This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

I'm glad you're back for day three of our look together through Revelation,
chapter one. I feel like if you've made it this far, you're going to make it
through the stud of the entire book. We've begun to face the fact that we may
not understand everything in this book, but God wants to bring to us
understanding, understanding that will give us hope.

In verse nine, we get a personal glimpse into how God brought this book, this
revelation into our hands so that you and I can read it and see it. Verse nine
says, "I am John, your brother. In Jesus, we are partners in suffering and in
the kingdom and in patient endurance.

I was exiled to the island of Patmos for preaching the word of God and speaking
about Jesus. " Here we get a very personal look into the writer of the book of
Revelation. He says, "I am John, your brother.

" That's all. Now, this is John the apostle, the one who walked with Jesus
Christ. But instead of some grand title, he just says, "I'm your brother.

" I just imagine what John could have said as he began this book. "I am John the
disciple," or he could have said, "I am John the one who walked with Jesus. " He
could have said, "I am John the one who stood at the cross, John the one who
cared for Jesus's mother after his resurrection.

I am John the one who helped to start the early church. I am John the one who
saw my brother killed for his faith and yet remained faithful. I am John who has
served Jesus Christ for 60 plus years now, faithfully through trials, through
tribulations.

" He could have said all of that and much, much more. But instead he just says,
"I am John your brother. " I just want to let you imagine with me the situation
in which John our brother wrote this book.

He's an old man by now. We know that this book was written probably about 95 A.
D.

, he's the last of the apostles to be alive. And as an old man, he's been taken
to exile on the island of Patmos for his faith, just for preaching the word of
God, just for speaking about Jesus Christ. Patmos was a Roman prison island,
barren little island about 10 miles long by five miles wide.

And John was taken there as a prisoner, banished to this island. In the Roman
system, when a criminal was banished to an island, all his possessions were
taken. Everything that John had in the normal world, if he had any land, any
possessions, any home, it was all taken.

All that he had left were some rags of clothes that they gave to him, some
meager food that they would feed him with each day. As a criminal prisoner, he
probably was put to work in the rock quarries with chains around his wrists and
ankles. That was his life.

Just think about this with me. John who has been faithful to Jesus Christ all
the years of his life, didn't he deserve something different? Didn't he deserve
something better?

Yes, he did. But he was not going to get it on this planet, in this world, as
with so many faithful servants of God. Their experience in this world, even at
the end of life, is not getting what they deserve for their faith.

That comes in heaven. Now I pray for you, I pray for me, that God will give you
blessings even at the end of life. But if he does not, if you go through trials
and tribulations and even persecutions at the end, remember that's not the end.

That's not the final reward. The final reward of our life is not the last days
of our life on this earth. The final reward is eternity in heaven.

And John recognized that. He recognized that in seeing who he was as a writer of
this book. When God had a plan for the Apostle John, he was sent to this prison
island, and he may have felt, well, that's the end of my ministry, no more
preaching, nothing else left to do.

But God knew that he was going to deliver this revelation, the record of this
revelation to write down for us to read on that prison island. During this time
of the reign of the Emperor Domitian in the Roman Empire, when Christians were
being persecuted, they may have wondered what's next for us, where is the hope
for us? And he delivered it.

He delivered it to John on Patmos. That is amazing to me. With the minute you
feel like God's put me on the shelf, he's put me in a place where he could never
use me again, that's the moment when he does amazing things through your life.

And John, as he writes, he says, "I'm your brother," and then he talks about the
connection that he has to you and I as the readers. He says, "In Jesus we are
partners. In Jesus we are partners in three specific ways.

We need to get this. If I'm going to connect with what God wants to say to me
through the book of Revelation, I've got to understand how God connects to me at
the very beginning of the book. In Jesus we are partners in suffering, in the
kingdom, and in patient endurance.

" If I don't understand that, if I don't know that I'm a partner with John in
those three things, I won't understand a word of this book as I read through it.
Not in my heart, not in my soul. I'm a partner in suffering.

We all live in this world and there is evil in this world. And yes, some people
suffer more than others. And yes, even in this world we do have blessings.

We get to see the blessing of what God has created. We have the blessing of
God's church. There are blessings in this world, but there is suffering because
it is an evil world.

We are partners in that in this world. And you need to read the book of
Revelation as a partner in suffering with other believers. We are also partners
in his kingdom.

We're not only partners in suffering, we are partners in the kingdom of God. The
plan that God has not only in my heart and life and through his church in the
present day, but the plan that he has going all the way into eternity. I have to
realize I'm a partner in that as well in order to understand the book of
Revelation.

I'm a partner in suffering. I'm a partner in the kingdom. And I am a partner in
a third thing.

I'm a partner in patient endurance. Now this word, "Hupomenos," has the idea of
an endurance that is active, a hope that is active. Not sitting back in my chair
waiting for the end of time to come, but being out sharing the good news,
letting people know, letting hope be poured through my life, patient endurance.

That's for many of you, your life right now as you hear this. We are partners in
that as believers in Christ. When I realize I'm a partner in these three things,
now I'm ready.

I'm ready to hear what God has to say. And John says in verses 10 and 11, "It
was the Lord's day and I was worshiping in the Spirit. Suddenly I heard a loud
voice behind me, a voice that sounded like a trumpet blast and it said, 'Write
down what you see and send it to the seven churches, Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum,
Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.

'" Here is John in these verses. He's worshiping in the Spirit. People wonder
what that means.

Is he describing some particular kind of worship? No, he's just describing the
practice of genuine worship. The Bible tells us in the Gospel of John, Jesus
said that all of us who are genuinely worshiping God worship him in the Spirit
and in truth.

So he's allowing God's Spirit to work through his heart and life and connecting
with the Lord Jesus Christ. And in that moment of worship, I've told you the
book of Revelation is a story of worship and it begins with John in an attitude
of worship. In that moment of worship, God says, "I've got a message.

Write down what you see. Send it to these seven churches. " Now it's not that
this message was just for those seven churches.

This message was first sent to the church in Galatia, but it was for all
believers of all times. This message was first sent not just to one church, but
to seven churches because God's going to have a message for them, particularly
at the beginning. But it's also a message for all believers at all times.

I love these verses because they're so personal. Personal about John and who he
is and was and the fact that God worked through even the difficulties of his
life to bring about this book of Revelation. Maybe nothing says more to me about
John than verse 10, "Here he is on the Lord's day in this place of suffering,
this place of exile, and what's he doing?

He's worshiping in the Spirit. " There is no place where you cannot worship
because there's no place where God is not there. So right now, where you are,
let's worship him.

Lord, that's what we want our attitude to be, an attitude of worship, lifting
you up for who you are worth, what you are worth in our lives, no matter what
the circumstances, no matter what the day, no matter what the feelings, no
matter what somebody has said about us or done to us, we choose in this moment
to worship you. God, we realize that although we may not get what we deserve in
this world for our faith, the blessings that you have promised us, we will enjoy
those for all of eternity. And Lord, as we go through tough times on this
planet, help us to look forward, not back, blaming ourselves or others or being
unforgiving.

Help us to look forward in worship and in hope. We ask this in Jesus' name,
amen. Tomorrow, as we look at verses 12 to 16, we're going to focus our
intention on Jesus.