I wrote this reflection on Revelation 12:1-6 at the beginning of the year, inspired by the work of J. Denny Weaver in his excellent book The Non-Violent Atonement. When I was looking for images to accompany this, I remember being struck by how the woman was generally portrayed as being very serene. I don’t remember dealing with the ‘agony of giving birth’ in that way, and can’t imagine that being chased by a dragon would have made it any easier…
We are still in the season of Epiphany this Sunday, a time in which we seek insight and revelation about the nature of God. In that spirit, I would like to tell you about an experience of insight and revelation that I have had. Every time I go into a certain department store in my nearest town, I am assaulted by displays of brand-new consumer goods that nobody needs, beautifully presented and begging to be bought. Once I fight my way past the glitz to the escalators at the back, I always catch the distinctive smell of the bins. That stench of decaying waste seems so entirely appropriate given the conspicuous consumption that this store promotes: the more we buy, the more there is to throw away one day. The fossil fuel consumed to produce all this stuff and the working conditions of many people involved in its production each damage the earth and her inhabitants. It’s like that smell from the bins lifts the lid on what’s really going on. Each time I notice it, the dark side of consumerism comes to mind: scratch the veneer of beauty, affluence, and luxury and we discover extraction, decay, and oppression. Now I don’t want to single out this shop in particular, but I mention this experience because I find it so striking. I have chosen to speak on the lectionary reading from the book of Revelation this morning, a book which is also known as the “Apocalypse of John.” Now, in popular culture, the word Apocalypse has come to mean the end of the world, or something so catastrophic that it feels like the end of the world. But in fact, apocalypse comes from a Greek word which literally means to pull the lid off something. Rather like the smell of the bins that lifts the lid off the glitz to show the underbelly of consumerism, John uses bizarre imagery and a confusing, sometimes terrifying, storyline to lift the lid off reality as usually understood to show us its true nature. He isn’t describing a parallel universe, but uses these images to reveal a spiritual dimension that we don’t normally perceive. If we restrict ourselves to a plain reading of history, we see Jesus as a wandering prophet and miracle worker who promised much, even the kingdom of God, but who delivered little; goodness, he was even executed as a common criminal. But if we lift the lid off surface appearances, as John does, and look for the cosmic dimension of his life, we see the Christ, the victorious lamb of God, the Alpha and the Omega, the bright morning star! And what about those who followed Him? Well, they were scapegoated by Nero for the great fire of Rome, dressed up in animal skins to be torn to pieces by dogs, and used as living torches to light the games and chariot races in Nero’s gardens; these Christians must have looked like complete failures, the most piteous of people. But in chapter 7, John reveals them to be white-robed martyrs, washed in the blood of the lamb whom God guides to springs of the water of life. In writing this book, John shows that perceived reality differs from transcendent reality, reality beyond the range of normal human experience. Anabaptsist scholar J Denny Weaver argues that John wrote this book to encourage his fellow Christians through times of hardship, to trust in the lamb that was slain and yet who lives, to believe in the power of the resurrection to ultimately defeat evil, and to be patient in the meantime. While he does talk of future hope, John uses apocalyptic imagery to lift the lid off events in the recent past to reveal the spiritual reality, to encourage the Church to see beyond the struggles they were facing and to hope and trust that God would ultimately bring justice and peace. However, I do realise that not everyone reads Revelation this way. Others see in it prophesy about the end times and seek to match the various symbols and events with present day phenomena. Taken to an extreme, this gives rise to such things as the The Rapture Index, which describes itself as a Dow Jones Industrial Average of end time activity. It has a point system with 45 categories, including occult activity, ecumenism, and the price of oil. Its all-time high of 189 points was on October 10, 2016, and, in case you are interested, after a it of a dip, we are back up at that value today. The book of Revelation is so wide open to interpretation that we need to be cautious in our reading of it – especially because of how such interpretations can motivate and influence people. The major theme is the resurrection of Christ, that he is victorious and that ultimately all things will be well. We are on safe ground if we can keep that as our lens for interpretation. Today’s reading presents us with an image of a majestic woman crowned with 12 stars, in the agony of childbirth, clothed with the sun, and with the moon under her feet. Poised close by, ready to devour her newborn, is a grotesque, flame-coloured dragon with 7 heads, 10 horns, and 7 diadems. Fortunately, as soon as the child is born, he is snatched away to the throne of God. So what might all this mean? The first clue is that the child will rule the nations with a rod of iron, referring to Psalm 2: the child is the Messiah. The birth and snatching away to the throne of God, refers to the birth, death and resurrection of Christ. In describing the woman, John combined various signs of divinity and beauty. She is clothed with the sun, as God is in Psalm 104. She is associated with the sun and the moon, as is the beloved in chapter 6 of the Song of Solomon. She is crowned with 12 stars, as pagan goddesses of the time were crowned with the 12 signs of the zodiac. These 12 stars also remind us of the 12 tribes of Israel. The woman represents Israel, the people of God from whom the Messiah comes, and she also represents God’s people, the church, which is pursued by Satan, the dragon. Dragons were familiar symbols in ancient thought. Babylonian mythology had a gleaming red dragon of chaos who was defeated by the god of light and order, and we see echos of this in mentions of Leviathan and Behemoth in the OT. More particularly, the 7-headed dragon seems to represent the Roman empire, whose capital was built on 7 hills, while the 7 diadems and 10 horns correspond to the reigns of the 7 Roman emperors from Tiberius, who reigned when Jesus was crucified, plus the three men who ruled for 18 months after Nero, but who couldn’t establish themselves. The rule of Rome and her emperors over and against the Church, was the earthly manifestation of the cosmic conflict between the rule of Satan and the rule of God. Another manifestation of this conflict between the kingdom of God and the powers of this world is Herod’s massacre of the innocents, a story which we also read about in this season of Epiphany. In our text for today, the child is snatched straight up to the throne of God as soon as he is born. John goes straight from Christ’s birth to his resurrection, missing out his life, not because it is unimportant, but because his focus is on the exalted and victorious Christ. This image from Revelation Ch 12 lifts the lid off the historical confrontation between Jesus and the Church, and the Roman empire to show its cosmic dimension and its ultimate significance. As the small and struggling church contemplated the might of Rome, the temptation was to despair. However, in those who recognise their own brokenness and perceive the resurrection of Christ, the reign of God has already triumphed. With this image, John also reminds his readers about the true, demonic, nature of empire, in case they are tempted to collude with it. But what help is this for us now? If we try to lift the lid and look beyond what is happening around us, what do we see? I think it is obvious that we are entering a period of enormous change. We are starting to see the effects of the climate and other environmental crises, political systems are coming under increasing strain, ethical norms are being abandoned, and conflict is growing nationally and internationally. The reign of human sin and arrogance appears to be leading us towards destruction, but, with the resurrection of Christ, the future reign of God has already begun in human history. While we still wait for the fullness of God’s reign, a piece of that future exists now: we see an increasing desire to reconnect with the rest of nature, to address historical wrongs, and to find new ways to live in peace. Will we choose to give up and let the dragon have free reign? Or will we join forces with God, even when our efforts to care for each other and everything else that lives on this planet seem insufficient and insignificant? John’s approach gives us a way to see the bigger picture, to find hope, even when things seem entirely hopeless. May God help us to lift the lid as John did, so that we can live in hope and share that hope with others.