All right, well, let's pray and ask for the Lord's help, and then we'll talk a little bit more about how to study the Bible. Father, once again, we come to you. We thank you for your holy word, and we thank you, Father, that through your word, you reveal yourself to us. We pray that you would give us hearts to know you through your word. We pray that you would give us hunger for your word, and we commit this time to you in Jesus' name, amen. Alright, so as we are talking about how to study the Bible, last week we started talking about genres, and does anybody remember what I meant by the fancy French word, genre? Oh, I'm a dismal failure. What's that? Types of literature, right. So, what would be various, not necessarily biblical, but just different types of genre? Sci-fi, yeah, the worst, of course. What's that? Yeah, Westerns. Yeah, so you get the idea. So you have genres of movies and music and art and all kinds of stuff. When we get to the Bible, we also have different literary types. And so what would be some of our literary types that we have in the Bible? Poetry. Historical narrative. Law, which is a subset of historical narrative. Prophecy, which is a genre all its own, right? Epistles. If you want to sound really, really smart, you'll say epistolary literature, right? Yeah, throw a little extra syllable in literature and you sound Really smart. All right, anything else? There actually are more, right? Apocalyptic, right? Apocalyptic, which is not necessarily a subset of prophecy, but we'll treat it that way. Anything else? Wisdom. Wisdom and poetry, which maybe we'll get to today, yeah. Yeah, we said historical narrative. Maybe that's it. I think that's all. If we missed any, we'll pick it up later. So tell me just one or two or three things that you learned last week about reading historical narrative. Nathan. Okay, yeah, not necessarily chronological. Why? Because it is actually theological history. So there's a purpose in the way that the material is arranged, for sure. Anything else about historical narrative? Phil? What's that? Yeah, very, very rarely will you have a certain literary type in the Bible that just stays strictly in that range, right? So, you'll have other things mixed in with narrative. Rick? Right. This is not modern historiography. This is history driven by theology. So the perfect example really is the Gospels, which spend the vast majority of their time on the last week of Jesus' earthly ministry. Why? Well, because that is the main point of the life and ministry of Jesus, is what he does in the last week. Alright? Alright, let's see. One or two more things. Yeah, 60% is historical narrative, which is really, I mean, it's remarkable when you think about it. Michael. Okay, so yeah, so very, very rarely in historical narrative does the narrator, i.e. the writer, give us, let's say, moral judgments on the actions of the characters. So you can't just say, well, because it's in the Bible, it's exemplary for me. It serves as an example. That would be a huge mistake. You could justify basically anything if you took that approach. I mean, just imagine the things you could justify just by saying, well, David did it. Right? Or Samson did it. I mean, it just doesn't work that way, right? Okay, so very good. So, yeah, okay, one more. Anne? What's that? Okay, so we have to be careful how we define that, right? Because what we don't mean is that historical narrative, i.e. story, is myth. That's not what we mean. That's basically the position of liberals, is that history, biblical history, is really not history at all. It's myth. But what Anne is saying is that as we read the historical narrative, what we are doing is we're trying to understand the language, let's put it this way, at face value, right? Not in a wooden way, necessarily, but in a way that actually is consistent with that kind of literature, right? Okay. So we'll probably come back to this literal thing just because it's such a big boogeyman. And of course, Jason will probably do a special, because Jason's gonna be doing a series on basically redemptive history and how to see Christ in the Bible, right? And so Jason will give you all the details on literal. All right, so now we come to prophetic literature. And I'm going to tell you that prophetic literature is by far the most difficult of all of the genres in the Bible. It is by far the most difficult. And there are a number of reasons why that's true. To begin with, we oftentimes don't understand neither the form of prophetic literature, nor the function of prophetic literature. So we read, let's say Jeremiah or Ezekiel, kind of like we're reading the Psalms, and all of a sudden it doesn't quite warm our hearts in the same way, right? You know when you read about Ezekiel being told to lay down on one side and make a little model of Jerusalem and then to eat his food cooked over human dung and then he pleads with God for mercy and at least cow dung and you're kind of thinking for some reason this doesn't do the same thing to my heart as the Lord is my shepherd I shall not want. Right? You read the prophets, and it is difficult, right? So how many of you, when you try to read your Bible through in the course of the year, you get to, especially those later chapters in Jeremiah, and you're like, this is work, right? This is tough. or Ezekiel, okay? How many struggle with Ezekiel? You know, there are a few verses here, a few passages here and there where you go, man, I'm glad these are in Ezekiel because otherwise I wouldn't ever name my kid Zeke. All right, we're often also in the dark. This is another reason why prophetic literature is so hard, is because a lot of times we don't understand the historical background. So we have to remember that prophecy is not typically foretelling future events. That is part of it, but the primary issue is actually foretelling of the word of God to a specific situation. And so because we don't typically know those situations, it makes it a little more challenging as well. And then also we don't necessarily know what to do with the metaphors and then some of the apocalyptic imagery that's used. And just by way of reminder, you might know that in the past, when I've gone to Zambia, this is what I've taught is basically Introduction to the Prophets. And we redid that series here in the afternoons I don't know, a few years ago, and those are all on Sermon Audio. We go into great, much more detail than we will have opportunity to do today. So we come to the major prophetic books. So we actually have books that fit into, and we call them the prophets, alright? And so how do we generally divide the prophets in the Bible? Nick? Oh, are you raising your hand? Are you, oh, yeah, okay. I thought it was like, like, what's that? Major and minor. And of course we call the minor prophets the minor prophets because they're incredibly insignificant and unimportant, right? No, not at all. In fact, the only reason we call them the minor prophets is because we take the Latin word for minor that doesn't mean insignificant, it just means shorter. Okay? That's the only difference. You have the major prophets, and they're major because they're longer, and then you have the minor prophets, and they're minor because they're shorter. In Hebrew Bible though, the minor prophets are typically all subsumed under the book of the 12. Typically seen as one book, the book of the 12. So we have the major prophets, minor prophets. Do we have any prophetic literature in the New Testament? Yes, what would that be? Okay, yeah, so Matthew 24 is prophetic literature right in the midst of historical narrative. Do we have any other prophetic literature in the New Testament? Revelation. By the way, Revelation is actually three different types of literature all rolled up into one. It's epistolary literature. Think about this. These are actually letters that are sent to seven letters to seven churches, right? Revelation 2 and 3 is very epistolary. Then you have prophetic, the book of this prophecy, right? The words of this prophecy, and then you also have apocalyptic, so you have all three wrapped up. There's also prophetic aspects in 1 and 2 Thessalonians, for instance, alright? So, We're not going to be overly interested this morning in talking about the prophetic sections of the New Testament as much as we're going to talk about the Old Testament prophets. So how do we actually understand the prophets? Let me just tell you that Luther, when he was expounding and teaching on the prophets, has this really great statement about, they have such a weird, strange way of speaking. They're here one minute, and here the next. And Luther's complaint with the prophets was they seem to bounce all over the place. Anybody ever notice that when you're reading? You're thinking, okay, well, you've gone from this to this to this, and sometimes it just does not make sense. Well, in order to understand the prophets, I'm going to suggest that we have to understand a few basic things that kind of give us a framework as we come to prophetic literature that will help us actually have a better understanding. And the first is the connection to Moses and the covenant. Now this is something that we don't typically think about. And yet, what is the most common designation of the Old Testament? What is the most common designation of what we call, refer to, as the Old Testament? The law? and the prophets. In fact, the very expression, the law and the prophets, is a summation of the totality of the Old Testament itself. the law and the prophets, or Moses and the prophets. And so the prophets actually do not just like spring out of nothing and have their own unique particular ministry, rather all of the prophets, and I mean actually all of them, carried on their ministries within the Mosaic covenant. In fact, one of the ways to think about the prophets is that they were covenant enforcers, right? In other words, all of the prophets' ministries revolved around the idea of calling the people of God back to repentance and calling them back to covenant fidelity or covenant faithfulness. And in fact, what you see in the prophetic literature is this. The curses of the covenant form the foundation of the prophecies of judgment And the promises of the covenant form the foundation for the promises of salvation or restoration. So in other words, the prophets operate within the covenant curses and blessings that Moses gave. And so you can read these, by the way. In the series that we did, we went into great detail into how this works, all right? So understand this. When the prophet is proclaiming judgment and doom, he's proclaiming judgment and doom within the context of the curses of the covenant that would come upon a faithless, disobedient people. When the prophets are proclaiming words of salvation, of restoration, What they're doing is they're proclaiming God's promises based on the covenant blessings given to an obedient faithful people. So that's the basic structure or framework of the prophet's ministry. And of course, there are a number of passages that in a sense demonstrate this. We won't look at them for time's sake right now, but when does the prophetic activity actually really take off historically in the history of Israel? Hmm. after the divided kingdom. There's a reason for that. So, do you have prophets before the divided kingdom? And the answer is yes, but typically prophets before the divided kingdom were often called seers. They actually gave, you know, Gad for instance, or Nathan, they come to David and so forth. After the divided covenant though, all of a sudden you have the emergence of the ministry of the prophets. Primarily, or since leading the pack, was Elijah and Elisha. All right? All they're doing, actually, is calling Israel back to covenant fidelity to God. That's what they're doing. All of those, in other words, the entire stream of the prophets that begin, especially after the divided kingdom, are rooted back in the very ministry of Moses himself. Now, that's something that's important to keep in mind. Another thing that's important to keep in mind is to understand the historical background of the prophets. And so, I don't know if you can see this or not, but the prophetic literature is basically divided into three eras, alright? You have prophets before the exile, prophets during the exile, and prophets after the exile, alright? So those are the three major, so it's important to know what profit fits into what section. So what profits do you think are going to be heavy on the threats of judgment? before the exile. Why? Well because the exile is the ultimate covenant curse and judgment of God upon the people of Israel. And so the Northern Kingdom experiences exile in 722 BC with the Assyrians and then the Southern Kingdom experiences exile in 586 BC with the Babylonian captivity. And so one of the things, historical situations to keep in mind is, is this a prophet to the northern kingdom? Is it a prophet to the southern kingdom? Is it a prophet before the exile, during the exile, or after the exile? When do you think that most of the promises of restoration and salvation occur? during, right? Now you're going to have all of these mixed together, but as far as like predominant themes, your prophets after the exile, are they going to also, are they going to be heavy on judgment, or are they going to be heavy on salvation, restoration? Salvation, restoration. There's actually something woven into the very fabric of the way that the prophets work, so that these prophets, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, and notice Obadiah is down here, he prophesied to Edom, but it's still after the exile. These three prophets actually are all post-exilic prophets, so the people have returned to the land, And yet, in returning to the land, even though they experienced a measure of restoration, are they fully convinced that they are now back in the Davidic kingdom, living under the rule and reign of God, and the temple's been restored, and are they thrilled that the kingdom has actually come? No, they're actually disappointed. Why? Because the glory of the restoration that was promised seems to be rather disappointing. The second temple is much smaller than the first temple. The Davidic rulers, a guy named Zerubbabel, who's not even king, he's just a governor, right? And so there's this embedded disappointment in these post-exilic prophets who then are pointing to what? Who do you think are the most messianic? Your post-exilic prophets. are the most heavily messianic of the prophets. And you say, well what about Isaiah? Well absolutely, but Isaiah has a whole section that's devoted to promises of restoration and it's in that section that we have the promises of the suffering servant. So every prophetic book fits into a historical background. fits into one of the historical phases of Israel's history. Remember they're all related to Moses and then another thing that's important in understanding the prophets is actually knowing the forms of the oracles to some degree. So this is what prophetic literature basically is. It's a collection of oracles or instead of oracles what word could we use? No? Sermons. Sermons. What is Jeremiah? It's actually a collection of sermons. What is Isaiah? It's a collection of sermons. What is Malachi? It's a collection of sermons. These are all oracles. These are all the messages that they gave to the people of God. And so there are, you have to think of it this way though. These are collections of sermons that don't have sermon titles. nor main headings, all right? So they're not nearly as well outlined as Jason's sermons, but I would say far more inspired and inspiring, all right? Now, that would be, they're the prophets, come on. Okay? So there are, within any given prophetic literature, there are gonna be sub-genres within the prophets. And so guess what the primary genre within the prophetic literature is going to be? You can actually just see this by looking at virtually any page in your Bible in the prophets. Poetry. You know how you can tell, is most of the time in our English Bibles, poetic form is actually more indented, all right? Instead of prose, which would be more of a paragraph form, poetry is in an indented form. You look on all kinds of pages, this is true in all of the prophets, and you see a lot of poetry. You will see some prose, okay? So you read through Isaiah, Isaiah's predominantly poetry, then you get to 38, 39, and the passage regarding Hezekiah, and it switches to prose, and then 40 goes right back to poetry. Do the prophets ever use parables? Yes. Anybody remember a parable in the prophets? There's a famous one. Ricardo. Yes, the vineyard parable in the book of Isaiah chapter 5. And it's a total parable, all right? And so you see these different sub-genres. Do the prophets ever use apocalyptic imagery? Yes, and we'll talk about that more in detail in a second. Are the prophets filled with typology? And the answer is, of course, yes. And so, the third thing here under C, keeping the prophets in redemptive historical perspective. So this is how one of the things which is helpful in trying to remember. So where does the prophet fit in history? One of the things that can help you is a good Bible dictionary or a good Bible handbook. Just read that section on the prophets. They'll give you basically all the information that you know and then look for the major divisions within a book. Now how many major divisions are you gonna have in the book of Obadiah? How many of you, Obadiah, is your favorite book of the Bible? Yeah, it's just one chapter, right? It's one oracle. Whereas on the other hand, Isaiah is broken up into three major sections. 1-39, 40-54, and then 55-66. And each one of those books actually, each one of those sections has a particular relevance not only to the time in which it was written, but then also future elements as well. Same thing with the book of Jeremiah. If you realize that Jeremiah 29 through 34 is called the book of consolation, written specifically to the Jews who were already taken into exile, you realize that the promises that are given in that section, and so what great promise do we have from Jeremiah 29 to 34? The New Covenant, right. So Jeremiah 31, 31-34 is the promise of the New Covenant. The promise of the New Covenant is given to the people of God in exile, right? What about Jeremiah 29-11? Anybody like that verse? You have it on a plaque? Jeremiah 29-11? On your front doormat or hanging in your kitchen on your refrigerator? Jeremiah 29.11. Jeremiah 29.11, going once, going twice. Come on, please, help me. Okay, Nathan, we got one. All right, and it's, by the way, this would make a great license plate, Moralesis, Jeremiah 29.11. For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord. Plans to prosper, plans for welfare, really plans for shalom, not for calamity. To give you a future and a hope. That is a great promise for God's people at all times. Does it help to remember that it is given to a people who had experienced exile and were living outside of the promised land? Absolutely, right? So keeping these things in mind is really, really helpful. Keep an eye as you read through the prophets on the fallen condition focus. Cheryl's trying to talk Martin into buying a new car so they can get a new license plate and Jeremiah 29 11 be great. So as you read the prophets, one of the things that helps in terms of application is keeping your eye on what we would call the fallen condition focus. So typically the prophets are calling out Israel for her sins. So there would be relevance in that for us as we read. Keep your eye on the threats of judgment. Keep your eye on the promises for salvation. As you read the prophets, look for repetitions. Anybody think of any prophetic repetitions or repetitions in the prophets that kind of have stood out to you over the years? There are some good ones. Let's see, what about the book of Ezekiel? Okay, so... When you read the book of Ezekiel, there's a repeated refrain through the whole book, and that is that God is going to do what He's going to do, so that my name will be known among the nations. So whenever I see a repeated phrase, you have it, for instance, even in Isaiah 1, in that day, God will be exalted, man will be abased, that's a refrain that you see. I would take a different color highlighter and just highlight those refrains, right? Because those repeated lines or phrases actually give us, in a sense, sort of a theme that is serving as the framework for that passage. Look for typological allusions, all right? So what I mean by that is look for references, allusions to creation, Eden, Exodus, temple, land, priests, prophets, kings. So one of the major themes of restoration in the prophets is actually put in Exodus terms. So the restoration of the people to the land is actually another Exodus. Now what happens, and we're not going to talk a lot about typology right now, but let me just say typology is a pattern. that has a trajectory. So in typology what you have is, let's take a pattern of judgment. So do you see patterns of judgment in the Old Testament? The answer is of course. You see it in the garden, you see it in Genesis 6 and so forth. Those form patterns of judgment that then serve as a trajectory. pointing us to what? The final judgment. We see patterns of redemption or restoration and then those patterns get picked up so of course restoration language is going to be in terms of the exodus that are pointing to what? To the restoration of the people to the land but what is the ultimate exodus that the prophets are going to be talking about? The ultimate exodus. Not quite, no, no, no, no. Okay, so here's a clue that will just change your life. Luke 9.37, right? Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration. Who appears with Jesus? Moses and Elijah being symbols of what? The Law and the Prophets. And Luke's gospel says Jesus was discussing with Moses and Elijah his exodus. which would soon take place in Jerusalem. Now sometimes our English Bibles, they don't say Exodus, they say departure. But do you think it's significant that he's talking about his Exodus which would soon take place in Jerusalem? The answer is yes. Why? Because it is the redemption of Christ on the cross Which is what? The ultimate exodus. It is the ultimate deliverance from the house of bondage. And so that's what I mean. You have a pattern, and that pattern has a trajectory that points you farther than what the immediate pattern is. Right? And this is, by the way, this is the way the Bible understands itself. You read the book of Hebrews. The book of Hebrews tells us that the building of the tabernacle according to everything that was shown to Moses on the mountain was what? Actually a pattern that was a reflection of the tabernacle that already existed in heaven. And then that tabernacle pointed to something else, and what did that tabernacle point to? That tabernacle pointed not to some sort of restored temple in the millennium, that tabernacle actually pointed to Jesus Christ. Alright, and so the Bible understands itself in these ways. Oftentimes in the prophets, the picture of heaven or the picture of full and complete restoration takes on the language of Eden, the garden of Eden. Why? Because that's the paradise of God. And so what God is going to do is he's going to restore the new heavens and the new earth to Eden, but only better. And so you have language of creation. What is the language of, I will create a new heavens and a new earth? That is the language of creation and now recreation. All right? So you've got these cyclical patterns, and as you read the prophets, make sure that you notice the language. Make sure you notice the language that revolves around temples and priests. And why? Because temples and priests and kings all ultimately don't just point to themselves, What do they point to? They point to fulfillment in the future, typically in the Lord Jesus Christ. Alright? And so, you know, one of the good things to do is to pray that God would actually open your eyes so that you can see these things. Isn't this what happens with the disciples on the road to Emmaus, right? Jesus actually points out to them in The Law and the Psalms and the Prophets, how it was necessary for Christ to suffer and then enter into His glory. And then what do those disciples say when they get back to the disciples in Jerusalem? Did not our hearts burn as He opened up the Scriptures to us? Alright? That brings us to the last thing on the prophets, and that is to see how the salvation or restoration promises point us to Jesus Christ. And so, let's just take that famous Jeremiah 2911 passage. Is that passage relevant to my everyday life? Of course it is. But, what is the ultimate promise in Jeremiah 2911? that God's plans are for our shalom, our peace. What is the ultimate fulfillment of being given a future and a hope? You're actually not promised necessarily a nice life in this life. But what you are promised is peace in Christ and being given a future and a hope in Christ that transcends anything in this present life. And so these promises point us ultimately towards the Lord Jesus Christ. All right? Okay. So messianic prophecy, by the way. So anybody remember any particular messianic prophecy in the prophets? Anything stand out to you? Okay, yeah, Isaiah 9, Isaiah 9.6, unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. Right? Great. You know, Handel actually really talked that off for us. Right? Some of you are wondering, what are you talking about? Handel's Messiah. Isaiah 53, yeah, suffering servant, right? By the way, there are four suffering servant, five suffering servant passages in the book of Isaiah. All of them point explicitly towards the Lord Jesus Christ, okay? Okay, yeah, the fifth servant song is Isaiah 52, 13 through 53, 12, okay? We usually just say Isaiah 53 for short. Any other really awesome messianic prophecies? In the prophets, in the prophets. We're talking about the prophetic literature. Ricardo? Okay, we're still talking about the prophetic literature, right? Joel 2, yeah, and of course, In that day, I'll pour out my spirit upon all flesh. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, so forth, right? Yeah. What's that? Okay. Yeah, and we have a promise of the restoration of the fallen tent of David, and that actually is quoted for us in Acts chapter 15. So we have lots of these, hundreds of these. But understand that messianic prophecy is not just in the form of future prediction. Sometimes messianic prophecy in the prophets is in the form of historical reflection. So if you're reading Hosea chapter 11, you realize that Hosea is actually giving a history of Israel. And yet, in Matthew chapter 2 and verse 15, Matthew says, so remember Joseph takes Mary and Jesus down to Egypt to escape Herod in a dream they're told they're able to come back. And then Matthew quotes Hosea 11.1 and says, and this was to fulfill what was written in the prophets out of Egypt I called my son. Now one of the things that we do is we look at that and we say, Well, that's not a prophecy to be fulfilled. That's actually historical reflection. Well, what's happening? What's happening is the fulfillment of typology because Adam is a son who, of course, fails. Israel is a son who, of course, fails. And then God brings in his perfect son who doesn't fail. And so in a sense, that which happens to Adam, and then more importantly, that which happens to Israel, ends up being fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so that very historical section actually is used by the New Testament as a prophetic pattern to point us to Christ. All right? Okay, so what about apocalyptic literature? I want to put something up here for you, and I'm going to read it to you. This is called An American Apocalypse. I wrote it, so it's not inspired. I want you to follow along if you can read it. I'll read it. In the middle of the new king's first week, there was a great upheaval on the hill. I looked to see and I saw a woman holding a gavel riding on a donkey. Her face looked as if it were plastic. Then I looked to see and I saw a pale rider riding on the head of the donkey. He was weak and sickly but spoke great things. Then arising from the Boston Harbor, there arose an upheaval and the donkey was badly shaken. The woman who rode the donkey was thrown and when she fell, her gavel was taken by one who rode an elephant. A majority of the stars fell from heaven as the elephant ascended to the place of authority. The pale rider fell to the side of the donkey's head, holding on to the ear of the donkey by the arm of a slot machine. He almost fell, but his fall was not yet. The great white house was in chaos, and the new king, in the middle of his first week, lost his majority of the stars of heaven, who were lost with the woman who rode the donkey, and it looked as if the new king would have to make a covenant with the elephant, but lo, there was only deceit in his mouth." Now, this is actually an example of what we would call apocalyptic literature. That's not really literature, it's doggerel, but not even that. It's just my twisted imagination. Now, what do you need to know? First of all, who knows what I'm talking about? So you know what I'm talking about, some of you? What do you actually need to know in order to interpret this apocalyptic literature? You need to know American politics, current politics, as in 2011. Okay, this goes back, 2011. And you need to understand American politics. And what do you need to understand about American politics? Think a little bit more about the imagery that's used. What's that? The donkey and elephant. Where do we get the donkey and elephant? That may be more theologically correct than you could imagine, but where do we get the donkey and elephant imagery? Yeah, but where does it come from? Political cartoons. That's where the imagery comes from. It's from political cartoons. Alright? Are the political cartoons saying something with the elephant and the donkey? Of course. Alright? So, understanding the historical background, understanding the connected imagery, is really important. So, in the middle of the new king's first week, there was a great upheaval on the hill. So, who's the king? Huh? No? Obama, right? Great upheaval on the Hill. What's the Hill? Yeah, Washington DC. The great upheaval was when he lost the majority in the House and the Republicans took the majority. Okay? I looked and see and I saw, by the way, that's typical apocalyptic language, right? I looked to see and I saw a woman holding a gavel. Who's that? Nancy Pelosi. The gavel. The gavel represents what? She's Speaker of the House. Riding on a donkey. There's our political cartoon corresponding to the Democrat Party. Her face looked as if it were plastic. That's just a pejorative reference to multiple surgeries. Then I looked to see and I saw a pale rider riding on the head of the donkey. Who's that? Harry Reid. Pale rider, okay? He's the rider who's doing what? Riding on the head of the donkey. He is the, at that time, the majority leader. He was weak and sickly, which is of course a pejorative reference to his physical appearance, but he spoke great things. So then, arising from the Boston Harbor. So what does that do? Boston Harbor. What does that bring to mind? The Boston Tea Party, which then should bring to mind for 2010, what? The Tea Party, right. So you guys are on it. And there arose great upheaval and the donkey was badly shaken. Alright? Then we move to the next. The woman who rode the donkey was thrown and she fell. And when she fell, her gavel was taken by one who rode an elephant. Changing of power. Alright? A majority of the stars fell from heaven as the elephant ascended to the place of authority. Just shift of power, change of the majority. The pale rider fell to the side of the donkey's head, so he lost his position. And then, just to make sure everybody knows who we're talking about, holding on to the ear of the donkey, so he barely hung on. Remember, he almost got voted out as the minority leader at that point. He's holding on to the arm of the slot machine. What's the significance of that? He's from Nevada, okay? He almost fell, but his fall was not yet, by the way, typical apocalyptic language. The great White House, that's obviously too clear, right? Was in chaos, a new king in the middle of the week, lost his majority, stars of heaven, who were lost, blah, blah, blah. And it looked as if the new king would have to make a covenant with the elephant. Looked as if he would have to Compromise with the ones that are now in power, but lo, there is only deceit in his mouth." That, by the way, is an example of the way apocalyptic literature works. Now, let's say you were a wooden-headed literalist. What would that look like? First of all, you'd have a real donkey and a real elephant, right? I mean, so all of a sudden, all the imagery, all the symbolic imagery is lost for the sake of being literal, and for the sake of being literal, the meaning is gone. Now, when we understand apocalyptic literature, we have to understand that it is, it's very nature is symbolic, all right? So oftentimes, apocalyptic literature comes through dreams and visions, what the prophet sees, all right? So can anybody name apocalyptic sections in Old Testament prophets? What's that? Daniel. Daniel is the preeminent book that contains apocalyptic literature, especially Daniel 7, Daniel 8, And any other books? Apocalyptic imagery, apocalyptic literature? Jeremiah has some. The two most heavily apocalyptic books in the Old Testament, Ricardo? Ezekiel, right? And so the imagery, so when we come to the New Testament, guess what the most heavily apocalyptic book is? Well, the book that we call the Apocalypse, for good reason. That's actually the title of the book of Revelation in the Greek text, the Apocalypse, the revelation of Jesus Christ. And so, apocalyptic imagery is rooted, first of all, in Old Testament, but it's also rooted in historical situations. Alright? So, in other words, let's think about Revelation for a minute. So, in Revelation 13, we have the introduction of the Beast. Okay? Now, the Beast has Old Testament imagery connections, right? Daniel 7 and 8. But it also has historical situation connections because, for instance, Nero was frequently called The beast. Because he's vicious and so forth. So imagery is rooted in the Old Testament and it's applied to historical situations. Apocalyptic symbolism is often times cryptic, but it's supposed to be. It's not absolutely unintelligible, but it is usually written in times of persecution. and it's depicting both a historical and an eschatological situation. In other words, the people that are the initial recipients of that literature understand it within a certain historical context, but that historical context doesn't exhaust the meaning of the symbolism. So it comes in both a historical and an eschatological situation. So, for instance, the book of Revelation, do you think the people in the first century that were recipients of the book of Revelation understood certain imagery in light of, let's say, the Roman Empire? Very clearly they would have. There's no doubt about it. Does the Roman Empire exhaust the apocalyptic imagery of the book of Revelation? No. No. And so, when we think about apocalyptic imagery, oftentimes there's an emphasis on the kingdom of God. This is true in Daniel 2, Daniel 7, Daniel 8. And it is an emphasis on the fact that the kingdom of God is actually gonna break in to human history. Now, is apocalyptic imagery risky? Very risky. What makes it so risky? Yes, people come up with all kinds of ideas about it. Let's add to that, that are detached from their Old Testament imagery and their historical situation, right? What can you actually do with apocalyptic imagery if you detach it from its Old Testament connections and historical connections? You can build a cult if you want it, sure. I think somebody said it. What can you do with it? Anything you want! Anything you want. And if you don't believe me, just get on YouTube. And look up the Mark of the Beast, for instance. I mean, you can get all kinds of incredibly just odd, even heretical interpretations, because what happens is in apocalyptic imagery, when you lose that historical connection in the Old Testament roots, and then all of a sudden, who becomes the controlling interpreter of the image? The person that's interpreting, and the actual interpreter of the imagery is the Old Testament. All right? That's why you actually have controls, interpretive controls, right? So it doesn't just mean anything you want it to mean, right? That's more akin to allegory than it is to the idea of apocalyptic imagery and typology, okay? Alright, well that went longer than I thought, but any questions before we do Hebrew poetry in six minutes? Questions, comments? Michaela? Yes? Yes, that's Verne Poythress, The Returning King, and sort of an overview of Revelation. Very sensitive to its Old Testament connections. Really terrific, terrific book. All right. Okay, Ricardo. How do you interpret the book of Revelation Yeah. Right, I mean, do we really actually think that the Mark of the Beast, that what John had in mind as he was given this revelation, were, you know, subdural microchips? No, no, just not. Here's something for fun, just as we close out. There are two manuscripts, very early, that in Revelation 13-8 actually have that the mark of the beast is 616. Could you imagine? Dan Wallace says, if we took that variant reading, 400 tons of dispensational literature would go up in flames. There's actually a reason why there's a 616 variant reading. But here's the thing, is that numbers are symbolic in Revelation. And when we come to any number, we have to ask what the significance of the number is. So for instance, throughout Revelation, you have seven letters to seven churches, right? Is seven significant? The answer is of course it is. You can go on and on. You have multiples of 12. You have therefore the 144,000, 12,000 from each tribe. So you have to be cautious as you go through and one of the problems that ends up happening is if you try to be overly literal with apocalyptic imagery you end up missing the message. simply the way that it is. That doesn't mean that every single apocalyptic image that's used in the book of Revelation or the book of Ezekiel for that matter is absolutely clear. Now there are things, for instance, in the book of Daniel, because they're historical, that actually ends up being very, very helpful. So in Daniel you have four beasts. Those four beasts actually correspond to four historical empires. Those four historical empires then end up being used, at least the symbolic meaning of those empires end up being brought over into the book of Revelation So that the beast of Revelation 13 is a composite of the four beasts of Daniel chapter 7. How do we know that? Because actually John tells us. Alright, does that make you want to read? Well, it should, it should, right? It should make you want to read, and read the prophets, and glean, and ask the Lord to open your eyes to help see the Lord Jesus, right? All right. Well, this is taking a little longer than I thought, but next week we'll get to poetic and wisdom literature, so let's pray. Father thank you for your word and we thank you that you've given us a revelation of yourself so that we might know you know your son Jesus Christ and know Lord who and what we are and what you require of us and so father we pray that even in the hour to come as we As we seek to preach your word, we ask that you would give us the help of the Holy Spirit, that you might open our eyes to behold wonderful things from your word. In Jesus name, Amen.