(Please read this Scripture passage first, before the homily.)
Welcome to the book of Revelation, also called the Apocalypse, which means revelation. What is it? It is prophecy; it is teaching and it is encouragement. It is easier to say what it is not. It is not a comment on our recent national elections. It neither affirms one candidate nor condemns the other. If it is a call to repentance, it is not a call for “America” to repent, but for me and you to repent. It is about the Church and world of the late first and early second centuries. Because the book spoke to the people who first read it or heard it, it was preserved for succeeding generations. If the book of Revelation had meaning only for those actually living in the last days of the world, the first recipients would not have preserved it.
It comes to us as a revelation from God through Jesus Christ made to John, who is in exile on the lonely island of Patmos. It has a warning, that we should pay close attention to what is revealed.
We can expect to see visions and hear strange sounds. We can expect coded references to people, places and events. We can expect symbolic numbers and colors. We are familiar with things like this: we use coded colors, such as red for danger or blue for water. We are use the elephant and the donkey as symbols of our political parties. We are familiar with caricatures of politicians. We should not be surprised to find similar tools used in the book of Revelation.
An opening vision, which we do not hear proclaimed, describes a beautiful and, perhaps surreal, place with golden lampstands, and the Son of man dressed in a long priestly robe, with a royal belt around his waist, with eternally white hair, with eyes that know all and with the appearance of might and majesty as he holds the churches in his hand.
John writes to the seven churches. He writes in the name of the God of the past, of the present and of the future, the God of all time, of every place and of every circumstance. Each letter follows a general format: greeting; recognition of good done; encouragement; warning and call to repentance; need to pay attention; promised reward.
Since we have only two weeks to spend on the book of Revelation, we shall try to give a broad picture of the book. By way of a spoiler alert, we will discover that God does remain in control of the cosmos throughout the all of the struggles and evils in the world. This is the revelation from God through Christ to John for his day and for our day.