85. COME UP HITHER

85. COME UP HITHER

Revelation 4:1-2: “After this I looked, and behold, a door was opened in heaven; and the first voice which I heard was as it were a trumpet talking with me which said, Come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter. And immediately I was in the spirit; and behold, a throne was set in heaven, and one sat on the throne.”

Here we have the beginning of the second of the four visions of the Book of Revelation. The first vision began in chapter one verse ten, this one in chapter four verses one and two, the third in chapter seventeen verse three, and the fourth in chapter twenty-one verse ten. Each of these beginnings contain the phrase “in the Spirit.” 

The first person pronouns, “I”, and "me" in this passage are the writer, John, not the Church, as is so often interpreted. It was John who 'looked' and 'beheld' and 'heard' the voice. John is writing what he has seen, heard and experienced. There is no basis here for interpreting this verse as a reference to the "rapture of the Church," as is so often taught. (We will deal with the "rapture of the Church" when we get to chapter 18:4.) 

John was invited to "come up hither" by the "first voice which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet." (RSV) This refers to the voice mentioned in Revelation 1:10 when John was "in the Spirit on the Lord's Day." We do not know whether or not John was raptured bodily to heaven at this time, but we do know that he was "in the Spirit."

It was necessary for him to "come up hither" in order to see the things of the Spirit. We should understand that "in the Spirit" it was the "Day of the Lord"; it does not necessarily mean it was the Sabbath in the natural, but rather the "Day of the Lord" as is so often spoken of in the Old Testament Scriputres. [See my commentary on Revelation 1:10.] By the same token, the things John saw, he saw "in the Spirit" not in the natural state of consciousness.

Many times the Lord called His prophets to a natural mountain in order to give them a new perspective on the world. Moses was called to Sinai to receive the Law and to Nebo to view the Promised Land and to give Israel warning of the future trials. Elijah also was called back to Sinai to hear the still small voice of the Lord. Israel established its temple upon a mountain, Moriah, the mount of seeing.

Habakkuk was put in a watch-tower, high above the plains, that he might see the dangers that were approaching the nation and give them warning. It was not the earthly military powers that posed the gravest danger to Israel, but their own spiritual weaknesses. Habakkuk's message was: "The just shall live by his faith." And: “The Lord is in His Holy Temple; let all the earth keep silence before Him." By this message he turned their eyes away from the military defeat and the death of their king to the fact that God was not dead, the hosts of heaven still were marching on.

The prophet must view the world from a higher perspective, heaven’s perspective. The prophet sees the heavens, while others only see empty space. To see the things of the Spirit, we must rise above the things of this world; to hear the testimony of Jesus Christ we must enter into Him by the Spirit. To enter into the experience of the Book of Revelation, we must "come up hither" along with John and the Angel. We must enter, with John, into the knowledge of the Scriptures from the viewpoint of Christians of that day.

This lesson is an edited excerpt from my book, Revelation In Context, available at the Living Word Bookstore in Shawnee, Oklahoma and also available online at www.amazon.com or www.xulonpress.com. Free downloads are available at www.revelationincontext.sermon.net