The Revelation of Jesus Christ

Any big conspiracy theory people in our church? (you know its going to be an exciting

You know the other day I was looking up the best conspiracy theories and I found a few really convincing ones:

The best I found was that there is a pretty large group that believe the movie the lord of the rings is the prequal or at least tied into the Teletobies.

And And that sounds crazy, but if you look at the scenery where they live is pretty simaler

There is another I was reading about the show tom and Jerry

And if you know the show the premise is Tom is constantly trying to catch Jerry, but he isss really bad at it

And people are saying Tom is so bad at it because he actually likes Jerry like a best friend.

And if he doesn’t make it look like he is trying to get Jerry the owner will get a cat that will.

Theres another I found that has to do with the Mcdonalds Ice cream machince

And maybe their is a reason they are always broken

There are theories about the Chicago bears and that their schedule is rigged and that the reffs rig everything

Others just say the team is not very good.

But you there are probably some bigger ones then these, but there is something about theories like this that draw us in.

Because we love the idea of this secret knowledge.

And you know we are starting this series in the book of revelation

And to be honest I have put off doing this series for awhile, because there are some crazy theories and conspiracies about this book

And if we are being honest a lot of these interprutations and theologies can be really destructive and cause a lot of issues

And so my hope during this series is not neccesarilly getting into every nitty gritty detail, but for us to get an overview of whats happening in this letter, how we should read it, and really what it means for us and the world.

But before we dive in I just want to give us a little bit of a background of what is happening because the Romans have a very strong view of the empire they have built

And it has demanded the allegiance of everyone above anything else where they would be required to worship the Romans false gods and they even considered the emperor a god.

And so this caused issues for the early church in two ways.

On one hand a lot fo the early church is being persecuted because they are only worshiping the true God

But then their is this other group where they have began to merge Christianity and the empire together.

And so John who rights this letter is one who has been persecuted and banished to a small island.

And this is where he writes this letter

And so we are just going to start with Revelation 1:1-3 and it says this:

Revelation 1:1–3 NIV

1 The revelation from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, 2 who testifies to everything he saw—that is, the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ. 3 Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear it and take to heart what is written in it, because the time is near.

So I just want to start with the first phrase in verse 1 because it says the “Revelation from Jesus Christ”

The litteral translation of this is the “apocolypse of Jesus Christ”

And that word apocalypse has a different meaning then how we understand apocalypse.

Because when I say Apocolypse we think of Zombies, destruction, death,

But a biblical understanding of apoalypse is “an unveiling or exposing”

And so in a way the first thing that John points out is that the Jesus Christ coming and his word that comes in this letter, but also in our lives is creating an unveiling

And this message is directed to the churches,

So Gods word unveils our heart and really where the church is.

Its almost like how I have this thing covered anyone want to guess what it is?

(have something that is trash but looks valuable covered up)

and essentially what the book of revelation does is Gods word comes and it unveils this issue of where the heart of the church and the people are.

And I want to pause here, because when we experience God’s word is essentially unvails our heart.

Because the truth is we might not have an emporer that we are being called to worship,

But the time we live in we probably have more things competing for the allegiance and subtle worship than ever.

And I think its really easy to find ourselves as a church and individual Christians where we find ourselves setteling our worship of God with our allegiance and potential worship of other things.

But heres the thing because the first thing that this letter tells us is that this sheet we have placed over our heart where we have covered it up, or just said well this is what everyone is doing,

We are told God is removing and unveiling our hearts to show us where we are off and not just that but he is unvailing His will.

Where we might have written it off but it is this amazing thing that we have missed.

And in verse 3 John says if you are reading this. If your heart is being unveiled you are blessed.

And this is not you are blessed you are going to be rich, you are going to be a happy person, all your worries are gone.

Because this would make no sense to people reading this being persecuted.

But the word for blessed is the same word used in the sermon on the mount, when it says

blessed are those who mourn,

Blessed are the broken hearted

Blessed are the poor in spirit

Meaning that our circumstances can be less then ideal, they caan be really bad, but when God is unveiling our hearts we are blessed because this book wont make you rich but it will transform your life

There is a book that I have really enjoyed reading getting ready for this called “Reading revelation responsibly” (I would recomend it as a good resource if you want to go deeper) (there is also the new Testement for everyone: revelation by NT write which is pretty accesable

But Reading Revelation Responsibly says “We read revelation not necessarily to be informed, but to be formed and transformed.

And heres the truth a blessed life is typically not measured by what you have or have done, but its usually what God is doing in you.

And if we allow our hearts to be unveiled we are blessed, because wee get this picture of what God is doing even in the most broken moments of the world.

INSSERT ILLUSTRATION

And lets move to the next part verses 4-8 because the letter continues and it says this:

Revelation 1:4–8 NIV

4 John, To the seven churches in the province of Asia: Grace and peace to you from him who is, and who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits before his throne, 5 and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood, 6 and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father—to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen. 7 “Look, he is coming with the clouds,” and “every eye will see him, even those who pierced him”; and all peoples on earth “will mourn because of him.” So shall it be! Amen. 8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty.”

So the first part of the letter was more an introduction but then this section of the letter is where a lot of imagery starts to appear and really it begins to set the tone for the rest of the letter, because it says grace and peace and then it continues to tell us about what Jesus did.

And there is something important here because how a message starts usually sets the tone for the remainder of it right?

like if a tragedy happens on the news, they new not start by saying it is a beautiful day we are so thankful to be alive, but they go we have some disturbing news and that ssets the tone for the rest of the letter

in a sense often times when we think about this letter we think of violence or destruction, but based on this section it points us to a hope and it actually says that this book should really fill us with grace and peace.

Where we are being transformed, but also having this peace that God is the one that holds our lives.

And the world can go sideways but if God holds it in his hands then we are okay.

In fact you probably noticed that we are told here that God is the alpha and omega.

And this is hard for us to wrap our heads around,

Because you have God working on our hearts personally unveiling things, but then you have him where He is in all things, above all things and sees all things

I love how CS Lewis puts it because he says this is our life (its a line) (use white board)

And where we have been, where we are, and then where we are going.

And then we have everyones lives that are all of these

And the thing is God is not just a line, but God holds the board.

You know if we believe we have a God who is working in everything, that should really give us a sense of peace shouldn’t it?

Because that means while the world can be broken , while there is evil in the world, and sometimes its easy to go God are you here?

We have this belief that God is moving and redeeming the broken places and he holds this in his hands.

And so John has given us this background and the trajectory of this letter and in verse 9-20 John has this vision

And if you read it its this loud first chapter because there are all sorts of noises,

In fact John says he sees aa voice, which doesn’t make sense right?

If Margarita yelled at me I would say I turned around and saw Margartia,

But here John goes I turned around and saw the voice.

And I don’t know this but I imagine John’s ministry and there were proabably times where he was really discouraged, and God waas still talking with him, but he looked at the world and it felt broken, or to far gone, or he got exiled.

And now he is sitting here in this area where God is speaking loudly and he is going thats the voice I have been following and for this short vision I am seeing God in full.

And John sees God and describes Him in these beautiful ways and we do not have time to go through all of these today, but we will see these images come back later.

But he gets to verses17-18 and he says this:

Revelation 1:17–18 (NIV)

17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. Then he placed his right hand on me and said: “Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last. 18 I am the Living One; I was dead, and now look, I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades.

You know we have this beautiful image of God and I guess this is how I want to end, because I says do not be afraid I am the first and the last, I am the living one, I was dead, but look I am alive for ever and ever.

I was thinking of how I wanted to end because to be honest Revelations a weird book and part of how I am approaching this book, is with this trust that as we go through we will God will have something stick out to us.

But I think about our culture and we live in a culture of fear,

You know we just got out of an election cycle, that was very fear based on both sides.

we see advertisments that maybe they don’t look fear based, but they communicate if you don’t get this you will miss out.

We probably have personal things happening in our lives where our anxiety is off the off the hook.

But this morning can we just picture the scene here

Then he placed his right hand on me.

He met me where I was and He said do not be afaid I and the begining and the end.

I am alive.

This morning maybe you need something unveiled maybe you jsut need God.

What does trust we have a God that holds us where we are this morning.

Will you pray with me?