Spirits shone for the divine illumination of its Jewish and Gentile inhabitants. It was the renowned capital of Croesus and the rich kings of Lydia. It was about thirty-three miles to the south of Thyatira. It is now no more than an ignoble village of low and wretched cottages of clay, with no other inhabitants than shepherds and herdsmen, who feed their flocks in the neighboring plains. The Turks call it Sart, or Sard. The surrounding ruins are of great extent and grandeur, and abundantly show how large and splendid a city it was formerly. There are a few living in the place called “christians” by their Turkish masters. They do not, however, represent “the few names which have not defiled their garments,” but contrariwise, the “dead” after “the things remaining which were about to die” had actually become defunct. Even their temple has become a Mohammedan mosque, and they, with senseless stupidity, sustain a miserable servitude. Their predecessors contemporary with the apostle John, were exhorted by the Spirit to “become vigilant, and strengthen the things remaining which are about to die, or he would be come upon them as a thief.” Had they done so, and continued faithful in all future generations, Sardis would doubtless have been a bright exception to the surrounding desolation. But the fate of the city is indicative of the persistency of their apostasy from what they “had received and heard.” The Saracen locusts and the succeeding Euphrateans, have consummated the evil which began to afflict them in the extinguishing of the Spirit-Lightstand in the primitive ecclesia of the city. In the desolation, moral and material, which exists in the Turkish Sard, we have an illustration of what are the consequences of the Eternal Spirit “having come upon” a people “as a thief.” Gloom, misery, and death, ignorance and superstition, now reign over this once populous, wealthy, and enterprising capital of the Lydians. The Spirit came upon them as a thief, and swept them with desolation, because they would not be mindful of his word. And such is the fate prepared for all who similarly offend.
p. 356 The presbytery in Sardis was exhorted to “become, vigilant.” This implies that it was not so when the Spirit caused John to write. It was even then “about to die,” but, from the exhortation, evidently not so far gone but that it might recover. Their “works” were not such as the Deity approved. Heretical opinions subversive of the faith had crept in. Though the particular heresies are not specified as in former epistles, whatever they were they were of a nature to defile. This appears from the fact, that they who “kept strictly” what they had originally “received and heard,” had preserved their garments from defilement. Others had not been mindful to do this; but had received and heard something else, so that their garments were defiled. Whatever the dogmas were, though it might gratify curiosity to know, it matters not; this, however, is certain, that they worked death in those who received them. This is the sure influence of all thinking not in strict accordance with “the law and the testimony.” Whatever is not of the truth is defiling before God. Every “reasoning,” lofty conception, and thought not according to the knowledge of God, is polluting, and engenders disobedience and apostasy. The faith is perverted, and the practice marred. Such was the condition of the presbytery in Sardis—defiled by human tradition and dead; a type of all “christendom” at this day.
But even in this city of the dead there were “a few” living ones—a remnant, that “contended earnestly for the faith once for all delivered to the saints,” and kept it. These were of the same class as “the rest among the Thyatirans” who held not the teaching of Jezebel; nor had acknowledged the depths of the Satan as they taught. They watched and kept their garments, that they might not walk naked, and be exposed to shame, at the coming of the Lord—ch. xvi. 15. “Blessed” are such; for, saith the Spirit, “they shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy.”
1. “Walk with Me in White”
The reader is requested to refer to what has been already written on the clothing of the constituents of the symbolic “Son of Man” at page 169, under the caption of “Clothed to the Feet,” in illustration of the promise of the Spirit to the few undefiled in Sardis. To walk with him in white robes is to be the subject of an union with the Spirit such as obtains now between Jesus and the same. Jesus now walks with the Spirit; for “whithersoever the Spirit goeth” he, as the preéminent of the Cherubim, also goes—Ezek. i. 12, 20. Hence, as this obtains with p. 357 respect to him, it will also with them; for it is written, that the redeemed from among men “follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth,” which is equivalent to walking with the Spirit—in material and personal union with him.
But they shall walk with him “in white robes,” εν λευκοις. Those who walk with the Spirit must be “worthy.” The “few” in Sardis are declared to be such—“they are worthy,” saith the Spirit. Their robes must be of moral and material whiteness. Their character being pure and unstained, their nature must be made to correspond. In the present state, the saints are invested with holy garments, termed “their garments” in the writing before us. Having “put on Christ” by faith in the kingdom and name, and by immersion, he is for them a robe of righteousness; and by walking in him according to the truth received and obeyed, and so yielding the fruit of the Spirit, they “keep themselves unspotted from the world,” which is as a garment of “fine linen, clean and white,” which symbolizes the righteous actions—δικαιωματα—of the saints—Rev. xix. 8. These premises constitute the basis of their exaltation to holy spirit nature. This is “white,” or pure. It is the incorruptible and deathless body, undefiled by the affections and lusts of our present nature, “in which dwells no good thing.” Hence, then, he that walks with the Spirit in white robes is a righteous, incorruptible, and deathless man. To “clothe” the undefiled few in Sardis, “in white garments,” is for the Spirit from heaven to reorganize their dust, and having modeled it after his own image as “the Heavenly Man,” to give it life with incorruption, glory, and power. Thus will the resurrection-life of Jesus be manifested in their mortal flesh; and thus will they “be clothed upon with their house which is from heaven; by which operation their “mortality will be swallowed up of life”—1 Cor. xv. 42; 2 Cor. iv. 11; v. 2-4.
2. “They are Worthy”
Belief of the gospel of the kingdom and immersion, while they are indispensable to worthiness, do not alone constitute men “worthy.” The constituents of the Angel-Presbytery had all believed the gospel and been immersed, yet they were pronounced by the Spirit “dead.” This faith and obedience gave them an orthodox standing among contemporary Christians, who supposed that they were enjoying spiritual life; but the Spirit, who sees not as men see, declared that they were unworthy of his favor, because “their works were not perfected in the sight of the Deity.” They were in the case of a man who says “he p. 358 hath faith, but hath not works.” This is the reason why the Spirit testified that they were “dead;” for he had said by James, that “faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.” The Angel in Sardis said they had faith; while “the few” in the same city “had works.” They all claimed to have faith; they had all believed the gospel and been immersed; for in the time of the apostles none were recognized as Christians who had not thus consented to “the wholesome words of the Lord Jesus.” But how were the “worthy” to be distinguished from the unworthy? By their professions? No; the “dead” undertook to “show their faith without works;” but the Spirit rejected their claim, and gave his approbation to “the few,” who “showed their faith by their works,” as Abraham their father did, “whose faith” in the promises of the Deity “was perfected by works,” whereby he obtained the honorable and exalted title of “The Friend of the Deity.”
Contemporary with the apostles was one named Clement, who for nine years was a member of “the Angel” of the ecclesia in Rome. He wrote an epistle to the ecclesia in Corinth for the purpose of healing schisms that had arisen there after Paul’s death; and which he terms a quarrel with their pastors from a weak partiality for one or two persons.” There is a paragraph in this epistle, much approved by “the evangelists” of our day, which, if taken in the sense they put upon it, place him in fellowship with the class in Sardis, termed by the Spirit “dead.” His words are these:
“All these,” he is speaking of the Old Testament worthies, “were magnified and honored, not through themselves, not through their own works, not through the righteous deeds which they performed, but through HIS WILL. And we also by his will being called in Christ Jesus, are JUSTIFIED not by ourselves, nor by our own wisdom, or understanding, or godliness, or by the works which we have wrought in holiness of heart, but by FAITH; by which the Almighty hath justified all, who are or have been justified from the beginning.”
Milner, the ecclesiastical historian, introduces this passage by saying that “the distinguishing doctrine of Christianity, without which indeed the Gospel is a mere name, and incapable of consoling sinners, is doubtless justification by the grace of Christ THROUGH FAITH ALONE. See the testimony of this in Clement. It deserves to be distinctly remembered, as an unequivocal proof of the faith of the primitive church”—Vol. I. p. 79.
From certain passages in this epistle, we apprehend that Clement was one of those “pious pastors” living at the close of the first century, who passed current for “ministers of righteousness,” like the many in Sardis; but was in reality “dead,” having to a considerable extent acknowledged p. 359 “the depths of the Satan as they taught.” Speaking of Peter, he says, “having suffered martyrdom, he departed to the due place of glory;” and of Paul, he says, “having suffered martyrdom from princes, he left the world, and reached the shore of a blessed immortality.” This is Platonism, and stamps the faith of Clement with reprobation. If anything had gone to “the due place of glory” after Peter’s death, it must have been, in Clement’s opinion, what the heathen term his “immortal soul;” and if “the due place of glory” and “the shore of a blessed immortality” be somewhere arrived at before resurrection, the promises covenanted to Abraham and David are nullified as superfluous. A man holding such unscriptural notions is a very unfit exponent of “the faith of the primitive church.”
But in relation to justification, we rather think that “the evangelists” have misunderstood Clement. What he says above is true enough of the justification of sinners. These are justified by faith in baptism. If they believe the gospel of the kingdom in its mystery, their faith without regard to their previous works, good, bad, or indifferent, is counted to them for justification, at the time when they are in the act of obeying the truth, in being immersed. This is not the clerical idea of justification by faith alone. This consists in a sinner attaining to a persuasion that Jesus died for him; and that in having reached this conviction, the blood of Jesus is thereby applied to his immortal soul, and he is justified. This may be an instantaneous operation, and totally independent of all knowledge of the scriptures, as evinced by “conversions” every day. We do not believe that even Clement, who believed in the resurrection of the fabled Phoenix from its own ashes, had any idea of such a justification by faith alone as this; and sure we are, there is no such justification taught in the bible from one end of it to the other. Clement was treating of the justification of sinners; not of the justification of saints. Sinners are justified from all their past sins in the way stated, and so become saints. As saints, “faith alone” will not save them. James teaches this clearly. “By works a man is justified, and not by faith only.” He is writing of a man, who, like Abraham, had already become a saint. The saints are justified by works, but the saint who seeks to be justified by, or to be pronounced “worthy,” by faith alone, is like his faith, “dead;” for “faith without works is dead”—dead as that of the many in Sardis.
But, however heathenish some of his creed evidently was, Clement cannot be classed with the dead faiths in Sardis, upon the ground of denying the necessity of good works to the perfecting of a previous faith. He evidently believed it necessary for all saints, who would “be accounted worthy” by the Spirit, to be rich in good works. p. 360 “Shall we,” says he, “neglect good works? Does it hence follow that we should leave the law of loving obedience? God forbid; let us rather hasten with all earnestness of mind to every good work; for the Lord himself rejoices in his works. Having such a pattern how strenuously should we follow his will, and work the works of righteousness with all our might.”
They who pursued this course were pronounced “worthy.” They “received” the gospel, and “heard” it by obeying it; and thenceforth, “patiently continuing in well-doing,” sought thereby “glory, honor, incorruptibility and life” in the Aion—Rom. ii. 7. Thus, their faith was perfected by their works; and, as Jesus taught, “they were accounted worthy to obtain that Aion, and the resurrection from among the dead,” after which “they can die no more; for they are equal to the angels; and are the Sons of the Deity being the children of the resurrection”—Luke xx. 35. In this way they are “clothed in white garments,” and “walk with the Spirit in white robes; for they are worthy.”
3. “The Book of Life”
Even the few names in Sardis had to save themselves by their perseverance, upon the principle that “he who perseveres to the end shall be saved.” Hence, the Spirit saith, “the victor, he shall be clothed in white garments.” This is positive. But in order that he may be assured of the perpetuity of his clothing, that it shall never wax old, as garments are accustomed to do, it is added, “And I will not at all obliterate his name from THE SCROLL OF THE LIFE.” In the English Version, this is rendered “book of life” without the definite article; but in my translation I have prefixed it to life as in the original. It is the scroll of THE life, that is, of a special life.
The first place in the New Testament where this phrase occurs is in Phil. iv. 3. Here Paul mentions certain “whose names are in a book of life”—εν βιβλω ζωης; among whom is Clement, one of his fellowlaborers; but, whether the same Clement, who wrote about “the due place of glory,” can only be conjectured.
It next occurs in Apoc. xiii. 8 and xvii. 8. In the former it is styled “the Scroll of the Life of the Lamb slain;” and in the latter, simply “the Scroll of the Life.” It is next found in ch. xx. 12, 15. In the former of these verses, it is termed “another Scroll which is of the life;” and in the latter as elsewhere. In ch. xxi. it is “the Scroll of the life of the Lamb;” and in ch. xxii. 19, the phrase is “a Scroll of p. 361 the life,” the article the being omitted before “Scroll.” These are all the places where it occurs in the New Testament.
This is the most important of all books; for if a man’s name have not been inscribed upon it, he cannot possibly be saved; for it is written that whosoever of the dead, small and great, standing before the Deity at the opening of the Scrolls, shall not be found written in the Scroll of the life, shall be cast into the lake of the fire. These are those who worship the Beast, by whom the saints have been overcome.
From these testimonies there would appear to be two scrolls,—the one styled A scroll of the Life, and the other THE scroll of the Life. These two scrolls are opened at the setting up of “THE GREAT WHITE THRONE” of judgment, at the epoch of resurrection. Certain things having been written in these scrolls, the resurrected are judged from them. These things are their works. One of these scrolls will present a very unseemly aspect—a sort of EVERY-DAY BOOK OF LIFE, in which names of believers are inscribed with very disreputable mementoes appended to each. These will find no admission to “the other scroll which is of the life”—THE LEDGER OF THE LIFE, to which those names may be supposed to be transferred from the Every-Day Book, that are not condemned to obliteration. The dead constituents of the Angel of the ecclesia in Sardis, together with the few undefiled ones there, had all been written in the Every-Day Book of the Life; and their works inscribed under their respective names: and the general record of this scroll is read in the writing penned by John. He shows that the works therein recorded resolved themselves into two classes; the one signalized by the words “thou art dead” after their names, and the other by the sentence, “their garments undefiled.” Now of these classes, the names of the latter alone will be transferred to the Ledger; while the names of the former will be obliterated or excluded. The confession of names in the presence of the Father and in the presence of his messengers, will be read, not from the Every-Day Book, but from the Ledger of the Lamb’s Life, which contains the register of names inscribed there, απο καταβολης κοσμου, from the foundation of the order of things extant.
This is styled the scroll of the life in allusion probably to the custom of oriental monarchs, who, as they had several books for the record of things, so they had a peculiar book, in which they entered the names and actions of all those who did them any special service, that they might reward them in due time. See Esther vi. 1-3, where it is styled “the Book of Records of daily affairs.”
The Scriptures make very early mention of the existence of such a p. 362 book before the Lord. Moses refers to it in Exod. xxxii. 32, saying, “If thou wilt, forgive thou Israel’s sin; if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written. And Yahweh said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book.” The Spirit in David says, “Are not my tears in thy book?” that is, “Are not my sorrows in thy remembrance?” Hence “book” and “remembrance” are associated in Mal. iii. 16, where it is styled “a book of remembrance;” as, “They that feared Yahweh spake often one to another; and Yahweh hearkened and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared Yahweh, and that thought upon his name. And they shall be mine, saith Yahweh of armies, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will have compassion upon them as a man hath tender affection for his own son that serveth him.” This is evidently the book of the life, or the Ledger; for all written in it are precious with God in a day when the wicked are trodden down. Daniel also refers to the same book in testifying that, in the time of trouble when the books shall be opened, “every one of his people (the Saints) shall be delivered that shall be found written in the book”—xii. 1.
The Ledger book of the life is styled apocalyptically “the Scroll of the life of the Lamb slain”—Rev. xiii. 8; xxi. 27. It is contrary to the law of symbol-writing to regard this as a book in the vulgar sense. There is something in the real thing to which a book of record has some resemblance or analogy. Such a book is for remembrance of deeds. Hence the name given to the book of life in Malachi (which in the Old Testament includes both the Day Book and the Ledger) “a Book of Remembrance.” Scroll, then in this relation, is symbolical of remembrance by whatever system of means it may be compassed. “I will remember their sins no more,” which is equivalent to, “I will blot out the record of their sins from the book of my remembrance;” or I will pardon them. Hence to pardon is equivalent to inscribing the name of the subject in the Day book of the life; or to placing him in God’s remembrance for resurrection unto life even for the life procured by the sacrifice of the Lamb of God, if found to be “worthy.”
But, how is a man’s name inscribed on the memory of God for resurrection? In answer to this, it must be remarked, that the Spirit of THE INVISIBLE ONE is the remembrancer of His dominion. Whatever the Spirit remembers is written, so to speak, in the book of remembrance before God. “God is Spirit; and they who worship him must worship him in Spirit and truth”—John iv. 24. Pardon is the result of Spirit-and-truth worship. Now the relation subsisting between the Spirit and the Truth is one of intellectual and moral p. 363 identity; so that he who hath the truth hath in him the mind, the thinking, and teaching of the Spirit: but he that hath not the truth, is destitute of the Spirit, and not a true worshipper. It is the Spirit-Word that quickeneth; and therefore Jesus says, “It is the Spirit which is life making; Spirit is and life is the words which I speak to you”—John vi. 63. And again, he says, “The Spirit of the truth proceedeth from the Father”—vi. 26; and, “The Spirit of the truth shall guide you into all the truth”—xvi. 13; and bring all things to your remembrance”—xiv. 26; and John, the beloved disciple of Jesus, adds, “the Spirit is the truth”—1 John v. 6. We are considering things mental, not physical. The Spirit in its physical relations is the divine power that creates, fashions, and sustains all things; and will raise the dead, and subdue all things to God. But in opening men’s eyes, and turning them from ignorance to knowledge, and from the service of the adversary to God; and in recording them in his remembrance, it is the truth believed and obeyed that is the agency employed. The Spirit is the Remembrancer; or symbolically, “the Scroll or Book.”
It is by the truth, called “the word of the truth of the gospel of the kingdom,” (Acts xx. 24, 25; Col. i. 5,) believed and obeyed, that relations are established between men and God. This is the spiritual connecting medium that links them to his throne in their present state; and, though men in the general think very little of “the truth,” because they are natural liars and ignorant of it; yet His eyes are ever upon it, and he has “magnified it above all his name.” “Sanctify them by thy truth; thy word is truth”—John xvii. 17; and, “Ye have purified your souls in the obedience of the truth through Spirit.” Hence, the truth is sanctifying and purifying; and, as the truth is God’s, and precious to him, and always before his mind, the sanctified are his peculiar treasure. Their names are therefore inscribed in his book of remembrance by their union to the truth in the obedience it enjoins.
Paul styles the baptized believers in Corinth, “an epistle of Christ written with spirit of the living God.” The writing, he says, was done through him and Timothy, as the instruments. God, Paul, spirit, and Corinthian hearts held a similar relation to each other in the writing of the epistle, (and all similar churches collectively, made, as it were, a Book of Epistles,) that head, pen, ink, and paper, do to an ordinary letter. The mentality of God was by the process stamped upon Corinthian hearts, so that they became part of his thoughts; and while he is written upon their memory, they are also written upon his, who is the way, the truth, the resurrection, and the life. Hence, to be written in the scroll of the life, is to be “in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus p. 364 Christ,” and they in him by the Spirit—truth dwelling in their hearts—2 Cor. iii. 3; 1 Thess. i. 1; Eph. iii. 17; John vi. 54, 56.
God, or the Father, manifested through his Sons by the Spirit, which is the one God-manifestation to us, (see 1 Cor. viii. 5, 6,) is the Arboretum of the lives. Wherefore, to be in the book of the life is to be part, and to have part, of the tree of life, as it is styled in the English Version. This understood, will account for a various reading in the Greek text of Rev. xxii. 19. Book of Life and Tree of Life are different symbols related to the same thing. The oldest manuscripts extant read, “God shall take away his part from the tree of life;” but more recent ones, “out of the book of life.”
4. “The Life of the Lamb”
The life of the book is peculiar. It is “the life of the Lamb slain.” The present life is hereditary and natural. It comes to us based upon the sympathies of flesh, which “profits nothing” in relation to that which is “the Lamb’s.” He gave his life as a price for the purchase of life for many brethren—Matt. xx. 28. It is therefore styled “the life of the Lamb slain;” and a right to it is predicated on a justification unto life” which results to a believer from the obedience of faith, or doing the commandments of God—Rev. xxii. 14. The dead enter upon this life, then, by resurrection, because of righteousness. Sin was the original cause of their death, for “the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit (gives) life because of righteousness”—Rom. viii. 10. From the very nature of things, therefore, the righteous, or the Saints, they who are sanctified by the truth, they only can be on record in God’s remembrance for the life of the Aions. All others inherit the life of flesh because they are flesh; and have an existence bounded thereby, because they walk after the flesh, in the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life. Thus, death and corruption are the horizon of the flesh; incorruptibility, life, honor, and glory, the boundless expanse to them who sow to the Spirit of God. “If ye live after the flesh ye shall die, but if, through the Spirit, ye do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by the Spirit (or the truth) of God, they are the Sons of God”—Rom. viii. 13, 14; Gal. vi. 8, 9.
But “the scroll of the Lamb’s Life” is not yet opened. When the Lord God shall have judged the Woman Jezebel, who sits upon the Scarlet Beast of the many waters; when he shall have killed the beast with the sword, (Rev. xiii. 10,) and have utterly burned her with fire, p. 365 (Rev. xviii. 6-8,) he will have “prevailed,” and, in prevailing, have opened the Book of Epistles, the Book of Seals, and the Little Book of Vials. But in order to open these, he must first open the Book of the Lamb’s Life. It is as necessary to the opening of the first three books, that “truth should spring out of the earth,” as that “righteousness should bow down from the heavens”—Psal. lxxxv. 11; for the Lord Jesus above, and the Saints, his brethren, at present in the earth beneath, are the associates to whom it is appointed to coöperate with the Spirit in the execution of “the judgment written”—Psal. cxlix. 5-9. He who was dead, but now is living for the Aions, has the keys of the invisible and of death which reigns there—Rev. i. 18, so that until he appears, “the Gates of the Invisible”—Matt. xvi. 18, will remain closed upon the Saints, and the Book of the Life will be unopened. Their resurrection is the opening of the Book of Life, or God’s remembrance of them practically demonstrated in their deliverance from death. Spirit-truth inscribed them on his memory, and Spirit-power, the same Spirit of God that revealed the doctrine through prophets and apostles, raises them from the dead, or opens the gates of the invisible, by Jesus; and then will be verified the words of Paul, who says, “If the spirit of him who raised up Jesus from among the dead dwell in you, he who raised up the Christ from among the dead shall also make alive your mortal bodies by means of his spirit indwelling among you”—Rom. viii. 11. “I am always bearing about the putting to death of the Lord Jesus in the body, that the life also of Jesus, (the Lamb’s life,) may be manifested in our body. For we, the living, are always exposed to death on account of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh.” And, “he who raised up the Lord Jesus shall also raise us up by Jesus, and shall present us with you,” when “mortality shall be swallowed up by life”—2 Cor. iv. 10, 11, 14; v. 4. This is the Lamb’s life—immortality of body, a living incorruptible body, evolved from the ashes of the former body by the Spirit of God, therefore a Spiritual Body, or SPIRIT, which are equivalent terms in the case; born from the invisible by resurrection, which is the opening of the house of death. Thus, “that which has been produced from the Spirit is spirit”—John iii. 6. The resurrected spirit-body is one of “the invisible things” of the Aion to come, and therefore aionian, in the Common Version termed “eternal.” It is the aionian house—the house aionian from heaven, and in the heavens—which is explained in the words, “Our commonwealth subsists in heavens, out of which also we wait for a deliverer, the Anointed Lord Jesus, who shall remodel the body of our humiliation, that it may become conformable to the body of his glory”—2 Cor. v. 1-4; Phil. iii. 20, 21. The beginning of p. 366 the citizenship is the putting on Christ as the righteousness of the adopted. Hence it is written, “as many of you (believers) as have been immersed into Christ, have put on Christ”—Gal. iii. 27 Christ Jesus who is in the heavens, is “put on” by individuals on earth, who “believe the things concerning the Kingdom of God and the Name of Jesus Christ, and are immersed”—Acts viii. 12. In doing this, their citizenship begins; and it begins in the heavens, because Christ, whom they put on, is in the heavens. In so becoming citizens of Israel’s Commonwealth, their citizenship is recorded in the Every-Day Book of the Lamb’s Life—their names are borne on his breast, after the type of the names of the twelve tribes of Israel being borne on the breast of Aaron, when he wore the official breastplate on which they were engraved. In other words, the Lord Jesus Christ, the High Priest after the Order of Melchizedec, (Psal. cx. 4; Heb. v. 6; vi. 20; vii. 17, 21; Zech. vi. 13,) though personally absent from earth, is, by the Spirit, not far from every one of us (Acts xvii. 27, 28.) He is still as observant and forecasting of the truth as he was in the days of the apostles, although, indeed, he abstains from direct miraculous interposition in its behalf. When one believes and obeys the truth, he becomes “known of God,” and therefore of Christ—Gal. iv. 9; for to come in the obedience of faith to the knowledge of God in Christ-manifestation, is to be known and acknowledged of him. Christ is in his heart by faith, (Eph. iii. 17,) and he is in Christ’s heart, or breast, on the same principle—Christ in the believer, the believer in Christ, and Christ in God: and therefore, the believer “in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ.” This is what “the obedience of faith” accomplishes for a man in the present state.
Now such a citizen is in a waiting position. His faith lays hold of Christ within the vail. His thinking concentrates there. On earth bodily, his mind is anchored within the vail—Heb. vi. 19; for the “anchor of his soul” is the hope of Christ’s departure from the far country where he now is; and that he may unveil himself, the vail of mortal flesh being no longer a curtain excluding the believer from “seeing him as he is”—1 Jno. iii. 2. His hope is, the manifestation of Jesus εξ ουρανου, out of heaven. Thus, he is looking, or waiting, for him, that he may come and remodel or transform him in the twinkling of an eye—1 Cor. xv. 51, 52; or, if he may have been previously “laid aside” in the earth, that he may build him up, and convert his mortal remains into “a house not made with hands,” that it may become a habitation for God, who shall dwell in it by Spirit—Eph. ii. 22;—a habitation produced by Jesus Christ, the life-imparting Spirit, at his appearing, and therefore styled, το οικητηριον ἡμων το εξ ουρανου, our habitation from heaven.
p. 367 The putting on additionally (επενδυσασθαι, aor. 1. infin. mid., the word used by Paul 2 Cor. v. 2, and rendered in the C. V. “to be clothed upon”) the present nature of Christ, as it was added to his mortal body; or the clothing of our flesh with incorruptibility and life, is “presence with the Lord.” When the body of our humiliation is conformed to the body of his glory, “we shall be like him,” and see him as he is;” and not before. Till this corporeal transformation is effected, we are “absent from the Lord.” It cannot possibly be otherwise; for until “the books are opened,” none are delivered; for until then judgment is not declared;” nor can any man “enter into the temple till the seven vial-plagues are fulfilled”—Rev. xv. 8; and much of the seventh remains to be fulfilled by the conjoint operation of Messiah and the Saints. The temple in the heaven is undeveloped. It does not exist in the “far country” where Jesus is now; but belongs to his Aion on the earth. He comes to coöperate with the Saints in its development. When the work is finished they will be with him “in the heavens;” and no more plagues will afflict the world for a thousand years. The books are not yet opened. This being indisputable, it is certain that no dead saint is with the Lord, or in heaven. No reward is given till the book of life is opened: and that book will not be opened until all have been recorded there, who may yet obtain right to the wood of life composed of many trees. “Thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just”—Luke xiv. 14; and “the Son of Man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and THEN (after this event) He shall reward every man according to his works”—Matt. xvi. 27; and again, “When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, THEN (after this coming) shall he sit upon the throne of his glory”—Matt. xxv. 31. These are “the wholesome words of the Lord Jesus” published to Israel in his proclamation of the gospel of the kingdom; and they define with great exactness the time of the opening of the book of his life—at the resurrection when he comes to sit upon the throne of his glory; this is tho great epoch of judgment and reward.
It is the Lamb’s life as opposed to the first Adam’s life; and to that hypothetical existence, fabricated by the philosophizings of Sin’s flesh. Adam’s life is flesh sustained in action by blood, air, and electricity, or by digestion and respiration; and transmitted by natural laws. The fabulous existence elaborated by the unenlightened thinking of Sin’s flesh, is that theory upon which all superstition is based—the conceit of an inborn ghost, deathless and having independent existence, apart from all corporeality. This incorporeal abstraction the Devil, that is, Sin’s Flesh, has denominated “THE IMMORTAL SOUL.” This p. 368 serpentine philosopher, whose pious lucubrations “deceive the whole world”—Rev. xii. 9; xx. 2, 3—teaches, that it is “the vital principle,” the real man, and the true image and likeness of his Maker! Religion, he says, is for the preventing of all immortal ghosts who sincerely repent of their sins, from falling into eternal torments, to which they are all liable by an eternal decree; and for their emigration from earth on angels’ wings to kingdoms beyond the skies! This is the gospel of the Archdeceiver of the world; and preached substantially by all the “Holy Orders” of his establishment; and all mankind, in their Names and Denominations of Blasphemy, go “wondering after” the abomination. So long as the serpent in the flesh can charm them with such vanity they will remain unregistered in the book of the Lamb’s life, and be obnoxious to the plagues of the Little Book in which it is written, that “for the fearful, and UNBELIEVING, and the abominable, and murderers, and harlotists, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and for all the liars (the “clergy”) their part is in the lake burning with fire and brimstone,” being there “tormented in the presence of the holy messengers, and in the presence of the Lamb”—Rev. xxi. 8; xiv. 10; xix. 20; xx. 14, 15. The life purchased by Jesus for his brethren has no affinity with such a fiction. He purchased life for dead bodies; not happiness for immortal ghosts. “This is the testimony, that God gives aionian life to us, and this life is in his Son; he who hath the Son, hath the life; he who hath not the Son of God, hath not the life”—1 Jno. v. 11, 12; and “shall not see life; but the wrath of God abides upon him”—Jno. iii. 36.
5. “Confess His Name.”
It is promised to him who shares in “the victory,” that he shall, not only “be clothed” with incorruption, and “his name” remain perpetually inscribed among the deathless; but that his name shall be honorably mentioned in the august presence of the Eternal Majesty of the Universe, and before his angelic hosts. This promise to the undefiled, whether in Sardis or elsewhere, at that time or in previous and after ages and generations, reads in the English Version, “I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels.” The word in the original is emphatic. It is not simply ὁμολογησομαι, but the same word with the preposition εξ prefixed “I will confess his name from out of” something. The import of this is, “I will connect myself with his name as one selected from among others, whom I reject, because their works have not been found perfected in the sight of the Deity.” This is the renewal of the promise given by the Spirit through Jesus, and p. 369 found in Matt. x. 32, and Luke xii. 8. In these places, he says, “whosoever shall confess in me before men, in HIM will I also confess before my Father who is in heaven;” and “whosoever shall confess in me before men, the Son of Man also will confess in him before the angels of the Deity.” These, it will be seen, differ from the English Version, which makes no account of the proposition εν, twice repeated in both of the original texts. In these it is εν εμοι and εν αυτῳ, which I have rendered IN me and IN him, according to the primary signification of the word. The Spirit in Jesus promises here to be also in all who are in him, on condition of their confessing him before men. This excludes the notion, that the promise applies to men not in Christ who with their lips say, that they believe that Jesus is the Christ. Such a confession as this was made by the demonized; or men who, in the nomenclature of Luke, had each “a spirit of an unclean demonion.” Under the influence of this affection, they confessed, that Jesus was the Christ, the Holy One, the Son of the Deity—Luke iv. 34, 41. But this confession availed them nothing; for, he rebuked them, and put them to silence. This, nevertheless, was confession before men; but it was a confession that did not proceed from men of the right class, the class defined in the text. The demonized were not in the Spirit, nor was the Holy Spirit in them. The spirit in them was the spirit of their flesh insanely excited. They were madmen “in the flesh,” whose confession the Eternal Spirit would not accept.
And to descend from the first to the nineteenth century, we find society almost entirely constituted of the demonized. The Spirit testifies this in the saying, that “all the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of the Great Harlot’s prostitution”—Apoc. xvii. 2. The people and their spiritual guides are thoroughly imbued with “an unclean spirit,” by which they are bewitched in all their parts and faculties. They are all, as Paul predicted they would be, in apostasy “from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits, even to the teachings of Dæmonia, falsely speaking in hypocrisy: their own conscience having been cauterized; forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats”—1 Tim. iv. 3. Such are the DEMONIA defined by Paul. Society is full of them; for every ocoupant of a pulpit that does not preach the gospel of the kingdom which he proclaimed, is a deceiver teaching falsely, and therefore, as Paul styles him, “a deceiving spirit,” or “Daimonion.” When these, and the multitudes they call “their people,” confess that “Jesus is Christ, the Son of God,” it is the unsanctified confession of the demonized. They are not “in Christ,” for they have neither “received” his doctrine, nor “heard,” or obeyed it in the obedience it prescribes.
p. 370 The promise of the Spirit, then, that He will confess in them in the Father’s presence, and in that of his angels, is not to individuals clerically demonized. The promise is to those “IN” the Promiser. The testimony in Matthew and Luke was spoken primarily to the disciples in the presence of Jesus; and, secondarily, to all disciples in Christ in after times. In the discourse, he alluded to the persecution they would have to endure on his account. That it would be persecution unto death; which, however, they might escape, if they would deny him and the truth. But, being in him, he exhorted them to steadfastness; so that, if they should lose their soul or life (την ψυχην) for his sake, they should find it, in the Spirit’s confessing in them before the Father and his angels. Many in Christ apostatized, or “departed from the faith,” when they were brought to the test of “confessing before men” in authority and power, at the risk of property, liberty, and life. Like Demas, they forsook Christ, “having loved this present world;” and will, consequently, be denied hereafter.
It may not be amiss to remind the reader here, that to be in the Spirit who speaks to the undefiled in Sardis, is to have the faith, which is “the substance of things hoped for, and the conviction of the things unseen;” and to have it so as to love it, that the faith may work in him by love, and purify his affections; and that being thus prepared, to be immersed into the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. When he has been the subject of this transforming operation, by which his moral nature and state have been changed, the words of the apostle, in Gal. iii. 26-29, are applicable to him: “Thou art a son of the Deity in Jesus Anointed through the faith; for as many as have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ: and if Christ’s, then Abraham’s Seed, and heirs according to promise.” Such an one is “in God the Father, and in the Lord Jesus Anointed,” and therefore in the Spirit—2 Thess. ii. 1; and competent to confess in him before men.
Having shown this, it remains to define how the Spirit will himself confess such a confessor before the Father and the angels. “I will confess his name before my Father.” This is the apocalyptic equivalent for “I will confess in him.” In John xvii. 22, Jesus prays to the Father that all his brethren “may be one, even as we are one; I IN THEM, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect IN ONE.” To be made perfect is to be raised from among the dead, and made incorruptible and deathless. Thus Jesus was “perfected the third day”—Luke xii. 32; Heb. v. 9; and became the Author of aion-salvation to all who obey him. A saint made perfect in this sense is as much “spirit” as Jesus now is; for John, speaking of what the saints shall p. 371 be when made perfect, says, “we shall be like him, and see him as he is”—1 John iii. 2. Then the prayer of the Logos, ascending from the mouth of Jesus to the THEOS from whom it emanated, will be answered—that “I,” the Logos, may be “in them,” the saints. When he is thus in them, their names will STAND OUT CONFESSED—exomologized— before the Father of the glorified Jesus—“the Spirit”—and the angels. Hence, when this unity is established, whatever the Spirit confesses is confessed in them and in their midst; and he whom they have praised and honored in word and deed, in the present state, will celebrate their excellency in the future.
6. “His Name.”
A name is representative of a person. It is a word or term by which an individual is designated. That which is inherited or bestowed at birth, indicates the relationship and attributes of flesh and blood to certain specialties. John Smith, by proving that he is the heir at law of the deceased William Smith, may inherit his estate; but in relation to “the life of the Lamb slain,” there is nothing in the name “John Smith” that gives him any claim upon it.
The scriptures, which treat of all things pertaining to life and godliness, have delineated the character to which all must be conformed who would be inscribed in the book of the Lamb’s life. John Smith may have the name, or reputation, of being conformed to that character, while he is only so in pretence, or not really. He is, then, like the members of the Star-Angel in Sardis, who were “dead;” he has “a name that he lives;” but it is good for nothing.
The name to be confessed before the Father is one that is “holy, unblameable, and unreproachable in his sight.” It is representative of one who has “continued in the faith, grounded and settled, and not moved away from the hope of the gospel.” This suggests a time when the subject received the name. It was not when he was born, or sprinkled according to the formula of the catechism children are taught by rote. It has no relation to human “godfathers and godmothers,” who have been introduced by ignorance and superstition, as substitutes for the divine. The name is called upon the subject when faith is manifested in the obedience it prescribes. James styles it το καλον ονομα, the honorable, excellent, or distinguished name, which had been called upon those to whom he wrote—ch. ii. 7; and Peter, in answer to the inquiry of the believing multitude on the day of Pentecost, told them to be “every one of them immersed upon the name of Jesus Anointed into p. 372 remission of sins.” Thus they were grafted, as it were, “upon the name,” which became their designation before the Father.
The subject having been called by this name in baptism, it became “his name”—the name to be confessed if preserved undefiled, and were duly illustrated by him who had been ennobled by it. Many inherit the name of a distinguished ancestry, which is brought into contempt by their misdeeds; so there have been many who have disgraced the name, more exalted than any other name, to the privileges of which they have been introduced. Their character has not been conformed to the divine example incarnated in Jesus; “who, though he were a son, learned obedience by the things which he suffered;” having been obedient even unto death, his name became illustrious; but in their keeping after being named upon them, it became a by-word and reproach. But the undefiled in Sardis were not such. They preserved it unsullied; and in the name confessed, and kept it as their own to be celebrated by the Spirit in the presence of his Father and in the presence of his angels, the messengers of his power.
“He that hath an ear let him hearken to what the Spirit saith to the ecclesias.”