The London Pulpit Revelation 2:16 Repent; or else I will come to you quickly, and will fight against them with the sword of my mouth. 1. A new name preaches to us of a new relationship. A child parts with its own name, and takes the name of the family into which it is received as an adopted son or daughter. "The Lord God shall call His servants by another name." 2. This new name is the declaration of sanctity. If we are children we should maintain the honour of the family name. "Ye that love the Lord, hate evil." 3. Dignity is expressed by a new name Christianity bestows a name of rank and title that is emphatically new — above the human, above the angelic — Divine. 4. Secrecy belongs to this name. "A new name which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it." Our holiest and grandest emotions are those that stifle utterance. They seal the lips, and make us feel how inadequate are all human vehicles to express heavenly and Divine emotions. The pleasures of the worldling lie on the surface. "You have seen, it may be," says a writer, "an antique Italian painted window, with the bright Italian sunshine glowing through it. It is the special excellence of pictured glass that the light which falls merely on the outside of other pictures, is here interfused throughout the work, illuminating the design, and investing it with a living radiance... Christian faith is a grand cathedral with Divinely pictured windows. Standing without you see no glory, nor can possibly imagine any. Nothing is visible but the merest outline of dusky shapes. Standing within all is clear and defined, every ray of light reveals a harmony of unspeakable splendours." (The London Pulpit.) Parallel Verses KJV: Repent; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will fight against them with the sword of my mouth. |
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