The History Channel Missed the Point
The Book of Revelation is a book of redemption, not a book of calamity. The Lord Jesus Christ has shed His blood to redeem this earth and He is called The Lamb during the entire seven years of The Great Tribulation. He is never seen during this entire redemptive process as vicious and vindictive but as a “Lamb slain” to pay the price of cleansing this earth. The church world has rejected this great book because of this false concept. If anyone is to blame for the dark events in this book, it is the devil and the wicked crowd that have raped the human family of righteousness. Jesus Christ would be the worst of tyrants if He allowed the filth of this world to go unchecked.
Revelation is a storybook. It takes the reader from the scene of Christ’s glory as the Father’s High Priest in His heavenly temple to the final temple called “New Jerusalem” where His Bride will dwell eternally with Him. The Book of Revelation is the “masterpiece” of all Biblical stories. It begins with His glory and ends with His saints’ glory. At the beginning of this story, He walks in the midst of His church, but in the end, His church walks in the midst of New Jerusalem, the most spectacular city ever imagined. This storybook is the “Revelation of Jesus Christ,” the complete unveiling of all His glory. The very first chapter gives forty-one references to the Son of God.
Chapter one is a word portrait of the “Only Begotten Son.” In the first eight verses there are twenty-three redemptive titles or descriptive words that the angel gives John concerning Jesus Christ. All of these terms or titles relate to His life, His ministry, and His accomplishments and promises. The second half of the first chapter is the portrait of Him as the High Priest in the Father’s heavenly temple. There are eighteen titles or descriptions of Him in His roles as our Advocate and Intercessor. Stephen got a little view of this great truth of His intercession just before he was ushered up into heaven when he saw Him “standing at the Father’s right hand” (Acts 7:56).
From this picture of His glorious person, the storybook takes us through all the great end-times events until we walk down the streets of gold in the matchless city He has prepared for His Bride. The story is not all pretty, but it’s all true and will unfold in the order in which it is told. The great thing about the Book of Revelation is that God wants you to be prepared and to be in heaven, not on earth, as the story unfolds its dark scenes. Nobody that reads The Revelation before the Rapture should have to endure the hellish events that will occur on earth. If there is one reason above all others that He gave us this “Book of Revelation,” it is to educate as to what we can do to be on the right side as the story transpires.
Do not let anyone make you think that the devil or his Antichrist and false prophets are the main characters of this book. They are not! The Son of God is the heart of Revelation. His unveiling is so that we might see Him from His resurrection glory to His eternal presence in the new heaven and the new earth. This is the theme of this book. His presence is the life of the story. While He is the life of Revelation, He is always in the very presence of His Father that gave Him as the sacrifice. He is called a Lamb more than any other of His great titles because His death makes the whole story possible.
The dark parts of Revelation are never meant to scare you but to show the end of sin. This story will excite you to know that when God finally says “there shall be no more curse” (Revelation 22:3a), and puts an end to sin once and for all, the results will truly be heaven on earth. The Son of God directs every scene of horror because sin must be seen in its right character. While sin reveals all its ugliness, the rainbow over the Father’s throne keeps sending a message of mercy. Not one time in this book are sinners left without the opportunity to call on the “God of all mercies.” The story of Revelation gives us an honest look at sin, but in the presence of a “Lamb as it had been slain” (Revelation 5:9).
What a story this “masterpiece” of all God’s literature represents. This great Book of Revelation makes the whole Bible become a different book. Our God and His Son are at the center revealing their great love. God’s Bible is not a narrow book as some may accuse. It is factual, so factual that no science has ever proven it to be false. The archeologists have searched the crust of the earth and have found much evidence of past history, but each new finding only proves that history is “His-story.”
Read this book like a story and revel in its great revelations. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ with a total surrender to Him; for He lives in this great Book of Revelation, and you will be on the winning side, for you will know the end of the story. “The grace of our Lord be with you all. Amen” (Revelation 22:21).