Revelation 1:6-18

6and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father — to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

7Look, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him. And all the tribes of the earth will mourn over him. So it is to be. Amen.

8“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “the one who is, who was, and who is to come, the Almighty.”

9I, John, your brother and partner in the affliction, kingdom, and endurance that are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.

10I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard a loud voice behind me like a trumpet

11saying, “Write on a scroll what you see and send it to the seven churches: Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.”

12Then I turned to see whose voice it was that spoke to me. When I turned I saw seven golden lampstands,

13and among the lampstands was one like the Son of Man, dressed in a robe and with a golden sash wrapped around his chest.

14The hair of his head was white as wool — white as snow  — and his eyes like a fiery flame.

15His feet were like fine bronze as it is fired in a furnace, and his voice like the sound of cascading waters.

16He had seven stars in his right hand; a sharp double-edged sword came from his mouth, and his face was shining like the sun at full strength.

17When I saw him, I fell at his feet like a dead man. He laid his right hand on me and said, “Don’t be afraid. I am the First and the Last,

18and the Living One. I was dead, but look — I am alive forever and ever, and I hold the keys of death and Hades.