Prophetic Countdown

Our study on the Book of Revelation continued… Please, Heavenly Father, bless us as we seek to learn Your truth! Open our hearts, open our eyes to the love You have for us. Let the Holy Spirit guide each and every one of us as we study.  We are not worthy and will never be worthy of Your love, Your mercy, Your grace, but our Savior, Jesus Christ says we find worth through HIM. Please, because of His sacrifice for us, a sacrifice He made with Your blessing, please save us in Your truth!  -

Continuing from 'Daniel and the Revelation' by Uriah Smith'

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'Blessing on the Reader.--"BLESSED is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy. " Is there so direct and formal a blessing pronounced upon the reading and observance of any other part of the word of God?

What encouragement we have for its study?

Shall we say that it cannot be understood? Is a blessing offered for the study of a book which it can do us no good to study?

God has pronounced His blessing upon the reader of this prophecy, and has set the seal of His approbation to an earnest study of its marvelous pages. With such encouragement from a divine source, the child of God will be unmoved by a thousand feeble counterblasts from men.

Every fulfillment of prophecy brings its duties. There are things in the Revelation to be observed, or performed. Practical duties are to be fulfilled as the result of an understanding and accomplishment of the prophecy.

A notable instance of this kind may be seen in Revelation 14: 12, where it is said, "Here are they that keep the commands of God, and the faith of Jesus."

"The time is at hand," writes John, and in so doing he gives another motive for the study of this book. It becomes more and more important, as we draw near the great con_

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summation. On this point we offer the impressive thoughts of another:

"The importance of studying the Apocalypse increases with the lapse of time. Here are 'things which must shortly come to pass.' . . . Even when John bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw, the long period within which those successive scenes were to be realized was at hand. The first in the connected series was on the eve of accomplishment. If proximity then constituted a motive for heeding these contents, how much more does it now! Every revolving century, every closing year, adds to the urgency with which attention is challenged to the concluding portion of the Holy Writ. And does not that intensity of devotion to the present, which characterizes our times and our country, enhance the reasonableness of this claim? Never, surely, was there a period when some mighty counteracting power was more needed.

The Revelation of Jesus Christ duly studied supplies an appropriate corrective influence.

Would that all Christians might in fullest measure receive the blessing of 'them that hear the words of this prophecy and that keep the things which are written therein; for the time is at hand.' " [1]  ([1] Augustus C. Thompson, Morning Hours in Patmos, pp. 28, 29.)

The Dedication.--Following the blessing, we have the dedication in these words:

Verse 4 John to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace be unto you, and peace, from Him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven Spirits which are before His throne; 5 and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, 6 And hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

The Churches in Asia.--

There were more churches in Asia than seven.

We may confine ourselves to that western fraction of Asia known as Asia Minor, or we may include still less territory than that. Even in that small part of Asia Minor where the seven churches were located, and right in their very

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midst, there were other important churches. Colosse, to the Christians of which place Paul addressed his epistle to the Colossians, was but a short distance from Laodicea. Miletus was nearer than any of the seven to Patmos, where John had his vision. Furthermore, it was an important center of Christianity, as we may judge from the fact that during one of his stays there Paul sent for the elders of the church of Ephesus to meet him at that place (Acts 20: 17-38.) At the same place he also left in good Christian hands, his disciple Trophimus, sick. (2 Timothy 4: 20.) Troas, where Paul spent a season with the disciples, and whence after waiting until the Sabbath was past he started upon his journey, was not far removed from Pergamos, named among the seven.

It becomes therefore an interesting question to determine why seven of the churches of Asia Minor were selected as the ones to which the Revelation should be dedicated.

Does the salutation to the seven churches in Revelation 1, and the admonitions to them in Revelation 2 and 3, have reference solely to the seven literal churches names?

Are things described only as they then existed, and portrayed as they were to come to them alone? We CANNOT so conclude, for good and substantial reasons:

The ENTIRE book of Revelation was dedicated to the seven churches. (See Revelation 1: 3, 11, 19; 22: 18, 19.)

The book was no more applicable to them than to other Christians in Asia Minor--those, for instance, who dwelt in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, and Bithynia, who were addressed in Peter's epistle (1 Peter 1: 1); or the Christians of Colosse, Troas, and Miletus, in the very midst of the churches named.

Only a small part of the book could have individually concerned the seven churches, or any of the Christians of John's day, for most of the events it brings to view were so far in the future as to lie far beyond the lifetime of the generation then living, or even the time during which those churches would continue. Consequently those churches could have not direct connect with them."

******* (My notes-)

We are BLESSED if we read, we are BLESSED if we hear this Book of Revelation.  Let me ask you for a moment, can you have someone read something to you, or even read something yourself without truly hearing it? The answer is yes for us all. I'm sure there have been times when you've had to read something several times before you COMPREHENDED what you were reading- before you truly heard what was being said. There have to have been times when you've had someone repeat what they've read to you because you didn't quite get what they were saying.  And answer me this, please, what good is it to read without comprehension?  It's a waste of time, isn't it, to read without comprehension?  I have to amend that, there are situations where sickly people or troubled people enjoy being read to even if they aren't understanding what's being read because they want to hear the sound of another human being, and this is perfectly acceptable. And children, often we read to very young children who have no comprehension of what we are saying, and we do this because it begins to educate them to reading.  So, yes, there are exceptions to the idea that it's senseless to read without comprehension.  However, we are blessed if we read and blessed if we hear.  Reading and hearing both receive blessings.

The question was asked by the author of the above, 'Is there so direct and formal a blessing pronounced upon the reading and observance of any other part of the word of God?'  Is there? No, there is not.

Further on we read about the importance of the this book to each time in history and even more important as more and more time passes.

There is a COUNTDOWN. 

People want to say that's silly. I just read today some of the ridicule from people over people who even dare to believe in  God, let alone believe there will be an end to life as we know it, an end to this world as we know it.  People will deride those who believe, they will call them fools of the worst sort. 

The truth is, there is a COUNTDOWN, and we do NOT know what exact time it is, but we are given SIGNS, lots of signs.  We know each day that passes the clock has counted down further. 

Prophecies given hundreds, thousands of years prior to their fulfillment tell us LOGICALLY that all the rest of the prophecies given WILL come to pass.  We can doubt all we want but this is truth!

Being prepared for the end, for that clock to run down, is something people that are God's will have to be.

These seven churches are wrapped up in prophecy that will extend to those living in the VERY last days of the countdown.  This is truth and this is what we are studying, praying for a blessing, for comprehension, for truth, for readiness as God would have us.

More tomorrow all by the WILL of GOD!

Thank You, Lord, thank You for all Your wonderful blessings on this Sabbath evening! Keep us forever in YOUR love!

In the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord, our Savior! Now and FOREVER!

Amen.