Tag: bsf revelation study week 9

09.4 Revelation – God in the Center

God in the Center

Holy, Holy, Holy
Lord, God, Almighty
Who was, and is, and is to come!

This song from Revelation 4:8 is the perfect cube.  3×3, God exactly in the center.

Like at it like a sudoku puzzle.  Every way you read it is a perfect and complete summation.  Lord, God, Almighty.  Holy, Lord, Who was.

It challenges our thinking when we open our eyes to just how deep and meaningful this is.  Especially to the fact that God is in the center.  As the bible starts out, “In the beginning God”.

Even our thinking of the royal court of heaven.  When we think of a royal court, the center of the court is the throne.  That is because Kings and Queens may come and go and each be seated on that throne.  But in heaven, God is the centerpiece, not the throne.

And like a wheel, everything rotates around and is linked to the center.  Interesting trivia, in geometry, the center of a circle is called the origin.

So, here is an application and a challenge.  Take this square to your next quiet time of devotional.  Worship God in each quadrant as it comes out from the center.  How do you respond to the Holy God?  How do you live you life in recognition that God is your Lord?  How do you acknowledge that God is present, today, in your life?  How, do you bow in reverence to the “All Might” of our God?

It is fun and rewarding to recognize that you are worshiping God in the same way as the celestial beings encircling Him seated at His throne.

My Answers:

8.
a.
All persons of the Trinity are Holy, a perfect and complete holiness

b.
All might is of God’s.  He is the Lord (master/king)

c.
God is eternal and present.  He is not just “the God of the old testament” or the “God of Jacob or Israel or Daniel”.  He is also not just the baby Jesus in the manger.  He is eternal and eternally present

9.
To live it out in thought word and action.  Tor give all praise to God.  To truly strive to do His work, putting Him at the front and myself at the rear

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09.3 Revelation – Is To Come

Is To Come

In our lesson today we see God’s power and perfection, but we also see God in His Eternity.  God alone has no beginning and no end.  Everything else, the heavens and the earth and everything in them was created.  Everything physical, living or elements, great or small, was created.  Everything spiritual, other than God, was created, including the angels in all their different forms.  Sound was created.  Light as we know it was created.  Everything except God.

We often will praise God for His consistency.  God is the same yesterday and today.  He is unchanging.  He does not begin better because He is and always has been perfect.  He does not become less.  He doesn’t gain might or power or authority nor does it ever diminish.

We see this in the descriptions of heaven referenced throughout the bible.  Daniel, Isaiah, Ezekiel, John, Stephen, Moses, all see the same thing.  None have words to fully describe it, although each tries with comparisons and allegories to things and sounds in this world.

But I found it interesting that the words that are spoken about this in heaven that we find in both Revelation 1:8 and in Revelation 4:8 are NOT, “the one who was and is and will be”.  While that would be consistent with how we sometimes view God, that is not how God is viewed by Himself or in His house.  That description would be of a flat God.  A two dimensional God.  A God without feature or movement.  A God without a crescendo or climax in His relationship with mankind.

Instead, in those verses God is described as “the one who was and is and is to come.”  Did you catch the difference?  God and all of heaven is looking forward in anticipation a great and glorious day.  The glimpses of heaven the great prophets are given are not simple of another day in heaven like every other day, they are of a day of glory when God comes to judge and collect His people out of the world.

As you live in relationship with God, are you simply putting in your time?  Going through the motions?  Treating each day as just another day?  Or, like someone with front row tickets and a backstage pass to the greatest event of all eternity, are you living with excitement and anticipation?  Are you decked out in your team colors for the event?  Do you study His word so you can sing along with every verse?  And, most importantly, do you know with whom you are supposed to share that extra ticket that God has placed in your pocket?

If God and all of Heaven are looking forward to this day, shouldn’t we be as well?  They pyrotechnics alone sound pretty amazing!

My Answers:

5.
lightening thunder,  rainbow, shine, clarity like crystal – God’s power and perfection

6.
thunder, lightning, loud trumpet blast, lapis lazuli under his feet, God seated on a throne, winged beings flying , singing Holy, Holy Holy, smoke/cloud, living creatures, gems on the throne, flying creatures, throne of lapis, figure like that of a man glowing like full of fire with brilliant light, the appearance of rainbow

7.
a.
The first voice like a trumpet (Jesus), At once I was in the Spirit (H/S), the one who sat there (on the throne) (God the Father)

b.
The Holy Spirit is sent by the Father to remind us of everything  Jesus has said.