Sunday, May 20, 2012

Revelation 8-9 and Old Testament imagery

I've been astonished in preaching through Revelation just how full of Old Testament imagery is the book of Revelation.Preaching on chapters 8 and 9 this morning it is easy to see how these chapters are fertile fields for nut-bars imagining that what John is describing is nuclear fallout, war planes and helicopters.
However, when one picks upon the OT imagery it is clear that the language is not so much John trying to put into words visions he sees of the 20th and 21st centuries, but John using Old testament language and categories to describe the visions of the state we have been and shall be experiencing from the resurrection of Christ until his return.
There are recapitulations of the 10 plagues of God's judgment against Egypt (Blood, locusts, hail, darkness, and stubborn unrepentance). There are undoings of Gen1-2 itself as there are attacks upon the earth, sea, springs of water, the very sky and ultimately God's image bearers themselves. And that is just scratching the surface, not to mention the use of imagery from Ezekiel, Daniel, Jeremiah, Joel, Psalms, Proverbs and more.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

If the Lord is the same yesterday today, and tomorrow, why would he not be prophetic about his second return as he was in his first? How many times can he put 3.5 yrs, or 7 years in so many different ways for us not to understand Daniels last week?

Unknown said...

So If God is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. Why would he not use prophecy to tell his second coming as he did his first? He did... Because God is coming again he left us clues as to the season to which to expect him in... This "imagery" you talk about are those clues a.k.a. Prophecies. God did not leave us blind so we cannot say that John was just portraying what could be and not what will be. However, believing that what John was talking about will not come to pass is foolish and selfish. Would you be like the Jews were when Jesus first came and deny his name. For the Lord is returning and this "imagery" happens to give us the fact we need to prepare... Written By A. Farmer Age 13