Vision of Jesus
Notes
Transcript
Announcements
Potluck Plan
Membership Class - visible sign of an invisible reality, that we are in Christ. And membership is a devotion to one another because God has devoted himself to us.
Gospel Tech
Prayer for Poppinos - This month we are pausing for a few moments to care for the missionaries that we support around the world. This morning we’re praying for Gene and Anne Poppino who are in our neck of the woods. Gene is one of our church elders and Anne serves on the Finance Team here at Gateway, and the Poppinos are on the pastoral care team for Cadence International which shares the gospel with American military around the world.
Gene has a lot of roles - counseling missionaries, vetting and interviewing new missionaries, training and equipping missionaries, conflict resolution, and more to aid in God’s work thru Cadence. Gene also has COVID. And if you know Gene you know he doesn’t get small colds. So where you or I might be sick for 2 days, Gene could be sick for almost two months. So we wanna pray that’s not the case for our brother.
Thank you for the Poppinos
Pray for health for Gene and Anne
Gene can make it to trip next week
Have energy & health for upcoming trips and a multitude of appointments
God even in sickness would you root and ground the Poppinos in love that they may have strength to comprehend the breadth, length, height, and depth of your love and be filled with the fullness of God.
Intro
Looking forward to a pot luck together.
We’ve got a small army of crock pots over on the far wall.
My favorite fall cooking tool is our Instant Pot.
Anybody used an instant pot? An instant pot is a crock pot on steroids.
If it takes a crock pot 6 hours to make something, it takes an instant pot 30 minutes.
You put some frozen chicken in there, a few more ingredients like noodles, seasoning, set the timer…that thing applies the pressure to make you dinner in no time.
The word pressure comes to mind as I read Revelation.
In our passage today, Rev. 1:9-20, John says I’m your partner in the tribulation and that word literally means pressure.
John’s life and the life of the early church was not a crock pot. It was an instant pot. They were under immense pressure.
What kind of pressure? Pressure to not worship Jesus under threat of shame, exile, or worse. Pressure to not say Jesus is Lord but to say Caesar is Lord.
It looked like the church was going to cave under the pressures that pushed against them.
But then John, on a small island 40 miles off the coast, has a dream. A vision. And he sees not just something, but some one.
Under intense pressure, John has a vision of the glorious risen Jesus in the middle of some lamps.
We are not under the same kind of pressure as John, but what kinds of pushback are we facing today from following Jesus? And why would this vision of Jesus be helpful for the church then and now?
We’re going to see this morning in Rev. 1:9-20 that whatever the pressure, we worship the Living One.
Whatever pressure, whatever circumstance, whatever trial and tribulation, we worship the Living One.
In Revelation 1:9-20 we’re going to see what John heard, what John saw, and what Jesus said.
First, what John heard
9 I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance that are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.
In this first section John hears something, but first we learn where he was.
This passage is our second week in our study of Revelation which we’re calling “Discipleship on the Edge.” And that phrase is borrowed from a book by Darrell Johnson in which Johnson says Revelation is less of a crystal ball and more of a discipleship manual.
How do we stay faithful to Jesus and worship Him above all when we are on the edge of an uncertain future?
So we’re right at the beginning, there are many visions, signs, and crazy things ahead, but there’s also a lot of Jesus ahead and that’s why last week we said it’s a really good thing to read this text together.
First, John links himself to these churches to whom he’s writing with a deep bond of brother and partner.
The Bible is anything but heartless. John is deeply involved in the lives of the churches to whom he is writing.
He’s a brother and partner in
The tribulation, and the kingdom, and the patient endurance that are in Jesus.
That word tribulation means affliction, distress, and the sense of the word is pressure.
In the gospel of John, Jesus uses this word to describe childbirth.
The tribulation the churches are in is like the pressure of giving birth. The word intense falls short. There’s almost a violence to it. And yet, after a little while, joy.
The tribulation and the kingdom.
The kingdom is God’s rule. The world as it’s meant to be. It’s the Garden of Eden.
So John is a partner in their hell - the tribulation - and their heaven, the kingdom.
The tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance - the steadfastness.
Sticking it out. Perseverance. Persistence. Waiting.
What a succinct way to describe faith.
It’s pressure - it’s peace - it’s patience.
And it’s all in Jesus.
Maybe you need to hear that this morning that the pressures of life are a part of life in Christ.
Where was John writing from?
Patmos - a small volcanic island about 40 miles off the coast. Why was he there? Because he heard the beaches were great and a member of his church had an airbnb there?
No, on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.
What is the word of God and the testimony of Jesus?
The word of God is Scripture, namely the Old Testament for John’s listeners.
And the testimony of Jesus is that he is the one who came to fulfill the Old Testament as the promised King who came as God in human form to live a perfect life, to die on the cross for the forgiveness of sins, he was raised to new life as proof he was the Son of God, and then he ascended into heaven above all other powers and now he reigns at the right hand of God as the King of Kings and lord of Lords.
In short, the gospel. John was exiled for preaching the gospel.
Why would John be exiled for preaching the gospel?
Because the gospel says Jesus is Lord, worship him! Living in Rome meant saying Caesar is Lord, worship him!
The gospel says Jesus is Lord, live like him and obey his teachings! Living in Rome meant saying, Caesar is Lord, when in Rome do as the Romans do.
John and these churches were under pressure to not preach the gospel and not worship Jesus, but give their ultimate allegiance and loyalty to Rome and Caeasar, and live like Romans, not like Christians.
What pressure are you facing today?
It’s not the same pressure that John and these early churches were facing.
Although there are some Christians in the world who are facing similar push back.
We’re under pressure from our jobs to perform, to perform well, to please our bosses, to provide for our families.
We’re under pressure with our time to get everything done and have something left over for ourselves and others.
Maybe your health is putting you under pressure, physical or mental health. Maybe your finances.
We feel this pressure in life.
And what we inevitably do is we find courage to face the day in something. I feel this pressure but it’ll be okay because…my family is here. I have money in savings and I have the house.
What we find meaning, satisfaction, and hope in is what we worship.
John and these churches to whom he is writing are under pressure to NOT worship Jesus.
What John heard
10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet 11 saying, “Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea.”
Under this pressure, God sends John into another dimension of reality where he hears a booming voice commission him to write a book.
This voice tells John to write to 7 churches in Asia Minor. And each of these 7 churches will get a letter from Jesus in chapters 3-4 of Revelation. The order in which they are listed is the route a courier would take to deliver these letters.
And John is told to write to them. But the number 7 is a symbol of completeness and wholeness.
So John isn’t just writing to them, he’s writing to us.
TRANSITION - If you heard a voice speaking to you from behind you, what would you do? Turn around.
From what John heard to what John saw
12 Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands,
The first thing John sees is seven golden lampstands.
We have a 1 year old so we don’t have lamps. Simon wants to break lamps.
John’s lampstands are more like manora’s than a lamp you have on your nightstand.
What are these lampstands?
Jesus is actually going to tell us in verse 20, but In Exodus 25, we read that the golden lampstand was one of three items that was in God’s presence in the Holy of Holies -
You had the ark of the covenant, the table with the bread of presence, and you had the golden lampstand.
And the golden lampstand was made of pure gold hammered to give light and look like a tree. Highly symbolic of the tree of life.
In Exodus, there was one golden lampstand in God’s presence, here John sees seven.
13 and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. 14 The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, 15 his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. 16 In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength.
In the midst of the lampstands
John sees a heavenly person.
John says he was one like a son of man
There are a number of OT references here!
This is a reference to Daniel 7, a passage where in exile under intense pressure to worship someone other than God Daniel has a vision of a heavenly person
13 “I saw in the night visions,
and behold, with the clouds of heaven
there came one like a son of man,
and he came to the Ancient of Days
and was presented before him.
14 And to him was given dominion
and glory and a kingdom,
that all peoples, nations, and languages
should serve him;
his dominion is an everlasting dominion,
which shall not pass away,
and his kingdom one
that shall not be destroyed.
John in saying I saw that Daniel 7 man.
And John stares at him long enough to notice what he’s wearing - a long robe with a golden sash - this heavenly garb
He notices his hair. Why his hair?
Notice the similarity between John’s description and Daniel’s vision in Dan 7:9
9 “As I looked,
thrones were placed,
and the Ancient of Days took his seat;
his clothing was white as snow,
and the hair of his head like pure wool;
his throne was fiery flames;
its wheels were burning fire.
So this person John sees is like the son of man, but he’s also like the Ancient of Days.
His eyes pour out flames
His feet were like metal…
His voice was like a waterfall…Ezekiel, another prophet who was in exile under pressure to give up hope heard something similar
2 And behold, the glory of the God of Israel was coming from the east. And the sound of his coming was like the sound of many waters, and the earth shone with his glory.
And John saw his hands, but specifically his right hand which is a symbol of strength, holding seven stars
And his mouth isn’t just full of teeth it has this sharp two-edged sword
12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
His face was like staring at the sun.
Moses, another prophet spent time with God on a mountain top and God was so bright this is what happened…
29 When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand as he came down from the mountain, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God.
John is trying to write and say I saw God. But not just God, the God-man.
And he was with the lampstands, a symbol of the church. The God-man, Jesus is with the church.
Under pressure, Jesus is with the church.
CS Lewis once said that no fairy tale begins with “Once upon a time there was a president…”
What that means is we all long for a king.
This God-man that John sees is THE king. The God-man. Jesus. The one who is worthy of all worship and praise.
Whatever we worship today, whether it’s ourselves, our money, our family, our jobs, our phones…it pails in comparison to Jesus.
And that same God-man, the great King, this Jesus, is with us as his people.
TRANSITION - WHAT JOHN HEARD, WHAT JOHN SAW…
WHAT JESUS SAID
17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last, 18 and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades. 19 Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this. 20 As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.
Under immense pressure to not worship Jesus, John has a vision of the God-man.
And this vision - like most other heavenly visions in the Bible, knocks him to the ground.
But, Jesus comes and it doesn’t just say he lifted me up it says he laid his right hand on me. I noticed that this week.
Right hand is a symbol of power and strength and comfort for God’s people because he is controlling history and all things with his right hand. So with this right hand Jesus comes to him and says
Fear not
How many of us need to hear that this morning?
Notice what he doesn’t say
Fear not, it’s going to be alright.
Fear not, things will get better real soon.
What are the next two words?
I am..….
Comfort, strength, peace, the ability to move past our fears are not simply things that Jesus gives they come by experiencing who he is.
I am the first and the last
The alpha and the omega
The creator of all and the one to whom all history points. There is nothing before him. There is no one after him. Caesar does not compare to him.
And the living one
The one being in the universe who is truly alive.
But not only that
I died and behold I am alive forevermore
9 We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him.
Everyone dies. Even Jesus!
But Jesus beat death. He was raised from the dead. Not just resuscitated, but resurrected.
I have the keys of death and hades.
Picture Jesus, like a divine janitor. Jangling some keys. When you buy a house they don’t hand over the lawn mower, or the plates, you get the keys.
What does it mean to hold the keys? To have control! Power! I own this. I’ve defeated this. It is mine.
Why is this significant?
Who thought they held the keys of death and hades? Who held the power of death over the known world and with that power pressured everyone to bow the knee? Rome!
Who thought they held the keys of death and hades and sent Jesus to the cross because he said that he was the true king and not Caesar? Rome!
But who really holds the keys? Jesus!
Rome was called the eternal city, but in a few centuries it would fall. Jesus died once for sins and is the Living One who will brin about the true eternal city.
And so for this servant of Jesus - John, the one whom Jesus loved - and these seven churches - who feel under the pressure of Rome and who on paper look ready to be crushed can have courage and hope and perservance to face even death because the Living One is with them.
It may look like Rome has the power of life and death in their hands but I’ll show you who has the keys.
And this living One says write this down.
I’m giving you a revelation John to give to them so they can have patient endurance, know that they’re in the kingdom, and have perseverence through this pressure.
Send this to the churches because my power and my presence will come to them through this word Just like it does for us today.
What if as you ate some salad, some meatballs, some dessert today, you paused to look around you and thought - the Living One, who holds the keys of death and Hades is with us today?
Conclusion
Whatever pressures we face today, we worship the Living One.
Even if we die, we can even face death because the one who beat death is with us.
We’re not facing the same physical threats to our lives as John as these churches, but not all these churches were under threat of physical violence as we’ll see in the next two chapters of the revelation.
But the commonality is the question, whatever pressures, whatever circumstances we face, who will we worship?
“In the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And an outstanding reasons for choosing some sort of god or spiritual thing to worship is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive. If you worship money and things, if they are where you tap real meaning in life, then you will never have enough. Never feel you have enough…Worship your own body and beauty and sexual allure, and you will always feel ugly, and when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally plant you. Worship power - you will end up feeling weak and afraid, and you will need even more power over others to keep the fear at bay. Worship your intellect, being seen as smart - you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out.” - David Foster Wallace
What does it look like for us to worship Jesus over everything else?
It doesn’t mean we don’t love our families, we ought to have incredible love for our family.
It doesn’t mean we don’t manage our money well or plan well for retirement.
It doesn’t mean we don’t have hobbies, friends, or enjoy life.
It means that above all - we love Jesus first. Because he’s the Living One. The A to Z. Th First and the Last.
And like John and the churches we are under pressure to put our worship elsewhere and this vision of Jesus reminds us who holds the keys.
I imagine John had these words of Jesus in mind:
33 I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”
I, Chris, am your brother and partner in the Instant Pot, the pressure cooker of life. Let’s encourage each other as we seek to worship the Living One who is with us now and forever.
Communion
Benediction