All right, if you'll return in
your Bibles to Revelation chapter four. Revelation four. No sooner had the church of the
Lord Jesus come into existence on the day of Pentecost, then
it began to suffer persecution, first at the hand of the Jews,
then later on as the gospel went out into the nations, to the
Gentile nations, The Gentiles themselves began to persecute
the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. In particular, those
who were in places of power. The governors, Caesar himself,
and all the other government officials. They were the ones
who were most opposed to the gospel. And so the church right away
began to suffer persecution. And before the end of the apostolic
age, and I put that at roughly the mid-60s A.D., I think by
that time, all of the apostles except one, John, who wrote this
book of Revelation, all of them were dead. And that age of were
characterized by the Apostles going hither and yon preaching
the gospel and laying the foundation of the church that day had passed. But before that day even came
to an end, virtually every major heresy that the church has ever
confronted and had to deal with, it rose up in that generation.
Of course it was helpful that it did so in the long run because
that meant the apostles were forced to confront these heresies
and answer them and deal with them in the scriptures and therefore
when these very same heresies come up in our day we have the
scriptures we have the word of the apostles to help us to deal
with them but it was troubling And the churches themselves became
lazy. They became lazy in defending
the faith and protecting it from error, and all kinds of gross
error rose up, and even gross wickedness. The book of Corinthians
mentions a fellow in that church who is carrying on an affair
with his father's wife. We don't figure it was his mother
or they would have just said his mother. Maybe his mother
was dead and his father remarried. But nonetheless, that was a thing. Paul says not even the Gentiles
do that kind of thing. And by that, he meant not even
the godless. carry on like that, and yet it was happening right
in the churches. And just before Revelation 4 in chapters 2 and
3, the Lord Jesus had sent letters to specific churches, and one
of them mentioned this woman in the church named Jezebel,
and she was enticing people within the church to commit fornication. Evidently, She had raised herself
up and claimed to be a leader within the church and was, just
like Jezebel of old in the Old Testament, was telling the people,
it's okay. It's okay. You can carry on with
whoever you want to carry on with. And they become lazy and the
very church of which John was considered a member and an elder
in that church, the church of Ephesus, it was said of that
church, you have forsaken your first love. It was a discouraging
time. John, by now, is in his 90s,
a really old age to reach. And, you know, the older you
get, the easier it is to get discouraged because the natural
energies of life don't flow so strongly as they once did. And I'm sure he thought back
to 60 years previous on the day of Pentecost and what a day of
glory that had been. When the Spirit of God descended
upon the disciples and they began to speak in languages that they
had never learned before. And they spoke to all the people
there in the temple in their own native language of the great
works of God. And on that day, 3,000 people,
3,000 in one day, believed the gospel of Christ and were baptized
and added to the church. And they kept preaching, and
people kept believing, and the church kept growing. And the
people within the church loved one another so much so that they
would sell their possessions to help the poor among them.
Those who had much would sell what they had and take the money
and give it to the church that it might be distributed to the
poor among them. Those were some heady days. But
they didn't last. Humans being what they are. They
began to find fault with one another. Divisions rose within
the church. The church got big enough that it just seems like this is the
way with human organizations. When it's small, everybody kind
of needs one another, and then it grows. Then you think, well,
you might not think it in so many words, but I really, we
don't need those people. And they come up with picky unish
things to divide over. They divided even instead of
separated themselves according to social status and the rich
people would be all together and the poor people be left by
themselves. And no doubt there were some
divisions among race or ethnicity. I would imagine there was some
trouble between Jews and Gentiles. We read of it in the book of
Galatians, how the Jews would keep to themselves and not associate
with their Gentile brethren. John had seen all this happen.
And at the time he writes this book, he is in exile. cut off from all of his brothers
and sisters in Christ. He's on an isle of Patmos, which
was essentially a prison island, all alone. And I imagine he wondered,
was all this for nothing? I expected something different
than this. I thought by now, that the church
would be big and strong and all over the world. And I thought we'd all be dwelling
in peace. But that's not how things turned
out. He was discouraged, the people
in the churches were discouraged or distracted or whatever. So
the Lord sent them a special message. A special kind of message. It's the book of Revelation.
This book was designed specifically to encourage the troubled people
of God. Now, most people approach this
book and say, well, I'm gonna find out what's happening. Are
we in the last days? Do I see this sign or that sign?
They're trying to figure out when Jesus is gonna come back.
This book isn't about that. It's about things that are going
on all the time. And when you look at the things
mentioned in the book, yes, you can see an arc all the way from
the birth of Christ until his return, but you can also see
smaller arcs within history in which the same kind of things
happen. The gospel is preached, the church begins to grow, and
as soon as the world notices the church begins to grow, the
world begins to persecute the church. And there's trouble from
persecution and trouble from division and trouble from heresy.
All of this comes upon the church. And just when it seems all is
lost, the Lord returns in power and delivers the church from
her enemies. Someday he'll do that for the
last time. That'll be the end of our world as we know it. But these words are to encourage
persecuted saints. Now, our day is something like
their day, is it not? Particularly those of us in the
United States, or maybe we could say all of Western civilization.
We see such corruption and violence growing. We see persecution of
believers beginning to rise. It's not real serious yet in
our country, but that's the direction it's going. One of the leaders of our government
even said, well, freedom of religion only exists inside a church building.
Basically saying you're not allowed to go out and say what it is
you believe. Because after all, that would
be hate speech. Because if you say this is true and nothing
else is true, you're speaking hatefully about everybody else's
beliefs. I don't know if it'll happen in my lifetime or in the
lifetimes of anybody sitting here. I don't know God's timetable,
but I know that unless the Lord comes and checks this tendency,
the time will come when it will be as dangerous to be a Christian
in the United States of America as it was at one time to be a
Christian in Jerusalem or in Rome. And I think one of the things
that's most discouraging is to see what's done in the name of
Christ in our own land. When you see these false prophets,
these preachers of profit, these charlatans who take the name
of Christ upon their lips and use it to enrich themselves and
to blind the eyes of people from the truth. And you think, where is truth? Is there any truth being told? You can go, you can drive a long
way looking for a church that tells the truth. So I'm glad
we're able to have this internet set up and live stream our services. There's people out there. There
isn't a truth telling church within driving distance. and they're unable to move. So at least they're able to tune
in and watch. And we've seen even those churches
that preach the truth, we've seen the flesh of the people
within them rise up and cause trouble and division. and needless controversy. As for a fellow like me, well,
I'm 30 years younger than John was, but I know this, it's been 32
years since I came here, and what I thought would be going
on in this church by now never came to pass. We never grew significantly. We bought this building, kind of excited that the Lord
would fill it, and yet we're still in a situation where everybody
could have their own private pew if they wanted to. Nobody has to share. And you might think, is all this
for nothing? Well, the same message that was
sent to build up the saints of old will build us up if God will
give us eyes to see it and understand it. Now, before we look at, and there's
eight things, and I'm just going to be able to touch on them lightly,
either that or this is going to end up being a two-part message,
because I don't want to keep you here forever. Well, I might
want to, but I don't think you'll stay forever. Eight things, but before we look
at these eight things, let's notice two things about John's
vision. First of all, it says in verse
one, after I looked, or after this I looked, and there before
me was a door standing open in heaven. Now what this tells us
is that what John is about to see cannot be seen from here. He is going to witness things
that the natural eye cannot discern in this world. And see, that's
what discourages us. We look and what we can see going
on in this world does not confirm what we believe in our hearts. Before John could be encouraged
There had to be a door open in heaven, a way in which he could
enter the very place where all that we hope for, all that we
believe in, where that is actually going on. Now, John didn't actually
go to heaven. In the sense of the word, we
think when people die, they go to heaven. How do we know that?
Well, these are symbolic visions. And you say, well, how do we
know that? Well, because he saw God sitting on a throne. You
say, well, what's that got to do with? Bible says no man has
seen God at any time. He's the invisible God. You can't
see him. God in his absolute existence
exists outside time and space. And so what God, or excuse me,
what John sees when this door in heaven is open is a symbolic
vision of what's going on behind the scenes. We're down here on
the stage. We see what's going on in this
play called history. And it doesn't look good. And
God, as it were, said to John, he said, here's a door open,
come backstage, come back and find out what's really happening. Come see what natural eyes and
natural wisdom can never let you know. And then he goes on
to say that he was, you know, someone said, come up here and
I will show you what must take place after this. And he said,
at once I was in the spirit. So once again, we're confronted
with the fact that what John is about to witness is not anything
natural, and not anything that you're gonna be able to discover
naturally. And it's interesting, that word
discover is actually a good translation of the Greek word that names
this book. We call it revelation, but the
word is apocalypsis, and you might recognize the word apocalypse
in that. But the way we use apocalypse
in our day is not really what the word means. The word has
a very simple meaning. It means to uncover or to discover. You see, spiritual truths are
covered to us. We can't see them. The natural
man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they
are foolishness to him. Neither can he know them, for
they are spiritually understood. Now that's how Paul described
it. And not even John the Apostle,
in the midst of his discouragement and disappointment, would have
been able, from his own mind and his own wisdom, or from looking
at the things going on around him, been able to discover, uncover
what God's about to show him. It's spiritual things. Now, I said there are eight things. Let's look and see what John
saw. door opened in heaven, at once
he's in the Spirit, so he goes through the door, and there before
me was a throne in heaven, and someone sitting on it. Now a
throne is a symbol of authority and power. In our world we have many such
symbols. When the policeman pulls you
over and he walks up, he's supposed to be wearing a badge. Why? That's
a symbol of authority and power to which you are supposed to
submit. Now we, being a democratic republic,
we don't have anyone on a throne, though some of our people act
like they're on a throne. You'd think some of them think
they're kings and queens, but they're not, not supposed to
be anyway. Nonetheless, if we see the Capitol building
or a picture of it, what do we immediately think? Power, authority. We see the White House or the
Supreme Court. Those buildings and the insignia
on them are all symbols of power. Here, this throne is a symbol
of power and authority, and it's a throne in heaven. What does
it tell us about that throne? That throne rules everything.
Now, all of our symbols of national authority and power, they're
over there in Washington, DC. But that power and authority
and those symbols of power and authority only extend to the
boundaries of the United States of America. We do not have any
right to go into any other country and tell them how they have to
live. Why? Our power and authority doesn't
extend to them. Well, here's the throne. And it's not a throne
on earth. It's not even just limited to
the whole earth. It's a universal throne. It's
a throne in heaven, which is above all. And this throne is
a symbol of absolute sovereign power and authority over everything
that is. But what's good is a symbol.
What good's a throne if there isn't anybody in it? He said,
I saw a throne and somebody sitting in it. Of course, we know that
this one who sits in it is none other than God himself because
of what they say about him. They cry, holy, holy, holy is
the Lord God Almighty. And they're speaking to the one
on the throne. And they go on to say, you are worthy, our Lord
and God. You created all things. So this
is the creator on the throne. Now remember, this is designed
to give Comfort and encouragement to troubled believers. Well, where's the comfort in
this? The very simple truth that our world, though it looks like
it's in chaos, and though it looks like the evil powers are
winning, there is a throne in heaven, and our God is upon it,
and he's controlling all of it. Some people think that God's
sovereignty is just that He can adjust to whatever it is men
decide to do. That's far too weak a description
of God's authority. God's authority is so great that
men do whatever it is they do precisely because God decreed
that they would do it. And when we see our own culture
succumbing to corruption, when we see our leaders acting as
though they've got no sense at all, when we see a hatred of
the Church of Christ beginning to rise up, it's not just that
God knows how to handle that, all of that is coming about because
of His sovereign decree. Of course he has it in control.
He's the one that causes it to happen, and it's happening to
bring about his purpose. It's happening for the good of
the church. And when the appropriate time comes, he'll put an end
to it. Our Lord calmed the sea, and
everybody talks about how, well, You know, the disciples even
said, well, what manner of man is this that even the sea obeys
his voice? And all they were thinking of
was that he calmed, actually caused the wind to stop and that
made the sea to go down. What they didn't realize at that
point, he's the one that first called up the wind in the first
place and caused the sea to get rough. He says, I create peace
and I bring disaster. I the Lord do all these things. what a comfort to know this,
there is a throne in heaven and there's somebody sitting on it.
It's even more comforting when we begin to see the character
of him who sits on it. It says in verse 3, the one who
sat there had the appearance of Jasper and Carnelian, or as
our brother's version said, a ruby. It's hard to to translate these
ancient languages, particularly sometimes in identifying animals
and precious stones and things like that. But it's not terribly
important that we know exactly which kind of precious stone
it is. The point is that God is represented, he is symbolized
as a precious stone, glittering and glorious. Our God is not like the gods
of men who have their weaknesses. The gods of men are kind of like
the superheroes that they make movies out of these days. They
may be Superman, but they got some kryptonite somewhere. They
can undo them. God is no superhero. He has no weaknesses. There is
no part of him which is not absolutely perfect and glorious in every
way. We do not have a God with weaknesses. We do not have a God who is wrestling with anybody, as though
the outcome of such a struggle is unknown. We have a God who
is described as he spoke and it was, he commanded and it stood
firm. He does what he pleases among
the armies of heaven and the inhabitants of the earth and
none can stay his hand or say unto him, what are you doing?
He is glorious in righteousness. Your throne, oh God, is forever
and ever. A scepter of righteousness is
the scepter of your kingdom. Oh, what awful injustice and
unrighteousness. occupies the places of power
and authority in this world. Isn't that true? Daily you read
about those in power and authority subverting justice in one way
or the other. Not this throne, not this God. Everything he does is true and
righteous altogether. People may not like what he does.
I say may not, They don't like
what he does. But that's not because what he
does is wrong. It's because that everything
he does is absolutely right. And there's no denying it. And then it goes on to say of
him, a rainbow resembling an emerald
encircled the throne. Now the throne is the place of
absolute power and authority. And that's good. And the one
who sits upon that throne is a God of absolute justice. But if that's all there was to
this vision, we would be in trouble. Because if absolute righteousness
and judgment is the only thing that characterizes that throne,
We're lost. Because what would righteousness
and justice do to us? The only thing that righteousness
and justice can do to the sinful and the disobedient is to condemn
and curse and punish. That's all justice can do. But
there's more to this throne. It says there's a rainbow around
it. And it's not like the rainbow we see in the sky. It's like
an emerald. It's all green. Now what does
a rainbow signify? The first rainbow showed up after
the flood. There'd never been a rainbow
before then because there'd never been rain before then. But Noah
gets out of the ark, and one day it begins to rain. Well,
the last time Noah saw it start to rain, it marked the beginning
of the end for the world. And no doubt, It terrified him. But God says, Noah, listen to
me. It's raining, but I am never
again going to destroy the earth with a flood. And I'm going to
put my bow in the sky as proof. And therefore, whenever it rains,
providing the sun is in the right position, whenever it rains,
a rainbow appears. What is that rainbow? It's a
token of God's covenant never to judge the world with a flood
again. So in general it becomes a symbol of God's covenant of
goodness. And so here's this throne of
sovereign power and righteousness and yet encircling the throne
is this green rainbow, green signifying life. It's a covenant
of life that guides the decree of the throne. The law was a
covenant of death and always will be. The law can
never bring life to people like you and me. We're lawbreakers. The law can give life only to
those who keep the law and all of us break it. But here is a
covenant represented by the concept of a rainbow and yet its green
color indicates it is a covenant of life. It is God's purpose. It's a symbol of God of the new
covenant, the covenant of God in Jesus Christ, which says to
the very worst of sinners, look unto me and be ye saved all the
ends of the earth for I am God and beside me there is no other. It is that covenant that God
did not make with fallen man. It's a covenant God made with
one man, the man Christ Jesus. Because he's the only one that
could fulfill the terms of the covenant. And he did in his life
and in his death. Thus he said on the night that
he was betrayed, he took that cup and he said, this is the
new covenant. this green rainbow covenant in
my blood, and the throne of God is directed
by that covenant, which means that all whom Jesus Christ came
to save shall be saved. For the covenant by which they
are saved is the overarching principle that guides the decrees
that come from that throne. In other words, this is a symbolic
representation of, and we know that all things work together
for good, to them who call, who love God, who are the called
according to his purpose. The second thing, second thing we see, is a powerful word from the fullness
of God's omnipotent spirit. It says that from this throne came flashes of lightning, rumblings,
and peals of thunder. This is verse five. Before the
throne, seven lamps were blazing. These are the seven spirits of
God. Or it could be translated, this is the sevenfold spirit
of God. So what's he saying? From this
throne comes a powerful word, a word with power that's symbolized
by lightning and thunder. Now we had some pretty good thunderstorms
in West Virginia, but I'll admit, I had no idea what a thunderstorm
was until I moved here. And when the sky is so big and
you can see those clouds roll in and the lightning, and there's
no trees to cover you or nothing, and here it comes. It took me
a while not to be terrified of them because of their power. And this is a powerful word,
but notice this powerful word coming from the throne Right there, the one who's declaring
this word is the Spirit of God represented by these seven lamps. Now, why seven? Seven is the
number of perfection or fullness. The Spirit of God is in this
world in fullness. Before the Lord Jesus Christ
came, the Spirit of God came and he was giving only partial
light and partial truth. But now with the coming of Christ
and Christ's fulfillment of all that was prophesied in the Old
Testament, with that fulfillment, the Spirit has been sent in fullness
and he has never left. And he still speaks with a power
and an authority that cannot be denied. We call that irresistible grace,
but I like this image of it better. He speaks, and to whomever he speaks, they
hear, and they are moved. Yes, it can be discouraging to
meet like this, and there's so few of us, and we wonder, why
aren't more people believing? Have we somehow or another missed
the gospel? Is it because of our weakness?
No. The Spirit of God has spoken powerfully to everyone he intends
to gather in and he will keep doing so until the world is over. Now back up a little bit and
it says in verse 4, surrounding the throne were 24 other thrones
and seated on them were 24 elders. They were dressed in white and
had crowns of gold on their heads. Now remember, John is discouraged. John's hands hang down. His shoulders are stooped, spiritually
speaking. But now he's been given this
vision. And the first vision he sees is that God's throne
is still established, and he's still sitting on it, and it's
still being ruled by the covenant of the gospel. And he learns
that the gospel message is still being thundered out in the power
of God's Spirit. And then he sees these 24 elders,
who are these? This is representative of all
the believers from the very beginning to the very end. Say, why 24?
Because believers were symbolized by the 12 tribes of Israel in
the Old Testament. And believers were sort of symbolized
by the 12 apostles. They were, as it were, the original
believers in the gospel of Christ as it was revealed in Christ's
day. So adding those two groups together, you end up with 24.
So you got Old Testament saints, you got New Testament saints.
But they are all of them, they gathered together in one body
on thrones around the throne. It didn't look like Christians
were in charge of anything at the time. that John wrote this
book. It looked like the world was
being victorious over them, but that's not what was really happening.
There they were, all the elect of God represented in these 24
elders, on thrones, encircling the throne. And notice what it says about
them. They were dressed in white. I look at me. I look at us. I don't see white. Do you? I see sinners. I see those whose
hearts are stained with awful transgression. I see how we can fuss and fight
among ourselves as though we aren't brethren in the Lord Jesus
Christ. I see how we can act like unbelievers
and feel like unbelievers. And yet we look at things from
heaven's viewpoint and what do we see? All of God's chosen redeemed
and called people, dressed in spotless white. Where did those
robes come from? You and I didn't make them, that's
for sure. They are made up of the righteousness
of our Lord Jesus Christ, freely given to us. And then it says
they had these white robes and they had crowns of gold on their
heads. These crowns are not royal crowns. There's a Greek word
for them, diadem. We sing that song that has the
line, bring forth the royal diadem and crown him Lord of all. And
so that's one kind of crown, a royal crown that signifies
a king. But there was another word in Greek, stephanos, And
it was a word to describe a laurel wreath that was given to the
winner in a race. Sometimes these wreaths were
made out of gold. And so they'd have this little
golden circlet. It corresponded to the gold medal that somebody
gets in the Olympics. So what are we saying? That all
the people of God are gold medal winners in the universe. That's
what it's saying. They are victorious. So I don't
see much victory. That's right. Because the victory
in which they participate is not something that can be seen
naturally. What is this victory? John says
faith is the victory that overcomes the world. It does not say that
by faith we win the victory. It says faith is the victory. The very fact that you believe
the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is victory. Now we're still running the race. And so from our perspective,
we don't know if that crown will be ours because this crown is
given to those who die in faith. It's given to those whose faith
cannot be taken away. Now there are those who have
a faith that can be taken away. Because that faith came from
within themselves. That faith was the product of
the preacher's ability to speak or to manipulate their emotions.
And they thought they believed. And they made a profession of
faith. But in time, something came up and they departed the
faith. And they weren't victorious,
and they are not dressed in white, and they wear no golden crown. But there are those whose faith
is the gift of God, whose faith is a result of a work of God,
and the works of God never fail. Therefore, they never do. They are given faith at one point
in their lives, and for the rest of their lives, they believe.
Even when they don't feel like they're believing, they still
are. How do we know? They never leave
the faith. They may move from church to
church, but they never move to another message. They never move
to another gospel. They never moved to another Christ.
Their hope is in Him and nothing else. Now, obviously, we're not
going to finish. We'll finish it up next week.
We'll use the remainder of the things he saw for our message
next week. But here's what I want us to
get a hold of from this much. Everything's going on exactly
like it's supposed to. And we don't have any reason
to be discouraged. Our God is on the throne, ruling
in sovereign power, judging in righteousness, and yet doing
all things according to the covenant of his gracious gospel in Christ.
The Spirit of God is spreading that word everywhere it's supposed
to go with the power of thunder and lightning. and not one of
God's people is being missed. Every one of them is already
in the plan and purpose of God, already victorious, clothed in
white, and seated with Christ in the heavenly places. Next week, one of the things
he sees, which gives authority to all this. He says in verse
six of chapter five, then I saw a lamb looking as if it had been
slain, standing in the center of the throne. That's our Lord
Jesus Christ. He is the reason that there is
an emerald rainbow around the throne. He is the reason that
the devil who goes about as a roaring lion seeking who may He may devour,
can't devour anybody of God's people. Because not only is he
a lamb that's been slain, he's called the lion of the tribe
of Judah. He's a bigger lion. And by his blood, he has purchased
a people and he will take possession of them. The only question And there's
only questions from our viewpoint. There are no questions in heaven.
You know, everything there is already done. But from our viewpoint,
things look questionable. And I ask you then, where is
your hope for eternal things? In what do you rely? What do you look for? Are you
looking for Streets paved with gold and colonnaded mansions. Is that your view of heaven?
Is that the things you want? Or is this what stirs your heart
and gives you comfort? In heaven there's a throne and
there's someone sitting on it. And is your hope to be accepted
at that throne in what you have done or in what that lamb slain
has done. Someday you will stand before
that throne. And if your hope is not in Christ,
then that emerald rainbow will not be for you. And all that
will be left for you is a throne. with somebody sitting on it,
glorious in righteousness and justice, and there you'll stand
full of sin. And that will not turn out well.
But if you are in Christ, when you stand before the throne of
the sovereign, omnipotent, and just God, that emerald rainbow
will direct his verdict And he will say, not guilty, because the blood of the slain
lamb has put your sin away. May God grant us all to find
our hope in Christ. James.