Text: Revelation 1:1-3

My purpose for this message: To set the stage for the study of Revelation as a study of King Jesus and His victory. 

Delivered: April 11, 2010

 

What Revelation Isn’t, the Blessing it Is

(The Apocalypse of John)

 

Today, we’re finally going to start studying the last book in the Bible: Revelation.  Our journey will probably take 2-2 ½ years including interruptions.  The Bible’s 66^th book is packed with the elements of fantasy fiction complete with evil beasts, heroes who die and come back to life, political intrigue, secret numbers, cosmic chaos.  Only it’s neither fantasy nor fiction; it’s true. 

The word revelation means “unveiling”, like when a sculptor removes the cloth cover from her latest work.  (By the way, there’s no “s” on the end, it’s just one revelation.)   “Unveiling,” is not what I’ll be doing, but is what Jesus Christ already did in the book.  Do not put your hope in me during this study, because I probably won’t be able to give you all the answers you’d like to have.  Better Bible teachers than me have surrendered after trying to understand a passage like the 12 chapter.

Dangers of this study: One, trying to match what’s in here with what’s on FoxNews or CNN.  If much of what’s written won’t happen until some time that’s yet future for us, it means that for the past 2000 years, Christians who thought they saw Revelation being fulfilled in their local news, were wrong.  We could just as easily be wrong.  Events mentioned may occur in the next 4 months, or not for another 500 years. 

Two, since Revelation is full of symbolism you might conclude that if it’s too hard to figure out what the symbols represent, the material must not be true (like a fairy tale, it conveys a true principle, but the story isn’t actually true).  What Revelation predicts, will happen, even if our interpretation as to how it will happen, turns out to be wrong.

A third danger is to become overly fascinated with future events which may or may not happen in our lifetimes; to debate the ins and outs of what will happen and in the process, Jesus Christ gets eclipsed.  As Arnold Olson–one of the EFCA’s great pioneers warned: It would be tragic if the study of prophecy became a[n]… arena of endless debate rather than the incentive to purity of life, unity of believers and urgency of service.

Who wrote the book and when?  We know from chapter 1 it’s a fellow named John.  Certainly wasn’t John the Baptizer who was killed about the time Jesus began his ministry.  The only other John we know of was the apostle John, one of Jesus’ 12 disciples—the only one who died a natural death, and the man who wrote the gospel of John and 3 small letters toward the end of the NT.  Not many of today’s scholars think it was that John, but I still lean that way.  All the early church fathers said it was him. 

John likely wrote it about A.D. 95-96 from Patmos, a Roman penal colony on a tiny island in the Agean Sea.  We don’t know why John was banished there, only that it was for the cause of Christ (Revelation 1:9).  Probably by Emperor Domitian, a ruler who was so cruel his own wife helped plot his assassination.

 

The Bible contains different kinds of books: history like Genesis and Acts, Poetry like Psalms and Song of Songs, teaching/didactic books like Romans and 1 Peter, and prophecy like Isaiah and Haggai.  Revelation is one of a handful of books called “apocalyptic” literature.  These are books like Daniel and parts of Zechariah, which contain futuristic prophecies and many difficult symbols.

But it will be 5-6 months before we get to the weird stuff!  Today we begin with just the first 3 verses.  READ Revelation 1:1-3.  PRAY.

 

1.     The Revelation of Jesus Christ.  1:1

The Revelation John was given was from Jesus, but also about Jesus.  As Pastor Mark Driscoll warns readers of Revelation, “Don’t miss the big ‘E’ on the eye chart.”  Revelation is not mainly about beasts and special numbers, it’s about Jesus.

·       1     He’s the first and last, He’s the One who was, is, and is to come; who bled for our sins; out of whose mouth comes a 2-edged sword. 

·       2 & 3   The One to whom the churches answer.

·       5     The only One worthy to open a sealed scroll. 

·       6     He releases judgment on the earth. 

·       7     The martyrs who’ve died for Him. 

·       11   Beside His Father, He reclaims the world as His rightful empire.

·       12   The cause of a great cosmic war and the target of the devil. 

·       13   Men decide to worship or reject Him.

·       14   Contrasts the people He’s redeemed with those He’s judged.

·       16-19 The General commanding God’s forces to victory

·       19   The husband of the church

·       20   The monarch of the planet

·       21   The Light of the New Jerusalem

·       22   The soon coming king of those who are His; root and offspring of David, bright and morning star.

So as we study this book, remember that we’re not just talking about future events in a vacuum, but as they are carried out and point us toward, Jesus.  Here at Keystone, when we say that our mission is to love Jesus Christ and spur others toward the life in Him, it sounds very much like what this book is trying to do to generation after generation.  It’s all about Him.

 

2.     When? (“soon” and “time is near”).  1:1, 3

The only thing we know about a timeline from these remarks, is that the events mentioned were future when John wrote them down.  Are they still future?  Are phrases like “soon take place” and “time is near” accurate if 1900 years later we’re still waiting?

Throughout history people have distorted Revelation again and again to serve their purposes.  20 years ago radio preacher Harold Camping predicted the end of the world would come on September 6, 1994.  (Do know what happened to prophets in the OT who made a wrong prediction?  Death by stoning [Deuteronomy 18:20-22]).  Camping never stops: his latest prediction is that the world will end on October 20, 2011.

You may be old enough to remember the 1993 ATF assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas.  Cult leader Vernon Howell who renamed himself David Koresh, siphoned off members from a Seventh Day Adventist renewal group.  Using Revelation 5 he taught that He was the Lamb, Jesus Christ himself.  Partly because Revelation has a history of being hijacked by crackpots and questionable teachers, some readers deny that it speaks at all about the world’s future.

Typically, people look at Revelation in one of four ways:

·       Idealist: This is the person who thinks Revelation’s no different than…, say, the book of Ephesians.  It’s not prophecy about the future, just good, timeless principles to teach us things like God is sovereign, there’s a battle between good and evil, and that’s Christians will probably suffer for Jesus. 

·       Historicist: This person believes that what Revelation depicts is the great ongoing battle between good and evil, a picture of the church throughout the ages.  They don’t think John gave specific prophecies about specific future events. 

·       Preterist: This person believes that John never meant to write a book to people living in 2010, let alone A.D. 795.  Some don’t even think he meant to write a book for the New Testament.  They think he wrote to specific people (7 churches in Asia) about their specific situations.  In their minds, everything in Revelation has already taken place, especially in the fall of Jerusalem in A.D.70. 

·       Futurist: Revelation describes three main periods of time in the future: the 7 years prior to Christ’s return, a 1000 year span of time after His return, and the eternity that follows.

 The idealist and the historicist wouldn’t try to figure out what timeframe John meant by saying these events would happens “soon take place”, or that the “time is near”.  To them, the book isn’t a program the ushers hand out to us who are watching the human drama unfold.  It doesn’t contain all the acts, all the scenes, all the times that the scenes begin and end.  It’s not that precise, we shouldn’t expect to connect some future event with something John recorded.

The preterist thinks John wrote the book earlier, say, A.D. 69, and what he meant by “soon take place” and “time is near”, was next year: A.D. 70 (when Jerusalem was destroyed).

I am more of a futurist.  People like me think that by “soon take place” and “time is near”, that John meant that every reader of every age should be prepared for these things at any moment.  They are imminent and consequently we should love—as Peter says—holy and godly lives as we look forward to the day of God... (2 Peter 3:12).

 

3.     Take it to heart and receive God’s blessing.  1:3

Blessed are those who read it; in John’s day each church had a single copy of a book like this, and so John meant the man reading it to the congregation was blessed.  And those who sat and heard it; they were blessed.  And those who take its message to heart are blessed.  What message? 

·       Serving Jesus Christ and suffering go hand in hand; be ready. (We need this message—even if we expect to be raptured before the worst comes.  Although the tribulation will produce unspeakable persecution, there are many believers right now undergoing what they consider unspeakable persecution.  There’s no reason to assume we’ll be spared persecution altogether before the end comes.)

·       As the end approaches and life worsens, don’t lose heart; God is still running the operation and Jesus wins.

·       There is an end to God’s judgment and the reward that awaits His faithful ones, is incredible.

What message?  Our hope is in Jesus Christ.  Get used to the sounds and smells of battle, but never fear that the outcome is in doubt.  Jesus—and you, Christian, win.

 

Concl

The book is for you, grieving Christian; it’s for you, despairing Christian; for you bankrupt Christian; for you terminally ill Christian; for you lonely Christian.  It is the book of hope—not which comes through temporary eye-drying, or temporary medicine, or temporary financial rebound, or temporary friendship.  It is the hope of absolute, eternal, complete, victory as a much-loved child of God in the ranks of the King of Kings.

Remember as we study this book, it’s really not about war, plagues, one-world government, or the mark of the beast…  It’s about Jesus.