“He that hat an ear let him hear what the spirit saith unto the churches.”

(Revelation 3:7-22)

The book of Revelation begins with seven brief letters directed to seven Christian congregations in seven separate cities of Asia Minor. The seven cities have different names, of course: Ephesus, Philadelphia, Sardis, etc. They have different locations on the map. The churches face varying opportunities and problems, different besetting sins and virtues. Each letter deals with the specific situation in each church and is hence different from the others, but the concluding exhortation is always the same in these seven letters: “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.”

There is no text of scripture the contemporary church clings to more hopefully than this seven-fold exhortation from Revelation: “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.” Particular congregations in our time have their own particular sense of lostness in their contemporary situations. Whole denominations admit their sense of being adrift in the fast-flowing sea of modern culture.

Social scientists have been busy writing books on the irrelevance of the modern church. Denominational boards and agencies have been confessing the ineptness of their programs and the ineffectuality of their traditional organizational structures. Individual Christians have been overwhelmed with a sense of futility and frustration in their accustomed round of religious activities.

Three years ago Pope John called a worldwide council to begin discussion which would lead to reforms in the hope of bringing the Roman Catholic Church up to date. A Time magazine end-of-the-year article on Christian Renewal traced, through all the Christian bodies, the desperate sense of need for renewal. Everywhere, it seems, in every Christian communion there is the conviction that something more than man’s wisdom, man’s cleverness, and man’s strength is needed for the renewal of the church. Unless the living God comes to His church now, gives her His orders, and supplies her with His power, there is no hope.

So, everywhere there is emerging an interest in the Biblical teachings of the activities of the Holy Spirit. The theme chosen for studies in the World Alliance of Presbyterian and Reformed churches during this half-decade — 1965-70 — is: “Come, Creator Spirit.” The clear teaching of the scriptures is that God has a message for His church in every emergency — that that message can be heard — if only His church will listen: “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.”

But this is not easily done. Dag Hammerskold, in his Markings, wrote: “How can you ever expect to keep your powers of hearing when you never want to listen. That God should have time for you, you seem to take as much for granted as that you cannot have time for Him. The devils enter uninvited when the house stands empty. For other kinds of guests, you have first to open the door.”

But what is the channel of the Spirit’s speaking and organ of the church’s hearing? Is it the New Testament phenomenon of speaking in tongues, as we read about in our first scripture lesson? Not only did this peculiar outburst take place in Jerusalem, but according to the New Testament record, it occurred also in Caesarea, Corinth, and Ephesus.

The Pentecostal churches of America for years have insisted that speaking in tongues was not just a vagary of New Testament religious life, but the continuing sign of authentic baptism by the Holy Spirit for the true believer whom God calls and empowers in His church of every age. The Pentecostals speak with tongues now, and they insist that these strange utterances which are not at all the language of home and business and school — not intelligible by any objective language standards — are what the Spirit now is saying to the churches.

And in our time there is a revival among the old-line churches — even in Presbyterian and Episcopal congregations — of this glossolalia, or speaking in tongues. Six hundred persons in a large Presbyterian church on the West Coast have experienced glossolalia. An Episcopal rector at Van Nuys, California inaugurated a vigorous movement in that denomination of people who speak in tongues.

But though there is widespread interest in tongue-speaking in Christian churches today, and though those who experience this phenomenon insist it is by the power and influence of the Holy Spirit, nevertheless there is no clear message from the glossolalia of what the spirit is now saying to the churches. The noise of the tongue speaking is apparent enough, but the meaning of the message is not at all clear. So we must look beyond the glossolalia to find what the Spirit saith to the churches.

John Calvin’s dictum was that the Holy Scriptures, when read by the eye of faith and interpreted by the ever-present Spirit, became for the believer the very message of God. The new resource guides for the worship and work of the local congregation in our denomination contain help for appropriate Biblical studies to be used by every committee in a congregation. The idea is that people can hear what the Spirit wants to say to the church about her mission in the world today only as they wait in faith before the Word and the Spirit.

But individuals and committees in local congregations, however dedicated in purpose or persistent in study, are subject to the errors of provincialism and human fallibility, so from the earliest days the church has believed that some of the most authoritative directives of what the Spirit hath to say to the churches have come from church councils.

The Jerusalem Council decided that the Holy Spirit was saying to the church that henceforth it was to tolerate no racial requirements for membership. The Antioch Council decided that when the Spirit said unto that church: “Separate unto me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them,” that the Spirit was delivering a world mission mandate to the church of Jesus Christ.

So, even now, the deliverances of church councils: Presbyterian General Assemblies, Baptist Conventions, Methodist General Conferences, Roman Catholic Ecumenical Councils — these are venerated as special channels of conveying what the Spirit saith unto the churches.

But, again, as our Westminster Confession of faith puts it, even church councils “may err, and many have erred;” and the Holy Spirit can and does speak to the church in the full stream of her life and work apart from councils or in addition to them. Three particular aspects of the worldwide Christian movement are currently being pointed out as live and vocal transmitters of what the Spirit has to say to the churches today.

First, the ecumenical movement that is gathering momentum steadily is one aspect of the church’s life manifesting the voice of the Spirit. This movement of the majority of the major Christian denominations on all the continents and among all races toward closer fellowship with one another is an amazing reality of our time. In this ecumenical ferment the Spirit is saying something to the churches, and it is something which has to do with unity and cooperation and closer fellowship in the witness and service of all believers.

Second, there is in the life of most of the churches today a remarkable openness to change, unknown for centuries. Roger Hazelton, writing in the Christian Century (01/06/65) states: “There is in today’s churches a coming life … a vitality that is a true mark of the Spirit … It takes shape primarily as a readiness to be changed, an expectancy of grace, an air of waiting and listening for the Spirit.” The World Reformed Alliance report at Frankfort last summer, in speaking of the same thing, described this openness of spirit as “the courage to expect miracles”.

A third aspect of the life of the contemporary church where the Spirit is at work saying something to the churches is the very noticeable increase of acceptance of responsibility by men for their neighbor’s welfare. New and burning concern is stirring in all the churches about the problems of poverty and injustice and discrimination and spiritual starvation.

These are facts in the situation of worldwide Christianity in our time: ecumenicity, openness to change, acceptance of responsibility for others; and these are transmitters through which the Spirit is talking loud and strong to the churches.

But what are the tests of the validity of the Spirit’s guidance? How can we know whether the directive of a church council is what the Spirit is saying to the churches or what communist propaganda has infiltrated into the contemporary church? How can we be sure our private interpretation of a pertinent scripture passage is by the direction of the Holy Spirit or by the inspiration of our greedy desire to preserve what we have piled up or to keep others out of the coveted status we have achieved? How can we know?

There are tests of the Spirit — sure and infallible ones — scripturally grounded and authenticated by reason and experience — these three at least:

First, the norm of the personality of the Holy Spirit is the personality of Jesus Christ as the gospels portray Him. The Spirit today will say nothing to the church which contradicts His word for the Father or contravenes His example of love and forgiveness for all.

Second, the leading and speaking of the Holy Spirit will always direct the churches into mission and service that makes human life more human — after the example of perfect humanity in Jesus Christ. There is always a tendency within the churches, as Karl Barth has so trenchantly demonstrated, to make our religious observances into routines performed in order “to get from God what can only be given by Him in gracious freedom.” (Roger Hazelton) Isaiah long ago found his people making horrible mistakes about their religious observances. “Is this the fast I have chosen?” asks Isaiah for the Lord: “A day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sack cloth and ashes under him? Wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the Lord … Is not this the fast that I have chosen? To loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? — is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy home?” (Isaiah 58: 5, 70)

Yes, this is a sure test of the Spirit’s guidance. He will always lead Christ’s church, not into more elaborate rituals for manipulating God to give us what we want, but into a mission of service designed to make all of life more human.

Finally, there is this scriptural test of the validity of the Spirit’s message to the churches: Does what the Spirit saith to the churches follow the four processes of His ministry to the seven churches in Revelation:

First, encouragement. He is the Comforter. He never comes without approval and commendation of whatever we have done in loyalty and faithfulness to our Lord, however small that may be. He makes us feel comfortably at home with our Lord and welcome with God’s people. First, He speaks — if He is God’s Holy Spirit — to our spirits, welcome and encouragement.

Second, He speaks criticism — honest and frank — of everything in which we have failed our God and denied His way. His is no ministry of soft-soaping. We are all sinners. We have failed our Savior. Unless He comes with criticism for our sins and failures, telling us exactly of what we must repent, He has not come. It is not God’s Holy Spirit who speaks.

Third, He gives warning. He shows the doom and devastation that inevitably overtake the unrepentant. He opens our eyes to ultimate consequences. If there is no clear word of warning in what we hear, then we are not listening to what the Spirit saith unto the churches.

Fourth, He speaks a promise, bright as the sunrise. He never comes to His church, no matter how defeated, discouraged, despondent we are and have every reason to be, without saying: “To him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he will go no more out … And I will write upon him the name of my God … To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne.” (Revelation 3:12, 21)

“Then shall thy light break forth as morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily, and thy righteousness shall go before thee; and the glory of the Lord thy God shall be thy rear guard.” (Isaiah 58:8)

“He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.”

Have we ears? Can we hear? What is the Spirit saying to the churches through us?