God Is on the Throne
Revelation 4:1–11
A video recording of this sermon can be found on Westminster Presbyterian Church’s YouTube channel .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDRrRo-8Z8A
As your church ministry leaders were scrambling last week to figure out if we should open our building to have a church service or not, I googled, “churches closing.” I did so because I was looking to see which churches in the area were closing on Sunday and how they were communicating it to their congregations. The first link I clicked on, which I thought was related to a particular church’s response to the coronavirus, was instead an online article from September 2019 about “5 Good Reasons a Church Should Close,”[1] meaning close for good. The article was not what I was looking for, but I found it intriguing, eye-opening, and convicting. Here are the five.
The real mission is lost. Every decision is viewed through a cost filter not through a gospel filter. In other words, the question that is rarely, if ever asked, is, “Would this decision help advance the gospel or not?”
The church cares more about itself than the people it is called to reach. Put differently, member concerns trump evangelism.
Its members hate the world. The church is so against the godless culture—as demonstrated in the pastor’s them-vs-us sermons, members’ social media posts, and so on—that God’s people forget that God so loved the world that he sent his Son into the world to save people from out of the world.
Preserving the past is more attractive than embracing the future.
The money isn’t remotely tied to the mission. The focus is not on life-changing ministries, but on preserving large endowments and bank accounts, while the church sits on millions of dollars in real estate.
As we have just worked our way through the seven letters to the seven churches (some of those churches that Jesus threatened to close!), this list is indeed providentially thought-provoking. We are not closing the church, but may we repent of ways in which those very church-closing characteristics characterize us, grateful for those that don’t, and prayerful that we would be a church that embraces the future and our mission, gives and budgets to support that mission, and cares about the lost and the world around us.
Now, that was not the only providential moment from the past few days. Here’s another. As we finished our series on the seven letters, I wondered in light of the present coronavirus pandemic if I should turn our attention to a different, perhaps particularly relevant, part of Scripture, or if I should do a topical sermon to address the fears, anxieties, and concerns we might have. However, as I studied the next text in Revelation (chapter 4), I thought that the message of that chapter is actually the most relevant and practical and encouraging message I could think of. For what do we—the church and the world—need most now? We need a vision of God! During this time of international crisis, and as the church “suffers” in our homebound exile, it is imperative that we know and believe and embrace the truth that God is on the throne (“and behold,” Rev. 4:2, “a throne stood in heaven, with one seated on the throne”). So, I invite you at home to turn with me to Revelation 4 and let’s together read that message. Let’s see with the Apostle John, who was exiled on the island of Patmos, this awesome vision of our awesome God.
Revelation 4:1-11
After this I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven! And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, “Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this.” 2 At once I was in the Spirit, and behold, a throne stood in heaven, with one seated on the throne. 3 And he who sat there had the appearance of jasper and carnelian, and around the throne was a rainbow that had the appearance of an emerald. 4 Around the throne were twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones were twenty-four elders, clothed in white garments, with golden crowns on their heads. 5 From the throne came flashes of lightning, and rumblings and peals of thunder, and before the throne were burning seven torches of fire, which are the seven spirits of God, 6 and before the throne there was as it were a sea of glass, like crystal.
And around the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: 7 the first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with the face of a man, and the fourth living creature like an eagle in flight. 8 And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say,
“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty,
who was and is and is to come!”9 And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, 10 the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying,
11 “Worthy are you, our Lord and God,
to receive glory and honor and power,
for you created all things,
and by your will they existed and were created.”
So then, having finished our study on the seven letters to the seven churches (Rev. 2-3), next in Revelation 4 we move from what’s wrong with the church to what’s right with God. We move from the imperfect church—e.g., from a church that lost their first love (Ephesus, 2:4), gave in to false teaching (Pergamum, 2:14-15), got involved in immorality and idolatry (Thyatira, 2:20), and were spiritually dead or lukewarm (Sardis, 3:1; Laodicea, 3:16)—to our perfect God. You might say we move from sinful earth to holy heaven.
We also move from hearing to seeing. Seven times in chapters 2-3, we were told to listen: “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” Now in chapters 4-5, we are told to see. Chapter 4 begins, “After this I looked, and behold.” Chapter 5 starts, “Then I saw.” In chapter 4 we behold God in his glory, and in chapter 5 we behold the Lamb who was slain. So then, today we will fix our eyes on God as he is described in chapter 4. In verses 1-6a we will see our victorious God, and in verses 6b-11 we will see our worthy God.
Behold Our Victorious God
We will start with our victorious God, who we read about in verses 1-6a. Look with me first at the setting, given to us in verse 1-2a.
After this I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven! And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, “Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this.” At once I was in the Spirit. . . .
Notice the “door,” the “voice,” and “the Spirit.”
First, we have the door. The apostle John is startled. I agree with the exclamation point after “heaven” in the ESV. For, it is not every day you are on the island of Patmos when all of a sudden a door to heaven opens to you. Now, I don’t know if the door imagery here is playing off the door imagery in the letter to Laodicea, but I like to think it is. That is, that the Laodiceans have Christ outside of their door and he’s knocking on it to get back in; and here Jesus has opened the door to John, saying, “Come on in and see this!”
When you think about this open door to heaven, the image is not that of something far, far away in the highest heavens—up with the stars. Rather, the image is like the tiny door in Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland or the large wardrobe in C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia. John has found an earthly passageway to another reality—the “place” where God lives and reigns. Like Isaiah (Isa. 6) and Ezekiel (Ezek. 1), John is suddenly taken “into the Lord’s heavenly holy place . . . to see his glory and receive his word.”[2]
Beyond this “door” is the “voice” (“And behold, a door standing open . . . . And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet,” v. 1). The voice is alarmingly loud—like a trumpet. Or, is it beautifully sounding—like a trumpet well played? Or, is it victoriously announcing—like a trumpet blast? Who knows? What we do know is that Jesus is the one who gives this trumpet call. I say “Jesus” because, since the beginning of Revelation, he is “the voice” (1:12-13) who has been revealing the past, present, and future to his servant John. And here he will reveal the future—“I will show you what must take place after this” (4:1). Jesus will reveal the coming salvation through judgment. But before John sees the future—the seven seals, seven trumpets, and seven bowls of God’s wrath—he must see God and know that God is good and great. First things first!
To take John there is the Holy Spirit—“At once I was in the Spirit” (v. 2; cf. 1:10; 4:2; 17:3; 21:10). Once again the Spirit is working alongside the Son to reveal the Father. Let’s follow where the Spirit leads. Let’s squeeze through the doorway to heaven. For, whether we are being persecuted for righteousness (as some of these ancient Christians were) or fearful of the future (as some of us are now), we all need to see what John saw. We all need our hearts gripped by the glory of God.
So then, look down at our text to the second half of verse 2. We come to our second “and behold.” Are you looking? Look. Look. Look! Look at verses 2b-3:
And behold, a throne stood in heaven, with one seated on the throne. And he who sat there had the appearance of jasper and carnelian, and around the throne was a rainbow that had the appearance of an emerald.
Notice how God is described here. There are no facial descriptions—“And God had a long grey beard.” There aren’t even hints of physical descriptions—“And when God sat on the throne I briefly caught a glimpse of his strong biceps. Michelangelo got it right!” No, Michelangelo got it wrong. If I asked the children in their children’s bulletin to draw a picture of God they’d have a difficult time doing it. The physical restraint, you see, is intentional. The human mind is an idol factory, and if we were given even two legs to work with we’d turn God into two golden calves. Our Creator is not a creature! The second commandment is still foundational for the Christian faith: “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth” (Exod. 20:4; cf. Deut. 4:16).
So then, if it is a sin to picture God in certain ways—primarily because there is no earthly symbol that corresponds to his invisible divine essence—how then are we to think of God? What is he like? Revelation to the rescue! John pictures what is around God in order to depict God. And of first importance is the throne. The word “throne” is repeated nine times in verses 1-6 and three times in verses 7-11. Twelve times! This throne symbolizes kingly authority. Moreover, the posture of sitting on it reinforces that theme. God is king. God is in charge. God controls the world.
The one sitting on the throne, we are told next, “had the appearance of jasper and carnelian” (v. 3). These are two reddish-colored precious gems. Polished jasper is as translucent as crystal, and it possibly symbolizes God’s holiness and glory. The carnelian, which is a deep reddish colored gemstone, looks like “a fire is smoldering inside the stone.” It perhaps also symbolized God’s holiness and how he “burns in wrath against sin.”[3]
Next is the “rainbow” around the throne (v. 3). The rainbow, based on Genesis 9, is a sign of God’s merciful covenant. And, related to that precise theme, that the rainbow mentioned here in Revelation 4:3 has a tint of emerald (it “had the appearance of an emerald”) is perhaps symbolic of what divine protection looks like after the other red elements of God’s holiness and wrath are filtered through it.
Besides the one seated on the throne, we have who and what are around (v. 4), from (v. 5), and before (v. 6) the throne. “Around the throne were twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones were twenty-four elders, clothed in white garments, with golden crowns on their heads” (v. 4). Who are the twenty-four elders, why are they dressed in white, and why are they also sitting on thrones? The most common interpretation is that the twenty-four elders are human beings from the two covenants—the twelve apostles and twelve representatives from the twelve tribes of Israel (cf. 21:14)—who together embody the perfectly redeemed people of God. Another opinion is that they are Christians who have conquered (i.e., died and received Christ’s consolations promised in the seven letters). A final view is that they are “angelic members of the heavenly court” because the title “elders” in the rest of Revelation seems to be “classed with angels rather than with humans (cf. 4:4, 10; 5:5, 6, 8, 11, 14; 7:11, 13; 11:16; 14:3; 19:4).”[4] I’ll go with the angelic opinion, but I do think the two covenants view is cooler. So, you go with that. One of us is bound to be right.
Whoever they are, they are dressed in white to symbolize victory and purity, and they sit on thrones and they have “crowns” (v. 10), to symbolize their royal priesthood (cf. 5:10). Okay, if they are kingly priests, maybe they are humans; maybe you’ve got it right. Anyway, let’s get back to God! He’s the point of this passage. He is why we are here today. He is what we need. See this vision! Look at verses 5-6:
From the throne came flashes of lightning, and rumblings and peals of thunder, and before the throne were burning seven torches of fire, which are the seven spirits of God, and before the throne there was as it were a sea of glass, like crystal.
What is symbolized here is God’s holiness and justice. Throughout the Bible, “the sea” is symbolic for the evil forces of this cursed world. However, God controls and conquers the sea. Before the throne of God the sea is calmed. The Lord says, “Peace, be still” (Mark 4:39) and the sea stays still forever. Furthermore, the calm and crystal-clear “sea of glass” introduces God’s transcendent holiness. There is a “distance and separation between God and everything else,” especially evil, but even us.[5] Just like a billionaire’s estate might have a long driveway to emphasis the size and grandeur of his mansion, so God’s magnificence is emphasized by this immense, serene, and beautiful body of water leading up to the throne. Just stop and think for a moment. Imagine the beauty and majesty of God! Imagine what soon will be sung in verse 8. Imagine the holy-holy-holy-holiness of our great God.
Besides God’s transcendent holiness, notice also his perfect justice. That is what is represented with the other images here—the flashes of lightning, the peals of thunder, and the seven torches. In the rest of Revelation, whenever God’s judgments are mete out—“after the seven seals have been opened (8:1, 5), after the seven trumpets have been blown (11:15, 19), and after the seven bowls of God’s wrath have been poured out (16:17, 18)”—thunder and lightning mark the occasion. The symbolism is simple enough to envision. Like lightning striking from the heavens to the earth, so “God’s justice flows from God’s throne.”[6] God is just, and he judges justly.
Recently I was reading about Sir Isaac Newton, the great physicist and mathematician. One day, as Newton was in his room at Trinity College, Cambridge, through a narrow slit in the shutters white sunlight struck the glass prism on his desk. He noticed that the white light split into the colors of the rainbow. Then and there, it dawned on him that light was a complex unity of different colors. Here in the prism of Revelation, “God is light” (1 John 1:5) in the sense that he is holy, sovereign, wrathful, merciful, and just. Do you see the colors? That is what we ought to see here. We are to envision John’s vision of a victorious God. That holy, sovereign, wrathful, merciful, and just God is on the throne.
The purpose of this vision is twofold. First, this vision is intended to unveil reality to us. As N. T. Wright puts it:
Behind the complex and messy confusions of church life in ancient Turkey; behind the challenges of the fake synagogues and the threatening rulers; behind the ambiguous struggles and difficulties of ordinary Christians—there stands the heavenly throne room in which the world’s creator and lord remains sovereign. Only by stopping in our tracks and contemplating this vision can we begin to glimpse the reality which not only makes sense of our own realities but enables us, too, to win the victory.[7]
Second, this vision is intended to give us a new or renewed vision of our glorious God, which is our deepest need. In his book, The Supremacy of God in Preaching, John Piper writes:
People are starving for the greatness of God. But most of them would not give this diagnosis of their troubled lives. The majesty of God is an unknown cure. There are far more popular prescriptions on the market, but the benefit of any other remedy is brief and shallow. Preaching that does not have the aroma of God’s greatness may entertain for a season, but it will not touch the hidden cry of the soul: ‘Show me thy glory.’”[8]
Behold Our Worthy God
Today I have been attempting to do just that: to take you up with me into the glories of the throne room. In verses 1-6a we have seen our victorious God. He is on the throne. Next, in verses 6b-11 we will see our worthy God. He is worthy to be worshipped.
As we study this section, we first notice who worships God.
And around the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: the first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with the face of a man, and the fourth living creature like an eagle in flight. (vv. 6-7)
Before, behind, and on each side of the throne, four living creatures worship God; and, these creatures have a lot of eyes. They don’t have four eyes, as I do. Rather, in the front and the back, they are “full of eyes” (v. 6). This is a gross image, true. But its symbolic value is beautiful. They behold God’s glory up close (next to the throne) and in great measure (with a hundreds of awe-inspired eyes).
These four creatures are “like” (like = symbolic value) four of the greatest animals God ever made. If you don’t think a lion is in some sense greater than a skunk, an ox than an ameba, the face of a man than the tail of a cow, or the flight of an eagle than the backstroke of a tadpole, then I’m sorry to say that your liberal education has not freed your mind to see the obvious. These four are the undisputed kings of the animal kingdom—of the wild beasts (lion), tamed animals (ox), birds (eagle), and all of creation (man).[9] Put together, these are the “noblest, strongest, wisest, and swiftest” creatures in all creation.[10] They do not represent, as often depicted in Christian art, the four gospel writers—Matthew (human), Mark (lion), Luke (ox), John (eagle). However, like the gospel writers, their purpose is to point all creation to worship its Creator. And like the seraphim in Isaiah’s vision (Isaiah 6) and the four creatures of Ezekiel’s vision (Ezekiel 1), these living creatures are creation’s choir. They lead us in worship. Look at and listen to Revelation 4:8-11.
And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!” And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying, “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”
Above two attributes and one action of God are praised. The attributes are God’s holiness and eternality. Using the superlative—“holy, holy, holy”—God’s holiness is obviously emphasized. Then, with the phrases “who was and is and is to come” (v. 8), and “who lives forever and ever” (vv. 9, 10) God’s eternality is emphasized. God is holy eternal!
So, the two attributes for which God is praised are his holiness and his eternality. The one action is that God created. God is worthy to receive glory, honor, and power, because he “created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.” Notice the repetition—“created. . . created.” God is praised because he created the world and everything in it. This detail was surprising to me. It was not surprising because I don’t think God should be praised as our Creator. Rather, it was surprising because I thought (knowing what I know of Revelation) that God would be praised for his righteous judgment and his merciful salvation. I expected to read, “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you redeemed your people, and by your will you judged all evil.” Instead, this end-times praise takes us back to “in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:1).
I decided months ago that after this short series on the beginning of Revelation that I would preach through the book of Job, a book that I also think will be quite timely to preach through. So, in preparation for preaching that tragic, complex, and beautiful book, I have tried to spend time letting each and every word of it soak into my soul. Well, something that soaked into my soul this week was God’s speeches to Job in Job 38-41. In these chapters, the Lord interrogates Job by bringing in the sea, the light, the snow, the hail, the rain, the thunderbolt, the ice, the frost, the clouds, the lightning, the lion, the raven, the mountain goat, the doe, the wild donkey, the wild ox, the ostrich, the horse, the hawk, the eagle, and then Behemoth and Leviathan to testify against Job. God cross-examines Job with questions about creation:
Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Do you have a good grasp as to how the stars hang in the sky or why the sea doesn’t spill over upon the land? Can you send forth the storehouses of snow, the torrents of rain, the bolts of lightning, the crash of thunder? Do you give the horse its might, the wild donkey its freedom, the eagle its sight, and the ostrich its stupidity? Have you entered into the springs of the sea, or walked the recesses of the deep? Have you comprehended the expanse of the earth? Tell me, Job, if you understand all this.[11]
In essence, God asks Job to do what we are to do when we come to Revelation 4:11: to “stop and consider the wondrous works of God” (Job 37:14). For the existence, maintenance, and operation of the earth, stars, waters, and animals not only confirm God’s just rule, as they “testify against human arrogance, ignorance, and ingratitude,”[12] but they also call us to worship. Creation calls us to worship.
O Lord my God! When I in awesome wonder
Consider all the works Thy hand hath made.
I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,
Thy power throughout the universe displayed.Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to Thee;
How great Thou art, how great Thou art!
Having noticed God’s two attributes and one action as motives for praise, next let’s notice the length and posture of worship. The four living creatures never give it a rest—“day and night they never cease” (v. 8) to praise God from whom all blessings flow. Whether they literally worship around the clock and do nothing else, or that adoration is their constant attitude and occasional action throughout the day, we don’t know. What we do know is that they embody a central theme of John’s prophecy “Worship God” (Rev. 19:10; 22:3, 9; cf. 7:11; 11:16; 19:4).[13]
While I’m tempted to raise the bar to heaven, and say to you now, “Emulate these crazy-looking creatures,” instead I will simply say, “Let’s obey Paul’s command: ‘I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship’” (Rom. 12:1). How often do we offer our whole selves to God? “Always” is the answer. We worship God when we come into this building and sing “Holy, Holy, Holy,” as well as when we park our car (by letting others have the best spots) and when (listen children!) we obey our parents when they say (or sometimes shout), “It’s time to get in the car!” Or since, no one got into a car this Sunday morning to come into this building, we worship God when we leave the last gallon of milk and the last roll of toilet paper at ALDI for the next family. We worship God when we heed our government’s instructions. We worship God, as we said on our corporate confession of sin today, when we think of the needs of others above our own, when we care more about giving our lives for the kingdom than saving them. Yes, we worship God when we obey 1 John 3:16-18 (NIV):
This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.
Like the four creatures, we are to worship God always.
What then is the posture of worship here? It is on the floor, face down, casting crowns toward God. In antiquity, if one king was conquered by another, the conquered king would take off his crown and place it as the feet of the conqueror.[14] This was a sign of submission. While Christians aren’t conquered by God (well, in a sense we are; but, in another sense we will reign with him), we do, however, show our submission, as well as our humility and gratitude, by giving back to God what he has given to us.
Now, with the posture of worship presented here (the bowing before, the casting of crowns, the high praise), it is easy to critique both the culture and the church. Our secular culture celebrates Earth Day one day a year, but who of them celebrate Creator Day on at least fifty-two Sundays a year (“you shall keep holy the Sabbath”), or, as it should be, every second of every day? That said, what concerns me most is not the culture but the church. Needless to say there is mind-numbing and heart-calcifying triteness to the contemporary church. Is how John envisions God what most churches seek to reflect in their Sunday gatherings? Do most churches today reflect God’s transcendent holiness, absolute sovereignty, wrathful justice, and merciful salvation?
Do we at Westminster? I hope we do. My goal each week is to invite you to move beyond the cheap imitation copies of God (the empty idols of our age) and the poor parodies of divine power (whether it is Caesar in Rome or Caesar’s Place in Vegas) into the throne room of the true and living God. And our goal, as a church, is to see something of God’s infinite greatness, because as Augustine famously put it (and I’ll slightly paraphrase): the thought of God stirs us so deeply that we cannot be content unless we praise him, for he made us for himself and our hearts find no peace until they rest in him.[15] It is indeed “the chief end” of our existence to glorify God by enjoying him forever (see WSC 1:1). So, today, as always, amid the uncertainty, let us worship God, worship God, worship God.
The Theologian
Before the invention of the printing press in 1439, the Bible was copied by hand, like all other books. In the fourth century, a scribe who was copying what we now call “Revelation,” wrote at the top of the first page, “A Revelation of John.” He also wrote in the margin the Greek words, tou theologou (“the theologian”). Eugene Peterson notes the appropriateness of this title for John: “St. John is a theologian whose entire mind is saturated with thoughts of God, his whole being staggered by a vision of [theos] God. The world-making, salvation-shaping word of God is heard and pondered and expressed. He is God-intoxicated, God-possessed, God-articulate.”[16]
I don’t know if I have been much of a theologian today, or if I have done the best job in taking you up with me into the glories of the throne room of Revelation 4 to be caught up together in the holy awe and wonder of heavenly praise, but I hope I have given you at least a glimpse of the greatness of our victorious and worthy God. And I hope and pray that in this time of crisis and confusion—as people get sick and some die, as others grieve the loss of life and livelihoods and savings—that beholding the throne of God will calm our hearts, soothe our souls, and bring us the vision for the present and the future that we all desperately need.
Notes:
[1] https://careynieuwhof.com/5-good-reasons-a-church-should-close/
[2] Dennis E. Johnson, Triumph of the Lamb: A Commentary on Revelation (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2001), 97.
[3] Bruce M. Metzger, Breaking the Code: Understanding the Book of Revelation (Nashville: Abingdon, 1993), 48.
[4] James M. Hamilton Jr., Revelation: The Spirit Speaks to the Churches, Preaching the Word (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 144-145.
[5] Ibid., 147.
[6] Ibid., 146-147.
[7] N. T. Wright, Revelation for Everyone (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2011), 46.
[8] John Piper, The Supremacy of God in Preaching (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1990), 9.
[9] Wright, Revelation for Everyone, 47.
[10] Metzger, Breaking the Code, 50.
[11] This is my paraphrase of verses from Job 38:4–18.
[12] Susan E. Schreiner, Where Shall Wisdom Be Found? Calvin’s Exegesis of Job from Medieval and Modern Perspectives (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994), 141.
[13] “With the words ‘Worship God!’ the angel directs John back to the central theme of all prophecy and certainly of the revelation that is to be the theme of John’s prophecy.” Richard Bauckham, The Theology of the Book of Revelation, New Testament Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 121.
[14] See Craig S. Keener, Revelation, NIV Application Commentary (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2000), 179-180.
[15] Augustine, Confessions, trans. R. S. Pine-Coffin (New York: Penguin, 1961), 21.
[16] Eugene H. Peterson, Reversed Thunder: The Revelation of John and the Praying Imagination (New York: HarperOne, 1991), 3.
Douglas Sean O’Donnell is the Senior Pastor of Westminster Presbyterian Church in Elgin, IL. He previously served as the senior lecturer in Biblical Studies and Practical Theology at Queensland Theological College in Brisbane, Australia. He has authored, edited, and contributed to a number of books, including two children’s books, six commentaries on the Bible, and The Pastor’s Book with R. Kent Hughes. Doug holds a PhD from the University of Aberdeen and is a member of the St. John Fellowship of the Center for Pastor Theologians.
