Thursday

Related Verses
Rev. 2:1, 7
1 To the messenger of the church in Ephesus write: These things says He who holds the seven stars in His right hand, He who walks in the midst of the seven golden lampstands:
7 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, to him I will give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the Paradise of God.

Rev. 3:18, 20
18 I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined by fire that you may be rich, and white garments that you may be clothed and that the shame of your nakedness may not be manifested, and eyesalve to anoint your eyes that you may see.
20 Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, then I will come in to him and dine with him and he with Me.

Isa. 55:1
1 Ho! Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, And you who have no money; Come, buy and eat; Yes, come, buy wine and milk Without money and without price.

John 14:21-22
21 He who has My commandments and keeps them, he is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will manifest Myself to him.
22 Judas, not Iscariot, said to Him, Lord, and what has happened that You are to manifest Yourself to us and not to the world?

Related Reading
Christ, as the High Priest, takes care of the churches as the lampstands in His divinity with His divine love, signified by the golden girdle on His breasts, to nourish the churches (Rev. 1:13b). Christ is not only human but also divine. He is the Son of Man wearing a golden girdle, signifying His divinity as His divine energy. His divinity as the divine energy nourishes the churches in many ways. 

On the one hand, He trims the wicks of the church lamps, cutting away all the wrongdoings, shortages, failures, and defects mentioned in the seven epistles to the seven churches. Christ does the best trimming work in His humanity to cherish the churches. On the other hand, in each of these seven epistles, we see Christ’s nourishing. (CWWL, 1994–1997, vol. 5, “The Vital Groups,” pp. 156-157) 

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We may say that [Revelation 2:7] is a prophecy referring to the kingdom age, in which the overcomers will enjoy Christ as the tree of life in God’s Paradise. But if we do not enjoy Christ as the tree of life in the church life today, surely we will not participate in the tree of life in the kingdom age…If I do not eat Christ here today, I will not eat Him in the kingdom age. 

In the seventh epistle the Lord counsels the church in Laodicea to buy gold, white garments, and eyesalve to be saved from their degradation in lukewarmness (Rev. 3:18). He promises to dine with the ones who would open the door to Him (v. 20). We can see that this is the nourishing of Christ in His divinity exercised by and with His love. 

His nourishing the churches in His divinity is so that the churches may grow and mature in His divine life and become the overcomers in His sevenfold intensification. 

Our Christ today is our High Priest. In His humanity He is easily touched with the feeling of our weaknesses. He sympathizes with our weakness because He was tempted in all respects like us. He is cherishing us in His humanity. Meanwhile, He is nourishing us in His divinity with all the positive aspects of His person revealed in the seven epistles to the seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3…In His humanity He is cherishing us to make us proper so that we may be happy, pleasant, and comfortable. In His divinity He is nourishing us so that we may grow and mature in the divine life to be His overcomers to accomplish His eternal economy. (CWWL, 1994–1997, vol. 5, “The Vital Groups,” pp. 157-158)

Just as a child is cherished by the very presence of his mother, so we are cherished by the Lord’s presence…The Lord’s presence produces an atmosphere of tenderness and warmth to cherish our very being. 

No matter how enjoyable the fellowship may be in your home, the atmosphere there is not nearly as cherishing as the atmosphere in the [church] meetings…It is by the atmosphere produced by the Lord’s brooding presence that the Lord cherishes the church. To be in this climate, this atmosphere, this environment, gives us rest, comfort, healing, cleansing, and encouragement…For this reason I do not want to miss even one meeting of the church. 

Nourishing and cherishing go together. Through the nourishing we enjoy the supply of life inwardly, and through the cherishing we experience the soothing, comforting atmosphere outwardly. Whenever we are in an atmosphere of cherishing, we can absorb every word of the ministry. This indicates that under the cherishing we receive nourishing. (Life-study of Ephesians, p. 438) 

Further Reading: Life-study of Ephesians, msg. 53