Sermon – Revelation is Good News

(I preached this sermon on Sunday, July 27, 2025 at Christ Lutheran Church. It is based on Revelation 1:4-8).

In 1963, Dr. King wrote a letter—not from an office, but from a jail cell in Birmingham.
He had been arrested for confronting injustice.
His letter wasn’t angry—but it was urgent.
He opened it with “My dear fellow clergymen…”
He was writing to the Church—to wake it up, to call it to courage, to remind it who it’s supposed to be.
Graceful, but not soft. Truthful. Healing. Prophetic.

A century earlier, another letter of sorts was issued.
The Emancipation Proclamation—spoken in the middle of a war.
Lincoln didn’t wait for peace to declare freedom.
He spoke it into the war, as a word of hope and transformation.
“All persons held as slaves… shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.”
It didn’t end the war. But it redefined its meaning.

That’s what John is doing in Revelation.
He writes from exile on the island of Patmos, from the edges of empire.
Not from power, but from pressure.
And still—his very first words are: “Grace to you, and peace.”
A greeting. A healing word. A declaration of freedom from the heart of oppression.
This is Revelation not as a codebook or end-times map, but as a pastoral letter to the wounded.

Over the next five weeks, we’re going to spend some time in the book of Revelation.
So before we dive deep, I want to give you a clear picture of what this book is—and what it isn’t.

Revelation has often been misused. It’s been twisted into a horror movie—full of terrifying images of destruction, meant to scare people into submission, to convince them that God is angry and ready to unleash wrath on the world.

But that’s not the God we worship.
That’s not the heart of Revelation.

This book isn’t about fear—it’s about faithfulness.
It’s not a code to be cracked—it’s a vision of hope in the midst of empire.

So let’s take a few minutes this morning to set the stage—
To clear away the confusion, and to hear this powerful, prophetic letter the way it was meant to be heard:
As a word of grace, peace, and healing for people living under pressure.
As a promise that God is not done with the world, and that God is coming to restore it all.

Revelation is not a secret code to crack.

It’s not a puzzle for end-times conspiracy theorists or charts about the rapture.
It’s a pastoral letter, a political critique, and a prophetic vision written to people under pressure.
It’s not about escape—it’s about endurance. Not about fear—it’s about hope.
Revelation is written to people suffering under the Roman Empire—and it names that empire for what it is.

What is empire in Revelation?

Empire is never satisfied.
It devours.
It kills, destroys, oppresses.
It controls commerce and economy. It buys and sells human lives. 
It uses violence to keep people in line.
It demands loyalty but gives nothing in return. Even those loyal to empire are disposable.
It teaches that might makes right, that the strong survive, that the ends justify the means.

It values nothing but itself—no human dignity, no sacred creation, no image of God in others.
It eats everything in its path.

Revelation unmasks empire—and announces God’s alternative.

In the face of empire, John writes:
“Grace to you. Peace to you.”
That’s not soft language—it’s a political announcement.
It’s saying:
You are not who Rome says you are. You are not what the world says you are. You belong to the Lamb who was slain—who still lives.
The message of Revelation is that empire will not last.
God wins.

Jesus is portrayed as the anti-emperor.

He is the faithful witness, not a tyrant.
He is risen from the dead, not feeding on others’ death.
He is ruler of the kings of the earth, but he rules with love, not domination.
His hands heal instead of harm. His power sets free instead of enslaving.

The reign of God is healing.

Jesus gives grace, peace, and healing.
He creates a people who live differently:
a community of trust, forgiveness, justice, and compassion.
He restores what empire has broken.
He doesn’t just pull us out—he comes down into creation.
And at the end of Revelation, we see the whole point:
God doesn’t destroy the world to save us from it. God restores it so we can live in it—with God, together, in love, forever.

This is a hopeful book.

Revelation is not about fear—it’s about freedom.
It’s not about destruction—it’s about restoration.
It’s not about leaving earth—it’s about heaven coming to earth.
It’s a vision of a world where God wipes away every tear, where mourning and crying and pain are no more, where the empire is gone and God dwells with us.

We live under a different kind of empire—one that masks its power in consumerism, cruelty, and policies that abandon the most vulnerable.
Many of us feel like we’re living in exile from what we hoped America could be.
We are tired. We are under pressure.
And like the early church, we need to hear a word from God that says:
Grace to you. Peace to you. Healing to you.

So hear now this letter again—
Not to ancient Asia, but to Harrisburg.
To Allison Hill. To you.

From John,
To the handful of churches holding on in Harrisburg—
especially those east of the Capitol dome,
from Derry Street to Market Street,
from 13th to 17th,
where Zarker runs quiet at night
and Vernon hums with children playing,
where Thompson stretches toward hope.

To all who still gather in the name of Jesus—
in storefronts and sanctuaries,

in small bodegas and authentic ethnic eateries, 
in borrowed spaces and broken buildings,
under banners of many languages and with aching hearts—
Grace to you.
Peace to you.
Healing to you.

From the One who is,
who was before all this began,
and who is still coming—
not with a sword, but with bandages for our wounds,
and a promise that all this pain is not the end.

From the Spirit—
moving like wind through boarded-up homes,
breathing through your sighs too deep for words,
present in sevenfold wholeness,
offering strength, courage, and community
to every tired elder and every hopeful child.

And from Jesus the Christ—
The faithful witness,
the first to rise from death,
the One Rome couldn’t silence,
and Washington can’t contain.
The One who walks these streets,
sits on stoops,
waits at clinic doors,
stands beside the undocumented and the uninsured,
the overworked and the overlooked,
those who mourn and those who hunger for justice.

To him who loves us still—
who has loosed the chains they said we’d never break,
who wipes the tear before it falls,
who reaches out scarred hands to say,
“I know. I see. I’m with you.”

To him who makes us into something new—
Not just a church, but a people:
A community of priests and poets,
caregivers and peace-bringers,
healers and hope-holders.
To him be glory.
To him be power.
Now and forever. 

Look!
He is coming—
not from some faraway heaven,
but from within this very place—
rising through broken pavement,
shining through those who refuse to give up.

Every eye will see—
Even those who looked away.
Even those who voted for cruelty,
who stood by while neighbors suffered,
who said, “That’s not my problem.”
Even they will see, and be changed.
And all peoples will mourn and rejoice—
because the truth will no longer hide. 

“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God,
the first and the last,
the One who was here before the first brick was laid,
and will still be here when the last siren fades.
I am—the Beginning and the End.
I hold time in my hands.
I hold your city in my hands.
I hold you—
wounded and whole, broken and beautiful,
healing and held.

And if God speaks in many languages,
then let this final blessing come to all who need healing today—

Gracia para ustedes. Paz para ustedes. Sanación para ustedes.

Jesús está aquí—sanando, liberando, amando.

Yo soy el Alfa y la Omega, dice el Señor. Yo te tengo.

This is the word of the Lord,
from Patmos to Birmingham,
from Washington to Harrisburg,
from the cross to the clinic—
A word of grace.
A word of healing.
A word for you.

Thanks be to God.