Revelation 1:4b-8 Commentary

As I edit this, Donald Trump has been recently declared the United States’ 47^th president. While this saddens if not angers a smidge less than 50% of his fellow countrymen, it thrills roughly the same number. Americans remain deeply divided in their opinion of president-elect Trump.

Yet on this Christ the King Sunday, the Scriptures remind the Church that while the identity of a country’s leaders is in some ways important, it’s not of ultimate importance. Our Epistolary Lesson insists that neither Americans nor citizens of any other country have any king but the risen, ascended Christ. He is the King of everyone and everything who would be king.

The biblical scholar N.T. Wright in his book Revelation for Everyone points to the particular importance of a word that lies outside of this Sunday’s Epistolary Lesson: “revelation [apokalypsis*]” (1). The Greek word is, of course, the root of the English word “apocalypse.” It has largely negative connotations for English speakers. After all, in popular usage, apocalypse suggests chaos and destruction.

When Revelation speaks of apocalypse, it does allude to a kind of destruction. But it specifically points to the ultimate destruction of the evil one and his henchmen. The book of Revelation also describes some of the terrible suffering the evil one is wreaking on God’s dearly beloved people. Yet its apokalysis also reveals what’s ultimately good news. In fact, Revelation’s very first Greek word points to a fundamental truth about the book’s chief function: to unveil and reveal a great deal about God’s good and loving plans and purposes.

However, its chapter 1:4b-8 especially reveals some things about the Second Person of the Trinity, Jesus Christ. It reveals the risen, ascended Christ as what verse 5 calls “the faithful witness [ho martys ho pistos], the firstborn from the dead [prototokos ton nekron] and the ruler [archon] of the kings of the earth.”

Because so few of Jesus’ contemporaries recognized any of this about Jesus, that profession would have been a startling revelation for them. Certainly some people saw Jesus after his resurrection from the dead. But that encounter left many of them frightened and confused.

What’s more, very few of even Jesus’ own friends and followers thought of him as a faithful witness to God’s loving plans and purposes. On top of that, none of them thought of him as the ruler of the kings of the earth. Jesus’ contemporaries thought of him, instead, as a teacher and occasional miracle worker who, when his claims made him seem like a rabble-rouser to Rome, they executed like a common criminal.

As preachers prepare and preach on this text, we may want to keep in mind what our own contemporaries think of Jesus. We may wish to spend time exploring how many, if not most of them think of him not as a faithful witness, but as a good teacher. Some of even our own family members think of Jesus not as the living Lord, but as a dead role model. And while some of our friends and neighbors think of Jesus as an advocate for their various “kings” and agendas, many of them don’t think of him as the ruler of their rulers and agendas. John’s profession of Jesus’ identity would be a genuine revelation to them.

This Sunday’s Epistolary Lesson reveals, in addition to his identity the return of the risen, ascended Christ. In verse 7 John reveals how he is “coming [erchetai] with the clouds [nephelon], and every eye will see [opsetai] him.” This revelation all by itself offers a striking contrast to Jesus’ first coming. Not every eye, but just a relative handful of eyes saw the Son of God’s first incarnation. Every eye will, by contrast, see his second coming.

Verse 7 also, however, reveals a couple of further startling things about Jesus’ second coming. First, the Greek word opsetai at least hints at more than just the physical act of seeing. The translation offered by Biblehub.com suggests a kind of recognition as part of that seeing. In other words, verse 7 at least implies that each person will not just see, but also recognize the identity of the coming Christ. His return will publicly and universally “reveal” once and for all just who Jesus is.

Those who finally recognize Jesus will include, marvels verse 7b, even those who “pierced [exekentesan]” him. In fact, not just the Roman soldiers who crucified Jesus and the authorities who failed to recognize him for who he is, but also each person will finally recognize Jesus for who he truly is, the risen, ascended Son of God.

While this recognition will cause Jesus’ friends and followers to rejoice greatly, it will provoke the opposite reaction in his enemies. “All peoples [phylai] on earth,” verse 7 continues, “will mourn [kopsontai] because of him.” The revelation of Jesus’ identity at his return will cause people of all ethnicities and languages who haven’t yet received God’s grace with their faith to literally wail in their grief.

When the authorities’ execution of him ended Jesus’ first coming, we sense that only a relative handful of people lamented that ending. When he comes a second time, however, Revelation 1:7 at least intimates that many people will wail because of their failure to recognize him as their Lord and, by God’s amazing grace, Savior. In other words, while the revelation of Christ’ identity will cause Christians to rejoice when he returns, it will cause his enemies to grieve.

In the meantime, however, this risen, ascended Christ is doing amazing things for his friends. He, according to verses 5b-6, “loves [agaponti] us and has freed us [lysanti] us from our sins by his blood [en to haimati autou] and has made us to be a kingdom [basileian] and priests [hiereis] to serve his God and Father.”

This too is a startling revelation. When the world and even our fellow Christians look at us, they may see little more than ordinary people who have ordinary gifts. Our neighbors see people who all too often surrender our lives to our sinful inclinations. What’s more, few of us recognize in Jesus’ friends a priesthood, much less a kingdom.

Yet the apostle John insists the Spirit of the risen, ascended Christ has transformed us into priests who serve our God and Father. In fact, Revelation 1:6 suggests that Christians are also a kingdom, a kind of realm that is made up of all those who gladly submit to the reign of the Sovereign Christ.

This is a word of grace not just for the world’s rulers, but also those who support or criticize them.  Rulers ascend and descend from their thrones. Only One is the King of all such kings who never leaves his throne, whether for just a moment or every four years. In fact, Christ the King’s rule is so thorough that it bends all things, both those in which we rejoice and those we lament, for God’s glory and God’s people’ wellness.

*I have here and elsewhere added in brackets the Greek words for the English words the NIV translation uses.

Illustration

In his book The Bible: As If for the First Time, Harry A. Neilsen writes, “A revelation bears very little resemblance to human wisdom or human deeds. Even at its gentlest, in a healing, for instance, it is like a hit from the blind side, a hornet in the shower, something that refuses to be defined or packaged in polite categories.”

As preachers ponder proclaiming Revelation 1:4b-8 on this Christ the King Sunday, we might consider how some Christians have tried to politely package John’s revelation of who Jesus is. Some of us have tried to domesticate and shrink it into a coded message to make us wise as to just how and when its message will come to pass.

John’s apokalypis refuses to be so tidily packaged.