Hard Things in the Bible, Part 3: Revelation

The book of Revelation or Apocalypse certainly qualifies as one of the ‘hard things’ of the Bible. But don't leave! I promise, we can make some sense of it.

Revelation is full of prophecies and symbolism. That shouldn’t surprise anyone: Revelation tells you, right at the beginning, that it was written in symbolism:

Rev. 1:1 “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants the things which must shortly take place. And He sent it and he symbolized it when he sent by his Angel to his Servant John.”

The Greek word rendered 'symbolized' can also be translated as 'signified' or 'in or with signs'. 

As we pointed out in part 1 of this series, opinions are a dime a dozen... everybody has them, and they all have the same value: zero. The only way to know for sure that your understanding of a hard Bible passage is on the mark is to compare it to other parts of the Bible.  So that’s how we’re going to go about this.

Before we get to the individual symbols, we need to understand when to look for these signs or symbols. Does Revelation answer that? 

 Rev. 1:10 “In the Spirit I found myself present on the day of the Lord.”

John’s use of the term “Day of the Lord” did not mean Sunday, despite some really bad translations that render it that way. Sunday didn’t have any special significance until hundreds of years after John died and even then, it was part of Catholicism’s attempt to overwrite pagan ideas. 

But there are other biblical references to a special future “day” of the Lord. 

Revelation 1:10 uses the Greek word "en". The first definition of en is ‘in’, not ‘on’... John's visions happened "in the Lord's day", not 'on the Lord's day'. What's the difference? When we are being specific we say ‘on such and such a day’, but when we are referring to a time period, we say “in”: ‘In my grandfather’s day’, for example. The Bible does the same:

 “Just as the days of Noah were, so the presence of the Son of man will be. For as they were in those days before the Flood, eating and drinking, men marrying and women being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and they took no note until the Flood came and swept them all away, so the presence of the Son of man will be.” (Matthew 24:37-39)

So in Revelation 1:10,  because it says "in", not "on", 'the Lord's day’ means a time period, not a single day. What time period, then, did John mean by "the Lord's day"?

In the passage just quoted, Matthew 24:37, Jesus refers to that time period of the last days preceding the Flood as a parallel to his future presence. 

(By the way, if your Bible says “coming” instead of “presence” in these passages in Matthew, you need to get a better Bible. The Greek word in all these places is parousia, from which we get our English word “presence”... It even has a P, an R, and an S, just like “presence.” The Greek word for “coming” is erkhomenon; and the fact that the root part of that word, ‘khom’, sounds a lot like the English word “come” is not an accident, either.)

Jesus' often warned of a future day of reckoning. 

“Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord, Lord...” (Matthew 7:22)
“Just as lightning flashes from one part of heaven to another part of heaven, so the Son of man will be in his day.” (Luke 17:24) Note the parallel account in Matthew: “Just as the lightning comes out of the east and shines over to the west, so the presence of the Son of man will be.” (Matthew 24:27)

So when John says that in some spirit-assisted way he found himself ‘in the Lord’s day’, it is reasonable that he was speaking about seeing visions of Jesus' future presence... some future, pre-Armageddon period of time.

If further proof is needed, John’s description of the ‘horsemen of the apocalypse’ in Revelation chapter 6 includes war, famine and pestilence – the same signs Jesus told his apostles, in Matthew 24, would mark the period called 'the last days'.

What has confused some readers of the Revelation account is that the first horse out of the gate is the white horse, and his rider is armed with a bow, given a crown, and described as heading toward a conquest. 

People want to equate that picture with Armageddon, but it almost seems backwards. After all, if the white horse and the crowned rider refer to the 'thy kingdom come' we've all prayed for, why is it immediately followed by war, famine and pestilence? Billy Graham even went so far as to claim that the rider on the white horse couldn’t possibly mean the establishment of Jesus’ kingdom; It had to represent some false kingdom.

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He and several other Bible commentators, however, are leaning on their own interpretation instead of using the Bible to understand the Bible. Matthew 24 is undeniably discussing the same events as pictured by the horsemen of Revelation 6. Matthew 24:3 reads: "The disciples came near to him by himself, saying, `Tell us, when shall these be? and what is the sign of thy presence, and of the full end of the age?'"

The answer Jesus gave was that his presence would be characterized by many bad things that would begin happening on Earth.  So yes, the establishment of Jesus’ kingdom - the beginning of the ride of the white horse - doesn’t happen at Armageddon. It happens prior to, and then is immediately followed by bad things, rising to the crescendo of Armageddon.

Another vision within Revelation makes exactly the same point:

“War broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels battled with the dragon, and the dragon and its angels battled but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them any longer in heaven. So down the great dragon was hurled... On this account be glad, you heavens and you who reside in them! Woe for the earth and for the sea, because the Devil has come down to you, having great anger, knowing that he has a short period of time.” (Revelation 12:7-12)

Again, we see a reference to a period of time, marked by ‘woe for the earth’, that precedes the climax which will spell the end for Satan.

Of course, there’s way too much to the book of Revelation to discuss in a short article like this one. In coming discussions we’ll deal with some of the individual symbols, characters, beasts, and numbers.

 

Please feel free to Share this, leave a comment, and subscribe. Click here for Part Four of this series.

Bill K. Underwood is a columnist, consultant, photographer and author of several bible-friendly novels available at Amazon.com. You can help support this site by purchasing one of his books.

Hard Things in the Bible, Part 2: The Antichrist

The word “antichrist” has become a punchline. People have, with absolutely straight faces, claimed that the Antichrist is:

• Donald Trump
• Barack Obama
• Hilary Clinton
• Mark Zuckerberg
• Bill Gates
• Oprah Winfrey
• The current pope
• Most of the previous popes

... and many, many more.

“Antichrist” clearly makes a handy insult to slap on whoever your current enemy is. But should we be looking for an individual to turn out to be ‘the Antichrist’? Who or what, really, does the term mean? Since it is found in the Bible, it makes sense that we should turn to the Bible to find the explanation. And it really isn’t all that mysterious.

"Antichrist" is found 4 times in the Bible, all in the letters of the apostle John. Perhaps he coined the word (which was easy to do in Greek) or perhaps it was already in common use in his day. ‘His day’ is something we need to talk about.

John wrote these letters in the year 98 of our calendar. He would have been pretty old by then; perhaps even 100 or more. He addresses those in the congregations to which he wrote as “young children”, which you’re allowed to do at that age. He'd spent nearly 70 years watching the growth of Christianity. He'd also begun seeing a disturbing trend away from the teachings he'd heard straight from the horse's mouth, during the three and a half years he'd spent in Jesus' company.

One of those teachings, one of the things Jesus foretold very clearly, was that true Christianity was going to be polluted and watered down almost immediately after his death. Jesus gave a famous illustration about two roads, two gates:   

"Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad the road which leads to ruin, and many there are who enter by it; But the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few.” (Matthew 7:14, 15)

He was not here describing the difference between say, Christians and Jews, or Christians and Pagans, or even, as the world is currently divided, Christians and Muslims; no. How do we know? Just a few verses later he said: “On that day many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?' And then will I declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers.'” (Matthew 7:22, 23) Jews, pagans and Muslims do not do 'mighty works in Jesus' name'. Jesus was talking about Christians, people calling him “Lord”, who would turn out to be the opposite of Christians – anti-Christians, if you will. 

 

And, he said the fake Christians would actually outnumber the real Christians: "Many" on the broad road, "few" on the narrow road.

He made the same point in his parable of the wheat and the weeds: 

“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field; but while men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also...” 

Jesus knew that after he fell asleep in death, Satan would begin diluting Christianity with weed-like, fake Christians, anti-Christians. Furthermore, he warned that this would be the case throughout the history of Christianity. “Let both grow together until the harvest,” he said.  (Matthew 13:24-30)

Though they may not have quickly coined the phrase “antichrist”, his apostles clearly understood the warning. Paul showed he understood it: “That day will not come unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of perdition.” (2 Thessalonians 2:3) His words harmonize with Jesus’ own, about fake Christians, anti-Christians, being visible, notable on ‘that day’ of judgment.

A person unfamiliar with biblical wording might assume Paul’s expression meant a single individual, but John makes it clear that “antichrist” is not singular: “. . .Young children, it is the last hour, and just as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have appeared, from which fact we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us...” (1 John 2:18, 19)

Notice that John repeats the point Jesus made: the antichrists ‘went out from’ Christians. Do you think they called themselves something other than Christians at that point? Of course not! No doubt they contended that they were the real Christians, and John and his friends were the anti-Christians. Jesus’ warning about Christians being misled didn’t say they would start following Buddha or Mohammad; he said, “. . .false Christs and false prophets will arise and will perform great signs . . .” (Matthew 24:24)

So, if you're looking for the antichrist, you need to look among people calling themselves Christians.

Think about the so-called ‘Christian’ leaders flying around in their private jets, wearing their expensive, clothing, boasting sacred-sounding titles, claiming that Jesus wants them to have their huge paychecks; pretending to be holy while covering up their decidedly non-Christian behavior and completely undermining Christ’s teachings... those people, individually and collectively, are the real antichrists.

If you follow one of them because, 'She's a powerful speaker,' or because 'His sermons make me feel good,' or 'He heals people', or whatever your reason is, just focus on this: Jesus promised there would be both true Christians and false Christians, anti-Christians, from his death until the end. The Christian groups you see around you all fall into either one class or the other.

If the person or church you're following teaches anything different from what Christ taught, which side do you think they're on? Click here to go to Part Three of this series.

Bill K. Underwood is the author of 3 novels: The Minotaur Medallion, Resurrection Day, and Unbroken, and the non-fiction book 99 Ways to Fire Your Boss, all available on Amazon.com.You can help support this site by purchasing one of his books.

How to understand the hard things in the Bible

If you are a Bible believer, like me, you no doubt have found many comforting passages, and many easy-to-understand life principles. But the bible also contains some things that, as Peter admitted, are “hard to understand.” (2 Peter 3:16) And Peter warned that these things would get twisted.

Over the years, I’ve heard some whoppers:

• The pope is the antichrist
• Martin Luther was the antichrist
• Trump is the antichrist
• The whore of Babylon in Revelation means New York City
• The whore of Babylon is Las Vegas
• The whore of Babylon is the Vatican
• The ‘Mark of the Beast’ will be getting a chip implanted in your hand
• The ‘Mark of the Beast’ is a vaccine

Clearly these can’t all be right. Perhaps none of them are. But if there isn’t a sure way to know, then what use is the Bible? People claiming the Bible says these things makes the Bible a joke. 

There is a way to tell. 

Not surprisingly, Jesus own words provide a formula: In his prophecy about the destruction of Jerusalem, he warned his Jewish followers: "When you have seen (to use the language of the Prophet Daniel) the `Abomination of Desolation', standing in the Holy Place --let the reader observe those words—then let those in Judea flee to the mountains.” (Mt 24:15)

His apostles had no idea what he meant by “the abomination of Desolation”. But they were familiar with the prophecy of Daniel; and Jesus’ counsel was for them to carefully observe Daniel’s words. What words? 

Daniel had indeed used similar words. Daniel 9:26 prophesied that “Messiah will be cut off.” Although the apostles hadn’t gotten their head around that idea when Jesus said the above words to them, a few days later, he was “cut off,” executed. No doubt his apostles re-read Daniel 9 very closely after that. Just a couple sentences after describing the cutting off of the Messiah, Daniel said that “on the wing of disgusting things there will be the one causing desolation; until an extermination...” (Daniel 9:27)

By itself, that sentence didn’t enlighten those new Christians very much. But Jesus told them to study Daniel. He didn’t specify which part. Another prophecy in Daniel gave them another clue: “How long will the vision of the constant feature and of the transgression causing desolation continue, to make both the holy place and the army things to trample on?” (Daniel 8:13)

Those Jewish Christians would have easily figured out that the ‘constant feature’ referred to daily sacrifices on the altar in the temple in Jerusalem. “This is what you will offer on the altar: two one-year-old rams each day, continually. Offer the one young ram in the morning and the other ram at twilight... It is to be a regular burnt offering throughout your generations.” (Exodus 29:38-42) And the “holy place” had to refer to the temple itself, real estate that was then and still is considered by the Jews to be ‘holy ground’. 

So Jesus prophecy told them to watch for something that the Jews considered “disgusting” to begin to ‘trample on’ the temple and put an end to the daily, constant sacrifices there.

Thirty-three years went by. The Jews got more rebellious against Rome until, finally, Rome sent an army, complete with portable “idols” in the form of the Legionnaires’ standards – basically, a flagpole topped with a pennant and a gold-plated symbol (such as a lion, wolf, sun, snake, medusa, etc.) that represented each legion. Each soldier literally worshiped his legion's standard, and pledged to give his life for it. They brought these idols right up to the gates of the temple, and they even began tunneling under the wall so that their idols, disgusting things to Jews, were literally standing on holy ground.

That was the sign Jesus had given his followers. It was unclear before it happened. But once it happened it was obvious.

From this example, we learn two vital tools to determining what some of the “hard to understand” things in the Bible mean:

1. Use the Bible to explain the Bible.
2. Prophetic passages may not make sense until the events prophesied are happening.

With this foundation, then, let’s take a look at some of the things we mentioned at the outset: The antichrist; Babylon the Great (also called ‘the whore of Babylon’); the Mark of the Beast, and other hard-to-understand things. We’ll go there in the rest of this series.

 

Feel free to leave a comment. 

Bill K. Underwood is the author of several books, all available on Amazon.com. You can help support this site by purchasing one of his books.

Does Coronavirus signal the end of the world?

My home lot is small. My neighbors are very close by. This time of year, people are in their yards or have their windows open. Their conversation on an afternoon during the pandemic went like this: 

“This is the end, no question." 

"We’re at the apocalypse."

"They aren’t going to fix this, I don’t care what they promise."

The others agreed. No one argued. No one said, ‘Oh, we’ve seen worse.’ No one said, ‘It won’t come in my lifetime.’  

Are they right? Is Coronavirus the end? Is this a punishment from God, a biblical plague, to be followed in short order by darkness, hail, locusts, and the oceans turning to blood? 

 

The short answer is, No. 

But does that mean the Coronavirus pandemic has no biblical significance? Not at all. It would be very unwise to ignore it.  

Coronavirus is absolutely not a punishment from God, as a born-again man tried to tell me a couple months ago, being visited on those heathen Chinese for destroying ‘Christian’ churches. (He later contracted the disease himself...) God simply doesn’t work that way. Long ago, Abraham said to God: 

“It is unthinkable that you would act in this manner by putting the righteous man to death with the wicked one so that the outcome for the righteous man and the wicked is the same! It is unthinkable of you. Will the Judge of all the earth not do what is right?” (Genesis 18:25)

It was a rhetorical question; of course the Judge of all the earth will always do what is right. 

So if the Bible does not teach that the pandemic is a punishment from God, does it explain why random people are dying while others are surviving unscathed? Yes it does: 

 “The swift do not always win the race, nor do the mighty win the battle, nor do the wise always have the food, nor do the intelligent always have the riches, nor do those with knowledge always have success, because time and unexpected events overtake them all.” (Ecclesiastes 9:11)

“Unexpected events.” There is no fate; no one is destined to die because of Coronavirus. It is more likely to kill those with weakened immune systems. But it isn’t a death sentence for the human race. Millions of people have survived it so far, and millions more will come in contact with it or some new plague; and some will survive while others die. The ‘mighty don’t always win the battle.’   

 

There are, in fact, things you can do to improve your chances of survival.

Adam’s and Eve’s bodies were wonderfully made by their creator with multiple lines of defense against disease. But with each generation we get further and further from that perfect start. On top of that, within one century we went from virtually everyone eating farm-fresh organic food, breathing clean air, drinking clean water, and staying physically active all day - to a generation that sits in front of a computer all day and thinks mac-n-cheese and ‘Impossible burger’ is actually food. 

If you’re a health nut who buys organic food, filters your water, filters the air in your house and walks two miles a day, you still won’t live forever. We all inherited death from Adam. But whose chances of warding off a virus rank higher: the health nut, or an overweight smoker living on diet soda and pop-tarts? 

We’ve come, in one century, from a generation that took responsibility for their own health, to a ‘herd mentality’ that thinks we’re all going to die if science doesn’t come up with a solution.

If the ‘health service’, so called, was really interested in saving as many as possible, it seems like their message should be: 'Build your immune system! Get more sunshine, keep moving, get plenty of rest, take vitamins C and D and E, eat fresh food, and don’t stress!' If everyone did some or most of these things, everyone’s immune system would improve a little, and far fewer people overall would be in danger from a virus.

Is the pandemic the end of the world? No. There have been many plagues down through history. But that is not the point. Jesus said the last days would be marked by wars, “great earthquakes, and in one place after another food shortages and pestilences.” (Luke 21:10, 11)

In the war between Napoleon and Wellington – sometimes called the Peninsular War, between England and France in the early 1800s – many wondered if it was the end. All those signs were being seen: War, food shortage, pestilence, even great earthquakes. Serious Bible scholars, however, knew it wasn’t the end. How? Because Jesus added, “And this good news of the kingdom will be preached in ALL the inhabited earth, for a witness to ALL nations, and then the end will come.” (Matthew 24:14) Matthew Poole, for example, pointed out that in his day, the 1700s, the gospel had barely reached America, let alone India or Australia, and certainly couldn’t be said to have been preached in every nation. (See Matthew Poole for Mark 13:10)

Today, however, all the pieces of Jesus’ warning sign are in place. Since World War I broke out, the world has been constantly at war; has been bouncing from the Spanish flu to polio to heart disease to ebola to cancer to AIDS; the world has seen food shortages all over Africa and Asia and even in more affluent lands; has endured a barrage of earthquakes in one place after another; and, most significantly, has witnessed the Good News of the Kingdom being preached in literally every nation and language. The most widely translated website on the internet, by a huge margin, is not Google or Facebook; it is jw.org, in over 1,000 languages, whose overriding theme is the good news of the kingdom.

Coronavirus may not be the end of the world. But the end is certainly not waiting for some new sign to be fulfilled before it comes.

Please leave a comment.To read another of my columns on a similar subject, click here.

Bill K. Underwood is a columnist, photographer and author of several books available at Amazon.com. You can help support this site by purchasing one of his books.