Chapter 18 of Revelation we see
the destruction of Babylon the fall of Babylon and the reasons
why Babylon had to fall had to be destroyed the wretched Wretched evil that was So concentrated
there. It's it's all evil. It's everything
that's Antichrist and in this chapter We don't see Babylon,
we see another city, we see New Jerusalem. And what a contrast. Look at
verse one again, and after these things I heard a great voice
of much people in heaven saying, Alleluia, salvation and glory
and honor and power unto the Lord our God. The previous chapter
it was all woe and desolation and moaning and crying out and
pain and regret and sorrow. And now we have this great sound,
a great voice of much people. We saw later it was thundering
and it was as many waters and thunderings. And notice the words after these
things, and that's of course the previous chapter. Let's read
some of it to get a sense again of of what we're talking about. For her sins, verse five in chapter
18, have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities.
Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double
according to her works. In the cup which she hath filled,
fill to her double how much she hath glorified herself and lived
deliciously. So much torment and sorrow give
her, for she saith in her heart, I sit a queen. You know this
is the mother of all sin, pride. It's what caused Adam in the
garden to say, to hear the words, you shall be as gods and like
it. Pride, I sit a queen. How much
she has glorified herself. That doesn't sit well with the
God of heaven and earth. Therefore shall her plagues come
in one day, verse eight, death and mourning and famine, The
kings of the earth, it talked about these three groups of people,
the kings and the merchants and the sailors mourning her destruction. It's saying, alas, verse 16,
she was clothed in linen and purple and scarlet and decked
with gold and precious stones and pearls. Of course she was,
she knew exactly how to reap the evil rewards of Opposing
God in this world. There's a lot of money in that For in one hour so great riches
has come to know And they cried when they saw the smoke of her
burning verse 18 saying what a city They cast dust on their
heads weeping and wailing And That mighty angel comes in
verse 21 and casts that great stone into the sea and says,
this is what's happening to Babylon. It says a millstone is tied around
her neck and she's cast into the depths of the sea. Better
not to be born, the Lord said. Better not to have been born
at all. Instead of facing the wrath of
God, And then after these things, after these things, having looked
on the horror of God's wrath poured out. And what we're seeing
there in that chapter is the end of everything but Christ.
I don't know if we realize that. It's the end of everything but
Christ. Those in Christ, where Christ
is, who he is, what he's done, his glory, his praises, his everything. It's Christ and his people. It's
God in the person of Christ. Somebody said we won't ever see
anything of God except Christ. I don't know how you know that.
But Christ is our God. He's our Lord and our God. And we'll look on him there like
never before. Somebody said too that if Christ
is all then, what we need to understand is he's all now. Because
what is this? What is this world, what is it
worth? What's all the people of this world worth? This is what the prophet was
speaking about when he said the Lord alone shall be exalted in
that day. Everybody else that made themselves
kings and queens, are put down by God and not just relieved
of their imagined royalty, but cursed and damned forever and
punished forever by God Almighty. The Christ alone being completely
and utterly and eternally exalted. Paul said, I believe it was Paul
that said, we see not yet all things put under him. They are but we don't see that
yet. We haven't experienced that yet, but we're going to all things
put under him so that Christ exalted in in reality When this
is all said and done and in our very experience we know that
he's that's already happened in his in where he is and he
inhabits eternity and But we're gonna be there, and we're gonna
experience that. Christ alone exalted is the worst
nightmare of his enemies. It's the most infinitely horrible
thing that could happen to those who despise Christ. And that's
what we're seeing. But Christ alone exalted is the
most unspeakably wonderful thing that could happen to those who
love him. Those who know Him and love Him, we don't want anything
else. We don't wanna be exalted. We don't ever wanna be exalted.
We're gonna exalt Him forever. He says we will be exalted. And
whatever that means, though, I know this, we're gonna be praising
Him. We're gonna be glorifying Him like He's worthy of it. To
see Christ alone exalted and to be in on that, Be in on it
these ones in chapter 18. They're out there. They're put
out just like being put out of the Garden of Eden Only this
is final. This is beyond hope But what will the people of God
say to the events of chapter 18? What will the heavenly host
of God's redeemed, how will they react to all of the horror of
that? Will they be filled with sorrow and pain, maybe in sympathy
for them? Will they be scared to death
by it? That'd be a pretty frightening thing now to see. Are they gonna
be horrified if you saw something? What's the most horrible thing
you ever saw in this world? It's not even close to that.
No, they're not gonna be horrified. They're gonna say hallelujah.
Hallelujah, praise ye the Lord. That's what that means. That
word means praise ye the Lord. Like Stephen, I thought about
Stephen when he was being stoned. And he said this, as he was being
stoned, he said, behold, I see the heavens opened and the son
of man standing on the right hand of God. As they're picking
up rocks and crushing and pounding his flesh with them and destroying
his flesh with those rocks, he said, I see the Lord Jesus Christ
standing at the right hand of God. So this multitude in heaven,
though they just witnessed the terrible destruction, of God's
wrath, God taking vengeance upon those described. Listen to, here's
what God's doing. This is who he's destroying.
Listen to chapter 18, verse two. And he cried mightily with a
strong voice saying, Babylon the great is fallen and has become
the habitation of devils and the hold of every foul spirit
and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. What a description. The habitation of devils. That's where devils live, is
in the false, man-centered, anti-Christ, free will religion of this world. That's where the devils feel
welcome and feel at home. The habitation of devils, the
hold of every foul spirit. Every spirit. You know, religion
puts on a great show, don't they? They wear nice clothes and they
say sweet, you know, sentimental things. They make up little poems
and stuff that sound nice. And they decorate, you know,
their little habitation there real pretty and all that. They're
foul spirits, foul spirits. You ever get crossways with one
of them, you'll find out. Religion is the most horrible
and vile and cruel and the more religious you are, the
meaner you are. Been my experience my whole life,
my whole life. And clearly from the scriptures.
The Lord Jesus Christ didn't just walk around saying to everybody,
you're a bunch of snakes. You make me sick to my stomach.
You're a bunch of snakes. The poison of snakes is under
your lip. He didn't just walk around saying
that to people. He said that to the church going people. And the cage of every unclean
and hateful bird. You remember when the Lord told
that parable? He said the mustard seed is the tiniest seed of all
the seeds. But when it's planted and it
becomes a tree, it's one of the biggest, most beautiful trees
you'll ever see. And the birds of the air come
and take refuge in its branches. He said the kingdom of heaven
is like that seed. It's a big tree that the bird, his little
birds come and they find a place to live in the branches of that
tree. This is the opposite of that. Every unclean and hateful
bird roosts in the cage of the devil. Talking about their free
will and they live in a cage. Revelation 18.2. And though they've seen these
described here, utterly destroyed, yet they can't take their eyes
off of Christ. Stephen's being stoned and can't
take his eyes off of Christ. No matter what you see in this
world or experience, don't ever take your eyes off of Christ. And they don't say woe unto them,
They say, praise him. See the difference? They don't say good enough for
them. They say, hallelujah. Praise you, the Lord. For what?
Salvation. Is that a strange time to talk
about salvation when God's pouring out his wrath on somebody? Not
when we're in heaven it's not. It might seem like that now. Instead of uttering some exclamation,
some expression about what happened to those that Christ didn't save,
instead of commenting on that, they praised the Son of God for
saving them. It's just like, again, I remember
a lot of things that preachers have said to me over the years,
and I thank God for them now, but one of them said this too. And people talk about why in
the world would God, would a loving God send sinners to hell? The
question is, why in the world would he save me? That's what
they're wondering about. That's what they're in awe of.
He saved me. That should have been me. But
it's not. Hallelujah. Salvation unto him. Salvation unto him. He saved
me. He had mercy on my wretched soul. Here's what they're thinking
about, Revelation 18, four. And I heard another voice from
heaven saying, come out of her. That unclean, wretched place,
that cage of every foul and unclean bird, that habitation of devils,
come out of there, come out of there. Oh, that says a lot, doesn't
it? Think about that with me for
a minute. Come out of her, my people. that you be not partakers
of her sins, and that you receive not of her
plagues. This voice from heaven is representative
of how that God has called each and every one of his sheep home
to him throughout the endless ages of this world of time, out
of darkness into his marvelous light. Notice he calls us out
of her. That's where we were. There's
not good people and bad people. There's just bad people. And
if any of them are gonna be saved, they're gonna have to come out.
Come ye out from among them and be ye separate, saith the Lord.
You know, religion preaches that because I heard it for, I don't
know, 18 years. Religion preaches that as something
we're supposed to do. What if the sun, you know, I
guess the sun thought, well, I guess I better shine. You know,
God said, let there be light. That's not how it works. God
says, come out. God says, Lazarus, come out of
there, come forth. And he does. And he didn't walk
around saying, thank God I came forth. Not for a second. Come out from among her and be
ye separate, saith the Lord. The Lord hath put a difference
between this world and his sheep. That's what that means. We're not born neutral. We're
born evil. We're born foul. We're born devils. The Lord Jesus said Judas was
a devil from the start. The great whore is that she's
a murderer, verse 24 of chapter 18. She's a liar, verse 23 of
chapter 18. She's a thief making merchandise
of men's souls. And we, by nature, take refuge
in her. By nature, that's our home. Our habitation, our hold. Our
fortress, our cage. It's a place where our bloody
feet find rest by nature, but it's bondage. It's a cage we
can't get out of. Scripture talks about us being
in a snare. The more you do to get out of
a snare, the more you're snared. That's us by nature. The more
you do to try to make up for your sin, the more you sin. The
way you get out of a snare, somebody lets you out of it. That's God. He calls us out of her into his
marvelous light. That's salvation. That's why
they cry, salvation unto him. They're attributing salvation
to the one that saved them. He calls a side of darkness into
his marvelous light. There is only in her and out
of her. That's all there is. Think about
that for a second. To be anywhere but Christ is
to be in her. Every foul and unclean spirit,
every devil, To be out of her is to be found
in Christ. That's the only way out of her,
the only place out of her. If you go from being an atheist
to a religious Catholic, say, for example, you're still in
her. If you go from being a Catholic
to a Baptist, you're still in her. The only way out of her is in
Christ. And he says not to us go out
of her, but come out, come out of her, come to me. I'll give
you rest. I'll give you a home indeed. And then they say this, glory,
glory unto him. You remember what it said about her?
How she hath glorified herself. By his grace, not us. Look at
this world. Glory, glory, glory. Man, man,
man. The mark of the beast is all
over this world already. Religion's looking for the mark
of the beast. And it's on most of their foreheads right now.
Plain as day. Plain to see. Glory, God's glory is seen in
that he has mercy on sinners. That's why salvation comes first.
You'd think glory would come first, but that is his glory.
I'll have mercy on whom I'll have mercy. I'm gonna save some
wretched, foul, worthless, horrible sinners like me. Oh, man. That's what we're praising
him for, mercy. Instead of being afraid of the
wrath that we witnessed, we say praise him for his mercy. Secure
in that rock, hidden in the cleft of the rock and covered with
his hand, we see God's glory without fear, without any danger. And then they cry honor unto
him, honor. You know that word means to be highly esteemed?
Holy and reverend is his name, the psalmist said, alone. Nobody else is ever to be called
reverend. And this is the same word also,
it means highly esteemed, but it also means this, 1 Peter 2,
7, unto you therefore which believe, he is. Remember that word? That's honor, honor. To be highly
esteemed. Power in him, power. Now these
words of praise that these are crying or singing, whatever,
they're not random. They're not random. The leper
in Matthew 8 said, Lord, if you will, you can. That's what we're saying in glory.
You could and you did. You saved us. You saved us. He acknowledged on his face before
the master that salvation is an exercising of God's will and
not man's. You think about that. Lord, if
you will, not Lord, I've decided. You reckon. I've said to you
before, we don't want to speculate a whole lot, but our Lord did
talk about hypotheticals. What do you think would happen
if that man were to waltz up there singing, I have decided
to follow Jesus? Somebody did do that, and you
know what the Lord said to him? Go home. I don't even have a
place to lay my head. You don't have any idea what
you're getting into. Go home. And then he went to another man,
Instead of somebody coming to him and saying, oh boy, I want
to follow you. The Lord went to somebody else
and said, follow me. And that man said, I got a lot
going on here. I got to bury my father first
and then I'll follow you. The Lord said, let the dead bury
their dead. You follow me now. You see how
that works? And I don't mean to be flipping
like that. I know you do. I know you do. Thank God. That's
what they're saying. Power. Power unto him. He can. He said, my arm's not
short that I can't save you. And that's exactly, when Paul
spoke of the tragedy of man-centered freewill religion in 2 Timothy
3, 5, that's exactly what he touched on. He said this, they
have a form of godliness, but denying the power. That's the
same word as in our text. Denying the power thereof. Denying
that God can do as he pleases in the armies of heaven or among
the inhabitants of the earth. And none can stay his hand or
say unto him, what doest thou? They deny that. He can't do anything
unless you let him. The redeemed in glory are shouting
the praises of him who saved us in spite of us. who saved
us the same way he did Saul of Tarsus, by arresting us and putting
us in the dust and saving us anyway on the road to hell. That's what they're crying now.
And that's us there with them. We just don't know it yet. Verse two, for true and righteous
are his judgments. For he hath judged the great
whore which did corrupt the earth with her fornication and hath
avenged the blood of his servants at her hand. Now notice this. It's easy to say things like
the Lord is merciful, but he's also full of wrath. There's no
but to it. One of God's attributes is not
I don't know if the right word is antithetical or something.
One of his attributes does not oppose the other. He is who he is, and it's not,
his mercy doesn't diminish his wrath, and his wrath doesn't
diminish his mercy. He's having mercy when he's,
We're crying salvation to him because of his judgment of the
great whore. You see that? It's not in spite
of it. They don't oppose one another. For, because, power unto him,
salvation, glory, honor, for true and righteous are his judgments. Salvation's not separate from
what happened to the great whore. Though there is a great gulf
fixed between those who hate Christ and those who love him,
and there's a great difference between the consequences of hating
him and the glory of loving him by his grace. But it's all one
act. The exaltation of Christ, the
culmination of all of his purposes coming to pass, is damnation
to the one and salvation to the other. It's just one thing though,
it's Christ. We don't praise him for salvation
because we aren't focused on the wrath that just took place,
but because we are. Does that make sense? Four true
and righteous are his judgments. One is wailing and the other
is rejoicing. One is the saver of life and
the other is the saver of death for the same reason. That's what
I'm trying to say. And that reason is him. In both
cases, it's a triumph for God and for those in Christ. Whether
life or death, you look it up in 2 Corinthians 2, 14 through
16, if you want to jot that down. But notice again now, they're
not saying hallelujah, good enough for them. But hallelujah unto him. Not good enough for them, How
glorious is Him? Look what He has done. Look at
His judgments. Look at His attributes. Look
who He is. That's what they're focused on.
I realize that His judgments include their condemnation. But
we're praising Him and His wonderful attributes, not gloating because
we're saved and they're not. That's never Christ. We haven't
learned Christ like that. And it never is that way. I hope that's clear. And notice in verse three, they
just say it again. You know what that says to me?
It wasn't just a rash reaction. Well, how can you say that, Chris?
Well, John in verse 10 of chapter 19 has a rash reaction. Look
at him. In verse 10, John said, I fell at his feet,
at the feet of this angel, to worship him. And he said to me,
see thou do it not. I'm thy fellow servant and of
thy brethren that have the testimony of Jesus. Worship God, don't
worship me. But what just happened that we
just talked about, it wasn't like that. They said it again. after they had time to think
about it, after they saw him all glorious in his judgments.
And remember, his judgments are not just condemning, damning,
and punishing the great whore. His judgment, part of his judgments
is you're righteous. He judges his sheep righteous. He judges them worthy of eternal
life. That's part of his judgment too.
Christ is the difference. God is worthy of eternal praises
for his judgments. However, and whatever he decides. That's what judgment is. The
deciding of a case, whether that's good for you or bad for you.
Whatever he decides. True and righteous. True and
righteous. Then look at verses four through
six together. Verses four through six. I believe
these are better looked at together. And the four and 20 elders and
the four beasts fell down and worshiped God that sat on the
throne saying amen, hallelujah. And a voice came out of the throne,
saying, Praise our God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both small
and great. And I heard, as it were, the
voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters,
and as the voice of mighty thundering, saying, Hallelujah, for the Lord
God Omnipotent reigneth. Isn't this whole scene so beautifully
simple? You have one city called a city
because it's a conglomeration of people. It's a people. And then you have another city
made up of people that God said, come out of that city. Get out
of there. Kind of like he told Lot to get
out of Sodom and Gomorrah. Get out of there. You got no
business there. Come out. Come to me. I'll give you life and rest and
peace and hope and salvation. And they do. And so another city
is created by God, a perfect city, a city that he describes
this way, wherein dwelleth righteousness. It says in that city, his servants
shall serve him. That's not what happened in the
Garden of Eden. This city, Babylon, has been being populated since
the very start. Those that despise God, been
being populated from the start. And so has the other. God has
been calling out from among her his people from the start, from
the start. And the way that happens, the
way that they are separated, what makes them different, God
put a difference between them and the place they came out of,
the ones from which they came. And that difference is Christ.
As he hangs there, that beautiful picture of him on the cross and
one thief on one hand and one on the other. And one of them
dies cursing his name. And by his grace, the other one
sees who he is. That's how God saved me. He just
showed me who he is. And he dies saying, Lord, remember
me. You're coming into a kingdom.
Can you imagine what he looked like on that cross? Again, we
don't want to let our imaginations run wild, but we know some things
about what happened to him on that cross. He said, you're the
king. You're the king. When you come
into your kingdom, remember me. Remember me. So simple, so clear. He said, didn't he? As he began
to walk this earth with us, he said, there's two gates, there's
two doors. There's two doors. But God on the throne, verse
four, we read that in verse four, he's on the throne. They worshiped
God that sat on the throne, saying, so be it, that's what we want.
That's what I like to see, so be it. When the preacher says
something, you say, amen, you're saying, that's the truth. That's what I came to hear. That's
what I came to hear. We like it that way. He sits
on the throne and praise his holy name. Praise his name. He sits on the throne and he
is there for a reason, verse six. The last part, for the Lord
God Omnipotent reigneth because he's in charge. He's not just
a figurehead. He's on the throne because he's
the Lord, because he rules, because he reigns, because of power and
glory and honor and all the things that we attributed to him and
do so all the time. You can't attribute salvation
now to a God that leaves salvation up to somebody else. He got to
save people. If you're gonna scream salvation
unto him, he got to save somebody. They're attributing, we are,
I should say we, we're attributing power to him who actually exercises
power. Whose gospel is the power of
God unto salvation. That's how he saves people, by
the power of his gospel. God chose his people in sovereign
authority. Look with me, I want us to see
this, and we'll be through, I'm on the last page here. 2 Thessalonians
2 though, let's look at this together. 2 Thessalonians 2. Verse eight. I want us to see
the context of a verse that we're very familiar with. We're pretty familiar probably with
verse 13. We're bound to give thanks always
to God for you brethren, beloved of the Lord, because God hath
from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification
of the spirit and belief of the truth. But I wanted us to look
at some of the context of this and see how it's talking about
our text. Look at verse eight. And then
shall that wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with
the spirit of his mouth and shall destroy with the brightness of
his coming. Even him whose coming is after
the working of Satan, with all power and signs and lying wonders,
and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that
perish because they received not the love of the truth that
they might be saved. They hate Christ. They hate who
he is. They hate what he did. They hate
the truth of Christ. Verse 11, and for this cause,
God shall send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie
because they hate his son. Why are people going to hell?
Well, boy, they smoked and drank and cussed and they were bad
to their mama. The difference is Christ, difference
between life and he that hath the son hath life. And he that hath not the son
of God hath not life. For this cause, God shall send
them strong delusion that they should believe a lie. Who's on
the throne? That's part of it too, isn't it? That's part of
it too. He damns who he pleases. If you
hate his son, he's not gonna be sad about throwing you in
hell. Don't ever think that. Don't ever think that. He's not
gonna be one bit sad about it. And neither is anybody else.
Let's just be honest about it. Nobody gonna be sad about that.
that they all might be damned who believe not the truth but
had pleasure in unrighteousness. In other words, they had pleasure
in themselves. You think about, oh, they had
pleasure in all the things, you know, you don't have to look
out here for unrighteousness, it's right here. They loved themselves
rather than the Son of God. but we are bound to give thanks
all the way to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord. We thank
God for you. We don't brag on the sinner for
deciding something. We thank God that they decided
something because he's the one that did it. He's the one that
saved them. Brethren, beloved of the Lord,
because God hath from the beginning chosen you, not because you chose
him, but because he chose you. We thank God for you. Chosen
you to salvation. They say, well, God chooses all
this, this, this, and that religion. I've heard him say it a million
times. He chooses this, he chooses that. But when it comes to salvation
now, that's up to you. God decides, God's in control.
But salvation, he leaves up to you. No, he chose you to salvation,
if you're saved. And here's how he did it, the
spirit of God. He set you apart unto salvation. He made a difference. He said,
come out of her and he put you out of her. You remember, we
mentioned a lot. Do you remember how a lot came
out? God sent somebody to lay hold of him and get him out of
there. We're not coming out on our own.
We're just not. Sanctification of the spirit
and belief of the truth. He's not going to save you apart
from you here in the gospel and Fallen in love with Christ Where into he called you by our
gospel to the obtaining of the glory of of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, brethren, stand fast.
That's what I've got to say to you tonight. Stand fast. Having
done all it says in another place, stand. You're standing on the
rock. Stand right there and hold the
traditions which you have been taught, whether by word or our
epistle. Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself
and God, even our Father, which hath loved us and hath given
us everlasting consolation and good hope through grace. Comfort
your hearts. It's hard to stand, isn't it,
when you're sad? It's hard to stand when you're
broken. It's hard to stand when you're in turmoil all the time.
It seems like I see more and more of it all the time. God's
people in turmoil and confusion and not even acting like God's
people. You remember when Paul accused,
I believe, the Corinthians of that? You're acting like lost
people. There's a lot of that going on now. But he says, may God comfort
your heart. Establish you in every good word
and work. What's gonna comfort your heart
now is not that everything's gonna be okay even though you're
a wretch. What's gonna comfort your heart is Christ. May God
give me grace to preach Christ and never stop until I breathe
my last breath. Don't ever take your eyes off
of him. Stephen didn't, and none of these ones. They saw the most
horrible thing you can ever imagine happen, and they said, praise
him. Isn't that glory? That's glorious. They couldn't take their eyes
off of him. And notice that God's sovereignty
is not just something that we just admit to. Just notice this
in verse six, in closing. We don't just grudgingly accept
that God is sovereign. I've seen that many, many, many
times in my life. I've had people say, you know,
yeah, I believe God's sovereign, but. Okay, this is true, but we want
to get away from that. We don't want to focus on that.
You know, they grudgingly admit that he's sovereign. His people
delight in the fact that he's on the throne. Look at verse
six again. Hallelujah. Praise ye the Lord because he
reigns. Thank God he reigns. Many will
concede doctrinally that God is sovereign because it's just
so clear in the scripture, but they don't seem too happy about
it. They don't act like it. They don't act like he's sovereign.
If you pinned them down, they'd admit it, but they don't teach
it, they don't preach it, and they don't rejoice in somebody
that does. They rejoice in somebody that
nitpicks and loves to argue and debate people. That's what they
like. They like the knowledge that puffeth up because it puffs
them up. But bless God, he reigns. Bless
His holy and reverend name. The salvation of those that I
love doesn't depend on them coming around or figuring it out. I'm so glad of that. Their salvation
doesn't depend on my ability to explain to them or to convince
them of anything. Their eternal souls are in the
hand of Him who delights to show mercy. and is altogether lovely. God who commanded the light to
shine out of darkness can, if he wants to, at any moment, shine
in their hearts and give the light of the knowledge of the
glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Glory unto him, he reigns. God have mercy on us and on those
that we love. For Christ's dear sake. Amen.