To him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.” vss. 5b-6
Revelation 1:4b-8
While it’s unlikely that the writer of Revelation was the apostle John, it did come from a church leader bearing that name and living in the mid to late first century at a time of intense persecution. The book is styled after the form of Jewish apocalypticism and reminds us of the writings in Daniel in the Hebrew scriptures. In his opening doxology John makes clear that he belongs to the kingdom of the living Lord Jesus Christ, the One in whom he has found both love and forgiveness. It was the existence of this shadow kingdom within the Roman Empire that gave the emperors such heartache. They rightly saw that this kingdom, which stretched across national borders, was claiming the loyalty of Romans from every class and background. Ultimately the Emperor Constantine tried to subvert the Church by making it the religion of the Roman Empire, but that was never her destiny. As a kingdom of priests, those mediating the presence of the Divine, we have only one Lord, and we serve best when we are the leaven within the state and not the spiritual arm of the state. Our loyalties are to Christ the King and not some political lackeys.
Thought for the Day: How is loyalty to Christ different from loyalty to the nation?
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