(avg. read time: 7–14 mins.)
I will have much more to write about the second part of the theme of the vindication of the suffering faithful another time, as I plan to post something late this year about resurrection and identity formation in Revelation. In turn, this will also discuss the promises given to each of the seven churches, which are fundamentally about the vindication of those who have persevered in living the victorious life in the present while they await their future hope. Even so, the theme of perseverance of the suffering faithful in Revelation requires its own entry due to how prevalent it is in this book alone. It is this important because of how Revelation is taken up with the theme of allegiance to Christ vs. assimilation to the world (and thus the evil forces that control the powers of it in the present age). Perseverance is thus linked to the former while the lack of it is linked to the latter. John establishes this importance from the outset by describing himself in terms of one who is suffering for his faithful obedience and persevering through it (1:9). He is a partner with his audience in the affliction, kingdom, and perseverance in Jesus. He is where he is because of his devotion to the word of God and the testimony of Jesus in the gospel he proclaims.
John, conveying the messages of Jesus, then goes on to describe at least part of most of the seven churches of chs. 2–3 as having the characteristic of perseverance. The first church in Ephesus is described twice as having the characteristic of perseverance (2:2–3), the only such term used twice in describing this church. They have maintained their allegiance to Christ through all trials they had faced. This church had often faced questions of identity and truth every time it faced false teachers. Jesus assures them that they are who they say they are and that even though the tests for these so-called apostles came back negative for the DNA of Christ, the tests for the church came back positive. They had done exhausting work in service to Jesus without becoming exhausted. They had refused to bear the load of false teaching, but they had gladly borne the load of perseverance in loyalty to Jesus’s name. And they refused to lose in their struggle with the current age by taking the route of the Nicolaitans in acquiescing to the culture of idolatry, licentiousness, and syncretism. Unfortunately, they had lost their first love in the process, and that was a threat greater than any outside force. This is a reminder that perseverance must always be tied to the core of love, without which it becomes mere continuation. (For more on this text, see here.)
The second letter to the church in Smyrna opens with a reference to Jesus’s resurrection (2:8). The language of Jesus’s self-description here echoes 1:18 with the same kind of terminology being used, although it is shortened here. The repetition of this description here in one of the seven letters raises the question of why it is used here and not elsewhere. The self-description of Jesus in these seven letters draws on John’s descriptions of him in ch. 1 (cf. 1:12–13, 16 and 2:1; 1:17–18 and 2:8; 1:16 and 2:12; 1:14–15 and 2:18; 1:4, 16 and 3:1; 1:5, 18 and 3:7; 1:5 and 3:14). It seems that 1:17–18 in particular is used here because this identification is of special relevance to the believers in Smyrna. More so than any other church, the Smyrnaeans are suffering and facing the prospect of a crisis engineered by the devil. Jesus tells them not to fear what they are about to suffer and to be faithful unto death. The undergirding basis for these imperatives is what Jesus declares at the beginning of the letter that he was dead and came to life, and the audience who had received the gospel would know the story of how Jesus was faithful unto death and that his inheritance for his faithfulness was resurrection and ascension to the right hand of God the Father. This is the story in which the believers participate when they receive the gospel with faith. Jesus’s story is the story that defines believers and their conduct. Because he has gone through this experience, he can promise this end goal for his followers, described in 2:10 as their receiving the crown of life from him. This contrast of death with the life that Jesus gives them matches the contrast in his one appellation in 2:8. Indeed, the end goal of resurrection, of vindication for living this victorious life, is described in the promise of 2:11.
The characteristic is also attributed, without the key term “perseverance,” to the church in Pergamum, although some among them have failed in this respect by becoming more assimilated to the surrounding world. This contrast and the fact that the church dwells where “the throne of Satan” is makes those who have persevered stand out all the more. Indeed, the example of Antipas is pointed out as one who was killed for his faithful witness in their midst (2:13). This description of “faithful witness” recalls the same appellation being applied to Jesus in 1:5. As in the case of Antipas, this description conveys holding fast to one’s testimony in the face of suffering and death (cf. 2:10; 17:14). Jesus himself was God’s witness unto death and paved the way for those who follow his path of witnessing to resurrection to everlasting life on the other side of death (hence the description of him as the “firstborn of the dead” [also 1:5]). Indeed, in other cases where a “witness” is referred to, apart from Jesus, the person(s) in question has faced or will face suffering and death for their testimony (2:13; 11:3; 17:6). In many cases, this is also true of the associated vocabulary of “testimony” (1:9; 6:9; 11:7; 12:17; 20:4). Thus far, these witnesses share in common with Jesus the testimony unto death, but because of what happened with Jesus—as Revelation itself will lay out—these witnesses will also share in the resurrection of that prime Faithful Witness.
The church in Thyatira, despite the issues of many members, is also noted for perseverance, as well as works, love, faith, and service (2:19). Indeed, their last works are said to be greater than they were at the first. But they have tolerated a poisonous root in their midst, so that many have gone astray. Still, the remaining faithful ones have not fallen for that which is rotten in Thyatira, and the only obligation laid upon those who remain is to hold fast to what they have until Jesus comes.
The last congregation characterized as persevering in faithfulness is the church in Philadelphia (3:8–11). Again, the terminology is absent, but the concept is certainly here for this congregation that is said to have little power, yet has held the word and not denied the name of Jesus. Because they have kept that word, Jesus will keep them out of the hour of trial. Indeed, they are told only to hold onto that which they have.
I have already commented on 6:9–11 as part of my entry on the question of the intermediate state for the dead in the NT, so I will not return to it here, except to say that it is one of the most vivid demonstrations of the perseverance of the saints in this book. The white robes they receive are a sign of their vindication, which also reappears in 7:14 in reference to the uncountable multitude. These are the people who have come out of great affliction and washed their robes, thereby making them white in the blood of the Lamb.
Another case in which we see both the perseverance in suffering of the faithful witnesses and their vindication is in ch. 11 with the two witnesses. Their testimony finishes with the beast conquering and killing them, which causes the world to rejoice. But their fate after their deaths will also testify and bring glory to God, for the beast’s victory is only temporary as God revives the two witnesses and brings them to heaven (11:11–12). This fate of the two witnesses has two functions in how it points both backward and forward. It points backward in that they die in the same place that their Lord died (11:8) and their subsequent fate is the same as his in rising from the dead and ascending to heaven. It points forward in that the faithful martyrs will be raised from the dead and exalted by the end of the story, just as these faithful witnesses were.
The next relevant text is one of the great victory declarations in 12:11, which is part of a declaration following the cosmic battle resulting in Satan being cast down to the earth. While this represents a divine victory with declarations of salvation and power, the kingdom of God, and the authority of his Messiah (12:10), the victory language is most directly applied to believers. They have conquered their accuser and they have done so by the blood of the Lamb. Because of the resurrection, what might have been a sign of Satan’s triumph—by means of his subordinate powers—over Jesus through the infliction of death on him instead became a sign of Jesus’s victory. And it is that victory in which faithful believers participate by means of their testimony to him and their surrender of their lives to suffer for his name unto death. This is, of course, the path that Jesus himself blazed in his faithful testimony unto death (1:5), and those who follow him are now able to attain the consummation of victory in the same form that he did. Jesus’s victory is obviously different in scale in that his blood is able to provide victory that believers cannot provide for others, and it is his victory that they share in, as has been made clear elsewhere. But what has also been made clear elsewhere is that this victory is truly participatory in having a distinct form patterned after the life of Jesus—and the gospel events included therein—that believers must actively follow by living the victorious life he has given to others.
Perseverance is called for in the resistance of the saints against the beast of the sea in 13:10. This beast is in fact a conglomeration of the four beasts that come out of the sea in Dan 7. While seven heads and ten diadems link this beast to the dragon, the ten horns are from the fourth beast (7:7, 20, 24), the appearance like a leopard is from the third beast (7:6), the feet like a bear come from the second beast (7:5), and its mouth being like a lion’s mouth comes from the first beast (7:4). This beast thus sums up all the others in himself and represents their capstone. Interestingly, the representative of the saints that receives the kingdom of God is one like a son of man, in contrast to the representations of these four kingdoms as beasts. I may be reading too much into this, but perhaps in addition to the beasts signifying power, violence, and ferocity, the symbolism could mean that in the defiance of these kingdoms against God they dehumanize themselves—that is, by denying that they were created by God to bear the divine image—and are thus represented as freakish beasts. The kingdom of God and the saints who inherit it, on the other hand, represent what it means to be truly human, to bear God’s image in representational obedience in accord with God’s creative purpose. As such, this capstone kingdom combines the defiant and dehumanizing evils of all that came before it, but the kingdom that conquers it will be the kingdom that combines and fulfills all that God has declared and promised from creation unto the end of this age in the age that is coming.
The connections with Dan 7 continue as the beast utters arrogant and blasphemous words (7:8, 25; cf. 11:36) and wages war against the saints so as to overcome them for a time (7:21, 24–25; cf. 8:23–25; 11:28–35). Again, this beast is taking on the role of the king of the last kingdom in Daniel, and thus John is preparing his readers for what his fate will be before he even declares it. Those who share the beast’s fate will be all the people of the earth who succumbed to his compulsion to worship him (much like the situation in Dan 3, where once more the outcome “spoils” the outcome of its parallel in Revelation). These people will be the ones whose names are not written in the Lamb’s book of life (cf. Dan 12:1). Finally, just as having one’s name written in the Lamb’s book of life is concomitant with having the seal of God on one’s forehead (3:5; 7:3–4; 9:4; 17:8; 20:12, 15; 21:27), not having one’s name written in the book and having the mark of the beast on one’s forehead or right hand is the dark parody opposed to the action of the true God. These many connections from Daniel serve to uphold the call for perseverance, which is what is called for to last through the trials the requirement of this mark brings. After all, some must go into captivity and be killed by the sword, but those who persevere will be those declared victorious in the end when they receive the promises of God in full.
The call for perseverance is reiterated in 14:12 after the third angel has declared judgment on those who worship the beast. As in ch. 13, this call is issued in the context of the intense pressure that the saints will face to act otherwise. They are to keep their character as those who keep the commandments of God and the faithfulness of Jesus, showing their union with them and participation in his story, as has been stressed otherwise at multiple points in Revelation (including texts that are not addressed in this analysis). This participatory union is also signified by the beatitude John is instructed to write, “Blessed are the dead in who die in Christ from now on” (14:13). The Spirit also adds the declaration of their vindication in saying that they are blessed because they will rest from their labor, for their works will follow with them.
Although perseverance terminology does not appear after this in Revelation, it is certainly signified otherwise. We are told on multiple occasions about the shedding of the saints’ blood, as also expected from chs. 13 and 14 (16:5–6; 17:6; 18:24). The ultimate outcome of those who have persevered in their testimony to the point of giving their blood in death is resurrection, as shown in 20:4–6. Those who partake of what is called “the first resurrection” are the faithful, who have borne the martyr identity throughout Revelation. Their resurrection here fits the parallel with Ezekiel (namely in chapter 37), the closing chapters of which seem to have been the chief source for a rubric for the last few chapters of this book. As the “battle” with Gog and Magog from Ezek 38–39 will appear shortly, God’s people are raised from the dead and given a kingdom, as in Ezek 37. The reference to the number 1,000 itself supports this dimension of significance. As well as being a multiple of ten—one of the other symbolically significant numbers in Revelation—1,000 is a number particularly connected to God’s faithful covenantal love (Exod 20:6//Deut 5:10; Deut 1:11; 7:9; Ps 105:8; cf. 2 Pet 3:8). This point is further supported by the prevalent biblical theme of the vindication and exaltation of the suffering faithful saints, here signified by the saints being enthroned for the thousand years in anticipation of the new creation, the culminating expression of God’s faithful love.
The image of those who participate in the first resurrection as sitting on thrones brings to its resolution the theme of the promise that believers will reign as priestly kings (again, in fulfillment and amplification of Exod 19:4–6). As in the gospel story of Jesus, the believers’ resurrection is linked with their exaltation and session on their thrones. Their identification as those who lost their lives because of the testimony of Jesus and the word of God (i.e., the gospel) as well as their resistance to the idolatry of the beast clearly indicate their faithfulness. As such, resurrection is the proper end of faithfulness, as we have seen elsewhere in Revelation, and as we have seen in the gospel story of Jesus. The inheritance they receive for following Jesus and participating in his story is patterned after what Jesus received after his faithful death in resurrection and exaltation. Resurrection is a crucial part of their fulfillment of what it means to be the people of God who identify themselves by their allegiance to Jesus.