Revelation Is Not a Puzzle: 4 Keys to Interpretation
How should Christians read Revelation? Discover four biblical keys: Christ, its purpose, Old Testament imagery, and the call to hear and obey.
Most people open Revelation looking for a solution. Jerome said Revelation “has as many mysteries as it has words…for in every one of its words manifold meanings lie hidden”[1]. So we approach it asking: Which empire is the beast? What does the mark of the beast 666 mean? Where is Armageddon? When do the trumpets sound? We don’t know why the voluminous commentator, John Calvin, avoided it. What we do know is that when he came to 2–3 John and Revelation, he moved to the Old Testament instead.[2] For others, whole publishing careers have been built on answering those questions, charts included.
The book does ask to be understood. Yet not in the way so many think. The seals, trumpets, and bowls are not a collection of coded predictions that we can confidently match, one by one, to individual events in a modern timeline. If each symbol pointed to one datable event, how would we identify which event among thousands? Thus, we’d get endless interpretations and no certainty, and the book would stay closed.
That’s why I say Revelation was not given like a mass of puzzle pieces to be solved. God did not give Revelation to be interpreted by us but to interpret the world for us. That one sentence changes what you’re doing when you open it. You’re not the detective. You’re the one being shown something.
So how do you read Revelation? Here are four keys: Read it as a book about Christ, to reveal, written in Old Testament signs, and to be heard and obeyed.
Reading Revelation
“God did not give Revelation to be interpreted by us but to interpret the world for us.”
Who is Revelation About?
It’s “the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1:1). That means from him, about him.[3] Every year for Christmas we put out a puzzle on a table with all the pieces just dumped out. Anyone who walks by is free to dive in and start putting pieces together. Inevitably one of us will get lost in the thousand pieces. So, what do they do? Find the picture on the box top. Jesus is the picture on the box. He’s the One who brings the book’s many pieces into a focused image. Revelation is not a puzzle; it’s about a person.
What Does Revelation Do for Us?
The Greek word apokalypsis means revelation or unveiling. God pulls back the curtain, not so that we can satisfy our curiosity about the future, but so that we can see the world in the light of Jesus Christ.
Here’s the exciting thing: God did not give Revelation to be interpreted by us but to interpret the world for us.[4] As the very opening words say, “God gave” this “revelation of Jesus Christ” who “sent…his angel to his servant John” so that all “his servants”—that’s you—might see and know “the things that must soon take place” (1:1). When I became a Christian, I was given three books: the Bible and two of Hal Lindsey’s: The Late Great Planet Earth and The Rapture. I was told these were “the keys to understanding the Bible.” Over time, I’ve come to see that Revelation was not given to make us dependent on prophecy experts. It was given to reveal Jesus Christ and teach us how to understand the world in which we live.
How Do We Understand its Imagery?
Revelation was written to real churches in real trouble (1:4). But they didn’t need a prophecy chart to crack its code of “signs.” Interestingly, the verb the ESV translates as “he made it known” (sēmainō) is related to the word John uses of Jesus’ “signs” in his Gospel. If there is a cheat code for the things “signified” in Revelation, it’s the Old Testament. These ancient churches were to go back “to the law and to the testimony” (Isa. 8:20; KJV, NASB) to understand this revelation of their Lord and Savior.
For example, when John sees the gloriously resurrected and ascended Lord, with white hair “like white wool, like snow” (1:14), that’s directly from Daniel 7:9 and the vision of the Ancient of Days. Here’s the remarkable truth revealed by this imagery: Jesus, the Son of Man, shares the divine glory of the Ancient of Days. We’ve made Revelation difficult; Jesus is the key to cracking what’s become a code. I worked through this whole vision in the opening sermon of our series through Revelation. After all, it was these Jewish Scriptures of “Moses and all the Prophets” that the resurrected Jesus himself “interpreted” to two disillusioned and downtrodden disciples “the things concerning himself” (Luke 24:27).
How Should We Respond to Revelation?
Blessed is the one who reads aloud (singular) the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear (plural), and who keep (plural) what is written in it (1:3). Revelation was intended as a circular letter from the exiled apostle to the churches, so that they would be enlivened and encouraged to action. That’s you, wherever you gather with God’s people to hear and wherever you go back into the world to keep.
This means it’s not a book to gather around at prophecy conferences to satisfy our intellectual curiosities; it’s meant to be practical. It shapes the worship, endurance, and obedience of Christ’s people.
Conclusion
None of these keys makes Revelation simple. It’s still a strange book, full of imagery that resists quick summary. What they do change is what you’re looking for when you open it.
You’re not hunting for a hidden timeline. You’re being shown a person.
So, read Revelation with your Bible open to the Old Testament, not to a chart. Read it aloud, and read it with other Christians. Read it expecting to be given courage rather than information.
And when you get lost in the pieces—and you will—look at Christ on the box top.
Daniel R. Hyde is preaching through Revelation at Oceanside United Reformed Church this fall. The series, Jesus Wins, runs through December 20; full manuscripts, audio, and video are posted as we go.
Notes
[1] Jerome, Letter to Paulinus, AD 394.↩
[2] On the chronological history of Calvin's commentaries, see Wulfert de Greef, The Writings of John Calvin: An Introductory Guide, trans. Lyle D. Bierma (Baker Books, 1993), 93–109.↩
[3] William Hendriksen, More Than Conquerors: An Interpretation of the Book of Revelation (1940, 1967; Baker Book House, seventh printing, 1990), 43.↩
[4] Hendriksen reads this as the revelation Jesus gives. More Than Conquerors, 51. G. K. Beale sees both. The Book of Revelation, NIGTC (Eerdmans, 1999), 183.↩
[5] See David A. deSilva, Unholy Allegiances: Heeding Revelation's Warning (Hendrickson, 2013), 8.↩
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