Why Should We Study Revelation? Pt. 1

The questions we wrestle with as Christians about who God is, how do

we live out our faith, what is the Bible, what is the truth of the

Bible, what are we supposed to believe? How are we supposed to live? There

are really big, deep questions that we ask each

other, that we ask God, that we wrestle with ourselves.

And that's why the Cultivate podcast exists, to help us go deeper in

our understanding of who God is, his word and the way that

he's called us to live. Hey,

everyone. Thank you for joining us, the cultivate podcast.

I am Charlie lead pastor at the Grove Church and we have

with us Abigail Boone. What's

up? Expert producer. Hey. Queen of asking

questions. Indeed. The queen of curiosity

and thoughtfulness and just deep questions. Thank you. So you

always always know that it's gonna be a good episode It's

curiosity. When you're sitting right there. Digs deep. No. No. I mean, I'm not no.

That's no shot at Mark. So I just I just know it's gonna be a

good episode because you're here. How are you doing? I'm I'm great. I'm glad to

be here. Good. Good. So as

you know and you know maybe that we have been

covering a lot of different topics over the course of the last

several weeks and kind of birthed out of a summer

seminar class that we did where we had different speakers come

in. Also known as SummerSlam. Hey, yo. That's

right. That's what I like. You like you prefer SummerSlam?

This sounds like we're doing, like, WrestleMania. If I called it SummerSlam, would

you have made a wrestling logo for it? Absolutely. Yes.

Put that down for next year. Put that in your Monday book or whatever it

is you've done. And so I was

out of town for a couple of them, and I spoke at a couple of

them. You you make the most of them, all of them? Yes. Okay. Other

than the one about how to read the Bible or, like, tips on that, but

all the rest of them, they're awesome. Yeah. It it was a really it was

a really cool really cool deal. And so if I was the

speaker, you've been interviewing me and other speakers, I interviewed

them to kinda just get some of that information out. And so the last

topic that we did was? Revelation. Revelation.

You said it singular. I did. I did that yesterday. What's

that? Wednesday. Wednesday. Wednesday.

Just one revelation. One revel just one long revelation. Right.

Right. Not a series of revelations. Unlike the Psalms

Right. Which are a collection of Psalms. Mhmm. And But each

individual chapter is a Psalm. Is a Psalm. Right.

And these are the acts, plural, of Of the apostles. Of

the apostles. Not the one act. But one revelation

of John. Right. Yes. Okay. John. John. Yep.

Oh, we're already learning something. No. Is it the John? The

John. Well, there's 3 Johns. 1st and second and third John.

Is it that guy? That's three letters, but by the same John.

1st John, 2nd John, 3rd John is not a reference to the

John, but the Oh. The the letter

itself. Okay. The first letter of John, the second letter of John is

3rd John's 3rd letter, 1st John, 3rd John. Okay. But All the same

guy. Can you imagine? But what's your name to the John? I'm 3rd

John. He must say come in late. Just one John,

one John who wrote the gospel of John, one John who wrote those three

letters, and one John that wrote the book of Revelation,

singular. Okay. Same same guy, the apostle alive.

The apostle, also referred to by himself

in the gospel of John as the disciple that Jesus loved. That's

Which that's that's something else. I'm gonna start saying

that I am the staff member that Charlie loves. No. I love

it. I love it. I love it. Test that out at staff meeting, and let

me know how let me know how that goes. Mhmm.

Yeah. So the questions about

the book of Revelation and do you remember specifically what the what

the big picture question was? Why should we

study it? Yeah. Bingo. Something like that. I'm

good. Right? And so I remember the in

the series that we did with Mark that,

his question was, how do I interact with people of other religions? Right. And

then he just didn't answer it. And it took us 4 I feel like it

took us 4 episodes. To kind of kinda get a

tryna get an answer. So are you gonna answer?

Well, you're the asking the questions. I'm trying to transition to you to ask us.

So I'll answer whatever question you I'll answer whatever question you ask.

Okay. And so we'll nail down why should you send this

book. Okay. Alright. And so the thing that

I said then, which I'll say now because it's in the Bible? Yeah. I mean,

at at its simplest, we could have a 5 second answer to that question,

which is I mean, it's it's in there. Right. I mean

Yeah. So there's that.

But I'm guessing that most people mean something different than that. Have

you ever asked that question? Ever read have you ever read or studied

Revelation? I think I started

it once k. And I didn't make it all all the way

through because it kind of reminded me of Hebrews.

Okay. This is just, like, kinda going over my head I'm not I'm not tracking

what you there are way too many metaphors and illustrations here. Yes. Yes. I

don't know who Melchizedek is in Hebrews, and I don't know what this dragon is

about here in Revelation. And I don't know what this is about my personality, but

it was like, you know what? That's happening in the future. May not be there.

Right. And I think that is kind of part of the heart behind the

question. Mhmm. I read this, and I'm just confused.

Mhmm. It doesn't seem to be teaching me anything about the

way that I should live life. And I think for most of us, that

is the practical real reason why we study the

Bible. Mhmm. I like I you know, what kind

of person should I be? Right. What application can I Yeah? Or

work from this. What is this going to tell me about who God is? Like,

so I want it to lead me to some sort of worship or deeper

knowledge of God, or I want it to

help me understand how to be a better person, how to

live more the live the Christian life in a better way.

This doesn't seem to be doing Right. Either of those things.

It's not a it's not a it's not a story where I'm just, oh, it's

a really interesting story. It doesn't feel like that either.

Right. Feels really weird, metaphorical,

futuristic, a little bit scary, a lot hard

to understand. Mhmm. So hard pass. Right. Yeah.

Is that is that kind of is that kind of how you feel about it?

Oh, definitely. Because I definitely put I don't know if this would

apply to the whole entire Bible, but I've heard before that

you can ask is this prescriptive or descriptive

about different texts in the Bible. And I feel like I get to that. And

it's like, this is just a really crazy story. Right. And I don't know

what category to put any of those in. Right.

And so, yeah, it's definitely just, kinda seems like a

curve ball that you get to at the very end of the bible, and it's

like, well, I read the rest. So this

particular genre in the Bible is referred to as

apocalyptic Mhmm. Literature.

And Revelation is the only book that pretty much in its entirety

is apocalyptic, but there are some sections of Matthew

Okay. Where Jesus talks like this. And there's some

significant portions of the book of Daniel that are like this Okay.

That would be considered they have apocalyptic sections to them, where there's just

a lot of talk about what the end of the world

is going to be like. Okay. So it means literally what I'm thinking. Yeah. Like,

the apocalypse. Yes. End of the world. The world.

Yes. And so apocalyptic literature

It's a hard word to say. Apocalyptic. Apocalyptic. Yeah. You just wanna make

sure, you know especially for a southerner who is not

accustomed to pronouncing all of the consonants

within a word. Right. Yeah. Apocalyptic. Apocalyptic.

Okay. Get rid of the a. It's apocalyptic literature.

Yeah. Exactly. But if you're gonna say it, you gotta make sure you get all

the all the word apocalyptic literature.

Yeah. So it has it has this, you know,

descriptive, prophetic nature about what the end of the world is going to

be like. So Revelation is a lot of it, but it's not the only place.

Again, Matthew and Daniel both have some of that. And so if it was

important enough for Jesus to talk about while he was

here Mhmm. If it was then important enough to

give John this kind of prophetic revelation to where he

saw all this and tried to describe it and you know, as

writing it down a revelation, it seems like it does have it has a bit

of bit of weight to it. Okay. I don't think I've ever heard it described

as prophetic. I kinda put that in the category of the old

testament. But what does the word prophetic mean?

It's announcing something that's coming? Okay.

That makes sense. I just never put that in the New Testament. Right. Well, I

mean so, yes, that's what apocalyptic would be is if we believe

that it is true, it is a prophetic description Mhmm. Of what the end of

the world is going to be like. Okay. And for some and for and for

reasons, you know, obviously, Jesus thought it was important.

God thought it was important to mention some in the old testament.

Jesus was here to do this thing with John,

and I think it is the thing that, and this may be something you don't

connect with, but I think it is a thing that a lot of people feel

a lot of anxiety about. Right. Like, how how how does all

of this end? I mean, the 2 big, you know, you know,

the the 3 big questions I really feel like that people

ask just big picture about life, where did we come

from? Mhmm. What is life supposed to be about? And how does it end?

Yeah. Do you feel like you hear anxiety

because it's confusing or because it sounds scary?

Or both. So let's just imagine a world where

Jesus is around, and their book of Revelation doesn't exist

yet, and Jesus

is talking to he's he's bringing it up willingly.

Right. The people aren't coming up to him being like, so How's the

world gonna end? Tell us about the apocalypse. What's that all about?

Right. That seems kinda big. He is willingly choosing

to bring this up. And so if you think about the crowd

that he's talking to, you're, by and large, you're talking to

a hopeless group of people. Right. Poor,

disenfranchised, no power, no real

hope in this world. And I think there is a

desire on Jesus' part to kind of cast hope

Mhmm. That even though this world may be bad,

and it and it may feel like it's only getting worse. And that's what a

lot of the descriptors of it are, for good or for bad. A lot of

the descriptors are, you may think the world is bad, but you understand

that is that is true. And it's and it's

and it's only gonna get worse. Right. But I

think even in that, there's a bit of hope in

that as you see the world getting worse,

take heart, take a little courage because

God God knew this. This isn't happening outside of God's control.

God's not up in heaven spinning around in a circle believing going

shoot. Oh, man. Someone what happened? What would happen to think this is right? I

mean, this That would be the true scariness, I feel like. Right. And so and

so for Jesus to say, this is coming. We know that

it's coming. God has his hands on it.

You can take some you can take some hope in that. It's still

not like, oh, I mean, I know for sure something bad's gonna

happen. I feel some comfort from that. That sounds weird. But

to know that God is aware and is

kind of guarding and protecting his people in that time, that you can take

some comfort. If I'm if if a bad thing is definitely come

coming, I can take some comfort in knowing that God is in it.

Right. And so I think that is a part of it. And then, also,

as the more you describe that the world is temporary

and is ultimately going to end, the

more hope points towards but there is a

there is another place that God is preparing. Right. But that seems

like the ultimate hope that Right. I don't know that,

atheist or maybe every worldview assumes that the world is

going to end. I don't know if there's a worldview that thinks we're just gonna

continue forever. Yeah. I I But it is a hope that

this is bad, but there is something else. Right. Yeah. So I've I've

I I trust that God is in the in the calamity that is to

come, and I trust that God has a

a a better future for me. Yeah. And so

you put a a small, even if it's a vague road

map together, then I can know what to expect. And then

as those things start to happen, I can be I I can even have more

confidence that that God is in control. Oh,

this is unfolding just the way Jesus said that it would, and I can take

a measure of comfort in that. You know, sometimes when people

experience things and they're like, that's just like what it says in

the Bible, and they start to panic about it. And I'm, like, isn't that the

opposite reaction we're supposed to have? Like, all that terrible thing happened,

it was predicted in Revelation.

God God got proven right again, which is good. Mhmm. And

this is unfolding the way that he said. And so I can actually

trust. I can trust not only in god, but I can also trust in

the road map Because I think the panic that some people

feel as things start to feel more apocalyptic,

the opposite of that is what we're supposed to. Right. God God's God's

got this. He saw this coming. He told me to expect it.

And now that it's happened, I'm like, I don't like it, but I trust

God. And I think there's also a sense too this is

something that Jesus said, hey. There's gonna be people

that are gonna say that they're me come back again.

And there's gonna be people that, hey. The hey. Messiah is over there. The Christ

is over there. It's like, when they say that, don't listen. Right. Paul says the

same sorts of things. He's like, you've heard about antichrist, that antichrist

is coming. Actually, a lot of antichrists are coming. Like, but but, hey. But

this, some of you are afraid that the day of the lord has come and

you missed it. Some of you don't even know what the day of the lord

is, and so Paul's just kinda like, listen. Here's here are kind

of the the things that you can know, and I say this. That's what

Jesus says, what Paul says. I'm saying all this so you don't get deceived.

Right. Because I think one of the things that I feel like a lot of

people who try to play gotcha with Christians will

say, you know, Jesus was a a a poor guy,

lived in the Middle East, and, you know, was rejected by

the power structures of the times. Like, man, if Jesus came back today, Christians

wouldn't even recognize him. And, like, and I okay.

Point taken point taken that a lot of the church is

hostile towards people from that part of the world Mhmm. And can be

and and not be as caring and compassionate towards poor and

people who are experiencing homelessness. We can be like so

I that that point is taken. The point that I do not

take is that Jesus is gonna get born as a baby

again, and we've gotta work really hard to make sure we recognize him.

Right. Plus he made it very clear. Hey. Hey.

I'm going to return in the way that I leave, which was

kind of this big moment, which he was kind of carried into

the into the sky. You won't be able to. And he also said that and

when it happens, it will be a worldwide event. Right.

And so he doesn't want us to get There's not gonna

be like, you missed it. Right. Yeah. Like,

well, some that person says they're Jesus. Are they? If you don't don't

they said there's gonna be a lot of people that are claiming that. It's gonna

be undeniable. You're not gonna be like, okay. Well, that's a lot of angels

in the sky, and that was really loud, and it's kinda scary.

And everybody all over the world is seeing all of this all at once.

Mhmm. Well, and it's also

if we look at the rest of the Bible, God's not typically a God of

confusion. Right. He's I mean, maybe there's

some mystery. I mean, that's in the Yeah. That can be Confusion and

mystery of different things. Yeah. But, yeah, he's not gonna

intentionally try and dupe us. He has yet to take that strategy, so

it'd be crazy if he took that strategy toward the end of the

world. And and and when people were confused

about whether or not he was the Christ, I mean, he sat down with the

scriptures. He's like, hey. You've kinda misunderstood the scriptures. He goes back and and

shows us. And so there are parts of revelation that I believe

that are unclear, that are difficult to understand. But

I think the things that are the most clear are when he comes

back, it's gonna be big. He oh, I gotta say, he is

coming back. Mhmm. When he does, it's gonna be big. And when he

does, that signals the beginning of the end. Yeah. Those are the

things that we're not we're not we're not we're not he's not coming back a

second time. He came once and is like, no. No. No. You don't understand. There's

gonna be 2. Right. He's not gonna come back a second time. He's like, no.

No. No. No. It's actually 3. Wait. No. No. No. No.

It's actually 4. Yeah. He said, when when I come back, it's

it's game over. Yeah. So before

we get too far down this this road, I kinda wanna zoom out

kind of to base factual level. So the book is

written by John. Yes. Who was he writing

to? What was is this something that, like, he

just, like, had a vision? Did he leave it to someone?

What was the intent of the book? Kinda give me that breakdown.

So John, the apostle. Mhmm. Right? Yeah. There were 12

disciples. Jesus called to help him. Simon, Peter, Andrew, James, his brother, John.

You know that do you know that song? I do not. Okay. I am. Probably

should. There's a song I know there's a there's a song where you learn the

books of the Bible and a song where you learn the 12 disciples. I did

learn the books of the Bible. I don't know the old testament one. Apparently, there's

an old testament song. I don't know that one. So as the apostle John,

like, we talked about also the author of the gospel of John, the three letters

of John. Brother was James. He was a

fisherman. The only one of the 12

apostles who died of natural causes.

Interesting. Okay. He, he was like, was it

persecuted or something? Executed. Okay. Yeah.

He was exiled. Okay. He was exiled.

And and while on that island where they exiled

him is when he had this revelation. And if you just,

like, send him to a random, like, empty island?

It it would it yeah. I mean, so it was kinda That sounds

awful. I I I would imagine. I we could look

into this more. I would imagine that this is probably more like what

Australia was for, for the British initially.

Okay. I think it was probably like a prison island. Okay. So I don't imagine

it was probably or something like that. That's what I'm

imagining in my mind. I'm talking about I'm talking about British history

and Australia being a prison colony, and you went Harry Potter. I

feel bad. I should've gone Harry Potter. Met Bellatrix and I

probably should've missed people there. I probably should've gone Harry

Potter too. And so if you

have a Bible that has red letters Mhmm. Right, so you go

to the gospels. Oh, I can know where Jesus is speaking. Then you go to

Revelation. A lot of people are surprised to see There's red letter there. That

a lot of it is red letter. Interesting. And so

it starts the first few chapters start with a

very specific prophetic word that

Jesus has for 7 different churches. Okay.

You know? And so tell tell tell the church in

Philippi this. Mhmm. And tell the

church here this. Tell the church here this. And and

each one of those things has a really interesting construct to it where

it starts with kind of an affirmation. Mhmm. Hey. You're doing really

well here. I'm proud of you, but you need to stop doing

this or be careful about this. And so it

starts it starts in what would probably feels

a lot more like one of the Old Testament prophetic books. Mhmm.

A word from God comes to John, give this word to this

particular group of people is the typical construct of

those most of the books of prophecy in the Old Testament.

And so the first few chapters start that way. Mhmm.

But then it moves from that to a more a a a

different sort of vision that John has.

Okay. And with the purpose of

I I I I I I want you to see this. I want

you to write it down. I want you to to describe it,

and with the idea then that we would have it and would then have

this basic knowledge. Okay. So it's meant to be it's not like

going to the Ninevites and tell these people. It was just Well, the first

the first part the first part of it was Okay. And the second part of

it was until the this thing that you're going to see and

experience, I need I want you to tell everyone that. Okay.

Which is the primary reason why it was included in the

Bible when they were making the decision about what of all of these different

letters and books and gospels and things, how are we gonna put

these in? It seems like it was its main purpose was to

be shared. Uh-huh. The reason why some people were like,

are we sure though? Like This goes about like, for real? Because it's

it's just so vastly different. Right. I mean, you've got

these two main genres in the Old Testament. You know,

gospel acts, if we count that as one thing, it's kind of a telling of

the story of Jesus 4 different ways. And then the follow-up, kind of

the sequel, here's what the apostles did after Jesus was gone.

And then you have all these instructive letters from Romans

all the way to Jude Mhmm. Written by, you know, handful of different

guys, written to a different groups of people. You know? But

yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's that's right. Let's let's make sure we understand the history of

Jesus, what the apostles were about, get some of their their

best, most clear, most important, you know,

instructive books. We're done. And

then We've also got this, though. Right. Right. That's kinda weird.

Yeah. But, like, but not but, like, read it though, like, this

is this is from John, the apostle. He says it is a

word directly from Jesus and a word directly from Jesus that

was meant to be shared. Mhmm. And so even back then, there was

some question about it. Right. Because there's no

other other than the prophets, there's no other in the New

Testament book that says this is directly from

Jesus. Well, yeah. I mean, like like like, word

for word directly from Jesus. Like, Paul was very clear he like, in

his letters that the the

the the substance of what he was teaching was from God.

Right. That it had it had got authority behind it.

Mhmm. But it wasn't the same as a prophetic word of

Right. There's nothing that Paul wrote that was gonna be in red

letters. Right. Unless he was quoting something from a gospel, which we'll get that

at least once. Yeah. So it the

this is different than that. There isn't any other,

like, just pure prophetic books like this

one. Yeah. And I think even then, at the time that

they're putting the the the the New Testament together,

even more so now, there was still a a really kinda

pragmatic let's let's put in things that are gonna

be prescriptive. There you go. Right?

Okay. Things that are things that are that are

that teach easily. Right. And except for those things describing

what those 7 churches should do, a lot of revelation is

not particular it's not easily teachable in the sense of, hey. Here,

we're gonna learn about this this third bowl judgment that is gonna hit during

this particular time of the tribulation. Therefore,

be a better husband. Right. It's it's not like that. It's just kinda

like You're just kind of gathering Oh, okay. A vision for something

that's gonna Right. Happen in the future. So

all of the the whole book is apocalyptic.

Right. Right. And so, it's all future focused,

but then it kind of makes me think of

not teaching or there is teaching in the gospels

and in the letters talking about not being anxious about what's to

come. Like, there's peace in knowing God and you're

good. So how does that kind of

match up? And I know John's intent probably wasn't anxiety,

but we're taught not to have anxiety. And then you're saying the biggest

response to the book is that people are like, oh,

no. Well, the book can't be held responsible for people having bad reactions

to it. Right. Right. Right. Right. You know, if if if Jesus

says this to John and then ultimately to us so that we will

be aware, and as we are aware, we

can trust that God is in control of it, that things are unfolding

the way that oh, in a way that God always knew that they

would. You should take some comfort in that. The fact that some

people look at future bad things coming

and have a a the inverse reaction to that, that's

not that's not that's not the book's fault. Yeah.

So do you think the main intent was to give hope?

Or it was to I think it was and I think it was probably written

to an audience that would be more inclined to draw

comfort from knowing that there was a plan behind Right.

Adversity as opposed to a much softer culture that

we have, which is we believe that we can

insurance policy and plan and build

and we can We can find our way out of it. We can we can

prevent Right. Catastrophes. Right. Right? That

that just extreme weather events that

have happened since the Earth, you know, for 1000 of

years. Right? Mhmm. I mean I mean, just like we we feel

like, well, eventually, we're gonna be able to build houses and buildings

and things that won't be able to be Right.

Affected by weather events. So, like, I mean, like, we're we're just

we we we believe we can control. Mhmm. And

so I think when you read and say the world is gonna spiral

out of people's control but God still has control, I think

there are a lot of people, Christians included, that will not draw

comfort from anything that's main objective is

you're gonna lose control. Right. Mhmm.

But the end, it's almost

like we've gotten into the habit of looking at the disaster

that's coming rather than the end result that's coming after that.

Right. Which is what you would take hope in. Right. Is that because I That

as things get bad, there is gonna be someone who's gonna be able to come

and clean it up Right. And take you to some place even better. Right. Because

then I mean, like, probably any kid would tell you there's

scary things that happen, but it's 10 times scarier when you look at their your

parent, and they're scared too. Right. But that's not the case.

Right. Jesus, he's got this under he's he's got this

he knows this is coming. And in addition to

knowing here hey. Here's how it's gonna play out,

But also and as you see that playing out rather than being scared, it's like,

oh, this is playing out the way that he said. And look, it in

the same book, it says that Jesus is gonna come and

he's gonna win. Right. The ending is not in doubt. And

so the fact that it seems like at during various points in

history, evil seems to be winning. Mhmm.

I don't have to fear that evil is going to ultimately win.

God is ultimately going to win. Mhmm. Don't don't allow

yourself to to be paralyzed by the fact that there will

be times when evil seems to be winning. Right. You're gonna

hear of wars and rumors of wars, and there's gonna be natural

disasters. And there's gonna be famine. And there's gonna be pestilence. And all these

things are going to happen. And and Jesus kinda describes that as kinda

like these are just kind of like like like like predictors.

They're like they're like the growing pains of what is actually going to

come. So don't don't be alarmed by it. Don't freak out about it.

What's coming on the other side of that is even gonna be more so. Don't

even freak out about that because on the on the other end of that is

the triumph of God, of good over evil,

of God over Satan. And so take take

heart, don't be surprised, and don't freak out.

Right. So in the Old Testament, when

there's prophetic about

Jesus coming, anything like that, their response was

almost just I don't know if extreme alertness was it,

but they were looking for the coming king.

And, like, there's I was reading the beginning of Luke, I

think, and there's someone mentioned at the beginning of the book that he was around

the temple for years and he wanted to see the Messiah.

That seems like, they were so excited about the prophetic word

that was coming. Is that a response that we should have? It's it's interesting that

you say that because I think that for the most part, a lot of the

prophetic writing in the Old Testament mostly had an

immediate application to it Sure. Mhmm. Of, like, hey hey. This is

about this thing is about to happen in the next couple of years,

and here's what I need you to do right now. Mhmm.

And it did have some more futuristic

prophecy to it predicting the coming of Jesus.

But I think, again, I think they lived so much in the moment, and I

we can't really judge them as a culture for this. They live so much in

the moment that they

a a lot of them weren't anticipating Mhmm. The coming of

Jesus. And those that were anticipating the

coming of the Christ, of coming of the Messiah, We're looking at

it through a very narrow lens of you're going to

overthrow this bad government right now for me.

Right. And so even still, they there was a very kind of

self focused, now focused view

that allowed them to miss the bigger

picture of what Jesus wanted to accomplish

while he was here. Mhmm. The same way right now, we we

we we can look at all the the things in the book

of Revelation, and we get we get distracted by,

well, that sounds like I'm gonna have to go through something bad. Right.

Right. And we're and we and we just have such we just can't get out

of our own tunnel vision of what is this

gonna mean for me. Mhmm. I don't well, I don't want these bad things to

happen. I don't want these bad things to happen to me. And so you'll

see, and I think we'll talk about this a little bit more as we kinda

get into some of the details of what Revelation says, is that

sometimes we have this response of, like, we feel like it is

our job as Christians to prevent some

of the things in Revelation from happening. It is our

job to protect ourselves and to make sure that something

like make sure, you know, antichrist doesn't get power.

Mhmm. I I mean, good luck. Right.

Right. God says the antichrist is gonna take power. Too. Yeah.

And you sitting around voting for who

you think isn't someone isn't the antichrist or or lamenting

against politicians who have non Christian values

is not gonna prevent something that that God has

said very surely will happen. Mhmm. I mean, there are

some things like the book of Jonah where he says, hey. Here's a prophetic message,

and what what happens depends on

your response to it. Mhmm. So

Jonah's message was, you know, repent or god's gonna

destroy the city. Mhmm. Well, they repented, so god didn't destroy the city. This

isn't repent or Armageddon's gonna happen. Right. It's gonna

hey. Guess what? Armageddon's gonna happen. Mhmm. And we're

again, we're so adverse to that. We spend some time trying to

prevent it rather than really having a

big picture theology of that includes suffering,

that includes a broken world, and can take hope

in even in the midst of suffering

and trials. Mhmm. And so I think for

people who only knew adversity, primary readers of

a lot of these apocalyptic things, who only knew adversity, only

knew persecution, only knew subjugation,

they would have taken it as hopeful. Mhmm. But if you think,

actually, I I really like it here. I kinda like my life. Right. I'm sure

it's bad in places, but I don't live in those places. Yeah. And sometimes

bad things happen here, but I've got plans to kind of overcome most of

that. So do you think we've lost sight of

how awesome eternity with God is gonna be?

I think we I think I think, yeah, I think we we we like what

we have here, and I think there's a deep fear of the unknown. Yeah.

Hey. Guess what, Abigail? For eternity,

you're gonna have to live someplace you've never

seen and do something you don't know what, and you're gonna have to

do it forever. Right. Like, I remember Heidi, my wife,

saying this to the guy who was doing some of our pre marriage counseling. She

was talking about anxiety about becoming a wife. Like, I'm

making a commitment to do something for the rest of my life that I've never

exactly what it is. That I've never done once in my I've never once been

a wife. Mhmm. And now I'm making a commitment that I'm gonna do it for

the rest of my life. I think there's a little bit of that to it.

Mhmm. I think I think there's a sense in which I

know what this is even though it is imperfect,

and I ignore the bad parts. I work really hard to make it only

good, and I convince myself that this is good.

So bad kinda freaks me out, and I'll take

this imperfect thing that I that I

know versus anything that I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. That makes

sense. So oh, I mean,

it makes me think of, I was in a history class in college

and they're talking about manifest destiny and all of the different ideas

of early America is very inspired by scripture,

all these things. And then one student was like, well, looks like

the Christians failed. You don't have, like, a government of

your own and all this stuff. And I was like, that's a really interesting point.

That's not what I ever thought our goal was, but

we could maybe get that kind of confusion of, like, we can do enough

to Well and and we'll talk about this. And this may be a good

stopping point for us then to kinda make the transition. Because there was for a

long period of time, which would have included

the the late 17 100, 18 100, where

a thought about what the book of Revelation meant was

things were going to be bad for a season, but we, in

fact, did have the ability

to Christianize the whole world. And then once we did

that job, Jesus would come back. Right. That all the bad things in

Revelation are gonna happen during this window, but we

can fix it. We are gonna make the world better. We are gonna make the

world completely and totally Christian. And then once we

have, as God's people, have conquered evil here, Jesus comes

back. Mhmm. So we can talk more about that because I think that that

really did kind of inform that. Yeah. And

we can talk about all the reasons why people don't believe that anymore because

the way the world unfolded in the early parts of 20th

century. Right. But that's that's a good stopping point because now now we're about to

get into it. So I think before we start talking about the the details of

that, it'd probably be good for us to do kind of the big picture overview

of kind of the major schools of thought. Yeah. So we'll do that next episode.

But let's answer that question. Okay. And let's, you

know, actually follow-up on our promise that I would get an answer out of you.

Of what? Someone walks up to you, and maybe

they've had experiences of anxiety with the book of Revelation, or

they just don't understand it. Why should I read it?

With all of what we've said in mind, why would you say it's worth their

time to sit down and read it? Well, I mean, I would say, I think

for the most part, I think I think you are. If you've got a limited

amount of time, I mean, I would I would I would encourage you to read

spend more time on the gospel of John and the book of Romans

and second Timothy and Galatians. I mean, there's lots of

books that I feel like are just better

as far as your ability to kind of as far as, like, what

I really want out of my devotional Mhmm. Reading

time with God. But I do think that it's important on some level for

us to have some general understanding of kind of the big picture story

of the Bible from Genesis to Genesis to Revelation. I mean, we don't

spend a whole lot of time talking about the

the the kings of the divided kingdom between

Israel and Judea post Solomon before the exile into

Babylon. And And even me saying that phrase, like, I don't even know what we

need to under we need to understand that. We need to understand

have an overview, big picture idea of the whole thing. And so part

of that is understanding how the story ends.

And at the same time, I think it's important for us to read and understand

that so that we aren't caught off guard, and I think it does

help us shake off an,

imperfect worldview that we have that this

world is great, and our job is to make it great as opposed

to really understanding that we live in a broken

fallen world, and our hope is not in this world but the next. Yeah.

But I would encourage you

to read it in a group, and I would encourage you to read

it with someone who has at least some sort of I

would encourage you to study it with a trusted person Yeah.

Because it is not easily understood. So we'll have a sign up

sheet to read it with Charlie. Stop. Most most people

most pee like, there are lots of parts of the Bible that I would encourage

people to read the parts that are most easily

understood on your own. Sure. But there are parts of the Bible that are significantly

more difficult to understand on your own. Mhmm. And so that's where

we'll spend most of our time on Sundays teaching from the books

that people can uneasily understand on their own because I want people to believe that

the Bible is user friendly, which it is. But there are some parts

of the Bible that are just significantly less user friendly. Right.

So it's important to understand it. It's great. Spend your time

mostly in your devotional reading, reading and studying the parts of the

Bible that you can most easily understand. Mhmm.

Some of these other ones, do it in a group with someone who's gonna help

you not get off the rails. Right. Yeah. That makes

sense. Yeah? Okay. Good answer. I don't want you to feel like I didn't answer

the question. If I feel like it's okay. Okay. And I'm sure we'll round that

out even more For sure. Next episode. For sure. For sure. Hazus, thanks for joining

us. If you have an interest in the book of Revelation, you're probably

just like you just like you it'll drool coming out. I can't I can't wait

for the next episode. We're gonna talk about all the things. I feel like most

of the time, I have a whiteboard. This is gonna be difficult in

podcast format. Stolen. Wow. But even still, like, I mean, well,

most of the people are listening to this rather than be be unfair.

But we will. We'll kind of talk about some of the the different theories about

what revelation is saying and which

ones are more in fashion versus other ones and why and kind of a little

bit of the history of it. And then we'll just, you know, we'll try to

we'll try to do a bit of a deep dive into some of this too.

So Yeah. I I love again, that's why I love the fact we got you

here. We don't really know a whole lot about it. I'd rather be

talking to somebody to fill in the gaps. So we can just kinda fill in

some of the gaps, make sure we fully understand this as best we can. So

thanks for joining us. Encourage you to keep coming back, to the next

episode. We're doing this for a couple more. Thanks for joining us. And as always,

Abigail, thank you. Good to be here.

Thank you for listening to the cultivate podcast. Our hope is that you are taking

steps to go deeper in your faith, that you are asking big questions, and you're

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