MONDAY
Our new campaign is called The Exalted Christ. In this campaign we are going to talk about the church’s relationship to government and culture. Fully immersed in an election season, I thought this campaign would be appropriately timed. Election seasons tend to bring a fresh anxiety about our future. This anxiety about the church’s future stems from our always-tense relationship to government and culture. In Revelation, John writes to seven churches to encourage them to be faithful to Jesus in the midst of strong governmental and cultural pressures. He does this by sharing his visions of the exalted Christ and his supremacy over everything. With this perspective, no matter what happens in November, we have Jesus, and Jesus is better.
I imagine the election season gives you some anxiety. I also imagine that description gives you some anxiety—I’m talking about politics and Revelation! Yikes! Allow me to put your mind at ease…maybe.
We all tend to have big emotions around politics. Some of us are really excited and pay a ton of attention to it. Some of us are super annoyed and do our best to tune it out. Some of us are fearful and anxious. Some of us are angry at the other side and readily voice our opinions. Wherever you fall on this spectrum, we can all acknowledge that politics are an important part of our lives. Therefore, we cannot divorce politics from our discipleship! Our whole minds are to be renewed in Christ. Every thought is to be submitted to him. This includes how we think and interact with politics.
This campaign will touch on politics, but only through the lens of what Revelation says and applying those themes and truths to today. Revelation is incredibly political, as we will see. Therefore to teach it faithfully, we must get political. This may not ease your fears, but I promise to stay faithful to the text. We will all be thinking about politics over the next few months. So let’s be sure to view it through the lens of Scripture, as John teaches us to do in Revelation.
This brings me to your second anxiety—Revelation! G. K. Chesterton once said, “And though St. John the Evangelist saw many strange monsters in his vision, he saw no creature so wild as one of his own commentators.” Interpretations of Revelation vary from not so great, to good, to outright strange.
The predominant view in the Evangelical church has been the one represented in popular media like Left Behind. This book series, and movies (starring Kirk Cameron in the 2000-2005 version and Nicholas Cage in the 2014 version and Kevin Sorbo in the 2023 version! So many!) along with The Rapture and The Thief in the Night, coupled with countless teachings, have led many of us to understand Revelation only through the lens of future events (futurist). This is a legitimate, possible understanding of Revelation, but it is not the only possible understanding. There are some who view the prophecies of Revelation as all being fulfilled before AD 70 (preterist). Some view the book as a roadmap, of sorts, of the history of the church (historicist). Some view it as general principles and truths that apply to readers throughout time (idealist). As we go through this book, we will find that each of these lenses have something valuable to say to the proper interpretation of this book. But we should be cautious to restrict our view to only one understanding of the text as it is quite complex.
This culture of end times theology has led to a few unfortunate results in the church:
- Avoid Revelation entirely - It’s only relevant for the distant future with little to say about my life now. So, why bother? It’s hard to interpret and I don’t have time to give it the deep dive it needs. Honestly, this is where I’ve been since seminary.
- Fearful - Some of the images are quite scary—a beast with multiple heads and horns, horse locusts, mountains crashing to earth, etc. There are a lot of visions of death and tribulation. Yikes!
- Paranoia and Speculation - I remember hearing speculations that Obama was the antichrist. Never mind that those same people speculated that Clinton was the antichrist as well. Some today speculate Trump is the antichrist because his election year is 2016, which is the sum of 666 + 666 + 666 + 6 + 6 + 6. 😱 Also his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s real estate company owns 666 Fifth Avenue in New York. 😱😱 Every time Russia or Iran gets squirrelly, new predictions of Armageddon come forth. I’ve heard speculation of Revelation referencing helicopters and even nuclear bombs. It gets out of hand real quick!
- Christian Nationalism - The best definition of Christian nationalism that I have heard comes from Paul Miller. He says that Christian nationalism is the belief that “America is a Christian nation and the government has a responsibility to keep it that way.” Much of these predictions and speculations revolve around the nation of Israel. Therefore, many Christians believe it is vitally important for America to support Israel. I’m not saying whether or not Christians should vote for candidates who support Israel. Nor am I saying whether or not this is good policy. I’m simply saying this is a result of this end-times theology.
This response of speculation, fear, and Christian nationalism is precisely the opposite of this book’s intended effect. The book of Revelation was written to seven churches in Asia Minor to help comfort them. It was written to encourage them to live faithfully to the way of Jesus in the face of Roman persecution, social and economic pressure to deny Jesus and worship the emperor, and false teachers within the church. These, of course, are pressures the church still faces today. John comforts and encourages his readers by sharing his visions that reveal the spiritual reality overlaying the earthly reality. This reality is one of the most difficult aspects of reading and applying Scripture. So much of Scripture attempts to reveal the spiritual reality overlaying our physical reality. Jesus’ teaching on the Kingdom of God does just this. The physical world feels more real. We have bills to pay, families to manage, votes to cast and responsibilities at work. John and the biblical authors know this, and that’s why they spend so much time and energy reminding us of the reality of the spiritual world. In a sense, this world is more real. On this Scot McKnight writes, “Babylon is now and temporary; new Jerusalem is now and eternal.” The kingdoms of this world and the ruling structures they possess will pass away. The kingdom of God will continue to expand and one day be the only reality we know. In this sense, it would be silly for residents of God’s kingdom (New Jerusalem) to spend all of our time and attention on Babylon (earthly politics). God’s kingdom is better; it’s real; and we experience it now in part. When Jesus returns we will experience it in full. So let’s be sure to put our attention more on God’s kingdom and maybe less on man’s kingdoms.
These visions are admittedly a little weird, but all of them reveal the supremacy of the exalted Christ over the evil spiritual forces, empires, and their rulers. These visions had a lot to say to John’s original audience, and the historic church. They also have a lot to say to us in the modern church, and the future church. Like we do with every biblical text, the meaning for us today must be anchored it’s original meaning in the first century.
With all of this in mind, I want to invite you to approach Revelation with fresh eyes. Of course, we can’t simply forget everything we’ve heard about it and interpretations we’ve come to believe or even teach. I wouldn’t ask you to do that. Instead, I am simply inviting you to read Revelation with an eye less towards speculation (to borrow Scot McKnight’s word) and more revelation (I mean…it’s the name of the book). What does this book reveal about Jesus? What does it reveal about the physical world we live in? What does it reveal about the spiritual world’s interaction with the physical world? We should read Revelation like we would read Lord of the Rings or The Chronicles of Narnia but with more reverence, of course. I, at least, read those with an eye towards how they reveal Jesus and Christian truths in a creative way. We shouldn’t read it as a code to be deciphered. These visions should spark our imagination and wonder, leading us to worship the exalted Christ and swear our allegiance to Him no matter what comes our way.
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