REVELATION 10
Read Revelation 10:1-11
The previous few chapters of Revelation have given us a quite horrific picture of destruction and death, the problems of this world caused by sin. It all seems very bad news and with no prospect of relief. Chapter 10 brings us the good news.
Here, John is given a vision of a mighty angel, so big he has one foot on land and one on the sea. We quite often see angels in the Old Testament. Generally speaking, they are messengers from God, but quite often they seem to be a bit more than that. In Exodus 3, we read that an angel appeared in the burning bush, but when Moses went to take a closer look, then God himself spoke to him from the bush. In Judges 13, Samson’s father had a long conversation with an angel and was then concerned that he would die because he had seen the face of God. In some way, God seems to be manifesting himself as an angel and sometimes it is difficult to distinguish between them. Much the same sort of thing is happening in Revelation 10. The angel is described as coming down from heaven, the realm of God. He is robed in clouds with a rainbow above his head. When God appears in the Old Testament he is usually surrounded by clouds and we recognise the rainbow as a sign from God to Noah (Genesis 9:12-27, Daniel 7:13). The face of the angel shone like the sun, as did God’s when he appeared to Moses (Exodus 33) and he had a voice like thunder (Psalm 29:3). This figure might be described an angel but he does seem to have all the characteristics associated with God in the Old Testament.
In his hand he has a scroll. We have already seen a scroll in heaven back in Revelation 5 in the right hand of he who sat on the throne (that is, God). It was only the lamb who looked as if it had been slain that was worthy to open the scroll – the redemptive word of God. Now John is given the scroll and told to eat it, a strange instruction but it takes us back to the Old Testament where Ezekiel, in a similar vision, was instructed to eat a scroll (Ezekiel 2:9). This is typical of Revelation and its word pictures. The scroll is the word of God and both Ezekiel and John are instructed to take God’s word into their very being so that it becomes part of them. They both found that it tasted sweet. God’s word is good, it is a pleasure, not a burden, but there is a sour aspect. The bitter taste is the knowledge for those who do not repent (see the end of Chapter 9) that they will not be saved, a point Jesus himself emphasised in Matthew 7:13.
So, what is going on here? Following the harrowing descriptions of sin and its consequences in the previous few chapters, what we have now is a picture of God coming in person to deal with the matter. How is he going to do that? He will do it through his word – through the gospel message – the message of salvation. It is God’s word that deals with sin. Salvation is to be found in God’s written word, which tells us that our redemption was carried out for us on the cross by God’s living word, the Lord Jesus Christ.