Apocalypse

     "Apocalypse" means to reveal things from afar. John the Beloved revealed the end of days from the first century A.D. Although, the end of time would come with Jesus who would "come quickly" (Rev 22:20), the concept of time is irrelevant to God. "Quickly" could have meant then, now, soon, or much later. John revealed the signs of the end of times so that Christians would be sober and vigilant (1 Pet 5:8).
    In my forthcoming book, Killing God, I disclose that the "Church", whose first building was built on the threshing floor of Ornan, is where God threshes out the "good" grain from the chaff. Revelation is all about the "threshing of the Church" at the end of days. God threshed the Church in Jerusalem and even the Jewish nation using King Nebuchadnezzar and the nation of Babylon. That threshing is a metaphor for the end of days when God finally tires of his seventy times seven chances and gives one last chance! With poetic justice, with the destruction of the Church, or Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem, it seemed to be the last chance for the Jews to turn to God.
     In the end of days, events occur after the Christians - the living and dead - are taken up to Heaven. One-hundred forty-four thousand Jews at that time will be given the same chance that the Jews had in Babylon. Keep in mind that Jerusalem represents Heaven. (I believe the Garden of Eden was the Kingdom of David, and Jerusalem the location of the Tree of Life which was in the midst of the Garden of God). It is to be noted that Babylon "killed" Jerusalem when they destroyed it but like Jesus it was resurrected again in 1948 when the nation of Israel was established. Jerusalem, like God, can only be wounded; it too is imperishable! In Revelation the "foundation of peace" which is Jerusalem, will be replaced by New Jerusalem after the world, like Israel, will again be destroyed by fire!
     Not only did John reveal the apocalypse but so did Isaiah, hundreds of years before! Isaiah warned Judah (the land of the Jews) about it's destruction by Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon:

Isaiah 13:5 They come from a far country, from the end of heaven, even the Lord, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land. 6 Howl ye; for the day of the Lord is at hand; it shall come as a destruction from the Almighty. 7 Therefore shall all hands be faint, and every man's heart shall melt: 8 And they shall be afraid: pangs and sorrows shall take hold of them; they shall be in pain as a woman that travaileth: they shall be amazed one at another; their faces shall be as flames. 9 Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it. 10 For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine. 11 And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.    

     This was a warning from God using Isaiah for the revelation.  Isaiah saw destruction coming, not only for the Jews, but for the world at the end of days. Isaiah's vision was prophecy for the destruction of Judah and for the end of the world. The entire Book of Revelation compares the apocalypse to Babylon. When we read about Babylon, we are symbolically reading about the world in latter days!

Acts 2:20 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and notable day of the Lord come...

1 Cor 5:5 To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

Revelation Chapter 6 is John's vision and revelation of the great and terrible day of the Lord!

With Babylon it was the destruction of the flesh which God allowed. At the end of days, it is the same thing. God threshed Jerusalem using Babylon, and He will thresh the world using the same "great whore" (Rev 17:1).