Revelation for the Head and the Heart

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Norman McNulty

Kenneth Mathews

Revealing Jesus in Revelation

And I actually wanted to have a two-week seminar like the old Bible conferences of the 1850s.

But I'll have to do that when I'm retired, I guess.

But we're glad for this weekend and coming together.

I'm going to, without any delay, jump right into the presentation.

I do not want to be late on the next speaker.

And I want you to be able to get home at a decent time.

So as we begin, John the Revelator on the Isle of Patmos means Jehovah is gracious.

John wrote also the Gospel of John and he said, For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, he gave, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

For God sent not his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved." You know God does not hate this world or does he hate Jesus?

These are all big theological issues, but he does not hate this world.

He gave up the 1 whom he loved the most so Jesus could make an atonement for his sinful creation.

For he hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

Can you look forward to spending eternity studying this most wonderful gift?

So all heaven is interested and involved in the salvation of God's errant creation.

If God said it was good, Satan says it's bad.

If God says worship me, Satan says no, worship me.

He has convinced most of the world that God hates them and Jesus will destroy them because they're living life their way.

This is the state of affairs in this postmodern world, but it is Jesus, it is Satan who hates Jesus, Revelation 12, 7, fought him in heaven.

He hates the Bible truths, 12, 15, he cast a flood of false truths and persecution out after the church and he hates God's people, Revelation 12, 13, and 17, and goes to make war with the remnant of the church, the woman's seed.

So the book of Revelation reveals Jesus' activities on behalf of all those who come to God by him.

Jesus ever liveth to make intercession for you and me.

So Jesus has revealed himself to his servants through the prophets.

This is an amazing statement because what Jesus is really telling you is He doesn't do anything on this earth that He has not revealed to His prophets for our understanding.

And that is so important because people say, well we don't know what Jesus is doing and who knows if he is helping us and on and on.

But he does nothing unless he reveals his secret counsel to his servants the prophets.

And we can be sure that we have a more sure word of prophecy.

You know that famous quote from 2 Peter, where unto you do well that you take heed as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn and the day star, whose Jesus arise in your hearts.

Now this is an important quote from Jesus himself in John 13, 19, from now on I am telling you before it comes to pass so that when it does occur you may believe that I am he.

What is happening here is fulfilled prophecy is 1 of the evidences God gives his people to confirm their faith and trust in him and his word We do not faith is not a leap in the dark.

It's not well I don't know where he is, but I trust something about somebody.

No, prophecy, more people have come into the last day message because they saw Jesus in the prophecies and saw what he was doing, and his sure word of prophecy gave them confidence that he could save them.

Now while Daniel's book is a prophecy, John's book is a revelation.

In the Revelation all the books of the Bible meet an end.

The book of Daniel is unsealed in the Revelation to John and it carries us forward to the last scenes of this earth's history.

The book is, as John states, the revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto him to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass." This is very important.

We're going to see why in just a moment, but the book of Daniel and the book of Revelation are extremely close together, they're complementary.

The Holy Spirit authored both of them, the Holy Spirit interprets both of them, and the Holy Spirit preserves both of them.

And the Holy Spirit gives you understanding of both of them.

Now let's pick just 2 examples, and there are many.

First, Daniel predicts his book is sealed until the time of the end.

John predicts what happens at the time of the end as well as Daniel 11 which would be another subject of great interest.

Daniel predicts number 2, the sanctuary will be cleansed at the end of the 2300 years.

In Daniel 7, 8-14 the Father, ancient of days and the Son, move into the most holy place on October 22, 1844 and commence their pre-advent judgment.

And we're going to see how Daniel 7, 8-14 links with Revelation 11, 15-19 later on in some of the lectures.

So Satan has grandly succeeded in destroying this amazing Holy Spirit inspired and protected synchronization between Daniel and Revelation.

Current evangelical theology demands no time prophecies.

Scholars claim the book of Daniel was written about 164 BC, so that makes it history instead of prophecy.

Scholars claim the book of Revelation was simply 7 letters sent to the churches in the first century and may only have spiritual relevance to these times.

These demands of the theologians, therefore fully deny the prophetic nature of these books.

Furthermore, the historicism and typology hermeneutics reintroduced by the reformers has almost been totally set aside.

Historical criticism has all but destroyed the credibility of Daniel and Revelation in the minds of the believers and the public at large." Now, I want to say something about typology because it should be a tool in your hermeneutical belt.

In other words, when you study Revelation, you want to know about typology.

And of course the most famously known typology in Scripture is when John the Baptist looks out into the crowd and says, Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world.

He just uttered a typology, the Lamb of God being Jesus Christ.

Now there are many more typologies that are available for study and understanding as we compare the Old Testament with the New Testament.

I would refer you to Richard Davidson's PhD thesis, Typology of Scripture.

It's still available either through Andrews University or the local bookstore.

What is interesting to note is that both historicism and typology was discarded by the Alexandrian school of religion and scripture in the third and fourth centuries.

When Luther and his brethren rejected the allegorical method of the Alexandrian school during the Protestant Reformation, they reintroduced not only the features of what we call historicism, but also of typology.

Now, along with the early church fathers and the Protestant Reformers, I would submit to you today that Seventh-day Adventists became and still should be great typologists.

Now I'm not talking about weird typologies, we're talking about things that the Old Testament speaks of and are referable directly to the New Testament that the body of believers understands.

We're not talking about fanciful theories.

Now, I found in Hans Larendell's book an interesting statement by an evangelical scholar, I think his name is Fritchie, and he suggests something that I find crucially important.

He states, "...typology and prophecy are twin sisters." Now think about that for a minute.

Typology and prophecy are twin sisters, both pointing forward to the great day of the Lord, The day of the glorious consummation of all God's covenant promise.

Their internal connection can be explained as follows, I'll read it and then I'll explain it.

Typology differs from prophecy in the strict sense of the term only in the means of prediction.

Prophecy predicts mainly by means of the word, whereas typology predicts by institution, act, or person.

First of all, prophecies are the bones of the prediction of the future.

When you look at Revelation 12 and 13 you see these little pictures of a great dragon and a wonderful woman in chapter 12 and then you go back to the Old Testament to see more what they are about because it tells you more in the prophets and in the Torah.

I mean Isaiah and Jeremiah, the Old Testament by and large is just almost we're illiterate on what it's doing and how it points forward.

Remember we said all of the books of the Bible end in the book of Revelation.

So prophecies are the bones of the prediction of the future.

Typology is the muscle, fat, and sinews that provide the details of the prophecy.

Thus the typological stories and histories of the Old Testament provide many details in the New Testament prophecies.

Well thus far we've made it to the first half of verse 1.

Alright, now finishing our introduction, John states in verse 1 that Jesus sent and signified these prophecies by his angel and to his servant John.

John is writing his prophetic words by a sign, the sign language of scripture.

I know we're reviewing a few things and most of you who came are deep students, but this is such a huge statement and I want to tell you why.

I need not, by allowing scripture to interpret scripture, we shall understand the book of Revelation by ignoring the sign language, common terrorists can only speak of beast, demonic locusts, and an evil serpent.

And when you read the evangelical scholarship on Revelation, they do not want to apply any symbolism to the story because many times it's politically incorrect, religiously incorrect, but otherwise you're just talking about demonic locusts and you can talk for several hours about how bad the demonic locusts are but nobody knows why they're bad, who they're hurting, when did they happen, or anything else.

So this whole notion of sign language in Revelation is just critically important to understanding.

All right, God's primary purpose for humankind as revealed in scriptures is the salvation of sinners, not their destruction.

The Lord is not slack concerning his promise as some men count slackness but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." And I stress these texts every now and then throughout my 3 presentations because I don't want you to feel like that all we're talking about necessarily is judgment, judgment, judgment, judgment.

And you read the Old Testament prophecies of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel.

And it is scarier than scary what happens to people who are apostate and rebellious against God in the judgments.

And I hope you see where I'm going with this because we're fixing to say what happens in the Old Testament is exactly how God deals with His people in the New Testament.

We just need to understand the New Testament language and we are going to talk about that.

Revealing Jesus in Revelation

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