Revelation 1:9-20

New Century Version

⁹ I, John, am your brother. All of us share with Christ in suffering, in the kingdom, and in patience to continue. I was on the island of Patmos,^[a] because I had preached the word of God and the message about Jesus. ¹⁰ On the Lord’s day I was in the Spirit, and I heard a loud voice behind me that sounded like a trumpet. ¹¹ The voice said, “Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches: to Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.”

¹² I turned to see who was talking to me. When I turned, I saw seven golden lampstands ¹³ and someone among the lampstands who was “like a Son of Man.”^[b] He was dressed in a long robe and had a gold band around his chest. ¹⁴ His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like flames of fire. ¹⁵ His feet were like bronze that glows hot in a furnace, and his voice was like the noise of flooding water. ¹⁶ He held seven stars in his right hand, and a sharp double-edged sword came out of his mouth. He looked like the sun shining at its brightest time.

¹⁷ When I saw him, I fell down at his feet like a dead man. He put his right hand on me and said, “Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last. ¹⁸ I am the One who lives; I was dead, but look, I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys to death and to the place of the dead. ¹⁹ So write the things you see, what is now and what will happen later. ²⁰ Here is the secret of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand and the seven golden lampstands: The seven lampstands are the seven churches, and the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches.