Painting #3 Heaven Opened - Throne Revelation 4:2-6

The Emerald Rainbow

Revelation 4:1.     After this I looked, and, behold, a door was opened in heaven: and the first voice which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me; which said, Come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter.

     This is a critically important verse in Revelation. It begins and ends with the same words in the original, “after these things,” which ties it back rigidly to the third component in the prophetic outline set out by the Lord in Revelation 1:19. “Write the things which thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter” (i.e., “after these things”). At this point, the Lord proceeds to show John the things which shall be after these things, that is, after the things associated with the churches, as described in Chapters 2 and 3 – “the things which are.” It would seem obvious that the events beginning at this point must occur after Christ’s dealings with His churches on the earth have been completed, and He is now turning His attention to other urgent matters as far as the earth is concerned. Correspondingly, there is no mention at all made of churches in all the great happenings outlined in the next eighteen chapters.

     What, then, has happened to the churches? The answer is evident. Some, like Ephesus, have had their candlestick removed (Revelation 2:5), and are no longer true churches, if they exist at all. Some, like Thyatira, will have been “cast into . . . great tribulation” (Revelation 2:22) because of their wickedness, which demonstrated that they had never known Christ at all and had knowingly followed false teaching. But others, like Philadelphia, had been graciously kept by their Lord “from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell on the earth” (Revelation 3:10). 

     But how could this be accomplished? The answer is clearly given in John’s experience at this point. The purpose of the Book of Revelation was to show (not merely to tell) these great events of the future, and this was to be done through signifying(that is, miraculously demonstrating) it through John (Revelation 1:1), who actually saw (Revelation 1:2) all these events first hand. He was there! This was not a dream, or even a vision, but the real thing.

     The Lord had promised the Philadelphians an open door, and had warned the Laodiceans He was knocking on their closed door. Now He shows John the door opened in heaven and invites him to enter. The voice was the same he had heard at first “as of a trumpet” (Revelation 1:10).

     Other references relate the future coming of the Lord to the trumpet. “The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God” (1 Thessalonians 4:16). “For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” (1 Corinthians 15:52).

     The invitation accompanying the trumpet was to come up. The door was in heaven and John was on earth, but the Lord had preceded him into heaven, and now he was to go up to meet Him there. John had become, to all intents and purposes, one of those who would be alive when the Lord returns. “Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air” (1Thessalonians 4:17). “I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also” (John 14:3).

Revelation 4:2.     And immediately I was in the spirit: and behold, a throne was set in heaven, and one sat on the throne.

     After the trumpet-like voice cried out the invitation, “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye” (1 Corinthians 15:52), John was at the scene in heaven where all the great events to come would be taking place before his eyes. Paul had similarly once been translated, “whether in the body, or out of the body, I cannot tell” (2 Corinthians 12:3) to the “third heaven,” to “paradise,” but the things he saw were not permitted him to utter. 

     Paul had been translated far out in space, but now John was translated in both space and time, to the throne of God and the end of the age, and what he saw he was commanded to utter. Our present physical bodies are creatures of space and time, but God is the Creator of space and time as well as matter and can therefore control them all. John was miraculously “in the spirit” for such a mighty miracle. To all intents and purposes, he was a participant in the great “rapture” that will occur to the saints when Christ returns, and found himself instantaneously translated, as will they, up to the heavens.

     As a matter of fact, the particular heaven will be that of earth’s high atmosphere. When Jesus ascended from earth, angels told His disciples that He would return “in like manner” (Acts 1:11). At the end of this present age, He “will descend from heaven” (1 Thessalonians 4:16), but not at first all the way back to earth. Both living and dead believers will be resurrected and glorified as they are caught up “to meet the Lord in the air” (1Thessalonians 4:17). It seems that it was to this very scene that John was called.

     He saw, as shall we in that day, a beautiful throne “being set,” as the Greek implies, in the heavens near the earth. The heavenly throne “far above all heavens” (Ephesians 4:10) had been itself translated swiftly through the cosmos to earth’s environs, for the time had finally come to “judge the world in righteousness” (Acts 17:31).

     The throne John saw is quite possibly the same as “the judgment seat of Christ,” before which all Christians must appear (Romans 14:10; 2 Corinthians 5:10). Although the question of salvation is already settled for the believer, there are many Scriptures indicating that believers must be judged according to their works, either to receive rewards or suffer loss of rewards (Matthew 12:36; 1 Corinthians 3:11-15; Galatians 6:7; Colossians 3:24, 25; 2 Timothy 4:1-8; Revelation 22:12; etc.). This judgment must have been completed prior to the millennium, because the believers will by then have been arrayed in white garments representing the “righteous acts” of the saints and given thrones of judgment reserved for “overcomers” during the millennium (Revelation 19:8; 20:4). The judgments described in Revelation chapters 6-19 have to do with the earth and its Christ-rejecting inhabitants, and nothing is said concerning the judgment of believers in heaven for rewards. Consequently, the latter can only have occurred immediately after the rapture and prior to the unleashing of the plagues on earth.

     The promises to the overcomers at the end of each of the seven letters to the churches are some of the rewards to the dispensed at the judgment seat of Christ, when “the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is” (1 Corinthians 3:13). Billions of believers will assemble before Him in the air, and the fiery eyes and flaming face of the glorified Son of man will instantly purge all dross from their lives and hearts. Like John, we shall fall “at his feet as dead” (Revelation 1:13-17). Then “we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). That in itself will be abundant reward.

Revelation 4:3.     And he that sat was to look upon like a jasper and a sardine stone: and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald.

     Whether or not this throne is the same as the “judgment seat of Christ,” it does appear that the scene at this point is subsequent to the purging of sins and dispensation of rewards that will take place at the judgment seat. The prospect now is one of preparation for the judgments on the earth. The triune God is on His throne, incapable of being seen or described in His fullness even by resurrected saints, “dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see” (1 Timothy 6:16). The light emanating therefrom, however, can be seen, and John saw and described its ineffable beauty, with all the colors of the rainbow.

     In fact a beautiful rainbow, with the emerald green color dominating, completely encircled the throne. The light from the divine presence on the throne, however, featured the two colors at the ends of the rainbow spectrum, red and violet. The red, speaking to John perhaps of judgment and sacrifice, reminded John of the blood-red sardine stone (after which the city of Sardis had been named). The purple, speaking possibly of divine royalty, was as the crystal-clear purple jasper stone (note Revelation 21:11). The green of the rainbow was like the verdure clothing God’s terrestrial creation. The whole panorama glorified God as Creator, as Sovereign, as Redeemer.

     The rainbow is very significant. The Bible refers to it only on four occasions. The first is in Genesis 9 (verses 13, 14, 16) when it was first established by God after the Flood and acknowledged by Him as a sign of the Noahic covenant made between God and “all flesh.” This “everlasting covenant,” and the rainbow which betokens it, assures the world that God will never again send a world-destroying deluge. Thus the rainbow speaks of God’s mercy toward mankind even in the midst of judgment.

     The second notice of the rainbow is found in Ezekiel 1:28, in Ezekiel’s vision of the glory of God. In a scene much like that which John saw “in the spirit,” Ezekiel saw in a “vision” (Ezekiel 1:1) the throne of God, with the cherubim, and the rainbow. “As the appearance of the bow that is in the cloud in the day of rain, so was the appearance of the brightness round about.”

     The third occasion is in the Book of Revelation, here at 4:3 and again at 10:1. Again it is associated with the very presence and character of God. Evidently the rainbow perpetually surrounds the throne of God, or at least at such times (as in Ezekiel’s day, as in Noah’s day, and in John’s day) when God’s judgments are being visited on the earth. The rainbow, as it were, continually “reminds” God that there is a remnant of believers even in the midst of an ungodly culture ripe for judgment, and that He, as the “God of all grace” (1 Peter 5:10) will “in wrath remember mercy” (Habakkuk 3:2).   

The Elders of the Redeemed

Revelation 4:4.     And round about the throne were four and twenty seats: and upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment; and they had on their heads crowns of gold.

     The word “seats” is the Greek thronos, the same word as used for “throne.” The elders were seen by John seated on thrones exactly as he had seen the divine presence seated on the throne (4:2). The identity of these elders, sometimes mistakenly interpreted as angels, is very important.

     The elders are undoubtedly redeemed and glorified men, or, at the least, representative of such men, in view of the following considerations: (1) although there are principalities and powers in the angelic hierarchy, there can be no “elders,” since all angels are of the same age, created probably on the first day of creation; (2) the term “elder” is always used elsewhere in the Bible only of men; (3) elders are always chosen representatives and leaders of the people, both in Israel and in the church; (4) there are no elders in the visions of God’s throne in Isaiah 6 and Ezekiel 1 – 10, in consequence of the fact that prior to the cross the spirits of all the redeemed were still confined to Hades; (5) the elders were wearing white raiment (as promised to overcoming believers in Revelation 3:5) and victors’ crowns (Greek stephanos, “wreath,” as also promised to overcomers in Revelation 2:10 and 3:11); angels, being “ministering spirits” (Hebrews 1:14) are never described in the Bible as wearing crowns of any kind; (6) in Revelation 5:8, 9, these elders sing a song of praise to the Lamb who had redeemed them by His blood.

     But why twenty-four elders? The Israelites used seventy elders (Exodus 24:1) and no indication is given as to the number of elders in the early church. There were twenty-four orders of priests in Israel(1 Chronicles 24:7-19), but these were not the elders and, even though believers are to be kings and priests (Revelation 1:6), there seems no reason why the office of the priest should be commingled with that of the elder in heaven. The number twenty-four has often been held to be symbolic of the twelve patriarchs plus the twelve apostles. The latter, however, are specifically assigned to the job of judging the twelve tribes of Israel on twelve thrones in the millennial kingdom (Revelation 19:28), whereas the twenty-four elders are at the throne in heaven. If twelve of these are the twelve apostles, assigned to judging the twelve tribes, then the identity and function of the other twelve are left up in the air. It is barely possible that they are the twelve sons of Jacob.

     There is one other interesting possibility as to their identity. The term “elder” has both an administrative and a chronological connotation (note 1 Peter 1:1, 5). That the elders in Revelation are individual men, and not just symbolic of all believers, is indicated by the individual conversations reported of individual elders (Revelation 5:5; 7:13). They do represent all believers of all the ages, but they are also individual men, the elders of all redeemed humanity. It is interesting, and possibly the answer to this question, that in the Book of Genesis there are twenty-four patriarchs listed in the line of the promised seed (Adam, Seth, Enos, Cainan, Mahalaleel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech, Noah, Shem, Arphaxad, Salah, Eber, Peleg, Reu, Serug, Nahor, Terah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, Pharez). These men could more properly be denoted the “elders” of God’s elect than anyone else. Finally, another possibility is that, since the Lord did not choose to specify their identity, His method of selecting them is on the basis of merit, and thus He cannot reveal their identity until after the assignment of rewards at the judgment seat of Christ.

Revelation 4:5.     And out of the throne proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices; and there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the seven spirits of God.

     Although the throne was encircled by the emerald rainbow, denoting grace overseeing judgment, as it were, from the throne itself came forth sounds of judgment. Before the great Flood (following which the rainbow was established) there had been no rain on the earth (Genesis 2:5), a condition resulting from a worldwide canopy of invisible water vapor – the “waters above the firmament” – established by God on the second day of creation. The greenhouse effect maintained by this thermal vapor blanket supported a pleasant and permanent universal subtropical climate in the antediluvian world, with no great winds and therefore no rains and snows. The breaking up of the “fountains of the great deep” (Genesis 7:11) induced the condensation and precipitation of the canopy and resulted in the global cataclysm of the deluge. Psalm 29 describes this great flood in words of poetic grandeur centered around events following the seven-times uttered “voice of the Lord.” The first utterance released the waters, the second introduced the great thunderings from heaven, as the vapors condensed and began to move, generating the first and most violent atmospheric electrical storm in history. These “lightnings and thunderings and voices” emanating from God’s throne mirror that great time of judgment in the past and betoken another great time of judgment about to break on the earth once more (though, in accordance with God’s promise to Noah, it would not “destroy the earth”).

     The sevenfold Holy Spirit (see comments on 1:4) now appears, in conformity with the scene of judgment, as seven lamps of fire. Although the Holy Spirit is invisible and omnipresent, He does on occasion appear in visible manifestation – for example, as a dove at the baptism of Jesus (Matthew 3:16; Mark 1:10; Luke 3:22). He had appeared on the day of Pentecost as “cloven tongues like as of fire” (Acts 2:3). One of His ministries is to “reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment” (John 16:8). Although He is at the throne, with the elders, He will continue to exercise this convicting ministry on earth.  

Cherubim and Seraphim

Revelation 4:6.     And before the throne there was a sea of glass like unto crystal: and in the midst of the throne, and round about the throne, were four beasts full of eyes before and behind.

     The sea of glass before the throne (no doubt “before” it on all four sides, separating the unmovable throne of majesty from all His creatures surrounding it), is obviously the antitype of the laver in the tabernacle (Exodus 30:18-21) and the sea in the temple (2 Chronicles 4:2-6), both used for the cleansing of the priests before they could minister in the work of the Lord.  In the heavenly temple, however, the sea was not moving water but still as crystal.  The priests had already been cleansed and thus could already walk on the sea as it were, entering directly into the presence of the Lord.  The crystal sea may also be in view in the two visions of God as noted in Exodus 24:10 and Ezekiel 1:22.

    The four beasts (Greek zoon, “living creatures”) have been the subject of inordinate speculation.  The introductory statement concerning them is that they are round about the throne – one on each side, but also in the midst of the throne, closer to God than any other of His creatures.  Thus these are the highest of the angelic hierarchy, in immediate access to the throne of God.  Furthermore, they are full of eyes, able to see in all directions at once so that nothing escapes their observation.  Their very name, “living ones,” denotes the fact that they are vibrant with life, imparted to them by God their Creator.

    These, like the elders, are real beings – not symbols.  They also speak, both as a unit (Revelation 4:9; 5:14) and individually (Revelation 6:1, 3, 5, 7).  They are not men, however, like the elders, but are specially created beings – angels – for a very special set of ministries related to the immediate presence of God.