<p>1:12 <i>And I turned to see the voice that spoke to me. And having turned I saw seven golden candlesticks</i>- &quot;To see the voice&quot; rather than &quot;to see the person that spoke&quot; suggests that this personage is a word made flesh, a person totally identified with their voice. And that is of course how John has portrayed the Lord in Jn. 1:14.</p><p>Our covenant relationship with God isn't just between Him and us. It demands that we are in covenant with His people; we can't love Him that begat without loving those others begotten by Him, as John puts it (1 Jn. 4:9). When John later heard the voice of Jesus and turned to see Him, instead of seeing Jesus in person as he expected, he saw instead the seven candlesticks, symbolic of the ecclesias / body of Christ (Rev. 1:12). Perhaps this was the idea behind the way that &quot;Jehoiada made a covenant between the Lord and the king and the people, that they should be the Lord's people: between the king also and the people&quot; (2 Kings 11:17).</p>