The Scroll of Life

The Scene in Heaven (Revelation Chapter 5)

The Transition Anticipated

Beginning with Revelation 4, a transition is anticipated. Note the highlighted words:

Rev 4.9-10a
And when [ὅταν]
the living beings [will] give [δίδωμι future active indicative -3P] glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne, to Him who lives forever and ever,
the twenty-four elders will fall down [πίπτω future middle indicative -3P] before Him who sits on the throne,
and will worship Him [προσκυνέω future active indicative -3P] ...

The four living beings unceasingly declare God's holiness and self-existence (“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come.”)—until, that is, they begin their “new” declaration of “glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne”. At that point, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, John uses the future tense: the “the living beings [will] give …” “twenty-four elders will fall down before Him who sits on the throne, and will worship Him ...”.

The Transition Initiated

As noted above in Rev 4.9-10 the verbs are found in the future tense; John did not say that the event above actually took place as he observed it (that is, within the reference time frame of chapter 4), but rather when a certain condition is satisfied (namely, when the four living beings “[will] give glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne”), then it will take place.

For a moment, let's jump ahead in the exposition here to corroborate this point by looking at Rev 5.8:

Rev 5.8
When He took the scroll, the four living beings and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each one holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense (which are the prayers of the saints).

Note that the tense of the highlighted verbs is now aorist tense rather than future, indicating that the action of the main verb has taken place. It is no longer anticipated to occur sometime in the future; rather, it took place within the reference time frame of chapter 5.

In contrast to the assertions of future actions presented in chapter 4, John now observes that the Lamb took the scroll from the right hand of Him who sits on the throne then, subsequently, the four living beings and 24 elders prostrated themselves before the throne. And, given the strong similarity between the following two phrases, “Worthy are You, our Lord and our God ...” in Rev 4.11 and “Worthy are You ...” in Rev 5.9 (spoken of the One who sits on the throne and the Lord Christ, respectively), we can safely conclude that the transition anticipated in chapter 4 took place in chapter 5!

It is now time to look at the Greek words used for scroll in the Revelation.