#30SecondBible: Revelation

Stubborn Hope

By Keisha E. McKenzie

The Revelation from Jesus Christ to everyone caught in the thicket of empire, persecution, and death; everyone who hopes for equality, plenty, and life: the time is near. It’s a message of stubborn hope, written for a people pushed around, waging war, and telling stories. “Write what you’ve seen, what is now, and what will take place later.” And the message is coded in letters to the resistance around Asia Minor. John tells all the truth to the people, not to the powerful. He tells it with lampstands and beasts, and sulfur and thunder, and women and elders, the Lion and the lamb. The Time Is Near. Blessed are those who hear this.

  1. What does it look like to be "caught in the thicket of empire" in our world today?
  2. What's your message of stubborn hope?

Good News For The In-Betweeners

By Keisha E. McKenzie

This is for the in-betweeners, living between everyday oppression and world peace, the now-is and the is-to-come, in that dry space where nothing is certain. Revelation is what we write when we’re chanting “We will win!” but we don’t know for sure that we will win, and we don’t all agree what winning means. Sometimes the good news is that the war is over but Revelation is for times when the only good news is that we can still envision good. In those times, there will be an angel, a John, and hope in the fall of empire and the restructuring of the world. And we who live in the middle of this story, not its end, we proclaim that Babylon is fallen and righteousness is the rightful rule for the Earth. This is our hope and our testimony: Maranatha.

  1. What does it feel like to live between everyday oppression and world peace?
  2. In one word, what is your hope? What is your testimony?

May It Be So

By Kent Dobson

In John’s wild vision he sees Jesus dressed like Caesar, speaking to seven illegal churches. And the heavens are torn open and God is in his sacred court. Jesus is now a lamb, slain and alive. Then war breaks out against he empire and the beasts that rule it. Some saints survive and some die. Evil and justice are making war on one another. The devil, the serpent, the dragon, human evil itself is finally defeated. A New Jerusalem appears where the Tree of Life heals the nations and their hatred. The tears of humanity are wiped away. It ends with an Amen, meaning, “may it be so."

  1. What do you remember about the book of Revelation?
  2. What would take to wipe away the tears of humanity in our world today?

Come Quickly

By Kent Dobson

The book of Revelation is not a crystal ball to the future. It is a mythopoetic vision of what is already happening. We face an apocalypse of our own making, with our own weapons and our consumption of the very earth that keeps us alive. The question is not, “What will happen? What does the Bible say will happen?” The question is, “Are there any wild dreamers who see beyond our empires, who call out our own self-destructive evil, who are caught up in a new vision, a new Tree of Life for our own troubled century?" As the book says, “Come quickly."

  1. Who are the wild dreamers in our world today?
  2. What is your new vision for our trouble century?

Come, Lord Jesus

By Diana Butler Bass

Revelation is about the New Testament's central conflict: the lordship of Christ versus the lordship of Caesar. In nine visions John describes a God whose power is that of a lamb, who is worthy to redeem the universe. Love unleashes the forces that conquer evil. When human history ends, God's dream is fulfilled. A sacred city descends from heaven, the crystalline river flowing through its center, water the world with harmony and wholeness, where people from every tribe and nation live forever in goodness. Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. Amen.

  1. What does it look like to water the world with harmony and wholeness?
  2. “Love unleashes the forces that conquer evil.” How have you experienced this in your life?

There Is Hope

By Diana Butler Bass

Revelation seems to depict a violent God who rejoices in wrath. It is frightening and not life-giving. But there is hope; hope from the bottom. John was a victim of imperial Rome and was exiled for faith. His is the hope of victims everywhere, that God will intervene on their behalf and that empires of hate will be replaced by love. God is coming surely to rebalance history. And what we think of as ultimate power, that of oppressive domination, it will surely be undone by God’s fierce love and justice. It seems frightening, but only if we are on the wrong side of love.

  1. What does it mean to you for history to be rebalanced?
  2. What does it look like to be "on the wrong side of love?"

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