Patmos is an island in the Aegean Sea that belonged to the Roman province of Asia, whose administrative capital was Ephesus. John’s exile was therefore …
The Historical Evolution of Christianity The seven churches are real communities in Asia Minor, but the messages addressed to them are also prophetic. They describe …
The Last Three Churches and the Modern Age Revelation 3 completes the prophetic history of Christianity. Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea do not describe three denominations. …
After These Things: How Revelation Moves Revelation 4 opens with the words “After these things.” That expression tells us what John saw next. It does …
The King James Version reads “redeemed us” and “made us kings and priests.” The stronger critical reading is different: the song speaks of people purchased …
The seals do not describe a supernatural war directed by a dragon against a cosmic woman. That explanation belonged to an earlier stage of my …
Revelation 7, as it has been transmitted, does not contain one continuous scene. It contains three different prophetic blocks that have been placed beside one …
The opening of the trumpet vision requires a decision about the structure of Revelation. If the seals and the trumpets are read as two consecutive …
Revelation 9 presents two judgments that belong to the same historical movement but operate through different forms of power. The Fifth Trumpet begins when a …
Revelation 10 is not another trumpet judgment. It is an explanatory interlude placed between the Sixth and Seventh Trumpets, just as Revelation 7 stands between …