Revelation 1:4-18

New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised

⁴ John to the seven churches that are in Asia:

Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, ⁵ and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.

To him who loves us and freed^[a] us from our sins by his blood, ⁶ and made^[b] us to be a kingdom, priests serving^[c] his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

So it is to be. 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.

A Vision of Christ

⁹ I, John, your brother who share with you in Jesus the persecution and the kingdom and the patient endurance, was on the island called Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.^{[d] 10} I was in the spirit^[e] on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet ¹¹ saying, ‘Write in a book what you see and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamum, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia, and to Laodicea.’

¹² Then I turned to see whose voice it was that spoke to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, ¹³ and in the midst of the lampstands I saw one like the Son of Man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash across his chest. ¹⁴ His head and his hair were white as white wool, white as snow; his eyes were like a flame of fire, ¹⁵ his feet were like burnished bronze, refined as in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of many waters. ¹⁶ In his right hand he held seven stars, and from his mouth came a sharp, two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining with full force.

¹⁷ When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he placed his right hand on me, saying, ‘Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last, ¹⁸ and the living one. I was dead, and see, I am alive for ever and ever; and I have the keys of Death and of Hades.