Unveiling Revelation: Introduction & Context (Ep 39)

Jason

Welcome to the My Ministry Mission Podcast. My name is Jason, and I am your cohost. That's right, I said cohost. I'll explain. I have been wanting to delve into a topic that's been swirling in my brain for a good while, but I haven't had the courage to really move on it until recently. Which is why I'm glad my good friend Laura had agreed to join me for this series. Say hello, Laura.

Laura

Hello, Laura.

Jason

I knew you were going to do that! I don't know why. Every time I practiced this in my brain, you always said it. Anyways, so what's the series? I'm glad you asked! I've been wanting to do a series that focuses on the Book of Revelation. And I've got to tell you, I'm a little nervous. Okay. I'm actually a lot nervous because Revelation is such a fascinating part of the Bible, but there's so much nuance, so much context to take in and so many different perspectives that it's just this overwhelming amount of information that it's kind of felt like this impossible, insurmountable task. However, the whole point of me starting this podcast was to help learn and grow and then to share that. So today's episode, we are going to touch on introducing the Book of Revelation, talking about the apocalyptic genre, and just give you some context and history on the subject. And this will probably lead into a series that will last maybe four or five extra episodes. So it's going to be a little different than normal because I do have a cohost and understand that we have some working notes and we've scripted some of this out, but we're also going to try to talk about Revelation and share some ideas. We may go off tangent because neither one of us is very good at regulating ourselves when we do Bible talk. So that being said, keep listening. It's going to be awesome.

Jason

All right. God has placed a message in my heart for the listeners, specifically those of you who are out there who are struggling, hurting, or suffering. And the first thing I want to say is that I'm sorry if you're hurting. I'm sorry if you're struggling. This is a broken world. It can be really hard to continue on day after day sometimes. There's no pretty words that are going to dress up the situation and make it seem okay. But I ask you to invite the Lord into your broken life. Invite Him into your mess and into your suffering, and bow your head the next time you feel overwhelmed. Ask Him to bless you exactly where you are, just right then and there. And then be ready to receive his blessings. Believe it or not, he's trying to use you for his good works right now, right this moment. And you're going to have a hard time seeing that if you're overcome with your situation, and that is the enemy's work. Satan wants you so busy feeling stuck in your life that you don't look up to see the hand of God reaching for you. Look, he's there with you. It may not make the situation seem any better, but it will give you strength. It'll strengthen your spirit so that the situations, the challenges in your life don't overtake you. Look, our Lord will put blessings in your path. He'll nudge others to provide for you, to comfort you, to be near you when you need them. And if you stay faithful to Him, I promise one day you will experience a miracle. So I just wanted to get that out there before we really get started.

Jason

Okay. I'm actually really excited to have my guest on here for this series. And I shouldn't call her a guest. I should call her my cohost. I feel like she's quickly become a good friend. I, admire her dedication to the Lord and her knowledge of Scripture. In fact, when I first proposed this you're going to laugh, Laura. When I first proposed this and she started looking over the material, she immediately corrected me and said, “it's not the Book of Revelations, it's the Book of Revelation. No s at the end.” So, first of all, thank you for doing this. Thank you for keeping me in line and humble, and welcome to My Ministry Mission.

Laura

Well, thank you for having me, Jason. I appreciate the opportunity to join you and, just to have some discussion and, just share the knowledge of Scripture and Jesus with everybody.

Jason

That's awesome.

Jason

Please, whatever you want to share, tell us about you, whatever you want the listeners to know before we delve into this subject.

Laura

Okay. So, I accepted Christ when I was about five, and I was raised in the church. And it wasn't until about, I'd say 15 years ago that I started really thinking about my relationship with God, thinking about what that means and how that relates to my life. And even in the last two or three years, I've really decided to dive more into Scripture for myself. Instead of just listening to pastors at church or reading a small devotional.

Jason

Each day, you started to feed yourself more.

Laura

Yeah.

Jason

That's great. All right, well, thank you again. I know you hear that a lot, “Thanks for joining me” “You're honored” whatever. But I really am honored that you are willing to do this, because I do respect what you have to say and your knowledge on it and your ability to look things up rolling into this.

Jason

I have one more housekeeping topic, and I say this because I want to be very careful going into this series, because there's a lot of different eschatological views when it comes to the Book of Revelation. There's preterist historicist, idealist, futurist, even some eclectic views that kind of borrow from others. And there's different views of the millennium, amillennialism, post millennialism, and it's very hard to say these words in succession, but the challenge here is that each of these views are accurate and possible according to Scripture. And you had reminded me early on that there's also challenges and warnings that go into each of these views. even the ones we may agree with or feel are more accurate. So, for the purpose of this series, I want to make sure that we understand that we're planning to focus on the context. And if you, the listener, choose to do more digging, that's good, all the better. But there's not to say something won't get referenced or we won't make a reference to one of these views from time to time. But the point is not to try to sway you on any particular view. That's not the purpose of this series. We want to dig into the meat of Revelation and give you a little insight that may help guide you if you decide to delve in and do a little bit research on your own. So, that being said, and the listeners, if they're still listening with all of these interludes and everything, let's get rolling. You ready?

Laura

Sure.

Jason

Awesome. So, I think we kind of shuffle things around a bit. We're going to start with kind of talking about the early church and the Roman Empire. That plays a heavy role into maybe the formatting of the context of Revelation. So, the Roman Empire itself was very, very powerful and wealthy during these early days of the Christian church. When John actually wrote the Book of Revelation, it's believed the population was somewhere around a million citizens, and most of these citizens were polytheistic, having inherited their beliefs from the Greek pantheon. And then the Christian church came and started to grow and became a major presence in the Roman Empire by the late 40s AD, not 1940s … 40s. Just want to make that clear in case anybody's confused. it was a collection of beliefs, believers who kind of met in small groups and within homes to worship and study together. An example of this was outlined in Romans 16:3-5 where Paul writes, “Greet Priscilla and Aquila my coworkers in Christ Jesus. They risk their lives for me. Not only I, but all the, churches of the Gentiles are grateful to them. Greet also the church that meets at their house.” So, kind of interesting about the Roman Empire at that time is that they were very tolerant of most religions as long as they were polytheistic and as long as they recognized and worshiped the emperor as god. And this was clearly not a thing Christians or Jews could do and be faithful to God, so this made them very unpopular, especially the whole not worshipping the emperor part.

Laura

Right. And the devout Jews had actually condemned Christianity at their councils at Jamnia around the years 70 to 85 AD and they reported any Christians to the Roman government as religious deviants. And they even demanded that these Christians not be afforded the protection under the religious licensing laws that allowed them to practice their own religion. And any Christians who refused to worship the emperor were faced with harsh persecution and consequences.

Jason

Yeah. which we still see today.

Jason

This is where we're going to kind of deviate, because I'm curious your thoughts on if you look at the nation we live in, America, as well as nations across the world, are we seeing kind of a repeat of what the Roman Empire became?

Laura

Right. I didn't actually think about that, but, you do make a very good point. We are seeing that even in our government, even no matter what we're looking at, we are seeing that Christians are the only religion that seems to be not allowed to practice, or at least not the way they want.

Jason

Right. Kind of looked at, persecuted, and Jesus warned us of all. But so back on topic with revelation being written during this intense period of persecution, I mean, it's possible that it reflected the challenges of the early Christian church and kind of provide some hope and encouragement to the believers. Under duress, which is what we see in kind of Revelations 2:10, where it reads, “Do not be afraid of what you are about to suffer. I tell you, the devil will put some of you in prison and test you, and you will suffer persecution for ten days. Be faithful even to the point of death, and I will give you life as your victor's crown.” Now, we kind of started adding to this. We did a Google Docs and both added to it, and I found some fun, interesting commentaries regarding the ten days. And the one thing that I kind of want to go off out of order a little bit is that the number ten represents completeness and perfection. And I'm curious, what does that mean in reference to the ten days? Because none of the commentaries actually explained the significance of ten in the context of completeness. they just talked about how some think that Jesus meant ten years, others think that it meant ten emperors under the Roman Empire. Do you have any thoughts on that? Like, what is ten? Why is that significant?

Laura

I did notice your notes earlier, and I was thinking that the number ten also represents the law, as in the Ten Commandments. So, I'm actually looking that's super interesting to see what church John was actually writing to. He was writing to the Church of Smyrna. And if you go back to the beginning of that letter, it says, “Write this letter to the angel of the church in Smyrna. This is the message from the one who was the first and the last who was dead, but is now alive. I know about your suffering and your poverty, but you are rich. I know the blasphemy of those opposing you. They say they are Jews, but they are not because their synagogue belongs to Satan. Don't be afraid of what you are about to suffer. The devil will throw some of you into prison to test you. You will suffer for ten days. But if you remain faithful even when facing death, I will give you the crown of life.” So, taking that into consideration, it could have something I mean, I haven't done a whole lot of research on the churches in recent years, but it could have something to do with going back to suffering because of the law, the Ten Commandments, because I know that devout Jews follow that, or at least try to follow that to the letter, but, it kind of divides the Old and New Covenants. The Old Covenant of the Law was the Ten Commandments, which was focused around what men had to do to earn their righteousness. They thought they could meet God's perfect standard, but they couldn't. And then when Jesus came and died and rose again, he didn't abolish that, but he fulfilled it. And that way we wouldn't because we can't, so he fulfilled it for us. And with the Christians being persecuted here, they are being persecuted because they don't focus on following the Ten Commandments. They're thinking more along the lines of grace. At least that's what I'm reading from it.

Jason

Yeah. Interesting. There’re so many rabbit holes in this conversation.

Laura

Oh, exactly.

Jason

I'm afraid to look at any of them. But we do know that Revelation uses symbolic language and imagery to represent different themes and constructs. And in chapter 17 and 18 of, Revelation, it actually describes the fall of Babylon. And a lot of scholars believe that Babylon is symbolic of the Roman Empire due to its association with, like, pride, adultery, rebellion against God. And Rome is also proverbially known as the city built on seven hills. And Revelations 17:9 states something about “the seven heads are seven hills.” And then we kind of move on to another source of hope and encouragement in Revelations 21:4, where John writes and, this is one of my favorites, he writes, “He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away,” In a moment of challenging times, in conflict and persecution. I mean, it kind of feels like it's hopeful, kind of comforting, but kind of not. I'm not sure how I would feel about hearing something like that, but the message is, ultimately, Christ would be victorious and hearken in a new era of peace where pain, death, sadness, all of these things that we struggle with now would just no longer exist. Right.

Laura

That's what it sounds like to me. And that actually sounds really good right about now with everything.

Jason

Yeah. no, there are some days where it's like, hey, we could speed this thing up a little. That'd be great.

Laura

I was literally just thinking that the other day.

Jason

Oh, dear.

Jason

Okay, so I told you we were going to go off topic here and there, moving on to the purpose of Revelation. Now, I found a couple of interesting things to know and you can tell me if you have any others or what you think about these, but it is the only prophetic book in the New Testament compared to, I think, 17 prophetic books in the Old Testament. And it actually is kind of self-titled. It starts out in Revelation 1:1 talking about “The revelation of Jesus Christ.”

Laura

Actually, that was something I hadn't noticed until I read it in the notes a little while back. You're right. It is the only book in the New Testament specifically dedicated to prophecy. I mean, there are prophetic references in other books, but it's the only entire book.

Jason

Right. And it is an apocalyptic genre. And I'm going to kind of shift into that topic because it's kind of like, what does that mean if we look at TVs and movie shows and the apocalypse is like this weird end of the world thing, even Dictionary.com has it defined as, two different entries. It's the complete and final destruction of the world as described in the Book of Revelation. Okay. But the second one is an event involving destruction or damage on an awesome or catastrophic scale, which I guess still kind of falls under Revelation. But I kind of think apocalyptic literature gets a bad rap. I mean, what do you think?

Laura

When I hear the word apocalypse, first thing that comes to mind is the zombie apocalypse.

Jason

Right. I don't know if it’s because it's my notes, but I have that in my notes. Everyone goes to the zombie apocalypse. I don't know why.

Laura

Or a viral apocalypse. I've seen TV shows with a virus apocalypse. Well, we're not going to go there. Not after the last three years.

Jason

Fair enough. The word apocalypse comes from the Greek word “apokalupsis” which is derived from “apokaluptein” which is a combination of “apo” meaning “un” and “kaluptein” meaning to cover. So basically, I mean, the word apocalypse just means to uncover, unveil, or reveal, as in the book of Revelation. So, Book of Revelation is actually literally the book of the apocalypse. Right.

Laura

Makes sense to me. Got to love God's, play on words.

Jason

Yeah. No, it's fun. Translating is fun. But its primary purpose is to unveil or reveal it in truth. Particularly those related to the ultimate triumph of God over evil. God took a moment to pull back the curtain for John, the author, and show what's really going on behind the scenes in the world from a godly or divine perspective. The Book of Revelation isn't meant to scare us. It's meant to show us a truth. But it's kind of scary in that it shows us the truth. Right?

Laura

Oh, yeah. And, anything futuristic does tend to inspire fear.

Jason

Right.

Jason

So, moving into the authorship of it because I mentioned it. The Book of Revelation identifies the author in Revelation One, verse one where it reads, the revelation from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servant what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John. So it actually identifies the author four times in 1:1, 1:4, 1:9 and 22:8. And the early church theologians believe that this identifies John the Apostle as the author. And this is kind of a widely accepted view, that most Christians have, but the timeline fits. John the apostle lived from roughly 6 AD to 100 AD. And most scholars believe the Book of Revelation was written between 94 and 96 Ad. Although there's some preterist interpretations that suggest 68 AD. But that still falls in John's lifetime.

Laura

Right, and you mentioned Revelation 1:9 that revealed John as the author. And in that verse, it also specifies that he is writing from the island of Patmos. The Apostle John was exiled there by the Roman emperor Domitian, and he was the closest apostle to Jesus. I mean, think about it. There were the original twelve apostles that Jesus called, and then there were three that went with him to the Mount of Transfiguration. John along with Peter and James, and then John alone. If you go to John 13:21-26, John is leaning against Jesus when Jesus speaks the name of the man who will betray him. And Peter told John to ask who it was, which he did. And Jesus answered, I am of the belief that he only whispered it. I mean, think about it. If you know anything about Peter, if he hears that Judas is about ready to betray Jesus, he's going to do something about it.

Jason

Yeah, no, it's going down. Peter is going to start throwing elbows.

Laura

So John alone knew who was going to betray Jesus. And if you go fast forward to John 19:26-28, Jesus, as he's hanging on the cross, gives his mother into John's keeping. John was the only one there. He was the one who Jesus tasked with taking care of his mom. So it would stand a reason that the apostle John would be the one tasked with taking the message of Revelation to the churches.

Jason

And now I'm of the opinion that it was the Apostle John, but there are some that believe that he did not write Revelation, that some scholars believe it was written by a Christian figure known as John the Elder. And others believe that maybe John was just a pseudonym that was used by the author to kind of maintain anonymity to help protect the Christian community during this time of persecution. Now, one of the primary reasons behind this spin off theories is because the scholars have argued that the Greek used in Revelation is different from the Greek in John's works, which suggests a different author. But other scholars believe that these differences are not significant enough to preclude one man from having written both. So the authorship, it may never be fully definitively resolved. But like I said, for the purposes of this episode, I think I'm going to jump on board with the commonly accepted John the Apostle wrote it. So, understand that the Book of Revelation isn't the only place where we see apocalyptic or proto apocalyptic writing. parts of Daniel and Ezra are apocalyptic in nature. Even, Isaiah, chapters like 56 through 66 and Ezekiel 37 through 48 are what they call proto apocalyptic, which is a word I hadn't heard of before, but it's basically apocalyptic writing that hasn't reached full apocalypse maturity. So, like, apocalypse light is what I'm getting from that.

Laura

And as mentioned before, Revelation is the only prophetic book in the New Testament. There are, as I've mentioned, several apocalyptic references in other New Testament books, most notably the letters that Paul wrote to the Corinthians and the Thessalonians, in addition to brief mentions in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke.

Jason

Absolutely. And from what I understand, Revelation includes much of the imagery also found in books like Ezekiel, Daniel, and Zechariah.

Jason

So now that we've kind of talked about apocalypses, let's see if we can understand the apocalyptic genre. When we started to kind of read and research, kind of felt important to me to understand this genre, this apocalyptic genre, because the style of writing uses extensive and vivid symbolic imagery, which is often used to represent these complex ideas and spiritual truths. I guess the first rule of reading apocalyptic writing in the Bible is pay attention to the symbolism as well as the emotion that that evokes. At the same time, you can't overanalyze the symbolism. So, it's important to be aware of it, but don't get lost in the details. I mean, the problem is for me, is that I do get lost in the details, and I want to get down to nitty gritty.

Laura

Yeah, you and me both. And that being said, there are several mindsets that I've seen that people have with regards to the things that John's describing. I mean, are they purely symbolic, completely literal? Or is it a combination of the two? And then one theory I did read was that John is describing things in the future, like planes, helicopters, things like that, using the only frame of reference and language that he has. I mean, think about it.

Jason

Yeah, when I read that, I was like, can you even imagine living in biblical times and seeing like, a helicopter or a nuclear bomb in a like how do you even describe that?

Laura

There would be absolutely no words that I could use. But John seemed to manage.

Jason

Fair enough, he did it. So I think it's important to also remember that we aren't supposed to understand the precise meaning of the imagery contained within these writings. I mean, Jesus himself told us in Matthew 24:36, “About the day or the hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.”

Laura

Well, that is a very well-known verse, and I kind of like to say that if someone were to figure it out, like, there are theories going around YouTube like crazy. If they were to figure it out or guess the day or time of the rapture, then God would just go change it because he's God and he says nobody knows. So, if you figure it out, he's going to change it just because.

Jason

Right. And if somebody did figure out, wouldn't he know that they were going to figure it out?

Laura

Yes.

Jason

This could go on for a while. This could spiral out of control really quickly

Laura

As much fun as it would be.

Jason

Fair enough.

Jason

Okay, so apocalyptic literature, it's usually forward looking or prophetic, as we mentioned before, as it relates to Revelation, which is probably why it uses images. If there's no definitive way to prophesy the future, you're going to use symbols and imagery. That makes sense to me. So, these types of writings are not intended to be linear. They kind of remind me of a mosaic. Maybe that's why we spend so much time and effort trying to interpret Revelation, but it just seems like it can be scattered around or multiple chapters could be happening at the same time. So, it just kind of goes everywhere. And I think the last thing to consider with apocalyptic literature is that it's often dualistic in nature, meaning two powers are opposing each other in some great battle, like God and Satan.

Laura

And that dualistic nature will also present itself as a Rhema word. the word Rhema being Greek for a spoken word for a specific time and a specific purpose, one for the audience for whom it was originally intended, and for the audience reading it today.

Jason

That's a fun word, Rhema. I'd never seen that before until you wrote it. Like, I'm learning so much.

Laura

Well, I learned it from a pastor I watch online, so I can't take credit.

Jason

That's fine. I grab a lot of things from a lot of different places. Sometimes I don't even remember where I learned things.

Jason

All right, so there are certain key themes introduced in Revelation, and I wish we could go through all of them, but touch on a few of them. The first one is the victory of Christ. I mean, it's arguably the most important message. Revelation is this idea of spiritual survival, and more specifically, how the church and Christians can survive in a hostile world with Christ's support. I mean, if nothing else, we can take away one message that God will intervene in human history through Christ to eliminate evil and reward the faithful. I mean, this is eventually going to happen. And this look into the future of our existence in Christ is here to help Motivate followers. I mean, no matter what happens to the church, God knows what we need and is willing to provide it on his schedule. Of course. I mean, to put it simply, Jesus will be victorious over all of his enemies, granting peace and comfort in a broken and deteriorating world. So, the question is, who are Jesus's enemies? Well, I mean, we can start with death, Satan and all of Satan's helpers, right?

Laura

That's a good place to start. Another theme in Revelation is judgment. And there are two judgments that John speaks of. He speaks of the judgment seat of Christ and the Great White Throne judgment. And I'll be honest, I totally wanted to say great white shark just because, but I digress.

Jason

Yeah, no, I heard in my head, totally heard it in my, head

Laura

Of course. So, I'm going to preface all this with just letting you all know that some of my eschatological views will probably come out in some of these things, but that doesn't necessarily mean I'm right. So here we go.

Laura

All right, starting with the judgment seat of Christ. And it was first referenced in 2 Corinthians 5:10. And I've always believed, always been taught that this is the judgment for believers and they will be giving an account of themselves to God. And in 2 Corinthians 5:10, it references good and evil done, but God has already judged and forgotten our sins. So, to me, this judgment is more than likely referring to what we've done to further God's kingdom. Have we shared the gospel? Have we served at church? What have we done? Not necessarily what have we done wrong, but what have we done right? And there are several scriptures. 2 Timothy 2:5, 2:4 2:8, James 1:12, 1 Peter 5:4. They all reference crowns that we're going to that believers will receive as rewards for what we have done for Christ. And then the judgment seat of Christ is where we would receive those. And then as an act of worship, we will turn around and present them back to Jesus as an offering. Now, this judgment is not for sin, as, I just mentioned, this judgment is not for sin. Jesus was already judged and punished for our sin. And Romans 8:1, Paul says, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” And in Hebrews 8:12, the author who is unknown says, “and I will forgive their wickedness and I will never again remember their sins.” And this is where those eschatological beliefs get a tad hairy, so to speak. I mean, depending on your view, these two judgments can happen at varying points in the timeline. the judgment seat of Christ, pretribulate seat of Christ will happen right after the church has been raptured. Others believe it will occur simultaneously with the Great White Throne judgment, which I'll get to in a moment. And according to Revelation chapter 20, that's supposed to happen after the millennial reign of Christ, which again, I said, that's where this gets a bit hairy because depending on what you believe about those instances, these judgments shift timelines.

Jason

Yeah, it could be anywhere from literally a thousand years to just a metaphorical reign to all sorts of different views.

Laura

Exactly.

Jason

Gets a little crazy there.

Laura

Conversely, though, the Great White Throne judgment is for unbelievers, for Satan and for his minions, and not those cute little yellow guys running around in denim overalls

Jason

Yeah, I don't think this judgment is going to look good for them.

Laura

Probably not. So, Revelation 20:11-15, says that books, including the Book of Life are opened and anyone's name not found in the Book of Life are going to be thrown into the lake of fire. Now, should this happen after the Rapture, seven year of Tribulation and millennial reign, then there are going to be believers and unbelievers on Earth. So, it's unclear, and let's be honest, most of this is unclear, whether those who become believers are going to go to the judgment seat of Christ, or if they're going to go to the Great White Throne judgment. And again, one's beliefs on this are determined by their beliefs about the Rapture, Tribulation, and all the rest. So the books mentioned are likely the books of all the good and evil that people have done throughout history. I mean, that makes the most sense to me, that is living and dead alike. And it's my belief that as we mentioned earlier, Hebrews 8:12 says “God will forgive their wickedness and never again remember our sins.” That the believers are going to be given an account of all the good they did for others, for furthering the kingdom and so on, and will be rewarded appropriately. Now, it stands to reason that if believers are going to be rewarded for their good deeds, then I also believe that unbelievers, after giving an account of all the evil they've done, will be punished accordingly. I mean, you've heard of the Seven Circles of Hell, right?

Jason

Yeah, no, that's terrifying.

Laura

I know, right? But at least we don't have to worry about that, right?

Jason

This is why I'm so glad that you're here, because that whole account of judgment, I don't think I would have been able to say that so eloquently.

Laura

I appreciate that.

Jason

Yeah, of course. The establishment of God's kingdom is another theme introduced in Revelation, and it's basically God will establish his kingdom using basically a two-step approach. First is the destruction of evil. All things evil must go. And then second is the coming of eternal life and a new heaven, new earth, new Jerusalem, and then from that point forward, righteousness will reign. Right?

Laura

Woohoo.

Jason

I know, right? Excited! It's coming!

Jason

All right, so there are key symbols introduced in Revelation as well. I mentioned that there's a lot of symbolism. We're going to get into some of that in upcoming episodes, but we just want to introduce a few examples. Now, the first one is numbers, are used in a very symbolic nature to introduce or represent things throughout Revelation as either good or bad. An example of this is a number two, which demonstrates completeness and is, connected to a valid testimony or an effectual witness, such as the two Witnesses. another example is a number four, which symbolizes wholeness in coverage. Specifically, God's creation as the four corners of the earth, which represents the wholeness of earth. another example is the phrase, “Every tribe, language, people and nations” symbolizes everyone on earth without any exception.

Laura

Right? And in Revelation 19, it talks about the four hallelujahs, which we'll get into later, but it is a use.

Jason

So you're saying is every time we praise, we should do it in fours just to make sure it's complete? Okay. Finally, the famous number seven, where it represents completeness or fullness and perfection. And you'll see the number seven throughout the Bible. And in fact, I read one article that suggested the number seven appears 739 times in the Old Testament and 108 times in the New Testament. Haven't personally counted them, m, so I'm going to have to take that for its word. But, examples of the number seven include seven days of creation in Genesis or the seven voices of God in Psalms 29. And, then we have bad numbers. Bad numbers include fractions which represent incompleteness or imperfection or something that remains unaccomplished. Three and a half is a really bad one because it's half of seven. And for the Witnesses, this symbolizes suffering and martyrdom. The, number 42 is a symbol for the intense period of persecution of the saints. And this one makes me sad because I love Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. And 42 is if you know it, you know it anyways.

Laura

And I don't know, just to be honest. But it is interesting to note that some of the numbers will represent the same time frame. For example, the 42 months is three and a half years and both are indicative of suffering and persecution.

Jason

Ah, very good. There's a lot of that, that I read and I'm like, how do you pack this into a short summary? And you don't. The answer no, you don't.

Laura

Especially not when it says, yeah.

Jason

Ah.

Jason

One of my favorite is the beast. So, in Revelation 13, it starts by John describing a beast that comes out of the sea with seven heads and ten horns and ten crowns. And the horns are a symbol of strength and power and the crowns represent the beast rule over the ten nations, which this imagery is also connected to Daniel 7.

Laura

Right? And, this beast that was mentioned in Daniel 7 is a composite of four world kingdoms, Babylon, Persia, Greece and Rome. And again, there's the number four fullness.

Jason

Yeah, that's crazy.

Laura

Exactly.

Jason: 34:34

Later in Revelation 13, it describes another beast that comes from the earth with two horns which could represent authority over the two realms. Now I should also mention that in Revelation twelve, John describes a red dragon which represents Satan. Now, both of these beasts yield to the dragon and there is sort of an unholy trinity between the two beasts and the dragon himself.

Laura

Right? And the two beasts have always been kind of fascinating, especially after reading the Left Behind series by Tim Lahay and Jerry Jenkins, which when I was a teenager, that was a huge thing. But the two beasts are the Antichrist, who's described in Revelation chapter 13:1-10, and the false prophet who was described in Revelation 13:11-18. Now, the interesting thing to note, and I didn't even realize this at first, was that the beast representing the Antichrist comes from the sea and the beast representing the false prophet comes from the land. Okay? So as Jason, as you mentioned, Satan, the Antichrist and the false prophet will mimic the relationship between God the Father, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. The Antichrist receives his power from Satan, just as Jesus received it from God, and they will control every aspect of society, and they're going to seek to steal God's glory. Just like in the time of Moses. Pharaoh's magicians would mimic the miracles that Moses was doing with the staff, turning into a snake, things like that.

Jason

Until They could.

Laura

Until they couldn’t. Until they couldn't fix the water that was turned into blood, until they couldn't stop the frogs and so on and so forth. But in addition to all that, the two beasts which the Antichrist and the false prophet, they're going to control politics and religion respectively. Politics and religion are going to join up to appear more palatable and religion will dictate what can and cannot be done in society. So, the mark of the beast in Revelation 13:11-18 is originating with the false prophet, with the religion aspect of it, not the politics side, not the society or economy side. The religion is going to dictate who can buy and sell.

Jason

That's insane.

Laura

That's a little scary.

Jason

It gives me a little kind of goosebumps thinking about that.

Laura

Yeah, it's terrifying.

Jason

Yeah, absolutely.

Jason

Okay, so another symbol introduced is the heavenly visions. Now the Book of Revelation, I mean, it's amazing, as we mentioned in the beginning, it kind of lifts the veil to reveal some of God's plans for us. And John was given a gift to go see what was really going on in creation and the ultimate end of the spiritual battle which we find ourselves in. And in Revelation chapter 4, John is invited to the throne in the kingdom of heaven and was commissioned to undertake this prophetic task. Now, I won't go into too many details, because I think this will be covered in later episodes to come. But I want the listeners to try to imagine what it must have been like to see the throne, to stand before Christ and be given such a bold and noble gift of knowledge. So, I want to wrap up this episode by reading the beginning of Revelation 1:1-3, because I think it's important to include this in this episode. And by ending on it, I hope to inspire others to turn off this podcast and go read at least the first chapter in Revelation. “The revelation from Jesus Christ which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who testified to everything he saw. That is the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ. Blessed is one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear it and take to heart what is written in it, because the time is near.” I just wanted to kind of end on that because I think that's such a powerful beginning to this prophetic book. So, I will leave, it there and see. Do you have anything else to add before we finish up this recording?

Laura

No, I think we've just about covered it all. Well, in a manner of speaking anyway.

Jason

We covered enough. We'll leave it at that.

Laura

We covered enough for now.

Jason

That's the show for today special. Thank you to my awesome cohost, Laura, and I hope you, the listeners, found this to be a solid beginning for this new series. I invite you to come back in a couple of weeks for our next episode, where Laura and I will dive into the seven letters to the seven churches as we continue down this journey of the Book of Revelation. I invite you to join me online at https://myministrymission.com, where you can find my testimonials, ways to contact me, either through the website or on social media or email, and what to do if you're interested in being a guest. But until next time, remember to read your Bibles, remember to love each other, and may the Lord bless you and keep you. God bless everyone.