Welcome to compass finding spirituality in the everyday. I'm
Ryan Dunn and I don't feel like there's enough doom
and gloom in the world. How about you? We need to amp up
the anxiety. Don't we like more darkness, more
defeat, right? So we're gonna dive into Revelation
and apocalypse in the bitter end of all things.
Okay. I'm just kidding. Sort of, sort of kidding. We're talking
about revelation in this episode. That's the final book of the
Bible. It's often pointed towards as a blueprint for
the end of the world, but we're gonna see a bit
different side of revelation in this episode. Not a
side that's about doom and gloom in the end, but one that is about
a new creation and hope and justice. Our
guide for this romp through revelation is Matthew
Ian Fleming. Matthew has given us the book, the end
is the beginning, revelation, hope, and the love that
lit the stars. Matthew launched and leads church anew,
which creates fresh content and vibrant gatherings for the
church that is becoming. He is a pastor in the
evangelical Lutheran church in America and is based in
Minneapolis and possibly like you grew up hearing warnings
about being left behind or that the antichrist walked among
us or that any day Jesus could return with a big sword and
start chopping people. So if that sounds like you, or you're just
curious about things like the rapture, the end times and the second
coming, this episode is for you. Now
speaking of the end of things, 2024 is coming to a
close. As this episode comes out, this episode will
be our last one of the year as we'll take a short break for the
holidays. So our next compass episode will be out to
you January 8, 2025. Looking forward
to sharing some new year's hope with you, but back to the
present, let's meet Matthew Ian Fleming here on
compass.
Pastor Matthew, you and I share, it seems like
a bit of a, theological
heritage in that. I also spent a lot of time riding
around in church fans, arguing about radio stations and
listening to K LOVE and the like, so just out
of curiosity, bands like newsboys,
delirious, auto adrenaline, 3rd day, those bands
from the early odds. Like, what CCM band from that
generation are you still likely to rock today? Oh, man. So
I just had this conversation with somebody who was like who who came up to
me at church, and they had read a chunk of my book. And he was
like, you made me remember 5 Iron Frenzy. And I listened to that
speech. 5 Iron Frenzy was so much fun. I go I
would go back to Reliant k, actually. That was that was
my jam as a as a youth. And I
still listen to, a decent amount of contemporary Christian music. We do
some at church too. And Yeah. So I listen to newer stuff as well,
like, oh goodness. Now I can't remember the name of the
group. It's a collective. Well, anyway, he can edit that
out. But REN Collective. I don't know. That's the only thing I can do. Not
not that one. I like some of REN Collective stuff too. But,
but Reliant k I would say Reliant k is really the,
the, the band that I'll still go back to and listen to every now and
again. Mostly out of nostalgia, I think. It just,
it does something to me. So yeah. That's Yeah. Speaks to a time and place
in your life and Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah.
Yeah. Well, our conversation is really geared around,
thoughts about the end times and revelation. And so this is how I'm going
to execute my, my pro transition here.
Do you have a favorite rapture or revelation song?
Oh, man. I love that.
I think so I mentioned in the book, Peace on
Earth by U2, and it's not exactly like an end time
song, but I just love the feel of
it. I used to perform with a band that toured over,
the state of Minnesota when I was in college, and, and we
sang that during Christmas time. And
and it it just has this haunting hunger for
God's presence that will make things better. And I think that really gets at the
core. So probably not not about the rapture or about the
end times, but I think it really gets us into how I
read Revelation, which is a group of people who are who are hungry for
God to intervene in the moments, of history
and, and that apocalyptic literature can function as a
way to give people hope when they don't
have it. You know, it seems maybe
this is just kind of my rose colored hermeneutic that I bring
to music in general, but it seems like there are is a lot of
music expressing that kind of hope or
intent, you know, or even a recognition like the world isn't as it
should be. We're longing for it to be as it could be.
Right? Yeah. I think, I think there's music, in all sorts
of traditions that do exactly that that, you know, contemporary Christian for sure. There's
some of that. But also, I think pop music,
will often have, a deeply theological
hunger. So one of my ponderings as a worship
planner even is to see how secular and sacred those lines
can be blurred, because often, music
that we hear off of the K LOVE tracks,
really resonates with a deep, longing
for, for a different way, a better way.
Well, I hope we can keep this conversation a little bit light given the the
topic at hand. So we'll just jump
in with this question. What is the Bible? What is the Bible?
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think that's exactly right.
So the the the book that I wrote, is a book
about Revelation first. Yeah. But, the way that
I read the Bible is distinct than the way that I was taught. I
was taught that the bible was written by God with a really, really, really, really,
really long pencil, and that it goes directly into our
ears and there's nothing in between. And it just
so happens that there's all sorts of things. There's year there's years in
between. There's context. There's cultures. There's translation.
So, so I've grown to really love
the interpretive, methodologies that are
available to us. They've been a gift to me in my own faith life.
So I I introduced my own definition of scripture because I just think
it's helpful for people to know, where I'm coming
from. And it's this, it's that, that the Bible
is our witness to the living voice of God, that it's
a witness to God speaking in our midst. And what I love
about this definition and just kind of settling into it and playing with
it is that the Bible speaks from multiple vantage points,
from different voices, different perspectives, different times,
different cultures. And each of the books of the
Bible and even different sections within each book might speak from a
different, vantage point. And
allowing each of those voices to speak leaves us with a chorus,
rather than just one single, tome. It leaves us with
a chorus or a library, of different voices that might
speak, in different ways and at different times. And
each each can be a gift and a challenge, a wrestling match
or a struggle or, or an invitation. So,
that's, that's a little bit about how I enter the Bible. Yeah.
And that's important to set up because it, we are going to talk quite a
bit about revelation. And revelation is a
book that in the Christian world, we sometimes have a hard
time marking in time. So there's a
school of thought that says, well, revelation speaks to events of the
Roman empire centuries ago. And then there's another school of thought that
says, well, revelation is this prediction of events, which have yet to
occur. You are able to expound a little bit on
revelation being something that is relevant to the here and
now. Can you talk a little bit about why Revelation is so relevant
to our modern context? And I think I think it's because
of a both end of that question. Right? That,
that, yes, Revelation had a really clear
well, probably clearer than it is now message to people in ancient
times. Mhmm. In a time that was full of
really significant change, and,
and a huge Roman
occupation, and that presence is is all across Revelation. You can't
ignore it. And so you have to enter that
imagination to actually wonder about how
it might be speaking to today. And so I think it's a
both and. I I think entering that,
that world, John's world, and that imagine the imagination of this
vision actually invites us into,
seeing how it might speak and whisper and shout and
scream, into today's context. And part of
that is, wondering about where we stand.
So the Christian community in ancient times was not
in power. It was, it was a
minority, a significant minority in a,
in a Roman led and ruled context.
And that would change in a few short 100 years to
Christianity becoming the religion of the Roman Empire.
And that change is significant, And we live on the other side of
that. And yet I think we live in a time where
people are asking the questions of, does
Christian faith have the same resonance and relevance today as it did in
previous generations? And lots of people are lamenting the decline
of the church and the declining significance of,
of Christian perspective. So it leads us into
those same sorts of conversations and questions of how do
we interact with this world? I think the other,
interesting contribution that that Revelation can have to today is
the significant crises that we face. We face
crises of of incredible polarization
in in the United States context. We we face crises of
of global climate change and crises of, of
violence and and wars and rumors of wars as it says in Matthew,
but, but there are significant crises facing
us. And the the promise of revelation is that
God is in the midst of those, with
promise and perseverance, and sustaining
hope.
Well, in your book, you mentioned that revelation can be a source both
of, of hope and of humor.
That piques my interest, pastor Matthew, what's so funny about revelation?
I mean, yeah, what is so funny about revelation?
That's great. I mean
so so part of it is that it gets used and misused
so frequently that you have to laugh a little bit.
I mean, it's the punch line to to so many jokes in popular culture,
from the pearly gates. Right? How many how many jokes do we have about Saint
Peter and the pearly gates? The only place that the pearly gates appear are in
the pages of Revelation. And it just so happens that nobody's
guarding them. They're flung wide open. It's a
little different than, than the jokes often insinuate. But,
but I think, you know, Revelation was,
was a source of a lot of fear for me growing up. And some of
that was growing up with a lot of rapture theology. And so the way that
I've dealt with it is by finding a way to laugh, and
finding a way, to find humor in these pages. So
I I don't I don't know that Revelation was intended to be a humorous
book, but it is a coping mechanism and it's a way that we can
actually dig in deeper to the message by laughing off the things that maybe
hurt once, and wondering if there's something deeper that it might have to say to
us. You mentioned the rapture,
and it's something that has become so infused with
a lot of Christian theology. Can you tell us
about the rapture for, for those who may be unfamiliar?
And I, I think that there's probably a significant
portion of our audience for this podcast who may not be
familiar with either rapture theology or where the
idea of the rapture came from. Came from. Yeah. Exactly.
In fact, I was just teaching this at our own congregation this week, and I
just asked for a show of hands, like, who who's had experience with the
rapture? And most people knew what it was
theoretically. And and I think the the clearest
example is the Left Behind series. It was such a national best seller,
that it became table conversation
in all sorts of places where it might not have otherwise.
But what I was surprised by, was someone raised their hand and said, I read
Left Behind and I just figured somebody made it up. I didn't think it was
I just thought it was a novel. I had no idea it was connected to
a broader theological tradition. And that was
such the opposite experience to mine. When Left Behind
came out, it was like, this is this is what's gonna happen.
Mhmm. So just to kinda put a, put a pin in what
rapture is, it is this this vision that at some
point, the the the the elect, the
chosen, the true believers, however you might, articulate that,
will will be caught up and brought into heaven. And then there
will be many who are left behind through a great time
of, violence and tribulation and challenge,
until ultimately, Jesus returns to make
everything whole. If if that's kind of the arc of Revelation
Theology and that we're on the lookout, for that
time when those might be caught up. And and to
put a point on it, when I was young, you know the
moment where, like, you're in the grocery store and,
and at 6 or 7 years old, you're looking at the cereal box on the
bottom shelf and thinking, oh, if we get this cereal box, it comes with that
bouncy ball, and I'll get to get the bouncy ball. And then all of a
sudden, you look up and mom is gone. It
just so happens she's in the aisle next door. But
I, in my, understanding, was certain
that she had been raptured and I was left behind. And so
not only the lostness of that moment as a little kid, but that
that's guys in theology and and
spirituality and an expectation that,
that God might whisk away the people that I love and leave me
behind, is a really fearful place to be in.
So to to to go even
further, revelation or rapture theology
is something that emerged so much later in in
Christian tradition. It's not a part of the the long standing
tradition of how Christians have read revelation or or thought
about Jesus' return, until
the 1800 about, and it started in in the
British Isles and then caught fire, among the,
the revivals here in the United States, and then grew
and grew into the 19 seventies and
beyond, among some significant changes and shifts
in in, political structures and all of the changes that were
going on in the 19 sixties counterculture and then,
the 2 1000, y two k and the 2
1, terrorist attacks really kind of
amplified this message of these are the end times and,
and we're in the midst of it. And so it gave a it gave a
way of looking at, and making sense of
the, the strange things in our world, but using,
using the Bible in ways that really don't let the text speak for
themselves. And so rapture theology provides,
an angle to look at these texts, but the word rapture occurs only
once in second Thessalonians. It uses
a a a passage where Jesus gets apocalyptic in Matthew 24,
and then uses revelation to kind of tell a story
that really doesn't hold up when you look at the texts,
as at least as my reading has shown me.
Well, what made you decide to dive so deeply into
Revelation and rapture and end times theology now?
Yeah. I mean, I think one side of that answer is
that Revelation has stuck with me.
I I had always been curious about it as a kid and, again, growing up
with a tradition like this. It was a focal
point of mine. It kind of became this haunting fear in the
back of my mind all the time. And so I've always had a
curiosity about it. And when I taught it to our church, I found that a
lot of people are curious about it. People would show up for a Bible
study on Revelation when they wouldn't show up for any other Bible study. You know,
I have 10 or 15 people at Bible study. Oh, Oh, but we're gonna talk
about revelation. Oh, man. Do they turn 1? No. It's 30. Yeah.
So that was 1. But I think I think it's
really important work to give people the tools
to understand, what this book says. You
know, Martin Luther, who is, you know, a reformer
and and part of the tradition that I serve now as a Lutheran pastor,
was pretty reluctant to give revelation to people. He
said, don't go there. It it it won't do any good. It'll leave
you down lead you down rabbit holes that that aren't gonna help your faith. And
there's some truth to that. John Calvin, one of the
other reformers, wrote a commentary
on every book of scripture except Revelation.
Mhmm. You know, just negating its importance in some
way. And I think that in times like these,
when Revelation gets turned into memes on Facebook, when
revelation gets, to be, a punch line
of a TikTok or or or
meme elsewhere, it's really important that we give
people tools to understand what's actually in the book and to at
least have a framework of understanding the broader impact.
So the word I've been using as I teach it is that I don't I
don't wanna teach you every single verse and get you lost in the in
the in the in the weeds, I want you to step back and see
the overall arc of this book and be able to speak with confidence
about what it means so that when you bump into somebody who might
mislead you, you can say, no, I I know a bit about that book and
I and I'm comfortable with where I am. It it can be a
really misleading, book in the wrong
hands. It can be used all of these strange images can be used
to lead people down some really dangerous corners.
And I really wanna equip people to know what's in it so
that they might not be misled.
Mhmm. In recognizing that fear
of revelation and how people might
interpret it on their own, you know, somebody is going to
hear this podcast and they're going to dive in and they're going to be like,
okay, so I'm not familiar with the book. I'm going to dive in and within
a couple of chapters be like, I have no idea what is happening
here. Is there kind of a overarching
hermeneutic or lens that, you can supply for
us with which we might, bring
to our reading that Yeah. Might lend to some understanding, especially
towards our modern day context? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. I I I think so. The the one that I
introduce in the book is Psalm 139, which
is we have these anchors in our tradition. These kinda
core pieces, at least in my tradition, it was memorizing scripture,
that are just a key component of of who we are. And John
316, of course, is one of the the favorites. Another one that
I just taught recently is Psalm 46, God is our refuge and strength, a very
present help in trouble. And,
and and, you know, Romans 8, that there's nothing that can separate us from the
love of God in Christ Jesus. I mean, there are these
anchors. The anchor that I introduced at the beginning of
this book is Psalm 139. Where can I go from
your presence? If I rise on the wings of the morning or
settle at the farthest side of the dawn, if I make my bed in the
heavens or or at the depths of the pit, there you are
holding me in the palm of your hand, to summarize anyway.
And I think that that, as a hermeneutic, really helps
people tread through revelation.
That, that God is there
in the midst of unbelievable violence, in the midst
of of really scary things. The other thing that I'll
add is that, actually reading the end of Revelation
can provide a way to see where all of this is going.
There are 3 images, of what God
hopes for for creation at the end of Revelation, and it's a new
heaven and a new earth. Not as in wiping away and building something
new, but actually tending this this chaos
and turning it into something beautiful. And then the
second, a new a new city, a new Jerusalem. And it's
this massive city that's bigger than
any city today or even in ancient times, big
enough for everybody to have a room.
And then finally of this new garden of of the tree of life,
a new Eden, where God provides for the healing of the
nations. And if you read that section first, I
actually think it'll give you the conviction to to read through the whole book and
know that that's where that's that's the promise.
That's the promise of God to sustain, and to be
present in the most trying times.
So what do we do with the rest of it then? Are these writings
about false prophets and stinging locusts? Are
these predictions of things which are to come or
observances of realities that are, or what are you making of that?
Yeah. I mean, the the tool that I introduce is, like, it takes
some reframing and and rearranging of some mental
furniture if you've been taught that revelation is really a blueprint for
the end of the world. I don't read
revelation that way anymore. I don't read it as a prediction
that we need to somehow unlock and and compare all of these
strange numbers and notes. Some of those numbers are really
easy to interpret. The number 7, for example, which
means God's wholeness and complete, hemming
in of everything that is. 7 days to
creation and, and, and all of the
like. But some of the numbers are
confusing, and they remain confusing. And scholars conjecture
and guess, but they're conjectures and guesses.
So, so what I do with all of the stuff in the
middle is really connect it back to the context in which it
came, which is speaking about the unbelievable violence of
the Roman Empire and wondering about God's
presence in the midst of unbelievable violence of empires
of today. And again, then that begs the question of which
side of the coin are we on? Revelation draws a line
that Christians are to be, subversion
and challenge to that empirical might and stand apart
from it, and that God tends Christians in the midst of that.
But at times in our history, Christians have been
empire. And are we standing in that moment or are
we standing amidst those who are being trampled by its
feet?
How has this
new or evolved understanding of revelation
impacted how you live out your your faith
in today's context? Yeah.
Yeah. That's a great question.
Well, hold on. Maybe we pause here, and you
can reaffirm the question. But how honest do you want me to be, Ryan? I
mean, we're Yeah. So selective. I don't wanna get you in places
you don't wanna go. But,
Yeah. I mean, what I might say is
that we are called in this moment
to speak on behalf of those who are on the
margins and to recognize if we are if
we have power and where we have power and to use that power for the
sake of our neighbors. Something like that. Does that feel fair enough?
Yeah. Maybe even mentioning the election context, whichever side of
the coin you might be on. I don't know. Yeah. No. You can go there.
Alright. That sounds good. Maybe just set the question one more
time. Yes.
Sorry. Random order.
All right, here we go. So as
you've come to this new understanding
or adopted this new understanding of revelation, how has
that impacted the way that you live out your
faith in our modern context or in your community around
you? I think that's really important
question for us to ask today. I mean, you and I are recording
this a few days after the 2024 election.
Mhmm. And, we've been through a season
of campaigning that has become, vile
in a lot of ways. And we're living
in the impending fear of what, will
come. At least I should say I'm living in an impending fear of
what will come. And I sit in a place that has
significant privilege. I sit in a place that
I'm not fearful of being rounded up and
sent out of this country. But I
think the invitation is to think about the people who
are impacted by that. Revelation speaks to a
people who are in the midst of that
deeply fearful moment, and it gives them
hope and shows them what happens to empires,
but it also gives an indictment and a challenge to
those who might stand on the side of empire.
And I think for Christians today, it's really that question.
Which side are we on and might we side with those
who are marginalized and those who are under the wheels of
injustice? And might we, like Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, drive
a spoke into the wheel itself instead of just
bandaging those who are wounded by it.
So how does the reading of this book
and by by the book, I mean, revelation supply
you with hope for the context
in which we're in, where, you know, just recognizing the reality
that we are polarized. People are a little uneasy
around each other. A significant portion of our
population is fearful of what is to come.
How how are we reading hope out of that? Yeah.
Yeah. There is this flow in Revelation.
It actually functions in cycles. So
each time it dives into this kind of painful
vision of, of violence and terror and
fear, it then moves back up into
a chorus of music and song and worship.
I think that there is something beautiful about that,
that there are very few places where we bump elbows
with people who think differently. There are very few places
in our world where we can sit next to one
another and share a cup of coffee or a meal
or a song or a prayer
or hearing a sermon. And I know many of
our churches are not those places anymore. Some
of them are. I serve a church that is one of those
places where people who voted for different candidates
might sing together on Sunday morning.
And that gives me an incredible amount of hope.
And I think that worship is a piece that rewires
us. And so I think the invitation of revelation
is to take worship seriously. It's to
take worship so seriously that we expect that there
will be transformation that happens on Sunday mornings or Wednesday
nights or Sunday evenings. To take it so
seriously that we expect that the spirit will
move amongst us. That we expect that there will be
transformation out of our congregations and into the
community and into the political sphere, but that that's where it
happens. Revelation is a songbook for our church.
Even if you've never read a page of it, you've sung a hymn that draws
from Revelation, and it continues to be the
imagination of our worship spaces. So
how might we take worship so seriously that it might
actually transform our communities?
Now I wanna note that revelation ends with the
image of it ends with a lot of images, but
amongst that is, is the tree, right? And reminiscent
of, of the trees in the beginning, that we see in
Genesis. And here in this podcast, we began in talking about
song we're ending in talking about song. So,
and it maybe with that, I don't know,
there's this sick, there's this cyclical
underpinning that suggests that just as things
were, set out with purpose in
righteousness and justice in the beginning. So to it, it may
be in the end, and which
isn't actually the end. And can you speak to us a little bit? Because we
keep talking about revelation as being like the closing off
point or, you know, even well, the
name of your book is the end is the beginning. So how is
this what we mark as the end so often the end times, how is it
the beginning? And again, this is rearranging
the furniture in our brains a bit. But if you start to put aside that
notion that it's a blueprint for the end of the world, it
actually gives, some real promise to
God sustaining and being present in times
of deep uncertainty and violence and war and famine
and, and oppression. And also the
promise that God is tilling the soil. That God is
tending the garden. That God's, promises
for fruit that will fall from this this tree of life that
will feed everyone. And leaves for the healing of the
nations. So, so revelation,
again, stepping back and looking at the big picture the big
picture can actually invite us to
lean more deeply into the communities, to to wonder
more profoundly about our impact, as fellow
humans and neighbors, to wonder how the gospel then
propels us into, into work alongside of the
marginalized. And again, reading this book at the end of
scripture might actually begin a new
relationship with, our faith, with with the
Bible, with this living voice of God that's speaking
afresh, and anew, in our in our
communities and in our world. So I hope that if you've read
Revelation, you've gotten all sorts of tools of going back and
reading other corners of scripture. That maybe it might ignite in people,
a way of looking at this ancient book that speaks anew in our own
lives. That calls us to witness and to acts of of
justice and kindness. And to wonder, you know, what does
the Lord require of me? But to do justice, and love kindness,
and walk humbly with God.
Well put. Well, we're drawing
to the end of our podcast time together. I
hope it's a a new beginning,
a revelation for somebody to, to begin
to explore more for, people who maybe wanna
follow-up on what you're doing or what you're up to? Where is a
convenient spot for them to do so? Yeah. The
easiest, place is to, to go to churchanew.org.
I'm the director of a movement of congregations and
and and leaders. And so there's lots of great
resources on that website, and you can find more information
there. My book is available wherever books are found. The
title, The End is the Beginning, Revelation, Hope, and the Love that Lit
the Stars. And I hope that it's helpful.
Request it at your local library. Buy it from your local bookseller.
Or all of the online retailers have it as well. Cool.
Fantastic. Well, Matthew, thank you so much for joining us. Thank
you, Ryan. I really appreciate the time. Thanks
for joining us. Did this episode insight a
longing for more theological exploration or cultural
observances? Of course it did. And you're gonna wanna check out another episode
of Compass. If you were into this one, then you've got to check out
episode number 135 with Derek Kubelis. It's about hell
and purgatory and wicked things like that. Actually, it's really mostly about God's
love, but we dove deep into a theology of hell in
that episode. And I feel like episode 129 with Lenny
Duncan would be a good companion to this particular episode too. And
that episode, we talked about hip hop from a spiritual perspective,
but a number of the themes shared some resonance with what we
talked about in this episode. While you're listening, leave a
rating and or review. The Compass podcast is brought to you by
United Methodist Communications. You can check out all of
our episodes, get show notes and relevant links at umc.org
/compass. And that is all for this week. We're taking
a bit of time off since our next episode will be due to drop
on Christmas day, which I gotta admit is not a great day to be releasing
episodes. So we'll be back a fresh and new
with something new on January 8, 2025.
Peace to you until then.