Preparing for a Bible study on the Book of Revelation showed just how little I knew about the last book of our Bible. Revelation (or Apocalypse) is a book about a dream, a rather disjointed vision that needs to be visualized rather than just reading it. The need for pictures as well as words challenged my limited technical skills, but the necessary exposure to text and lots of images showed how much of my limited knowledge was wrong and even misguided.
There are many references in our culture to the Book of Revelation as well as a lot of misinformation. For example, there is no “Anti-Christ” in this dream recorded by John of Patmos, a follower of Christ who had apparently been exiled to the island of Patmos, off what is now Turkey. He apparently suffered greatly under the Roman Empire’s persecution of those who refused to adhere to the empire’s religious practices. His work describes many monsters or fantastical “beasts” as well as multiple plagues and punishments administered by God’s angels before Jesus and his angels come to clean up the mess, warring with the evil ones and establishing a “New Jerusalem that will not pass away.”
It would be easy to interpret Revelation as a prediction about the end of the world as we know it, and this has been done repeatedly over many centuries. I think it is much better to read Revelation on its own terms: as the despairing vision of a sincere believer who is so discouraged that he thinks the only way even God can restore His creation is to destroy it and start over again.
Lyn Pickhover, Still Learning