Unlocking Blessings: Engaging with the Book of Revelation

Devotional

Day 1: The Promise of Blessing

Engaging with the Book of Revelation is not just an intellectual exercise but a spiritual journey that promises blessings to those who read, hear, and keep its words. Revelation 1:3 highlights this unique promise, emphasizing the importance of immersing oneself in the text to experience spiritual growth and fulfillment. The story of a successful lawyer who felt a void in his life despite his achievements illustrates this point. He discovered that by reading Revelation, he could fill the spiritual emptiness and gain a deeper understanding of God's plan. This narrative serves as a reminder that the blessings of Revelation are accessible to all who actively engage with its teachings. [08:28]

Revelation 1:3 (ESV): "Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near."

Reflection: Is there a part of your spiritual life that feels empty or unfulfilled? How can you begin to engage with the Book of Revelation to seek the blessings it promises?

Day 2: Understanding Revelation

The Book of Revelation, often perceived as complex, is intended to be understood. The challenge lies not in the text itself but in our interpretation. By engaging with Revelation, believers gain insights into God's glory, the warnings to the seven churches, and the ultimate triumph of Christ over evil. This understanding is crucial for spiritual growth and offers hope and anticipation for the future. Revelation provides a vivid description of the new heaven and earth, encouraging believers to look forward to the fulfillment of God's promises. [21:55]

Revelation 22:12-13 (ESV): "Behold, I am coming soon, bringing my recompense with me, to repay each one for what he has done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end."

Reflection: What preconceived notions do you have about the Book of Revelation? How can you approach it with an open mind to gain a clearer understanding of its message?

Day 3: Active Engagement

To fully receive the blessings from Revelation, one must actively engage with the text. This involves not just reading but also writing questions, taking notes, and sharing insights with others. The goal is to learn and share the message, fulfilling the Great Commission. By actively engaging with Revelation, believers can deepen their understanding and help others do the same, creating a community of faith that is rooted in the teachings of this profound book. [31:23]

James 1:22-25 (ESV): "But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing."

Reflection: How can you incorporate active engagement with the Book of Revelation into your daily routine? What steps can you take today to begin this practice?

Day 4: The Revelation of Jesus Christ

Revelation is both about Jesus and from Him, emphasizing the roles of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each playing a distinct yet unified role in the Godhead. Understanding these roles helps believers grasp the urgency and significance of the message. The Father preserves the integrity of the Godhead, the Son took on human flesh to save humanity, and the Holy Spirit administers the church and convicts the world of sin. This understanding enriches the believer's faith and highlights the importance of sharing the message with others. [40:49]

John 16:13-15 (ESV): "When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you."

Reflection: How does understanding the distinct roles of the Trinity enhance your comprehension of Revelation? In what ways can you share this understanding with others?

Day 5: Literal Interpretation

Understanding Revelation involves recognizing the Trinity's roles and the message's urgency. The text calls for a literal interpretation, focusing on the grammatical, historical, and contextual aspects. This approach encourages believers to anticipate Christ's return and to live in a way that reflects the teachings of Revelation. By interpreting the text literally, believers can better understand the prophetic messages and apply them to their lives, fostering a sense of readiness and hope for the future. [49:05]

2 Peter 3:10-13 (ESV): "But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells."

Reflection: How does a literal interpretation of Revelation influence your daily life and decisions? What changes can you make to align your life more closely with the teachings of Revelation?

Sermon Summary

The Book of Revelation is unique in its promise of blessing to those who read, hear, and keep its words. This promise is found in Revelation 1:3, which emphasizes the importance of engaging with the text to receive its blessings. The story of a successful lawyer who felt something was missing in his life despite his achievements illustrates this point. He realized that he had not been reading the Book of Revelation, which led him to discover the blessings he was missing. This narrative underscores the idea that understanding and engaging with Revelation can lead to spiritual growth and fulfillment.

Revelation is often perceived as difficult to understand, but it was written to be comprehensible. The challenge lies in our interpretation, not in the text itself. By reading Revelation, we gain insights into God's glory, the warnings and promises to the seven churches, and the ultimate triumph of Christ over evil. The book also provides a vivid description of the new heaven and earth, offering hope and anticipation for the future.

To maximize the blessings from Revelation, one must actively engage with the text. This involves reading or listening to the chapters, writing questions and answers, taking notes, comparing ideas with other resources, and sharing insights with others. The goal is not only to learn but to share the message, fulfilling the Great Commission.

The Book of Revelation is a revelation of Jesus Christ, both about Him and from Him. It was given to John to share with the seven churches in Asia Minor, emphasizing the importance of sharing the message. The text highlights the roles of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each playing a distinct yet unified role in the Godhead. The Father preserves the integrity of the Godhead, the Son took on human flesh to save humanity, and the Holy Spirit administers the church and convicts the world of sin.

Understanding Revelation involves recognizing the Trinity's roles and the message's urgency. The text calls for a literal interpretation, focusing on the grammatical, historical, and contextual aspects. It encourages believers to anticipate Christ's return and to live in a way that reflects the teachings of Revelation.

Key Takeaways

1. The Promise of Blessing: Revelation 1:3 promises blessings to those who read, hear, and keep its words. This unique promise highlights the importance of engaging with the text to receive spiritual growth and fulfillment. The story of the lawyer illustrates how reading Revelation can fill the spiritual void and lead to a deeper understanding of God's plan. [08:28]
2. Understanding Revelation: The Book of Revelation is meant to be understood, despite its complexity. The challenge lies in our interpretation, not the text itself. By engaging with Revelation, we gain insights into God's glory, the warnings to the seven churches, and the ultimate triumph of Christ over evil. [21:55]
3. Active Engagement: To maximize the blessings from Revelation, one must actively engage with the text. This involves reading, writing questions, taking notes, and sharing insights with others. The goal is to learn and share the message, fulfilling the Great Commission. [31:23]
4. The Revelation of Jesus Christ: Revelation is both about Jesus and from Him. It emphasizes the roles of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each playing a distinct yet unified role in the Godhead. Understanding these roles helps us grasp the message's urgency and significance. [40:49]
5. Literal Interpretation: Understanding Revelation involves recognizing the Trinity's roles and the message's urgency. The text calls for a literal interpretation, focusing on the grammatical, historical, and contextual aspects. It encourages believers to anticipate Christ's return and live according to Revelation's teachings. [49:05]
** [49:05]

Youtube Chapters

[00:00] - Welcome
[00:30] - Introduction to Revelation
[01:45] - The Promise of Blessing
[03:10] - The Lawyer's Story
[05:00] - Understanding Revelation
[07:20] - Engaging with the Text
[09:00] - The Revelation of Jesus Christ
[11:15] - The Trinity's Roles
[13:30] - Literal Interpretation
[15:00] - The Urgency of the Message
[17:20] - Sharing the Message
[19:00] - Conclusion and Encouragement

Sermon Clips

there's going to be 24 lessons so this is our our first one we're kicking off i just want to say hi to everybody and i hope you came to be blessed because that's what this book is all about it really surprises people when i say that but in revelation chapter 1 verse 3 it says blessed is he that readeth and he that hear the words of this prophecy and keep those things which are written therein for the time is at hand notice the first word in this verse it says blessed blessed is he blesses he that readeth and they that hear the words of this prophecy and keep those things in other words you will be blessed if you read you hear and you keep the words and the message of the book of revelation so this is something to look forward to that's something to get you excited about in fact you won't get a better welcome or an expectation out of any book than this one right here in fact the book of revelation is the only book that has an explicit promise of a blessing in it now the other there are other verses that say blessed are those who keep the word of god and listen to the word of god that's throughout the scriptures but book of revelation actually says you'll be blessed because you read this book so if you want to be blessed you need to read this book which by the way reminds me of a story of a successful lawyer in town who thought he was truly blessed, he was all the at the top of his game yet a he had a had his dream house scar a beautiful wife wonderful kids a dog second home prestige wealth class impact and everything else, everything he could ask for. [00:00:05]

of eternal life and yet he was still feeling like he was missing out on a blessing for some reason and then one sunday the pastor announced that a new study was going to start they were going to start in the in the book of revelation so his wife and he decided hey we ought to go attend that and in preparing for the class he sat down to read the book of revelation and was reading through chapter one came down to that third verse that i've already read here blessed is he that readeth and he that hear the words of this prophecy and keep those things which are written therein for the time is at hand and he's looking at that thinking ah i have not been reading the book of revelation that's where that's why i'm missing out on the blessing well at first he was shocked because he was trying here he was here he was uh learning about uh the secret to being blessed is to read this book well he'd been reading other books which was fine but to read this book with a as an explicit promise that he was going to be blessed i mean that got him excited now here's something to keep in mind as well when we're talking about revelation chapter one verse three with this blessing of promise that tells us something very important that tells us that the book of revelation was written you to be understood but what's one of the uh what's one of the the most common things said about the book of revelation man this book is just hard to understand it's almost impossible i can't understand what it's saying but you can't be blessed if you don't understand and that tells us something very important god wrote the book of revelation to be understood if there's a problem with understanding it it's because we are having a problem with interpreting it it's our problem not god's problem so what we need to do is figure out what god has to say so let's ask this question here what blessings do people lack when they actually don't read the book of revelation well they're missing out on a on a very unique description of god's glory and majesty of jesus christ's glory and majesty before the throne of god they're missing out on the important warnings and promises given to the seven churches and they're missing out on this on what is essential to surviving the last days they're missing out on the insights of what evil will do when unleashed from the restraint of god and and why and they're missing out on the presentation of [00:02:49]

how Christ will bring an end to evil forever as well as missing out on the description of the creation of the new heaven and the new earth. So the lawyer realized, man, he was missing an opportunity to grow in his faith, his love and obedience because he wasn't reading the book of Revelations. Now, I've got a couple of suggestions for getting the maximum blessings from this book of Revelation. [00:05:38]

And it all begins with, first of all, like anything in life, you get as much out of it as you put into it. So if you really want the maximum benefits, you need to put some effort into making sure that happens. [00:06:08]

Number three, follow the notes in your handout and write notes during the lesson. And number four, compare lesson ideas with other articles on the topics discussed in this lesson. And number five, review and share and discuss the recorded audio video lessons. And then we want to prepare a personal set of quiz questions and answers from the lessons. And you can join in on that, too. I've got a bunch of questions. [00:06:44]

But I find one of the best ways to learn is to ask questions, write them down, and then try and find the answer, as any teacher would do. Isn't that right? [00:07:12]

And usually it's the teacher who learns more than the students because they do more preparation. And they're figuring out what are the important questions to know the answers to. And number seven, announce just the lessons and what you're doing on social media. [00:07:21]

Anyway, that would be a way to maximize your blessings out of this study. Because to be blessed, we want to do more than just, oh, that's an interesting lesson. I really enjoyed that. [00:07:43]

And each lesson will describe a chapter in the book of Revelation. And they really break out very nicely. And I'm going to go through each topic with you in just a minute. [00:08:14]

chapter we're going to see the big story what is it what is the story of the end times all about and students who complete the the class successfully do all the assignments and if you take a test you'll not only understand Revelation better but you will qualify for a credit hour from the Ambassador Bible Institute so that's available as well if you want to go through the rigors of that all right here's our goals for the class it's to help us experience the blessings promised to those who read here and keep the Word of God the book of Revelation in particular it's also one of our goals is to understand Revelation from a grammatical historical contextual futurist view of Revelation as opposed to allegorizing it or thinking that it already took place no we're going to take it literally we recognize when you read a story or you read the Bible and take it literally you can recognize even in language when we talk to each other you recognize the difference between a metaphor or hyperboles and illustrations that we use to talk about things and we recognize in that that in the Bible as well another goal is we want to be conversant about the events about the activities about the scenes the images and the lessons the message in the book of Revelation and then of course another goal which ought to be a part of all of our activities and events whatever we're doing for the Lord we ought to be looking at achieving the goal of loving God with all our heart soul and mind and increasing our closeness to God we want to be more aware and gain a deeper understanding of this world which means we want to be probing into the some of the doings of Satan and some of his intentions and looking at his influence and then we want to increase our personal anticipation of Christ's return looking forward to life everlasting in the new heaven new earth and then understand the church warnings and to heed the church exhortations to improve and sustain our fulfilling of God's Great Commission again goes back to sharing doesn't it we want to share the message of God I think we'll fulfill those goals all right let's look at Revelation chapter 1 here and this will be our lesson the revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto him to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass and he sent and signified it by his angel unto his servant John now one of the [00:08:36]

interesting things I find about this this introduction right here is this is the revelation of Jesus Christ what does the heading in your Bible say look above verse 1 and you'll see the heading and most Bibles would say the revelation of st. John the Divine that's what mine says now that's not exactly wrong I mean it's the revelation that was given to him so yeah it was revealed but I love to make that point to emphasize hey this is the revelation of Jesus Christ in two ways actually number one it's a revelation of Jesus Christ about him who he is and all that he's doing but it's a revelation from Jesus Christ as well so in that regard it's a two -fold revelation the revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto him and that's rather interesting God gave a revelation to Jesus jesus christ to share with us and it says to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass you might say when when was this revelation given well was given about uh ad 70s somewhere around there shortly after uh christ's resurrection john was still alive he was living in exile and he got this revelation but wait that's almost 2 000 years ago and he's saying that this is going to shortly come to pass what does that mean well obviously it's not shortly come to pass in our time i mean if that if we were talking about shortly come to pass we'd be saying you know within the next hour two hours or maybe the next day or next week but not 2 000 years i mean i mean we're dead and gone that's that doesn't seem very shortly to us the important thing here is to understand that this is in god's timing for god who is eternal extending into eternity past as well as into eternity future there is no time line for him he's outside of time in fact god created time he's not the one he's not the one who is bound by time and confined by time when he says shall come shortly to pass if you think about in god's mind it's already happened and the reason for that is because god past present and future for him there is no past present or future everything is present tense and we see that when moses you see that when moses says he's not the one who is bound by time and confined by time moses is actually talking to god at the burning [00:14:26]

bush and moses said who shall i say has sent me and god says i am and what did jesus how did jesus identify himself in the book of john when the uh the pharisees the pharisees had challenged him and said who do you think you are basically and he jesus said i am they picked up stones to stone them now why were they picking up stones to stone them because as they said you have called yourself god claiming to be god they understood what that meant i am is the name of god but in the context of what we're talking about i am means i am i'm at your present at your future at your past it doesn't matter i am i'm always present tense all right i'm only making that point because when he says shortly come to pass he's looking down here at the timeline of humanity which has been around for over 6 000 years and he's looking down here saying it's it's going to happen real real soon now i might remind you in acts chapter 2 peter had quoted in acts chapter 2 peter had quoted joel saying that we are in the last days what you see fulfilled here 50 days after the resurrection of jesus christ peter peter's explaining to people here's what you're seeing you're seeing the last day promises and events described in the prophecy of joel now that's important because now we know that oh we're in the last days and we've been in the last days for 2000 and we've been in the last days for 2000 years years talk about this shall shortly come to talk about this shall shortly come to pass pass it all starts coming together now in god's it all starts coming together now in god's time time there is no time it's shortly coming to there is no time it's shortly coming to pass pass but for us as far as we're concerned but for us as far as we're concerned especially in light of the especially in light of the prophecy of joel it's nice to know hey we prophecy of joel it's nice to know hey we are in the last days are in the last days and that means we're not going to go and that means we're not going to go longer than the first longer than the first half i would half i would suspect that the last days means you're in the last half or shorter so well the Lord will show us exactly what that means and he continues on in verse 1 and it says and he sent and signified it that is his revelation message by his angel unto his servant John and that's where John is involved now and the revelation [00:17:06]

that he's recording it the revelation of jesus christ is being recorded written down and revealed to john so he can share hey that's exactly one of our goals for our class and how and one of the tips i mentioned to maximize our blessings let's share it let's not just learn it but let's share it with others just like it was given to john to share we want to do the same thing now verse two john says who speaking of himself who bear record of the word of god and of the testimony of jesus christ and of all things that he saw so he's saying i i was here i'm an eyewitness all these things actually happen in verse three as we read already blessed is he that readeth and they that hear the words of this of this prophecy and keep those things which are written therein for the time is at hand oh there's that that sense of imminence again it's going to shortly come to pass and the time is at hand and you know when jesus came he said the kingdom of god is at hand oh look at that for the time is at hand now here's something for us to take note of and that is when jesus was walking on earth here two thousand years ago and he was saying the kingdom of god is at hand that's exactly true and how is that because every moment of every day of our lives every day we are breathing and eating and living is an opportunity to receive jesus christ into our life the kingdom of god is at hand in everybody's life since the time of adam until christ returns the kingdom of heaven is always at hand meaning that it's always available the opportunity is always here today is the day of salvation right now and so yes the time is at hand but of course he's speaking of the events that are unfolding isn't he and so we're looking forward to the to the end times and that final day when the seventh trumpet blows the last trumpet blows and the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our lord verse four says john to the seven churches which are in asia grace be in the kingdom of god and the kingdom of god and the kingdom of god and the kingdom of god to you and peace from him which is and which was and which is to come and from the seven spirits which are before his throne and from jesus christ who is the faithful witness and the first begotten of the dead and the prince of the kings of the earth unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood [00:20:26]

There's three people mentioned here that John is bringing grace from. It says in verse 4, grace be unto you and peace from him which is and which was and which is to come. Isn't that interesting? Here we have him that which was and which is and which will to come. Who does that make you think of? [00:26:37]

You would think that it was our Lord God, Jesus Christ, wouldn't you? [00:26:57]

Because he was, he is, and he is coming. [00:27:04]

But notice here, and we got a second person, and from the seven spirits which are before his throne. And this is referring to the Holy Spirit. [00:27:09]

The seven spirits here refer to his perfection, for his completeness, his omnipresence everywhere. And for specifically seven churches being addressed. The Spirit. The Spirit of God is the administrator over each one of those churches. [00:27:30]

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