Revelation on The Revelation

Bob Hill and his new wife Betty were vacationing in Europe, as it happens, near Transylvania . They were driving in a rental car along a  rather deserted highway.  It was late and raining very hard.   Bob could barely see the road in front of the car.  Suddenly the car skids out of control!  Bob attempts to control the car, but to no avail!  The car swerves and smashes into a tree.  

 Moments  later, Bob shakes his head to clear the fog. Dazed, he looks over at the  passenger seat and sees his wife unconscious... With her head  bleeding!  Despite the rain and unfamiliar countryside, Bob knows  he has to get her medical assistance. Bob carefully picks his wife up and begins trudging down the road. After a short while, he sees a light.  He heads towards the light, which is coming from a large, old house.  He approaches the door and  knocks.

A  minute passes.  A small, hunched man opens the door.  Bob immediately blurts, "Hello, my name is Bob Hill, and this is my wife, Betty.  We've been in a terrible accident, and my wife and I have been seriously hurt.  Can I please use your phone?"

 "I'm sorry," replied the hunchback, "but we don't have a phone.  My master is a doctor; come in and I will get him!"

Bob brings his wife in.  An elegant man comes down the stairs.   "I'm afraid my assistant may have misled you.  I am not a medical doctor; I am a scientist.  However, it is many miles to the nearest clinic, and I have had basic medical training.  I will see what I can do.  Igor, bring them down to the laboratory."

With that, Igor picks up Betty and carries her downstairs, with Bob following closely.  Igor places Betty on a table in the lab.  Bob collapses from exhaustion and his own injuries, so Igor places Bob on an adjoining table.  After a brief examination, Igor's master looks worried.  "Things are serious, Igor.  Prepare a transfusion."  Igor and his master work feverishly, but to no avail.  Bob and Betty Hill are no more.

 The Hills' deaths upset Igor's master greatly.  Wearily, he climbs the steps to his conservatory, which houses his grand piano.  For it is here that he has always found solace.  He begins to play, and a  stirring, almost haunting melody fills the house.

Meanwhile, Igor is still in the lab tidying up.  His eyes catch movement, and he notices the fingers on Betty's hand twitch, keeping time to the  haunting piano music.  Stunned, he watches as Bob's arm begins to  rise, marking the beat!  He is further amazed as Betty and Bob both  sit up straight!  Unable to contain himself, he dashes up the stairs to the conservatory.

He bursts in and shouts to his master:  "Master,  Master! ...  The Hills are alive with the sound of  music!"   (Unknown source).

Isn’t it funny, what you can do with words, especially when you put them together in certain ways and they have a certain history that comes with them?

In Lewis Carroll’s wonderful book, Through the Looking-Glass, the fictional characters of Alice in Wonderland and Humpty Dumpty are in a conversation discussing semantics and the practical meaning of words.  Let’s pick up on the conversation:

"I don't know what you mean by 'glory,'" Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. "Of course you don't – till I tell you. I meant 'there's a nice knock-down argument for you!'"
"But 'glory' doesn't mean 'a nice knock-down argument,'" Alice objected.
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master – that's all."
(page 72, Hayes Barton Press, 1872):  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humpty_Dumpty#cite_note-6

When we use the word “apocalypse” what comes to mind?   It’s certainly not funny.

When terrorists attacked New York on September 11, 2001, the headlines of one British newspaper on the following day was one word:  Apocalypse.     

For us today, apocalypse is a popular word used to describe the most powerful and painful images we have of human death and earthly destruction.  Particularly coming into our minds might be such world-shaking disasters of “biblical” proportions like the 2004 tsunami in Thailand, or hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, or the most recent  massive 2010 earthquake in Haiti.   Those of us who are older might also remember a ground-breaking movie about the Vietnam War entitled, “Apocalypse Now.”    In each of these images, when we think of something being “apocalyptic”, we can’t help but think of massive disaster, destruction and death.

Interestingly, the word “apocalypse” itself does not mean this at all.    As with many words, since its adoption from ancient Greek, this word has had a mind of its own.  It is one of those words, which seems to mean whatever we want it to mean.  The word apocalypse is actually based upon the Greek “apokalupsis” and has been rightly translated in our Bible as “Revelation”.   It means “revelation” as it refers to the unveiling of a mystery or the disclosure of once hidden truth.   But if we placed the popular meaning of apocalypse into this text we could get into trouble.  The opening of this book would then literally read, “The disaster of Jesus Christ…..”   Unfortunately, this is exactly what this book can become in the hands of its many “would-be” interpreters.

What I hope this little exercise in semantics reminds us is that we must be very careful not to take a word, or a book that is so ancient and has had a particular meaning in the past for a people who once heard it, and then automatically think we can decoded it nicely and neatly into a secret road map that leads us into a particular future in some very specific way.   Even though we might like to take comfort in believing God has given his people a “crystal ball” or “secret code” so we can peer into exactly what will happen next, this not the true to the specific intention nor the general meaning or even the right application of this book.  As Revelation should remind us right from the start, the revelation is “about” and “of” Jesus Christ in the world, not specifically a revelation that is intended to give us a photo shot of the end of the world.   

According to John’s own words, the “future” Revelation unveils is a supposed to be read as a “revelation of Jesus Christ,” “to the seven churches scattered in Asia” and in regards to the future, it is intended to be a revelation about “what is shortly to take place”.   There is no way under heaven or on earth, nor by any stretch of any informed imagination that one can rightly take John’s “shortly” to mean 2000 years of history up to, or beyond our own day.  While we can and should apply the message of the Revelation to all time, and even to find specific hope for the future we face and, can have with hope in Jesus Christ, we are not suppose to read into the Revelation what we simply want it to mean.  That can lead to disastrous misinterpretations.

The ending or beginning which is found in Revelation, whichever way one might interpret it, is a time John describes as the fulfillment and consummation of all things in Jesus Christ.  You actually find a lot more “overcoming” of everything instead of the “ending” of anything in this book.  That’s really the main point.  There is no final ending of God's good world, except that it is finally transformed into what God always intended it to be.  The only things which end are those things which are evil, oppressive and stand aggressively against God’s rule and reign over the earth.

 Any ‘cocked sure’ attempt to bring the meaning of John’s Revelation to bear on our current situation in history, without significant qualifications, historical filters and interpretive restraint can lead to very real theological and political “disaster” in and of itself.  Some have even suggested that wayward and wrong interpretations of the book of Revelation could, and in fact have, lead to self-fulfilling prophecies which were never intended by the original author (I’m specifically thinking of David Koresh here and other “End Time sects).   I think it was G.K. Chesterton who wrote, “I have never met a creature so hideous in this book, as one of its own interpreters.”  

 If you are going to read and understand Revelation, how you read it and however you come to understand it, please be careful.  Your interpretation might become hazardous to your health.  For your own safety and sanity, make sure you are always open to more revelation on The Revelation.   


© 2010 All rights reserved Charles J. Tomlin, B.A., M.Div. D.Min.


P.S.  I'm currently writing a study guide for the Book of Revelation for a Bible study that is in the works, entitled "Who Is Worthy to Open the Book?"  I am using the image of the "lamb" as the interpretive key to the book of Revelation to help simplify the very complex structure of the book.   I hope to have this completed before Winter 2012 and will then supplement this study guide with a Power-point slide presentation to help you grasp the many symbols and images John uses throughout.   I plan to give a few more samples of this work in progress.