All right, if you'll open your
Bibles to Revelation chapter 5. Last night, we started what
I hoped would be one sermon, but it didn't turn out that way.
I entitled it, Heavenly Comfort for Saints on Earth. When I didn't
get done, I just thought, well, we'll put a part one on it. And
then he asked me what today's was, and I said, Heavenly Comfort
for Saints on Earth, Part 2. Or you could just say, The Turning
Point, because that's what I introduced yesterday, and that's the part
of it we're going to get to today. So take it however you want.
It's one sermon in two parts, or two sermons that just kind
of go together. Chapter 4 gave us a view of heaven,
a symbolic view, but that's what it was telling us. showing us
the eternal reality of God. When our Lord taught the disciples
to pray, it's recorded twice for us in the scriptures. One
of the lines was, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth
as it is in heaven. And normally the way that that
phrase is handled is we want that people do God's will on
earth just like they do it in heaven. And that would be good,
but we know that ain't going to happen in the sense of people
starting to obey God. I mean, we're the church of the
Lord Jesus Christ, and we don't do a very good job of obeying
God. So I looked it up as I want to do. I like looking at original
languages. And the word translated done
is the word Well, you find it in 2 Corinthians 5.21 when it
says, we're made the righteousness of God in Him. It's the word
that is used for birth, creation. It has to do with reality. It comes into our language as
a prefix or a root word, gen. And you think of how many times
the word, that gen, Generator. A generator is something that
brings, we normally think of electricity into being. Another
is generation. What's a generation? Well, a
group of people born in the same level of a particular ancestry. Gentile even comes from there.
Gentleman. Gentleman means someone who's
well-born. That was its original meaning
anyway. So you find out this meaning has, the word's essential
meaning has to do with bringing something to reality. And if
you take that basic definition of that word and apply it to
our Lord's prayer, what He's saying is, thy kingdom come,
your will be made real on earth just like it already is in heaven. And isn't that what we saw yesterday?
The 24 elders are already there. It's all done. It's already real
there. And all we're doing here as we
pass through what we call time, what we experience as time and
space, all we're doing is seeing the reality of heaven become
the reality of earth. And soon, I say soon, I don't
know how long, sometime, All the reality of heaven shall have
been made real on earth, and that will be the end. One of my favorite hymns, this
is My Father's World. And the last line, and it's the
only hymn I can recall right now, that says this kind of thing,
and I think the meaning of it must have got past the guy who
compiled that hymn book, because he didn't believe what it says.
Jesus who died will be satisfied, and earth and heaven be one. And that's what this book is
about. Well, the whole book is about it, but this book of Revelation
is showing us in symbolic fashion this process of heaven and earth
becoming one. That because of what Jesus Christ
did, He will be satisfied and He's not going to be satisfied
until God's kingdom come and all that's real already in heaven
be made real on earth. Well, yesterday we saw these
realities in heaven. There's not chaos, there's a
throne with somebody sitting on it. It's not a fractured and troubled
church, but it is one body gathered round the throne of God, made
of people, made perfect by the righteousness of God and victorious
through His victory. There is not a diminishing power
of the Spirit of God, and a diminishing of men willing to preach the
gospel. But rather, the full Spirit of God speaks with full
enlightenment and power of the truth of Christ. And He sends
men out to do it, and they do it. There's nothing messed up. There's nothing that's failing.
There's absolutely nothing lacking. Right now. Someone once says there never
has been an emergency session of the Trinity. Didn't see that
coming. What are we going to do now?
You know, we do that. We make our plans and then they fall
apart and we got to, you know, call everybody together in an
emergency session and figure out how we're going to react
to these new realities. The three persons of the Trinity
never have to say, well, you know, it's not working. We got
to come up with plan B. No. Do you know that the Lord
Jesus Christ is not worried? He's not upset. God the Father
isn't... That didn't work out, did it?
They are all in perfect happiness and satisfaction with the way
things are going. And that brings us to chapter
5. And as we enter this chapter,
John was yet in a state of conflict. Remember I said every story's
got conflict. He's in a state of conflict.
He knew what the natural eye saw about reality, and he had
just been shown what faith is enabled to see. And that guy
gave rise to the question, How do we get from what I see with
these eyes to what I've just been shown and see by faith? I mean, there's no doubt what
is described in chapter 4 is a glorious scene. John's saying,
I don't have any idea how you get there. And I don't mean get
to that place, get to that condition. The vision of heaven is wonderful
and glorious, this vision of heaven given to John, but it
made no sense. I guess in common language of
today, he couldn't get his head wrapped around it. He wouldn't
question the wonderfulness of it. And theologically, he didn't
doubt God, he didn't doubt the truthfulness of what was being
shown to him, but he couldn't see how what he witnessed and
experienced on earth bore any relation to what he had just
been shown in heaven. You know, an understanding of
the glories of heaven is not the gospel. You can know about all the wonderful
things of heaven But that doesn't mean, and you can even believe
that it's real. But that's not the gospel. We can try to imagine
what it's like, and there are many people that do that, and
they find some great comfort in what they see. But their comfort arises from
a presumption that that's going to be their experience. And they
have never answered the question How do I get from here to there? Just knowing there's a there
doesn't mean you'll ever be there. Imagine being at the one side
of the Grand Canyon and you see there's a group of people over
on the other side and you get out your binoculars so you can
see what's going on and they're having a good time. It's evidently
a family reunion, and you know how family reunions are. Everybody
gets along at the reunion. They go home and talk about each
other, but at least at the reunion, everybody's nice. No, but it's,
you look, and they're having a good time, and there's some
good singing going on, and everybody's dressed up nice, and you think
to myself, oh, that is just wonderful. Well, it is. But between you
and that is this great chasm. The gospel is not knowing that
such a place and condition as heaven exists. It's understanding
why it exists. And John's standing there, as
he's going through this experience of this vision, and he says,
I see the glory, but so far nobody has shown me why it exists. or giving me any reason to have
confidence that I shall be a part of it. That's what chapter 5 shows us.
How did this happen? Why can we, seeing what we see
and experiencing what we experience, look at chapter 4 and say, That
happened, and I know why. And I know that despite all I
see around me, this shall be my experience someday. I shall be among the elders. I shall be around the throne
of God, dressed in beauty not my own, perfect white robe, glittering
golden crown of victory. Worshipping God without hindrance. So John says, and I saw, this
is verse 1, and I saw in the right hand of Him that sat on
the throne. Now who's this? This is just
God. God in the most fundamental sense that we think of God. I realize there's no way for
us to really understand that. People say that they can't believe
God because they can't understand Him. I say, well, anybody you
understand isn't God, so just get used to it. We cannot fathom God in His absolute
essence. His utter I am-ness, we cannot
understand that because we are made, and it shall forever be
this way, in my opinion. It shall forever be this way. We are forever creatures of space
and time. And we can't even think of anything
without reference to where it is and when it is. We can't describe
anything without these reference points. God doesn't exist in
those reference points. He's the one that created time
and space. He stands outside of it. But nonetheless, that's
what's being spoken of here. God, in all of his utter godness,
sits upon the throne. He said, I saw in the right hand
of him that sat on the throne. And of course, this is what tells
us that this is a symbol, because God doesn't have any hands like
that. But when it's saying it's in
the right hand of God, what it means is that this which is in
His right hand is that which is closely associated with Him. Just as His Son, He said to Him,
sit here at My right hand, the place of favor. Well, a scroll
in the right hand would be a record of someone, this is what I want. This is my will. Saw in the right hand of him
that sat on the throne a book. We would better read that scroll. And one reason we know that it
means, when we think of a book, we think of something with pages
in it like this. And there were a few of those
way back yonder, but almost all writing was done on scrolls.
And we know this is a scroll because it said it was written
within and on the backside sealed with seven seals. Well, we wouldn't
think of a book where there wasn't writing on both sides of the
page. But scrolls didn't always have writing on both sides. They
would write on one side and roll it up. And when you looked at
it all rolled up, it was blank on the outside. But this one
was written. And they would write some this way because, after
all, scrolls weren't cheap. They were made out of expensive
materials if they were going to last. And so they would start
writing on one side of it, rolling it up, rolling it up, rolling
it up, and when they got done writing on that side, they'd
start rolling from this side and writing on the other side
of it. And so here's this scroll in the right hand of Him that
sits on the throne, and it's written within, it's on the inside
of the roll, but also on the outside of the scroll. It's all
filled up. And this scroll is the answer
to the question, how, why is chapter 4 true? It answers the
question how we get from this situation in which we presently
exist. How do we get from here in our
experience to there in our experience? How can there be such a thing?
as heaven, and it's written in that scroll. Now, notice several
things about this scroll. It's in the hand of the one who
sits on the throne because it was written by the one who sits
on the throne. It's his scroll. It's not our scroll. We love what's written in it.
but D, we didn't write it. We believe that we, as faithfully
as humans can, declare what's in that scroll, but we don't
claim that we're the ones that came up with it. The scroll is glorious, its message
is glorious, but there's no glory for us in the fact that we know
it. The fact that we know it owes
to part of the glorious message that's in that scroll. Our brother
taught us about how simple the truth is. It's one thing. But
we couldn't have known that one thing if God didn't teach us. You can go to seminary and learn
lots of things and still not know the one thing. So we need to be careful that
on the one hand we stand valiantly, for the truth as it is in Christ
Jesus, but at the same time, never think that we're better
than any false believer or false prophet, because we believe what
is true. It's not our scroll. And we would
have had no clue what's in it if there had not been one found
who could open it and bring it to pass. And He sent His Spirit
to show us what's in there. It was fully written. Why does
it say it's written on the front and back? Is it because God couldn't
afford a second scroll for the backside, you know, and have
this really ornate set of scrolls? No, it was written on the front
and back, filled up so nobody else could add anything to it.
I got, these are last night's notes. This is the printed notes
I used. I'll show you this page. Yeah, all nice and printed. This
morning I sat there and just as thoughts came to mind, I scribbled
down on the part that was left blank by the printer. I could
put more on to what I had last night. Couldn't do that with
God's notes. It's completely filled up. No
one they can add. If they're going to add to what
God has written, they're going to have to come up with their
own scroll, another scroll. And they do. But understand this,
if it's not in this scroll, God didn't write it. And it was sealed by God with
seven seals. Now what was the seal? Well,
they'd make these scrolls, they'd roll them up, And if it was a
message from the king, which certainly this is, the king would
put a dollop of melted wax right there where the end of the scroll
was, and then he would press his signet ring. We get our word
signature from signet. And so that was the king's signature,
which meant the scroll carried the king's authority. This was
the king's word written here. Not only that, that seal carried
with it an authority that says no one is allowed to open this
other than the one to whom it was sent. I mean, even our post office
today, you're not allowed to open mail if your name's not
on the front of the envelope. It's a federal offense. Now we
lick the envelope, you know, that's our seal, but nonetheless,
the idea of a thing being sealed up because its message is not
intended for everyone, it's intended for a particular person, and
you seal it, and while the seal itself may not be a strong thing,
the authority that is behind that seal prevents people from
breaking it. I mean, how hard is it to open
an envelope? Very easy. Most people won't open someone
else's mail. Why? Well, it's a federal offense. The authority of the United States
government, through its post office, can charge you with a very serious
crime and consequent punishment. So that's what these seals were
for. But notice this. This isn't sealed with one seal. It's sealed
with seven seals. Now, why is that? After all,
one seal would have carried the entire authority of God behind
it. Well, it's sealed with seven
seals, because seven is always the number of perfection, completeness,
or whatever we call it. It was utterly sealed up, not
only by authority, but by power. Not only would the authority
of God prevent anyone from opening it, but the one who is supposed
to open it, God's power would keep it sealed up until He was
willing that someone open it. So we have this combination of
a requirement for both proper authority and sufficient power
to open those seals. And so what do we read? Verse
2, and I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, who is worthy
to open the book and to loose the seals thereof. Now, normally
when we read the word worthy, we always apply it simply to
terms of character. That's the way we use the word
worthy. But it can have a broader meaning. Because if you look down in verse
3, it says, and no man in heaven nor in earth, neither under the
earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon. Now,
ability is not about character. Ability is about power. So the way the word worthy is
being used means not only someone of the proper character to be
allowed to open it, but someone with sufficient power to open
it. And there wasn't found anybody
could do it. And he says, verse 4, and I wept
much. Where is John? He's in heaven. Isn't heaven supposed to be where
there's no tears? How come John's weeping there? Now, what I'm
about to tell you, I learned from, well, I guess what we consider
a false prophet. But even false prophets say the
right thing once in a while. My son, you said, even blind
squirrel finds a nut once in a while. And I was listening
on the radio, and really, I didn't know who it was. But he was preaching
on this text of Scripture, and he said, why did John weep? He's in heaven. But he's in a
heaven with no Christ. What's that say about heaven?
Heaven isn't heaven without Christ. Heaven may tell us about glorious
things. Heaven may have a written version
of the means by which the heavenly state is attained. But without Christ, that scroll's
never opened. And that reality in heaven never
becomes a reality on earth. Brethren, heaven is not about
colonnaded mansions and golden streets. Our Lord taught us not
to go after those things. Why in the world would He make
a heaven made up of the things He told us not to pursue in the
first place? Those are symbolic descriptions, actually, of the
gospel, but the gospel and heaven are so closely related, you know,
you can hardly, well, you can't separate them, but they are symbolic
and it's simply used symbols that we understand of what we
consider to be glorious things. We think that colonnaded mansions
are wonderful. We think that gold is the best
thing there is. So if God's going to talk to
us, he's got to talk to us in a language we can identify with.
So he described these glories in things that we can identify
with. But brethren, the glory of heaven is not gold. The glory
of heaven is not mansions. In fact, you know, in King James
when it says mansion, back then it didn't even mean a big house.
It just meant some place to live. What is the glory of heaven? It's Christ. A heaven without
Christ is something to be wept over. I once told the folks in our
congregation, I said, I don't know where heaven is, I don't
know where hell is. I said, but if the Lord Jesus
Christ in all His glory were standing on Main Street in Rock
Valley and there was a believer standing there next to Him and
an unbeliever standing next to Him, one would be in heaven and
the other would be in hell. People say hell is where God
is not. The people in hell wish God wasn't
there. Christ is the heavenness of heaven. No wonder John wept. There wasn't
anybody that could make it happen. I wept much because no man was
found worthy to open and to read the book, neither to look thereon.
And one of the elders saith to me, Now this is just a believer
in Christ Jesus. But this elder, of course he's
symbolic of how things shall be when all is wrapped up. He already knows. He knows something
John has not yet been able to realize and put together. He said, don't weep. Behold, the line of the tribe
of Judah, the root of David hath prevailed to open the book and
to loose the seven seals thereof. Now notice he does not say that
he has prevailed so that he shall in the future open this book
and in the future open these or loose these seven seals. He
says, he has prevailed to open it and to loose them. What he's saying, it's already
been done. And what John is having, he's
just having played out in front of him in this symbolic version,
he's just playing out how it happened. He's seen, as it were,
a newsreel of things in the recent past which will affect all things
in the future. He said, Behold the line of the
tribe of Judah, the root of David. You say, wait a minute, he's
the offspring of David. Isn't he the branch of David? No. He's the root of David. Christ
didn't come from David, David came from Christ. Now I realize
that he is the son of David. But what did David, the Lord
of Israel, say? The Lord, and there you'll see
King James is all in caps, which means Jehovah said to my Lord,
And the word there is Adonai, which means in the King, Lord.
And the I at the end of it means it's my Lord. Remember how on
the cross the Lord said, we pronounce it Eli, but it's really Eli.
And that I on the end is the my part of it. El means God,
my God, my God. Adonai, my Lord. Jehovah said to my Lord, sit
here at my right hand till I make your enemies a footstool for
your feet. And the Lord brought that up to the religious leaders
of the day. He says, how is it? How is it
that David calls Him Lord? And it's talking about Messiah
who's not even yet been born. How can David's Son be David's
Lord? Well, because David could say,
just like John the Baptist did, even though John the Baptist
was roughly six months older, he could say, he is before me,
meaning above me, because he was before me. The Lion of the tribe of Judah, the
tribe of kings, the root of David, he, has prevailed. So I don't see the church prevailing.
That's because you're looking at the church and not the church's
king. It's because you're looking with
eyes of flesh rather than eyes of the Spirit. The prevailing
of the church is the prevailing of Christ. It's not just because
of the prevailing of Christ. The churches Victory is the victory
of Christ. And the church cannot fail because
her king has already won. He hath prevailed to open the
book and to loose the seven seals thereof. Well, how did he do that? I mean,
that's God who wrote that book. God has it in His hand. God sealed
it up. What did the line of the tribe
of Judah do so that He could approach Him who sits on the
throne and take the book or the scroll, loose the seals, and
open it, which means to bring to pass that which is written
inside the book, the scroll. Well, here's the answer. The
elder says the line of the tribe of Judah, and in verse 6, I beheld,
and lo, in the midst of the throne, and of the four beasts, and in
the midst of the elders, stood a lamb, as it had been slain,
having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits
of God, sent forth into all the world. John hears about a lion
and sees a slain lamb. Now here's one of the mysteries
of the gospel. How did Christ prevail? By dying. Who ever heard of winning
by dying? Now there are people who are
willing to risk their lives in an effort to save those they
love. And there are those who in the
process of doing what is necessary to save those that they love,
they are killed in that process. We send men to war, and they
go to battle, and some of them are slain in battle. But here's
the thing, their death is not what won. Their death was an
accident of the process of winning. If they could have stayed alive,
the army still would have won. So their death was not the intention. Their death was not in itself
the victory. Their death did not defeat the
enemy. We don't win by dying. Jesus
Christ did. He did not die simply because
death was unavoidable in the work in which He was doing. Death
is the work He did. And everything He did up to that
point was to make Him suitable to die. The Scriptures say He was made
perfect through suffering. You say, What do you mean, make
perfect? There's nothing wrong with the
Lord Jesus Christ. It meant He was made a perfect Savior through
suffering. He can't be a Savior without
suffering. He can't be a Savior without
dying. Not all the power in the world
can save us from the justice of God. It takes blood to save from justice. If He had saved us by a mere
act of power, it would forever be a tenuous salvation. Because His Father's got power
too. And He might say, hey, I didn't
like that. And in His power, unsave us. You use power to save people
from those who have no right to them in the first place. But
if you want to save someone who is rightfully in bondage or rightfully
under judgment, the only thing that's going to work is to pay
what they owe. And then they are released. And
the one who holds them desires to hold them no more. And then
they are free. They don't have to be looking
over their shoulders the rest of their lives, wondering if
the one from whom they were rescued merely by an act of power has
somehow or another regained His power and has come after you
again. The victory did not kill the
Lord. His death was the victory. And you talk about blindsiding
the devil. You know, the devil was involved in the crucifixion.
I don't know when it was he caught on. Whoops. What I have moved this people
to do is exactly what is going to topple my kingdom. I heard a song among those songs
that's called contemporary Christian music. Certainly, there's not much of
it worth listening to, but I got a kick out of one thing where
a guy was using his song to illustrate what went on there. He said,
our Lord was on the cross. And he acts like, you know, it's
this big climactic moment coming, you know. But the devil and the
demons are, you know, all happy and throwing a big party, you
know, because the Lord's dying. And then they hear this, 10,
9, 8, Seven, you know, and they're
still having to have, and then all at once, they start to get
afraid because it goes three, two, he has won. How frustrating it is to be the
devil. Everything you do plays right into the hand of the one
you hate and turns him into the victor. He entered the heart
of Judas to betray him. That was necessary. The devil
ended up betraying himself. He entered the heart of the Pharisees
to murdering. Played right into the hands.
He moved in Pilate to surrender to their will. Can you imagine
a Roman authority surrendering to the will? of those he holds
captive. But the devil's working in to
do all this and thinking he's winning in the process. I'm going
to kill this guy and he won't be able to save anybody. And
then he finds out it was by that very process that he became the
victor. This lamb has seven horns. Horns are symbols of power. Once
again, seven is the number of perfection. This Lamb is the
omnipotent God. Whatever He does, it's done with
infinite, eternal power and cannot be undone. Seven eyes. Eyes are that by
which we see things. and gain wisdom and eyes by which
we watch over things. Seven of them means eyes that
don't miss anything. So here is a lamb full of wisdom
and also a lamb who acts as a shepherd to watch over his sheep. And
with his perfect vision, he never misses a thing. There's never
an enemy gets past him. There's never an enemy of the
sheep. There's never a wolf in sheep's clothing that His seven
eyes won't identify for what it is and guard the sheep. The seven Spirits of God. Once
again, just like in the previous verse, meaning the fullness of
the Spirit of God. For how does the Lord Jesus Christ
shepherd His sheep? He sends His Spirit into the
world and His Spirit works through the most unlikely people. But
it doesn't matter because this is the omnipotent Spirit of God,
and He can take men like me and spread His Word, and people
come alive, spiritually alive. In some sense, I could boast,
as could have some of the prophets and some of the apostles, I have
raised the dead. For I have spoken the word that
gave them life. But just like the prophets and
the apostles, I'd have to say, but it really wasn't me. I just
opened my mouth and God spoke. His spirit went forth in the
word. And that word, which is the living
word of God, gave life to those to whom it was sent. And everyone
else? And Paul says, it's the savor
of life to some, the savor of death to others. Who's sufficient
for this? Who can make it the savor of life to some and death
to others? Paul says, well, certainly not
me. I have no clue what it's going to do to any particular
individual, but God makes it the savor of life to some and
the savor of death to others. It goes on and it says this,
verse seven, and here's what I said was the turning point
of the story and of history itself. And he came and he took the book
out of the right hand of him that sat upon it, the throne,
sat upon the throne. Now, I want you to look at this
scene. It's been set before us. We're in heaven. There's a throne
with somebody sitting on it. Twenty-four elders around the
throne. Four beasts. Seven-fold Spirit of God shining
light into the world and all of this. And God's got this book
in His hand. In His omnipotent hand. He wrote
it. He's holding it. It's sealed
with seven seals. A call goes out. Who is worthy? to take the book and open it. Well, it's kind of like, you
know, the sword of King Arthur. Everybody tried and nobody could
because it was in the stone and the stone wouldn't let go. And
Arthur, the one for whom the sword was, he walks over and
just. So here's God. with this scroll,
this scroll of grace, this scroll of salvation. Nobody can take
it. But here comes the line of the
tribe of Judah in the form of a slain lamb. And when he approaches
the throne, God goes. He did not take that book by
an act of power. He did not wrestle it out of
God's hands. He was the one about whom the
book was written, for whom the book was written, and to whom
the book was written. It was his book by the gift of
the Father. And he just walked up and one,
two, three, four, five, six, seven. And everything written on the
inside and everything written on the outside. came to pass. Now, our salvation is both a
work of justice and a work of power. The work of justice was rendered
Godward. That was His death. And the slain lamb opened the
hand of God with the record of His grace and salvation in it.
Here's the thing, you and I were rightly held captive by God,
captive to His justice, but there's another who held us captive at
His will. He had no right to hold us captive,
but He's not gonna let go. And the only way we can be safe
from Him is by an act of power. You know who I'm talking about.
The God of this age, the devil himself held us captive. We were
held captive to our own flesh. We are held captive to the death
that was pronounced upon us and experienced within our spiritual
nature. We're held captive to all these
things. And the shedding of blood wasn't going to cause any of
that captivity to go away. Rather, it's going to require
an extension of power greater than the power that holds us
in bondage. Christ's death all by itself
released us from all obligations to God to pay for our sins. But Christ's death did not of
itself release us from the grip of the devil. But Christ's death
put Him in a position to rightfully take the scroll in which is declared
how God, or Christ, saves His people by the extension of His
power against the enemies of His people. Because when they
open the seals, what starts to happen? Death, war, pestilence. That doesn't sound like salvation.
Remember who's getting the death, war, and pestilence. Not us. enemies. You know, when I went
through this book, I've been through this book twice with
our church because I've just fallen in love with it, you know,
and I love describing all that's in it to the best of my knowledge.
But one of the things that I jumped out at me as I was going through
it. I believe it was the first time. But, you know, people talk
about, oh, it's the apocalypse, you know, and they talk about
all these judgments coming from God, and then they want to get
up on their self-righteous high horse, you know, and this is
God. He's judging the homosexuals and the abortionists and the
gamblers and the drunkards. Do you know why He brought judgment
on this world? Twice it tells us, one I can
remember right off the top of my head, speaking about Babylon,
the great prostitute. She was cast in the lake of fire
because the blood of the saints was found in her. Now I want
you to think of this. It's hard to say because it's
such a precious truth. God loves His church, His bride,
so much. He will destroy the world for
touching her. You say, I don't understand that.
Well, let me explain it to you. Touch a man's wife and find out
what he does. He may be the nicest man you
ever met until you messed with his wife. We are the bride of
the Lord Jesus Christ. We don't deserve to be, but that's
not the issue. The issue is that we are. And
He loves us like any good man loves his wife. And He will destroy
a city to rescue her. And Jesus Christ will destroy
the world to rescue His bride. And I saw heaven opened, and
behold, a white horse. And him that sat upon it was
called faithful and true, and in righteousness he doth judge
and make war. Out of his mouth goes the sharp
sword that with it he should smite the nations. He shall rule
them with a rod of iron, and tread out the winepress of the
fierceness of the wrath of Almighty God. Why? because the world touched
his bride. There were Christians dying in
this day. And it looked, from John's viewpoint
and the viewpoint of anybody, it doesn't look like anybody
cared, because it kept on going. And the vision given to John
said, it's coming. He's already got his horse saddled. and He will come at the proper
time, and He will destroy this world for touching you. Verse eight, and when He had
taken the book, the four beasts and the four
and 20 elders, fell down before the Lamb, having
every one of them harps and golden vials of odors, which are the
prayers of the saints. And they sung a new song, saying,
Thou art worthy to take the book and to open the seals thereof,
for Thou was slain and has redeemed us to God by Thy blood. out of every kindred and tongue
and people and nation and mass has made us unto our God, kings
and priests, and we shall reign on the earth." Does that mean at the end of
all things there's going to be this thousand year period where
saints sit on the thrones of this city and that's it? No.
That means right now we reign on the earth. You say, how are
we reigning? It doesn't seem like the earth
is doing what we want. The earth is doing what our King
wants, and we're doing what we want. We are worshiping the Lamb. Now, you have heard the phrase,
the crude phrase used, when such and such happened, all hell broke
loose. When He took the book, out of the hand of God, all heaven
broke loose. All heaven in its eternal reality
broke loose in praise, broke loose in adoration, broke loose
in song. And they sang this new song.
Now, they've been singing a good song, not like the song before
was a bad song. They're praising God. Talk about
how He's worthy, because He created the world. Here's a new one. Worthy. Thou art worthy to take the book, because you were slain and you
redeemed us. And then He goes on in verse
11, And I beheld and heard the voice of many angels around the
throne, and the beasts, and the elders, and the number of them
was 10,000 times 10,000, and thousands and thousands. I've
read, I don't know if it's true, but I've read that the highest
number in Greek is 10,000. They don't have a numerical system
like us. They use letters, like Roman
numerals, only it was Greek numerals. Well, the biggest one, not Greek
numerals, Greek letters, And they stood for numbers, and they
would just stack them up, and you had to add them to get, well,
the biggest one was 10,000. So he says 10,000 times 10,000,
which is simply John's way of saying a group so big nobody
can number it. We say, oh, how few there are.
Well, there's only a few we see, but that's not all there is. And they started singing, saying
with a loud voice, worthy is the lamb that was slain to receive
power, the power to rescue his people. Riches, wisdom, and strength,
and honor, and glory, and blessing. In every creature which is in
heaven, and on the earth, and unto the earth, and such as are
in the sea. And all that are in them heard
I saying, Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power be unto
him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and
ever." What's he saying here? Every sentient creature physical
or spiritual, man, the angels, the demons, they are all compelled
by this glorious reality of who Christ is and what He's done.
They are compelled to praise Him and count Him worthy. Does
it not say, Therefore hath God highly exalted Him, and given
Him a name above all names, that at the name of Jesus every knee
should bow, and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord? This
is them doing it. And as near as I can tell from
what he's saying, not only the sentient beings, all the creatures
in whatever way God enables, the animals roaming the forests,
the fish swimming in the sea, are praising the Lord Jesus Christ
in their own way. We may not understand their language. The Lord does. It says, even of the inanimate
things, day to day they utter a speech in glory of the Lord. And the four beasts said, Amen. Who are the four beasts? Those
are the preachers. You find a preacher who can't say Amen to that, he's
not one of those four beasts sent out from God to preach.
He's a wolf in sheep's clothing. If he can't be glad that Jesus
Christ is Lord, then he's not from God. And the four and 20
elders fell down and worshiped. You find a group of people that
call themselves Christian that cannot rejoice in the sovereign,
omnipotent power granted to our Lord Jesus Christ, our mediator,
and count him worthy of it. They aren't among the 24 elders. and they worshiped Him that liveth
forever and ever. And you know what? We're down
here and we can look kind of pitiful compared to that vision
of heaven, but do you realize that while it is in a sense a
vision of heaven, it is also simply the heavenly vision of
us right now. You who believe, are the elders
in white robes with crowns of victory on your head. And you
are the ones who are saying worthy is the lamb that was slain. You
are the ones falling down on your face, worshiping God who
lives forever. And you are the ones for whom
the lamb was slain and has now extended himself as the lion
of the tribe of Judah. who will tear to shreds anybody
that touches you, because you are His, and He's not going to let anybody
else have you. Isn't that a whole lot better
than walking around worrying that all at once everybody around
you is going to snap out of existence, as they used to teach me about
the book of Revelation? Isn't it wonderful to read this
book and see that it's all about Christ's love for His people
and that despite what they see, their Savior is near and nothing
will ever harm them. Well, I hope that's been a blessing
to you. The Lord bless you.