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

Then I saw in the right hand of the one who sits on the throne a scroll written on the inside and on the outside, sealed with seven seals.

I also saw a powerful angel proclaiming with a loud voice, "Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals?"

No one in heaven, on earth, or under the earth could open the scroll or look inside it.

I began to cry bitterly because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or look inside it.

"Stop crying," one of the elders told me. "Look! The Lion from the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered. He can open the scroll and its seven seals."

He went and took the scroll from the right hand of the one who sits on the throne.

When the lamb had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders bowed down in front of him. Each held a harp and a gold bowl full of incense, the prayers of the saints.

They sang a new song: "You are worthy to take the scroll and open its seals, because you were slaughtered. With your blood you purchased people for God from every tribe, language, people, and nation.

When the lamb opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, "Go!" I looked, and there was a black horse! Its rider held a scale in his hand.

The sky vanished like a scroll being rolled up, and every mountain and island was moved from its place.

He held a small, opened scroll in his hand. Setting his right foot on the sea and his left foot on the land,

Then the voice that I had heard from heaven spoke to me again, saying, "Go and take the opened scroll from the hand of the angel who is standing on the sea and on the land."

So I went to the angel and asked him to give me the small scroll. "Take it and eat it," he told me. "It will turn bitter in your stomach, but it will be as sweet as honey in your mouth."

So I took the small scroll from the angel's hand and ate it. It was as sweet as honey in my mouth, but when I had eaten it, it turned bitter in my stomach.