Concerning Israel not being abondened I agree that they have not been permanantly set aside, but certainly calloused “in part…until the compliment of the nations may be entering.” It was my intention to write a proper article on the outline, and nature of the book of Revelation, and to show evidence why it is much more literal than people suppose. It is important to know that it concerns the Day of the Lord. John himself says so “I came to be, in spirit, in the Lord’s day…” Rev 1.10 This connects the book immediately with much prophecy and scripture. It also helps to know a basic idea what is happening in the book. The main section of the book is divided into two sections from 4.1- 11.18 and 11.19-20.15 The first section is the throne section “…and lo! a throne, located in heaven” (4.2) and the second section is the temple section “And opened was the temple of God in heaven…” (11.19) The throne section refers to the political redemption of the earth, and the temple section refers to the religious redemption. These two sections cover the same time period. There is much value in this book, yet it is treated sometimes with less seriousness than the stupidity of Nostradamus.
There is a warning not to add or take away from the words of this book. It is obvious why the warning was given. We do not even accept John’s own explanations of what he has seen. One example: “And the woman whom you perceived is the great city which has a kingdom over the kings of the earth” Despite prophecy and the clear meantion of the city of Babylon, we just will not accept even clear statements. We have made up our minds that the book is too hard to understand, and lacks any true coherance.
If Noah’s ark was in Revelation, we would not take it literally. Maybe we would think it referred to the purification of our world system. If Jonah and the whale was in Revelation we would re-interpret it to maybe mean the underground persecution of the Church. If Exodus was in Revelation, we would not accept the 10 plagues as literal, or the crossing of the red sea, or Moses staff.
As I said before the demons in Luke 8 took the future place of Satan’s imprisonment seriously. John explains in Rev. 20 1-3 where Satan will be jailed, why he will be jailed, for how long he will be jailed and then explains he will be loosed a short time before he is imprisoned again. Well if the first imprisonment is an actual location, we must takes his second imprisonment as an actual location 1st time. "And he casts him into the submerged chaos.
2nd time. “was cast into the lake of fire” John connects the two locations. It is also “where the wild beast and where the false prophet are also” Don’t let those that believe in eternal torment fool you. These three beings are supernatural. It is also clear they do not suffer for eternity.
Some of us are a little nuts.) You don’t know who’s sitting down at the other side of that computer screen or you wouldn’t be intimidated at all. I’m a potter and an artist and I went to school for nursing, not bible school. We have all sorts on the forum. This isn’t a collection off professional theologians here – we have a few of those yes, but they don’t post very often and they’re just people also. You’re doing just fine.
Please do continue to let us know if you’re needing reassurance. We all need that from time to time.