Will you please turn to the last book of the Bible, Revelation?
Revelation 1:8.
“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” saith the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”
Revelation 1:17.
“And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as one dead. And He laid His right hand upon me, saying, Fear not; I am the first and the last, and the Living One.”
Revelation 2:8.
“And to the angel of the church in Smyrna write: These things saith the first and the last, who was dead, and lived again.”
Revelation 21:6.
“And He said unto me, It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.”
Revelation 22:12-13.
“Behold, I come quickly; and My reward is with Me, to render to each man according as his work is.”
“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”
May the Lord look to Him. Amen.
Our heavenly Father, how we praise and thank Thee for the time that we have just had around Thy table, gazing upon Thy Son, our Lord Jesus, testifying to the fact that He is our Saviour, our Redeemer. He is our God, our Lord. He is our Friend, our Lover. He is everything to us.
Oh, how we praise and thank Thee for the privilege of such gathering with Him and together. And, our Father, as we have just read Thy Word, we ask that Thy Holy Spirit will quicken Thy Word to our hearts, that it may be life and spirit to us.
Let, through Thy Word, us see Thee in a fresh and living way. We do desire that Thou shalt have a greater place in our lives. To Thee be all the praise and glory, in Thy precious name. Amen.
We are living at the end of the last days. We are living in a very unique time, and we believe that because we live in such a day, the ministry of John the Apostle is very much needed and very vital to us.
Why? Because the ministry of John the Apostle is a ministry of recovery.
We mentioned before how God laid the foundation of ministry in James, in suffering and in martyrdom; and how God used Peter, the fisherman, casting the nets and drawing people into the kingdom of God.
We also mentioned before how God raised up Paul, the tentmaker, taking these materials that had been drawn into the kingdom, setting them in order, fitting them together, and building the house of God.
So then, as time went on, the net began to break, and the house began to be in ruin. It was at that time that God raised up John the Apostle.
When he was called by the Lord by the Sea of Galilee, he was mending nets. That is the work to which God called him: to mend the net, to recover that which has been lost, and to recover to that which God originally designed for His people.
Now, dear brothers and sisters, as we are coming to the close of this age, there is much more that needs to be recovered. Because of this, we believe that we need to have a better understanding of his ministry. Or, probably in another way, we need to look to the Lord that a ministry of John may be restored to the church today.
In the past, we have mentioned a few characteristics of the ministry of John.
First of all, we said the ministry of John is the ministry of the beginning. He always leads us back to the beginning, and that is what we really need. We need to be led back to the beginning.
“In the beginning was the Word.”
There is none else. There is nothing else. And the Word was made flesh, tabernacled among us, full of grace and truth. How we need to be led back to the beginning and to see that there is nothing and no one but the Word, but God, but Christ.
We need to see Him. We need to see that all that He has said is truth; all that He has done is grace. We cannot find grace and truth anywhere else but in Him. In everything, we need to be led back to the beginning.
We also mentioned the second characteristic: the ministry of John is the ministry of life.
He pays little or no attention to anything that is external. His whole emphasis is on life.
“In Him was life; and the life was the light of men.”
How, in our days, we need to go back to life. For if the life of God is not in Christ Jesus, it is not life; it is not eternal; it will soon pass away. We have to go back to life.
And, of course, as you think of life, we cannot help but think of love, because that life is love. John is the apostle of love. He encourages us to love the Lord and to love one another.
And, of course, in that life is light.
“If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanseth us from all sin.”
The third characteristic of the ministry of John, as we have mentioned before, is that it is the ministry of the absolute. With John, there is no gray colour, no borderline. It is either this or that. It is the absolute.
Nowadays, everything seems to be relative. We are told there is nothing absolute; it is all relative. Oh, how we need to go back to the ministry of John, that there is absoluteness.
Our God is absolute. Truth is absolute. When our Lord Jesus was on earth, His obedience to the Father was absolute. There is nothing relative in our Lord Jesus.
How we need to be drawn into the spirit of uttermostness unto the Lord, not living in a relative, gray kind of life.
Now, this morning, we would like to go to the fourth characteristic of the ministry of John: it is the ministry of the ultimate.
In the passages that we have read, God declares Himself as the Alpha and the Omega.
Now, we know that alpha is the first letter in the Greek alphabet, and omega is the last of the Greek alphabet. It is just like A and Z in the English language.
The Lord said that He is the Alpha: He is the first letter; He has the first word. And He is Omega: He is the last letter; He has the last word.
Of course, through these letters, thought is spelled out. From A to Z, from Alpha to Omega—in other words, our Lord Jesus, He is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the first word and the last word. He spells out the thought, the mind, the purpose, and the will of God to us.
We will not know anything about God if we do not see Him as the Alpha and the Omega. He spells it all out for us.
He is not only the Alpha and the Omega; He is the first and the last. Now, do not think that these are just repetitions.
When you think of the first, it means that He has priority over all things. That is the first. When you think of the last, you know that everything concludes in Him.
In other words, He is above all things and before all things, because all things were made in Him, by Him, and for Him. Because of that, it is the will of God that Christ should be all and in all.
God will sum up all things in Him. He has the preeminence over all things, and God will sum up all things in Him. He is the first, and He is the last.
Again, we find that He is the beginning and He is the end. When you come to Revelation 22, you find that all these are mentioned together:
“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”
It is not repetition; it is emphasis. It is showing us the various aspects of what He is.
The beginning—there is no beginning but in Him. He begins everything. He originates, He initiates, He plans everything.
You know, if there is something that does not originate from Him, something that we initiate, something that does not begin with Him, that is no beginning. In the eyes of God, that is vanity, nothing.
And He is the end. He is the goal, the very purpose of God. Everything comes up to Him. He is the end, the purpose.
John’s ministry is not only that Christ is the beginning; his ministry is that Christ is the end too. John’s ministry is not only the ministry of the beginning, that we have to go back and begin with the beginning—that is, with Christ and none else, nothing else.
But John’s ministry is also the ministry of the ultimate. He brings us to the very end, the very final consummation, the ultimate.
You know, it is like a circle. The beginning is the end, and the end is in the beginning. God knows the end from the very beginning, and from the very beginning God gets to the end.
With God, there is no time factor. When He says it, it is done. It is there forever too.
Brothers and sisters, John is the kind of person who will never be satisfied with anything that is not the final, the ultimate.
You know, there are lots of people who are very happy with just a little bit, very happy just with covering a little distance. Anything that is kind of enough, that is good enough.
But John is the kind of person who will never be satisfied with anything less than the ultimate. He is always seeking for the ultimate. How do we know?
Because when John the Baptist came on the scene, you find John became his disciple.
Of all the Jewish people at that time, outwardly they were all looking for the coming of the Messiah. That was their prayer. Yet, actually, very few were really waiting for the coming of the Messiah. John was one of those who waited for the Messiah to come.
When John the Baptist came on the scene, the voice of the prophet, immediately you find John joined himself with John the Baptist. He was seeking for the ultimate, looking for the reality.
He became a disciple of John the Baptist, and when he became a disciple of John the Baptist, he was a real disciple. Other disciples may come and go, but he stuck with John the Baptist. There he was with John the Baptist—he and Andrew, the two of them. He never left John.
But when John the Baptist said:
“Behold, the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world!”
You know what happened to John, the brother of James? He left John the Baptist with no hesitation. He went and followed the Lord.
John the Baptist had many disciples in his life, and many of his disciples never left him. If you read the four Gospels, you will find these disciples of John the Baptist, and how the Lord Jesus was really a problem to them.
Because they stuck with John the Baptist, they thought the Lord Jesus was a little bit too much. To the very end of John’s life, they stuck with John.
Oh, you say that is very loyal. In one sense, it is good; but in another sense, it is bad, because they were satisfied with John the Baptist, who was only a forerunner in the process. John the Baptist was not the ultimate.
If they stayed with John the Baptist, when John the Baptist passed away, they passed away too. But with John the Apostle, it was different. To him, it was not this man or that man. To him, he was looking for the ultimate.
If John the Baptist was on the way to the ultimate, he would walk with him for a while. But he was looking for the ultimate, and when he saw the ultimate, he was willing to leave everything but the ultimate.
He was the first one who came to the Lord Jesus to be His disciple, and he was the last one to leave. He had found in Christ the ultimate.
Because he had found in Christ the ultimate, you find he was used of God to write the last of the Gospels, the last of the Epistles, and the last book of the Bible.
You know, sometimes I think, if we only had the three Gospels—the Gospel according to Matthew, the Gospel according to Mark, and the Gospel according to Luke—would that not be Gospel? If we only had the three Gospels and did not have the Gospel according to John, do you think we would have an ultimate view of our Lord Jesus?
Well, the three Gospels are so precious. If you read the first three Gospels, you can see the Lord Jesus as the perfect Man: humble, yet noble. You will find that He is a servant of all men, and yet He is the King of all things.
You will find a life that He lived on earth so perfect that it defies description. We have never seen a man like Him. We have seen how He travelled around and did many good things, good deeds, many miracles—wonderful.
If we only have the three Gospels, what impression do you get of the Lord Jesus? Even though they mention resurrection, and all the three Gospels mention resurrection, they allow the disciples to touch Him at the resurrection.
It is the Gospel according to John that gives us an ultimate view of the Lord Jesus.
Yes, He is the Son of Man. He is the perfect Man. He has done perfect works. He has lived a perfect life. He performed many miracles. He died on the cross in our stead. He was resurrected from the dead and ascended on high. He is humble and noble, servant and King. He is all that.
But what is that all for our Lord Jesus? If that is the all of our Lord Jesus, we have not yet touched the ultimate of Christ.
When John writes his Gospel, you find that he presents Christ to us in a very different way—an entirely different approach. In other words, he gives us the spiritual and heavenly side of our Lord Jesus.
In John 1:14, with which we are very familiar, we read:
“And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us … full of grace and truth.”
Now, I do not know what your version is, but in my version there is a parenthesis there:
“And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us (and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father), full of grace and truth.”
You know, this parenthesis is very important. Why? Because the parenthesis gives us the inner view.
The outer view is: “The Word became flesh, and tabernacled among men, full of grace and truth.” That is what you can see from the outside. Full of grace and truth.
But John put a parenthesis there, and that parenthesis needs spiritual eyes. If you do not have spiritual eyes, you will not see what is written in that parenthesis.
That is the trouble with many people. They see the Lord Jesus full of grace and truth. You cannot help seeing that He is full of grace and truth. Even His enemies had to acknowledge, “You are a man of truth, and You speak the truth.”
But without spiritual eyes, they cannot see what is in the parenthesis. The parenthesis is: “And we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father.”
Oh, brothers and sisters, this needs revelation. This needs spiritual insight. It is by the opening of the inner eyes that you begin to see the Lord Jesus as more than just a man full of grace and truth. You see Him as the only begotten of the Father. You see that glory.
So the whole approach of John the Apostle in writing the Gospel according to John is that approach. Yes, he describes what the Lord did. In every chapter from Chapter 1 to Chapter 12, you find the Lord did something.
He talked to people, healed the sick, raised the dead, and opened the eyes of the blind. Our Lord Jesus did a number of things. He was doing all these things, and He said many words full of grace.
But John said all these works are signs. The significance is not in the deed; the significance is what the deed tells us. But you need spiritual eyes to see and spiritual ears to hear.
What he is trying to show us is that this Man is different. He is from heaven.
He is the only One who comes from heaven. He is on earth, and yet He is in heaven. He brings with Him a heavenly atmosphere. Whatever He touches, He touches with a bit of heaven.
He is bringing heaven to earth, and He is bringing earth back to heaven. He joins heaven and earth together. He is a heavenly Man.
Brothers and sisters, things earthly are temporary. The world and the things of the world—the pride of life, the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh—all the things of this world, anything that is earthly, is temporary. They will pass away.
They are not real. They are not the ultimate, the final. No, it is the heavenly that is real. It is the heavenly that is the ultimate.
If all that we know of our Lord Jesus is just the earthly, it will pass away. It is not the ultimate. We have to touch Him as the heavenly One. As we touch the heavenly reality of our Lord Jesus, we touch something that is real and everlasting.
Everything that is physical is temporary. Only that which is spiritual is eternal. This is what John is trying to show us in Christ Jesus. It is not so much the physical side of Him; it is the spiritual reality in Him that we must touch.
If we touch the spiritual reality of Him, then you find our relationship with Him is entirely different.
If you read from John 1 to John 12, you will find our Lord Jesus, even though He did contact the world, yet if people only touched the physical side of Him, it ended in nothing. But only those people who touched the heavenly, spiritual reality in Him were drawn into the kingdom of God.
You can see this even clearer if you go to John 13 through John 17. There you find our Lord Jesus trying to show the disciples that His relationship with them was not on a physical, earthly basis.
Even though He was a comforter to them, a guardian to them, and He did take care of them—He knew all things—He was trying to tell them, “I am going away for your sake, for your good.”
“But from now on, My relationship with you will be on an entirely different ground. It is no longer the earthly and the physical; it will be the heavenly and the spiritual.”
“I go, but I will come; and We will dwell in you. And you will be in Me.”
A new relationship. Because of that, after the resurrection, you remember, He did not allow Mary to touch Him, because Mary really wanted to maintain that earthly and physical relationship with Him. But the Lord said, “No, that is gone.”
That was only for a time, for the sake of accomplishing the work of redemption. But then you have to get into the heavenly and the spiritual.
During those forty days that our Lord Jesus appeared to His disciples many times, the way He appeared to them was rather strange. Suddenly He appeared, and suddenly He disappeared. Just when they came to know Him, He disappeared. When He appeared, they did not know Him.
You remember, He walked with the two disciples from Jerusalem to Emmaus. All the way they were talking, and they did not know Him. Then, when they broke the bread, when the Lord broke the bread, suddenly they knew Him, and He was gone.
You remember how seven disciples were fishing? They could not get anything the whole night. Early in the morning, when there was still that mist and they could not see very clearly, someone was standing on the shore, calling out, “Did you get anything?”
They said, “No.” And that Man said, “Cast your net to the right side of the boat, and you will get it.” They did not know who was talking to them. They could not see, because He was far away.
But when they caught that mass of fish, John said, “It is the Lord.” How did he know? Not by sight. He knew it.
When they came to the shore, the Lord already had the fire made, and fish was already there. They really did not need Saint Peter’s fish; He had fish already there.
And you know what John said? “No man dared ask Him, Who art Thou? knowing that it was the Lord.”
Strange! If you know who He is, you do not ask. Of course, you do not ask. But they wanted to ask, and they dared not ask; yet they knew it was the Lord. Why?
A new relationship. It is no longer on the physical and earthly basis. Everything is on the spiritual and heavenly basis. It is a new ground they had never trodden before; therefore, they did not know exactly where they were.
But, brothers and sisters, that is what the Lord is taking us to. He is taking us out of the earthly into the heavenly, out of the physical into the spiritual.
Our relationship with the Lord is not on an earthly and physical basis. Our relationship with the Lord is on that heavenly and spiritual basis. It is something deep within us. We know Him.
Our Lord Jesus is the end, the ultimate. Only in Him will you find satisfaction. There is nothing beyond Him. He is the end, the ultimate.
Oh, how we need to have Him and know Him in that heavenly and spiritual reality. That is the Gospel according to John.
How about his Epistle? You know, his Epistles are the last of the Epistles—the last letter, the end, the ultimate.
Now, if the Gospel according to John tells us the ultimate of Christ, then his Epistle tells us the ultimate of Christians, of believers.
If you want to grasp the ultimate of a Christian life, you have to go to the Epistle of John. So, maybe let us read a few verses in the First Epistle of John.
First John 5:13:
“These things have I written unto you, that ye may know that ye have eternal life, even unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God.”
Now, this is the purpose of John writing this letter. When he wrote the Gospel, he said he wrote these things that we may believe in the Lord Jesus as the Son of God.
Now, in writing the letter, he said, “These things have I written unto you that ye may know.” You have believed; now you need to know. Know that you have eternal life, you who believe on the name of the Son of God.
In other words, here you find this Epistle tells us that the ultimate of a Christian is knowing.
The word “know” here in Greek is oida. You know, in Greek there are two different words for “know” or “knowledge.”
One is objective knowledge: knowing it objectively as a historical fact, something that you can gather by information, research, and study. That is objective knowing.
But there is a knowing that is subjective knowledge. You know consciously. You know experientially. You know it by your life experience. Here the word used is subjective knowing.
In other words, we need to know the Lord. Now, knowing the Lord is the ultimate of a Christian, is it not?
What is the one passion of Paul the Apostle? If you read Philippians 3, we all know that:
“That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, becoming conformed unto His death.”
In other words, the one passion of Paul as a Christian was to know Him, to know Christ—not to know Him objectively by study, by research, by information, by listening, by digging.
Well, there is a place for these things. Of course, we must do that. If you do not, you will not get into the subjective knowledge; you will be very limited.
But still, we must remember: as Christians, the ultimate that we are seeking is to know Him in a real way—consciously, experientially, in life.
Oh, we need to know Him. Of course, there is no end to that knowing.
Our Lord Jesus is so rich that we may spend our lifetime trying to know Him, and even in eternity we have to know Him, and there is no end to that.
Eternity cannot be dull, really, because at that time our knowing of Him will be—I do not know how many degrees—much more than today.
Our Lord Jesus often said, “How dull you are!” After His resurrection, He told His disciples, “How is it that ye also are without understanding?” You just do not understand Me.
You know, we are dull. Now, do not think you are clever. We are dull. No matter how quick you are, you are slow.
Oh, how patient our Lord Jesus has to be with us. We are so slow, so dull. But in eternity, dear brothers and sisters—well, even in the kingdom time the sun will shine sevenfold. So in eternity it must be more than sevenfold then, to a far higher degree.
Still, there is no end to knowing Him—not just mental knowledge, but real knowing Him, experiencing Him. Now, that is the ultimate of a Christian life.
How much do we know Him? Have we just become contented with that little that we know of Him?
Is it the cry of our heart: “Oh, that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death”? These are not mental knowledge; these are experience.
By the Holy Spirit, we are being led into Christ. It is the Holy Spirit who can lead us in such a way that we may really know Christ. This is the ultimate of a Christian.
The First Epistle of John ends with a number of “knows.” I do not know if you noticed that. That is the way he ends up this Epistle.
First John 5:15 says:
“And if we know that He heareth us whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions which we have asked of Him.”
In other words, we who know the Lord, we know. What do we know? We know that He hears us. Oh, if we ask Him anything, He hears us. Why? Because we ask Him according to His will.
So we have the confidence and the boldness, knowing that He hears us. Brothers and sisters, we who know the Lord have a relationship with the Lord, and this we know.
There is a living relationship between us and the Lord. Because of that living relationship, we know His will. Because of that relationship, we know He hears our prayer. Oh, how precious is that relationship. We have all the confidence and boldness because of that.
First John 5:18 says:
“We know that whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not; but He that was begotten of God keepeth him, and the evil one toucheth him not.”
Now, do you believe that? Do you know that? Do you really know that everyone begotten of God does not sin?
Ah, have I been begotten of God? Am I saved? You know, people have great problems with John—great problems with John. Theologians especially, because John puts it in such clear terms: “Everyone that is begotten of God does not sin.”
You find in Chapter 3, too, how do we know that you are a child of God or a child of the devil? A child of God practices righteousness; a child of the devil practices sin. Now, who are we then?
That is why John is always absolute. He is always absolute. We know.
Oh, brothers and sisters, how blessed it is if you know by experience. What do you know? You know everyone that is begotten of God does not sin.
Well, it is true, unfortunately, sometimes we do sin. Even in the Epistle, John said:
“If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”
So he granted that there is such a possibility to sin, and yet he says there is no possibility to sin at the same time.
Yes, that which is begotten of God does not sin. The seed that is born in you is Christ. He never sins. He cannot sin. He overcomes sin.
That which is begotten of God does not sin, and He that is begotten of God keeps him, and the wicked one does not touch him.
Can the wicked one touch Christ? The wicked one tried, but he failed. The Lord said, “The prince of the world cometh: and he hath nothing in Me.” Absolutely no ground. He cannot touch Me.
Oh, what a comfort it is to know that we are begotten of God, and the eternal life in us cannot sin, and the devil cannot touch us. This life will keep us.
Is it not true? Sometimes we are tempted, and the life within us keeps us, guards us. We notice, and that is Christianity.
First John 5:19 says:
“We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in the evil one.”
Oh, what a comfort. We know this. The whole world lies in the wicked one. Is that not true? But we are of God.
We are in the world, but we are not of the world. He has called us out of the world. We are of God. We belong to God, and to God alone. Yes, we know.
Finally, First John 5:20:
“And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we know Him that is true, and we are in Him that is true, even in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.”
In other words, we know that we are in Him. We know we are in Him, and He is in us. Union. Union with God in Christ Jesus. We know this.
Brothers and sisters, this is the ultimate of a Christian. The ultimate of a Christian is knowing Him. In knowing Him, we are in Him. We are in Him who is true, the reality. That is union. That is the ultimate we must look for.
Then the Book of Revelation is the ultimate of God’s work. Throughout the ages and the generations, God has been working all along. Here, when you come to the Book of Revelation, you find the ultimate, the consummation of God’s work.
As we look into this world today, oftentimes we wonder if this is the final, if this is the last word, if this is the end. No.
Nothing that we see today is the final. Everything that happens on earth today comes and goes. Nations will come and go. People will come and go. Events will come and go. Systems will come and go. Everything in this world is not final.
Communism is not final. Nor is socialism. These are not final. What is the final, the ultimate?
The holy city, New Jerusalem. That is the ultimate of God’s work.
There you find, in the holy city, the New Jerusalem, the consummation, the gathering together of all that God has done, both in Old Testament times and in New Testament times.
You will find the saints of Old Testament times there, and the saints of New Testament times all there. The gates bear the names of the twelve tribes of Israel; the foundations bear the twelve names of the apostles.
In other words, it is the gathering up of all that God has done through the ages, consummated in that holy city, the New Jerusalem: a corporate expression of Christ to eternity. Glorious!
Nothing that God has done is lost. If it is something that God has done, it will eventually be found there in the holy city. That is the ultimate.
Dear brothers and sisters, our eyes should be on the ultimate. The absolute gives us the way; the ultimate gives us the goal.
As we walk with the Lord, our walk with Him must be absolute. But our eyes are always looking at the ultimate. We will not stop at any place, anywhere, with any person.
We have to go on to the ultimate: Christ and His eternal purpose.
So may the Lord help us to see that this is the ministry of John. This is a ministry of recovery.
How sad it is to see God’s people have no understanding of the ultimate. God’s people are involved or bogged down in things good in themselves, in activities good in themselves. God’s people are even bogged down in doctrines and teachings good in themselves.
But, brothers and sisters, these are not the ultimate. They may be on the way, but they are not the ultimate. We may have to pass through them, but let us pass through them and not stop in them.
We have to go to the ultimate—to Him who is the Alpha and the Omega.
Shall we pray?
Oh, heavenly Father, we do ask Thee that by Thy Holy Spirit Thou wilt reveal Christ to us as the ultimate, that He is for us everything.
Oh, we cannot seek anything less than Thee: to know Thee as Thou really art, and thus be in Thee.
And finally, to manifest together as that holy city, the New Jerusalem. To Thee be all the praise and glory. In Thy precious name, Amen.