Last Saturday the #CY365 photo prompt was “Currently Reading.”
Two of the books I’m reading are the Bible book of Revelation along with Discipleship on the Edge by Darrell Johnson—a book about Revelation (which two of our pastors are teaching a class of seniors and others on Tuesday afternoons).
The teaching sessions and the book are fascinating. We’ve learned about apocalyptic literature as a genre. (Revelation is an apocalypse—written large with symbols and hidden meanings in order to encourage the Christian churches of that time with a message disguised by images they, but not necessarily their persecutors, would have understood.)
We’ve been given insights into the meanings of numbers and symbols with special emphasis put on how would the people of John’s time may have understood the book.
A refrain that Johnson keeps repeating throughout is “Things are not as they seem.”
Revelation
A letter to lamp stands,
a throne room, a crowd
worship continuous
passionate, loud.
Creatures mysterious,
seals that won’t break.
Apocalypse visions
for Church’s sake.
Dragons and angels
that prostrate themselves,
sevens and forties
hundreds and twelves.
Horsemen and plagues
that fill mankind with terror,
signs from the heavens
that change Earth forever.
Martyrdom, bloodshed
pursue the Lamb’s team
but do not despair—
Things are not as they seem.
© 2018 by Violet Nesdoly (All rights reserved)
(If you’re interested, audio sessions of these classes are online, under the heading “Behind the Curtain: A Study In the Book of Revelation” – bottom of THIS page.)
