The Bible Question is 'Who?'

We've been studying Revelation together for the past few weeks in Teen Sunday school. Last weekend we covered chapter 4, sort of leaving port and pushing off into the great unknown of the main body of the book. The stuff that i think my teens were thinking of when they asked to study this book, the many headed beasts, the woman clothed with the sun, the dead prophets in the street.

Something in us, and i think it's a good thing, wants to spend time puzzling these things out doesn't it? Something wants to tie down once and for all who the 144,000 are and whether the millennium is a literal thousand years, and what exactly happens during that time anyway. I'm no different. I was reading A Fire Kindled From Heaven again this weekend, and found myself wondering why i think the Puritan's have the Song right but Revelation wrong. It's ok to mix and match from history though isn't it. I don't even agree with Piper on everything (that's what i tell people anyway!)

I guess there are two equal and opposite errors we can make reading Revelation. We can either take it too literally, or not literally enough. If we make the first error we end up reading Revelation like Acts, trying to ascribe meaning to every detail, and missing the big picture. If we make the second, we forget that John really did see these things, and they really do have something concrete to tell us, and we end up missing the big picture.

And what's the big picture? Wrong question, who is the big picture? Jesus. Who is always the Bible question. Who does Abel tell us about? Or Joseph? Or Ahasuerus? It is the Revelation of Jesus Christ. It's not a text book for the end of the world.

This is clear in chapter 4. When you read it, the word throne stands out above anything else. So you can get caught up in the colours of His appearance, or who four things the living creatures signify. Or you can get your eyes on the throne, and bask, and join in with the worship of the creatures and elders. We can look around us and be discouraged whether in the first century or the twenty first, or we can look to the throne and see Jesus. See Jesus who holds everything in the palm of His hand. See Jesus who rules for His people.

This is the big picture isn't it? Not only of Revelation, but of the whole Bible. The question is who, not what. Who sits on the throne? Who is worthy of worship? Who is your beloved? Who is this man who commands the wind and the sea.

Jesus. He is the big picture, He is the answer to the puzzle, He is the key to the lock, He is the highest point of any superlative you care to name. And He is the point of Revelation. Let's get our eyes on Him.