Welcome to EBible Fellowship's Bible study in the book of Revelation. This will be study #8 in Revelation, chapter 1, and we are continuing to read in verse 1:

The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him, to shew unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass; and he sent and signified it by his angel unto his servant John:

Last time we were looking at the word "signified," and we saw how God uses this word to indicate that the Bible itself is a "sign," a "sign" that points to the reality, the truth, that the Bible records. We will not get into that again; we are interested in the last part of the phrase, the last part of verse 1:

...and he sent and signified it by his angel unto his servant John:

Now it says, "by his angel," and that mean God's angel, and that would make this "angel" the "angel of the Lord," or the "angel of JEHOVAH," as He is often called in the Old Testament. We could go to many verses, but we are just going to go to one place in the book of Judges, chapter 13, and we will read a few verses there beginning in verse 17 of Judges 13:

And Manoah said unto the angel of JEHOVAH, What is thy name, that when thy sayings come to pass we may do thee honour? And the angel of JEHOVAH said unto him, Why askest thou thus after my name, seeing it is secret? So Manoah took a kid with a meat offering, and offered it upon a rock unto JEHOVAH: and the angel did wondrously; and Manoah and his wife looked on. For it came to pass, when the flame went up toward heaven from off the altar, that the angel of JEHOVAH ascended in the flame of the altar. And Manoah and his wife looked on it, and fell on their faces to the ground. But the angel of JEHOVAH did no more appear to Manoah and to his wife. Then Manoah knew that he was an angel of JEHOVAH. And Manoah said unto his wife, We shall surely die, because we have seen God.

This is a good passage for us to turn to in order to properly identify the "angel of JEHOVAH," to discover who He is because the "angel of JEHOVAH" is referred to several times, and Manoah sums it up concerning his meeting with the "angel of JEHOVAH," when he says to his wife, "We shall surely die, because we have seen God." Well, they saw the "angel of JEHOVAH," yet, correctly and rightly, Manoah knew that this was God Himself appearing as the messenger of God. The Lord Jesus Christ IS the Messenger of God - He is the "angel of JEHOVAH."

We can confirm this another way, in addition to Manoah saying, "We have seen God." Back in verse 18 of Judges 13, when Manoah asked the "angel of JEHOVAH" His name, and the "angel of JEHOVAH" responded, "Why askest thou thus after my name, seeing it is secret?"

Now this word "secret" is Strong's #6383 and it is closely related to Strong's 6382, and that word is found in Isaiah, chapter 9, in verse 6, where it says:

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful...

There the word "Wonderful" is that closely related word to "secret." Notice how "Wonderful" follows, "and his name shall be called..."

Just as the question was put to Manoah, "Why askest thou thus after my name, seeing it is secret?" Or, "Wonderful." It is the name of Christ, because Christ is the "child" that is referred to in Isaiah 9, verse 6.

Well, the "angel of JEHOVAH" or the "angel of God," the implication is in Revelation 1:1, at the end of the verse, is that "he sent and signified it by his angel," by the "angel of God," who is none other than God Himself, "unto his servant John." So, there is no question that John is the man that God used to write the book of Revelation. It also says this in verse 9:

I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.

He was on this island, Patmos, and God gave him this glorious revelation of the book that would become called by that name, the book of Revelation. It was the concluding Scripture, the concluding divine word, the concluding message from God that would cap His communication to mankind, to His Elect people. It was a glorious conclusion to a most glorious work!

There has never been any writing that could ever come near to compare to the writing of the Bible, a writing that God began with Moses, some 14 or 15 centuries earlier, and the writing that God maintained and established through many prophets down through the years, up until the days of Apostle John. Now it was coming to a close and the canon, the Bible itself, would be completed, and God used the Apostle Paul and gave him the tremendous privilege to be the man who would receive the final recorded revelation of God's infinite word. This word was sent by God, carried by His angel, signified by the Lord, and sent to John.

Now the name John comes from the Hebrew word and name "Joannes," and the name John in the New Testament is used a good number of times. It is derived from "Joannes," and that word in the Hebrew is #3110; but "Joannes" comes from, actually, Strong's 3076, and that is made up of two words, which means, "JEHOVAH favored," or the "grace or mercy of JEHOVAH," depending on how you would like to say it: the one word means "favor," "grace," or "mercy," and the other word is derived from the word for "JEHOVAH." So the name "John" comes from the Hebrew which would mean the "favor of JEHOVAH" or the "grace of JEHOVAH," or something similar to that.

And, certainly, the Apostle John was an individual who did receive the "favor" and "grace" of God, as the Lord Jesus selected him to salvation, and also selected him to be one of the twelve. He is a representative of God's people, of the Elect, as he received the divine revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Well, let us move on into verse 2:

Who bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw.

That is, John is bearing record, or witnessing, to the truth of the things he is writing down in this book, of the visions that God gave him, of the things that he saw. This is really a similar statement to what we read in the epistle of John, in the first epistle, in chapter 1, and I will read the first three verse there, beginning in verse 1:

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; (For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;) That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.

So, in other words, God entered into the human race and became man - the Word become flesh - and that Man, the Lord Jesus, was a real man. He was a true historical figure. He actually lived in the precise manner the Bible says: He was born of a virgin, He grew up as the Bible indicates, and He began His period of ministry, and He did miraculous signs and wonders all around the Sea of Galilee, and so on.

The Apostle John was a contemporary. He was a man, like you and me, just an ordinary person, born like you and I have been born, and living at that time, as you and I are living now, and he encountered Christ, and the Lord Jesus chose him and his brother James to be Apostles. And, therfore, they had first-instance experience; they saw these things with their own eyes; they were able to "handle" Christ with their own hands, etc. They had personal testimony and witness to the things that we read in the Bible, and we are just amazed!

Could it be, when we read the Gospel accounts and we read of Christ giving sight to the blind, could it be that this actually happened? Early on, as we hear these things, we might wonder because it is just so incredible and so amazing. And then you read even more tremendous things: the lame walk, the deaf hear, the dead are raised! What incredible events took place long ago.

We do not see anything like that today. There is no such thing, anywhere near that, going on anywhere in the world, nor has there been for almost 2,000 years. And, so, the world around us says those things are not possible, and our eyes have never actually seen them, so we just wonder at the awesome events that are recorded in the Bible. And, yet, the Bible is a collection of witnesses that give testimony to the veracity, to the truthfulness, of these historical events.

And John was an individual who, when we read that he bears witness, and in Revelation 1:2, he "bare record" of the testimony of Jesus Christ and the things that he saw, for all intents and purposes, basically, John is saying like those today who place their hand upon a Bible and swear that they are going to "tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God;" and then they sit down, and we feel content, for the most part, that this individual has sworn with an oath, and he has put his hand upon the Bible.

Now is that not interesting, that court houses still use the Bible as an expression of utter truthfulness, of swearing that you will not tell a lie? The Bible is the symbol that our legal system uses as a standard for absolute truth, and men just put their hand upon it, but God has written the words in it, and He Himself has declared that everything written herein is "faithful and true." He says this a couple of times in the concluding chapters of the book of Revelation, but, more than that, God declares in the book of Hebrews, in chapter 6 and in verse 15:

And so, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise. For men verily swear by the greater: and an oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife. Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath: That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us:

You see in what we are reading what God did? He took an oath! He did not have to do this. He did it for our benefit; He knows the weakness of our minds; He knows we are "but of dust," and we have "feet of clay." He knows that with men, when they swear an oath, well, that is "the end of all strife." They are taking a vow, and they are declaring, "Yes, I will fulfill the thing that I have agreed to. I am being very honest with you now, and I am guaranteeing that I will follow through."

Well, God has written His word FULL of incredible promises! We can be true about that. There is no doubt that the things written in the Bible are almost beyond imagination. To think the evils of this world, the sin, the wickedness, the awful things like murder, robbery and deceit, and all the ugly things that are just magnified to no end in our day, that they will be gone forever in a day coming soon, when the Lord destroys this world, and recreates a new world. Just that alone, if that were all, and if it were only the removal of the ugly, wickedness from this world, when God creates a new Heaven and new Earth (if that was all He was going to do), we would think this was super wonderful! A world without murder, a world without stealing and robbery!

But it is not just the removal of evil, it is a world - a new Heaven and a new Earth - that will last forever more! And He is going to give His Elect people a new resurrected body that is perfect, pure, holy and good: they will always think right thoughts; they will always do right actions. Never again will there be an evil desire. Never again will they error from the Way. Never again will these things harm them. There will be no more pain, no more sorrow, no more tears, no more death! We just shake our heads! Eternal life? How can it be?

All we know is death and misery. How can there be a place of eternal bliss and happiness and love? Yes, we can admit that these things are so glorious, so wonderful, so fabulous, so marvelous, and beyond anything that this world can even hope to come close to attaining. Yet, God says they will take place. "You can count on it. The things that I have written in my word will come to pass, in a little while, shortly they will come to pass. These things will happen! It is guaranteed because I have spoken them. I have declared them. This Bible, this book, is the testimony, the witness of Jesus Christ, and I confirm it with an oath. I will swear so you will know that I mean it."

And so He swears "by two immutable things." "Immutable" means things that cannot change, like men change from day to day or week to week. A man changes; you might meet him one day and then he is of one mind, and then you meet him a year later, and he is a totally different person, it seems, because men can change. We are very changeable, movable creatures. But God is not changeable. He is infinite, immovable, steadfast in all of His ways. When He says something, He will bring it to pass; He will complete it, fulfill it, and make sure it happens exactly as He declared it would.

So the one thing of these two immutable things, He tells us, in which it was impossible for God to lie. That is not in the realm of possibility. God cannot lie, and that is the great comfort, a tremendous encouragement for each child of God. We love the word of God so much because it is true, just like the Lord Jesus Christ is the Truth. We rely on this. We flee to it, in a world of deceit, in a world that lies and swims in an ocean of lies - it is not comfortable unless it is lying, and telling some tale or story. But not the Bible!

The Bible is a sea of Truth. It is an everflowing stream of righteousness, of uprightness, of purity and holiness, and it would be none of these things if it were not true in everything it declares, from Genesis through the completion of Revelation. In every word, every letter of every word, every statement, every idea and thought that comes from the infinite and brilliant mind of God is absolutely faithful and true! We can count on it and trust it. We can lean upon it and cast our lives upon it, knowing that God will bring it to pass.

Now when you read Hebrews 6:18 and it says "by two immutable things," and then the first one is listed (that God cannot lie), but the second thing is not stated, and we wonder, "What is that second thing that God is swearing by?" The second thing is His very Person. It is the character of God that the Bible reveals. It is His holiness, and His purity. If He says something, not only is it impossible that it be a lie, but the very Being that we know as God confirms it. Everything about God confirms that when He says something, it will happen.

We are just greatly thankful, and we are just so happy that God has given us this kind of record of Himself and of things that will come to pass. It is very comforting, as we go through trials and afflictions, and as we experience hardships and difficulities in this world, to know that it will not be forever. Yes, it is a momentary affliction, and, yes, it may last for a period of days or months or years of time, but what is time, any length of time, in comparison to the eternal weight of glory that is soon to be revealed?

Well, let us go on reading in Revelation 1, into verse 3:

Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.

"Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy...

Blessed are you, and blessed am I, and blessed is anyone that readeth the Bible! You know, we can spend time reading any number of things. The world has no shortage of things to read. The book of Ecclesiastes says, "Of making many books there is no end."

You can go to any library and you will see just thousands and thousands of books. Men love to record their thoughts. And, yet if we read a novel, a non-fiction novel, and what does that mean? It means it is not true. If we read that, is there any blessing? We might spend some time caught up in the story, and maybe it interests us or excites us, but at the end, is there any blessing in the hours we spent reading it? No.

How about if we read the newspaper and we are reading whatever section - sports, entertainment, the daily news and the things happening in the world - and maybe we spend a half hour or hour reading the newspaper, is there any blessing after we are done reading the newspaper? No.

We can think of all kinds of things that we might spend our time reading, and we do, and then ask yourself, "Is there any blessing when I have put in the time to read this?" And you will find that the answer is, "No. There is no blessing in reading the things of the world." You will only profit in the slightest way, perhaps with a chuckle, perhaps with gaining a little bit of knowledge about something, but there will be no spiritual blessing. The only thing in this world that is able to provide a spiritual blessing is the word of God, the Bible.