4 After this I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven! And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, “Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this.”
Chapter 4, all shades of interpretation agree, commences a new section of the Book. On the view we have already decided to follow, it opens the second vision, continuing to the end of chapter 7, and again covering the entire Church-age from Christ's first coming to His sec ond, and describes conditions obtaining throughout the whole period. This has, however, been vehemently disputed as an interpretation by those who hold 'dispensational' views of prophecy, and we must needs pause at this point to establish the position we take, and vindi cate it with adequate evidence and reason for holding it.
It is asserted that between chapters 3 and 4 of Revelation the Rapture of the Church takes place (see 1 Thessalonians 4:16) and that therefore what is related from chapter 4 on wards, concerning the fearful tribulation that is to come, has no application to the Church since it has been removed from the scene. If this view is correct, however, then the interpreta tion we have already given in chapters 1-3 must go by default, for there we assumed the exis tence of a Church in tribulation, as indeed John (1:9) and Jesus (2:9) seem to do. Two things in 4:1 are significant in this connection. It is sometimes held that the words 'Come up hither' refer to the Rapture of the Church, but this is surely very precarious as an explanation of the words, which, after all, were spoken to John, not to the Church, and it is fanciful to make them refer to anything else than John's own immediate experience. Also, there is a vital con nection between the 'door opened in heaven' and the 'door' opened in 3:20, which main tains the continuity of thought and message. He who admits Christ unreservedly will be ad mitted into the secrets of heaven. Indeed, we might very legitimately take chapter 4 with its vision of the Throne as an explication of the promise Christ has just made in 3:21 that those who overcome will be given to sit with Him in His Throne. The new vision, therefore, is a fresh incentive and encouragement to the Church to hold fast and be faithful in the midst of all its tribulation.