1Now, brothers, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to him, we ask you 2not to be quickly shaken in your mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter as if from us, saying that the day of Christ has already come. 3Let no one deceive you in any way. For it will not be unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of destruction. 4He opposes and exalts himself against all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, setting himself up as God. 5Don’t you remember that when I was still with you, I told you these things? 6Now you know what is restraining him, to the end that he may be revealed in his own season. 7For the mystery of lawlessness already works. Only there is one who restrains now, until he is taken out of the way. 8Then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will kill with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the manifestation of his coming; 9even he whose coming is according to the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 10and with all deception of wickedness for those who are being lost, because they didn’t receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11Because of this, God sends them a powerful delusion, that they should believe a lie, 12that they all might be judged who didn’t believe the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
13But we are bound to always give thanks to God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because God chose you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief in the truth, 14to which he called you through our Good News, for the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. 15So then, brothers, stand firm and hold the traditions which you were taught by us, whether by word or by letter.
16Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace, 17comfort your hearts and establish you in every good work and word.
The book of the Revelation of Jesus the Messiah is different from any other book of the New Testament, though not different from portions of the New Testament such as is found in Matthew 24 and Mark 13, or the teaching of Paul in 1 Thessalonians 5 and 2 Thessalonians 2, the teaching of Peter in 2 Peter 3, or major prophetic portions of the Old Testament, particularly the book of Daniel. The book is not merely an apocalyptic work. It has apocalyptic elements (primarily much symbolic and figurative language) but it is also a prophecy, and also includes historical accounts of the churches in Asia. The normal method of interpretation works well with the Revelation, as well as a very good familiarity with the Old Testament and the Gospel accounts. His imagery largely comes from these portions of the Bible, and elucidates the meaning of the text. The rule of thumb with all biblical interpretation, as well as other literature, is “when the Scripture makes sense, seek no other sense, lest it be nonsense.”
One should not avoid the book because it is a difficult book. St. Dionysius of Alexandria said that
The darkness of this book does not prevent one from being astonished at it. And even if I do not understand everything in it, that is only because of my incapability. I cannot be a judge of the truths which are contained in it or measure them with the poverty of my mind, being guided more by faith than by understanding. I find them only surpassing my understanding.
There are primarily four ways in which the events of the Revelation have been understood through the centuries, namely, the Preterist, Idealist, Historicist, and Futurist approaches.1 I will present these views by means of a chart that I included in my Chronological and Background Charts of the New Testament:2
| 1-3 | 4-19 | 20-22 | |
| Preterist | Historic churches | Symbolic of contemporary conditions | Symbolic of heaven and victory |
| Idealist | Historic churches | Symbolic of conflict of good and evil | Victory of good |
| Historicist | Historic churches | Symbolic of events of history: fall of Rome, Mohammedanism, papacy, Reformation | Final judgment, millennium (?), eternal state |
| Futurist | Historic churches and/or seven stages of church history | Future tribulation; concentrated judgments on world and on antichrist; coming of Christ | Millennial kingdom; judgment of wicked dead; eternal state |
From a study of the book there are also four primary theological perspectives that have been developed, namely, Postmillennial or Preterist, Amillennial or Idealist, Premillennial, and Apocalyptic. The following chart from my charts book 3 explains how the different theological methods understand the book:
| 1-3 | 4-19 | 20-22 | |
| Postmillennial or Preterist | Historic churches | Generally historicist | Victory of Christianity over the world |
| Amillennial or Idealist | Historic churches | Generally historicist | Coming of Christ; judgment; eternal state |
| Premillennial | Historic churches representative of historical stages | Generally futurist | Literal millennial reign; judgment of great white throne; New Jerusalem |
| Apocalyptic | Historic churches | Generally preterist | Symbolic of heaven and victory |
See my brief treatment of the interpretive methods of revelation in H. Wayne House, Last Things: Four Views of Revelation (Kindle). ↩︎
H. Wayne House, “Interpretations of Revelation,” Chronological and Background Charts of the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1981), 152. ↩︎
H. Wayne House, “Theological Perspectives on Revelation,” Chronological and Background Charts of the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1981), 152. ↩︎