"We are the dead..." from, "In Flanders Fields" by John McCrae

Revelation 1:6 

Priests.  Kings.  Here we have echoes of Peter and those living stones that conform to the cornerstone (1 Peter 2:5).  The cornerstone is first and is set in time – conforming to the eternal, yes, but set in time.  Salvation gets started in time – at the cross!  You didn’t get chosen before time.  God doesn't work things out that way.  He works in time.  He came to die on the cross.  There's no draft board in Christianity...you have to enlist.  Come to the cross.

Revelation is still a reckoning.

Revelation 1:3 

I find it to be very sad that those who buy into the rapture notions of people like Tim Lahaye, miss the blessings of chapters 4-20 of the book of Revelation.  Escaping before the tribulation means that these 17 chapters have no meaning to pre-trib folks since they think the church will be missing in action.  Stop believing LaHaye’s fiction.  You will go through GREAT tribulation if alive when it arrives.  Get ready.  (HINT:  start studying up on what Jesus says about deception.)

Revelation 1:4 

The one “who is and was and is coming” is directly contrasted with the one “who was and is not and is coming again” (KJV=shall ascend. . .) in Rev. 17:8.  Notice that the only people safe from the beast’s attraction are those who are devoted to “the one” in 1:4 – that would be Jesus.

Revelation 1:5

“The firstborn from the dead” (KJV=first begotten see also Col.1:13) is Jesus.  Clear.   Simple.  No difficulty understanding that. Who are these people that claim to have been chosen for special handling… hand picked and granted some sort of pre-existing (do you really know what “before the foundation of the world” means?) life that trumps death!  WE are the dead.  If you want to be born again, join us at the cross.

Revelation 1:5 

Not to sound like a broken record here but, who are these people that claim to be chosen and granted exemption from the blame and guilt of personal sin? Sin must be “washed. . . in His own Blood?”  There's no pre-rinse cycle! Oh! You thought the book of Revelation was written so people can learn all about intriguing mysteries of the future?  It is the Revelation of Jesus – it is all about Him.  It comments on everything that concerns Him. Forget your ridiculous mechanistic theories.  He cares for you!  Come to the cross.

I confess... Augustine was wrong.

There are times when we humans are faced with what is so obvious that it seems impossible to find a starting place to describe it.  The foolishness of the Calvinist notion of total depravity is one such thing.  How is it possible to read Paul’s words in Romans 7:9 and continue to believe in Calvin’s system (Warfield reminds Calvinists that the TULIP is either a cohesive unit or complete rubbish) or in Augustinian ideas of original sin?  “Once I was alive apart from the law . . .” Someone please point out the depravity part of this statement!  Calvin’s system gets the order of relationship with conviction of sin wrong.  How can that system be trusted to describe a relationship with the living God Himself?  Verse 10:  The commandment designed for life brings death to anyone but God Himself.  In fulfilling the law, Jesus activates the truth of Romans 3:23.  The cross establishes man in sin relative to the law.  For us, there’s no need to look elsewhere in time. In other words, the Calvinist/Augustinian notion that God made everyone before they were injected into the time stream and some were permanently defective is a stupid lie. “All have sinned” happens in time. It is not a part of God’s eternal purpose. Evil does not dwell in our homeland.