A Blessing Promised To Those Who Read This Book
Our Pastor decided finally to, many's anticipation, preach on Revelation. Many preachers stay away from this book for a variety of reasons. None are good IMHO because right in the first chapter we're promised a blessing for just reading it.
He's already done two sections in the last two weeks and I thought I'd jot down a few of the highlights for any that are interested. It also helps me in cementing some of the thoughts that have come up in the process, and as always I've got food for thought to keep me busy for a while. This is a book that many seem to be curious about, Christian or not.
The first thing he touched on was the purpose of Revelation. Basically in a nutshell it was to glorify the Son of God, worship, God's Sovereignty and the second coming and judgment.
This book tells us that Jesus is coming back as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. The world is going to come to a climatic end even as the world laughs...and they do.
Peter wrote and I'm way abbreviating here. You can read the whole section in 2 Peter 3:1-13.
"Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers walking after their own lusts, saying "Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation." For this, they willingly are ignorant of that by the word of God.............But the heavens and the earth which are now by the same word are kept in store reserved unto fire against the day of judgment....."
Basically we are going to see Global Warming but nothing like the media predicts. Yes, the world will be destroyed by heat . Who knows...... maybe the Environmentalists are really onto something.
Revelation comes from the word "Apokalupsis" which means to make visible. It's basically an unveiling; giving us a glimpse of what is to come.
The Apostle John wrote this book. He was known as the Apostle of Love and wrote 4 books of the NT including this one. He was a Pastor in Ephesus in the first century, but at the time of the writing of this book he was a prisoner on the Isle of Patmos. His territory before his imprisonment was to the 7 churches of Asia Minor to which this book is first addressed. He had first hand knowledge of thise churches.
He uses the number seven 52 times. This is a number of perfection or completness. There are 404 verses in Revelation and 278 principles of the OT are used in this book. Chap 1:19 is the key verse to the whole book. "Write the things which you have seen (past), the things which are (present) and the things which be hereafter (past.).
There are two thoughts regarding the dating of this book, and it's very important to the interpretation depending on which date you believe. The first date is about 68 AD during the time of the Emperor Nero. Nero was, as some describe, the most evil man to ever live. If the date was 68 AD then the focus of the end of the world would be on Jerusalem which was destroyed in 70 AD. One of the criteria used is that John doesn't mention anywhere about the fall of Jerusalem. That would have been very important to him. We need to remember this is a letter from Christ, so the fall of Jerusalem would not have been significant to Christ as it might have been to John.
The other date is 95 AD and John would have been exiled under Domitian. Domitian quite often used exile as a form of punishment. He too, as Nero, hated the Christians. This date is more acceptable to many for a variety of reasons. One, we can see the churches in the first three chapters are in trouble. If this was written by the earlier date, they were in trouble just as they were being built up. For instance 2 Timothy was written in 64 AD and was not written from the angle of total chaos like we see in this book. The Laodician Church in Chap 3, for example, is shown to have been rich in material possessions and spiritually poo. Historically there was a major quake in 60 AD so that would be a remarkable recovery so soon. 95 AD makes more sense here as well.
Paul, who wrote most of his letters in the 60's before he was beheaded by Nero in 67, never mentioned the Nicolaitans that Christ said he hates, (2:15). So the thought is that they were a force to reckon with later, after Paul died. Paul did do alot of warning before he died about false teachers coming in as wolves to the flock.
There are four views in reading this book, and this is ver important as to how you translate this book.
Idealist View: The most liberal and/or pagan churches would choose this view. In this view it's entirely viewed as symbolic. The general principles are about good and evil but not to be taken literally. Well if we go to Acts 1 and 1 Thess 4 we see that those writers spoke of Christ's visible literal return. The angel in Acts promised he'd come back the same way he left.
Historic View: Some would believe this is actual church history. They would view 6-18 as history with the beast in Chap 13 as the rise of Islam. The anti-christ is the rise of the Pope. This idea came about by Joachim (sp?) in about 1202 AD.
Preterist: This word means past. This view was very popular before WWII and almost totally disappeared as a result of the first two world wars. They believed that the world would eventually get better and better as a result of the spread of Christianity until the whole world got in line and became Christians. This view came into being about 1641 after the reformation by Alcazar (sp?) and basically believes everything in Revelation has already been fulfilled. They would look at Chapters 1-4 being in John's present, 5-11 would be the victory of Judaism, 12-19 is the victory over Pagan Rome, 20-22 is the glory of church in victory.
Futurist View: This would be my view and has been the view of the early church starting with Justin Martyr in 165 AD making this the oldest view of all. Iraneous wrote about this view in 185 AD. He personally knew Polycarp (martyr) who was a direct disciple of John, the author of this book.
This view holds that Chapters 1-3 were in John's present time and the rest of the book all future.
Looking at the first 3 verses we see that there is an expectation that we would read it. Many over the years have avoided this book. It's not an easy book to accept especially for those that have no concept of Christ being a just judge. Judgment in itself is not a pleasant topic. Nobody wants to believe the things in this book could really happen, but as we have gotten closer, with each passing day, things that made no sense years ago now seem to be a very likely possibility given the current events. .
"Stay dressed for action and keep your lamps burning and be like men who are waiting for their master to come home from the wedding feast so that they may open the door to him at once when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those servants whom the master finds awake when he comes. Truly I say to you he will dress himself for service and have them recline at table and he will come and serve them. If he comes to the second watch or in the third and finds them awake blessed are those servants! But know this; that if the master of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming he would not have left his house to be broken into. You also must be ready for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect." Jesus (Luke12:35-40)
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