“The Bible ends with a flourish: vision and song, doom and deliverance, terror and triumph. The rush of color and sound, image and energy, leaves us reeling. But if we persist through the initial confusion and read on, we begin to pick up the rhythms, realize the connections, and find ourselves enlisted as participants in a multi-dimensional act of Christian worship.” (Eugene Peterson)
John’s Revelation is not easy reading. It puts intense demands on our intelligence and imaginations. But at the same time it will reward us with illumination and intimacy. It is imperative that we read and assimilate this book on its own inherent terms.
- Revelation is the grand finale to the canon. The language has been changed to heighten your experience. It will arouse the senses and immerse you into what is happening.
- Avoid presumptions and prejudices. Revelation is not a Rorschach test open to a neurotic obsession or escapist fantasy concerning end time events. Evil is not to be glamorized or sensationalized. It is exposed as a fraud…exposed and defined, contained and diminished, then denigrated and destroyed. The book includes a strong warning to those who dismantle and re-construct its message to conform to a personal agenda or a denominational system.
- Everything in this book can be found in the previous 65 books (over 500 references in just over 400 verses). This presumes an understanding of the entirety of the Bible.
- Jesus Christ is the medium and the message of what is revealed about God and His purposes. He is the center and He holds together all that is the circumference. He is actively at work in the context of a believing community of “over-comers” in the proclamation of the gospel and the propagation of His Kingdom.
- Revelation is full of layers of multi-dimensional truth. It is to be read from the perspective of the “eternal now,” where history and the future are breaking in on, and even rupturing the present.
The intent of the book of Revelation is not just to inform us about God. These words involve us in God. The mystery of salvation is not a baffling puzzle. It is the exploration of the infinite. Together with the Spirit of God, let us use all of our faculties to understand, interpret, and to enjoy our God forever.