# Mystery Explained  ## Metadata - Author: [[David Campbell and Andrew Fountain]] - Full Title: Mystery Explained - Category: #books ## Highlights - Revelation is not a handbook to last-days events. It is a pastoral letter written to Christians of every age and generation on how to live lives faithful to God and Christ in the midst of all the challenges a hostile pagan world throws at them. ([Location 82](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=82)) - Revelation is full of the Old Testament. There are more allusions to the Old Testament in Revelation than in all other books of the New Testament combined. Most scholars estimate there are over 500 such allusions in Revelation’s 404 verses, compared with less than 200 in all of Paul’s letters. ([Location 87](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=87)) - prophecy in the Bible deals far more with calling people to repentance and obedience in light of God’s purposes in history than about the simple prediction of future events. ([Location 94](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=94)) - The story line of Revelation retraces that of the Exodus. Christians are portrayed as leaving the bondage of spiritual Egypt or Babylon, crossing the fearful sea where evil resides, and entering the place of God’s protection in the wilderness as they fix their eyes on the eventual goal of the eternal promised land. ([Location 99](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=99)) - Revelation takes us back to the garden of Eden in order to demonstrate that God’s goal in that history is to restore the garden but in an even better form, one in which the very presence of evil is forever banished outside its confines. ([Location 104](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=104)) - The purpose of the parables was to render the gospel message hard to understand for unbelievers, whose hearts were thus further hardened. But for those whose hearts were right, the parables served to drive them deeper into a desire for understanding. ([Location 319](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=319)) - The prophecy is not a set of predictions but, as in the Old Testament, a divine command from God calling for response. ([Location 468](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=468)) - they overcome the attacks of the devil, even though they may appear to suffer defeat, as Christ did on the cross. ([Location 525](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=525)) - even in this time of Satan’s wrath, his power is limited (20:2; Mk. 3:27), and the power of God’s kingdom, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead (Eph. 1:19-20) is available to his church. ([Location 2383](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=2383)) - According to the Old Testament, to “know” a name implies having control over the person. The mysterious or unknown nature of Christ’s name here points to his absolute sovereignty over the world. ([Location 3597](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B099M8G9CT&location=3597))