A Revelation Invitation

by N. T. Wright, Westminster John Knox Press, 2011. (In 2023 the book was republished with a study guide by Michael L. Kirkindoll.)

This book [Revelation] in fact offers one of the clearest and sharpest visions of God’s ultimate purpose for the whole creation, and of the way in which the powerful forces of evil, at work in a thousand ways but not least in idolatrous and tyrannous political systems, can be and are being overthrown through the victory of Jesus the Messiah and the consequent costly victory of his followers. (from the Introduction)

[L]ike all answers to do with Revelation, it remains partial and puzzling: this is a book designed to go on making you ponder and pray, not one designed to answer everything to your satisfaction. (p60)

[T]hrough the awful turmoil and trouble of the world, God is establishing through Jesus a people who, following the lamb, are to bear witness to God’s kingdom through their own suffering, through which the world will be brought to repentance and faith, so that ultimately God will be king over all. (p 103)

If you have never read a commentary on Revelation and want to know where to start, this is the commentary I recommend. Wright, maybe the greatest theologian of our generation, has a gift for communicating mysterious and complex concepts into plain English, which is to our benefit when tackling the book of Revelation.

As you read this commentary you proceed with a sense that you are having a conversation over coffee with the author. He shares from his life and relates to our everyday experiences. This theologian/historian is also a master at speaking to the social, cultural and political conditions of the first-century Roman world—similar in many ways to our modern experience.

Although Wright writes to “Everyone”, his interpretation of Revelation is not simplistic. He frames Revelation within the wider narrative of the Bible as a whole. Then, within that context he always writes with John’s overall aim in mind: God’s sovereignty over all creation, over the nations and over the circumstances affecting God’s people. He also speaks to both the destructiveness and the destruction of evil which prompts the Spirit’s call to repentance for the world and for his people.

If you are looking for a clear, sound, understandable explanation of Revelation, you will get that in N. T. Wright’s Revelation for Everyone.