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CHAPTER 1Christ chooses some as kings and priets unto God—Christ shall come again—John sees the Risen Lord. |
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1 aThe bRevelation of
Jesus Christ, which God gave unto hima, to shew unto his
cservants things which must dshortly come
to pass; and he sent and signified it by his eangel
unto his servant John:
2 Who bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw. 3 aBlessed is he that breadeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the ctime is at hand. |
1a which God gave unto him It is important to always remeber the proper order of things. While Jesus Christ is the anointed God who we do worship and is the same as Jehovah, the God of the Old Testament, it is imperative to understand that he is so placed in that position by the Father. And Christ's administration of ministering unto this second estate is very much under the direction of God the Father of Spirits. And as Christ so instructs us, we do pray unto the Father in the name of Jesus Christ, the Son giving all honor and glory unto the Father and do the will of the Father in all things. | |
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4 JOHN to the aseven churches which
are in Asia: Grace be unto you, and peace, from him which
bis, and which was, and which is to come; and from the
seven cSpirits which are before his throne;
5 And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the afirst begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto him that loved us, and bwashed us from our sins in his own cblood, 6 And hath made us akings and bpriests unto God and his Fathera; to him be cglory and ddominion for ever and ever. Amen. |
6a hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father To more fully appreciate this scripture it helps to have an understanding of the Temple Endowment. It would seem that such endowment had been received, by whatever means, by the various members of the Church. Thus we come to understand that these saints of the early church did have a fulness of the gospel including the endowment to become kings and priest unto the Most High God, being Jehovah, Jesus Christ who the Father did place in that position that we might through Him become such ruling kings and priests in the Kingdom of Heaven forever in the eternity to come. | |
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7 Behold, he acometh with clouds;
and every eye shall bsee him, and they also which
pierced him: and all ckindreds of the earth shall
dwail because of him. Even so, Amen.
8 I am aAlpha and Omega, the bbeginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the cAlmighty.
The First Estate: The preexistence is the 'First Estate'. It is the estate of Intelligences and of Spirit birth. It is the estate that the Spirit Children of God are in from their first primevil childhood. It is an estate of innocence in that a first hand experience with the carnal and corruption of the natural man is not present there in that estate of the development of man. That is the first eternity which is that eternity of the spirit in the presence of God the Father. From that eternity in order to maturate, man must fall and learn to exercise his out agency in the face of opposition. Those who faithfully have kept this First Estate then are blessed to continue on into the 'Second Estate'. The Second Estate: This mortal existance is the 'Second Estate'. It is the estate of man's maturation where he experiences opposition in all things and learns to over come the natural man and subject all things by the exercise of his own agency to that spirit within him. The 'Second Estate' has a beginning and an end. Jesus Christ as Jehovah was, has and is God the Father's selected Redeemer who stands at the beginning and end of this 'Second Estate' as its 'Ministering God' in the name of the Father. Only those who are of this Second Estate may minister unto it (D&C 130:5), thus God the Father selected and anointed Jehovah, His Firstborn Son in the spirit to be His Redeeming Representative to all of mankind. Through acceptance of Jehovah who is the same as Jesus Christ, we gained our entrance into this Second Estate. He and only He stands at that position of entrance into this Second Estate. He is our Alpha, our Beginning. He is the First. During this mortality we are tested and proven further. We exercise our agnecy and if we select Christ and come unto him, we may then successfully find our way into the next estate, that final eternity. The Next (Third) Estate: All who have been born into this Second Estate will be raised by the power of the resurrection. That door back into Eternity is also provided by and through Jesus Christ who is the same as Jehovah. He does in all reality stand from 'all eternity' to 'all eternity'. These may be thought of as two eternities but are in fact the one and the same eternity just experienced from two different perspectives of esistance. Thus when it is said that the Plan of God is one 'Eternal Round', it does but refer to the fact that the process is from eternity to mortality and back to eternity, when the process carries on forever, just being experiences by other from their varying perspectives of being either spirit child of spirit only or from that perspective as being a resurrected being of flesh and bone, the housing of the Spirit which the Spirit to varying degrees has learned to control and overcome. Thus without going into the various degrees of glory of eternity, we can now place Jehovah, who is Jesus Christ, in his proper position of being the Alpha or Beginning and the Omega or End of this 'Second Estate'. It is through Him, His positioning by the Father, that we do enter into this mortality and through Whom we do exit this 'Second Estate' back into eternity but in from a developed perspective. He is our Alpha and Omega. He is our beginning and our end. He stands First and Last at the passage ways from all eternity to all eternity. The sealing room in the temple is a good visual aid in this respect. The two mirrors facing each other upon the walls of that room reflecting each other's image on into visual eternity represent the eternity from which we came when we were Spirit Children and the eternity to which we are going after death and upon our resurrection. The room itself is a representation of this 'Second Estate' of the here and now mortality which we are in. Christ, Jehovah, stands at each of those mirrors as our entrance into mortality and our exit out of this mortality. He stands there from all eternity to all eternity as the only way from man to follow. He is that truth and that light by which we must operate in order to effect the eternal plan of our God. of the Father. been placed by the Father |
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The Revelation Begins |
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9 I John, who also am your brother, and companion in
tribulation, and in the kingdom and apatience of Jesus
Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for
the testimony of Jesus Christ.
10 I was in the Spirit on the aLord's bday, and heard behind me a great cvoice, as of a trumpet, 11 Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the afirst and the last: and, What thou seest, bwrite in a book, and send it unto the seven churchesa which are in Asia; unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Pergamos, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea. |
11a send it unto the seven churches Some take this to mean that the Revelation was soley given to and applied only to those seven churches. Most understand that this is not the case. Sending the Revelation to the seven churches in Asia did but insure the preserving ot the Revelation unto the Christian world to come. It is somewhat like suggesting that the five books that Moses wrote was written only to and had application only in the concurrent children of Israel of his day and had no application to any others but them. Surely it can be seen that such universal scripture does have application to all. Just as the five books of Moses lay the basis of the Bible to all the world, so does the book of Revelation record the scriptural Revelation of John which has just as much application to all the world and even more so to those of the lasts days. | |
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12 And I turned to see the voice that spake with me.
And being turned, I saw seven golden acandlesticks;
13 And in the midst of the seven candlesticksa one like unto the aSon of man, bclothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle. 14 His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his aeyes were as a flame of bfire; 15 And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his avoice as the sound of many waters. 16 And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged asword: and his bcountenance was as the csun shineth in his strength. |
 13a in the midst of the seven candlesticks The Manorah of the ancient temple was symbolic ot the seven despensations of time from Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Elijah, Christ and Joseph Smith may be one representation of these or dividing out seven periods of a thousand years each may be another manner of preceiving these seven times. What is central to all of these is that they are 'centered' about Jesus Christ in that Christ is the way the truth and the light that all must come unto. It is he who is central to the Plan of Salvation. He is the one true God, so placed by the Father, whereby we are saved and to whom we must look for our salvation and redemption. |
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17 And when I asaw him, I fell at
his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear
not; I am the first and the last:
18 I am he that aliveth, and was bdead; and, behold, I am alive for cevermore, Amen; and have the adkeys of ehell and of death. |
18a
Rev.
9:1 |
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19 aWrite the things which thou
hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter;
20 The mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in my right hand, and the seven golden candlesticks. The seven astars are the bangels of the seven churches: and the seven ccandlesticks which thou sawest are the seven churches. |
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