"Greetings and Salutations" - Rev. 1:4-8

Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, 5 and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.

To him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, 6 and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

7 Look! He is coming with the clouds;

every eye will see him,

even those who pierced him;

and on his account all the tribes of the earth will wail.

So it is to 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.

Let’s begin honestly — few of us want to approach the text of the Revelation, most often because it seems so cryptic, so hard to decipher what it is actually talking about. It’s fantastical, like a fever dream written down. There are so many symbols to decode, so many allegorical elusions made to people and places and systems of the day and of the exiled people of Israel’s history. The echoes of Egypt, Babylon, Syria, and Rome are clearly here, but the style and the storytelling also allude to a grander battle between the empire of evil and the kingdom of heaven.

So, we steer clear, most of the time.

But aren’t we actually equipped to wrestle with this text? Aren’t we a culture saturated with heroic myths (think of Marvel’s Avengers, or the modern mind and time-bending films of Christopher Nolan, like Inception or Interstellar. Or maybe even the renewal of old mythologies, like King Kong or Godzilla, Jurassic World or the Lord of the Rings). We are actually surrounded by narratives and stories that utilize fantastic imagery to spark new ideas and critique the world as we see it. A couple of my favorite story series, both Harry Potter and also Marvel’s X-men comics, utilize magic and mutant powers to tell stories about educational systems, puberty, sexual attraction, growing up, and becoming who we are meant to be.

Perhaps some of these movie and book references don’t resonate. Maybe think back to the old stories of the Wild West, of John Wayne or the Lone Ranger. Or think of H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds or The Time Machine. These works painted fantastic, somewhat realistic, pictures of an idealized or disrupted world. They use our imaginations to stretch us to see the world differently, whether it be in the idealization of a rugged, handsome farmhand who saves the day or the downfall of civilization at the hands of alien invaders.

Fictions tell us the truth about the world, but from a fresh angle. Prophetic and apocalyptic literature tells the truth about the world, as well, from a critical angle. Prophets tell the truth about the world that isn’t always comfortable to hear or doesn’t always play by the rules of logic. But it opens up the truth for us to see and wrestle with, all the same.

As we look at selections from the Book of Revelation for these next few weeks, I encourage you to listen to them and reflect upon them with open hearts and minds. This text is not telling us with precise, reasonable language what will come to pass at the end of the world. But it also is painting a picture of what it looks like for empires to fall, for war and chaos to reign, and for the promise of God’s redemption to make all things new through such times.

I’ve titled this sermon series “A Letter from the End of the World.” It’s meant to be a little bit of a play on words, but also a little bit of truth. This book, first and foremost, is a letter. It’s not a letter like the writings of Paul or Peter that fill the rest of the New Testament. But it is a letter, a vision written down to be shared with the seven churches spread out around Asia, or Eurasia, as we might understand it. Because it is a critique of the Roman emperor, the language is veiled in mysticism and fantasiticality, but it is still a letter. It is also written from what we might call the “end of the world.” John is exiled to the island of Patmos, cast out from the centers of power, at the “end” or “edge” of the world. Finally, I’m playing with our standard understanding of this text, that is somehow tells us how the world will come to an end. It does this, yes, but not in the literal, nicely drawn up with a bow way that some Christians have attempted to reduce it to. Rather, it frames what theologians call eschatology — the ultimate end of things. The what and where of the trajectory of time and human existence. It is, in someways, the “end” as in the purpose or the telos of things…not simply about time itself. Again, it is helpful to remember how we tell stories and perhaps ease up on our need for this text to be literal and focused and clear. This text is about meaning.

I think about when my son, Asher, makes up stories and builds great castles with his toys and blocks. He’s making meaning, he’s dreaming and exploring what is possible. And then he’s telling me about it, acting it out, building it, in order that I might see it and understand what his imagination is trying to say. Sometimes, admittedly, it’s weird or unrealistic. But that doesn’t make it less true. Rather, when we encounter something like the Revelation, we might say it is even truer than plain speak because it seeks to unveil something deeper.

Alright, that is enough framing prologue. In summary, remember first,

The context — Roman persecution of Christians, John exiled on the Greek island of Patmos. Emperor Nero is addressed in this polemic, AD 54-68

The author - John of Patmos, associated with the community of the disciple, John, but not the same person.

The style — apocalyptic letter. Political critique of the empire. Language of Babylon throughout implies the evils of oppressive, overreaching empire. Foreshadows the fall of Rome and the rise and fall of all empires to come. A revelatory text that looks through the chaos of empire dissolving to see the consistent through-line of God’s good way, lived in and coming again in Christ.

The audience: the churches, the empire, and all who follow in the line of the people of God who proclaim that Jesus will one day come again. Just, as a note, in ch. 1, vs. 10, John explains who he is sending this letter to, the seven churches...

The Churches - vs. 10

The New Revised Standard Version A Vision of Christ

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 in a book what you see and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamum, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia, and to Laodicea.”

Thankfully, with all of this prologue, our reading today gives us a fairly straightforward reflection on the hope of the people for the restoration of all creation and the return of Christ. In the opening salvo, John reminds his audience that they are waiting for the hope they found in Christ to made whole, to reach its ultimate end, its eschatological purpose.

And so fitting that we hear this text on the Sunday after Easter. Last week, we proclaimed the resurrection of Jesus, the joy of death being overcome, the truth of resurrection as it is still happening all around us, even now, and the hope we hold for the restoration of all things in Christ. See, we’re in the same boat…we’re hoping and waiting and living in anticipation of “all things made new.”

We might ask, after Easter Sunday’s good news, “so, now what? What happens next? Where is all of this headed?”

John wants to remind his audience that this is a story that has been and continues to be told for all time. His greeting and salutation says it: “Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come...” This story is told by the God who has been, is, and will always be. We are looking in on a snapshot of a grand narrative, one in which God is the beginning and the end, the Alpha and the Omega. (Alpha is the first letter in the Greek alphabet, Omega is the last, by the way. You get the image here?)

What we are welcomed to see in this text is that God’s purposes, God’s grand design, is outside of human concepts of time and space. God is. Or, as God spoke to Moses in the burning bush in the Old Testament, God is who God is, I am who I am. There’s infinity here.

John wants to remind and situated his audience in this grand narrative.

John also uses language in this opening greeting that echoes the words spoken by the kings of the earth, the emperors and the powerful. Jesus Christ, he says, is the faithful witness…the one who has told the truth about how we find life, how we receive restoration, how to love one another and be the kingdom of God that we are meant to be and belong in. Jesus’ story was a faithful telling of a new kind of world that God is making in and around us.

Jesus is also the firstborn of the dead…what does that mean? Jesus entered into death and overcame it in the resurrection, as we witnessed last week. In this fantastic imagery, we then understand that Jesus is “born” from the dead…which seems like an oxymoron, except for the reality that from death, Jesus raises and initiates something new in us as well. We are all dying…and the promise is that death is not the final chapter.

Finally, John says Jesus is “the rule of the kings of the earth.” This is just one of many critiques of the power and stature of the emperor. Who would dare say they are king or ruler over the emperor? Think of this letter, getting out to the seven churches and beyond, and perhaps into the hands of a member of the Roman emperor cult. Imagine the outrage at someone else being named ruler over the kings of the earth. That was the emperor’s job! No one is higher…no one has more power…no one has divine right over and above Nero, Augustus, Julian. Again, think of our modern day myths: No one has more power than Thanos, the Mad Titan. No one has power over time itself. No one is higher than the rulers of our day…think of if this kind of language was used to juxtapose Jesus against the president of the United States. Better yet, think of this kind of language used to describe a peasant itinerant preacher from Palestine over and above the president of Russia, Vladimir Putin? I’m sure that would not go well.

Christ is the first and the last, the beginning and the end, the firstborn of a redeemed and restored humanity.

Ok.

And John continues on to say that we…you and me…these rag tag, exiled, dispersed communities of God…that we are loved…that we are freed…and that we are established as a community in our own right, priests no less, serving God, whose dominion and glory have no end. Well…isn’t that subversive? Isn’t that diminishing of all other powers that hold our allegiance and commitment? Think of King Charles of Spain, in the 16th century, trying to build a universal empire. His phrase was: “El imperio en el que nunca se pone el sol” — "the empire on which the sun never sets”

Empires, powers that be, want universal authority and allegiance. The problem is, at least for us who follow Jesus, that there is an authority that stands over all other authorities. God says, “I am who I am.” and “I am the Alpha and the Omega.” The one who is and was and is to come, the Almighty.

All of these greetings and salutations are meant to frame what is to come.

We stand in the aftermath of Easter Sunday, in the fallout of resurrection life. We ask the question, “what is next?”

This study and the texts that will follow in the coming weeks seek to give us an imagination for what it means to live into “what’s next.” They show us that we belong to an alternative community, a subversive and superseding kingdom, higher than any kingdom of the earth.

Practically, in earthy flesh, here and now, today, what does this mean for us?

I actually think this opening text provides a very simple truth for us, as we then look ahead to the chaotic witness of the prophetic words of Revelation. This is the simple truth: We belong to and are loved by the God of all things. Through Jesus Christ, God’s son, we are welcomed into a life that is post-death, life before death and life beyond death. We are a community of those beloved, restored people.

When we live into this truth, we begin to realize that while the storms and wars at the ends of the world might destroy and unhinge life as we know it, we know that we belong to something else. We, here and now, the church, are an alternative community, where we practice abundance, we share what we have, we celebrate and mourn together, we admit we are not better than the person next to us, no more worthy of God’s love, and also no less glorious or equipped to be priests in God’s kingdom.

I’m excited to journey through this wild text with you all. I’m hopeful that we will see it for what it is, a picture of hope and the coming of the restoration of the earth, the place we love and inhabit.

I’ll close with a word about Earth Day — as the people of God, who know we are loved and received into God’s family and kingdom, we get to participate in the resurrection and restoration of all things, here and now. We anticipate all things being made new, and we get on about it right now. We plant gardens and trees. We care for the earth by reducing our waste and consumption. We celebrate the harvest, the yield of hard work and the bounty God provides. We are a people who participate in restoration. For it is already here. And, yet, it is coming.

Our prayer on this Earth Day weekend is that God would come quickly to make all things new. And that God would use our simple acts of care and love and healing to begin this work, even now, even today, even in us.