Revelation
The Revelation to John
1 Jesus Christ’s revelation which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place, and which he sent by his angel and indicated to his servant John, 2 who testified to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, all that he saw. 3 Happy are he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy and keep what is written in it; for the time is near.
4 John to the seven churches in Asia: Grace to you, and peace, from him who Is and Was and Is Coming, and from the Seven Spirits that are before his throne, 5* and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To him who loves us and liberated us from our sins with his blood, 6 and made us into a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, belong glory and might forever and ever; amen! 7 Lo, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye shall see him, and they who pierced him, and all the tribes of the earth shall wail over him. Yes; amen
8 I am the A and the Z, says the Lord God; the one who Is and Was and Is Coming; the Almighty.
9* I, John, your brother and fellow-participator in distress and royalty and endurance in Jesus, was in the island called Patmos for the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. 10* I was in the spirit on the Lord’s day, and heard behind me a loud voice, as if it were the sound of a trumpet 11 saying “What you see, write in a book and send to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea.” 12 And I turned around to see the voice that was speaking with me; and when I turned around I saw seven golden lampstands, 13 and in the midst of the lampstands the like of a son of man dressed in a long robe and belted at the breast with a golden belt, 14 his head and hair white like white wool, like snow, and his eyes like flame, 15 and his feet like green gold as if it had been refined in a furnace, and his voice like the sound of much water; 16* with seven stars in his right hand and a sharp two-edged sword coming out of his mouth; and his appearance like the sun when it shines its strongest. 17 And when I saw him I fell at his feet like a dead man; and he put his right hand on me, saying
“Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last, 18* he who is alive and was dead and is alive, lo, forever and ever, and has the keys of death and the grave. 19 So write what you saw, and what is, and what is to be after this. 20 The secret meaning of the seven stars that you saw lying in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands: the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches; and the lampstands seven, seven churches.