Speak on the subject tonight
of behold a throne. Behold a throne. And John said, after this I looked. So think about those words after
this for a minute. The words after this cause us
to consider what John had seen and heard already. And we need
to refresh our minds a little about that because what he saw
in chapter four, verse one here and the rest of this, first part
of chapter four, it all goes together. It's important to see
it together. John already knew the Lord. before
the Lord appeared to him on the Isle of Patmos, he said, in verse
five of chapter one, he said, this letter's from me, and it's
from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness and the first
begotten of the dead, the prince of the kings of the earth, unto
him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood,
and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his father, to him
be glory and dominion forever and ever, amen. He knew who was
talking to him when he began to talk. But boy, when the Lord
speaks to you personally now, then John hears that voice. Also
in chapter one as a trumpet speaking. What's a characteristic of a
trumpet? Clear and sharp and unmistakable,
unmistakable. You're gonna hear it. And listen
to what he said. This is what the Lord said to
him. He said, John said, I was in the spirit on the Lord's day,
verse 10 of chapter one, and heard behind me a great voice
as of a trumpet saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and
the last. He created everything that's
created and everybody he created is gonna be bowing at his feet
at the end of all of this. He's the first and the last. and he said this what thou seest
write in a book and send it unto the seven churches which are
in asia under ephesus under smyrna under pergamus thyatira sardis
philadelphia laodicea those are the seven letters we've been
looking at for the past several weeks and then john turns and
sees the lord jesus in a beautiful and majestic vision In verse
13, that starts of chapter one. In the midst of the seven candlesticks,
one like unto the son of man. Clothed with a garment down to
the foot and girded about the paps with a golden girdle. And
his head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow.
He's the ancient of days. And his eyes were as a flame
of fire. Can you imagine picturing that?
Beautiful and yet fearful too. He fell at his feet as dead when
he saw him like this. and his feet like undefined brass
as if they burned in a furnace, and his voice as the sound of
many waters. And he had in his right hand
seven stars, and out of his mouth went a sharp two-edged sword,
and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength."
Can you imagine? And when I saw him, I fell at
his feet as dead. Notice a lot in the scripture
a lot of people falling down at his feet when he reveals himself.
I Had never seen anybody dancing with him Or any of the nonsense
that religion talks about I see a lot of falling down like you're
dead In all of his majesty And he
laid his right hand upon me and said fear not I Fear not, I am
the first and the last, I am he that liveth and was dead,
and behold, I am alive forevermore, amen, and have the keys of hell
and of death. I'm the one that decides who
lives and who dies, and I'm the one that decides who goes to
hell and who don't go to hell, and I'm telling you, John, you
got nothing to worry about. Would that be a blessing to you,
to hear that from him? And then John wrote all those
letters to the seven churches, what the Lord Jesus had to say
to all these churches. John heard it from the Lord's
own mouth and wrote those things down. So how that must have impressed
him, what the Lord criticized and condemned in his churches.
There's much of that. There's much warnings, but also
commendations, also encouragement and words of peace to his churches. Well, imagine what that must've
been like though, to hear that from his own mouth. And then
in our text, he looks and behold, a throne. The one that loved us and washed
us from our sins in his own precious blood is sitting on the throne
of the universe. Isaiah said the government is
on his shoulders. What government? The government.
The governments of this earth are governed by him. This universe
is governed by him. Your life is governed by him. And he does as he pleases in
the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of this earth.
And then he saw that that throne was set in heaven. It's set,
it's established in heaven. But the first thing that John
mentions is a door. There was a door opened unto
heaven. The way that he was able to see
the throne and the one sitting on it was because there was a
door opened. Opened. Not just a door, a door
opened. Somebody opened it. Christ is
the door. He's the door all through the
word of God. He was the door into the ark.
He said, I am the door. I am access into the presence
of God. There's access to the throne
of grace. There's a door open and John
saw a throne and somebody sitting on it. And what a blessing to
see that. To see that the one who loves
us and says, you've got nothing to be afraid of. He can back
it up. He's sitting on the throne. And
here's what it looks like. There's access to the throne
of grace, and here's what that looks like. Romans 5, when therefore
being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our
Lord Jesus Christ. Sinners don't have peace with
God by nature now. By nature, we're all the children
of wrath, even as others. The carnal mind is enmity against
God. If God put every one of us in
hell, he'd be doing the right thing. But there's peace with
God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have a door by whom
we have access by faith that he gives us faith not of yourself
it's a gift of god not of works lest any man should boast ephesians
2 8 and 9 we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand
We can come boldly to the throne of grace because there's a door
and the Lord Jesus Christ is the door and he opened it. And when you look through the
door, he's the one you see sitting on the throne. Christ is all.
Paul wasn't exaggerating when he said Christ is all. And we have access by faith into
this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory
of God. And the Lord has deliberately
and graciously opened this door. The one who shuts and no man
can open, this book says, and the one who opens and no man
can shut has opened the door into heaven. And like the door
in the ark, Noah went in there and his sons and his wife and
his son's wives, and God shut them in. He shuts doors too.
He opened the door to them, those who found grace in his eyes,
and then he shut the door, and his wrath fell down upon this
earth. And those who found grace in
his sight and were inside the ark, which is Christ, a picture
of Christ, they were safe. The wrath of God fell on that
ark and knocked them. Everybody outside of Christ,
though, different story. Horrible. Can you imagine? You're
clutching your loved ones and the water's getting higher and
higher. And you're going up into the
mountains to see if you can get up and maybe it'll stop. But
no. No, it's not going to. If you
don't have Christ, God's wrath is upon you. If you're not in Him, He that hath the Son of God hath
life. And he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. Christ is the door. Christ opens
the door. Right now, the door is open.
But it's not always gonna be. It's not always gonna be. Now
is the day of salvation. Now. Notice that the open door
allowed John to see heavenly things. I've never been to heaven. I've
never seen a vision of it. And let me tell you something,
nobody else has either that's alive today. I don't care what
they tell you. They're charlatans, they're idiots. But I'll tell
you this, I know who's on the throne. The same way John did. There's
a door open and I can see heavenly things. I know that Christ is
the lamb slain for his elect. I know who's on that throne,
and I know that he is as a lamb. John saw him as a lamb as it
had been slain because he laid down his life for his elect.
I know that he rules all things for their good. I know that.
I can see heavenly things. We're given understanding. God has given us an understanding
that we may know him that is true, and we're in him that's
true. That's life eternal. I know how
God can be just and justify a wretch like you and an even worse one
like me. Because he has shown me that.
He's opened a door there. These are all heavenly things,
but we see because there's access. There's a door. Christ is the
door so that we can see and also enter into the presence of God. But what do we see when we look
through the door? Christ. Isaiah got a glimpse into heaven
once, and here's how he described it. Isaiah 6, one, in the year
that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a
what? A throne. He saw the same thing
John did. First thing he saw, high and
lifted up, and his train filled the temple, his glory filled
the place. Above it stood the seraphims. Each one had six wings. With
twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet,
and with twain he did fly. And one cried to another and
said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth
is full of his glory." That's what Isaiah saw when the Lord
opened the door and showed him what's going on. Stephen got
a look too. In Acts chapter seven, verse
54, when they heard these things, when they heard Stephen preach
the gospel, they were cut to the heart and they gnashed on
him with their teeth, but he being full of the Holy Ghost,
remember what John said? I was in the spirit, immediately
I was in the spirit when the Lord spoke to me. That's what
happens when the Lord speaks. But Stephen, being full of the
Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory
of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God. And you
look up that word and, that seems like a strange word if you're
doing a word study, look up and there. I'll tell you what that
says right there. It doesn't say, and saw the glory of God
and Jesus standing on the right hand of God. It says, and saw
the glory of God, even Jesus standing on the right hand of
God. Christ is the express image of
God's glory. There's a man on the throne,
the God man. Right now, tonight. And Stephen
looked up and saw him standing on the right hand of God and
said, behold, I see the heavens opened. There's a door. And the
son of man standing on the right hand of God. Oh, the right hand
of God is his authority, his power all through the scripture.
When it talks about the right hand of God, that's his power
and authority. He was on the throne when Stephen
saw him too. So it's no wonder John saw what he saw. But he
also, he heard something first. Listen to this. That trumpet
voice that he heard in chapter one, he said it was like a trumpet
was speaking. He heard that trumpet voice again in our text. The
way that Christ reveals himself to sinners is by his voice now.
By his voice. We see visions and things like
that, but if you're gonna know him, he's gotta tell you who
he is. He's gotta speak to you. That's the way it happens. We
see in the heaven and when Christ speaks to us through his gospel,
we see in the heaven and we see him as high and lifted up like
Isaiah did. The Lord told John, listen to
this, look at what he said to him, come up and I'm gonna show
you something, come up here, I'm gonna show you something.
Think about that for a minute. The Lord's talking about showing
John things that are gonna happen. But listen, this applies to you
and I tonight. If we're ever gonna really see
anything that happens, we're gonna have to come up here. You
have no idea what's going on unless you've seen it from the
perspective of heaven. This world has no idea what's
going on in this world. You've got to see it as God reveals
it. You've got to come up to heaven,
so to speak, and see from his perspective now. Are you not
gonna have a clue? Not a clue. By God's grace, his
people see this world and all that happens in it from the perspective
of heaven, the perspective of Christ. Paul said in 1 Corinthians
2.16, who hath known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct
him, but we have the mind of Christ. That's what he's talking
about. We have. He's revealed to us
and shows us things as he sees them. Not perfectly, but we have
a. He's shown us a lot, hadn't he?
While others despair, we know that all things work together
for our good. While others are engaged in the
rat race, we know that the fashion of this world passes away. We
just pilgrims here, we're just passing through this place. This
is not our home. While others seek their own glory.
And of course we still have, we still have a fleshly nature,
but we know, and by God's grace, we seek to glorify and worship
him. Everybody else is in it for themselves.
This life for most people, it consists of working to get money,
to buy beans so you can eat, so you can work, to get money,
to buy beans so you can eat. That's what this life is to most
people. But we seek God's glory. We seek to worship him. Our lives
are centered around this, around hearing from God. How is that? We've come up there
in a sense and seen through his eyes. by his revealing grace
in his gospel. We see from a heavenly perspective
because he has spoken to us and called us up to see things to
a degree the way he does. Verse two, he said, immediately
I was in the spirit when the Lord speaks to you. You have
to be in the Spirit. The flesh don't hear what God
said. The carnal mind is enmity against
God. You can't see the things of God.
The natural man perceiveth not the things of the Spirit of God.
And so John couldn't have seen or heard anything unless he was
in the Spirit. And that's just the grace of
God now. The Spirit of God has got to to dwell in us and show
us the things of Christ. And behold, a throne was set
in heaven. Being in the spirit means you've
heard from the Lord himself. That's the only way you can.
That's the only way you can. When he speaks to you and says,
I will show you, that's what he's, I'm gonna show you some
things. You're fixing to see some things. And you're fixing
to see some things that this flesh can't see. So you're gonna
be in the spirit. You're gonna be in the spirit
like John was or you're not gonna see it. And so he sees to that. Only by the spirit of God dwelling
in us can we see what Christ shows us when he speaks to our
hearts. When he speaks, there has to be an ability to hear
what he says. And that doesn't come from the
flesh. That's from the spirit, that's spiritual ears. And what
does he show us? The throne and somebody sitting
on it. And it ain't you. And it ain't
me either, and you better be glad. We'd have all put each
other in hell a long time ago, wouldn't we? Well, no, I like
you, Chris. Not all the time, you don't.
You'd have tossed me in hell, wouldn't you? Sooner or later. Because I'm not as good as you
are. That's how we think. We don't
have mercy. The flesh don't have mercy. Mercy's
of the Lord. His throne is a throne of grace. So he shows us the throne and
he shows us somebody sitting on it. Notice first that it is
set. It is established. God's sovereignty, his throne,
the throne represents the sovereignty of Christ, of God in all of his
persons. But we see Christ on the throne
here and his sovereignty is absolute and immutable. That just means
it don't ever change. It's always absolute. Always
has been, always will be. He was perfectly sovereign when
he created this universe and everything and everybody in it.
And he'll be sovereign when he destroys it and takes his people
to glory. It's absolute and immutable.
Nebuchadnezzar was shown that. And you know what he said? None
can stay his hand or say unto him, what doest thou? That just
simply means nobody can stop God from doing everything he
pleases and nobody can even question him. You don't have the right
to question him. Well, why did God do that? Just
shut up. He did it because he's omniscient.
He knows everything. He did it because he's perfectly
good and wise and gracious. and he can't do anything wrong,
he can't make a mistake, that's why he does it and not you. Don't even question, we got no
right to even question him. Who are you, Paul said in Romans
nine, to reply against God? Nobody, that's who you are, me
too. So it's set now, and like Nebuchadnezzar
said, and listen, this is a great comfort to the people of God.
Who else do you want on the throne? Do you really want God to just
let you have a free will? You don't know much about yourself
if you want that. There can only be one free will,
and it ain't yours. There's only one that can do
everything he pleases, always what he pleases, and that's God. No matter what happens on earth,
no matter what changes or develops down here, two things don't change,
the throne and who's sitting on it. And that's a great comfort
to his sheep. that's the last part of this
verse somebody was sitting on that throne he sits there because
he has finished a work he's sitting we read while ago we saw him
standing at the right hand of god while ago we'll talk about
that in a minute but listen to this hebrews 10 11 and every
priest in the Old Testament standeth daily ministering and offering
oftentimes the same sacrifices which can never take away sins."
Why did God even set that up then? Why did he set up an Old
Testament priesthood? To picture Christ. The law is
our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ. Those priests, there
was no chair in the tabernacle. They stood daily ministering
and offered sacrifices that can't take away sin. But this man,
Christ, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever,
sat down. That's why John saw him sitting.
Because he has already accomplished salvation. He finished the work
that the father sent him to do. And that's what I do when I'm
done with my work too. I sit down. And that's what he did. He finished
the work. he sat down on the right hand
of God because his sacrifice that he the one sacrifice for
sins forever for all of his elect his precious blood did take away
all of the sins those priests in the old testament day offered
sacrifices that couldn't take away sin but he only offered
one because it did take away all of the sins of his elect
forever all for whom he shed it he was
able to do what no earthly priest could do he sat down because
salvation the redemption of all his elect was accomplished finished
it's finished and he sat down he's sitting because he worketh
all things after the counsel of his own will He's not up pacing
around worried about things. Nothing happens in his universe
that is not precisely according to his eternal immutable purpose
and decree. Nothing. Even Satan is on God's chain
and he uses him as he pleases. He's not fretting over whether
or not people will believe on him. He's not pacing around worrying
about whether somebody's gonna do something contrary to his
will. The one time we see him standing, where we read well
ago in Acts 7, I believe it was, is when he's welcoming Stephen,
his loved one, into glory, into his presence. Stephen said, Lord,
receive my spirit. And the Lord stood up. Oh my. As David said, our God
is in the heavens. And he hath done whatsoever he
hath pleased. How would you characterize God?
That's what it means to be God. He does what he wants to do.
If your idea of God has God ever trying to do anything, then you
don't know God. You haven't read this book. He
hasn't revealed himself to you. He don't try. He don't try. He does. And it's done when he
does. When describing the one on the
throne, John describes him in spiritual terms now. You gotta
understand that he didn't see a precious jewel sitting on the
throne. Okay, these are spiritual, this
is spiritual language that he's describing the Lord in. He didn't literally see a precious
stone on the throne of God, he saw God. But just like when we're
seeing him in the gospel, you're not picturing some physical form.
You can't do that. You have no idea. Nobody does
what his physical form would even look like. He's talking
about him in spiritual terms. We don't picture him as an old
man with a white beard like they do in the movies or something.
That has no basis in fact, in truth, in the word of God. That's
absurd and it's blasphemous, and in glory where John saw him,
John is using spiritual imagery to describe the glory of God.
And so he said this, he that sat was to look upon like a jasper
and a sardine stone, and there was a rainbow round about the
throne in sight like unto an emerald. Now, all we can talk
about, there's a lot of mysterious things in the book of Revelation,
and we'll see that more and more as we go through this book. But
we can talk about what we know. What we know is a jasper stone
is a stone. If I said, what color is a ruby? You know what color it is. And
I say, what color is an emerald? It's green, right? A jasper stone
can be just about any color. And that pictures all of the
various attributes of God. Different colors mean things
in the scriptures. Blue is the deity, purple is
royalty, and things like that. And I can't sit here and tell
you what all the different colors of a jasper stone mean in the
character of God. But I know this, John saw him in all of
his attributes, his holiness, his grace, his justice, his wrath,
his love, his mercy. That's what he saw, the attributes
of God, the spiritual nature of God, not a physical image,
but the nature of him in spiritual terms. And that's what this is. There's no flaw in our Savior.
Some say that that the word Jasper here should be diamond, that
what was called a Jasper then was really a diamond. And that's
a possibility too. I can't say dogmatically either
way, but what's a diamond? Think about that. Pure and clear,
no spot. If he's a diamond, he's a flawless
diamond. And what does a diamond also
do? You look at it. If a diamond
was just completely clear, It wouldn't be that pretty, would
it? You know what's pretty about it? You can see all the colors
of the spectrum of light in that diamond. If you hold it up to
the light, you can see all, when light shines on that diamond,
you can see all of the colors of the spectrum. And so there
again, it's all the different colors. It's all the different
attributes of the Lord, either way. And so this Jasper that
John speaks of is a vision of all of the glories of God, His
holiness and righteousness and love and grace. You can't see
the colors of light. Just like looking at that light
and seeing the light in the air, there's light. But you know,
light doesn't really look like that. When it goes through a
prism or a diamond, it's a lot of different colors. It's made
up of different colors, but you can't see them. unless it's shining
on the diamond, unless God reveals it by himself. He's the one that reveals all
of the colors of his glory. This is God revealing who he
is and all of his glorious attributes, that's what he saw. And then
a sardine stone, guess what color it is? It's just one color, it's
red. You've got to see the red or
you can't see any of the other colors. Because God is holy, there's
got to be a redstone too, doesn't there? Got to be red. These two
together give us a spiritual description of God. Many colors,
many attributes, many characters of God, many offices, many glorious
characteristics, but also red. picturing the precious blood
of Christ. This is how all of the other
colors of God's glory are seen on Calvary, where the blood of
Christ flowed down. You must see the red if you're
going to see God's holiness. You must see the blood if you're
going to see his goodness. You're going to see his grace.
How do you define grace? Look to Calvary and see the red. The love of God. Oh, herein is
love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent
his son to be our sin offering, to shed his precious blood and
wash our sins away. So all of the glories of God
are seen at Calvary. And then there was a rainbow.
You know what a rainbow is? The rainbow is a covenant token
of God's promise that he will not destroy the earth again by
flood. And you know why he did that? Because when Noah and his
family came out of that ark, the wrath of God against the
sin of all the world had fallen, but they were in Christ, and
so they were perfectly safe. I highly suspect that not one
drop of water fell on them in that ark, you reckon? I highly
suspected not one drop of God's wrath ever touched them, because
they were in the ark. When they came out, God made
a covenant with them. You're safe. You're not ever
going to suffer God's wrath. That's what the picture in the
rainbow is. All of my wrath has been poured out on your substitute,
and you will never suffer for your sins. That's what the rainbow
means. It's a covenant. It was God telling Noah and his
family that since all of God's wrath was poured out on the ark
and not them, they would never be threatened again with the
wrath of God. This is Christ suffering the
wrath and judgment of God and fully satisfying God's justice
against the wickedness of his people in the ark and wiping
out the rest of the earth, which is a picture of the final judgment.
It's gonna be a lot worse than that flood as horrible as that
must have been God's throne is a throne of grace the rainbow
is round about that throne When we look at him we see the
rainbow and when he looks at us he sees the rainbow Covenant grace God's wrath has
been poured out on the earth and those in Christ and are eternally
blessed and safe. Verse four, round about the throne
were four and 20 seats, and upon the seats I saw four and 20 elders
sitting, clothed in white raiment, and they had on their heads crowns
of gold. All right, now these four and
20 are said by some to be 12 prophets in the Old Testament
and the 12 apostles in the New Testament, making up 24. There
again, I can't verify that. I don't know that that's right.
Nobody knows for sure about that, but they represent God's elect.
That's pretty clear. These are people arrayed in white,
the righteousness of Christ. We see that all through the scripture.
The wedding garment, who are these in white robes? These are they that have washed
their robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb. That's
God's people. That's God's elect. No question
about that. Angels don't do that. They don't
wash their robes in the blood. Saints do that. God's people
do that. And they wore crowns. So these
are the chosen people of God represented around the throne,
and they wear white, of course that's the righteousness of our
Lord, and they wear crowns. Religion talks about earning
crowns, you know, we're earning crowns by our good works in this
world, or we're earning extra jewels in our crown. One thing's
for sure, whatever we're wearing in the presence of God in glory,
it ain't gonna have anything to do with anything we earned.
You can mark that down. What we earned is hell. By his
grace, we're arrayed in white and wearing a crown of life,
a crown of glory. And we're going to read about
that a little bit. Paul spoke of a crown of righteousness.
2 Timothy 4, 8, henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of
righteousness. which the Lord the righteous judge shall give
me at that day. He gives us his righteousness.
We don't get into heaven any other way. We have the righteousness
of Christ now. But that crown is a token of
that when we're in heaven. And whether it's a physical crown,
nobody knows that for sure either. I'm gonna be real honest with
you in the book of Revelation now. People say oh this means
this and this means that and you're not gonna be able to prove
that from scripture If you can't prove it from scripture then
shut up You got no business saying it But I know what a crown is
and I know what righteousness is and I know that God gives
it We didn't earn it and look and not to me only but unto all
them also that love his appearing that that goes I Completely against
what religion talks about well some of us earn crowns Some of
us are gonna have a bigger mansion than other no everybody that
God loves is getting one of these We all have to have the righteousness
of God in order to be around his throne like these 24 were
Everybody receives that crown because it's his righteousness
and not theirs James 1 12 blessed is the man that endureth temptation
and For when he has tried, he shall receive the crown of life,
which the Lord has promised to them that love him. Everybody
up there is gonna love him. Again, that's everybody. That's
not somebody earning the crown and somebody not earning the
crown. It's all those that love him because he first loved them.
And it's promised and given, not earned. First Peter 5.4,
when the chief shepherd shall appear, you shall receive a crown
of glory that fadeth not away. Reckon whose glory that is. We're wearing his righteousness,
his life, his glory. And notice here, we're pictured
sitting around about the throne. We're not walking down golden
streets. We're not going through pearly
gates. We're not living up on the mansion over the hilltop.
We're sitting around his throne, beholding him and hearing from
him. That's what glory is. It's him. Sitting at his feet, like Mary
did, hearing his word. If you're not interested in that
now, you wouldn't be up there either. That starts here. That starts
right down here. It's gonna be a lot better up
there, but it starts right here. If you have no desire to do that,
then you wouldn't there either. But what a blessing to know that
this is how it all ends. When all is said and done, we
wind up with Him and like Him. We wind up sitting around His
throne. We're never gonna get tired of
just looking at Him glorying in Him on His throne, singing
worthy is the Lamb. Never gonna get tired of that.
That's how marvelous He is. If we could see that now, we
wouldn't get tired of it now. But if I preach to you for a
couple of hours tonight, you'd get tired of it, wouldn't you?
We're not quite like we're gonna be yet, but we're gonna be. We're gonna see Him as He is.
And we're sitting down too. It says they were sitting down.
You know why we're sitting down? Because he's sitting down. Because
he finished the work, he's satisfied with it, and so are we. We're
utterly satisfied to sit at his feet. He accomplished salvation
and sat down, and we rest for the same reason. He accomplished
salvation for us. Oh my. at his feet, beholding
him. And look at the next verse. We're
gonna hear him too, just like we do now. Not just like. We're
gonna hear a little better. But we're gonna hear from him
there too. And out of the throne, verse five, proceeded lightnings
and thunderings and voices. And there were seven lamps of
fire burning before the throne, which are the seven spirits of
God. Just as the word of the Lord is precious to us here,
And Job said, more even than my necessary food, I esteem thy
word, Lord. God will never stop speaking
to us in glory. It's our favorite thing. That's
not gonna stop. To hear from him, it don't get
better than that. Beholding him and hearing from
him, he never gonna stop. Can you imagine as beautiful
and glorious as it is, to hear the gospel now. Can you even imagine what it
will be like to sit at his feet around his throne without seeing
and hear his voice? Oh, it's wonderful now. It's
the best thing there is. It's the best thing there is
now. But boy, when God spoke at Sinai, with thunderings and
lightnings, like it says, these thunderings and lightnings. When
God spoke at Sinai, there was thunder, lightning, and the people
were scared to death, but not here. They ain't scared. Not when we're just like our
Lord. We're gonna be just like him.
We're not gonna be scared of his lightnings and thunderings.
We're gonna be in awe. We're gonna be worshiping. we'll be
impressed but we won't be scared this simply speaks of the power
of his voice the authority of what he says not threatenings
not anymore and these seven spirits again this is spiritual language
you gotta understand he didn't see seven holy spirits there's
not seven holy spirits there's one holy spirit but seven is
the number of perfection in the scripture And so the perfect
spirit of God, there's one spirit and one God in three persons,
but seven is the number of perfection. So this is the perfect Holy Spirit
of God. And he manifests himself to John
as lamps. He sees him as lamps. Well, why
is that? Well, as God speaks, the Holy
Spirit gives us light to see and understand. The Holy Spirit
is gonna dwell in our hearts then and light up and show us
the truth. Those lamps never go out in glory. They never go out. We will know
even as we are known, and the Spirit of God is instrumental
in that, just as He is now when the gospel's preached. David
said, thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. That's true because the Holy
Spirit of God takes the things of Christ in His word and shows
them to us. Lamps, seven lamps, perfect light,
the Holy Spirit of God. And then verse six, and we'll
just look at the first part of it. We'll talk about these beasts
next time, Lord willing, because it describes them in detail in
the next several verses. And so we won't touch on them
yet until next time. But look at the first part. And
before the throne, there was a sea of glass like into crystal. Sea of Glass. This Sea of Glass, there are
a lot of differing ideas on this too, and again, I'm just gonna
be honest with you, there's a lot of different opinions about what
it represents. Some say it's the blood of Christ,
and here's what we know, it could well represent the blood of Christ,
because only by going through the blood, you know, that's the
picture here, No one approaches the throne of God. You're not
gonna sit around his throne, but by the precious blood of
Christ. And so that could be what's talked about here. I believe
it pictures Christ himself. You know why I think that? Because
everything that we've read tonight pictures Christ. Everything. Look at it again. After this,
I looked and behold the door. Who's that? Was opened into heaven. What's that? Paul said, I have
a desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far. What are
you talking about, Paul, going to heaven? What does that mean?
To be with Christ, which is far better than this. And the first
voice which I heard, there's Christ again. It's a trumpet.
saying, come up hither, I'll show you some things. And immediately
I was in the spirit and behold, a throne was set in heaven and
somebody sat on it. Who's that? Everything in this
passage pictures Christ. Even when it talks about the
24 elders, what are they doing? They're sitting around his throne,
hearing him speak and rejoicing in him and worshiping him. It
all pictures Christ and I don't think this is any exception.
No man approaches the throne of God except by Christ. He said,
no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. That's true even in
glory. Even in glory. Christ is the
pure river of water of life in Revelation 22 one. So this isn't
much of a stretch here to imagine that he's this sea of glass as
well. Listen to how this river of water of life is described.
And he showed me, in Revelation 22 one, and he showed me a pure
river of water of life, clear as crystal. That sounds a lot
like that sea of glass, doesn't it? Like crystal. So I believe, and it was proceeding
out of the throne of God and of the Lamb, and the Lord is
that river, Christ is that river. The river of water of life, that's
the Son of God. And so I believe he's also this
crystal sea that surrounds the throne, and I know this. I can't
be sure about that 100%, I'm 99% sure about that. But here's
what I know, there's nobody coming under the throne of grace but
by Christ. Ain't no question about that. Simon walked upon
a raging sea to go to Christ. in this world, and when he took
his eyes off of Christ, he began to sink, and the Lord reached
out his hand and caught him. But now, we're looking into glory
now, because Christ has redeemed us with his precious blood. We'll
walk on a sea of glass to the very throne, not a ripple on
it, not a ripple. And we can't look away from him
there. to the very throne of God to
worship in his very presence around his
throne. Amen.