The Revelation of Jesus Christ - The Herald

of the "Great Company" in glory. The occurrences under the seventh seal are doubtless
retrospective and cover much the same period as the first six. It would appear that the
trumpets and vials, together with certain parenthetical visions, indeed, all the visions
following the sixth seal, are included in the breaking or loosing of the seventh seal. This
arrangement of the visions was doubtless the one held by the later expositors, particularly
D. N. Lord and C. T. Russell, as will be seen by their expositions hereinafter set forth.
The salutation
Verses 4 to 9, inclusive, are no part of the Revelation given by God, the Father, to Christ,
but rather an inspired preface, which deals more especially with St. John's feelings as he
sat down to record or write a description of the wonderful, strange, and startling things he
had seen in the visions which passed before him as he was in the spirit on the Lord's day.
Segregating the various points contained in these verses, an eminent writer has very
properly analyzed them as including:
1. An affecting salutation: "John to the seven Churches which are in Asia: Grace be unto
you, and peace, from Him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the
seven Spirits which are before His throne; and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful
witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth."--
Verses 4,5.
2. An exultant ascription: "Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His
own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be glory
and dominion for ever and ever. Amen." --Verses 5,6.
3. A solemn prophetic allusion: "Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see
Him, and they also which pierced Him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of
Him. Even so, Amen."--Verse 7.
4. A devout theological recognition: "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the
ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty."--
Verse 8.
Several of the matters involved in these utterances are supposed to be quite familiar to the
understanding as well as to the experiences of true Christians, such being the ones for
whom the visions that follow are given. As it is not the purpose in this exposition to deal
specially with these lines of thought, we confine ourself to the consideration of the matters
contained in verses 7 and 8.
It has been understood by most expositors that the words, "Behold He cometh with clouds
and every eye shall see Him," are to be fulfilled literally--that Christ will appear in literal
clouds and every human being will see with the physical eye the Son of God, at His
Second Advent. It is our thought, however, that while a personal advent of the Divine
Christ is taught in this and other passages, it should not be understood that human beings
will literally see Him. "I go My way [He once said] and the world seeth Me no more." He