Session #5 – Christology in the Book of Revelation

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A Theology of the Book of Revelation

Session #5 – Christology in the Book of Revelation (Continued) Review

What is God portrayed as doing in the book of Revelation? He is establishing His kingdom on earth. How is He going about this process? The Messianic War The Eschatological Exodus The Faithful and True Witness What we are going to see tonight is that the death of Christ is fundamental to how God establishes His kingdom on earth… The Death of Christ

On the importance of Christ’s death for understanding the book of Revelation, Richard Bauckham writes, “Fundamental to Revelation’s whole understanding of the way in which Christ establishes God’s kingdom on earth is the conviction that in his death and resurrection Christ has already won his decisive victory over evil.” (73) There is no place in the book of Revelation that makes this clearer than Revelation 5. At this beginning of the chapter, we encounter a scroll, which contains the apocalyptic vision that John is delivering to the seven churches. This scroll reveals God’s plan for the establishment of His kingdom. Bauckham is helpful again, noting that “the key to John’ vision of the slaughtered Lamb (5:6) is to recognize the contrast between what he hears (5:5) and what he sees (5:6).” He continues, stating, “He hears that ‘the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, had conquered. The two messianic titles evoke a strongly militaristic and nationalist image of the Messiah of David as conqueror of the nations, destroying the enemies of God’s people.” (74). Imagine for a moment that we closed that backdoors of the SDR and then you heard a lion roar in the gym. It would be terrifying, right? Can you imagine how the hinges of the doors would shake? Now, let’s open the doors. What do we find? We find a roaring Lamb! As John turns to see what he has heard, his understanding of how God has established His kingdom is reinterpreted. The victory that Christ wins is by sacrifice, not the sword. And this victory is for all nations, not just Israel. “Thus the means by which the Davidic Messiah has won his victory is explained by the image of the Lamb, while the significance of the image of the Lamb is now seen to lie in the fact that his sacrificial death was a victory over evil.” (74) The victory that Christ achieves as the Lion-like Lamb and Lamb-like Lion encompasses all three motifs: Messianic War, Eschatological Exodus, Faithful Witness. “The continuing and ultimate victory of God over evil which the rest of Revelation describes is no more than the working-out of the decisive victory of the Lamb on the cross.” (75) Having seen that the kingdom of God comes through the sacrifice of Christ, the attention begins to turn to the role of the church in the establishment of that kingdom here on earth. Here, our attention turns once again to the importance of the theme of the witness. As Revelation 12:11 has told us, Satan is conquered by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of the testimony of the witnesses, the martyrs, “who, following Christ’s example, bear witness even at the cost of their lives.”



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The kingdom work of Christ continues on earth until he returns through the work of his church, the army of witnesses, the army of martyrs… The Army of Martyrs

Who constitutes this “Army of Martyrs?” We find this army in Revelation 7, where John hears of the 144,000. The number 144,000 is based on 12,000 men from each of the 12 tribes of Israel. These numbers represents the type of census that was taken to evaluate the military strength of a nation. “In the Old Testament a census was always a reckoning of the military strength of the nation, in which only males of military age were counted.” This was a messianic expectation of the Jewish people. They were waiting for the day when “the twelve tribes of Israel would reunite in the last days under the leadership of the Lion of Judah to defeat the Gentile oppressors of Israel.” (77) So, who are the people represented by the 144,000? Jehovah Witnesses believe that the 144,000 refers to a specific number of Christians who alone will rule with Christ in heaven. Others believe that the 144,000 refers to Christians from Ethnic Israel, yet intermarriage between the tribes, for hundreds of years (by the time of John) and for several thousand years (by the twenty-first century), effectively dissolves the tribes, who identity was based on marriage within the tribe.” (Schnabel, 87) Furthermore, this would limit the number of Jews to be saved to a precise figure, not to mention the fact that in Pauline churches, racial and ethnic distinctions had been torn down in Christ, who had made both groups into one (Eph. 2:14). (Schnabel, 87). How, then, can we determine who is being referred to by the number 144,000? Do you recall what we saw in Revelation 5? Specifically, John heard one thing but he saw another. What John heard was a roaring lion that conquered, but when he saw, it was a lamb standing as though it had been slain. Do you see what happened in Revelation 5? John’s expectations were reoriented around what God revealed in heaven. John was looking for a mighty Lion to triumph over evil, but instead, he saw a mighty lamb, who has triumph. The contrast in Revelation 5 was between what he heard and what he saw. The same thing happens again in Revelation 7. Notice what Revelation 7:4 says, “And I heard the number of the sealed, 144,000, sealed from every tribe of the sons of Israel.” Then, after the 12,000 from each tribe are mentioned, John looks! Revelation 7:9 states, “After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” Do you see what God has done in this passage? Once again, he is subverting their expectations! Just like the Jews were expecting a roaring lion from the tribe of Judah that would tear their enemies apart, but instead they got a lamb who laid down His life for the oppressor; so also, now, the militaristic and nationalistic expectations of the tribes of Israel are turned upside down as God now intends to advance His kingdom through an army of martyrs from all nations. The kingdom would not be advanced at the point of a sword, but through the plan of a suffering church. Remember how we considered how the martyrs triumphed over Satan last week? They did not triumph by might and strength, but through faithful witness and suffering. That was the message of Revelation 12:11 – by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony!

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As the church marched forward in obedience to Christ, it would advance the kingdom through a willingness to suffer just as Christ suffered to defeat evil. Again, Richard Bauckham is helpful here on this point, writing, “Thus, just as Revelation 5:5-6 depicts Jesus Christ as the Messiah who has won a victory, but has done so by sacrificial death, not by military might, so Revelation 7:4-14 depicts his followers as the people of the Messiah who share in his victory, but do so similarly, by sacrificial death rather than by military violence.” (77) We do not advance the kingdom of God by force. We advanced the kingdom of God through sacrificial faithfulness in the face of suffering, persecution, tribulation, and trial. The next place that we see these 144,000 in Revelation 14:1-5 Then I looked, and behold, on Mount Zion stood the Lamb, and with him 144,000 who had his name and his Father’s name written on their foreheads. 2 And I heard a voice from heaven like the roar of many waters and like the sound of loud thunder. The voice I heard was like the sound of harpists playing on their harps, 3 and they were singing a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and before the elders. No one could learn that song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth. 4 It is these who have not defiled themselves with women, for they are virgins. It is these who follow the Lamb wherever he goes. These have been redeemed from mankind as firstfruits for God and the Lamb, 5 and in their mouth no lie was found, for they are blameless. At first glance, it seems as those my proposed interpretation of the 144,000 falls apart. Obviously, this number is not referring to an innumerable multitude of Christians from every nations of the earth. Look at how these people are being described – virgins who never tell a lie, who are blameless. If we only look at this passage, though, we will be mistaken. We have to remember that the imagery that John is drawing up is from the Old Testament and the imagery of virgin soldiers from the 12 tribes of the people of Israel is straight from the language of Deuteronomy 23:9-14, 1 Samuel 21:5, and 2 Samuel 11:9-13. Before the Israelites went to war, they had to keep themselves free from defilement that would have been incurred through sexual intercourse. Thus, “this ritual purity belongs to the image of an army: its literal equivalent in John’s ideal of the church is moral purity.” (78) Before the people of God would do battle with the beast, they were to keep themselves free from the defilement of the enemy in the world so that they would offer an acceptable sacrifice in their service of the kingdom. Hence, the use of the term “blameless” in verse 5, which points to the “physical perfection required in an animal acceptable for sacrifice (Exodus 29:38, Leviticus 1:3, 3:1) The army of martyrs were to offer their bodies as a “living sacrifice” wholly acceptable to God. As this did this, they were to follow in the footsteps of Christ as a “faithful witness,” in whose mouth “no lie was found.” Remember what I said last week about the third major theme in the book of Revelation? The Faithful Witness? We, as followers of Christ bear this responsibility now! As members of the army of witness, the army of martyrs! “Thus, the victory of the Lamb’s army is the victory of truthful witness maintained as far as sacrificial death.” (79)



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