Shabbat shalom kol beit Yisra'el and Mishpachah, welcome back to the 23rd part of the series on the Book of Revelation. We are still in the Throne Room of Yahweh, the hub of the Universe, the highest dimension of the spirit world, the heavenly realm. We have been introduced to the 24 Elders and the 4 Living Creatures, Zoa or Seraphim, the driving power of the place essentially being round-the-clock worship, its chief characteristic being holiness, a set-apart place of purity where there is no sin of any kind. And so we ended chapter 4.

We now move into chapter 5 where the action begins - an extraordinary search for someone in heaven and on earth worthy enough to break the seals of an unopened scroll. Let's rejojn the narrative and read the first seven verses:

"1 And I saw in the right hand of Him who sat on the throne (kesay) a scroll (book) written inside and on the back (on both sides), sealed with seven seals. 2 Then I saw a strong (powerful) malak (angel) proclaiming (announcing) with a loud voice, 'Who is worthy to open the scroll and to loose its seals?' 3 And no one in heaven or on the earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll, or to look at it. 4 So I wept much, because no one was found worthy to open and read the scroll, or to look at it. 5 But one of the elders said to me, 'Do not weep. Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah (Gen.49:9-12), the Root of David (Is.11:1-10), has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose its seven seals.' 6 And I looked, and behold, in the midst of the throne and of the four living creatures (Zoa, Seraphim), and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as though it had been slain (Is.53:7-8), having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Ruachot haElohim (Spirits of God) sent out into all the earth. 7 Then He came and took the scroll out of the right hand of Him who sat on the throne" (Rev.5:1-7, NKJV).

Many wrong, if ingenious ideas, have been advanced by theologians and scriptorians trying to interpret what this 'scroll' or 'book' might represent. Some have said it represents the history of the 'Christian Church' even though the Messianic Community or 'Church' is not the subject of the Apocalypse at all. Another suggestion is that it represents "the Book of the B'rit (Covenant)" (Ex.24:7; 2 Ki.23:2,21; 2 Chr.34:30-31) or "the Book of the Torah (Law)" (Dt.31:26). The far-fetched reasoning behind this 'logic' is that this is a future covenant to do with the House of Israel because 'the New Covenant is in mercy' (Heb.10:16-17) while the Book of Revelation has to do with judgment, a line of reasoning which emerges from a failure to identity what or who Israel is in the New Covenant and a rejection therefore of the Torah for the Messianic Community (Church). Scripture already informs us what a sealed book signifies, namely, tribulation (Is.29:11; Dan.12:1.3).

Since the particulars of the end-time tribulation were not to be made known in Daniel's day, the details were "shut up" or "sealed" until "the time of the end" (Dan.12:8-9, KJV). Similarly, Daniel was ordered to seal up the details of another, earlier vision: "...seal up the vision, for it refers to many days from now" (Dan.8:26, NRSV). That an unsealing of a scroll or book should commence the beginning of the end times of woe and tribulation, as we find in the Book of Revelation, is exactly what we would expect to see. Even then, though they are revealed to him, John is still required, in his day, to seal them up; specifically he is told: "Seal up what the seven thunders have said, and do not write it down" (Rev.10:4, NRSV). That revealment is for a navi (prophet) in our day to present.

Therefore the opening of the seals in John's revelation is the enlargement, development and continuation of the Book of Daniel, describing, from Yahweh's side, the judgments necessary to secure the fulfilment of all that He has foretold. The opening of each seal, as we shall see later, has a special judgment as its immediate result. The scroll given to Ezekiel was similarly important (Ezek.2:10). Then we must consider the object of all this judgment which is the redemption of the lost inheritance.

I remember when growing up my parents instructing me to never open a letter addressed to them without their permission. The privacy of the contents of a sealed and postmarked envellope, whether it contained a personal letter or a bill, was made plain in no uncertain terms. Indeed, in the United Kingdom it is against the law for anyone to open a letter that is not personally addressed to them, and I assume that's true in most, if not all, other countries too, not that that presents an obstacle to dictators who like to open letters and censor their citizens. In the UK too letters from a bank containing confidential account information might additionally be marked PRIVATE and CONFIDENTIAL to remind anyone who might forget the law. No one was allowed to know your account details except you and the bank. How that's changed! So as I youngster I was deeply impressed with the once-only spoken rule never to open private mail not addressed to me. I was taught to respect privacy and confidentiality and, of course, I complied, because that's what everybody did. And in olden times, before envellopes were invented, a red wax seal was applied to the folded corners of the letter to make that clear. As an English gentleman I was taught that my word was my bond so my conscience was always the restraining factor and advance guard of the law. Indeed, in Britain someone who defaced a postage stamp on a letter bearing the queen's head, as all British stamps do, was liable to prosecution under the law. You see, her image guaranteed the sanctity of a letter's privacy.

Something similar is meant by the symbol of the seven seals on the Scroll held in the Heavenly Father's hand. They would have born the logo of the Creator and have therefore been sacred. Tom Wright in his Commentary on the Book of Revelation invites us to imagine that a letter arrives in our mail box or through our front door categorically stating, in similar language: TO BE OPENED BY ADDRESSEE ONLY. Then he asks us to imagine a letter bearing the even more mysterious words: TO BE OPENED BY THE PERSON WHO DESERVES (or IS WORTHY) TO DO SO [1]. What an unusual instruction that would be, making the account of this sealed scroll all the more intriguing. This carries the first sense even further. Indeed, it poses a further question: how can anyone looking at the letter know they deserve to open it? What would be the criteria for knowing you were worthy? I think every single one of us knows that we are deficient and unworthy in some way, "overdrawn at the moral bank" as someone once said.

This is exactly the same kind of question asked by Yah'shua (Jesus) of those men who accused a woman caught in adultery. He in effect asked them whether they were worthy to execute her: "He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first," He said (John 8:7, NKJV), and one by one they walked away because they knew they were sinners. Essentially the same question is being posed in the text, at least that's what mortal men would have rightly concluded. But here, in the Book of Revelation, it is being posed to all Creation, starting with the inhabitants of the Throne Room, and all of the Elders and the Seraphim knew they were unworthy to do such a thing. Therefore the whole of creation hesitated. Indeed, this is a critical moment because Creation will remain at a standstill, unable to move on toward the resolution of the issues of the fallen worlds, until this question is answered.

If we are brutally honest, all kinds of things disqualify us from being worthy of opening that document. So heaven isn't, after all, just one long round of endless, repetitive sessions of praise as some popular imagery would have us believe. This is the Throne Room of Yahweh, the Creator, and His world is not merely a tableau - a silent, motionless group of persons arranged to represent a scene, a living picture to be enjoyed as one might in an art gallery. This is a project like the work on a construction site. It's going somewhere. It isn't static. There is important - vitally important - work to be done if the creation is to be rescued from the deadly dangers that have taken root within it thanks to rebellion by both malakim (angels) and by men. It may seem to us, where time moves slowly, that nothing ever really permanently changes, but time is experienced somewhat differently in the heavenly realm. A thousand years to us is like a day to the Beings in the Throne Room (Ps.90:4; 2 Pet.3:8). Note that it isn't timeless, as some suppose, but rather things happen at a more intense and rapid pace. If we were to view it with physical eyes from our perspective, the heavenly world would appear as a blur, a reason we can only ever view it through spiritual eyes which often means having to be "out of the body" as Paul's acquaintance was who was taken to the Third Heaven (2 Cor.12:2). Yet in this passage it does look as though time has stood still because no change can take place in either the affairs of heaven or of earth until someone worthy has been found to open the seals of that scroll.

Today, as then, there is important work to be done and we, as the servants of Yahweh on earth, are called to be an active part of that program. Things not only can change for the better, they must change, but that requires us to roll up our sleaves and plunge our hands into the soil of mortality. There is work to be done to overthrow the forces that are out to destroy the very handiwork of Elohim (God), 2,000 years ago as much as today. Time may go slowly down here for us but our contribution towards putting things right is never insignificant or unimportant. Seen from the perspective of a single person it might appear so but we are part of an army of workers whose collective labour matters. Yet even that army is helpless without an effective commander who by dint of his expertise, brilliance, and self-sacrifice to the cause has in effect already won the war because He will outwit his opponents time and time again.

Let's make no mistake about it. Rolling back the tidal wave of destruction caused by the rebels is no mean task. The historians among you know the effort and spilled blood required to unseat one tyrant. And there have been many, are many, and will be more to come before the age of tyrants is finally at an end. The task, then, is a terrible and costly one, and one understandably might be tempted to shrink back from it. 'What can I possibly do to change things?' might well be a question each of you asks him- or herself, and yet we are called to step forward, present ourselves for service, and to get on with it. But there's a difficulty with that. You see, we ourselves are also part of the problem rather than being the solution. We just don't, on our own, have the credentials or ability to change anything. Indeed, in the span of my own lifetime, it seems that things have just got worse and worse. I remember when I arrived in Norway in 1988, there were less than half-a dozen murders a year in the capitol, Oslo. You could leave your front door unlocked most places. Today the murder rates, along with rape and acts of violence, are off the charts. That's pretty much true of cities anywhere in the world today, alas. It's obvious we are arriving at yet another historical climax leading to a conflagration like the last two world wars.

Returning to the strong malak's (angel's) announcement in verse 2, "Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals?" (NRSV), it looks as though there is something more in this Seven-Sealed Scroll/Book written on both sides than was said in verse 1...and more than the mere continuation of Daniel's prophecies of which the Book of Revelation is a continuation. You see, there must be something that calls for these judgments in the first place, something that requires the putting forth of all this power...hence the strong malak (angel). If the Scroll has to do with the whole subject of prophecy itself, with its causes, and not merely with its consequences and its end, then it may well take us right back to the very beginning, to which the cherubim already point us, when man was driven out of Paradise, when he lost his inheritance because of disobedience and sin...when the promise of a coming Deliverer, Redeemer and Saviour was given.

You see, the 'first vision' "in heaven" (Rev.4:2) where "coming from the Throne [were] flashes of lightning, and rumblings and peals of thunder" (Rev.4:5, NRSV), takes us to the point where it was left in Genesis 3 where we're told Yahweh "drove out the man (Adam); and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a sword flaming and turning to guard the way" (Gen.3:24, NRSV). The Throne is set up here, but man is outside and unable still to gain access to the "tree of life" (Gen.2:9; 3:22,24; cp. Rev.2:7; 22:2,14,19). Hence the question in the proclamation: "Who is worthy?". Who has the right to redeem the forfeited inheritance, the lost paradise? That's the big question here! Satan is in possession of this world now. He is its "god" and "prince" (Jn.12:31; 14:30; 16:11; Eph.2:2) which is why mere human political action will never be enough to put it properly to rights. And because of this, the devil was able to tempt Him (Christ) who had come to redeem or purchase it in the only lawful way in which it could be redeemed (see Lev.25:25; Dt.25:5; Ruth 4:1-6).

If this is the case, then we can understand the meaning of this proclamation which has such an important place in this heavenly vision. And the enquiry, therefore, will be like that of Boaz, 'Who will act the part of the Goel or Redeemer for man, and for Israel, and recover the lost estate of Elimelech, the late husband of Naomi?' If you turn to Jeremiah 32 you'll see that a sealed scroll or book was given in connection with such a transaction:

"Jeremiah said, 'The word of Yahweh came to me: Hanamel son of Shallum your uncle is going to come to you and say, 'Buy my field at Anathoth, because as nearest relative it is your right and duty to buy it.' Then, just as Yahweh had said, my cousin Hanamel came to me in the courtyard of the guard and said, 'Buy my field at Anathoth in the territory of Benjamin. Since it is your right to redeem it and possess it, buy it for yourself.'

"I knew that this was the word of Yahweh; so I bought the field at Anathoth from my cousin Hanamel and weighed out for him seventeen shekels of silver. I signed and sealed the deed, had it witnessed, and weighed out the silver on the scales. I took the deed of purchase -- the sealed copy containing the terms and conditions, as well as the unsealed copy -- and I gave this deed to Baruch son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah, in the presence of my cousin Hanamel and of the witnesses who had signed the deed and of all the Judeans sitting in the courtyard of the guard.

"In their presence I gave Baruch these instructions: 'This is what Yahweh-Elohim, the Elohim (God) of Israel, says: Take these documents, both the sealed and unsealed copies of the deed of purchase, and put them in a clay jar so they will last a long time. For this is what Yahweh-Elohim, the Elohim (God) of Israel, says: Houses, fields and vineyards will again be bought in this land.'

"After I had given the deed of purchase to Baruch son of Neriah, I prayed to Yahweh..." (Jer 32:6-16, NIV).

As you can see, this process was quite a serious business, and had to be done according to the tavnith or pattern of instructions in the Torah. This is true of both simple purchases of land, the redemption of Elimelech's posessions by the Kinsman-Redeemer, Boaz, and now - here in the Book of Revelation - the much weightier redemption of Israel, of the whole world, and indeed of the Cosmos itself! Do you see the connections, and why strictly following the Davar (Word) is so important because the whole of Creation is governed by it! What then follows is the New Song, whose theme is nothing less than the Redemption of Creation, accomplished by the One who was altogether worthy, both by unanswerable right as well as by unequalled might. For the Goel was an avenger as well as a Redeemer.

So, returning to my original point, if we're part of the problem, as ancient Israel was - and remember Israel was called to represent Yahweh on earth - then this is the heart of the challenge issued by the "strong malak" or angel in verse 2. Yahweh-Elohim, the Creator, has a scroll in His right hand, like an architect with a rolled-up design for a building, or a general with a rolled-up plan of a campaign. Both my father and grandfather were architects so I grew up very familiar with these great big scrolls, each rolled up like a long tube. My father's office in Kuala Lumpur was full of them. There was always something mysterious about them. They carried the weight of 'importance' about them. My father had a huge drawing board with sliding rulers (one of my sons owns the one possessed by his maternal grandfather) - those were the days before Computer-Aided Design (CAD) when everything had to be meticulously drawn out by a skilled hand. I still have many of my father's and gradfather's framed drawings and sketches which you will see on the walls of our home. This particular scroll, though, is sealed with seven seals. Why is it sealed? Because the plans to undo and overthrow the world-destroying projects that have already gained so much ground in our era, are secret, and Satan desperately wants to know what's in them, just as any military leader does of the operational plans of his enemy. It's why the devil's servants carefully monitor the sayings of the authentic nevi'im (prophets) who are privy to aspects of the Heavenly Council.

But the Adversary has a problem. There are so many false nevi'im (prophets), how is he going to sort through them all? It's a problem that Christians/Messianics face too. So from one angle the false prophets are performing a useful rôle in confounding the devil...at least the ones he hasn't himself inspired. The Enemy knows a lot but he doesn't know everything and he wonders how, if, and when Yahweh will undo his current projects. So if you're living close to the heartbeat of the Throne Room, I can assure you that your websites and other writings are being monitored for intelligence-gathering purposes, and if you're wondering why your social group hasn't been closed down by the corporatists for speaking out vocally, that's probably the reason. So long as you have information useful to them, you may be threatened but you'll be left alone to operate in the open. How do I know? Because many times I put that idea to the test to satisfy my own curiosity. It's good to know if you're being watched for a number of important reasons, not least because I find it amusing in a serious sort of a way. (And, yes, even these remarks are going into their database to see what can be done to undermine people like myself, though a lot of good that will do them since I'm not their problem, but Yahweh - there are more where I came from).

Be assured that Yahweh fully intends to get Creation back on track but the equation is complicated. The evil world you see around you is only temporary but because of the necessity of human free agency, as I mentioned last week, much time is needed to sort this all out. Give humans a free hand, and they're guaranteed to make an unholy mess, like the aftermath of a drunken party. Individual human salvation, the collective salvation of Messianic Israel, and the salvation of the whole planet and, finally, the salvation of the vast cosmos full of galaxies, stars and planets - zillions of them - all has to be carefully balanced and integrated into a single story-line or Plan, with nothing left to chance, because our Father has an eye for both microscopic and macroscopic detail all rolled-into-one Master Plan. The devil's integrated plan is pathetic by comparison as he has nothing like the Seven Ruachot (Spirits) with which to view Creation. His is more like a patchwork quilt of statistical probabilities and possibilities since he doesn't even know what humans are going to do, let alone Yahweh Himswelf. Freedom of choice can mean unpredictability. His spy network totally failed him at Calvary because the resurrection took him by complete surprise. Had it been a Calvinist world of predeterminism, things would have been fixed long ago. Indeed, the Fall would have been fixed within minutes and not millennia. That's one of many reasons Islam and Calvinism aren't true. We aren't helpless puppets with the ability to shrug off our responsibility in all this by simply uttering such cop-out phrases as 'In sha'Allah' ('as Allah wills!') or (the Calvinist version) 'it's all to the glory of god!' That is naïve at best and foolhardy at worst. Tyrants don't get unseated without action on our part. Our task is doing what Yahweh wants us to do and not what our unredeemed passions might drive us to do. We are bound by a Torah Code of Action.

So who is there 'out there' worthy or deserving enough to open this Master Plan of the Ages and put it into action? Is there anybody who has not, themselves, contributed in some way to the problems of fallen creation, to the age-old spoiling and trashing of Elohim's (God's) beautiful world? John's answer shows that he, like the other New Testament writers, had a realistic view of the deep-seated problem of all the human race, and indeed, it seems all other creatures as well (v.3). Nobody deserves to open the scroll.

And that's a huge problem because back in Genesis 1 & 2, Yahweh the Creator committed Himself to work within His creation through obedient mankind. We are His agents, integral to both governance and action on our plane of existence. He cannot skirt around this, His word cannot return to Him void, empty or unfulfilled (Is.55:11). This is how the world was designed to work, through human obedience. That's a big risk on His part and it also means lots of time is needed to fix mistakes. In other words, our Heavenly Father couldn't just turn round and say, 'Well, humans have failed, so I'll have to find some other way to fix things.' If anyone believes that, they're thinking like a pagan...or a fallen human being. For Yahweh to have said such a thing would have been tantamount to Him unmaking the structure of creation, and imply that it was neither good nor perfect. It would have meant turning it into an entirely different sort of world. Besides, Yahweh doesn't make mistakes.

So from a human perspective - and remember, we're the outside observers of this scene - someone must be found with an unblemished record. And though Yahweh has the answer, we don't (or didn't at one time), and He must show us what it would take to fix everything up whilst still requiring human participation and obedience. The answer lay in Israel itself, the called, but failed, model nation, which the modern-day Republic of the same name is trying to do all over again and spectacularly failing. In the short space of 70+ years it's already turned into a moral cesspit showing that Esau, its present ruling spirit, is even less capable than Jacob. And Esau's solution? Build another temple, a plan that spectacularly failed the first time round too even if things got off to a splendid start under Solomon.

And yet [Messianic] Israel was, and still is, called to be Yahweh's true representative of humanity. That mitzvah (command) hasn't changed. Israel is still called to put Yahweh's original Plan into action. Though John doesn't say so explicitly, here we meet the second level of the problem. Israel, as I said, has already failed, sent into exile three times. Israel has let Elohim (God) down. And here, on the surface, Elohim (God) seems to be faced with a dilemma, something Satan thought was a real problem and one to exploit in order to topple Him from His Throne. If Yahweh says, 'Well, Israel hasn't done what I hoped, so I'll have to cut out that bit out of My plan,' it would look as though He has blundered and been flailing around with different ideas like a mere mortal, none of which have worked. You see, Yahweh-Elohim has made the world in such a way that His plans for the world must be executed by a human being. Since human sin now means that that those plans require a rescue operation, Yahweh has now called one human family to be the means through which this rescue will be put into effect. In other words, He has determined to run the world through perfected humans (Mt.5:48; 19:21), and to rescue the world through perfected Israel. Both have let Him down in the past. So what will He do now? "Does anybody deserve to open the scroll?" (v.2, KNT).

You can perhaps understand why John is in a flood of tears at this point. Can nothing be done? 'As individuals, and as a nation, we have abjectly failed', John must have been thinking to himself. 'What can possibly be done?' Now you might be saying, 'Well, John surely knows all about Messiah, so he knows the answer!' Yes, but he isn't in that point of the narrative that Yahweh is unfolding for him in a new way. He has to go with the flow and to go back in time, as it were, to properly understand. You see, he's being shown something new he didn't know before, illustrious apostle though he was! We all of us have new things to learn about Yahweh, His Plan, and His Messiah, and thereby gain ever deeper insights into, and an appreciation of, what has been done for us! So John is being shown a scene that has been played, as it were, in a continuous loop since the very beginning. This is the 'old, old story' being retold at a deeper level each time, and now, for the apostle's sake, so that he can understand what is to come, and why. From even way back then, at the beginning, Yahweh had a plan "to wipe away all tears from all eyes" (Rev.7:17; 21:4). Unlike in the case of the American Constitution, no 'amendments' were added later in Yahweh's Plan to cater for loopholes missed in the original Document. All this was planned from the beginning but we, in our finitude, must be taken back to the beginning and have the movie played back again to us until we have comprehended the length, breadth and depth of it. And as we are taken back and have it replayed to us, so our amazement and gratitude will grow each time. "Don't cry," says one of the 24 Elders. "Look! Here is the One who can do it" (v.5, KNT). And before we even look we know who this is. It is the truly human One. It is the true Israelite, the hope of Israel (Ac.28:20; Jer.17:13). It is the Messiah Himself, the Adamah-Elohim, the Man-God.

I know I have asked this before, and I only ask it again to make sure you are clear: why all the complex picture language in the Book of Revelation? Why doesn't John write 'straightforwardly' so everyone can understand?

• 1. Firstly, not everyone is supposed to understand, a reason Yah'shua (Jesus) spoke in parables in His ministry (Mk.4:11; Lk.8:10). Only those who have the Ruach haQodesh (Holy Spirit) can understand, because the Ruach (Spirit) is our interpreter or key for unlocking deep, sacred meanings. That's one reason;

• 2. Secondly, the language is 'Israelite' and so we are required to have a certain amount of historical and cultural knowledge of the Tanakh (Old Testament) and Torah so as not to read into the text the (usually false) assumptions of our own age. That's why the Messianic Community (Church) must have skilled teachers. Every language has its unique set of symbols and Hebrew is no different; and

• 3. A third - and probably the most important reason - is because all revelation is multi-dimensional or multi-layered, which is a part of its glory, with one symbol meaning different things depending what's being referred to, for instance. The symbol of a lion, which we encounter here, is a good example of multideminsional symbolic meanings. Revelation has many layers that have to be peeled back one at a time.

So who is the One who can open the seals of the scroll and read it? It is someone who is simultaneously a 'Lion' and a 'Lamb' for John is next invited to look "at the lion from the tribe of Judah, the Root of David" (v.5, KNT). Now the echoes that rumble like thunder around the cave walls of our scriptural memories conjure up prophecies and visions from the past. The Messiah will come from David's tribe, the tribe of Judah; and Judah was described, how, in Genesis 49:9?

"Judah is a lion's whelp (cub).
From the prey, my son, you have gone up.
He bows down, he lies down as a lion;
And as a lion, who shall rouse him?
The scepter shall not depart from Judah,
Nor a lawgiver from between his feet,
Until Shiloh comes;
And to Him shall be the obedience of the people"
(Gen.49:9-10, NKJV; cp. Is.9:5-6; Heb.1:8; 7:14).

This was picked up in a later apocryphal writing in which the Messiah appears like a lion to attack the 'eagle' of the Roman Empire (2 Esdras 11 & 12). No first century Judean would miss the reference, or fail to understand the "root (descendant) of David" in Revelation 22:16 (NKJV) which echoes the great messianic prophecy of Isaiah 11:1-10 which commences with:

"There shall come forth a Rod
from the stem of Yishai (Jesse - David's father),
And a Branch shall grow out of his roots" (Is.11:1, NKJV).

This description of the Messiah is followed by details about His rule (cp.Is.9:5-6) and the Messianic Age of shalom (peace) which He establishes in the Millennium. The passage concludes with:

"And in that day there shall be a Root of Yishai (Jesse),
Who shall stand as a banner (or 'miracle') to the people;
For the nations (Gentiles) shall seek Him,
And His resting place shall be glorious"
(Is.11:10, NKJV).

And as we would expect of the true Messiah, we are told, in the words of Revelation 5:5, not just that He "deserves", or "is worthy" (HRV) or "able" (NIV) to open the scroll, but, that He has "prevailed" (KJV), "overcome" (NASB, AmpV), "conquered" (ESV, RSV, NRSV, NLT, AmpV), "won the right" (NEB, JNT/CJB, AmpV), "won the battle" (NIRV), "won the victory" (KNT, JBP, GNB, Barclay) or "triumphed" (JB). The Messiah, it was thought, would fight and win the decisive battle against the last great enemy of Elohim's (God's) people, and so liberate them once and for all. Well, says one of the 24 Elders to John, He has done just that! Here He is in all His glory! By His incarnation, Torah-obedient life and atoning death Yah'shua (Jesus) has won the victory over human sin which gives Him the right to open the scroll and its seven seals to initiate the Father's divine program of the end-times.

And so we have arrived at one of the most decisive moments in all Scripture. What John has heard is the announcement of the Lion. What he then sees is the Lamb. He is to hold what he has heard in his head while gazing at what now he sees; and he is to hold what he is seeing in his head as he reflects on what he has heard. The two seem radically different. The lion is the symbol of both ultimate power and of supreme royalty, while the lamb symbolises both gentle vulnerability and, through its sacrifice, the ultimate weakness of death. But the two are now to be fused together, completely and forever. From this moment on, John, and we as his careful readers, are to understand that the victory won by the Lion is accomplished through the sacrifice of the Lamb, and in no other way. But we are also to understand that what has been accomplished by the Lamb's sacrifice is not merely the wiping away of sin for a few people here and there. The victory won by the Lamb is Elohim's (God's) lion-like victory, through His faithful Israel-in-person, through His obedient humanity-in-person, over all the forces of corruption and death, over everything that would destroy and obliterate Yahweh's good, powerful and lovely creation.

Sadly, there have been plenty of 'lion-Christians' who, yes, rightly believe Yah'shua (Jesus) died for us but now, wrongly, they believe, Yahweh's will is to be done in the lion-like fashion, through brute force and violence, to make the world fall into line, to enforce Yahweh's will. But John says: No, think of the Lion, yes, but gaze at the Lamb.

And there have been plenty of 'lamb-Christians' who, yes, acknowledege that Yah'shua (Jesus) may have been the 'lion of Judah' but, according to them, that's a political idea we should reject because salvation consists only in having our sins wiped away so that we can get off this compromised world, through either death or 'rapture', and go off to heaven instead and remain there forever. That's virtually a Gnostic idea. No, replies John, gaze at the Lamb, but remember that it is the Lion's victory that has been won and that we are to return to the earth as resurrected beings one day, very soon!

We end today with the interesting picture of the Lamb with 7 horns and 7 eyes. We have already studied the Seraphim who have eyes all over, inside and outside, but soon we are going encounter horns in a big way in other images in the Book of Revelation so we need to precisely understand what these mean. Let's start with the horns. In the Tanakh (Old Testament) horns symbolise power; and 7, as you all know, is the number of completeness. Thus Yah'shua (Jesus) has complete power (cp.Mt.28:18; Jn.17:1-2). We even find in the Pseudepigrapha at 1 Enoch 90:9 the Maccabees symbolised by "horned lambs" and in the Testament of Joseph (19:8), another pseudepigraphical book, you find similar imagery where the Messiah is designated a lamb who goes forth from the midst of horns with a lion on his right.

The seven eyes are even more interesting because they describe a functional feature of the 7 Ruachot or Spirits of Elohim who are sent out into all the earth unlike the Seraphim with all their eyes who are permanently stationed in the Throne Room monitoring that to ensure no impurity enters. Consider this difficult verse in Zechariah for further illustration:

"For who has despised the day of small things?
For these seven rejoice to see
The plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel.
They are the eyes of Yahweh,
Which scan to and fro throughout the whole earth"
(Zech.4:10, KJV).

The "seven" here refer to the seven lamps of the seven-armed sacred candlearbre or Menorah of Zechariah 4:2 which represent "the eyes of Yahweh" which scan or rove to and fro throughout the earth preventing anything from impeding the building of the Second Temple under Zerubabel. If the Lamb has "seven eyes" in addition to His "seven horns", then He has complete knowledge to match His complete power. In other words, the Son is both Omniscient and Omnipotent, proof that He is Elohim (God). Little wonder that His normal position of authority and power is at "the right hand of Him who sat on the throne" (Ps.110:1; Mt.22:44; Ac.2:34-35; 7:56; Heb.1:3). The Messiah therefore stands relative to the Father as Joseph (who was a messianic figure) did to Pharaoh of Egypt, who said to him:

"You (Joseph) shall be over my house, and all my people shall be ruled according to your word; only in regard to the throne will I be greater than you" (Gen.41:40, NKJV).

Similar imagery is applicable to any father's firstborn son when, as a mature man and as a father gets older and can no longer perform all his duties, he is finally appointed to a position of family authority. A man's 7 ruachot (spirits) are his wife (or wives - see the Seven Wives of David) which is a really big subject for another time!

The hope of Messianic Israel is that the Lion will prevail over His (and our) enemies, and the Book of Revelation here, assuringly, tells us that He absolutely will, for that 'meek and mild' Lamb has, in truth, the 7 horns of absolute power and the 7 eyes of absolute vision. He observes, through the 7 Ruachot (Spirit) of His, and our, Father, absolutely everything in this world and cosmos, something that Satan and his cohorts can only dream about, so impotent, powerless and blind is he by comparison. Yes, He is observing you and me in this assembly, and you who later may be reading or watching this online later. He sees you and your needs now. You are never invisible to Him, not for one second!

So to summarise: Yah'shua (Jesus) first takes the place of man as outside the Garden of Eden and out of reach of the Tree of Life (Gen.3:24). His redemptive work commences on the earth by His coming, not into the Garden, but into a wilderness - the wilderness of Judea (Mt.4:1). He approaches that flaming sword of the cherubim and hears the words of Him who said through the navi (prophet) Zechariah:

"'Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd,
Against the Man who is My Companion,'
Says Yahweh-Tsevaoth" (Zech.13:7, NKJV).

This sword was sheathed in Him, and thus He becomes entitled to enter and worthy to take the Scroll. Then, in verse 6 of Revelation 5, the Elder speaks of a Lion: but John turns and sees a Lamb. The Lion is about to put forth His power and eject the usurper, Satan, from his dominion. "The ruler (prince) of this world is judged," says Yah'shua (Jesus) in John's Gospel (John 16:11, NKJV). Sentence has been passed. A judgment summonse has been issued (Jn.12:31; 16:11) and execution is about to be carried out (Rev.12). But all of this is first of all shown to be because of the 'right' obtained by the payment of the redemption price, and that is why John sees a Lamb as "having been slain".

Past payment - the payment made at Calvary 2,000 years ago - is the basis of future power. Thus Paul would tell the Colossians and Hebrews:

"Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it" (Col.2:15, NKJV)

"Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself (Christ) likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil" (Heb.2:14, NKJV).

May His grace and peace be with you until we assemble next time is my prayer in His qadosh (joly, set-apart) Name. Amen.

Endnotes

[1] Tom Wright, Revelation for Everyone - The New Testament for Everyone Commentary Series, Vol.19 (SPCK, London: 2011), p.51

Acknowledgements

[1] Tom Wright, Revelation for Everyone - The New Testament for Everyone Commentary Series, Vol.19 (SPCK, London: 2011)
[2] E.W.Bullinger*, Number in Scripture (Kregel Publications, Grand Rapids, Michigan: 1967)
[3] E.W.Bullinger*, Commentary on Revelation (Kregel Classics, Grand Rapids, Michihan: 1984)
[4] E.W.Bullinger*, The Companion Bible being the Authorized Verion of 1611 with Structures & Critical Explanatory Notes (Samuel Bagster & Sons Ltd., London: 1974), pp.1883-1914
[5] David H. Stern, Jewish New Testament Commentary (JNT Publications, Clarksville, Maryland: 1992)

*E.W.Bullinger was a brilliant Anglican clergyman and scholar whose works merit careful study by serious students of the Bible. He was, however, seriously in error in at least three main areas, namely, (1) he believed the 'Church' has been raptured before the Book of Revelation opens, (2) he believed that the 7 churches in Revelation 2-3 are 7, literal Jewish churches or assemblies yet to come, and (3) he believed in a pre-tribulation, pre-millennial rapture.