Statesman63
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 | | Subject: Revelation Chapter 1 (Part 2) (verses 4-5a) Sun Oct 05, 2014 9:51 pm | |
| Revelation Chapter 1 (part 2) (verses 4-5a)
We left off on verse 4 of Revelation chapter 1. It reads, “John, To the seven churches in the province of Asia: Grace and peace to you from Him who is, and who was, and who is to come and from the seven spirits before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.” I included verse 5 because it is all one sentence. John is the author of this letter, and his audience is to the seven churches in the province of Asia. Paul wrote 7 separate letters to 7 churches (also to 3 people: Timothy, Titus, and Philemon. Both 7 and 3 are God’s personal numbers that He applies to Himself). John writes one letter to 7 churches and the idea is for all 7 churches to share the one letter by passing it around to each other for the next church to read. (Eventually though, they copied it and each had their own copy). These are 7 real churches. Only the church of Ephesus gets addressed by both John and Paul. It appears that we have the Trinity in this long sentence. Since verse 5 says, “...and Jesus Christ,” then the beginning of verse 4 (“Him who is, who was, and is to come”) refers to the Father. The phrase, “7 spirits before His throne” can also be rendered, “the sevenfold Spirit,” and if that’s the case then it refers to the Holy Spirit. But the 7 spirits can just as well refer to the angel at each of the 7 churches.
Notice that God assigns an angel to represent each of the seven churches. Verse 2:1 says, “To the angel of the church in Ephesus write.” Verse 2:8 says, “To the angel of the church in Smyrna write” and so on for all 7 Churches. So it appears that for each church in history, God assigns at least one angel to them. We said before that angels are messengers from God. They are also protectors of God’s people. They also bring God’s judgment (called discipline for God’s people), and warnings. It should be no surprise that angels participate in our worship services. 1 Peter 1:12 says, “Even angels look into these things.” Angels are interested in the affairs of the Cross because they never had the Savior die for them and redeem them—to them that’s a foreign concept.
Going back to the possibility of “spirit” referring to the Holy Spirit, an interesting point to add is that Isaiah 11:2 describes the Holy Spirit as placing His 7 attributes on Jesus. Isaiah 11:1-2 reads as follows: “A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. The Spirit of the LORD [1] will rest on Him—the Spirit of wisdom [2] and of understanding [3], the Spirit of counsel [4]and of Power [5], the Spirit of knowledge [6] and of the fear the LORD [7]...” The Holy Spirit is of the Lord, of wisdom, of understanding, of counsel, of power, of knowledge, and of the fear of the LORD. And as we all know, 7 is the number for completeness in the Bible. I should point out that Revelation 4:4-5 gives a vague definition of these 7 spirits, which reads, “Before the throne, seven lamps were blazing. These are the seven spirits of God.” This equates the 7 spirits to the 7 blazing lamps. The lamps themselves, according to Revelation 1:20 are the 7 churches. So it appears that the seven spirits represent the Holy Spirit’s presence in all churches. The Holy Spirit is what keeps the lamps on fire, or lit up with light. You recall that the Holy Spirit appeared to the disciples as flames (or tongues) of fire at Pentecost in Acts 2.
We will say more about the churches soon, but let’s discuss this clause that describes Jesus as “the first-born from the dead.” It means that Jesus was the first to rise to resurrect to true life after physically dying. Lazarus resurrected, but he had to die again. Lazarus only returned to his dying body of flesh. Jesus resurrected to true life into an immortal body to never die again. Jesus was the first to resurrect to life to never die again. We, on this side of the fence, often view life and death backwards. We consider those breathing on Earth as the living, and those in the grave as dead. The Biblical definition of life and death is the opposite: those who are without Christ are dead even if they are breathing, and those with Christ, are alive, but they are housed in a dead body of flesh. Those who are in Christ and breathing will not see true life until they first drop their bodies of death. Furthermore, to become alive in the first place is to believe in Christ. Therefore, no one preceded Jesus in raising to life because it takes faith in Jesus to achieve that state of life devoid of death.
“First born” has other meanings as well. Colossians 1:15 says that Jesus is the firstborn over all of creation. The Greek word for “First born” is “prototokos.” This word has to do with rank or preeminence. When we say “the First Lady of the United States”; that has to do with rank; not meaning that she is the first lady born or created in the United States. The Jewish firstborn had the rights of all of the inheritance of the father by rank. Also, Jesus was the first expression in history because the Bible says that the Word of God, who is Jesus, created all things. By the Word of His mouth, He made the first expression over all of creation from the Eternity Past of which He resided. For more on this, you can refer to Colossians 1:18, Acts 26:23, Romans 8:29, and Psalm 89:26-27. Jehovah’s Witnesses like to use these verses to say that Jesus was the first created being by God the Father, which is a mishandling of these passages.
Jesus, it says in verse 5, is the ruler of the kings of the Earth. It may not seem like it now, but Jesus is in complete control and everyone, even rulers will one day have to answer to Him. That is all for today. We will start back on Revelation 1:5b next. It is going to get really good and interesting soon so please stay tuned.
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