The Revelation of St John is one of those books that engenders an unconscious but natural avoidance. You don't hear it often studied in small group. There is the sense that the density of detail, the pervasive use of symbolism, and perhaps even a prerequisite knowledge of the Old Testament to parse it can be daunting. Unlike reading the Gospels or the Pastoral Letters, the pay-off in study to understand who we are before God, our sin, our salvation, and how to live our lives, appears reduced together with the higher level of attention needed to achieve it. Conversely, we rightly scrutinize those who show an overly excited attention to books like the Revelation and Daniel and Ezekiel for their prophecies, recognizing the catastrophe of assuming that we understand the Gospel so well that its time to "graduate" to the deeper, "more interesting" things.
As much as I grew up in a church that reveled in their frequent forays into these books, where one inevitably finds himself unable to defend his unorthodox view of the Gospel without resorting to passages that most have trouble understanding, even I found my limits visiting one group where it appeared prophecy was all that they studied. There was a level of pride I had never seen before, that they knew things that the world (and even most of the other churches) missed. There was this feeling of something missing among them, of love, of connection, of people who truly like one another, that overwhelmed even an outside observer. And there was nausea of knowing how patently off they were in their conclusions by any standard. It might be the subject of comedy had they not believed in it so strongly and acted so miserably. I was still part of that larger group, and even I could see it. They couldn't.
When I left, when the Gospel, that swept-clean spotless and paved road, appeared inescapably running through every book of scripture I read, I put down those books of prophecy. I couldn't touch them. It would be years before I was willing to read them again in any state of mind, and with more humility, wondering how much I would be able to understand just by reading. As enigmatic and cryptic as they seemed earlier, with plenty of persons around me eager to insert their confidence that this meant this or that, I now started from exactly zero. Lost.
I like puzzles. The less I understand, the more I feel like my dog gnawing obsessively on his bone, unable to feel satisfaction if he lets go, until it is finally, eventually consumed. With such puzzles there is the fleeting hope held out that it may be solved, if only one is persistent.
But beyond a challenge, I find a certain draw to this book. For such a puzzle, yet I'm taken by the encouragement that "Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and heed the things which are written in it; for the time is near. (Rev 1:3)" Somehow this book (as neglected as some others in my reading) was written to be understood, taken to heart, and heeded.
The word "awesome" is used so liberally and casually in the world. It's no surprise we on the Christian side want to do what we can to take it back, to reclaim it for things that are properly awesome. So we stress the language when we find a scripture, to see if we can emotionally force the feeling back where it should be in our services and our singing. Even so, it's hard for many of us, jaded by such inflated language in common use, accustomed to incessant and relentless stimulation in daily life, to see awesome for what it is, and to react properly to things as they appear in the Book. The problem with stressing the word, with injecting the emotions to reclaim the language is that it may yield a similar deadening to its affect if we even a little overuse it above what the verse may call for. No longer a new Christian, I find often that I feel immune, or now even resistant, to such deliberate stresses -- such proclamations of "incredible" and "awesome" -- even while knowing in my mind I should have been moved to some degree. I confess that when David says "oh, how I love your law", that I desperately want to know what that must be like, to feel that throughout my being, instead of simply nodding along.
The Revelation, like some other passages, is a breath of fresh air. Because in it we come face to face with God and Christ and in their activity in the denouement of the world. Each chapter, moving along, elicits increasing feelings of gravity, of terror and dread. No logical, rational person should remain unmoved or untroubled.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom. For someone increasingly desensitized to the use of words crafted to evoke emotional response, it is the very picture put in many lesser words that draws one back to their proper sense of awe. Dread is thus a welcome feeling, a stabilizing feeling, knowing that you have captured something very basic and profound about the true God, even perhaps understanding Isaiah's own "falling on his face as if dead" before the Almighty. For a Christian, this dread is terrible and at the same time wonderful in that one fully appreciates how this awesome face, turned against you, is at once turned away from you, turned outward to become a shield and protection to you. What must Daniel have felt to discover that those savage cats would tear any attacker to pieces, as he possibly rested his head on one with his feet on another as he went to sleep?
Immediately there is again sweetness, and comfort in this book, among the terrific pictures of destruction, death, martyrdom, and finale. For a long while I've loved the depth, and the density and the elegance of how it is written even as I struggle with what seem to be puzzles.
Take the letters to the churches, Rev 2 and 3. It helps me to break up each letter in five parts: the Preamble (introduction of who is speaking), the Praise (for that church), the Problem, the Prescription (what to do) and the Promise. Others name these differently. The thing is, if reading quickly, its easy to miss how these parts are woven into each other to increase the effect of the message.
Take Smyrna, for example. Jesus is "the first and the last, who was dead, and has come to life," and he says that he knows their tribulation and poverty. The church in Smyrna is suffering. Yet he assures them, praises them, that they are rich. He knows of the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not. Evidently, many or most in this church are converted Jews and among their persecutors are unconverted Jews attacking them. Jesus tells them not to fear. From their Gentile persecutors, they will be put in prison, to be tested, and have tribulation for ten days. This is the problem. He prescribes that they be faithful until death, which is a serious possibility. And then he promises them a crown of life, and further that he who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death.
Jesus calls their Jewish tormentors a "synagogue of Satan" not simply as a condemnation, but an aggressive affirmation to this church that for all of the slander that they have left God by following Christ, they are in fact God's own people and what they have left is of Satan. He sets the record straight lest in this onslaught one's faith begins to falter. For a Jew, likely put out of their synagogue which was the center of their spiritual and social life amid Gentile pagans, this is a fortifying assurance. For myself, I remember under far less dire circumstances, after severe yelling matches with parents and friends still in my old group, wondering if the differences were so big after all; wondering if I shouldn't just give it a rest and be quiet? Perhaps try to reduce the conflict that erupted around me. I wasn't prepared for the level of animosity when conversations started out as a calm back-and-forth. For a brief moment I had my sister alongside, angry, stubborn, over-eager to argue publicly against the bad doctrine, rejecting any compromise, pushing forward as we studied while this rift between myself and my old church widened into the necessary chasm. Finally we both left.
She eventually went back to them. I'm convinced however, that I needed someone next to me in those moments, uncompromising and willing to call that life for what it was, in order for me to continue. Anger and determination from her did more to steady my faltering resolve than sympathy could.
Why the contrast in the promise? Between a crown of life and second death? Because they are "apostate" Jews, and the Jews believed in an enduring punishment for Gentiles and apostates alike. They are threatened with hell, and Jesus promises them instead a crown of life and that second death will have no power over them.
And how does he introduce himself? As "the first and the last". If anyone should have the power over life and death, it's God. "Who was dead. And has come to life." If anyone should know about death, and wrenching life from death itself, it's Him. This is his mark of authenticity and authority and capability in these words.
This is care and intensity in something measured to bring comfort.
The message to Philadelphia is another variation on this theme, except here Jesus is "holy and true", having "the key of David, who opens and no one can shut, and who shuts and no one can open." But the problem is different, lacking the teeth of Gentile violence. Here, it is vindication that Christ promises against the same "synagogue of Satan". Why the keys of David? Why are we talking about doors? Because it's from David's line that the Messiah, the Savior of Israel comes. Because they are being told that outside of Israel they are shut out of God's presence and salvation.
But Christ holds that key. They cannot shut what he opens, nor can they enter what he shuts against them. Those liars will be forced to come and fall down at the feet of the Jewish Christians, to acknowledge what they viciously denied, that their long-awaited Messiah has deeply loved these people. He counsels them to hold on, that he will keep them from the hour of trial coming upon the world. And he ends with: "He who overcomes I will make a pillar in the temple of my God, he will not go out from it anymore" asserting their unassailable place in God's holy presence. "I will write on him the name of (again) My God, and the name of the city of (and again) My God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from (yet again) My God, and (even again) My new name." Jesus is repeatedly stamps the Father's name and His name on His people so they can't get it out of their heads that "I love you".
We have the privilege of knowing Him, of standing before One who, as CS Lewis put it, is "not a tame lion" who the world yet approaches carelessly and lightheartedly. For people who are broken by standing in invincible wretchedness before a holy God, and further beaten down by the world at its worst, we are picked up never to leave His Holy Temple. And this is our God.
The picture is never so clear as when there is good contrast.
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