I think that Jesus' ability to open the seals is a statement of His Godhood. I also think it is another way of stating something like Rev 10:1-3 and Daniel 10:5-6. Heaven was declaring the glory of Jesus to reign over history.

I think that we also tend to get carried with specificity. We sometimes attempt to read more in to the text than the text has to say. A summary of Rev 5 is God is good, the Lamb has come to rule over history, praise and glory to the Lamb for ever and ever.

Mike (and Greg),

Why all the fuss? Too much specificity?

I believe the intro to the seals says what it says in the way it says it for a specific reason: it sets the parameters for interpreting the seals.

First, no one was found worthy. That tells us that that verse takes place before Christ died and was resurrected. Only after His death and resurrection was He worthy. So we can date His taking of the book in 31 AD.

Please note that in the beginning of Rev. 5, Jesus was NOT worthy to open the book.

Secondly, John didn't write that every creature he saw in vision was praising God. He wrote that every creature was praising God. Ellen White unmistakably applies this verse to after sin is over. It does not appear to me that she is just using the language of the verse. Rather, it appears that she is definitely applying the verse to that period in the future.

Thus the only conclusion I can come to is that the seals begin in 31 AD and end at the end.

It just seems odd to me that Jesus had already demonstrated His Lordship over history and the future when He clearly spelled things out in Mat 24. This He did before the seals even existed as a prophecy and before He was found worthy to open the seals. Jesus knows the end from the beginning, so it seems inconceiveable to me that there was a time when He didn't know what was contained in the seals.

Mike,

The issue is not whether Jesus knew what was in the sealed book or not. The issue was whether He was worthy to loose the seals and open the book. It was His "prevailing," to use the language of the chapter, that made Him worthy to loose and open, even though He already knew what was within. Before He prevailed, before He was the Lamb slain, He was not worthy.

That is an interesting thought, God was not worthy. I say that with the knowledge that Jesus is Jehovah God.

Lest I be misunderstood, I'll add that Jesus was indeed worthy in many ways to do many things, but He was not worthy to loose the seals till after His death and resurrection.

I understand you're trying to establish the starting point for the seals by linking when Jesus was worthy to open them, but it feels like slippery ground to call into question the eternal nature of Jesus' worthiness. I think there is plenty of evidence for a starting date of AD 31 without casting doubt upon the everlasting worthiness of our Lord.

But the main question we're dealing with, unless I got lost along the way, is whether or not the seals also have a future dual application. I maintain yes, and you insist no. Does that sum it up correctly?

Mike,

You are correct. And this question is one of the reasons why.

quote:

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Revelation 5:9 And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation;

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The text plainly says that Jesus was worthy because He was slain and had redeemed them. That's what it says, and we just have to accept it.

That being so, any piotential future application needs to somehow harmonize with the fact that much of chapter 5 is a picture of the ascension.

This takes me back to Rev 13:8 where it plainly says that Jesus was slain from the foundation of world, thus His worthiness to open the seals has been a reality since from eternity past. This point doesn't contradict the fact that from a historical stance the seals began to be fulfilled in the first century anno domini. That is clearly established.

But now comes the "however" part of my thinking. Rev 5 does not emphatically disallow a future fulfillment based on the supposed timing of Jesus' worthiness to open the seals. To insist on such a thing is to question the eternal and transcendant worthiness of Jesus - something I'm not willing to do.

Rev 5 simply establishes the point that Jesus is worthy to open the seals and it lists His substitutionary death as one of the many reasons why. But it would be stretching things to say this reason also identifies the starting point of the prophecy. If it were then it could be argued that it began at the foundation of the world. Which in a general sense I guess that could be true.

Rev 5 doesn't specify when Jesus began opening the seals. Even if you use the date AD 31 it still doesn't say how long after that time the prophecy began to be fulfilled. Without a definite prophetic start date this prophecy cannot be classified as a time prophecy, and is therefore open for a dual application.

Does that make sense?

You've raised some good points.

It is true that Jesus is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. And yet Rev. 5 pictures a time when Jesus was not worthy to loose the seals, because no one in heaven or in earth was worthy. Then, after Jesus was literally slain, He was worthy to loose the seals. So we must be looking at Calvary, not the foundation of the world, in chapter 5.

You are correct that this does not pinpoint the starting point of the seals. It only tells us when the earliest point can be. The seals could not be opened before 31 AD.

We do have other Scriptures which tell us that the 1st seal was loosed at Pentecost.

Could it happen again? I don't see how chapter 5 can happen again. If Christ became worthy to loose the seals because of Calvary, then it becomes hard to say today that no one is worthy now to loose the seals. It seems that Christ only needs to die once to buy the right to loose the seals.

Could chapter 6 happen again? We would then have a 2000 year time gap between chapter 5 and chapter 6, and it is hard to imagine that such can be.

What do you think?