Last Wednesday, I taught on Revelation 4. One of the aspects of Rev. 4-5 is the presence of the 24 elders in the heavenly throne room (Rev. 4:4). I argued last Wednesday in Bible that the 24 elders are (or at least symbolic of) the 12 patriarchs (sons of Jacob) and the 12 apostles. The purpose of the 24 elders is to show the unity of the people of God across the testaments and that the people of Israel and the church now form one people of God who will worship God for all time.
One possible objection to this interpretation is actually John himself. John is present in the throne room separate from the 24 elders and witnessing the 24 elders bowing down and worshiping God. This poses a problem: if 12 of the elders are the 12 apostles, then wouldn’t John be one of the elders himself? Why would he be viewing the throne room scene instead being in the throne room scene if 12 of the elders are apostles?
This is a valid objection but one that can be easily answered. John’s presence in throne room separate from the elders does not pose a problem because there are 13 apostles in the NT . The twelve as listed in the Gospels (Mt. 10:1-3) become 11 at the end of the Gospels with the betrayal of Judas Iscariot. At the beginning of Acts, one of the first actions of the NT church is replace Judas (Acts 1:12-26). However, there is still another apostle added to their number: Paul (Gal. 1:1, Eph. 1:1).
This helps to clarify what is happening in the throne room scene. John, the last living apostle, sees the 12 apostles who have died and gone on to be with Christ. The 12th apostle is Paul . Paul’s presence is fitting due to his missionary efforts and writing of Scripture. Paul’s presence among the elders actually reinforces the unity of the church because Paul was a Jewish believer who evangelized Gentile peoples.
A myth about Jesus that needs to die is the myth of “nice guy Jesus”. Essentially, “nice guy Jesus” is your good neighbor from across the street. He’s there to help change a tire on your vehicle. He’s there to help with the cookout. He looks the other way when you yell at your wife. He looks the other way when he sees you drinking a little too much. He’s there when you need him, and he minds his own business when you don’t need him (or don’t want him around). The problem with “nice guy Jesus” is that it does not square with the Bible. And no book puts the myth of “nice guy Jesus” to death like Revelation.
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The letters in Rev. 2-3 are full of God’s grace to His church, and one aspect of that grace is Christ’s rebuke of the churches. Five of the seven churches are commanded to repent; four are commanded directly to repent (Ephesus, Pergamum, Sardis, Laodicea) and one is commanded indirectly (Thyatira). Only two of the churches are commanded not to repent (Smyrna and Philadelphia). These churches are rebuked for their various failings, whether it be tolerating a false teacher (Rev. 2:14), or immoral behavior (Rev. 2:20-21). The graciousness of those rebukes are shown near the end of the letter to Laodicea in Rev. 3:14-22. Christ says: “Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline”. “Nice guy Jesus” does not reprove. “Nice guy Jesus” does not discipline. Biblical Jesus does.
The reason is that “nice guy Jesus” does not reprove or discipline is that “nice guy Jesus” does not love you. He does not say anything about your sin because he does not love you. He does not say anything about the idols of your heart because he does not love you. This explains why people love the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. The Beatitudes are beautiful truth that warms the heart; the Beatitudes are exactly the words which followers of “nice guy Jesus” want to hear. But people will rarely venture into the rest of the Sermon on the Mount because they want to keep “nice guy Jesus” intact. They do not want to hear Jesus confront the sins of lust, worry, divorce. They do not want the Jesus who commands radical separation from sin with such radical language as cutting off your right hand (Mt. 5:27-30) or Christ not knowing them at the last day (Mt. 7:21-23).
But the beauty of of Rev. 3:19 is that Jesus loves those whom he reproves and discipline. This applies to us in two ways:
Personally, listen and expect Scripture to rebuke you. You should be worried when you read Scripture and are not rebuked. As every junior high coach in America tells their team at the beginning of the season: “You shouldn’t be worried when I am yelling at you. You should be worried when I stop yelling at you!” If the coach stops yelling, stops correcting, this means the coach has given up on helping the player to improve. Being rebuked in our thinking, rebuked for our speech, rebuked for our misconceptions are things which we should expect when we read Scripture. We are sinful people and this sin runs all the way down. We sin in how we act, how we speak, and how we think. We should expect then the Spirit to speak through His Word because we are sinners, and we should expect the Spirit to be correcting us because we are sinners. When we stop expecting to the Spirit correct us, this is when we should be worried.
Corporately, churches that take seriously God’s Word, read God’s Word, and apply God’s Word will be rebuked by God’s Word. Churches are not perfect institutions just because they are churches. The letters in Revelation dispel this notion. There were churches without love (Rev. 2:1-7), without zeal (Rev. 3:14-22), without a spine (Rev. 3:1:6), but they were still churches. And Christ rebuked and corrected those churches. Today, when a local church reads the Word, the elders and the congregation should expect to find areas in which their church is unfaithful and seek to become faithful by obeying the Word which brought the rebuke. They should obey because God’s grace in the rebuke revealed to the church an area in which they were unfaithful. But that grace can be trampled and spat upon when a church, having heard the rebuke from God’s Word, refuses to obey God’s Word. This is a church which will have its lampstand removed because they are unrepentant.
Obedience rarely comes down to whether someone knew that they ought to do this or that; most times they know what they ought to do. Obedience comes do to whether someone will do this or that. And let us be Christians and churches who hear the gracious rebuke of our Lord and seek to obey His Word.
Ancient Words 