Quote:
Originally Posted by Ohio
Never thought about that [Revelations 2 & 3 being addressed "to the angel of the church in..."] before. Are you sure about this?
|
No, I am not sure. But that never stopped me from wildly speculating before, did it?
What got me thinking along those lines was where the 70 disciples said, "Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name". They were evidently commanding the demons in the name of the Lord Jesus.
As well as Paul speaking to the girl who followed him around for 3 days in Acts 16. Finally Paul said, "I command you (not the girl, but the spirit) to come out..."
And Jesus asking to the man in the Gadarenes, "What is your name?" He wasn't expecting the guy to say, "My name is Fred Johnson. Who are you?" Instead, Jesus was addressing the spiritual force(s) controlling him.
And, like I said, Jesus didn't tell Peter to get behind Him, but rather Satan, who'd usurped Peter. So I read Paul's "we fight not with flesh and blood but against spiritual powers" in that context.
To push that reading onto the epistles in Revelations 2 and 3 is not a slam-dunk by any means. But still it's worth considering why John wrote to the angel, and not the church. I also remembered some kind of "midrash" commentary on the book of Daniel, where the rabbi was saying how every geographical area has an uber-spirit (i.e. the "prince of Persia").
Leaving this subject for a minute, it also answers
MacDuff's question of who gets to decide proper interpretation of the Bible. My answer is that we all get to interpret, in the ekklesia, and all the rest are free to go, "Whoa, there, Pardner! Where'd you come up with that one?" Giving one person unrestricted license to say, "This means that" is a recipe for disaster. But if (most) everyone can interpret, that is better because all can be checked by all. Sort of "democracy in action".
So I like speculating in the ekklesia. Usually someone will rein me in.
