I Am Alpha and Omega

by Daniel Bell

The island of Patmos sits just off the coast of Turkey. It’s small–barely 17 miles across. In classical Greek mythology, Artemis and Apollo convinced Zeus to raise it from beneath the sea. Its fame, however, comes from it being the location where the Book of Revelation was written. A Christian apostle named John was exiled there by the Roman Empire in the early 1st century. One night, this exile experienced an extraordinary vision. He saw the end of the world - oceans boiling, mountains crumbling, heaven and earth colliding in a terrifying, beautiful image. And, through it all, a voice declaring “I am the Alpha and the Omega. Who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty”.

1Alpha and Omega, as John would have understood them, are the first and last letters of the Greek Alphabet. So what does it mean for God to declare that he is the A and the Z? The First and the Last?It tells us two things: what God is, and who God is.

What God is is a difficult question. Traditionally, God is often depicted as a human in the sky – someone with immense power and wisdom, but who behaves mostly in the same way a human being would if granted the same level of power or 1 Revelation wisdom. God possesses human aspects, but defining God solely in terms of His humanity would be a mistake; God is more. We must remember that “God sees not as man sees”2. God does not experience “the future” in the way we do because He exists outside of time. God doesn’t exist in a place in the same we do, because God is omnipresent.. To say God is the “First and the Last” is to say that he is he beginning and the ending of all things, surrounding them and binding the Beginning and the End together. He is, as He said to John those centuries ago, “who is, who was, and who is to come.”

Trying to wrap one’s head around this can be frustrating, and I too have wasted many hours trying to grasp this. God, as the First and the Last, is a being of extraordinary power and ability. It’s this power and ability that makes the second aspect of this essay–who God is, all the more compelling.

The story of the Bible is one of a broken humanity finding redemption and salvation in God. This is accomplished through God’s presence among us. The belief in Jesus, God in human form, is central to the Christian faith, yet sometimes the implications of that belief are not fully appreciated. A being of such power comes to earth as god? A king?

2 1 Sam 16:17

No – He comes as a carpenter, in a poor, far-flung imperial province thousands of miles away from anything that could be considered as a relevant center of power. He lived at the bottom of society and among the last.

Furthermore, with whom did He associate? If we are discussing something on as grand a scale as the salvation of all mankind, it would be a reasonable assumption to make that He would engage with the “movers and shakers” – the wise, the strong, the powerful, people who could influence others. Once again, however, the logical choice is incorrect. God surrounded himself with the lowest rungs of society: poor workers, the ill, the outcast, even criminals.

One may assume these individuals had superb morals, regardless of their low social class. Perhaps they could influence their peers not through power but through their example. But they were not. The New Testament is full of countless stories of their failings. Three of his first disciples fell into a selfish bickering match about which one of them deserved the most power in the new order they had convinced themselves they were building3. Other, in their pride, insisted on the destruction of towns that had not received them well4. His family members called him insane. One of his closest confidants, the now-legendary Saint Peter, fled and denied him the second his own life came at risk5. And, in the end, he was sold over to be executed to the political authorities by one of his followers for some quick money.

This being, the most powerful being, the “First” set himself among the “Last,”or those who were at the bottom of society in every way imaginable. And, when eventually the powers-that-be began to see him as a threat to their established order and demanded his death, he did not stop them. Yet despite all this, the Bible is a story of the triumph and power of God. How is that possible?

It is possible because of the second meaning of “Alpha and Omega.” God does not view power in the same way we do. We see power, as the ability to bend others to our will – as something to be cherished, earned, and respected. God sees this power as something to not be worshiped but to be abandoned. Despite His immense power, he never uses it to control others, or exalt himself. Instead, he uses it to heal, to comfort, and to walk with the lowest among us.

In our world today, might makes right. Might is shown by military power as nations subjugate one another. It’s shown in wealth, fame, and charisma, as millions around the flock to celebrities and influencers. Jesus’ idea of power, where might is messy, poor, and shown in humility and service, violates all of these things we’ve been trained to believe. It’s why the story of the Bible makes no sense when viewed through our traditional idea of what and who is “right.” This inversion, where the last things are made first through the One who exists as them both, is what I would argue is the second, deeper meaning of “Alpha and Omega.'' God can be the first and last because in His mind, there is no difference between the two. To be powerful, to be “First,” is to sacrifice and to give yourself freely for the sake of others or to be in all things the “Last”. Such an ideal doe not compute with our world. In fact, it broke our world which is full of violence, sorrow, fear, and death. The central tenet of the Christian mission is Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. He did not come back seeking revenge, or in grand majesty. He came back simply as it was, returned to those who had abandoned him, and gave them instructions to continue their journey. There is no glory, no personal satisfaction in this road. These things will fade in time, just like everything else in our world. True power – service, sacrifice, unconditional love – is all that remains.

Jesus comes to comfort those who suffer. We pray to Jesus as if He is outside of our suffering, failing to realize that He sits in torment there next to us. A being of such power, choosing to suffer with us. This is not a god who needs royalty, pleasure, but a god who instead suffers with us out of love. God is a God of the lost, a God of the lowly. He is the First and Last God of the last and lowest people. The powers and pains of the earth are still young, and eventually they will die. What we see as suffering and weakness is immeasurable strength in the eyes of God. He is an Alpha for every Omega. A beginning for all of our endings. This is the God of scripture. This was His nature for those who came before us, and it will be his nature for all those who came after us.

To say that Jesus is Alpha and Omega is to affirm a radically different view of the world than the one to which we are familiar. It presents not only a view of an idealized past but a triumphant future that can be found again, where power is something to be given, not taken. The vision of the end, which John saw on Patmos all those years ago, will be like the beginning. War, death, decay – all will finally fade in the face of the eternal power of a servant God who has loved us from the First days to the Last.