156. Introducing Revelation

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Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the podcast where we prod the sheep and beat the wolf. This is episode 156,

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Introducing Revelation. It's our brand new series on the book of Revelation.

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For the last 19 weeks, we've been plowing through the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24, and we've been laying the groundwork for what is often considered the most difficult book in the

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Bible. And now, today, we're finally here. We've arrived at the port.

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The preparations have been made, and everything is ready. Now, we're casting out our vessel into the roughest and most treacherous waters in all of Scripture, and make no mistake, the waters are rough.

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They're rougher than the waters of the North Sea. You know those videos that you watch on TikTok? Yo -ho.

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Anyway, yeah, it's rough out here. In fact, it's so rough in the book of Revelation that few are willing to even brave into its waters, consider this,

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John Calvin, the eminent theologian and reformer who wrote commentaries on virtually every book of the

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Bible refused to even write one on the book of Revelation. That says something.

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He wasn't alone, in fact, either. A .T. Robertson, great scholar, put it plainly, perhaps no single book in the

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New Testament presents so many and so formidable problems as the Apocalypse of John.

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George R. Beasley Murray agreed, saying that Revelation is probably the most disputed and difficult book in the

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New Testament, along with Isbon T. Beckwith, noting, doubtless, no other book has so perplexed biblical students throughout

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Christian centuries down to our times as the book of Revelation. And that's just the scholars.

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John F. Walvoord admitted that attempts at its exposition are almost without number, yet there continues the widest divergence of interpretations.

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Leon Morris, who was a commentator and a pastor, sums it up well, saying, Revelation is by common consent one of the most difficult books of the

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Bible. It's full of strange symbolism. And the result is that for many modern men,

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Revelation remains a closed book. But it's not just Christians who struggle with this book.

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Pagans also struggle with this book and hate this book and find this book reprehensible, which ought to tell us something.

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For instance, D. H. Lawrence called this book perhaps the most detestable of all of the books of the

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Bible and even claimed that John's symbolism in this book cannot be imagined.

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George Bernard Shaw, who never is prone to holding back from his bloviating, his grandiose opinions, he dismissed this book as a curious record of the visions of a drug addict, which is disrespectful, but it lets you know that Revelation is important because it's causing the ire of some of these pagan philosophers.

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Yet, despite all of this, despite the controversy, the confusion, and the critics, Revelation is and always will be the word of God.

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It's mysterious, absolutely. It's complex, yes. But we have to remember, dear ones, that it's part of the revelation of God's inspired word.

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His word is a gift to us. It's a gift to us to strengthen us, to build us up, to mature us, to inspire us, to correct us, to strengthen us.

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And because we know that all of God's word proceeds from the mouth of God, or from the breath of God, and that all of God's word is a gift for us, and that none of it's gonna return void, then we can know that the book of Revelation, even though at times it seems paralyzingly difficult to understand, it can be, and it is going to be used by God to bless us, to strengthen us, and to give us clarity on who

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God is, what Christ has done, and what the future looks like. And that is my aim in this series, is to help people no longer be afraid of this book, to see that it doesn't, in fact, mean what you think it means, and to show

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Jesus's church that you and I have a much more important role in the world than you ever dared dream.

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So get ready, because over the next few months, we're gonna be journeying through this book together, line by line, verse by verse, and it's gonna be epic.

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We're not gonna skim the surface of it and barely talk about anything, and we're also not gonna go so deep into it that we're gonna get lost in endless speculation.

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No, we are gonna dig deep, we are gonna uncover its meaning, we are gonna make sense of some of the most powerful symbolism in the

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Bible, but we're also going to do it in a way that's actually helpful, in a way that every person can understand, because every person should be able to understand the word of God.

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I have no interest in this series turning into something for egg -headed theologians who love to argue in their ivory towers about endless theories and speculations.

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This is not my goal. My goal isn't to impress scholars, it's to make sure that you, the audience, understand this book, love this book, see

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God's purpose in this book, see what this book has to say to you and to I as God's people and as a part of God's church.

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Whether you've been studying theology for decades or you're a curious 10 -year -old flipping through the Bible for the first time, this series is for you.

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But before we dive in, before we get started today, I want to take a moment to thank every single person who watches this show.

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Whether this is your very first episode or whether you've been watching us the entire time, I want to say thank you.

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And thank you to everyone who leaves a like and a comment and all of that, because you're telling

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YouTube that this kind of content matters to you, that you want to see more of it, and that you want to see more of it on the internet.

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Think about it, if every single Christian who watches videos that are made by Christians on YouTube, if we would all together just practice simply clicking that little heart button, the like button, then we would send a profound message to the big techies in Silicon Valley that Christian media and Christian content matters.

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It's what we want to see. We want to learn the truth of the scriptures and this kind of content. We want to succeed so that other people can learn the truth and other people can learn the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.

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So thank you to everyone who watches, likes, subscribes, has clicked the notification bell so you never miss an episode.

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You are what makes this show possible and I am thankful for you. Also, I want to give a very special shout out to all of the members who are financially supporting this show.

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We now have 14 members, that's insiders, defenders, and the prod squad. And I'm so thankful that from the kindness of your heart and your commitment to what this show is and what this show's working towards, you are supporting it.

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I mean, onwards, I really, I'm running out of things to say, but my heart is full and thank you.

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Thank you for supporting this show in all the ways that you do. Finally, I want to say thank you to everyone who's checked out the product store and checked out all the cool merchandise that we have there.

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Today, I'm wearing our official broadcast hat. It's called our dad hat and I'm wearing the camo version because why wouldn't you?

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If we're going to take over the world, nothing says taking over the planet for Jesus like a camo hat with a big yellow shield and a

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Cairo crest intricately embroidered right into the very front of it. And just so you know,

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I didn't design the logo. My friend, Rob Hewitt of Livingstone Studio, my friend, my fellow co -belligerent at the

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Shepherd's Church in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, where I'm a pastor, he designed the logo. He helped me set up the merch store and he contributed greatly actually to the beautiful looking brand that this channel has.

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I designed like a ugly looking sheep and that was the old logo.

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Rob's logo is beautiful and it's glorious and it's with that, I'm so proud to announce that his studio, which is called

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Livingstone Studio, is our very first ever broadcast sponsor.

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And his studio is the sponsor for today's show because as the creator of the broadcast,

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I've put a ton of hours into making the show excellent and God honoring and biblical and exegetical and all of that.

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But one of the areas that I really struggled with was branding, feeling like my entire look, my logo and everything else was duct taped together somehow on the limited canvas skills that I cobbled together after seminary.

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But when I sat down with Rob Hewitt, he listened to my ideas, he heard my vision and he was able to take it from an idea that was inside of my head to make it a reality and you would not believe the feedback that I've received so far from the broadcast makeover.

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From the logo that goes on our shirts and our t -shirts to the YouTube banner, all of it was great.

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None of it was generic and everything Rob did for me as a client was with purpose and excellence because like me,

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Rob Hewitt understands how post -millennialism affects every single aspect of our lives.

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He didn't just make me a flimsy graphic that would get me through the next couple of years, he gave me a meaningful piece of art that has all kinds of theological truth embedded into it that I'm really proud of and I hope to be able to use for generations.

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Now, for you, he would do the exact same thing. Whether it's a high converting website, a logo that actually communicates your values to your customers, marketing materials that cut through the noise,

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Livingstone Studios crafts strategic design solutions that sets you apart, that tells your story and is made by a godly

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Christian designer who wants to see Jesus made much of. So if you're in need of website design, graphics or anything remotely related to that world, do yourselves a favor and reach out to my friend

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Rob Hewitt at robatthelivingstones .studio or you can visit his website at www .livingstones

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.studio to get started today. I'm gonna include those links in the show notes just in case you didn't have time to write them down and with that, it's time for us to begin our journey in the book of Revelation and we're gonna begin by looking at why

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Revelation can be understood and that takes us to part one.

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Why Revelation feels impossible and why it isn't. The reason that Revelation often seems overwhelming is because we come to it with the wrong question.

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We open the book and we immediately ask ourselves, what does this mean for me?

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And with the symbols that are filling its pages, many of them are so far outside of our immediate experience, we assume that the only way to understand this book is to try to force its symbols into our world like a toddler trying to beat a square peg into a round hole with a rubber mallet and it doesn't work.

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We take the symbols in this book and we make them represent things in our time instead of John's time and whether we mean it or not, we treat

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Revelation like it was written directly to us. It was postmarked with our name on it and it was delivered to the modern church instead of the world to which it was written and I don't think we do that with every single text.

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There's other New Testament books that we don't do that with but for some reason with Revelation and with eschatology in particular, we treat it like it doesn't have an original author and audience but that we are the audience that it was intended and to prove this point and to tease this out a little bit, let me give you an example of this.

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I want you to imagine that I went on vacation into the Middle East. I don't know why I would go on vacation to the

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Middle East. I am actually going on vacation to Myrtle Beach which is not the Middle East and I'm thankful for that but imagine

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I went on vacation to the Middle East, okay, and I discovered while I was there a 2 ,000 -year -old letter that was laying inside of an ancient pot in the middle of one of those

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Bedouin caves that was abandoned in the middle of the mountainy desert. Imagine that as I was tinkering around and messing around in the deserts,

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I happen upon this cave and I come in and I discovered all of this beautiful and brittle ancient pottery that's 2 ,000 years old and after perusing its contents,

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I find this letter, this incredibly well -preserved letter that was written 2 ,000 years ago in an entirely different time period to an entirely different people in an entirely different language.

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Now, the wise thing that I could do there is I would take it to a group of scholars,

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I would take it to a museum and I would basically hand it over to them to be able to translate it and to be able to study it and to determine its precise date, when it was written, why it was written, who it was written to and all of that so that I would be able to understand the context of the letter.

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What I wouldn't do is as soon as I found that letter at the bottom of that pot, I wouldn't say, ah, it was written to me.

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Clearly, this ancient man in Palestine had me in his head when he was writing to his friend, hiding in an abandoned cave.

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I mean, can you imagine how dumb that would be? That would be the surest way that I could ever think about to misunderstand what this guy was actually saying and yet, that's exactly what many people do with the

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Book of Revelation. They assume that John, who was exiled on the Isle of Patmos, who was literally writing to seven churches that he knew and loved and pastored was only pretending to write a letter to them but he was really, his real purpose was to write a secret coded message to believers in 21st century

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America and to assume that means that nearly every Christian who has ever lived on Earth is destined to misunderstand this book because it wasn't written to them, it was written to us and we're the only ones now who can figure out its secret codes and its mysteries.

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I'm sorry, but that seems like the most outlandish and foolish assumption that I could ever dream up but the assumption's real.

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The assumption is being taught in seminaries that this book was written to us about our time. This assumption has been taught to many pastors who've now brought that teaching into their pulpits and are teaching that to many churches and now, we have an entire generation of people who think that John, his purpose was to talk about 21st century things going on in America instead of the things that were going on in his day concerning the people that he knew about events that were getting ready to happen in their lifetime and it's that assumption that I would argue is the main reason that Revelation feels so intimidating and difficult for modern readers because when you take these ancient symbols and images and you rip them out of their ancient context and you try to insert them into our world 2 ,000 years later, you are puzzling and befuddling a book that actually makes good sense if you just read it the way that it was written.

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Instead of trying to figure out what it meant to John and his 1st century audience, so many people have assumed that this book is about Apache helicopters,

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Neuralink brain chips that Elon Musk's making now, cryptocurrencies that are going to kill the financial industry or whatever, and the

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Trilateral Council and a litany of other modern realities that frankly John wasn't even thinking about.

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And after those same people have spun themselves sideways into a hermeneutical hypnosis from trying to understand this book this way, the only thing that's left is they're left spiraling, confused and not understanding what this book means.

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They're actually 2 ,000 years away from what this book means. If you try to impose your world and your understanding onto the symbols of Revelation, you're going to walk away disoriented, probably frustrated, and you're probably never going to pick up this book again and that is exactly what has happened.

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But there's a better way. Instead of avoiding this book because you have the wrong assumptions,

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I'm arguing that it can be understood if you have the right assumptions. It can be enjoyed.

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It can be something that strengthens your faith. It can be something that encourages you and propels you into godly

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Christian service. It can be one of your favorite books because of how encouraged you are by reading it.

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But the only way that's possible is if you change your assumptions. Instead of assuming that this book concerns things that are going on in our world and our time, if you would just adopt a simple paradigm shift, then everything will begin to make so much more sense.

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If you would begin by asking, what does this book mean to John and what did it mean to the people that John was writing to, then everything falls into place.

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You ask questions like what events were they facing and would be facing in their immediate future.

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Then you're gonna see that revelation is not as difficult as it seems. It's gonna fit together like a puzzle.

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In fact, it can be understood by anyone who's willing to approach it rightly. It really is that simple.

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But just because something is simple doesn't make it easy. It's gonna be hard. It's gonna take hard work.

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It's gonna take a lot of dedicated effort. It's gonna take you leaving behind the assumptions that you have about this book and the distractions of the world that are going on in the background for you.

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And you're gonna have to actually enter back into with me the first century world, the world of temples and priests and the

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Mosaic covenant and blood sacrifices and the Hebrew prophets. You're gonna have to enter into that world so that you can look at this book with a new set of eyes.

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And when you do that, revelation makes so much sense. And when you see it, you begin to see what the real purpose of the letter is, is not to talk about the world that is crashing and burning, but it's that Christ is gonna subdue his enemies, that Christ is gonna advance his kingdom, and that Christ is gonna fill the entire earth with his glory as the water covers the sea.

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That's what revelation is about. And in the weeks and in the months ahead, we are gonna see just that.

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For now, I need you to know that this book is not impossible. It's not impossible. You can understand it.

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And the key to understanding it correctly is simple. It's not easy, but it's simple.

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And what that key is is gonna lead us into part two. Revelation is the most biblical book in the

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Bible. Now, for many, the book of Revelation is a dense, murky forest of fantastical symbols and strange images and bewildering visions that make a knot that cannot be untangled.

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It's a book that has been misused, misinterpreted, and twisted by sensationalist end time speculators, doom and gloom fantasy writers, and by doing that, it has robbed far too many for far too long of the hope that they could have in Jesus and his kingdom that this book is talking about.

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And the reason that that's true is because we've had the wrong key. Every lock has a key, and you need the key to open the lock.

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We've had the wrong key for a long time. But what if I told you that the key to understanding this book has been right in front of your face the entire time?

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What if I told you that on top of entering back into their world and trying to see this book through their eyes, as we talked about in part one, what if I told you that the key to understanding this message is not on a news chyron and is not on things that are happening in your town or in your country or wherever you're at, what if I told you that God has already given you the

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Rosetta Stone to untangle the apocalyptic hieroglyphics that are presented in this most visionary book, and it's not current events, it's not the writing of Nostradamus, it's not any of that.

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It's the Old Testament scripture. That's the key. If you want the key that opens the lock, it's the

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Old Testament. Because Revelation is not a book that is written in isolation from the rest of the

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Bible. It's the capstone of the entire biblical drama. It's the grand finale.

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It's the climax towards which every other biblical book is pointing and it's been pointing all along.

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It's the hope of Eden restored. It's the dream of God dwelling with his people once more totally, finally and forever.

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It's the full and final redemption of everything that sin broke.

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It's the decisive defeat of all of God's enemies. It's the full and total crushing of the serpent.

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It's the record of how God will spread his dominion from sea to shining sea.

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From the very beginning of the Bible all the way back to the Garden of Eden, God had a plan.

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And the plan was to create for himself a people. To create for himself a people that would be his people, that he would redeem them, that he would reign over them, that he would fill the earth with them and that they would fill the earth with his glory.

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Revelation brings that plan that begins in Genesis 1 to its climactic and glorious conclusion where the true and the better Adam finishes what the first Adam faltered in.

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And in this way, Revelation through completely psychedelic and gnarly images at times is not a new message with new themes.

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It's the consummation of everything that has already been written. It is the consummation of everything

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God has been saying from the beginning. It's the fitting crescendo on a triumphant story of God's advance to the ends of the earth.

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It's the hallelujah chorus in the midst of Handel's Messiah. Every note, every theme, every crescendo, every climax, every mezzaforte throughout the

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Bible finds its resolution here in this book. And for that reason,

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Revelation is the most biblically saturated book in all of the Bible, not just because its themes find its ultimate climax here and not just because it's the climax of redemption even, but because it also on top of those things at every single turn is borrowing its language, drawing its symbols and weaving together its story with Old Testament language.

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In fact, it's nearly impossible to find a single verse in Revelation that does not allude to something in the

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Old Testament in some way. With over 400 allusions to books like Daniel, Ezekiel, Isaiah, Zechariah, Genesis, Leviticus, and more,

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John is clearly signaling to you and I that Revelation cannot be understood apart from the rest of the

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Bible in general and really apart from the Old Testament. It's not meant to be decoded on Fox News or on the

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New York Times or whatever. It's not meant to be read with a prophecy chart in one hand and a

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Red Bull in the other. It's meant to be read with the whole Bible open before you because it's steeped in scripture.

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If there was a decoder ring that I could give you for the book of Revelation, it would be

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Genesis through Malachi. It would be the Old Covenant scriptures. And just in case my point is not yet clear,

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I'm gonna say it as plainly as I can, there is no book in the Bible that quotes other books of the

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Bible or alludes to other parts of the Bible as much as Revelation does.

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It quotes the Bible, sings the Bible, reiterates the Bible, alludes to the Bible in almost every single verse.

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It does not look forward. In fact, it looks back and it looks back to the

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Hebrew scripture so that the only possible way to understand this book is to understand the entire

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Bible. And frankly, that's why so many people struggle to understand

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Revelation today because biblical literacy in the modern church is at an all time low.

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So many people today simply don't know their Bible. If you want proof of this, go to Ligonier .com,

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The State of Theology. They do this every year. And you will understand that the general malaise of the modern

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American church, evangelical church, is that we don't know our Bible. And if we think we know our

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Bible, we're not familiar with the passages that Revelation is quoting. Things like Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, and Zechariah that John is pulling from.

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In fact, stated pointedly, if you do not know the prophets, if you don't know the

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Hebrew prophets, the four major prophets and the 12 minor prophets, you are not going to understand this book.

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And that's precisely why I wanna do this. That's why I want us to learn it because if Revelation is teaching you knowledge about the entire

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Bible, if it's pulling from every other part of the Bible, if the whole Bible is climaxing in the book of Revelation, then

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I want us to read this book so that we will know how God views the whole

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Bible through the lens of this one book. And that's why as we go through this book,

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I'm gonna be teaching you from all over the scriptures what this book is saying. Because it's not a standalone prophecy, it's the culmination of every word ever written by God all in one book.

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Every promise, every covenant, every thing finds its fulfillment here.

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It is the grand conclusion of the story that God has been telling from the very beginning.

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And if you read it that way, and if you follow along with this series, thinking about it in that way, you're not just going to learn the book of Revelation, but you're also gonna learn the central theme and hope and expectation of the entire scripture.

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So it may be needless to point this out, but I'm gonna do it anyway. If you do this, if you walk with us through this series, you are gonna be a deeper disciple of Jesus.

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You're gonna be a more vigorous Christian. You're gonna know your Bible better. And that is my goal, that we would grow together in Christ as we read this most biblical book together.

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And that leads us now to part three. Revelation's use of symbols.

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Now, Revelation begins with a statement that sets the tone for the entire book that Jesus Christ signified the message, which is

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Revelation 1 .1. Now, in our English Bibles, however, this is not very clear.

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And I don't want to assign motives. I don't want to say that the English Bibles have muddled this on purpose, but it is true that the

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English translation of the Greek passage is super unclear. Let me give you an example. In our

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English Bible, in the New American Standard Bible in the 1995 version, that's the one that I typically use.

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This is what Revelation 1 .1 says. The revelation of Jesus Christ, which

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God gave him to show his bondservants the things which must soon take place. And he sent and communicated it by his angel to his bondservant,

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John. Now, while this translation is true enough and it gets some points right, it actually misses what

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John is saying in its depth and its entirety. Because in Greek, and actually today,

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I went to my Greek New Testament. I was taught Greek and Hebrew in seminary. I'm not a scholar, but I'm proficient enough to be able to tell you that this passage was mistranslated.

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In the Greek, I translated it for you. This is what the phrase should say. The unveiling of Jesus Christ that God gave to him in order to show his slaves what must take place in a short time.

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And he signified this message by sending it through his messenger to his slave,

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John. Now, in my translation, I'm highlighting the exact meaning of every single one of those

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Greek words that John is using. Instead of the more generic terms that our English translation has given us that's muddled the meaning.

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And what you can see very clearly in the difference between these two is that mine has two important features added to it.

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One is instead of the revelation of John or the revelation of Jesus, mine says the unveiling.

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And that's because the word there, apocalypsis, means revelation.

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It means unveiling. The word in the Greek language means to put, to pull the veil off of something, to reveal it, to expose it, to open it up, not to conceal it and not to confuse it, which makes the naming of this book incredibly ironic.

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Because for 2000 years, many people have been confused by this book, but this book was not written to confuse you.

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It was meant to pull the wool off of it. It was meant to pull the veil out from underneath it. It was meant to expose it and reveal it.

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And that's the first thing in my translation that you'll see is that I'm highlighting that, the unveiling of Jesus Christ.

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Secondly, maybe even more importantly, instead of the generic word communicated that is used in the

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NASB 1995, that this is the message that was communicated by the angel to John, the actual

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Greek word there is not communication. It's not communicated. It's signified.

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That's the word, which is the same Greek word that we get other words like signs and symbols.

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So for instance, let me give you a couple of examples of this. When Jesus turned the water into wine, he didn't call it communication.

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He called it a sign. When Jesus walked on water, John didn't say that's communication.

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He said, that's a sign. When Jesus looked at the Jews and he scolded them and he said, a wicked and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, he's not scolding them for being wicked because they wanted more communication.

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The word in all three of those situations and the word in Revelation 1 .1 that is translated communicated by the

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NASB is the word for sign. It's the verb form of the noun sign, which means that Revelation 1 .1

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is teaching us about the signs that Jesus gave through his messenger to his slave named

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John. It is a book that is signifying symbols and signs, not a book that's communicating an esoteric message.

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It's really important that we understand that. That means that the entire point of the book of Revelation is that it's a book filled with symbols and signs.

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And that sets our expectation. It's a book of visions that belong a particular time and place, which is not our time and our place.

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And by Christ signifying, that's what he did, signifying the book in this way, filling it with signs and symbols in the way that he did, he was ensuring to us that the meaning could only be discovered by first century people who knew their

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Old Testament scriptures. Because that's the way the signs work in the Bible. Signs are given to particular people at particular times so they would understand what they meant.

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Signs do not apply to a distant people and some other foreign context.

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That's not the way signs are given. John says that when Jesus walked on water, it was a sign. A sign to who? To us?

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No, a sign to the people watching. When he turned water into wine, is it a sign to us? No, not really.

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It is a sign to the people at the wedding feast that the messianic kingdom have come. Yes, we look at it and we praise

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God for it. We say, ah, I get it. It's a sign that points to his messianic kingdom.

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But the sign was given to them for their time, for their context, so that they would understand the meaning.

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It was not hidden in riddle so that only a people 2 ,000 years later could understand it.

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That's not the way a sign works. So, by Jesus giving these signs to John, the very

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John who wrote this book, the John who knew those first century churches, we have to realize that the meaning of these visions and symbols must come out of their world so that they could understand it because Jesus wouldn't have given them signs that they didn't understand.

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I mean, imagine Jesus writing a book and saying, hey, I want John, I want you to write this book to seven churches and I want you to thoroughly confuse them and I want you to tell them things that don't apply to them, aren't gonna happen for them and they're gonna be like,

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I wonder when this is gonna happen. It must be that it happens during 21st century

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America. It must be that the locusts are Apache helicopters. It must be that the

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Antichrist is a European from the world economic form or whatever, none of that.

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But Jesus gave these signs, this book filled with signs to John, a first century man, so that that first century man could take these signs and give them to a first century people so that they could understand them.

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And as we've already discussed, the signs come right out of the Old Testament. So, if you wanna understand what

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John is saying, you have to understand the Old Testament Bible. Let me give you a few examples of how this works for a moment and I think this will be helpful.

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So for instance, at the dead center of the book, stands a lamb,

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Revelation 5, 6, Revelation 7, 10, Revelation 17, 14, you have this lamb.

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This is not an actual lamb. You don't have a walking, talking lamb going. You don't have that.

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It's a symbol and what's this symbol for? Well, look in the Old Testament. What is the lamb?

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Where does the lamb come into play? And you'll recognize that it's the Passover. It's the

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Passover lamb, whose blood is painted over the doorpost of people's houses so that the angel of death will literally pass over them so that they'll live.

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So by John depicting Jesus as the lamb of God, right in the center of his book, he's telling us to imagine that an angel of death is coming upon the enemies of God once more and that the only thing that's going to save God's people is the blood of the lamb and that blood of the lamb is

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Jesus. Except, except one really important point. In Exodus, the blood of the lamb was over every

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Jewish household and the angel of death passed over them but took the firstborn son of all the

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Egyptians. Now, instead of the Egyptians, it's the plagues, the devastation and the wrath of the angel of death isn't falling on the

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Egyptians anymore or the pagans anymore. It's falling on the apostate Jews who were so wicked in their sin that they've become like Babylon, Sodom and Gomorrah.

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The blood of the lamb is for the salvation of God's elect who will pass over them in judgment as he pours out his judgment upon the apostate

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Jews. That's the message that the book is getting across and we see it through this very simple lamb.

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In the book, Christ also is the ultimate king. He's the lamb that sat on the throne to rule.

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He's the one who sat down on the throne, on a throne that had been vacant and empty for nearly 700 years.

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The Davidic line had been squashed in the exile and he's the one who reestablishes the kingdom.

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He's the one who reestablishes the kingdom of God. So knowing what the throne means will let you know that a reinvigorated empire is coming and it's coming through Jesus as its king.

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We're not waiting on Jesus to be king. We're not waiting on Jesus to come and literally sit down on the throne in Jerusalem in order for the millennial kingdom to begin.

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The king is already sitting on his throne now. That's what Revelation is saying. Also, another sign in the book is his greatest enemy is a beast.

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A beast who has a whore who's riding on its back. Revelation 13 through 17 details this.

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Now, while the symbolism is a bit strange, I'll admit that, it's not undiscernible if you know your

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Old Testament Bible. For instance, let's use the answer key. You remember in math class when you were doing your problem and you flip to the back of the book and you see the answer key and you're, ah,

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I got it right, ah, I didn't get it right. The Old Testament's the answer key. So who is the beast?

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You have to go back to the Old Testament. Look in Daniel chapter seven where Daniel saw a vision of a strange beast which he calls an empire that's rising up out of the water.

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We know today as Daniel seven is talking about the Roman empire. And almost no one disagrees with that fact that Daniel's talking about the

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Roman empire and he calls them a beast. A beast who's eventually gonna come and make war with God's people. And then

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John tells us that on its back is a whore who is dressed like a high priest. And she's become drunk on the blood of the saints,

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Revelation 17, 16. So if you're a first century Christian who knew your Old Testament Bible, the meaning could not be more obvious.

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The apostate Jews, i .e. the ones who were dressed up like a high priest, the apostate

40:18

Jewish leadership, they were the whore. They were supposed to be the bride, but they were the whore that was in bed with Rome the beast.

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They were riding on the back of the beast because the Jews were in bed with Rome. And they were the ones drunk with the blood of the saints.

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They were the ones who were murdering Christians. Read the book of Acts. Every time you turn the chapter, there's persecution and martyrdom and murder that's going on from the

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Jews on the Christians. So when you look at the beast and you look at how the whore is riding on the beast to try to preserve her life and to preserve her sense of power, and you realize that that's the

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Jews in bed with Rome, turning their back on God as his bride and becoming a whore.

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And you realize then that because of that, God crushes both the beast and the harlot, both the

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Roman Empire and the Jews because of their covenant crimes against God. Then you understand every part of that passage.

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You understand it by looking at what the Old Testament says about those symbols and then plug it into Revelation.

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And it makes so much sense. Again, knowing the outfit that the high priest wore coming out of Exodus 28 and knowing that Daniel 7 is talking about a beast helps you understand

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John's meaning. He takes common images in the Old Testament like beast, brides, whores, clothing, and then he uses them and he props.

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He uses them as props and he uses them in characters in his heavenly apocalyptic drama.

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And instead of you and I looking at 21st century Israel or Russia or whatever else, we're supposed to be looking at the

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Old Testament scriptures. That's what's gonna help us understand and discern what John is doing.

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Now, along the way, we're gonna unpack every single one of these symbols, all the signs, all the visions of this book, and maybe we're not gonna get them all right, but we're gonna do our best and we're gonna unpack them by going back into the

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Old Testament and looking at what they mean. My point in all of this is saying, if you wanna understand this book, you gotta turn to the

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Old Testament. You gotta look at what it says. And my hope is as we do that, this book will become easier for us to understand.

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And that takes us to part four, Revelation foretells imminent events.

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As we've already noticed, Revelation is not a book about distant futuristic calamities that are thousands of years removed from John's world.

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It is a book of near -term catastrophes, near -term events that happen soon, quickly, and with great urgency.

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From the opening verse to the very final chapter, John is saturating his prophecy with timeframe references, with very obvious indicators that make the timing of this book unmistakable and unavoidable.

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And not only that, at its core, Revelation is framed by a literary device that is known as an inclusio.

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What do I mean? Well, an inclusio simply means that it's bookends on something, that there's something at the beginning and something at the end that are the exact same thing, and those bookends actually define the middle.

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An inclusio, if you want to think about it in food terms, is the buns that hold the hamburger together.

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And the buns that hold the book of Revelation together is the expectation that everything in the book is being held together by a near -term expectation.

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What do I mean? I mean that everything in the book is being held together by this idea that the events that it describes are gonna happen soon, quickly, and near to John.

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I mean that the events are near to him, near to his audience, near to the first century. We're reading words that John wrote down on the page in the late 60s

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AD about events that are gonna happen just a couple of years into the future for John.

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Not 2 ,000 years, but like five years into the future for John. He's writing a book about the future, but not the distant future, the near -term future.

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Now, let me show you how this inclusio works. Revelation opens, we'll talk about the beginning. That's the first hamburger bun.

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That's the first, okay. It begins like this, saying, the things which must shortly take place, or which must soon take place,

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Revelation 1 .1. Then we get to Revelation 1 .3. It says that the time is near.

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So that's the beginning of the book. Well, the book also ends with this exact same timeframe reference in Revelation 22, verse six, where it says the things which must shortly take place.

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And in Revelation 22 .20, Jesus says, yes, I am coming quickly.

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So because the beginning of the book and the end of the book are using the exact same language and the same phraseology, we can understand from John's perspective that the entire book is being defined by a near -term timeframe.

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Just as I look at a hamburger, which it has all these different parts, right? It has buns and lettuce, tomato and mayonnaise and ketchup and onions and jalapenos and barbecue sauce and onion straws and whatever you put on your hamburger, but it's one thing.

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It's got a bunch of little things in it, but it's one thing held together by these two beautiful butter -toasted buns, brioche, probably, if you're like me.

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And it's one thing. John is doing the same thing. There's a lot of different things going on in the book of Revelation, but they're held together as a single whole unit.

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And it's all wrapped around this concept of near, soon, quickly, the timeframe.

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It'd be the same way if you and I said, I'm so tired, I worked from sunup to sundown.

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You're letting me know that as soon as the sun popped up over the horizon, you were working. And you worked all the way through until the sun crept quietly back down across the sky as well.

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You're not saying that I only worked in the beginning and I only worked it in the end. In the middle of the day, I took a big snooze.

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That's not what you're saying. By saying it this way, you're giving me the beginning, you're giving me the end, and you're also giving me the middle.

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You're giving me the bookends, which also give me the entire bookshelf. That is exactly what

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John is doing in the book of Revelation. By telling us that these things are gonna happen soon in the beginning of the book, and at the end of the book, he says the same thing.

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Behold, the time is near. John is telling us that the entire book is gonna unfold in a time that is near, soon, quick, and urgent from John's perspective, from the first century perspective, which overwhelmingly limits the book and its fulfillment to the first century.

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Not the 21st century, not even the second century. The timeframe references in this book limit its fulfillment to the first century.

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But it's not just the beginning and the end that marks the urgency in the timeframe references in this book.

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Every major section of Revelation is infused with these kind of timeframe markers, these statements that give us an expectation of the nearness of the judgment that it's talking about, and it's all over the book.

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Again, in the opening salutation, John makes no attempt to veil or disguise his message.

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He says, these are the things which must shortly take place. Revelation 1 .1. The Greek word there for shortly is tacos.

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No, it is not what you get on Taco Tuesday. It means quickly. It means soon.

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It means about to happen. It's not a vague, nebulous idea about some point in the distant future, or once upon a time in a land far away.

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Tacos means something that is quick and something that is short, something that is near. It is where we in English get our word for tachometer, which is on your car.

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It tells you how fast you're going because it has this idea of quickness. Okay, right after that, that's verse one.

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Right after that in verse three, Jesus says that the time is near. That's the Greek word ingus, which is a word that means it's at hand.

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It's literally right at the very door. It's not thousands of years away. It is right in the forefront of the periphery.

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It's getting ready to happen. It's an urgent word. It means close. It means near. It means right at the very hand.

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Now, as the book progresses, this time frame of urgency increases.

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The urgency increases. The pressure increases, as it were. This is like, Revelation's like an Instapot where the pressure's constantly building to something urgent that's gonna happen in the first century.

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So for instance, to the first century church at Ephesus, Jesus warns, repent or else

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I am coming to you quickly, Revelation 2 .5. Jesus said to the actual church that met in the town of Ephesus that he's gonna come quickly against them if they don't repent.

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To another first century church in the town of Pergamum, Jesus repeats it by saying,

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I am coming quickly, Revelation 2 .16. To Pergamum, to the saints in Pergamum, Jesus is promising that he's gonna come quickly in their lifetime.

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Imagine, you have the pastor standing up in the town of Pergamum, in the, let's say, the

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Christ Church of Pergamum. He stands up and he says, hey, guys, we've received a letter from John.

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And it's actually a book of the Bible, praise the Lord. I'm gonna read it to you. And Jesus promises something to our church.

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It says, to the church of Pergamum, I am gonna come quickly. You know what that means? He's gonna come 2 ,000 years later.

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Nobody would think that, that's so silly. Okay, to the church in Thyatira, Jesus says, hold fast until I come,

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Revelation 2 .25. Imagine telling that church in Thyatira to hold on for 2 ,000 years.

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To hold on for, it would be the most utterly ridiculous thing that John could have ever said, because there's not gonna be a single member of that church who actually could hold on that long.

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That would be like, in PE class, when I was in school, my teacher telling me to hold on to the monkey bars for 10, 20, 30 minutes, even an hour.

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There's no way I could have held on that long. Well, how much more so could anyone in the church of Pergamum or Thyatira hold on for 2 ,000 years?

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The message was to them about them holding on, because Jesus is gonna come quickly. Again, because no one in that church is gonna live into even the second century, because all churches have a lifespan.

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There's gonna be times where churches open and are planted. There's gonna be times where churches close their doors, and another church is gonna open.

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That is the death, burial, and resurrection cycle of the church. She's always giving birth to new churches, and old churches are always collapsing.

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There is not a single one of these seven churches that are listed in the book of Revelation that still meet today.

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There is not a single one of these seven churches that have had consistent services for 2 ,000 years. So think about this.

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The fact that Jesus was telling this particular local church that existed in a particular time, in a particular place, to hold on, and yet they don't even exist today.

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That clearly, they didn't have enough faith. They didn't hang on. They closed their doors at some point, and now we're 2 ,000 years later, and they didn't hold on.

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That's so they disappointed Jesus. That is not what Jesus is saying. He was telling that church to hold on for a little while longer in their context, because he was gonna come, and he was gonna defeat their enemies, the

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Jews of the first century, who were murdering and persecuting Christians, to the church in Philadelphia.

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He says, I am coming quickly. Hold fast to what you have, Revelation 3 .11.

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Not hold fast to what we have. Hold fast to what they have. The message, brothers and sisters, is unmistakable.

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Christ coming in judgment was not a multi -millennia gap from these local churches in Revelation 2 and 3.

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They were near -term events that they were gonna look at and experience in their lifetime.

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Every part of this book is pointing us to this reality. Even the structure of Revelation's judgments reflect this as well.

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For instance, John says in Revelation 11 .14, behold, the third woe is coming quickly.

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That's one of the judgments in the book. Well, if John said that the judgment is coming quickly, the woe is coming quickly, the doom is coming quickly, and it still hasn't come in 2 ,000 years, then

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John doesn't understand what the word quickly means. And even more incredibly, the

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Holy Spirit who inspired this passage wouldn't know what the word quickly means either, because no one says to their boss, hey,

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I gotta run downtown really quickly, but I'll be right back, and then they're gone for 2 ,000 years, because we all know what the word quick means.

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It doesn't mean that. Now, unless someone's gonna claim that all of this urgency is just in the beginning of the book, and then it putters out towards the end,

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Revelation's last chapter has the most timeframe references in it by far. It's where the inclusio finds its thundering reiteration, where John says things like, these things must shortly take place.

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What does he mean by these things? He means everything that he just said in chapter 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, and 21.

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These things must shortly take place, which means that the entire book must happen quickly from the perspective of John.

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Jesus says in Revelation 22, seven, behold, I am coming quickly. He even says in Revelation 22, 10, do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is near.

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And that is a very important point that you need to understand. Because John is told that the timing of Jesus's coming was so near that he couldn't even seal up the scroll.

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Now, in case you're not familiar what it means to seal up a scroll, that's the work that you're gonna do in the ancient world to preserve a message for a future generation.

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It would be the modern equivalent of a time capsule that you put all of your little trinkets in, you know, your little troll doll with the weird goofy hair.

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And you're like, oh, someone's gonna come along one day and they're gonna love this. And they're gonna think how wonderful I am. And they're gonna see all of the things

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I think are cool. And time capsule. It would be like assuming that John wrote the book of Revelation as a time capsule for future people to dig up and find it and be like, oh, this is so interesting because he was writing to us.

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Jesus is telling John, don't waste your time doing that. Don't waste your time even sealing the scroll because it's not going to be for future people.

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It's gonna be for people in your day. In that day, if you didn't seal the scroll, maybe the scroll would be damaged.

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Maybe the scroll would begin to decay or it would begin to rot or it would begin to, you know, whatever.

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So he's saying that these events are gonna happen so quickly, so near in the future.

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I don't want you to seal the scroll. I don't want you to do anything to preserve the message. I want you to tell the message.

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I want you to herald the message. I want you to give it to those seven churches that you've been pastoring and tell them that quickly these things are gonna happen.

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Tell them that the time is near. Tell them now, don't seal the scroll. By contrast, when

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Daniel received his vision 700 years before Jesus, he was given a vision of things that were gonna happen centuries into the future.

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And what do you think God tells him to do? God tells him to seal up the book because its fulfillment was far too distant for it to even be relevant for his contemporaries,

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Daniel 12, four. So Daniel's writing a book and you imagine someone visits and says, hey,

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Daniel, what are you working on? I'm working on a book. Well, what's it about? I don't know. It's really confusing to me.

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God gave me this message. He told me to seal it up. And some people at some point in the future are gonna, it's gonna apply to them.

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And the person's like, oh, that's really weird. Well, good luck with that. That's what Daniel was told to do.

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But that's not what John was told to do. John is told do not seal up the words of this prophecy for the time is near.

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And the implication of that is undeniable. Daniel's vision was distant.

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John's vision was imminent, urgent and for the people of his day, it could not be more clear.

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But wait, there's more because Jesus isn't finished. He closes out the book of Revelation with two very powerful statements.

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In Revelation 22, 12, he says, behold. Behold is one of those words where it's like, hey, wake up sleepy.

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Look, pay attention. Behold, I am coming quickly, Revelation 22, 12.

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And then as the final declaration of this book, he says, yes,

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I am coming quickly. He repeats himself. To ignore the timeframe of the book of Revelation is to assume that Jesus has no idea what words mean.

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And he has no idea what repetition means. He's saying, yes, I'm coming quickly. Behold, I'm coming quickly.

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The time is near. I'm gonna come, make sure you repent. The time is near. Don't seal up the words of the prophecy.

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He's saying all that and yet there's so many people who read this book and they're like, this has to do with 21st century

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America. It doesn't. And that brings me to a kind of final point in this section.

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You and I might not fully understand how every single line of this book applies.

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There's gonna be times in this study where I'm going to be thoroughly confused.

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And in my study, before I write these episodes and then film these episodes and then publish these episodes, in all of that,

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I'm going to be confident but not completely. There's gonna be things that I look at in this book, especially in like Revelation 20, unless the

59:29

Lord just gives me a supernatural understanding, there's gonna be times where I'm gonna scratch my head and I'm gonna say,

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I don't really know. But here's the point. You don't need to know how everything in the book works.

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You don't need to know how everything in the book, what everything in the book actually means. What you need to understand is what's easy to understand and what you and I can grab hold of really quickly is that God, John and Jesus all expected that these events were gonna happen soon.

01:00:04

Not soon for us, soon for them. And if we understand that, then we can understand that the entire book has already been fulfilled in the first century, even if we don't fully understand every part of it.

01:00:17

That is the point that I'm making. And if you adopt that posture, then parts that used to be confusing to you actually now are gonna make sense.

01:00:26

So for instance, when we realized that God is gonna be pouring out plagues and curses and devastation on a people who should have been called his bride and yet they're called whore, then what we're seeing is that God is gonna be pouring out his doom and destruction on the first century

01:00:47

Jews. Why do we know that? Because the Jews were called the bride in the Old Testament.

01:00:52

Now, because of their whoring with Rome and with false religion and everything else, now

01:01:00

God has turned against them. Now he's pouring out the covenant curses on them. Now the bride is going to be destroyed because she's become a whore, just like the book of Hosea.

01:01:12

So when we realize that, we realize that old Jerusalem is gonna be crushed. And it was.

01:01:18

When we look in the history books, when we look at Josephus, when we look at everything that happened in the first century, the things that happened near to John, soon from John's perspective, and the things that happened quickly, quickly right after this book was written, we realize that about five years after this book was written, the temple was destroyed.

01:01:35

The priesthood was abrogated. The city was leveled. The city was set on fire. About a million Jews were killed.

01:01:40

And the people who were once known as the bride became the whore that God divorced and put away.

01:01:46

When you understand the timeframe, you understand, oh, the plagues, the punishments, the seals, the bowls, all of it was poured out on Judah.

01:01:58

Because now you understand the timeframe references. That's just one example. Another example is this cube -like city that comes down in Revelation 21.

01:02:08

And you're like, what is that? This big cube that happens. And then there's a tree of life in Revelation 22.

01:02:14

Gosh, that must be heaven. But when you realize that God just poured out punishment on old

01:02:20

Jerusalem and he's replacing it with a new Jerusalem, and that new

01:02:25

Jerusalem in Revelation 21 is called a bride. And he just put away a whore.

01:02:31

You see the images. Old Jerusalem is destroyed. Whore is destroyed. And it's being replaced with a new bride, which

01:02:38

Jesus all throughout the Old Testament calls the church. You realize that this cube -like city, and we'll talk way more about this when we get to it in probably 1 ,000 years when we get to Revelation 21.

01:02:50

But the new Jerusalem is the church. It's the people of God. It's the people who live in union with Christ and who live in the presence of Almighty God, who are now in Revelation 22, feeding the nations with the tree of life.

01:03:04

And why? Why is the tree of life in Revelation? Because Adam lost the tree of life in his sin, and Jesus regained the tree of life by dying on the tree of death.

01:03:16

So all these symbols are coming together to show us something about who

01:03:21

Jesus is, who his enemies are, and who his covenant people are, and what his kingdom is gonna look like.

01:03:28

And the whole thrust of the book is that Judah crucified Christ, killed his apostles, and now they're gonna be punished.

01:03:35

And at the end of that punishment, at the end of chapter 20, God gives the world the church, the bride of Christ, the one who's gonna feed the nations and care for the nations and give them the gospel.

01:03:48

And she, along with Jesus, will win the world back to God. That's what the book of Revelation is all about.

01:03:56

It begins with destroying the enemies of God, and it ends with God's people reclaiming the earth.

01:04:03

And when you understand the timeframe, you get all of the story. And that leads us to part five.

01:04:11

Revelation is a book of hope and dominion. Now, far from the book of Revelation being a book about despair and doom, which is maybe the reputation that you've heard, it's not.

01:04:24

The book of Revelation is actually about God's victory and his dominion. It's not the story of the church's retreat, defeat, and doom, but it's about the triumph of the living

01:04:35

Christ. It's not about the Antichrist's rise, but about the true

01:04:41

Christ's reign. And throughout its pages, Revelation proclaims the absolute sovereignty of Jesus, that Christ is gonna rule over every nation, over every ruler and over every power and force that would oppose his kingdom.

01:04:55

This book is the blueprint for the church advancing the dominion of Jesus on earth.

01:05:03

It's the fulfillment of the Great Commission, and it's the church's inevitable victory through the power of this risen lion -like and lamb -like king.

01:05:14

At the exact middle of the book is this glorious statement, which says this, the kingdoms of the world has become the kingdom of our

01:05:25

Lord and of his Christ, and he will reign forever and ever.

01:05:31

Revelation 11, 15. I mean, how much more clear could you get? John is telling us that in the first century, in AD 70, before the turn of the century, that the transfer of power has happened, that the world that used to belong to Satan and his minions have now been handed over to Jesus Christ.

01:05:53

He's saying that Jesus has all dominion, all authority, all power in heaven and on earth. And for 2 ,000 years and counting now,

01:06:01

Revelation 11 has been ringing true. You and I live in a world that is owned by, operated by, ruled by, governed by King Jesus.

01:06:11

The world doesn't belong to Satan. The world belongs to Christ. Revelation 11, five says that.

01:06:17

Matthew 28, verse 18 says that, that we are living in the present rule of Jesus, that Christ isn't waiting to rule.

01:06:27

He's ruling now. And the book of Revelation is the story of how

01:06:33

Jesus Christ, having ascended to the throne of God, is now subduing his enemies underneath his feet,

01:06:39

Psalm 110. He's now making the nations his footstool and he's now extending his rod of iron rule,

01:06:46

Psalm 2. And he's judging the old world order. He's establishing his eternal dominion on earth as it is in heaven.

01:06:54

And he's extending his kingdom to the ends of the earth. And it's this tremendous theme that begins right at the very beginning of the book.

01:07:02

For instance, in the fifth verse. So barely before the book gets out of the harbor,

01:07:08

John says, Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth,

01:07:16

Revelation 1, five. John is not describing a future or potential ruler. He's saying that Jesus is the ruler of the kings of the earth.

01:07:24

Jesus is the ruler over every president, every potentate, every dictator, every slimy senator, every congressman, every governor, every judge.

01:07:32

Jesus is the ruler. He has all authority. He reigns over all. He's the king of kings.

01:07:38

He's the Lord of lords. And that's now not something that's gonna be happening in the future. His dominion is not something that he's gonna receive later after 2 ,000 years of twiddling his thumbs in heaven.

01:07:50

It is something he possesses now. And he is currently spreading his dominion now.

01:07:56

Revelation 1, seven says, behold, he is coming with the clouds, which is dominion language.

01:08:02

And every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn over him.

01:08:08

Now, we'll break this passage down maybe next week, but this is not speaking about a far distant future event where everybody's glued to their

01:08:16

TV and watching Jesus return with the clouds. That's not what is happening. He's telling us that the king is gonna come in judgment against the people who pierced him, against the people who crucified him, which is not you and I.

01:08:30

It's not people from Iceland, Greenland, Chile, or Czechoslovakia. It's the Jews who hung him to that cross and who killed

01:08:39

God in the flesh when he came to visit his own people. Those are the ones who pierced him.

01:08:46

Those are the ones who are gonna weep when his judgment coming comes. And that's the judgment coming that came in AD 70 when he crushed their rebellion.

01:08:56

In a similar way, Revelation 1 -8 repeats and even settles the matter for me. It says this of Jesus.

01:09:03

I am the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord, God who is and who was and who is to come, the

01:09:09

Almighty. For Jesus to call himself the Almighty, he's declaring that there's no might, no authority, no power, no rule that doesn't belong to him.

01:09:20

Almighty doesn't mean some mighty. It doesn't mean me and that almighty. It means all might, all authority, all rule, all dominion, all power belongs to him.

01:09:33

Everyone on earth, everyone who has even a modicum of authority, it's delegated authority.

01:09:40

It's borrowed authority. Everybody on earth who has any amount of authority has their authority on lease from its rightful owner,

01:09:49

Jesus. And we will all be held accountable for how we use his authority and how we use his dominion while we are here on earth.

01:09:57

He is the Almighty, which in Greek is Pantokrator, which means that he is the one before whom all kings, all magistrates, all governors must bow, before whom all nations are gonna tremble and to whom all of history will bend.

01:10:16

And it doesn't just stop there that Jesus being the supreme leader, he is, he's supreme in every way, magnificent in every way, infinite in every way.

01:10:27

And yet the book of Revelation speaks about it in a very surprising way. It talks about his bride, the church, as sharing in his dominion, as sharing in his authority.

01:10:40

Instead of viewing the bride of Christ, like many people view the bride of Christ today as this whimpering, weak, beaten up, retreating girl who's bleeding and bruised.

01:10:51

Revelation doesn't talk about her that way. Revelation talks about the church as a royal bride who conquers, a bride who spreads her husband's life, a bride who is fruitful and multiplying, a bride who's filling the entire earth with her bridegroom's dominion.

01:11:11

She is the one in Revelation chapter two through three who is told to nekao, which means to overcome, to conquer and to be victorious.

01:11:20

The church is literally commanded to be victorious. She's the one who has promised the tree of life that was lost by her mother

01:11:28

Eve, but she would be given the tree of life back because the true and better Adam was gonna give it back to his wife because he died on the tree of death.

01:11:39

To Smyrna, the church has promised the crown of life, Revelation 2 .10. To Pergamum, she, the bride, is gonna be given the hidden manna.

01:11:48

To Thyatira, she's gonna have authority over all the nations, Revelation 2 .26. To Sardis, she's gonna be dressed like a royal bride in white garments, which symbolizes her purity and her royalty,

01:12:01

Revelation 3 .5. To Philadelphia, she's called a pillar in the temple of God, Revelation 3 .12.

01:12:08

And to Laodicea, the most stunning promise of all is given saying that he who overcomes,

01:12:16

I will grant to him to sit with me on my throne,

01:12:21

Revelation 3 .21. I mean, you can imagine that the only person on earth who could ever dream of sitting on the throne at the exact same time as the king is his beloved bride.

01:12:34

And here you have Jesus who's promising as the bridegroom to share his universal dominion and his authority with her, with his true helpmate, with his partner, with his church, that she's the one who's gonna take the life that he gave her on the cross and in his resurrection.

01:12:56

And she's gonna take that and she's gonna spread that life to the world. Like a mother who takes the paycheck that her husband gives her and turns it into a meal and turns it into a home and turns it into human flourishing, the church is supposed to take the good gifts that God has given her.

01:13:14

God in Christ has given her and we are to distribute those good gifts to the world. That's why in Revelation 22, when the church is feeding the nations with the tree of life that has 12 kinds of fruit for 12 different seasons, the reason that that looks that way is because the church is a mother.

01:13:33

The church is the one who takes the bridegroom's blessings and gives them to the nations.

01:13:40

The church is not an insignificant institution. The church is not a beaten and battered victim.

01:13:48

The church is the bride of Jesus Christ. The church is the place where you participate in the marriage with Christ.

01:14:00

If a woman finds her participation with her husband in being a bride, then you and I find our participation with Christ by being his bride, the church.

01:14:12

You cannot expect to have a secret, private, personal relationship with Jesus apart from his bride, the church.

01:14:22

That's a very important point that I think is missed so often today. And it really supports the fact that the church in the book of Revelation is the queen.

01:14:31

She's the mother. She's the one who feeds the nations with the tree of life. And she's the one who takes what

01:14:36

Jesus gives her and shares it with the world. She's beautiful, she's royal, she's radiant. She's a glorious creature worthy of our affection and honor.

01:14:47

And that's why Hebrews says that we are not to neglect the gathering of the saints because she is the very bride of Jesus Christ.

01:14:54

And it goes even further than that as well, because Jesus's dominion, he has all authority and all power on earth and he shares it with his bride.

01:15:01

But he also uses his dominion and his authority and his power to break his enemies to pieces, to shatter them, to destroy them, to take away the dominion from them that they spoiled and used for selfish purposes.

01:15:18

He does this to crush his enemies so that he can build his kingdom.

01:15:24

As we've said so far, Revelation is not a book about the world spiraling into a hopeless chaos.

01:15:30

It's a book about Christ breaking his enemies, breaking their dominion, taking it away from them.

01:15:36

For instance, Revelation 5 .5 declares, behold, the lion from the tribe of Judah, the root of David has conquered.

01:15:44

And guess what he's conquered? His conquering is not uncertain. He's not sitting in his room and he finally beat

01:15:50

Minecraft. Jesus Christ has conquered the world on the cross.

01:15:57

He triumphed over it in his resurrection. And now he's spreading his dominion with his bride, the church to God's people.

01:16:06

And every one who opposes him is gonna be crushed beneath his feet.

01:16:12

For instance, in Revelation 6, one through two, the very first seal is broken and the seal judgments and a white horse appears and many dispensational thinkers have said that this is the antichrist and it's not.

01:16:25

This is Jesus Christ himself riding his horse to victory.

01:16:31

It says that he went out conquering and to conquer. That's not the antichrist. That word, by the way, doesn't even show up in the book of Revelation.

01:16:39

It's only shows up in first John and second John. It's the only book that the antichrist, that word is used. Here, this is not some malevolent evil figure sitting on a horse and going and conquering the world and putting everyone in subjugation and chains, no.

01:16:54

Christ himself is unstoppably advancing. His kingdom is coming and it began in the first century.

01:17:04

This is why Revelation 11, 15 says the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of Christ because it's not a distant hope.

01:17:14

It's the inevitable reality that was ushered into the world 2000 years ago.

01:17:20

It's the world you and I were born into. It's the world we're gonna die in. This world belongs to Jesus.

01:17:26

The nations belong to Jesus. Every power, rule and authority belongs to Jesus. That's the point.

01:17:33

And that leads us to the fact that Revelation is not a book of doom and gloom. It's a book of victory and a book of hope.

01:17:43

Revelation is about the conquest of Christ, the expansion of his kingdom with his bride, the church at his side, rib to rib like Adam was to Eve, conquering his enemies, crushing them beneath his feet.

01:17:59

Every chapter declares his dominion and his reign. He's the one who conquers.

01:18:05

His people are the one who overcome with him. That is what the book of Revelation is all about.

01:18:10

And since we took 19 weeks to prove that in the gospel of Matthew in chapter 24, now

01:18:20

I wanna end by showing you how Revelation is the

01:18:25

Olivet Discourse. We've said this before, but I'm gonna say it again. Matthew, Mark and Luke wrote an

01:18:32

Olivet Discourse. You remember, Jesus rebukes the Pharisees, him and his disciples leave the city, they go to the

01:18:37

Mount of Olives, and Jesus says, I'm telling you the truth, not one stone is gonna be left upon another and the disciples are thoroughly confused.

01:18:44

All of them, all 12 of them, excuse me, 11, Judas had already done his thing. All 11 of them are thoroughly confused.

01:18:51

Matthew writes about the conversation that happened between them and Jesus in Matthew 24. Mark does it in Mark 13,

01:18:58

Luke does it in Luke 21. John doesn't even mention it. And you're like, did

01:19:05

John not think that this conversation was a big deal? The most important conversation in human history up until that point, that the temple was gonna be destroyed, that the city was gonna be leveled, that the sacrificial system was gonna be replaced, that a new kingdom, a new covenant, a new world was literally dawning before their very eyes.

01:19:24

Did John think so little of what Jesus said on the Mount of Olives that he didn't even write about it?

01:19:31

Au contraire, mon frere. Instead of John writing a chapter about it like Matthew does,

01:19:39

John wrote an entire book about it, which is the book of Revelation. Revelation is

01:19:45

John's Olivet Discourse. And that leads us to part six.

01:19:51

Revelation is John's Olivet Discourse. As we've been saying all throughout today's episode,

01:19:58

Revelation is not introducing new material and new prophecy. It's literally reiterating the entire

01:20:04

Bible. It's reiterating the entire redemptive story that from Genesis 3, that God promises that he's gonna send a son.

01:20:13

He's gonna send one from the seed of woman who's gonna crush the serpent. Revelation is talking about this.

01:20:19

And in Revelation, John is reiterating the same exact promises, prophecies, and themes that Jesus gives in the

01:20:28

Olivet Discourse. That's why we spent 19 weeks going through Matthew 24 as a warmup for Revelation, because I wanted you to see that all of these themes have already been demonstrated and already been delivered and already been given in another part of the

01:20:44

Bible. Matthew 24, in my opinion, is easier to understand than Revelation, so we started there.

01:20:50

But all of those themes show up here in Revelation. For instance, Matthew 24 and Revelation are saying the exact same thing.

01:20:57

Jesus, in his final public teaching before his crucifixion, declared that judgment was coming upon the

01:21:03

Jews, and it was gonna happen in a single generation for their covenant, breaking crimes against God, which means that Jesus is saying that it's gonna happen soon, quickly, and the time is near.

01:21:12

He's saying the exact same story as John is in the apocalyptic genre.

01:21:19

And in this way, Matthew 24 is like listening to a famed professor speaking about a decisive battle, and Revelation is kind of like reading a poem about the exact same battle.

01:21:32

They're two different genres. One is a college lecture and one is a poem, but they're covering the same material, but in a very different way so that everyone could understand the message with all of their faculties and all of their senses.

01:21:45

Because if you really wanna understand a topic, and if you really wanna know a topic well, then the way you do that is to learn about it from a variety of different angles.

01:21:57

For instance, if you wanna learn about something, sing a song about it, read a poem about it, listen to a lecture about it, have a discussion with someone about it.

01:22:07

All kinds of variety in presentation is what's gonna help you learn about a particular topic.

01:22:14

And the more variety that you introduce into your intellectual experience, the better that you're actually gonna understand the topic.

01:22:22

Whatever the topic is, it can be anything. Read a poem, listen to a song, listen to a lecture, read a book, all of these things are different ways of invigorating our mind to understand that thing.

01:22:34

I think this is why that the Bible is not just a book that you sit down and read like a novel.

01:22:42

That's one type of literature. But the Bible also has songs that we're supposed to sing, which are the

01:22:47

Psalms. It has poems that we're supposed to read. It has discourse. It has apocalyptic genre with symbols and all sorts of visions.

01:22:55

It has law. It has narrative. It has all kinds of literature because God cares about you.

01:23:03

And he wants you to understand what he's saying from a variety of different ways. The creator of your brain knows how your brain works.

01:23:11

And he gave you a multifaceted approach for you knowing him and knowing

01:23:17

Christ. And that's why Matthew 24 is such a great compliment to Revelation because Matthew 24 is doing the same thing, but in a slightly different way.

01:23:29

To separate the Olivet discourse from the book of Revelation is to sever two parts of the same story.

01:23:37

And as we've seen over the last several weeks, doing that would be foolish. The timeframe is the same.

01:23:44

The judgments are the same. The signs are the same. The warnings are the same. The message is the same.

01:23:50

Revelation is not about something different. It is about the same thing

01:23:55

Jesus prophesied in the 40 years building up to the downfall of Jerusalem. And I wanna prove that to you as we close.

01:24:04

So first, let's start with the timeframe judgments. Both the Olivet discourse and Revelation are emphatic about the elements happening imminently, near, soon, and quickly.

01:24:18

Again, Jesus declares in Matthew 24, 34, truly, I say to you that this generation will not pass away until all these things take place.

01:24:26

In the same way, John opens up his book, quoting Jesus, saying that the things which must soon take place, the time is near.

01:24:35

Do not seal up the words of the prophecy for the time is near and I'm coming quickly. Why? Because the events of Jesus and the events of John, the prophecy of Jesus and the visions of John are talking about the same thing.

01:24:49

Same time, same place, same bat channel. That's the first thing. Now, both passages also talk about the increase in pressure that happened between the years of 30 and 50

01:25:00

AD. Jesus uses an analogy of birth pangs that increase in intensity before delivery.

01:25:07

John does this in Revelation chapter 12. He talks about a woman in labor who's being persecuted by the dragon.

01:25:14

The same thing is happening. Jesus described these early events of this increasing pressure in Matthew 24, four through eight where he says that false messiahs are coming, wars and rumors of wars are coming, famines and earthquakes are coming, persecution is happening, and every single one of those elements that Jesus predicted in Matthew 24 show up in the book of Revelation.

01:25:35

For instance, John affirms that false prophets were alive and were perverting the early church in Revelation 2, 2 and 14 through 15.

01:25:44

Revelation also confirms the presence of the wars and the rumors of wars, especially in the early seal judgments in Revelation 6, three through four, which describes the bloodshed and the strife that was characterizing the years that were leading up to the

01:25:58

Jewish war. The book of Revelation also echoes Jesus's warning about famines and earthquakes, Revelation 6, five through six the great earthquake that happens in Revelation 6, 12.

01:26:08

And in those early years between 30 and 50 AD, John tells us that believers were being persecuted left and right, which is exactly what

01:26:16

Jesus said. And he tells us as an example of that in Revelation 6, nine through 11, where the martyrs are crying out for justice because they're being killed by the first century

01:26:25

Jews of the synagogue of Satan. Point for point, John and Jesus are unveiling the same events, which makes us know that they're talking about the same thing.

01:26:38

Now, in the years of 50 to 68, where the tribulations are starting to increase as the time moved closer to the destruction of Jerusalem, the crisis intensified and both the

01:26:50

Olivet Discourse and Revelation described the growing tribulation that happened as they neared the destruction event.

01:26:57

Jesus warned of increasing deception, stating that false prophets were going to deceive many.

01:27:03

John talks about the false prophet in Revelation 13, 11 through 18, which is the

01:27:08

Jewish leadership who were aligned with Rome and who were reverting the Jewish people. Jesus speaks about the escalation of wickedness and apostasy in Matthew 24, 12.

01:27:18

John portrays it in Revelation 17, one through two, where the harlot is filled with all kinds of idolatry and corruption.

01:27:26

So they're saying the same things. Amid all of that turmoil, Jesus promises that in the midst of the great tribulation, those who endure,

01:27:35

Matthew 24, 13, are gonna be saved. Revelation says the same thing, saying that those who hold fast to the end are gonna be saved,

01:27:42

Revelation 2, 10, Revelation 3, 10, and more. Jesus declares that the gospel is gonna be proclaimed in all of the nations before the end comes,

01:27:51

Matthew 24, 14, which is a prophecy that Paul says was fulfilled in the first century,

01:27:56

Colossians 1, 23. Revelation says that this gospel was gonna be proclaimed in all the nations as well,

01:28:02

Revelation 14, six. I mean, the parallels between these accounts are striking, and they reinforce the fact that the events of Matthew 24 and the events of Revelation are the same.

01:28:15

And then when you get to AD 68 to 70, the final catastrophic judgment of God upon the

01:28:22

Jews, Jesus calls that a great tribulation, such as that has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever shall be,

01:28:30

Matthew 24, 21. Revelation talks about this exact same event in terrifying imagery in Revelation chapter 19 and 20.

01:28:41

Jesus warns of the abomination of desolation. He instructs his followers to flee from Jerusalem to the mountains,

01:28:47

Luke 21, 20 through 21. Revelation mirrors this same thing by measuring the temple and telling its people to flee,

01:28:54

Revelation 11, one through two. Jesus urges immediate escape from the city, Matthew 24, 16 through 20.

01:29:01

Revelation describes the faithful being protected in the wilderness, Revelation 12, six, and verse 14 through 16.

01:29:08

And as the final siege, the final battle, the final fall of Jerusalem is approaching with unparalleled destruction,

01:29:16

Matthew 24, 21 through 22, Revelation presents the harlot and her city as a fiery cataclysmic end,

01:29:25

Revelation 18, four through eight. At the climax of all of this, Jesus declares that the sign of the

01:29:30

Son of Man is gonna appear in the heavens and it's gonna bring judgment, Matthew 24, 30. Revelation affirms this by depicting

01:29:37

Christ as the sign that appeared in the heaven, riding on his horse to destroy his enemies,

01:29:43

Revelation 19, 11 through 16. Every single detail between Matthew 24 and the book of Revelation reinforces the fact that the fall of Jerusalem was what

01:29:53

Jesus and John were looking at. It is the future event that was gonna happen from 40 years after Jesus made his prediction and only a few years after John gave his vision.

01:30:05

That is what the book of Revelation is about. That's what Matthew 24 is about, is the end of the old covenant order.

01:30:16

And just like Jesus in Matthew 24, at the end of it talks about his new kingdom coming, the book of Revelation does the exact same thing.

01:30:28

The judgment against apostate Israel was not the end of the story, because if it was, you could end the book of Revelation at 20.

01:30:34

When the people surround the beautiful city and fire comes down from heaven and destroys Jerusalem, you could end the book there, but that's not the end.

01:30:42

And that's not where Jesus ends in Matthew 24. Jesus ends Matthew 24 by talking about his church.

01:30:50

Jesus predicted that following the temple's destruction, his messengers were gonna gather the elect,

01:30:57

Matthew 24, 31, from the four corners of the land. Revelation shows this fulfillment as the new

01:31:03

Jerusalem coming down from heaven, which is Revelation 21, two through three. The old world was judged, just like Jesus said it was gonna be, but the new world, the world of Christ's unshakable kingdom was established, and that's

01:31:17

Revelation 21 through 22. Revelation is not a separate vision from Matthew 24.

01:31:23

It is an expansion of it. It is a visionary retelling of it, but the two stand together, testifying to the exact same prophecy, the destruction of Jerusalem, the end of the old covenant world, and the beginning of the reign of Jesus Christ.

01:31:43

And that reign and that kingdom is expanding. And his church is the new and eternal temple of God.

01:31:52

And the prophecies of Jesus in the Olivet Discourse and John in the book of Revelation are in perfect harmony with one another.

01:32:00

And they teach us that we, as the bride of Christ, are a part of his eternal kingdom that will never end.

01:32:08

His enemies will be put under his feet, but we will reign with Christ forever. That's what the book of Revelation is about.

01:32:17

And that leads us to our conclusion. I could literally not be more pumped for this series.

01:32:29

I feel like my body is trying to burst out of my skin because I've been wanting to teach this for years, and I didn't think

01:32:37

I was ready. And I've studied, and I've looked, and I've tried to understand all of the different parts of the

01:32:44

Bible that are playing into Revelation, and I can't wait for this. I've literally been praying about this and thinking about this for years.

01:32:51

And together, now, we're getting to go on a journey through one of the most breathtaking books, one of the most triumphant books, one of the most glorious books that has ever been written.

01:33:05

So that, not so we can be confused, but so that we can see the truth unveiled.

01:33:11

Not so that we can be discouraged, but so that we can see our hope and find our hope in Christ. So that we can see and savor the glory and the dominion of Jesus.

01:33:22

Revelation is not a quick little book that's filled with lots of ease. It's not easy, but neither is anything worth doing.

01:33:33

This is gonna be a long book. This is gonna be a challenging book. This is gonna be a book that's gonna challenge our minds.

01:33:40

It's gonna challenge our biblical knowledge, and it's going to, in the end, present to us a picture of the

01:33:47

Lord Jesus Christ in all of his glory, his church, and her splendor.

01:33:53

And I believe that when we understand it rightly, it will encourage us down into our bones.

01:34:00

I think about it kind of like the Lord of the Rings, which is not ironic because I think about everything kind of like the

01:34:07

Lord of the Rings, but here we go. Frodo went on this long, perilous journey from Hobbiton all the way to Mount Doom.

01:34:18

And when he was there, he threw the thing that was most precious, the thing that gripped him and the thing that Sauron was looking for, he threw it into the fires of Mount Doom.

01:34:29

And then out of the ashes of the collapse of Mordor, Frodo actually leaves and goes to a better world.

01:34:40

He leaves and goes to Valinor, where he lives with the godlike figures of that world, which is called the

01:34:48

Valar, he lives with them forever. In the same way, the book of Revelation takes us on this perilous journey towards a kind of Mordor, if you will.

01:35:00

And the ring that gets thrown over into the fires of Mount Doom is the

01:35:06

Jews, the Jews of that first century that killed Jesus Christ, that killed his church, that murdered the saints, the

01:35:16

Jews that traded in relationship with God for an apostate religion, the

01:35:22

Jews that became so mangled like Gollum in their idolatry fell over the edge and into the flames where they were destroyed forever.

01:35:33

The old covenant world came to a crashing end. And like Frodo, the church now lives in a new world and now is establishing her kingdom on that world forever.

01:35:47

Over the coming weeks and in the coming months, you and I are going to see Christ in all of his splendor and all of his glory.

01:35:55

We're going to see the ruling Christ from his throne. We're going to see the warrior

01:36:01

Christ crushing his enemies. We're going to watch as the nations are brought underneath his feet.

01:36:07

We're going to watch as the old world of temples, priests, and Pharisaic Judaism is going to collapse and a new world is going to rise up out of its ashes.

01:36:19

And we are going to stand in awe as a new heaven and a new earth are gifted to the world and the bride is made ready and she performs her mission to success so that the entire world is filled with worshipers of God.

01:36:37

We, you and I, are not distant observers. We actually have a part to play in the story.

01:36:45

We belong to the kingdom that has no end. We belong to the people that are the new Jerusalem, the bride of Christ that are going to inherit the earth, the church that's built upon the rock of Christ that can't be shaken.

01:36:56

What we are about to study, brothers and sisters, is not just things that were locked away in the past and it's definitely not things that are waiting for some distant future.

01:37:09

We're going to be reading things that are alive today, a kingdom that is advancing today, a reality that we are living in now.

01:37:19

And as we walk together through this great book, my prayer is that something's going to happen.

01:37:27

My prayer is that our confidence in God is going to grow. My prayer is that our vision is going to sharpen.

01:37:33

My prayer is that our hearts are going to burn out of their chest with a deeper passion for the reign of Christ and for the victory of his church.

01:37:41

I'm praying that defeatism will be defeated. I'm praying that we're going to see what he has done in all of its glory and splendor and that we as the people of God are going to join in the kingdom, that we're going to be the bride that feeds the world the gospel and sees the world conformed to the image of our king.

01:38:00

So over the next however many weeks it takes, I want you to lean in.

01:38:07

I want you to enter back into their world so that you can see the truth of the scripture. And I want the word to shape you.

01:38:13

I want its truth to embolden you. And I want this vision of Jesus, this triumph to drive you in your life and in your family's life and in your community and in your town and in your church and in your world to build for Jesus.

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Because he's made you a kingdom of priests and a holy nation and this kingdom will know no end.

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I'm here for it. I hope you're here for it. And until next time, God richly bless you. We'll see you again next week on the podcast.