Quote:
Originally Posted by zeek
Witness Lee identified Christianity with the religious aspect of the great Babylon in Revelation 14 - 18.
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And the call to come out of her my people also corresponds with Rev 2-3.
1. In Laodicea Jesus is outside knocking calling on those who are in to come out and He will sup with them.
2. In Philadelphia Jesus tells the overcomers that they will "go out no more" indicating that they had gone out previously. This cannot be negative (backsliding) since they are all overcomers and it appears to be a prerequisite to being in Philadelphia.
3. This split appears in Ephesus -- some have left their first love and the consequence of not repenting for this will be that you will lose your lamp stand. Once Jesus leaves the building (Laodicea) then you have lost your lamp stand since He is the light.
4. Every church after that indicates this split becoming deeper and wider. Balaam, Jezebel, martyrs, and most of those in Sardis are not walking white.
We can see this with the Catholic church. In the Catholic church we have individual monks living in remote regions of the world in a way that expresses Jesus Christ (movie "The Mission" comes to mind). At the same time there are those Bishops conflicted by the political aspect of the Catholic church trying to please various worldly powers like Portugal, Spain, etc (again portrayed in "The Mission") and then of course you have the Vatican city which by all accounts had become a very corrupt idolatrous place.
It is possible to portray the Catholic Church as Pergamum, Thyatira, or Sardis depending on what you are looking at. You cannot describe it as Philadelphia since the idea that "they have a little strength" is absurd, nor could you characterize them as being composed of those who "have gone out" from one of the other churches. But after the rapture of the first fruits in Rev 14 it is clear that all of them will become Laodicea.