In verse 14 the Lord says, “But I have a few things against you, because you have some there who hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumblingblock before the sons of Israel, to eat idol sacrifices and to commit fornication.” In these epistles, the Lord desires, according to God’s economy, that we should eat Him as the tree of life (2:7), the hidden manna (2:17), and the rich produce of the good land (3:20). But the worldly church turned from life to mere teachings, thus distracting the believers from the enjoyment of Christ as their life supply for fulfillment of God’s purpose. The enjoyment of Christ builds up the church, whereas the teachings issue in a religion.
This verse mentions “the teaching of Balaam.” Balaam was a Gentile prophet who caused God’s people to stumble. For the sake of reward (2 Pet. 2:15; Jude 11), he brought fornication and idolatry to God’s people (Num. 25:1-3; 31:16). In the worldly church, some began to teach the same things. Today, in Protestantism as well as in Catholicism, the same teaching prevails. Idolatry always brings in fornication (Num. 35:1-3; Acts 15:29). When the worldly church disregarded the name, the Person, of the Lord, she turned to idolatry, which issued in fornication.
In today’s Christendom, many of the hired preachers do not teach people to take Christ as their life supply. Rather, they subtly teach people to eat idol sacrifices, that is, to take in evil, devilish, and demonic things. These teachings cause people to deviate from the Person of Christ, leading them into spiritual fornication. Christ should be the unique Husband to the church, the unique Bridegroom to all the saints. But so many teachings in today’s Christianity cause people to take in the demonic things and to be related to things other than Christ. This indeed is to eat idol sacrifices and to commit fornication.
What does it mean to deny the Lord’s name and to deny the faith of the Lord? As we have seen, faith here does not denote the subjective faith, the believing ability; it denotes the objective faith, the items in which we believe. The faith of the Lord includes what He has done for us in His redemptive work, His death and resurrection, and all the items which we must believe in order to be saved. These things constitute our faith. The name denotes the Lord’s Person. We should neither deny the name nor the faith of the Lord. We must always hold on to His name and believe in Him.
When I was young, I was baptized in a Chinese Presbyterian Church where there were some Balaams. On a particular Sunday morning, one of these Balaams delivered a lecture on sanitary education, talking specifically on how to kill flies. Later, someone proposed that a particular object be set up in the church building and that everyone in the congregation bow down to it. When some of us opposed this, that Balaam said, “Even if Jesus Christ would rise up from the tomb and tell me not to bow down to this object, I would still do it.” By this remark he revealed that he did not believe in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. This is an example of denying the Lord’s Person and of denying our faith in Him. If you read history and study today’s Christianity, you will discover many things like this. In many so-called churches modernism is prevailing. The modernists do not believe that Jesus is God, that He was born of a virgin, or that He died on the cross for our redemption. They merely believe that He was crucified as a martyr, and they do not believe that Jesus Christ was resurrected. The teachings of Balaam always cause people to enter into union with the worldly things. This is to eat idol sacrifices and to commit spiritual fornication.
In verse 15 the Lord says, “Thus you also have those who hold in like manner the teaching of the Nicolaitans.” The worldly and degraded church holds not only the teaching of Balaam, but also the teaching of the Nicolaitans. The teaching of Balaam distracts believers from the Person of Christ to idolatry and from the enjoyment of Christ to spiritual fornication, whereas the teaching of the Nicolaitans destroys the function of believers as members of the Body of Christ, thus annulling the Lord’s Body in expressing Him. The former teaching disregards the Head, and the latter destroys the Body. This is the subtlety of the enemy in all religious teachings.
In the church in Ephesus only the works of the Nicolaitans were found (2:6), whereas in the church in Pergamos their works progressed into a teaching. Firstly, they practiced the hierarchy in the initial church; now they taught it in the degraded church. Today, in both Catholicism and Protestantism, this Nicolaitan hierarchy prevails in both practice and teaching. The Lord hates the Nicolaitan hierarchy because it kills the function of the members of the Body and builds up an organization in place of an organism. Consider the situation of today’s Christianity: there is no organism; rather, there is a strong organization. This hierarchy is evil and satanic, and the Lord hates it. In arranging the services of the church, we must be careful not to build up an organization. If we would have the proper church life, we must develop the function of all the members, encouraging them to function according to life in a living way that the Body might be built up as an organism. This vision must govern the church life, and we must never stray from it. However, if we are even a little negligent, we shall leave the organism and return to organization. Always be on the alert against the formation of any type of organization. We must come back to the organism that all the members of the Body may have the opportunity to function.