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“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” (Revelations 1:8)
“And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.” (Revelations 21:6)
“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” (Revelations 22:13)
The modern Western mind struggles to truly see Reality because it remains hopelessly trapped within Platonic dualism. I often address this reality in my posts because it’s so prevalent. A dualistic mind constantly divides reality into the competing opposites of “either/or” as a basis for understanding. Our world approaches life by myopic, surface level observation, and concludes “reality” is our sense perception. If it’s day, anyone with an alternative reality, (i.e. night) are wrong, because binary reasoning concludes everything is either true or not true. In my book OBLIVIOUS, I prove how two competing truth claims ultimately resolve themselves into a transcendent perspective or a “third way.” The ability to “pull back” and gain perspective is precisely what allows us to see wider aspects of Reality.
Returning to our verses, the book of Revelation wasn’t a prophesy written about a future world two-thousand years after John’s vision on Patmos. Instead, it “reveals” Ultimate Reality to us. Unfortunately, Bible teachers and theologians have read these texts from the myopia of Platon dualism, and as a result, we still have pastors and TikTok voices arguing between Calvinism and Arminianism, Catholicism and Protestantism, this or that, either…or, as if the goal of truth and reality is uniformity…spoiler alert…It’s NOT.
Today I aspire to free your mind and life forever, just as Christ has been doing for over 2000 years. When Jesus claims to be the “Alpha and Omega,” He’s resolving every big question that has divided churches, families, and countries since the history of the world. Alpha is the first letter in Greek alphabet, and Omega is the last. When Jesus explains that He is the“first and last” our binary minds put these into two separate categories and miss His message. He’s not just saying He started everything and that He’ll finish everything, but that He IS EVERYTHING in between.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God.” (John 1:1-2)
Consider your bed. The part of our bed that we care most about, upon which we focus all of our attention, is the top of our bed. We fuss over the softness or firmness of our mattress. We pick out the most ideal sheets and pillows, we adorn it with textures and colors that make us enjoy the third of our life we will spend in it. However, the top of the bed is not all there is to the bed. The bottom is equally vital, yet we care so little about it. It remains in the dark, it hides things we don’t want others to see, it gets dusty for lack of care. It’s this bottom side which supports the whole thing. The overlooked part is the rigid architecture which makes comfortable rest possible. Alpha and Omega is not merely the top AND the bottom, it’s a statement reflecting the total integration of all that exists…He’s the whole bed…and it’s purpose and consumption.
Alpha and Omega is HOW we learn to see the unity of all things. Alpha and Omega frees us from insisting the cosmos is entirely “other.” It converges opposing all opposing truth claims into a single transcendent reality.
- Conservative and liberal.
- Artist and engineer.
- Rule of law and unmerited grace
- Sinner and saint.
- Heaven and Hell.
- Spirit and flesh.
- Man and God.
- Severity and lovingkindness.
- Forsaken and remembered.
- dancing and mourning.
- Peak and trough,
- Good and evil.
- Light and dark
- Birth and death
Once you see Alpha and Omega as the whole thing…“Hear o Israel, the Lord your God is ONE.“ then you’ll forever be free of the illusion of the binary. Neither side exists without the other (Ecclesiastes 3) “God has made everything beautiful in its time.” Once we grasp the Alpha and Omega, our life will forever change. Christ will appear, out of nowhere, in and through and beyond everything. Cosmology moves beyond Newtonian constructs, and the participatory flow of love becomes visible. Faith becomes our response…not the pre-requisite.
Alpha and Omega isn’t just a timeline or continuum, it’s the completely satisfying answer to all of life’s most difficult questions. Until our minds are free from the binary by way of understanding Alpha and Omega, we will never “see” spiritually, and thus we cannot understand reality. This means we do not know who we truly are, nor each other, nor what we truly want, and the binary constrains us to endlessly argue for the ditch on our side of the road.
I know many of you will ask me if this Alpha and Omega applies to Heaven and Hell. After years of study, I am convinced that Heaven and Hell are both in God. They share the same proximity but differ in ontological perspectives. The love of God is one person’s heaven and another’s hell. If that shocks you, call me and let me walk you through this reality.
In Revelation, Christ reveals to John how God and humanity ultimately converge. Emmanuel, God with us. Hell is emptied of its people unto a decision is where “being” (book of life) and “doing” (book of deeds) are separated (judged) out from each person (Revelations 20:13). Heaven comes to earth (Revelations 21:2). The most horrible, false parts (portions) of each person are removed (cut in pieces)(Matthew 24:51) from them and consumed (Revelations 21:8). Leaving the true (real) part that has always existed and cannot be forgotten in God, to rejoin God, either by immediate entry, or by purification by fire where all falsehood, is consumed and transformed into God’s Holy all-consuming Fire (Lake of fire). All the harmful, fringe theological assumptions, tribal hatred, pride and pseudonyms all reach their end in the Alpha and Omega, and are resolved into a single, convergence, an Omega point, where every tear is dried, and every sad thing becomes untrue. All return to God from where we’ve always been. For some this is the greatest joy and homecoming, and for those clinging to their pseudonym, the stare and proximity of God will be their eternal torment.
Alpha and Omega is what allows us to ultimately find who we are within a cosmology (which is actually a Christology) that is finally big enough, loving enough, and intelligent enough, to free us into truly living. Alpha and Omega gives us a broad enough perspective that we can withstand the ebb and flow, ups and downs, tops and bottoms along with all seasons of life, because now we know for certain that everything is in God (true sovereignty). Revelation proves the whole thing is both a drama AND a construct, and if we have any thirst for it at all, Alpha and Omega provides us the most satisfying drink.
When we consider entering our eternal rest, we must remember all that went into “our bed.”
Thrive in Exile 