A couple of days after I got back from my vacation I was relaxing in my comfy chair, watching TV and doing needlework, when all of a sudden I heard a great banging and clattering, as if - I don’t know, as if a coal truck were dumping the winter’s load down a chute into the basement. You can tell how old I am, that’s how we heated our house when I was young. I looked outside, but there was nothing there, and it really seemed to be inside the house.
As it happened, there was a squirrel in the fireplace. Fortunately, there are glass doors on the fireplace, and so I shoved the footstool up against it to keep it penned up while I tried to figure out what to do. Well, to make a long story short, it was late the next afternoon before the pest control people came, and by that time not only had the little beast escaped its confinement but there was more than one. There were four. Apparently, so they told me, a female in heat had come down the chimney followed by half the neighborhood. Well, three gentleman callers, actually. Not only did they knock everything off the shelves and pull down curtains, but they weren’t afraid of me at all and they kept running around the rooms and up and down the shades and chittering and squeaking and I was TOTALLY FREAKED OUT.
Well, the squirrels are gone at last, and the pest control guy is coming back next week to cap my chimneys so it won’t happen again, but every time I hear the slightest noise in the house I get spooked. The furnace goes on, I jump. I wake up every time the wind blows a twig against a window. I even dreamed about them one night. I will never look at a squirrel the same way again. They are NOT CUTE. But at least I’m bigger than they are, and smarter than they are, and
I knew I’d win eventually. And now that I know how to protect myself I’ll eventually start feeling safe again. After the chimney caps are on, that is.
Not all scary things are as easily dealt with as that. There are places in the world where unexpected loud noises means a raid - either by irate neighbors with a score to settle or local authorities looking for a hidden Bible. In North Korea or Vietnam or Saudi Arabia the terror in the night is likely to be official - but it’s no less dangerous in Bangladesh or Nigeria, where the authorities close their eyes when Muslim extremists go on a rampage. There are places in the world where things are just as bad for Christians today as they were in the first century Roman empire when the Apostle John had his visions and wrote them down in the book we know as Revelation, or the Apocalypse. Apocalypse, incidentally, means the
same thing as Revelation: it’s an opening up, something coming to light or becoming visible, only in Greek instead of in Latin.
Tradition holds that John wrote during the time of the Emperor Domitian, who instituted the first large-scale persecution. Most of the emperors didn’t become gods until after they had died, but Domitian insisted that his subjects worship him as a god while he was still alive, so when Christians refused to do so he took it as a personal insult, rather than just a political problem.
But whenever it was, times were rough all around for Christians. Even if you weren’t going to be tossed into jail or even to the lions, have your business boycotted or your house torched, neighbors whispered behind your back and spread nasty rumors about what you did at your worship service. The rumors included everything from cannibalism to incest - from the communion table, of course, and the kiss of greeting between believers. Christians were even called atheists, because they didn’t respect the multitudes of gods that abounded in the Roman world. Which - since the gods would be upset by this - of course made Christians responsible for anything that went wrong, from bad weather to business
failures.
And in the middle of all this turmoil and anxiety and danger, John - who is the last apostle left alive - has a vision. He’s an old man by now, and he is in exile on the island of Patmos in the Aegean Sea, off the coast of what is now Turkey. Actually, he has several visions. He writes them down, sends them off in a sort of round robin to the scared and confused first century Christians in Asia Minor, and tells them they’d better pay attention. But what on earth are they to make of it?
Revelation is the hardest book in the New Testament to understand. In my opinion, the only one in the Old Testament to touch it for sheer incomprehensibility is Ezekiel. It is full of doom and destruction, strange and often terrifying images, obscure allusions and symbols and even what seems to be code. And yet this is what the Holy Spirit seems to think the church needs to hear. They already have the stories of Jesus - his life,his teachings, his miracles, his death and resurrection. They have the history of the early church, written down with such care by Paul’s faithful sidekick Luke. And they have Paul’s own letters telling them how their faith in Jesus is supposed to work out in their lives. They’ve heard from Peter, too, a few times, and some of them had even gotten hold of that
marvelous practical little manual of church life that James had written for the brothers in Jerusalem. And of course John himself, as their pastor, had been writing them to them regularly as well. We have three of his, and there were probably others as well. They’d been warned that persecution would come, and that they needed to stand fast, to hold on to their faith and be brave.
So again, I ask, why this confusing and vivid collage of warnings and worship? What need did it fill, what role did it play in strengthening and equipping the people for what was to come?
The Christian church in those days was at a unique crossroads. Almost all the eye-witnesses had died off, the political situation was at best unstable, and Jesus still hadn’t returned! But uniqueness of that particular time doesn’t mean things are all that much different nowadays. Crisis is normal in the life of the church. Sure, for 1500 years Christianity was the official religion of most of Europe, but that hardly meant Christians were safe. It didn’t even mean that Christians were necessarily Christian! There were riots in the streets of Byzantium over theological differences, whether Jesus was truly god and truly man or not, which incidentally is exactly the same argument we had in Presbytery last month when we voted to admit Rev. Dekker into membership. Some things never change.
And there was never-ending war, too. The Ottoman empire brought the Islamic conquest, which had begun in the 7th century, all the way to the gates of Vienna before it was turned back in the 16th century - after the death of Martin Luther; and of course you all remember horror stories of the Spanish Inquisition. There were struggles between kings and popes and priests, the Reformation led to 30 years of war, and there have always been saints and heresies and revivals and scandals. There has never been a time when Christians have not had to struggle with what it means to be faithful in the face of danger and temptation and confusion.
And so John was given a vision, and he passed it on to his flock, and to us, so that we might know understand what the noises in the night mean, be able to sort out all the mixed messages, to know how to act, and to keep us from being afraid. As the Thursday morning Bible study worked its way through Revelation during 2002 we came to understand in a new way what a great gift this book is to the church, and made a fair start on understanding how to read it for both guidance and encouragement. And so I will be preaching through John’s Revelation throughout the coming year. It fits beautifully, finishing up with the new
heaven and new earth during the season of Advent. Some of the questions we raise today won’t be answered until later on in the year, as we move through the puzzles and the visions and the promises. But each week we will open up more of the plans and character of God, and I hope that by the end of the year we will all have grown in our reliance on him.
John begins by giving his credentials, and affirming that everything he is abut to tell them is not only true but of the highest importance. “The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place; he made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who testified to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. [v. 1-2] The revelation both belongs to Jesus Christ, and is about him. And since John is the one who told his hearers about Jesus in the first place, they should believe this
message just as they had believed his gospel. John then goes on to instruct the recipients to read his letter aloud to, one assumes, the local congregation, and to urge them all to do everything they are told.
This is nice and clear. But then things start to get complicated. The letter is sent to seven churches. They’re named in chapters 2 and 3. But why only seven? What about the other churches? There were lots more than seven in Asia Minor alone, not to mention Galatia, Bithynia, Pontus, Cappadocia, Macedonia, Thrace, well, I could go on and on. Is the message only for the few? Well, the simplest explanation is that these cities are the most prominent and strategic cities in the region, and they form a sort of a circle, so if a messenger were to take the scroll John had written on Patmos, go to the nearest city, Ephesus, which is the first in the list, and travel around to read it to each congregation in turn, he’d go in
more or less the order given. Perhaps he’d stop long enough for a copy to be made. And then from each of those cities the word would quickly spread to the surrounding areas, And like all the other writings of the apostles, they’d eventually percolate all the way from one end of the Mediterranean to the other. Furthermore, seven is the number of completeness or perfection, and so maybe it was a figure of speech meaning all the churches.
Which brings us to a key issue in the reading of the entire book of Revelation. Some things are meant to be taken literally, and some things are meant to be taken figuratively, and some are both at once. But how to decide? That’s one of the things that makes this book so challenging and difficult. There are thorny questions in practically every sentence. I can’t answer all your questions today, but we will, I hope, work through the most important ones throughout the course of this year.
For instance, what about the seven spirits? Well, no one really knows. There are all kinds of theories. There were seven archangels around god’s throne in early Judaism. Some commentators think what is meant is Isaiah’s “sevenfold spirit” [Is 11:2] which is another way of referring to God’s own absolutely perfect and complete spirit. Still others think they are the guardian angels of the seven cities to which the letters are being sent. I think it’s most likely a reference to God’s spirit, since that would make the greeting a typically Trinitarian one, that is, from the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. “Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ... "[v. 4-5]
But however you interpret the reference to the spirit(s), there is absolutely no question that the central figure in this greeting is Jesus Christ. And the entire book must be read in the light of that central figure.
And each of the three titles John gives him would have a special meaning for the readers of these letters. First, Jesus is called the “faithful witness”. This is an assurance not only that his promises can be trusted, but a reminder they, too, must be faithful witnesses even if they have to suffer for it as Jesus had. Second, as “the firstborn of the dead”, Jesus’ resurrection gives them hope; and third, since Jesus is the ruler of the kings of the earth, even the kings and emperors who
persecute them will receive justice.
John doesn’t stop with who Jesus is, though; he goes on to remind his readers what Jesus has done. He loves them - and us. He has forgiven their sins - and ours. And he has made them - and us - a kingdom and priests. And every bit of the book of Revelation must be read in the light of these central facts. Because there are some very scary bits. When the angels rebuke the churches for their sins and failures, we must remember that Jesus has forgiven our sins. When the vision shows us violence and death, plagues and famines and war, we are to remember that Jesus loves us. Loves us enough to die for us. When we wonder
what to do we must remember that we are a kingdom of priests. We have a job. What’s a priest? A priest mediates between God and man. A priest intercedes with God for the people, and calls people back to God.
That’s what we’re supposed to be doing, all the time. Every act, every event, every person thing is to be seen in the light of the risen Christ. And we are not to be afraid, because, finally, as John affirms, Jesus will, in fact, return.
But there’s the rub. When will he return???? When? John keeps saying, “soon”, but it’s been two thousand years. That’s soon? Doesn’t seem soon to me! And so the people in those days - and in these - things are very much like they had been during the centuries before the birth of Christ, as people waited for the promised Messiah. When Jesus was born, it had been 400 years since the last prophet, Malachi, wrote. But it had been 700 years since Isaiah had first prophesied the coming Savior. And throughout that time people had wondered, and watched, and waited. Someone would point to an event and say, “This is the time!” And then a generation later they’d point to another sign with an excited
announcement: “No, this is it! We’re sure, this time!” Or a group would gather around a popular prophet or a charismatic warrior and insist that this was, indeed, the Messiah at last. And they would always be wrong, and they’d always be disappointed, and some of them stopped believing at all.
The message for us in the 21st century is exactly the same as it was for John’s hearers in the 1st. Everything that happens in the world around us should be evaluated in the light of who Jesus is, what he has already done for us, and what yet remains to be done - but that we can be absolutely certain will happen.
This is, as I said, a complicated and difficult book. But all of it, even the scary parts, must be read in the light of the risen Christ. He loves us, we can trust him, he’s in charge. God, as the Veggie-tales song reminds us, is bigger than the boogey man. So when things go bump in the night, whether it’s the political correctness police or your friendly neighborhood terrorist or even the draft board, DO NOT FEAR. God is bigger, God is smarter, and God going to win. Jesus said so, and he knows.
