In the VeggieTales episode “Where’s God When I’m S-Scared?” Junior Asparagus frets after watching the horrific Frankencelery on TV. As he tries to fall asleep, he worries that creatures are in his closet, under his bed, or hopping on the furniture in his room. Bob and Larry comfort Junior by singing,
God is bigger than the boogie man
He’s bigger than Godzilla, or the monsters on TV
Oh, God is bigger than the boogie man
And he’s watching out for you and me
Like all VeggieTales songs, this one is aimed toward children, and it combines the serious with the silly. But the song’s primary principle—that God is more powerful than any ghoul—is both comforting and deeply biblical.
As we grow older, our fears change, but they don’t cease. A child may suffer a sleepless night because he thinks a monster is under his bed. His dad may stay awake wondering how he’ll afford the roof over his head. The good news is that just as our fears “grow up,” so can our comforts and hopes. Revelation 1 presents us with a mature version of Junior Asparagus’s dilemma, one meant to comfort both the apostle John and all his subsequent readers.
Boogie Men on Patmos
When Revelation begins, John is exiled on the isle of Patmos. As he worships in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day, he hears a voice behind him. Turning, he sees the glorified Christ. John compares his eyes to flames of fire and his voice to the sound of water (imagine Niagara Falls at its full strength). Christ’s face shines like the sun, and from his mouth comes a sharp, two-edged sword (vv. 12–16).
This is, of course, the same Jesus whom John knew throughout the Gospels, yet Christ looks quite different here. This scary scene makes John fall down as though he’s dead until Jesus touches him (v. 17). Jesus encourages John, commanding him to “fear not.” This terrifying Jesus is the One who died and rose again for John’s salvation, warring against “Death and Hades” to set his people free (vv. 17–20). This is still Immanuel: the God who is both with and for John (see Matt. 1:23).
Why does Jesus appear in this form to John? Sure, the text reaches back to Old Testament symbols to reinforce Christ’s divinity and the fact that he’s the Messiah. But why does Jesus look so frightening? Couldn’t Jesus have communicated these points in a way that didn’t nearly terrify his beloved disciple to death?
John at a Precipice
By putting ourselves in John’s shoes, we can approach an answer. Twice in Revelation 1, John records that the events described in his vision will take place soon (vv. 1, 3). He makes the same point three more times at the end of the book (22:7, 10, 20). This language indicates Revelation isn’t merely a book about far-distant events that have little to no bearing on John’s personal life. Instead, John believes that the book’s contents have direct relevance for him and his first readers.
We thus find John at a precipice. He stares out at a future filled with persecution, destruction, despair, demons, and unsettling change. Surely he could identify with the words of Habakkuk, who dreaded God’s coming judgment on Judah through Babylon: “I hear, and my body trembles; my lips quiver at the sound; rottenness enters into my bones; my legs tremble beneath me” (Hab. 3:16).
But before John and the churches look at all the imminent and scary events to come, Jesus wants his people to see him. Only one thing in the book scares John so badly that he falls as if dead: Jesus. The only way for John to obey Jesus’s command to “fear not” was for John to see just how terrifying Jesus is.
Jesus’s Scariness: Neglected Attribute
John knew Jesus loved him; he—above all the others—was called the disciple whom Jesus loved (John 21:20–24). He knew Christ had died for him and that no deeper expression of Jesus’s love was possible (15:13). He knew “God is love” (1 John 4:8). But what John saw in this initial vision was that Jesus is the scariest being in the entire cosmos.
This vision uses a host of Old Testament symbolism, much of which is associated with judgment, war, and sovereignty. Jesus is “like a son of man” (Rev. 1:13), an allusion to Daniel 7, where the Son of Man receives “dominion and glory and a kingdom” (Dan. 7:14). The sword that protrudes from Jesus’s mouth (Rev. 1:16) alludes to Isaiah 49:2, where the suffering servant says that God has made his mouth a sharp sword. The suffering servant will conquer all, having even kings prostrating themselves before him (Isa. 49:7).
The only way for John to obey Jesus’s command to ‘fear not’ was for John to see just how terrifying Jesus is.
Further, John’s reaction mimics those of Isaiah and Paul when confronted with visions of the Lord. Seeing the Lord’s majesty and holiness, Isaiah concluded he was “undone” because of his sinfulness (Isa. 6:1–7, KJV). The brilliant brightness of Christ likewise caused Paul to collapse and confess that Christ is Lord (Acts 9:4–5). John reveals Jesus to be a holy conqueror, a warrior more formidable than even Death or Hades (Rev. 1:18). The person of Jesus struck John with more fear than demonic locusts (Rev. 9), the great dragon (Rev. 12), the seven-headed beast (Rev. 13), or the blood-drinking prostitute (Rev. 17). Jesus stood as a more formidable warrior than any of them.
Scary Jesus Is for You
John could take this new knowledge and combine it with what he already knew: the scariest being in the universe loved me enough to lay down his life for me. As John looked toward his scary future, he could obediently refrain from fear because he knew that no matter how scary things became, he had the much scarier One on his side, the One who’d sworn to be for him and with him.
The suffering servant will conquer all, having even kings prostrating themselves before him.
I once heard a story from an elderly Christian who remembered walking down a dark street while on vacation as a child. Shadowy figures lurked in alleyways, just out of reach of streetlights. The young girl felt no need to fret; she knew her loving father was bigger and tougher than anyone who might challenge him. Likewise, John could remember that the scariest “boogie man” in his subsequent visions stood no chance against his champion. Jesus loomed larger than all the boogie men.
I’m part of Gen Z. Sociologists tell us our generation is perhaps the most anxious of all time. We need to remember this part of our VeggieTales training: Jesus is bigger than any boogie man we face, whether that’s the housing market, inflation, student loans, Russian tanks, or the beasts and the prostitute themselves.
It’s noteworthy that John’s first remark about Jesus is that he’s “in the midst of the lampstands” (Rev. 1:13). Jesus explains that the lampstands symbolize the churches (v. 20). Christ hasn’t moved; he still dwells among his people, keeping their lights shining brightly. Most importantly, he still possesses the keys of Death and Hades, having defeated every imprisoning power to ransom a people for himself. If this God is for us—and he really is—then who could possibly stand against us (Rom. 8:31)?