Revelation 6:1-8 - The Final Four

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse is probably one of the most familiar images of Revelation, second perhaps only to the pearly gates and streets of gold of the heavenly New Jerusalem. But they’re not quite what we think that they are.

As this study moves into Chapter 6, we get into the “real stuff’ of Revelation, at least the way we may typically view this book. After all this preliminary stuff (description of Jesus, letters to churches, description of heaven), we get into what most people think Revelation is really about: a description of what will happen at the end times. These four riders are so horrific that we’re certain that they must represent what will happen when the world comes to an end. Not so fast.

First of all, we need to get rid of the idea that the “real” message of Revelation is to tell us what will happen during the end times. Sure, there are definitely parts of the book that do so; Chapter 19 and 20, for example. But that’s not the only thing that the book is about. And I’m not sure where we get that idea from. Look back at 1:19. At the beginning of John’s vision, he sees Jesus and he describes Jesus to us. Then Jesus tells John, “Write what you have seen, what is now and what will take place later.” That’s the way Jesus himself describes John’s vision: what is now, and what will be. It’s a description of both the present and the future. “What is now” is a disclosure of how spiritual forces and beings are affecting human life. The vision tells us where history is heading, but it also helps us understand where we are now.

Chapter 5 ended with the Lamb (Christ) taking the sealed scroll of God’s plan for creation, and he prepared to break open the seals to reveal and enact that will. As the Lamb opens each of the first four seals, a horseman rides out from heaven into the earth. That’s right: the Lamb releases the horsemen as He fulfills God’s plan for the world. So the horsemen are not demonic forces causing havoc and tribulation as they challenge God’s authority and blessedness. They are actually part of God’s plan! Jesus is in charge of it all. If that makes you feel uncomfortable, you’re in good company. How can God, the good, holy, loving One, be the one who brings horror to the earth?

One of the toughest nuts to crack in Christian philosophy (and other religious philosophy as well) is called the “problem of evil.” The problem is this: we believe three things that contradict each other. They are:
1. God is good and loving.
2. God is all-powerful.
3. There is evil and suffering in the world.
If God can do anything, and if he’s good, then why does he let bad stuff happen? As I’ve studied this dilemma, nearly all answers are some version of fudging on one of the three beliefs. Some people say that God isn’t really all that good and loving, or that our understanding of goodness and love is different from God’s. Elie Wiesel, the Holocaust survivor and Nobel Prize winner, went this direction. Others say that God means well, but that he just can’t quite pull it off. Harold Kushner (author of “When Bad Things Happen to Good People”) and process theologians play this angle. And other people say that what appears to be evil and suffering really isn’t that bad. Or at least, it’s necessary to serve a higher purpose. John Calvin went this way, and the “Free Will Defense” does too. I have yet to find a variation of any of these three approaches that doesn’t leave a bad taste in my mouth.

Revelation unapologetically affirms all three beliefs. God is good and holy: we’ve already seen that in Chapters 4 and 5, and it will be even clearer in Chapters 21 and 22. His goodness is the final word. God is all-powerful. He is in control of what happens. As we see demonic beings and forces of evil later in Revelation, we will see that they are only able to do what God permits, and that he can undo them in a snap. Nobody tells God what to do. And Revelation takes suffering seriously. It’s how John described himself in 1:9, and the horrific descriptions of suffering and calamity that we’ll find as we go on just support it even more. We might not be able to make sense of it, but that’s the message that Revelation gives us. And in this passage, we get the message that whatever the horsemen do is what Christ has permitted them to do. In fact, they play a role in God’s plan. That does not mean that God’s plan is a plan of suffering and calamity. And I don’t think that it means that suffering and calamity are necessary for God’s will to take place; nothing is “necessary” for God. Instead, I think that these horsemen of horror reveal the reality of the world into which God’s plan comes. Think of them as the CT scan that shows where the cancer is. The scan doesn’t cause the cancer. But a scan that reveals the cancer makes the doctor’s treatment plan possible. Evil has to be identified before it can be removed. But it’s all under God’s control.

There’s a progression among the four horsemen. And again, bear in mind that they’re riding in our world right now.

The first rider is a conqueror. This is where it all starts out. Conquest is about winning: proving that you’re the top dog. Competition is good, right? We want to show that we’re Number One. Whether it’s a sports match-up, or a game of cards, or class rank in school, or even international relations. We want to win. But as we’ll see, this prideful desire to be the best, a form of self-idolatry, inevitably causes horror and even death.

This rider is pretentious; he tries to be Christ, the true Conqueror. Compare this rider to how Christ is described in 19:11-16. We get ourselves into trouble when we try to take on for ourselves the position that belongs to Christ, and to Christ alone. We all want the victor’s crown and the white clothing of the winner.

The second rider is warfare, riding on a blood-red horse and wields a mighty sword. Conflict inevitably occurs when you get two people who both think they’re in charge, and they try to impose their will upon each other. That’s the recipe for every fight from a playground shoving match to international war. Sometimes it’s literal physical conflict. But sometimes conflict is more subtle but no less damaging: ruining someone’s reputation, taking away their opportunities and assets, belittling what they hold dear, and so on.

Warfare and conflict leads to injustice. The scales of justice become a farce, as common people are denied the simplest staples of life (like wheat and barley) while the privileged enjoy their luxuries (oil and wine) untouched. The most recent outrage in our country has been the multi-million dollar bonuses for AIG executives, while unprecedented numbers of people are losing their homes and jobs. But the rider of the black horse is more than injustice: it is also famine (remember that metaphorical meaning can be multiple), as the basics for life are being rationed out. In the long run, everyone loses in situations of conflict, because so much is destroyed. The “winner” gets a bigger piece of the pie, but it’s a smaller pie.

And finally, the last rider is Death, with Hades (the dwelling place of the dead) following behind. The shortages and privations of conflict between people and parties who are trying to conquer each other finally kills us all. We’ve played a simple simulation game in our church in which groups of people assume the identities of different nations, and they’ve told that the goal is to survive. What they rarely realize is that there’s plenty of food for everyone. But instead of thinking that way, they try to have their nation “win.” So countries like Australia and Canada and the US, which produce more food than they need, charge more for their extra food than poor and needy countries like India even have. So India “starves,” while the richer countries add more money to their treasuries. Competition and conquest kills.

Conquest. Warfare. Injustice. Famine. Disease. Death. For some reason we want to think that these riders of the apocalypse are a sign of what will happen in the future. But they’re not. It takes a pretty blind person not to notice that these things are going on all around us, and have been for centuries. It’s happening now. And it always has. Well, someone may argue, it’s going to be worse in the future. After all, the fourth rider is going to kill a fourth of the population. That’s huge. Yes, it is. But it’s happening now, and it’s happened in the past.
• By some estimates, up to 95% of the population of the American continents was wiped out by new European diseases that arrived with Columbus and those who came after him. This could represent up to one in every five people on the face of the earth at the time. Even the most conservative estimates say that half of the people on two continents died over the course of just a couple generations at most.
• The Black Death of the 13th century killed at least a third, and perhaps as much as 45%, of the population of Europe.
• In some African nations, the rate of infection for HIV/AIDS is more than 25%. Drug treatments can provide a long and healthy life for people who are infected…if they can afford the drugs. But because of the third horseman, the people who need the help don’t always get it.
And these are just a few examples. Warfare, famine, and disease lead the way for Death to have his way in our world.

It’s easy for us to kid ourselves into thinking that the four riders will disrupt the “normal.” But the represent what is normal, at least in this fallen and broken world of ours. We just don’t recognize it. And that’s not just true for people here in an affluent land that is sheltered from the worst of it. During World War II, people on both sides of the battle line ignored the horrors of the Holocaust that were going on around them. In Africa, the AIDS epidemic was denied by the very people whose villages were being depopulated by it.

When we don’t recognize that the four horsemen represent “normal” in this world, several things happen. First, we get attached to this world and we think it’s marvelous. Second, when troubles hit us, we think that they’re unusual calamities. Third, we fail to recognize that our efforts to get on top, or at least a little bit higher, cause so much suffering. When we get on the white horse, the other three follow us.

Revelation 5:1-14 – Git R Done

In Chapter 4 we saw John’s description of the ongoing situation in heaven. In this chapter he tells us about the most important event that took place in the most important place in the universe.

God is holding a scroll in his right hand as he sits on the throne. I take this scroll to be God’s plan for the world and for its salvation and redemption. But it’s sealed. Seals can only be broken by those who have the authority to open them. Or to put in another way, the one who opens the seal must be the one who has the ability to implement it. If you aren’t the one to do what the scroll describes, or if you’re not able to do it, you can’t open it. In this sense, the sealed scroll is a bit like a graduation diploma. You don’t get the diploma until you qualify for it. In the same way, you can’t open the scroll describing God’s plan for the world unless you’re able to do it.

But no one in all of creation (all three levels of the three-tier cosmos as John understood it) was able to open the scroll. Since the scroll couldn’t be opened, God’s will could not be consummated. In fact, no one could even know what the plan was! John weeps because of the goodness of God’s plan. Until the scroll is opened, the world will continue to suffer.

The good news is that Someone emerged with the ability and authority to be able to open that scroll. As John describes him, it’s pretty obvious that it’s Jesus, even though he doesn’t name him. But this is also where the Trinity can get tricky for us. Or maybe it’s Jesus’ divine nature that makes it confusing. (Of course, isn’t that the same thing, just from a different direction?) Why can’t the One sitting on the throne open the scroll, since He’s the one who wrote it? And when Jesus appears, John sees him standing in the center of the throne, which is where God is. The identification of Jesus as God is pretty hard to miss. And yet, there’s some sort of a distinction. The Father and Son are one God, but two Persons.

The elder who comforts John by telling him that someone worthy to open the scroll has appeared describes him with a double reference to the Son’s Old Testament identity: the lion of Judah and the root of David. To call Jesus the “root of David” is actually a reversal of the messianic hope of the Old Testament, which looked for the shoot to come from the stump of Jesse (Isaiah 11). Jesus as Messiah is not merely the culmination of messianic hope which began with the royal family of David. He is the source of that hope as well. Both the beginning and the end. Alpha and Omega. The elder tells John that he can open (that is, reveal and enact) God’s will because of his triumph. But he doesn’t tell John what he did to be triumphant. But it makes sense: he can make God’s will happen because he has already started to do it. The triumph he has won is the beginning of the fulfillment of God’s will that’s written on the scroll.

The elder also describes Jesus as the lion of Judah. He’s the powerful one of the people of God. The name reeks of images of power and strength. So, when John turns to look at him, you’d expect to see a powerful, impressive beast or figure who inspires you with awe and wonder. Instead, John sees the exact opposite. It’s a lamb, one of the weakest and most defenseless of creatures. And as if that wasn’t enough, it’s a lamb that has been slain. If this leaves you scratching your head, then you got the point of it. The symbolism that we find in Revelation is often, and accurately, described as metaphor. But when it comes right down to it, we exchange the depth of metaphor for the flatness of allegory. At the risk of turning this into a literature lesson, let me explain the difference. Metaphor and allegory are both figurative styles of speech and writing. But allegory is a type of substitution; you can replace what the text names with the “real” thing that it’s actually talking about. In this case, if Revelation is allegory, then Lion of Judah = Jesus, throne of heaven = God’s authority, and so one. Allegory is simply a fancy or pleasing way to make your point. (Sometimes people also use allegory to hide what they’re really talking about so that they don’t get in trouble.) But metaphor is different. In metaphor, you can’t simply say that A = X. Metaphor takes things that don’t belong together and calls them the same thing. When it does this, it makes you rethink the entire story. All of the previous ways that you thought about stuff has to change because of the challenge that the metaphor creates. Metaphor is substitutionary; it’s evocative. It prods you into new ways of thought that stand everything on its side.

This is a perfect example of a metaphor, in this way. A lion is a lamb. The one who was slain and defeated is alive and triumphant. The lamb and the One on the throne interact with each other, but they are the same person. (The lamb is at the center of the throne, so he’s apparently sitting on it. So how can he take the scroll from the right hand of the One seated on the throne, if he himself is the One seated on the throne?) This will drive you crazy if you insist on holding on to conventional straightforward thinking. Just like saying God is Three in One, and that Jesus is fully human and fully divine.

And that, in a way, is at the heart of our faith. Like metaphor, our faith reshapes and transforms everything. The most powerful force in the world is the force of love, which offers itself up for the other. Jesus won the greatest victory by being tortured, humiliated, and killed. The adventure of faith is to make sense out of what seems to make no sense at all (like a powerful lion being the same thing as a slaughtered lamb), but which changes our lives and our world at its very core.

When Jesus (the lion/lamb) takes the scroll, the living creatures and the elders fall down in worship. In other words, they do what they had been doing all along. But now, it’s different. As John put it, they began to sing a new song. John also gives us a bit more detail about what exactly they’re doing in their worship. He says that they have harps, and that they have bowls of incense. He tells us that the incense is the prayers of the saints (that is, the people of God). It’s an image that we find elsewhere in the Bible, by the way. And he doesn’t have to tell us what the harps represent: music. I had a choir director once who said that music is the one thing from this world that we’ll take with us to the next. I’m not sure why she thought so, but it sounds good to me. Music is praise. So the incense (prayers) and the harps (praise) are the two things that we have to give to God. (That answers the ultimate question of what you give to someone who has everything.)

The chapter concludes with three songs that are sung in praise of the lion/lamb. The first song (verse 9) comes from the living creatures and the elders around the throne, proclaiming that the lamb is worthy to open the scroll because of what he did: dying to give all people the status of being God’s people. What he did went beyond the traditional notion that God’s people could only come from the Jewish nation. And by becoming God’s people, they (or we) receive more than “just” redemption (although that’s pretty sweet!): we will also rule with God. I know it’s true, but it’s hard to believe. God includes us not just as citizens but as rulers!

The second song comes from the thousands upon thousands of angels in heaven, who also sing that the Lamb is worthy. But for them, he is worthy not just of being able to perform the task of consummating God’s will, but to receive a seven-fold blessing. If we had more time and space, I could reflect on what each of these seven concepts tell us about who Jesus is. But instead, I’d like to think about the fact that the angels offer it to him, instead of him taking them for himself. Hubris and egotism is grabbing for what you don’t deserve. Jesus does the exact opposite. He receives that which is due to him. And that’s what sets him apart from all the boasters of the world.

The third song includes all of creation (and that means us as well). This time, the song is not just for the Lamb, but also for the One who sits on the throne. It’s praise for Christ, and also for the Godhead which includes Christ. Once again, we encounter that metaphoric tension of being distinct but being the same all at once. Creation repeats four of the seven attributes which the angels sang about. But it also adds that this is an eternal blessing; forever and ever. That’s also what makes God different: everyone else who gets praise and glory only has it for a while. The Steelers will have to defend their title in the fall. History is full of powerful empires that crumbled away to memories. The greatest people die just like the rest of us.

The songs end with a return to the inner circle of the living creatures and elders around the throne, who offer their affirmation to all that has been sung, and who continue in their perpetual worship. (By the way, that’s what “Amen” means: a powerful affirmation of what had been said. Basically it means that you agree so much that you want those words to be your own. “Amen” isn’t just a polite way to end your conversation with God.)

Revelation 4:1-11 – The Center of the Universe

I commented on this passage about four months ago, in December, as part of my series on prayer in the Bible. While I don’t normally like to revisit a Bible text this soon, coming back to it again like this allows me to explore some of the themes in this passage in more depth.

On the remote chance that you don’t remember the December comments or that you didn’t read them, first a quick summary. This description of the “throne room” of heaven reveals the power of praise. In fact, it is at the heart of the entire universe, as God is at the center of concentric circles of praise. Closest to the throne are the four “living creatures,” who represent the created order. Next are the twenty-four elders, who are the leaders of the people of God (the patriarchs of the twelve tribes of Israel, and the twelve apostles). As we’ll see in Chapter 5, the circles around the throne continue to expand to include the angels in heaven and all of creation, including us. When we’re worshiping, we’re taking our place in the circles of praise that surround God at the center of the universe.

Now for some more details in this passage that will help us appreciate its meaning better.

First, we need to consider how John got to see what’s happening at the center of the universe. Up to this point in the book, he’s had a vision of Jesus, who gave him messages for the churches he served. But now Jesus invites him to go up into the heavenly realms to experience the spiritual aspects of the created order. From his vantage point there, John sees what’s going on from a completely different perspective from the one he’s had in the past (and the one we usually have), and it takes up most of the book of Revelation for him to describe it. But the first, most important, thing for him to experience and describe is what goes on in the presence of God. Most readers and commentators on Revelation focus on the frightening and fantastic beings and events that it describes, starting generally at Chapter 6. But in my opinion, Chapters 4 and 5 are the most important part of John’s vision, because they describe what’s happening at the center of it all, in the very presence of God.

John got there by the invitation of Jesus (the one who first spoke to him in 1:10). The only way any of us can come into God’s presence is through the work and the invitation of Jesus (John 14:6: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me.”). And it is the Spirit who carries John there, just as the Spirit draws us to God through means such as Scripture, prayer, and the church. Although John doesn’t name Him explicitly, we can assume that the One seated on the throne is the Father, thus including all three Persons of the Trinity. However, as we’ll see in 5:6 and other places, the identity of the three Persons gets hard to keep separate. That’s appropriate, I’d say.

John’s description of the throne of heaven, and of the One seated on it, gives us seven aspects of God, expressed in symbolic form.
1. The one on the throne has the appearance of precious gems. God is precious and valuable. Too often we value the blessings we receive from God more than we value him, like a greedy child who likes the goodies that his parents give him, but doesn’t care about the parents themselves.
2. The throne is encircled by a rainbow, the first image of God’s grace and of his first covenant with humanity (Genesis 9:12-16). God is gracious. We often think of God as a judge who watches and evaluates our every move. We’ll see God’s role as judge later (20:11-15), but this is something that God does, it’s not something that He is. Grace is more important than judgment.
3. The twenty-four elders surround the throne. As I’ve already mentioned, they are the leaders of the people of God and represent us there. God includes us. We’re not some afterthought, relegated to a far corner of heaven somewhere. He values and includes us. At times we may be tempted to think that God merely tolerates us. But he delights in us. What amazing love!
4. The elders are wearing white robes, are wearing crowns, and are seated on thrones. Through the gracious work of Christ, they are holy and pure, and they are honored. The multitude of God’s people that we’ll meet in Chapter 7 are also wearing white robes, and I’ll go out on a limb and claim that they are also honored. After all, Romans 8:16-17 tells us that we’ll be co-heirs with Christ). The only way we can become pure and holy is for God to give it to us. For him to give it to us, he has to have it himself.
5. Thunder rolls from the throne, and lightning flashes from it. It’s the power of God, as Exodus 19 also describes. Some religious scholars think that Israelite worship of the Lord began with an understanding of Him as the storm god. I certainly won’t go that far, but the fact that these scholars suggest it demonstrates that in the Old Testament, they find a lot of descriptions of God’s power expressed in storm images. For the ancient peoples, thunderstorms were one of the most powerful forces that they encountered. Their power, and all power, comes from God. We’re not worshiping a Lord who is safely cooped up in a church or in a remote place called heaven. He is active and powerful. You’d best pay attention to him!
6. There are seven lampstands surrounding the throne. John tells us that they are spirit of God. Exodus 25 and 2 Chronicles 4 tell us about the golden lampstands that were part of the tabernacle and the temple, where God was present with his people. In fact, the light of the lamps came to be recognized as a symbol of that presence, and tending to the lampstands was a critical aspect of temple worship. That’s the key to the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah, by the way. The despotic emperor Antiochus Ephiphanes had desecrated the temple and extinguished the lampstands. After a successful revolt the temple was rededicated and the lamps relight. This is also, by the way, why we light the candles in the front of the church before worship: to represent God’s presence with us as we worship him. So, just as the elders represent our place in God’s presence, the lampstands symbolize God’s presence with us. We are never alone.
7. The throne stands before a clear, crystal-like sea of glass. This should remind us of the story of creation that we find in Genesis 1. When Solomon built his temple, he include a giant basin called the Sea (1 Kings 7:23-25), to remind the worshipers of this as well. In ancient cosmology, the dry earth exists in between two bodies of water. The water below is the ocean, which is visible in the places where the land stops. The water above is in the heavens, and occasionally leaks down on us as rain. The earth can exist in this space between the waters because of the sustaining power of God (Noah’s flood happened when God decided to collapse the waters together). The fact that the heavenly waters are below the throne indicates that God is above the heavenly waters, and in fact controls them. God sustains all of creation. Sometimes we think of creation as something that God did back at the beginning, and now the world is going along its merry course by its own devices. Not true. Creation is a continuing process which allows us to continue to exist. We depend upon God for every moment of our existence.

I touched on a description of the four living creatures before. But just as a reminder, they embody the best of God’s creation (we also see them in Ezekiel’s vision in Ezek. 1). First, they are living. As Jesus said, God is the God of the living (Mark 12:27). What he creates is alive, dynamic, and vital (even if some parts of creation like mountains and the planets are literally alive). The creatures are covered with eyes, to demonstrate their knowledge, insight, perception, and discernment (have you ever noticed how many words that describe knowledge or wisdom are related to vision?). This isn’t a surveillance “Big Brother is watching you” kind of vision, but the kind of insight that sees through deceit and false appearance to perceive what’s real.
The first creature is like a lion: noble, impressive, even regal.
The second creature is like an ox: strong, solid, and useful.
The third is a human: wise and intelligent. Notice that the human isn’t the first or the last creature, but somewhere in the middle. A bit of humility is warranted for us; we’re not the pinnacle of creation, although we are made in God’s image. Given the ambiguous nature of humanity, I think our wisdom and intelligence is a double edged sword: perhaps “cunning” would be a better way to express it. By the way, the Ewe people of Ghana and Togo, whom I work with, call Europeans and Americans “yevu.” From the way the word’s been described to me, I think “cunning” is the best way to translate it. On the one hand, it’s a recognition of the technological savvy of Westerners. But it also recognizes the way that colonialists have stuck it to the Africans.
The fourth creature is like an eagle: swift, keen vision, and able to rise above it all.

The main thing that the living creatures and the elders do around God’s throne is lift up their praise to Him. As John describes it, the praise never lets those poor elders take a break. The living creatures never stop lifting up their praise to God (v. 8). And every time they do, the elders fall down on the ground and lay down their crowns in worship (vv. 9-10). Verse 10, by the way, is the inspiration for that line in the hymn “Holy, Holy, Holy:” “Casting down their golden crowns around the glassy sea.”

I was starting to feel bad for these elders who never get a rest. And some people wonder if life in heaven is really going to be all that great, if all we’re going to be doing is worshiping all the time. When we think this, we’re losing sight of what worship is all about. Maybe that’s because our understanding of worship has been clouded by the fact that far too often “worship” means getting up on a Sunday morning when we’d rather sleep in, and listening to a long boring sermon and singing creaky old hymns while wearing uncomfortable dress clothes and sitting on hard wooden pews. Yes: far too often our worship activities fall short of the excitement and wonder that they should have. A better way to think of what life is like for those elders, and what it will be for us, is to think of other activities that get us excited. Here are three examples:
1. Do you remember the line in advertisements for Monster Truck Jams? “We’ll sell you the whole seat, but you’ll only need the edge!”
2. Have you ever wondered why they put seats in places like Heinz Field and the Petersen Event Center? The fans are always on their feet! At Pitt basketball games, the student section is always on their feet, hopping up and down.
3. When I think of some of my favorite concerts that I’ve been to, I was on my feet the whole time, enjoying the music. I’ve never been in a mosh pit, but that would be the extreme version of this.
So, in each of these examples, people are on their feet because they’re excited. There may not be as much alcohol and vandalism, but the level of excitement in heaven around God’s throne will be more like Pittsburgh’s celebration of the Superbowl victory than a stodgy Sunday morning service. But even more! Yeah, football’s great. But if we truly understand who God is, as John’s description tries to present it, all of eternity won’t be long enough to contain our excited praise of Him.