A BOOK OF LIFE
The book of Revelation is a continuation of what John revealed in his Gospel and in his Epistles. The Gospel of John mainly reveals to us the matter of the divine life. The divine life is nothing less than the Triune God—the Father, the Son, and the Spirit—as our life and our life supply. The life revealed in John’s Gospel is too divine, too mysterious, too high!
In John’s three Epistles he reveals more mysteries of the divine life such as the divine fellowship, the divine abiding, the divine anointing, the divine birth, the divine seed. Because the Gospel of John and the Epistles of John are on the divine life, we should not consider that the Revelation of John is different. John was a writer who revealed the divine life. We must consider that his last book should also be on the divine life. For example, the entire Bible is on the tree of life. Right after God created man, He brought him to the tree of life. The Bible begins in Genesis with the tree of life and it ends in Revelation with the tree of life. This is because the entire Bible is a book of life.
We have covered many crucial verses in this message and the two previous messages. If possible you had better study those verses, remember them, recite them, and pray-read them again and again. It is better to do it each month for two years. See what will come out. I assure you that you will see something. These are the crucial verses in the Bible. You need to eat them and digest them, taking every verse into your being.
A CONCLUSION TO THE WHOLE BIBLE
Now we come to the consummation of God’s expression. The book of Revelation is an issue of the entire Bible. Without the book of Revelation the entire Bible has no conclusion. If you know what is in Revelation, you could see that nearly all of the signs included in the Old Testament are here. The first sign in Revelation is the lampstands. The lampstand was mentioned in Exodus the first time (Exo. 26:31-40), the second time in 1 Kings (7:49), and the third time in Zechariah (4:2-10). If you don’t have the book of Revelation you cannot know what is the real issue, the real outcoming, of the lampstand.
The last sign in Revelation is the New Jerusalem, a city built foursquare with three gates on each side. The New Jerusalem was also revealed in Ezekiel. At the end of the book of Ezekiel there is a city by the name of Jerusalem having four sides with three gates on each side, and all the twelve tribes’ names written there (Ezek. 48:31-34). Between the lampstands in Revelation 1 and the New Jerusalem in Revelation 21 and 22, there are the tree of life and the manna (2:7, 17). The tree of life was also mentioned in Genesis, and the manna was mentioned in Exodus 16.
Another item which was in the Old Testament and which consummates in the New Testament is the Lamb of God. John mentioned the Lamb of God in chapter one when he said, "Behold, the Lamb of God Who takes away the sin of the world!" The lamb was also mentioned in Genesis 22 when Abraham offered his son Isaac on the altar. God came in and stopped him, and when Abraham turned he saw a ram which he offered instead of his son Isaac. There is also the Passover lamb in Exodus 12. The consummation of the lamb is in Revelation 22:1, where the river of water of life proceeds out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.
There are also the seven lamps in Revelation. The seven lamps and the seven Spirits of God were already mentioned in Zechariah 4. The four living creatures in Revelation were in Ezekiel 1. Nearly everything in the book of Revelation can be found in the Old Testament because Revelation is a conclusion to the entire Bible. If you would understand the book of Revelation, you have to understand the entire Bible. The book of Revelation is the issue, not only of John’s writings, but also of the entire Bible.
(Concerning the Lord's Recovery, Chapter 6, by Witness Lee)
