Son and Heir

Son and Heir July 23, 2015

Revelation 21:7-8 is set up as a chiasm:

A. It is done.

B. I am Alpha and Omega, beginning and end.

C. I give water to the thirsty.

D. Those who overcome will inherit these things and be sons.

C’. Cowardly, etc. 

B’. Have share in the lake of fire.

A’. This is the second death.

The associations are not obvious on the surface, but on further reflection they are striking. The “completion” announced at the beginning of verse 7 (A) includes the completion of punishment, the “second death” at the end of the passage (A’). God identifies Himself as Alpha and Omega, and gives Himself to those who are faithful to the end; He gives Himself in fiery judgment to the cowardly and unbelieving. They too are in the presence of God (cf. 14:10) but are tormented by the flame of Yahweh that is His love. C and C’ contrast the thirsty to the vicious who are punished by fire. 

At the center of the passage, the Lord promises an inheritance of “these things” to those who overcome. “These things” include the spring of the water of life referred to in the immediately preceding clause. Like Caleb, those who overcome inherit a well-watered land, a garden land. But “these things” also include the God who is and gives; the water of life itself is the water of the Spirit. Those who overcome inherit God. They are all Levites, whose portion in Israel was not land but Yahweh Himself. Levites and also kings: The clause at the end of verse 7 echoes 2 Samuel 7, the promise to David and David’s sons would be sons of God. 

The final clause of verse 7 is a poetic gem:

A. I will be

B. to him

C. God (theos).

A’. He  himself will be

B’. to me

C’. son (huios).

If we exclude the connecting kai, the clause has seven words in a 3 + 4 pattern: esomai auto theos / autos estai moi huios. The parallelism in this rhyming couplet is not only literarily satisfying but theologically profound. God enters into a “dative” relationship with the overcomers who are his sons. Remarkable enough, that. But then the parallel inverts, indicating that the relationship is mutual: The overcomer is in a dative relationship with God as much as God is with him. Elsewhere, the mutually is expressed genitivally: God is the God of His people – Israel’s God – such that Israel has “rights of ownership” in the God who possesses Israel.


Browse Our Archives