1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,280 Hi, my name is Dr. Ryan Dellamater and I'm the pastor of Ocean Water Church. 2 00:00:06,280 --> 00:00:12,800 You know, I've studied the Bible for over 30 years of my life and I'm thrilled that 3 00:00:12,800 --> 00:00:16,160 I get to lead Ocean Water Church. 4 00:00:16,160 --> 00:00:22,040 We meet at Sir Coffee the second Friday of each month from 6 to 10 p.m. 5 00:00:22,040 --> 00:00:25,060 We have worship and tacos and teaching. 6 00:00:25,060 --> 00:00:28,200 Next time we're going to get together is on Friday, September 8th. 7 00:00:28,200 --> 00:00:30,280 I hope that you'll join us. 8 00:00:30,280 --> 00:00:36,040 Now, this school year I'll be teaching through the book of Revelation, which is the last 9 00:00:36,040 --> 00:00:37,840 book in the Bible. 10 00:00:37,840 --> 00:00:43,000 And it's obviously a book that's very mysterious to some and very important to many. 11 00:00:43,000 --> 00:00:49,480 We plan on learning a lot and we'll be challenging ourselves to rethink our assumptions and to 12 00:00:49,480 --> 00:00:53,400 look at this book in a fresh way. 13 00:00:53,400 --> 00:00:58,920 Is this book a picture of Jesus or a manual for the apocalypse? 14 00:00:58,920 --> 00:01:01,340 Well, first let's talk about interpretation. 15 00:01:01,340 --> 00:01:07,080 It's almost impossible to interpret the Bible without some preconceived notion of what the 16 00:01:07,080 --> 00:01:08,080 text means. 17 00:01:08,080 --> 00:01:12,560 And it's not different in the book of Revelation. 18 00:01:12,560 --> 00:01:16,280 Everyone comes to the Bible with something already in their mind. 19 00:01:16,280 --> 00:01:23,040 Now, of course, the more popular way to understand the book of Revelation is that it's telling 20 00:01:23,040 --> 00:01:27,200 us about the future and maybe even our future. 21 00:01:27,200 --> 00:01:30,560 And that's what's called actually the futurist perspective. 22 00:01:30,560 --> 00:01:37,680 Now, others look at events through history as a fulfillment of this revelation, sort 23 00:01:37,680 --> 00:01:40,040 of the newspaper in one hand, the Bible in the other. 24 00:01:40,040 --> 00:01:46,360 Now, another way to approach the book of Revelation is not to think that it's speaking of something 25 00:01:46,360 --> 00:01:55,520 that has been or will be fulfilled, but instead understanding it as a picture, telling truths 26 00:01:55,520 --> 00:01:58,520 that can be applied to any situation. 27 00:01:58,520 --> 00:02:04,200 However, the way that I want us to look at this is a different way of understanding this 28 00:02:04,200 --> 00:02:09,680 book and its approach that I become persuaded to believe. 29 00:02:09,680 --> 00:02:16,620 And the approach that I'll be talking about in this entire year is that the teachings 30 00:02:16,620 --> 00:02:21,680 of the book of Revelation were written for the followers of Jesus who lived in the first 31 00:02:21,680 --> 00:02:23,600 century. 32 00:02:23,600 --> 00:02:25,960 This is called the preterist perspective. 33 00:02:25,960 --> 00:02:31,060 Now, from the Latin word, which means before, and specifically I think that there's a lot 34 00:02:31,060 --> 00:02:35,840 of imagery that we're going to find throughout this book of Revelation. 35 00:02:35,840 --> 00:02:42,280 It's really an elaboration on what Jesus taught in the Olivet Discourse that's found in Matthew 36 00:02:42,280 --> 00:02:48,440 chapter 24, which I'm going to spend 35 different teachings going through this book, and it 37 00:02:48,440 --> 00:02:50,480 parallels what's written in Mark and Luke. 38 00:02:50,480 --> 00:02:52,700 And here it is in a nutshell. 39 00:02:52,700 --> 00:02:58,280 It's that God's judgment was to come upon the nation of Israel and that that would culminate 40 00:02:58,280 --> 00:03:00,400 in the destruction of the temple. 41 00:03:00,400 --> 00:03:07,680 Now, sadly, history confirms Jesus' words as the Jewish people and the Romans engaged 42 00:03:07,680 --> 00:03:12,560 in a brutal war at the end of the 60s. 43 00:03:12,560 --> 00:03:16,360 Not the 1960s, the year 60. 44 00:03:16,360 --> 00:03:20,640 A war that ended with the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple. 45 00:03:20,640 --> 00:03:27,240 Now, Jesus specifically said, the days are coming upon you when your enemies will build 46 00:03:27,240 --> 00:03:35,680 up earthworks all around you and encircle you and come at you from every direction. 47 00:03:35,680 --> 00:03:40,520 They will bring you crashing to the ground, you and your children within you, and they 48 00:03:40,520 --> 00:03:49,080 won't leave one single stone on another because you didn't know the moment when God was visiting 49 00:03:49,080 --> 00:03:50,080 you. 50 00:03:50,080 --> 00:03:51,080 Now, let's unpack this a little bit. 51 00:03:51,080 --> 00:03:57,440 It was 40 years before 70, before the temple was destroyed. 52 00:03:57,440 --> 00:04:04,040 Now, John the Baptist, Jesus of the disciples, called upon Israel to repent, to be faithful 53 00:04:04,040 --> 00:04:07,920 to God and the covenant that God had made with them. 54 00:04:07,920 --> 00:04:14,400 Now, the Jesus movement, not the movie, the Jesus revolution, but the Jesus movement, 55 00:04:14,400 --> 00:04:18,880 the original, was led by the apostles, very popular in the first century. 56 00:04:18,880 --> 00:04:26,280 In fact, many thousands of Jewish people did repent and become faithful followers of Jesus. 57 00:04:26,280 --> 00:04:31,680 However, a majority of the leadership of Israel, and I want to be clear, what I'm talking about 58 00:04:31,680 --> 00:04:37,600 when I talk about the leadership of Israel, I'm mostly talking about the Sadducees who 59 00:04:37,600 --> 00:04:39,400 were in charge of the temple. 60 00:04:39,400 --> 00:04:46,780 Now, many of the chief priests were Sadducees and they rejected Jesus. 61 00:04:46,780 --> 00:04:52,760 Not only did they reject his message of repentance, but they rejected Jesus as their king. 62 00:04:52,760 --> 00:04:58,520 Now, in fact, after they had turned Jesus over to the Romans, they publicly pledged 63 00:04:58,520 --> 00:05:02,920 their allegiance to the Roman Empire over him. 64 00:05:02,920 --> 00:05:07,800 Now, the chief priests said to Pilate about Jesus, he said, crucify him. 65 00:05:07,800 --> 00:05:11,000 And that's what they wanted and that's what they declared. 66 00:05:11,000 --> 00:05:13,200 And we have no other king but Caesar. 67 00:05:13,200 --> 00:05:20,640 So instead of choosing the king that God had sent them, the Messiah that God had sent them, 68 00:05:20,640 --> 00:05:26,620 they had chosen the kingdom of this world over the kingdom of God. 69 00:05:26,620 --> 00:05:30,440 They had chosen the Roman Empire. 70 00:05:30,440 --> 00:05:37,880 Now, again, for decades following this, the apostles testified to the resurrection of 71 00:05:37,880 --> 00:05:43,280 Jesus and they continued to call upon the nation of Israel and the leadership of Israel 72 00:05:43,280 --> 00:05:44,280 to repent. 73 00:05:44,280 --> 00:05:47,800 But again, the majority did not. 74 00:05:47,800 --> 00:05:54,160 And this is all while God was doing great things among the faithful remnant of Israel, 75 00:05:54,160 --> 00:05:59,640 allowing them to spread the message to the rest of the Roman Empire. 76 00:05:59,640 --> 00:06:08,080 This is how the original church spread out from Jesus' few followers at the beginning. 77 00:06:08,080 --> 00:06:11,960 And many non-Jews came to the faith and as a result, it didn't matter. 78 00:06:11,960 --> 00:06:16,760 The majority of Israel or at least a very active minority continued to trust in the 79 00:06:16,760 --> 00:06:23,600 kingdom of this world and its method of conquering, just like many do today. 80 00:06:23,600 --> 00:06:26,840 And what is that? 81 00:06:26,840 --> 00:06:27,840 It's violence. 82 00:06:27,840 --> 00:06:33,960 It says, therefore, when the Jewish rebels revolted against the Roman Empire in 66, they 83 00:06:33,960 --> 00:06:39,360 revolted violently and they started a war, just like many people do today. 84 00:06:39,360 --> 00:06:44,140 But this simply solidified that Israel as a nation had not trusted God. 85 00:06:44,140 --> 00:06:50,840 And the message of the kingdom of God proclaimed by Jesus, their continued rejection of Jesus, 86 00:06:50,840 --> 00:06:58,880 and their insistence on overcoming the Romans through violence, forced God's hand. 87 00:06:58,880 --> 00:07:01,720 And it was time for judgment. 88 00:07:01,720 --> 00:07:08,240 Now when we talk about judgment coming from God, we have to keep in mind that God is love. 89 00:07:08,240 --> 00:07:15,480 And so it is not God doing the direct action, but he respects the free will of the people 90 00:07:15,480 --> 00:07:20,220 and he does not involve himself in protecting them. 91 00:07:20,220 --> 00:07:21,220 That's hands off. 92 00:07:21,220 --> 00:07:25,440 God gives us the ability to choose what we want to do. 93 00:07:25,440 --> 00:07:32,320 And so when the Jewish people revolted against the Roman Empire, God's protection and favor 94 00:07:32,320 --> 00:07:33,600 was no longer there. 95 00:07:33,600 --> 00:07:40,080 Now as a result, the status quo of Israel and the status quo of the religion of Judaism, 96 00:07:40,080 --> 00:07:50,160 which now no longer had a temple and its priesthood, that status quo was torn down, both figuratively 97 00:07:50,160 --> 00:07:56,640 and literally with the temple being completely destroyed. 98 00:07:56,640 --> 00:08:01,300 So Jesus knew that this would be the inevitable result. 99 00:08:01,300 --> 00:08:07,240 So when he came to Jerusalem that final time before his crucifixion, Luke reports to us 100 00:08:07,240 --> 00:08:12,140 saying, Jesus saw the city and he wept over it. 101 00:08:12,140 --> 00:08:13,140 What does this mean? 102 00:08:13,140 --> 00:08:18,400 Well, it's not as if God had not warned the people. 103 00:08:18,400 --> 00:08:21,580 He had done a lot of warning. 104 00:08:21,580 --> 00:08:27,920 He had warned them through Jesus and the apostles with, in fact, I think the book of Revelation 105 00:08:27,920 --> 00:08:32,080 being the final word on the subject. 106 00:08:32,080 --> 00:08:39,200 So what that means is I tend to think that at least the core of the book of Revelation 107 00:08:39,200 --> 00:08:49,800 was already written or at least orally transmitted in the 60s before the temple was destroyed. 108 00:08:49,800 --> 00:08:56,760 And so therefore when the brighter of the book of John wrote about Jesus' coming, it's 109 00:08:56,760 --> 00:09:04,000 a coming in judgment that would soon take place in the city of Jerusalem. 110 00:09:04,000 --> 00:09:09,320 Now remember, John wrote, he said, behold, he is coming with the clouds and every eye 111 00:09:09,320 --> 00:09:14,760 will see him, even those who pierced him and all the tribes of the land will mourn over 112 00:09:14,760 --> 00:09:15,760 him. 113 00:09:15,760 --> 00:09:22,840 Now similarly, Jesus said, behold, I am coming quickly and my reward is with me to render 114 00:09:22,840 --> 00:09:27,840 to every man according to what he has done. 115 00:09:27,840 --> 00:09:30,480 So it presents Jesus as a judge. 116 00:09:30,480 --> 00:09:37,640 Now again, I think the book of Revelation is an apocalyptic account of what happened 117 00:09:37,640 --> 00:09:44,400 in the 60s of that first century that we're seeing from the perspective of heaven, the 118 00:09:44,400 --> 00:09:51,560 judgment that fell on Israel and the Roman Empire, both the Jewish people and the Roman 119 00:09:51,560 --> 00:09:59,640 Empire were judged and were to receive the consequences for their part in rejecting Jesus 120 00:09:59,640 --> 00:10:03,560 and his message of repentance. 121 00:10:03,560 --> 00:10:07,840 So to answer the question, was Revelation already fulfilled? 122 00:10:07,840 --> 00:10:09,640 I think for the most part, yes. 123 00:10:09,640 --> 00:10:16,360 It is actually using imagery and apocalyptic language to speak about what was going on 124 00:10:16,360 --> 00:10:23,400 in the first century within their specific historical context. 125 00:10:23,400 --> 00:10:26,760 Now I'd love for you to follow along this whole series. 126 00:10:26,760 --> 00:10:28,040 Today's just an overview. 127 00:10:28,040 --> 00:10:33,560 We're going to be exploring this in 35 more messages this entire school year. 128 00:10:33,560 --> 00:10:36,380 And I'd like you to follow along. 129 00:10:36,380 --> 00:10:43,320 You can follow us on YouTube at our Ocean Water channel, also on Facebook, on our website 130 00:10:43,320 --> 00:10:45,000 and on Instagram. 131 00:10:45,000 --> 00:10:49,800 And I always hope and pray that every time you open God's word, that God will speak to 132 00:10:49,800 --> 00:10:50,800 you. 133 00:10:50,800 --> 00:10:55,120 I read my Bible every single day, just like I have tried to for the last 30 years of my 134 00:10:55,120 --> 00:10:56,120 life. 135 00:10:56,120 --> 00:10:58,800 When I open it up, I ask for God to speak to me. 136 00:10:58,800 --> 00:11:02,020 And I pray every day that God will guide me. 137 00:11:02,020 --> 00:11:06,280 And I hope that you'll do the same as we go through this book together. 138 00:11:06,280 --> 00:11:07,640 Thanks so much for tuning in. 139 00:11:07,640 --> 00:11:28,040 And until next time, I hope you have a beautiful day.