(Ver 1.0) This is Part 2 in a series of lessons about the Biblical ways of seeking to improve our understanding of the book of Revelation. If you have not read the introduction to this subject, I would recommend you begin with “Part 1”. But know, that this series of Bible studies appears extremely relevant to the times that we are living. It is focused purely on 1) finding the Truth, 2) on eliminating deception and 3) resolving confusion that has built up against us understanding this Book. Truly this is one of the most fought over books in the Bible today. Satan is doing his best to keep people in the dark to what is about to happen to the entire world. You would not believe the level of demon activity that has been directed at stopping this series from coming out.

I have been working on at least 6 to 8 Bible studies simultaneously about differing advanced subjects found in Revelation. But I have felt several checks on publishing any of them, because of a lack of necessary teachings of basic dependent topics that will be used as the series’ building foundation. Today we are going to begin to learn an introduction to Building a Foundation of Truth by introducing everyone to some of the key simple, prerequisite, and dependent doctrines which will help us learn the advanced spiritual subjects of Revelation hopefully, more quickly and confidently.

In this lesson we will begin by learning what a foundation represents in personal Bible study and why it is so essential to understanding the more complex advanced topics. I believe, by establishing and building a firm foundation of the fundamentals we will be able to be more assured that we are seeing things in Revelation more clearly. I believe this is true because the Bible will always interpret itself and define the symbols and their meanings in another part of the Bible.  

In these lessons, I would like us to identify the causes for any conflicting differences between each diverse groups’ views found in the book of Revelation. One of the basics that I have learned is that a person’s view of Revelation largely depends upon their personal slant or strategy of Hermeneutics’. Hermeneutics is a theological term given to the method of interpretation preferred. Many people lean either one of two ways.

There are two extreme views of interpreting Eschatological texts. The first extreme is to make everything “Allegorical”, meaning each word has a symbolic significance referring to a secret unknown hidden message. Using this approach in isolation, anyone could make the Bible say anything they desired it to say.

The other extreme view is to take every word in the text as “Literal”. This approach would also be very problematic since the book of Revelation describes a pregnant woman standing on the moon, who is also clothed in the Sun. Then there is a Great Red Dragon who sweeps 1/3 of the stars out of heaven. There are literally too many references like these, that could not be physically possible to mention them all.

Both extremes are very problematic and will lead the student into error. What I have discovered with the Lord’s great help, is that there is a peaceful, safe and happy balance between both of these extreme positions where the truth is found. I believe, balance is a key factor to understanding everything in the Bible more correctly.

And we will hopefully do this by examining the roots of the subjects. It is a very Biblical concept that all “fruits” of Truth or Lies are produced from the Word seeds that are being planted in our hearts and minds. And these seeds establish the root foundations for our professing beliefs.  Therefore, if we have the wrong roots from the wrong seeds, we will continue to produce the wrong fruits (interpretations, conclusions, doctrines and beliefs).

We will hopefully be going through a lot of foundational Bible teachings from Old Testament prophets. These Old Covenant books have much more to do with Revelation than many can imagine. In fact, without out a good understanding of Eschatological writings before Jesus came the first time, it is practically impossible to understand anything about the Book of Revelation. Here is a short list of key books of the Old Covenant that have key prophetical insight into the book of Revelation.

1. Genesis
2. Exodus
3. Leviticus
4. Numbers
5. Deuteronomy
6. Joshua
7. Judges
8. Ruth
9. Psalms
10. Proverbs
11. Isaiah
12. Jeremiah
13. Ezekiel
14. Daniel ****
15. Hosea
16. Joel
17. Zechariah

I believe I could have listed every Old Testament book because Jesus is the hidden subject in all of them. And we should know the book of Revelation is also about Jesus Christ as the main subject. Now for a list of some of the key New Testament books that will help us understand events in the book of Revelation:

1. Matthew,
2. Mark,
3. Luke,
4. John,
5. Acts,
6. Romans,
7. 1 & 2 Corinthians,
8. Galatians,
9. Colossians,
10. 1 & 2 Thessalonians,
11. Hebrews,
12. 1 & 2 Peter,
13. 1, 2 & 3 John,
14. Jude

Again, I could have listed every book of the New Testament because these too are all about Jesus Christ which help us to understand the book of Revelation. The Bible is a giant Holy Puzzle Book. God spread out clues to be Revealed at the proper time by the Holy Ghost randomly all over the Bible. And without us knowing as many of these as possible, we will be severely lacking in trying to understand the book of Revelation. Of course, only God knows all of these clues and how they fit together.

This means without his help, it will be impossible for anyone to know what will be happening to those that dwell upon the earth very soon. I still believe no single teacher knows the entire Bible or the book of Revelation. God has spread out the revelations throughout history of the Bible and the church age of Grace. There are approximately 40 different writers of the Bible over 1500 years, and none of them knew or understood the entire 66 textual books.

Today, in these “Last Days”, we are seeing the same thing happening in the church. In the last 2000 years, there have been numerous revelations given to many gifted teachers in what God called “The Former Rain” throughout the church age. And today, God is pouring out His greater “The Latter Rain” revelations to prepare the church for His soon return. Let’s explore foundation to begin:

Introduction to Building a Firm Truth Foundation

Here are our basic lesson foundational verses. I believe the book of Hebrews was written by the Apostle Paul. I believe this because of his advanced knowledge and revelations given to him by Jesus Christ.  Paul was raised a pharisee of the pharisees and knew the Old Covenant intimately but from a human biased natural view. Much like people view the book of Revelation today. However, in Hebrews 6 he writes of the concept that is essential to learning anything in the Bible.

Hebrews 6:1 – Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God,

Hebrews 6:2 Of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.

Hebrews 6:3 And this will we do, if God permit.

Let us list some of the key subjects to analyze these scripture words:

1. We will first notice, that there is a “beginning” level to every new Christian’s knowledge implying a continuing increase in gaining spiritual knowledge. This beginning of learning spiritual knowledge appears to be analogous to a little new born natural child after birth. Jesus confirms this in John 3:3 saying, “No man enters the Kingdom of God without being born-again”. A natural new born begins a continual process of learning for the first 0-5 years are learning a lot of life’s simple natural basics. Including speech, taking personal care of self, eating, drinking, bathing, washing, bathroom, etc. Then it increases to higher levels of numbers, alphabet, reading, writing, and arithmetic. As natural knowledge and understanding can increase infinitely so also is the spiritual knowledge that never ends by God’s design. But it ALL begins with the Basics. This is the problem with so many teaching the book of Revelation. There appears to be a lack of the basics that are required to understand the advanced Eschatological subjects.
2. But after a natural child’s beginning learning process to build their foundation of simple things in life, the basics must be left (built upon) having become automatic firm life changing habits of thoughts, beliefs and words and behaviors. In other words, a student in the university should not be talking goo-goo, da-da, and ma-ma levels of childlike words to their teachers.
3. These beginning basics are “Required” because they are then used to build new more advanced knowledge upon which is moving each individual towards perfection (More Complete Mature Understanding) both in the natural realm and in the spiritual realm. In fact, Jesus taught us spiritual truths by requiring us to first understand natural truth basics. For example, the “Parable of the Sower”, taught us the process “Seed” planting to “Harvesting Fruit”. And Jesus said if you do not understand this concept, how then can we understand anything of the Spirit?
4. The clear warning is given for Christians to not let slip the basic foundation knowledge of the Spirit and the Word. This proves we can let anything slip away. I knew a man once that learned the “Spanish” language in High School but to converse in it 40 years later only a few words were remembered. This is a natural of lack of use and application. We have all done this before. Natural knowledge must be refreshed and applied and equally and greater does the Spirit Knowledge.
5. Hebrews lists some of the Basics of Spiritual knowledge that the writer thought were important to keep in our minds. These included 4 foundational doctrines; 1) Baptisms, 2) Laying on of Hands, 3) Resurrection of the Dead, and 4) Eternal Judgment. All of these have application to the book of Revelation but especially the last 2: Resurrection and Judgment.
6. The last statement in our beginning verse emphasizes the key important of being “Led by the Spirit” in what we teach and what we learn. This acknowledges our total dependence upon God to reveal and not upon us to figure out anything in the book of Revelation.

It appears to me that many of the current views of Revelation today, have either 1) “no foundation” or 2) a lot of major “Different Biblical foundations” that causes their beliefs to clash so dramatically with other teachers. Therefore, finding good, sound and correct foundations appear to be a great topic to build our study upon today. Here is another opening foundational verse for the subject of “Building Foundations”

Romans 15:20 Yea, so have I strived to preach the gospel, not where Christ was named, lest I should build upon another man’s foundation:

Did you notice that Paul just confirms every teacher has a potential differing view of the Bible than He did? Do you believe Paul agreed 100% with each of these teachers? I think not, and neither did the other disciples typically agree automatically with what Paul taught. Take a look at what Peter said about Paul’s teaching foundations:

2Peter 3:15 – And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you;

2Peter 3:16 – As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.

Apparently, Peter and others were being challenged to understand a lot of the things that Paul was teaching and writing to the churches. And there were even some people teaching opposing things to their own personal destruction. Wow, this sounds very important for us to resolve in the modern-day church. There just cannot be opposing views of the book of Revelation and all of them be correct. It seems to imply that because some teachers will destroy themselves that God may be solving the problems of conflict within the church through attrition.

We will continue building a sound groundwork with an introduction to some of the basic essential foundational concepts that I believe the Lord has taught me to follow in studying the Bible over many years. From hearing several teachers attempting to tell us what the Book of Revelation means, it has appeared to me, that they may lack an unshakable foundation to build their lessons of Revelation upon. I believe this is one of the reasons why Paul was hesitant to go into another teacher’s established built church foundation as he wrote in Romans 15:20.

Paul appears to be expressing concern for a problem that he has encountered when teaching the Word of God. The concept of building a foundation implies a comparison to a contractor building a modern house. Like home builders, there are literally thousands upon thousands of Bible teachers in the world today. You can find them in every city and they are all at varying levels of spiritual maturity, physical age, Bible knowledge, training and teaching experiences. We can confirm by reading a house being built in Hebrews by God in Jesus Christ:

Hebebrews 3:1 – Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus;

Hebrews 3:2 – Who was faithful to him that appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house.

Hebrews 3:3 – For this man (Jesus) was counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who hath builded the house hath more honour than the house.

Hebrews 3:4 – For every house is builded by some man; but he that built all things is God.

As we can see God is building a greater house in Jesus in the New Covenant, than He built with Moses in the Old Covenant. This clearly teaches us the need for a sound foundation on the Word of God, because God is not speaking of a building physical house anymore. Jesus is building a Spiritual House.

But remember Paul spent several years in intense study before teaching any of the scriptural doctrines. Also remember that it appears Jesus was personally teaching Paul what the verses were saying proving Jesus to be the builder of Paul’s foundation (Galations 1:12, 1 Corinthians 11:23). How many today can make this same claim of Paul? It should be obvious that Jesus is still building the same house today as in the beginning of the church.

Paul in Romans 15:20, addresses that he had a desire not to go as much into churches that already had pastors to teach them. But, rather it appears Paul’s desire was to go into the mission fields where no one had ever heard the Gospel. Do you agree with that conclusion? Maybe you see it differently? If so, please share another view and maybe everyone can learn something new. But please remember to give us scriptures to help us better understand your belief foundation. For now, please allow me to show you why I am seeing it this way.

What would happen if Paul would have come into a shaky teaching foundation from another church teacher who lacked the knowledge level where Paule was at with the LORD? The answer to this may surprise you. If Paul would have torn or knocked down a house by a preacher with inferior revelation knowledge levels, this would have left this preacher looking very bad in the eyes of his followers and may have even divided the church.

This may have brought down the pastor and their church and would have certainly not have been what Agape LOVE would have done to try to bless them. I believe according to what God used Paul to write “love” in 1 Corinthians 13, acting in LOVE towards another minister who does not know as much as you do is more important than trying to teach him what is wrong with his lessons. Can we agree that acting in Love to live a God example, is far more essential than bringing unasked for correction to a minister? By leaving a nasty, mean or hateful comment on this lesson causes only you to look bad, not me. If God acted that way, He could make us all look bad since we all are so ignorant compared to him. Here are afew other verses that may help us learn more about building foundations and how it is applied today:

Matthew 7:7 – Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you:

Matthew 7:8 – For every one that asks receives; and he that seeks finds; and to him that knocks it shall be opened.

Doesn’t it appear the Lord Jesus Christ has desired us to come to him first, to either ask, seek or knock? This is why a pastor of a church should ask someone to speak at their church and not the other way around. A traveling minister should never solicit their services and offer to teach them what they know without being asked. This should be common sense, but this is how the Holy Spirit normally operates. He will remain silent unless asked to speak while you remain quiet to listen.

I personally believe that we should never cause another minister to look stupid or foolish or even ignorant. While I will point out what I believe is taught wrong on the internet, I will not name names to who is teaching this. This is not what Love would ever do. I believe Paul was more concerned about acting in LOVE and UNITY than He was about who knew more! But that was my opinion for right now!

However, every Truth is still important. And this is why Paul wanted to go to places in the world where no one had ever heard the Gospel. This way, I believe there would not be any shaky foundations to deal with and He could focus upon building a firm unmovable foundation without affecting others. Therefore, I also do not want to attack other teachers by name, even if I address something that I have heard that does not fit with what I believe the Lord has shown to me about Revelation. My goal is not to divide the church further. but rather to unite us again to bring us back into one accord like they were in the book of Acts chapter 2. Let’s begin with an important law of interpretation to get us started. Please read these words carefully:

Isaiah – 28:9 Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand doctrine? them that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts.

Isaiah – 28:10 For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:

These verses are speaking to me directly, but hopefully to you also. God asks the question about who he can teach knowledge and then to cause them to understand this knowledge. That statement implies there are people that He is not able or willing to share His infinite knowledge with. But as for me, I desire to be one of these that He teaches His ways to.

Next notice the ending statement of verse 9. God is implicitly and explicitly saying He will teach those that are weaned from drinking only milk. This is referring to babies and applies to spiritual babies by double reference. Do you remember what Paul said to people in 2 Corinthians 3:2? In this verse Paul desired to feed them “Meat” but they were unable to receive it so he had to feed them with “Milk”. This is more symbolic references to milk which represents the Word of God simple basic truths versus the meat which represents God’s deeper more complex chewy words that baby Christians are unable to receive (understand).

This describes the book of Revelation almost precisely. It is as complex “Meaty” book of Deep Spiritual Truths that most carnal or new baby Christians are just incapable of understanding. This book takes some maturing spiritually in order to begin to understand much of the book. This is exactly why we are beginning this series with a fundamental understanding of the Bible basic doctrines which will be followed by the rules and laws of more accurate interpretation.

We will be covering very important basic doctrinal details and rules that can never be contradicted. Because if they are left unresolved or uncorrected, they will cause cracks in our building process as we are attempting to build from basic truths onto more complex spiritual subject truths. Any scriptural conflict between two or more verses on the same subject must be resolved before teaching a subject as truth. I believe this is one of the greatest weaknesses in the majority of teachings on the book of Revelation and other subjects in the Bible. There are far more conflicts of scriptures that are either ignored or explained away than many want to acknowledge.

This is not a complex concept to grasp. For example, before a student can attend a university, they better have learned basic skills of reading, writing, spelling and arithmetic. Without a very good understanding of the basics the very advanced university subjects would be incomprehensible. This is exactly what the book of Isaiah was trying to say, using other words of meat and milk.

Then the Hebrew words for “Precept upon Precept” appears to confirm more about legal terms of Laws and Commandments as in establish legal rules of conduct that must be followed. This introduces us to more legal terms as using rules of laws to accomplish these tasks of spreading Truth correctly. Just as building a natural house has laws and inspections to pass before safe occupancy occurs, so also does building any spiritual house of Truth

But notice in these verses that God declares that His Words of Truth are Built upon laws and rules. Go read verse 10 again and then go look up the Hebrew words and see what they mean. For example, the Hebrew term “Line upon Line” has direct applications to “making correct connections”. The Hebrew word H6957 is defined by Strong as a cord used as connecting two or more implied objects. This concept is potentially analogous to someone using a string or line for measuring, alignments, levels, etc. as done in a good building home building project.

Every contractor and builder knows all of the parts going into build the project come originally from a detailed blueprint plan that was made by an architect. Each detail of the plan to work involves exact measurements and lengths. When items are placed together, they all must be plumb and level by utilizing a type of tight cord called plumb bobs, chalk lines, and levels. These are all essential parts of joining together individual pieces (words and verses) into unified building processes (Doctrine).

Take for instance, laying bricks that are connected by stacking them upon each other in a highly ordered level fashion for strength usually using a binding mortar substance. Thus, we can see how these descriptions in Isaiah are applying to God’s Words of Knowledge as a figurative process for creating a house.

It looks like God is using the natural process of building houses to describe the spiritual process of being successful in life and living eternally. But this can certainly apply to preachers and teachers in how they are spreading their Doctrines of Truth. Instead of bricks and lumber, teachers are using words of God or the words of Satan. One will be unmovable and the other will fail.

Matthew 7:24 – Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock:

Matthew 7:25 – And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.

Matthew 7:26 – And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand:

Matthew 7:27 And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it.

The Rock is Jesus Christ the incarnate Word of God (John 1:14). He is the only firm foundation for those that are in Him. But he is also the “Stumbling Stone” that will cause many to fall. In fact, He is the prophesied Stone in Daniel that will bring down the world’s Satan kingdom system. But we are seeing in this lesson that he is the only “Firm Foundation” for “Truth” that will stand in all storms of erroneous beliefs.

Conclusion

Today in the church it can appear to us that there are only a select few teachers with a passion for desiring to know and teach the Truth as accurately as possible building upon a solid foundation called the Word of God. There is way too many different views on the book of Revelation for them all to be Truthful. These contradictions in the same scriptures alone, prove there is a massive problem in how people are interpreting scriptures, or lacking the knowledge to.

Therefore, we must conclude that there is an existence of a purposeful work of confusion that is occurring in the church today. I do not currently believe that any minister is purposefully misleading others in their teachings. They all appear very sincere and honest individuals.

Therefore, we can only logically and scripturally attribute this massive confusion on the book of Revelation to be the works of Satan using his cunning hidden ways of deception. And it appears this work of deception is occurring in the church, in more Bible subjects than we want to imagine and in far greater degrees than people want to admit. We must as teachers and disciples of Christ’s word commit fully to the Holy Spirit to keep us from being deceived.

I believe when we “ALL” commit to be filled and led by the Spirit of God, we will begin to gain the specific knowledge of God’s Word that we need to know right now. This will cause us to be led down the path together in learning the truth.  And then let us ask the Lord to help us to balance our new God given scriptural knowledge correctly together with all of the other scriptures that he has recorded. Hopefully then, we will ALL be closer to achieving unity.

Remember, what Jesus said to His disciples after they asked him 3 different questions concerning prophetical future events in Matthew 24, Jesus’ first response was a warning.

Matthew 24:4 – And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you.

It appears the number one warning about the end of Time was an attempt to teach there will be deceivers everywhere, even in churches. Remember what Revelation 12:9 reveals about Satan as the source of deception for the “Entire World”. This tends to imply the more carnal and natural a Christian thinks, the more easily deceived they are.

Thank you for reading and studying the Bible with us and being faithful to pray for us and all other believers. There is massive deception taking place just in teachings of the book of Revelation. Some say “No Rapture”, some say “Pre-Trib Rapture”, some say “Mid-Trib Rapture”, some say “Post-Trib Rapture” and now there is a new deception called “Pre-Wrath” which is another misapplied view of the a “Mid-Trib Rapture”. Unless there are four raptures that are happening, somebody is deceived.

God Bless you and I love you regardless of your beliefs on Revelation. But I will warn you, I am also a believer in the doctrine of “Lordship Salvation”. For those that have fully committed to Jesus Christ to make Him Lord of their Life, you can be assured that whenever Jesus is coming, you will be taken. Otherwise, if you are just a believer in Jesus and have not made Him Lord, I would strongly recommend you give your heart to the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

Please like and share this series with those you know. Feel free to leave comments with scriptures on and topic.