I mentioned in class that my first go to resource is the commentary of Old John Gill.

I use a Bible software package called E-sword LT, it has a free Gill commentary built into the KJV of the Bible. Very easy to use on iPad or iPhone and PC or MAC versions. E-Sword X on my MacBook.

There are probably other versions on other apps.

There are online versions.

John Gill’s  Exposition of the Bible

But one integrated with the Bible app is much easier.

I use it all the time.

I like him because he comments on virtually every verse and breaks it down into phrases. He often gives alternative interpretations before his recommendations. Being 18th Century, he does run his sentences a bit long, I found breaking them at the Semi-colons helps to read them, sort of where we would put a period now.

“John Gill (23 November 1697 – 14 October 1771) was an English Baptist pastor, biblical scholar, and theologian who held to a firm Calvinistic soteriology. Born in Kettering, Northamptonshire, he attended Kettering Grammar School where he mastered the Latin classics and learned Greek by age 11. He continued self-study in everything from logic to Hebrew, his love for the latter remaining throughout his life.”

“Early life and education

At the age of about 12, Gill heard a sermon from his pastor, William Wallis, on the text, “And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?” (Genesis 3:9). The message stayed with Gill and eventually led to his conversion. It was not until seven years later that he made a public profession of faith.^[1]“

Beyond that here are some of the materials I found useful….

Most of what is below were recommended reading & audio from Dr. Dilday’s site.

He is not well known. And tends to present the Historical Protestant view in his work which is often neglected today’s modernism.

I’ve done all of his 250~ sermon audio series on Revelation.

Quite a challenge, I did it one summer and fall while on various hikes listening on my iPhone. Prior to that I listened to a Sermon Audio Series by W. J. Mencarow.

Book of Revelation 117 Sermons Apr 14, 2007 – Mar 16, 2013

I think he took his sermons and made them into a series of books, the first of which is:

History Written in Advance: The Historic Understanding of the Book of Revelation – Volume I, Chapters 1-3 Hardcover – January 20, 2023

I have not read them.

You must think I’m crazy. But I retired in 2002. Someone first recommended Mencarow, then for more depth Dilday. But I did these instead of listening to talk shows, podcasts, etc. while doing something else.

I do recommend Dilday’s for his thoroughness. But he as any good professor often says what he is going to say, then says it, then repeats it in the next lesson.

Dilday’s Sermon audios are here and can be sorted and scanned for verses of interest. He virtually covers each verse.

Liberty and Grace Reformed
Pastor Steven Dilday | Culpeper, Virginia

Be aware he never finished the series; it stops at the Mystery of the Seven Thunders. Chapter 10. Also, about 99 of his sermons were also listed under the Still Waters Revival Books site, they are just duplicates of the Church ones.

After he left that Church, he has taught at several smaller colleges.

Dr. Steven Dilday holds a BA in Religion and Philosophy from Campbell University, a Master of Arts in Religion from Westminster Theological Seminary (Philadelphia), and both a Master of Divinity and a Ph.D. in Puritan History and Literature from Whitefield Theological Seminary.  He is also the translator of Matthew Poole’s Synopsis of Biblical Interpreters and Bernardinus De Moor’s Didactico-Elenctic Theology.

He also taught in the Languages department at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. And at Whitefield and I think another small school in South Carolina.

He works more independently now in his translation work.

A few years ago, he began putting the Revelation lessons back together in a slightly different format at linked to his Poole translation work.

The Revelation of St. John the Divine

I highly recommend starting there with his introduction material and first couple of lessons. You will find in the comments the links to the appropriate sermon in the audio series. Plus a few other useful readings. Do just a few lessons before committing further.

As for Books……

E.B. Elliott’s Horae Apocalyticae, four volumes, fifth edition.

Edward Bishop Elliott (24 July 1793, in Paddington – 30 June 1875) was an English clergyman, preacher and premillennarian writer.

“C.H. Spurgeon calls it “the standard work on the subject”, and it is, in my estimation, the single best resource on Revelation.  It is both an exegetical and historical masterpiece, filled with wonderful and rare information.  However, in four volumes, it is an extensive amount of reading.  You will want the fifth edition.

​There is a relatively inexpensive digital edition available here.”

The four links below I downloaded the PDF copies, successfully. It is fairly readable, but each volume is some 600 pages. I’ve been reading sections I search for in the PDF.

Printed copies are available here

Horae Apocalypticae, Vol. 1

Horae Apocalypticae, Vol. 2

Horae Apocalypticae, Vol. 3

Horae Apocalypticae, Vol. 4

He does have an abridged version.

The Last Prophecy: An Abridgment of Elliott’s Horae Apocalypticae. An Introduction to Church History.

“The abridged edition of Elliott’s Horae Apocalypticae is available.  The advantage:  You can get the gist with less reading.  However, the loss is significant; most of the persuasive power of Elliott’s work is in the painstaking attention to detail.  And we are trying to get beyond mere opinion…”

Other writings include.

“Matthew Poole’s Synopsis of Biblical Interpreters:  Revelation 1-11 is a verse-by-verse history of interpretation.  Originally composed in Latin, a translation will provided for this class.

James Durham’s Learned and Complete Commentary is practical and full of the sweetness of Christ Himself.

Although I am not able to follow Gregory Beale in his general approach to the Book of Revelation, his Book of Revelation is frequently helpful in matters of detail and difficulty.”

I do avoid with a passion modern end times interpretation of Revelation. If you do any of the Dilday or reading or works you might see where I get that from.

One last one you can check out Dr. S. Lewis Johnson’s sermons on Revelation.

His Church preserved his work. It’s probably different again, I have not done his studies, but I found many of his other works useful, on Doctrine and I did his complete Book of John.

Footnote..

My Current Reading on Elliot’s book Volume 4 page 477 is about.

“CRITICAL EXAMINATION AND REFUTATION OF THE THREE CHIEF COUNTER-SCHEMES OF APOCALYPTIC INTERPRETATION.

It was stated at the conclusion of my Sketch of the History of Apocalyptic Interpretation, that there are at present two, and but two, grand counter-Schemes to what may be called the general Protestant view of the Apocalypse: that view which regards its prophecy as a prefiguration of the great events that were to happen in the Church and world connected with it, from St. John’s time to the consummation ; including specially the establishment of the Popedom, and reign of Papal Rome, as in some way or other the fulfilment of the types of the Apocalyptic Beast and Babylon.

The first of these two counter Schemes is the Preterists’, which would have the prophecy stop altogether short of the Popedom ; explaining it of the catastrophes, one or both, of the Jewish Nation and Pagan Rome: the second the Futurists’, which would have it all shoot over the head of the Popedom into times yet future; and refer simply to the events that are immediately to precede, or to accompany, Christ’s second Advent.

I shall in this second Article of my Appendix proceed successively to examine these two counter-Schemes; and show, if I mistake not, the palpable untenableness alike of the one Scheme and of the other.

Which done, it will only remain to consider the main counter Protestant Scheme to the one given in the Horae : viz. that which, instead of regarding the seven Trumpets in their natural way as the development of the 7th Seal, just as the seven Vials also of the 7th Trumpet, in continuous evolution of the future, would regard the Seals and the Trumpets as chronologically parallel lines of prophecy, each reaching to the consummation ; the 1st unfolding the fortunes of the Church, the 2d of the world.”

My leaning personally is towards the Historical Protestant view, and the way Dilday teaches it. But he does recommend reading Elliot, so I am curious.