I don't think it's hard at all to recognize that the Book of Revelation is written TO and FOR people who were living in the first century. The text itself tells us as much:
1:1 The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants
1:4 From John, to the seven churches that are in the province of Asia:
1:9 I, John, your brother and the one who shares with you in the persecution, kingdom
1:11 saying: “Write in a book what you see and send it to the seven churches – to Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.”
1:20 The mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand and the seven golden lampstands is this: The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.
It should be clear by this point in the text that John personally KNOWS and IDENTIFIES with his audience and they know him. He proceeds to write to those 7 churches. He is not writing letters to churches thousands of years down the road, or to 7 imaginary chuches that are really metaphors for something else. He is writing to people in the first century.
Just as John opens his book identifying his audience as fellow servants in the chuches, so he also closes his book with words regarding his fellow servants in the churches:
22:6 Then the angel said to me, “These words are reliable and true. The Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent his angel to show his servants what must happen soon.”
22:16 “I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you about these things for the churches.
This should inform us that his entire book is primarily written to and for churches in the first century. He even goes so far as to name 7 specific ones. These people knew John and he knew them. It's logical to say that it follows that the message in the book is going to be relevant to his intended audience.
How often this sort of thing is forgotten when people read the book of Revelation and assume that it speaks directly to us and our time.
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