The Philadelphian Conqueror
"Behold! I am coming quickly. Hold on to what you have,
so that no one will take your crown. Him who overcomes I will make a pillar
in the temple of my God. Never again will he leave it. I will write on him
the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem,
which is coming down out of heaven from my God; and I will also write on him
my new name."—Revelation 3:11-12.
Again the trumpet sounds. 'Behold!' It is the trumpet of
Advent. 'Behold, I come quickly!' The Master is at the door. What then? Hold
fast! 'Hold fast that which you have.' As if one of the special temptations
of the Church would be to let go her principles; to turn her back upon the
truth which once she held; to contradict not only herself, but the truth of
God. And all under that name of progress! "We are men of progress, therefore
we must be tolerant! Narrow views are bigotry and narrowness; tolerance is
advancement and development—large-mindedness and nobility of soul!"
Hold fast that which you have, that no man takes your
crown! In letting go what we have, we lose our crown. Such stress does the
Master lay upon consistent adherence to our testimony to His name.
Again the conqueror is set before us. For each of the
Churches there is warfare, and victory is to be our aim. A daily battle and
a daily victory! The good warfare and the glorious victory. Of this victory
let us now hear the reward.
I. The conqueror is to be a temple-pillar. Not
an outside, but an inside pillar. Not a door, nor a wall, nor any mere
vessel or utensil; but a column, a fair and majestic column 'in temple of my
God.' The interior colonnades or double rows of tall pillars in some
churches and temples (such as that of St. Paul's Cathedral, outside of
modern Rome), set upon marble floors, upholding marble roofs and arches, are
splendid beyond description. There the pillars stand, each in itself an
obelisk or a monument, beautiful in their matchless symmetry, tall as the
palm, and pure as the snow. Day and night they stand there, looking down
upon the temple and its worshipers, listening to its songs, and veiled in
its incense. They are part of the vast fabric; not like those who minister
there, going out and in, but standing immovable in their surpassing beauty.
Such is the reward of the Philadelphian conqueror. An
everlasting inhabitant and ornament of that sanctuary of which we read, 'I
saw no temple therein; for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple
thereof.' They shall go no more out! Their home is the innermost shrine in
the heaven of heavens. Like Jachin and Boaz (1 Kings 7:15, 21), there they
stand forever. As the Church is here the pillar and ground of the truth, so
are they hereafter. As Barnabas and Cephas are called 'pillars,' because of
their noble pre-eminence in upholding the truth, so are these conquerors to
be. And as pillars were used of old for affixing royal proclamations, so
that from them came forth the voice of the king, so shall it be with these
conquerors. Like the seven pillars which Wisdom hews out for her house
(Proverbs 4:1), they stand. Witnesses for Christ they were here, with
'little strength;' witnesses for Him they shall be hereafter, when that
which is sown in weakness shall be raised in power. Here they kept His word
and denied not His name; there they shall stand as His faithful ones forever
and forever.
II. The conqueror is to be inscribed with glorious names.
It is said of Christ that He has on His vesture and on his thigh
a name written, 'King of kings and Lord of lords.' It is said of the
redeemed in glory that they have their Father's name written on their
foreheads (ch. 14:1); so here on these Philadelphian pillars are many names
to be inscribed, each of them unutterably glorious. The inscriptions ennoble
the pillar; and the pillar displays aloft the inscriptions to the gaze of
'the great multitude that no man can number.' These inscriptions are written
by Christ Himself—'I will write.' As He engraved Israel upon the palms of
His hands (Isaiah 49:16), so does He engrave these names upon these
temple-pillars, that they may be eternal witnesses to them in the glorious
sanctuary; for throughout eternity His redeemed are to be His witnesses and
His conquerors—pre-eminently so. All saved ones are to tell something of
Him—His conquerors most. The inscriptions to be thus engraved are as
follows:
(1.) The name of my God. This is the name which God
proclaimed to Moses, the name which is the summary of His blessed character,
as the God of all grace. As He made Israel's names to shine out from the
twelve gems of the breastplate, so does he make His own name to shine out
from these pillars; quarried, hewn, polished, set up by the Holy Spirit, and
engraved by a greater than Bezaleel or Aholiab—by Christ Himself. What
honor! To be the marble on which Jehovah's name is carved, and from which it
shall blaze forth in the eternal temple!
(2.) The name of the city of my God. 'God is not
ashamed to be called their God, because He has prepared for them a city.'
And the name of this city is to be engraved on these pillars in connection
with the name of its builder and maker. The city's name is New Jerusalem,
and 'it comes down out of heaven from my God.' The city is theirs; and, as
its citizens, they are to have its name written upon them. Other pillars set
up on earth by man have the names of deities, or kings, or warriors, or
cities engraved upon them. But this inscription excels all in glory. It
shines out in its own brilliance, irradiating the pillar itself, and the
whole temple where that pillar stands.
(3.) My new name. This is the new name given by
Christ, which no man knows but he who receives it—a name, the like of which
has not yet been known on earth; a name which shall embody in itself some
peculiar honor and blessedness which we know not now, but which we shall
know hereafter. We need not try to guess it—we would but fail. It will be
made known in due time, when the battle is won and the reward is given to
the conqueror.
All this is because, with but 'little strength', this
Philadelphian Church had kept Christ's words, and not denied His name. The
reward is to correspond with the service. For the keeping of the word, there
is to be the recompense of the pillar with a divine inscription; and for the
owning of the name, that inscription is to consist of the most glorious of
names. Reward and service are ever made to correspond by Him who duly
appreciates the service of His saints on earth, and knows the peculiar
circumstances of trial or difficulty, or pain or weakness, in which the
service was performed.
Small may be our strength in these last days. The tide of
error, and sin, and worldliness may be running very strong. It may not be
easy to confess Christ, or to hold fast His truth. But His grace is
sufficient for us; and woe be to us if we give way to the errors of the age,
or conform to its vanities, or seek to please its multitudes, either under
the dread of public opinion, or the fear of not being reputed 'men of
progress,' or the shrinking from more direct persecution and hatred!
Faithfulness to Christ, and to His truth, is everything, especially in days
when iniquity shall abound, and the love of many shall wax cold.
Fear not! The reward is glorious! The honor is beyond all
earthly honors! The contempt and enmity are but for a day—the dignity and
the blessedness are forever and ever!
What though men call you narrow-minded for cleaving to
'old truth'—now obsolete, as they say; for 'worship of a book,' or
biblioatry, as they call it; for the stern refusal to lower our testimony to
our glorified Lord and coming King? Let us be content to bear reproach for
Him and His word. The glory to be given us at His appearing will more than
compensate for all.