Revelation 6-8:1

1. Revelation 6-8:1 Rider on the White Horse

2. Cycles of Seven

3. “I saw a scroll in the right hand of the one who sits on the throne; it was covered with writing on both sides and was sealed with seven seals.” (Revelation 5:1)

4. 1st Seal • “Then I saw the Lamb break open the first of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures say in a voice that sounded like thunder, ‘Come!’ I looked, and there was a white horse. Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown. He rode out as a conqueror to conquer.” (Revelation 6:1-2) • Who is the rider? • Good or bad? • A person or a time period?

5. Revelation 4-5; Ezekiel 1 • God in all his glory • Surrounded by four living creatures that have the faces of a human, lion, bull and eagle. • Blazing torches, colors of the rainbow, and flashes of lightening. • A “middle” or “center” of the throne – “the dazzling light which shows the presence of the LORD.” (Ezekiel 1:28)

6. The Scroll • “…covered with writing on both sides…” (Revelation 5:1). • “I saw that there was writing on both sides” (Ezekiel 2:10) • “I began to weep bitterly…” (Revelation 5:4) • “Cries of grief were written there, and wails and groans.” (Ezekiel 2:10) • Seals • Trumpets • Bowls

7. 2nd Seal • “Another horse came out, a red one. Its rider was given the power to take peace away from the earth and to make people slaughter one another. So he was given a large sword.” (Revelation 6:4)  Red: War

8. 3rd Seal • “Then the Lamb broke open the third seal; and I heard the third living creature say, ‘Come!’ I looked, and there was a black horse. Its rider held a pair of scales in his hand. I heard what sounded like a voice coming from among the four living creatures, which said, ‘A quart of wheat for a day’s wages, and three quarts of barley for a day’s wages.” (Revelation 6:5-6) • Black: Hunger

9. 4th Seal • “I looked, and there was a pale colored horse. Its rider was named Death, and Hades followed close behind. They were given authority over one fourth of the earth, to kill by means of war, famine, disease, and wild animals.” (Revelation 6:8) • Pale: Death

10. 1st Seal • “Then I saw the Lamb break open the first of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures say in a voice that sounded like thunder, ‘Come!’ I looked, and there was a white horse. Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown. He rode out as a conqueror to conquer.” (Revelation 6:1-2) • Who is the rider? • Jesus, the early Christian church • Good or bad? • A White rider must be good? • A person or a time period?

11. The problem of the sealed scroll • “The first four verses of chapter 5 imply that the heavenly council is faced with a serious problem” • “In the context of the Apocalypse as a whole it is clear that the problem facing the heavenly council is the rebellion of Satan which is paralleled by rebellion on earth. Chapter five presupposes the old story of Satan’s rebellion against God which leads to the fall of creation.” Adela Yarbo Collins, The Apocalypse, pg. 39

12. 1/3 of the angels sided with Satan, as did Adam and Eve • “Well, no wonder! Even Satan can disguise himself to look like an angel of light!” (2 Corinthians 11:14)  

13. God: “holding back the winds” • Satan: “was allowed to wage war against God’s holy people and to conquer them. It was also given authority over every tribe, people, language, and nation. Everyone living on earth will worship it…” (Revelation 13:7). 

14. “The rider on the white horse appears as a part of a group that acts as demonic agents of destruction.” • Mathias Rissi, “The Rider on the White Horse”, Int 18 [1964], 414-416 • “Allen Kereslager takes the white horse to signify deceptive and counterfeit activity on the part of its rider.” • Sigve Tonstad, “Saving God’s Reputation”

15. Cosmic Conflict theme (Rev. 12-14)

17. Gog: Another rider with a bow • “So the Sovereign LORD sent me to tell Gog what he was saying to him: ‘Now while my people Israel live in security, you will set out to come from your place in the far north, leading a large, powerful army of soldiers from many nations, all of them on horseback. You will attack my people Israel like a storm moving across the land. When the time comes, I will send you to invade my land in order to show the nations who I am, to show my holiness by what I do through you.’” (Ezekiel 38:14-16) • “The Sovereign LORD said, ‘Mortal man, denounce Gog, the chief ruler of the nations of Meshech and Tubal, and tell him that I am his enemy. I will turn him in a new direction and lead him out of the far north until he comes to the mountains of Israel. Then I will knock his bow out of his left hand and his arrows out of his right hand.” (Ezekiel 39:1-3)

18. “If the deceiver is partly to be unmasked by the evidence of his own actions, it means that he will be granted the opportunity to bring his design to fruition. Satan must be allowed to commit evil for his evil character to be manifest.”  • Sigve Tonstad, “Saving God’s Reputation” • The four horses reveal and expose Satan’s kingdom to be a fraud and one that leads to destruction and death.

19. 2 Riders in Revelation • Revelation 6 • Goes out with a bow to conquer • The end result is the bloodshed and death • Revelation 19 • Goes out with a sword in his mouth • The rider is named “Faithful and True.” • His “robe…covered with blood” (Revelation 19:13) 

20. The 5th Seal: does anyone blame Satan for suffering? • "Where are you God? Why do you seem to be silent?” • “How can an all-powerful and all-loving God allow this to happen to me?” • “Why do bad things happen to good people?” • “How come my prayers for help seem to go unanswered?” • “Where was God….?” • “If there is a God he has a lot of explaining to do for allowing innocent children to starve to death or to be sexually abused.”

21. 5th Seal • “When the lamb opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slaughtered because of God’s word and the testimony they had given about him. They cried out in a loud voice, ‘Holy and true Master, how long before you judge and take revenge on those living on earth who shed our blood?’” (Revelation 6:9-10)

22. The answer? • “Each of the souls was given a white robe. They were told to rest a little longer until all their coworkers, the other Christians, would be killed as they had been killed.” (Revelation 6:11)

23. 6th Seal: A contrast of two groups • Violent Earthquake • Sun Blackened • Moon blood • Stars fell • Sky disappeared • Kings, rulers, military chiefs, rich, powerful, “and all other people, slave and fee, hid themselves in caves…They called out, “Fall on us and hide us from the eyes of the one who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb.” (Revelation 6:16)

24. 144,000 • “After this I looked, and there was an enormous crowd---no one could count all the people! They were from every race, tribe, nation, and language, and they stood in front of the throne and of the Lamb, dressed in white robes and holding palm branches in their hands.” (Revelation 7:9) • “One of the elders asked me, ‘Who are these people dressed in white robes, and where do they come from?’” (Revelation 7:13)

25. “They have washed their robes and made them white with the blood of the Lamb….the Lamb, who is in the center of the throne, will be their shepherd…And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” (Revelation 7:14,17) • “He will wipe away all tears from their eyes...they will see his face.” (Revelation 21:4, 22:4)

26. One group: • Worships the lamb-like beast (the dragon) and receives the mark of the beast (13:2-4) • “All peoples on earth will mourn over him.” (1:7) • “Hide us from the face of the Lamb” (6:16) • 144,000 • “The Lamb will be their Shepherd” (7:9) and receive the seal of God • “He will wipe away all tears” (7:17, 21:4) • “They will see his face” (22:4)

27. 7th Seal • “When the Lamb broke open the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.” (Revelation 8:1)

29. “Just watch my servant blossom! Exalted, tall, head and shoulders above the crowd! But he didn’t begin that way. At first everyone was appalled. He didn’t even look human-- a ruined face, disfigured past recognition. Nations all over the world will be in awe, taken aback, kings shocked into silence when they see him. For what was unheard of they’ll see with their own eyes, what was unthinkable they’ll have right before them.” (Isaiah 52:13-15) • “Kings will be speechless with amazement. They will see and understand something they had never known.”

30. “Who believes what we've heard and seen? Who would have thought that God’s saving power would look like this? The servant grew up before God--a scrawny seedling, a scrubby plant in a parched field. There was nothing attractive about him, nothing to cause us to take a second look. He was looked down on and passed over, a man who suffered, who knew pain firsthand. One look at him and people turned away. We looked down on him, thought he was scum. But the fact is, it was our pains he carried-- our disfigurements, all the things wrong with us. We thought he brought it on himself, that God was punishing him for his own failures.

31. But it was our sins that did that to him, that ripped and tore and crushed him--our sins! He took the punishment, and that made us whole. Through his bruises we get healed. We’re all like sheep who’ve wandered off and gotten lost. We’ve all done our own thing, gone our own way. And GOD has piled all our sins, everything we’ve done wrong, on him, on him. He was beaten, he was tortured, but he didn't say a word. Like a lamb taken to be slaughtered and like a sheep being sheared, he took it all in silence.

32. Justice miscarried, and he was led off-- and did anyone really know what was happening? He died without a thought for his own welfare, beaten bloody for the sins of my people. They buried him with the wicked, threw him in a grave with a rich man, Even though he’d never hurt a soul or said one word that wasn’t true.” (Isaiah 53:1-9)

33. Stunned Silence • “The scroll confronts the council with a seemingly insoluble predicament, a veritable crisis in the divine government, highlighted by the tears of the Seer (5:4) and by the silence of everyone else (5:3). The breaking of the seals signifies that this predicament has been fully worked out, and with the breaking of the seventh seal comes a sense of closure to the heavenly council…Only when the Lamb in its slaughtered state is allowed to exert a commanding influence on the entire scene will the representative biblical imagery for the silence in heaven receive its due

34. …[The text in Isaiah] is about silence – the silence of shock and awe in the face of an entirely unexpected manifestation. Revelation presents an analogous situation when the heavenly council confronts a disclosure that defies expectations, but the relationship between these texts consists of more than an analogy. The startling nature of what is disclosed, causing kings to ‘shut their mouths because of him’ according to Isaiah (52:15), belongs organically to the vision of the ‘lamb that is led to the slaughter’ in the original Old Testament context (Isaiah 53:7). Moreover, both texts describe the fate of the Lamb, one anticipating it, the other one after the fact…” Sigve Tonstad, “Saving God’s Reputation”