After these things I saw, and behold, a door opened in heaven, and the first voice which I heard as of a trumpet speaking with me, saying, Come up here, and I will shew thee the things which must take place after these things.
The seven letters to the churches are finished. Now a door stands open above, and the voice John first heard in chapter 1 calls him up. Commentators treat this verse as the hinge of the whole book. Here the history of the churches ends, and the prophetic visions begin.
The Lord had already told John to write in three parts (Revelation 1:19), and this verse marks where the third part starts.
Note verse 19 with care. It contains the Lord's own division of the book. John was to write (1) the vision he had just seen... Then (2) he was to write "the things that are," and (3) "the things which shall be hereafter"... Now in Revelation 4:1 the voice from heaven lifts John in spirit up to heaven, to show him "things which must take place after these things." So as we pass into Revelation 4, we begin the third section of the book. We say this without hesitation. Any explanation of the visions of this book that breaks this distinction, or ignores it, is bound to be faulty, if not plainly wrong.
The exact wording matters. Older translations end the verse with a vague "hereafter"; the ESV has "what must take place after this."
"Come up here, and I will show you" — not exactly "things which must be hereafter," as if the time were left vague and far off, but "the things which must be after these." ...The importance of this is that it binds what follows in the book to the end of the history of the seven churches.
"The first voice" is not the first in a coming series. It is one John already knows — and its location has changed.
The "first voice" here does not mean the first of the voices about to speak, as some have oddly thought. It means the voice John had already heard in Revelation 1 — the voice of Him who stood among the seven golden lampstands. It still addresses him like a trumpet, no longer from earth but from heaven. There was a door there, and the voice spoke from it. So this part of the book assumes that earth is done with for the moment, and the scene lies above.
The picture is precise, and it differs from a later vision in the same book.
"A door opened in Heaven" means you must enter heaven to understand prophecy. That is where all everlasting good begins. There the coming scene of millennial and eternal blessing is arranged and planned. And there, too, the preparatory judgments have their source. "A door opened in Heaven" let John pass in. "Heaven opened" is for the saints to pass out (Rev. 19:11).
This door is not a picture of how believers come near to God now.
It is not for drawing near into God's presence by faith: the Spirit of God never calls that the opening of a door. In Hebrews 10 we see the veil torn, and the believer even now draws near by faith, through the value of the blood of Christ. But here we have the ordinary picture of something one enters through.
Earth has a door too, and it is shut on Christ.
At the opening of these chapters we leave an earth that has shut its door on Christ. We find a door opened into heaven for those who belong to Christ, with an invitation to come in and pass through it. Passing through, we leave behind a scene where people make nothing of Christ. We find ourselves in a scene where Christ is all in all.
Commentators see more than a change of viewpoint here. They read John's call upward as a picture of the church's removal, and they point to a silence in the chapters that follow.
Revelation 3 ends with "the churches." These two words do not appear again until Revelation 22:16. That is, the churches are absent right through the unfolding of "the things which must be hereafter." ...The catching up of John into heaven is a symbol of the rapture of the church, as set out in 1 Thessalonians 4:17. From this point on we see the vision of things that take place on earth after the church is gone.
The call up is also the condition for understanding what follows. Where you stand decides what you see.
The first thought this chapter suggests is this. Heaven is the only true place from which to look at the things that come to pass after the seven churches. It is not upon and from the earth that we can rightly judge of these events. It is from above that we must learn and look; if we are earthly-minded, we shall never understand them. Suppose I stay on the level of the scene where the judgments are falling. Then I shall try to make the best of present things and push the judgments off. I am not entering in by the door opened in heaven.
- Door — Heaven opens inward here so John can pass in; the later vision opens outward so the saints can come out.
- Voice — The trumpet-like voice of chapter 1 now speaks from above, not from earth. Earth is done with for the moment.
- Divider — "What must take place after this" opens the third of the Lord's own three divisions. Ignore it, and you will read the rest of the book wrongly.
- Departure — John's call upward pictures the church's removal. The book does not name the churches again until its final chapter.
- Direction — You can judge prophecy only from above. Stay on earth's level, and you will try to explain the judgments away.
Immediately I became in [the] Spirit; and behold, a throne stood in the heaven, and upon the throne one sitting,
A voice has called John up through an open door in heaven. The scene shifts from the churches on earth to the courts above, and the first thing he sees there is a throne.
John says nothing about his body going anywhere. The Spirit secured what he saw.
Here we simply see the prophet caught up. There is no idea of a bodily taking up into these heavenly scenes, such as is suggested in the case of the apostle Paul... What we are to be occupied with is what he saw and heard... Being in the Spirit assures us that the Spirit was, as it were, eyes and ears to him, so that all was secured and perfect. What he was as man was to be no hindrance to this. When God would reveal, He takes perfect care that no "human element" spoils the revelation.
This power was not John's own, and it did not rest on him without a break.
The vision of Christ as Son of Man in glory among the seven golden lamps was too much for human eyes. For that time the Spirit had complete control of the seer; he lived and moved in another kind of existence... But by its nature this cannot last. The state had lapsed. Now he must see and write fresh visions of the future... His fitness to see and grasp the coming prophetic scene was not in himself, but in a power outside the realm of nature.
Writers weigh the word "set" differently. Some hear firmness in it:
The word "stood," or set, tells us how stable that government is; "the Heaven" fixes the exact seat of royal authority. What a contrast to the shaky thrones of earth!... It is the pledge that the decree of the Eternal will compel obedience from every created being.
Others read the word as marking a fresh position taken up for this new stage:
Finding a throne placed, or set there, shows instead that God takes up a particular position or relationship. This matches exactly what the voice said to John: "Come up here, and I will show you what must happen after these things." God may always be on a throne in a general sense... But the throne of government is a special relationship, known as He reveals it.
Every rebellion since the fall has aimed at this seat.
The throne is the emblem of rule and authority: the guarantee for order, blessing, and security throughout the universe. The fall was really a challenge to the throne. Sin is rebellion against the throne. Unbelief denies that the throne exists, pride reaches for the throne, and the devil defies the throne. How good it is, then, after thousands of years of rebellion, to pass into heaven and find the throne "set in heaven," unshaken, unmoved, and immovable.
John never names the one on the throne.
The main object seen is God and His throne — His power ruling in providence. The throne is not linked with priesthood, but with the power that divine government comes from. God would establish souls in the thought that He governs, even in the middle of all the wickedness that was still to come... It is the throne of One who did not need to be named, but who lets His glory be seen as far as a creature can see it.
The tense of the verb matters too. One is seated — not one who once sat:
On the throne is one sitting, and only one. That means there will be no change of kings, no handing over of sovereign power, no succession. It says "sitting," not "sat" — the throne is never empty and never between rulers.
What comes out of the throne shows what kind of throne it is.
In heaven he sees a throne set, and this, from its effects and surroundings, is a judicial throne. It is not at all the same character of the throne of God as we know and approach now. We come boldly to the throne and find grace and mercy to help in time of need. But we find nothing of the sort here, either in the throne or in what comes out of it.
John's move from earth to heaven pictures more than his own experience.
John's own position changed. He left earthly scenes for heavenly, so that he could watch from there how God deals with the earth in judgment... Revelation 3 ends with "the churches," and those two words do not appear again until Revelation 22:16... John's catching up into heaven pictures the rapture of the church, as described in 1 Thessalonians 4:17. From this point on, the vision shows things that happen on earth after the church is gone.
- Call. A voice says "Come up," and the Spirit answers at once. John's fitness to see came from a power outside nature, not from himself.
- Vessel. Being "in the Spirit" secures the vision, not John's body; God allows no human element to spoil what He reveals.
- Throne. The first thing John sees is a seat of rule, unshaken after thousands of years of rebellion aimed straight at it.
- Occupant. One is sitting — unnamed, unchanging, with no succession, no vacancy, no interruption of His rule.
- Character. This throne governs and judges. It is not the throne where we now find grace and mercy in time of need, so John had to leave earth to see it.