The letter to the church at Laodicea.--3:14-22. 1. “ These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God"--3:14. The God of Amen means the God of truth, as stated in Deuteronomy 7:9 : “ Know ye therefore that the Lord thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations.” The repeated expression the faithful and true witness, refers to the things of the apocalypse -the absolute certainty of all the announcements made by his angels and agents in all of the visions. The reminder that he is the beginning of the creation of God is the same in substance as that he is Alpha and Omega, meaning that he is the beginning as well as the end, the first as well as the last. It carries the same affirmation as in John 1:3, “ all things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made.” It means that in the beginning with God he was the active principle in creation, and is the Lord over all creation by primogeniture right--that is, the exclusive right of inheritance belonging to the firstborn. This right possessed by Jesus Christ is also affirmed by Paul in Hebrews 1:1-14 :1-2 : “ God . . . hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds . . . being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.” In priority of existence, having been the agent of all creation, he is Lord of the new creation, the whole spiritual realm.