So the text that we're going to be looking at today is in Revelation chapter 1 verse 9 through 20 and it's the beginning or the commissioning of Apostle John so that he sees the vision, he encounters the glorified Christ and then the vision that he sees he is commanded to go and teach to the six or seven churches.

So we're going to be looking at that this afternoon. Let me pray first and then we jump in. Gracious Father, we thank you for answering our prayers and we thank you Father God for guiding our steps and at times our hearts become anxious Lord God because we don't know what's coming.

We look at our present circumstance and it's not exactly where we would like to be. So we pray Father God that as we continue to walk with you that every day and everything that we experience and as you continue to answer our prayers and reveal to us that you are concerned for us and that you have our well-being in your mind that you would continue to cause your church to grow.

As we are exposed to your word that we would have continued confirmation Lord God that you are truly Lord, that you are sovereign, that everything that you've promised and everything that we study in this book that one day will come true and that we would have that solid assurance Lord God to build our lives and our future in Jesus name we pray.

Amen. All right so we're going to start looking at the beginning Revelation chapter 1 verses 9 through 20. We're going to look at the first few verses. The first section where John, okay John who's the recipient of the vision and we're going to look at that in verse 1 and starts by saying John your brother partner in the tribulation and so God gives this vision to John in order that he may be prepared.

So basically the first section begins with John being called and revealing his glory and his vision to him so that he can convey it to the church. So God gave this vision and glory and this is very similar to what you'll see and again I'm for the sake of time I'm not going to turn there but Isaiah, Ezekiel and the book of Daniel and we can give countless other examples but every time God wants to use somebody to represent him he basically reveals himself in a greater light and the purpose of that obviously is so that he can be his messenger and so we see that with his disciples where before he sends them out he doesn't sit there and say here's some instructions and I want you to regurgitate what I have to say.

He spent allows him to spend a significant amount of time walking with him, watching him, knowing him because their calling wasn't simply to say here's the gospel information that I have for you and it is no different for us that our calling in life isn't to regurgitate information that we know about Jesus.

It is very ineffective so if you've ever tried to share the gospel with somebody here's a bunch of facts that I know that I believe in and I hope that one day you'll believe these bunch of facts. The gospel was never meant to be transferred from fact to fact, from person to person that way, from in a classroom.

It was always meant to be as a form of testimony. That's why we call it witnessing, that we witness something and then we convey what we witness to the other person and so that's the pattern that we see in the scripture. He is about to give this revelation to the church and obviously to all of us but in order to do that he prepares him.

He does that, we see that in the book of Isaiah chapter 6, Ezekiel chapter 1 and we're going to refer back to Daniel's prophecies over and over again as we're studying Revelation and we see the same pattern with Daniel. That God first reveals himself to Daniel before he gives his prophecies.

We know that John had intimate knowledge of these churches and why I say that is because he calls them partner, he calls them partner in tribulation and in kingdom and patient endurance. So we're going to take a look at that. So John is not writing this letter to seven churches that he doesn't know.

He's very intimate and he knows their faults, he knows their strengths and especially the church of Ephesus. He probably has a lot of interaction with the other churches because he spent so much time in the church of Ephesus, most likely he spent a lot of time with these other churches too.

So John is not taking this message and sending it to a group of people he doesn't know. He knows them very well, he knows that they're in the midst of intense suffering and that's why he's writing to them and he says, "I'm suffering with you. I'm not just saying these things and saying, 'Hey, you should suck it up because Jesus is coming.' He said, 'I'm in the same boat as you and the same things that are encouraging me will also encourage you.'" We're told that he's at the island of Patmos and he said it's an account of his word, meaning specifically in the context of him suffering.

I think I have some pictures. This island of Patmos was used by the Romans for political prisoners. So there was a small group of people that already lived in that island but for the most part it was a pretty desolate area, not a lot of vegetation. In fact, I have some pictures.

So just for your information where Patmos is. So does this have a laser? Pastor Mark, does this have a laser? Am I too far? Oh, there it is. So there's the island of Patmos. This is Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Lathaiatira, Sardis. So you'll see that all the seven churches are located right in this area.

And this is Asia Minor. This whole area is Asia Minor. Apostle Paul begins his ministry somewhere over here in Antioch. His first missionary journey is limited to right in this section. Second missionary journey, he comes here and then he tries to venture out and he comes all the way out here.

And then he wanted to go to Asia Minor but the Holy Spirit tells him not to go. He wants to go to Bithynia. The Holy Spirit tells him not to go and then he crosses over to Philippi and then he begins to do ministry over here. So John, sorry I got John and Paul mixed up.

John was very familiar with these churches. So what he's writing to them is not, he's not writing as a third person. He's writing because he's very intimate. He knows this church very well. Okay. This is an actual picture of the island itself. And obviously this is a portion of it.

This is not what it looks like everywhere. Obviously there are people, there are villages there now but this is probably a lot closer to what it may have looked like for John when he was on this island. The context of the vision. It says that John was in the Spirit.

Okay. So John was in the Spirit. Now all of your Bibles probably have that capitalized as the capital S. Now there's a debate as to what that means. Is he talking about that he was filled with the Holy Spirit or the Holy Spirit was the one who was kind of like put him in a trance and he was speaking to him directly?

We don't know for sure what exactly that means but we do know that there is a pattern again where God shows himself and it says in each one of these instances where Peter or Paul, they also encounter Christ. They tell us again in Acts chapter 10, 10-11 that he became hungry.

Talking about Peter when he has this vision of Jesus telling him not to call the Gentiles unclean. If God calls them clean, that you should consider them clean. But here we can see that he fell into a trance. Now again we don't know exactly what that trance is. When I used to be a part of the charismatic group, I thought I knew for sure what that was.

And it could be, it could be kind of like you're not asleep, you're not awake, it's kind of in the middle ground somewhere. But again that's all conjecture, we don't know that for sure. And we see that Apostle Paul, same thing, when Jesus speaks to him, he said when I had returned to Jerusalem and was praying in the temple I fell into a trance.

And so most commentators believe that John also was in that kind of a state where visions were given to him so he wasn't necessarily awake like we are awake now, and he wasn't necessarily asleep like we would normally sleep, but he was somewhere in between. Now we don't know, we can conjecture and add stuff and say this is what it was, but again that's all just our opinion, our guess.

We don't know exactly for sure. But that's the context in which John receives, and he said that he received this on the Lord's Day, and the reason why this is significant is because the Lord's Day is most likely in reference to the first day of the week, Sunday. Now why is this significant?

Why is it significant and why are we spending time talking about the Lord's Day? When was the Lord's Day for the Christians? It was Sunday, right? They called, the early church began to call the day that they were worshiping God on Sunday the Lord's Day. They worshipped on Sabbath for 1500 years.

And again it's not like today. Today we have one worship on Sunday and we have a lot of churches that don't do it on Sunday. We have Wednesday, Saturday, oh why do we have to do it on Sunday? And I know that some churches debate this issue, and maybe even within the church.

It's like well let's not be legalistic, you know, like missing church every once in a while is not that big of a deal. And I know we have kind of a nonchalant attitude toward corporate worship, at least in our generation. You have to remember that the Jews for 1500 years, what happened when they blasphemed or they didn't observe the Sabbath?

They were more than exiled. They were taken out of the city and they were stoned. It was a very serious offense. So they took this very, very seriously. So remember when Jesus was performing miracles, right? Remember in John chapter 5, he heals a man, you know, and his great miracle took place and everybody sees this and then the Jews get angry because of what?

Because it happened on a Sabbath. They were so committed to the Sabbath that even after seeing a miracle, a man who was obviously lame, and even they acknowledge this, clearly a miracle took place, but they become angry at Jesus. How can this be a man of God if he breaks the Sabbath?

So they decided that he must not be from God. If he's a man of God, he has to keep the Sabbath. So if you read the New Testament, if you read the Gospel, you can see just how important the Sabbath is. So, you know, one of the things that we say that as evidence that something very, very drastic, spectacular must have happened in order for the early Jews to begin, even just to begin to worship on Sunday.

It may not sound like a big deal to us, but this is how they worship for 1500 years, right? And all of a sudden, the Lord's Day for them changed from Saturday to Sunday. And obviously the reason behind that is because that's the day that Jesus was resurrected, right?

Something drastic has to have happened for them to have changed that, right? And that, again, we believe is the resurrection. I think it's significant here as well because when John is giving this revelation, we can already see the impact of the Gospel in the early church, even in the introduction.

The first thing that John hears, before he sees anything, he hears his voice. And the voice is, what does the voice sound like? Trumpet, right? He turns around to hear this voice and it is not a quiet whisper, right, like Elijah. He's sitting there and a gentle whisper comes and God speaks to different people in different ways.

He speaks like a trumpet, like he said it sounded like a trumpet, right? Now was it an actual trumpet? I don't think so. He said it's like a trumpet, right? So what is the significance of him turning around and he hears Christ's voice? And he hears it like a trumpet.

So Jesus is somebody that he knew personally, walked with, slept with, ate with, right, for more than two, three years. But he turns around and he hears his master's voice, right? In fact, John says of himself, the one that Jesus loved. That's how he describes himself in the Gospels.

So he had an intimate relationship with Christ, but when he turns around and he sees his resurrected Christ, he's not seeing a friend. Not that he isn't a friend, not that he isn't somebody that he was very intimate with, but he sees a glorified Christ. And so he hears his voice.

So if it is a trumpet, what was the trumpet blown for in Israel's history? It could be war, right? Warning, some kind of declaration. But it's definitely, you don't use a trumpet if you have something quiet to tell somebody. Trumpet is not what you would use if you have something to tell and you don't want anybody else to hear it.

So the fact that John turns around and he hears his voice and his voice sounds like a trumpet, it immediately tells us this is something that needs to be declared. And when you blow the trumpet in the context of war, it means it's something urgent. That what he's about to show him and his calling to go and tell the people is very, very urgent, right?

Now we can look at that and say, well, we're 2,000 years removed from that, so it's no longer urgent to us. This obviously was written for all of mankind, not only for the first century. So the impact of us reading it and saying, well, he's blowing a trumpet, we should receive it with the same kind of impact that the early church had.

That what he's about to say in the book of Revelation requires careful attention because he's speaking to us with a sense of urgency. The recipient of the letter, the seven churches, they're all about 50 miles apart, so these little tiny dots represent the churches, and they're all about 30 to 50 miles apart, so they're not too far away.

What would be about, like from here to LA, would that be about 50 miles? About 30 miles would be from here to maybe Downey, Gwinnett Park? So it's not that far, even if they were walking, I mean, for that time. So they're all about close proximity, and again, when he's commanded to write this and then take it to the churches, it was meant not only for one church, but they were to take his writing and go to each church and read it out loud for every church.

So the content of what he says, even though it says Church of Ephesus, Church of Smyrna, Church of Thyatira, those letters were not just meant for an individual church. What he says to those individual churches may be relevant to that particular church, but the general content was meant to be read by every church.

There are certain things that he meant to say universally to everyone. The order in which the churches are mentioned, again, we're going to get into a little bit more detail next week, so I'm not going to get into it too much today. It goes right down this line, right?

Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, so basically, you know, knowing that this is where the letters are going to go first, so most likely if one of John's disciples takes the letter, he would probably cross the sea right here and then stop by Ephesus and just make his way and just kind of travel this road, and that's why it's written in that order.

And next week, we're going to deal with the first four, and the week after that, we're going to deal with the second four, second three. The vision itself, if you Google image of Jesus in Book of Revelations chapter one, there's so many scary images. I chose the most acceptable one for the church.

I don't think I have, there's one with Jesus literally fire coming out of his eyes, double edged sword coming out of his mouth, but I chose the more tame one. So the seven lampstands, Jesus standing in the midst, first thing that John sees is the golden lampstands. These lampstands are not like the lampstands that they saw at the temple where you had kind of like the seven candles on one stick, but it's just seven separate lampstands.

So what is the significance of that? The very first vision that he sees is not of Christ, is not of all these other things. First thing that he sees is the seven lampstands. What is the seven lampstands? Later on it tells us. It's the church. So what do you think the significance is that John turns around and the first thing that Jesus shows him is the seven lampstands representing the church?

The significance of the church, right? That Christ is very concerned about the church, right? He says he sees the lampstand and then the second thing that he sees is what? Jesus standing in the midst of the lampstands. So the first image that John sees before Jesus shows him anything else is that these seven churches and Christ is in the midst of them and he's about to write a very intimate letter to each one of them.

So everything that he has to say, not only from chapter three, we can kind of disconnect. He writes the seven things to the church and then the rest of the book of Revelations up to chapter 22, we can study it as if it's not connected to the first three chapters, right?

So we have to be careful to remember that everything that Jesus has to say in the 22 chapters of the book of Revelation is directly related to what he says in the first three chapters to these churches, right? Because he says, "I want you to see this vision. I want you to see that I'm genuinely concerned for them and I care for them and then tell them that these things are about to happen so that they may wake up.

If you are falling asleep, wake up. If you lost your first love, repent. Renew your first love. If you're compromising in doctrine, if you're not careful, Christ is going to come and he's going to take away your lampstand." So everything that he says in this book is directly related to the seven churches that he's talking to.

Some churches have no particular issue and he's telling them to hang on. Christ is coming, right? And you've been faithful to the end, stay to the end because Christ is coming and he's going to be victorious, right? So the first thing that he sees, again, the significance of that is it connects us to everything else that he has to say.

So when we're reading the book of Revelation, we have to read it like you're one of the seven churches, right? What does chapter 20 have to do with the church of Ephesus? How would a lukewarm church, a Laodicean church, how would they have read chapter 13, chapter 15, right?

And so you kind of have to see it in practical application because he wasn't just writing a bunch of mysterious things for the rest of the church to figure out for the next 2,000 years. It was a very personal letter to these seven churches where John says of himself that, "I'm a co-laborer.

I'm suffering along with you. I'm also waiting patiently for him." And then the very first thing that he sees is Jesus standing in the midst of these seven churches concerned for them. And he said, "What you have seen, take this to the seven churches." And then he says he sees the Son of Man standing in the midst of the seven churches, right?

Or the seven lamb stands. The term Son of Man is very significant. It is the most favorite self-designated term that Jesus used of himself, right? He's called the Son of God, right? Sometimes prophet, Lord, master. But the term Son of Man is the term that Jesus used most frequently of himself.

Now the term Son of Man generically, kind of like the term Son of God, generically can apply to the nation of Israel. It could apply to children of God. But the term specific Son of Man is related to the term that is used in Daniel chapter 7, 13. I don't know if I have that passage.

I don't. Okay. Can you turn your Bibles to Daniel chapter 7, 13 because this is very important and I want you guys to see the connection. Turn to Daniel chapter 7, 13. And I think I mentioned to you, I think the very first day that when you study the book of Revelation, a big chunk of some of the prophecies, you'll see the direct connection with the prophecies in the book of Daniel.

So this was not, a lot of these prophecies were not new. It was a continuation or fulfillment in Christ. So if you look at Daniel chapter 7, verse 13, Daniel sees a vision. He says, "I saw in the night visions and behold with the clouds of heaven, there came one like a Son of Man and he came to the ancient of days and was presented before him and to him was given dominion, glory, kingdom that all people, nations, languages should serve him.

His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed." So we see elements of this also in Hebrews chapter 1, describing Christ. So clearly this is talking about the Messiah that's coming and this Messiah is not just a glorified human being because his kingdom will last forever.

It is eternal. And all the nations, every single nation will bow before him. So he's not just a glorified human being. So Jesus uses that of himself, that title of himself more than any other title. And you'll notice that when John sees Jesus, he says he sees one like a Son of Man.

Now why do you think he uses that term "like a Son of Man"? I talked about this a little bit last time. How many times does he use the word "like"? Let's see. Like the long robe, golden sash, his hair was of his head and was like wool, the word like flame, like furnished, like roar, right?

Like did I miss any? So in all the descriptions of Christ, he uses the term "like." He's like this, he's like that, he's like this. So when you Google Jesus' vision or John's vision of Jesus in Revelation chapter 1, if you were to draw him literally, I mean, it's a pretty scary picture, right?

And you got a sword, double-edged sword coming out of his tongue. He's got eyes of fire, hair like wool, white as wool, and all this stuff. Remember we talked about that? Why does he use the term "like"? He's seeing a vision, a glorified Christ that he may have seen a glimpse of maybe at the transfiguration, right?

But again, that was only a glimpse, and this is before he was buried and resurrected. So now in his full glorified, resurrected body, he's seeing Christ like he's never seen before. So everything that he's seeing, is he actually seeing a sword coming out of his mouth? He said it's like a sword.

So we don't know. Maybe it was a sword, maybe it wasn't a sword, we don't know. But he's trying to do his best to describe the glory that now resides in Christ. And so if you've never seen anything like that, he can say, "Well, I mean, Jesus, I've seen something like that.

Maybe the emperor of Rome, there's this majesty about him, and there's something about the beauty of that, or the power of the nuclear bomb." And you can kind of sense that, but if you've never really seen glory up close, how would you describe that? If you've ever traveled anywhere, and you've tasted a flavor that you've never experienced before, and you just loved it, you loved it, and you come back and you say, "Man, I went to India and I tasted this particular spice, and it was so delicious.

What is it like?" It was kind of like burrito and sushi and pizza. The best hamburger you've ever tasted. You say, "That's strange. What is that like? That sounds disgusting." But you're trying to convey something that you've tasted that doesn't exist. This is the first time you've tasted it, and you loved it.

So you're going to use language that's going to convey that this is what it was like. It was kind of like this. But I can't tell you it was like a burrito because it wasn't a burrito. I can't tell you that it was like hamburger because there's nothing quite like it.

So the best that I can do is to give you an image of this is what I saw. I saw the glorified Christ. So everything that he sees is something that he can't explain with words. Does that make sense? And that's why he's saying "like." So we can draw a picture of him with the fiery eyes and all this stuff, but I don't think that's quite exactly what he saw.

I've already mentioned this, so I'll move on. The next part is very important because he sees a vision of Christ, and it's not conveyed in one verse, but in totality what he sees, he's presented as Jesus, as prophet, priest, and king. Remember Melchizedek? No king was ever allowed to give sacrifice, and only people who are in the line of Judah can be a king.

But Christ comes as a prophet, he's a priest, and he's a king. And this is an office that only Christ can hold. This is unique to Christ that no other human being, no other king, no other prophet, no Levite has ever come close to, and they're not allowed to, because this is specifically reserved for Christ.

So all those offices that was created and God used for a particular purpose in the nation of Israel, they are all types of Christ. So if you look at the Levites and the things that he told them, all of that was to convey the office that Jesus was going to come and fulfill.

Every single king in the nation of Israel, they were sub-kings of the real king. Remember why Saul got punished? Because Saul didn't recognize a king above him. He thought he was the king of Israel, and he was punished for that. So every king subsequent, after that, that they need to first and foremost recognize that they were simply servants of the real king, which was Christ.

So in this beginning picture of Christ, he's presented to us as a prophet who receives the revelation of God and to give to the servant through the angels. He's the mediator between man and God. He comes as a king who is exalted, sorry, prophet, and then he comes as a priest, finally.

In fact, the very first thing that is mentioned, Jesus is clothed in long robe and golden sash around his chest. For the sake of time, we're not going to go there, but in Exodus 28 and 29, 5, that's the dress of a priest when he would come and serve.

So Jesus is wearing priestly garments. Hair on his head were white like wool. Let me go back real quick because the picture of Jesus mentioned here, "Son of man, he came the ancient of days and was presented to him." Okay, no, it's not this passage. Is it? No, no, it was a previous passage.

Okay. All right, I'm going to go through this real quick because I'm not going to sit here and say the hair means this and feet means this and, you know. I think we can guess when he says eyes of flame that he has piercing eyes, he sees all things, right?

His feet were like burnished bronze refined in furnace ready for action. He's got solid feet. His voice like roar of many waters. And again, that same description of Christ is given about God in Ezekiel 43 verse 2. So all of these qualities that are describing Jesus is exactly the way God is described to us.

So if any Jehovah Witness comes to you and says, "Now, Jesus is not God. He's the Son of God." There are so many places in the Bible that can only refer to Jesus as God himself, right? Nobody who reads the Bible faithfully can come up and say Jesus never declared to be God, just the Son of God.

That is not the case, right? In his right hand, he held the seven stars. See the seven stars here? I might have the one with the flaming eyes. I might, maybe. I forgot if I put it in here. And those seven stars represents the angels. And so each one of those angels, when he writes to the seven churches, he says to the angel of the church of Ephesus, the angel of the church of Smyrna.

So we're going to talk about that later when we get to that. Okay, I'm not going to get too deep into that today. From his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword. And obviously, you know, in Hebrews 4, it says the Word of God is sharper than any two-edged sword, double-edged sword.

So meaning that it's sharp, it can cut, right? It is very powerful. His face was like the sun shining in full strength, again, to convey that he was seeing the glorified Christ. John's response to this vision. Yeah, this is the one. But I hid his face. If I lower him, you'll see his eyes of fire.

Okay. John's response to the vision is the typical response that we see in any human being in the presence of God's glory. He falls down in terror. Now remember, he walked with Jesus. He said of Jesus, "I'm the one that he favors and loves." Right? I mean, if anybody had an intimate relationship with Christ, it was John, and it's according to him.

But he sees the glorified Christ, and he's in terror. He's in fear. He's never seen his master like this before. Maybe at the transfiguration, he saw a glimpse of that. Maybe after the resurrection, he saw his glorified body when Jesus came forward. Remember, I think it was in Matthew chapter 28.

They all fall down and they worship him. So they saw a glimpse of that, but nothing like this. As soon as he confronted with that, he has a similar response of Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, every single person in the presence of his glory falls down in terror. Now I think this is so crucial to a proper relationship with Christ.

Because we can have an intimate relationship with Christ, and we know that he loves us, he cares for us, and all of these things are true. But if we don't know that same God who terrifies sinners, then that grace isn't going to be a biblical grace. It's going to be a grace that's created in our culture, kind of like grace like a generous grandfather or grandmother that just kind of lets you get away with anything.

It's going to be a kind of grace where there is no punishment for sin. God just kind of overlooks the things that we do. So if we don't understand grace in the context of this terrified vision of Christ, and the only reason why John is able to have any kind of contact with Christ is what does Jesus do?

Look at the text. What does Jesus do? When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. He was terrified, but laid his right hand on me saying, "Fear not." The only reason why John is able to even look up is because Jesus lays his hand in gentleness.

Even though he's in his full glory, he says, "Fear not. I am the first and the last." So let me stop right here. Now he's trying to tell John not to fear. You would think that he would say, "Don't fear. I am gentle. I'm not going to hurt you.

I am compassionate and loving. I cover for your sins." Now all of these things are true, but he says, "Do not fear because I am almighty God." That's basically what he's saying. Do not fear. I am the first and the last. This is the same description of Yahweh. Do not fear.

I am God. Sorry. I'll do it. I am the living one. I died and behold, I am alive forevermore. I have the keys of death and Hades. Isn't that the reason why he was fearing him in the first place? Wasn't that the reason why he saw the glorified Christ and said, "Oh my God, she's in his glory," and he's terrified and Jesus says, "Do not fear." What does all of this convey to John?

Think about the big picture. Why this letter is going out and who it's going out to. In what context is this going out to? He's saying he's the almighty God. I am the Alpha and the Omega. I am the first and the last. I died. I came back to life.

I have the power of death and hell. How would you feel? Probably scared. Right? But that God is on your side. As terrified as he may be, that's your God. When he says, "I am the first and the last," he's not simply telling that to him. He's conveying to him because his world has been flipped upside down.

We don't know for sure if he was actually put into boiling oil and then he survived. We don't know that for sure, but we know for sure that all of his friends have already died. If not everybody, most of them have already been martyred by this time. So John knows, he himself probably was thinking, "I'm ready to go myself," and he sees his brothers and sisters suffering in Christ in these churches and they're all terrified.

And we're not just talking about dying. We're talking about a very painful death, some of them. Crucified, thrown into boiling oil, having lions and wild animals tear them apart. They were torturing Christians. And it's a horrific death. So when Jesus tells John, "Do not fear because I am the first and the last.

I died and I was resurrected and I have the power to give life and I have the power of death and hell," all of this is conveyed to John that this Almighty God is on your side. I am with you. I'm your master. That master that you followed for three years was resurrected and you thought was being killed by the Romans.

Now he sees the glorified Christ. This is who I am. So can you imagine, John already probably knew this because he bowed down and worshipped him, but now he's meeting God himself, which he already conveyed. He already bowed down and worshipped him, but now he's in the presence of his glory.

So can you imagine just being a part of the transfiguration, how that might have changed the three of them? And how Peter talks about that later on, how he was there in the transfiguration. So can you imagine if that had that kind of impact on them, that what kind of impact this would have had on John?

I think his letters would have been affected by this. His sermons probably would have been affected by this. Every person that he met probably would have been affected by this. How do you stand in the presence of the glory of this God that you've been worshipping, ancestors who created the universe, and then not have that as the center of your conversation for the rest of your life?

So we see that John is given the privilege to be in his presence because he has something very, very important for him to write. The sinful man is clear, the Old Testament says the sinful man in the presence of God without his mercy and grace, without being covered by his blood, would surely die.

Only because Jesus lays his hand and says, "Fear not." Because he's the high priest, he's the mediator. And so all of this leads to his commissioning. He is absolutely sovereign. He is alive forevermore that even when you die, you shall live. And he has the keys to Hades. In other words, fear not.

And then the final, and this is kind of related to, again, going forward to help us to understand these prophecies, his commissioning involves past, present, and future. So if you look at, let me put the last part up there. He's commissioning, he says, verse 20, "Ask for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in the right hand." Okay, verse 19, "Write therefore the things that you have seen," right?

I know there's a delay. Past. Those that are present. Remiss. And then those that are to take place. Okay, future. So we talked, again, I think we talked about this in the introduction, that why when we interpret these visions that we have to keep in mind that he wasn't simply talking about one particular event, right?

Because even as he is commissioning him, he says, "Write down what you have seen, what are, and what will be." So when we're trying to interpret these visions, we have to keep that in mind, that John is not just looking at the present. He's not only looking at the future.

He's also looking at the things that he's already seen. So we have to dig and find out which makes the most sense. So there's always threefold application, right? There's present things that are going on that may have already happened that John has already seen, right? And so the things that he has to say to the church of Ephesus, he already knows all of that, right?

Those are past tense. Those are things that he's already known about them. And then there's things that are, meaning that there's things that Christ is fulfilling even at this moment. It's not the ultimate deliverance, but Christ, is he their mediator now? Is he their God? Is he the God who is sovereign?

Is he the God who will protect them? Like all of these things are true as of now, right? Even as he is writing it. And then there's things that he says will be, right? These are things that can be ultimately fulfilled when Christ comes. And those are the things that we ought to look for.

So again, everything that he's about to tell us is not present tense, is not past tense, is not just future tense. It's all three, right? This is how Jesus commissioned him. All right, that's all I have for today. The three discussion questions. When was the last time that you thought seriously about the second coming of Christ and how does the hope of the second coming affect your walk with God?

So I think for today, it'd be great to be in your small group and take some time for personal discussion about where you are in your walk with God. Do you have a personal relationship with Christ or is it just a legal standing? And again, I think I mentioned this last week and Sunday and even today.

So I'm not asking, do you believe in Jesus? The question is, do you actually have a personal relationship with Jesus or is it just a legal standing like my sins have been paid for? So how do you understand that? Well, think about any human relationship that you have. Does it look anything like it?

Is it anything like if you, your relationship with Christ, right? You don't talk to him. You don't think about him. He's not real to you, right? So would you consider that you have a relationship with another person if it looked like the relationship you have with God? That's a little bit more practical.

Does that make sense? So that's the question that I'm asking. I'm not asking where do you stand legally before God. It's a much more practical, personal, subjective question. Do you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ? So take some time to think about that because the cliché is it's not religion, it's about relationship and I know it's a cliché and everybody uses it, but it's a cliché for a reason because it's true, right?

Because at the core of the meaning of that is Christ died for us so that our sins could be forgiven, so that our relationship could be reconciled, so that we can have a personal relationship with our Abba Father, right? So that's a more practical question, number two. And third, why do you think the study of the end times is important in the life of a Christian, practically speaking?

Why do you think God communicated mostly through visions and dreams when speaking in the end times rather than through clear writings like the epistles? We talked a little bit about that last week, but maybe you can take some time to talk about this and maybe it'll help us to prepare for the future study in Revelation, okay?

All right, so let me pray for us and then I'll get you guys to get into your small group. Heavenly Father, I thank you for my brothers and sisters and at this time as we break up into our small groups, I pray, Father, that you would bless the times that we will have and that discussions would be honest, that we would be transparent, that in our weakness, Lord God, that we would not try to pretend.

And I pray, Father, that those of us who are striving and enjoying our fellowship with you, I pray, Father God, that you would turn the frustration into compassion. Help us, Lord God, to be strong for the brothers and sisters around us and care for them, Lord God, as people that we love.

For those of us who are struggling and weak, help us to be vulnerable enough to lean on others, to ask for prayer. Help us not to think about what they will think. And I pray, Father God, that each one of us has been called because we are weak. I pray, Lord God, that you would give us the spirit and you give us strength, Lord God, to empty ourselves, that Christ may be magnified.

So I pray that our small group time will be sanctifying for all of us. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.