Everyone believes the world will one day come to an end; however, we disagree on how, when and why. In this sermon, Greg begins the series on Revelation and shows us three things to keep in mind when reading the book of Revelation.
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A Vision of Beauty
• Greg Boyd
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Everyone believes that the world will one day come to an end. Many Christians use the book of Revelation as a roadmap for the end of the world. They see it as a literal interpretation of the future. However, this isn’t the reason that the book of Revelation was written. It was written for a specific time and place, and for a specific reason. Over the next few weeks, we’ll be talking about this book and what it means to the Kingdom.
We need to understand that the book of Revelation is a thing of beauty and not to be feared. Whenever we hear about the end of the world, or hear that a book portends the end of the world, it can cause people anxiety and fear. But the book of Revelation is a thing of beauty. It was written to the Kingdom to tell them about God’s work on Earth and how we should persevere. Revelation was written so that people would act in the here and now, instead of worrying about the future. Today, we have three things to focus on as we start this study.
First, the people of God are called to trust God. Many people have turned to others to help predict the future because we feel it gives us power. The Bible uniformly condemns the use of divination, which is tapping into the spiritual world to foretell the future. When we think we need to have some sort of eye into the future, it shows a lack of trust in God. Jesus said don’t worry about tomorrow. So, trust God.
Second, our job is not to figure out the future but to be passionate disciples of Jesus now. God is the great I AM who is always present with us. He’s not waiting in the past or future. He’s actively at work today. To dwell in the future means that we will miss God now. Live for God with all your heart now and the future will take care of itself.
Finally, Revelation should not motivate us with fear but with beauty. If you take all the symbols of the book literally, it can be quite fearsome. Many people dying, darkness, and destruction pervade the pages of this letter. But the book of Revelation is a book of good news more than anything else. So, never let fear be your motivator.
As we begin this series on Revelation, it’s important to keep these three things in mind. They will be our guide as we read and learn from Revelation. This picture of beauty is something we can trust and never fear. We only ask that people keep an open mind as this isn’t the common understanding of Revelation in modern, Christian circles.
Hide Extended SummaryTopics: Controversial Issues, End Times, Fear
Sermon Series: Rescuing Revelation
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Focus Scripture:
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Revelation 1:1-4
1 The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place; he made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, 2 who testified to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw.
3 Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of the prophecy, and blessed are those who hear and who keep what is written in it; for the time is near.
4 John to the seven churches that are in Asia...
12 thoughts on “A Vision of Beauty”
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What a great message!!! I can’t wait for this series!!!
Yes, living in the present moment is everything as we are immersed into the “Zoe-Life” that comes from our Father, allowing us to love and forgive others with a genuine power and affection. An Inaugurated eschatology pans this out in which God is building His family for the future – forgiven person by forgiven person over the centuries through a marvelous anakainosis process! But…… looking forward to the culmination of that future though, through particular parts of Revelation – (21:1- 7) for example, does provide for and ground our hope in, the ultimate outcome of our Eternal Life in Christ. Our palingenesia crescendo will be awesome beyond the ability of words to describe as we enter the New Heavens and the New Earth to be with our Savior face to face forever!!!
Imagine for a moment stunning five-mile high waterfalls flowing crystalline blue and gold, flowers that bloom evermore beautiful on the hour along with magnificent sunsets that glow with flames of radiant color in the sky with an unending warmth and glorious vivacity as the sweet smell of jasmine and orange blossoms fills the air. Fireflies begin to dance just above the cool grass in the early evening as children play singing songs and clapping their hands in a joyful rhythm while birds and animals of all kinds, peacefully commingle with one another. There are trees so heavy-laden with fruit their branches are bending! You can hear celebration and singing in the distance, a beautiful chorus –you’ve just got to join in. Our Lord is there and greets us with a smile and a big hug and says, “Come quick, I’ve got a special place at the table for you – wait till you taste the pumpkin pie – it’s outta this world!!!!!!!”
These are the new physics of Heaven, which will be on Earth – an “Eden” reborn where Gods sustaining love, power and light permeates every molecule, atom and subatomic string of this incredibly beautiful Resurrected Creation and we’re going to be a part of it!!!!! We can hold this in our hearts and minds now as we allow The Holy Spirit to take our imaginations there! The only “crystal ball” that we’ll ever need, will be the one that our Father in heaven is preparing for us!
Maranatha!!!!
I am excited for this series! Is there a more specific reference for the “scholarly literature” mentioned in this service?
Great message! Thank you for your passionate teaching which I have not seen anywhere else.
Also, form 8 years old on I always had so many thoughts like you mentioned in the beginning of your sermon; how did we come about, how is it I’m me, and my Mom is herself and my friends are themselves, and we aren’t anybody else but who we are with entirely different brains etc. and how can it be we die and this unique person we all are just goes away, and on and on. It’s nice that many years later I’m not the only one who thought this way. You make me think I wasn’t all that crazy:-)
Thank you for this sermon — looking forward to the rest of the series!
I guess we could say that the scientific community is calling God a “pin-head.” Ha .. sorry. Couldn’t resist.
Like others, I am exited for this series, too, thank you for doing it. Good message. I am an eternal animal welfare person who thinks of scripture as it relates to all flesh. I am curious about John’s message in the Revelation as it pertains to “destroying those who destroy the earth.”
What in your opinion does this mean?
Thank you. Again as always, enjoyed the message. Refreshing to hear this view of the book.
Thank you Greg.
Good one Loree; my kind of humor 🙂
Now in 2025, After feeling bogged down by the most recent series on Revelation, it was a fresh breath to hear this message.
Towards the end, Greg emphasises how we need to first understand what the original intended audience heard John telling them – and then and only then would we draw application to the Church today. I’m not sure whether i’ve heard this emphasis in the new series. I’m fairly certain that no one has mentioned the 70AD dynamic, as Greg does here; rather, it seems that in the recent series – we are leaping straight to modern day application.
I really appreciate this sermon a lot!
Kevin, I took a peek at all the sermons in this series.
I spotted a comment from Loree above:
“I guess we could say that the scientific community is calling God a “pin-head.” Ha… sorry. Couldn’t resist.”
And your response “Good one Loree; my kind of humor”
I liked it too but what’s up with the pin-head?
At the beginning of time, quark confinement, just after .00001 of a second, for every 10 billion pairs of quark and anti-quark collisions there was 1 extra quark, equaling the tiny fraction, making up the majority of the ordinary matter masses of the universe (protons, neutrons) with electrons a remaining fraction 1/1,835.
The Higgs field, a Nobel Prize-worthy discovery, posits quarks are only 2%, of the mass inside protons and neutrons. The other 98% is the kinetic and potential energy of the quarks orbiting in nucleons.
So the material part of you and me and very thing in the universe is only one part quark (that makes protons and neutrons) or one part lepton (electron).
Note again: protons, neutrons, and electrons make atoms that make everything, (Matter) that is, in the universe, to every 10 billion photons.
Albert Einstein famously stated that “Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one,” suggesting that our perception of reality is NOT an absolute TRUTH but rather a constructed experience based on our five senses and interpretations thereof, which can be considered an illusion.
“In the world of atoms, solid matter, the floor upon which you stand, and the foundation that bears the weight of a skyscraper is actually empty space. If you could scale the center of an atom, the nucleus, up to four inches, the surrounding electron cloud would extend to four miles away, and essentially all the breaches between would be empty. – The solidity of iron is actually 99.9999999999999 percent vacuous space made to feel solid by ethereal fields of force having no material reality at all”.
– Gerald L. Schroeder ‘The Hidden Face of God’
Seriously when I pound my hand on my desk is there nothing there other than ethereal fields of force?
What happened to the all the quarks that were replaced by the 1 to 10 billion photon ratio?
Consider they ALL still reside in Heaven where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.
Really liked this from another recent comment: – from a Kevin?
“We are not just all members of the same fan club; we’re actually members of one another. We belong to one another. We have more than just shared interests. We actually have a shared life and a shared love and a shared calling and a shared purpose.” ~Bronwyn Lea
As Greg says our next now moment starts in our imagination and TRUTH can only be found, through the power of the Holy Spirit, with a vision of true reality found in Heaven NOT via photons of light eliminating an illusion.
Consider whenever any of us veers off the narrow path of wisdom where ALL truth is stored in heaven it subtracts from the shared purpose of Heaven forward and adds that back to the chaos of the fall lie. [Greg’s cosmic DANCE]
A Dancing fact: The 1 actual partial of mass (matter) for every 10 billion photons of energy, quarks, DANCE inside protons and neutrons in the nucleon both attracting and repelling within a range of a quadrillionth to one ten trillionth of a centimeter by exchanging color within themselves via gluons (the strong force) or between each other via pions (the nuclear force) and this happens every .0000000000000000000000023 (10-23) of a second.
As Greg mentioned mathematics in this sermon: NOW we are getting to the start of some serious math – God’s math!
When Jesus returns Heaven will NOT need photons of light just the power of the Holy Spirit.
We will get new bodies not made from a stardust illusion but the real stuff.
As far as wealth goes it will be the mathematical result of the plus TRUTH versus the minus LIES that we have lived. [ALL we take with us]
There is a book by: John Mark Comer ‘Live No Lies: Recognize and Resist the Three Enemies That Sabotage Your Peace’ – the devil – the flesh – the world
Kevin hopefully this photon joke is your kind of humor!
A photon that was traveling arrived at a hotel.
A baggage porter approached the photon and said: ‘Are you carrying any luggage’?
The photon said: ‘No I’m traveling light’.
Consider we are much like the photon with the addition of [truth versus lies]!
Interesting ALL the comments in this series. There haven’t been many in the most recent series on Revelation.
Wish i could track with you in the math and science stuff but i failed both those classes. Your photon joke though – yes i did get that. Very funny 🙂
Kevin
Yes funny but the ongoing baggage that accumulates in our lives from living lies is very true.
The problem with living lies is that our perceived reality gets so complexly entangled over time that we can’t keep track of ALL the lies. At some point that will need to get ALL untangled and left at the gate.
It’s much better just to travel light always speaking the truth, IN LOVE, found only in Heaven.
In summary from where I left off in my prior, above, comment:
Einstein’s equation E = mc2, relating energy to mass states all elementary particles interact with each other by exchanging energy through other quantum particles, which are believed to appear out of nowhere, combining and annihilating each other in less than an instant, 10(23) of a second, causing random fluctuations of energy without any apparent cause.
The fleeting particles generated during this brief moment are known as ‘VIRTUAL PARTICLES’. They differ from real particles because they only exist during that exchange – the time of ‘uncertainty’ allowed by the uncertainty principle.
Using virtual particles as the underlying explanation for dark matter/energy, in cosmology, “ZERO POINT ENERGY” is a concept from quantum mechanics that describes the minimum energy a quantum field can have, even at ABSOLUTE ZERO.
The steady and dynamic states are studied for a spherical cloud of zero point energy photons. The anti-gravitational force due to its pressure gradient then represents dark energy, and its gravitational force due to the energy density represents dark matter. ZERO POINT LIQUID OXYGEN ENERGY refers to the inherent, minimal amount of vibrational energy that the molecules in LIQUID OXYGEN possess even at ABSOLUTE ZERO.
Woodland Hills did a seminar on NLP Representational System Preferences a while back and recommended a book ‘Molecules of Emotion: The Science behind Mind-Body Medicine’.
The author, Candace Pert, was a Jewish origin American neuroscientist and pharmacologist who discovered the opioid receptor, the cellular binding site for endorphins in the brain.
Candace believed that virtually all illness, if not psychosomatic in foundation, has a definite psychosomatic, a mental factor such as internal conflict or stress, component. The molecules associated with emotions, called neuropeptides, are produced throughout the body, not just in the brain, and are released by cells in various systems the immune system, digestive system and the heart, essentially acting as chemical messengers that carry information related to our emotions throughout the body.
This works well with the idea we a much like photons traveling light affected though by the fruit of the spirit TRUTH or works of the flesh LIES.
In simple terms Proverbs 17:22 A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones. [ashes dust from a hologram illusion]
Molecules of emotion referring to the concept that emotions are carried throughout the body by specific peptide molecules that bind to receptors on cell surfaces, acting as chemical messengers that influence our physical state, — while “zero point energy” referring to the minimum energy a quantum system can have, meaning even at absolute zero, molecules still vibrate with a tiny amount of energy; —- connects these two ideas in that this quantum level of energy, THE POWER OF THE HOLY SPIRIT, is related to the subtle energetic aspects of emotions.
On the other side of the coin concerning non-living matter SPACEX has been doing work to extract hopefully at some point FREE zero-point energy. They are mixing zero point liquid oxygen with methane gas, 85 times more toxic than carbon dioxide, for the purpose removing the methane from the greenhouse gas problem and 2nd overtime replacing ALL forms of fossil fuels. Note: The current rocket fuel is kerosene, a fossil fuel, mixed with anti-freeze.
Spacecraft, to Mars someday, powered by ZERO POINT LIQUID METHANE OXYGEN ENERGY will make a trip within 7-40 days dependent on the separation between Earth and Mars at any given for the purpose of dragging material rich asteroids close and then using robotics to process the raw materials and ship there back to earth for finished goods processing.
Earth will be cleaned up to become a reality, Greg would surely welcome, with 10 times the folks and animals we currently have.
Considering the trillion plus galaxies out there just maybe there is a correlation between each of them and each of us and with each new birth more zero-point energy being created by the pressure created between dark energy and dark matter to propel the kingdom forward ending with my three thoughts in my prior, above, comment.