Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #22 of Revelation 2, and we are going to be reading Revelation 2:17:

He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.

We have already looked at the first part of this verse in our last study, and we saw that the one who overcomes is only an “overcomer” in Christ, as Christ is actually the One who has overcome and who has been victorious.  It is in Him, through Him, and by His grace that His people, the elect, are saved, and we are said to have overcome through the faith of Christ.

And we are given to eat of the “hidden manna,” and that is phrase identifies with the Word of God, the hidden truths of the Bible, as Christ was typified by the manna that God provided to the Israelites during their wilderness sojourn.  The “hidden manna” is the hidden mysteries of the Bible, the parabolic nature of the Scriptures.

Then it goes on to say, “To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.”  This is rather unusual, and it is language we do not come across that often in the Bible.  What does God mean when He says that he that overcometh (referring to someone who does become saved, a child of God) will be given a “white stone,” and in that stone a new name written, and no man knows that new name except he that receives it?  This is very unusual and curious.  We wonder, “What is God saying?” 

We approach this just like we approach everything else in the Bible, as we carefully look up the words, comparing Scripture with Scripture, allowing the Bible to define its own terms.  First we have to look at the “white stone.” It is the color “white,” and we know that in the Scriptures “white” points to pureness and holiness, and that which is without sin.   It is also a color that is often identified with eternal God Himself.  For instance, it said of the “one like unto the Son of man,” in Revelation 1:14:

His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire;

This is a description of Christ indicating His purity.  And God sits upon a white throne, as we see later on in the book of Revelation because He is the Judge of mankind who judges with total righteousness.  There is no sinfulness in His judgment, nor in Him.  So we see there is a “white stone,” and this may indicate it is referring to God Himself.

Then regarding the word “stone,” we know that in the Bible a stone, or a rock, often points to the Lord Jesus Christ.  He is the Rock that the eternal church of God’s elect is built upon.  For instance, it says in 1Corinthians 10:4:

And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ.

Here, there is no question that a “rock” or a “stone” often points to the Lord Jesus Christ. 

But the problem with our verse is that this word used in our verse is not the typical word for “stone,” or “rock.”  This is a Greek word that is only found three times in the New Testament, and two times it is found here in Revelation 2:17: “…and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written…”  The only other place that this word is found is in Acts 26 where the Apostle Paul was recounting some of his history, and he says in Acts 26:9-10:

I verily thought with myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. Which thing I also did in Jerusalem: and many of the saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority from the chief priests; and when they were put to death, I gave my voice against them.

Here, Paul is remembering when he was Saul of Tarsus.  He was a Pharisee, and he was very angry against this sect known as Christians, and he hailed men and women, casting them into prison.  And he also confesses that he gave his voice against many of the saints of God in order that they would be put to death.  We are interested in this verse because the word “voice” in Acts 26:10 is a translation of the same Greek word translated twice as “stone” in our verse in Revelation 2.   We wonder, “How can this same Greek word be translated twice as ‘stone,’ and once as ‘voice’?”  It does not make any sense until we realize that he said regarding whether they should be put to death and gave his voice against them, so he is basically letting us know that he “voted” against them.  It would be similar to a jury when it deliberates.  There is someone on trial, and in the jury room they have to answer the question, “Do you find this person guilty or innocent?  How do you vote?”  And that is what the Apostle Paul did here.  He voted against them, that they be put to death.  We know that was his mindset when he was there when Stephen was stoned to death.  He was very helpful to the people who stoned Stephen by taking care of their cloaks as they cast stones at Stephen. 

So Saul did give his “voice,” or it might say, “I gave my stone against them.”  In times past they would cast a vote at times through a stone, or a pebble, indicating which way they were voting for an individual.  That seems to be in view here where Saul cast a pebble, or a stone, against the saints of God in order to put them to death.

It is not as solid as we might like, but we can see how a “white stone” is pointing to a small stone such as a pebble.  Actually when we study this verse and try to take everything into account, it points to the Lord Jesus Christ.  The individual that overcomes and is given to eat of the hidden manna, which is someone God has saved, is also given a “white stone,” a type of Christ Himself.  We are given the Lord Jesus Christ as a gift on our behalf.  We receive the Lord.

Then it goes on to say in Revelation 2:17:

… and in the stone a new name written…” 

This helps to verify that we are correct about the first part of the verse in our understanding because in the stone, or in Christ, the redeemed sinner has a “new name written” because we are adopted into the family of God.  We take to ourselves the name of Christ, and we are called Christians.  In the Lord Jesus Christ is where our new name is found.  It says in Revelation 3:12:

Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out: and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God: and I will write upon him my new name.

Here, we see that this is the “new name written.”  It is God’s new name.  We are Christians.  We have the name of God because Jesus Christ is Almighty God, and He has given us His new name, or He has given us the name that accompanies salvation.  In the stone, or in Christ, each one of us has a new name written.  We are privileged and richly blessed to receive the name of Christ as it comes along with the gift of eternal life, and all the rich and abundant blessings that accompany salvation.

It also says in 2Corinthians 5:17:

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

And Christ is the “stone.”  This helps us to see what God is saying in Revelation 2:17 because it is one of those verses were the word “stone” was not too helpful in seeing that it pointed to Christ, but as we continue reading this verse and we see how the Lord is speaking of this stone, and how the new name is written in that stone, then we realize that this must be another name of the Lord Jesus.  He is called here the “white stone,” and in Him a new name is written for all of God’s people whose names were written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.  And now we have a correct understanding of what the verse is saying.

Then it goes on to say at the end of the verse in Revelation 2:17:

… which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.

That refers to the man or woman the Lord has saved, and has been given to eat of the hidden manna, and has been given the “white stone,” or Christ, and has been given that new name in Christ “which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.”  No man knows this “new name,” or no man knows the salvation of God except (saving) he that receiveth it.  Since salvation is of the spirit, it is invisible to the natural world, the world does not understand it because they have no ability to truly know it.  It is a very personal thing between the Lord and the redeemed sinner.  Let us go to the Gospel of John, and in chapter 14 we will read a couple of verses that will help us to see what God is saying.  It says in John 14:15-17:

If ye love me, keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.

That Comforter is the Holy Spirit.  Here, the Lord is outlining the fact that the world has no knowledge of the kingdom of heaven that is within the child of God.  The world has no understanding of what it means to be a Christian.  To them, if you say you are a Christian, then you are a Christian, including everyone who says they are a Christian.  It is just something they do like going to church, following the teachings of that church, and so on, but they have no idea of what it is to be born again.  They lack understanding.  They are ignorant of God’s true salvation program, and so are the people that remained in the churches and, likewise, are not truly born again.  They do not understand, and they just cannot comprehend the work that God has done in a saved individual.  This is why the true Christian who has been given the “white stone,” or Christ, and who has been given the new name written seem so strange to others in the world who do not understand: “Why do you read that Bible all the time?  Why do you talk about things that I do not get?  Why are you talking about spiritual meanings and hidden truths in the Bible?” 

Do the churches talk about spiritual meanings and hidden truths of the Bible?  No.  They talk about the plain historical events in the Scriptures, or their grammatical or moral understanding of the Bible.  They are looking at the natural level of literal, direct things that their natural minds can understand because they do not know the Spirit of God.  They do not have this “new name” that is in the “stone” of the Lord Jesus Christ.  They have not been born of the Spirit in order to come to the Bible with a spiritual understanding.

Here, God indicates, “…which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.”  Actually, the Bible indicates that man knows nothing of the spiritual things of God unless God imparts that understanding to him, and He reveals Himself.  That relates to salvation because man knows nothing of God’s salvation and being born again unless God has actually made that individual born again.  And certainly, man knows nothing of the spiritual teachings of the Bible unless God opens his understanding so that he can receive them.

Let us continue by going on to Revelation 2:18:

And unto the angel of the church in Thyatira write; These things saith the Son of God, who hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brass;

Again, we are reading of the addresses to the seven churches, and the Lord has already addressed three churches.  He has sent His message unto the messenger, the angel of the church in Ephesus, the angel of the church in Smyrna, the angel of the church in Pergamos, and now to the angel of the fourth church in Thyatira.

We do not know the meaning of the name “Thyatira.”  We are not helped with that as we turn to the Bible.  Sometimes there will be a word like “Smyrna,” which is related to “myrrh,” that helps us to know the meaning of the word.  But at this point we do not know the meaning of Thyatira.

We do read of Thyatira in the book of Acts.  A very faithful woman was from there.  It says in Acts 16:14-15:

And a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped God, heard us: whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul. And when she was baptized, and her household, she besought us, saying, If ye have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house, and abide there. And she constrained us.

This lets us know that God had some of His people in Thyatira, as Lydia was a child of God.

So the Lord is writing unto the messenger of the church in Thyatira, and each of the seven addresses of the seven churches is sent to the messenger (angel) of that church because that points to God’s elect, and then the messenger would give the message from the Lord to that particular church.  Again, each one of these churches is representative of all the churches that would come into existence throughout the church age.  It is a figure of the entire corporate body of the church age.

It goes on to say in Revelation 2:18:

… These things saith the Son of God, who hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brass;

Again, God is referring back to information He has already given us in this book in Revelation 1 when the Apostle John turned to see who was speaking, and he saw “one like unto the Son of man,” and it says in Revelation 1:14-15:

His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire; And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters.

The Lord is building upon this information that He has already shared with us.  If you have been following these studies, you will remember that we looked at the fact that the “one like unto the Son of man” having his eyes “like unto a flame of fire,” identifies with His being Christ as the Judge of mankind and all the earth.  His eyes are the eyes of God, and they are all-seeing: “…all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do,” as it tells us in Hebrews 4:13.  When God’s eyes see mankind, He is able to pierce our minds and see into our hearts.  What does He see?  He sees sin everywhere He looks.  He sees sin flowing forth like a wicked stream out of the hearts and minds of man as he thinks things contrary to the Law of God and transgresses His Word.  As God looked on the hearts of men during Noah’s day, He “saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”  How do you think things are today?  The world of Noah’s day we would consider to be almost a “dream world” of peaceful calm and relative morality, as compared to the wickedness in the world of our day.  Certainly God sees only evil continually as He looks upon individuals that have no Saviour, and He sees their sins.

And that is why His eyes are “as a flame of fire,” because as the Lord witnesses the sins of mankind it provokes his wrath, and His wrath is kindled by those that were created in His image and responsible to keep His commandments, but they do not.

We also read, once again, of the Lord’s feet which were “like unto fine brass,” and chapter 1 added, “as if they burned in a furnace.”  And that is because the Lord Jesus Christ had gone through the fire Himself as He paid for the sins of His people from the foundation of the world.  He went through the fiery wrath of God’s judgment, and He satisfied the demands of the Law of God concerning all the sins of all those for whom He died, and now His feet are as “fine brass.”