How to Study the Bible III - Interpreting the Book of Revelation
Vern Peterman · Sep 18, 2016
How to Study Bible (2016), No. 36
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/492653973171

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

OK, a few different things before we get started. One is we're kind of in a discussion mode about what electives to offer starting next year. And next year is not that far away. So if you have any thoughts or suggestions, something you'd like to do, that would be most welcome. So anyway, and we can either do a repeat of some previous elective. I'm contemplating some of that with some updates and expansions. Or something we've never done before, that's fine too. So anyway, if you have any ideas on electives for next year, those are welcome. The other thing is In November and December, we don't have yet planned exactly what passages and topics we're going to cover and how to study the Bible. So if you have something that you would like us to cover in terms of a topic or a passage, feel free to let me know. So anyway, input is welcome on those things.

So we're here looking at interpreting the book of Revelation. This is actually taken for the most part from the beginning of our Revelation series, but it's one of those areas where we have ten points regarding interpreting the book of Revelation in here. And as we do so, as we look at the book of Revelation and proceed with it, it's saying we need to observe those ten points so that we can interpret and understand the book of Revelation clearly. There's actually redundancy in terms of arriving at answers. The Book of Revelation is interpreted in very many greatly different ways.

That's unnecessary. Typically it's because people don't interpret literally and they don't observe enough and then they have to put a system on top of what it says to work how it's understood. The Amillennialist system, for example, looks at the 144,000 and the 12,000 from each tribe and naming the tribes and saying that those tribes are from Israel, and then they just look at it and say that's the Christian church and the denominations. Yeah, and so literal interpretation just goes, whatever it says, that's not what it means, is the approach they take. Do you interpret Revelation the same way as you do the rest of the Bible and the New Testament, or do you interpret it differently? That's a very good question. Thank you for asking that.

I interpret it the same way, and what we'll see here is the general principle in terms of how we interpret it is the exact same way. However, we have in the book of Revelation also some things to observe that impact how we interpret things internally to the book of Revelation. And we'll be going through those. That's a very good question. The quick answer is I interpret it the same way. But we'll be observing some things unique to the book of Revelation that will further guide us into understanding it correctly.

And so let's get to it. Here's the book of Revelation. To me it's a fantastic book. I became enthralled with it when I was going through seminaries. There were some other classes that I looked at and said, I don't really want to take those classes. Can I take Revelation? classes instead. Oh, sure. And the reason I just really enjoy and get drawn into the book of Revelation is not because I'm a prophecy nut. I'm really not.

It's because it has a hundred and fifty verses describing the heavenly scene. And to me that's home. That is why I just love studying Revelation. is the Apostle Paul can tell me I have a heavenly citizenship. The Apostle Paul can tell me I'm seated there in the heavenlies.

But he was told, you are forbidden to describe it, even though he went there. John was told, you must write. You must write. And so we're going to take a look at that. So that's what draws me, personally. I look at that, I say, man, this guy is describing home. And it's the only book that does. It's a very special book. Okay, so let's take a look in the middle of page one. It's the first one.

We'll interpret the book of Revelation literally. If the plain sense makes sense, seek no other sense. Now, when we say the plain sense makes sense, does that mean that we don't understand figures of speech as figures of speech? No. So, figures of speech When those are used, we understand figurative speech. Also, when there are symbols, does it mean we just interpret them real literally and keep going? No. We also understand the symbols, and we'll look at that in the subsequent things. So when we say literal interpretation, that does not mean we're somehow wooden literalists where we take everything absolute, at the face, literally. And let's think in our own language, we can be very literal and still need to understand what's the cultural meaning. Example, how many of you go to the restroom for a rest? No, and we have restrooms here, right? And how many of you go to the bathrooms in this building to take a bath? Now, not so much, right? So even in our own language, wooden literalism is not going to work. It doesn't describe what's going on. So we got this.

When over a hundred prophecies of Christ's first coming were given in the Old Testament, they were given and fulfilled literally. We went through, for example, Psalm 22, which has several references in it to the crucifixion, written a thousand years before Jesus was even born. It has references to the crucifixion, and those fulfillments, what we see in the New Testament, are literally fulfilled. Psalm 22, verse 1, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Did Jesus literally or figuratively or symbolically fulfill that. He literally quoted Psalm 22 verse 1 in Aramaic. Eloi Eloi lama sabachthani. That's what he called out. Though Christ spoke repeatedly against the teachings of the Pharisees, and did he? Oh yes, and one of the big blocks of speaking against the Pharisees is Matthew chapter 23, the whole chapter. Woe to you Pharisees! And they just love to hear that, right? So, you got that.

He never rebuked them or argued over their literal interpretation of prophecy. The Pharisees wrote down, recorded in the Talmud, that they believed that the 70th week of Daniel was yet future, a seven-year period of time that will be horrible, and the Antichrist, whom they call Armilus, will be running things here on planet Earth, and at the end of which the Messiah will come. Did Jesus argue with them over that? No. because he agreed completely.

Except that, he's the Messiah. Yes? Did you say that the Jews believe Antichrist is Armalus? Armalus. Armalus. That's the name. Is that the equivalent of our Antichrist? Yes. That's their name for the Antichrist. That's their name for the Antichrist, Armalus. As a matter of fact, that's in the fourth bullet. down below.

So Orthodox Jews today, based on the Old Testament alone, and about 70% of Revelation is straight out of the Old Testament. By the way, keep that figure in mind, because that's a biggie. It's huge. 70% of Revelation is straight out of the Old Testament. That means more than two-thirds of Revelation is not new. More than two-thirds of Revelation is not new, and it means you have a cross-check on two-thirds of the book, just out of the Old Testament. And so, interpreting Revelation, it's funny, I first taught it back in 2011, right after 9-11, excuse me, 2001, right after 9-11, and I told people, first time, interpreting Revelation is a piece of cake. And that's after most people read it and they say, what was that? But it is a piece of cake. So the Orthodox Jews today, based on the Old Testament, 70% of Revelation is out of the Old Testament.

There will come a time upon the earth, a terrible time of tribulation. The tribulation will last seven Jewish years, 360 days each. The Antichrist Armilus will come to deceive and to destroy. At the end of the seven-year tribulation, the Messiah will come to feed his enemies and rule the earth from Jerusalem for a long, long time. That's what they believe based on just the Old Testament. That is harmonious with what we would teach here and not what I believe Jesus and the Apostles taught.

So now, let's go to the top of page two. This is point number two. When John uses the word like or as, and he does that over a hundred times. By the way, is that a metaphor or a simile? It's a simile, right? A metaphor makes direct equivalence. Instead of saying Vern eats like an elephant, Vern is an elephant. So, it is a simile when you have like or as. He does it over a hundred times, including in the first chapter. We take that as a direct comparison.

An example would be Revelation 1.16. His face, and this is Christ's face, was like the sun shining in His strength. So we've got that, and John does that a lot. So we have two-thirds of the book of Revelation straight out of the Old Testament.

We interpret it literally. We then have these hundred places of like or as. We take that as John is describing, using something that people would recognize. Hair like wool, eyes like fire. Next, number three. The text explains the symbol right in the text. We simply take John's explanation. How easy is that? Right?

So if John says, as for the mystery of the seven stars, and what's a mystery by the way? Something that was unrevealed, but is now being revealed as a mystery of the seven stars. So is it mysterious? No, it's now revealed, which you saw in my right hand, the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels or messengers of the seven churches and the seven lampstands are the seven churches. So is it a mystery? It's a mystery in the biblical sense in that it previously was not revealed but now is.

Number four, we will continue to examine carefully word usage, grammar, and verb tenses. And one of the things that's really, really great with the way John writes, whereas Paul writes in complexity. He writes long sentences. He uses three and four part compound words, some of which we haven't seen anywhere else in all of Greek literature. It seems like Paul possibly invented the word. John writes simply and very, very, very consistently. So that helps us here. He does not use complex grammar. He uses simple grammar, simple words, and he sticks Once he says something, he stays with it. Yes.

And if I remember correctly, John is much more repetitive in his texts. I just remember when we first learned New Testament Greek, that was the one that I could actually understand just because it was short, sweet, and he just kept using the same vocabulary for the most part. And that's one thing, as you're going through like 1 John, which is a difficult book to interpret, what I've found is you can find a comparable set of words and word pairs and sentences and whatnot in the Gospel of John and or Revelation to help you understand 1st John. But Revelation is actually easier to interpret than 1st John.

So anyway, we're going to examine everything in context. When I say context, one of the things we have to remember is not just the immediate context. Let's say, here's Jesus saying, you know, I am the first and the last, the beginning and the end, right? And so, do I read the immediate context? Do I read and understand it in terms of the immediate context? Yes, you would. Is that all the context? Ultimately, the context kind of goes out in scales, right? How does that fit with the rest of Revelation? How does that fit with the rest of Scripture?

When you say context, you're going all the way from the micro-context, the small-scale context, and you step your way out. Plus, when you have something written by the same author, that has a priority of context. over other authors. When you're reading something by the same author, that has a priority of context over other authors. So first you go to what they've written before as your primary source. Let me give you an example. Every one of the messages to the seven churches, he has something said to the overcomers, right? So this is Christ, in the context, speaking to the overcomers. Now, how can I tell what an overcomer is? Who is an overcomer? What is an overcomer? Would you go to other primary texts that he wrote? One of the things I'm going to do is say, here's John, and he wrote about overcomers.

In 1 John chapter 5, he who believes is the one who overcomes. Now I just got a definition from who? John, right? And you go into the gospel of John, and Jesus says, I have overcome, right? So he has overcome, and why do we overcome? Because we believe in the one who's overcome. So here's John, he's consistent, and guess what?

All the promises to all the overcomers In the end of each of those messages, all of them are fulfilled, every single one, in Revelation chapters 19 through 22. So whether you go forward in the New Testament to the Gospel of John, to 1 John, or whether you go to the end of the book of Revelation, you have your answer, and it's consistent. Overcomers are those who believe. And all the promises are fulfilled in chapters 19-22.

So I've used context here, specifically John's writings, because he's a very consistent writer. John answers his questions in all that he has written. We're going to interpret according to history and culture. One of the things we do when we go through the seven churches in Revelation, and the guys over in Uganda were astounded at this, is that we look at the history and culture of each of those seven cities, and what Christ has said, what John has written, matches the history and culture of every one of the cities. John did not just kind of close his eyes and write something. Jesus did not speak ignorant of what was the character. He says to the overcomers, I'm going to give you a new name, right? To a city that kept renaming itself.

You are not hot or cold, you are lukewarm. It's because there was about a six mile pipe coming from Hierapolis where the water was hot. And by the time it got through this pipe, it was lukewarm. The people upstream in Colossae had cold water. The people over at Herapolis had hot water. But in Laodicea, it was lukewarm. Everything that is said fits the history and culture. John does not write ignorant of that. He writes and Jesus speaks with complete understanding so that what is said will communicate to those people.

Now, in the second paragraph under six, and this is a biggie, the symbolism in the book of Revelation is Jewish rather than Greek. In the Jewish culture, the symbols are spoken or written asking the question, what does it mean? What does it mean? In our Greek mind, and we actually inherited more of the Greek culture, What does it look like? So people read the descriptions in Revelation with a question in their minds, what does it look like? And they'll think, this is a crazy book. This book is just nuts. Why?

It's because we're reading the symbols, and there are lots of symbols, we're reading the symbols with a Greek mind instead of with the Jewish mind, what does it mean? And because 70% of the book of Revelation is out of the Old Testament, a great many of those symbols are already explained in the Old Testament, which was a Jewish book. So that's where Revelation is just abundantly clear. Now we make in point 7, the next point, 70% of the book of Revelation is straight out of the Old Testament. That is huge. Where's the first place that you look when you see some symbol that you think, wow, that's just really bizarre? Where's the first place you look? You start in the Old Testament, right? Where does that show up first? Old Testament.

One of the things we saw in Psalm chapter 2 was a rod of iron. He's going to rule with a rod of iron. So guess what's repeated later on in Revelation? When Christ comes again, he's going to rule with a rod of iron. Right out of the Old Testament. Yeah, it is a figure of speech. It's not a real rod of iron, just like he doesn't have a five foot long barbarian battle sword coming out of his mouth. It's a figure of speech, a symbol, which is a kind of figure of speech, that comes straight out of the Old Testament. By the way, the sword coming out of the mouth, that's out of Isaiah.

So that is huge, because a lot of people will go into the symbols and, you know, what does it make me feel like, what does it seem like, and none of that nonsense is necessary. Every single symbol is spelled out, usually in the Old Testament. We're not guessing at any of them. That's why I say that interpreting Revelation has redundancies. If I have something that's explained, and then it also says like or as, and I've got that kind of use, and then I find it in the Old Testament, we have redundancies telling us what things are. We're not just guessing. So if somebody comes up and says, I think it's this, forget that.

And so then, number eight, we'll read Israel's Israel and the Church's the Church, and we'll differentiate between the saints of the Church age and the saints of the Tribulation. Was the Church ever mentioned in the Gospels? It was, and even using in like Matthew 18, word church was used. But, but, a lot of things were said in the Gospels that the guys didn't get.

Why? They didn't understand even what Christ's death and burial and resurrection meant until afterwards. Even in Acts chapter 1, Jesus is ready to ascend and they're still asking, is now the time you're going to establish your kingdom with Israel? Right? Well, until the Lord showed up on the scene, this church thing, this body of Christ thing, had not been introduced. So it was brand new. Even in the book of Acts, the word church first shows up in chapter 5, even though the church began when? Acts chapter 2, right?

So these guys are catching up to, and it's really what we do as well, they're catching up to what God's already done. And we do that as well. We spend the rest of our lives catching up to what God's already accomplished. Now, we're going to distinguish not just between church and Israel, but between saints of the church age and saints of the tribulation as we go through there. So that's one thing to point out.

The word saints is those who are saved of all time by faith. It doesn't mean just church saints, but it's a word that's used in the Old Testament for those who believe, saints. It's the use of those who are of the tribulation period. Those who believe and are therefore saved of all time are saints.

But we're going to distinguish between church saints and saints of the tribulation. Are saints of the tribulation going to be raptured? No, not going to happen. are saints of the Tribulation Period in Christ. We are not given a lot of positional truth about saints of the Tribulation Period, but there's no evidence that they are in Christ. That appears to be uniquely of the Church Age. We have been baptized into Christ, that's Romans chapter 6, 1 Corinthians 10 verse 2, the Jews were baptized into who? Moses. They were baptized into Moses, we have been baptized into Christ.

We'll be taken out of here and we don't have any indication that those during tribulation period are in Christ. Do we have an indication that they are not? Just like we don't know about the Holy Spirit. We're not given information. We have lots of positional truth given to us. We don't have information about what is the position of those who are around after the rapture. We're just not given much. Let me ask this question. Why would we not be given information about that? Because we're going to be out of here.

One is we're going to be out of here, so we don't need to know what their position is. Is it possible for them to get revelation during that time about their position? And by what means could they get revelation during that time about their position? One is you've got 144,000 single Jewish males who are stomping around the earth and they're sealed and untouchable.

And then you have two witnesses who are prophesying for the first three and a half years. You have a gospel angel. It appears the gospel angel's main job is presenting the gospel, and including especially the gospel of the kingdom. And so you have several means of revelation to those people. How about during the millennial kingdom? What means of revelation will they have?

Well, Christ is just going to be here. Christ himself will be here, right? Will we be there? Yes. Yes, right? So there will be means of revelation for those people. We don't need to know those things for ourselves, because we're told about ourselves. Yes?

That's a mystery. What's that? That's a mystery that hasn't been revealed. Yeah, it's not been revealed, but it could very well be revealed. I would think it would be revealed to them at that time. Yeah, they will have revealed to them what they need.

Right. And the tribulation is seven very intense years, so the saints are probably, what they need to know is already revealed, which is, it's going to be a short time, just hang on. Right. I mean, basically, that's what they're going to need to know when everything blows up, literally.

Yeah, there are periods of time, and that's going to be one of them, where people are just running for their lives. And really, you think about a lot of the reformers, a lot of them were in that position where, you know, we're going to protest against the Catholic Church, but if you're running for your life, it's hard to develop the fine points in your theology. Okay, so let's move on here. Then we're going to take full advantage of John's amazing consistency. Christ is called the Lamb 30 times using the exact same word every time.

In the book of Revelation, And a related word is used in John 1.29.36 where John the Baptist says, Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. By the way, that takes away doesn't mean it goes away. It means to lift it up and take it off of us, the other half of that being, to take it upon himself. But the word Lamb, it's interesting, here is Christ who has immense power. But the word John uses for lamb is the smallest lamb. The little lamb. Isn't that amazing? The little lamb. The one who, Revelation chapter 1, constantly loving us. Constantly loving us. John is the only one that understood that or wrote about it.

It's because he may have been in the priestly position. And that may very well be. We don't have time to go into it now, but there's actually quite a bit of evidence that John was in line for the priesthood. He and his brother James certainly would have qualified. By the way, was John the Baptist potentially in line for the priesthood? He was, because his father was a priest, right? And his mother was up the line of Aaron. So he actually was very well qualified, but opted not to do that. I don't believe he was in the scene. I don't believe he was in the scene. People have speculated that. I don't believe that's correct.

But he was qualified by bloodline for the priesthood, and I believe there's a lot of evidence that James, the one who died in Acts chapter 12, and John were in line for the priesthood. As a matter of fact, I think at least John's mom and probably his dad, Zebedee, worked to get them connected. Only John writes about Nicodemus, a member of the Sanhedrin, and Joseph of Arimathea is also in there, but only John writes of Nicodemus. So two members of the Sanhedrin.

Peter goes to the courtyard of the high priest, and they won't let him in. Who gets him in? John, because they recognize him. So here's John. He's young, but they've already made efforts to connect him. Here's John in line for the priesthood and well-connected.

He even knows the name of the High Priest's servant, Malchus. And only he mentions the name of the High Priest's servant, whose right ear gets cut off. So he is specially connected. He knows the name of the High Priest, gets into the courtyard because they recognize him. He is almost certainly in line for the priesthood, should he have opted to go there. The same with John the Baptist, who was hypothetically in line for the priesthood and could have done it. He chose to do something else instead. Okay, so now, here's Christ is said to have a sword in his mouth five times. In each case, John uses Greek word for a barbarian's long sword, a ramphaia, a five foot long barbarian battle sword. It was not used like the Makaira. We're going to see the word Makaira when Peter goes and uses the sword to cut off the Malchus right here. That's a Makaira.

That's a short sword that you use like this. And you use it with one hand and you use it with skill. The Ramphaya was swung overhead, just momentum. And you got this kind of helicopter blade. And it's designed to just hack flesh. That's how they used it. It was not used with, you know, you hold this thing five feet out and try to coordinate. It's not happening. This thing is long, it's heavy, and it's this helicopter blade just swinging around. Keep it sharp. It's designed to chop things off. Okay. John is consistent.

He only uses that up to the point where Christ comes again. Does he continue to use the word ramphia out of Christ's mouth once Christ returns? No. Once Christ has returned at his second coming, after that, you don't see the word again. But he uses it five times and he doesn't alternate between one word and the other coming out of Christ's mouth. Very consistent. The phrase loud voice occurs 19 times and a loud voice never comes from someone on the earth. No exceptions. John is just very consistent and he doesn't switch around between synonyms on things. Number 10, Papa page 3. We recognize that there are some things that are clearly spelled out and will not be understood clearly as to their application until the time when they are fulfilled.

People have been forever trying to guess who the Antichrist is. By the way, including Martin Luther, and by the way, including the Franciscans. The Catholic Order of the Franciscans, also trying to guess who the Antichrist is. People have been trying to guess the Antichrist for a long, long time. I've even heard John F. Kennedy. I've heard, you know, the Pope. Henry Kissinger is the Antichrist. Various people are always trying to guess who the Antichrist is. Who's going to need to know who the Antichrist is?

Will we be here? No. We won't be here. So, trying to guess who the Antichrist is ahead of time is a fruitless waste of time. As a matter of fact, he'll be out of here before he even comes to power. That's correct, and so we'll be out of here. We probably won't know who it is, ever, during our lifetimes.

Only the people who begin that tribulation period will say, oh, there's the guy. He makes the treaty, and he's going to do this and this and this, and it's predictable. Okay, so that's a key thing, that there is a time to understand certain things. and trying to guess before its time is beyond fruitless. Now, I'm going to pass over this, here are some things we'll not do in any detail except to say we're not going to try to guess the date of the Rapture, we're not going to try to guess the date of when the Tribulation starts.

By the way, who is going to start the Tribulation period? The Father. How's that going to happen? On earth, what's going to happen? There will be a treaty that Israel can use and rebuild their temple. It will be broken in the middle of the tribulation period. So there's that treaty.

But how does it get started in heaven? God the Father hands over the scroll. This is Revelation chapter 5. Hands over the scroll to the Son, who opens the seals in sequence, one at a time. It in heaven gets initiated at the Father's willing, that it happened, and then the Son follows through, because He's the only one qualified to open the seals. And that's how it gets started. The Father, Jesus said in Acts chapter 1, He's the one that determines times and epochs. It's not even the Son that calls that out. So, am I going to guess it? None of us is going to guess that. Not happening. Not accurately. It's going to be a waste of time. Alright, so we're not going to set dates.

So let's go to the top of page 4. What you'll see there is Nancy says this particular chart is extremely helpful to her because it shows that the book of Revelation alternates between earth and heaven. And it's a declared pattern. The whole book follows this pattern.

And one of the ways it's been said is that Paul writes like a lawyer and like a logician. Since this, therefore this, because of that, and everything is made in logical statements. And the Apostle Paul will write in complexity. He'll pull up big giant words that are three and four part compound words. Paul writes with logic. Because of this, you know, therefore you must reckon. Because of all this identification, therefore you must reckon. John writes like a musician.

He starts off and then he reaches this heavenly crescendo and then it goes back down to earth and then he comes up to this heavenly crescendo again and drops back down. And so one of the things that people get confused about is where is this? Here's the map, folks. This is the map, right there.

You see it right in front of you, there's heaven and earth, it alternates, you know exactly where it alternates. And it shifts up to heaven, it goes down to earth, it shifts up to heaven, it goes down to earth, and you know exactly where you are at every single verse. And it's clear. There's no guessing. Get to chapter 12, there's a sign in heaven. Where? So it's not ambiguous, it's very clear, you know exactly where everything is taking place in the whole book.

That's it. It's real simple. So what often confuses people is this back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, and then you lay it all out. Oh, okay. And as I'm going through the book, I can know exactly where I am, and everything happens either in heaven or on earth. Any thoughts, questions on that? Piece of cake.

Alright, so now the next one is just kind of the chapter outline, and in some cases we've grouped them, and what you see is the first three chapters are addressing the church, And chapters 2 and 3 are the messages to the churches. By the way, the messages to the churches, are those relevant to us? Yes, they are. It's written to churches.

And how do we apply what's in those letters? Whoever has an ear, and your name isn't Malchus, right? He has one ear. So anyway, whoever has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. Are you part of the church? So the Spirit has said something, so one of the things we'll do with that is look at it and say, okay, there's seven different churches, what applies to me? If Jesus were to write a letter to Holly Hills, what would he say? If he were to write a letter to me, like those, what would he say? So there's church application, there's personal application. husband and wife and family application in the midst of that.

So then in chapters 4 and 5 it's back on the heavenly scene, remember up and down, it's back on the heavenly scene and we see that the rapture has already taken place. That's why we put rapture in there. People are looking for revelation to describe the rapture and it's not there. but the rapture has already happened.

Let me give you a quick example. In the messages to the seven churches, at the promises to the overcomers, they're told you get a crown, you get a robe, you get a throne. 24 elders there on the heavenly scene, what do they have? They get a crown, same word, a robe, and a throne. So the rapture has already taken place. Don't look for the rapture. And when the invitation to John has come up here, that's not the rapture. Some pre-tribulation rapture people have thought so. But the same words are used with the two witnesses.

Come up here. As you step through it, what we see is the tribulation period extends from chapter 6 to chapter 19, where Christ comes again. And then we have the Millennial Kingdom, chapter 20, and the White Throne Judgment. And then chapters 21 and 22 are the New Heavens and New Earth. Not the present ones. What's going to happen to the present heavens and earth?

It's done away with. Peter describes it as the Atomos, the elements melt. Right? The elements melt. John describes it as a scroll getting rolled up. But this present heavens and earth, this is all going to be gone. It could be gone as soon as 1,007 years from now. And I would be happy with that. So it's going to be gone. This present heavens and earth It completely disappeared off the scene.

And there will be a new heaven and a new earth, and chapters 21 and 22 describe that. No more sun, why? Because God, we won't need it, God is going to be the light. What's the source of light? God. Yeah, God himself and Christ the Lamb. And by the way, Christ is the Lamb all the way to the end.

We'll be at a place where there'll be no more sorrow or mourning or crying or pain, but we'll recognize He paid the price for me that I could never pay. Thank God I don't have to pay it. He paid a price for me. We will recognize that eternally and we'll be forever grateful that He paid the price I couldn't pay.

So this is the sweeping outline, graphically, of the book of Revelation, keeping in mind it also goes from heaven to earth, and keeping in mind these ten principles. So what we'll do next time is we'll take Revelation chapter 1 verses 9 through 20 to get some examples of how this gets implemented.

You know, when you see Christ has eyes like fire and hair like wool, and he looks like some sort of a hippie freak, you know? And so you have this description that's like, wow, man, this guy is really weird looking, right? And he's got this five foot long barbarian battle sword hanging out of his mouth, right? So you see this just weird description. A guy that if you actually literally saw him, you would say, man, get me away from this fella. And yet, what John is doing, we'll see, is Jewish description, things out of the Old Testament.

And we're going to find out one more thing, and that is literal interpretation through the book of Revelation will mean it's sequential. Except for chapters 12-14, and I'll show you why. So when we meet next week, hold on to these. Next week we'll hold on to these and we'll go through chapter 1 verses 9 through 20 and see examples of how this gets implemented. And we'll also see, here's why we interpret the book of Revelation sequentially except for chapters 12, 13, and 14. Otherwise everything else is sequential.

Questions? Questions? Comments? Thoughts? Inspirations? Exasperations? Yes? I guess you said that James and John were in the priestly line. Would that be one of the reasons that you're congregating them? That's a very good question. Because what I see is, OK, here is their mother going around making sure her sons are connected. And you can imagine that same kind of mindset would explain why John is able to get into the high priest's courtyard. And Peter can't by himself. But they recognize John. who's probably still a teenager.

And here's John who uniquely writes about Nicodemus, including when Nicodemus tried to stand up for Jesus early in the Gospel of John. Why would he know about that? Uniquely. And there are other things as you go through the Gospel of John, you look at it and you say, oh, John knows some things the others don't, including here's the high priest's servant's name. The others write about the ear getting cut off, but only John knows the high priest's servant's name. Only John, a short time later, gets into the high priest's courtyard by facial recognition. Oh, we know who you are.

And so your question really comes down to, at very least, James and John's mother. made efforts to make sure that her sons were well connected. And so her asking, can this one sit on the right or the left? That's right in line with all the other connections that you see in the Gospel of John, where it is quite apparent that John is very connected, and he writes about things, even things that are said among the Sanhedrin. And he's not on the Sanhedrin yet, right? But he knows. He is so well connected that he knows and can write uniquely about things that happen and people who are among the Sanhedrin that nobody else writes about.

Yeah? Well, that makes sense because they knew John, but they didn't know Peter, but they wanted to know who Peter was. Yeah. That's why a few people asked him, well, weren't you with him too? Yeah. Oh, and here's one other thing. And John writes that one of the guys who asked Peter was a relative of Malchus. Isn't that interesting? And he knows that. So John is a guy who's very well connected. Even to recognize, OK, this guy's name is Malchus. And one of the guys who asked Peter is a relative of Malchus.

The Gospel of John is so much different relative to the writing style and everything else in the other three Gospels. It also shows that John is really more focused on, I think, the spiritual aspect of Christ. Believing. Believing is very much emphasized in the Gospel of John. It just says so much about the Book of John and why it's so clear and concise. seemingly simple, but not profound. John writes with an understanding of many things that the other authors don't seem to have. Isn't it interesting that if you have a new believer If you're going to take him to a book in the Bible, generally it's to the book of John.

John's a good place to start. Nancy and I, I don't think either one of us have the gift of evangelism, but if we have an opportunity to sit down with somebody like that, we take them through the gospel of John. Usually by the third chapter, if they're going to be saved, they are. You're right. Yes?

So Paul and John would have had some interaction I'm assuming, even though Paul would have been older, John would have been younger, if they were both either in the line of the priesthood or the pharisee. Paul wouldn't be. Well, no, but Paul was in the pharisaical line, which means they would have had to have some interaction. He was on the side of Benjamin, but he did claim to be a Pharisee, right? Yes, so it seems like they would at least have had some interconnectedness around the temple and the law and those sorts of things. By the way, Paul was a Pharisee. and John had more Sadducee connections.

John had more Sadducee connections, which is going to come out. We're going to introduce on Sunday morning, a couple weeks from now, John is recording some Sadducee insights, including the Pharisees celebrated their Passover on Thursday night of crucifixion week and the Sadducees celebrated their Passover on Friday night.

They didn't believe in a resurrection. That's just one of the reasons why I'm going to tell you from noon till about six and even into later hours The Sadducees were going to have the worst day of their life. They were going to be freaked out, miserable. It was going to be a horrible Passover.

Really, really awful. We'll get to that in a couple of weeks here. Do you think that's why John put so much emphasis on the Lamb? Really, it is astounding when you start to put it together. They're going to have a horrible day. They're going to be freaked out, way beyond uncomfortable, before the day is over. And it's going to start at noontime.

Where do I find Christ's line and John the Baptist's line in scripture? Christ's line is given in an outline form in Matthew chapter 1, and Christ's line is given through Mary, because Matthew is Joseph's genealogy, and it's been doctored, shortened up. Luke gives a more exhaustive genealogy through Mary. And that's in Luke chapter 3 that he gives that genealogy.

Yes? One last thought. It's really interesting that what we said about John and Hunter is so different. And then you got John for second and third. And the fact that Mary was living with him. Can you imagine the insights that he was given just by that association and that household. Can you imagine John sitting there saying, really? Really? It's one of the things that when I was over in Israel, in order to avoid just being a huge chatterbox, I had to kind of decide what I pointed out. Here's Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane and these soldiers come to arrest him. And he could look over and say, guys, look. You guys are really stupid.

Because up behind me here, when I come again, I'm going to come there. That's after I ascend from this mountain right up above us here. And see this little valley between here and the temple? The Antichrist is going to get killed right there. you know, and to look at that, and I'm going to come back, and I'm going to speak with the sword of my mouth, and everybody's going to be vaporized. And that'll be it. And see that gate? That gate's going to be blocked, Ezekiel 44 verses 1-3, it's going to be blocked, but I'm going to open it miraculously.

I mean, so there's all kinds of things that I'm sure he saw. Nazareth, by the way, overlooks the Valley of Armageddon, you know, Armageddon. It overlooks it. So imagine, here's Jesus. At one point, we visited Nazareth Village, which has a watchtower. And Jesus probably spent time in that watchtower. That would have been his duty as a part of the town, was to overlook that watchtower. And he probably spent time right in that watchtower.

But you look out from there, and there's the Valley of Megiddo right there. And he knows what's going to happen. Yes. So my understanding is correct. So John would have been about Tristan's age. So let's say 19 through 21-ish, maybe? Yeah, probably late teens. Late teens. Okay, so approximately Tristan's age.

Then when Christ is hanging on the cross, he says, okay, John, you're going to take care of my mother. Right. So this is a very young man who is going to take care of Mary. Yeah, but he understood the duty. Essentially, Jesus did too. So he handed, but then John lives to be into well, yeah. Yeah, he probably died about 96.

Anyway, I just connected that the one apostle who had the longest life also was given over the care of earthly life. And that meant he had a unique role with respect to the rest of the Disciples, right? Unique role. Which is also interesting because Christ had other brothers and sisters. Yes, he did and we know the names of the four brothers and we have names by a not quite as reliable tradition, at least two of the sisters.

Huh. Yep. It's also interesting, he's on the inner circle. Yes, that's right. What one apostle got the most attention? From Christ? Peter. And after that, what was the next circle? Peter, James, and John was the next circle. And then the others relatively spread somewhat evenly. But yeah, that was the pattern.

Okay, we've run out of time, so let me pray and we'll close. Thank you, Lord, for your word. As we see things, you have put such clarity in the book of Revelation, and we're so glad for that, and we know that it's because you wanted us to understand these things. And thank you for the 150 verses that are there on the heavenly scene. How wonderful, how marvelous to get a description of what this will be like for us. And we just give you thanks. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.