Revelation 3:10

The position of μου shows that it belongs not to τὸν λόγον τῆς ὑπομονῆς as a whole, but to ὑπομονῆς (2 Thessalonians 3:5). The precise sense therefore is not “my word about patience” (i.e., my counsel of patience as the supreme virtue of these latter days, so Weiss, Bousset, etc.), but “the word, or the preaching, of that patience which refers to me” (i.e., the patient endurance with which, amid present trials, Christ is to be served; so Alford, Spitta, Holtzm.). See Psalms 38 (39), 8: καὶ νῦν τίς ἡ ὑπομονή μου; οὐχὶ ὁ κύριος; The second reason for praising the Philadelphian Christians is their loyal patience under persecution, as well as the loyal confession of Christ (Revelation 3:8) which had possibly brought on that persecution. κἀγὼ κ. τ. λ. (“I in turn”; cf. similar connection in John 17:6-8), a reproduction of the saying preserved in Luke 21:36. The imminent period τοῦ πειρασμοῦ refers to the broken days which, in eschatological schemes, were to herald messiah's return. Later on, this period is specifically defined as a time of seduction to imperial worship (cf. Revelation 13:14-17; Revelation 7:2, with Daniel 7:1, LXX). The Philadelphian Christians will not only triumph over the contempt and intrigues of their Jewish foes but also over the wider pagan trial (which is also a temptation), inasmuch as their devotion, already manifested in face of Jewish malice, will serve to carry them through the storm of Roman persecution. The reward of loyalty is in fact fresh power to be loyal on a higher level: “the wages of going on, and ever to be”. This seems better than to take the world-wide trial as the final attempt (Revelation 8:13; Revelation 11:10, etc.) to induce repentance in men or to punish them, from which the P. Christians (cf. Revelation 7:1-8, and Ps. Sol. 13:4 10, 15:6, 7) would be exempt; but it is impossible from the grammar and difficult from the sense, to decide whether τηρεῖν ἐκ means successful endurance (pregnant sense as in John 17:15) or absolute immunity (cf. 2 Peter 2:9), safe emergence from the trial or escape from it entirely (thanks to the timely advent of Christ, Revelation 3:11). Note the fine double sense of τηρεῖν : unsparing devotion is spared at least some forms of distress and disturbance. It is like Luther's paradox that when a man learns to say with Christ, “The cross, the cross,” there is no cross. Rabbinic piety (Sanh. 98 b) expected exemption from the tribulation of the latter days only for those who were absorbed in good works and in sacred studies.