Not a Shelf but a Shout

I, John, your brother and companion in the suffering and kingdom and patient endurance that are ours in Jesus, was on the island of Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. On the Lord’s Day I was in the Spirit, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet, which said: “Write on a scroll what you see and send it to the seven churches: to Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia and Laodicea.” Revelations 1:9-11

Each of the Apostles writes from a personal perspective that invites us to fellowship with them, John describes himself as a brother and a companion. He does not see himself as a mystic or a guru or demigod. Beware of spiritual rankings; they are always attempts to make men more like gods than to acknowledge that God became a man. John paints himself as man in fellowship with God. He writes, “Our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ” but not until he first says, “We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us” John is concerned with delivering a message that leads us to relationship with the Godhead and he wants the message of that fellowship to be based on truth. “If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth.” The truth is that the life a Christian leads should be hard. We are only John companion if there is a measure of suffering within the kingdom that requires some patient endurance.

John is an old exiled man when he is writing to us. He must have concluded that he was done and put on a shelf until his passing into glory. Wearied with age biblepath.com states, “he had to be carried to the church in the arms of his disciples. At these meetings, he was accustomed to say no more than, "Little children, love one another!" After a time, the disciples wearied at always hearing the same words, asked, "Master, why do you always say this?" "It is the Lord's command," was his reply. "And if this alone be done, it is enough!" I do not know the veracity of this story I do know that it is keeping with the character of the man who laid upon the breast of his savior.

Patmos was the shelf in which the living epistle of John the beloved was to collect dust and grow silent. It becomes the setting of pen placed on scrolled parchment that would roll through the history of mankind and call us to awe at the majesty of the master.

John was worshipping on the Lord’s Day, the seventh or the first day of the week, when Jesus spoke to him and said write and send. They were messages for specific churches in John’s generation and the things that were written to them were written for our example. I am cautious of teaching that tries to divide the churches into ages and epochs. Numerous scholars share this caution, to quote only one;

“The Seven Churches are representative of all churches everywhere in all time. There is no sound reason to make these to represent 7 progressive historical periods of the church age. All attempts to do this are transparently artificial. There are churches having these kinds of problems in every generation." - Willard Ramsey, in "Zion's Glad Morning."

I want to find Jesus’ message to me and to you in each of comments these churches. I hope you will join me in patient endurance as we journey through the word of the Lord as recorded in the book of Revelations. Like John, we might believe that you have been put on a shelf, but the greatest illuminations of the Word of God are in front of you not behind you. Rise Up! Hear the Trumpet Blast of him whose voice is like rushing water. You may fall down as dead, but you will rise up with the Word of the Lord in your mouth.