"The One upon the Throne" -- Revelation 1:4-8, 5:11-14 (4th Sunday After Pentecost)
- Scott Clark
- Jul 6
- 9 min read
It is a confounding time to be a constitutional lawyer. For that matter, it is a confounding time to be an American who paid any attention whatsoever during high-school civics class.
We remember what they taught us: The Founders declared their independence from an increasingly authoritarian regime. In their Declaration, they described the regime’s abuses of power. The Authoritarian Ruler had:
· usurped the legislative power, insisting that laws be subject to his will alone;
· obstructed the administration of justice and the power of the courts;
· deployed armies and troops among the people;
· cut off Trade with all parts of the world;
· “endeavoured to prevent” immigration and naturalization; and
· “sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.”
It’s a much longer list, but you get the idea: They opposed authoritarian rule.
And so, as the Founders put our Constitution together, they designed a system intended to prevent the concentration and abuse of power through a systems of checks and balances.
With continuing concern about the authoritarian abuse of power, the Founders quickly amended the Constitution to include a Bill of Rights – enumerating the rights and freedoms of the people. And 100 years later – as the constitutional corrective to the nation’s original sin of slavery – the Fourteenth Amendment undergirded all this with a constitutional guarantee of equal protection of the law, due process of law, and the privileges and immunities of citizenship to all those born in the United States.
This is not contested. This is basic high-school civics – the fundamentals of how our constitutional democracy is structured to empower and protect the people.
It is a confounding time, because that’s not at all what we see today. We see our nation governed for the most part not by legislation, but by Executive Order. The legislative branch has essentially ceded its power to the Executive – so that he stops funding of programs that have been directed by Congress; legislates a war on the values of equality and equity that undergird the civil rights laws; declares null and void the birthright-citizenship guarantees of the Constitution; imposes and lifts tariffs at his whim; dismisses and dismantles government watchdog agencies; deploys troops on American soil against American people; and uses the coercive power of the government to silence universities and law firms who might challenge his power. And the judiciary, decision by decision, seems willing to relinquish its responsibility to uphold the Constitution – or specifically, to check or balance the Executive.
In these confounding days, what we see is the reassertion of authoritarian rule. And we are having to face the reality that these systems – that they taught us - would empower, and sustain, and protect a government of the people, by the people, and for the people – well, those systems may fail.
We are turning this summer to The Wild Hope of Imagination – “imagination” – the Spirit-given human capacity to envision and create a world better, brighter, and more beautiful than the struggle and suffering we are experiencing now. We are turning to an imagination more powerful even than these systems that are tottering on the point of collapse.
And today, we are turning to the Book of Revelation. [1] Now you haven’t heard me preach much on Revelation. Revelation intimidates me a little. It is imagistic and wild. I am inclined more to the linear – to the rhetoric of a good argument, or the plotline of a good story, or the rhythm and cadence of a psalm. One of the challenges with Revelation, I think, is to experience it, without trying to tame its wildness.
Revelation is apocalyptic.[2] Literally. It is a very specific type of literature we find in scripture – and in other writings of the time. “Apocalyptic” comes the Greek word “apocalysis,” which means “a revealing.” Our minds might go to cinematic images of the Zombie apocalypse or Mad Max. But, really, if you want a movie comparison, I think “apocalypsis” is more like that moment in the Wizard of Oz, when Toto pulls back the curtain to reveal the man behind the Wizard. That moment when all is revealed and nothing is what it seemed. Or maybe it’s that moment in Kansas, when Dorothy realizes she was loved all along. It’s like waking from a nightmare to the bright light of day. Or that moment when you turn the kaleidoscope and the pieces fall into place in a flash of beauty you’ve never seen before.
Apocalyptic writing uses big images to address big suffering caused by big powers. For the people who are suffering, its apocalyptic wildness needs to be bigger and more powerful than the powers that are holding them down.
The writer of Revelation – whom we know as John of Patmos – is writing this book – actually, a letter – to seven churches lined up geographically along the southern part of what we know as Turkey.[3] They are a hurting people. They live colonized under Roman imperial rule. They are part of this strange new sect of Judaism that follows the Way of someone named Jesus. That puts them on the margins of the margins.
They live in the time of Emperor Domitian – a megalomaniac, who – even more than most emperors – demands that the Empire acknowledge him as god. These folks acknowledge a different God. Scholars used to say that they were suffering during a time of extreme persecutions of Christians, but historians now wonder whether it was that acute.[4] It was more the daily grind and constant threat of the violence of empire, everywhere, everyday. They live in an Empire, but their way of living puts them in opposition to the Empire, and the Empire has all the power. As one scholar notes, they “are a people who have very little hope of success in the world.”[5]
And so, John of Patmos writes in the apocalyptic, which seeks to deal with “the suffering of the just at the hands of the unjust”[6] by means of extravagant and wild imagery, more powerful than the biggest power that they – that we – can imagine.
Now, there are popularized ways of interpreting Revelation that I do not follow – namely, to read Revelation as a blueprint of the end times, and to say those times are now.[7] (Like the fictional Left Behind series of books.) People have done that down through the centuries. And.. the Powers have come and gone, and the world has churned on. Jesus has said not to spend our time there. “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven.” (Mark 13:32; Matthew 24:36)
And, I should also say that there is an aspect of those popularized interpretations that is especially troubling – the way they incorporate violence and God as actively destroying people and God’s own creation – as a way of bringing about God’s reign. That is not the reign of God.
This scripture – like all scripture – is a testimony to God’s love for the whole world in Jesus Christ. Revelation – like the whole of Scripture – is a text of liberation, love, and life.
We will approach Revelation as we do all Scripture. We will look at this ancient text and consider it in its ancient context. We’ll listen to our siblings in the faith from long ago – as they speak of how they have experienced God – of their hope in Jesus Christ. We’ll take them seriously. And then we will listen for how the Spirit may be bringing that wild hope to life in our world – in our imagination – in our lives. It is a cross-cultural conversation.
And this morning, we’ll just dip our toe into the water. We are looking at these two passages from the opening of Revelation, and how they offer us (1) a grounding, (2) and an image, and (3) a song.
As it opens, Revelation grounds us in Jesus. Its first words are: “The apocalypse (or revelation) of Jesus Christ.”[8] The first passage that Joanie read grounds us in the sovereignty of God in Jesus Christ “the one who is, and who was, and who is to come” – the Alpha and Omega. The Powers come and go – but God is sovereign from the beginning of time, now, and on into forever – over every one of the nations. God’s power is the power of resurrection from the dead. Life from death. God’s power is grounded in God’s love – and opens up into our freedom. Revelation begins with a word that reverberates down through every time to every people striving under every power. It is a word of love and liberation when the Powers oppress. It is a word of love and liberation – in these confounding times – when the Powers that we thought would save us teeter on the brink of collapse. This is the Revelation of the Sovereign Christ.
This morning’s Scriptures ground us – and then reveal this rather startling image. Imagine this ultimate sovereignty – the very power of God – as a lamb. If we’re going for animal imagery that evokes sovereignty, we might more traditionally expect a Lion. But “Look, he is coming with the clouds. The one who was pierced.”
As the vision unfolds in Chapter 5, we see... on the throne... a Lamb.[9] Think back to last week – the “dominating imagination” with its power-over and violence – and the “healing imagination” with its mutuality and sharing.[10] The One on the Throne is not one who brings violence – but the One who suffers with us. The Lamb who was pierced and slain. The One on the Throne is not one who inflicts violence, but one who bears the brunt of violence. What will follow in Revelation will reveal the violence of our dominating culture, but the One on the Throne – who ultimately prevails – is revealed as one who loves us, who comes to live with us, and who sets us free.[11] What is revealed here is an alternative way to domination –what is revealed is the power of active, sovereign non-violence and love.
That grounding – and that image – then lead us into a song. There is singing throughout Revelation.[12] “Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!” We sing the world that is coming true – the Powers have no power. There is another way.
I was struck by how our first hymn this morning sang that out. It’s a prayer to the God who is sovereign over every nation, every power.[13] It names the threat of violence and fear. It seeks God’s help – God’s still small voice – Christ’s power to bring forth in us – the bright vision of the day when war shall cease, the dawning of the day when truth and justice reign. It’s a song to keep singing.
So that’s it for today: a grounding, an image, and a song.
This is a confounding time. It is a confounding time... to be human. It is a confounding time for those of us who seek to find our humanity in Christ. To be human in Christ is to long for the thriving of all people, all creation, the whole world. And yet what we see in this confounding time is the powers raging on. What we fear in this confounding time is that the structures that we thought could save us – or that we thought would enable us to save ourselves – may not be as strong or noble as we were taught.
The wild hope of our imagination finds its sure footing in Jesus Christ
· the one who was, and is, and is to come –
· the one who has come to embody good news for the poor, healing for every hurt, freedom for all who are oppressed – t
· the one who enters into the deep suffering of the world – and who is sovereign from there.
“To the one upon the throne in the power of love and justice and peace – to Jesus Christ – be praise and honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen!”
© 2025 Scott Clark
[1] For background on the Book of Revelation, see Catherine Gunsalus González & Justo L. González, Revelation (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1997); Barbara R. Rossing, The Rapture Exposed: The Message of Hope in the Book of Revelation(New York, NY: Basic Books, 2004); Christopher C. Rowland, “The Book of Revelation,” New Interpreters’ Bible Commentary, vol. xii (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1998),
[2] See González, pp.6-8; Rowland, pp.560-62.
[3] See González, pp.4-6.
[4] See González, p.8.
[5] Gonzalez, p.3.
[6] Gonzalez, p.7
[7] See particularly, Rossing, infra; see also González, pp.9-11.
[8] See González, pp.12-19; Rowland, pp.560-63.
[9] See Rossing, pp.109-114.
[10] https://www.togetherweserve.org/post/a-healing-imagination-2-kings-5-1-14-3rd-sunday-after-pentecost
[11] See Rossing, p.109; Rowland, pp.606-07.
[12] See González, pp.41-45; Rossing, p.109 (“In revelation, we sing our way into God’s new vision for our world.”).
[13] See O God of Every Nation, Hymn # 765 in the Glory to God hymnal.
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