[Originally preached on 24 August, 2003]
Revelation 11.1-14
Our text is filled with images. Seeing so many together can be very confusing. So, my plan for this morning is to try to approach our text simply by using three questions. First, what do the images mean? Here, I hope to give you the key thoughts of the passage. To do that I’m going to skip some of the detail and not go into all the reasons why I think of an image in the way that I will present it to you. Second, we’ll ask, what is this saying to the seven churches of Asia Minor? Remember that they were the first audience of this book. If we are going to understand the text properly we need to ask this question. Then, last, we’ll ask, what is this saying to us? If we fail to ask this question then we are only dabbling in our text out of a sense of curiosity and not desiring to hear what God is saying to us through it. And what good is that?
So, on to our first question, what do the images mean? Our text holds two pictures of the Church. The first is in the first three verses. Here, John is told to measure the temple, the altar and the people who are worshipping there. But it is important to see that the court is omitted. First, the temple of God is no longer a building located in Jerusalem. For one thing, when John wrote this, that building had already been destroyed for over twenty years. But more importantly, the temple of God has become the Church, the people of God who worship Him. This is one of the important themes of the New Testament. So, what John is doing is related to the Church. Next, notice that the court that is not measured is to be trampled by the nations. But this trampling doesn’t happen to the part that is measured. There is a sense in which the Church is vulnerable to the attacks of the unbelieving world. But there is another, more profound sense in which it isn’t. This first image sets us up for the second image of the text where we will see that there will be persecution and death for the Church and yet the people of God are ultimately protected by God. The first image is about how the Church is vulnerable, exposed to danger, and yet ultimately safe.
Now, the second picture of the Church fills out the details of the first. This portion of our text is just filled with Old Testament images. Let’s start with a couple of the easier ones. We read about two witnesses. We also read about fire consuming the foes of these two and their ability to shut the sky so that it doesn’t rain. Both of these come out of the life of Elijah, the prophet of God who stood against the idolatry of his day. [2 Kings 1; 1 Kings 17] Then there is the ability to change the water into blood and to strike the earth with plagues. Who is this but Moses in his battles against the oppressor of God’s people, Egypt. Then it gets a bit more challenging. We read about two olive trees and two lampstands. What is this about? Here, John’s vision draws from the prophecy of Zechariah. Listen to something from that prophet.
And the angel who talked with me came again and woke me, like a man who is awakened out of his sleep. And he said to me, "What do you see?" I said, "I see, and behold, a lampstand all of gold, with a bowl on the top of it, and seven lamps on it, with seven lips on each of the lamps that are on the top of it. And there are two olive trees by it, one on the right of the bowl and the other on its left." And I said to the angel who talked with me, "What are these, my lord?" Then the angel who talked with me answered and said to me, "Do you not know what these are?" I said, "No, my lord." Then he said to me, "This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts. Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain. And he shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of 'Grace, grace to it!' " Zechariah 4:1-7
Here, we have one lamp and two olive trees. The oil from the trees fuels the lamp. And how does the angel explain all of this to the prophet? He talks about the indispensable power of the Spirit and about someone called Zerubbabel. What’s going on? Zechariah’s prophecy is written to Israel soon after its return from exile in Babylon. Zerubbabel is one of the leaders of Israel. And the situation is desperate. He has been called to rebuild Jerusalem and especially the Temple. It is an impossible task. And yet, the promise of the text is that, by the power of the Spirit, Zerubbabel will be able to do the impossible. The great mountain will become a plain. John’s vision uses this Old Testament background to speak to another desperate situation. The Church is faced with the impossible and yet, powered by the Spirit, it will be able to accomplish what otherwise would be unattainable. Now, what is this impossible task that has been given to the Church? The Church has been called to be a witness to Jesus and His Gospel. It is to prophesy to the nations. Remember that to be a prophet is not first a matter of predicting the future. Being a prophet is, first of all, being a spokesman for God. The Church is charged to speak for God to a hostile world. The emphasis of its proclamation is a call to repentance, which explains the sackcloth of verse three.
We see exactly how hostile the world is in the next part of the picture. Verse seven tells us of the beast. The details of this image aren't important right now. It is enough to see that this beast comes out of the abyss. It is aligned with what is evil. This beast wages war on the Church, and it actually succeeds in this war. The two witnesses who signify the Church are killed in the great city – the world –though, interestingly, not until they finish their mission. And this great city is the combination of the evil of Sodom, the oppression of Egypt and the antagonism to Christ of Jerusalem. Once the Church is overcome, the people heap disgrace on her. To be left out for the carrion eaters was the height of humiliation and great disgrace. And so, the people of the world despise the conquered Church and rejoice at its destruction.
But what happens next? The Church is revived. It receives the breath of life from God and stands again. The victory of the beast was only apparent and the rejoicing of the world is cut short. Then the Church is called up to heaven by God, Himself, even as its enemies look on. At the same time destruction comes to the great city. All that is left is for the last trumpet to sound. Now, those are the highlights of our text. I’ve left out a lot, but what you now have is enough.
Now, we’re ready for our next question. What is this saying to the seven churches of Asia Minor? What we have here is a picture of the Church in the midst of the world. It is a reminder to the seven churches of some important things. First, John writes to the churches to remind them that they have a mission. They have a calling that they must fulfill. And what is that calling? It is to proclaim the Word of God to a world that is not at all interested in listening. The mission of the Church is to shine brightly in a very dark world. It is important that the seven churches are reminded of this. Remember that most of them were faltering in one way or another. Several of them were compromising with the world around them. How could they be prophets to the world if they were so like the world? Some of the churches overreacted to the world. In so doing they lost key elements of what it means to be the Church. Remember the church at Ephesus which had lost the element of love. How can a church be faithful to its calling without love? What we have here is a reminder from Christ to His churches, a reminder of their mission. They were defined by Jesus as His witnesses to speak the Gospel to the world. The churches were forgetting who they were called to be.
There is more. The churches are also being reminded that they are vulnerable yet protected as they pursue their mission. Here, remember the measured temple and the unmeasured court. Remember the two witnesses who were killed and yet revived. In one sense, the Church is at the mercy of the world. So much of the power - physical, economic, political, social power – is in the hands of the world. They are able to trample the Church and to kill. Remember Antipas of Pergamum. [Chapter 2] Yet, remember also the promises of Jesus to the seven churches. He who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death, will eat of the tree of life, will hear Jesus confess his name before the Father. The Church is vulnerable, as a sheep before the wolves of the world. And yet, she is completely safe.
Then, we see that the Church has all the resources necessary to accomplish its task. It is fueled by the oil of the olive trees. It has the power of the Spirit. If the Church were in a war that could be seen, a military war or a political war or a cultural war, then power would be a matter of things like numbers of people and amount of money. But this isn’t that kind of war. The Church is involved in a Spirit-ual war. In this kind of war the pressing need isn’t money or people. The real need is the power of the Spirit of God. The text is clear. The Church is fueled by the Spirit in abundance. The Church is able to do amazing things. And here, just think about the images of Elijah and Moses whom the Spirit used to do tremendous things. John writes to the seven churches telling them that in terms of what you can see they are in an impossible situation. They are small collections of socially powerless people. How could they hope to even dent the armor of the Roman world? But the emphasis of this part of the book of Revelation is on what you can’t see. That’s what these visions from chapter four on are all about. And what you can’t see is that the Church is filled with the Spirit of God. He makes it possible for the Church to succeed, to accomplish the impossible. All the necessary resources are there.
Then finally, the vindication of the Church. When you get to the end of the story it will be obvious to all that the Church was right. It will be obvious even to the seven churches who probably doubted. The Church will be vindicated before all when God calls her up to Himself. The mission has been accomplished. The task is over. The time for rest and for reward has arrived for the faithful. And the time for destruction has arrived for the unrepentant. They would not receive the testimony of the witnesses of Christ. John’s vision is an explanation of the real nature of things. It is given so that the churches would have proper expectations and a sure hope.
Now, our last question. What is our text saying to us? I think that you can see that these four points – mission, vulnerable yet safe, the resources of the Spirit, ultimate vindication by God – all speak to us. And I think that you can pretty much see how. But let me stress a few things. Remember that we have a mission. We are to shine brightly with the Gospel in a dark world. So, whatever else you do, job, hobbies, relationships, whatever, they are all defined by this. We are called to proclaim the Gospel to this world. That doesn’t necessarily mean you have to stand on a street corner and shout at the people as they pass. But in the normal flow of daily living, your testimony to Jesus needs to become obvious. By your words and your actions, the light of the Gospel is to shine before men. There are no excuses for not shining. All the resources that we need are ours, if we would avail ourselves of them. We have the Spirit of God. What else do we need? This doesn’t mean that this will be painless. We are vulnerable before the world. In a way, they hold all the cards. But we know that we are safe and that ultimately we will be vindicated before the world. It won’t be in this life, but it will happen. One day, in the presence of our enemies who made life so hard, we will be able to hear, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’ So let us give ourselves to prayer. Prayer is the key. Let us pray that the Spirit would make us faithful unto death, if need be, so that we might fulfill our mission and please the Savior.
Revelation 11.1-14
Our text is filled with images. Seeing so many together can be very confusing. So, my plan for this morning is to try to approach our text simply by using three questions. First, what do the images mean? Here, I hope to give you the key thoughts of the passage. To do that I’m going to skip some of the detail and not go into all the reasons why I think of an image in the way that I will present it to you. Second, we’ll ask, what is this saying to the seven churches of Asia Minor? Remember that they were the first audience of this book. If we are going to understand the text properly we need to ask this question. Then, last, we’ll ask, what is this saying to us? If we fail to ask this question then we are only dabbling in our text out of a sense of curiosity and not desiring to hear what God is saying to us through it. And what good is that?
So, on to our first question, what do the images mean? Our text holds two pictures of the Church. The first is in the first three verses. Here, John is told to measure the temple, the altar and the people who are worshipping there. But it is important to see that the court is omitted. First, the temple of God is no longer a building located in Jerusalem. For one thing, when John wrote this, that building had already been destroyed for over twenty years. But more importantly, the temple of God has become the Church, the people of God who worship Him. This is one of the important themes of the New Testament. So, what John is doing is related to the Church. Next, notice that the court that is not measured is to be trampled by the nations. But this trampling doesn’t happen to the part that is measured. There is a sense in which the Church is vulnerable to the attacks of the unbelieving world. But there is another, more profound sense in which it isn’t. This first image sets us up for the second image of the text where we will see that there will be persecution and death for the Church and yet the people of God are ultimately protected by God. The first image is about how the Church is vulnerable, exposed to danger, and yet ultimately safe.
Now, the second picture of the Church fills out the details of the first. This portion of our text is just filled with Old Testament images. Let’s start with a couple of the easier ones. We read about two witnesses. We also read about fire consuming the foes of these two and their ability to shut the sky so that it doesn’t rain. Both of these come out of the life of Elijah, the prophet of God who stood against the idolatry of his day. [2 Kings 1; 1 Kings 17] Then there is the ability to change the water into blood and to strike the earth with plagues. Who is this but Moses in his battles against the oppressor of God’s people, Egypt. Then it gets a bit more challenging. We read about two olive trees and two lampstands. What is this about? Here, John’s vision draws from the prophecy of Zechariah. Listen to something from that prophet.
And the angel who talked with me came again and woke me, like a man who is awakened out of his sleep. And he said to me, "What do you see?" I said, "I see, and behold, a lampstand all of gold, with a bowl on the top of it, and seven lamps on it, with seven lips on each of the lamps that are on the top of it. And there are two olive trees by it, one on the right of the bowl and the other on its left." And I said to the angel who talked with me, "What are these, my lord?" Then the angel who talked with me answered and said to me, "Do you not know what these are?" I said, "No, my lord." Then he said to me, "This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts. Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain. And he shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of 'Grace, grace to it!' " Zechariah 4:1-7
Here, we have one lamp and two olive trees. The oil from the trees fuels the lamp. And how does the angel explain all of this to the prophet? He talks about the indispensable power of the Spirit and about someone called Zerubbabel. What’s going on? Zechariah’s prophecy is written to Israel soon after its return from exile in Babylon. Zerubbabel is one of the leaders of Israel. And the situation is desperate. He has been called to rebuild Jerusalem and especially the Temple. It is an impossible task. And yet, the promise of the text is that, by the power of the Spirit, Zerubbabel will be able to do the impossible. The great mountain will become a plain. John’s vision uses this Old Testament background to speak to another desperate situation. The Church is faced with the impossible and yet, powered by the Spirit, it will be able to accomplish what otherwise would be unattainable. Now, what is this impossible task that has been given to the Church? The Church has been called to be a witness to Jesus and His Gospel. It is to prophesy to the nations. Remember that to be a prophet is not first a matter of predicting the future. Being a prophet is, first of all, being a spokesman for God. The Church is charged to speak for God to a hostile world. The emphasis of its proclamation is a call to repentance, which explains the sackcloth of verse three.
We see exactly how hostile the world is in the next part of the picture. Verse seven tells us of the beast. The details of this image aren't important right now. It is enough to see that this beast comes out of the abyss. It is aligned with what is evil. This beast wages war on the Church, and it actually succeeds in this war. The two witnesses who signify the Church are killed in the great city – the world –though, interestingly, not until they finish their mission. And this great city is the combination of the evil of Sodom, the oppression of Egypt and the antagonism to Christ of Jerusalem. Once the Church is overcome, the people heap disgrace on her. To be left out for the carrion eaters was the height of humiliation and great disgrace. And so, the people of the world despise the conquered Church and rejoice at its destruction.
But what happens next? The Church is revived. It receives the breath of life from God and stands again. The victory of the beast was only apparent and the rejoicing of the world is cut short. Then the Church is called up to heaven by God, Himself, even as its enemies look on. At the same time destruction comes to the great city. All that is left is for the last trumpet to sound. Now, those are the highlights of our text. I’ve left out a lot, but what you now have is enough.
Now, we’re ready for our next question. What is this saying to the seven churches of Asia Minor? What we have here is a picture of the Church in the midst of the world. It is a reminder to the seven churches of some important things. First, John writes to the churches to remind them that they have a mission. They have a calling that they must fulfill. And what is that calling? It is to proclaim the Word of God to a world that is not at all interested in listening. The mission of the Church is to shine brightly in a very dark world. It is important that the seven churches are reminded of this. Remember that most of them were faltering in one way or another. Several of them were compromising with the world around them. How could they be prophets to the world if they were so like the world? Some of the churches overreacted to the world. In so doing they lost key elements of what it means to be the Church. Remember the church at Ephesus which had lost the element of love. How can a church be faithful to its calling without love? What we have here is a reminder from Christ to His churches, a reminder of their mission. They were defined by Jesus as His witnesses to speak the Gospel to the world. The churches were forgetting who they were called to be.
There is more. The churches are also being reminded that they are vulnerable yet protected as they pursue their mission. Here, remember the measured temple and the unmeasured court. Remember the two witnesses who were killed and yet revived. In one sense, the Church is at the mercy of the world. So much of the power - physical, economic, political, social power – is in the hands of the world. They are able to trample the Church and to kill. Remember Antipas of Pergamum. [Chapter 2] Yet, remember also the promises of Jesus to the seven churches. He who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death, will eat of the tree of life, will hear Jesus confess his name before the Father. The Church is vulnerable, as a sheep before the wolves of the world. And yet, she is completely safe.
Then, we see that the Church has all the resources necessary to accomplish its task. It is fueled by the oil of the olive trees. It has the power of the Spirit. If the Church were in a war that could be seen, a military war or a political war or a cultural war, then power would be a matter of things like numbers of people and amount of money. But this isn’t that kind of war. The Church is involved in a Spirit-ual war. In this kind of war the pressing need isn’t money or people. The real need is the power of the Spirit of God. The text is clear. The Church is fueled by the Spirit in abundance. The Church is able to do amazing things. And here, just think about the images of Elijah and Moses whom the Spirit used to do tremendous things. John writes to the seven churches telling them that in terms of what you can see they are in an impossible situation. They are small collections of socially powerless people. How could they hope to even dent the armor of the Roman world? But the emphasis of this part of the book of Revelation is on what you can’t see. That’s what these visions from chapter four on are all about. And what you can’t see is that the Church is filled with the Spirit of God. He makes it possible for the Church to succeed, to accomplish the impossible. All the necessary resources are there.
Then finally, the vindication of the Church. When you get to the end of the story it will be obvious to all that the Church was right. It will be obvious even to the seven churches who probably doubted. The Church will be vindicated before all when God calls her up to Himself. The mission has been accomplished. The task is over. The time for rest and for reward has arrived for the faithful. And the time for destruction has arrived for the unrepentant. They would not receive the testimony of the witnesses of Christ. John’s vision is an explanation of the real nature of things. It is given so that the churches would have proper expectations and a sure hope.
Now, our last question. What is our text saying to us? I think that you can see that these four points – mission, vulnerable yet safe, the resources of the Spirit, ultimate vindication by God – all speak to us. And I think that you can pretty much see how. But let me stress a few things. Remember that we have a mission. We are to shine brightly with the Gospel in a dark world. So, whatever else you do, job, hobbies, relationships, whatever, they are all defined by this. We are called to proclaim the Gospel to this world. That doesn’t necessarily mean you have to stand on a street corner and shout at the people as they pass. But in the normal flow of daily living, your testimony to Jesus needs to become obvious. By your words and your actions, the light of the Gospel is to shine before men. There are no excuses for not shining. All the resources that we need are ours, if we would avail ourselves of them. We have the Spirit of God. What else do we need? This doesn’t mean that this will be painless. We are vulnerable before the world. In a way, they hold all the cards. But we know that we are safe and that ultimately we will be vindicated before the world. It won’t be in this life, but it will happen. One day, in the presence of our enemies who made life so hard, we will be able to hear, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’ So let us give ourselves to prayer. Prayer is the key. Let us pray that the Spirit would make us faithful unto death, if need be, so that we might fulfill our mission and please the Savior.
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