When I was a kid, I never really enjoyed staying home from school sick, because that was a guarantee that my mom wouldn’t let me play outside later that evening no matter how good I felt by then. But one thing that I loved about staying home from school was getting to watch “The Price is Right.” That show is the best! I can still remember lying on the couch in the living room thinking, “Wow! All those poor souls at school are probably doing some boring worksheet right now, and I’m at home watching ‘The Price is Right.’”
The best part of that show was right after someone would win the initial pricing game. They call those four contestants up to the stage for that initial game, and then someone wins and gets to go up on the stage with Bob Barker. And that’s when Bob really starts to build the suspense. He directs their attention to a set of doors off to one side that are closed, and he says, “Wouldn’t you like to see what’s behind those doors?” And sometimes he would drag it out while the contestant is standing there in agony, just dying to see what’s behind those doors. And then Rod Roddy’s voice would come over the speakers and say, “It’s a new car!” and the doors would fly open and the crowd would go crazy, and there would be a brand new car, just waiting to be won.
Now I want you to keep in mind this picture of the doors opening up to allow the contestant to see the prize, because that picture will help us understand the idea behind the word that we’re going to look at tonight—the word “revelation.” As we continue in our series “Breaking Down Bible Words” we’re going to approach this word the same way that we have approached the others—first, we’ll define the word revelation and then we’ll talk about what the idea of revelation means for us.
I. What does the word “revelation” mean?
We can see what the word “revelation” means by looking at its root word—reveal. When you reveal something, you are uncovering something, you are bringing something that was hidden out into the open. So the idea behind the word “revelation” is the idea of unveiling or displaying something that was previously hidden. Think again of when those doors opened on “The Price is Right”—the prize was hidden from the contestant; the contestant didn’t know what it was until those doors opened to reveal what was behind them.
We can see this idea of revelation in a couple of familiar stories in the Old Testament. Turn with me if you would please to 1 Samuel 3. Here we find the story of Samuel as a little boy when he first heard the voice of God [READ 3:1–7]. Here we see the first part of this idea of revelation. Samuel was confused here because the Lord had never spoken to him before. Prior to this, he had not had any communication with the Lord. But now God was speaking to Him for the first time, and you probably all know that God went on to have a conversation with Samuel about Eli the priest and Eli’s family, so that by the end of the story it says down in v. 21, “And the Lord appeared again at Shiloh, because the Lord revealed Himself to Samuel at Shiloh by the word of the Lord.” So here we have the other part of this idea of revelation—God had been unknown to Samuel but now He was known, he had revealed Himself to Samuel because He had spoken to Him.
We see this same idea again over in the book of Daniel. Turn with me to Daniel 2. You probably know this story—in this chapter, King Nebuchadnezzar has a dream but he doesn’t understand what the dream is supposed to mean, so he calls upon his magicians and his sorcerers and commands that they tell him what the dream was and then interpret it for him. Well, the magicians and sorcerers try to tell the king that his request is impossible and that they couldn’t possibly know what the king had dreamed. And that point, the king became furious with the magicians and sorcerers and issued a decree to have them all killed. That’s when Daniel and his friends enter the story [READ Dan. 2:17–19]. So here we see the idea of revelation again—the dream and its interpretation had been hidden from Daniel. He didn’t know what it was any more than the magicians and the sorcerers did. But God revealed this information to him so that it was no longer hidden from him. And after this, Daniel went before the king and gave him the information of this revelation that he had received.
So these stories illustrate the meaning of the word “revelation”—something that was once hidden has now been unveiled or revealed. Now its important for us to recognize at this point that the concept of revelation tells us that there are limits to human knowledge. Not only are there things that we simply do not know—there are things that we cannot know unless God reveals them to us. And we have to admit that there are some things that God has simply chosen not to reveal to us. Let’s think about a couple of these things for a moment. First, we know that God has not chosen to tell us the precise reasons for all of the suffering that we face in life. Many times throughout our lives, we will grapple with difficult, painful events and we won’t know exactly why these things are happening. Now God has told us a lot about suffering in a general sense. We know that pain and suffering were introduced into this world by sin, and we know that suffering and adversity can help us grow spiritual in astounding ways, but we simply don’t know why God allows an earthquake to strike Haiti. We don’t know why God allows us to contract cancer, or why he allows two members of a family to die in an accident while the other two are spared. We cannot know these things unless God chooses to tell us.
Second, we know that God has not chosen to tell us some of the precise details about our future. God doesn’t tell us exactly where we’re going to go to college; he doesn’t tell us how long we’ll be working at one job, or how long we might have to wait before another one comes along.
Transition—So what are we to make of all of this? If this is true, then what does the idea of revelation mean for us?
II. What does the idea of revelation mean for us?
A. It drives us toward humility before God—Matthew 11:25–27
When we realize that there are things that we simply cannot know unless God reveals them to us, it reminds us that we are and must be dependent upon God. This idea is a powerful antidote to pride. If we understand truth about God, it is only because He has allowed us to understand it. Turn with me to Matt. 11:25–27. Here Jesus is talking about a divide between those who do believe in Him and those who don’t [READ Matt. 11:25–27]. Notice that Jesus points out here that the truth about who He is has been hidden from those whom the world considers to be wise and intelligent. In contrast, it is those who are as infant, lowly and dependent, who receive the truth about Jesus.
Do you ever find yourself getting frustrated with people who just can’t seem to see the world from a biblical perspective? Perhaps there’s a social or political debate that you can think of where the biblical perspective seems so clear to you, but other people just can’t seem to understand it? In such moments, we need to guard ourselves against becoming proud because its so easy for us to think that other people are just stupid, and an arrogance can start to creep in to our lives that makes the truth look very unattractive.
Friends, we must remember that if we can understand biblical truth, it is only because God has allowed us to understand it. It is not because of any great thing in us, or any degree of wisdom that we possess—it is only because God has broken through the blinding power of sin and given us eyes to see and ears to hear, as Jesus so often called for in the gospels.
So what does the idea of revelation mean for us? First, it drives us toward humility before God. And second,
B. It gives us confidence in the source of our faith—Galatians 1:11–12
Think about this for a moment—if we can only understand spiritual truth by God’s revelation, then spiritual truth must come from God Himself. There are many people today who try to say that Christianity is just a man-made religion, that it is not really divine truth. But the idea of revelation contradicts such a belief. Let me direct your attention in particular to what the apostle Paul says about the source of His teaching. Turn with me to Gal. 1:11–12 [READ Gal. 1:11–12].
This is a very important point to note, especially in light of the things that people teach about Christianity and the apostle Paul today. If you watch television specials about Christianity or Christian doctrine, you’re liable to hear something like this: “While Jesus was alive, he taught a simple, ethical message about loving each other and turning the other cheek. But after he died, Saul of Tarsus saw the dedication of the early Christians and recognized an opportunity to become their leader. So Saul became the apostle Paul and he hijacked the simple message of Jesus and turned it into a full-blown religion with all sorts of doctrines and dogmas that took Christianity in a whole new direction.”
Or in other words, to sum all of that up, what these critics are saying is that Christianity did not come from God, it was essentially the brainchild of the apostle Paul. But notice that Paul claims that precisely the opposite is true—he didn’t twist the teaching of Jesus, he received his message by a revelation from Jesus!
The idea that Christianity is a man-made religion doesn’t make any sense. Christianity does not bear the marks of a man-made system of belief, particularly when we think about what Christianity teaches about God. If you want to see what man-made gods look like, look no further than the gods of Greek and Roman mythology. Those so-called gods are just human beings on an exaggerated scale! They have all of the same problems that we do!
But how could anyone dream up a God like the God of Christianity? How could we, who celebrate our birthdays every year, conceive of a God who has no beginning? How could we dream up a God who is a Trinity? How could we who are filled with hate invent a God of such love that He would die for the very creatures who spurned Him? Why would we make up a God who commands us to control some of our natural desires, like desires for revenge or fame and glory? Why would anyone make up such a God, and who would believe the person who did? The only answer that makes any sense is that the God of the Bible is real and we know about Him because He has told us what He is like.
So the concept of revelation gives us confidence in the source of our faith. The message of the Bible is a message that truly is from God. It is not a myth, it is not a legend, it is truth that has been revealed to us by God. So when we choose to believe in doctrines like the virgin birth and resurrection of Jesus, or the doctrines of heaven and hell, we can know, as Peter said, that we are not following cleverly devised fables, but the very truth of God.
In light of all that we have discussed, we can be so thankful that God has decided to reveal His truth to us. We would know nothing about God unless He had revealed Himself to us, and we can be so thankful that He did, particularly after the human race fell into sin. Even then He did not leave us in the dark, but he continued to reveal Himself to us, eventually even sending us His own Son to show us what he is like. All of this speaks to the tremendous grace of our God and His persistent love for us.
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