The Book of Chronicles and Revelation

The way God organized the Bible, Chronicles is the last book of the Old Testament. It ties in beautifully with the last book of the New Testament.

God inspired 1 and 2 Chronicles as a single book.

This world is lost in the present. God is always challenging His people to keep the overview—to see the grand sweep both historically and prophetically. The book of Chronicles can really help us to do that.

Chronicles is prefaced by massive genealogies that extend from the beginning of man to the Babylonian captivity—a terrible end. 1 Chronicles 1-9 contain a sweeping genealogy. The very first word of Chronicles is Adam. Adam is a key word to this genealogy that gives us the historical overview. This genealogy begins with God and Adam and the tree of life. We always fail if we don’t eat from the tree of life. Ezra, the author of Chronicles, wanted to make sure that people understood where it all began. Man must never forget his spectacular origin—the beginning of the movie. We always tend to forget that history.

However, the book of Chronicles focuses mainly on the second Adam, who is going to rule on David’s throne forever. He frees the nations of Israel from the final and worst Babylonian captivity—a horrifying end, followed immediately by the rule of the second Adam forever. If we view this book spiritually, we get an inspiring prophecy of the future.

The second Adam leads God’s Church, spiritual Israel, today. He speaks to His Church and the world through new revelation. How could the second Adam lead us if He didn’t speak to us?

1 Chronicles is also similar to 2 Samuel. Samuel is one of the former prophets. This makes Chronicles also very prophetic.

Chapters 10 through 29 of 1 Chronicles are all about David’s throne—20 chapters!

If you look at the book of Chronicles spiritually, it is a key of David message to conclude the Old Testament.

This book contains almost nothing on Jeroboam and the 10 tribes of Israel that moved away from Jerusalem, Judah and David’s throne.

Chronicles really contains an epic sweep. In this book, Ezra shows us how to keep God’s Church today locked into a spiritual perspective. That means we must understand our physical and spiritual history. What are our origins? Why are we here? Why did God call us today, out of season? God deals with the nations of Israel and spiritual Israel (the Church) very differently.

Chronicles expands and enriches that key of David and fills in the gaps in many practical ways, showing us how we can organize our Work more carefully and do much more within the context of that key of David message. God keeps giving His Church more and more of that vision, step by step. He keeps our mind on Jerusalem above and on David’s throne.

Why does Chronicles spend so much time on David? Because that throne, and that vision, will continue for eternity! God wants us to keep focusing on David’s throne because it is the throne from which Jesus Christ will rule forever.

Only the firstfruits who eat from the tree of life will rule on David’s throne with Christ. Only the very elect—who eat the most from the tree of life—will rule on David’s headquarters throne forever. God clearly rewards us for what we do. We accomplish according to how much we eat from the tree of life. When we eat from the tree of life, God gives us this foundational key of David vision. Whoever has this key of David message, is eating from that tree.

The book of Chronicles is built around the key of David message, the greatest vision in the Bible. To know about the genealogy, you must have that vision. Even one commentary recognizes that to understand Chronicles, you need to understand its focus on David and his throne.

This history also reminds us that God was the first king of Israel, and He will be the last.

Chronicles shows us how to become an outstanding king and priest, so we can share David’s throne with Jesus Christ. Look at Chronicles spiritually, and you see how God will rule the world. For example, it shows that David was a master at organizing—in the tabernacle service and in everything he did. That points you to the rule of the Kingdom of God in a special way.

This outline is similar to what you find in Revelation 1-3, which is a spiritual genealogy of the seven Church eras. Then Revelation 3:7-8 discuss the key of David vision.

The book of Revelation begins with a spiritual genealogy. Though it discusses seven churches in chapter one, it starts with God, or the tree of life. This gives you a foundation not only for the seven churches and the book of Revelation, but also for the government of the whole world! God is going to rule this world through His Church and His kings and priests (Revelation 1:6).

God is building His leaders, His kings and priests who will rule on David’s throne. We will help Him bring billions of people into God’s Family. Christ is getting His wife ready for that enormous job (Revelation 19:7).

The last two eras of God’s Church have had that key of David vision. God uses these two eras to lay the foundational vision for the 1,000 years of the wonderful World Tomorrow. They know all about the throne of David, who was just a man. Isaiah 9:7 tells us that throne will continue forever. God is bringing human beings like David—the firstfruits of the tree of life—into His Family to help Him rule from that throne.

The throne of David is really God’s throne. So why doesn’t God tell us so directly? Why is it called the throne of David? Because God is bringing men and women, human beings just like David, into His Family. God is giving the greatest opportunity and glory to the firstfruits who are called out today, before Christ’s Second Coming.

God is re-creating Himself in man. That is His masterpiece. If we deeply understand that vision, it should take our breath away.

We are given the honor of helping God teach this message to every person who has ever lived.

Chronicles gives us God’s perspective. As you deeply study this book, you can sense that this vision is coming from the mind of God!

In the 2008 ministerial conference, I spoke about Chronicles. The previous conference I spoke on the book of Ezra and Nehemiah. At each conference I gave three to four messages on each subject.

At the Feast of Tabernacles between those two conferences, I gave three sermons on the key of David.

Now I see how they all are closely tied together. They are almost like one message. You can see a pattern of what Christ was doing, step by step, to educate His future kings and priests! All three subjects were orchestrated by the mind of God. There was new revelation in each series of messages.

Only the Philadelphia Church of God today could understand the book of Chronicles. God is showing us how to avoid a monstrous, satanic captivity like that of the Laodiceans.

Looking at this book spiritually, Chronicles gives us an Old Testament version of the key of David.

Many prophecies explain how the second physical temple is a type of God’s spiritual temple in this end time.

Chronicles mainly consists of history from the time of David on down to the Babylonian captivity and the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the second physical temple 70 years later. Spiritually, it is about the history of the people of God who came back from Babylon to rebuild spiritual Jerusalem. Spiritually it is for us. God called us out of spiritual Babylon, the 95 percent of God’s people who rebelled against God and wrecked God’s Church and Work in this end time. We are the spiritual Jews who come out of spiritual Babylon to raise up the spiritual ruins (Revelation 3:7-9).

If you are going to focus on that key of David, you need the spiritual Chronicles genealogy in mind. You must know where you came from. You must know what Mr. Armstrong was talking about when he spoke about the two trees and the throne of David. And you must know where that message originated. It came from our Head, the one who has the key of David (verse 7). And He just keeps expanding this vision for us more and more over time!

The Tree of Life

The book of Revelation begins, “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him, to shew unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass; and he sent and signified it by his angel unto his servant John.” This revelation is of Jesus Christ, but it was given to Him by His Father. The Father and the Son are represented by the tree of life—from which the seven churches must eat.

Verse 13 shows Christ in His splendor—with dazzling priestly garments and a face that shines like the sun in its full strength! It’s hard to even imagine such awesome splendor—but God says His people are going to look like that! (e.g. 1 John 3:1-2).

“And when I [John] saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last” (Revelation 1:17).

If people get away from the tree of life—from God—they will never be part of God’s Church. Christ is the Head of the Church, and He always points to the Father, who is Head of the Family.

Revelation 2 begins the messages to the seven churches, starting with the Ephesus era: “Unto the angel of the church of Ephesus write; These things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks; I know thy works, and thy labour …” (verses 1-2).

To this Church era, Christ says, “Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent. … He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God” (verses 5, 7).

What did the Ephesus era fall away from? From the tree of life!

That is where the genealogy in Chronicles begins. Its first word, Adam, points back to the two trees—the very beginning. The Ephesus Church ate from that tree in Revelation 1. But then that first era of the New Testament Church of God—the one that Christ Himself personally prepared—lost touch with the tree of life, and it stopped overcoming.

Read Revelation 2:7 again. God says we must overcome to eat of the tree of life! We must overcome, or we don’t eat spiritually!

Chronicles gives us a clear picture of how to avoid destruction and captivity. If ever there were a time that we needed to know that, it is now. So many of God’s people are in captivity to the devil! It’s the same old scenario of Adam and Eve. The same devil deceived them away from the great God and away from eating the precious food from the tree of life!

Revelation 3:5 says, “He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels.” Christ is talking about God the Father and the God Family. That is our destiny. White raiment is also what Christ wore in the vision of Matthew 17—and there His face shone like the sun! People who feed from the tree of life are going to have white raiment and shining faces like God’s!

God isn’t going to give that incredible reward to somebody who thinks he can casually get by on only 15 or 20 minutes of prayer each day on his knees. The inner man must be renewed day by day, or God isn’t there!

God wants us always to remember that we were dust and that we came into that Family of God from dust. The firstfruits have a magnificent reward as the wife of Jesus Christ. How could you be Christ’s wife and not be God? Not equal to God in rank, but still a God being, or son of the Father. How could you marry the Being in Revelation 1 and not be God? Do you think any personality less than God could marry Christ? Think about that!

Herbert W. Armstrong taught this truth for years—especially in his book Mystery of the Ages. For the last seven years of his life, he repeatedly emphasized it, particularly in his messages to God’s people in the Church. He got into the key of David vision much more deeply than ever before. He told them he was accountable for helping them into the Kingdom of God, and this is how it was going to be done! It is a panoramic vision, a spectacular overview.

Shamefully, though, most of God’s people lost it. As Mr. Armstrong went back to the two trees, they complained that he was repeating himself too much—yet they didn’t even get the message he was trying to teach them!

People think they somehow can get by on very little prayer on their knees, or very little Bible study. But these are profound truths from God! We have to become experts on this Bible—studying it and understanding it and eating from that tree of life every day—or we will die spiritually! Most of God’s people today are dying—a few even inside the Philadelphia Church of God—because they don’t understand the key of David. Many of them don’t even want to understand it.

Look at where the key of David message is positioned in the book of Revelation: just before God describes the “synagogue of Satan” (Revelation 3:7-9). That satanic movement became obvious to many members almost immediately after Mr. Armstrong died in 1986, and we quickly entered the lukewarm, Laodicean era of God’s Church (verses 14-22). Mr. Armstrong tried to hammer the key of David message into the minds of God’s people, but most of them didn’t get it. They were in the synagogue of Satan because they lost the key of David vision, if they even had it.

That is still the only message that will bring them into the Kingdom of God!

This key of David theme of Chronicles is found throughout the Bible. Revelation 22:14-15 say, “Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city. For without are dogs, and sorcerers ….” So there is Adam and the “tree of life” message. Then in verse 16, Christ Himself says, “I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star.” That certainly is the key of David message. You can see the link between the historical overview and the key of David vision. That message is found throughout Revelation and throughout Chronicles, as well as Jeremiah and other books.

The spiritual promise that God would send salvation through the one Seed, Christ, the Bible calls the “scepter promise.” As Herbert W. Armstrong taught, God handed the scepter promise of the kingly line—culminating in Christ and grace through Him—to Judah, son of Jacob and father of all the Jews.

Scepter means kingly office, royal power. It means a badge of command or sovereignty. This promised kingly line leads up to Christ’s Second Coming and involves grace for everyone. This is a message for all humanity! You can never change it; all humanity is tied into David’s throne and Jerusalem and Judah. That is the structure God is going to use throughout eternity.

A Prophetic Book

God expects us to amplify the key of David in every way we can. That is why He continues to reveal more and more about it.

Commentaries say that Chronicles means “book of current events.” That may be right, but I think it is one of the most future-oriented books in the Bible. Certainly it is the most futuristic book in the Old Testament; after all, it is the conclusion to the Old Testament. Primarily, it is a “book of current events” for this end time!

A lot of the history in Chronicles is taken right out of the former prophets, which are prophetic. That illustrates how prophetic the book of Chronicles is! Not very many people understand that.

The main author of Chronicles was Ezra, though he may have had help from Nehemiah. Ezra apparently wrote this book during the Persian period to carnal-minded people. But his message is dual. If you look at it spiritually, this is also a message for us today—specifically for the Philadelphia Church of God.

Chronicles was written after the Jews had gone into captivity and returned to raise the ruins. Ezra had a clear, broad view of all that history. After Zerubbabel rebuilt the second temple, Ezra helped the people establish God’s law. That was his job: to establish the law. Ezra really knew how to build a foundation for raising the ruins!

Those who came back from the captivity needed to be encouraged. They needed a good, positive message, and Ezra gave them one. You find almost nothing about David’s sins in Chronicles. After all, those problems were already in the history books—Ezra didn’t need to rehash them. Instead, he was trying to show these people how to do it right!

The Bible is a coded book—and God has broken that code in Chronicles.