“Direct Flights ”

• Scriptural Reference: Revelation 7:11-17
• April 29, 2007
• Listen to the audio

I haven’t talked to many preachers who like to preach from the book of Revelation, not many, that is, who take their seminary training seriously. You see, if you take your seminary training seriously, you learn Hebrew and Greek, the biblical languages. You study the culture and times that gave rise to the languages. You do this because you cannot understand what a certain text means if you don’t know something about the people who were inspired to write it. In doing this, you learn the meanings behind the biblical culture’s symbols and the kinds of events that inspire them. And you learn that the Bible doesn’t contradict itself in its basic, grand message.

What does this have to do with the book of Revelation? Well In 1832, the widow of Richard Wingfield, the 5 th Viscount Powerscourt, a religious woman by the name of Theodosia, convened a Bible conference. She invited all manner of clergy to the conference, including a lawyer by the name of John Nelson Darby. At that conference, Darby first introduced his ideas concerning a “secret rapture” which he claimed to have discovered in the Bible. Darby believed that the return of Christ will be preceded by the evacuation of all Christians from the globe prior to a period of great suffering and tribulation. Darby was a lawyer with no theological training. In fact, since he had become disillusioned with the Church of England, and especially the clergy, anything they might say to critique his views he held in utmost contempt.

Nevertheless, Darby had a powerful gift of persuasion, perhaps attributable to his profession as an attorney, and he managed to garner a cadre of supporters in what was to become the Irish Anglican church, of which he became a deacon, and then a priest. Later, when the clergy of the Irish Anglicans were required to declare loyalty to the King of England, Darby and his followers split off and became the Plymouth Brethren.

The most famous 20 th and 21 st century adherents to Darby’s ideas are Hal Lindsay, who wrote the book “The Late Great Planet Earth,” and Tim LaHaye who co-authored the fantasy series entitled “Left Behind” with Jerry Jenkins. Lindsay and LeHaye, though, are rivaled, perhaps, only by Cyrus Scofield, whose interpretive annotations in the margins of the Bibles he published are taken by many people to be as authoritative as the biblical text itself. In fact, my grandmother had a Scofield Reference Bible and read from the margins more than she read from the text itself. It’s interesting to note that Scofield, like Darby, had his most intense training as an attorney and only after informal ministerial studies, became a clergyman.

Now, why am I saying all this about Darby, Scofield, Lindsay, and Lehey? Please note that for 1800 years prior to Darby, the vast majority of the greatest minds of Christendom and millions of dedicated followers of Christ never knew anything about a “secret rapture.” Note also that since Darby and contemporary with Lindsay, LaHaye, and Scofield are thousands of pastoral theologians like yours truly who have studied the biblical texts, love the Christ, and do not accept their sensationalist conclusions. Instead, the rich imagery of the book of Revelation (not RevelationS) is meant to convey a very simple, biblically consistent message.

God created everything and everyone. God created it all good. Human beings were given free will because God did not want the kind of joyless, dry, and passionless relationship that comes when you have no other choice, when all you are is an involuntary slave. Free will was a risky gift, though, and humans chose to reject God. That fouls everything up. God, though, embarked on an ages-long effort to call people back to himself, first through the chose people Israel and the Law revealed to them, then when they rejected that, through the prophets that called the people back. Then, when they rejected that and suffered the consequences that ensued, God still did not give up, but went to his people himself in Jesus, who was God-in-flesh, and lived out God’s desires for humanity.

When the Imperial and Idolatrous powers of the day conspired to kill Jesus, God demonstrated his love and power by raising Christ from the dead and demonstrating that anyone who followed that Christ would enjoy that same power over even death, death the ultimate threat of Empire and idolatrous, organized religion. The Book of Revelation depicts the ultimate failure of Empire and Idolatry, uses ancient Hebrew Scriptural images to paint the picture and underlines the basic reality of the universe: God is the Creator of all that is. God loves his creation. Remain faithful to God, as revealed by the Lamb, and you will be victorious, too. You will join the Cosmic worship service that anchors all of Creation.

That’s the message of Revelation. It isn’t some spooky, secretly coded archive only recently discovered. It comforted the persecuted Christians of the first years of the Christian movement, back when it was simply called, “The Way,” and it remains a commentary on all who would serve the will of any Empire, be it the Roman, British, or current American. If you serve empire rather than Christ, you will not enjoy the cosmic worship service. If you serve Christ, no matter what empire does to you, you will enjoy the cosmic worship service for eternity – and this no matter what your ethnicity