The Lord Himself speaks now, He, who sits on the throne. There is no more mediation by angels or elders or ‘living creatures’. He Himself has attached the seal to the words of prophecy. In this way the Book obtains the legitimacy that a contract obtains at a solicitor’s, with a ribbon, a wax seal and a stamp. The Lord sets His seal on this Book just as the seal on Jesus’ grave represented all the might of the Roman Emperor, so that anyone who broke that seal would enter into direct conflict with everything that seal represented, that is Rome, the Emperor, the military power, the whole apparatus of justice. The Lord sets His seal on a contract that never will be broken. “See, I make all things new, I, the eternal God, Who has made Himself known through His Word; I, Who created Heaven and earth; I, Who, in the Word being made flesh, made Myself known to you; I shall do that.” What a tremendous, comforting significance that word must have had for the true churches throughout the centuries, in the Roman era, with all its persecutions, in the following centuries, when Rome persecuted Christians and Jews once again, during oppression, which continues to the present day, in China and Russia, in Sudan and South America from dictatorial regimes or under Islam. “Write,” the glorified Christ had said.1 He could have also said of Himself: “I am the first and the last,”2 as God had said of Himself: “I am the alpha and the omega.”3 These are words of the Most High God, Who is faithful and true, and that is why His words are too. Everything in Heaven and on earth becomes New. This renewal is already starting now among God’s children. “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a New Creature; the old things passed away; behold, New things have come” NASB. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a New Creation. The old has passed away; behold, the New has come” ESV. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the New Creation has come: The old has gone, the New is here!” NIV.4 The ‘Coming of Christ’, His Day, must first come however, before the new breaks through fully, and everything will become new. The process starts, first of all, in the hearts of human beings who received New life by being born-again. The ‘Kingdom of God’ for 2000 years now is in the hearts of His People, His Church. Then it continues in the fulfilment of Christ’s visible reign ‘over all the earth’ and thereafter, in a perfect way, in the New Heavens and on the New earth. Then Creation itself will be liberated, ‘set free’ as well.5 Reconciliation and redemption, deliverance in the Biblical sense of the word are not only for the redemption of men’s souls. They will also include the redemption of their bodies. This does not mean, as in Greek thought that the soul is set free from the body, but that the body itself is set free from everything that has entered into that body through sin: mortality, hereditary abnormalities, diseases, old-age weaknesses, apathy and impotence. We only use a very small part of our brains. Their capacity could be endlessly much greater, even now, were it not for the fact that they are blocked by sin. How much greater the potential of the newly created body will then be. The body itself will be set free, together with Creation itself. Once again, there will be a little foretaste of this, for Creation too, in the thousand years of Christ’s reign, but it will be perfect when God will be all in all. “Faithful and true, a faithful witness,” is what Christ calls Himself.6 God is faithful, who has called you into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.7 And God is faithful; He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, He will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.8 That is comforting for us as well, and also with a view to the future still ahead of us.
• The Christian Church has had the Book of Revelation in its possession for almost two thousand years already. What a ‘sin’ that it has been a ‘closed’ book in the churches for so long, so that all kinds of sects have been able to run off with wild speculations about it. However, whoever tries to read it in an attitude of an open mind, praying for enlightenment by the Holy Spirit, will find great comfort and reason to join in with the tremendous ‘praise and worship’ in it. A Roman Catholic bishop says: ‘If Europe disappears, Islam will invade the World’. A high-ranking bishop in the Catholic Church has made it his mission to open Europe’s eyes to the dangers posed by Muslim immigrants. “As a bishop, it is my duty to warn the West,” said Cardinal Robert Sarah, the Vatican’s prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. Known for his conservative stance on social and moral issues, he has called out liberal Catholics, declaring that “it is a false exegesis to use the Word of God to promote migration.”
• The Cardinal claims that the immigration crisis is not only harmful to Europe, but to the migrants themselves as well. “All migrants who arrive in Europe are penniless, without work, without dignity…” And this could lead to all kinds of violent consequences, in his opinion.
Bible References:
1.Revelation 1:11, 19 2.Revelation 1:17 3.Revelation 1:8 4.2 Corinthians 5:17 5.Romans 8:21 6.Revelation 1:5 7.1 Corinthians 1:9 8.1 Corinthians 10:13
