John Rogers—Year C Seventh Sunday in Easter

Anthony: Our first passage of the month is Revelation 22: 12–14, 16–17, and also 20–21. I’ll be reading from the New Revised Standard Version, the updated edition. It is a Revised Common Lectionary passage for the seventh Sunday in Easter, which is June 1.

“See, I am coming soon; my reward is with me, to repay according to everyone’s work. ¹³ I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.” ¹⁴ Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they will have the right to the tree of life and may enter the city by the gates.  “It is I, Jesus, who sent my angel to you with this testimony for the churches. I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.” ¹⁷ The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.” And let everyone who hears say, “Come.” And let everyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift. The one who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus! ²¹ The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all the saints. Amen.

And when we come to Scripture, John, we’re always searching to find out what the text is revealing to us about God. So, from your perspective, your exegetical perspective, what does this text tell us about God?

John: I love, I always love thinking about the parameters of a text and what it says of kind of where we are in the book. And regardless of sort of our understanding historically of the chronology of the New Testament gospels and epistles, that this, here it is at the end, and this is the last word, and what it says to me about God’s character. God is, we are both saying, kind of this maranatha quote from Corinthians, like, “Come Lord Jesus” — that, we are asking that.

But as I was thinking about this text in preparation for this recording, I was also imagining because I really, there’s so much in this world right now and in my life that I’m like, Lord Jesus, I just need you to come. And that’s not a temporary by the power of the Holy Spirit come. But I need you to come back and restore that which is broken in my life and in this world.

But I’m also hearing a God of the covenant who is the Alpha and the Omega, who is saying, come to me. And there is this uniform openness to that which speaks to God’s character of invitation. And I think sometimes when we think about Revelation, we feel like that it’s just this wild apocalyptic eschatological book.

And if we, and when we do that, it feels like that we paint a different picture, a wild picture of it. But I think at the heart of what we’re getting here at the end of our Scripture is a God that’s saying the same thing that he said. And I love that right before this text, Eden is restored. God is saying, “Come to me. I want to be in fellowship. I want to be in relationship. I want to be with you. And so, I’ve just proven that — I came to you.” Here we have Jesus saying, “I’m sending an angel to speak these things to you.” And we get a word of invitation.

And the last word, Anthony, I think it’s so beautiful. The last word we get is grace. “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all the saints. Amen.” And so, I think that’s what I’m hearing here.

Anthony: If you’re preaching this text to the congregation, and of course it’s unique to every congregation, but what else would you convey beyond the fact that Jesus says, “Come,” and gives us the final word of grace.

John: I think this is king of funny because Eugene Peterson never liked either. He didn’t want to give verses, here and here, so he breaks it down occasionally, like three verses here, like in sections. And he certainly didn’t want to give the sections headers.

But when I look at my Bible, I have a parallel Bible where on one side it’s the NIV, on the other side, it’s the Message. And I love, like, when I look at this, it says on one side, in the NIV, in the sections, the two sections in chapter 22, there are three sections. Eden Restored, John and the Angel. And then lastly, Epilogue, Invitation and Warning. And those feel pretty good and like structurally true. But I love what Eugene, when he is forced — I don’t know if it was him or somebody else in the editing process — to put a title where it says, right before verse 6, Don’t Put it away on the Shelf. I think as my invitation to anyone preaching this text will be reminded that though it is important to exposit God’s word in the pulpit, your words carry very little power if you are not dusting off that Scripture and letting it penetrate your life in your own private chamber.

And I think we often think in transaction. Like I do it as well in teaching and facilitating, but I love that header. Don’t put it away on the shelf, don’t appropriate the text into a programmatic function or a function of the job that you might even be really gifted at. That here is a word that is alive, that is true, that is filled with goodness and grace and promise. That, if this is the Bright and Morning Star, let him be the bright and morning star as you put your sermons together, as you draw from this Scripture to let it encourage those people who have your attention.

Anthony: I’ve often wondered at John. What would it sound like if we actually took Scripture as the more important word than our own words as preachers and teachers? Huh? If we read Scripture in that way, that this is truly the most important word we’re going to receive today. And I’ve heard pastors say sometimes after stating a pericope, like we just read in Revelation that, “Oh, that taught itself. I should sit down now.” And sometimes I think, yeah, let’s just do that and leave it there. Especially with a book that says, don’t add any words or beware.

John: That’s right. True. That’s true.