Third John - Revelation
Third John is written to request a visit while Revelation is a visit that requests to be written.
Visit
A visit is the closing request in Third John. In Revelation Jesus visits.
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65 Third John :13-14 |
66 Revelation 1:12-15 |
There's an interesting effect happening between Third John and Revelation when the characters of the stories are considered. Third John is likely written by the disciple John, or someone using John as their pen name. The text does not identify John directly, but the name of the book suggests John is writing. John identifies himself as the author of Revelation directly. So John writes his friend in Third John to say he really wants to come visit, but John is the one who gets a visit, and that from Jesus, in Revelation.
Some things require a visit to solve, especially things like disputes between people. This is a big part of what the elder begins to discuss in Third John and plans to deal with when he visits in person. So the book is cut short because it might actually become gossip to write about what's going on and the matter cannot easily be solved by writting anyway. In contrast, Revelation is a visit from Jesus that is experienced in private, but ultimately needs to be written so everyone else can read about it. Jesus comes to John, but he is supposed to write what Jesus says and shows him and send it to the seven churches.