Revelation Commentary
– Introduction to
the book of Revelation Verses 1:1
through 1:20
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Today, we start a
verse-by-verse study on the book of
Revelation. If you would like to put
some notes in your Bible as we go
through the book of Revelation, this
would be a good time to get your
Bible out and do so.
Revelation 1:1
The revelation of Jesus Christ, which
God gave to him to show his servants
what must soon take place. He made it
known by sending His angel to his
servant John.
Revelation 1:2
who testifies to everything he saw
– that is, the word of God and
the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Revelation 1:1
The revelation, (e.g., the
full disclosure) of Jesus Christ,
which God (the Father) gave (to) him (Jesus) to show his (the) servants (of Jesus) what must soon take
place. He (the Father) made it (this
revelation) known by sending his
angel (messenger/Jesus) to (me) his servant John.
Revelation 1:2
who testifies (as a witness) to everything he saw
– that is, the word of God (Jesus, is
“the Word”) and the
testimony (words) of Jesus Christ.
The Book of Revelation
predicts a full disclosure of Jesus
Christ is coming. I want to share
some thoughts on this process.
According to the U.S. Census, 6,
651,605,767 people live on Earth
right now in 2007. According to
the American Bible Society,
approximately 2.5 billion people have
not heard of Jesus and another 2.1
billion people have heard about Him,
but they strongly reject or resent
Christianity. That’s 4.6 billion
people who do not know or like Jesus
Christ.
Each month, our world
has a net increase in
population of about 11 million
people! (For comparison, Los Angeles
is a city of 10 million people.) From
these stats, we can see that
Christianity (currently 27% of the
world’s population) is shrinking
as a percentage of the world’s
population because the net number of
people standing in opposition to
Christianity is growing larger each
day.
The shrinkage of
Christianity is not a problem for
God, because He had devised a plan to
reveal Jesus to a hostile, arrogant
and ignorant world.
Unfortunately, the
revelation of Jesus will not be a
pleasant experience, but it will
be very effective. This
disclosure will necessitate turning
everything in this world upside down.
In short, the revelation of Jesus
Christ will begin with an
overwhelming show of force and wrath.
Jesus Himself will implement and
oversee a compelling drama that will totally
demolish the religions and nations of
the world.
It is ironic that the
coming revelation of Jesus Christ,
which the Father designed and
pre-decreed by His own authority,
will cause many so-called Christians
to abandon their association with
Christianity. In other words, when
Jesus is revealed, a lot of
Christians will not want to have
anything to do with Him. Conversely,
a large number of people from other
religions will have their hearts and
minds opened to the Savior and they
will welcome and love Him when their
blindness is removed!
Ultimately, the
revealing of Jesus will cause the
people of Earth to take a stand. One
group will submit to the authority of
Jesus. By faith they will obey His
commands and accept the consequences.
The other group will justify their
rebellion and they will take their
stand with Lucifer (the
Antichrist) and they will suffer the
wrath of God.
The revelation of
Jesus will be a drama having many
players, parts and sub stories. All
of these pieces will combine to
reveal things about Jesus that could
not otherwise be known. For example,
the Father wants the world to know
that Jesus is fully God. Jesus has
all the prerogatives of the Father
because Jesus is a co-eternal member
of the Godhead just like the Father
and the Holy Spirit.
A day is coming when
the whole world will be stunned into
a condition of reverence so that
everyone can hear and consider that
Jesus Christ is the only Savior of
mankind, and by right of His
blood-redemption, He is the Owner of
Earth, Lord of lords and King of
kings. It is also fair to say that of
all gods presently worshiped, Jesus
is hated more than any other because
Jesus has made some exclusive claims
that are highly offensive to people
in other religions. For example:
John 14:6 Jesus
answered, “I am the way and the
truth and the life. No one comes
to the Father except through me.
“
Given the hostile
feelings that billions of people have
towards Christianity, you should be
able to understand how the revelation
of Jesus as the God of Heaven and
Earth, the Savior of man, Owner of
Earth, Lord of lords and king of
kings will be “a hard pill to
swallow” for a very large number
of people!
During the revelation
of Jesus process, the religions of
the world will implode, the nations
of the world will be demoralized,
faith will be severely tested and
everyone will experience suffering
and tribulation. A big part of this
coming drama will be man’s
desperate need of a Savior!
Of course, our need of
a Savior will become self-evident
when our security and possessions are
ruined and after this physical
experience strips away our pretense,
an even greater truth will be seen!
Man needs a Savior to escape the
penalty of sin.
God the Father personally
designed the drama that reveals
Jesus at the end of the world and He
sent Jesus to John with a copy of
“the drama.” The Father put
the revealing of Jesus within the
context of a “tribulation”
because the Father wants the world to
know the love, which Jesus has for
all mankind. The Father wants the
world to know who died for our sins.
Profound Point:
Earth’s
degenerate condition has come to a
place where God’s wrath is the
best means through which God’s
love can be explained. So, Jesus will
tear down the arrogance, darkness and
ignorance that sin and religion has
produced by exercising justifiable
wrath. This will hurt and affect
everyone.
The Father designed
the Great Tribulation to be an
educational drama. This drama will
show the world what sin and rebellion
really are, and during this drama,
Jesus will be revealed as our
Creator, our sin bearer, our Friend
and God. Near the end of the first
century A.D., the Father evidently
gave this drama story to Jesus. Then,
Jesus chose John to write it down, so
that those of us who would be alive
when this drama took place could
understand in advance what “must
soon take place.”
The words “must
soon take place” presents a
problem for some people because the
book of Revelation was written around
A.D. 95 and that was about 2,000
years ago! 2,000 years later is NOT soon. The word
“soon” means imminent.
The word
“soon” in Revelation 1:1
has led early Christians to assume
that Jesus was returning to Earth
right away! In fact, all of the
apostles were sure that Jesus would soon return. We
investigated their belief in the
imminent return of Jesus in my first
broadcast on the book of Daniel.
Even though the word
“soon” has been misapplied
for 20 centuries, the word
“soon” has helped to keep
the interest and hope in our
Lord’s return alive and that is
not entirely bad even though there is
the desensitizing danger in
crying “wolf” when there is
no wolf.
However, the word
“soon” in Revelation 1:1
means exactly what it says when the word is placed
within the contextof the revelation
which occurs at the appointed time of
the end. In other words, because the
book of Daniel was sealed up until
the appointed time of the end,
the book of Revelation has been
misunderstood ever since it was
written because the rules of
interpretation found in Daniel are
necessary to correctly interpret the
book of Revelation.
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