Revelation

Richard D. Phillips

• Publisher: P Publishing
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781629952406
• Topic: Théologie et religion
• Subtopic: Commentaire biblique

A clear, penetrating study highlighting the sovereign rule of Christ over history that achieves his church's salvation. Through John, Jesus proclaims a message inspiring perseverance in faith until the end.

PART 1

Christ amid the Lampstands

1

THE REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST

Revelation 1:1–3

The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near. (Rev. 1:1–3)

On November 27, 1989, the day when Communism fell in Czechoslovakia, a Methodist church in the capital city of Prague erected a sign. For decades, the church had been forbidden any publicity, but with the winds of freedom blowing, the Christians posted three words, which summarized not only the New Testament in general but the book of Revelation in particular: “The Lamb Wins.” Their point was not that Christ had unexpectedly gained victory, but that he had been reigning in triumph all along. Richard Bewes explains: “Christ is always the winner. He was winning, even when the church seemed to lie crushed under the apparatus of totalitarian rule. Now at least it could be proclaimed!”¹

Given its message, Revelation may best be understood by those who are lowly in the world. A group of seminary students were playing basketball when they noticed the janitor reading a book in the corner. Seeing that it was the Bible, they asked what part he was reading. “Revelation,” he answered. Hearing this, the young scholars thought they would try to help the poor soul make sense of so complicated a book. “Do you understand what you are reading?” they asked. “Yes!” he said. When they smugly inquired about his interpretation, the lesser-educated but better-informed man answered: “Jesus is gonna win!”²

Not everyone in church history has shared this positive view about Revelation. Martin Luther was so dismayed by the book that in the preface to his German translation, he argued for its removal from the Bible.³ Karl Barth, the famed twentieth-century theologian, exclaimed, “If I only knew what to do with Revelation!”⁴ Barth’s confusion over this book is shared by many Christians today, especially in light of the bewildering interpretations made popular in Christian literature. Ambrose Bierce spoke for many when he defined Revelation as a “famous book in which St. John the divine concealed all that he knew.”⁵

Yet the opening words of the book should lead us in the opposite direction. Revelation 1:1 begins: “The revelation of Jesus Christ.” This means that this book’s purpose is to reveal something. God gave it “to show to his servants the things that must soon take place,” and “made it known” to his servant John. It does not sound like Revelation is intended to conceal or confuse, since it reveals, shows, and makes things known.

We begin by finding that Revelation is a message from the triune God through John to seven churches in Asia. Before the salutation that begins in Revelation 1:4, John penned a prologue that provides four vital pieces of information to help us understand the book. According to the opening verses, Revelation is an apocalyptic prophecy, a historical letter, a gospel testimony, and a means of blessing for God’s needy people. In light of this blessing, John Stott comments: “This last book of the Bible has been valued by the people of God in every generation and has brought its challenge and its comfort to thousands. We would therefore be foolish to neglect it.”⁶

AN APOCALYPTIC PROPHECY

The word translated as “revelation” is apocalypse (Greek, apokalupsis), which is why this book is sometimes known as the Apocalypse of John. The word means “the unveiling of something hidden.” It might be used of a sculpture that had been covered with a cloth, which is now pulled away. Or it might be used of a grand building whose facade had been covered by scaffolding, but now with the scaffolding removed the glory of the architecture is seen. The apostle Paul used this word to describe Jesus’ second coming (2 Thess. 1:7). The book of Revelation will also say much about Christ’s return, yet its panorama is broader than merely the final days of history. Revelation is, more accurately, an “unveiling of the plan of God for the history of the world, especially of the Church.”⁷

The word apocalyptic describes a kind of ancient literature, the name of which derives from this first verse of Revelation. Early forms of this genre began developing before Israel’s exile in Babylon, continuing through the intertestamental period and into the first century. The Bible books of Daniel and Ezekiel are examples, and Revelation draws heavily from both. Apocalyptic books usually feature an angel who presents dramatic visions to portray the clash between good and evil. These books employ vivid symbols, including symbolic numbers, to depict the spiritual reality unfolding behind the scenes of history. An apocalypse usually contains the message that “God is going to burst into history in a dramatic and unexpected way, despite all appearances that God’s people are facing oppression and defeat.”⁸ While there are differences between Revelation and other apocalyptic books, it fits the basic description of this literary genre.

Realizing the kind of book that Revelation is will greatly influence our approach to studying it. Some Christians seek to uphold a high view of Scripture by insisting that it always be interpreted literally. When applied to Revelation, this rule breeds only confusion. It is true that John literally received the visions recorded in Revelation, but the visions consisted of symbols that must be interpreted not literally but rather symbolically. This is true of the fantastic imagery in Revelation, such as the dragon and his beasts, and of symbolic numbers such as 7, 1,000, and 666. When we are reading the Bible’s historical books, such as Samuel and Acts, we will normally take the plain, literal meaning unless there is compelling reason to interpret a passage otherwise. In studying Revelation, we should reverse this approach and interpret visions symbolically unless there is a good reason to take a passage literally. This is not to say that the visions do not depict real events, whether in John’s time or in the future, but that the events are presented symbolically rather than literally in Revelation.

Not only is Revelation an apocalypse, but it should also be understood as a book of biblical prophecy. This is how John mainly describes his book: after using the term apocalypse in the first verse, five times he identifies the book as a prophecy, starting with 1:3: “the words of this prophecy.” We usually think of prophecy as foretelling distant events, but the main job of a prophet was to give a message from the Lord that demanded an obedient response. James Boice comments: “Prophets speak to the present, in light of what is soon to come, and they call for repentance, faith and changes in lifestyle.”⁹ It is in this respect that Revelation differs from most other apocalyptic writings, since it speaks not only of far-off events but also of those that were soon to break upon the readers. John wrote about “things that must soon take place,” urging that “the time is near” (Rev. 1:1, 3). This was not just a way of saying that things, though really distant, should seem near, but rather that God was revealing challenges that were immediately before his readers. For this reason, Revelation is considered an apocalyptic prophecy. While taking an apocalyptic form, it delivers a prophetic message that is directly relevant to its original readers, as well as to Christians of all times.

As a prophecy, Revelation is best understood in connection with the vision of Daniel 2, which foretold a series of four earthly kingdoms—Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome—that would rise up in succession, only to be destroyed in the days when “the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed” (Dan. 2:44). Daniel points out that he is revealing “what will be in the latter days” (2:28). The Greek translation of that verse used apocalypse for the idea of God’s revealing. In using the same language, John mimics Daniel 2:28, except that he writes that the reign of Christ that Daniel foretold “in the latter days” now “must soon take place” (Rev. 1:1). This is all the more poignant when we realize that Daniel prophesied that Christ’s kingdom would arise during the fourth worldly kingdom, the very Roman Empire under which John lived (Dan. 2:44). The divine kingdom that Daniel prophesied from afar, John prophesied as now happening. This shows that the book of Revelation is focused not merely on the final years before Jesus returns but on the entire church age—the reign of Christ, which began during Daniel’s fourth kingdom with his resurrection and ascension into heaven—which continues until Christ’s return.

In developing and expanding Daniel’s vision of how the kingdom of Christ overcomes the kingdoms of this world, Revelation is organized into seven parallel sections, seven being the number of completion. Each section highlights a portion of the story as the drama advances to the final climax. This drama involves a sequence that was going to happen in John’s time, that recurs through the church age, and that will take concentrated form in the final days before Christ’s return.

Fairy tales begin their story of a fantasy world with the phrase “Once upon a time.” In this book, John gives a visionary prophecy of the true story of the world in which we live, beginning, “The revelation of Jesus Christ” (Rev. 1:1). His visionary prophecy tells us the most important truths about our world. First, he tells us that Jesus Christ, who reigns above, has his church on earth. Did you know that Jesus is in the midst of his church, a Bridegroom seeking the love of his bride, as the vision shows him standing amid the seven lampstands (Rev. 1:12-13)? Second, did you also know the truth that the world is a dangerous place with enemies opposed to Christ and his beloved? Christ’s bride, the church, is beset by a dragon, which depicts Satan, who is served by horrible, ravenous beasts, a harlot Babylon, and followers who bear his mark (Rev. 12-13). Third, what will happen to Christ’s bride, the church, with such deadly foes intent on her harm? Revelation’s answer is that God will defend his people, judging his enemies and sending Jesus with a double-edged sword to slay those who persecute his bride. In succession, Christ defeats his enemies, starting with the two beasts and then the harlot Babylon, and finally casting Satan and his followers into the lake of fire (Rev. 18-20). Fourth, after Christ has come to rescue his bride, Revelation’s true story of our world ends with the church living happily ever after in the glory of the royal heavenly city, awakening to life forever in the embrace of her beautiful, loving, and conquering Prince (Rev. 21-22). (You see, by the way, why fairy tales are popular, since they often tell the story of salvation that our hearts long to be true!)

The prophetic unveiling of this history is the message of Revelation. Revelation does not primarily intend to present mysterious clues about the second coming. To be sure, as Revelation advances, it narrows its focus on the return of Christ, which brings final victory. But the message of Revelation is God’s government of history to redeem his purified and persecuted church through the victory of Christ his Son. For this reason, Revelation does not speak merely to the generation in which it was written or to a future generation when Christ returns. Rather, as William Hendriksen explains, “the book reveals the principles of divine moral government which are constantly operating, so that, whatever age we happen to live in, we can see God’s hand in history, and His mighty arm protecting us and giving us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ, . . . [so that we are] edified and comforted.”¹⁰

A HISTORICAL LETTER

A second feature for us to realize is that Revelation is a historical letter that is firmly grounded in the times in which it was given. It begins with the customary letter format in 1:4–5, giving the name of the writer and the recipients, together with a greeting, and also ends as a letter (Rev. 22:8–21). This is why it is appropriate for Revelation to appear at the end of the New Testament Epistles. Michael Wilcock writes: “It is in fact the last and grandest of those letters. As comprehensive as Romans, as lofty as Ephesians, as practical as James or Philemon, this ‘Letter to the Asians’ is as relevant to the modern world as any of them.”¹¹

Revelation is traditionally understood as having been written by the apostle John, the beloved disciple of Jesus, during the time of his exile on the island of Patmos. Some scholars have argued that another John may have written this book, but the testimony in favor of the apostle is impressive. Most noteworthy are the statements of the early church fathers in support of the apostle’s authorship. These witnesses include second-century writers such as Justin Martyr (100–165), Melito of Sardis (c. 165), who was bishop of one of the churches to which John wrote, and Irenaeus (c. 180), who also hailed from Sardis and knew Polycarp of Smyrna, who had been a personal disciple of the apostle John. It has therefore been claimed that no other New Testament book “has a stronger or earlier tradition about its authorship than Revelation.”¹²

Equally important is the date of Revelation’s writing. The strong consensus among evangelical scholars holds that John wrote Revelation during the last years of the emperor Domitian’s reign, probably around A.D. 95. This dating agrees with the early church tradition through Irenaeus, who said that it was given “not a very long time since, but almost in our own day, toward the end of Domitian’s reign.”¹³

Some scholars argue instead that Revelation was written much earlier, before the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple in A.D. 70. Most who hold this view argue that Revelation does not look forward to the return of Christ but only prophesies Jerusalem’s destruction. Important to this argument is the assignment of the symbolic number 6...