To the angel of the assembly in Ephesus write These things says he that holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks in the midst of the seven golden lamps
Each of the seven letters opens with a description of the Lord, drawn from the vision John has just seen, and the first one is deliberately broad. It fits not only Ephesus but the whole Christian testimony.
Here we are on broad ground. The characteristics are general. The first letter, the message to the angel of the church in Ephesus, looks at the state of the Christian testimony on the earth in its widest form. It does so, one may suppose, from the days of the apostle John himself. So the Lord presents Himself with the same breadth.
"Angel" here does not mean a heavenly being. Scripture uses the word more widely.
"The angel" is a title we meet again and again in the Scriptures. It has been widely, and we believe rightly, understood to mean a messenger or representative. In Acts 8:26 we read, "An angel of the Lord said to Philip." No one questions that this means the Lord's representative speaking in His name.
The angel stands for the church, not beside it. Praise and blame alike land on him.
There is no real question that the Lord addresses the churches themselves. He says it plainly at the end of each letter: "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches." Yet each time His words are, "To the angel of the church," and the whole address matches that. He puts the responsibility for everything that is wrong on the angel. It is he who tolerates the woman Jezebel. It is he whom the Lord threatens with the removal of his lampstand.
The stars are held, not merely owned. Their light is borrowed, and it lasts only while His hand holds them.
It is only in the case of Ephesus that we see the Lord holding the seven stars in His right hand, that is to say upholding them and communicating His power to them as instituted from the beginning. Without contact with Him, they would have no authority. And if He let them fall from His hand, they would have no more power than all the lesser powers of the world — other stars that we often see in the Revelation leaving their place to fall on the earth to devastate it, or to go out (Rev. 6:12; 8:10; 9:1).
If teaching and rule belong to His hand, human arrangements take what is not ours.
The stars mean the angels, or mystical representatives, of the seven churches. They are responsible for teaching and for government, just as the stars give light and rule the course of time. The gift and authority for both belong to Christ. Man may make rules for the government of the Church, or for the ordination of teachers and pastors. But this really takes over Christ's authority, however unintended.
He is among them, but not in the role we might expect.
Here Christ is not presented as standing among the Assembly to lead the praises of His people. He is not among two or three to guide their prayers. He is not the one Shepherd uniting the sheep into one flock, nor the Head of the Church — His body. He is seen here in the solemn character of the Judge among those who profess to be Christians. He walks (Rev. 2:1) among the Assemblies, observing their condition and passing sentence — approval or blame.
What He measures them by is fixed, and it is not their own opinion of themselves.
He is the One who holds in His right hand of power the seven stars, those who are in the place of responsibility before Him for the assembly, and who now walks in the midst of the seven golden lampstands to survey their condition, to test their state by His word, which is like a sharp two-edged sword, and to judge their character as His responsible light-bearers in the moral darkness of this world. We learn from this, first, that to take the place of rule or responsibility among the saints for Christ according to God is to call in all the sustaining power of Christ; and second, that in weighing the state of an assembly as a witness, the Lord judges by His own unfailing standard of holiness.
The names of the cities are not incidental. Ephesus opens the series because it pictures the beginning.
Take the first one. Ephesus means "desirable," the kind of word a Greek used of the girl he had chosen. Ephesus gives us a picture of the Church as it was in the beginning, when the Lord held the stars (His servants) in His hand, and controlled their ministry. He sent them here and there, just as He would... But human systems have largely changed all that.
- Held. The stars shine only because His right hand upholds them. Let go, they are no brighter than any falling light.
- Held for others. The stars carry teaching and rule, and the authority is His. Arrange ministry by human rules and you take what belongs to Christ.
- Held to account. The Lord writes to the angel, the church's representative, and lays every fault in the assembly at his door.
- Held to a standard. He walks among the lampstands here not as Shepherd or Head, but as Judge, weighing each by His own unfailing standard of holiness.
- Held from the start. Ephesus, "desirable," pictures the Church at its beginning, when His hand still held and directed His servants.
I know thy works and [thy] labour, and thine endurance, and that thou canst not bear evil [men]; and thou hast tried them who say that themselves [are] apostles and are not, and hast found them liars;
The risen Christ opens His message to Ephesus with praise, not complaint: hard work, endurance, and the courage to expose men who falsely claimed to be apostles. Yet one thing is missing from the praise, and the Lord goes on to expose it.
The words "I know" follow from where the Lord has just placed Himself — walking among the lampstands. That has a sharp edge for a church tempted to keep the peace by leaving hard questions closed.
The first expression, found also in the letters that follow, tells us that the Lord always sees the condition of His people. Their state and their activities are always before His eyes, and He examines them. This follows from the position He takes here as walking in the middle of the lampstands. It is good to remember this. There is often a temptation to close up questions, or even to cover up sin, in the assembly — to prevent discussion, or for the sake of peace. That is paying more attention to the faces of men than to Christ, who searches into everything with eyes like a flame of fire. "No creature is hidden from His sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account." (Heb. 4:13.)
The Lord does have a complaint to make. Praise comes first.
The Lord commends before He reproves. He loves to count up what grace — His own grace — has produced in the souls and ways of His people. In these letters we see the Church in its downward course, going from bad to worse. But the Lord is unchanged. He loves to commend His saints when and where He can... Always be ready to own gladly, and to say openly, how much you value all that is good and excellent — especially where evil may be present.
The verse lists "toil" as well as "works." They are not the same thing.
Then the Lord commends the "labour" that marked their works. There may be much service and yet little labour in the service. The word shows that their service called for energy and real toil. It cost these saints an expenditure of labour.
Patience can slide into putting up with evil men. At Ephesus it did not.
There was patience, and this is the first if not the greatest mark that Paul gives of his own apostleship. More than this, nothing breaks down more readily than patience, after it has stood many a trial. But here at Ephesus there was endurance... Again, where there is patience, there might be a tendency to pass over evil, or at least evil men. But it was not so here. They had borne things for His name's sake, but they could not bear evil persons.
Set beside later practice, that refusal looks sharp:
In the days of Ephesus, believers could not bear those who were evil. In our day, discipline in the church is almost at an end. In many places anyone is welcome to share fully in all church privileges, especially if they have a good bank account. In the beginning it was very different. That little Ephesian assembly said, "We don't want growth at the expense of holiness."
The timing of these false claims was no accident.
The apostles were disappearing, and perhaps all had disappeared except John. It is easy to see why Satan would then try to supply men quite willing to claim to be their successors. The church in Ephesus tested these pretended apostles... When men made such a claim, the church stood together in testing them and refusing those who set themselves up to be what they were not.
The testing was not a hunch but a measurement against a known standard.
Moreover, they had tested the claim of some to rank alongside the apostles. They tested it thoroughly, and the light of the signs which marked the Lord's apostles exposed every false claim... The word "tried" means tested, or put to the proof. "Hast found them liars." The groundless claim of these pretenders to apostolic office and authority was completely overthrown, and the men themselves branded as "liars," or, as Paul puts it, "false apostles."
The praise is real. But two words are missing from it.
The Lord is aware of their "labour" and their "endurance." But the springs of "love" and "hope" are missing here. Those two were the source of the labour and endurance of the Thessalonian saints (see 1 Thess. 1:3). The searching gaze of the Lord goes right down to the inner springs of the soul. Those springs give character and energy to every action. When an action is cut off from the spring that alone can give our work spiritual vigour and tone, He exposes it faithfully — in love, yet firmly.
Commentators read these seven letters as tracing the course of the church as well as addressing seven real assemblies.
As Paul had predicted, failure soon began; and at the time this book was written, first love had already cooled, and the seeds of serious evil, both in doctrine and in practice, were already sown. Still, for a time, evil teaching and practice were resisted, and there was much activity and zeal in labour. This is the state of things described in Ephesus.
- He knows. Christ walks among the lampstands and sees everything. Covering a matter for the sake of peace fools people, never Him.
- He commends. What He knows first, He praises first — He counts up what His own grace has produced before naming a single fault.
- He values toil. Their work cost real toil. Their patience was endurance that had already stood many a trial.
- He honours discernment. Patience did not soften them toward evil men. They tested men who called themselves apostles and found them liars.
- He looks deeper. He names labour and endurance. He does not name love and hope as their source, and that missing spring is what He goes on to expose.
and endurest, and hast borne for my name's sake, and hast not wearied
This verse finishes the Lord's praise of the church at Ephesus. They held out, they carried suffering for His name, they never gave up — yet one question hangs over the record: does a list like this prove love?
Before any praise or blame, the Lord says "I know." One writer shows what those two words settle for every church.
The same expression appears in the letters that follow. It tells us that the Lord always sees the condition of His people. Their state and their activities are always before His eyes, and His eyes examine them. This follows from the position He takes here as walking among the lampstands. This is worth remembering. In the assembly there is often a temptation to shut down questions, or even to cover up sin, to prevent arguments or to keep the peace. That pays more attention to people's faces than to Christ, who searches into everything with eyes like a flame of fire.
Plenty of people start well and then stop. One writer treats endurance as the mark that tells real work from a good start.
Then they had patience — endurance. Many begin well, like the Galatians, but give way when unforeseen difficulties come. It is the mark of divine work that it endures. Human energy quickly spends itself; faith draws on a supply that never runs down. It was true faith that was at work in these Ephesian saints.
They carried their suffering for the Name of Jesus Christ. One writer links that Name to something it had already done for them.
Not only had there been endurance, but it continued. They were still enduring when the apostle, "the Lord's secretary," wrote. They had also borne suffering for His Name. They had suffered much and been severely tried, but they carried it all gladly for the sake of the Name of Jesus Christ. Because of that same Name their sins had been forgiven (1 John 2:12).
"Not grown weary" describes someone still standing when everything around them moves the other way. One writer asks what that looks like for the church now.
The verse sketches the position of a soul standing in integrity for God while the current rushes past it. You may find the evil strong, but you have God and you can endure; you can look for the way out that God will provide. What is the position of the church of the living God now? Everything is tottering and shaking. Have you no heart for what is dear to God?
This praise could pass as a full measure of a healthy church. One writer goes through it item by item to show what it cannot prove.
What, then, is the test of "first love"? Not "work" — activity in outward service; they had that at Ephesus. Not even "labour," for they had that too. No, nor "endurance" either — though that is a clearer sign than either of the others of divine power in the soul. Not zeal against evil. Not boldness to examine and refuse the highest claims. Not even suffering for Christ's name, and suffering it without growing weary. All this is good and acceptable to God, and the Ephesians had all of it. Yet the Lord says, "I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first."
One writer notices a silence. Another letter praises the same three things in Thessalonica and names the source of each. Here those sources go unnamed.
They had not "grown weary." There was no thought of giving up the conflict with evil. They had not wearied of the contest, nor wearied in it. What a beautiful picture of devotedness to the interests of Christ! But what about the springs of these holy activities? They are not mentioned — not because they were entirely missing, or there could have been no praise at all... "remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Thess. 1:3). The Ephesian assembly showed work, labour, and endurance. But the "work" seems in part separated from "faith," its moral source. The "labour," too, seems not to have drawn its full strength from "love."
- Seen — Christ walks among the lampstands and examines everything. No church can settle a question by managing appearances.
- Endured — endurance is the mark of divine work. Human energy spends itself; faith draws on a supply that never runs down.
- Borne — they carried it all for the Name of Jesus Christ, the Name that had already brought them forgiveness.
- Unwearied — they stood in integrity while the current rushed past. They never wearied of the contest or in it.
- Yet lacking — not one item on this list is the test of first love. The work went on, but it had drifted from the springs that feed it.
but I have against thee, that thou hast left thy first love.
Ephesus was a hard-working church that endured and refused false teachers. Yet the Lord, who had just praised all of that, says He holds one thing against them — and it is about their love, not their work.
Some older versions soften the charge by adding the word "somewhat." Those versions also read "first love" where the ESV has "the love you had at first," and the writers below use the older phrase. The charge is single, and it is severe.
This uncovers the root of Church and individual failure: the heart has departed from Christ. The fine gold had become dim. The flower was fading… Love is the very heart of Christianity, its crown, and its distinguishing glory. When love is missing, the moral power of Church and individual life is gone. Things may look fine and promising on the outside. Only an all-seeing eye sees the lack within: coldness of heart to Christ… The loss of that first, pure love is a serious matter. We must not treat it as a mere "somewhat," as the Authorised Version does.
Commentators describe it as a heart taken up with Christ, gripped by what He has done in redemption.
Ephesus had gone on well in staying consistent. But that forgetting of self, and thinking only of Christ, which are the first fruits of grace, were gone. As we find everywhere in the Scriptures, nothing can make up for a lack of heart for Christ… First love is that absorption of the heart with Christ. An overwhelming sense of His grace and love in redemption always produces it.
Everything the Lord praised in the verses just before was real. But it was not what He was measuring.
What is the test, then, of "first love"? Not "work" — activity in outward service; they had that at Ephesus. Not even "labour," for they had that too. No, nor "endurance," though that is a clearer sign of divine power in the soul than either. Not zeal against evil, nor courage to examine and refuse the highest claims. Not even suffering for Christ's name, and suffering without tiring. All this is good and acceptable to God, and the Ephesians had it all. Yet the Lord says, "I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first."
Love and works are not rivals. Where love is real, works follow.
It is not that works will be lacking where there is love. The Lord Himself, in this message, links "first love" with "first works." There were indeed works at Ephesus that the Lord could approve. But they were not the first works that come out of first love.
The reproach itself shows how much He cares.
What must Christ be jealous about but His love to the church, which was stronger than death? It is impossible for Him to forget His love to the church. So it is just as impossible for Him to rest content without her love returning to Him. Remember, only love can satisfy love… There may still be much outward fruit in "works, and labour, and patience." But whatever the toil and labour may be, the spring of it all is gone.
The wording matters. Where the ESV says "abandoned," the older text this writer quotes says "left." Either way, they walked away from something; they did not mislay it.
It is not, "lost your first love." I do not think that is a scriptural thought. It is, "left your first love." Something has come in, says that blessed lover in Revelation 2, that has eclipsed Me. All your affection for Me and interest in Me has gone. You can get on without Me now, but there was a time when you could not.
The heart cools in private before anything goes wrong in public.
Any sin a Christian falls into is only the outward act. There were failures in secret before the outward wrong ever showed itself… Notice how significant this is: at the very start of the church's history, love to Christ was already declining. That is the root and starting-point of all failure and sin.
The remedy is a return to the starting point.
The only remedy is to go back to first things. "You have abandoned the love you had at first… Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first." There must be a return to the beginning, and in the beginning Christ was everything. His will came first. He alone was "honoured, loved, adored."
- First — First love means self forgotten and Christ everything. A fresh sense of His grace in redemption produces it.
- Left — Not lost by accident. Something crowded Him out, and He noticed while everyone else saw a model church.
- No substitute — Work, labour, endurance and courage against error were all there, and all praised. None of them can stand in love's place.
- Because loved — He complains because His own love is too strong to accept a smaller return. Only love satisfies love.
- Root — This first cooling is where the whole decline begins. So the cure is to go back to the beginning, where Christ was everything.
Remember therefore whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works but if not, I am coming to thee, and I will remove thy lamp out of its place, except thou shalt repent.
The risen Christ walks among His churches. Here He speaks to one that was busy, discerning and patient — yet had let its love for Him cool. Verse 5 is His remedy: three commands, and a warning if they go unheeded.
The first word sends the church backwards, not forwards. Commentators read this as a rule that holds everywhere. You cannot see how far you have slipped until you compare where you stand with where you began.
The first clause holds a principle of the first importance, one the Word affirms again and again. To discover the character of our failure, or how far we have backslidden or departed from the truth, we must always go back to the beginning. For example, we can only see the true state of the church today by comparing it — or rather contrasting it — with what it was when it was first founded at Pentecost.
They were to recall a height of love, not a record of achievement. Even the city's name carries that idea.
The Lord never forgets His joy in the first love of His people. He never forgets Judah's first love. He remembers the Church's first love just as much, and He desires it — which is, in fact, what "Ephesus" really means. Remember the moral elevation you once occupied. To what depths you have fallen!
Memory alone only produces nostalgia. The second command is harder. It means seeing yourself as Christ sees you.
In the eyes of others the assembly at Ephesus might well look like a model assembly. In the sight of Christ it was fallen. The assembly must not only remember; it must repent. It is useless to grieve over the loss of early freshness if there is no repentance. What is repentance but owning our true condition before the Lord?
Verse 2 has already credited this church with works. So the call to do the first works cannot mean simply more activity. The difference lies in what drives them.
Recover "first love" and the "first works" will follow as a matter of course. To human eyes these may look just the same as the works mentioned in verse 2, but to His eyes they are very different. He judges everything by the motive behind it. The mainspring matters so much to Him that if first love is damaged for good, the ability to shine departs and the lampstand is removed.
"I will come to you" is not the promise of Christ returning for His people. It is a coming that deals with the church where it stands, like His warning to Pergamum.
With Ephesus, the only coming described is a providential coming: "or else I will come to you quickly, and will remove your lampstand out of its place." It is the same with Pergamum, where He fights with the sword of His mouth. But this is not His coming to receive the saints, nor to bring in His kingdom.
Older translations add the word "quickly" to this verse, and the ESV leaves it out. The difference matters, because the sentence on Ephesus was not carried out in a hurry.
"Or else I will come to you." He does not say "quickly" here, though our text has it, as it does at the later stage of evil in verse 16. "And remove your lampstand out of its place." He is slow to carry out judgment. This is the warning of the final removal of the assembly from its place of lampstand responsibility. That sentence is only put into force in Laodicea.
The lampstand is the church's place as a light-bearer. Losing it can look like a small penalty for a heart grown cold.
This may seem harsh treatment for such an offence, but the Lord looks to the final consequences. A church that was once taken up with work may grow cold in its affections. For a while it may escape scandalous evil and corruption, but it has lost its security. If it does not repent, its fall is sure, though it may be delayed. Its lampstand will be removed. It will stop bearing the light entrusted to it. God will openly disown it as unfit for His use.
Losing the lampstand raises an obvious fear: is salvation itself at risk?
Removing the lamp as a light-bearer does not in any way weaken the eternal security of all who build on Christ — the Rock of Ages.
The severity is not coldness. A church exists to show the world what Christ's love is like.
He cannot let anything remain in the world that fails to show the great love with which He loved the church. If He did, He would not be "the faithful and true witness." This tender, faithful reproach is the blessed proof that His love never grows cold, however much ours may fail.
- Remember — measure today against the beginning; that is the only way to see the fall.
- Repent — not regret over lost freshness, but owning your true condition before the Lord.
- Redo — the first works look the same as busy works. The motive behind them is what differs.
- Removal — this coming is a visit in judgment, not the coming for His people. What it takes away is the lampstand, the place of light-bearing.
- Rooted in love — the reproach itself proves His love never cooled, however much ours has.
But this thou hast, that thou hatest the works of the Nicolaitanes, which *I* also hate.
The Lord's letter to Ephesus has already praised their work. Then He mourned their lost love and warned of coming judgment. Before He finishes, He goes back to praise, singling out one thing they shared with Him — a hatred.
The order matters. The rebuke and the threat of judgment come first. Then the Lord finds something still worth naming.
Whatever the condition of this assembly, the Lord cannot hold back the expression of His love. He had given a solemn warning of coming judgment unless she repented. Even so, He returns to commendation. "Yet this you have: you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate." (v. 6.) So far there was communion with His mind. This is what draws out His approval. History suggests the Nicolaitans were a sect who turned the grace of God into loose living. They combined a profession of faith with ungodly lives. Ephesus hated their impurities, and so did Christ.
Notice what exactly the Lord and the assembly hate here.
The absence of love has been mourned, but hatred, love's opposite, was rightly present. The Nicolaitans were not hated, for they shared in the general love of God (John 3:16). But their works were hated, and for this the angel is commended. They must have been works of a decidedly evil character to call out such a stern word of condemnation.
Commentators differ over who these people were. One writer raises the question and leaves it open:
The name of some sect whose deeds and doctrines are condemned without being described. Rev. 2:6, 15. Many suggestions have been made about the teachings of the Nicolaitans, but nothing is known with certainty. Since both their 'doctrine' and their 'deeds' are mentioned, and Christ 'hated' both, it has been thought they were libertines.
Others work from the meaning of the word itself and reach a different picture — not immorality but domination:
Here, if we are left simply with the name, it is startling and instructive enough. Of course, to those who spoke the language, the meaning would be no hidden or obscure thing. It means "Conquering the people." The last part of the word ("Laos") is the Greek word for "the people." It gives us the common term "Laity." The Nicolaitans were just those who put down the laity — the mass of Christian people — so they could wrongly lord it over them.
The same name comes back later, in the letter to Pergamos. The two letters do not treat it the same way.
Something comes before the state of Pergamos, and it is mentioned in the very first address. But there it is clearly incidental, and does not mark the state of things. In the first address, to the Ephesians, the Lord says, "Yet this you have: you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate" (2:6). Here it is more than the "works" of the Nicolaitans. There are now not merely "works," but "doctrine." And the Church, instead of rejecting it, was going along with it. In the Ephesian days they hated the works of the Nicolaitans. But in Pergamos they "had" those who held the doctrine, and did not condemn them.
Ephesus had lost love yet kept this hatred.
Love and hatred of evil will always be found together. The Psalmist says, "O you who love the LORD, hate evil!" (Ps. 97:10). A false kindness may ignore evil under the excuse of love. It may even treat evil doctrine as of little importance to the Lord. Genuine love will lead us to hate evil without ignoring the good. In our hatred of evil we may overlook much good; or, in trying to hold on to the good, we may compromise with evil.
- Commendation. After the rebuke and the threat of judgment, the Lord goes back to praise. He will not hold back the expression of His love.
- Communion. What He commends is agreement with His own mind. They hated what He hates, and this draws His approval.
- Works, not people. The Lord aims His hatred at works, never at persons. The Nicolaitans themselves shared in the general love of God.
- Uncertainty. No one can say for sure who they were. Some take them as an impure sect that turned grace into loose living. Others read the name as "conquering the people," a class lording it over the rest of God's people.
- Progression. Ephesus hated these works. Pergamos later put up with the same evil as doctrine. Evil that is no longer hated ends up accepted.
He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the assemblies. To him that overcomes, I will give to him to eat of the tree of life which is in the paradise of God.
The letter to Ephesus ends the way all seven letters end: with a call to listen and a promise held out to the one who overcomes. Both halves raise questions. Why does the Spirit speak to "the churches" in the plural, when this letter goes to one church? And what does it mean to eat from a tree Adam was shut out from?
The call singles out one person at a time, not a category of specially qualified believers.
Scripture nowhere recognizes a middle class of hearers. If such a class existed, the Spirit would surely address it. But everything here is intensely individual. "He who has an ear, let him hear" points out at once the overcomer and the need of overcoming, and the promise goes with this... There is to be an overcoming now in the Church of God itself, and so no going along with the crowd is possible. Each must be awake to his responsibility.
The words are the Lord's, yet the verse says the Spirit speaks them.
The Lord addresses the Church, and the Spirit applies in power the words of the Lord to the individual with the opened ear.
The plural wording widens the audience beyond Ephesus.
Then comes the general call: "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches." It does not say "to the church," but "to the churches." So the one who has an ear must weigh not only what the Spirit says to his own church, but what He says to all the others. The call is therefore general, and goes to all believers.
In this letter the call to hear comes before the promise. From the fourth letter on, that order flips.
Here the notable change takes place. The call to hear begins to follow the promise, instead of coming before it. The reason is that a remnant is here formed... The Lord from then on puts the promise first, because it is useless to expect the church as a whole to receive it. In the three previous churches, as anyone may notice, the call to hear comes first. The Lord is still dealing with the general conscience of the church.
What has to be overcome? The letter itself names it.
Overcoming here is overcoming the evil specified in the Assembly. What the Lord deplored in Ephesus was the loss of their first love. Anyone who regained that first love — by grace, and by the Spirit's power working in the opened ear and heart — would be an overcomer in the sense of this Scripture. He would have a right to the special promise given here.
Some copies of the text add the words "in the midst of." One writer traces those words to a copyist thinking of Eden.
Note carefully that the words "in the midst of" have no place in the true text here... It was doubtless a thought of Eden in the copyist's mind that put them in. In the paradise God made for man in Eden there were two trees: the tree of responsibility, which is the knowledge of good and evil, and the tree of life. But in the Paradise of God there is only one, and it fills the whole sphere. It is Christ. He endured the judgment of it on the cross and became our life. So all the history of our responsibility and our failures will be over for ever.
The garden Adam lost was man's. The one promised here is God's.
It is to the eye and ear of faith that the Lord brings out the promise of the tree of life in the paradise of God. He sees the church failing in fellowship with God, and so He sets before it the tree of life and the paradise of God. It is God's paradise — blessed security! There can be no falling away there. It was man's paradise first. Then failure came in. To keep man from taking the fruit of the tree of life, and eating, and living for ever, God drove him out. But now the promise to the one who overcomes is to eat of the tree of life freely, and in security, in the paradise of God.
Scripture also says where this paradise is:
2 Corinthians 12:2 and 4 identify Paradise with "the third heaven" — the immediate dwelling place of God. Revelation 2:7 speaks of it as "the Paradise OF GOD," where the tree of life is.
- Hear personally. Scripture names no middle class of listeners. The call lands on one conscience at a time, and each must be awake to his own responsibility.
- Hear widely. The Spirit speaks to the churches, so every believer weighs all seven messages, not only his own.
- Hear and overcome. At Ephesus, overcoming means facing the fault the letter names. First love comes back by grace and the Spirit's power.
- Hear and eat. The reward is Christ Himself as the tree of life. The tree of responsibility is gone, and one tree fills the whole scene.
- Hear and stay. God drove Adam out of man's paradise. In God's paradise the overcomer eats freely and in security, with no falling away.