Here are some questions based on last Sunday’s sermon text (Revelation 1:4-8), in case they’re helpful to you for personal growth or group discussion…

• [4] Do you tend to skip over the greetings that open the letters of the New Testament, as if they were lacking in substance, unimportant, mere formalities to be sped through in order to get to the good stuff? What function(s) do you imagine these greetings serve? Does it interest you to think that these greetings communicate “grace to you and peace” from God, revealing his fundamental and perpetual disposition toward you to be one of blessing?

• As John writes of God the Father as “the one who is and who was and who is to come,” the emphasis is upon God’s being in the present. How do you conceive of God’s relationship to time? What significance does this have for your relationship to him? What reassurance or comfort might you take from it?

• As John writes of God the Spirit as “the seven Spirits who are before [the Father’s] throne,” he uses the symbolism of the number seven—matched up with the “seven churches” representing the universal church—to highlight the divine fullness of the Spirit who fills the church. And because the Spirit is before God’s throne, we are before God’s throne in him (Eph. 2:18). What does it mean to you that the Spirit fills the church, and that you have access to the Father in him? Do you need to feel or see this to be true in order for it to be true?

• [5] Why is it helpful or encouraging to know that Jesus is “the faithful witness”? “The firstborn of the dead”? “The ruler of kings on earth”? Can you think of the significance of these things in light of other Scriptures?

• [7] The son of man “coming with the clouds” means his receiving and exercising divine kingship and judgment in the world (see Daniel 7:13-14). To “wail” because we have seen the “pierced” one can mean the weeping of repentance leading to salvation (Zechariah 12:10 – 13:1), or possibly the “weeping and gnashing of teeth” of those who reject the Messiah and find themselves excluded from his kingdom (Matthew 8:10-12). Either way, eventually everyone will have to admit that Jesus Christ is Lord (Philippians 2:10-11). Does this knowledge comfort you or disturb you? Has the knowledge of the crucified, risen, and glorified Lord moved you to weep with repentance?