Michigan Camp Meeting 2024: As For Me and My House

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Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

Understanding Revelation 12-14

Tom Shepherd

01 How to Interpret the Book of Revelation

02 Revelation 12: The Woman, the Dragon, and the Baby

03 Revelation 13: The Two Beasts Part 1

04 Revelation 13: The Two Beasts Part 2

05 Revelation 14: More Than Three Angels

You are about to enjoy a presentation recorded at the 2024 Michigan Conference Camp Meeting held at Cedar Lake, Michigan.

We pray that the Lord will bless you as you listen.

Lord, we thank you for this opportunity to study the book of Revelation.

We pray, Lord, that you'll deepen our experience of your love, your grace and power as we look into this book, especially in its central vision.

So we're going to read the first 3 verses of the book of Revelation here they are.

Revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place.

He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John.

Who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw.

Blessed is the 1 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.

Now it's interesting it says to read aloud.

1 of the things we're going to talk about today is how to interpret the book of Revelation.

Then the rest of the week we're going to dive into the central vision of chapters 12, 13, and 14.

So probably most everybody is really interested in chapters 12, 13, and 14.

But it's good to get some kind of groundwork about how to interpret the book, how to understand the book.

And 1 of the ways to do that actually is to read it aloud.

Now, most of us were taught how to read aloud when we were in the third grade.

Oh, this is the English Standard Version.

English Standard Version, which is an update on the Revised Standard Version.

It's kind of like a revision of a revision of a revision of the King James.

And if you have questions about translations, stay afterwards.

I'll be happy to talk to you about those kinds of questions.

But most of us learned how to read when we were in third grade, And after about maybe the fifth grade, we were never asked to read out loud okay, and So sometimes when people are asked to read the scripture in church They read it like this Well God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." That's a great text, but that's not the way to read it.

Another time maybe we can have a class on how to read the scriptures aloud.

But to read it aloud, it should go like this, For God so loved the world, and gave his only Son, That whoever believes in him should not perish, and have eternal life.

When you announce the scripture to read it, how many times should you announce it?

This is the most famous verse in the Bible.

Because it gives people time to open their Bible.

And you want them to bring their Bible to church, right?

But if they bring their phone, they're probably going to look at that instead of listen to the sermon.

Okay, so, what about those words that I underlined, made it known?

Now the Greek word that stands behind this is that beautiful word up there, simenon.

And it means to show by symbols, to show by figurative representation.

So, When we read the book of Revelation, the Apocalypse, we expect symbols.

Now, most of the Bible, we don't expect to see symbols.

When it says Jesus rode on a donkey into Jerusalem, we don't say, what does the junkie represent?

We don't ask those kind of allegorical questions.

But when we come to the book of Revelation, it's kind of turned upside down, because it told us at the beginning, it's made known, it's shown by symbols.

And of course, the book of Revelation is filled with symbols.

Do you remember the first time you read the book of Revelation?

When I tell stories in church to the children, I say, this story comes from a long, long time ago.

But I have some memory of reading the book of Revelation the first time.

Now maybe it's still confusing when you read it.

You see all those different things that are going on.

There's these locusts and there's swords coming out of Jesus' mouth.

There's dragons, there's these evil spirits like frogs.

You're like, oh my goodness, what does this all mean?

All right, so that's why you need a lecture on how to interpret the book of Revelation, see?

And so we're gonna go through some steps, all right?

If they've made multiple revisions of the King James Version, why does somebody just say to show by symbol instead of make it noun?

Well there's different, this word has different meanings, a variety of meanings.

So every translation is actually an interpretation.

And it helps us understand that we expect to see symbols in this book.

Of course, you don't have to read very far and you come across symbols.

Some people get a little worried about this idea of symbols.

I met somebody, I was just recently here, none of you, but I met somebody and I said, oh, it's symbolic.

They were asking me a question about Revelation.

Oh, they said, don't make it all just fiction.

So here's the steps we're going to go through.

We're going to talk about an outline of the book of Revelation.

I can't go into great detail on this, but I'm going to show you an outline of the book of Revelation.

Rules for interpreting symbols, because we know that there are symbols in this book.

We're also going to find that Old Testament allusions are key to interpreting the book of Revelation.

And then I'm going to give you a brief little rundown on the different schools of interpretation, the different ways that people approach the Book of Revelation.

Okay, so you like those 3, it's good stuff, right?

Series

Understanding Revelation 12-14

01 How to Interpret the Book of Revelation

Transcript

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

Bible Manuscripts and Translations

04 Which Variant is Original?

1h 1m

Understanding Revelation 12-14

04 Revelation 13: The Two Beasts Part 2

1h 2m

Preach the Word

02 Preparing the Message

59m

Preparing Your Church for Evangelism

01 What is the Church? How Do I Fit In?, Part 01

1h 4m

Emmanuel Institute Bootcamp

4. Antichrist

1h 42m

Lessons for Today’s Christians from 1 Peter

1 Peter, Part 1

58m

Understanding Revelation 12-14

02 Revelation 12: The Woman, the Dragon, and the Baby

58m

Bible Manuscripts and Translations

01 Are Bible Manuscripts Reliable?

1h 3m

Restoration 2024: The Message of Healing

Giving Glory to Him

1h 2m

Spark Training: Public Evangelism

Spark Training: Public Evangelism- Part 1

57m

Theodicy

Melanie’s Problem

1h

Sound Doctrine