The Price of Orthodoxy

Here is an interesting thought from William Barclay's the Revelation of John in his section on the Church of Ephesus. Where Jesus says:

All the same I have this against you---that you have left your first love.

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Much more likely this means that the first fine rapture of love for the brotherhood is gone. In the first days the members of the Church at Ephesus had really loved each other; dissension had never reared its head; the heart was ready to kindle and the hand ready to help. But something had gone wrong. It may well be that heresy-hunting had killed love and orthodoxy had been achieved at the price of fellowship. When that happens, orthodoxy has cost too much. All the orthodoxy in the world will never take the place of love.