Revelation 1:9-17
9 I, John, both your brother and companion in the tribulation and kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was on the island that is called Patmos for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.
10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day, and I heard behind me a loud voice, as of a trumpet,
11 saying, "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last," and, "What you see, write in a book and send it to the seven churches which are in Asia: to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamos, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia, and to Laodicea."
12 Then I turned to see the voice that spoke with me. And having turned I saw seven golden lampstands,
13 and in the midst of the seven lampstands One like the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band.
14 His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and His eyes like a flame of fire;
15 His feet were like fine brass, as if refined in a furnace, and His voice as the sound of many waters;
16 He had in His right hand seven stars, out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance was like the sun shining in its strength.
17 And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, "Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last. (NKJV)
“Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last.”
The Book of Revelation is for the Church as she goes through tribulations and trials and persecution. In 95 A.D. Jesus appeared in a vision to John the Apostle who was in exile on the Isle of Patmos.
The name, Patmos is significant because it means “mortal” and comes from a root that means crushed or squeezed. The name has significance for the Church as she suffers persecution through the ages.
The saints cried out to God: “And they cried with a loud voice, saying, ‘How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?’ ” [Revelation 6:10]
It was to John that the Lord gives the consolation and thus to the Church.
Following a system of spiritual interpretation, we are ready to look at the vision of Jesus Christ.
The vision is of Christ amidst the Lampstands or the Church on earth. This vision is given in 1:9 to 3:22. We will only deal with 1:9 to 1:16 in this message.
The title of today’s message is taken from verse 17:
“Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last.”
It is very important that you do not get the idea that this vision is how Christ literally appears as He is now at the right hand of God. The vision is a set of symbols that teach us truths about the living Christ.
The Book of Revelation is a book of symbols and if you miss the spiritual meaning of the symbols you will surely get bogged down in hopeless literalism. Sometimes John will explain the symbols and at other times we must look to the OT for its meaning. The OT: because Jesus “walks among the prophets.”
For this spiritual exposition of the Book of Revelation, I am mostly following
Mr. Charles D. Alexander, although I also draw upon William Hendriksen, Simon Kistemaker and Ray Summers et al. If I tell you this then it is not plagiarism and I forfeit any claim to absolute original exegesis.
9 I, John, both your brother and companion in the tribulation and kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was on the island that is called Patmos for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.
John is the apostle to the Church as he is her “brother and companion in the tribulation and patience of Jesus Christ…”
John suffers tribulation and so does the Church. The Kingdom of Christ is a kingdom of patience. The people of God endure the oppression and hatred of Satan and the evil world system for only one reason. The reason is that they have the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ. If you take a stand for Jesus Christ you will suffer persecution, but you will be “blessed.”
The people of God are not promised in the Bible that they will avoid illness and poverty and hardship and conflict in this life, no matter what the religious hucksters on TV tell you. These false prophets are selling “Health and Wealth” and the “Prosperity Gospel” and they lie and deceive the simple and defraud them of their meager funds.
The people of God wait in patience and faith for the return of their Lord as they endue trials and hardship.
Do not send money to these false prophets rather hear what Paul instructs:
Romans 8:22-23
22 For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now.
23 Not only that, but we also who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body.
2 Corinthians 5:4
For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life.
The Church through the centuries has been attacked and has faced tribulation.
There is no Scripture that supports a secret “rapture” of the Church in the conception that she will not go through tribulation. When the saints who are alive at His coming, meet Jesus in the air, this present world will be burned up and there will be a “new heaven and a new earth.”
John is the Church’s brother and companion in tribulation as he weeps until he saw the Coming forth of that Blessed One who bears the marks of our redemption in His body and so he writes: Revelation 5:4-5
4 So I wept much, because no one was found worthy to open and read the scroll, or to look at it. 5 But one of the elders said to me, "Do not weep. Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose its seven seals."
In chapter 10 John tells us that he ate the Book of the Church’s testimony:
Revelation 10:8-11
8 Then the voice which I heard from heaven spoke to me again and said, "Go, take the little book which is open in the hand of the angel who stands on the sea and on the earth."
9 So I went to the angel and said to him, "Give me the little book."
And he said to me, "Take and eat it; and it will make your stomach bitter, but it will be as sweet as honey in your mouth."
10 Then I took the little book out of the angel's hand and ate it, and it was as sweet as honey in my mouth. But when I had eaten it, my stomach became bitter.
11 And he said to me, "You must prophesy again about many peoples, nations, tongues, and kings."
The Revelation is sweet to the taste, for it is the testimony of Christ, but it is bitter in the bowels, because it tells of the trouble ahead for the Church. Even after John’s day and Emperor Domitian is gone it does not mean that tribulation is over for the Church.
"You must prophesy again about many peoples, nations, tongues, and kings."
10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day, and I heard behind me a loud voice, as of a trumpet…
John is “in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day”. John is to receive this prophecy for the comfort of the Church. Most of the commentators say this is a Sunday. In my understanding the “Lord’s Day” refers to Judgment Day rather than the First Day of the Week. The context of these visions is the judgment of the enemies of the Church and not a worship service on Sunday.
In a spiritual ecstasy John is lifted up beyond time, as was Ezekiel and Daniel of old, and shown the events of the future in a prophecy.
Prophecy is sure because God has determined the future.
Jesus Christ is standing amidst the Church and will declare His omnipotent reign over the rulers of the earth.
"… saying, I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last,"
Matthew gives us Jesus’ words:
And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. [10:28]
And John gives the Church a word of consolation that extends now for over 1900 years and will be there for the Church until the Lord comes.
In the centuries that followed John’s day the bodies of the servants of God have been given over to Satan who uses not only tribulation but false doctrines to harm those unable to discern error. And still the Church is protected against ultimate defeat. So through the ages and until the end of this present age the Church will remain in the “Kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ.”
Jesus is revealed in the writings of John as the only begotten Son, the Word made flesh, Eternal Wisdom, by whom everything that was made was made.
He is sovereign over life and over death and He has the keys to hell and death.
He is the fulness of the Godhead in bodily form, the hope of eternal life, the fountain of all grace and truth. He is the only true Light without whom there is no knowing.
If the disciple whom Jesus loved, to whom was imparted such intimacy with the Savior beyond human measure, was struck down as though dead when he saw only a symbolic vision of the risen Lord, what must it be to be there in His glorious presence, not in symbolic form but the Glorious Master Himself?
11 … saying, "What you see, write in a book and send it to the seven churches which are in Asia: to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamos, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia, and to Laodicea."
When we come to chapters 2 and 3 we will see that the “seven churches which are in Asia” are actual local churches but they are symbolic or the figure of the Church throughout all the ages of her testimony to Jesus Christ.
Let the beasts of hell and history roar. Let the profane scream their blasphemies. What can they do against the One who holds all power and Creation in the palm of His hand? Take comfort if you are one of His dear sheep because He will not lose a single one of His own. This is Christ’s message to the Church.
12 Then I turned to see the voice that spoke with me. And having turned I saw seven golden lampstands, 13 and in the midst of the seven lampstands One like the Son of Man,
If you know your OT you will immediately think of Daniel’s “Son of Man.”
We will say more on this title later.
***********************************************************************
John describes the voice as a great trumpet-like voice. John turns to see the speaker and it is a vision of the living Christ whom he had seen more than sixty years before ascending from the Mount of Olives into heaven to God the Father.
John turned to behold the transcendent and triumphant Christ. He was clothed with a long flowing garment and a golden girdle – the clothing of a priest and king. His hair was “white as white wool… white as snow” – symbolical of His holiness.
His eyes were as piercing as “a flame of fire” – symbolizing penetrating vision and omnipotence. His feet were like “refined brass” – symbolical of strength; brass was the strongest metal known in John’s day. His voice was the “voice of many waters” – symbolical of His authority over peoples and nations. His face had the brilliance of the “sun shining in full strength,” i.e. noonday – symbolical of His majesty. In His strong hand he held “seven stars” – symbolical of the destiny of the churches as it lay in the pastors. Out of His mouth went a “sharp two-edged sword” – symbolical of keen and accurate judgment of the deeds of men. He stood in the midst of “seven golden lampstands” – symbolical of the churches.
Here in this vision of the risen Christ is the key to understanding this Book. We surely must not suppose that this is a literal appearance of Christ today. It is symbolic and the meaning is this: A living, holy, majestic, omniscient, authoritative, powerful Christ stands in the midst of the churches and holds her destiny in His hand and says: “Do not be afraid, I was dead. I am alive forevermore. More than that I hold in My hand the keys to death and the grave. You should not fear to go to any place to which I hold the key. You may be persecuted to death but I am still your King.” *** [Ray Summers]
The symbolic vision of Christ seen by John is after the pattern described by Daniel who saw Christ in a similar appearance thus:
“A certain man clothed in linen, whose loins were girded with fine gold of Uphaz. His body also was like the beryl [topaz?], and his face as the appearance of lightning, and his eyes as lamps of fire, and his arms and feet like in colour to polished brass, and the voice of his words like the voice of a multitude”. (Daniel 10:5-6)
Does not the vision given to Daniel comport with John’s vision?
It is certain that linen and gold have no place in the eternal world; only what these materials and substances represent is to be found there.
Nevertheless, the voice, the words, the presence of the Lord were so powerful a reality that John (like Daniel) falls down as one dead, the mortal frame being unable to endure the manifest presence of the Eternal One.
Here is One who has conquered death and the grave and whose eyes search through all eternity to discover if there is any foe remaining or to come who can challenge His power, and who declares verily that He finds none and know not of any:
“Fear ye not neither be afraid. Have not I told thee from that time, and have declared it? Ye are even my witnesses. Is there a God beside me? Yea, there is no God. I know not any.” (Isaiah 44:8)
In my introduction to the this series I said that most of the confusion existing in attempts to explain the Book of Revelation is because so many writers and preachers have not first established a valid principle of interpretation. We have shown that such a principle is found precisely where we should expect to find it - in the first chapter. We are given a symbolical vision of Christ and it our business to search out the meaning of the symbols. They will not be difficult to find if we look for them in the correct places, viz. the OT prophets.
The New Testament Church is the full and final manifestation of the Kingdom of God in time, the means by which God’s eternal purposes are realized, and through which is displayed that ‘manifold wisdom’ (the unveiling of His own nature and Name) which is His eternal purpose:
“To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known BY THE CHURCH the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord”. Ephesians 3:10-11
There can be nothing after the Church. She is the completion of the revelation of God. In the Book of Revelation she is not supplanted by any other institution or order, Jewish or otherwise. God has said all He ever will say, in time or in eternity, in that glorious Church in which is invested the entire stock of His wisdom, love, grace and power. She IS His eternal purpose, and she occupies the scene as long as time shall last until her Beloved returns in the clouds of heaven to take her for ever into His eternal glory.
Now let’s examine the first vision of Jesus Christ:
The GARMENT and the GIRDLE
13. … clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest [paps: KJV] with a golden band.
Let us see therefore who and what He is who so introduces Himself to John for the comfort and strengthening and assurance of His Church.
This garment is the sign of His royal dignity as King of Creation, King of the Ages and Lord of all. It is the same garment as that in which He appears to Isaiah (chapter 6):
“In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord high and lifted up and his train filled the temple”.
The ‘train’ of Christ is His royal garment and is symbolic of the divine glory which belongs to Him alone as ruler of His Church. That His glory fills the temple signifies that all worship, honour, power and blessing belong to Him.
As the brightness of His Father’s glory and the express image of His Person (Hebrews 1:3) it is given to Him to receive in Himself all worship and praise due to the Godhead, and it is through Him and in Him therefore that we worship the Father. John is careful in his gospel to assure us that Isaiah’s vision was of Christ, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity. (John 12:41)
He who in Isaiah’s vision filled the temple with His train, here in Revelation fills the Church, the true temple of God, which is the temple of His body. He who in Isaiah is acclaimed by the six-winged seraphim as the Lord of Hosts who fills the whole earth with His glory, is the same who now appears to John and proclaims,
“I am He that liveth and was dead and behold I am alive for evermore”.
In the next word, “Girt about the paps [chest] with a golden girdle” we see again the correspondence of the vision at Patmos with that which Daniel saw by the banks of the great river Hiddekel [Tigris]. There the Logos was girt about the loins with a girdle of fine gold of Uphaz, here in Revelation plainly ‘a golden girdle’.
The altered position of the girdle (round the breast in Revelation, round the loins [waist] in Daniel), signifies the difference between activity and ‘dignified repose’ (Bengel). “Loins girded” is synonymous with service to be rendered. The flowing garment down to the foot, with the girdle high upon the breast shows that His work is ended.
As John sees the Saviour in this vision it is as One whose mission is accomplished, redemption’s price has been paid, suffering and humiliation are ended, the Servant’s task has been perfectly and gloriously finished to the satisfaction of the Father. Christ has pronounced upon His own works the words, “It is finished”.
Henceforth He reigns at the Father’s right hand henceforth expecting till His foes are made His footstool in accordance with David’s great prophecy in Psalm 110:
“The Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool”.
The reign of Christ is not a cessation of activity for He is engaged at all times in an intense unwearied acting on behalf of His people, but His own conflict is ended; He has completed the will of the Father who sent Him into the world. There are no more foes for Him to overcome. (See Rev. 3.21)
Romans 8:31-39
31 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?
33 Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies.
34 Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
36 As it is written:
"For Your sake we are killed all day long;
We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter."
37 Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.
38 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come,
39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
HIS HEAD
14 His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow,
In Daniel 7 the Almighty appears as “the ancient of days” whose garment is white as snow and His hair as pure wool (i.e., pure shining whiteness). What is in view, is the holiness, majesty, and glory of GOD.
Majesty and eternity rest upon CHRIST. The whiteness is that of dazzling light as in the Transfiguration (Matt. 17:2), when it is recorded that “His face did shine as the sun and his raiment was white as the light”. Mark says His raiment became shining, exceeding white as snow, so as no fuller on earth can white them. Luke says the fashion of His countenance was altered and His raiment was white and glistering.
Luke also records that the three disciples fell into a deep sleep, unable to bear the glory of the light. This is in accordance with Daniel’s experience: “There remained no strength in me ... then was I in a deep sleep on my face, and my face toward the ground”. John records (Rev. 1:17) “When I saw Him I fell at his feet as one dead. And he laid his right hand upon me saying unto me, Fear not ...” So also with Daniel, “Behold an hand touched me which set me upon my knees and upon the palms of my hands ... Then said he unto me, Fear not, Daniel ...” (Dan. 10:9-12)
In his first epistle John has this in mind no doubt when he --writes, “God is light and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth”. (1 John 1:5-6) God is pure Spirit. He clothes Himself with light as with a garment. (Psalm 104:2)
Light is the first principle of the natural creation. “God said, Let there be light. And there was light.” Light is that mysterious and indefinable force or energy without which there is no life, order or form. It is a parable of the divine glory and essence which permeates all things and is fitly presented as the garment in which the ineffable Lord envelopes Himself, in a sense entirely spiritual.
That which is not of God is dark and forbidding, a symbol of death and the grave, fittingly presented in Scripture as symbolic of the eternal fate of the impenitent.
Hell is a sphere from which all light is excluded and darkness reigns, yet perhaps we should be more correct if we regard that darkness of the soul as being something inherent to itself. The soul is not so much in darkness as darkness is in the soul, that is, it becomes the eternal state of the soul. Paul says of believers;
“Ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord”. (Eph. 5:8)
Light is synonymous with truth, purity, holiness, and if we were asked to define what we mean by God, we might well answer, “He is light, life, love”.
So John saw in this vision of Christ, the dazzling splendor of the Son. The crown He wears is not of earthly treasure or substance, but His own eternity, purity, truth, love. He makes the Godhead visible in His glorified Manhood for He will for ever wear that nature which He took from man in the womb of the Virgin.
In the dazzling whiteness of His head it is not old age that we see, but eternal, unchangeable youth. Of all the sons of men, this One outshines them all, and lightens all creation by His central presence. All other light is darkness when He is there, and we shall have eyes only for His glory in that day when, fashioned anew in the likeness of His glorious body, we shall behold without fear, that light which otherwise would smite us to the ground as it did Daniel, and John, and as it did to the three disciples on the mount of transfiguration.
HIS EYES
14. … and His eyes like a flame of fire;
v.14 “…and His eyes were as a flame of fire”.
See Daniel 10:6: “His eyes as lamps of fire”.
Hengstenberg writes, that fire in Scripture is a symbol of the holy wrath and punitive righteousness of God.
Alexander argues that this description refers to the omnipotence and the omniscience of Christ.
Omniscience - knowing and perceiving all, understanding al things, vision with which there is no past or future but all things comprehensively present with the One who is eternal - this is something which belongs to God alone and can never be imparted to the creature.
The omniscience of Christ is declared in His “Alpha ands Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the ending”. (Rev. 1:11, 17; Chap. 22:13).
All that is true of the Father as to His attributes is true of the Son and of the Spirit. “The Spirit searcheth all things, yea the deep things of God”. (1 Cor. 2:10)
He who scrutinises and understands and comprehends the divine wisdom must be that wisdom, that mind, that Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the Third Person in the glorious Trinity, co-equal, co-eternal, and He is the Spirit of the Father and the Son (Romans 8:9). In the one Spirit therefore the Father and the Son contemplate each the other. The Father sees Himself in the Son and loves and comprehends what He sees. “For the Father loves the Son…” (John 5:20) The Son possesses and in fact IS, the wisdom and power of God, and in the One Spirit there is an eternal exchange of love, and a perfect subordination of the Son to the Father’s will which is always and ever must be His own will also.
“The eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and the good”, says Solomon. (Prov. 15:2)
Elihu (the Elijah of the Book of Job) declares, “He withdraweth not his eyes from the righteous, but with kings are they on the throne; yea he doth establish them for ever and they are exalted”. (Job 36:7)
“The Lord is in his holy temple, the Lord’s throne is in heaven. His eyes behold, his eyelids try the children of men”, says David in Psalm 11:4-5, and goes on to say that though the Lord looks upon the righteous only to try them, upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and a burning tempest (same psalm, see margin).
In the Song of Songs, Solomon’s inspiration puts into the mouth of the bride (the Church) this description of her Beloved (Christ) – “His eyes are the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters, washed with milk and fitly set”. (Margin, sitting in fulness) (Song 5:12)
According to the object upon which they are set, the eyes of the Lord therefore behold in love or in punitive justice. In this sense Hengstenberg is right to regard the verse in Rev. 1:14 as showing Christ’s fiery judgment against the enemies of the Church; yet that judgment rests upon His all-knowing, His omnipotence, and includes His tender regard for His Church in the energy of His wrath against her traducers [mockers] and persecutors.
That Christ’s eyes should appear to John in his vision as flames of fire develops the OT visions of the Lord so as to emphasise His care for His people. Christ sees all, in His all knowingness. Nothing escapes His vision in His watchful care over His Church. He sees from the beginning all that the enemy will seek to do, and writes in advance the history of the conflicts of His people against all the power of this world.
For the Book of Revelation is just that: the inner history of the Church in her warfare against the powers of evil. That it is written in advance of the conflict shows that all history is in the hands of Christ. The outcome is decreed just as much as the conflict itself. Through it, the Church will be refined. She will take up the cross daily to follow her Lord. She will be often cast down but never destroyed. The record of her warfare was engraven upon the everlasting marble of heaven before the world was, and as sure as the conflict must take place, so surely must the outcome be victorious. Hence Paul:
But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.
We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;
Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;
Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.
For we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.
2 Cor. 4:7-11
The enemy raises himself up in vain. He cannot escape the wrath of the Lamb, from whose flaming eyes nothing is hid. All history will prove His righteousness, and will silence all who would traduce.
Kings or kingdoms, rulers or empires, Rome, Babylon, the mysterious kingdom of antichrist - whatever arises to destroy or oppose the Church must be destroyed at last before the punitive justice of Christ.
So that we ourselves glory in you in the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure:
Which is a manifest token of the righteous judgment of God, that ye may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which ye also suffer:
Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you;
And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels,
In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: (2 Thess. 2:4-8)
Then shall that Wicked be revealed whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth and destroy with the brightness of his coming. (2 Thess. 2:8)
How then say some that there is a “great tribulation” to come, through which the Church will not pass? The Church has always been passing through tribulation as part of her appointed testimony to the glory of Christ?
It is to be doubted whether some writers and preachers have ever made a serious study of Church history, or in particular of the Reformation period.
TREADING DOWN HIS ENEMIES
15 His feet were like fine brass, as if refined in a furnace,
Bengel writes, “This has respect to His great power with which He brings all under Him. Oh, how will He tread down all His enemies!”
Much comment has been expended on John’s word here translated “fine brass”. In the Greek the word is CHALKOLIBANOS which in fact is not Greek at all, but Greek-Hebrew, CHALCO being Greek for copper and LIBANOS (LIBANAH) being Hebrew for “white”. It is an enigmatical word, probably formed by John himself, for it is not found anywhere else, like his word SYCHAR for SYCHEM (John 4:5) there being no place so named as SYCHAR but John altered a letter to make the word mean “a lie”, to show the lying vanity of the Samaritan religion, and prepare us for the inner prophetic meaning of Christ’s action at the well of Samaria.
In John’s Gospel, the prophetic intention of the narrative was to show the lying vanity of all religion based on geographical location. Hence, “Neither in this mountain nor yet at Jerusalem ... but the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth”. (John 4:21-24). And away goes the vanity of supposing that God will some day turn back the clock of prophecy and centralise true worship once more at some new temple built at Jerusalem - a vanity which has confused the minds of good Christian men for several generations past, and deprived the Church of much wholesome instruction in the Word of God.
The prophetic play upon names appears also in the title of the traitor, Judas Iscariot. There is no such place as Iscariot, nor is the designation a surname of Judas. It is a title like the name Sychar. Both come from the same root, as is obvious from a glance at the spelling. Iscariot means “the man of lies” as Sychar means “the place of lies”.
John’s word, CHALCOLIBANUS is an enigmatical term immediately explained by John in the next phrase, “as if they burned in a furnace”. It is composed by John on the pattern of Ezekiel 1:7 “Their feet sparkled like the colour of burnished brass”) and Daniel 10:6 (“His arms and his feet like in colour to polished brass”).
But why should John have made such play upon the word?
There seems no reason to doubt that Hengstenberg has correctly divined the intention: “In the formation of the word we are presented with a small image of the innermost nature of the Apocalypse”.
In other words, John, as in the case of SYCHAR is giving us a key to interpretation. As his Gospel can only be understood prophetically, that is, spiritually, so the Book of Revelation. Words are but the framework of ideas, and in the prophetical books they become symbols of depths of meaning lying beneath the ordinary usages of language.
Hence because the Jewish teachers did not understand that the Old Testament prophets wrote in parables, the coming of Christ was hidden from them and the nature of His kingdom was totally mistaken. So they rejected Him and called for His crucifixion. In doing so they in fact fulfilled the Scriptures without the intention of doing so. Hence Paul proclaims in the synagogue of Antioch:
“They that dwell at Jerusalem and their rulers, because they knew him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every sabbath day, THEY HAVE FULFILLED THEM IN CONDEMNING HIM”. Acts 13:27.
Isaiah had written long before,
And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not.
Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed. 
Isaiah 6:9-10
The Saviour quotes these very words from Isaiah when answering the question of the disciples, “Why speakest thou unto them in parables?” “Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given .... In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah ...” and He proceeds to recite the very words of Isaiah as quoted above. (See Matt. 13:10-16)
It is a disquieting thought that so many good Christian men today follow the same method of prophetical interpretation as the rabbis of old - and come to the same conclusion that the Jews were after all correct in their expectation that the Kingdom of God can only be a kingdom on earth, a visible empire in which the Jews will rule the world.
They have not come to terms with the enigmatical nature of prophecy which requires a spiritual mind for it to be understood.
What John sees in this enigmatical word is copper (or its alloy, brass), in a glow heat, a white heat - therefore, “as though glowing in a furnace.”
The thought is carried back to Isaiah’s vision of Christ as a majestic figure striding from Edom, His garments sprinkled with the blood of His foes, and declaring, “I have trodden the winepress alone, and of the people there was none with me; for I will tread them in mine anger and trample them in my fury; and their blood will be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my raiment. For the day of vengeance is in my heart, and the year of my redeemed is come”. (Isa. 63:1-4)
The picture is one of complete and absolute triumph, achieved throughout history by our solitary Champion, who in His onward march for the deliverance of His people tramples underfoot all Satanic opposition. This should be set against the over-emphasis today upon the agency of man in the promotion of the divine purposes in the gospel. Personality and method loom large in the modern evangelical world, and more is said about doing than worshipping. We shall do better if we worship more. Belief in the divine prerogative and sovereignty does not discourage true service, but to ignore the supremacy of Christ in all things leads to the pitiful expedients so rife today when in the evangelical world it appears that man moves God and not that God moves man; that man determines whither and when the Spirit of God shall work. *** [Alexander]
“Who hath directed the Spirit of the Lord, or being his counselor hath taught him?” -is the question God asks in Isaiah 40:13. Pau1 takes up this word in Romans 11:34-36 where he asks, “Who hath known the mind of the Lord, or who hath been his counselor? Or who hath first given to him and it shall be recompensed unto him again? For of him, and through him, and to him are all things, to whom be glory for ever. Amen”.
Let that “Amen” silence all the preaching and the writing which for too long have placed the so-called free will of man before God’s sovereignty in the weak evangelical theology of today.
In short the triumph is Christ’s and not ours. Alone He bore the curse which lay heavy upon all creation. Alone He died and carried our condemnation with Him down to the tomb. Alone He has led and still leads His Church through the historic avenue of time. We are a passing few, here today and gone tomorrow; He alone carries on His work in the invisibility, treading down principalities and powers and dominations and oppositions, staining His garments with the blood of His foes as He marches on to the ultimate triumph when He shall have put down all rule, authority and power.
HIS VOICE
15. … and His voice as the sound of many waters;
Daniel 10:6: “The voice of His words like the voice of a multitude”.
Ezekiel 43:2: “And behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east and his voice was like a noise of many waters, and the earth shined with his glory”.
The Ezekiel quotation is of special value as it occurs in the chapter which describes the return of the glory of God to the mystical temple (the New Testament Church). There was no temple existing in Jerusalem at the time of Ezekiel’s temple vision. The earthly temple had been destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, prior to which Ezekiel had his first visions of the glory of God leaving the sanctuary at Jerusalem on account of the sin of the people. He sees the temple restored-but it is a prophetical temple, the reality of which is the mystical temple of Christ, the Church - let all the world cry to the contrary, for God will never permit the restoring of animal sacrifices which Christ died to abolish. Nor will He centralize His kingdom in an earthly Jerusalem which Christ declared would never again be the center of the true worship of the Father. (John 4:21-24)
Hence the return of the glory of the Lord seen by Ezekiel can only mean the establishment of the New Covenant with its kingly priests (Rev. 1:6), its mystic candlesticks, and its heavenly worshippers. The glory of the God of Israel comes from the east (that is, from the sun rising, a token of the new gospel day which was inaugurated with the death and rising again of the Saviour).
Ezekiel hears His voice - as the sound of many waters. This is the sense in which the same words are used by John. Drowning out all the discordant sounds of earth, asserting the divine prerogative, filling with the terror of His power the enemies of the Church, inaugurating that mystical reign of Christ described by David (Psalm 110, so often quoted in the NT),
“The Lord said unto my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make thy foes thy footstool”.
Here is a kingdom which cannot fail, because it is in its nature eternal, as He is eternal who proclaims it. This is the kingdom to outlast all other kingdoms and grind them to powder, and thank God the believer does not have to wait for the dawn of some earthly millennium in order to enter upon the enjoyment of it, for it is already here, its foundation the empty tomb, its King One who has conquered death and the grave and has therefore no more enemies to overcome. There are not any who can speak against that mighty voice which rolls through the heavens, proclaims salvation from sin, hell and death, and overwhelms like the noise of some stupendous water flood all the discordant sounds of earth: as though all the oceans of earth were suddenly released from their ancient bounds, and in one tumultuous, irresistible tide rolled over the kingdoms of this earth, the terrifying voice thereof shaking the firmament, so that nothing else can be heard for the majesty of it. [Alexander]
So is the voice of Him who bears, and who is, in Himself, the glory of the Lord
“The voice of the Lord is upon the waters. The God of glory thundereth. The Lord is upon many waters. The voice of the Lord is powerful. The voice of the Lord is full of majesty”. Psalm 29:3-4
THE GUIDING PRINCIPLE OF THE CHURCH
16 He had in His right hand seven stars,
This is explained for us in the last verse of the chapter: “The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches”. The Church is not a democracy; it is ruled from the throne above.
Perhaps Martin Luther was right when he declared that the Church is wherever the Word of God is preached.
Let the Word of God therefore be fully preached. Let that be the first thing. Let men who preach prove themselves in the discipline of the study, spending their years in hard work at their books and at prayer and in the homes of the people. Let them labour to be examples to the flock to feed whom is their calling. Let them eschew ambition - except it be ambition to be useful just where they are. Let them not lightly flit from place to place in search of better living or higher distinction, but let humility and the interests of the sheep prevail with them.
Christ lays down no rules except the rule of love. He leaves one command only to Peter – “Feed my lambs”. It is thus He holds the Seven Stars in His hand?
The Seven Churches of Asia are the universal Church of all ages. Many of them are in a state of danger. Most of them need repentance. Some are worthy of commendation. Always, by whatever means, it is Christ who moves amongst the candlesticks. He is concerned about the decline of love, the rise of dangerous error, empty profession, pride and luxury. If we give ourselves to the encounter with these evils we shall do well. Perfection is in heaven alone, and in the imperfections of earth, Christ rules by faith, hope and love in pulpit and pew.
Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.
For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock.
Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them.
Therefore watch, and remember, that by the space of three years I ceased not to warn everyone night and day with tears.
And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified.
Paul the Apostle, Acts 20:28-32
THE TWO-EDGED SWORD
16. …out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance was like the sun shining in its strength.
The fundamental prophecy from which this description is taken is Isaiah 11:4:
“But with righteousness shall he judge the poor and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and HE SHALL, SMITE THE EARTH WITH THE ROD OF HIS MOUTH, AND WITH THE BREATH OF HIS LIPS SHALL HE SLAY THE WICKED”.
Isaiah sees Christ coming in the full power and authority of His gospel kingdom. He is the rod coming forth from the stem of Jesse upon whom rests the sevenfold Spirit. His kingdom consists of ‘the poor and the meek’ whom it is His office to defend and exalt.
Christ has this prophecy in mind in the opening words of His ministry in the Sermon on the Mount: “Blessed are the poor in spirit .... Blessed are the meek ....”
His kingdom therefore is not one of national prerogative or of millennial glory imposed upon a crushed and sullen world, but one in which humility and meekness are the distinguishing features. His people are at the mercy of a cruel and persecuting world. Their defence rests upon the power of their redeeming Lord and Saviour who takes up their cause against their persecutors and smites the earth with the rod of His mouth, and slays with the breath of His lips.
Again, in Isaiah 49:2 Christ speaks and declares “He hath made my mouth like a sharp sword”. That the entire chapter deals with gospel times is fixed for us by Paul’s use of verse 8 in his second letter to Corinth where he quotes this verse and adds the words, “Now is the accepted time; now is the day of salvation”.
(2 Cor. 6:2) Israel is rejected in this chapter of Isaiah (v.5) and the gentile world brought to salvation in her place (v.6).
The sharp sword therefore in Isaiah’s prophecy signifies the judgment which Christ executes upon the enemies of His kingdom, and the defence He affords to His true Church. It is in this sense that Christ appears to John in our passage in Revelation. It is a sword which is not wielded by the hand, but which proceeds from the mouth and therefore consists of the words and righteous decrees which He utters against the foe.
One word from Christ can make or unmake the entire creation. One word is enough to scatter the armies of the wicked. John had already seen an example of the power of Christ’s word, when in Gethsemane the officers of the temple came with a band of armed men to arrest Him. “Whom seek ye?” He asked. “Jesus of Nazareth” was the response. “I AM HE” (“I AM” in the original) declared the Son of God. At this word they ‘went backward and fell to the ground’. (John 18:4-6)
All the armed might of this world, urged on by the powers of hell, has no power over the Son of God except that which He permits to them. He imperiously cautions those who came to Gethsemane to arrest Him, “If therefore ye seek me, let these go their way” - an order which John recognised was a foreshadowing of Christ’s world-wide commission to defend and save His people in accordance with His prayer that same night, “Those whom thou gavest me I have kept and none of them is lost save the son of perdition that the scripture might be fulfilled”. (John 17:12)
John perceived that the action of Christ in the Garden in defense of His disciples was the token of His agelong defense of the Church for whose final deliverance He had prayed that night in that most remarkable of all prayers.
So the enemies of Christ and the Church are scattered and destroyed, restrained and humbled, by His all-commanding Word. With the breath of His lips He slays the wicked, whether they be visible or invisible.
Near the end of Revelation the sword is again seen in triumphant execution against the combined might of earth and hell arrayed against the Church. This is the so-called ARMAGEDDON about which so much noise is made nowadays (chap. 19:11-21). A caution is implied here against the literalistic and futuristic conceptions now so popular in relation to this subject.
Even amongst persons well-disposed to the right view of prophecy there is much confusion concerning this ‘battle’. The idea persists of an actual battle to be fought at Megiddo in northern Palestine on the site where Deborah and Barak destroyed the host of Sisera in the days of the Judges. We are even asked to believe that the army of the wicked (In the 1970’s it was the Russians) will number 200,000,000, a figure taken from Revelation 9 and which relates not to the army which shall assail the Jews just prior to the return of Christ (as the futuristic theory runs), but to the armies of heaven, the entire company of the angels, assembled for the defence of the Lord’s people and the entire destruction of the armies of the Evil One.
In Revelation the armies of heaven (Rev. 19:14) follow the Redeemer on white horses, arrayed in pure linen, and Christ smites the rebellious nations with the sword which proceeds out of His mouth (verses 15 and 21).
God’s people must make their choice between an impossible Armageddon fought in northern Palestine between the angelic host on the one side and a motley army on the other armed with ancient weaponry - shields and bucklers, bows and arrows, javelins and spears (see Ezekiel 39:9, quoted in aid, with much enthusiasm, by the sponsors of a material Armageddon) - they must choose between that, and the warfare in the spirit in which the whole Church is now and always engaged, and ever will be till He speaks the final word of victory who is the Word of God, the Eternal Logos, the Wisdom and the Power of God incarnate.
That victory will be won by one weapon only-the sword which proceeds out of the mouth of our great Champion and Hero, Christ Jesus. For Armageddon is not some afternoon battle fought somewhere in the Middle East between immense armies which could not be accommodated, supplied and fed on so limited a terrain as the tiny field of Esdraelon beside the ancient river of Kishon.
It must be and is, the continual conflict now raging, and which always has raged, between the forces of light and darkness, in the invisible of the spirit. Are we not assured by Paul that the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of satanic strongholds; that we war not against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high (that is, heavenly places? (2 Cor. 10:4; Eph. 6:12)
The entire Book of Revelation deals with this warfare of the Church against the powers of darkness, and the battle of chapter 19 is only the last phase of that battle which is always being waged and which we are fighting now. It is a battle of faith, and the last word is with Christ, from whose mouth proceeds that sharp sword with two edges with which He smites the nations. He rides into the unearthly conflict on His white horse of imperial and unchallengeable power, dipping His garment in the blood of His foes (and ours), and destroying them by His creative Word.
This is what John sees on our behalf on the isle of Patmos; this is the assurance the Church has of complete victory.
17 And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, "Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last.
"Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last.
If the Lord so wills we will continue next time and see the
“Mystery of the Seven Churches”.
As I close this message today you must know that no matter which interpretation of the Book of Revelation you believe is the most compatible with the entire Bible, unless you personally trust Jesus Christ and His righteousness alone for your eternal destiny, whether you are “right” or “wrong” will only add to your torment in hell as you remember how many times you rejected Christ and chose to stay with your favorites sins.
Repent and believe in the Gospel!
Amen
