In continuing my series on the seven churches of Revelation, I want to spend this post examining a bit of the motivation of Jesus. What was in His heart in actually giving these messages to the churches? As I said in my first post, each letter was carefully thought out and crafted by the Son of God Himself, and then given to both a literal church alive during the first century as well as to anyone in any age reading the text who would have an ear to what the Spirit is saying, with a particular focus on the generation that would see the book of Revelation unfold in their lifetime. So while I will come from the angle of examining the letters to these seven real churches, in subsequent posts I will focus more on the application of each letter to the saints alive today as those who I believe may very well see the Lord’s return in the span of their lifetime.
The seven letters were much more than just “quick little post-it notes” given to the churches. Through them, Jesus was looking to stir each church (and ultimately, us) to a greater place of abandonment, obedience, and heart-level agreement with who He is. He stirs the churches through several unique strategies:
1) Jesus reveals His glory to the believers so they would walk in awe and wonder of who He is
Immediately preceding the letters to the churches in Rev. 1:11-20, John sees Jesus in a way he had never seen Him before. John identifies the One he is seeing as the “Son of Man”, inextricably linked to Daniel 7:13-14 and the letter to the Hebrews where a human Jewish messiah would establish a kingdom and deliver Israel from their Gentile oppression. But instead of being clothed in soiled garb from desert traveling, John now sees his friend in priestly garments girded with a golden sash, speaking of His divinity and high priestly role (Heb. 8-9). His hair was white like wool like the Ancient of Days was in Daniel 7:9, speaking of His eternal holiness and purity. His eyes were like a flame of fire, full of the fiery emotions towards His people and fully perceptive and aware of the thoughts and intents of the heart. He had feet like refined brass, which speaks of His strong leadership that will never fail and will always endure. His voice was like mighty waters, unwavering and unstoppable when it speaks. Out of His mouth come words that have the ability to pierce through joints and marrow and discern the thoughts and intents of the heart (Heb. 4:12). His face shone brighter than the sun, revealing the perfection of His emotions that He longs to impart to all of His people.
John, the seasoned apostle and one of the closest friends of Jesus, falls at His feet awestruck as a dead man when He sees Him in His splendor and glory. Jesus introduces Himself with many of these same attributes in each of the letters to the churches. Each attribute of Jesus’ heart and character is revealed to specifically remind each church of the One affirming, motivating, and rebuking them. His motivations are pure, His heart is full of desire, and His rebukes are only given from a heart of fierce love and devotion to them.
2) Jesus shepherds the believers with kindness, love, and tenderness
In each of the seven letters, Jesus comes as a tender shepherd to His people, affirming their labors done in love, their zeal for righteousness, and their faithfulness to His name even unto death. He brings encouragement for loving the things He loves and for hating the things He hates. He comes as the shepherd of Psalm 23, where His rod of correction is not drawn in anger or bitterness but in tenderness and great desire, disciplining those He loves (Heb. 12:6).
As we approach the end of the age, the Great Shepherd promised to raise up shepherds today according to His heart that will feed His church into a greater knowledge of Him, lead them into a deeper understanding of His ways, and direct them into true repentance and full heart turning back to Himself. (Jer. 3:15)
3) Jesus encourages the believers to repent so that they would not fall short of the dreams of His heart for them
Jesus knows that the only one who can disqualify or “take out” any believer from the race is themselves, so He comes with strong words calling many of the churches to repentance. A true heart turning is what He is looking for from the churches so that they would not be ashamed before Him at His coming (1 John 2:28) or lose their reward for their faithfulness (2 John 8).
Rebukes from the Lord are redemptive – they are always given in His perfect love and infallible wisdom. He wants every believer to step into the fullness of His dream for them, and the act of true repentance is simply a realigning of the heart and a renewed agreement with the path and vision Jesus has for our lives. Repentance is deeply connected to trusting the tender shepherd in His view of the complete picture of our life, both in this age and in the age to come.
4) Jesus wants to motivate the believers into changing their hearts and their behavior through the promises of rewards
The promise of obtaining rewards, or special honors from the Lord in the age to come, are given to stabilize the heart in the midst of persecution and trouble. Jesus promised to reward the “overcomers”, or those who would conquer the external and internal obstacles that obstruct a full response of the heart in love towards God. The rewards Jesus offers are divine motivators to help them make godly choices. Jesus knew, however, that not every believer would respond to God’s invitation to fight for the promised rewards. They are only to be obtained by the hungry and the desperate.
Jesus’ reason for giving these letters has the same application for us today, especially as believers living at the end of the age.
These letters, warnings, motivations, and rewards are given to us so that offense does not take root in our hearts as the end of the age events unfold. They are to provoke agreement and gratitude in our hearts for Jesus’ leadership strategy to drive sin off the planet, as seen in the later chapters of Revelation (6-22). Not understanding this leadership strategy will ultimately lead the human heart into offense and total rejection of God.
Gratitude is the vehicle that propels us away from offense, so we must set our minds to know more than just the overall ideas of these letters. The details written to each of the churches are written to give us insight and motivation to become the glorious bride without spot or wrinkle that He has longed for.
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