Doctrine
of Imminency, Part 2.
Revelation 22:6-11
What
is important to understand As we come to this section
is that there is a time shift that occurs beginning in verse 6 in terms of the
time frame of the audience of the book. As we have looked at most of this book
it has been focusing on the future but at the very beginning it focused on a
present tense environment with John as he talks about being in the Isle of Patmos and suddenly the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ
appeared to Him, and then there is the un folding of the various visions
related to the future events of the Tribulation, Messianic kingdom and the
eternal state.
A
focal point here is that judgment is coming. That is really the theme of
Revelation. There is a time when God is going to bring all things to an end and
there will be an accountability for all creatures.
There will be accountability for the angels, accountability for
mankind—judgment of
The
message that was given at the end each of the letters to the seven churches was
a present tense challenge to believers in those congregations. In relationship
to the things that they were doing wrong there was a challenge that they needed
to change (that is the meaning of the world “repent”) and that for those who
were overcomers—which is not a term that is applied
to every Christian but applies to those who are moving forward and advancing in
their spiritual life, those who are growing and maturing—there would be special
categories of rewards and blessings.
Now
as we come to the conclusion of the book, the epilogue, there is a return to
that challenge. There is a sense of urgency that the writer is communicating,
that the coming of Christ is soon. It could be today, it could be next week, a
month or two, but the question that is really being addressed at the end is:
Are you ready? If Jesus were to return tonight, are you ready? If God is going
to start bringing the all things of history to a conclusion, when that begins
then everything unfolds fairly rapidly. Once the dominoes begin to fall they
fall rapidly, one after the other in terms of the end times
events.
Salvation
is a free gift, a gift of God; the issue is belief versus actions. Does that
mean that actions don’t matter? Not at all, because what we see at the end of
Revelation 22, getting into heaven or getting salvation is one thing, a free
gift; but in terms of additional blessings that are handed out at the judgment
seat of Christ, additional privileges that occur during the Millennial kingdom
and beyond, these are based on rewards and rewards are earned. Salvation is a
free gift, a gift is given and is simply received; rewards are something that
are based on performance. So we cannot become complaisant in terms of our
day-to-day lives but we must be thinking in terms of that future
accountability. Jesus could come tonight either in terms of the Rapture or in
terms of personal death and we need to be ready.
Imminency is what we develop. As we read the Scriptures, the New Testament we
see that the New Testament writers expected Jesus to return in their lifetime.
They’d seen the resurrected Jesus, the knew He had ascended to heaven, except
for Paul who was saved later, and it was at that point on the Damascus road
that he had seen the resurrected Christ. Paul expected Jesus to come back in
his lifetime, there was that sense of imminency. They knew that before things wrapped up that
there was this future period that Daniel had referred to as the 70th
week, that seven-year period of time that would be one of the most horrific
times in history. Daniel 12:1-3. Jesus repeats that in Matthew chapter
twenty-four. It is the most horrendous time of war in all of human history. And
they knew that was coming before Jesus would return to the earth to establish
His kingdom. So why did they expect Him at any moment if all of those events
would have to occur before Jesus returned to the earth? Because they understood
that Jesus would be returning for the church prior to those events. Then those
events would unfold and then there would be the second coming of Christ to the
earth.
The Rapture is always imminent, but there are
always the skeptics. In 2 Peter 3:3, Peter recognizes this: NASB “Know this
first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with {their} mocking,
following after their own lusts, [4] and saying, “Where is the promise of His
coming? For {ever} since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was
from the beginning of creation.”
John 14:1 NASB
“Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in
Jesus said in Revelation 22:12 NASB
“Behold, I am coming
quickly, and My reward {is} with Me, to render to
every man according to what he has done.” That is talking about the judgment
seat of Christ, 1 Corinthians 3:9-12; 2 Corinthians 5:5-8. This is not talking
about the end judgment, it is talking about the
rewarding of believers when Jesus comes. So that is the urgency at the end of
the book of Revelation. We are to be patient therefore until the coming of the
Lord. On the other hand, it is near. In James 5:9 we read that the judge is
standing right at the door. His coming is imminent.
Titus
No prophecy
needs to be fulfilled before the Rapture can tale place, so it can take place
at any moment. There is a myth running around out there that evangelical
Christians are trying to get Jews back into
Revelation
22:7 NASB “And behold, I am coming quickly. Blessed is he who heeds
the words of the prophecy of this book.” Again we see this emphasis on being
ready, that there is a nearness, an immediacy, because
the coming of Christ is imminent. The second part of this verse gives us the
sixth of seven blessing statements that are in book of Revelation. The speaker
here, though, is the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a parenthetical statement and it
is interjective after the statement of the angel in
verse six. It is important to pay attention to who is speaking in each of these
verses. The angels is speaking in verse 6, Jesus is
speaking in verse 7, John is speaking in verse 8, the angel again in verse 9,
10 & 11. Here Jesus again in a sense of urgency injects verse 7.
“Blessed is
he who heeds the words of the prophecy of this book.” This comes at the end, at
the epilogue of the book. At the beginning of the book there is a very similar
statement that was given in Revelation 1:3 NASB “Blessed is he who
reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and heed the things which
are written in it; for the time is near.” The word “blessing” is the Greek word
makarios [makarioj]. In some contexts it can mean happy, but that is not really what
it means in this context because of the terrible judgments. Privileged is
probably a better idea because as we read these statements it is a promise of
certain extra privileges or blessings, benefits that come to those who have
been obedient and those who are overcomers. It is not
salvation, it has to do with blessings after
privileges come to the obedient believers. So this is a special blessing to
those who read, hear and heed the promise. “Blessed is he who reads” is the
Greek word agaginosko [a)naginwskw] which means to read publicly. In the
early church most of the leaders plus the people came out of a Jewish
background, out of the synagogue where the Torah was read publicly in the
assembly. There is a blessing to those who read and those who hear the words of
the prophecy. Those are connected together: those who read and those who hear.
But the blessing comes to those who heed the things that are written. The word
that is translated “reading” here is the same word that is translated in 1 Timothy 4:13 where Paul told Timothy NASB
“Until I come, give attention to the {public} reading {of Scripture,} to
exhortation and teaching.”
But it is
not just reading and hearing. Scripture has the idea of hearing with a view
towards obedience. James emphasizes this in
The next
blessing statement in Revelation 14:13 NASB And I heard a voice from
heaven, saying, “Write, ‘Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now
on!’” “Yes,” says the Spirit, “so that they may rest from their labors, for
their deeds follow with them.” This is the only blessing that is related to
Tribulation martyrs. The third is in Revelation 16:15 NASB
“(“Behold, I am coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake and
keeps his clothes, so that he will not walk about naked and men will not see
his shame.”) Who is Jesus talking to? Is He talking to
Tribulational believers? Or is this a parenthetical
aside in the midst of all of these judgments where Jesus is addressing John’s
current audience or church age believers? This imagery of a thief is an aside.
Jesus is not talking about Tribulational believers,
He is reminding church age believers that there is judgment coming in the
Tribulation but there is judgment coming, and this goes back to the same
imagery as 1 Thessalonians 5:2-6 NASB “For you yourselves know full
well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night.” The
day of the Lord refers to the entire period of judgments leading up to the
final intense period, the seven-year Tribulation period. “While they are
saying, ‘Peace and safety!’ then destruction will come upon them suddenly like
labor pains upon a woman with child, and they will not escape.” Nobody is
saying “peace and safety” during the end of the Tribulation period, there is
massive warfare. So this is talking about the period that precedes the
Tribulation period when they say “peace and safety,” when man finally thinks
that he is going to have world peace at the end of the church age then sudden
destruction comes on them as labor pains upon
a pregnant woman, and they shall not escape. That whole imagery of labor
pains is found in Isaiah, Jeremiah and various other prophets in the Old
Testament; that this is what characterizes that final period of time that
Daniel calls the worst period for
The next
blessing comes at the end of the Tribulation period. It is a statement made by
an angel at the time of the return of Christ. Revelation 19:9 NASB
Then he said to me, “Write, ‘Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage
supper of the Lamb.’” The church is the bride, the
marriage supper celebrates the wedding of the bride to the groom, the Lord
Jesus Christ, the Lamb. Those who are invited are believers who survived the
Tribulation and those who have received resurrection bodies. Revelation 20:6 NASB
“Blessed and holy is the one who has a part [inheritance] in the first
resurrection; over these the second death has no power, but they will be
priests of God and of Christ and will reign with Him for a thousand years.”
Revelation
After John
has heard this interjection by the Lord Jesus Christ—that He is coming quickly,
and the blessing to those who respond to and apply the Word of the prophecy of
the book—he falls down again, and he is going to worship God this time. In
Revelation he made the mistake of fallen down to worship the angel. Revelation
22:8 NASB “I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And
when I heard and saw, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who
showed me these things.” He is not saying he is worshipping the angel but he falls
down to worship. The angel rebukes him in verse 9, just as he was corrected
back in
Revelation
What is interesting is the verses that immediately precede Daniel
12:4. This is addressed to the Jews, the Israelite people at the end of the exile
period.
Daniel 12:1 NASB
“Now at that time [Tribulation period] Michael, the great prince who stands
{guard} over the sons of your people, will arise. And there will be a time of
distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and
at that time your people, everyone who is found written in the book, will be
rescued.” There is a deliverance that occurs at the end of the Tribulation
period. We believe Jesus will return at that time and He delivers the remnant
of
Revelation
22:11 NASB “Let the one who does wrong, still do wrong; and the one
who is filthy, still be filthy; and let the one who is righteous, still
practice righteousness; and the one who is holy, still keep himself holy.” This
verse seems a little confusing to a lot of people but it really isn’t. There
are four categories of people mentioned here. The one who does wrong, the one
who is filthy [the negatives], the one who is righteous, the one who is holy
[the positives]. We could look at this and say it is talking about unbelievers
and believers, but that misses the point. The point here is that He is dealing
with reward and judgment again for believers. The whole section here is
addressed to church age believers, those who are obedient and those who are
disobedient. The obedient believers are the ones who—even though they sin and
fail—have cleansing from sin because of 1 John 1:9—they confess their sins;
they are cleansed. Those who are unrighteous are the ones who stay in their
sins.
The word adikeo [a)dikew] means unrighteous. We find the noun form of this word in an interesting
place, 1 John 1:9 NASB “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and
righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness [a)dikh]. So we are cleansed from all unrighteousness
when we confess our sins. Later on in 1 John 5 John says that all adike [a)dikh] is
sin. What happens when we sin and confess it there is complete cleansing. But
there are those who never confess sin, never admit to wrongdoing, and there is
no cleansing for them; so these are the ones in the first two categories. Those
who are righteous, those who are holy are those who relate to growing, maturing
believers. The point of all of this is that Jesus is again challenging church
age believers that He is coming to reward us. Revelation