He Reigns over all

Daniel 7:9-14          Psalm 47             Acts 1:1-11           Luke 24:44-53

He Reigns over all

As a child, I would often see shapes of things or animals in the cloud formations. One cloud might look like a ship, another like a dog, and so on. This pastime was somewhat spoiled at school when we had to learn the names for all these different formations. Stratus clouds were flat or layered and mostly smooth. Cumulus clouds on the other hand were heaped up and puffy, like cauliflower. Cirrus were wispy clouds high up in the sky. Then there were the Nimbus clouds that brought us rain. 

But to confuse matters even further, there were also combination types like the cumulonimbus clouds, otherwise known as the King of Clouds, that exist through the entire height of the troposphere, usually identified by their icy, anvil-shaped top. But for those living in arid regions, knowing the difference between cloud formations was important. While older folks did not often know all the fancy names for these clouds, they knew when the clouds meant rain or when they meant no rain…they knew when to protect the crops, when to run for cover, or when to tie down anything that could be blown away. They could read the weather by the shape and altitude and size and colour and the movement of the clouds.

Clouds are important in the Scriptures too. Sometimes, the word meant a real, physical cloud that brought rain…such as the clouds that caused the Flood. But the word was also used figuratively to indicate God’s presence…a presence that might bring blessing or might bring judgement depending on the recipient. 

For instance, the cloud that led the Israelite slaves out of Egypt, came between the fleeing people of God and the pursuing Egyptian army. To Israel it was protection and light…to the Egyptians, it was menacing and dark. Moses said, in relating the story of the Exodus, that as the army pursued them into the divided sea, God looked down from the cloud upon the Egyptian army and threw them into a panic. But this same cloud lovingly led Israel to Mount Sinai providing shade for them along the way. This same cloud also served as a protecting and comforting guide all the way to the Promised land.

Now, God’s presence on Mount Sinai and in the Tabernacle and later the Temple was also described in terms of a thick cloud coming down on the mountain or on the two structures. Bear in mind that this cloud also came down on the Apostles on the Mount of Transfiguration, but that’s a sermon for another time. Sometimes, loud noises or a loud voice came out of the cloud, thunder and lightning and something that sounded like trumpets…at other times, it was like a silent, burning fire of overwhelming brightness (sometimes referred to as the “Shekinah” glory)…at other times, there was just a sound of rushing wind…but every time, it was God manifesting his presence in or through some sort of cloud formation.

Scripture also often speaks of God riding on the clouds…or coming on the clouds. In Deuteronomy 33:26 Moses spoke of God riding through the heavens to help his people. In Psalms 18 and 68 David spoke about God coming on the clouds to scatter his enemies, riding upon the wings of the wind, clothed in darkness and thick clouds. The clouds were also said to be God’s chariot. As such, clouds were often synonymous with the Presence of God.

So, it should not come as a surprise to see that when the High Priest entered into the Holy Holies on the Day of Atonement…passing through the thick, heavy veil that represented the dividing wall between us and God…besides the blood offerings for his own sin and for the sin of the people, he had to take a censer full of coals of fire from the altar before the Lord, put two hands full of crushed, sweet smelling incense in it and bring it inside the curtain so that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy seat, representing God’s throne or judgment seat. Only then could he take the blood of the sacrificed bull and sprinkle it on the mercy seat for the atonement of Israel’s sin. 

Now, fast forward to Jesus’ death on the cross. Do you remember what happened when Jesus died? The veil covering the Holy of Holies was ripped open from top to bottom, right? What was that all about? Well, in the book of Hebrews, the author compared Jesus to the High Priest showing his infinite superiority as the sinless Son of God who offered himself once as a single sacrifice for sins. Jesus neither had to offer a sacrifice for his own sins as he had none nor did he have to repeat his sacrifice of himself because he did not enter a sanctuary made by human hands, a mere copy of the true heavenly sanctuary, but rather he entered heaven itself, not with the blood of animals, but with his own blood.

Now, keep all these images of the High Priest and the Great High Priest, as well as the image of God’s appearance at Mount Sinai, the Tabernacle, and the Temple, in mind as we look briefly at our reading from the book of Daniel. “As I watched,” Daniel wrote, “thrones were set in place, and an Ancient One took his throne, his clothing was white as snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool; his throne was fiery flames, and it wheels were burning fire.” Daniel tells us that this is a court room scene, and that judgement was about to be passed. Then he said that he saw “one like a human being coming with the clouds of heaven and he came to the Ancient One and was presented before Him.” 

Can you see how all these images fit together? The clouds indicating God’s presence but also the clouds of incense that had to precede the entrance of the High Priest into the Holy of Holies to make an offering of blood on the Day of Atonement? Daniel is describing here what happened when Jesus, our Great High Priest, offered himself up for us. This image encompasses the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus as it is all part of the one atonement for all time. Jesus entered the Heavenly Holy of Holies…into the court room or throne room of God…coming with clouds (or clothed with clouds) as an offering of Himself for our sin. 

It is important to note that Jesus invoked this very same passage from Daniel at his mockery of a trial before the High Priest, Caiaphas. When Caiaphas asked Jesus, “Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?” Jesus replied, “I AM (remember how God responded to Moses when asked to reveal his name – God replied I AM – Jesus is deliberately quoting the reply here); “I AM,” Jesus replied, “and (now here it comes) you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Power and coming with the clouds of heaven.” At this point the High Priest tore his clothes and pronounced Jesus guilty of blasphemy. Why? Because he knew the passages quoted Jesus well enough to realise that Jesus was bluntly stating that the one being judged (in other words, Jesus) would soon be the Judge of all, including the High Priest! Soon, they would know in no uncertain terms that Jesus was who he said he was…the Son of God!

That’s what John meant when he said of Jesus in the opening chapter of Revelation, “Look! He is coming with clouds; every eye will see him, EVEN THOSE WHO PIERCED HIM (i.e. those responsible for his crucifixion); and on his account, all the tribes of the land (in other words, the twelve tribes of Israel) will mourn.” (Just keep in mind that often mourning indicated remorse-filled repentance rather than simply wailing…when you have a moment, please go and read Zechariah 12:10 and following…and compare that with all that is written in Acts 2 especially verses 37 and following.) For the first readers of the Revelation, John’s statement would not have been read as an end of time prophecy. Rather, they would have understood that John was making a statement about Jesus’ present enthronement as Lord of lords and King of kings and of his judgment of Apostate Israel.

So, when the Gospels and the opening chapter of Acts speak about Jesus being lifted up on clouds and returning on clouds the authors are not describing some form of celestial skateboarding. No, they are using a well-known image that their first century audience would have understood. Jesus ascended into the Presence of God to sit down as the universal ruler to reign over all…ever to place all his enemies under his feet. Jesus is King and Judge of all.

Now, I’m not sure where we lost this understanding as the Church, but the 19th-century Anglican bishop named Christopher Wordsworth (1807-1855), who was the nephew of the poet William Wordsworth, clearly understood what it meant for Jesus to go on clouds and to come on clouds. In his great hymn (a hymn unfortunately mostly forgotten today) he transports us into that heavenly court room or throne room described in Daniel and in the Day of Atonement passages and other such passages.

See the Conqueror mounts in triumph, see the King in royal state,

Riding on the clouds His chariot, to His heavenly Palace-gate;

Hark, the choirs of angel voices Joyful Hallelujahs sing.

And the portals high are lifted, to receive their heavenly King.

Who is this that comes in glory, with the trump of jubilee?

Lord of battles, God of armies. He has gained the victory;

He Who on the Cross did suffer, He Who from the grave arose.

He has vanquished Sin and Satan, He by death has spoiled His foes

Now our heavenly Aaron enters with His blood within the veil;

Joshua now is come to Canaan, and the kings before Him quail;

Now He plants the tribes of Israel in their promised resting place;

Now our Great Elijah offers double portion of His grace.

Thou hast raised our human nature on the clouds to God’s right hand.

There we sit in heavenly places, there with Thee in glory stand;

Jesus reigns, adored by Angels; Man with God is on the Throne;

Mighty Lord, in Thine Ascension we by faith behold our own.

Isn’t that simply marvellous? Where and when did we as the Church sell our birth rite for pot of defeatist, fear-filled, theology? Our Jesus has not only paid the penalty for our sins, but he has also conquered sin, Satan, and death, he has set us free and has opened the door into the very throne-room of Almighty God! 

Spiritually speaking, we have not only crossed through the Red Sea, dearest beloved brethren, we have crossed over the Jordan, and we have entered into the Promised Land! What we are engaged in right now is a mop-up operation…like Joshua we have been commanded to take, not the land, but the world by making disciples of all nations! And our King has promised to be with us always, even to the end of the Age. 

So, regardless of dictators, dark days, diseases, dangers, disasters, and death, Jesus remains on the throne. Nothing can happen to us that does not somehow fit into His Masterplan of salvation for the world.

I’d like to close with the final verse of Bishop Wordsworth’s hymn:

Glory be to God the Father, Glory be to God the Son,

Dying, risen, ascending for us, Who the heavenly realm has won;

Glory to the Holy Spirit; to One God in Persons Three

Glory both in earth and heaven, glory, endless glory, be!

Let us pray.

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2022

That His Ways May Be Known Upon Earth

Acts 16:9-15 Psalm 67 Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5 John 14:23-29

That His Ways May Be Known Upon Earth

Two weeks ago, I preached a sermon at a wedding in Villiersdorp, South Africa. I originally wrote the sermon in English thinking that it would be simple to translate it into Afrikaans. Boy, was I wrong!

Language is a complex creature…there is so much more to language than words. English evolved primarily in England, drawing inspiration from northern hemisphere cultural practices and centuries of conflict and collaboration with invading and conquering nations, and later with people in the so-called colonies. Afrikaans, on the other hand, was in one sense born in the Netherlands but restructured in southern Africa being enriched by the heat of the country and the sweat of striving against the harsh environment and the struggle between people groups, many of whom were brought there under the dark clouds of persecution and slavery. 

And to complicate matters even further, idiomatic and metaphoric and poetic speech is largely created in the crucible of experience…the experience of those who use the language as a tool to deal with day-to-day occurrences in their particular situations in life and, as such, this type of expression does not translate easily from one language to another without a lot of thought and hard work and interpretation. In order to translate the language, the would be translator needs a working knowledge, not only of the language, but also of the people who have shaped it over time.

Now, this is equally true regarding the translation of ancient languages, such as Hebrew, Aramaic, and Koine Greek, into modern languages such as English. Take the word ‘star’ for instance. When the ancients spoke about stars, they viewed them as objects set in the heavens to be read as signs or even as omens for good or for bad. Today we know that “stars” are balls of gaseous, inanimate matter that have nothing to say about our present or our future. 

Or take the word “wind” as another example. In ancient Hebrew, the word for “wind” is the same word for “spirit” or for “breath” and more often than not they were meant to be understood as one concept rather than three. The breath of God is at once breath, wind and Spirit. But we view each one as distinct from the other. 

The bottom line is, there’s more to the language than words, and this has a direct impact on the interpretation of ancient texts, such as the Scriptures. This is especially important when dealing with passages that are highly idiomatic or poetic. When approaching such texts, one must be weary of transposing an alien set of rules on the text, especially in the interpretation of metaphors and images and any attempt to translate or decipher or unravel or exegete such texts demands respect for the integrity of the manuscript itself. Therefore, we need to diligently study the Bible…all of the Bible…so that we might immerse ourselves in the whole story, using Scripture to interpret Scripture instead of using our prevailing culture or our fashionable ideologies. 

Take the book of the Revelation as an example. Now, I am sure you have heard a number of fantastical predictions about the so-called end times or last days that are peppered with quotations from this letter of the Apostle John to seven churches in Asia. But when I read some of these extrapolations, I wonder what John would have to say if he were around today. Would he even recognise his own writings? Or, more importantly, would the Holy Spirit recognise them?

You see, we cannot simply take a letter like Revelation and gaze into it as if it were a crystal ball because it was never meant to be read like that. It was written to seven known churches and was meant to be read and understood by the members of those churches at that time. In fact, John tells them that they will be blessed by reading it and that the events written about in the letter were to take place shortly…he said that a few times in the opening chapter…not at the end of time. The letter itself was meant to be a revelation of Jesus…an unveiling of His exalted and ascended Person and an explanation of His continued work in and through His Body, the Church.

So, we must ask ourselves how would they have read the letter? Clearly, they were meant to understand the message…but what would they have understood? Thankfully, today we have access to Cultural and Archaeological Study Bibles that help us to come to terms with things that happened in ages past…that give us a glimpse into cultures and behaviours and idioms and images of the time. 

These tools are all very helpful, but even more importantly, when reading the Bible, we must always keep in mind the fact that the books and letters and Psalms and Gospels were written by people who were steeped in what had been written before and who truly valued the Scriptures and who shaped their lives and practices by what they had internalised and memorised. So, when we read about a holy city, a river of the water of life, a tree of life, the number 12, seeing the face of God and having His name imprinted on the foreheads of His people, we need to think as the author and as the first recipients of the letter would have thought. They would immediately have thought about what had already been written in what we now call the Old Testament, and they would have interpreted the images accordingly.

Now, I believe that at the time John wrote this letter, the Temple in the geographical City of Jerusalem was still standing, simply because there is no mention of its destruction by Rome in AD…not in any of the New Testament document for that matter…rather it is predicted as something yet to take place. 

The revelation then is that in Jesus, things have changed. As He said to the Samaritan woman at the well, the time had come for worshippers to worship, not at a Mountain in Samaria nor at a Temple in Judea, but to worship God in spirit and in truth…in other words, wherever believers were gathered together regardless of geographical location. 

So, when John spoke about the New Jerusalem coming from heaven, he was describing the City of God that did not have an earthly origin…He was describing the gathering of people who, in Jesus, were born from above. A people inhabited by the Lord God Himself. What we do as the Church when we gather together in worship is not merely a representation of the reconciliation of the Creator and His creatures…no, God is really present with us. He is enthroned amongst us. He lives within each one of us. He has taken up residence in us. The dwelling of God is with us and He lives with us. As such, He has made and is making all things new.

John used a wonderful part of speech called a double possessive when he began to describe the Heavenly City. He spoke about the City having the glory of God. On the one hand, the glory is hers, but on the other hand it is the glory of God. Now think about that. God’s glory is ours because we are united in Him. 

But it does not originate with us…indeed it cannot. As created beings, we only have what we receive…we have nothing that is not gifted to us. But precisely because we have received it, we shine out a glory that is at once both His and ours. 

Now, isn’t that a beautifully comforting image? Our God is that close to us…He is that near that His glory is your glory. But it is exactly because of this closeness…this unity, that John used Edenlike language to describe the reality of the Church. Because we are reconciled to God through Jesus and are now new creations in Him, in a spiritual sense, we have returned to a pre-Fall state. The river of life that flows from the throne of God and of the Lamb, flows through us. The tree of life that John described using an almost strange plural form evokes the tree in Genesis as well as the tree in the first Psalm…and that tree in the first Psalm is a person…a person whose whose delight is in the Law of the Lord. That person is likened to a tree planted by a stream of water that bears it fruit in season and whose leaves do not wither. Does that sound familiar? It is the same imagery John used in the passage we read from earlier.

This passage that we read today, dearest beloved brethren, is John’s depiction of the Body of believers…this is a picture of the Church. The River of Life is an image of God’s Spirit flowing in and through us. The Tree of Life is an image of Jesus and us – indicating our purpose as the Church…the purpose of this plural Tree of Life is to bring healing to the nations. The purpose of the Church is to bring the message of our reconciliation with God through Jesus to the nations…and just as Jesus promised, He is with us always, even to the end of the Age. 

You see, in Jesus, the curse has been removed. There is no longer any need for a Tabernacle or a Temple because the ultimate, once-for-all-time sacrifice has been made and accepted and the separating wall between us and God has been removed and we – we who are in Jesus – we have been made a kingdom of priests who have their residence in God. 

John said that there is no need for the sun or the moon as they were created to indicate the passing of time…to mark seasons, days, and years (see Genesis 1). But because we are in Jesus, we are eternal beings. And there is no longer any darkness in those who are clothed in the light of Jesus. God’s glory has become our glory, His light is our light, His life is our life…

But with this glory, this light, and this life, comes a certain responsibility. We are the light of the world or of the nations and we are meant to shine so that all people who are still captives in darkness will see and be attracted to the King who lives in the City. That is why Paul, and the other First Century believers, as well as believers down through the centuries, preached the Gospel in countries beyond the borders of their own homeland…that is why they left their homes and sometimes their families to share the liberating message of the Gospel with other people groups. And, true to His word, Jesus was with them wherever they went, opening ears and turning hearts through the guiding purpose of His Holy Spirit. 

So, far from being a scary, I‘d-rather-not-read-it kind of letter, Revelation is a must read. It is filled with beautiful images of God’s redemptive purposes in a world He loves with a love that is so deep it simply cannot be comprehended. But it must be read in the context of the whole Bible…it must be interpreted according to the figures of speech, the idioms, the images, the cultural practices, and the understanding of the words used by the original recipients. When we do that, we are blessed by what we read, just like John said we would be because the glory of God in Jesus is revealed, not obscured. 

Like my English wedding sermon had, in part, to be rewritten using images, words, humour, and practical applications native to the Afrikaans culture, so we need to read and interpret the Scriptures within the context of its original authors and recipients. Once we have done our homework, then we may recast the principles learned in words and images akin to our own culture.  

The Scriptures teach us that we are here on this planet for one purpose and one purpose only…to worship our Lord in such a way that His ways may be known upon earth. We are a city set on a high mountain…we are the new heavenly Jerusalem. We are the light of the world. We are a kingdom of priests living in the Heavenly throne room of God. We are Holy Spirit indwelt people…the Holy Spirit flows in and through us so that our leaves may bring healing to the nations…and therein lies our purpose. We are witnesses…witnesses to the reality of deliverance from slavery to sin and Satan and of the defeat of death and hell through the death and resurrection and ascension of Jesus…witnesses to the removal of the curse through the reconciling power of the substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus. 

Dearest beloved brethren…let the Light that is ours in Jesus, shine…

Let us pray.

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2022