OPEN: This morning I’m going to teach you a little about something that’s called “Hermeneutics”. Hermeneutics is the description of how to read and understand your Bible.
When I was in Bible College I had a professor who told us that whenever the Bible had a lot to say on a given topic, almost every scholar was unanimous in agreement as to what the Bible said on those topics. BUT, whenever there are only 2 or 3 verses on a given topic there will be a whole host of opinions by various scholars on what the Bible meant.
II Timothy 3:16-17 tells us: “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.”
So all Scripture is God-breathed.
It’s all good stuff.
Every verse and every chapter has power and meaning.
But a few years back, it occurred to me that although every verse is God’s Word, God has a tendency to spend more time and ink on certain things in the Bible than he does on others.
For example:
Genesis has 50 chapters and covers a time period of about 2000 years. As you can imagine, there’s a lot of early history that Genesis doesn’t tell us about.
But by contrast, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy have a total of 137 chapters and cover only 120 years of God’s history.
One book – Genesis – covers about 2000 years.
Four books – Exodus thru Deuteronomy – cover 120 years.
Where’s God’s focus? Where’s He spending His ink and paper?
Well, obviously on those four books.
That’s not to say Genesis is unimportant. It tells us of the beginnings of God’s creation and of Israel… and lays the foundation for everything else we believe about God.
But the next four books focus on God’s righteousness and His expectations of His people, and obviously God felt it was important to spend His ink and paper on telling His people these things.
Now, in the Old Testament there are 3 sections.
There’s HISTORY and POETRY and PROPHECY.
The History section consists of one long continuous story from Genesis thru Esther.
The Poetry section is only 5 books.
And the Prophecy section is made up of the 5 major prophets and the 12 minor prophets.
The History books make up almost half of your Old Testament.
And the Prophecy section takes up almost the other half.
Now God used poetry because it speaks to people in ways that no other literature can. But let me repeat, the History section is almost half of your Old Testament and the Prophecy section makes up almost the other half.
Why?
Well, the history is valuable because it shows how God interacts with His people.
And the prophecy is valuable because it shows God’s judgment on nations, and (more importantly) it tells us that SOMEBODY’S coming.
Who’s coming?
That’s right - Jesus is coming!
Now, let’s go to the New Testament.
The Book of Acts has 28 chapters and covers about 10 years of the church’s existence.
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John have 89 chapters that focus mostly on the last 3 ½ years of Jesus’ life (and even more intently on the last week of his earthly ministry).
ONE book (Acts) with 28 chapters covered 10 years of church history.
FOUR books with 98 chapters (Matthew thru John) focused on 3 ½ years of Christ’s ministry.
Where was God spending His ink and paper?
That’s right – the Gospels.
And that makes sense because the Gospels tell us all about Jesus.
It doesn’t mean Acts is unimportant… it just means the Gospels are more so.
The Gospels lay the foundation of what everything else in the New Testament is all about.
Now let’s look at how God constructed the New Testament.
God gave us 5 books of history (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and Acts).
And then there are 21 books/letters telling us how we ought to live our lives as Christians.
Five books of history, 21 books telling how to live.
Hmmm.
And how many books of prophecy?
One book. Revelation.
So, there’s ONE book of prophecy… and 21 books telling us how we ought to live our lives.
Where’s God spending His TIME and His INK?
That’s right, God is mostly focused on how we should live.
But now, if you listen to the TV evangelists… where do most of them spend most (if not ALL) of their time?
They make lots of money on their books and teaching videos and appearances.
But they focus principally - if not entirely - on this one book of prophecy.
Let me repeat: Revelation is an important book.
All Scripture is God-breathed… it’s all valuable.
But Revelation is NOT the place where God spent most of His TIME and INK in the New Testament
Now, let me be perfectly clear here:
Any church or preacher that spends the majority of their time focused on Revelation is not balanced.
They are not focusing on the things that God focuses on.
And that's not healthy.
That being said: what is the purpose of Revelation?
Most TV evangelists like John Hagee will hammer away at their audience telling them that they MUST believe what they teach about Revelation... or they are “heretics”. They’ll wave a newspaper in one hand and the Bible in the other and tell you they know exactly what Revelation’s images are all about AND that almost everything in Revelation was meant ONLY for NOW.
This is nothing new. People have been doing this for centuries.
People have been trying to make Revelation point to THEIR time period for the better part of 2000 years. They’ve even gone so far on occasion as to tell you they knew exactly when Jesus was going to return. Seemingly everyone from Isaac Newton to the Jehovah Witnesses, to the Baptists, to the Assemblies of God to even some in the Churches of Christ have tried making predictions about Jesus’ 2nd coming.
And they’ve all been wrong.
Even I tried predicting when Jesus would return.
I predicted He'd come by the time I was 50.
(Pause) I missed it by “that much”.
If anyone tells you know EXACTLY what Revelation is talking about… don’t believe them.
Teachers like that have never been right in the past, and there’s little reason to believe they’ll get it right this time around.
And that’s ok.
It’s ok not to understand everything about this book of prophecy.
Jesus will still come back when He’s ready.
And even if everybody who’s a Christian gets it wrong about the particulars in Revelation – they’ll still be welcomed into heaven.
But scholars have repeatedly missed the boat on Revelation.
And I think the reason most of these folks have missed the boat in the past, is because they’ve missed the real FOCUS of the book of Revelation.
John Rigle teaches one of our adult Sunday School classes, and over the past few weeks he’s been doing a study on Revelation. He has repeatedly told his class – read the book. Read Revelation from front to back. Read it several times. Get to know the book and when you come to class you’ll have a better feeling for what he’s teaching.
So I took his advice and read the book all the way through. And as I read it, I was left with one significant impression: Revelation was prophecy that God intended to be a book of encouragement for the church. It was meant to encourage God’s people that
• God has a plan.
• Jesus IS coming back
• and that we win and Satan loses.
Every part of the book of Revelation has a purpose in THAT message.
ILLUS: When I decided to preach thru the book of Revelation I asked John Rigle for advice on how to preach the series. He sighed and said:
“Jeff why don’t you just preach about the 7 churches (1st three chapters)”.
Well, I didn’t want to do that.
For one thing I’d already done that.
Besides there’s so much in Scripture to preach, it seemed a shame to just go back and go over the same material all over again.
And besides, in 34 years of preaching I’ve only preached a few times on Revelation and I had NEVER preached on the whole book.
I regarded this as A CHALLENGE to preach the whole book in 9 sermons.
ILLUS: At our preacher’s meeting Thursday I mentioned how I used our broken bus for a sermon illustration last week. Then Scott (our associate) challenged me to mention our now repaired bus as part of my sermon this Sunday.
When I said I didn’t really want to do that… he said:
“I dare you to. In fact, I Triple Dog Dare you to mention it this Sunday.”
(Pause)
Well, how could I back down from a Triple Dog Dare???
So THERE… I just mentioned it.
But in the same way, I regard the challenge of preaching thru Revelation as a Triple Dog Dare.
As I was reading thru Revelation it suddenly realized that a lot of preachers only preach on the 7 churches… and then they skip almost everything else John wrote.
I believe they do this for a couple of reasons:
1st – they’re afraid of the rest of the book.
It’s intimidating.
And there’s a fear that (since they don’t understand all the imagery) they’ll get a lot of things wrong.
2nd - it’s almost as if they believe that the first 3 chapters of Revelation had nothing to do with the rest of the book.
It's almost as if these 7 churches had nothing to do with the rest of the prophecy.
And that doesn’t make any sense!
“Why would Jesus spend 3 chapters of Revelation addressing these 7 churches?”
That’s 3 chapters!!!
There’s ONLY 22 chapters in the entire book!!!
Why use up that much ink and paper if the 7 churches have nothing to do with the rest of the story?
Now these are real churches facing real challenges and difficulties.
They have to deal with…
• False teachers
• Immoral members
• Persecution
• Imprisonment
These are LOCAL churches, with LOCAL problems.
BUT Revelation is a prophetic book of epic proportions and worldwide implications.
It describes how God intends to deal with Satan and for dealing with a world filled with wickedness.
And yet Jesus tells John: “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.” Revelation 1:11
Why spend 3 chapters on 7 churches that have NOTHING to do with the rest of the book?
Well (pause) Jesus spent 3 chapters on these 7 churches BECAUSE they had EVERYTHING to do with the rest of the book.
ILLUS: There’s an old fable about the angel Gabriel talking to Jesus.
Jesus has just risen from the dead and has ascended into heaven and Gabriel is standing in awe of the Savior and he asks Him,
“Jesus, you’ve been to earth and walked among men. You’ve taught them and healed them and cast out demons. And then you died and rose from the grave to forgive them their sins. What are your plans for sharing this wonderful news with the rest of the world?”
Jesus responds: “Well, there is James, John, Peter, Andrew and the others. They are the ones I’ve entrusted with my message.”
Gabriel is thoughtful for a moment and then asks: “But what if they fail? … Do you have a plan B?”
Jesus: No, there’s no plan B… these people ARE my plan.”
As Jesus introduces these 7 churches in the first part of Revelation He's saying they are the plan.
He’s basically saying that these churches have EVERYTHING to do with God’s plan to deal with Satan, and with wickedness in this world.
You see, every LOCAL church is part of a mighty army for God.
Every individual Christian is a soldier in the service of the King.
We are the front line in the battle to take back this world.
And God calls each and every Christian, and each and every local congregation to stand in the gap and say to Satan: “ YOU SHALL NOT PASS!!! We won’t allow it! Don’t even think about it!”
ILLUS: There’s an old story from ancient history about an invading army that nearly destroyed Rome. They had swept down from the north and because of their numbers and fierceness, they had intimidated Rome's forces to the point where they had crumpled.
There was now only one obstacle that lay between them and conquest. A bridge over the Tiber river.
According to the story, a man named Horatius stood on the front of that bridge and held back the enemy while his friends destroyed the bridge behind him. There was only enough room on the bridge for a couple of enemy soldiers to attack him at any given time, and Horatius suffered several wounds as he held them off. But he refused to yield. He held the bridge long enough for his army to destroy the bridge... and ONLY then did he dive into the Tiber and swim back to the safety of Rome’s shores.
One man taking a stand against an entire enemy army.
Over and over again in history we read of this kind of heroism in war.
Individual soldiers or small groups of men taking a stand against the enemies… and turning the tide of battle.
That’s what God is calling us to do.
He’s calling us to stand against evil.
To Stand against Satan.
To do whatever it takes to turn the tide of the battle for God.
It’s the small church - the small group of brave believers - who turn the tide in the battle for righteousness.
You can sense the importance these churches have in God’s plan by what Jesus says to them.
He tells Ephesus that He knows how they’ve stood against evil but scolds them for losing the passion and love they’d had for Him. They’ve lost their “first love”.
He tells Pergamum that He admires their faithfulness in the face of persecution but He’s upset that they’ve permitted heresy to begin entering their church.
He tells Thyatira that He’s pleased with their love and faith and patient endurance but He’s angry they’ve allowed a false teacher to be part of their congregation.
And it goes on and on and on…
He even warns the church at Sardis that they need to repent.
“If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you.”
He’s telling them they need to take their role seriously.
They’re NOT just a bunch of local churches in various towns.
They are part of mighty army standing against the forces of a powerful enemy.
They must NEVER forget who they are!
But too many churches do just that.
They forget they’re not just LOCAL churches
Too often local churches see their whole goal as being: to keep the doors open at ANY COST.
ILLUS: I served at a church where the board refused to stand against evil because they were afraid someone would come and burn down their building.
Well, let me light the first match.
Any church that loves their building more than righteousness deserves to lose their building.
I’ve known of churches that looked the other way when their leaders became immoral because they were afraid they’d lose the money those immoral people would supply.
I say: let their finances dry up. May they shrivel up and die. Any church that loves money more than God deserves to go broke.
I know of one church that allowed a heretical teacher to continue teaching because he threatened to leave and take a bunch of families with him if he wasn’t allowed to continue teaching the false doctrine he believed in.
And he intimidated the elders of that church and bullied them into submission.
Then, one day, that church hired a new minister. Once he learned of what was happening, he sat down with those Elders for several meetings and convinced them that this was wrong. The Elders got some backbone and told the false teacher he was no longer allowed to teach that heresy.
So that teacher left… and took ONE family with him.
From that day on… that church grew into a mighty congregation.
They now have 3 services and 1400 members.
As I was reading thru these first 3 chapters something caught my attention
Every time Jesus addressed one of these congregations He said this:
“He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”
7 times in the FIRST 3 chapters of Revelation God repeats this phrase:
Over and over and over again.
Why?
Because they’re just like the rest of us.
They have the same struggles and the same challenges we do.
And just like they were pivotal in God’s strategy to defeat Satan… so are we.
In that phrase - “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches” - Jesus is saying to us: Pay attention to what I’m telling these churches, because what I say to them… I say to you.
THIS IS NOT A GAME!
This is dead serious.
Do you understand what I’m saying here?
I’m saying we’re part of the book.
We’re part of God’s grand plan to take back this world.
That’s why we’re reminded that Jesus has made us to be “…kings and priests to His God and Father…” (Revelation 1:6 NKJV)
We have been called to a cause that is bigger than our local congregation
We are KINGS AND PRIESTS and WE are part of something bigger than ourselves.
We are representatives of a mighty God in a fallen world.
CLOSE: Russ Blowers was once a preacher in a large congregation in Indianapolis.
He was also a member of the local Rotary club. Apparently, every time Rotary meets they have a different club member gives a brief statement about his job. When Russell’s turn came to do that He said this:
"Hi, I'm Russ Blowers.
I'm with a global enterprise.
We have branches in every country in the world.
We have our representatives in nearly every parliament and board room on earth.
We're into motivation and behavior alteration.
We run hospitals, feeding stations, crisis pregnancy centers, universities, publishing houses and nursing homes. We care for our clients from birth to death.
We are into life insurance and fire insurance.
We perform spiritual heart transplants.
Our original Organizer owns all the real estate on earth plus an assortment of galaxies and constellations. He knows everything and lives everywhere.
Our product is free for the asking. (There's not enough money to buy it.)
Our CEO was born in a hick town, worked as a carpenter, didn't own a home,
He was misunderstood by his family, hated by enemies, condemned to death without a trial, and arose from the dead and He lives in Heaven and one day He’ll return to earth as King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
I talk with Him every day.”
My point is this: We are not just a moderately sized congregation in a moderately sized community. We are part of a grand scheme to take back this world, a mighty plan to bring Satan to his knees and break down the gates of Hell.
You are more than what you appear because you serve a God who intends to use you for more than what this world would ever think possible.
INVITATION
