The ingredients of apocalyptic include:ĭualism (the world divided clearly into forces of good and evil)įocus on the appearance and work of the Divine Messiah While the ingredients of this genre do not provide an analytic grid (as narrative does), knowing the ingredients will help us know what we are looking at as we read. The Book of Revelation falls into a type of writing known as apocalypse. Secondly, the individual units fall into place if we apply the usual grid of narrative questions, such as: (1) Where does the event happen? (2) Who are the agents? (3) What action occurs? (4) What is the outcome? Any passage in Revelation can be charted in terms of these basic questions.
Instead of telling a single, linear story, these visions are arranged in the form of a pageant, with mysterious visions rapidly succeeding each other-and never in focus for very long. Most obviously, the book presents a series of visions. Several important literary forms converge in Revelation. To believe that the predictions of Revelation will be ultimately fulfilled at a coming end of history should not prevent us from seeing how much of the book is happening right before our very eyes. To cite an obvious example, the visions of the cataclysmic decline of the elemental forces of nature look more familiar with every passing year as our planet’s ecological crisis grows. It is a safe premise that the symbolic mode of Revelation makes it always relevant and perpetually up-to-date. Yet this is not to deny that the events portrayed in Revelation are also recurring, ever-escalating, and heading towards a climax at the end of history. Surely, most of what John portrays has happened in some form throughout history, including in our own day. Thus, we should not assume that everything in Revelation is simply futuristic. John wrote these words 2000 years ago, and there is good reason to believe that some of his prophecies were fulfilled already in the First Century A.D. The author tells us that his visions concern “the events that will happen soon” (1:1 NLT). The Book of Revelation tells us enough about the future that we can be confident of ultimate victory in Christ. Without a knowledge of how history will end, we would feel insecure and perplexed as we see human culture decline. In addition to this desire for narrative closure, we instinctively feel a need to know something about the future.
But we also need to know how a story ends for this we turn to Revelation, the closing act of the biblical drama. In effect, Revelation allows us to peek at the last chapter of human history to see ending of the Bible's grand narrative. The story of the Bible, for example, begins by answering the question of origins.
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