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John Sees the Son of Man

Revelation

Jan 15, 2023


by: Jack Lash Series: Revelation | Category: NT books | Scripture: Revelation 1:9–20

I. Introduction
A. Last week we began a series on the book of Revelation, written by the apostle John, the last book of the Bible. This week we will finish chapter one. Chapters 2-3 are the letters to the seven churches.
B. I preached on these letters in 2019, as you might recall, so in this series I am going to preach on them all in one week, next week. That will advance us to chapter 4 two weeks from today.
1. So, we’ll look at the letters to the seven churches as a whole, their role in the book of Revelation, and the things in them which most relate to the rest of the book.
C. Revelation 1:9–20 I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance that are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. 10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet 11 saying, “Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea.” 12 Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, 13 and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. 14 The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, 15 his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. 16 In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. 17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last, 18 and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades. 19 Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this. 20 As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.
D. Four chunks this morning
1. The author, John v.9
2. John’s vision of Jesus, v.10, 12-16
3. John’s interaction with Jesus, v.17-18
4. Jesus’ assignment for John, v.11, 19-20
II. The author – v.9 I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance that are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.
A. I was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.
1. John was being punished for preaching the gospel by being exiled to the Greek isle of Patmos, off the coast of Asia Minor. And that’s where He was when He had this vision and wrote this book.
B. “your brother & partner in the tribulation & the kingdom & the patient endurance that are in Jesus”
1. What an extraordinarily telling statement! Tribulation, kingdom, patient endurance: the Greek here indicates that the three are to be taken as a package, not as three separate things.
2. Here is the experience of living in Jesus: tribulation, kingdom, patient endurance.
3. You’re going to experience tribulation. You’re going to be part of a kingdom. You’re going to need to patiently endure.
4. The seven letters (which follow this passage) each end with a promise to those who conquer:
a. “To the one who conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life...The one who conquers will not be hurt by the second death...To the one who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna,” etc. Revelation 2:7, 11, 17 (See also Rev.2:26; 3:5, 12, 21.)
b. Well, this is what it means to conquer! It means to persevere through tribulation.
5. This is how we reign as kings in Christ kingdom, by faithfully enduring the persecutions and difficulties and hardships we each face in this world.
6. These hardships are not an exception; they are the rule. They are a part of the Christian life.
7. I see nothing in the Bible which indicates that someday before the return of Christ Christians will read this verse about how we are brothers and partners in the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance that are in Jesus – and many others like it – and say to themselves, “I’m so glad we no longer live in a time of persecution/mourning/suffering like Christians once did!”
8. This may sound defeatist, but the opposite is true. This is how we conquer!
9. We’re victorious in the same way Jesus was victorious on the cross: triumphing through suffering.
10. He didn’t LOOK victorious, but the fact is, through His suffering He was winning history’s greatest victory!
11. And so it is with the church in this age. By patiently enduring our suffering we are being victorious. And that’s what this book of Revelation is all about.
III. John’s vision of Jesus – v.10, 12-16, 20 I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet...12 Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, 13 and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. 14 The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, 15 his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. 16 In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength...20 As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.
A. “I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day.” John was in the prophetic spirit, that is, the Spirit had come upon him in such a way that He was in God’s presence and ready to receive God’s prophetic word.
1. I don’t have time to talk about the significance of this reference to the Lord’s day here in v.10, but this is a pivotal verse in the doctrine of the NT sabbath and in the Biblical case for a change from the seventh day to the first day.
B. “I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands.”
1. The lampstand is not a big part of typical American life. But, the lampstand, also called the menorah, is very familiar to the Jewish people. Today it is the nation of Israel’s national emblem.
2. There was, of course, a lampstand in the OT tabernacle/temple, standing on the floor, about the height of a person (Exod.25:31-40). It had seven branches each holding a flaming wick (picture).
3. Here in John’s vision, the first thing he sees is seven lampstands, seven menorahs.
4. Later, in v.20, we’re told that the seven lampstands symbolize the seven churches.
a. So each lampstand represents one church. And the branches of the lampstand presumably symbolize the people of that church. And each person is aflame.
(1) Remember at Pentecost (Acts 2:3) when the Spirit came and rested on each person in the form of a tongue of fire – just like each branch of each lampstand is aflame.
b. Last week we talked about the symbolism of the number seven, meaning the whole / complete.
c. Well, the seven branches represent all the people of that church, and the seven lampstands represent all the churches.
C. “and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man”
1. Of course, Jesus called Himself the Son of Man more than any other title. But this vision of a son of man ought to make us also think of Daniel’s vision of the son of man in Daniel 7:13-14: “Behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an ever-lasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.”
2. I’m not saying John got his vision or his words from Daniel. I’m saying that in using this language the Holy Spirit is not just giving a fresh new revelation to John, He is also directing us to connect this vision with previous visions. As we walk through the book of Revelation, it is like God turns on lights to many other passages in the Bible.
3. And many of these passages offer us additional insight into the things John is seeing in his vision in Revelation.
a. Illustration: in this passage in Daniel we have the Son of Man coming to the Ancient of Days and presented before Him and given the nations of the earth. Well, a few verses earlier, in Daniel 7:9-10, the Ancient of Days is described in language of divinity: He’s sitting on a throne, there’s fire all around Him, His hair is white to reflect his ancientness.
b. But in John’s description, the Son of Man has the fire and the white hair. What’s the point? Well, in Daniel, it’s not made clear that the Son of Man is divine. But now in Revelation we see that the Son of Man is also described in the language of the Ancient of Days, isn’t He?
4. “The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, 15 his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters.”
a. This is Jesus, but it’s not like the Jesus in the gospels. Well, maybe it is in one place.
b. How about the Mount of Transfiguration, where Jesus was transfigured and His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light (Matthew 17:2)? That’s sort of similar to this, isn’t it? In both cases He is a man but He is shining with the glory of God.
5. Here in his vision, John sees Jesus not in His humble earthly state but in this glorified heavenly state, though still human: white hair, eyes like fire, feet like burnished bronze, a voice like the roar of many waters. And He’s standing amongst His lampstands.
6. This is exactly what the world most needs to know, not only that there is a God who made us and who rules the universe and who will one day come and judge us all, but that there is a God-man who came to earth in love and then ascended to heaven, where He dwells in unspeakable glory. And He dwells among His churches.
D. John goes on to describe this son of man as “clothed with a long robe & a golden sash.”
1. What the son of man is doing here is not stated explicitly, but it is clearly implied by two things: his attire and his proximity to lampstands.
2. If you saw a photo of an operating room with a person in full surgical attire and mask holding a scalpel, you don’t need to be told what that person’s doing. And that’s like this picture here.
3. A man in a long robe & a golden sash standing beside lampstands would have made any Jew think about the priest tending to the lampstand in the temple.
4. You see, priests did a number of things in the temple, but one of their jobs was to attend to the lampstand: to trim the wicks, to keep it filled with oil, to relight those that had gone out, to remove ones that didn’t burn. And now Jesus is the priest, tending to the lampstands like a gardener tends a garden, or how those who have wood stoves tend to their fires, or how we maintain our cars.
5. So, this is a vision of our high priest Jesus not only hanging around His churches, but tending them, maintaining them, fixing them, cultivating them.
6. But originally the OT priest tended only one lampstand, not seven. What’s with the seven lampstands? In the OT, God had only one people: the Jews. But now in the NT, the salvation of God has been opened up to all nations and peoples. Again, that’s what the seven means.
7. Forty days after His resurrection, Jesus ascended to the right hand of the Father in heaven.
a. So, what’s He doing there?
b. We know He’s interceding for His people there (Romans 8:34, 1John 2:1, Hebrews 7:25).
c. We know He’s preparing a place for us (John 14:3). But what else is Jesus doing right now?
d. Well, this vision tells us: Jesus is in the midst of His lampstands/churches, maintaining them.
e. And that brings us to the sword...
E. John tells us in v.16 that “from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword.”
1. The vision, then, is Jesus the high priest tending to His churches.
2. Priests had special tools with which to work on the lampstands.
3. So, if Jesus is standing among the lampstands to maintain them, what tool does He have to use?
a. He has a double-edged sword, which is His holy word. That’s why it’s coming out of His mouth.
b. Ephesians 6:17 refers to “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”
c. And Hebrews 4:12 says, “His word is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit.”
4. So, Jesus uses the word which comes out of His mouth. With His word He affirms, He corrects, He instructs, He warns – fitting His churches to do what they’re supposed to do – to shine as lights in a dark world.
5. That’s why the word of God is so important to believers and to churches. The word of God is God’s tool to do His work in each believer and in each church.
6. What makes this obvious is that this the passage which leads us into the seven letters to the seven churches. And what do we see in the seven letters but Jesus – by means of His word – affirming, instructing, exhorting, assuring and correcting His churches?
7. This is what the seven letters are. It’s the Son of Man walking among His lampstands, molding them, transforming them, enriching them, refining them, perfecting them by means of His word.
8. Now Jesus has not written Gainesville Presbyterian Church a special letter. But He has written us MANY letters! And He wants to use them to encourage us and to challenge us and to convict us and to instruct us. For “all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God (and the churches of God) may be complete, equipped for every good work.” (2Timothy 3:16-17)
IV. John’s interaction with Jesus – v.17-18 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last, 18 and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.”
A. It’s easy for me to miss the drama of the Bible. We read what John saw, but I don’t imagine the emotions that went with the vision.
1. I notice the strangeness of it and the puzzle of it, but I’m not struck by the experience of it.
2. John saw this vision and fell down as though dead!
3. And this is the pattern all through Scripture, whenever people come face to face with God. (Is.6:5)
4. And it’s safe to say that we would have responded in a similar way.
5. But we don’t have to see a vision of Him to be gripped by His holiness!
6. “Blessed are those who do not see and yet believe.” John 20:29
7. We are supposed to “Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.” Philippians 2:12
B. But I love that the Lord lays His hand upon him and says, "Fear not."
1. You know, there’s a very similar vision in Daniel 10:5-12 “I lifted up my eyes and looked, and behold, a man clothed in linen, with a belt of fine gold around his waist. 6 His face like the appearance of lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze, and the sound of his words like the sound of a multitude...8 My radiant appearance was fearfully changed, and I retained no strength. 9 I fell on my face in deep sleep with my face to the ground. 10 And behold, a hand touched me ... 12 Then he said to me, “Fear not, Daniel.”
2. And why do we not need to fear? “Fear not, I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death & Hades.” (17-18) John need not fear because the scary One is also the loving One and the sovereign One and the One who redeems and delivers.
3. And when we see scary things on the horizon, or have nightmares which frighten us, our Daddy puts His hand on us and says, “Don’t be afraid. Everything’s OK. I’ve got this!”
V. Jesus’ assignment for John – v.11, 19 “Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea.” 19 “Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this.”
A. In v.11a&19a we see how God is behind not only the prophetic revelation, but the inscripturation.
1. This is the way it was with the OT prophets.
2. This is the way it was with Jesus.
3. This is the way it was with the apostles.
4. God tells the messenger what to say, the messenger says it, then it gets inscripturated.
5. It’s all part of the divine process.
B. The NT is not an accident. It’s not like a bunch of things got written and then the church decided that this was God’s word. You can see here that this is what God intended all along. He commanded that his revelation be written down. Jesus even talked about it, and the apostles were aware of it as they wrote (see John 14:26, 16:12-13; Luke 1:12; Eph.3:3-5).
1. The written word of God is the tool of Jesus whereby He fuels us, trims us, cleans us, polishes us, straightens us, brightens us.
2. This happens to us as individuals, of course. But it also happens to us as a church. There is a holy process which takes place when God speaks His word to His people gathered in His presence.
3. The preacher is flawed, of course, and His flaws easily become an obstacle. And it is his duty to seek to rid himself of things which make it hard for his hearers to hear.
4. But the hearers have a duty as well, a duty to try to look past the flaws, to discern the perfect voice of God speaking through the imperfect spokesman. It’s not enough to spot mistakes or blunders or confusions in a sermon. One day we will give an answer to God as to how well we listened to and responded to the things God spoke to us through very fallible messengers.
C. So, we work to get the message in, but we have another job as well, and that is to work to get the message out, to spread the word.

VI. Addendum: the seven stars
A. V.16 says “In his right hand he held seven stars” and then v.20 says that “the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches.” So what does that mean?
1. Some have proposed that angel here means pastor, since the word angel means messenger, and since the letters to the seven churches are directed to the angel of each church: “to the angel of the church in Ephesus, to the angel of the church in Pergamum, to the angel of the church in Thyatira, etc.”
a. The problem with this view is that in the visionary portion of Revelation (4-22) the word angel refers exclusively to heavenly beings (about 60 times).
2. The other view is that the angels here are guardian angels.
a. The idea is that each church has a representative angel in heaven, acting on God’s behalf toward that church, bringing blessings from the Lord, similar to a waiter in a restaurant.
b. I know this sounds strange to our ears, but this is consistent with the role of angels in Daniel (10:20-21; 12:1; cf. 7:27; 8:10, 24).
c. And we see it also a little bit in the NT:
(1) Matthew 18:10 See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my heavenly Father.
(2) Rev.8:3-4 Another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer, and was given much incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar before the throne, and the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, rose before God from the angel’s hand.
(3) And perhaps Acts 12:15: They said to her, “You are out of your mind.” But she kept insisting that it was so, and they kept saying, “It is his angel!”
d. So, maybe there is a guardian angel of Gainesville Presbyterian Church, given by God to help us and protect us. It will certainly be interesting to find out more in heaven.