A voice coming from the throne said:
“Praise our God, all you his servants,
[and] you who revere him, small and great.” (Revelation 19:5 NABRE)
Today's verse is a first-century version of the happy dance!
It describes part of the celebration of God's final victory over evil at the very end of time. It is meant to encourage us and to give us hope through our darker hours, just as it was meant to support the early church which was suffering under Roman persecution at the time this book was written.
Interestingly, the phrase "small and great" echoes two other verses in the Bible, one from Psalms and one from earlier in the book of Revelation. In both cases, the same sort of encouragement is offered to the faithful believers. First, in Psalms, written hundreds of years before Revelation, we see that God remembers and blesses those who respect and trust him. And again in the earlier chapter of Revelation, our symbolic book of the end of time, we see that God will reward the faithful, great and small.
Today, I will be encouraged by the promise that God knows me and that he blesses me now and always.
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