Converting our Imagination 2<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"What kind of book is the Book of Revelation? We perhaps need to make something clear: The decision of what kind of book Revelation is determines how we\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Converting our Imagination 2\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"What kind of book is the Book of Revelation? We perhaps need to make something clear: The decision of what kind of book Revelation is determines how we\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Jesus Creed\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-11-24T11:41:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2010-11-18T14:58:25+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com\/community\/jesuscreed\/files\/2010\/11\/Apocalypse1-300x175.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Scot McKnight\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Scot McKnight\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/\",\"name\":\"Converting our Imagination 2\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2010-11-24T11:41:27+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2010-11-18T14:58:25+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#\/schema\/person\/5919e847c58ffe6efb5899fb61797252\"},\"description\":\"What kind of book is the Book of Revelation? We perhaps need to make something clear: The decision of what kind of book Revelation is determines how we\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Converting our Imagination 2\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/\",\"name\":\"Jesus Creed\",\"description\":\"Scot McKnight on Jesus and orthodox faith in the 21st century\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#\/schema\/person\/5919e847c58ffe6efb5899fb61797252\",\"name\":\"Scot McKnight\",\"description\":\"Scot McKnight is a recognized authority on the New Testament, early Christianity, and the historical Jesus. McKnight, author of more than fifty books, is the Professor of New Testament at Northern Seminary in Lombard, IL.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/author\/scotmcknight\/\"}]}<\/script>\n","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Converting our Imagination 2","description":"What kind of book is the Book of Revelation? We perhaps need to make something clear: The decision of what kind of book Revelation is determines how we","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Converting our Imagination 2","og_description":"What kind of book is the Book of Revelation? We perhaps need to make something clear: The decision of what kind of book Revelation is determines how we","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/","og_site_name":"Jesus Creed","article_published_time":"2010-11-24T11:41:27+00:00","article_modified_time":"2010-11-18T14:58:25+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com\/community\/jesuscreed\/files\/2010\/11\/Apocalypse1-300x175.jpg"}],"author":"Scot McKnight","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Scot McKnight","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/","name":"Converting our Imagination 2","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#website"},"datePublished":"2010-11-24T11:41:27+00:00","dateModified":"2010-11-18T14:58:25+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#\/schema\/person\/5919e847c58ffe6efb5899fb61797252"},"description":"What kind of book is the Book of Revelation? We perhaps need to make something clear: The decision of what kind of book Revelation is determines how we","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Converting our Imagination 2"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/","name":"Jesus Creed","description":"Scot McKnight on Jesus and orthodox faith in the 21st century","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#\/schema\/person\/5919e847c58ffe6efb5899fb61797252","name":"Scot McKnight","description":"Scot McKnight is a recognized authority on the New Testament, early Christianity, and the historical Jesus. McKnight, author of more than fifty books, is the Professor of New Testament at Northern Seminary in Lombard, IL.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/author\/scotmcknight\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/197"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10798"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10798\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}

{"id":10798,"date":"2010-11-24T05:41:27","date_gmt":"2010-11-24T11:41:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/community\/jesuscreed\/?p=10798"},"modified":"2010-11-18T08:58:25","modified_gmt":"2010-11-18T14:58:25","slug":"converting-our-imagination-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2010\/11\/24\/converting-our-imagination-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Converting our Imagination 2"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

What kind of book is the Book of Revelation?<\/p>\n

We perhaps need to make something clear: The decision of what kind of book Revelation is determines how we read it, what we see in it, and what it means for our world today<\/em>.<\/p>\n

$\"\"$ <\/a>Michael Gorman\u2019s new book, Reading Revelation Responsibly: Uncivil Worship and Witness: Following the Lamb into the New Creation<\/a><\/em><\/strong>., says the book is a hybrid book: it is apocalyptic, it is prophetic, and it is a letter.<\/p>\n

What are the top three mistakes made in reading Revelation? Why are we so tempted to make the images so literal? Why the lack of poetic imagination on our part?<\/strong><\/p>\n

How can this book speak to us in the next two years as we get bombarded by political rhetoric, political rhetoric vested with the promise that a party can save the country? How does Revelation teach us to respond to such rhetoric?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The function of Revelation is \u201cto sustain the people of God, especially in times of crisis, particularly evil and oppression.\u201d\u00a0 He sees the following (and he\u2019s right):<\/p>\n

A scathing critique of the oppressors
\nPassionate exhortations to defiance
\nUnfailing confidence in God\u2019s ultimate defeat of the present evil.<\/p>\n

There are dualisms here: cosmic (two opposing forces at work; think Star Wars), historical (children of God, children of darkness), ethical (choose sides), temporal (now and the Age to Come), and a dispositional dualism: pessimism and optimism.<\/p>\n

It is filled with colors (which are images) and numbers (which are adjectives)!<\/p>\n

Yet, this book is filled with non-literal images of the real world, and the problem in interpreting is that too many think of the images as real and therefore literal. It depicts real world things with utterly unreal images. It draws on the prophetic literature of the Old Testament in order to comfort and challenge the people of God \u2014 at that time.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s goal is not speculative foresight but theological insight. It reveals that the Empire will come down, the Lamb will be exalted, and the people of God are to be faithful.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, it is resistance literature and it is a pastoral letter to real churches who needed to have their imaginations converted from fear of the Empire to the Victory of the Lamb who will guide us into the Age to Come.<\/p>\n

Here is a great text to sample this sort of reading of the book, from Revelation 18:<\/p>\n

18:1\u00a0After these things I saw another angel, who possessed great authority, coming down out of heaven, and the earth was lit up by his radiance.\u00a018:2\u00a0He shouted with a powerful voice:<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cFallen, fallen, is Babylon the great!
\nShe has become a lair for demons,
\na haunt for every unclean spirit,
\na haunt for every unclean bird,
\na haunt for every unclean and detested beast.<\/em><\/p>\n

18:3\u00a0For all the nations have fallen from
\nthe wine of her immoral passion,
\nand the kings of the earth have committed sexual immorality with her,
\nand the merchants of the earth have gotten rich from the power of her sensual behavior.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

18:4\u00a0Then I heard another voice from heaven saying, \u201cCome out of her, my people, so you will not take part in her sins and so you will not receive her plagues,\u00a018:5\u00a0because her sins have piled up all the way to heaven and God has remembered her crimes.\u00a018:6\u00a0Repay her the same way she repaid others; pay her back double corresponding to her deeds. In the cup she mixed, mix double the amount for her.\u00a018:7\u00a0As much as she exalted herself and lived in sensual luxury, to this extent give her torment and grief because she said to herself, \u2018I rule as queen and am no widow; I will never experience grief!\u2019\u00a018:8\u00a0For this reason, she will experience her plagues in a single day: disease, mourning, and famine, and she will be burned down with fire, because the Lord God who judges her is powerful!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"