If you take your Bibles and turn
with me to Revelation, Revelation, chapter four. Revelation, chapter four. And
this morning we'll be looking at this chapter and some of chapter
five because they are so entwined and by God's grace, pray for
me that I would be able to get what you need from this message. It was overwhelming to me to
study and it's overwhelming to me to write and yet I want you
to get the fullness of it. I want you to get the fullness
of the measure of this scripture so that you might be blessed.
So pray for me that by the time that I'm given here that I can
give you what you need. Revelation chapter 4. I'm not
going to read the chapter, but we're just going to start in
verse 1. The Scripture says, And after this I looked, and
behold, a door was opened in heaven. And the first voice which
I heard was as it were a trumpet talking with me, which said,
Come up hither, and I will show thee things which must be hereafter. And immediately I was in the
Spirit, and beheld a throne was set in heaven, and one sat on
the throne." Last time we studied this, we studied the door. We
studied how that Christ is the door to heaven. He is the only
way, truth, and life. And remember that this book is
a revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a message of the
gospel. It is not just some prophetic
book that we puzzle pieces together to try to match up with time. It is the gospel. It is the same
as the other books of the Holy Scripture that speak of Christ.
Now, when John saw this door and heard the voice, he said,
immediately, I was in the Spirit. In other words, what we're going
to hear is what John saw spiritually. He was in the Spirit. As though
his spirit and his body had, his spirit had left his body
and he had entered into heaven itself. But unlike Paul who did
that same thing, he was not able to write. John is able to write. John is able, he is commanded
to write these things which he sees. And these are all spiritual
things. So when you read of 24 elders,
you're not reading of 24 people sitting down on 24 specific thrones
with fires and lamps and all kinds of things around. This
is the gospel. It is a gospel message. And so
when we see these things, we see them through spiritual eyes. Spiritual eyes. You know, many
times Jesus said the kingdom of heaven is like unto. Now,
we would not suppose that the kingdom of heaven is exactly
unto whatever the parable was. And so, we know these things
are not exact, because He is speaking in an earthly language,
revealing to us spiritual things. Now, first thing I want us to
see is that these spiritual things only come by spiritual sight.
They don't come by carnal reason. They don't come by... carnal
understanding. If you were to take these things
and say, man, four beasts and 24 elders and lamps and thunderings
and stuff like that, then they try to figure out what that is.
Well, if you don't have spiritual eyes, you can't see what that
is. No matter how far you dig, you're not going to be able to
see it. But for us who have spiritual eyes, this should be plain. It
should be simple. It's not something complex. It
is the gospel. It is what we see. The gospel
of Jesus Christ. When man is born, we are born
blind and carnal. We cannot see spiritual things,
no matter how hard we try. No matter how hard we try to
teach our children, we cannot show them spiritual things. I
can only tell them what I see. They cannot see. So therefore,
I am witnessing to a blind man. Witnessing to a blind man. The
natural man receiveth not the things of God, for they are foolishness unto
him. Neither can he know them, because
he is spiritually judged, discerned." That word means judgment. When
God judged Adam, we were all judged in Adam and found spiritually
guilty, dead. under that covenant of works.
Now, we are all discerned in Adam, and so that no man can
know the things of God save the Spirit of God. And unless the
Spirit of God gives us spiritual eyes, these things will seem
foolish. Seem as nothing. Therefore, unless
Christ, the Holy Spirit, give us revelation, Call us up to
enter in to the door, which is Christ. We cannot see these things. Those Pharisees, they murmured.
Jesus said, I'm the bread of life. I come down from heaven.
They began to murmur among themselves. There's a lot of murmuring going
on among religion, isn't there? They murmur and they complain
and they bicker and they go back and forth. We're not here to
bicker with them. We're not here to murmur with Him. We're not
here to complain with Him. We're not here to do anything
but to express the truth. Jesus said, don't murmur among
yourselves. No man can come unto Me except
the Father which hath sent Me draw him. And I will raise him up at the
last day, as it is written, that ye shall all be taught of God.
Friends, if you are a believer in Christ, get this. You are
taught not of your pastor. You are taught of God. God teaches you. If you know
anything at all concerning Christ and spiritual things as forgiveness,
reconciliation, justification, redemption, righteousness, if
you know the person of Christ, it is only because you are taught
of God. This is a spiritual matter. Salvation is all spiritual. At the end of these verses, Jesus
said, these words I speak, they are spiritual. He said, eat my
flesh and drink my blood. What do they think? Oh, he's
cannibalistic. How in the world is he going
to give all of us his flesh? He don't have much flesh. How
is he going to do that? He don't have but a little bit
of blood. How is he going to give us all that blood? He said,
these words I speak, they're spirit. And these words that
John is speaking, they're spirit. And they are truth. Don't worry
about religious men and what they murmur. Don't worry about
what they complain about because they don't understand. Man is
responsible. God is sovereign. Yes! That's
all you need to know. Yes! You don't need to bicker. You don't need to complain. You
don't need to enter into any debate with Him. How can that
be? God's Word said so. God chose the people. Christ
redeemed those people. Christ calls those people. Yet
you must come. You must believe. I'm not here
to reconcile those things. I'm here to just tell you. That's
it. And God's people, we see it. We see it and we understand
it. Not to the foolish measure, but
we bow down to it and say it is truth. Let God be true in
every man and liar. Everything's for God's glory.
Everything is for God's glory. Self-righteous men may murmur,
But praise God, for God has hidden these things from the wise and
prudent and revealed them unto babes." That's good, because
I'm not a wise and prudent man. I'm a simpleton, and I need spiritual
teaching. I cannot learn myself. Now, what
is these spiritual things that are seen here? John says, I was
in the Spirit and beheld a throne. The first thing that a man who
is spiritual understands is this, that there is a throne in heaven. That not all things are ruled
by chance, not things are ruled by luck. Everything is ruled
by a throne and one God who sits on that throne. That's what every
spiritual eye sees. I see that. I know that. I believe
that by faith. I trust that with all my heart.
More than I trust that you're sitting in that seat. I know
this. God is in heaven and His throne is set. And nothing, nothing
shall move that throne. This is spiritual. It's not carnal. Nobody can see that throne with
their physical eyes. I keep having a man to tell me,
well, if God would come down. I said, God did come down. God
did come down. God wrote a book, put it in a
book for you, and you still will not believe. I know this, all things are controlled
by God. All things. All things. I don't mean to pick on anybody,
but if you scratch your head, if
you scratch your arm, Cheryl just scratched her arm, Know
this, all things are under God's dominion. Always. Always. Not one atom escapes Him. There
is a throne. It is a sovereign throne. It
is a throne that rules after the counsel of His own will.
This is what God says of Himself in Deuteronomy 32, 39. He says,
see now that I, even I, That means me, alone,
by myself. There is no God with me. And this, this will throw any
self-righteous man into a tailspin. I kill. And I make a life. I wound and I heal. You mean God killed those? Absolutely, God did it. Because
if it wasn't done, God didn't do it. If it was done, God did
it. And to tell you the truth, if
it wasn't done, God restrained it. God does all things. And this
throne is set. Everyone who has spiritualized,
we see this. This throne is set. He said,
I beheld a throne. It was set. That word means established. It means as though you were take
that throne and drill it down into the ground as strong as
you can and make it as sure and as established. That throne is
attached to heaven. In other words, to get rid of
this throne, you would have to throw out all of heaven and God
with it. This throne is set, and no one
will move this throne. This throne is set. It's established. And therefore, as a throne, what
do we think of when we think of a throne? We think of a king.
We think of a despot. We think of someone who has absolute
reign and rule. And this throne is not like earthly
thrones. Earthly thrones have come up
and they've been thrown down by other thrones. And men have
taken over other kings. And we've seen this through history.
But this throne, this throne was established before anything
else was established. God was sovereign. when he was
all by himself. God ruled all things. And therefore,
as a king, omnipotent, powerful, all things that he says goes. Everything he says happens. That's authority. Scripture says in Psalm 93, thy
testimonies are very sure. Why? His throne said. It's said
in heaven. The next thing we see with spiritual
eyes is the character of God. The character of one who sat
on this throne. Look at this. He sat. One sat
on the throne. And he that sat was to look upon
like a jasper and a sardine stone. And there was a rainbow round
about the throne in the sight like unto an emerald. You notice
that John uses absolutely no human physical characteristic
to describe God. None. He didn't say God's nose
was this long, or God's hands were this big. No. He uses these
stones, these beautiful, precious stones that are vivid in color,
vivid, to describe only the glory and character, because that's
all we can see. We can't see God. All we can
see is His glory and His character. You can't see the wind. All you
can see is the effect of the wind. We can't see God. We can
see the effects that God has made. We look around and look
at this creation. We know that there is a God we
have not seen. And He is all-powerful. And so He uses these stones.
And He uses two particular stones to begin with. And I'm rushing
through this so fast. There's so much here. It says,
first of all, the Jasper stone. Matthew Henry says of this stone,
it is a transparent stone and it's a variety of colors. You look into this stone and
you see a variety of colors. In other words, it's a vast display,
but yet it's clear. You see through it. We see the
holy perfections of God in this. God is light. And in Him is no darkness at
all. We see by spiritual sight the
sardine stone. You know, the sardine stone is
a red stone. It is a red, blood red stone. We see the justice of God. The holy perfections of God. and the justice of God. Why? For without the shedding
of blood, there is no remission. God is just and holy. God is righteous and pure. His holiness and justice. He
must punish sin. If someone comes into your city
your town, and he has molested children. You feel enraged, because
I do. When I hear such things, I'm
enraged. And whatever punishment that
man gets, I know it should be more. How much more shall God punish
him? If we think we're just in accusing
and condemning and judging another sinner like ourselves, how much
more shall God have a right to judge men? God has a right to
judge. Shall not the judge of all the
earth do right? Yes, He will. You can expect
it. And we also see this, because
this gives us a glimmer of hope. in this. If we only saw these
two stones, there would be no hope for us to stand before such
a holy and just God. But notice this. He said, And
he that sat was like unto a jasper and a sardine stone, and there
was a rainbow at the back of the throne, in sight like an
emerald. Oh, the rainbow part you should
get. It's a covenant. Remember Noah. That was the covenant that he
put the rainbow in the sky to say that he would no longer flood
the earth with water like that again. Our God is a covenant
God. He deals with men after a covenant. And there are two covenants.
There is a covenant of works and there is a covenant of grace. And God will deal with each one
of you and myself underneath one of these covenants. And notice this. This covenant
was likened to an emerald. And I had to study this because
I didn't know what in the world the emerald was. I had no clue. But it just was so clear after
it was revealed. You remember the breastplate
on the high priest? It was covered in stones. And
each stone had a name for the children of Israel on that stone. And they were given in the order
of their birth. So on the second row, there was
one there that was an emerald. And inscribed was Judah. Christ, the Lion of the tribe
of Judah. See, this is not a multi-colored
rainbow. It's a single-colored rainbow.
This covenant is a covenant of grace in Christ, the Lion of
the tribe of Judah, the Son of David. And it's always It's around the throne. That
means everywhere God turns, He sees the covenant with His Son. Beautiful. Spiritual sight. Next thing, look at this. And He that looked upon... let's
go to verse 4. It says, "...round about the
throne were twenty-four seats." Twenty-four thrones. And upon
these thrones I saw four and twenty elders sitting clothed
in white raiment, and they had crowns on their heads." Oh, the
glory of this is great. Don't you suppose for a minute
when you get into heaven you'll see twenty-four thrones and just
twenty-four people sitting there? This is the church of the living
God. In prophetic language, think.
See with spiritual eyes that this is both the dispensation
of the Old Testament and the dispensation of the New Testament.
This is you. This is me. We are the 24 elders. Twelve represent the twelve tribes
of Jacob. on the Old Testament side. And
twelve represent the apostles and the New Testament dispensation. That's awesome. Man, we're on
that side right there with them. This is us! This is us. And friends, these 24 elders, they were given crowns. and robes
of white, and they sat on these thrones. This shows us, friends, the sovereign,
eternal election of God. Before I was born, according
to the purpose of God, I had a white robe and a crown and
a throne. already mine. Is that not wonderful? Is that not great? And notice this, that there were
24 seats. How many people were sitting
on those 24 seats? Were there 23? Was there 22?
Was there 26? There was no more and no less.
Every seat was taken. It's not a cakewalk. You know
how you do that cakewalk and then the seat's taken away and
you go, ah, I don't get nothing. No! No! Twenty-four seats! Twenty-four elders! God has chosen
and redeemed and applied that redemption to a certain number
of people that He Himself has determined. A certain number
of people. And every one of them will be
there. It's so rich. The gospel is so
rich. All that God chose, all that
Christ redeemed, all that the Spirit calls will be there. The
foolishness then to think of anything else being
greater than this. Now, notice this, that the 24
elders, each one had a crown and a robe. In other words, he
didn't say, well, this person had a robe and his robe had some
tassels on it. And this guy, he had a robe,
and it was just a robe. There wasn't nothing on it. And
then this guy's got a crown, and there's little jewels running
around his crown. And the other guys, they didn't have any jewels
in their crown. No! They had all the same robe
and all the same crown. What foolishness to desire anything
but the crown of eternal life and the robe of Christ's righteousness.
Is there anything else you would add to that? Is there any little
trinket that you want to put on that? I know Audrey loves
to do little crafts and she'll take a hat and she'll start stapling
a bunch of glitter and things on it. No, there's nothing to
add to this robe and ground. It's already been prepared. When? Go back. And when you go back,
go back further. And when you go back, go back
further. As far as you can go, and then you still not even come
close, keep going. That's when my robe and my crown
was made. Already. Now then, I want you to see this,
because now the scene changes. Oh, I'm so out of time. I want you to see this before
we close. I want you to see that the scene now changes. Here we
have God. and His beauty and His character
beaming out. We have the covenant around our
Lord, our God. We have the 24 elders sitting
on the throne in their crowns. And everybody seems at peace.
All is at rest. Then we get this. And out of
the throne proceeded lightnings and thunders and voices. And
there were seven lamps burning before the throne, which are
the seven spirits of God. And before the throne there was
a sea of glass likened to crystal. And in the midst of the throne
and round about the throne were four beasts full of eyes, before
and behind. And the first beast was like
a lion, the second beast was like a calf, the third beast
had the face of a man, and the fourth beast was like a flying
eagle. And the four beasts had each of them six wings round
about him, which were full of eyes within. And they rest not day and night,
saying, Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God Almighty, which was, which
is, and which is to come. And when those beasts gave glory
and honor and thanks to Him that sat on the throne who liveth
forever and ever, the four and twenty elders fell down and they
got off their thrones and fell down before God, casting their
crowns at His feet. saying, Thou art worthy, O God,
to receive glory and honor and power, for Thou hast created
all things, and for Thy pleasure they were created." Do you not
see the difference? See the difference in the serene
picture that he first sees, and then this picture? The throne
of lightning and thunder, the seven lamps that are burning
before God. Then you have these four beasts
that are always pronouncing the holiness of God. What is this? seven lamps. Our God is a consuming
fire. It's number seven is a number
of perfection. These are the seven spirits of
God. There's not seven spirits. There's only one Holy Spirit
of God. These seven spirits means the
perfection of the Spirit. In other words, the Spirit has
eyes both within, without, and all over. He sees all things.
He is a consuming fire. He burns up all sin and destroys
it. And these beasts, who are these
beasts? Some people think they are preachers.
No, the preachers are down there on the floor. That is where we
are at. I am with you on the floor. I'm
casting 100 at His feet and I'm on the floor. I'm not flying
around saying, holy, holy, holy. No. These are the same as Isaiah
saw in the prophetic vision in his book, in Isaiah chapter 6,
when he said he saw the seraphims with six wings. And these beasts
have six wings. They're the same. And I looked
up the word seraphim. It's important. It means fiery
serpent. Now, before I looked that up,
I thought, beautiful angel, you know. Beautiful angel, holy,
holy, holy. Everything's peachy keen. Everything's
wonderful. No. Remember the fiery serpents
during the time of the Israelites that bit them? What did that
picture? It's the law. Friends, these
beasts are the law of God who cry, Holy, Holy, Holy, Holy,
Holy, Holy day and night without rest. The law never rests, friends. It never finds rest. It's always
pronouncing the holiness of God. Always. They have eyes within
and without. In other words, they see not
only your actions without, they see your actions that you've
done, the actions you'll do, and they'll see the actions within
your heart. Those are the eyes that see.
One is like a lion. The law is like a majestic beast. Who shall escape His clutches?
Romans chapter 2 said none of us will escape. The law is like an ox or a calf. In other words, the law demands
blood. It demands the blood of the innocent. The law is like the face of a
man. God doesn't want a calf. He must have a man to sacrifice. It must be a man that intercedes
for us in this law. That's why God had high priests
of men. The picture of thee, high priest,
was to come. And then you see the last one.
The last one is like an evil story. The law of God never rests. But men think that because an
evil work is not executed judgment speedily, they got away with
it. But when God's appointed time comes, they are like an
eagle that swoops down without notice and snatches them. Takes them. Beasts are the law. And what else does a man do but
throw down everything he thinks he has and says, you're worthy
to cast me into hell if that's your pleasure. All things were
created for you. You that have spiritual eyes,
is that not your experience? Have you not experienced the
law in this way? I have. But as we go on, we'll see that
there's hope. There's hope. John wept because
of this. I'll tell you, if you're without
Christ, you should weep. You should weep. But know this,
the Lion of the tribe of Judah hath prevailed. And when that's revealed to these
elders and to the beasts, you'll notice that they come together
and sing together. I'll just give you a little bit. There's so much in that one chapter. Just go on for days with that. It's the full of the Gospel.
These things you know. I've not taught you anything
new, have I? Is anything that I taught you
today new? Nothing. Nothing. The book of Revelation is the
gospel. Read it as it is the gospel. With spiritual eyes. May God bless you. Well, that's probably going to
be a lot of questions now.