What do you make of the image of Jesus as both lion and lamb? How do you think these come together in these chapters of Revelation, and does the combined image help us understand how the author understood who Jesus was?
The author uses paradox (lion and lamb) throughout these chapters to create a kind of tension in our understanding of God. How does this paradox communicate the nature of Jesus? Are there themes from the Gospels or Pauline epistles that are echoed here?
This letter is especially poetic in style. What literary devices or patterns in the writing stand out as poetic or stylized to you? How does this affect the way the letter is received?
Applying the Text:
Revelation is written in part to contrast the sovereignty of God with the sovereignty of the Emperor. How do you reflect on the relationship between God’s authority and the authority of government or economic power today?
In chapter 5, the one who is worthy of the throne is the one who is slain. What does this teach us about God’s power and how we are to follow Christ? Is our worthiness built on the might of the lion or the vulnerability of the lamb (or both)?