Revelation 1 vs 4-8
Revelation Chapter 1 Verse 4
· The “Asia” in Biblical literature is modern day Western Turkey. (Map Picture) It's significant that John writes to the “seven” churches. There were far more than seven at this time but these seven (chapters 2 and 3) represent the church as a whole and as we will see, the church through the ages. Seven is the number of completion. So, it speaks not just to a subset of churches there in Asia during John’s time but to the whole church, the complete church.
· John’s exhortation is “grace and peace.” Notice his situation doesn’t control his state of mind. He’s exiled, condemned, alone…, and yet there is this solid undercurrent of love, purpose and power flowing through his veins!
· Grace “charis” was the greeting of the Greeks…peace “shalom” was the greeting of the Jews. And notice John puts them together…why? Because they are always linked. Where grace goes, peace goes. They are always linked in the Bible and they are always linked in life. This peace is not only a ceasing of war, it also means “at one.” Someone who isn’t torn about between who they are on the inside and who they are on the outside…
· Grace always first. God wants to install peace into my heart of hearts, but even more, He wants to give to me His grace! Grace, the unmerited, undeserved, unearned and unmaintained by me favor, affection and love of God. You can’t merit it or earn it… you don’t deserve it…its simply the love of God applied because of what Jesus has done for you! And the degree that I receive the grace of God is the degree that I will know peace.
· And notice this grace is not from us, it’s not from the world, it’s not from “making it,” doing well, being well…this grace and this peace is from the One who was and who is and who is to come. I love this description of God because God transcends time. He lives in the eternal now. He is above time and circumstance! He was there with you then, He is with you now, and He will be with you in what is yet to come! Why? Grace! What’s that do!? PEACE!
· Recognize this grace and peace also extends from the seven Spirits who are before His throne. Now this isn’t some sort of team of Holy Spirits but rather this is a sevenfold characterization of the one Holy Spirit. A revelation of the character of God. (Think Menorah in the temple)
· Isaiah Chapter 11 verse 2. These seven aspects of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom, the Spirit of understanding, the Spirit of counsel, the Spirit of might, the Spirit of knowledge and the Spirit of the fear of the Lord. The characteristics of the Holy Spirit, and He who indwells every Christian…
Revelation Chapter 1 Verse 5
· Jesus Christ, the faithful witness. Jesus is the complete unveiling of God… Just like the little girl who was drawing one day and her father walks up and says “Honey, what are you drawing there?” And she without stopping says “I’m drawing God, daddy.” And then her father says with a smile and a bit of a chuckle “Honey, no one knows what God looks like.” She slams down her crayon and looks up at him and says, “Well they will in a minute!” HA! As she draws out what God looks like, what He is like…that is what Jesus did for us…The faithful witness to the very nature and character of the Father.
· The Firstborn from the dead. The Defeater of death. The first to bring life out of death never to die again… Jesus said in John 14:3, “If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.” He was the Firstborn paving the way for you and for me.
· To Him who loved us… There’s a moment there with Jesus. I don’t know how else to say that. Just a moment where you look over at Him and realize, through my times of being forsaken growing up, used and forgotten by those that should have loved and protected me, through those times, He loved me. Through my times of using others, nights of drowning my reality in drugs, through every moment that I walked in darkness, He loved me…
· I think of the moment Jesus looked at the rich young ruler and it says in Mark 10:21, “Then Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “One think you lack…” No indication that the rich young ruler did what Jesus said after that, and yet Jesus loved him. I think of the moment Jesus and Peter locked eyes…, Luke 22:59-61, “Another confidently affirmed, saying, ‘Surely this fellow also was with Him, for he is a Galilean.’ But Peter said, ‘Man, I do not know what you are saying!’ Immediately, while he was still speaking, the rooster crowed. And the Lord turned and looked at Peter. Then Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how He had said to him, ‘Before the rooster crows, you will deny Me three time.’” Jesus loved him then…
· The statement here that He loved me is a moment I have with God time and time again and every time its like the first time…
Revelation Chapter 1 Verse 6
· Ok, if you’ve ever had issues understanding the idea of grace or the Biblical principle of propitiation, here it is in technicolor! Jesus died for me. For the dealing with my sin. That through Him I would be made clean, washed clean, in the spirit, He had all the perfection in His account and by His blood, He has written me as a co-owner of His account. All the illustrations!!!
· But wait, there’s more. That’s mercy. That’s love. That’s “my life for yours.” AND with that, we do indeed get the eternal life of Jesus Christ, the only Son of God! AND, with His blood also comes this intense honor and privilege of position of king and priest! The honorable and the holy.
· All I really was in need of is forgiveness… And yet because of the grace of God, His extra goodness…, I have been given and become SO much more than that! SO much so the angels desire to look into this… (1 Peter 1:12). Scratching their angel heads, not able to figure this out!! So, thank you Jesus and GLORY and DOMINION – shout of praise – also!!
· And herein is a further revelation of Jesus Christ as John writes inspired by the Holy Spirit, “To His God and Father,” showing both the humanity and the divinity of Jesus Christ…
Revelation Chapter 1 Verse 7
· All of the peoples of the earth and look they will mourn. Would the church mourn? No! We would hoot and holler! But the tribes of the earth at this time…not the church, they wail!
· The world will cry out when they see Him come…notice, not at the rapture. This is the second coming, the second advent…after the tribulation period, after the time described in 1 Thessalonians 4 when WE are called UP into the clouds…you see a different time, a separate event from Jesus coming back to earth WITH the clouds meaning with heaven in tow…, you and I returning with Him as Jude writes “The Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of His holy ones.”
· The tribulation period is not for us…His wrath is not for those who are washed clean and made righteous in His blood. You see Jesus, our sin taken upon Him, has already experienced, has already satisfied the wrath of God against our sin and therefore we have justification and sanctification to the extent that the Lord tells us in Romans 5:9 that “Having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from (out of) wrath through Him.” And 1 Thes 1:10 we read that “Jesus who delivers us from (or out of) the wrath to come!” Not delivers us IN but delivers us from! And not present wrath but future wrath! So, we are not delivered in wrath during the tribulation but delivered from wrath before it begins. Zephaniah 2:3 God declares “Seek righteousness, seek humility. It may be that you will be hidden (absented) in the Day of the Lord’s anger.” Jeremiah 3:12 states, “I will not cause My anger to fall upon you.”
· And after the church age, chapters 2 and 3 of the Book of Revelation, during the judgment period where the vials of God’s wrath are being poured upon the earth, Revelation 16:7 records for us voices coming from the alter of God saying, “Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are Your judgments.” Why? Because those that have been washed clean by the blood of the Savior are not there to absorb additional wrath. Unfounded wrath…unjust punishment…no, the judgment is holy and righteous!
· And so, this event, the second coming when Jesus returns…us with Him to rule and to reign…every eye will see Him (not possible until recent years with technology), even the Jews…all of the peoples of the earth look and they will mourn.
Revelation Chapter 1 Verse 8
· I want to show you something. Who is this Alpha and Omega? The First and the Last? The Almighty! Well, the cults say “Obviously, it’s God the Father!” Ok I agree with that!
· Now, turn to Revelation 22:12-13. “And behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to give to everyone according to his work. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last.” Who is that? God the Father! Has to be! I agree. Well, look down to Revelation 22 verse 16. “I, Jesus,….” Checkmate. You cannot have two beginnings and ends… You cannot have two Alpha’s and two Omega’s… There MUST only be one…
· So JWs, Mr. Mormon, you have a problem. If the Alpha and the Omega in Revelation 1 is God the Father and the Alpha and the Omega in Revelation 22 is Jesus Christ then you have two Almighties. You have two Alphas and Omegas OR you have a mystery, that Jesus and the Father are One! And if they are One then indeed the premise, the pillar, the position of your profession is bankrupt and you are lost. You see this is Jesus Christ speaking here. The same that was speaking in the Old Testament, the second Person of a mysterious and completely Other Triune God!