The Book of Revelation is a complex and often difficult book to fully understand, with its many symbols, timelines, and sequences of events. Beginning in chapter 6, seven seals are opened, four horsemen ride, 144,000 servants of God are sealed, seven trumpets sound, and seven bowls are poured out. Events cascade toward a climax at the return of Jesus Christ, including a woman riding a beast, Satan cast to earth, earthquakes, and the fall of Babylon. Living through these events would be absolutely terrifying, much like the imagery in Amos 5, where a man escapes a lion only to meet a bear, then is bitten by a snake while hiding. Before all of this unfolds, however, Revelation begins with Christ's concern for His church. Chapters 2 and 3 contain instructions to seven churches in Asia, each with specific problems and corrections. Many who came through the Worldwide Church of God were taught that these seven churches represented sequential eras of time, with Worldwide occupying the Philadelphia era. Yet Revelation 1:4 and 1:11 simply state that the churches exist together, without indicating a progression of time. Men can easily read into scripture what they want it to say. Revelation 1:3 opens with a promise of blessing to those who read, hear, and keep the words of this prophecy, and many translations specify reading aloud. The church at Ephesus is commended for its works, patience, endurance, and rejection of false apostles, yet Christ warns that they have left their first love and have already fallen, perhaps without even realizing it. He commands repentance twice and warns that He will remove their lampstand. The lampstand, as identified in Revelation 1:20, represents the church itself, and as Zechariah 4 illustrates, it holds the bowl through which God's Spirit flows. Without the lampstand, there is no vessel for God's Spirit, and without His Spirit, there is no true church, regardless of its name or claimed era. The danger Ephesus faced applies to any congregation