GOD'S NEW WORLD, DAY 25 (welcome to Asia II)

 


     Unmasking the matrix.  The Jesus-followers of Ephesus lived in a world where Caesar was Lord, in which the (temples of the) gods were everywhere, a world where everyone knew their place, a world populated with countless nameless slaves, a world of empire – both efficient and ruthless, with a social order that demanded loyalty (and taxes!) and which promised peace, justice and prosperity (for the 1%).  Everything the Ephesians would have encountered on a daily basis served to reinforce the official, imperial interpretation of reality – the architecture, the many statues of the emperor, the temples of the many gods, the social protocols, the way money was spent (and collected), the dress codes – everything proclaimed “this is the way things are and the way they are meant to be”.  As John writes to the seven churches of Asia, he faced a significant challenge – how to get his readers to “see” the world for what it really was, to see themselves as who they really were – in a nutshell, how to see everything’s true nature.  John offers his readers an alternative vision of all things “on earth and in heaven”.  In Revelation, John wants to “draw back the curtain” on reality so as to permit his readers to see things from God’s perspective, i.e., “from heaven”.

     Concerning heaven.  As far as the Bible is concerned, heaven is not far away.  “God’s dimension”, if you will, is just behind a curtain that is sometimes drawn back so we can glimpse what’s going on “behind the scenes” (“Revelation” is the translation of the Greek word apocalypto, i.e. to “unveil”, to “uncover”).

     Whether it’s

·        Abraham welcoming three strangers to lunch and later realizing that one of them is “God” (and the two others are angels: Gn. 18-19),

·        or Jacob dreaming of a ladder reaching up to God’s abode and then awaking to the fact that he had spent the night on the threshold of heaven (cf. Gn. 28.10-17);

·        or Moses discovering that a shrub in the desert is actually a heavenly portal (cf. Ex. 3.1-6);

·        or the prophet Elisha seeing the chariots of the armies of heaven surrounding the armies of Aram who were besieging Jerusalem (cf. 2 Kings 6.14-17);

·        or Isaiah having a vision of God’s throne while praying in the Temple (cf. Is. 6.1-10);

·        or Ezekiel being awestruck by the sight of God’s throne-chariot while sitting by the rivers of Babylon (cf. Ez. 1.1-28; cp. Dn. 7.9-10),

heaven is portrayed in the Scriptures as being right there – behind the veil of everyday reality.  Indeed, the phrase, “the heavens were opened” is a recurrent one in Scripture (cf. Ez. 1.1; Mt. 3.16; Mk. 1.10; Ac. 7.56; cp. Rev. 4.1).  In biblical cosmology, “heaven” is the “control room” for earth.  The deliberations of the “heavenly council” influence the unfolding of events on earth (cf. Jer. 23.16-32; 1 Kings 22.13-28; Job 1, etc.).  So, when John is flitting about between earth and heaven, the book of Revelation is invoking this biblical habit of portraying heaven as being intimately connected with “earth”, i.e., reality as we normally experience it (cf. Rev. 21—22).

     Purposes of the Creator for his world.  Part of John’s challenge as he seeks to redefine reality for his readers is the fact that their world looked the same as it always had.  Had the life, death and resurrection of Jesus actually made a difference in the world?  It didn’t look like it during the years following the first Easter.  Yes, followers of Jesus were travelling throughout the Roman empire announcing the gospel of Jesus’ lordship and establishing new communities loyal to him.  However, the business of the empire rumbled on unabated.  It didn’t look very much like the kingdom of God was present.  The imperial machine continued to advance, and most Christians probably thought that the prudent course of action was to keep their heads down and not draw unnecessary attention to themselves.  Indeed, as the inhabitants of the seven cities of Asia went about their usual routines, they were probably blissfully unaware that their daily decisions had cosmic significance and contributed to the victory of the Creator over all the forces of evil.  They were called to “overcome” all anti-God forces (cf. Rev. 2.7) because Jesus had already overcome (Rev. 3.21; 5.5).  John wanted to impress upon his readers that, as followers of Jesus, their lives were anything but mundane – au contraire, John was telling them that they were living at the climactic moment of world history (cf. Rev. 11.15-18) – by following Jesus, they had been swept up into the purposes of the Creator, of the One seated on the throne (of heaven) and of the Lamb.

     Already and not yet.  On the cross, Jesus accomplished the victory of God over all the powers in rebellion against him.  Through his resurrection, God had inaugurated the “Age to Come”, the time where the kingdom of God would become a reality in the world, an era of peace and justice where the people of God would “rule” the earth (cf. Rev. 5.10).  However, as Paul pointed out in 1 Corinthians 15, the launch of the Age to Come through Christ’s resurrection had not put an end to the “present evil Age” (cf. 1 Cor. 10.11) – Jesus, says Paul, was the “first fruits”, the evidence/guarantee that the harvest would follow, i.e., the resurrection of all those who belong to Jesus (1 Cor. 15.20-23).  Christians live in a time when the two “Ages” exist simultaneously – the kingdom of God is being established in the midst of the kingdoms of the world – and this means that Christians should expect to experience conflict.  The kingdom/victory of God has already been established and, at the same time, has not yet been (completely) established.[1]  John is calling his readers to “patiently endure” (cf. Rev. 1.9) this “clash of kingdoms” and assures them that God’s final victory is guaranteed and that their suffering is actually part of God’s triumph over evil.

 


[1] Scholars refer to this dynamic as “inaugurated eschatology”, i.e., the “end” has already happened, but is not yet complete.  By “end”, we mean the completion of the purposes of God.

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