Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! The Easter season continues until the day of Pentecost on May 19th. Let us continue the celebration!

Tomorrow is the 2nd Sunday of Easter and the sermon is based on our epistle from Revelation 1:4-18. The number is seven is mentioned four times. There are seven churches, seven spirits, seven golden lampstands, and seven stars. And when it comes to the book of Revelation that’s just the tip of the iceberg as the number seven is mentioned a total of 54 times! What’s with all the sevens? Tomorrow’s sermon will cover the reason and the meaning…and I believe that you’ll find it not only very interesting, but very comforting since the number seven is representative of YOU, the people of God! Invite a friend!

Most importantly, you will receive the body and blood of our Risen King and in this Holy Sacrament, you will be fed and nourished with the forgiveness of sins!

Also, the parish council looked at a potential new property yesterday. There are some strong points about it, but we are trying hard to weigh all of our options, one of them being the creative possibility of our own prefab modular building that might enable us to remain in Irvine, etc. We are praying, asking for wisdom (James 1) and seeking the Lord’s guidance.

Here is an excerpt from last Sunday’s sermon:

“Seven” (Revelation 1:4-18)

Rev. Dr. Alfonso O. Espinosa

            Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, Amen. Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! And it might surprise you dear Christians that the risen Christ, our Savior Jesus, is described magnificently in a book that is so controversial in Scripture: the book of Revelation. In spite of its challenges, do not let anyone use Revelation to scare you because even the seemingly scary stuff (that represents evil) is described as conquered by Jesus for you! If certain authors and teachers treat it as a book of doom and gloom; as a book of terror and threats, then see through these false teachers because this great book is about the victory of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ over sin, death, and the power of the devil. Furthermore, Christ’s victory in Revelation is not – contrary to popular presentations of Revelation – primarily about something in the future that is yet to come, but rather it is a victory that has already been accomplished! From our epistle today based on Revelation 1, Jesus who conquered death for you said in this vision given to St. John the apostle at verses 17-18: “Fear not, I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.”

            But Revelation does more than demonstrate the power and victory of our Resurrected Savior. It also teaches about your new life in Him; about living as His people filled with His life! And part and parcel of what teaches about your new life in Revelation is God’s use of the number seven.

In Revelation, the number seven is all over the place! “The number seven occurs fifty-four times. The book is addressed to seven churches, represented by seven lampstands. There are seven stars symbolizing seven angels of the churches. There are seven spirits of God represented by seven lamps. Further, there are seven seals and a Lamb with seven eyes and seven horns. Seven angels blow seven trumpet-blasts. Seven other angels pour out the contents of seven bowls full of the final seven plagues. Seven thunders utter voices. The beast out of the sea has seven heads. There are seven mountains, seven kings, and so on. This number seven indicates completeness.” (William Hendriksen, More than Conquerors, Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991. 42)

The note that the number seven indicates completeness is a good way of looking at the use of seven as a symbol in the special kind of literature that Revelation is (namely apocalyptic which is characterized by a lot of figurative language and a lot of symbols; Revelation is – after all – a vision). But again seven as completeness is cool. Think of the creation: God created the heavens and the earth in six days and he rested on the seventh day. The seventh day reflects upon the completion of creation. Furthermore, when Exodus 20 compares the regular week to the creation week, we relate to what Moses is saying: all of this is about a complete week. We can say this morning, “Congratulations that by the grace of God, you completed another week this past week!” Last week is now complete. Seven is about completeness!

But before I get into the text, why does the Bible even contain this kind of code-language? What’s the point in doing that to begin with? These are important questions and please be encouraged to know that there are important answers to these questions. John the apostle was writing Revelation from an island – a very small island in fact called Patmos – where he was exiled for preaching the Gospel.

The other apostles were martyred for the faith. John was also persecuted, but he was exiled. The point, however, is that the early church — even at the point in which John was writing Revelation — was already being persecuted. So in order to spread the Word of God and to network the people of God in the Church, John wrote in code language that has peculiar characteristics that amount to a special literary genre called “apocalyptic.”

But the really awesome thing is that sometimes symbolism helps us to understand things better anyway! And the number seven which was code for God’s completed work is also a number for you. You are complete dear Christian.

Let us rejoice in the Lord’s boundless love for us!

In Your Service and To Christ’s Glory,

Pastor Espinosa

p.s. we apologize that our site went down for a few days over last weekend…we’re back!