God's truth revealed for our good
Notes
Transcript
Appetiser
Appetiser
I don’t mean by this that there are various truths; the truth is the truth. But all truth is God’s, because He is the truth. The Bible is the truth that tells us about God and His plan for the world.
Why should we care about Revelation, the last book of the Bible? Because it is the culmination of God’s revelation of truth for our good. So there are two reasons we should take this book seriously:
Main Course
Main Course
Because of what it is, v1-2a
Because of what it is, v1-2a
A “revelation from Jesus Christ”
“revelation”: The unmasking of things to show them as they really are
We only see what happens in the surface; Revelation takes us behind the scenes.
It doesn’t tell us everything we want to know, but what we need to know about what God is doing in the world.
“from Jesus Christ”: from the One Who speaks to us from God
In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe.
In it, God speaks to “his servants”.
It is a book for Christians first: Jesus speaks to us (and we are his witnesses to the world). He rescued us for Himself.
As “his servants”, this is how we know what He desires of us.
Unless we hear from God, we get lost, and the world swallows us up.
The Book of Revelation (Preface)—G. K. Beale
I am especially thankful to my church family, The Orthodox Congregational Church of Lanesville, Massachusetts, for patiently listening to my sermons on Revelation, which were based on my research for the commentary. I am thankful for the opportunity to have been able to write the commentary in the context of a local church body, which enabled me to see Revelation through the eyes of the church. I found often that I understood passages in Revelation better after I preached on them. I believe this was the case since Revelation was meant originally to be understood within the context of the church.
In it, Jesus shows “what must soon take place”
Cf. Da 2:28-30, 45-47. The opening verse of Revelation are broadly modelled on these verses. Therefore, they serve as a clue to how to understand them.
Especially compare Da 2:28a
Daniel 2:28a (NIV (Anglicised, 2011))
but there is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries. He has shown King Nebuchadnezzar what will happen in days to come.
Notice how “what will happen in days to come” becomes “what must soon take place” in Re 1:1.
John is saying: you are living the unfolding of what Daniel was prophesying. What for him was distant future, for you has come near (see the end of v3), and is in the now unfolding towards the fulfilment of what he saw.
Daniel saw the poster of the premiere. But now the film is rolling properly, and you are in it!
We live in the last days: they’re not future, but now. These are “the culmination of the ages” (He 9:26)—the end is here, and is coming nearer by the day.
As one writer put it:
Revelation is to teach us to understand the times, not the times to interpret to us the Apocalypse
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset, and David Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, vol. 2 (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997), 550.”
It is God’s commentary on what you and I are experiencing, especially as Christians, living even today.
Jesus “made it known” to his servants. The word is related to a word John likes, “sign”. The focus of the sign is always what it signifies. In other words, Revelation will be a picture book that Jesus interpreted to John via an angel, and that is to what John testifies. The signs might be very interesting, mesmerising even: but God wants us to understand them and teach us through them, so we can better understand what and why things are happening in the world we live in.
A “prophecy” (v3)
That is to say, “the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ”. Prophecy and future-telling have become synonymous in many minds, but only a small portion of prophecy actually deals with the future. A prophecy is God’s authoritative word, spoken by his servant, to God’s people. It reveals God’s mind, so we know how to live in God’s world. Dt 29:29
The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children for ever, that we may follow all the words of this law.
Its purpose is a call to action, not just to inform. “hear it and take it to heart” (v3)—the two go together, heart-moved obedience.
Don’t we sorely need this?
Revelation is a commentary on the times we live in, the experiences we have as God’s people. We are lost without this insight. This is particularly clear when we run into trouble.
“Where is God?” type questions
“What am I to think of this?” type questions
“What am I to do?” type questions
Because God’s will is to bless us through it, v3
Because God’s will is to bless us through it, v3
It is God’s purpose with the book to bless: to do good to us. But Revelation only promises God’s blessing to certain people. “Blessed” (reminding us of Psalm 1?)
“is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy”: as we’ll see, Revelation is addressed to seven local churches. It was to be read aloud to them.
This is a NT practice, cf. 1Ti 4:13. Here is the blessing promised to the one who did the reading.
13 Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching.
It rests on OT practice, Ne 8:2-3
2 So on the first day of the seventh month Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, which was made up of men and women and all who were able to understand. 3 He read it aloud from daybreak till noon as he faced the square before the Water Gate in the presence of the men, women and others who could understand. And all the people listened attentively to the Book of the Law.
This because God’s people gather to hear God speak, Dt 6:4-5
4 Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
The public reader is the witness of God’s born again people, men and women, to what God’s Word is. We don’t read from Shakespeare, Tolkien, even Calvin and call people to submit to it as God’s Word. We read the Bible and say: this is what you are to submit, this is God’s revelation; “the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy” testifies to this as reading as one submitting to it—and receives God’s blessing for it.
“are those who hear it and take to heart what is written in it”: that is to say, who are not merely hearers but doers of the Word, cf. Jas 1:22
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
In fact, hearing and not obeying is likened by Jesus to be foolish—not just stupid, but essentially sinful, and God is not with that person (though they might think, “so deceive yourselves”); as the storms of life will reveal this, Mt 7:26-27
But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.’
“because the time is near”: cf. “what must soon take place”
An edge for the now: now you are living in God’s unfolding plan...
An edge for the future: …which is nearing its culmination.