dictionary actually says, here's its very first definition now for it, quote, an event involving destruction or damage on a catastrophic scale. Actually, that's understandable because if you've read through Revelation, you will recognize it is cataclysmic. It is a great disaster that is worldwide in scale that happens during the tribulation period prior to the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, what is revealed is so disturbing, a lot of people try to figure out some way to diminish its message or even eliminate it if possible. I pointed out last week the efforts of Dionysius in the early 3rd century to do this by challenging the authorship of the book and then also advocating very strongly for an allegorical interpretation of the book. That way you didn't have to pay attention so much to the message. Eusebius picked this up in the fourth century and advocated it strongly. And yet, the literal interpretation of the book, often called the chalastic view, meaning a thousand, remained the dominant in the church until Augustine in the early fifth century was able to promote an allegorical approach that became dominant throughout the churches. Now that also matched the socio-political realities at the time because the church went from being persecuted up through the early fourth century to being tolerated to by the end of that century being the official religion of the empire. And so it was easy to say allegorically, Satan must be bound, he's diminished, and the church is ascending, therefore, an allegorical interpretation fit the circumstance at the time. Now, that means the interpretation was not driven by what was in the text, it was driven by the circumstances. And that's not how we are to interpret scripture. I pointed out last week that despite the many attempts to challenge the authorship of the Apocalypse, it's very well attested, both externally and internally, that the book is written by the Apostle John. John is referenced four times in the book, three times in the first chapter, and then in the conclusion, chapter 22, verse 8. It's all John. He wrote it when he was exiled on the Isle of Patmos, 94, 95 A.D., when Domitian was the emperor and he was released after his death. More important than the arguments that go back and forth about human authorship, who actually did the writing down of the message, is what it says in verses one and two. Now we looked at this last week, and so this is a little bit of review. Revelation, chapter one, verses one and two. The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his slaves, the things which must soon happen, and he indicated this by sending it through his angel to his slave John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the witness of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. So the human author John is only bearing witness to what was given by God to Jesus Christ, who then gave it to an angel, who gave it to John, who wrote it down for us. Those who belong to God, those who are slaves of God, Christians. Now, we don't tend to like the term slave applied to us. and especially any peoples who value their freedom and might even fight to the death to maintain it, and that has certainly been true of the English-speaking world. And so even as early translations began, instead of translating the word here, which means slave, doulos, as slave, they translated it as servant, whenever it referred to a Christian. We didn't like the term. But the reality is, is that we're slaves. If you're a Christian, you have been bought with the price of the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's purchased you. That means you belong to him, and so John can refer to this as slaves of God. Now, instead of being something that would be disturbing to us, that's something we should take glory in. Because we who are Christians rejoice that Our purpose in existence is now bound up in this quest to please our master who loved us so much that despite our antagonism against him, our sin against him, our enmity against him, Jesus Christ died for us to reconcile us to him. And so it's a great privilege to serve him. And in this particular verse, we rejoice because God has sent this message of his revelation to us of the things that must happen. Now, what are these things that must happen? Well, Jesus used the identical phrase in all the discourse to refer to the prophecies that he was referring to that had been given by Daniel. And while that would certainly include Daniel, the prophecies in Daniel 2, 7, and 11, the immediate context In Matthew 24, 15, there's a prophecy in Daniel 9, 26 and 27 about the abomination of desolation that occurs in the middle of the tribulation week, the 70th week of Daniel's prophecy. And that is why we took the time to study Daniel in preparation for looking at this book of Revelation. You cannot understand Revelation unless you understand the Old Testament prophecies. John's just gonna keep referring back to it. And this is one of them. We'll see more specific parallels between the Olivet Discourse and Revelation when we get to chapter six. Now the clause again occurs of these things that must happen in Revelation 4.1 and 22.6, which actually marks out the main body of the properties of this book of the things that must happen. That's what he's referring to. The attach clause in Taché, which had a time element, and so the phrase would be translated as these are the things that must happen soon or must happen quickly. Now the events that are described that take place happen in a relatively short time frame, seven years. That's fairly fast and there's a lot that's going on. And so some would say this means suddenly or quickly, but it doesn't really fit the context of the idea of as rather as soon as of short time. It's more related to that as supported by the end of verse three where it says, the time is near. That's our clue of what he's actually talking about here. This time is near. Well, that becomes an objection to the prophetic nature of the book. Those who do not like especially the end of the book, they end up saying, well, it's been however many years, over 1,900 years since John wrote this at the end of the first century. So how can be this soon? How can this be near? Well, the answer to that is actually simple, if you know prophecy. If you don't, it's confusing. I've detailed in the past the doctrine of eminence, The prophecies in Daniel 2 would be fulfilled in the latter days, chapter 228. It would be fulfilled after these things, the prophecies in Daniel 2. And Jesus referred to the prophecies in the early part of the Olivet Discourse as not yet. And in Luke 21, nine, the parallel passages, the time is not immediate. The end is not immediate. It's not here yet. But John is writing then, he is writing at the end of the first century. And all these things that happen, Jesus has gone to the cross, he has paid the price of our sins, he has resurrected from the dead, the church has been established, and so he's writing in a different period. And so when John is writing here that things must happen soon or the time is near, it's because nothing else must happen before these events are fulfilled. When Daniel's writing that in the sixth century B.C., when Jesus is writing it in the early part of the first century, there were things that still needed to happen. That's not where John's at. Nothing must happen before all these begin to be fulfilled. And so he's going to state it this way. Now, that matches the statement of the apostles, such as James 5, 8, and 9. The coming of the Lord is near. The judge is standing right at the door. And that might have been written as early as in the mid-40s AD. 1 Peter 4, 7 states, the end of all things is near. And children, it is the last hour in 1 John 2, 8. Paul makes a lot of statements concerning an imminent return of Christ with an expectation it could even happen in his own lifetime. We who are alive and remain will be caught up together with him in 1 Thessalonians 4. We also need to remember the Lord does not judge time the same way that we do. 2 Peter 3.8, a thousand years for him is, or a thousand years for us is like a day for him. He doesn't see time the same way because you're not a creature of time. It exists before and outside its boundaries. And so when we look at even the language of the Hebrew prophets, we find something similar. For example, there's a lot of reference to the day of the Lord, that it's coming, that it is near, and yet what is described isn't going to take place for thousands of years. So what John says here fits directly with this doctrine. There's nothing that must take place for these events to start unfolding before us. And so it is near. It will happen soon. Now of course for us and very pragmatic since we're living this many years later, we are definitely more close or closer to it than John in the first century, right? We're at least 1900 years closer to it. So we should have a greater anticipation. Now remember, the purpose of Revelation is stated in verse three. Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy and keep the things that are written in it for the time is near. So this warning about an impending judgment is a blessing even to the unsaved. Why? Because as you read through this, you should be scared out of your socks, right? And that is strong motivation to get right with God. Do you want to go through this? Well, that's a strong motivation. So there's a blessing there for the unsaved. For the saved, there is also blessing because there is a motivation for us to pursue personal holiness and being ready for the Lord's return. 2 Peter 3.14 and 1 John 3.3 both state it directly that those who have a hope in the Lord's return will purify themselves. In addition, we have the end of the book with great encouragement, God wins. Or someone even put that in a song. I read the back of the book. God wins. I don't need the rest of the book, do I? I know where it ends. And that's an encouragement to us. No matter what circumstances we go through, we know where it ends. And that enables us to persevere in present circumstances as we wait for his return. James 5, 7 references that, even as a farmer waits patiently. So we wait patiently for the harvest. Now, before moving on to the structure and text of Revelation, I think it would be helpful if I gave you at least an overview of the approaches that people have made in attempts to interpret Revelation. Now, admittedly, this is going to be a little bit on the academic side, but it's important to get through this. Now, the term hermeneutic, I know that sounds like a big, fancy word. It is. You get a grad degree if you can pronounce it, I think. Right? Because you don't take a class into it until college or seminary. Hermeneutic is simple. It's simply a reference to the method used to determine the interpretation of the text. Okay? So it's not a bad word, just not a word you'd use in everyday speech, yet you do it all the time. The hermeneutic is a critical factor. A presupposed theology will determine the hermeneutic used, as we've already seen the case of Dionysius, Eusebius, and Augustine, and it's still true today. A presupposition that Jesus will not physically reign over his kingdom on David's throne excludes a literal interpretation of Revelation 20, and actually the rest of the book, too. And so they reject the grammatical, historical, or the literal method of interpretation. Now, at the same time, it works the other way, too. An allegorical or a mystical hermeneutic allows and in fact pushes for and interpretations that are not supported by the scripture text, but fit well with what is desired or presupposed. Now the question we really should always have had is, anytime we're looking at scripture, is what did God actually say? What did he actually communicate? What did he expect from those to whom he first communicated it? And then, how does he want me to understand and respond to it in the present? And that is the way we work through it. Now let's take a look at the major methods used, recognizing that some of these methods are mixed together, and there is a plethora of interpretations of Revelation. That's why it gets confusing to people. all sorts of ideas for it. So I'm gonna lay out here some of the approaches and why you end up there. The preterist approach assumes that revelation is, quote, this is Dr. Thomas' assessment, quote, a sketch of first century conditions in the Roman Empire, thereby emphasizing its historical background, unquote. It assumes that the language used, according to Walvoord, quote, only faintly reflects actual events. He continues and comments, quote, it considers revelation as symbolic history rather than prophetic. a record of the conflicts of the early church with Judaism and paganism, and then in the closing chapters, a picture of the contemporary triumph of the church. Now this view holds that all the events described in Revelation were completed with the destruction of the temple in 70 AD. Now that removes every prophetic element within the book. And so its approach uses an allegorical or a spiritual hermeneutic, spiritualize everything. The next one is called the Tradition Historical Approach. Thomas summarizes this as, it views revelation from the perspective of background material in Greek or Oriental myths and Jewish tradition, unquote. What it does is it removes the prophetic element of the book and instead gives vague suppositions based on alleged apocalyptic language that's different than plain speech. In other words, you can't just read it and understand it. You gotta have some other key to it. Its interpreted method is also allegorical. The next is the continuous historical approach, and this considers revelation to be, quote, a symbolic presentation of the total of church history, culminating in the second advent. So it also interprets allegorically in order to force the text to refer to historical events from the first century to the present. Now, since allegory is very flexible, then as history continued to unfold, you got a new interpretation. Wahlberg, writing in 1966, stated, as many as 50 different interpretations of the book of Revelation come out of this view. Well, that was a while ago. You know what? There's a whole lot more than 50 now, because history has continued to unfold, and we'll just make this mean something else. He actually cites W.T. Garam's comment that this approach, quote, variations exist to an almost endless stream, and this touches every aspect of the book. That's actually a very popular way that people approach this. And the other thing is to note that Abraham Kuiper rejected the method, but in the end, he didn't do any better, because he interpreted Revelation in a, quote, devotional and spiritual sense. So he still couldn't read it for what it said. He had to read something else into it. The next is called the timeless symbolic or idealist position. According to Thomas, he summarizes, it, quote, has the apocalypse representing the eternal conflict of good and evil in every age, usually in reference to the particular age in which the interpreter lives. Also uses an allegorical approach, and it concludes that God in the book is revealing basic principles by which he acts, and these are not specific events. So though it looks like a specific event for you to read, it looks like a specific event, They say, no, it's not. It's something else. Well, what? Whatever the interpreter desires. Because it's neither historic or prophetic. Now I should point out that this particular approach is what's used by those who contextualize the meaning of a text. We would refer to that now as those who use what's called standpoint epistemology. In other words, the scripture's meaning is determined by the place, culture, position, and experience of the one interpreting it, the reader, instead of the author. So skip authorial intent, it's whatever I want it to mean. It's a form of eisegesis. That means you read into the text what you want, so it'll support what you would like, rather than exegesis, which comes out of the text and is determined by that, and I have to respond to what it says. The last approach is called the futurist, and this recognizes revelation is indeed what it states. It's prophecy of the things which must soon take place, as stated in Revelation 1.1. I discussed that earlier. It is the only approach that uses a grammatical historical hermeneutic, a literal method of interpretation, so that the prophecy is understood in a normal manner. You can read it and understand it. Now you may not know what it's describing, but John didn't either. But he's still describing something real. This is also the method that most strongly recognizes something I tried to emphasize a lot last week. All scripture is God-breathed. It's inspired by God, 2 Timothy 3.16, right? And it works through human authors because as men were moved by the Holy Spirit, they spoke from God, 2 Peter 1.21. All the other methods easily fall prey to or they will advocate theories that diminish or eliminate divine authorship. It's not really from God. Now I say this because even those that use other methods that do hold to a divine authorship treat it as if God is incapable of saying what he means and meaning what he says. He's God, he can create everything, but he can't communicate well. Or they have to conclude that John was not a faithful witness in what he wrote down. He's gotta be one of those. Dr. Thomas points out an additional problem that arises because interpreters often mix these different approaches, and you get great confusion. Some elements in Revelation, they take as prophetic descriptions, and others are allegorical principles. He gave quite a few examples in his commentary. One was a mixing of the idealist and futurist methods, resulting a view that there is a real prophetic end, because I like chapter 21 and 22, but the rest of it is allegorical and can mean anything to whatever generation's reading it at the time. We'll see this in a few minutes as we look at some theological systems. Every generation has something. It seems to fit if I can do this allegorically, but only God gets to determine the real end, and we have the real end. Chapter 21 and 22. Now I stated earlier, the hermeneutical method used to interpret a scripture will determine the theology that arises out of that method. And I hope a brief discussion here, and it's a very brief discussion, it's at least helpful to recognize the approaches that are being used by Bible commentators, even if they mix them together. That you can start recognizing, are they being true to the text, or are they doing something else? I think it's also helpful if I at least give you a brief description of the major theological systems applied to Revelation. Since I pointed out before, presuppositions of the system will influence the determination of the interpretation used. Now the various systems are generally described in relationship to the view of the 1,000 years stated in Revelation 20 regarding the reign of Christ. And there are subcategories under the main systems, but the three main ones are amillennialism, post-millennialism, and pre-millennialism. Now the millennial, that term, is derived from the Latin term meaning 1,000. Earlier on in the first, second, third, fourth century, it was called Kiliism, from the Greek word that means 1,000. So that's all it's referring to. So I know we get all these terms. They're just simple things. We're referring to 1,000 years. It's Revelation 20. What are these 1,000 years mentioned six times in that chapter? More specifically, the millennial views are related to the nature of humanity on the present Earth and the chronology of events that are related to it. So let's start with premillennialism. Premillennialists use a literal hermeneutic to interpret Revelation as a prophetic description. These are real things, they're going to happen. The cataclysmic events preceding Revelation 20, they're real. Jesus physically returns. Satan is bound for a thousand years in the abyss. He is unable to deceive humanity during that time. The first resurrection of those that are martyred occurs at the beginning of this thousand years, and they reign with Christ during that thousand-year period. The reign is usually seen as a fulfillment of the prophecies of the Old Testament concerning Israel, and that Jesus is actually reigning on David's throne in Jerusalem from a restored Israel. Satan is released at the end of that 1,000 years. For a short time, he foments a rebellion against God. It is utterly crushed. Satan is then thrown into the lake of fire along with the beast and the false prophet. The second resurrection follows this. which then they are judged at the great white throne. And according to their deeds, what they've actually done. And then they were thrown in the lake of fire. And that is the second to death chapter 21 and 22 is eternity beginning of attorney, new heavens, new earth. What's eternity like? Now, the essentials of being a premillennialist are simply this, a belief that Jesus will return and reign for a thousand years. But there's a lot of variations even with premillennialists, because not everybody follows a literal hermeneutic in all the scripture passages. An example of this is a non-dispensational premillennialist, David Nevin's Lord in the mid-1800s. And he had quite a following for a while. He believed that a historical explanation of Revelation was preferable to a futurist view. So he liked the end, but he didn't like the middle, and so he'd go out and work on the middle. In the mid-1900s, George Ladd restated the same view. It was actually an old view, but people were surprised by it, but the same idea. He's still considered premillennial because he believes Jesus will return and reign for a thousand years, but the rest of the book, it could be allegorical. So there's a lot of mixing, you have to be very careful. Now amillennialism has many variations, but the essential element of amillennialism, ah is a negation of the next word, it means no millennium. So that's pretty simple, right? Amillennial means no millennium. It uses allegorical interpretation, and as I mentioned before, this view became dominant with Augustine in the early 5th century, because it matched what was going on in the sociopolitical realm. In the medieval period, it became the official doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church. Now, the scholastic view was not dead, but it was certainly suppressed, because now it would be seen as heresy if you're within the Western world. The Reformation brought about a renewed interest in millennialism, but there was rebellion in the city of Munster in 1534 that was tied to millennialism, and the result was, at least it was a factor for Luther and Calvin to be very suspicious of any millennialism, and so they held onto a amillennial approach. But the Reformation brought something that was going to undercut this. The Reformation emphasized a literal interpretation of scripture. And so that brought a revival of premillennialism in the 17th century and then postmillennialism in the 18th century. Now what is postmillennialism? Now this holds that Christian preaching and teaching will reach fruition in the future and bring about a millennium in which evil is reduced to a minimum. and the Christian moral spiritual influence will so dominate that the church will be central in solving economic, social, and educational problems in society. So it's the ascendancy of the church. Now the millennium is then viewed as symbolic, not necessarily 1,000 years, but it's followed by the second advent of Christ, the resurrection of the dead, and the last judgment. Post-millennium would wax and wane, over the centuries, depending on the political century. It gained strength in the 18th century, it declined in the 19th century, it rose again in the late 19th century, early 20th century, but two world wars, the Cold War pretty much decimated it, until the Soviet Union collapsed, and then we see a rise in it again. It actually is currently a very popular view among those who are politically active Christians, as they use it as a support for their fight against government oppression. So again, it's a view that's tied very much into the current circumstances. Okay, I know that's a lot. I know that may have been somewhat confusing. Hopefully it was a little bit clarification because you hear these terms and you're like, what are they talking about? If you've never heard them, you don't know what they're talking about. So at least you have a handle on it. Now, there are a lot of different outlines that have been developed for revelation. Some are simple, some are very complex, some are just plain confusing, and then some are very memorable because they like alliteration. Everything starts with a particular letter. That's a memory device, and that's why they will do that. Now, a good outline will help you remember the flow of the book, and sometimes that may or may not follow the actual structure of the book. I gave you a simple outline last week that just marks off the major events occurring in Revelation. The actual structure of Revelation, though, follows the stated purpose in verse one. This was to reveal to God's slaves the things which must soon take place. That's its purpose. And then a literary structure comes in verse 19, because John is told specifically, quote, therefore write the things which you have seen, the things which are, and the things which will take place after these things. So he gives a chronology. Write it according to this chronology. What was, what is, what is to come. Now I printed a modified Actually, it's not modified. I just put Dr. Thomas' complete version in as a handout for you. You can see it's very extensive. That's just for your records. I don't expect you to memorize it. This isn't a class. Aren't you glad? But it can be helpful as you go through it, at least to see where these things fall. A simplified version of this MacArthur put together based on the same thing is this. Number one, the things which you have seen. That's what John was told to do. And this would be the prologue, John's commission to write it, that's chapter one. The second one, the things that are. So that would be the letters to the seven churches in chapters two and three. And then the rest of the book is the things which are going to take place. And so that would cover the scene in heaven in chapters four and five. It would cover the tribulation period, which goes all the way through chapter 18. It would cover Christ's return in chapter 19. It would cover the millennium and the great white throne judgment in chapter 20, as well as the eternal state in chapter 20 and 22. That's what's to come. And we'll be going over all that in detail as we progress through the book throughout this year. So we'll go slow enough, not to overwhelm you, but fast enough that it doesn't become an academic exercise either, because that's not helpful. Our desire is to know what he has said, this message of revelation, that we might live according to it and be blessed by it, taking the warning to heart. Now, I do want to point out in advance that the structure is a little more complex, actually, than even Dr. Thomas's outline, because there are some things that pop up into it that don't necessarily flow chronologically. For example, there's a parenthetical section in Chapter 12 to give a background information about what is about to happen. In chapter 12, there's a symbolic history of Satan's efforts to destroy God's plan of salvation in trying to prevent the coming of Messiah or destroy him early on, and God's actions to protect Messiah. That's a background. Another one is there's a sequence of judgments. We usually refer to these as seven each. There's seven seal judgments. There's seven trumpet judgments. There are seven bowl judgments. But there's not 21 judgments because the seventh seal, its judgment are all of the trumpet judgments. The seventh trumpet, its judgment are all the bowl judgments. That's a little more complex, okay? Well, if that seems confusing, don't worry. We will get to it when we get to it, and it'll be a little more clear then, okay? But it can be a little complex here. That's just so you're aware of it. There's also the use of a lot of symbolism throughout Revelation. Chapter 12 has quite a bit of it. But there's a huge difference between symbolism and allegory. They're not the same. Symbolism has established meaning. Allegory is only limited by the imagination of the interpreter. That's hugely different. So if we're looking at something symbolic, we can find out the meaning of it. In fact, most of the time, it states what it is. For example, there's a great red dragon in chapter 12, and then the text states, it is Satan of old. So we know exactly what the symbol is representing. And so I'll be pointing those out as we go through the text. But I just want you to be aware that close attention has to be paid to the text in order to understand it properly. Now, in preparation for next week, I want to take a very quick look at John's salutation in verses four. Well, I was going to get through eight. We're not going to get that far. Just verse four, beginning of verse five. But I want to read through verse eight. This is his salutation. Now, a salutation is an opening statement of greeting. It usually identifies who is writing. It identifies who he is writing to. And usually there's an expression of goodwill. Now in doing this, John is going to emphasize the truth of the preface of verses one through three. Look there with me as we follow along. Verse four, John to the seven churches that are in Asia, grace to you in 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, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. to Him who loves us and released us from our sins by His blood. And He has made us to be a kingdom, a priest to His God and Father. To Him be the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Behold, he is coming with the clouds. Every eye will see him, even those who pierced him. And all the tribes of the earth will mourn over him, so it is to be. Amen. I'm the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty." Now, John identifies himself. He is the one writing the letter, and he is specifically writing it to the seven churches in Asia. That's not China. This is referring to the province of Asia, the Roman province, which we would now know as Western Turkey. And we'll put some maps up here as we go on, exactly where these particular cities are located, all in Western Turkey. And we'll identify those as we get to chapters 2 and 3. Now we know from verse 1 that the message being revealed in this letter is meant for his slaves, which we identified earlier. That's all true Christians. Those have been bought with the blood of Christ and therefore belong to God. So it's for all Christians. That's the message intended recipient. So John is sending a copy of this letter, this revelation he's been receiving, to each of these seven churches, and from each of those seven churches, that is going to be copied and disseminated throughout the world until all Christians have access to it. That would be the methodology here. So specifically to these churches, and in fact there is a particular message to each of those churches, but the whole message is for all of God's slaves, all Christians. Now the greeting itself is a very common greeting among Christians. In fact, 13 of the New Testament epistles contain the same exact greeting, or a slight variation of it. And this is more than just a deep wish expressing, well, for good. It specifically is a wish for grace. Grace is God's unmerited favor, The desire here, the wish is that that would be upon them along with experiencing God's peace that comes from that grace. It is by God's grace that we are saved through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, correct? That is what gives us a correct standing with God. God's grace gives us that. So it's a, first is a wish for having this correct standing with God. His grace would be upon you, you belong to him. And because the Christian is justified by faith, we can have peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul states that directly in Romans 5.1. This peace is an experiential tranquility that passes all understanding in all circumstances. Why? Because we have peace with God, because he loves us, because he's omnipotent in everything, omniscient in everything, then we can follow through with Psalm 55, 22 expressed in the Old Testament, 1 Peter 5, 7 repeats in the New Testament. Cast all of your burdens upon him because he cares for you. That gives you tranquility. No matter what circumstances there are, whatever burdens you may have, I can cast them on the Lord. I know he hears, I know he cares. He proved it in Christ. God demonstrated his love for us, and that while we're yet sinners, Christ died for us. And that is a comfort to us, and that gives me peace. And so that is what the wish is here, that you would be under God's grace, and that you'd be able to experience that peace. Now, John then marks out a threefold source for this greeting. One, from him who is, and who was, and who is to come. Second, from the seven spirits who are before his throne. And third, from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the king of kings. Now at first glance, it might be thought that the first source here is Jesus. He, the one who is, and was, and is to come. the grammatical construction of this phrase shows it's actually an undeclinable proper name instead of description. This is the title of somebody. It's the name of somebody. Well, who? Well, again, at first glance, most people are going to think of Jesus because he has these attributes, especially the last one, because he's promised to return, right? But Jesus is mentioned specifically as the third source of the greeting. So it's not Jesus. Who then? It's a title for God the Father. The expression here magnifies the unique eternal nature of God because he exists throughout time and outside the boundaries of time. He was present before time exists. He'll be present after time ends. And we go, what? There was something before time? There'll be something after time? The answer is yes. Do we know what that is? No, we're creatures of time. We're in the box. but God's not in the box with us. Now, the present and past expressions of existence are as we'd expect, but then it's followed by a future, and we would expect that to be, if we were keeping in line with who was, who is, it would be who will be, right? But it doesn't say that. It says who is to come. That expressed the future. That places an emphasis on the imminent implementation of the prophecies being revealed. God is the judge who is coming, and his wrath is going to be poured out at any time. That's why it states it slightly differently there. There's an emphasis. Now, the second source to greeting is the one that becomes confusing to people, the seven spirits who are before his throne. What seven spirits, right? Now, that's problematic simply because it's an unusual title, but it occurs three more times in Revelation. The seven spirits are mentioned in chapter 3, verse 1, chapter 4, verse 5, and chapter 5, verse 6. So obviously, John has something particular in mind here, right? Well, those references help us. Now, some have thought, well, angels, right? Maybe it's angels. But throughout Revelation, angels are distinctly called angels. They are seen in distinct angelic form. In addition, the greater problem here is this would be placing angels in an equality with the Father and the Son, and angels aren't equal. That doesn't really fit. That'd be an improper equating. This is a reference to the Holy Spirit. Well, then why is it seven spirits and not just one? The Holy Spirit is usually referred to as a singular, right? Well, first, the other reference to seven spirits in Revelation tie them to God and Christ. Second, John uses symbolism from Zachariah, and he does it throughout the book. The seven lamps in Zechariah 4, 1 through 10 are tied directly to the prominence of the Spirit's activity in the world in Zechariah 4, 5 when it says, not by might or by power, but by my Spirit, says Yahweh of hosts. The seven spirits are referring to the Spirit. Revelation 4-5 states directly the seven lamps are the seven spirits of God, which ties those two together. And another ties between Zechariah 4-10 and Revelation 5-6 in which the seven eyes of the Lord are stated to be the seven spirits of God. You got it clear now? Of course not. You're like, seven what? Eyes? Lamps? Okay, the simplified version is this. The seven is used for different things, lamps and eyes, and they're all tied to the spirit, which are tied to the Holy Spirit directly. Where do we get all that? Zechariah chapter four. That is why we studied Zechariah. How are you gonna understand what it says in Revelation if you don't understand what was meant in Zechariah? You're not. Now you can see why people go allegorical. I don't know what it means. I'll make up something. But it actually is not as difficult as it may seem if you know the word of God well. John, referring back to Zachariah, explains himself. This is a reference to the Holy Spirit. We'll wind to number seven. Seven symbolically is consistently a reference to perfection or completion. And we'll see that over and over again. Seven's used a lot in Revelation. But there's a reason for it. It's a number of perfection. It's complete. And the Holy Spirit certainly is perfect and complete. Now, the third source of the greeting is stated directly to be Jesus Christ. Now, though Jesus is usually named second in any formulation of the triune Godhead, here he's named third. The reason for that is it allows John to then expand and elaborate on who he is and what he has done and his character, his nature. If he did it second and then the Holy Spirit third and then they had to come back to it, it's a little awkward. So he mentions Jesus third and then runs with it. He also uses here the fuller designation, Jesus Christ. He will only do that one more time, chapter 22, verse 21, because that emphasizes the full glorified humanity of him. Throughout the rest of the book, it's gonna be either Jesus, most often, and sometimes Christ. But here, Jesus Christ. Full humanity, glorified God. He then elaborates the identity of Jesus with three descriptive titles. One is the faithful witness, two is the firstborn of the dead, and third is the ruler of the kings of the earth. And we're gonna get into all of that, but in the interest of time, that will be next week. Each reference here is significant about Christ, and that leads directly into doxology at the end of verse five and into verse six. If you're not careful, you might wonder what that is. It's a doxology. It's a glorification of God because of what has just been stated. We're gonna give praise to God here. Now, I recognize the introductory material for a book can seem overly academic, and certainly the first part of this sermon probably was. But it is crucial to both understanding the book and its authority in our lives. Without that, you're not sure, does it have authority? Revelation is a message from God, the Father, given to Jesus, the Son, and then through an angel to John, who wrote it all down for us, who are slaves of God. That's crucial for us. That's the authority. It's God. The blessing promised in reading and heeding the book can only come if you believe that the message is from God. Because if you don't believe that, you're not going to take the message seriously. You're not gonna have a serious response to it, and you need to. This is what God has revealed to us. If you believe that it's just work of humans, religious musings of man, it might be interesting, but it has no authority. And so there'll be no blessings that'll come from it because you won't be serious about what it says. The same is true that if you believe the message is so unclear as to be beyond reasonable comprehension, you're not gonna pay attention to it. And a lot of people will skip Revelation. They might read many sections of the Bible, but they get to Revelation, they start getting into all these terrible things that are happening, like, forget it. I'm not going there. Or they'll just jump to the end of the book, chapter 22, or 21 and 22. Oh, okay, at least we went, and I don't want to know about this other stuff. But if I know it's a message from God, then I need to pay attention to it. It's important. The tragedy of the methods of interpretation rely on allegory and mysticism and spiritualizing it is it removes meaning. It just creates confusion. I can't know what it means. And I can't figure out how this interpreter got there because nothing seems to lead that. It's just his own musings. The grammatical historical method of interpretation lets the text speak for itself because it has this presumption. God is capable of communicating to you in an understandable way. Imagine God being able to do that. Of course he can do that. But that's what we presume God is doing that here and the message is understandable even if it's gonna take some work to figure it out. And he wrote it specifically for us who are his slaves. And so I have a quest to understand it because I belong to him. The literal interpretation also allows us then to receive the grace and peace from God. And that is my wish for you. May God's grace and peace be upon you as you draw closer to him and understanding all of his messages for you. Father, thank you for the truth of this word, and as we start getting into it in the weeks to come, Father, that though there will be things that will be disturbing as we see that your wrath will be poured out on a wicked earth, we also are comforted that we know where we stand with you. and your love for us is unchanging in every circumstance. Father, our desire is to live for you, to glorify you in the present and in the future. Continue to give a greater understanding of you, who you are, and all that you've done, and to hold tightly to you and the promise you've made as we face the future. In Jesus' name, amen.