Lesson 2: Things That Have Been, part 2

Revelation 1:7-8
7 Behold, He is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him, and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of Him. Even so. Amen.
8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

Before Jesus ascended into heaven, He told His disciples He would return. He would return physically to the earth, and the angels who spoke to the disciples said He would return exactly as He had left – that meant Jesus would return so people could see Him coming out of the clouds just like they had seen Him go. A lot of people are confused by this today, so let us begin this lesson by explaining the two appearances that are still in the future from Jesus.

First, this return described in these verses and in many others in this book of Revelation, describe Him coming in a way that is described in verse seven above as, “every eye will see Him.” We have the technology today with cameras and internet which, for the first time in history, can make this a reality. All of us who have Internet connection have witnessed live events from another part of the world as we see it in our own homes half a world away. Since we will see later in this study a specific date this event will happen, we can be assured that cameras will be fixed on the skies so that literally everyone on earth will be able to watch this event take place.

Verse seven above also says that many people who watch Him return will weep and mourn because of His return. We will study more about this later as well, but for now we will just say that the weeping and mourning will be because they realize that Jesus has told the truth all the time, and they refused to believe it.


Jesus told His disciples before He left that He was telling them information that would come true in the future for one specific reason – so they would be able to see and believe Him when they saw these things happening. This is one of the main reasons why this book of Revelation was written – so we who are living at this time in history can see and understand that the things Jesus told us in the Bible were real, are now coming to pass, and we know beyond any shadow of doubt that He is God.

In verse eight above Jesus calls himself “the Alpha and the Omega” – meaning He is the first and the last. Alpha and Omega are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, and Jesus meant it as a picture of who He is. How better can someone describe a Person who is described as the “word of God” than with the first and last letters of an alphabet. This verse also gives us a clue in interpreting the rest of this book when it describes Jesus as the one who “is and was and is to come.” This book of Revelation will describe things that are in the past, that are in the present, and that are coming in the future.