Our Returning King
Our text comes from the last letter in our Bible, the Apocalypse of Jesus Christ, which we more commonly refer to as the Revelation. Himself imprisoned on the isle of Patmos, John reminds us that tribulation was already a present reality for Christians (9). For two millennia, Christians have turned to this letter to find the “patient endurance” in Jesus Christ referred to in verse 9. We join them here:
The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near.
John to the seven churches that are in Asia:
Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth.
To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him. Even so. Amen.
“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”
I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance that are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet saying, “Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea.”
Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength.
When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades. Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this. As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.
–Revelation 1:1-20 (ESV)
Of course, we are all negotiating the tragic events occurring at Covenant Presbyterian Church & School in Nashville earlier this week. Tragically, among the six victims was the nine-year-old daughter of Chad Scruggs, Covenant’s Senior Pastor and an alumnus of Covenant Seminary. Chad and Jada have four beautiful children, one of whom has already run her race and is in the arms of her loving Savior. I had the privilege of sharing a breakfast with Chad on one of my trips to Nashville last year. As you know from reports, he is a gifted pastor and a wonderful husband and father.
No matter how mature or healthy, however, no one can be prepared for this type of tragedy. That’s impossible. The pain is only multiplied by two additional nine-year-old and three more adult victims.
Such pain. Such heartbreak. Such evil. How can this happen? Why would God allow a person to succumb to such darkness and then allow it to metastasize into such horrific evil? Why didn’t God intervene? Inescapable and heart-wrenching questions for which our answers are far too thin.
No matter what we affirm about God’s sovereignty, the Scriptures warn against reckless and cold explanations of suffering. Lest we forget: Job’s friends were not very friendly. Nor were they helpful. Especially in moments of suffering we recognize that life is not the way it is supposed to be. Writing about his own grief following the death of his wife, C. S. Lewis described the loss as “an amputation.” He said that there is nothing left to do with suffering “except to suffer it.” In these moments it feels like our sorrows will never end and that the voice of evil has drown all else out.
But we know this is not true. Though we cannot and should not give pat answers to Monday’s tragedy, as Christians we do know that there is more to the story of this world than its sin and tragedy. During this upcoming week, Christians around the world will rehearse our living hope, which has been secured by our Savior, Jesus Christ. Through his vicarious death and resurrection, Jesus vanquished the foes of sickness, sorrow, pain, sin, and death.
Now, no matter the moment, believers live on the “risen” side of Easter. And even if we cannot feel the reality of that hope in this moment, it is important that we acknowledge to one another the anchorage of faith given to us by our Suffering Savior King.
This is what Christians do in suffering, we remind each other that there is a better word coming at the end being spoken to us by our returning king. Though we may not have all our questions answered, our Savior has given us the most important answer that speaks to our need.
In many ways the entire Revelation is that better and last word of hope, but there are three points of encouragement I’d like to highlight for us here in chapter one.
As our returning King, Jesus gets the last word on history
To be sure, our fascination with the Revelation swirls around our desire to know specific details about the future events. Even so, the focus of Revelation is not on the details of the future, but the King of the future. It’s less concerned with our questions about the future and more concerned with who the Lord over history is.
Twice in this chapter we read that Jesus is the Alpha and the Omega, he is the beginning and the end (8,17). In other words, Jesus is the key to history itself. In fact, he is not only the last word, but he is also the first word. Jesus Christ is both creator of all things and its telos or consummation. In Jesus Christ, will all things reach their glorious fulfillment.
In verse 16 we are given confirmation that Jesus is the authoritative interpreter of history. There we are given the image of a massive sword ushering forth from the mouth of our returning king, which reminds us that Jesus is the King who wields the sword of Spirit and truth.
In moments like this, this news is especially comforting because it reminds us that our present circumstances do not tell the whole story. For example, how tempting it would have been for John to think,
Here I am, the last apostle, and I am exiled on this terrible, rocky excuse for an island in the middle of the Aegean Sea. All hope for the Kingdom of God is lost. I wonder, maybe Jesus was wrong.
Yet here Jesus reminds John and us that our present circumstances or any particular moment in history cannot possibly explain the whole course of history. We cannot see into the whole story and for this reason, we must allow ourselves to be held onto by the Alpha and the Omega, the one who holds that history, and us, in his own hand.
As our returning King, Jesus gets the last word on evil
History is not just about competing narratives it is about navigating the reality and horror of evil. As Christians, we shouldn’t be shy about acknowledging the fact that we don’t fully understand how God is at work in the midst of so much evil in this world. Just because we don’t have all the answers does not mean that our God is agnostic about evil and the suffering it brings. I don’t know about you, but in the midst of the unfolding story I not only experienced sadness, I experienced a sense of holy outrage and a longing for these wrongs to be righted.
Indeed, fundamental to Jesus’ return will be setting the world to rights and putting an end to even to both the presence and effects of evil. It is to this hope that verse 7 speaks,
Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him.
The picture here of Jesus’ return is not only glorious, but terrifying. It signifies his reigning authority over all the cosmos, including his authority over all those who do evil. Though there be days that are evil, on the day of our Lord’s return those days will finally come to an end. A primary purpose for Jesus’ second coming is the judgment he will bring upon all sin and the evildoers of this world (1 Pet. 4:5). Vengeance is God’s business (Rom. 12:19), not ours.
As Miroslav Volf writes,
If God were not angry at injustice and deception and did not make a final end to violence - that God would not be worthy of worship...The only means of prohibiting all recourse to violence by ourselves is to insist that violence is legitimate only when it comes from God. (Miroslav Volf, Exclusion and Embrace: A Theological Exploration of Identity, Otherness, and Reconciliation.)
As King, Jesus gets the last word on us
But even more important than God’s last words on history and on evil are his last words on us. Look at verses 4-6,
John to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.
So many words jump out at us here: grace, peace, firstborn, ruler of kings. But I want to consider two that surely are among the most important Jesus could ever speak to our hearts: “loved” and “freed”. In Jesus Christ we are loved. And in Jesus Christ we have been set free from our sins.
To him who loves us
Consider with me for a moment the love of our Savior. Notice first the tense of this verb. It is in the present tense. Our Savior “loves us;” this is a present reality. Though Jesus cannot be seen by his people with the visible eye, the Revelation reminds us that he is no less present with us, especially in the midst of our suffering.
We’ve yet to speak of the seven golden lampstands. Verse 20 tells us that they represent the seven churches of Asia. And though not stated explicitly, they in turn represent all the churches of the triune God throughout all history. But notice who is with the churches. John turned his head to the voice of the one who was speaking and saw “in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man” (13).
Jesus was not only with John, but he was with his church. Friends, that means that Jesus is still with us today. And the reason he is with us is not because of our love, but because of his.
To those set free
Secondly, verse 5 tells us we have been set free from our sins by Jesus’ blood. While Jesus’ love is past, present, and future, the freedom from the penalty of our sins secured for us by Jesus’ blood is uniquely and completely in the past. In the past, Jesus was offered up as the sacrificial lamb. He never wore the garments of a priest. Through his resurrection, Jesus has been shown to not only be the lamb who was slain, but the most excellent High Priest who has purchased for us everlasting light. Now, his garments are the very emblems of the freedom he has won for us.
When I think about the tragedy our friends are experiencing right now in Nashville, I will tell you, my words fail. Indeed, there is a time for our words to fail us and when we must hold our hands over our mouths (Job 40:4). But even in these moments, there is a final word, a better word that speaks comfort to us, even in the midst of unspeakable tragedy. There is one who turned the implement of violence upon himself. With the prophet Isaiah, we remember it was the Lord’s will to crush him (Isa. 53:10). Loved and freed. About this there can be no doubt.
In times like this, we Christians are torqued between a “day of evil” (Ephesians 6:13) and the favorable time or the day of salvation (2 Cor. 6:2). Of these, the day of evil must be endured. But about the other, Jesus calls us to seize the opportunity, proclaiming the Gospel. We can do both because our Suffering Savior King not only gets the last word, but is the Word of life (Phil. 2:16).
