Throne visions

[markedward]

Where I'm at on the matter is...

Daniel 7 culminates in (a) the Son of Man ascending to the right hand of God, (b) the everlasting Kingdom of God being established, and (c) the defeat of the beast.

Revelation 4-5 roughly constitutes the same events as (a), chapters 6-19 constitute (b) and (c), depicted multiple times in different perspectives each time.

And, whereas the above is about the establishment of the everlasting Kingdom, Revelation 20.11-15 shows us (d) the consummation of the everlasting Kingdom, when the final judgment is given; when the the last enemy (Death) is defeated; when the Son delivers the everlasting Kingdom to the Father.

My primary input is this: the Revelation is not meant to be, in a word, "systematic" (i.e., "This is this, and this must follow this", etc.). It is absolutely truthful, of course, and we can expect it to be fulfilled exactly as John said it... but the fact that it is full of symbolism, and that certain scenes are repeated (how is Babylon able to be declared "fallen" in three different chapters otherwise?), should give us the hint that we can't turn the Revelation into an exact chronology of events, where X happens here, and Y happens here, and Z happens here, or even that what we see in the Revelation is all of the details (there are, likely, things left out that we didn't need to know, or were not important to the overall message of the book). And from this, we should apply this same thought to Daniel's prophecies: they're incredible, and we know they will be fulfilled entirely, but they just aren't "systematic".