Most of what you find there on the lesson guide is dealing with the way of Revelation, and really the way that you can approach the book. But before we do this, before we go through that, I just want to spend a little time reviewing where we've been. So, just to take a look of this introduction review. So, first thing that we looked at was the Who of Revelation. It was written by the Apostle John, written to We just say all the churches, really, the seven churches in Asia, but also all of the servants of God. So really the whole church, but also written for God himself. And of course, we remember that chain of transmission that God gave this message to Jesus, who then gave it to his angel, who then gave it to John, who then wrote it down for us. And the reason why we see that there in verse one, of Revelation 1.1, the revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto him to show unto his servants things that must shortly come to pass and he sent and signified it by his angel and sent unto his servant John. We recognize that there's something that we can learn about this book even in that first verse and you can actually go back to that lesson guide to uncover some of those things that we've already gleaned. So that's the who of Revelation, the where of Revelation. It was written by John from Where? The island of Patmos, which again is off the coast of modern-day Turkey, and it was written to the seven churches of Asia, which is also modern-day Turkey. Now, when we come to the when of Revelation, when it was written, there are several different alternatives, alternative views. There's an early date and a later date. The early date dealt with the reign of Nero, And if anybody remembers what that year was, AD 65, and then the later date was AD 96, and that was during the reign of Emperor Domitian. And the reason why they think that it might have been either of those two men is because of the kind of persecution that the churches faced during those time periods. Nero's persecution was more localized to Rome, whereas Domitian's was probably not as widespread as some later emperors. And that's why there are others who think it might have been written even later than this. But this is sort of the prominent view. But there was some spattering of persecution among the churches there in Asia. And you'll see that as we go through chapters two and three. If you go to verse 3 of chapter 1, we saw that there is a threefold purpose, or the why of Revelation, and those three purposes are, does anybody remember? Nancy? That's right, to read, to hear, to keep. And of course, there's a blessing that is attached to that. Not only do we find that blessing here at the first chapter, but also at the very end of this book. Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein, for the time is at hand. So to keep the words of this prophecy, what is something that you should be on the lookout for as you go through the book of Revelation? The commands, right. And it doesn't necessarily mean commands directed to us, but commands directed even to John, to the churches, general commands that you find in there, because as we are entering into this story, many of those commands can be applied to us, even though they may not have been initially and directly sent to us or given to us. So that's the why, threefold purpose. Keep that in mind as we go through it. Now last week we focused on the what of Revelation, that is what kind of book Revelation is, and there's three ways that it describes itself and presents itself. Again, verse one, the very first word in this book in the Greek is the title that we give it, Revelation. The Greek word is apocalypse, which really shows to us that in a special way, this book is meant not to conceal reality, but rather to unveil reality that was previously unknown. So this is an apocalypse. This is a revealing and unveiling and uncovering of things that God wanted us to know about as his church, as his people. Of course, this then became used to describe other books that were written in the same time period, from 250 BC to AD 100, in both Christian circles and in Jewish circles. But I think what we learn from this is that God wants to use that style of writing that was prominent then, we also have some Old Testament examples of that, but God wanted to use that style to transport his people into really another universe, another world that connects hidden, spiritual, heavenly realities with visible, physical, earthly reality. Again, so often we live with blinders on in our lives that are so focused on the visible, physical, earthly realities that we forget that there's that spiritual dimension, that heavenly dimension. And that is what this apocalyptic book is to give to us and to bring us into that type of universe. We also saw in verse three that this book also presents itself as a prophecy, not just as an apocalypse, but a prophecy in which John, as a prophet, both foretells doctrinal truth. There's a lot we can learn about God, about Jesus, about ourselves, about the world, about God's word. He foretells, but he also foretells. That's the predictive nature of prophecy. And so we see that both of these are prevalent in this book. I like the quote that Grant Osborne gave us, and this was on last week's lesson guide. Revelation can be considered a theological workbook addressing the church in the present through the prophecies of the future. And that can apply to every church at any age in every generation. This book was meant to apply to them. So when we think about the Christians that lived a thousand years ago, you know, even though much of what we find in Revelation has still yet to take place in our age, it was still practically relevant for them in their age. And it's still practically relevant for us in our age, even if it takes another thousand years for all that is recorded for us in this book to transpire. So this is relevant for every Christian in every age, even though it is that kind of a prophecy. And then if you look at verse four, Just the way that this book is introduced, where it says, John, to the seven churches which are in Asia, grace be unto you and peace, we recognize that not only is this an apocalypse or a prophecy, it's also an epistle. It's a letter, not unlike the letters that we find in the rest of the New Testament. It begins and ends like an epistle, like Paul and Peter and James would have written and have written. And so this is also for our exhortation and edification. No matter when we live, no matter where we live, we can learn and glean from this book. So the reason why we're going through this introduction is to really set the stage for us to realize that there's more to this book than just predictive prophecy, which is, again, is what a lot of times people focus on. We need to focus on really the practical relevance of this book in light of even predictive prophecy. So this all leads up to the last W of our introduction, and of course it has to be a W, and that is the way of revelation, or the way to approach revelation when we hear it, or when we read it, when we hear it, and when we apply it. And one of the ways to approach Revelation is to look at the various systems that have already been current in the church to come to the book of Revelation and interpret and understand what God is trying to teach us. So in the history of the church, Christians have had some major questions about the book of Revelation. And I think we had those same questions when we read it together a few, well, I guess a month or so back now. Questions especially like what to do with all the signs and symbols of the book. I mean, there's a lot of things in there that are hard for us to fully grasp and understand just by reading it and not really delving into some of what those signs and symbols mean. Well, every Christian, since the writing of this book, has had similar questions. So we are not alone in that. We're not gonna be unique in our difficulty sometimes in understanding these things. So as we recognize that, it ought to encourage us. You know, we need the Holy Spirit to reveal these truths, right? Just like he has been promised to reveal and guide us to these truths. So some of the questions are, do these signs and symbols have more specific meaning or more general meaning? And we're going to see that over the course of history, church history, there are some who have said, well, it's just more general in nature to understand these signs and symbols. And some are very, very specific in understanding these signs and symbols. Some are more in between. The most challenging symbols over the course of church history in the book of Revelation have to do with a beast, chapter 13. Who is this beast? Who is this anti-Christ figure? And of course, we do not have the word anti-Christ in the book of Revelation, but John does use that term in his first letter, the first epistle of John. And so there are some things that we can look at to try to equate the beast of the sea with the Antichrist, with Paul's man of sin, perhaps also with the one that was described in Daniel, of the prince that should come. And so again, trying to look at these different things, what is and who is this beast? Who does he represent? Another challenging symbol, and we've already looked at this at the beginning of our study through eschatology, is the millennium. That thousand year period of time that is mentioned some six times in Revelation 20. And obviously we've already seen how different approaches come to that understanding of that number, that amount of time. Is it more symbolic? Is it more general? Or is it more literal, more specific? So those are just two of the challenging symbols and questions that the church has had over the history of the interpretation of this book. So to deal with those questions, over time there developed four main approaches to the book of Revelation. Now, something to keep in mind as we look at these approaches, and we're not going to really delve into each one of them that much. We're going to kind of just gloss over some of the highlights, because there's some things that we can learn from each of them, but each one of these approaches has been held by Bible-believing Christians. We need to remember that. Bible-believing Christians that come to the book of Revelation, and they really want to know what God is saying in this book. And so even though we may not agree with necessarily one particular approach or another particular approach, we can understand where some of them are coming from with these approaches and really try to glean the best of these approaches for our own approach to the Book of Revelation. Now, in some ways, these approaches are similar to the different approaches to eschatology as a whole. And if you remember, the main approaches to eschatology to the end times, they all deal with that one question of the millennium. Is it general, specific, or somewhere in between? So, if you remember in Revelation 20, there are those who believe in amillennialism, which basically means that they're not looking forward to a future reign of Christ, but rather that that reign of Christ is taking place now in the church age, and that when Jesus Christ rose from the dead, that established his reign, which of course we know it did, but that's the only reign that they're looking for. And so they would look at Revelation 20 in just very broad symbolic terms. A thousand years obviously has extended now for 2,000 years, so it's not literal in its place. And of course, there's that interpretation. There's the post-millennialism, which basically means that We're still living in the church age. It's going to continue on. But eventually, the gospel is going to proceed with such great success that the kingdom of Christ will be established here in this world because of just the influence of the gospel on people's lives. And then will come the return of Jesus Christ. And there's a lot of people, a lot of Bible-believing Christians that hold to that view as well. The view that we're most familiar with is premillennialism. There is the dispensational variety in which they believe that before much of what takes place in the book of Revelation happens, that the church is actually raptured and held up in heaven for seven years before the coming of Christ. And then there's the historic premillennialism, which believes that the church is here in this world through all of Revelation until Jesus returns to rapture his saints that are living, to resurrect the saints that are dead, returns with them in victory, and establishes his kingdom for a thousand years. So we have, again, these different approaches, and there's overlap. There's overlap between how you approach eschatology and how you approach Revelation. But that's not a hard and fast rule. I found it interesting in my own study that there are people that hold to, for example, amillennialism, that hold to a futurist approach to the book of Revelation, or vice versa. So there are all kinds of varieties in this. So it's not a hard and fast rule, though there are some general things that we can look at. Now, the four main ways that Christians have approached revelation have been classified in these ways. The spiritual approach, which we will look at first, the historic approach, something called the preterist approach, and then the future or the futurist approach. So the first approach that we're going to consider is this spiritual approach. This is also called the idealist approach. It has also been described as the allegorical approach. And that's especially when you talk about earlier Bible teachers of the book of Revelation, like Clement of Alexandria, who lived from 150 to 215. So, I mean, this is early in the church. As well as a man named Origen, who is well known for allegorizing and spiritualizing a lot of what we find in the Bible. He lived from 185 to 253. So we can already see that this approach, the spiritual idealist or allegorical approach, the foundation for it is pretty early in Christian history. So we understand that many of these have been going on throughout church history even today. Now, this spiritual approach teaches that the book of Revelation primarily deals with timeless spiritual truths instead of events in history. timeless spiritual truths instead of events in history. Now, I think when you first come to the book, it looks like there's a lot of events in history that are taking place. But they struggled with seeing some of these things come to pass, and they struggled with the signs and the symbols about those events. And so they said, well, maybe he's talking about all of the events that are taking place in a spiritual way. So it becomes a book that reveals spiritual reality to the church in every generation. So what is something that we recognize in even our time? Well, there is a battle between good and evil. There's a battle between God and the devil. There's a battle between the church and the world, isn't there? So this is something that has happened to the church of God, to the people of God since the very beginning. And so they would look at this book and say, it's just describing what is taking place in every church in every generation until the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. So Revelation uses signs and symbols to describe the cosmic battle between God and Satan. And of course, there's a special focus at the end of this book on God's victory through Jesus Christ. So again, there's not a level playing field. We don't live in a dualistic world in which good and evil are on equal terms. Even though this battle may seem like it sometimes, and sometimes even from our perspective, it seems like the evil is actually doing better than the good sometimes, yet we know that ultimately there's victory in Christ. And that victory took place on the cross, and it's just now being played out in time. So again, they're not equal playing field, but it does describe this cosmic battle. So a key to understanding this approach is this. There is no historical fulfillment of the symbols of revelation. Again, timeless spiritual truths instead of events in history. And so there's no historical fulfillment of the symbols of Revelation unless you get to chapters 21 and 22. They might say that much of that does describe some things that are happening literally with a new heavens, new earth. But even some of them would say that that is more symbolic of what will take place when Jesus does return to set up his rule here. This approach was popular again not just in the early church but even in the Egyptian church back in that day. Alexandria in Egypt was very prominent for spiritualizing things that we find in scripture and this approach influenced a man by Augustine, who again, we have a lot of his writings. He was a faithful expositor of the Word of God. He lived from 353 to 430, but he held to this spiritual view of revelation, and he actually describes it in terms of the city of God versus the city of Satan, which of course, the city of God is going to reign supreme. So if you've ever seen his books or you've ever heard about the two cities, that's where Augustine is approaching that from, even in the Book of Revelation. This approach is still a popular approach today. There are many Bible-believing Christians who approach the Book of Revelation in this spiritual, idealistic form, especially among those who are amillennials. And as I mentioned, there are some characteristics that would lead an Amillennial to be very pro-spiritual interpretation of Revelation, because they see a thousand-year reign of Christ going on right now, not necessarily in a literal fashion, but more in that spiritual fashion. There's a man that we've actually enjoyed some of his teaching here at Grace Baptist Church, Dr. Robert Godfrey. who works with Ligonier Ministries. He has an entire series on Revelation and he looks at it using this approach. And so again, he's a great Bible teacher. He's a great church historian. But he approaches revelation in this way. And I'm sure that that series is a great series. In fact, I purchased it. I have it online. And someday I'm actually going to watch it. Or as we go through this, I'm going to watch it to see how he interprets some of these passages. But again, Bible-believing Christians can approach it in this way. And truly, there are some things to commend to this theory. So that is one of the key to understanding the approach. There is, however, a weakness to that approach. Just like all of the approaches, really, there's a weakness to this approach, and that is that the book itself presents itself not only symbolically. As we already saw in verses one and three, it actually presents itself in terms of actual times and in actual events. Again, if you look at verse one, says the revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto him to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass. So it's presenting itself right up front dealing with events. If you look at verse three again, blessed is he that readeth and they that hear the words of this prophecy and keep those things which are written therein for the time is at hand. So if you just look at this from a spiritual standpoint, this couldn't just describe things that are taking place after the resurrection of Christ into the future. This can describe everything from the birth of Christ back to the beginning when Adam and Eve fell in the garden. And so it does present itself with times and events, and that is something that they have to deal with. That is a struggle there. Any questions on the spiritual approach to Revelation before we move on? All right, well the next one is called the historic approach. It is also called the historicist approach. Just put historic, historic approach. This is a little different in that it teaches that revelation is a forecast, okay? So far it's something that we kind of understand, a forecast, but it's a forecast not of just the future at the end times, but rather a forecast of the entire panorama of church history from the ascension of Jesus, or really from the resurrection of Jesus, to his return in glory. So the interesting thing about the historic approach is that the person who approaches Revelation this way actually looks for parallels between the events in Revelation with events in church history that have already taken place. And then, of course, there's more to come, but they actually look at events in church history and try to parallel them, try to match them up with what we read about when we look at the seals or the trumpets or the bowls, the various things that you see take place. For example, some earlier interpreters of Revelation, as they were reading through, they came across that period of time that is mentioned several times in the book of Revelation in different ways, the 1,260 days. It's also referred to as the 42 months. It's also referred to as the time, times and a half from the book of Daniel. Well, they saw that. And they also remembered, well, there are times in Daniel where a day might represent a year. And so they looked at that and they said, OK, so we're going to look at the 1260 days, interpret them as years. And this is found in chapters 11 and 12. And around that time period, they started looking to see, you know, for the coming of Christ. So this view was popularized around the Middle Ages, around 1260, okay? So this is hundreds of years ago, imagine that. So this was popular during the Middle Ages when it seemed like those years were about to run out. But it also stayed popular. It stayed popular also during the time of the Reformation period. So if you think about John Calvin, you think about Martin Luther, you think about John Knox, some of the great reformers of this time, they were historicists in their approach to the book of Revelation. And so they would look through history and try to match up the things that are mentioned in Revelation with things that actually took place up until their time. The Reformation period, many of the reformers considered the Pope to be the beast of chapter 13. And then the Roman Catholic Church, led by the Pope, was the false prophet. And so obviously they didn't necessarily hold to some of the same details, you know, the one day equals one year type of approach. But they did believe that they were getting really close to the end times. Because, I mean, what else can it mean? We have a lot of description of Rome taking place here. And so it has to be dealing with a pope and the church as the false prophet. Actually, this approach lasted even longer than the Reformation period into the time of the English Puritans, and even some beyond. Sometimes I mention that I appreciate John Gill, as a great Bible commentator, he's actually the first, really the only person who has ever written a comment on every single verse in the entire Bible. A lot of people, well, it had to have been Matthew Henry. Actually, Matthew Henry did not write a comment on every verse in the Bible. Somebody had to come and actually finish some of that because he died before his work was finished, but John Gill completed it. He was a Baptist that lived in London, kind of a personal hero of mine, if you will, but he lived in the 1700s. He also was a historicist. So he kind of was looking at history and said, oh, you know, the locusts that come out in chapter nine, well, that describes what took place when the Muslim hordes were starting to sweep into Europe. And so they would look at certain historical events, match them up with these things, and would go from there. So really, the key to understanding this approach is that the symbols of Revelation describe the history, historic approach, the history of the church from beginning to end. So there's really no gap going on in the book of Revelation. As you can imagine, this is not a popular approach today. Though, there are some elements that are found in other approaches. For example, older dispensational. The older dispensational approach actually looks at the seven churches in chapters two and three, and they consider that each one of those churches represents a period in the church age. So you've got the Ephesian church at the beginning, and then you have the Laodicean church at the end, and they would say that we're living in the Laodicean age. But the interesting thing about that is just about everyone who holds to this view thought that they were living in the late Elysian age. So the people that thought about the 1260 years, they thought that's the late Elysian age and the end is about to come. The reformers thought this is the late Elysian age because everybody thinks that their age is the age in which the church is lukewarm. Either hot or cold, God's gonna spew this out of their mouth. So that's one of the interesting things about that, and it leads to the weakness of that approach, which is this. Much of the identification between symbols and events or people is so subjective. It really is subjective, especially if you think about the Laodicean age. Have you ever heard that? Oh, we're living in the Laodicean age. Every Christian in every church in every age would probably say we're living in the Laodicean age. because they look at it from that perspective. Because we're longing for Christ. We're longing for something better. We want this to happen. So there's this imminency to the book of Revelation that takes place for Christians whenever they've lived. So every writer on Revelation considered their time to be the last time. I thought that was kind of interesting. Again, there are some who hold this today, but not very many. Any questions about the historic approach? The next approach, though, is another popular one today, and that is the Preterist approach. I had to look up what Preterist meant. It simply comes from a Latin word that means past. And that makes sense, based on their approach. The Preterist approach teaches that Revelation primarily deals with issues and events that were known to and experienced by the original audience in the past even though the general truths are still applicable to every generation of Christians. So they look at the book of Revelation and say that most of it, if not all of it, has already taken place. So they are preterists. They think that it's already done and that the last 2,000 years is not found in the book of Revelation. So it's all dealing with the past. This one's a little more challenging, I think, for us to get our heads around, but there's a lot who do hold it even today. One writer, Bill Mounts, says this, the book must be interpreted in light of the immediate historical crisis in which the first century church found itself. Now obviously, that's true. That's the way we approach any Bible book. We want to transport ourselves as much as we can to the original audience to have a better understanding of how God was trying to teach them. But it's not necessarily all about them. It also applies to us. But that's not what they mean. They mean that literally the events, so they do believe they're literalists. They do believe that the events that are portrayed by signs and symbols actually happened, past tense, and you can look for them in what took place in the past. And one of the reasons why is because of the date of revelation that they hold to. Remember earlier I said, okay, we've got to keep these two dates in mind. There are some who believe in 65 as the early date when this book was written, some believe in 96. If you're a preterist, more than likely you hold to the earlier date because it's a prophecy. They knew that it was a prophecy, but they believed it was a prophecy about things that were going to take place in AD 70. That's not a hard and fast rule, but most preterists would believe that. So many of those who hold this preterist position also hold to that early date because they believe that what takes place is the destruction of Jerusalem, or just before or at the destruction of Jerusalem. Now, I'm not gonna come with all the details of this, but again, it's very interesting to look at some of the New Testament and Old Testament predictions of the destruction of Jerusalem And they would say, this is Jesus returning. But in power and in glory, he did come personally and powerfully and in glory to fulfill what he said he would do in Matthew 24, in which all of the stones on this mountain would be destroyed, not one sitting upon another. uh... so most predators would believe that everything in revelation most everything revelation took place in eighty seventy early enough to there are no some predators who like the later date because they know there's a weakness to that earlier date but they still see everything in revelation be fulfilled in our past and they look at it taking place uh... at the fall of Rome, which was in AD 476. So they give themselves a little more time for some of the things to happen in Revelation, but they still think that it's all been accomplished already, with the exception maybe of chapters 21 and 22, which is when the new heavens and the new earth. So here's a key to understanding this approach. And that is that there is, from our point of view, no prophetic prediction of the future return of Christ in Revelation. Now, that does kind of run countercultural to what we often think. But most, I would say, maybe not most, but a lot of post-millennialists hold to this view. And there's a lot of Presbyterians that are post-millennialists that would hold to this preterist kind of view. It doesn't mean they don't believe in a future return of Christ. They do. They're fundamentalists. They do believe that Jesus is going to return, but they believe that Jesus has already returned in glory when he exercised his judgment upon Jerusalem in order to set things in motion to establish his kingdom through his church, through the dissemination of the gospel throughout the world. Again, most orthodox or partial preterists, we would say, these are the Bible believers, they do believe that Jesus is going to establish the eternal state in chapters 21 and 22, but there are some preterists who are liberals, and they don't believe that there's really any future for God's people really in a kingdom or heaven. All right. So if you are a full preterist and believe that all of revelation is in the past and has nothing, nothing is yet for us, they would be considered unorthodox, probably liberal in their understanding of all scripture. But I know some brothers and sisters in Christ that are preterists. And it's hard to get my head around some of what they believe. They also, though, look at the Olivet Discourse that we looked at extensively in Matthew 24 and 25 in the same way. So again, no future return of Christ predicted in Revelation. Now, there is a big weakness in this approach, and they would agree to this weakness, and that is it takes so much of the book to apply to just one event. So when you come to the end of the seals and the end of, not just the end of the seals, but all of the seals and all of the trumpets and all of the bowls and all of the signs, all of those things deal with one event, the destruction of Jerusalem. Rather than what we see in a futurist point, and that's kind of where I'm coming from, my standpoint, is we see all of these things leading to a great event, but that's the great event of the return of Jesus Christ. And so again, they do this, whether it's the destruction of Jerusalem or Rome, but then they look at the symbols and the signs and they all kind of mean the same thing. There are certain dates or times that are mentioned in Revelation. You've got the 10 days, you got the three and a half years, you got all these things, and basically it flattens all of the symbols to kind of mean the same thing. And really, they start looking at it more in a spiritual way but has taken place in the past. It's really kind of an interesting approach that, again, I'm not that fully, I guess, I don't understand it as much as probably some who hold it. But again, this approach is popular today, especially among those post-millennialists. That includes another Bible teacher that I've played some of his things here. The late R.C. Spruill was a post-millennialist, and he was also a preterist when it comes to the book of Revelation. And of course, he's a Bible believer, but he looks at this in the early date. He sees some strength to that, and he believes that all of this took place in A.D. 70, showing that Jesus actually kept his word and his prophecies about the destruction of Jerusalem. And so that is someone that we would know and trust when it comes to much of his teaching. All right, well that leads us to the one that we're probably most familiar with, and that is the futurist approach. This teaches that the central message of Revelation is, here's the big word, eschatological, which means it just deals with the end times. So much of what John wrote deals with the future. This is what we are most familiar with, and this is the approach that was most popular in the early church. But that was interesting. It was held by men like Justin Martyr, who lived from 100 to 165. So he was an early Bible teacher. This is what he held. He would have probably known about or lived during the time of the Apostle John. Arrhenius, who knew Polycarp, who knew John, he also was a futurist. He lived from 13202. There was a Roman Bible teacher by the name of Hippolytus, who lived from 170 to 235. He also held this approach. And of course, here's the thing too, is these approaches kind of continued on, except for maybe the historicists. So it's not like the whole church is holding to the spiritual view, and then the historicist view, and then these are all different strains of views that have come up to us through church history and still exist. So it's not necessarily one general fast rule, though this seems to be the most dominant approach even today. One of the problems, though, and one of, I should say, the challenge of the futurist approach is really knowing where to draw the line from our perspective where the past ends and the future begins. And we're going to see that as we go through, and I'm going to give you my best understanding of where to draw that line. And it might be different than other futurists that you're familiar with, or even views that you might have been taught. But where to draw that line is kind of a key to the futurist approach. Overall, though, the key is to see Revelation, as one writer says, as a prophecy of future events, depicted in symbolic terms, which lead up to and accompany the end of the world. That is a futurist approach to revelation. I think that's how most of us approach it and read it. Probably the weakest, the biggest weakness of this approach, though, is that there's a temptation. And that temptation is to look at and interpret the signs and symbols of revelation in light of today. in light of today's geography, in light of today's technology. The Bible says that the whole world is going to see the two prophets die and come back to life and be resurrected or to be raptured to heaven. And they would say, well, see, that can happen because we have TV now, right? Well, John wasn't seeing television sets in his vision. He's just describing what was told to him in that vision and what he saw with his own eyes in a vision. So he probably wasn't seeing things that we're familiar with in this day and age, but he was just trying to have a hard time figuring it out. But that is a temptation to interpret it in light of today's news. Now, when it comes to these approaches to revelation, they've all, remember, been held at one time or another by faithful Bible-believing Christians. And the truth is, even though every approach has some weaknesses, there are also some strengths. There are things that we can commend, even these approaches. And that is why some have called for a fifth approach, and we're gonna end with this, which is called the eclectic approach. I'm going to tell you that I'm going to come as a futurist with a futurist approach, but with an eclectic methodology. In other words, there are strengths in each one of these views that a true futurist can hold to. And really, every one of them would hold to various ideas in each of these approaches. So this is one of those fun things that we come together and we, as iron sharpens iron, as iron impacts iron, we learn from each other best how to interpret revelation. Of course, one of the things we learned last week is Revelation is called a prophecy. And that's one of the reasons why we do look at it from a futurist standpoint, or I do. And of course, the key theme, the main theme, is right there in verse 7, where John says, Behold, he, the Lord Jesus, comes with the clouds. And every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him, and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. When we get to that verse, we'll actually look at all the parallels that we've already seen in our study of eschatology, and we see that those are still something that are yet in the future. That is the blessed hope and the glorious appearing that we're looking for, not the destruction of Jerusalem, but the coming of Jesus Christ. But this can also include the strengths of those approaches. For example, aren't there great spiritual truths that we can glean from Revelation, from the spiritual aspect, the spiritual approach? Isn't there a battle going on, a spiritual battle between good and evil, between God and Satan, between the church and the world, with Jesus being the victor of it all? Absolutely. So yes, we can draw those general truths, which we're going to try to do, even though the spiritual approach would say, well, that's all that it means. Also, we can appreciate the past focus of the predisposition because revelation was written to real historic churches using signs and symbols that would have meant something to them in the day and age in which they lived. In other words, we have to go back in order to move forward. We want to get ourselves as much understanding of what they would understand revelation to mean to understand it better for ourselves. And then the historic approach can also give us insight in the progress of the church all the way through the end. Again, I also mentioned that old dispensationalists held to a historic approach for the seven churches. And so they kind of appreciated that strength. Well, as we go forward, I'm going to show you my understanding that yes, there is some historic understanding of passages that we find in Revelation, not just the churches. But as we go forward, we'll look at that. And then you can make your determination as well. So the best way I think to approach Revelation is to really direct ourselves in that futurist way. It's a prophecy, but then to glean the best of these other things so that we can read it, hear it better, and ultimately keep what we are given. So next week we are going to look more at the structure of Revelation, and then start looking at verses 4 through 8, which is the greeting and doxology, and get right into the book. All right, hope that was helpful. Let's pray. Father, we thank you again for this day. Thank you that we can learn more about you, and I pray that as we get into Revelation, we will enter ourselves into this story so that we can learn more about it and then apply it to our lives and just really grow in your grace and knowledge. We pray, oh Lord, your blessing upon our service to follow, in Jesus' name, amen.