1   After this I looked, and there before my eyes was a door opened in heaven; and the voice that I had first heard speaking to me like a trumpet said, ‘Come up here, and I will show you what must happen hereafter.’ 2   At once I was caught up by the Spirit. 3   There in heaven stood a throne, and on the throne sat one whose appearance was like the gleam of jasper and cornelian; and round the throne was a rainbow, bright as an emerald. 4   In a circle about this throne were twenty-four other thrones, and on them sat twenty-four elders, robed in white and wearing crowns of gold. 5   From the throne went out flashes of lightning and peals of thunder. Burning before the throne were seven flaming torches, the seven spirits of God, and in front of it stretched what seemed a sea of glass, 6   like a sheet of ice.

The opening of the sealed book

In the centre, round the throne itself, were four living creatures, covered with eyes, in front and behind. 7   The first creature was like a lion, the second like an ox, the third had a human face, the fourth was like an eagle in flight. 8   The four living creatures, each of them with six wings, had eyes all over, inside and out; and by day and by night without a pause they sang:

  ‘Holy, holy, holy is God the sovereign Lord of all, who was, and is, and is to come!’

9   As often as the living creatures give glory and honour and thanks to the One who sits on the throne, who lives for ever and ever, 10   the twenty-four elders fall down before the One who sits on the throne and worship him who lives for ever and ever; and as they lay their crowns before the throne they cry:

   11   ‘Thou art worthy, O Lord our God, to receive glory and honour and power, because thou didst create all things; by thy will they were created, and have their being!’

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