A New Perspective

Revelation 1:4-8

Rev. Stephen H. Wilkins

Georgetown Presbyterian Church

April 22, 2007

Two fur trappers, Jacques and Pierre, were up in the great white north in a quest for wolf pelts, which were bringing in good money back in those days. One night they were awakened by the sound of snarling and growling. They looked out of their tent and discovered that they were surrounded by a vicious pack of wolves. Their hunting gear was out of reach, and so they were basically defenseless. Jacques turned to Pierre and said, "Those wolves look mean and hungry, and there are about fifteen of them and only two of us. I guess you know what that means." And Pierre answered, "Yeah, we’re rich!"

Isn’t it remarkable how people can be confronted with the same reality, and yet they can come to completely different conclusions? So much of how we encounter this world depends on the perspective from which we look at it.

Sometimes we need to step back and look at things from a different perspective in order to see them the way they really are. It’s kind of like the back of a beautiful tapestry. If you look at the back, what you see is a bunch of messy threads and knots that don’t seem to make any real design. It looks like chaos. But then when you look at the other side, you see an intricate, beautiful design.

A change in perspective can make a huge difference in how you see something. Sometimes we need help seeing things as they really are.

I think that’s one of the main purposes of the Book of Revelation – to help us see things the way they really are. Revelation is probably the most talked-about book in the Bible, but for the wrong reasons. We tend to look at Revelation as a secret code that we have to decipher in order to unlock the mysteries of the last days. It is our tendency to link specific current political figures and events to specific images in the book of Revelation, as if after 2000 years God’s word is suddenly more relevant than it was when it was first delivered to the seven churches in Asia. We have the theology that underlies the Left Behind series to thank for the current perspective.

We get so caught up in trying to predict the end of the world that we fail to see the glory of God in all its fullness in Revelation. I tend to side with folks like Eugene Peterson, who says that Revelation "does not primarily call for decipherment, as if it were written in code, but that it evokes wonder, releasing metaphors that resonate meanings and refract insights in the praying imagination." Revelation, I believe, is meant to be read as devotional literature, as reading that fills us with wonder and awe at who God is. And from start to finish, that’s what Revelation does – it points us to God, and it gives us a behind-the-scenes look at the spiritual reality of the world, and it proclaims liberation from the darkness of the world, and it reminds us that the victory belongs to God.

It’s no mistake that the readings from Revelation in the Lectionary fall on the heels of Easter. You see, the book of Revelation is like an exclamation point on the proclamation of Easter, because the victory that Revelation proclaims is dependent on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Revelation is real and relevant precisely because the resurrection of Jesus Christ ushers in a new reality for the believer. It is the reality of the resurrection that enables us to affirm that this is indeed God’s world, even when it doesn’t appear that way.

That, I think, was the original quandary facing the churches to whom Revelation was first sent. The early church in the Roman empire was a church under persecution. Emperor worship was at its peak, and there was immense pressure for the entire empire to bow down and worship Caesar. But the Christians refused to do so. Their confession was not "Caesar is Lord", but "Christ is Lord." And because of that one-word substitution – Christ for Caesar – the early church was severely persecuted and oppressed, to the point that they were ready to despair that perhaps their God was not so mighty after all.

What do you say to people under attack?

What do you say to people in pain?

Two millennia later, we ask the same questions. We see evil in our world, and we wonder if God really is in control.

What do you say to young men and women whose lives will always bear the emotional scars from what happened at Virginia Tech on April 16, 2007?

What do you say to parents who will never again be able to attend parents’ day, because the life of their child has been snuffed by the act of a sick and deranged young man?

What do you say to a nation that is searching for answers to the problem of evil in the aftermath of the worst shooting rampage in our history?

You say that our Lord is larger than life, that our God is bigger and more powerful than the sum of all the problems we might face. From start to finish, Revelation is about showing us that there is more to this world than meets the eye. It’s as if the world we see is the back side of the tapestry—confusing, not making sense. In Revelation, we are shown the front side of the tapestry, and what we’re told is that God is indeed sovereign, and that God is in control, and that there is a plan and a purpose, even in trial and tribulation.

Just look at the language of our text before us this morning. It’s full of names and images of God and of Jesus that proclaim absolute sovereignty, words that convey comfort and strength, words that declare to us that we need not fear, for our faith is not in vain.

God is described as the one who is and who was and who is to come—that’s the language of eternal existence. He’s the Alpha and the Omega—a reference to the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, and it points to the fact that from beginning to end, from creation to final consummation of the new creation, God is in control. At the end of Revelation, God is again referred to as the Alpha and Omega. It’s as if the Alpha and the Omega are the parentheses that bracket the whole message of Revelation – beginning, end, and all the in-between belong to God, who is sovereign and in control.

Jesus is the faithful witness, pointing us to God and giving us an example of witnessing even under persecution. He is the firstborn of the dead, which is a reference to the fact that his resurrection is the firstfruits of many more to come – his resurrection is our hope and assurance of our own resurrection.

You know, sometimes we shy away from mentioning the hope of heaven. Some people think it’s a copout that allows us to gloss over worldly problems without really struggling with them. It’s one of the things that C.S. Lewis mentions in his book, The Problem of Pain. He says, "We are very shy nowadays of even mentioning heaven. We are afraid of the jeer about ‘pie in the sky,’ and of being told that we are trying to ‘escape’ from the duty of making a happy world here and now into dreams of making a happy world elsewhere. But either there is ‘pie in the sky’ or there is not. If there is not, then Christianity is false, for this doctrine is woven into its whole fabric. If there is, then this truth, like any other, must be faced. . ."

The hope of resurrection is not an escapist hope – it is the hope that the longing of our soul will be satisfied forever. Jesus is the firstborn of the dead, the firstfruit of the resurrection in which we will also participate.

Jesus is also called the ruler of the kings of the earth, a title that falls under the "already-but-not-yet" category of biblical truth. You see, the life, and the death, and the resurrection of Jesus Christ, for those who believe, point to the complete Lordship of Jesus Christ. In Philippians, Paul points us to the day when every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess, that Jesus Christ is Lord. It has always been my contention that Jesus Christ already is Lord; we just haven’t yet reached the day when every tongue confesses that reality.

Do you see the kind of picture that John is painting for us? Can you start to make some sense of the messy threads on the back side of the tapestry of life? Can you begin to see that in a world that seems out of control, there is order and meaning?

Can you sense in these verses a re-stating of the age-old truths of scripture? Truths like, "God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in times of trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way, though the mountains tumble into the sea. . ." Or words like, "If God is for us, who can be against us?... For I am convinced. . . that nothing in all of creation can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Can you hear these truths repeated?

You see, in the end, Revelation doesn’t really give us a new truth. It simply takes the basic truths proclaimed in the other 65 books of the Bible, and it presents them to us in a new light.

Two weeks ago the words were shouted around the world, "Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!"

And you know what? That’s not a once-a-year truth. Christ is still risen today! Alleluia! And it’s because Christ is risen that we know things aren’t as they seem. The new perspective that the resurrection gives us enables us to know that sin and evil and suffering and pain don’t have the last word. God has the last word. And it’s a word of victory, of grace, of forgiveness and love.

What do you say to people in pain?

What do you say to young men and women whose lives will always bear the emotional scars from what happened at Virginia Tech on April 16, 2007?

What do you say to parents who will never again be able to attend parents’ day, because the life of their child has been snuffed out by the act of a sick and deranged young man?

What do you say to a nation that is searching for answers to the problem of evil in the aftermath of the worst shooting rampage in our history?

I say there’s a whole different world out there – you just have to look at it from a different perspective.

When you look at the world, what do you see? At which side of the tapestry are you looking?

Try looking at it from the perspective of Easter.