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The Revelation of Jesus Christ sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come: and it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Acts 2:19-21). .
Thus God has faithfully warned all men to "flee from the wrath to come"; and to John "The Revelation of Jesus Christ" was given, in order to put fear into the hearts of the unsaved. But there is cause also for praise from the hearts of the redeemed as they read of the terrible judgment to come upon a godless world, and realize that from this they b.ave been saved; for the church will be translated before the great tribulation begins to run its course. Now if John, on the Isle of Patmos; was projected into ••the day of the Lord," how, then, could he write of this pres ent church age, as he does in chapters two and three? In verses 10 and 12 of chapter one we find our answer: "I ... heard behind me a great voice ... and being turned, I saw • • . " First, he looked forward into "the day of the Lord"; then he turned back, as it were, and saw this church age in panorama, before looking forward again into the future at things which will surely come to pass. And this brings us to the consideration of the key verse of the book, which plainly declares that the vision John saw vvas in three distinct parts. THE THREEFOLD VISION The risen Lord Himself gave John the correct division of this prophecy when He said in Rev. I :19, "Write the things "QVhich thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter." Without this God-given outline of Revelation, we cannot grasp the meaning of the message. Let us look at it briefly just here, then keep it in mind throughout this series of studies: 1. "The things which thou hast seen" -these are things of Rev. 1:12-20, the vision of the risen Lord and His High Priestly work, which He is now doing for us at the right nand of the Father. 2. "The things which are" follow in chapters two and three, and form the second division of the book. Seven is the
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