the little book

in rev. 10 john is told to eat this little book. what does the book represent? why eat a book? why does it make his stomach bitter, but be as aweet as honey in his mouth? please explain.

If you look at Ezekiel 3:1 and following, this sounds very similar to what happens in Revelation 10. I think that it may be that the book is the prophecy that John is supposed to share (vs 11). Maybe sometimes it's easier to just have the prophets 'eat' the words rather than tell them every little thing they are supposed to say.

Becky is right about looking in the old testament for the answer. Revelation is filled with phrases that are designed to cause the reader to go back and look for another occasion when it was used. Some times its from the old and some times its from the new. Finding the reference gives you context. Between the context of Revelation and the context of the reference you should be able to figure out what is being portrayed.

In Ezekiel chapter 2 and 3 he is being sent by God to deliver a message to Isreal.They had not been living the way God had wanted them to and had fallen into idolatry. Because of this God gave them the curse of the law (Leviticus 26)and caused them to go into captivity. Chapter 2 verse 10 says: "and written on it were lamentations, mourning and woe." That pretty much summoned up the message he was supposed to deliver. It was the bad news that becuase of there sins they would be exiled for 70 years.

So how can we parallel that to Revelation chapter 10? First of all Revelation 10: 5-7 is a reference to Daniel 12 which we know to be a prophecy talking about the end of Judism and the the end of the Jewish age. That came about in 70 AD when Jerusalem and the temple was destroyed by the Romans. So that gives a time reference as to "when" Revelation 10 is referring too. Then we have the part about the little book in chapter 10. Like Ezekiel John is now the one recieving a message from God to be delivered to an unbelieving group of people. The Jews rejected Jesus as the Christ and those that didn't obey the gospel and didn't believe the words of Jesus in Matthew 24 were about to be destroyed in the destruction of Jerusalm. A very simiar situation was occuring to that of Ezekiel's day.

You know the phrase bitter sweet? I get the feeling that to John, a jewish christian, would have probably felt this way during this time period. The message that God was giving him would be sweet because Christians were being persecuted by the Jews (read Acts). And there destruction in AD 70 would free John and his brothers and sisters in Christ of this Jewish persectuion. However, the message would also be bitter because John was also a Jew. He would probably be somewhat upset that the capitol city of the Jewish nation, as well as the temple, and about 1.1 million Jews would die in the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70. So to him God's message would be bitter sweet.

Revelation 11 starts off by having John measure the temple but to leave out the outer court because it was to be trampled under foot by the gentiles, and they would tread it down for 42 months. Luke 21:24 says the same thing. Luke 21 along with Matthew 24 is where Jesus prophecied that Jerusalem was to be destroyed. Not to mention the fact that John was to measure a temple that wouldn't be in existence after 70 AD lets us know that we are on the right track and the time frame that these events were speaking of would be around 70AD.

One last interesting note. I mentioned before that Ezekiel chapter 2 verse 10 says: "and written on it were lamentations, mourning and woe." Revelation 9-11 is talking about the three "woes" associated with the final 3 trumpets that were sounding. And when the 7th trumpet sounded the final woe was was completed (Rev 10:5-7,Rev 11:15-19,Daniel 12)

And as Becky mentioned in another question starting with Revelation chapter 12 the story starts over and repeats itself.

I hope that helps explain the little books message.