Postcard from Patmos: Prologue (Part 2)

Transcript

JRS 2
07/03/2022
Postcards from Patmos: Prologue (part 2)
Revelation 1:4-8
Jesse Randolph

Well, just a few days before we loaded up our moving van to get out here to Nebraska, I had the great opportunity to go to my alma mater, The Masters Seminary, one last time. And to visit a man who has the profound influence upon me, John MacArthur. And in having this chance to briefly meet with him, I went with the intention of gleaning any pastoral wisdom he might be willing to give me. About succeeding a man like Gil Rugh after so many years of faithful ministry here at Indian Hills, and behind this pulpit. I don’t think I’ll ever forget Dr. MacArthur’s advice. He said it simply, he said, “Preach the word, and honor Gil.” Pretty short meeting, preach the word and honor Gil. As I’ve said already a few times up behind this pulpit over the past few weeks, I intend to do both of those things, with God’s help and of course, through your prayers.

But then Dr. MacArthur pivoted and asked me a question. He asked me a question that any preacher asks another preacher, “What are you planning to preach? What are you planning to open up to the people of God at Indian Hills?” And when John MacArthur asks you what you’re planning to preach, even though you know that all of God’s word is God’s word, and all of God’s word is right for preaching, you get a little nervous. I was no exception. And I told him. I told him about this “Postcards from Patmos” series, and how I planned, right out of the gate to go through these seven letters of the churches in Revelation 2 and 3. Dr. MacArthur affirmed that choice. He said that sounds like a wonderful idea.

But then he asked me this question, he said, “You’re planning to go through Revelation 2 and 3. How much time are you going to give to Revelation 1, before you jump into Revelation 2 and 3?” I told him, “You know, I’ll probably spend about a week in chapter 1, just kind of hit the highlights of John’s vision of the glorified Christ, before I get into the meat of chapters 2 and 3.” That’s when Dr. MacArthur paused. He had kind of that ‘furrowed-brow-like-stare-at-his-desk’ kind of moment. It was awkward for a minute while he just stood there and chewed and contemplated. And then he gave me this half-smile. Then he said this, he said “You should think about staying longer in Revelation 1. The people of God at Indian Hills are going through a lot of change with this transition, from being under Gil’s leadership to being under yours. And what you need to do is give them more of Christ.” I’ll never forget those words. “You need to give them more of Christ.” Those words, for me, were like a cruise missile of conviction, that hit their intended target, my heart, because MacArthur was right. I need to make sure, on the front end of this series, but I also need to make sure that the front end of my ministry here, that I give you more of Christ. More of our majestic and exalted and supreme Savior. He needs to be presented to you, in the multifaceted ways that He’s given to us in Revelation 1, before we dive into His assessment of these ancient churches in Revelation 2 and 3.

So, we’re going to continue on in our study of Revelation 1 today. With Dr. MacArthur’s advice, we’re going to extract, Lord willing, more Christological observations, that we can glean from these 5 verses that we’ll be in here this morning. As I, with God’s help, and through His word, give you more of Christ.
Last week, we studied the prologue to the book of Revelation, here in verses 1-3, this week we’re moving into verses 4-8, as we look at John’s greeting to the seven churches. Which is couched in words of doxology, inflamed worship. This eruption of worship that John goes through, as he considers our subject of study this morning, the Lord Jesus Christ. In these five verses, we’re going to see John says things under the direction of the Holy Spirit, which give us more information about the person, the nature, the attributes of the second person of the trinity. And we’re going to see John being fueled in his worship. And that’s a charge to us, to be fueled in our worship. A worship that’s sincere. A worship that’s pure. And a worship that’s rightly measured by the word of God, as we worship our God and our King.

Last week we pulled out five Christological truths from verses 1-3 of Revelation 1. And you might remember some of them. We saw that the Lord reveals Himself. We saw that He relates to other members of the trinity. We saw that He is God. We saw that He is Master over all. And we saw that He expects and blesses obedience.

Today, as we move into John’s greeting here in verses 4-8, we’re going to highlight six more truths. Six more Christological truths about the person, the nature and the attributes of our Lord. As we’re about to see, these are these six attributes. (By the way if you want to jot them down really quickly.)
He is the Giver of Grace and Provider of Peace. That’s one. He is the Davidic Heir, that’s two. He Loves Us. He has Appointed Us. He is Coming Again. And He is the Fulfilment of All Things. With that, if you’re not there already, please turn in with me in your bibles to Revelation 1:4, where we’re going to see John’s greeting, these words of praise, this doxology.

Verse 4, “John to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace, from Him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To Him who loves us, and released us from our sins by His blood, and He has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father; to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen. Behold, He is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him; and all the tribes of the earth will mourn over Him. So it is to be. Amen. ‘I am the Alpha and the Omega’, says the Lord God, ‘who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.’ ”

See, the book of Revelation is fascinating for so many reasons. One of the reasons it is so fascinating and rich, is it ties together so many different genres of literature. You know, last week we saw a prologue. Next week, we’ll see John giving his personal and true historical account of his vision of the ascended and glorified Christ. In weeks to come, we’ll see Christ’s individual letters to each of the seven churches. And of course, the remainder of the book, past Revelation 3, is filled with prophetic and apocalyptic insights.

In today’s text though we’re looking primarily, I’ve said it already a couple of times, at a doxology. A written expression of worship, which is packaged here for us, in the form of a letter. And in traditional letter style, at least in these days, the writer of the letter, is identified here first, there in verse 4, “John.” The writer of this work, the writer of this book, in human terms, is John. As in the apostle John. The author of the Gospel of John. The author of 1st, 2nd and 3rd John. The disciple whom Jesus loved. The former son of Thunder, whose sharp edges had sort of been rounded off as the years went on, as he matured into a respected and revered elder statesman in the early church. Now, there are of course those who, in the spirit of postmodern higher criticism of the bible, have attempted to debate that very truth, that John is the author, humanly speaking, of the book of Revelation. We’re not going to enter that debate. Because, frankly, there is nothing to debate, because the bible is clear. And the bible is self-authenticating. The bible is self-evident and absolutely true. And the bible says that John is the author of this book. So, we’re going to go with what the bible says, rather than entertain the opinions of scripture-denying, theological liberals. John wrote the book of Revelation.

Next, we’re told the audience to whom this letter is written. It says, “John to the seven churches that are in Asia.” John here is referring to seven churches in the Roman province of Asia Minor, modern-day western Turkey. That would have been his immediate audience to whom he was writing. And these were seven actual churches, located in the cities of Ephesus and Smyrna and Thyatira and Sardis and Philadelphia and Laodicea. These cites weren’t mythical places. These cities are not representing different phases of church history. No, these are actual cities and actual places, with actual churches. With real sinners, just like you and me, who were once dead in their sin. Filled with real sinners who were once enslaved to the deeds of the flesh. Filled with real sinners who had repented and believed in the gospel of grace. But, to then had joined this local community of believers. With the joy of their salvation undergirding them. With the flesh occasionally still attacking them. With sins still clinging to them. And the hope of eternal life fueling them.

But the question often arises, why these seven churches? Why not other seven churches? Are these the only churches of Asia Minor at this time? Weren’t there other churches that John could have addressed in these letters? Well, no. These aren’t the only churches that existed in Asia Minor at this time. There were, we can historically prove this, more than seven churches in this region, in this day. And certainly, there were more than seven churches that John could have written to. But these seven churches, the seven churches we’ll get to in the weeks to come, were representative. They represent typical conditions in the churches of John’s day, at the time that he wrote these letters. They, in fact, represent typical churches in the day in which we live, thousands of miles away, and a couple thousand years after these letters were written. If you take all that’s written in these seven letters, and put them all together, what you’ll see, and I’ll say this many times in this series, is this composite sketch of the church age, the churches at large throughout the church age. In all of their beauty, but also with all of their blemishes.

So, after identifying himself as John, and after identifying his audience, the seven churches there in Asia, John goes on to give his formal greeting to these churches, with these words, “Grace to you and peace.” Grace to you and peace. And in those words, in that greeting, we see our first Christological truth, this morning. Christological Truth #1, Our Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ, is the Giver of Grace and the Provider of Peace. “Grace to you and peace.” Here with those words, “grace to you and peace,” they just get so familiar to us, don’t they? They kind of roll off the tongue so easily. Ministries are named after these words. But for those who are students of scripture, and familiar with this concept, we know that this is not just John that uses this formulation. Paul used this formulation throughout just about all of his letters. Romans 1:7, 1 Corinthians 1:3, 2 Corinthians 1:3, Galatians 1:3, Ephesians 1:2, Philippians 1:2, Colossians 1:2, 1 Thessalonians 1:1, 2 Thessalonians 1:2, Philemon 3. Those are all places where Paul uses the similar formulation, grace to you and peace. In fact, the only place does not use that formulation, would be in his three letters to pastors, Timothy and Titus, who he addresses directly. But it wasn’t just Paul who used this formulation, grace to you and peace. Peter used a similar form of greeting in 1 Peter 1:2, and in 2 Peter 1:2. The point is, that John was using here a common and recognized form of greeting. But what did he mean by it? What was the significance of these words, grace to you and peace? What is the significance today? What can we glean from those very words, here in the year 2022?

Well, let’s start with the word ‘grace.’ Now, when we see the word ‘grace,’ “charis” in Greek, it has sort of a familiarity to it. And we automatically think that it must have always had Christian roots and Christian origins and a Christian derivation. But ‘grace’ is not a term that originated with the bible or with Christianity. ‘Grace’ is actually a borrowed term, meaning it was lifted from the common vernacular of the day. ‘Grace’, that word, would actually been a fairly common greeting for believers and unbelievers alike, in the marketplace even, to exchange with each other. It would have been something like, ‘Hey, how’s it going?’ ‘Hey, how are you, how ya doing today?’ Would be the ‘grace’ greeting of this pre-biblical or pre-New Testament world. It was just a common greeting. But by the time you get to the book of Revelation, right around AD 95, so six decades after the resurrection and ascension of our Lord, ‘grace’ wasn’t just something you just said to anybody anymore. It wasn’t just a throw away phrase, or a throw away common marketplace greeting. It was now recognized as stating something about a distinctive spiritual benefit, that Christians alone had received. Titus 2:11-12 – “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus.” That was the significance of the word ‘grace’ at this point. For the grace of God has appeared. So, for someone like John here, to say ‘grace’ to these churches. To use the word ‘grace’ in his greeting to these churches, and by extension us, was an acknowledgement that they, and by extension we sitting over in Nebraska many centuries later, have a distinctive and position and placement in Christ. So, that’s ‘grace’.

The next part of his greeting is peace. He says, “Grace to you and peace.” Peace is “eirini” in Greek, “shalom” in Hebrew. This would have been a common form of greeting among Jews. The way the average Jewish person would have greeted each other in these days would be shalom. A word that had rich meaning and significance. A word that is intended and designed to wish blessing upon the whole well-being and whole nature of the person that was in front of you. This wasn’t like saying, ‘hey’ or ‘what’s up’ to somebody that you ran into on the street. Rather, when you greeted somebody with the word ‘shalom,’ you were saying, ‘I wish for you peace’, ‘I wish for you well-being’, ‘I wish for you even prosperity’. For your whole person, for your whole being, for your health, your spirituality, even materially. It had a much broader connotation.

But again, by the time John wrote this greeting in Revelation 1, to the seven churches in Asia Minor, there was another aspect of peace that he now had in view. And that aspect of peace was centered around the death of Jesus Christ. The death of Christ had fulfilled the Old Testament expectations that one day a Messiah would come. And one day that Messiah would be offered as a sacrifice. And one day, because of that sacrifice, there would be peace between God and man. So, when you greeted somebody with peace in John’s day, you were acknowledging the peace that Jesus Christ had made between God and man. You were acknowledging the fact that Jesus had indeed made peace, Colossians 1:20, by “the blood of His cross.” You were acknowledging that God had indeed looked on Him, and pardoned you. You were indeed acknowledging that He is the ultimate peacemaker. You were acknowledging what Ephesians 2:14 says, that “He is our peace.” And you are acknowledging that the only way to understand true peace in this life and in this world is to have peace with God through Jesus Christ. That’s Romans 5:1, “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

So, with this context in mind, John here says, “Grace to you and peace” to these dear brothers and sisters in the Lord, there in these seven cities. He was more than just greeting them. This was a profound statement of brotherhood in the Lord. But it’s important to note here, now, while Christ, God the Son, is our source of grace and peace. That’s what’s being said here. It’s important to note that grace and peace are not sourced exclusively in the second person of the trinity. Grace and peace are sourced in the first and third persons of the trinity as well. For that, look at verse 4, as we continue on. He says, “Grace to you and peace, from Him who is and who was and who is to come; and from the seven spirits who are before His throne,” and into verse 5, “and from Jesus Christ.” Here we see, here I’m going to make a case, that grace and peace comes from all three persons of the Godhead. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit. All three members of the trinity, are identified in this passage, as being our source of grace and peace. We can glean this trinitarian root of grace and peace from these three prepositional phrases we see here in verses 4 and 5. “from Him who is and who was and who is to come; from the seven Spirits who are before His throne; and from Jesus Christ.”

Let’s take these one by one. First there is the phrase here in verse 4, “from Him who is and who was and who is to come.” This is a reference to God the Father. We see a similar reference to God the Father in Revelation 4:8 which says, “And the four living creatures, each one of them having six wings, are full of eyes around and within; and day and night they do not cease to say, ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God. The Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come’.” God the Father is Him who is. God the Father is Him who was. And God the Father is Him who is to come. God the Father is eternal and continuing in His existence. He is before the present time. He’s in the present moment. And He’s already in, as good as already happening, in future location. He’s everywhere. In all points of time. As least as we conceive of the idea of time. The Father occupies all the space that is ‘the was’, that is ‘the is’ and that is ‘to be.’

Now, you might be sitting there saying, “I get it, God the Father is ‘the was.’ He is the Ancient of Days, ‘the was,’ from eternity past. I get it. He is the one who eternally is. He’s not changing, He’s not changed by time. But from His perspective, He is eternally existing in a single, ever-present moment. But what do you mean by saying that God the Father is the one who is to come? Isn’t God the Son the one who is coming back? Are you, Jesse, confusing or conflating the first and second members of the trinity’?” And the answer to that question would be, “no.” We know and we affirm that “God is spirit,” John 4:24. We know and affirm that it will be God the Son who one day breaks the clouds as He returns to earth with His raptured church, placing His foot on the very hill from which He ascended. But we also know that Jesus Himself said, in John 14:9, “He who has seen Me has [also] seen the Father.” Meaning that when Christ returns to rule and to reign, the Father will be returning to rule and reign in a sense. And for that matter, the Spirit will be returning to rule and reign in a sense. And that’s because each of the three members of the Godhead share in a single divine will. And that means, if the second coming of our Lord, will in fact be a trinitarian phenomenon, with all three members of the triune Godhead, though it is Christ’s foot that hits the Mount of Olives, being joined inseparably in that event.

Robert Thomas, in his commentary on Revelation, mentions this, he says, “Though two separate persons, they, meaning God the Father and God the Son, along with the Holy Spirit, are nevertheless one God. The Son possesses equal dignity with the Father. And when the Son returns, He will come as the representative of the Father. So, there is a legitimate sense in which it will be the advent of the Father also.” So, grace to you and peace come from God our Father.

Next, we’re going to see that grace and peace come from God the Spirit. Look at the end of verse 4, “and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne.” Now, let’s just state the obvious, this text does not say, “and from the Holy Spirit”. If it did say that the job of exegetes and scholars and pastor and preachers would be a lot easier, if that’s what it said. But no, it says “and from the seven Spirits.” Now, there have been two major views, historically presented, through the church age, as to what that language, “and from the seven Spirits,” means. One view takes those seven spirits to be, supernaturally created beings, namely, angels. The other view takes the position that the seven Spirits refer to the third person of the trinity, the Holy Spirit. I take the latter view, that this is referring to the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Godhead.

Now, that ‘angels’ interpretation, I have to say, is not totally out of left field. Because, angels, after all, are mentioned in many places throughout the book of Revelation. But the main reason I go with this interpretation, that it’s the Holy Spirit, not angels, is that angels are never found in scripture, as ministering grace and peace in a blessing formulation, like we see here in Revelation 1. Nor could it be said that angels are the originators or the givers of grace and peace. If angels did give grace and peace, what that would do is put them on an equal level with both God the Father and God the Son. In our introduction it would be like saying, “Grace to you and peace, from God the Father, God the Son, and the angels,” which wouldn’t make a lot of sense. It would actually contradict a lot of what scripture teaches about angels having been created by God. Not being on par with God. So, primarily for that reason, I reject the angelic view of the meaning of these words, “the seven Spirits”. And I go instead, with this being a reference to the Holy Spirit. God the Spirit, along with God the Father and God the Son is the divine source of this greeting and the divine source of both grace and peace.

Now, when I state my conclusion on that so baldly, I know it doesn’t answer one obvious question that must be rolling around through at least some of your minds. Which is this: if this in verse 4 is a reference to the singular Holy Spirit of God, why is there a reference here to “seven,” plural, “Spirits, who are before His throne?” There have been some commentators who have pointed back to Isaiah 11, and specifically verse 2, as evidence for this being the Holy Spirit. Isaiah 11:2 is where we see this listing of what some have called, ‘the sevenfold designation of the Spirit.’ And some say, “Well, that’s the sevenfold designation of the Spirit. That’s another example of the Spirit being referred to in a sevenfold way, when it is the singular Holy Spirit.” The only problem with that approach, is that in the Hebrew translation of Isaiah 11:2, there are actually only six designations of the Spirit, not seven. We see, He is the Spirit of wisdom, understanding, counsel, strength, knowledge and the fear of the Lord; that’s six, not seven. Now, in the later Septuagint translation, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament, which came centuries later, we do see seven designations given to the Holy Spirit. But in the original earlier Hebrew manuscripts, it’s only six. So, I would argue that that supposed link between Isaiah 11:2 and Revelation 1:4 is actually broken.

A stronger passage in support of this position, that “the seven Spirits” of Revelation 1:4 is a reference to the Holy Spirit, is actually found in Zechariah 4. In fact, if you would, flip over with me to that book, to Zechariah 4. If you’re new here, if you’re looking for Zechariah, start in the gospel of Matthew, kind of midway in your bibles, hang a left to Malachi, hang one more left to the book of Zechariah, chapter 4. I won’t read the whole thing, but I’ll just kind of summarize what we see here, as your eyes look at the page. In Zechariah 4, we have this angelic vision that was given the prophet Zechariah. And in this vision, we see in verse 2, there are seven lamps and seven spouts belonging to each of the lamps, presented in this vision that the prophet receives. And initially the prophet doesn’t know what he’s seeing in this vision. He’s confused by what is being given to him by way of this direct revelation. And you see that confusion in verse 5, Zechariah 4:5, it says, “So the angel who was speaking with me, answered and said to me, ‘Do you not know what these are?,’ ” speaking of the lamps and the spouts, and the prophet answers, “And I said, ‘No, my Lord’.” And then in verse 6, the angel of Yahweh continues and clarifies and says, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel, saying, ‘Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’” capitol ‘S’, singular, “says the Lord of hosts.” In other words, what we have here, is the angel himself, linking the seven lampstands and the seven spouts to the singular Spirit of God. Similarly, I would argue, what John is doing in Revelation 1:4, you can flip back over there, is linking the “seven Spirits” language to the Holy Spirit of God.

So, tying it all together, grace and peace come from God the Father, the one who is, and the one who was, and the one who is to come. Grace and peace come from the Holy Spirit. And now we come to verse 5, look at just the first four words of verse 5, Revelation 1:5, “And from Jesus Christ.” That one is a lot more easy to interpret! “And from Jesus Christ.” One tricky thing here though, is Jesus, of course, is usually named second whenever you see some kind of trinitarian formulation. God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit. Here though, we see Him listed as third. And that’s not problematic, He’s not being described as ‘lesser than’ here. Rather, what’s happening here is He’s being listed third because all that is to be said after this is about Him. It makes sense that He would be listed third here, to sort of bridge all that is going to be said in the verses that follow. HeSo, to summarize what we’ve covered so far, is that Christ is the giver of grace and Christ is the provider of peace. And He is, in conjunction with God the Father and God the Spirit. That’s our Christological Truth #1. He is the giver of grace and the provider of peace.

Now, we need to get going. We need to move. Christological Truth #2, He is the Davidic Heir.
Let’s keep working through verse 5 here, where Jesus Christ, the glorified God-Man, is referenced in these three ways: He’s the Faithful Witness, He’s the Firstborn of the Dead, and He’s the Ruler of the Kings of the Earth. Now, each of those descriptive titles can be traced back to Psalm 89, which in its entirety, is a divinely inspired commentary on the David Covenant of 2 Samuel 7:8-16. Psalm 89 in its totality is extolling the promises that God made to David, that He would set a ruler on his throne forever. The Davidic heir, that ruler of course, we know, the Messiah, would be Jesus Christ. And who is the book of Revelation all about? Jesus Christ. So, it makes sense that John would trace back to Psalm 89 here as his source of illustration.

He starts by describing Jesus Christ, as we’ve seen here, as “the faithful witness.” That’s an allusion to Psalm 89:37 which reads, “It shall be established forever like the moon, and the witness in the sky is faithful.” Faithful witness applied to our Lord. Those words, “faithful witness,” call to mind what happened in John 18:37, where Jesus during His earthly ministry had that encounter with Pontius Pilate. And Pilate asked the question, “So You are a king?” To which our Lord replies, “You say correctly that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world,” and then He says, “to testify to the truth.” In this way, the Lord Jesus Christ is the faithful witness. The faithful one who testifies to the truth. The one who came to testify perfectly to the truth. And the one who is known, as John 14:6 says, “the truth”. He is the faithful witness.

Not only that though, as we keep on moving through verse 5, John mentions here that He is “the firstborn of the dead.” “The firstborn of the dead.” Again, that’s an allusion all the way back to Psalm 89. Psalm 89:27 specifically, which says, “I also shall make him My firstborn”. Now, applied to Jesus here, this is not referring to birth order. That’s how we, of course, in our world, in our state, think of firstborn in our day. No. Such a conception of Him being firstborn in terms of birth order would have no application to the Lord of glory. Who though in His humanity, was born into this world in a body of flesh, but otherwise had no beginning, no birth as the eternal Son of God. Rather, ‘firstborn” here in verse 5, refers to a place of prominence. It signifies the greatest. The one who is in the highest place. That’s how John would have conceived of this idea of firstborn. That’s how Paul conceived of the idea in Colossians 1:18, where that very term is applied to Christ. Colossians 1:18 says, “He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything.”

Our Lord is not only the firstborn though. It says here in verse 5, He is “the firstborn of the dead.” Others, of course, have physically died and then physically been raised back to life, only to die physically again. Lazarus would be a good example of that. No one else though, has ever died, been raised back to life, and then been given their new glorified body. That distinction belongs to Jesus alone. So, applied here to verse 5, that simply means He’s the firstborn from the dead in the sense that He is the example to us of what our resurrection bodies will look like. What they will be like. He’s the only one who has received a resurrection body thus far. And so, He’s, our forerunner. He is the first fruits of what we can expect.

Next it says, He is not only the faithful witness, He’s not only the firstborn of the dead, but He is “the ruler of the kings of the earth.” “Ruler of the kings of the earth” Once again, that’s an allusion or a reference back to Psalm 89. And again, this is Psalm 89:27, which says that the Davidic Messiah shall be “the highest of the kings of the earth.” Of course, when we’re talking about the Son of God, there is a sense in which He is the King of the earth today. As Abraham Kuyper noted way back in the 1880’s, “There’s not a square inch in the whole domain of human existence over which Christ, who is Lord overall, does not exclaim, ‘Mine!’ ” Or more on point is 1 Timothy 6:15 which says that, right now, our Lord is “the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords.”

But what John appears to have in view here when he refers to Christ as the “ruler of the kings of the earth” is something more specific. He’s referring to the one day that Jesus Christ will return to this earth. When He consummates His earthly millennial reign. In fact, turn with me over to, while we’re in the book of Revelation, to Revelation 19, for this vivid picture. Familiar picture I’m sure for all of you, of what this return is going to be like. We’re going to look at Revelation 19:11, as we get this glimpse of Christ coming the second time in all of His glory. Verse 11, “And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses. From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.”

With Christ here, being referred to in Revelation 1:5 as the “ruler of the kings of the earth”, in this sense, the Revelation 19 sense, John winds down his opening greeting to this letter. What we’re going to see, is in the rest of verse 5, all the way through verse 8, with thoughts of the glories of Jesus surely causing his head to spin, John now shifts into this doxology. This spontaneous eruption of praise. Beginning with the words that we see in the second half of verse 5, “To Him who loves us and released us from our sins by His blood.”

Which brings us to our next Christological truth. It’s a simple one. Christological Truth #3, “He Loves Us.” That Christ loves us. “To Him who loves us and released us from our sins by His blood.” The one who is the supreme “ruler of the kings of the earth”. The one who is the “firstborn from the dead.” The one who is the “faithful witness.” He is the one who loves us. We are the objects of His love. And not only that, but here, the word that we see for “love,” “agapointi,” is in the present tense. Meaning, the idea is that His love for us is ongoing and continuing. His love isn’t conditional. His love for us isn’t fickle. His love for us isn’t here today and gone tomorrow. No, He loves us. He loved us from eternity past. Ephesians 1:4-5, “In love He predestined us.” He loves us into eternity future. And in the present, this passage tells us, He loves us now. How comforting are those truths, dear brothers and sisters? To know that the love that the Lord Jesus Christ has for you is ongoing, and active, and uninterrupted. Does that cause you to yawn and think about the potato salad that’s going to be served this afternoon? Or does it cause your jaw to hit the floor? Does it cause you to think, like Paul and his own eruption of praise in Romans 8:38-39 to know that “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us [you] from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus or Lord.” I hope, I truly hope that that truth, if you are a believer in Christ today, causes your heart to soar! As it did for John, clearly in this passage. John Owen once noted that, “We are never nearer Christ than when we find ourselves lost in a holy amazement at His unspeakable love.” He’s absolutely right.

Not only does our Lord love us though. He has, as the rest of this verse tells us in verse 5, He has “released us from our sins by His blood.” Now many, in evangelical churches today, will see this passage about being released, and they will go right to John 8:36. That passage where Jesus is interacting with the Pharisees, and He has to tell them in their stubbornness, “If the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.” Sadly, there are many in our culture, even in the Christian church culture, who will layer their very American way of thinking about ‘freedom’ on top of that passage. They’ll think, not about Jesus’ freeing from sin, but instead they will think about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. They’ll think about ‘God, family and country.’ They’ll think about shooting fireworks out of the back of an F150 while Alan Jackson is blaring through the Kenwoods. They think that must mean what it means to be free in Christ. But that’s not what it means to be free in Christ, friends! No.

To say we are free in Christ, to say we are “released from our sins by His blood”, means we have been freed from the shackles of our sin. And sin was a brutal master, was it not? And having been released from these heavy shackles of sin, the reality is, we have now, if we have trusted in Christ, been made His slaves, His bondservants, His “doulos.” That’s what Paul says in Romans 6:17-18, he says, “But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.” Or again in Romans 6:19 Paul says – “For just as you presented your members as slaves to impurity and lawlessness, resulting in further lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness, resulting in sanctification.” Yes, those of us who have trusted in Christ, have been “released from our sins by His blood” as verse 5 of Revelation 1 notes. In that sense, we have been set free. But note, friends, that we still are slaves. We are slaves who have traded masters. We are no longer slaves to the backbreaking, soul-destroying yoke of sin. Rather, we are slaves to the one who has a gentle and easy yoke, our gracious Master, Jesus Christ. That doesn’t mean that life in Christ is always easy. Some of the things He call us to do and allows us to go through are very difficult. But better to live under the always good, every gracious rulership and authority of Christ, than to live under the anarchy of our own wills. Better to be free as Christ’s slaves, than to be enslaved to cheap or false conception of freedom or liberty.

Continue on in verse 5, the text says that we who have trusted in Christ, have been “released from our sins by His blood.” Now, its important to note, there is nothing mystical or magical or unique in His blood. Rather, His blood represents His death. It was on the cross that the Father punished the Son, so that His wrath would be satisfied. And the door would be opened to receive all of us who would identify with that Substitute, by repenting and trusting in Jesus Christ for forgiveness. It was the death of Christ at Calvary through which redemption was granted us. And the price for our sin was fully and forever paid. It’s through the death of Christ that we have any hope of entering into a right relationship with God. The Lord Jesus loves us. He has “released us,” the text says, “from our sins by His blood.”

The next Christological truth we can glean from this text is coming up here in verse 6. Christological Truth #4, He has Appointed Us. Having been bought by such a gracious Master, we have been set apart, we have been sanctified to do God’s work. Look at verse 6, “and He has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father.” You’ll note that section is bracketed, there is a hyphen at the end of verse 5, and there’s a hyphen at the midpoint of verse 6. That’s the translator’s way of saying, this is like a parenthetical, a mild interruption, in the ordinary flow of thought. But its not to minimize what’s being said. Its actually to emphasize what’s being said. And what’s being said, is that the Lord Jesus Christ has “made” us something. In fact, He’s “made” us two things the text says. He’s made us collectively “to be a kingdom,” and He’s made us individually to be “priests to His God and Father.” Now, John here is clearly borrowing from Exodus 19:6, where God the Father said to the Israelites at Sinai, “you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” But in John’s context, living when he lived, and in our context, living where we live and when we live on this side of the cross -- what he is simply speaking to here is our privileged status as the people of God. In being made “a kingdom of priests”, we are eminently privileged to be a part of the people of God today. But our status as citizens of this kingdom, of which John is speaking here, its going to come to full fruition in the future. Its going to come to full fruition in the future when Christ comes for His literal and physical 1,000-year reign on the earth. The time that the bible describes as the Millennium. When the Lord returns to this earth, after the Rapture, after the Tribulation, He’s returning to this earth to establish a Kingdom in which He will have all power, and all authority, and all autonomy. The Millennial Kingdom will not be marked by voting, or bicameral legislatures, or checks and balances, or otherwise equal bodies of authority. No. The Millennial Reign will be a monarchy, ruled and mediated by Jesus Christ. But because He is holy and because He is righteous, He will rule, and He will reign, in a perfectly holy and righteous way. And as a part of His Kingdom, this Kingdom, we will have the privilege of ruling with Him and under Him as His bondslaves.

The text also says, we’re not only “a kingdom” collectively, we’re also His “priests” individually. Now of course, back in Old Testament times, priestly duties were carried out by specific people, certain members of a certain tribe, who had to approach the Holy of Holies on a certain day of the year. You know, our God is a consuming fire, and there are those who were actually consumed by Him, for not following His in approaching Him. But because of what Christ accomplished in His finished and sufficient work on the cross, we today, who have now trusted in Him for salvation, are now called priests here in Revelation 1:6. That simply means we have no need for any earthly representative. No bishop, no cardinal, no pope, no pastor, no elder, no deacon, to approach God on our behalf. No, the only one who mediates us approaching God the Father is God the Son, who serves as our great high priest and advocate. With God the Spirit, as Romans 8: 26 says, interceding on our behalf. Though our sin patterns were foul. Though our life of sin was flagrant. Though our previous thoughts about God in our old lives were flippant. We who have trusted in Christ, now have the ability to approach the very God of heaven. To have access to Him. Through the love and grace and mercy and peace that’s been extended to us through the death of Christ.

And it’s those truths which lead to these words of praise at the end of verse 6, where John here says, “to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.” Jesus is the object of praise and glory here. Through his pen, what John is doing here, in writing, is falling down, in praise of the one who is our Savior. The one who loves us. The one who died for us to release us from our sins. And the one who will reign one day when He establishes His Kingdom here on earth. To that Jesus, John says, “to Him be glory and the dominion.” And not only that, he says, “forever and ever.” Our Lord is not subject to term limits.

And then John’s doxology here in verse 6, ends with this single, very familiar word, “Amen.” It’s a word we use every day, isn’t it? It’s a word that sometimes we can mistake for meaning “the end.” Or “I’m done now.” Or “Let’s eat.” But in these times, what was meant, was to signify one’s agreement with the truthfulness of what had just been said. In this case, what John has just said about Jesus Christ deserves an ‘amen.’ Meaning, “it’s true,” the way that John has portrayed the glory of Christ, and the weight of His holy being and the way that John has portrayed the dominion of Christ, His strength, His rule and His authority over all the world, both now and in the day to come. So, Christ has appointed us. He has appointed us collectively to be a kingdom it says. He has appointed us individually as priests.

The next Christological truth we can glean, this would be Christological Truth #5, He is Coming Again.
Seemingly out of nowhere, we see these words in verse 7, “Behold, He is coming with the clouds” Having given glory and praise to the Lord Jesus Christ at the end of verse 6, John now here says, really without much by way of transition, “Behold, He is coming with the clouds.” And what John does here, as he launches into his first prophecy concerning the risen and glorified Christ, starting with that word “behold” -- behold at this point, in this time, meant “listen carefully, pay attention, heed what I’m about to say.” And what is it that we are to heed? That “He is coming with the clouds.” This is a very clear reference to a familiar Messianic Old Testament text. Let’s flip real quick over to Daniel 7. This is what John is bringing in here in Revelation 1:7. Daniel 7, we’re just going to look real quickly at verses 13-14, which is the reference here. “I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven one like a Son of Man was coming, and He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which will not pass away. And His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed.” I’d encourage you, one of these days, just measure up the verses that we’re going through today with these verses, and see that the commonalities that is evident, if not just outright obvious, that this is the scripture that John had in mind back in our text, when he was penning his doxology here in verses 4-8.

So, it says, “Behold,” I’m back in Revelation 1:7 now, “Behold, He is coming with the clouds”, and then look what comes next. “And every eye will see Him.” This is a global event. The whole human race will see Him at His second coming. Now, this will be a global return of a global scale. But then we get this qualifier right after that, where it says, “every eye will see Him”, and then, “even those who pierced Him.” That’s drawing back from the book of Zechariah, where we were earlier in this message. Zechariah 12:10, which places special emphasis on those who, at a human level, were responsible for our Lord’s death. There in Zechariah 12:10, it says the “house of David” and “the inhabitants of Jerusalem,” speaking of the Jews of the day “will look on Me whom they have pierced.” Now, note here, this is a special work of God and a special work of the Spirit of God. In Zechariah we’re told that there will be this period of mourning in repentance at the climax of a coming 70th week of Daniel. What we know as the Tribulation, where God will bring about supernaturally, through what He calls in Zechariah 12:10, His “Spirit of grace and supplication”, as Israel comes to realize their guilt in crucifying their own Messiah. It’s a mourning of repentance. Brought about by the grace of God, through the Spirit of God. When the eyes of the people of Israel will be opened, bringing about their salvation at that time.

John moves on to further explain here in verse 7, the coming of the Lord, when he says it will not only be “every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him,” but then he goes on to say, “all the tribes of the earth will mourn over Him.” That’s speaking to a different group of people. Unlike the mourning of repentance that Israel will experience, leading to their salvation, this is referencing the tribes of the earth, the nations of mankind. In other words, all of the world experiencing a mourning of grief at the second coming of Jesus Christ. We see this portrayed in Matthew 24:30, the second coming of Christ at the end of the Tribulation, where it says, “And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory.”

So, the world’s grief, when the Lord returns, will be brought by their own abject sorrow for having rejected the King who is now coming. That worldly grief will be marked by a profound regret for mocking and spitting at the Divine Warrior who is now riding on a white horse. That will be brought about by the realization that it was their own stiff-necked rebellion that placed them at that point where they are now His enemies, and a reckoning day has come. And yet ironically, they still don’t repent. They still don’t bend the knee. They still don’t submit. So rightly, they are called to give an account. And rightly, they are judged. And rightly, they meet Christ’s righteous wrath meted out by His divine sword.

Verse 7 then concludes with this simple statement, “So it is to be. Amen.” Those words, “so it is to be”, could also be rendered “yes”. We could just say, “yes and amen.” Which is just driving home the point that John is making here, about the certainty of what he’s predicting here, about the coming of our Lord.

The last Christological truth we can glean from our text here this morning is Christological Truth #6, He is the Fulfillment of All Things. Take a look at verse 8, “ ’I am the Alpha and the Omega,’ says the Lord God, ‘who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.’ ” John concludes his doxology, which began back in verse 5, with these words. These are familiar words. These are important words. These are the words that mark the name of our young adult and college ministry. But what do these words mean? And specifically, who are these words referring to? Now, admittedly, who is being referred to as “the Alpha and Omega” here, is actually not as obvious as one might think. In fact, as you read many of the commentaries out there, there’s a fairly even split. With some saying it’s God the Father who is here referred to as the Alpha and the Omega. And some saying it’s God the Son. I take the latter position. And I do for a number of reasons. First, there are a couple of cross-references in Revelation, where we see similar words used to describe God the Son. In Revelation 1:17, He is “the first and the last.’ Jesus the Son is the first and the last. The same idea being the Alpha and Omega. In Revelation 22:13, we see the words “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” And according to Revelation 22:16, it was Jesus who said those words, as He identified Himself. So, we have support in Revelation, that this is God the Son being referred to, when we see the words Alpha and the Omega.

Second, taking “the Alpha and the Omega” to refer to Jesus, to God the Son, underscores His deity. We see that highlighted, the fact that Jesus is God, highlighted throughout the book of Revelation. Of course, you go to the Old Testament and Yahweh is referred to as “the first and the last,’ in many different places. Isaiah 41:4 – “I, the Lord, am the first, and with the last. I am He.” Isaiah 44:6 – “I am the first and I am the last, and there is no God besides Me.” Isaiah 48:12 – “Listen to Me, O Jacob, even Israel whom I called; I am He, I am the first, I am also the last.”

So, concluding that Jesus is “the Alpha and the Omega” here in verse 8, serves to further drive home the point, as we see elsewhere in book of Revelation, that Jesus is God. His is the fullness of the Godhead, as Colossians 2:9 puts it. He shares in the attributes, and the deity, and the totality of the Father, as Hebrews 1:3 would put it. Including the first and the last, the Alpha and the Omega.
Third reason I see ‘the Alpha and the Omega’ referring to God the Son, is that it’s found in the book of Revelation. And the revelation is called the Revelation of Jesus Christ. This whole book is about Jesus Christ, as I’ve said many times, and will say many times as we go through this series. So, all of this evidence, in totality leads me to conclude that the words “the Alpha and the Omega” refers to God the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the Alpha and the Omega. His the first and the last. He is the beginning and the end. He is everything. He rules over all. He brought it all into existence. And He will bring it all to its appointed conclusion.

And then here in verse 8, through the pen of John, our Lord gives His signature concerning His deity. He is the one “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” And no less so, the one being signed, it says here in verse 8, the one signing, giving His divine signature on this book, is the “Lord God”, Jesus Christ, co-equal with the Father. He is “the Almighty” one. The one with all power. The one with all authority. The one who answers to nobody. The one “who is and who was and who is to come.”

Well, over the last couple of Sunday mornings now, we’ve worked through a total of 8 verses of the book of Revelation. And in doing so, we’ve seen some pretty incredible Christological truths about our Lord jumping off the page. I can’t really read the room, because the lights are so bright in here. But I get the sense that there’s a bit of doctrinal overload here, as we work line upon line, verse upon verse, and do it from the standpoint of mining out these truths about our incomparable Savior. Next week, the perspective will shift. Next week will shift to the isle of Patmos. Where we’ll see this vision of the resurrected Lord that the apostle John received while he was exiled there. Before he dispatched each of the seven letters, the seven ‘postcards’ to the seven churches. I’ll look forward to seeing you all next Sunday, as we interact with what the Lord has to say to us, through that wonderful passage of scripture. Why don’t we pray?

God, we thank You so much for this time in Your word this morning. I know at times it has felt like drinking from a fire hose. But it’s a fire hose of truth. It’s a fire hose of truth that You have given us and breathed out. And the focal point, the central character, the central highlight of the truth we’ve received is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I pray that we would walk away from this place this morning energized, charged up, ready to proclaim the riches of the glory of our Lord and Savior, the Lord Christ. That these truths would not be, ever, ever a bore to us, or a drudgery to us to go through. But rather they would inflame our hearts to worship You more faithfully in spirit and in truth. Fill our hearts continually this week God, with truths from Your word, that remind us of our incomparable Savior. And give us boldness and confidence in the week ahead, to proclaim His name to a lost and dying world. We thank You for this time. We thank You for this church. We thank You for Your truth. In Christ’s name. Amen.