Revelation 2:5

πόθεν, from what a height. Contrast Cic. ad Attic. iv. 17: “non recordor unde ceciderim, sed unde resurrexerim”. To realise that a decline has taken place, or to admit a lapse, is the first step and stimulus to amendment (see the fine passage in Bunyan's preface to Grace Abounding, and the “Hymn of the Soul,” 44, 45, in Acts of Thomas). Once this is brought home to the mind (μνημόνευε, a prolonged effort), repentance quick and sharp (μετανόησον, aor.) will follow, issuing in a return to the first level of excellence (καὶ τὰ πρῶτα ἔργα ποίησον), i.e., to the initial charity (2Jn 1:6; 2 John 1:8; love shown in deeds). The way to regain this warmth of affection is neither by working up spasmodic emotion nor by theorising about it (Arist. Eth. Nic. ii. 4), but by doing its duties. (“The two paracletes of man are repentance and good works,” Sanhed. 32). It is taken for granted that man possesses the power of turning and returning; the relation of Christ's redeeming death to the forgiveness of sins throughout the Christian life, although implied, is never explicitly argued (as in Hebrews) by this writer. The present (ἔρχ.) emphasises the nearness of the approach, while the future (κιν.) denotes a result to follow from it. σοι either a dat. incommodi or (more probably) a local dat. (rare in classical literature, cf. Aesch. Pr. ver. 360) with “the sense of motion to a place,” (Simcox, Lang. N. T. 81), if not an incorrect reproduction of Heb. לָךְ (as Matthew 21:5, Blass). Cf. Journ. Theol. St. iii. 516. κινήσω κ. τ. λ., (“efficiam ut ecclesia esse desinas,” Areth.); not degradation but destruction is the threat, brotherly love being the articulus stantis aut cadentis ecclesiae. So, in a remarkable parallel from Paul (Philippians 2:14-16), quarrelsomeness forfeits the privileges of Christ's care and service, since the function of being φωστῆρες ἐν κόσμῳ, λόγον ζωῆς ἐπέχοντες depends upon concord and charity in the church (πάντα ποιεῖτε χωρὶς γογγυσμῶν καὶ διαλογισμῶν). A slackened sense of the obligation to mutual love formed the cardinal sin at Ephesus; to repent of this was the condition of continued existence as a church; utility or extinction is the alternative held out to her. The nature of the visitation is left unexplained; the threat is vague, but probably eschatological. The Apocalypse, however, knows nothing of the Jewish idea that Israel's repentance would bring the advent of messiah (cf. Schürer's Hist. II. ii. 163, 164), as though the transgressions of the people hindered his appearance.