Jeremy Duncan: I'm gonna suggest that if your imagination for Christ in the future looks nothing like the image of Christ in history, that should at least present some difficult questions for us. Welcome to the commons cast. We're glad to have you here. We hope you find something meaningful in our teaching this week. Head to commons.church for more information.
Hey, welcome to church today and welcome to the final part of our inspired series. Today we're looking at eschatology and we'll talk about what that means in a minute. But the bottom line is we are looking at the book of Revelation today. That said, we're at the end of a series and so I do want to recap briefly where we've been just so that we can get ourselves situated. Of course, if you missed any of the first four parts of the series, they are available right here on our YouTube channel and you can check them out.
However, this series is all about how to read the Bible through the lens of Jesus. For Christians, the Bible is not flat. It is going somewhere. It is unfolding. It is leading us to Jesus.
And then like the passages we'll see today it is trying to make sense of the world now bathed in the light of Jesus. And this is important because this is one of our core values as a community. We want to be intellectually honest with the text. We want to be spiritually passionate when we read the text trusting that God meets us through the bible as we read, but we always want to keep Jesus at the center of everything including our understanding of the bible. You could say it this way, Jesus is our hermeneutic.
Jesus is how we make sense of what we read. And so just as second Timothy 316 says, all scripture is God breathed in use of our teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness. But in order for scripture to train us in the way of Jesus, we need to read the scripture in the light of Jesus. So that's what we've been doing in this series. And so last week, we looked at the poetry of the Bible and the way Jesus reinterprets our imagination to bring things we might even think are contradictory together.
We saw Jesus read from the prophet Isaiah to speak of himself. He says he has come to proclaim good news to the poor, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor and then he stops. He comes to Isaiah's call for the day of vengeance and Jesus rolls up the scroll and sits down. And it's this remarkable reinterpretation of our eschatology, one that reaches toward the best of our imagination for tomorrow. Now seen through the light of Jesus.
This idea that justice and favor and goodness and truth can come unburdened by the need for violence. And so this is what we need to talk about again today, our eschatology which is just a fancy word for the study of the last things. In other words, this is what we believe about where the story is going. Today, we're gonna talk about conventional imagery, scope and scale, the rider on the white horse and the subversion of our violence. First, let's pray together.
God of all grace who comes to us in the person of Jesus, who reveals yourself in the person of the Christ, May we see in Jesus all of your word to us. Everything that you have spoken, everything that we need to hear, to see, to understand in order to move toward you. May that always become the lens through which we read the scriptures. May it always become the lens through which we interpret the world around us as we encounter Jesus, as your spirit fills us and leads us, may we slowly find our way back to your embrace. May we know ourselves as fully loved and may that understanding begin to permeate every cell of our being so that we are slowly transformed, sanctified, made into the likeness of Christ.
May we become the people you imagined us to be in the very beginning. In the strong name, the risen Christ we pray. Amen. Okay. Revelation is a difficult book.
There is no getting around that, so let's not pretend. However, I also happen to believe that this is a profoundly beautiful and hopeful book if we take the time to understand it well. About 6 years ago now, we did a series on Revelation. I believe it was about 8 weeks long and it's available on our YouTube channel as we speak. However, I think we may find our way back to Revelation again in a few years.
Today though, we are not going to try to attempt to cover the breadth of this book. It is massive in scope, both in what it's trying to say and in the barrage of imagery it uses to duet. In fact, we're going to focus in on just one very specific moment in this book, one where this Jesus centered hermeneutic that we've been talking about in this series becomes centrally important in understanding the images that are used in this passage. But first, we are going to need to do a little bit of background work because there's 2 things that I think are particularly important when it comes to reading revelation responsibly. The first is understanding the purpose of conventional imagery.
The second is to understand the scope and scale of this book. The third is, of course, this Jesus centered reading, but we'll find our way back there in a moment. But let's start with conventional imagery. One of the things that gets hard when it comes to revelation is how foreign all of these images are to us. We've got a beast with 7 heads and 10 horns and upon his horns, 10 crowns.
And first of all, how do you wear 10 crowns on 7 horns? I mean, that doesn't even make any sense. But then we've got a great red dragon that sweeps a third of the stars from the sky with his tail, sending them crashing into the planet. We hear a roaring lion behind us only to turn and see a lamb looking as if it had been slain. So let's put this on the table to begin with.
No one reads Revelation literally. It's absurd to even try that. We are all reading metaphor and image and we're all trying to decipher its meaning there is no such thing as a literal interpretation of a dragon sweeping the stars from the sky. And so when it comes to interpreting these metaphors, what becomes really important is understanding conventional images. That sounds familiar.
It should because that's exactly what we talked about when we looked at Genesis in this series. Every culture has conventional images that mean something within that culture. And Genesis is using the images of ancient cosmology to speak about the formation of the human story. Revelation is using images of 1st century politics, religion and economics to speak about the culmination of the human story. The problem is when we use conventional images, we don't explain them precisely because they are conventional.
So I'll give you a couple examples here. If I were to say to you that the bears devoured the bulls, that would mean one thing if I was talking to you about sports. It would mean something very different if I was talking about the stock market, and it would mean something completely different if I was talking about my latest trip to the zoo. But because these are conventions that we are used to, I could very reasonably use those images in any of those settings without taking the time to explain to you what I meant by them. And you would just know immediately from the context that when I say bulls, I mean investors with a positive outlook on the market when we're talking finances or when I say bears, I'm talking about a sports ball team that hasn't won a championship in decades.
If we're talking about that, you just know what I mean. In fact, it would actually be weird if I stopped mid story to explain those images to you because that would take you out of the moment. Well, that's what's happening here in Revelation. Most of these images that seem incredibly bizarre on their surface are actually quite well known conventional images drawn from the realm of ancient politics, religion, and economics. The writer is then using those images, combining them in new ways, juxtaposing them against the reign of Christ.
That brings us to our second point. We need to understand the scope and scale because revelation is not just about the end of the world. Revelation is about all things, all of our politics, all of our religion, all of the economic forces around us, all of the things that shape our experience of the world, everything finally brought under the reign of Christ, which in the end is a much bigger story to tell. And so Revelation does this by telling the same story, the same take of Christ's victory, 3 times over with progressively larger scope each time. Starts with Christ's victory in our hearts and communities.
They come back again to tell the story this time about Christ's victory over the politics and empires of the world. It circles back one final time to tell us about Christ's victory over the power of evil itself. But it's actually the same story each time. And it's the cross and Christ's sacrifice and the power of his nonviolent death that wins the victory each time. It's just that the writer wants to make sure we don't miss any aspect of what Jesus has already accomplished, And you can see this in a couple different ways.
1st, as the scope of the story gets bigger, the scale of the imagery that goes along with it gets bigger too. So we go from Jesus speaking to the 7 churches, to John seeing tribulations and troubles being poured out on the earth, to finally actual monsters battling it out across the globe. And every time the story starts again, the scope gets bigger and so do the images the story uses. The other way you can see this is that each time the story repeats, there is a literary device the writer employs. So the first couple verses of Revelation are introductory, but once things are about to get rolling we read in chapter 1 verse 10, I was in the spirit and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet.
This is our signal that John is about to have a vision and the story is about to begin. Now at the end of that vision, we hear Jesus say in chapter 3 verse 21, I was victorious and I sat down with my father on his throne. Except the next thing we read at the start of chapter 4 is John telling us again at once I was in the spirit and there before me was a throne in heaven with someone sitting on it. So now we're into a second vision and this one goes until chapter 11 verse 15 where we read that the kingdom of the world has now become the kingdom of our Lord and his Messiah and he will reign forever and ever. Amen.
Except the next thing we read at the start of chapter 12 is that a great sign appeared in the heavens and John is now having another vision of Christ again. This one takes us right to the end of the book where we read in chapter 21, behold, I saw a new heaven and a new earth for the first heaven and the first turf had passed away and there was no longer any sea or chaos. I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice saying, look, God's dwelling place is now among the people and he will dwell with them. This will be his people and God himself will be with them.
He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain for the old order of things has now passed away. So every time the story starts, it begins with a vision and every time the story ends, it ends with Jesus reigning over the world. But and this is important, and this is what we're going to look at today, the way that Jesus wins. The way that Jesus is victorious in the world.
The way that Jesus conquers every single time in Revelation is the exact same way the Gospels present the victory of the cross. Now Luke 4, when Jesus opens the scroll of Isaiah and says, the spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news, the year of the Lord's favor and then rolls up the scroll, hands it back to the attendant and says, today the scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. The way he refuses to follow that up with the day of God's vengeance. Sometimes the question will be asked, well, what about revelation? What about the rider on the white horse who is Christ, his robe now dipped in blood, a sword in his hand as he battles the armies of the world and sends them to ruin.
Is this not the day of the Lord vengeance? Is this not the fulfillment of our thirst for retributive justice? Now first, I'm gonna suggest that if your imagination for Christ in the future looks nothing like the image of Christ in history, that should at least present some difficult questions for us. I'm also showing to suggest that if we take the time to look again to properly understand the images in Revelation, the way this ancient text is structured and the way it is intentionally playing with our expectation of justice. I think we will discover a Christ who looks just like the Jesus we have encountered and fallen in love with in the Gospels.
So let's look at the rider on the white horse, one of the most critical images in the book of Revelation. This image is part of the 3rd cycle of Revelation. This is about the victory of Christ over evil itself. And we know this because in Revelation 11, we've already read that the kingdom the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and Messiah, but then right after that we read that the nations were angry and your wrath has come. The time has come for judging the dead, for rewarding your servants the prophets, and your people who revere your name both great and small.
And, and this is important, for destroying that which destroys the earth. That's Revelation 11 18. Now sometimes people have this misconception that Revelation teaches that God is going to destroy the earth and everything in it at the end of time and that is not true. In fact, Revelation tells us that a time will come to destroy anything that destroys the earth. Fact, this is very similar to what we read in Romans 1 where Paul says, the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all of the godlessness and wickedness of humanity.
Anger of God is not directed at you and I. It's not directed at people or humans. It's directed at our wickedness. And how we hurt each other and how we hurt ourselves. It's the same idea here.
The time has come for the destruction of that which destroys. So everything that we are reading in this final cycle of revelation is about the end of destruction, the end of wrath, the end of anger. It's an image of the anger of God directed at everything that hurts creation. Now granted, imagery does get difficult here. This is where we meet a great red dragon.
We meet a beast from the sea. We meet a beast from the land. We meet a woman drunk on the blood of holy people. But none of these are individuals. They are images that represent the principalities and powers of our world.
The red dragon is the concept of evil itself, The Satan. The beast from the sea is our politics. The beast from the land is our religion. The woman is our economics. Obviously, we're not gonna have time to work through each of these images in detail today, but if you are really keen and you're really interested, you could read chapter 8 of my thesis.
I can send it to you if you want. Just email me. For today though, what's important to understand is that what we are about to read now in chapter 19 when Christ finally appears in the climactic battle. This is not a battle with swords and shields and certainly not tanks and guns. This is the image of the wrath of God against everything that tears at creation.
It is an image of how God destroys evil. So we're going to Revelation 19 verse 11 11 and I'm gonna read a longer portion here and I'm gonna make a couple of comments as we go before we come back to wrap up. This is what we read. I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse whose rider is called faithful and true. With justice, he judges and wages war.
His eyes are like blazing fire and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself. He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood and his name is the word of God. Remember back to the first part of this series, Jesus is the word of God. Jesus is what God wants to say to us.
But continuing the armies of heaven were following him riding on white horses dressed in fine linen white and clean Coming out of his mouth is a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. He will rule them with an iron scepter for he treads the wine press of the fury of the wrath of God almighty. On his robe and on his thigh, he has this name written, King of kings and Lord of lords. So this is clearly Jesus indicated by this title. 2nd, we see the armies of heaven here about to meet the forces of evil in some kind of cosmic battle and they are dressed in white which represents holiness and they are being led by Jesus who is covered in blood whose only weapon has come from his mouth.
Now remember, this image here is before the battle has begun. We'll get to the battle in a moment. So let me ask you a question. Whose blood is it that is on Jesus robe? Whose blood is it that has washed the armies of heaven white?
This is Jesus blood. This is his sacrifice that we are seeing here and not only that, what is the weapon that he wields against evil? Well it comes from his mouth so this is not a literal image. Jesus is not some kind of sword swallower. This is his testimony.
This is his non violent sacrifice. His only weapon is the story of why he is covered in his own blood. Everything here in this image, in this climactic moment of the story is meant to point us back to the cross and the gospels. In fact, at no point does revelation give us a Christ who contradicts the Jesus of the gospels. In fact, the non violence of Jesus is precisely how revelation imagines his victory.
I mean, just look at we read next. Then I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together to wage war against the rider on the horse and his army. So here we go. The battle's about to begin, but the beast was captured. And with it, the false prophet who had performed the signs on its behalf.
The 2 of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur. The rest were killed with the sword coming out of the mouth of the rider on a horse and all of the birds gourged themselves on the flesh. Now, clearly, this is a graphic image because it is meant to play on our expectations of battle. But what actually happens here? The beasts which represent religion and politics are overcome without any incident.
The forces that support them in the world are defeated by the testimony of Jesus. And by the way, here's the only things that are named as being thrown into the fire of Revelation. It is the beast from the land. It's the beast from the sea. It's the red dragon.
It's a death and it's hades. Or as Revelation puts it, now comes the time to destroy that which destroys. But in fact, once we set aside some of the stories we've heard about Revelation and we look again more closely, what we see here actually lines up perfectly with what we saw in Luke 4. Because there, Jesus reinterprets the image of Isaiah 61 to call for the year of the Lord's favor without the day of the Lord's vengeance. Here, the scene of Revelation pulls from the image of the day of the Lord's vengeance in Isaiah 63, where the prophet writes, who is this coming from Edom with his garments stained crimson?
Who is this robed in splendor striding forward in greatness strength? It is I proclaiming victory mighty to save. Why are your garments red like those of 1 treading the winepress? Because I have trodden the winepress alone from the nations no one was with me. I trampled them in my anger and trod them down in my wrath.
Their blood splattered on my garments and stained all my clothing. And yet here, now in the light of Jesus, when we finally see the victory of grace made real, What we realize is that it was never the blood of enemies that God shed. It was never God's enemies blood that was on his robe. It was always the sacrifice, the forgiveness, the peace of God that was present in Jesus. This was the power to save the world.
You see revelation is full of violent images but that's because the world around us is full of those same images as well. The point of these images in Revelation is not to glorify our violence. It's not to suggest that God is violence. The point is to show how Jesus continues to undermine and subvert and transform our imagination of what could be. Because one day every tear will be wiped from every eye and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain for the old order of things will have passed away.
And then the God who is seated on the throne will say, behold I am making all things new. Write this down for these words are trustworthy and true, but that transformation comes not through a Jesus who is unlike what we see in the gospels. Now the salvation of the world is won by the Christ who is exactly like the Jesus of the gospels. This is what revelation is showing us and as we learn to read with Jesus as our lens, with Jesus as our hermeneutic, we slowly begin to uncover the God who has given us exactly the word that we need to see the divine more clearly. May the Jesus who brings good news be the Jesus through which you see the world this day.
May He become the Jesus through which you dream for tomorrow and act for what could be right now. Let's pray. God, might we understand that the Jesus who comes to us, the Jesus that we have met, the Jesus that we encounter through the gospels is the Jesus who you have spoken to us through. That this is your word to us. The lens through which we reinterpret our lives.
The lens through which we make sense of the world. The lens through which we read everything in the scriptures. To point us to the God who has always looked like Christ. God, may we push aside and away our violence, our thirst for retribution, and may we instead pick up a desire for justice, for goodness and healing, for the redemption that you imagine in the world. May our view of the future be transformed.
And where we have believed that only goodness can come to the shedding of someone else's blood might we begin to see the story of a God who would save the world, change the world, transform the world through your own sacrifice. May this be our model. May this be what that we follow. May this be our way in the world. In the strong name of the risen Christ, we pray.
Amen.