Brouhaha - Revelation Chapter 5

Revelation 5: 2 “²and I saw a mighty angel proclaiming with a loud voice, ‘Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals?’”

This week’s L.A. Times Sunday Crossword has a clue “Brouhaha” and I’ve discussed it with my friend Webster; he tells me it means “great excitement or concern about something”. Until then I thought it was the technical term for when the benches cleared in a ball game after the star was beaned. How does this relate to Revelation Chapter 5? Well, there’s a lot of excitement and concern going on here.

John sees God with a scroll in hand, written on both sides, with seven seals, perfectly sealed. When the angel asks who is worthy it turns out that no one in heaven, on earth, or under the earth is worthy and this causes John great concern. I would have been filled with concern too except we have an advantage over John; he is experiencing this in real time with all the emotions that come with it while we can read ahead and so I did. We are not to weep; the Lion of the tribe of Judah is worthy and He appears here as a Lamb as though it had been slain, the perfect sacrifice that is able to open the scroll.

The scroll was written on the inside and the back, both sides hold information. Normally scrolls are written only on the inside unless there is just too much for one side to hold. What is this scroll, so packed with information and sealed so that only the Lord Himself can open it? Godly words to live by, wisdom of the ages, a list of names? We’ll likely find out in later chapters but suffice it to say that it is a document worthy of a brouhaha on several levels.

Revelation 5: 8-9a “⁸When he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell before the Lamb, each holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. ^9aThey sing a new song:”

What I find interesting here, beyond the fact that they worship at every action, is that our prayers fill the golden bowls that the elders hold in the throne room. Every time that we pray it rises as incense to the Father and they empower the elders to sing a new song to the Lamb Who is Worthy.

Revelation 5: 11-12a “¹¹Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels surrounding the throne and the living creatures and the elders; they numbered myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, ^12asinging with full voice,”

Sounds a bit like a child’s retort “infinity times infinity”. The being in heaven and on the earth on uncounted…and they all worship.

Revelation 5: 13 “¹³Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, singing, ‘To the one seated on the throne and the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!”

Everywhere John looked he saw bunches of creatures and heard them all extolling the power and grace of our Living God. It was a regular brouhaha, excitement all over the place for the One Who is Worthy had the scroll in hand, none of the seals where opened yet and there was a din of anticipation. Jesus is opening the seals and through the Holy Spirit we will know what the scroll has to say.

Revelation 5: 14 “¹⁴And the four living creatures said, ‘Amen!’ And the elders fell down and worshiped.”

Let’s fill the golden bowls in the throne room with our prayers for the saints, prayers of adoration, and prayers of repentance; the Lord’s Prayer over and over again until it is written on our hearts, inside and on the back, just as the words of the scroll.

In His grip, jerry

After This I Looked...

Revelation 4: 1-2a “¹After this I looked, and there in heaven a door stood open! And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, “Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this. ^2a At once I was in the spirit,”

Earlier this week I took one of those silly Facebook quizzes, this one to tell me what my greatest fear is by having me simply choose various photos in answer to certain prompts, one prompt that only said to pick a photo, any photo (I chose the bear and have no idea how this affected the outcome). The answer was shocking and has shaken me up. It hit so true to me that I have been reeling from it and I’m still not certain that I am firmly on my feet about it. The answer? “You fear letting yourself down more than anything.” Closely related for me is the fear of failure. I have an active imagination and often picture grand results from endeavors, not unlike the endeavor to write. I fear failure and letting myself down so much that I often torpedo my own efforts to the point where I often don’t start or start so late that it’s doomed to fail but I have at least given myself an excuse for it that deflects from the probability that I was just not good enough. And at this insight I thought “this boy is really messed up, seriously messed up, and needs professional help.”

How does this relate to the book of Revelation and my study of it? Well, I haven’t cracked the book in several days and that’s no way to complete a study. God help me.

This is a Wednesday morning and I’ve just returned from the Men’s Prayer meeting that I haven’t gone to in months. I went this morning upon request to receive prayer for my upcoming school year of mentoring my little guy, Taylor. I’ll be going regularly to meet afterward with my Kids’ Hope prayer partner. On this morning we were lead into three times of quiet reflection, what I call waiting on the Lord. I can’t go into His presence without repentance and so I first repented of being thrown off-base by my personal revelation and the response was, “git back to it!” He can be so down-home sometimes.

Chapter 4 is all about John’s vision of the heavenly throne, the bejeweled God, throne, floor, and the inclusion of a lot of creatures plus the 24 elders on their thrones. The four creatures sing without ceasing Rev 4: 8b “Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God the Almighty, who was and is and is to come.” And the 24 elders cast their crowns before the throne and sing “¹¹You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”

Simple Throne

I am a simple man with a simple mind and, hopefully, a simple spirit so I won’t go into all the symbolism that is in this chapter, nor am I likely to dwell on it for any other chapter; maybe I’ll use a post just on that but it will surely need some study. For me, this chapter, Revelation 4, is all about God being worshipped. The fact that John is in the Spirit for this is no coincidence. In the Gospel of John, chapter 4 Jesus tells us straight out that true worshipers will worship in spirit and in truth and that the Father is seeking those who do so. This was no parable, it was plain speaking to plain folk like us. The 24 elders abandoned their crowns and thrones and simply adored God and gave honor. I love it when I am going through the day, nothing special or maybe so, but just going along and then I pause and realize that I had been in worship. Those times are…few…and…far…between. I hope to connect the dots.

In His grip, jerry

He Said What?

Revelation 2: 1 “These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks among the seven golden lampstands.”

The Revelation of John, chapters 2 and 3 are letters to the Seven Churches of Asia which are wholly in red in my Red-letter Bible and attributed directly to Jesus. This is disconcerting since there are a lot of “repent or” references such as being spewed out of His mouth, having Jesus make war with the Sword of His mouth, killing the children of fornication with Jezebel, a follower of the Nicolaitans, he will come like a thief – and you know what that means –, and a couple of references to having our lampstand removed. These are judgments that we don’t often consider as we are more focused on the grace of the Gospel. I vote for keeping my lampstand in His presence.

During any study I have to be careful of getting carried away with lingology, the study of special language used for a particular activity or by a particular group of people. This is a sound word based on my friend Webster’s definition of lingo and my making a study of it. I’ve so far relied on Webster, my The Oxford Campion to the Bible (a gift to me many years ago from my mother-in-law Janet, God bless her!), and internet searches, an admittedly sketchy source to be used with a grain of salt.

There are a couple of warning references to the Nicolaitans and following their teachings that encouraged people to eat meat sacrificed to idols and that it was okay to commit fornication so I focused on them. From my resources (internet search to WordofTruthRadio.com and A-voice.com) it appears that this is a gnostic sect whose doctrine appears to have been a form of Antinomianism. That’s a word that I dug into and it makes me shiver. Paraphrased from Webster and the two internet sources this is a belief that is based upon a recognition of the mercy of God as the ground of salvation, good so far but it makes the fatal assumption that man can freely partake in sin because the Law of God is no longer binding. Confirming John’s revelation Paul, chastised the Corinthians for such behavior as well.

We have little chance in the US of eating food sacrificed to idols although I wondered at all the deep-fried sacrifices made at fairs across the nation as we walked through the LA County Fair last weekend. While this is true on a physical layer, we serve a God who is searching for worshipers in spirit and truth and so we must be looking at the things sacrificed to idols on a spiritual plane. Of particular concern to me are the sacrifices being made to the idols of public opinion and popularism. I’m for letting the earthly government legislate to worldly standards while the churches should govern themselves via the Gospel. We should concentrate on the two commandments Jesus underlined for us; love the Lord our God with our whole hearts and love our neighbors as ourselves. Against these there is no law. It is a fine line that we need to walk between loving the sinner and hating the sin, welcoming the needy while rejecting sinful actions.

I want my lampstand in His presence and to do so I must reject the compromise and avoid the consumption of sacrifices made to the popular view while being committed to loving my God and neighbor.

In His grip, jerry

Revelation? Who, Me?

This Sunday I was told to read Revelation. So the first thing I did was to consult with my friend Webster and he gave me several definitions:

1a: an act of revealing or communicating divine truth b: something that is revealed by God to humans

2a: an act of revealing to view or making known b: something that is revealed; especially: an enlightening or astonishing disclosure <shocking revelations> c: a pleasant often enlightening surprise <her talent was a revelation>

An interesting range from “revealing divine truth” to “an enlightening surprise”. For our purposes lets us use 1a and b; fair enough?

The Revelation to John, as the book is formally titled in my copy of the New Revised Standard Version Bible, is a letter written to the seven churches that are in Asia (Rev 1.4). This is serious business for a layman like me to consider and I will seek out a proper reference guide. During times like this, and there has always been times like these, it seems important to me to really understand the revelation, what it is and what I am to do with it. As an American believer in Christ it has been easy for me to become complacent in my faith and it seems that it will somehow be stirred during this reading and study. It is easy to achieve complacency in this country where the persecution of our faith is on a psychic (read psychological) and emotional plane while our brothers and sisters in other countries face death and torture for their beliefs. The opening explanations in this little NRSV study bible tell us that this book was written to encourage the faithful “to resist staunchly the demands that they worship the emperor” and in the face of growing persecutions.

I think that I will choose times to read sections aloud as encouraged in Rev 1.3: “Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of the prophecy, and blessed are those who hear and who keep what is written in it; for the time is near.” I can use the blessing, who couldn’t? Especially with the time being near.

I’m a little nervous about this directive as I have a lot of reading and writing on my desk at the moment, stuff that I feel the Lord wants me to be doing, and to have a fresh review of Revelation could change the way I view these things and go about them. Maybe?

My prayer is this: May God grant me the grace and covering to accept a deeper revelation of Jesus Christ and the strength to act upon it and respond as Isaiah did with a resounding “Here am I, send me”. May God grant you the same grace and covering in leading you to a fresh discovery.

In His grip, jerry