Revelation 1:4-8 *
Dear Friends in Christ,
Did you know that the Sunday after Easter has been traditionally called “Low Sunday?” Did you also know that any similarity between this name and a fall-off in church attendance from the high holy day of the week before is merely a coincidence? Actually the name comes from the middle ages and refers to the contrast between the elaborate rites of Easter and the return to normal liturgical practices.
The fact of the matter is, however, that Christ is risen. The tomb is as empty today as it was last week. And because Christ is alive there is no such thing as a low Sunday – or any other day as well. Easter simply but dramatically and unalterably changes things. It changes our mood. It changes our outlook on life. It changes our outlook on death. It just changes everything. And the last thing to describe all these changes would be the term “low.”
Today we want to continue the high level of festivity and celebration that we began last week. We’ll have the chance to do that by working our way through a portion of the first chapter of the last book in the Bible, Revelation.
A note on how we will proceed. Having heard this lesson read from the lectern just minutes ago you know that it contains a lot of information, and there are any number of things we could talk about. We could spend time developing John’s personal situation or the vivid description he gives of Jesus or who the seven churches are or the imminent return of Jesus on the Last Day, because all that is in there, and all that is important and meaningful to us…
But today, on this Sunday after Easter it would seem most appropriate to narrow our field and joyfully focus specifically on
THE NAMES AND CLAIMS OF THE RISEN CHRIST
found in our text. In the process, we are given a wonderful review of the Easter message as we once again reflect upon
1. Who Jesus is
2. What Jesus did for us
Who is Jesus Christ? Within the five verses of our text we are given six different descriptions of our Risen Lord. Each title is packed with Easter meaning and comfort. Let’s take a look…
First He is referred to as “the faithful witness.” A
witness is one who knows and then testifies to the truth of a matter. Do you remember the exchange between Jesus
and Pontius Pilate shortly before the crucifixion? At one point Pilate asked Jesus if He was a
king. Jesus said He was, but a different
kind than Pilate was thinking. Jesus
then went on to say, “You are right in saying I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born was to testify
to the truth. Everyone on the side of
truth listens to me.” To which
Pilate then asked his (in)famous question, “What is truth?”
Jesus had already answered the question. Jesus testifies to the truth because Jesus is the truth. In other words, everything He says is true because, as Jesus declared in John 14:6, “I am the way and the truth and the life…” Meaning everything He says about Himself as being our Savior, our Redeemer, our Helper, our Friend, our Confidant is a faithful witness to the truth.
Think of what that means to us personally. All the promises Jesus makes to us in His
Word – such as His abiding presence in
our lives, the fact that He will never leave us or forsake us, the promise that
He is in heaven, right now, preparing a place for us to spend all eternity –
are trustworthy and true. We can rely on
them. We can count on them. We can stake our eternal lives on them. Because Jesus Christ is a faithful witness…
And the reason we know He is a faithful witness is because of the second name we find in our text: Jesus Christ is “the firstborn from the dead.” That is, He is the first one to physically rise from the dead and return to live in heaven forever in this glorified state.
This is something Jesus predicted would happen. And it did.
When the women went to the tomb early on Easter morning they were not
met by a three day old corpse in the beginning stages of decay. They were met by empty burial clothes and
angels who met their questioning looks with a question of their own: “Why are you looking for the living among
the dead. He is not here. He is risen, just as he said.”
“Just as he said.” Jesus
made many predictions and prophecies while on this earth. But of them all, the prophecy of His own
resurrection was the grandest and the greatest.
And on Easter it happened, “just as he said.” Herein is our Easter confidence: If he is a faithful witness to the promise that He would rise again – that is,
become the firstborn from the dead –
we know He will be a faithful witness
to every other promise as well. He
lives! What comfort this sweet sentence
gives.
Third title for the risen Christ: He is “the ruler of the kings of the earth.” When Jesus was going through His passion we remember how the soldiers dressed him up like a king and mocked Him. And no one will dispute that when hanging on the cross Jesus looked anything but regal or powerful.
What those who mocked Him didn’t understand is that He was there willingly, and that He simply chose not to use all the power at His disposal as the Son of God. What they didn’t understand is that Christ voluntarily humbled Himself as our substitute so He could drink for us the full cup of suffering that our sins deserved.
But Easter presents a different picture. He lives, and with His resurrection He once again assumed all the power and glory that is rightfully His as the Son of God. Now, He bows to no one. Like ants are to us, so the rich and the famous and the powerful on this earth are to Him. For His own select reasons He may let them hold sway for this brief period of time we call life. But in the end, the risen Christ is “the ruler of the kings of the earth.” He is the One who is in control. No one pulls the wool over His eyes. Therefore, wickedness and hardship and evil and circumstances we would not choose for ourselves must never be misinterpreted as powerlessness.
Why Christ allows what He allows to go on is His business. But of this there is no doubt: Christ rules. And He will rule forever. Which means we’re in very good hands.
The next three names we can take as a group. All speak of the risen Christ’s power and His
eternal and unchangeable nature. He is
the “Alpha and the Omega” (these are
the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet and mean that He is the
beginning and the end, that is, eternal).
In a similar vein He is “the One
who is, who was, and who is to come.” And
finally, He is “the Almighty.”
So, in answer to the question: Who is Jesus Christ?, this is what we learn
from our text: He is 1) the faithful witness, 2) the first born
from the dead, 3) the ruler of the kings of the earth, 4) the Alpha and the
Omega, 5) the One who is, who was, and who is to come, and 6) the Almighty.
That’s quite a lineup to have on your side. And we do.
But perhaps even harder to fathom than who Jesus is, is what Jesus does. Again, our text
provides us with a list. This time there
are four statements. Listen
closely. See if you can pick them out as
we hear them all together, and then we’ll look at them individually. The
Apostle John writes: “To him who loves us and has freed us from
our sins by his blood, and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve His
God and Father – to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen.”
What does the Risen Christ do for us? First He “loves us.” The verb tense is significant. It is a present tense, which means ongoing action. Christ’s love for us is in a continuous state. It is ongoing. In other words, there is never a time when Christ doesn’t love us.
This is important for us to know. Sometimes when difficulties come into our lives even the strongest Christian may flirt with the idea that Christ has stopped loving us, or at least stopped loving us to the degree that He once did. Our human reasoning says if we are truly loved by Christ, and if He is indeed all powerful, then why does He allow us to have pain and sadness? Why is life punctuated with tragedy and heartbreak?
All we can say is this: The Lord has His reasons. Some will become apparent to us in time. Others may not be revealed to us until we see God face to face. Whatever is behind the temporary unpleasantries that enter our lives, this much we know is true. It is not because the Risen Christ stopped loving us. Because He never stops loving us. “God is love,” writes John in his first letter. And we are His beloved. And the ultimate proof of His love is taken up in the next words on our list, where we are told…
“He has freed us from our sins by his blood.” Once again, the verb tense is significant. This time the verb is in the past tense, which means completed action. “The wages of sin is death,” both temporal and eternal, but we have been freed from all of our sins by His blood. When on the cross Jesus cried out “It is finished,” everything necessary for our eternal salvation was accomplished. When Jesus rose from the grave three days later, our salvation was declared complete before a watching world.
What does this mean?
It means that when a Christian’s funeral sermon (your funeral sermon) is preached the pastor won’t say, “So and so
was a good person who we hope is in
heaven right now.” Rather he will say,
“So and so was a redeemed person who now is in
heaven.” Why such boldness? Because two thousand years ago Jesus Christ,
the Son of God, walked this earth; and after living a perfect life in our
place, He then went to the cross in our place where “he freed us from our sins by
his blood.”
And now we live our lives from that perspective. We are Easter Christians. Continually loved by Christ and freed from
the damning consequences of our sin, the Risen Savior gives us an entirely new
identity. What is it? He “has
made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve His God and Father – to him be
glory and power for ever and ever!
Amen.”
We are both royalty and priests. Royalty in the sense that we are part of
Christ’s kingdom on earth now and will eventually be a part of that Kingdom in
heaven. Priests in the sense that we
have free access to our Risen Lord Christ through prayer. And as
both kings and priests we find true fulfillment in life in living for our Lord!
The Apostle Paul put it this way: “For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. 15 And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again. (2 Corinthians 5:14,15). We are kings and priests joyfully in the service of the Risen Christ…
What does the Risen Christ do for us? He 1) loves us (and never stops loving us), 2) He freed us from our sins by His blood (an accomplished fact that took place 2000 years ago), 3) He made us to be a kingdom, and 4) and priests (providing us with a new identity and reason for living).
So today, on this Sunday after Easter, it is true that we have no choirs or brass or special liturgy as we did last week. Nor did we have the build up to this Sunday as we did to last Sunday with a variety of Holy Week services.
Yet despite its historical name, today is anything but a Low
Sunday. Because once again we have had
the high privilege of considering this glorious truth and all it means to
us: He is risen!
He is risen indeed!
Alleluia. Amen.