The key is to read Revelation as it was intended, i.e., as a series of symbols taken largely from the OT to explain to the early Church the things that were about to happen to the unbelieving Jews in and around Jerusalem.
We see this in the opening verses.
1 The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants-- things which must shortly take place. And He sent and signified it by His angel to His servant John, 2 who bore witness to the word of God, and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, to all things that he saw. 3 Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written in it; for the time is near.Things which must shortly come to pass that were “signified” (spoken symbolically or spiritually) to John as a messenger to the early Church.
The images are best understood that way, by carefully comparing Scripture with Scripture (did you do that carefully when you read the book?) esp. in light of the OT prophets.
Futurists are very good at forcing the images into some artificial mold to try and make them fit with modern events. In fact, futurists have been trying this without much success for almost 200 years. There are almost as many theories as to what the images mean as there are futurists.
Take the image of Rev. 9:16 for example.
Now the number of the army of the horsemen was two hundred million; I heard the number of them.Most futurists have claimed that this represents the armies of modern China, an army of two hundred million that are poised to invade the Middle East. There is one significant problem with that view, China does not have 200 million soldiers with 200 million horses. In fact there are only about 70 million horses in the entire world!! And many of those are not suitable for use in war.
But does that slight problem bother the average futurist? Not at all. They invented the interpretation, so they are free to go ahead and invent another. The Bible is not really important for them as a basis for such interpretation. Their motto, “if it is sounds good, use it.”
It’s hard to explain to someone how these symbols of Revelation could have had meaning to 1st century believers since they generally refused to consider anything that does not fit with their preconceptions about what ought to be.
I really wish somebody would do a line by line Scriptural analysis of the Book of Revelation using 70AD.
Obviously you are not very well read on the subject. Tell me, what have you read from a preterist perspective?
“The key is to read Revelation as it was intended, i.e., as a series of symbols taken largely from the OT to explain to the early Church the things that were about to happen to the unbelieving Jews in and around Jerusalem.”
OK, but what is the meaning of Wormwood, and the mountain falling into the sea, and the two witnesses using that context? What actually happened to them that can be said to correlate with these images.
“China does not have 200 million soldiers with 200 million horses. In fact there are only about 70 million horses in the entire world!!”
This is interesting. I imagine that if on the news we hear about a huge horse breeding program, then we can take it as an end times marker.