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One thing which Ephesus had Thyatira wanted, and it was a blessed want; nothing is said of Thyatira's "toil." The temper which animated the Church made all its service joyous, Therefore the Lord's commendation is so full and unreserved; He does not talk of removing the candlestick out of its place; instead He frankly recognises the growing efficiency of His servants: "I know that thy latest works are more than the first." Nevertheless there is a great and grievous lack. As in Ephesus, the mention of this defect is unqualified; not, "I have a few things against thee," nor, "I have this against thee," but, "I have against thee that thou are tolerating that woman Jezebel," etc. The name is a mystic one. Jezebel was the lady-wife of the half-barbarous king Ahab; the story of her reign is the story of the quick corruption and utter downfall of the kingdom of Israel. Idol-feasts were followed by "chambering and wantonness," and corruption spread rapidly among the youth of Israel. So was this prophetess introducing the speculations of Asiatic freethinkers and the Asiatic habit of voluptuousness into the Church of Thyatira. A love of talk about forbidden things was setting in; regard for law was being weakened; audacity was taking the place of reserve; the teaching spread that self-indulgence was nobler than self-denial, and more in accordance with the freedom of the gospel. There was a double attraction in the teaching of the prophetess — the subtle charm of womanhood, and the seductiveness of the thoughts themselves she was disseminating. Thus she led her votaries on into what they loved to call the "deeper aspects" of life and morals. We must observe that the Church is not charged with complicity in this teaching. Nor is the minister accused of sharing in the doctrine; the implication is that he is pure. But it is charged against him that he tolerates it; and both he and the Church are warned of their neglect of duty. Why is he so tolerant of this modern Jezebel — a woman who is working in the Church mischiefs as subtle, and in their consequences as dire, as those which destroyed the manhood of Israel? First, doubtless, he bore with her because she was a woman. The gracious tolerance of a strong man often takes this form. It is very hard for such a one to assert himself at all; most hard where self-assertion seems most easy. Next, the woman called herself "a prophetess." Here comes in regard for "the freedom of prophecy"; the very inspiration of the Church was a hindrance. "Who knows whether God is not speaking by her, notwithstanding all that is suspicious in her teaching?" The very spirit of service might help to mislead a gracious man. Underneath the easy temper of the pastor of Thyatira there was, however, a grave deficiency, one of the gravest in a Church ruler: he had an inadequate sense of the authority of law. Thyatira stands before us the type of a sentimental Church; the charm and the danger of the sentimental temperament are both set before us here. There is a sentimentalism of the strong as well as of the weak. In the weak sentiment takes the place which belongs to conviction; they try to make feeling do the work of moral qualities. And they miserably fail; their Christian character itself degenerates; like the Amy of "Locksley Hall," they are doomed to "perish in their self-contempt." The strong are not in danger of this: their personal character may seem to keep itself unstained. But if they have responsibilities for others laid upon them, their sentimentalism may mean unfaithfulness. If Ephesus may be looked upon as typifying the peril of the Puritan habit, Thyatira is a type of what we may call Neo-Puritanism. The Puritan was the guardian of the claims and rights of the individual. He trusted his own conscience to see the will of God, his own intelligence to interpret it. In strenuous years the man of such a temper, and with this lofty ambition, tends to be hard, self-confident, a dogmatist in his thinking, a precisian in his conduct. He is the man who can try the spirits; who can tear aside disguises; can see through them who call themselves apostles when they are not, and can find them false. Times have grown easier; there has swept over us a great impulse of tenderness, which has become the prevailing habit, and the characteristic individualism of the Puritan has changed its form. Out of regard for the sanctity of the individual conscience and judgment, varying interpretations of God's law are to be received as binding on various persons; and where divers interpretations of law are admitted, the law itself ceases to be law. In the freedom which is to be allowed to self-development, the educative influence of positive enactments is gone; every man is to be his own schoolmaster as well as his own judge.

I. THE APPEAL TO REALITY. In contrast with their readiness to be deluded, He sets out His own clear vision, piercing through all plausibilities, and detecting the heart of the matter; His fervid indignation, too, that will not long be restrained. Nothing is more needed than occasional plain speech about the foulness which lurks in much that professes to be an enlarged spirituality. There is more than an etymological connection between sentimentalism and sensuality. They who encourage display of the peculiar charms of womanhood, and seek to advance public causes by constant speech of things which both nature and piety tell us should be held in strict reserve, degrade the woman they seek to emancipate and brutalise the man. More than once the world has been startled by the announcement of "esoteric" teachings and practices among some who have posed as heralds of a higher morality, which differ not at all from the words and deeds of others who are frankly vicious. And what is still more startling is the discovery that some who have not accepted all the doctrines of their circle have known of the prevalence of them, and suffered them to pass without rebuke. These are really the coarse.

II. THE APPEAL TO COMPASSION. "Behold," says the Lord, "I cast them that commit adultery with her into great tribulation"; "and I will kill her children with death." There were simple souls in Thyatira saved from moral ruin by their ignorance. They "knew not the deep things of Satan" which the initiated talked of. There were other simple ones who fell by their curiosity. It was the place of the pastor to stand between these and the Lord of the flaming eyes and the glowing feet; to save them from, seeming judgment by instruction, warning, "if need were by discipline, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment spotted with the flesh." It is a cruel thing to be tolerant of those who are destroying the souls of the unwary.

III. THE APPEAL TO DUTY. "I lay upon you the charge to be faithful to the law you have received. I impose no other obligation on you. But this you have; hold it fast until I come." It was the duty of all in Thyatira; it was the special duty of "the angel of the Church." An unwelcome duty it might be, but not on that account less urgent. And it was enforced by the promise "to him that overcometh." God's rewards are of two classes. We are to have more of what we have; there is to be given us that which we have not. We think more habitually of the former class — "to him that hath shall be given" — but the Lord thinks also of the latter class, and this is well for us. For if we were only to go on enlarging and developing the graces most congenial to us, which we find it easiest to exercise, we might attain to excellence, but we should be ever one-sided men. God would make us perfect men. He will not let us keep the defects of our qualities.

(A. Mackennal, D. D.)

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KJV: And unto the angel of the church in Thyatira write; These things saith the Son of God, who hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brass;

WEB: "To the angel of the assembly in Thyatira write: "The Son of God, who has his eyes like a flame of fire, and his feet are like burnished brass, says these things: