5 Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals. 2 And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, “Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals?” 3 And no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look into it, 4 and I began to weep loudly because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or to look into it. 5 And one of the elders said to me, “Weep no more; behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.”
Many are the interpretations given to the book with the seven seals, few of them lacking in some relevance and significance. It is held, for example, that the book which no man can open speaks of the fact that man is not master of his own destiny - it is in the hands of Christ. Man tries in vain to unravel the agony and mystery of life and fulfil its real purpose. But hu man history will not break its inevitable course, and the continuity of sin cannot be broken by any human hand. Indeed, all 'easy' solutions of the problem make shipwreck on the rock of man's past.
Man cannot undo the past. As Omar Khayyam says,
'The moving finger writes, and having writ
Moves on; nor all thy piety nor wit
Can lure it back to cancel half a line,
Nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.'
'The handwriting', declares Paul, 'is against us' (Colossians 2:14),
But a more general meaning even than this is called for, of which the above is only a specialised application. For the book with the seven seals is the book of human destiny, in the sense of containing God's purpose for the world, unfolding the principles of God's govern ment of the world. The idea is not only that Christ alone can make them clear - Christ is the key to history - but also that. He has charge of these purposes. The fact that the book is sealed indicates God's plan unfulfilled and unexecuted, and unless it is opened God's purposes for the world are not carried out. The book contains, if you like, the 'blue-print' for the establish ing of that wonderful vision in chapter 4 of the sea of glass. No wonder John wept, for if the book remained closed it would mean that God was defeated by His own universe and that evil had triumphed. This is the real force of the 'Weep not' in 5, for he is told that the Lion of the tribe of Judah has prevailed to open the book. The full significance of this we see in the following verses, which we read tomorrow.