NASA/courtesy of nasaimages.org

“I am making everything new” what a wonderful promise!

Not just a repair or clean up, but a renewed creation. Back in Genesis, the new line that started with Seth instead of Cain (the murderer) failed, after the flood Noah who was “a righteous man, blameless in his generation; and walked with God” (Gen 6:9) promptly became the first drunk, even Abraham – the father of faith – showed his lack of faith a few verses after responding to God’s call. Clean up jobs don’t work, they just sweep human sinfulness under the carpet. As Jesus’ parable (Mat 12:43ff. Luke 11:24ff.) shows even casting the demon out does no long term good, only a new creation will do, so… the one who began it all will end it all : “I am the alpha and the omega”.

And then there’s the holy city, which is quite clearly nothing like the existing unholy cities, the Babylons that we keep building: Gen 11, Babylon of the exile, and “now” (in John’s time) Rome, and note that in 11:8 he links Sodom, “Egypt” and Jerusalem to my list! Human cities concentrate human evil, but since we are ALL broken even the smallest inhabited place is already contaminated.

So we too need to be made new!

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When the Burma Army attacks a village, they leave nothing untouched. As the people flee, rice barns, houses and personal belongings are destroyed. Then landmines are placed around the village to stop the people from returning. (Picture and words: Partners)

With this reading, skipping all the confusing stuff about the seven seals and the seven bowls, and most of the material about the false bride (the whore of Babylon), we come straight to the end of the beginning in chapter 19. We’ve returned to the throne room in heaven, now in victory!

Westerners, especially those of us born after the end of the second world war (which means most listeners to this podcast ;) have difficulty really understanding this joy in heaven, most of our battles are such trivial ones. But live for a while with people far away, share their pain as their children get sick while a corrupt system that should provide treatment does not. Feel their anger at the tyrants who oppress, ruling at the end of a gun, burning crops and homes, raping the girls and working the men to) death. The horrors in places like Burma/Myanmar, Congo or Darfur hardly bear thinking about, but they are repeated in less extreme ways across much of the planet. Take a share in these feelings, and the victory of the lamb sounds just fine. Remembering my new friends in the camps on the Thai-Burma border, or thinking of my old colleagues in Congo, I’ll pray Maranatha Come Lord! So that they can join the celebration in heaven.

This chapter paints a Jesus the pious portrait painters never imagined, but when you think of what it really means
that our world is spoilt and broken by human Sin (not sins, as in the little wrongs we do but Sin the power that is woven of those little wrongs and becomes a cyclonic system in which fairly ordinary people commit monstrous atrocities) thinking of such a broken world makes sense of this Jesus.

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Lifting the First Seal of Apocalypse and the White Rider of war. Illuminated page (not an icon!) from the 17th century Tolkovy Apocalypse. Moscow, first half of the 17th century. (Image and text, Wikimedia)

If you’ve been wonderoing when all the visions in Revelation begin, wonder no more. Today’s reading is full of visions.

A throne in heaven: for God alone rules heaven and earth. One sitting on it: God is not named, for that would be too familiar in this dangerous vision, dangerous because humans are unholy and God is holy. Then v.3 is a reminder not to take this vision as visual, it’s a word picture

Many of us approach John’s visions wanting to know more than John tells us, either about what heaven is like or about God’s timetable for the future. So people dig into the visions, work cleverly at their imagined codes… Spurgeon in a sermon on this passage puts it well:¹

It is very little that we can know of the future state, but we may be quite sure that we know as much as is good for us. We ought to be as content with that which is not revealed as with that which is. If God wills us not to know, we ought to be satisfied not to know. Depend on it, he has told us all about heaven that is necessary to bring us there; and if he had revealed more, it would have served rather for the gratification of our curiosity than for the increase of our grace.

So sit back, relax, and enjoy the words, catch a glimpse of the glory and holiness of God! But, be content with this glimpse “through a glass darkly” because this side of death it is all you will get, or need. And one day, quite soon enough we’ll be there face to face! It’s better to spend time getting spruced up and ready, rather than speculating on what the view will be like!

This vision is full of echoes of Scripture. The most obvious in ch.3 is the “Trishaggion” (the triple declaration of God’s holiness) that recalls the temple vision in ch.6 of Isaiah. But the creatures with their eyes echoes Ezekiel’s opening vision (as does the scroll at the start of ch.5).

There are loads of intertextual echoes throughout this material. So, why not get a good set of cross references (the ones in the NET Bible are not bad, the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge ones are free with most Bible software, but the best I’ve seen come with Bibles from the French Bible Society – why haven’t others copied them? Get a set of cross-references and follow them to see how richly biblical chapter five is but don’t get so caught up in the trees that you miss the forest!:

Revelation 5:11-14 11 Then 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, 12 singing with full voice, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slaughtered to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” 13 Then 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 to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!” 14 And the four living creatures said, “Amen!” And the elders fell down and worshiped.

Because only the “lamb that was slaughtered” is worthy, because only he has or could “Revelation 5:9 ransom God saints from every tribe and language and people and nation.

Amen!

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1. C.H. Spurgeon, Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Vol 15, No.887

Dream car by U-g-g-B-o-y-(-Photograph-World-Sense-)

Most listeners to this podcast, judging by the website stats, come from comfortable Western countries. If this is you (and it is ME) then most of what is said to the first six churches does not closely fit us, though it more often gives us goals to aim for.

Laodicea by contrast does fit, neither hot nor cold – isn’t moderation one of our chief virtues, especially in Church (even more than our society more widely where often excess reigns). We are also (on a global scale if not as individuals ;) rich and successful. Of course if we look beyond the material things that are so plentifull we might really see ourselves as blind and naked! (As the risen Christ saw the Laodicean Christians :(

Our moderation, being not hot or cold won’t do. Jesus says he wants to spit us out!

It is in this passage that we read the word picture of Jesus standing knocking. It is not an evangelistic message but call to re-commitment!

Then running through these messages are the twin themes of sexual immorality and eating food offered to idols. Sex is much the same in any time and place, but the problem of food offered to idols hardly seems real today except…  What did eating food offered to idols mean to Christians in those churches in Turkey? Returning to their old ways, acting like and sharing leisure with old pagan friends, and so reducing God to another god. For most of us the similar temptation is to look for money and comfort to trust and enjoy things. Reducing God to an auxiliary role and not the main or only source of our life and happiness!

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Picture by Torley

This reading introduces the book and Revelation needs introducing because it is a difficult book. Among its oddities are the rhetorical flourishes (present elsewhere in the Bible but very strongly featured here), the use of picture language (which interestingly often cannot actually be pictured), vivid visions and a strong interest in the future/eternity.

Listening to John’s word pictures makes clear that these aren’t really pictures that John draws, the “word pictures” signal other things, so white as wool, white as snow – signals purity. However, it also does clever stuff called intertextuality – John sets up echoes with other Scriptures that ought to be familiar. These intertextual echoes are everywhere in Revelation and vital to understanding the book, so it’s one book where a good set of cross references will pay its weight in gold!

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Revelation Horse by ImNotQuiteJack

The book calls itself the apokalupsis of Jesus Christ – the revelation the disclosure of hidden things – so like parts of Daniel it will show us glimpses “behind the scenes” of the world letting us see a bit of what Christ is doing off stage. This means (paradoxically) that this book requires us to learn a bit about the setting and people for whom John is writing – it may be even more important for such a book than for one that tells the action on-stage ;) John is a prisoner, “for the word of God and the testimony of Jesus”, in PATMOS, a small rocky island in the Aegean, about 15 miles West of Ephesus.

Futurist: Revelation talks about the future so interpreters often assume it is talking about our near future! We call these readings “futurist”. Because the book calls itself a revelation of hidden things, it is easy for clever interpreters to convince people it is a secret to be decoded. So Hal Lindsay in 1972 decoded Revelation and “proved” that the world would end in one generation from 1948 – when the modern state of Israel was founded – a generation he said was 30 years, so 1978 was the date. When it passed he decided that a generation is actually 100 years, even if he lived to be a hundred he’ll be safely dead by 2048!

But the Bible is not a code, its message is clear “perspicuous” God is not a trickster or puzzler who sets us difficult intellectual problems to solve.he earliest futurist readings (like Justin Martyr in 2nd century) saw the 1000 years ending (with the world in 1000or 1030AD) but that is long past so now.

Preterist: Another approach sees the book entirely set in our past – around John’s own time – this seems more true than the extreme futurist approach BUT some things in Revelation would not have made sense to John’s readers as being fulfilled in their lifetime. There IS still a future element…

Intertextual: John continually echoes rest of Bible especially the prophets, in doing this he creates resonances and so suggests that history repeats itself.

Literary/symbolic: John creates a “virtual world” where the real significance of events and things in the here and now can be seen a bit like CS Lewis’ Narnia stories.

Whatever approaches (and for sure we’ll need more than one for almost any passage from Revelation!) we need a strong awareness of John’s setting and the people to whom he was writing. So why not read a few pages, from a Bible with introductions to books or from an “Introduction to the New Testament” book before you read the E100 chapters?

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Window on the world? (Photo by Las Valley 702)

Beware this reading is dangerous!

After readings from Peter and then James, the E100 gives us another reading from one of the less Greek of the NT writers. Like James John circles round his topic and returns to the same “place” (though having moved forward). John is (at least if you have a poetic cell or two in your brain) less confusing than James, partly because he is obviously writing poetry. But also because the ebb and flow of his thought, and its parallelism more obviously moves forward.

Having said John writes (near) poetry our reading cuts in at just one of the points where John breaks into prose and logic, though the first line sounds quite poetic. However after a little prose logic we get a fine “poem”, and one that carries a powerful “sting” like the prophets for many readers today.

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The truth is we have a wonderful country full of hotels,clubs,food franchises... and most of the people who work in this places for the rich come from a hood like this, No electricity and no water most of the time, still they manage to make it to work, get their kids to school,deal with public education, transportation and health which have always been a disaster here. The incredible part of all, is not how they survive,.. next time you visit a foreign country specially one in the third world, look a the smiling face serving you and know what they have to endure. (Photo and caption by Mercedes Ramirez Guerrero)

James is a difficult book to read, though in this podcast I’ll suggest that things we learn reading the Old Testament can help us. I’ll also try to explain how understanding where James is coming from can help, that is a bit of cultural understanding will make clearer how his mind works, and so his book. But if I tell you more you won’t listen to the podcast ;)

[PS: sorry, this podcast is longer than it should be, but it does introduce how to read James, and begins to address the "famous" faith and works dispute among early Christian leaders!]

I chose the picture and (longer than usual) caption on the right because an example James gives in this reading (James 2:16) happens (or almost happens) too often today – truly we live in a global village!

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This picture by Ed Yourdon popped up in a search for "Peter bishop of Rome" it seemed to fit this reading, and I have used Ed's excellent photos before, so welcome another chance to say "Thanks!"

This epistle is a bit of a puzzle it presents itself as written by Peter, Jesus’ rough practical fisherman disciple, but it is written in smart literary Greek and the style seems to reflect Hellenistic rhetorical training. (As well as the sort of knowledge of Scripture we might expect from Peter!) Perhaps it was written by someone who owed a great debt to Peter or perhaps Peter had help from a ghost-writer – Silvanus (see 5:12) is a frequent candidate.

The Bible quotations and allusions pretty consistently seem to reflect the Greek (LXX) which also points away from Peter having selected the words of the letter. But the letter is most deeply concerned to discuss the Scriptural basis of Christian theology (remember Scripture means OT). As well as the Psalms and references from Isaiah that are common in the NT it also quotes Proverbs several times and Leviticus.

However the letter was composed, its solid Scriptural foundation, and polished style make it surprising that it is not better known among Christians, perhaps it is only read so little because Paul has such a dominant place, and because Peter deals less in controversy and more with the simple basics of faith!

Wow never mind who wrote it, and what writing it meant, just listen to the powerful language and theology!

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Fragments of a roman box flue (photo from Finds.org.uk)

Clay vessels were everywhere, plates, bowls, cups, storage, cooking… most of the everyday objects we make of glass or china, and many we make of plastic (or even metal) were clay pottery in the ancient world. Living back then you were deeply (and probably unconsciously) aware of just how fragile standard clay pots are. We live in a world of bone china and hardened glass. Even the average cheap dinnerset is so much tougher than an ancient pot, and the broken pieces of pottery were everywhere. Walking across the top of Tell Miqne – identified by the excavators as the Philistine city of Ekron – there were small fragments of broken pottery everywhere. Most of them from ancient times.

Pots broke very easily, hardly needing to be dropped, but apart from shattering into smaller pieces the material is very durable. So when Paul talks of treasure in clay jars the first thing to come to mind would be the fragility of the vessels. On the other hand fired clay is indeed very durable – it does not decay like wood or even iron (which rusts), unless it is broken, a clay vessel seals and preserves. Fine wines were kept in clay jars, the famous Dead Sea Scrolls were (many of them) held in clay jars to protect and preserve them. So Paul’s imagery here is vivid, simple and immediate.

But, wait… there’s more :)

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