Verse nine, I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance that are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. Verse 10. I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day and when I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet, verse 11, saying, write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea. Verse 12, then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me and on Turning, I saw seven golden lampstands, verse 13, and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest, 14. The hairs of his head were white like wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, 15. His feet were like burnished bronze refined in a fire, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. Verse 16, in his right hand he held seven stars. From his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. Verse seven, when I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, fear not, I am the first and the last. Verse 18, and the living one, I died and behold, I am alive forevermore. And I have the keys of death and Hades. Verse 19, write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this. Verse 20, As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand at the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches and the seven lampstands are the seven churches. This is the word of the Lord, most surely magnify and bless this holy truth. Are there any questions before we start? Now, I mentioned this last week, and I think I mentioned it the week before, that as we read verses nine through 10, one of the places that are significantly absent from the English Standard Version in my reading is what is spoken here in the King James Version that's saying, in verse 11, saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last. And what thou see us write in a book and send it to the seven churches. which are in Asia, under Ephesus, and under Smyrna, and under Pergamos, and under Thyatira, and under Sardis, and under Philadelphia, and under Laodicea. And the thing that is conspicuously absent from that is the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last. Write what you see. Now, Certainly, even in the English Standard Version it has quotations and we don't discount that this is Christ's letter to the churches because There are expressions throughout that we recognize this is the revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ that God gave to him and he sent it to his servant John. So this isn't John writing to the seven churches, it's Christ writing to the seven churches. But the significance of his absence shows this truth of who we are. See, again, one of the things that are often missing in a study of the book of Revelation is in many expositions that look to the future and its futurist view, it forsakes the fact that this was written to real people, real saints, brothers and sisters of ours living 2,000 years ago and needed this truth for their life in Christ then. And the reason why it's significant to us is because it was significant for them. And so one of the things that we see is the church now being written to the seven churches, which we're going to get into when we get into the chat, actually in the next verse. When we look at it, and then go again and look at it in detail in chapters two and three, we'll see some significant features from the church that are blessed insights into who we are as individuals, but also what we are as the body of Christ, how we may be led of the Lord because of these things that are identified in these seven different churches in Asia Minor. And so by its absence, we see a truth of what the church is all about. Because as John says, he was in the spirit on the Lord's day. And then when it's, and he hears the voice of a trumpet, we know that this voice of the trumpet is the Lord Jesus Christ. And so when he hears this voice, it says, write to the seven churches. And then verse 12 says, then I turned around to see the voice that was speaking to me. And on turning, I saw seven golden lampstands. And in verse 20, we see what the seven golden lampstands are. They're representative of these seven churches. In verse 20, it says, in the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels, or if you will, the messengers or the evangelists of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches. And when we get to verse 20, we'll cover that in a little bit more detail. And that's the truth of who we are as a church. We're the body of Christ. And when the trumpet of Christ's voice vibrates harmoniously through the land because of our witness, when they start hearing as the Spirit is ministering unto souls that are unsaved or unto souls that are saved, like in our gathering, when we turn to hear that voice, we see one another. We see Christ because that's the purpose of our salvation. Romans 8 verses 28 and 29, for we know that all things work together for good to them who love God, for those who are the called according to his purpose, for whom he did foreknow he also predestinated to be conformed to the image of his son that he, Jesus, might be the firstborn among many brethren. He's making us to be more like Christ. So when the world sees us, the unbelieving world sees us, or when other churches, other local churches see us, they're seeing Christ. They should be seeing Christ. When they hear the voice of Christ, when they turn, they should see the church. And that's a blessed truth. That's why its absence is, it doesn't, in fact, it doesn't detract from who Christ is. It actually amplifies his work through you and me. So that's the explanation I have for what is called textual criticism. In most of the Greek manuscripts, in fact most of the ancient manuscripts, the 27,000 manuscripts of antiquity, most of them do not have Alpha and Omega here. Now Alpha and Omega will be later on, and it doesn't detract from who Christ is. In fact, as I said, the absence of something doesn't mean, well, that translation's no good. It actually, if we look at the original autographs, and the majority of those autographs being what they are, it actually is much more powerful. And what it does say is that How does that encourage us? It says that Christ must speak through us. We must be seen when Christ's voice speaks in the world in order to evangelize souls. And in order for us to move as a church, it should see us when it hears Christ's voice. Unfortunately, sadly, in some cases, mostly it sees some kind of There's a pastor I used to listen to long ago. He would say, sometimes I wonder if the body of Christ, when people look at the body of Christ, they're not seeing a spiritual spastic. I heard it and it stuck with me because I heard it twice, once in Hawaii and once in Southern California. This pastor, he goes, because of all the, you know, the corruption of false churches, false teachers are out there. But the bride of Christ, When we look at Revelation and we look at it through a gospel lens, we see the blood of Christ for what it is. It's beautiful. It's got Christ's body. He's the head. When he speaks, then we see the gold. We see the golden lampstands and the light of Christ on those lampstands. So we're looking at verse 10 in particular. In the King James Version, it says, I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day and heard behind me a great voice as of a trumpet, verse 11, saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, and what thou seest, write in a book. And since we're going to concentrate on verse 10, the first thing we'll take a look at is this first phrase, I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day. And I provided that first part for you. And it's, Eganamene enneumete ente kuriaka himera. Hemera is day. Kuriaka is the Lord, and it's the Lord's possessive day. It's the Lord's day. Pneuma, pneumati, pneumati, it comes, it's where we get the, it's the root word is pneuma, which is spirit. And pneumati would be, is conjugated for en-pneumati. And we've seen this word before in verse nine. Egonomine. And egonomine is just, it's like the Greek form of the verb to be. Is, was, this was, in this case, it's past tense, and objectively past tense, and it has the, that ege, part comes from the Greek ego, which means I. So, and we saw that in verse 9 when it says, I John, was when, excuse me, it's not I John that was translated there in verse 9. It was egonome en naso. It was, I was on the isle of Patmos. and he used that. And that was a question Brother Steve had asked last week. He said, does it say that he was in exile or that he was banished? No, in the Greek it simply says that he was, but historically we know that Patmos was a place of banishment. It was a place historically that was, I think they had salt mines there, and they had a couple of mines there. And it was kind of, if you will, it was the ancient, Greek Empire or Roman Empire. It was the Roman Empire equivalent of Devil's Island. You all heard of Devil's Island down in Guyana, down in South America. This is where, with John being there, he had to grow his own, like grow his own vegetables. He was given a place to stay. It was desolate. And really the only time that boats had come across into Patmos where they'd come in or where they'd left, pretty much the only time was to drop off prisoners and not to pick them up. As far as supplying, I have not found any historical records as far as for Patmos, whether there were actually guards on board there. The sea state was, again, like Devil's Island in South America, was such that there's really no way that they could have chopped down trees and make a boat for their own escape. I think there was only one safe harbor there just because of where it was situated. And remember that Patmos would be situated about 40 miles northwest, about 35 to 45 miles northwest of Asia Minor, north of Ephesus, which was the key port on the Aegean Sea. And so that would be Patmos. But at any rate, this first portion in Numati, ennumity, meaning in the spirit or lowercase spirit or in the spirit. Now this term is used and we see this here in Revelation 4, not only here in Revelation 1.10, we see it also in Revelation 4 verse 2. It says, at once I was in the spirit and behold the throne stood in heaven and when seated on the throne. And so he was in the spirit in Revelation chapter four. And again, we see it in Revelation 17 verse three in these some significant visions. This phrase itself, ennumity. Revelation 17 verse three. says, and he carried me away in the spirit, or literally in spirit, into a wilderness. And I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names and it had seven heads and ten horns. And then also in Revelation 21 verse 10, Verse 10 says, and he carried me away in the spirit to a great high mountain and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God. Now, John uses this term these four times in Revelation 1 verse 10 and these three times that we've looked in chapter four, chapter 17 and chapter 21. Now, and just these two words in that order, I provided you several places where it exists there. There are some places where if you kind of look it up, I did do some scraping on this one, because there's sometimes it says en-to-nu-ma-ti, sometimes it says en-te-nu-ma-ti, which can be translated in the spirit, but the contexts of those are a bit different. And so I didn't even provide them. So if you took a Strong's Concordance and followed it around and looked at the scriptures where pneumati or pneuma is used, you'd probably find several of them, but you'll know by even the translation that they have a different context. Now, I did provide you under here, and I'm asking you to turn first of all to Matthew chapter 22, And I gave you some for comparison. I just put them in there. I didn't divide them up. If you're a note taker, you might want to put a slash between Luke 1.17 and Romans 8.9 because we have the same term is used in all of these references, ennumity, but only in two of them The first two, Matthew 22 verse 43, and then Luke 1 and verse 17, do they seem to have the same connotation of what is talked about here by John? And I'll have a quotation for you from A.T. Robertson in his 19th century 19th century word studies in the New Testament. So in Matthew 22, remember the context of Matthew 22. Matthew 22, Jesus is being confronted by the Pharisees and Sadducees and the Herodians and so forth. They're trying to right after he tells some parables and then they're trying to trap him in his words about paying the Caesar what Caesars and then the resurrection of the dead and the great commandment. And then finally, let's see, where are we? 22 verse 43. He Well, beginning in verse 22, Jesus says to them, who've been questioning him, what do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he? They said to him, the son of David. In verse 43, he said to them, how is it then that David, in the spirit, right there, that's that term, calls him Lord, saying, verse 44, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet. And here the Lord Jesus is speaking of David, who is, by the inspiration of God, ministering in a revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ a thousand years before Jesus is born and crucified, that he says that he does so in the spirit. And so there is at least, if it's not revelation unto comprehension, it is still as revelation that he penned. I was quoting, and here is the quote from Psalm 110. that is also quoted in Hebrews, two places in the New Testament that we have it, and Jesus questions them about it, but David is in the spirit when he pens the Psalms. We take that, or at least the commentators, the Bible commentaries, will take this, and the theologians will take this portion right here where Jesus says that David was, by being in the spirit, he was inspired of God. He brought forth revelation. So we can assume this from the Psalms is what the commentators, or the theologians, at least the reliable theologians, in my humble opinion, will suggest. Luke chapter 1, if you turn to the right there, to Luke chapter 1, we see another that seems to be more in line with what in the spirit means in the case of John. Luke chapter one, and this is actually speaking of John the Baptist and his ministry before he's born. As the angel Gabriel presents to Zechariah, in the temple while he is of the course of Abijah or Aviyah, the eighth course according to the sons of Aaron and performing the priesthood that was set up by David. And in verse 17, or beginning in verse 16, speaking of John. Oh, we'll begin in verse 15. Why not? For he will be great before the Lord and he must not drink wine or strong drinks. So he's going to be a Nazarite. and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother's womb, verse 16. And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, verse 17. And he will go before him, before going before Jesus or the Messiah, in the spirit, there's that term right there, ennumeti. He will go in the spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the disobedient and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just to make ready for the Lord a people prepared. The reason why that would be still in keeping with this, that Jesus called John the Baptist, in Matthew 17, he called John the Baptist Elijah. If you will, Elijah's already come, and this they understood that he was talking about John the Baptist. But John said, John the Baptist said in John chapter one, that no, I am not Elijah. Are you Elijah for to come? No, I'm not him. Are you then the prophet? No. There's one that comes after me. In John chapter 1 he denied being Elijah. In fact, I think in Matthew he also denies being Elijah. But the angel Gabriel, speaking unto Zechariah, says that he is in the spirit and power. And the way that this is reconciled is that he's not really Elijah. Elijah is his own person, but the spirit of God that was upon Elijah that foreshadowed many truths of the Messiah to come, that, because he would be like, since the forerunner is to be like Elijah, this same spirit being in the spirit, it's a transforming work that ministers unto John as a prophet so that he would be a voice crying in the wilderness. This is, and so in the spirit, which is different from, if you'll turn with me to Romans chapter eight, verse nine, I guess, I'll just take one of these because Romans 8 verse 9, 1st Corinthians 12 verse 3, Ephesians 6 verse 18, and Colossians 1 verse 8 speaks of in the spirit as it pertains to us in a general saved manner. We're saved by God's grace and so we are in the spirit that we're not in the flesh. Brother Mike, you have something. I've thought often that John the Baptist, he preached against just like Elijah, yeah. For those of you, yeah, for those of you who think I'm being very silly, I've noticed that some of the recordings when, way back there, Brother Mike is asking a question, and for the sake of the folks in the fellowship hall that are listening, Brother Mike was saying that the spirit of Elijah, that as John rebuked, political leaders like Herod, etc., so did Elijah in his rebuke of Ahab and Jezebel, etc., and against false gods, which interestingly would go to the fact that when John the Baptist was calling people to repent, he was telling them to repent from dead works. Don't just go through the motions of keeping the law externally. You must repent. This is what prepared the people to receive Christ who was the progenitor of grace. Though all that were saved in the Old Testament were still saved by grace through faith. Or by grace. By grace alone is anyone saved. There's no one that is saved apart from God's grace. Oh, so Romans 8 verse 9, Romans 8 verse 9 says, Oh, that's verse 9, or chapter 9. Romans 8 verse 9 says, you, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit. Now, certainly in my English Standard Version, it has spirit capitalized. And most commentators will take that as being that since Galatians 5, 17 speaks of that the flesh lusts against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh, or the desires of the spirit are against the flesh. desires of the flesh are against the Spirit in Galatians 5.17, both King James Version and the English Standard Version, that what it's speaking of here, our flesh opposes the Spirit. Because our flesh hates God, hates God's Christ. Our flesh hates grace. And it opposes the Spirit, Galatians 5.17. So in this, in verse 9, where it says, you however are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, and it uses the same ennumity, it is in fact the Spirit of God. If in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you, anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. And this is one of the also one of the key verses as far as being saved by grace. You don't get, as far as for the Spirit, it is by God's grace that saves us because in order to, if you look at Galatians, and don't turn to Galatians 5 verse 22 and 23, but faith is all the way down, pistis in Greek, And in the English Standard Version, in the American Standard Version, or American Standard Bible, they translate that word, that the King James Version rightly translates faith, they say faithfulness. I don't know why they translate it that way, because in Greek it's pretty clear that it is faith. It's the word faith, pistis. Faithfulness is sometimes conjugated in a different way, expanded the word in Greek. But it is, you know, faith is way down on the list. How could you have faith apart from the Holy Spirit is my question. You can't. The faith that is apart from the Holy Spirit is the faith of devils. James chapter two, verse 19. You believe God is one, thou doest well, the devils believe and tremble. You know, they've seen Christ. And that was evident by those who were demon-possessed. When he walked the shores of Galilee, and they cry out, who are you? We know who you are, son of David. Have you come to torment us before the time? Son of the most high God, and he was called that. In fact, in one place, was it Luke or Mark, where the demon-possessed man went up and worshiped him. It was filled with a legion of demons. They went and worshiped him. but they were rebuking him at the very same time, which is the acme of evil. Because to, for example, if we came in here, in the flesh, to rebuke the Lord Jesus Christ and said we're worshiping, that is, one of the most heinous of sins. And we see that in Matthew chapter 7 verses 22 to 23, or 21 to 23, that Jesus said in that day, not everyone that comes to me in that day that says, Lord, Lord, will enter into the kingdom of heaven. You know, did we not Cast out demons in your name. Did we not do many mighty works in your name? Did we not prophesy or proclaiming the truth? Did we not prophesy in your name? And I'll say to them, depart from me you worker of iniquity. I never knew you. Those are the worst kind. But anyway, we see this and we'll see it in first, we're not turning to 1 Corinthians 12 verse three or the others, but they say the same thing. What it is is in context, this is our general salvation and so we're in the spirit, but how many of us have had special revelation that was so transforming that we've been able to do work of the apostles or see special visions like this, you know, the 22 chapters of John the Apostle, the brother of James. How many of us could say something like that? We only have one reference that I believe really that equates to this from the Old Testament, and that's Ezekiel chapter 37, verse one. It's just one simple word. It's actually two words, but it's the only place that really references this in the Old Testament. And it's, the word is veruach. And ruach is spirit, it equates to the Greek pneuma. But having the word, having the letter bet in front of it, bet will either mean in a or in the. And the way that the, well, let's turn to Ezekiel chapter 37 in the Old Testament and we'll see this a little bit, hopefully a little bit more clearly. And 37 is a very well-known passage of scripture for many of you. It's the Valley of Dry Bones. When Ezekiel sees this great vision before the Lord, Ezekiel was very much with the visions and so forth. And verse one, Ezekiel 37 verse one, it says, the hand of the Lord was upon me. And he brought me out in the Spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of the valley. It was full of bones. I want to read it a little bit because I like this passage of scripture. And he led me around among them, and behold, there was very many on the surface of the valley, and behold, they were very dry. Verse 3, And he said to me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, you know. I like the King James version of that. O Lord God, thou knowest. You know. I love that portion of Scripture. In fact, that would go very well. I kept it out, but I don't know, I might throw it back in to this morning's message in Job where we look at the incomprehensible God, a God that we can't fully understand. And here Ezekiel is presenting a truth. Lord, you know all things. I don't. You're God, I'm not. And so, you know. You ask me a question, I'll leave it up to you. And that's where we see this in the spirit. That's where we see this in the spirit that's particularly seems to reference what John is saying in Revelation and what Jesus said of David and what in Matthew 22 and what Gabriel said of John the Baptist in Luke chapter 1. We see Ezekiel and he's transported whether in the body as Paul says. You know, whether in the body or out of the body I know not. 2nd Corinthians chapter 12 verses 2 through 4. Remember he was caught up into the third heaven. Whether in the body and or out of the body I do not know. The Lord knows. But I saw things that were unspeakable. They were unlawful to utter. In other words, if I said anything about it, it wouldn't do it justice. He was taken to see something. Although I would suggest Moses, when he was seeing the instructions for the tabernacle and everything that was to be built, he was seeing heaven, but it doesn't have a reference of that he was in the spirit when he was taken there, but I would suggest it's the same thing. this is what would be marked as different. We're in the spirit here, worshiping God in Sunday school, through God's word, looking at the truth of God's word. And it doesn't mean that we're not in the spirit at all. We are in the spirit. However, this in the spirit, I believe, tends towards something that is very marked. And as we read the book of Revelation, we go, yeah, it is pretty marked in the visions that he's saying. This, so yeah. Any questions or comments there? Other places that you might, I believe that might equate to it, but doesn't use the term in the spirit and in the New Testament are like Acts chapter 10 verse 10. You don't have to turn there. Did I provide it, Acts 10 verse 10 in your handout? because I don't know what I did with the handout. Oh, I didn't take it from you, did I? I just have my notes there. Let me see. I did not provide that for you. So if you're a note taker, you might wanna write down Acts chapter 10 verse 10. We won't turn there, but you'll recall that in Acts chapter 10, just before Peter gives the gospel to the Gentiles, to Cornelius' house, he's in Joppa, and he is on the roof of Simon the Tanner. And he has a vision, and it says in the English Standard Version that while he was praying at midday, just before lunch, that a vision came to him, he was in a trance. It was, you know, he fell into a trance, and then he saw this great vision, a vessel, a sheet came down full of creeping things, and it says, Arise Peter, kill and eat. So he saw a vision, and so several commentators present M.R. Vincent of his new picture, Pictures in the New Testament, his commentary on the Greek language, and A.T. Robertson mentioned this as well, and several others, John Gill. presents that this being in the Spirit was more like this, akin to this. So that Acts chapter 10, that there was a particular vision that came to him. Also Acts chapter 22, when Paul is preaching to the people in Jerusalem when he's arrested and is allowed to speak, He presents in Acts 22 verse 17, that same similar truth. In fact, I'm turning there in Acts. Acts 22 and verse 17, he says, when I had returned to Jerusalem, Acts 22 verse 17, he says, when I had returned to, excuse me, when I had returned to Jerusalem and was praying in the temple, I fell into a trance. And the term is the same one that's used in Greek that was spoken of by Peter in Acts 10, or spoken about Peter in Acts 10 verse 10. And I gave you the reference also of 2 Corinthians 12 verses 2 through 4. If you're a note taker, that's when you probably want to look up and check it out that that was, again, Paul was in the, that he saw the third heaven. It doesn't say he was in the spirit, but he saw the third heaven. And that term for you young people, young men, so that you understand what that is, is we have the first heaven is what we see out there in the sky. the atmosphere around us. The second heaven is outer space. That's where the stars, where God hangs the stars in the sky. The third heaven is the abode of God, which that was a term that the Jews had for the third heaven because they understood there was the sky that you see immediately. And at night, beyond the sky that you see immediately and beyond the clouds, there is the stars where the sun is, et cetera. That's the second heaven. And the third heaven would be the home of God. And so that's just a term, not as far as, well, is it beyond the outer space? Yes and no, I guess. We'll see when that time comes. And if you're not saved, well, you'll see it too, but a lot more uncomfortably, I'd suggest. The next one is the Lord's Day. And this is, I guess we'll, We'll take the second part of the sentence when I get back from Skamon Bay. Any questions so far? Are you tracking, at least a little bit? So John is having this particular special revelation, according to most of the commentators. And then we have Ente Kuriake Hamara. Hamara means day. Kuriake is the Lord. And so, on the Lord's day. Ente is on the Lord's day. This expression means on the Lord's day or in the Lord's day in Greek. But A.T. Robertson says this in his word studies in the New Testament. Quote, Diceman has proven from inscriptions in papyri that the word kuriakos was in common use for the sense imperial. as imperial finance and imperial treasury, and from papyri and astraka, that Hemera Sabbas Day, which means, he has in parentheses, Augustus' Day, or Augustus' Day, was the first day of each month, or called Emperor's Day, on which money payments were made. It was easy, therefore, for the Christians to take this term already in use and apply it to the first day of the week in honor of the Lord Jesus Christ's resurrection on that day, according to Ignatius, again in parentheses from his Didache 14. He continues to quote, in the New Testament the word occurs only here, and in 1 Corinthians 11 verse 20, the day for the possessive of the Lord. You know, kuriake or kuriakin, because it uses the term kuriakin dipnon, kuriakin dipnon. His quote continues, it has no reference to Hemera Kuru, the day of judgment, as 2nd Peter chapter 3 verse 10. There are some terms, 2nd Peter 3 verse 10, I think the Apostle Paul uses it as well. There's a few references where the words are turned around. Day of judgment or day of the Lord. Hemera Kourio, which would be Day of the Lord, most of the commentators, and I'm one of the, I would agree with that, is that it does not, this is an equating to that. And I've heard it said of others. Some teachers, the late Chuck Missler, believed that, because there were some people that believed it was a reference to the Day of the Lord. But in the Greek, it's not. It does not jibe with the consistency of Greek. Plus, you have the extra biblical writings as well, historically, that this was a term that was also used in the Roman Empire. Because remember, the common language still in this time of the mid-90s, the common language was still Greek. Latin would not become the common language in Rome until the fourth century. So Greek was still Koine Greek, the common Greek, historical Greek, and all that. That was still the language of the civilized world. And so one place that we see, and he made reference to the first Corinthians 11 verse 20. I'm going to turn there. That was not the translation. The first day was not the translation. No, the first day was not the translation. The extra-biblical historical writings that they know from the Roman Empire, that they took the first day of the month and they called it, they used the term that was something like that. They would call it Curiacan Hemera or Curiacan, let's see, where was the term here? Oh, excuse me, Hemera Sebaste. was Augustus' day or Augustus' day. But the term also, what he implies here is that the term was also used among common people who were not Christians that they would call it curiacon haemora, which is the Lord's day or because curia was used of the emperor. Remember that historically, this in particular was something significant with Domitian. Nero did it too, but not as brutally as Domitian. This is why John, and for some of you who may not have been here, before John was exiled to the Isle of Patmos, He was boiled in flaming oil and was not hurt. That's the testimony of history. And so upset was Domitian, who was the Caesar at the time, so upset that nothing happened to him, he just banished him to Patmos, never to be seen again. And then the Lord, by his grace, after John had received this vision, had allowed him to come off. His heart was softened to this Christian. He was so dead set against Christians that he was breaking into the church home, the house churches, and taking what scriptures that they were, the New Testament scriptures that they were writing down and burning them. But where were we? First Corinthians chapter 16. is one reference, Acts chapter 20 verse 27 is another one, but 1 Corinthians 16. I know we're at the end of our time here. And so not in scripture, but again, extra biblical historical writings from the ancient church fathers and so forth, suggest that the reason why we do And we're calling it the Lord's Day because it's commemorative of the Lord's resurrection. This was the first day of the week. And then from Scripture, 1 Corinthians 16 verse 1, Paul makes mention of now concerning the collection. He's writing from Ephesus, remember, in his third missionary journey. He says, now concerning the collection of the saints as I directed the churches of Galatia, so you also are to do. Verse two, on the first day of every week, each of you is to put something aside and store it up as he may prosper so that there will be no collecting when I come. And historically, they met on the first day of the week because If you recall from way back from our church history lessons when we were walking through Acts, Paul was very practical in his Christianity and in his mission work. That's why mostly, with some exceptions like Philippi, he would go into the urban centers where there was a synagogue. proclaim the gospel among the Jews, and since they knew the scriptures, those are the ones that as he worked with them, whom God had called and God had saved, since they knew the scriptures like he did. He was a Pharisee when the Lord saved him. And the only scriptures that were around was the Old Testament. And since they didn't have Gutenberg's press for 1,500 years after this, They were handwritten, so not everyone had the Torah scrolls. Not everyone had the Law and the Prophets. So these scrolls and parchments were in the synagogues. So the teachers would go into the synagogues on the Sabbath, on the Jewish Sabbath on Saturday, hear the reading portions, and then preach Christ from it on the first day of the week, on Sunday. And historically, that was going on for quite a long time. And so when the Christians were gathering, mostly, it was on the first day of the week. And we see that in Acts chapter 20, verse 27. Now, I won't ask you to turn there. I'm almost there real quick. And then we'll end it with that, unless there's any questions, because I've taken us too far. Acts 27 verse 27, remember that when he was speaking to the Ephesian elders, ending his third missionary journey, having left Corinth and traveling, towards Jerusalem with the, you know, from Acts 16, the collections that they'd taken up. And he was, in Acts chapter 15, he was saying, you know, take up the collection also for those, you know, I bragged to those in Macedonia about your wealth. So, you know, the saints are suffering in Jerusalem. So when I come by, I'll pick up that collection as well so that I can take it to Jerusalem. And in verse 27 of Acts 20, he says, Excuse me, was it, not 27. Oh, not 27, Acts 20 verse 7. Can't even read my own notes, my own handwriting here. Acts 20 verse 7, on the first day of the week when we were gathered, it was before the Ephesian elders, on the first day of the week when we gathered together to break bread, Paul talked with them, intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight. Verse 8, and there were many lamps in the upper room, where we were gathered and a young man named Eutychus sitting in the window sank into a deep sleep as Paul still talked still longer and being overcome by sleep he fell down the third story and was taken up dead. But Paul went down and bent over him and taking him up in his arms said, do not be alarmed for his life is in him. And when Paul had gone up and had broken bread and eaten. He conversed with them a long while until daybreak, and so departed. And they took the youth away alive and were not a little comforted. They rejoiced that Paul killed them by his extensive teaching, but then raised them from the dead. to show the power of three hours of preaching, I suppose. And so that's where, when I say I've gone a little too long, I don't really feel too badly because none of you have fallen out the window. All of you are still alive. And so I rejoice in that even more than if you were dead and then brought back to life again. Any questions or comments? We'll pick up when I get back from Scammon Bay on the Lord willing that the weather is nice, that it doesn't, Hold me there that I'll be back on the 30th for communion, but our Sunday school will pick up verse 10 and run into verse 11. So let's pray. Our most blessed and gracious God and Father, thank you, Lord, for the precious word that you have given us. We don't seek after great revelations like John, but we do seek to understand that which you have revealed through John, not just in Revelation, but also how you've revealed Christ through all the scriptures, that you may be glorified through Christ's exaltation, and that we, as your people, be seen as shining lights of Christ's light. In his name we do pray, amen.