The whole vision of the Book Of Revelation was surrounded by existing events already in a state of development, and it was written in code as a warning to the churches living in that period, endangered by these conditions and facing the perils of persecution therein delineated. If Revelation is “a book of future prophecy,” then we are in a regime of prophecy still, and living in an age of prophecy. But the Lord declared in Luke 16:16 that “the law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it.” The phrase “until John” here does not mean until John appeared, but until John’s order ended. At the house of Cornelius, in Acts 10:37, Peter used the phrase “after the baptism which John preached.” Jesus said “until” John, and Peter said “after” John. Obviously after John meant after the cross; and until John meant until the cross. Jesus did not say that the law was until the cross--he said the law and. And what? The law and the prophets were until the cross--which means that prophecy ended exactly when and where the law ended. The word “until” expresses the point of termination. Paul states in Heb. 9 :10, that the ordinances of the law were imposed until the new covenant --the point of termination. So both law and prophecy were terminated by the cross of Christ and “since that time the kingdom of God is preached” and all men “press into it” under the Great Commission, the preaching of it. In reference to this same point, Jesus declared in Matt. 5:17, that he did not come to destroy the law or the prophets but to fulfill them. And in Heb. 1 :l-2 the apostle affirmed that Christ is the heir of all things spoken by the prophets. The phrase all things in verse 2 must have an antecedent--Christ is the heir of what “all things”? The antecedent is in verse 1. In the former dispensation God spake unto the patriarchs by his prophets, the agents of divine revelation. In so doing he employed many methods and revealed his will in various parts. But “in these last days!"--the gospel dispensation--he speaks unto us by the Son whom he appointed to be the heir of all things spoken by the prophets. Jesus Christ became the heir of the “all things” spoken by the prophets in that he is the fulfillment of these “all things.” In Eph. 1:10-11 the same apostle uses the same phrase “all things” in reference to the old and the new dispensations, saying: “That in the dis- pensation of the fulness of time he might gather together in one all things in Christ .. . according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his will.” The telescopes of the prophets were all focused on Jesus Christ; and the types of the old dispensation all pointed to Him who became “the heir of all things” thus spoken. Like other students the author has in the past attempted to tread the tangled maze of “the future prophecy” theory of Revelation from A. D. 96 through the “dark ages” to the end of time--and like all the others who did so, he bogged down in the meshes of the wildernesses! Such an effort is as traditional as the Catholic calendar of popes from the apostle Peter in A.D. 33 to pope Paul VI of 1963-- and is as erroneous as the Baptist claim of the chain of succession back to John on the banks of the Jordan--the links fall out. The historians use the word anachronism--meaning an error in the order of time. Taking an event out of the period to which it belongs and assigning it to a wrong period of time is an anachronism. The multiple theories asserting that Revelation is a book of future prophecy are anachronistic. The internal arguments--the contents of the book itself--are preponderantly negative to the future fulfillment theories, as many of the best scholars have admitted. After many years of intensive study it is the calculated conclusion of the author that the symbols of Revelation were fulfilled in the experience of the early church ; that it bears a pre-destruction of Jerusalem date; and that it is prophetic only in the sense of an apocalyptic description of the struggle of the early church with the Jewish and Roman persecutors, and the spectacular and phenomenal victory over the pagan persecuting powers. To accept this sensible application of the apocalypse is to walk in the light; to reject it and follow the future theoriza- tion is but to wander in the dark--in the maze of the medieval centuries--in search of some historical counterpart for symbols that were fulfilled in the corresponding events of the century of the apocalyptic disclosure. This “dark ages” network of prophetic bewilderment has so trammelled the Book Of Revelation, and made it to bristle with so many difficulties, that most readers and students of all other books of the New Testament shrink from any effort to understand and apply the symbolic language of the apocalypse, in the vague dread of the fearful future events of a wholesale onslaught of reckless fury to be launched against the church, either to overwhelm us in our day or to overtake our children in another day. So they stop reading the New Testament at the end of Jude. All who have followed these prophetic meanderings have been misled into theological back alleys. The relation of the contents of Revelation to the persecution of the church is undeniable, and there is no reason to look beyond the period of these persecutions for their fulfillment. The sym- bolism of the book offers no reason for future vagaries. Its code language has an obvious purpose--the same pur- pose the military has in communicating messages in code to its personnel in order to withhold the information from the public. If John had written Revelation in plain literal language it would have precipitated a premature onslaught against the church which would have obliterated it from the Roman empire and wiped it off the face of the earth. It was therefore communicated in code for the information of the churches facing this era of persecution, and there were the spiritually-gifted teachers in every early church able to decode its message to the members. The Seer of Revelation speaks to his own time, which was, indeed, the time of crisis which the book envisions. The efforts to map an incalculable future, and attempt to force history to conform to it is a strange and curious method of exegesis. With the foregoing deliberations in mind, the parallelism existing between the visions of the prophets in the Old Testament and the visions of John in Revelation will en- hance the study preparatory to an exegesis of the book itself. The visions contained in the Old Testament books pre- sented in apocalyptic form the fortunes of God's people Israel--the exile and the dominion of the wicked lords, and in short the cause of the Old. Testament church, the people of God, in conflict with the existing heathen powers. The apocalypse of John in Revelation similarly portrays the struggle and triumph of the early Christians--the New Testament church--in conflict with the existing Jewish and Roman persecuting powers in the period of their persecu- tions. All forms of apocalypse ended with the age of inspiration; there have been no revelations since, and there are no visions or apocalypses or prophecies of divine source today. For every phase, feature and symbol of the visions of Revelation, there is a parallel in the Old Testament apocalypses. They are related in both character and de- scription to the visions of John on the isle of Patmos. The classification and structure of the Old Testament books are essential to the application of the similar portions of the New Testament, such as the discourse of Jesus on the Mount Olivet, recorded in Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21, bearing on the siege and destruction of Jerusalem--and with these the Book Of Revelation. The apocalypse of John is the climax, consummation and crown of all biblical vision. The symbolic and typical system of the old dispensation, with its altars, visions and apocalypses, pointed to fulfill- ment in Christ and the church. The blood stream of the Old Testament began its flow from Abel’s altar and it did not cease until it was mingled with the crimson flow of the blood of Jesus Christ from the cross of Calvary. There are multiple passages in the New Testament gathered around the fact that the types and symbols and prophecies all pointed to Christ and were thus fulfilled. That is why Heb. 1:1-2 declares that God appointed him to be the heir of the all things spoken by the prophets ; and it is why Paul in Eph. 1 :lO-11 stated that in this dispensa- tion God has gathered together in one all things in Christ ; and it is why in Rom. 8 :27-29 the apostle shows that the all things of God’s plan work together for the good, or the redemption, of all men who are called according to his purpose in the redemptive plan; and it is why in II Pet. 1:19 that Christ was proclaimed the day star of all prophecy; and that is why Malachi, the last prophet of the Old Testament, in chapter 4, when seeking a figure of speech to adequately portray the grandeur of the One to come, selected the flaming orb of the day, and declared that the coming Christ should be the Sun Of Righteousness "with healing in his wings.” What the sun of the solar system is to the universe, Jesus Christ, the Sun Of Righteousness,would be to the darkened world of humanity in sin. In fulfillment of the prophecies He came ; the Sun Of Right- eousness had arisen, and it cast the beams of splendor across the crest of Calvary, glimmering and glistening in the blood of the crucified Son of God, who thus became “the heir of all things” spoken by the prophets. “And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me. Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures.” (Lk. 24:44-45) “And when they had ful- filled all that was written of him, they took him down from the tree.” (Acts 13:29) Jesus Christ is the heir of all things spoken by the prophets. -FE Wallace |