And when he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slaughtered on account of the word of God and on account of the testimony which they had maintained.  And they cried out with a loud voice saying, "How long, O Lord, the Holy and True One, do You not judge and avenge our blood on those who live on the earth?"  And each of them was given a white robe and was told that they should rest yet a little while, until their fellow servants and brothers, who are about to be killed as they were, should be made complete.  Rev. 6:9-11.
 
    Orenthal James Simpson, known commonly as "O.J." or "The Juice," was one of the most famous running backs in American football history.  His coach at the University of Southern California, John McKAy, said of his star player: "Simpson was not only the greatest player I ever had--he was the greatest player anyone ever had."  His National Football League achievements included most rushing yards in a season, most rushing yards in a single game, and most touchdowns scored in a season.
 
    After retiring from football, Simpson spent time working as a sports commentator, acting, and golfing.  Interestingly, Simpson acted in the film The Klansman, in which he played a man framed for murder by the police.  While still married to his first wife, Simpson met 17-year-old server, Nicole Brown.  He married her in 1985.  After what was described as a "rocky marriage,"  Nicole filed for divorce in 1992.
 
    Prior to the murders of his estranged wife and Ronald Goldman, the relationship between the Los Angeles Police Department and Simpson was one of admiration for his celebrity.  Right up to the time Simpson fled in his Bronco, the LAPD deferred to his celebrity status by allowing him to surrender voluntary to save him embarrassment of a public arrest.
 
    While Simpson was acquitted at he murder trial of his estranged wife, his friends in large part seemed to melt away, especially in upper-class Los Angeles.  Simpson still plays golf occasionally, but never at his former home course, the Rivera Country Club.  Members of that club informed his business manager, Skip Taft, that Simpson was no longer welcome there.
 
    The O.J. Simpson trial was the story of a man whose closest friends seemed to think him guilty of murder, yet he was (rightly or wrongly) acquitted of the crime.  This is the opposite of the situation in this text.  "How long?" is a cry of protest.  The saints are innocent, yet human courts have accounted them guilty.  The good news is that a higher court reverses that ruling.  While their vindication does not become public until the end, they are now on the winning side.
 
Lord, in a world of false accusations and unjust judgment, help me to hold my peace and trust in the ultimate vindication that You have promised.

      And when he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slaughtered on account of the word of God and on account of the testimony which they had maintained.  And they cried out with a loud voice saying, "How long, O Lord, the Holy and True One, do You not judge and avenge our blood on those who live on the earth?"  And each of them was given a white robe and was told that they should rest yet a little while, until their fellow servants and brothers, who are about to be killed as they were, should be made complete.  Rev. 6:9-11.
 
    One can read the awkward sentence at the end of this passage in two different ways.  Taken at face value, it seems to suggest that the future martyrs need to go through some sort of "completion" before their deaths.  Most Bible translators, however, add a few words to fill out the picture.  "Until the number of their fellow servants and brothers who were to be killed as they had been was completed."  That is, the end will not come until history records a certain number of martyrs.
 
    This was a popular idea in first-century Judaism.  Statements similar to Revelation 6:9-11 occur in 1 Enoch 47:1-4 and 4 Ezra 4:35-37.  The author of 4 Ezra wrote the book in reaction to the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, around the same time as the composition of Revelation.  As a non-Christian Jew, the writer seeks to understand God's will and ways in the light of incomparable anguish and suffering.
 
    Israel's history, from Old Testament times until A.D. 70, had more downs than ups.  Magnificent promises and prophecies mingled with betrayals, apostasies, and disappointments.  At the time of 4 Ezra's composition Jewish hopes for a national Israel seemed forever crushed.  Thus "Ezra's" words ring through and through with sorrow.
 
    In a "vision" Ezra wrestles with the vast number of faithful Jews who lost their lives in A.D. 70.  How can God ever fulfill His promises when His own chosen people suffer such disasters?  The angel Uriel responds that the whole current age is full of sadness and infirmity.  Only in the age to come will the promises of God find their complete fulfillment.
 
    "How long and when will these things be?" Ezra asks.
 
    Uriel tells him, "Didn't the souls of the righteous in their chambers ask about these matters?"  God's answer to them was: "When the number of those like yourselves is completed."  Such an answer may not satisfy us today, but it expresses the idea that suffering does have a purpose, a limit, and an ultimate goal.  We will never fully see justice in this world--only in the world to come.
 
Lord, I pray that I will not be distracted by my local and temporary perspective.  Help me to trust in Your overall control of both the present and the future.

   And when he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slaughtered on account of the word of God and on account of the testimony which they had maintained.  And they cried out with a loud voice saying, "How long, O Lord, the Holy and True One, do You not judge and avenge our blood on those who live on the earth?"  Rev. 6:9, 10.
 
    Friedrich Nietzsche, the nineteenth-century German philosopher famous for the line "God is dead," became a serious opponent of Christianity,  He claimed that it was a religion invented by the weaklings of the world to make themselves feel good about their unfortunate circumstances.  By exalting humility, submission, and poverty as virtues while condemning pride, power, and wealth, the powerless in society could cast their condition in a positive light.
 
    Nietzsche believed that this inversion of values was bad both for individuals and for society as a whole, and he ridiculed it as "the slave rebellion in morals."  Taking offense at texts such as the above that exalt the powerless and the victims of oppression, he had no use for "blessed are the meek" or "turn the other cheek."  The New Testament had much more to offend him: "Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant."  "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me."
 
    The philosopher scorned the entire Christian value system as a glorification of all that is weak and ineffective in life.  And his objections have no easy answer, no simple way to prove that the Cristian way of suffering and service in inherently superior to self-promotion and competition.  The Bible does make clear, however, that when God asks His followers to follow the way of humility and suffering, it is only because He Himself has already set the example.  He requires these characteristics in His followers because they are traits that He Himself exemplifies.
 
    In the person of Jesus, God demonstrates that He is "gentle and humble on heart" (Matt. 11:29, NIV).  Though He held the highest place in the universe, Christ "did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant (Phil. 2:6, 7, NIV)."  Jesus not only became human, which would be humiliating enough, but submitted to unjust arrest and execution (Phil 2:8).
 
    In Revelation 6:9 and 10 the souls under the altar recognize the injustice in their suffering.  At the same time, they are following in the footsteps of the Lamb that was slain.  The cross does not call us to do what is normal--it summons us to deny ourselves and follow Him, even to the point of death.
 
Lord, teach me the full meaning of the cross.  I yield my plans and my ambitions to You today.  Teach me Your ways.

 And when he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slaughtered on account of the word of God and on account of the testimony which they had maintained.  Rev. 6:9.
 
    The sacrificial language of this text suggests that Christians will not fully proclaim the gospel to all nations (Matt. 24:14) until God's people become radical enough to die for the sake of the unreached.  In the past many mission fields were pried open only in the wake of a multitude of Christian martyrs.  Today's "difficult fields," such as the strongholds of Islam and Hinduism, may require similar sacrifice.
 
    In the words of John Fischer: "Point a gun at each of the 60 million people who, according to [George] Gallup's poll, are born-again Christians.  Tell them to renounce Christ or have their heads blown off, and then take a recount.  I think George, like Gideon, would find his troops dwindling.  Actually, the price probably wouldn't have to be so extreme today.  Threatening to confiscate their TV sets might just produce the same results.  When faith is cheap, it is easily pawned."
 
    In the late nineteenth century Hudson Taylor sought recruits to help in his mission to China.  He claimed that he needed "men and women...such as will put Jesus, China, souls, first and foremost in everything and at every time--even life itself must be secondary."  Such a commitment was bound to be tested eventually.  The Boxer Rebellion of 1900, a response to the insensitivity of many Westerners in China, slaughtered 188 Protestant missionaries and 30,000 Chinese Christians.  Yet it led to threefold church growth in the decade that followed.
 
    In 1986 on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn a minister urged a man to accept Jesus as the only way to be reconciled to God.  The man became angry and announced that he had a gun and would kill the minister.  "You talk about heaven," he charged.  "We'll see how ready you are to die."  How one responds at a time like that depends on the cumulative effect of many small decisions over the years.  Most of us may never encounter a time when our lives are at stake on the basis of faith.  But if we have proved faithful in the smaller tests that we face each day, we will be well-trained for the ultimate test if that should come.
 
    In the incident on Flatbush Avenue the man with the gun ended up walking away and the next night even returned to apologize and ask where the minister's church was.  The faith of the martyrs always produces fruit, whether or not someone dies.
 
Lord, I have only a small idea of what "martyr faith" is like.  I'd prefer to go on living for a while, but I pray that whether I live many years or few, I will be found faithful today.

  And when he opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature saying, "Come!"  And I saw, and behold, a pale horse, and the one sitting upon it was named Death, and Hades followed after him.  And they were given authority over the fourth of the earth, to kill with the sword, with famine, with pestilence, and by the beasts of the earth.  Rev. 6:7, 8.
 
    The key Old Testament background to the four horses of Revelation 6 is the covenant and its curses.  But we also find additional background within the New Testament.  Revelation 6 has strong parallels with what scholars call the Synoptic Apocalypse, the end-time sermon of Jesus recorded in Mark 13, Matthew 24, and Luke 21.  These three chapters, therefore, form the major New Testament background text for Revelation 6.
 
    In the Synoptic Apocalypse Jesus moves through a series of events that will characterize the whole Christian age from the cross until the second coming of Jesus.  They include wars and rumors of wars.  Earthquakes, famines, and pestilences will strike various places.  In addition, Christ speaks of deception, persecution, and a final climax in heavenly signs.  All of these themes also occur in Revelation 6.  The basic message of both passages is that God is in full control of history, even when bad things afflict God's people.  The course of human history is the consequence of the Lamb opening the book.
 
    After I had taught a class on Revelation 6, a young man, extremely upset, came up to question me.  Taking issue with a couple things I had said in discussing the chapter, he seemed to have great difficulty with the idea that God was "in control" of human history.  After some discussion he finally revealed that when he was a teen-ager he had been forced to watch the murder of his brother.  The horrendous event forever marked him and the way he thought about God.
 
    You see, he felt that if God could have intervened on that occasion, He should have.  Since He did not, the young man was angry with Him.  But that placed him in a dilemma.  He didn't want to be angry with God.  So his solution to the dilemma was to believe that God did not have the power to come to his brother's aid.
 
    I affirmed his need to do theology in light of his brother's death.  But I pointed out that for some people the thought that God was unable to intervene would be even more frightening than the idea that He sometimes chooses not to.  On the surface the world seems completely out of control.  But the message of Revelation 6 and the Synoptic Apocalypse is that even when things seem chaotic, God still rules and will set everything right in his good time.
 
Lord, I trust Your judgment and Your timing.  Help me to have faith in You even when I think You should have intervened and You did not.

    And when he opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature saying, "Come!"  And I saw, and behold, a pale horse, and the one sitting upon it was named Death, and Hades followed after him.  And they were given authority over a fourth of the earth, to kill with the sword, with famine, with pestilence, and by the beasts of the earth.  Rev. 6:7, 8.
 
    This seal is the third in a series of deepening disasters.  While the language is literal, speaking of war, famine, and pestilence, the description reflects the progressive spiritual decline of those who reject the gospel.  To reject the gospel is like removing sunshine and moisture from a plant's environment.  Nothing can grow without water and light.
 
    A friend recently took on a difficult project--a stable area in his family's back yard.  He decided to begin repair work on the oldest section of the stable.  The room was in dire need of repair.  One wall was almost falling down, cobwebs hung everywhere, and the floor had almost wholly rotted out.  The whole place was filled with junk of various kinds, and it was with some trepidation that he began the process of clearing everything out so he could begin the restoration process.
 
    The first order of business, then, was to remove all the junk from the room and knock the one wall down before it collapsed of its own accord.  That done, Jim had to decide whether to remove the existing floor or build on top of it.  Finally he began to rip out the floor that had almost totally rotted out after decades of neglect.
 
    The demolition of the floor exposed the ground underneath the stable.  Jim was really surprised by the absolute "death" that existed underneath the floor after several decades.  The soil beneath the structure had turned into a very fine powdery substance.  Because no moisture or light had reached it for years, the ground almost completely lacked any kind if life.  The only things living there were some nasty-looking bugs that spent their existence boring aimlessly through a maze of silver dust.
 
    Our spiritual life will rapidly decline unless nurtured by the water of the Word and the sunlight of God's love.  The end result of spiritual neglect is a life full of "bugs" and the dry desert of discouragement.  But we can grow spiritually when we open ourselves up to God and His Word.  Spiritual renewal means ripping open the floorboards of sin that separate us from God and tearing down the walls of distrust and distraction that keep the Son from shining in.  The One who created the world from nothing can then bring life even to the spiritually dead.
 
Lord, today I choose to open myself to the light and moisture of Your presence.  Remove the spiritual obstacles in my life and fill me with Your refreshing Word.

   And when he opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature saying, "Come!"  And I saw, and behold, a black horse, and the one sitting on it had a scale for weighing in his hand.  And I heard, as it were, a voice in the middle of the four living creatures, saying, "A quart of wheat for a denarius and three quarts of barley for a denarius, and do not harm the oil and the wine."  Rev. 6:5, 6.
 
    A denarius was roughly a day's wage during this period, so the prices mentioned in the text represents a severe famine.  A man would have to work all day to get enough wheat to feed himself.  If he had a family to support he would need to buy the cheaper barley.  Given the large size of families in those days, the children would likely die or be stunted by malnutrition.
 
    Why does the text mention sparing the oil and the wine, items less necessary for life than grain?  In Asia Minor of the first century A.D. this text would have connected with a hot issue.  Wine trade at that time was more profitable than grain.  The wealthy landowners of Asia were, therefore, switching from grain to grapes.
 
    So property owners dedicated much of the land in the province of Asia (which included the seven churches) to producing olive oil and wine for profitable export.  Meanwhile, the cities of Asia had to import grain all the way from Egypt or the areas by the Black Sea.  So while landowners and shippers profited from their choice, the people in Asia had to pay higher prices for staple foods.
 
    The problem was serious enough that the emperor Domitian tried to intervene and force the landowners to restrict vine production in such places as the province of Asia.  His attempts were extremely unpopular and proved unsuccessful.  If he had succeed, it would have been quite a blow to the wealthy of Philadelphia, especially those who gained their wealth from vine production.  As is often the case, the greed of the wealthy had serious consequences for the poor.
 
    But we could also read the sparing of the oil and the wine as a token of God's mercy in the time of judgment.  Ancient Mediterranean warfare included destroying the standing crops in the fields, but not the vines and the olive trees (which took more than 15 years to reach productive capacity).  The loss of wheat and barley meant hardship for a year, but eradicating vines and trees would result in enduring disaster.
 
    While the judgments of God in our lives can be severe, they seek to redeem us, not destroy us.  It is not God's purpose to prolong suffering, but to use difficulties to get our attention and bring us to a place that would be better for us.  If everyone were more attentive to God's call much of the injustice in the world would disappear.
 
Lord, I want to be attentive to Your call in my life today.  May I not need overwhelming difficulties before I am willing to listen to You.

And when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, "Come!"  And another horse, a fiery red one, went out, and the one sitting on it was given to take peace from the earth, in order that they might slaughter one another, and a great sword was given to him.  Rev. 6:3, 4.
 
    Those who have never known war firsthand often glorify the image of war.  But those who have experienced it tend to view it more realistically.  The fear, the pain, the separation, the carnage, the loss of life--it has nothing pretty about it, except perhaps in the minds of armchair generals.  In the words of General Robert E. Lee:  "It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it."
 
    War is not far from any of us today.  Even without the use of weapons of mass destruction, terrorism has found ways to multiply suffering and garner worldwide attention.
 
    And while international terrorism is an ongoing threat, we cannot ignore its domestic version.  Timothy McVeigh's truck bomb killed 168 people in Oklahoma City, and he was not an isolated activist.  He took the script for the bombing from the novel The Turner Diaries, which has sold 200,000 copies.
 
    It is hard to use the word "civilization" in the phrase "twentieth-century civilization."  That century witnessed the Nazi holocaust against the Jews, the genocides in Cambodia and Rwanda, and the ethnic cleansing of Armenians and Greeks from Turkey, Croats and Muslims from parts of Bosnia, and Serbs from Croatia.  Less known is the "rape of Nanking," in which, after the city's surrender, soldiers gang-raped women and butchered men for bayonet practice.  And we do not have space to talk about the millions destroyed by Mao, Stalin, and World War I.
 
    In 1905 the United States approved Japan's annexation of Korea, often viewed as the nation's first subjugation in 5,000 years of recorded history.  During World War II the occupying soldiers abducted about 200,000 Korean women for daily rape.  After virgins became rare they seized married women.  They abused the women from 20 to 70 times a day, and when the war ended, they left them to die in desolate areas or exterminated them to conceal the evidence of their war crimes.  War brings out the worst in people of every ethnic group.
 
    If John had received his visions in our time, the terrifying symbols might have been different, but the essential message would be largely the same.  Humanity has not been evolving morally through the centuries--we have simply developed more efficient means of killing one another.  In a world filled with terror and chaos, nothing is certain except that God is the one who is in ultimate control of history.  The only solid ground we have to stand on is to trust in Him.
 
Lord, I choose to trust in You, no matter what I see on today's news.

                        And when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, "Come!"  And another horse, a fiery red one, went out, and the one sitting on it was given to take peace from the earth, in order that they might slaughter one another, and a great sword was given to him.  Rev. 6:3, 4.
 
    The root of all violence is the absence of peace.  Where people reject the gospel, peace vanishes from the earth.  Men and women get separated from spouses, parents, children, and friends (Matt. 10:32-36).  Everyone seeks to secure their own personal peace at the expense of everyone else and their peace.  The resulting chaos leads to violence.  On the other hand, the presence of the gospel in one's life brings genuine peace.  I didn't need to assert my opinions or demand my rights, because I already have everything I need in Jesus Christ.  Otherwise, even the smallest issues can lead to violence.
 
    An example of this took place at a recent baseball game.  The Chicago Cubs had not won the National League pennant since 1945, but they were only five outs from a trip to the World Series.  The score was 3-0 Cubs in the eight inning.  A foul ball looked as if it would land right at the top of the wall separating the playing field from the spectators in the left field corner.  Moises Alou, the Cubs' left fielder, raced toward the wall and leaped high into the air, extending his glove over the wall.  It looked as if he would make the catch.
 
    Just then a fan reached over with a glove of his own.  The ball hit the fan's glove and fell into the stands.  Alou landed on the ground and made an angry gesture toward the fan.  Somehow the incident seemed to suck the energy out of the Cubs.  Their opponent, the Florida Marlins, went on to score eight runs in the inning and would eventually win the World Series in place of the Cubs.
 
    Things got ugly in the stands.  Security officials had to escort the fan off the field, covering his head because of the objects thrown at him by other spectators.  "Kill him!" cried some.  "You cost us the World Series," others shouted.  After receiving death threats, the fan, Steve Bartman, went into seclusion, afraid for his life.  The irony of it all is that Bartman was not an anti-Cub terrorist, planted there to foil the team's chances to make the World Series.  He was actually a Cub fan who was brokenhearted about the result of his own actions.  When he saw the ball coming, he said, "I had my eyes glued on the approaching ball...and was so caught up in the moment that I did not even see Moises Alou."
 
    In the absence of the gospel, even the most trivial of pursuits can become the basis for human violence.  A relationship with Jesus Christ is the only way to genuine peace.
 
Lord, help me keep things in their true perspective.  May I extend to others the peace that You have given me.

     And I saw when the Lamb opened the first of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four creatures saying with a voice like thunder, "Come!"  And I saw, and behold, a white horse, and the one sitting on it had a bow.  A victory crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and in order that he might conquer.  Rev. 6:1, 2.
 
    The author of the book of Revelation carefully structured it, although many aspects of that structure elude most twenty-first-century readers.  The first half of the book focuses on the general realities of the whole Christian age.  One finds references to the cross, the preaching of the gospel, and the kinds of events that go on all the way from Jesus' day to the end of the world.  The second half of the book, on the other hand, focuses almost exclusively on the final events of earth's history.
 
    When you see parallels between the first and the second halves of the book, therefore, the first part of the parallel tends to focus on the general realities of the whole age, while the second part looks back on the Christian age from the perspective of the end-time.  For example, the first section of the book praises God for creation (Rev. 4:11) and for redemption (Rev. 5:9, 10, 12, 13)--events already in the past at the time of the writing of Revelation.  Revelation 19:1-6, on the other hand, lavishes the same language of praise on God's deliverance of His people at the end of history.
 
    In a similar fashion white horses appear in only two places in Revelation.  The white horse of Revelation 6 parallels the white horse of Revelation 19.  Both riders wear crowns, but John uses different Greek words for the respective crowns.  The rider of our passage wears a stephanos crown, a crown of victory.  The ancients used the term for the "Olympic gold medal," the token of victory received by Olympic athletes when they won a race.  The rider in chapter 19, on the other hand, wears the diadem, the royal crown of rulership.  The first half of Revelation repeatedly refers to Jesus and His people as overcomers, like Olympic athletes.  The one who overcomes like Jesus will receive the crown of victory.  In Revelation 19 Jesus puts an end to all opposition on the earth, and He can now wear the crown of royalty and sovereignty.
 
    I will never forget the Olympics of 1980.  The greatest moment for me and for most Americans was the victory of the American hockey team over the Soviet Union's.  The high feelings elicited by the cold war raised the excitement of the game to unimaginable proportions.  On top of this was the fact that the Russian team consisted of thinly veiled professionals, while the Americans sent college boys into the fray.  Athletics fans will never forget the "miracle on ice."
 
Thank You, Lord, for the reminder that every thought and every decision I make today is at least as important as a gold medal Olympic hockey game.  What I do today matters greatly in the ultimate scheme of things.  May Your victory become mine.