Book of Common Prayer

¹⁷ When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though I was dead.

He touched me with his right hand. “Don’t be afraid,” he said. “I am the first and the last ¹⁸ and the living one. I was dead, and look! I am alive forever and ever. I have the keys of death and Hades. ¹⁹ Now write what you see, both the things that already are, and also the things that are going to happen subsequently. ²⁰ The secret meaning of the seven stars which you saw in my right hand, by the way, and the seven golden lampstands, is this. The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches themselves.

The letter to Ephesus

2 “Write this to the angel of the church in Ephesus. ‘These are the words of the one who holds the seven stars in his right hand, and who walks in among the seven golden lampstands. ² I know what you have done, your hard labor and patience. I know that you cannot tolerate evil people, and that you have tested those who pass themselves off as apostles, but are not, and you have demonstrated them to be frauds. ³ You have patience, and you have put up with a great deal because of my name, and you haven’t grown weary. ⁴ I do, however, have one thing against you: you have abandoned the love you showed at the beginning. ⁵ So remember the place from which you have fallen. Repent, and do the works you did at the beginning. If not—if you don’t repent—I will come and remove your lampstand out of its place. ⁶ You do, though, have this in your favor: you hate what the Nicolaitans are doing, and I hate it too. ⁷ Let anyone who has an ear listen to what the spirit is saying to the churches. The tree of life stands in God’s paradise, and I will give the right to eat from it to anyone who conquers.’

Warnings against scribes and Pharisees

23 Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to his disciples: ² “The scribes and Pharisees,” he said, “sit on the seat of Moses. ³ So you must do whatever they tell you, and keep it, but don’t do the things they do. You see, they talk but they don’t do. ⁴ They tie up heavy bundles which are difficult to carry, and they dump them on people’s shoulders—but they themselves aren’t prepared to lift a little finger to move them!

⁵ “Everything they do is for show, to be seen by people. Yes, they make their prayer-boxes large and their prayer-tassels long, ⁶ and they love the chief places at dinners, the main seats in the synagogues, ⁷ the greetings in the market-places, and having people call them ‘Rabbi.’

⁸ “You mustn’t be called ‘Rabbi.’ You have one teacher, and you are all one family. ⁹ And you shouldn’t call anyone ‘father’ on earth, because you have one father, in heaven. ¹⁰ Nor should you be called ‘teacher,’ because you have one teacher, the Messiah.

¹¹ “The greatest among you should be your servant. ¹² People who make themselves great will be humbled; and people who humble themselves will become great.”