The Revelation of St. John the Divine

by A. H. Ames

But it would be unjust to charge to the account of systems imperfections and errors which spring out of the inherent frailty of human nature. And the spirit of evil against which the apostle warns us has had unhappily a range wider than pagan or papal Rome or any organization yet witnessed on earth. If that Church has too often carried upon her forehead the title, “Mother of harlots,” instead of the motto, “Holiness unto the Lord,” she has many a sister who must sit beside her as of kindred spirit; and, if the one has been “Aholah,” the other has been “Aholibah.” If, among her followers, she has numbered both some of the purest saints who have trodden this earth and some of the vilest sinners, and these, too, in her loftiest places, she is not alone in the distinction.

There have been individuals and Churches calling themselves Christians and Protestants that, like veritable Messalinas, have burned with incessant lust after every form and fashion of worldliness, and whose lovers, as Jeremiah says, have not had need to weary themselves in seeking for them. There is too much truth in the biting sarcasm of Heine: “Christianity was once based on blood; it now rests on another basis—money. Wafers of silver and gold are the only ones that work miracles in modern days.” When the solemn services of the holy sacraments lose their attraction and are accounted dull and pale when compared with the brighter light of social festivities; when prayer meetings are sparsely attended, while glittering parlors are crowded with guests; when the shouting of souls newly born into the kingdom is drowned by the “chant to the sound of the viol;” when grief over “the affliction of Joseph” is far less than the sorrow for the loss of worldly prestige or patronage; when religion is used simply as an adjunct to the social propensities or a synonym for liberality in promoting financial enterprises—then there is need that we read again the apocalyptic vision of Babylon, that we may avert the doom that is certain otherwise to come. Destruction must surely be the end of those “whose god is their belly, and whose glory is their shame, who mind earthly things.” The vials of divine anger must sooner or later empty their plagues upon all such.

In the selection and introduction of Tyre as the representative of a worldly Church the apostle indicates the source from which danger is to be apprehended. Tyre was a mart of commerce. Upon her ships the merchandise of the world was transported, and it was sold in her markets. Her trade extended to the ends of the earth, and by her mercantile transactions she was brought into contact with the whole circle of known nations. The close acquaintance and fellowship thereby wrought with all religions, races, and customs produced its customary result of lowering the standard of morals and, under the specious plea of encouraging liberalism of opinion, led to apathy toward all religion; while, at the same time, the increase of wealth, art, and refinement created a love for luxury and worldly good. Corrupted herself, she became in turn a source of corruption to others, and her intercourse with Israel had a disastrous effect upon the chosen people.

In this lies the peril of contact with the world. It is the scene of conflict; it may be the field either of defeat or victory. The Lord Jesus prayed, not that his disciples should be taken out of the world, but that they should be preserved from its evil. We are placed in it that we may transform it. It is possible that all beauty, art, wealth, culture, and commerce may be sanctified and made to contribute to the redemption of the world. Every thought may be brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.

But it may, on the contrary, transform and corrupt us. Without the aid of supernatural grace the influence of the world upon the Christian is demoralizing and destructive. Whatever is without God is equally without hope. Art, for instance, separated from its mission as an auxiliary to morals and religion and made independent, becomes artificial, and then degenerates into artifice. The world, instead of being lifted to a higher plane, drags the Christian to its own level. It is remarkable that Paul, whose facilities of observation were large and powers of perception keen, when writing to the Romans, the people of the eternal city, whose one dream and ambition in all her history had been power, commended the Gospel of Christ as “the power of God unto salvation;” but, when writing to Corinth, the busy center of commerce and merchandise, full of wealth, luxury, and corruption, he presented as the only influence which could correct these evils this profound truth: “Know ye not that ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God.”

There has not been a period since the days of John when the lesson which he wished to enforce in this vision of apostate and fallen Babylon was more important than now. Between the age of the apostles and the times in which we live a stronger resemblance exists than between any epochs in the annals of man. The rapid increase of means of transportation by which the ends of the earth are drawn together is effecting that state of things which the consolidation of the civilized world under the control of the Roman Empire produced. The boundaries between nations are being effaced; and their easy communication with each other makes possible an exceptional intermingling of languages, usages, moral codes, and religion. There is the same tendency toward the denial of all supernaturalism, on one side, and, at the opposite extreme, toward an eclecticism which concedes some truth to all forms of religion, while questioning the absolute truth of any, as that with which the apostolic Church was confronted. There is an excessive liberalism which, in its aversion to narrowness and under the plea of enlightened culture, would abandon all that specifically differentiates Christianity. But we will have read the records of the ante-Nicene period in vain if we have not learned from them that an imperfect Christianity, while it does not gain the world, does lose its own soul, and that the regeneration of mankind keeps exact pace with the measure of spirituality and purity which prevails in the Church of Christ.

Babylon, the counterfeit of the kingdom, is doomed to inevitable destruction. Over the sad end of a Church dominated by the spirit of the world and which has finally apostatized from Christ the worldly may say, in regretful lament, “Alas, alas, that great city;” the “merchants of the earth” may “weep and mourn over her; for no man buyeth their merchandise any more;” but the heavens rejoice. For where there is permanent alienation from God no real life can survive: “The voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all in thee.” There can be no fruitful activity or profitable labor, for “the sound of a millstone shall be heard no more at all in thee.” There can be no inward illumination or safe walking, for “the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee.”

3. Methods of Success Reiterated.—After a few words of exultant triumph over the fall of Babylon, and the bright hopes for the future of Christ’s kingdom opened up thereby, in which heaven and earth unite, the apostle, before finally leaving the subject, points us again (in chapter xix) to the weapons by which victory must be won. Repeating what has been so often said by him that the impression is made on us that herein lies the central thought of the book, but with a fullness of detail not previously equaled and with a stress of emphasis which guarantees the importance of the truth, he asserts again that the conquering weapons are “the blood of the Lamb” and “the word of their testimony” (Revelation xii, 11; xix, 15). The cross and the Bible—these are the means by which the world is to be overcome, these are the instruments through which the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost work, and with these the Christian and the Church are sufficiently armed for any conflict or adversary.

John saw “heaven opened (verse 11), and behold a white horse.” Thus does the Christ appear at the close of the conflict, sitting upon the white horse of victory, just as he appeared at the beginning when, armed with the bow, “he went forth conquering, and to conquer” (chapter vi, 2). He is described by the titles which he had attributed to himself in his letters to the seven churches of Asia. He is here the “Faithful and True;” so had he written of himself to Laodicea. “In righteousness he doth judge and make war;” to Philadelphia he had called himself “he that is holy, he that is true.” “His eyes were as a flame of fire;” these very words he had written to Thyatira. “Out of his mouth proceedeth a sharp sword;” to Pergamos he had spoken of himself as the one having “the sharp sword.” To Ephesus he had described himself as the one that “walketh in the midst of the golden candlesticks [or churches];” and here he is seen in company with the armies of his followers. He had promised Sardis that the faithful should walk with him “in white;” here the saints with him are “clothed in fine linen, white and clean.” To Smyrna he had said, “I will give thee a crown of life;” and here upon his head are “many crowns.” He has a name which all can read, “King of kings, and Lord of lords,” ruling (shepherding) the nations with the iron staff of his power. But he has also a name that no man knoweth; for he had himself said, “No man knoweth the Son, but the Father.” He is the Word of God, the embodiment and utterance of the Godhead’s deepest thought and being, the “brightness” of the Father’s glory, “and the express image of his person.”

The weapons which he employs are distinctly said to be the “sharp sword” that goeth “out of his mouth,” and the blood by which he atoned for sin. The “sharp sword” means, unquestionably, “the sword of the Spirit,” the word inspired by the Spirit of truth, the Scriptures which testify of him (John v, 39), the word by which we are sanctified (John xvii, 17), the Bible of revelation. By this word, “the breath of his lips,” he slays the wicked (Isaiah xi, 4). With this, “the spirit of his mouth,” he consumes the wicked one (2 Thessalonians ii, 8).