Part 1: Introduction | Part 2: From the Beginning | Part 3: The Flood | Part 4: The Sabbath | Part 5: Deliverance | Part 6: Isaiah | Part 7: Jeremiah | Part 8: Minor Prophets | Part 9: The Gospels | Part 10: Acts | Pauline Epistles 1 | Part 12: Pauline Epistles 2 | Part 13: Hebrews | Part 14: General Epistles
As we all know, the Canon ends with the Book of Revelation, which records Christ’s words to the Apostle John about “the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter” (Re 1.19). Four times John includes a creation reference.
Revelation 3.14
And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God.
Here Jesus refers to himself as “the beginning of the creation of God,” which sounds to us like the Jehovah’s Witnesses, or their ancestor Arius the 4th-century heretic.
Do we have a problem?
No. The word translated “beginning” here is the Greek arche. Like all words, it has multiple nuances, or meanings. It can mean “beginning,” as it does in John 1.1—“in the beginning.” The standard lexicon (dictionary) of New Testament Greek, which its users call BDAG, lists that as the first nuance. The second is “one with whom a process begins”; the third, “the first cause”—the nuance it assigns to this passage.
Thus this verse is quite similar to Paul’s use of “firstborn” in Colossians 1.15; it speaks of position or standing rather than of chronology or sequence.
Jesus is the person behind all of creation. The Laodiceans ought to hear what he has to say.
Revelation 4.11
This is John’s first vision of the scene around the throne of God in heaven. God is seated on throne (Re 4.2-3), surrounded by 24 “elders” (Re 4.4) who fall down to worship God, crying out, “Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.”
It appears to me that unlike the previous passage, the person being described here is not the Son, but the Father; the narrative continues into the next chapter, where “the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the Root of David” (Re 5.5) receives a scroll from the one sitting on the throne (Re 5.7).
But as in the previous passage, the fact of creation is cited as a basis for authority, even worship.
Revelation 10.6
Here the speaker is an angel—evidently a powerful one (Re 10.1-3) who announces a transition in the timeline (“that there will be delay no longer,” Re 10.6 NASB), swearing “by him that liveth for ever and ever, who created heaven, and the things that therein are, and the earth, and the things that therein are, and the sea, and the things which are therein” (Re 10.6).
This is John’s third consecutive use of the fact of Creation to demonstrate the authority of the Creator.
Revelation 21.1-5
John climaxes his book with his vision of the New Heaven and the New Earth. But he is climaxing not only his apocalypse, but also the entire Canon of Scripture; he closes the Bible with an inclusio, a bookend that contrasts the Beginning with the End.
- “The first heaven and the first earth were passed away” (Re 21.1).
- “There was no more sea” (Re 21.1), in contrast with the Creation, which began with the globe entirely covered by water (Ge 1.2).
- “The tabernacle of God is with men” (Re 21.3), whereas in the beginning he had walked with him “in the cool of the day” (Ge 3.8)—and we don’t know that this was a daily ritual.
- “There shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things [since Genesis 3] are passed away” (Re 21.4).
- “And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new” (Re 21.5).
Over these final two chapters of the book, John makes other connections with the first creation; the Tree of Life shows up (Re 22.2), and there are other linkages. See how many you can find.
So our Scripture ends with a full deliverance, a New Creation that overwhelms all that we have done to twist and pervert the old one. The end of the story—and the dawn of eternity—make no sense without the beginning.
Creation matters.
Next time, a wrap-up.
Photo by Greg Rakozy on Unsplash
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