THE FAITHFUL WITNESS, THE FIRSTBORN FROM THE DEAD, AND THE PRINCE OF THE KINGS OF THE EARTH
Revelation 1:5 to “the earth”
I seek divine help, dear brethren, to speak of these three glories of Christ – not that we should simply admire them in Him, but that we might be affected by them ourselves.
Our attention has been drawn already in these meetings to the passage that speaks of our “looking on the glory of the Lord” (2 Cor.3:18) and being transformed. I have the conviction that God has not revealed His things to us simply for our admiration, like a picture on the wall. Nor does He reveal them to us simply to satisfy our curiosity or our interest. But what is revealed by God has a purpose, an intent. There are many things that are not revealed, many things that we would like to know but we are not told about. But what is revealed, what God has revealed, has a purpose in mind and that purpose is that we should be conformed to the image of His Son, so that what we see in its distinctiveness and its glory in the Lord Jesus should be taken on by us.
The footnote to that word “transformed” – looking on the glory of the Lord and being transformed – tells us that it conveys the thought of metamorphosis, the term used to describe the change from a caterpillar into a butterfly. A caterpillar can be very drab but it turns into a beautiful creature. That is the sense of the word; that as we look upon the glory of the Lord we are transformed. It is a transforming experience to be engaged with the glory of Christ and it has in mind that what we see so vividly, so clearly set out in Him, should mark us, should change us, and should become characteristic of us.
The impression I have as to these three distinct glories referred to in this verse is that the first one refers to what the Lord Jesus was, the second to what He is, and the third to what He will soon be seen publicly to be. It helps as you look at these things to keep that in mind. He came into this scene in which we are. He is not in it now, but He came into it. The scripture says that “the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us”, John 1:14. He dwelt among persons; He came into the circumstances in which we are. Much could be said about that and the grace of it, the grace of that One who in His Person is infinite but who came into the everyday circumstances of human life. So for example, Jesus was wearied, He was thirsty. He knew about these things because He came into manhood and accepted, in grace, the limitations of that condition, while, as we have been reminded, ever remaining who He was in His Person. “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us”. Somebody commented about that that Jesus lived next door to somebody. People would have seen Him. They said disparagingly at one point, “Is not this the son of the carpenter?”, Matt.13:55. He came into the everyday circumstances of life in which you and I are. And He had relatives; His mother and His brethren pressed Him to adopt a certain course of action at various times – the sort of things that we are all subject to. Jesus came into those conditions but He ever remained who He was in His Person. But He came into them and in them, as this scripture says, He was a “faithful witness”.
Now, as I read that, I am challenged by it. Before He went up on high, the Lord said to His own, “ye are witnesses of these things”, Luke 24:48. The thought of witness is a very important one with God. Indeed, as long as time continues and the earth stands, God will keep in it a witness to Himself. He has done that since the outset of time and He will do it even after the saints of this dispensation have gone to glory. God will maintain on the earth a witness to Himself. Our brother was speaking last night about the testimony of our Lord. What a matter that is. In his first epistle to Timothy, Paul exhorted a young man, a timid man it would seem, a weakly man, and gave him some practical advice. He said, “Drink no longer only water, but use a little wine on account of thy stomach and thy frequent illnesses”, 1 Tim.5:23. How real things are in the Scriptures. Paul was thinking of this young man and the place he was going to fill out in the testimony and he said to him; “Be not therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord”, 2 Tim.1:8. Timothy was not to be ashamed of it, not to be frightened, not to be marked by a spirit of cowardice. That spirit never marked Christ; the faithful Witness was never marked by a spirit of cowardice, although I would have to say that it has often marked me.
I remember being at a meeting like this and the brother serving, Mr David Robertson, said, ‘If you are marked by a spirit of cowardice, it is not God who has given it to you’. “For God has not given us a spirit of cowardice, but of power, and of love, and of wise discretion”, 2 Tim.1:7. Courage is needed to be a faithful witness and it was seen supremely in Christ. Nothing would deter Him from faithfully bearing witness to the truth. As He stood before Pilate, He said, “I have been born for this, and for this I have come into the world, that I might bear witness to the truth”, John 18:37. Jesus did that and we know what it cost Him. He said prophetically, “I gave … my cheeks to them that pluck off the hair; I hid not my face from shame and spitting”, Isa.50:6. As one writer says adoringly, He “endured so great contradiction from sinners against himself”, Heb.12:3. That did not move Jesus from being a faithful Witness, a faithful Witness to the heart of God, His nature and His attributes.
The perverseness of the nation of Israel moved even a great man like Moses to call them all rebels, and for the moment that great servant of God was no longer a faithful witness to the true nature and disposition of God. Jehovah had to say to Job’s three friends who had taken him to task, “ye have not spoken rightly of me, like my servant Job”, Job 42:7,8. God had been let down. These persons who should have been faithful witnesses to His nature and to His attributes had been moved by the heat of the moment to speak in a fleshly way, a natural way, and because of that, their witness ceased in its faithfulness. That never marked Christ. However great the pressure, and it was tremendous, the pressure that was brought against this faithful Witness – what did it bring out? What it brought out was what was there. Infinite perfection came out under the pressure. There was nothing else in Him to come out. The scripture says, “Thou hast loved righteousness and hated lawlessness” (Heb.1:9); it has been said that that was really a description of moral perfection.
So the Lord Jesus went His way through the circumstances of life, meeting need, expressing the disposition of God, rebuking evil, rebuking religious pride. Not tempering his message by fear or favour, He was a faithful Witness – the faithful Witness. He is distinguished in that way. He stands alone in it but it is presented to us in order that we might be affected by Him. He came into these circumstances in which we are and He set out a Model for us, as Peter says, that we should follow in His steps (1 Pet.2:21). Jesus spoke the word given to Him to speak and He came to declare God. “No one has seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared Him” (John 1:18); He made God known. Whether people were listening or not, there was a declaration of God, the unseen God. If there had not been, we would be for ever wondering what God is like, but there has been a full declaration of God. All that may be known of God was expressed in that Man. How amazing that is.
The psalmist David says, “What is man, that thou art mindful of him?”, Ps.8:4. You think of the God who made the heavens and the earth, the moon and the stars; the psalmist says, “the work of thy fingers” (v.3). David marvelled that God even considered for man – weak, mortal man. That is what we are. But God has not only considered for men, He has chosen to dwell with them eternally. Eternally; wonderful grace that it should be so. And the extent of God’s interest in man has been expressed in that He came into His creation in a Man. Jesus has drawn near to us, as we have been reminded in these meetings, in a way that is intended to win our hearts and secure them. What suffering, what sorrow was His; “Behold, and see”, Christ says prophetically, “if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow”, Lam.1:12.
You think of Jesus weeping at the grave of Lazarus and some said, “Behold how he loved him!”, John 11:36. They thought that Jesus was simply weeping on account of bereavement, but the One who was weeping was the One who had power to raise Lazarus from the dead. He was weeping over the effect of sin upon the human race. He was weeping as He took account of the bondage and oppression of death upon the human race and the misery that it has brought. But He had the power. Mary and Martha knew that He had the power to heal Lazarus, but He had the power to raise him from the dead, even when his body had gone to corruption.
What a faithful Witness Jesus was! What a declaration of God there was at the cross. God was declared, His holiness was expressed, His righteousness was expressed as He dealt once and for all with the great sin question. And the faithful Witness on the cross said, “Father, forgive them”, Luke 23:34. I remember a brother saying – it affected me – ‘I used to think that when He said that, He was interceding with an angry God, but then I came to see that Jesus was giving expression, in perfection, to the feelings of God’. God was willing to extend forgiveness to the guilty, and Jesus, the faithful Witness, through His sufferings and through His death, provided Him with a righteous basis to do that. These things are intended to touch us, dear brethren. They are intended to affect us in our hearts inwardly in order that we might own our allegiance to Him – the One who, as we have been reminded, is Lord of all, the faithful Witness.
That is how He speaks of Himself to Laodicea. The church was intended to be a witness here, a light-bearer in a dark scene publicly. I suppose when Paul’s letter to Corinth, from which we read, was written, all believers were together. All believers in Corinth were together, so as has often been said, the postman would have known where to deliver the letter2. There would be the idol house and there would be the Jewish synagogue and there would be the assembly of God. There would be a testimony in Corinth, but we know, and this book spells it out, how publicly that position of testimony has been compromised. And when you come to Laodicea – and we have to own that we are pretty much in Laodicean days at the moment – there was an indifference to Christ, a self-satisfaction. Christ is seen as outside, knocking for entry. He presents Himself as “the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God.”, Rev.3:14. That is what the Lord Jesus was, dear brethren, when He was here in the scene of testimony.
He is not here now. The ground is left for us to hold on His behalf. The faithful and true Witness could say to the Father before He left, “I have glorified thee on the earth, I have completed the work which thou gavest me that I should do it”, John 17:4. Having done that, having completed that great work of atonement for which He came to this earth to do, He went up into glory. The ground, dear brother, dear sister, is left for us to hold in His absence until He comes. It may not be long. It may be much shorter than any of us consider, for He said, “again a little while and ye shall see me”, John 16:16. During that little while, what a privilege it is for believers to occupy the ground that He held and to hold it for Him in faithfulness and in affection.
But then the Lord Jesus speaks of Himself as the Firstborn from among the dead. How distinguished Jesus is. He is spoken of as the Firstborn in many connections; the Firstborn of all creation, the Firstborn among many brethren, but the Firstborn from among the dead describes what He is. I remember a brother saying once that Christianity publicly is founded on the platform of resurrection, a Man out of death. That distinguishes it from every philosophy and so-called religion. It is centred on a Man raised from among the dead. The brother added that Christianity vitally is linked with His ascension, a Man in glory, supreme Object of the heart of the assembly. But He is the Firstborn from among the dead.
We have been reminded of the importance of resurrection and our belief in it: “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord”, Rom.10:9. That is one thing; “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and shalt believe in thine heart that God has raised him from among the dead”. That faith in the heart will secure your eternal blessing, but confessing Him as Lord will secure your present salvation. If you confess him as Lord in this scene of testimony, you will find that people do not want you. We do not like to be unwanted, do we? We do not like to be unpopular. We like to think people would like to be with us. We would like to be included. Think of the One who was cast away as worthless by men. They said, in the words of the parable, “We will not that this man should reign over us”, Luke 19:14. They were happy with a murderer, but not happy with Jesus. He was not wanted. He was not wanted then and He is not wanted now. The cross was a great exposure of the heart of natural man. How can you have a part in the world that had no place for Christ?
But there is another world. He is the Firstborn from among the dead. He spoke of that world, and of those who are counted worthy to have part in “that world, and the resurrection from among the dead”, Luke 20:35. Do you ever think about that world? Maybe you weigh up your prospects in this world, but how about the world that is beyond death – a whole system of glory that we have been hearing about and it is centred in the One who is the Firstborn from among the dead. We read in the Bible of other persons who were raised. There were persons raised in the time of the Old Testament and there were persons raised in the time of the New Testament. As far as I can see, all of them were raised to die again; they resumed their life here in the same condition. But Jesus as the Firstborn from among the dead has risen in a new condition, and He lives in the power of an indissoluble life (Heb.7:16). These things are arresting – an indissoluble life! They are arresting to me, and I trust they are arresting to you, as we think of a blessed, living Man, once the object of derision here upon the earth, but now living in the resurrection world in the power of an indissoluble life. That is to capture our affections that we might seek after Him there. The scripture says, “seek the things that are above, where the Christ is”, Col.3:1. How wonderful to have your mind centred on that world.
1 Corinthians 15, the great resurrection chapter, tells us that Christ is raised from among the dead, and the apostle then says, “each in his own rank” (v.23). “Each in his own rank” is a military term. If you have ever watched the changing of the guard, or the movement in these processions that have taken place recently, there are the ranks and they are called out one by one. We tend to think of the resurrection as something perhaps a long way ahead but it has begun. The resurrection has begun. The first rank has gone in; “Christ is raised from among the dead, first-fruits of those fallen asleep” (v.20). The first rank has entered in and He is alone in that rank. The second rank is composed of those that are the Christ’s at His coming: “the first-fruits, Christ; then those that are the Christ’s at his coming” (v.23).
I just pause for a moment to raise the question, Are all in this company today among that company – that company of those who are the Christ’s? Are we all here among the second rank? There will be other ranks. There will be the resurrection of the unsaved for judgment. How blessed to be among the second rank of those who are the Christ’s, those for whom He shed His precious blood, those whom He owns as His own. It reminds us of that great gathering.
As I look around this room and see all these brethren here, it is a thrill, and I am sure I am not alone in that. Many of us come from small localities. Some have travelled a long way to be here. We are seeing persons whom we have not seen for a long time. It reminds me of that great gathering, our gathering together unto the Lord Jesus (2 Thess.2:1). There will be no gathering like that, when He gathers to Himself the whole fruits of His precious death. He will gather them to Himself – the second rank. All I would say is that if you are in doubt about it, make sure that you are numbered among them because He may come at any time to claim the fruits of His death and then the second rank will go in. Christ is the Firstborn; He is distinguished as the Firstborn, as the One who has overthrown the power of death, the One who has destroyed him that had the might of it. Christ has annulled it and He has “set free all those who through fear of death through the whole of their life were subject to bondage”, Heb.2:15.
I can remember a time when the fear of death held me in bondage, that fear – as I lay in bed in the dark night – that the Lord might have come, that my parents had gone, that my brothers and sisters had gone and I had been left. I needed to have that matter settled. I needed to have it sure in my own soul. And thank God it is. I can say that the fear of death is gone because I know a Man who lives beyond it and who has destroyed its power. How great He is! He has overthrown the power of death and him that had the might of it and He presents Himself living. And when I think of this room full of believers – I do not know how many we are, over three hundred I suppose, but it reminds me that He presented Himself living to over five hundred brethren at once. What a testimony!
Were those persons all liars? Was their testimony false? Why is it that so many reject the great truth of resurrection? It is a fact that has been surrounded by abundant testimony; “us”, Peter says, “who have eaten and drunk with him after he arose from among the dead”, Acts 10:41. How wonderful! How wonderful to consider the Lord Jesus as the Firstborn. The firstborn indicates that there is more to come. The second rank will be to His glory, composed of the myriads that He has secured. The vast company of the redeemed owes everything to Him, and they will be in that company, not on their own merit, but because they will owe everything to Him, the Firstborn from among the dead. Dear hearer, are you walking now in the light of another world? Are you an unworldly Christian? The Lord Jesus said of His own, “they are not of the world, as I am not of the world”, John 17:14. What delivers us from the world is a view of a living Man in another world.
Another Man in another world. Is that a reality to you? I ask you that. Be honest about it. If it is not a reality to you, then admit it. Ask the Lord to make it a reality to your own soul and you will find the delivering effect of it. The glory of this world and all that it has to offer will begin to pale in your view as you take account of the glory and the greatness of “that world, and the resurrection from among the dead”, Luke 20:35.
I wanted to finish with this reference to the Lord Jesus as “the prince of the kings of the earth”. What a title! The “prince of the kings of the earth”. In that connection, I would like to read a verse in the prophet Ezekiel. It is chapter 21 reading from verse 27. “I will overturn, overturn, overturn it! This also shall be no more, until he come whose right it is; and I will give it to him”. That is a reference to Christ, the One whose right it is. We have spoken of His sufferings and death, and it says, “In his humiliation his judgment has been taken away”, Acts 8:33. We live in a day where people are very concerned about their rights; human rights and every other kind of right is asserted. I remember sitting at a preaching a long time ago and the preacher said that the place where people will get their rights is the great white throne. That is where people, sinful people, will receive what they deserve. Persons who rejected the offer of salvation will have no rights there; they will have been forfeited, but there is One who has a right. It is a right that is acknowledged by those who love the Lord. We shall gather tomorrow, if He leaves us here, to remember Him in the way that He has asked us to. It always seems to me that, as we put our hands to that loaf, we are freshly pledging our allegiance to our absent Lord, the One whose right it is to reign.
The prophet says that of Him. I am reading now from Isaiah. Isaiah 9 says, “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder”. Then His name is given, and then it says, “Of the increase of his government and of peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it, and to uphold it with judgment and with righteousness, from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of Jehovah of hosts will perform this” (vv.6,7). Lying behind this, and lying behind what has been presented to us in these meetings, is the determination of God to establish Christ as predominant in the universe. It is the mystery of God’s will. God determined, long ago in a past eternity, that His Man, the Man of His choice, the Man of His heart, the Man who never failed, the Man who fulfilled His will to perfection, would reign. Jesus was the one Man who was never, ever a source of sorrow to Him, but a source of undivided delight. “This is my beloved Son, in whom I have found my delight”, Matt.3:17. God is determined that there will be no other man.
When Jesus was delivered into the hands of wicked men, the cry foretold in the parable went up in Jerusalem, “We will not that this man should reign over us”. Well, God will have Him to reign over the whole created sphere. He has the right and of His government and its increase there shall not be an end. He is the Prince, He is the Prince of the kings of the earth.
I just give you a few thoughts about that as they appeal to me. We have just witnessed in this country a prince ascending the throne. It is a poor analogy, but what it shows is that the Prince of the kings of the earth, the Lord Jesus, is the One whose right and place has been displaced by others for the time being. But He is going to succeed and they are all going to be removed. The kings of the earth do not have a good write-up in the Scriptures. You read in Psalm 2 about the kings of the earth there; “The kings of the earth set themselves, and the princes plot together, against Jehovah and against his anointed” (v.2). That is taken up in the Acts. We see Pontius Pilate and Herod there, the first the representative of a world power, a world empire, and the other a Jewish king. They were prepared to sink their many differences and unite in opposition to Christ. Thus the kings of the earth reign, occupying the ground which Christ personally is entitled to.
When we gather tomorrow to call Him to mind, one of the things we will do is to reverse the world’s judgment of the Lord Jesus. We acknowledge Him as our Lord. It is the Lord’s day, it is the Lord’s supper and it is the Lord’s cup that we drink. We acknowledge His lordly rights, His right to reign, to have absolute power and to exercise it as He will for God’s eternal glory. What things these are, dear brethren. What a Man Jesus is that it can be said of Him in this verse that He is the faithful Witness, the Firstborn from among the dead, and the Prince of the kings of the earth. And there is much more. Our brother has encouraged us in these meetings to look into these things for ourselves, and you will find in this book that it is rich with the glories of Christ, rich with them. When you come to the end of the book, Jesus Himself speaks about Himself; “I am the root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star”, Rev.22:16.
A brother told me once that a dear old servant of God was on his death bed and his wife was reading to him. She opened her Bible at the end and she read that; “I am the root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star”. And then she paused. She was wondering if it was too much for him in his weakened condition, and she asked, ‘Shall I go on?’. And that dear man opened his eyes and said, ‘No, no, that will suffice for all eternity’. All eternity. “The root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star”. I just touch on that to encourage your interest in this book. There is a blessing attached to reading it. And I believe that one of the blessings attached to reading it is that it will enlarge your appreciation of Christ. It is rich, it is abundant with titles and glories of Christ. I feel that I have scarcely done justice to it but it thrills my heart that it can be said of that blessed Man that He is the faithful Witness. That is a moral feature.
We may feel we are not much – we have not much gift or ability or understanding. But it is open to us too to be faithful. That is a moral quality. The Lord Jesus is the Firstborn from among the dead. He has done what we could not do. He has broken the power of death and opened up to our view another world altogether in order that we might have part with Him beyond death eternally. And be in no doubt about it, He is the Prince of the kings of the earth. He is the One whose right it is and He is waiting in patience. The apostle says to the Thessalonians, “the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God, and into the patience of the Christ”, 2 Thess 3:5. We may think we are being patient as we wait for His coming, but He is being patient too. He is waiting the Father’s word, but there is no doubt about it, He will publicly take the pre-eminent place, long denied Him. And not only will He take it but those that are His own are going to be associated with Him in it, in that day of glorious display.
May our hearts be encouraged, dear brethren, for His name’s sake.
Given at 3-day meetings, Glasgow
21 October 2022
Roland H Brown
Edited and Published by John Brown and Paul Martin
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