THE MESSAGE OF THE REVELATION OF JOHN

Professor Northrop Frye, of Victoria University, Toronto, described the Book of Revelation as the happy ending of God’s great romance with creation. Professor J.W. Bowman, of Illich School of Theology, Denver, called it Christianity’s first drama. Most scholars would classify it as prophecy. Its closest other biblical documents are Daniel, Isaiah 24-27 and Mark 13.

Like all Old Testament prophecy, John sought to setf orth his insight into God’s will and purpose for the faithful at a critical time in the life of the congregations he knew in seven Greek cities of Western Asia. John’s own faith centred on Jesus Christ and what God had done in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In his letters to the seven churches and his visions of what was soon to happen, his expressed his deep conviction that God’s sovereign love offered the only hope for those who like him would soon be martyrs.

Apparently, he himself had run afoul of the Roman authorities and had been imprisoned on the island of Patmos in the Aegean Sea. More intense martyrdom than he had already suffered lay ahead. In the end their victory in faith was assured by the victory of God’ s redeeming love in Christ.

Scholars generally agree that Revelation was written about 95 CE during the last years of Emperor Domitian. That emperor persecuted all who refused to accept the state religion and worship him as divine. For Christians this created a very simple but critical issue: Was Jesus Lord and God or was Caesar?

John wrote Revelation to communicate his own faith in the absolute sovereignty of God and Jesus Christ and to encourage the faithful to stand fast under the coming persecution. His visionary prophecies presented the Gospel tradition in a very different way.