Showing posts with label Apocalypse 14: 1-20. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Apocalypse 14: 1-20. Show all posts

Sunday, November 10, 2013

3rd November Trinity 2013, Flowing Blood

3rd Nov. Trinity
Revelation 14, 1-20       

And I looked, and there was the picture of the Lamb, standing atop Mt. Zion and with him one hundred forty four thousand having his name and his Father’s name written on their foreheads.
Ghent Altarpiece
           
And I listened and heard a voice from the heavens, a voice like a mighty rush of waters, and like a mighty thunderclap—the voice I heard was like the voices of harpists playing on their harps.

And they all sing a new song, there in front of the throne and in front of the four creatures and the elders, and no one could learn the song but the one hundred forty-four thousand ransomed from the earth. These are the ones who did not defile themselves by the straying, through which the spiritual in man is betrayed; they have remained virginal [pure] in their inmost being and follow the Lamb wherever he goes. They were ransomed as the seed of a new humanity which belongs to the Father God and to the Lamb. Deceit and lies are not found in their mouths; pure and unblemished are they in their innermost being.

And I looked and saw another angel flying in mid-heaven, bringing the good news which is good news forever to those live on earth—to every race and nation and every tongue and folk. And the angel cried out with a great voice, saying:

“Stand in awe of God and turn to honor him. For we have come to the hour of his divine decision. Raise yourself in prayer to him who in truth created the heavens and the earth and the sea and all the springs of water.”  

And a second angel followed, who said, “Fallen, fallen is the great city of Babylon, who made all nations drink of the wine of her sacrilege, in order to draw the holy into misuse.”

And a third angel followed them, who cried out with a powerful voice: “Whoever adores the beast and its likeness, and accepts its stamp on forehead or hand, he will drink of the wine of God’s anger, thick and strong and undiluted, from the cup of his wrath. And in the presence of the holy angels and in front of the Lamb shall anger be transformed into pain like the pain of fire and sulphur.

Their suffering rises and darkens the encirling air like smoke through the cycles of time. And day and night those who made the beast into their god, who honored its picture as the highest, who took its being into their innermost being, find no peace. In this place however there works the power of the steadfast endurance of those who have taken the healing power of the Spirit into themselves, who have fulfilled the goals of the Spirit, and who have worked trusting in Jesus’ healing deed.

Bamberg Apocalypse
And I heard a voice out of the worlds of Spirit which said, “Write this down: People of heaven are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Yes, says the spirit, let them rest from their efforts and labours, since their good deeds, the fruits of their lives, are not lost along their paths of soul, but have preceeded them here.

And I looked, and suddenly I saw in the spirit a white cloud, and seated upon the cloud the figure of a son of humanity, with a golden crown upon his head and a sharpened sickle. And another angel stepped forth from the temple crying in a loud voice to the one seated on the cloud:

“Let your sickle go forth and harvest, for the hour of harvest has come; ripe and dry and firm are the crops of the earth.”

And the one seated on the cloud threw his sickle down upon the events on earth, and the earth’s crop was harvested.

And again another angel came out of the temple in the heavens; and he too held a sharpened sickle. And a further angel came out who tended the fire at the altar. He cried out with a mighty voice to him who held the sharpened sickle and said, “Let your sickle go forth and harvest the grapevines of the earth, for their grapes have reached their prime.”

So the angel threw his sickle down to the events on earth; and he harvested the earth’s vineyard, and threw the grapes into the great winepress of God’s anger. And they took the winepress outside the city and trampled the grapes. Blood flowed from the winepress that reached to the muzzles of the horses for sixteen hundred miles around.

3rd November Trinity
Luther Bible, 16th Century
November 10, 2013
Revelation 14: 1-20

This is the time of harvesting. The grapes have been brought in. They are crushed and their juice is separated from skin and seed. The juice is collected to serve as wine for winter nourishment.
In today’s reading we are shown earth’s mid-time in mighty pictures. We have been planted on the earth. We are shown the spiritual harvesting of humanity, the fruits of our inner nature, our work and our striving. We have engendered both noble and ignoble thoughts, feelings, deeds. All these are harvested by Christ and his angels. Our funeral service reminds us that we are beholden to the spirit for everything we think and say and do. For what we bring forth, our inner and outer fruits will be the nourishment for divine beings, offered on the high altar.
Naturally not all of what we have produced is good. In the picture of the winepress, the pure juice of what flows in our blood is separated from skin and seed. What flows in the blood is the effect of our thoughts and feeling, the impulses behind our deeds. And what also flows in the blood is God’s faith in humanity. For Christ, God’s own Son, has poured out his own Blood into the earth. Taking up His Blood, drinking of His Wine, we can produce a good, rich and abundant harvest for the beings of the divine world. With His Blood in our blood, we can pray in the words of the poet:

Lord: it is time. …

Command the last fruits to be full,…
urge them to perfection, and chase
the last sweetness into the heavy wine.[1]





[1] Rilke, “Autumn Day”,  translated by J. Mullen