Now, I'm going to try something
that I've been working on at our church, and that's to preach
this message called Heavenly Comfort for Saints on Earth.
I've spent two Sundays on it, and I thought I was going to
finish up, but I didn't this Sunday. I said, well, evidently
there's going to be a part three. I'm going to see if I can't get
it all done in one, because it's an important message, and if
you can lay hold of I say lay hold of this truth. If this truth
lays hold of you, it'll do you real good. Do you real good.
The book of Revelation is grossly misunderstood by most professing
Christians and others simply claim not to understand it at
all. But once a person understands
it, it becomes a book of glorious comfort and encouragement for
the people of God. A few points to note about the
book. There's nothing in the book of Revelation that cannot
be found somewhere else in the Scriptures. There is no new information
in this book. It's not new information, it's
the same old information presented in a new and different way. So
we don't go to this book looking for something that hasn't been
told to us already in a more straightforward sense of the
word. Almost nothing described in the book is to be taken as
a literal historical event. Rather, the things described
are symbols of literal events that either happen at a point
in history or describe the ongoing condition all the time. There's nothing in this book
to frighten the child of God. I remember In the church I was
raised in, boy, if they told you to turn to the book of Revelation,
you better put your seatbelt on. They were trying to scare
you into a profession of faith. You know, the first word in the
Greek language is the word from which we get our English word,
apocalypse. And when you think apocalypse,
you think disaster. People talk about climate change
apocalypse or this apocalypse. The word apocalypse simply means
to take the cover off. Something's covered up, unseen. You take the cover off of it
and you can see it. And this book is about God taking
the cover off of things so that we can see things as they are
rather than as they appear to be. That's what the book's about.
There's nothing to frighten us. In fact, it's the exact opposite.
It's designed to un-frighten the people of God as they see
some frightening things going on in the world. It is less a
peek into the future than it is a peek behind the scenes.
You know, if you watch a play, you see what's going on out there
on the stage. But there's a whole lot going
on behind the scenes. And the people behind the scenes
know what the whole play is about before it ever gets started.
And they know why the play exists, what its end shall be. And if
you're back there, they can tell you. Because to them, it's already
done. We find in this book some general
patterns that will characterize the entire period from Christ's
birth until His return at the end of the age. And we see these
general patterns sometimes played out in just little vignettes,
little tiny stories throughout the history. God's people begin
to preach the gospel, the preaching of the gospel produces persecution,
the church suffers, and then the Lord Jesus Christ comes and
delivers the church from its enemies. That's what this book's
about. And of course, there's an arch all the way from Christ's
birth until His return, because that's what happens over that
whole time period. His general message is simple.
I once read a story. It was told for the truth. It
said a pastor was visiting a young family in his congregation. And
as he talked with the parents, there was a young boy on the
floor playing with his toys. He may have been six to eight
years old, somewhere in that neighborhood. And the parents
asked the pastor what the book of Revelation was about. And
the pastor said, no one really understands that book. And the
little boy popped up and says, I do. He said, I do. So they, of course, all kind
of looked at him and asked, well, what do you think it means? The
little boy replied, Jesus wins. And brethren, that's what the
book teaches. The Lord Jesus Christ wins. He's the victor. We always put it in grownup words. You know, he's the victor, he's
triumphant. Little kids, Jesus wins. The book is a series of seven
visions given to John, and each one of them covers the entire
period from Christ's birth until His return. And Revelation 4
here begins the second of these visions. Now in every story,
there is a point on which the entire story turns. All good
stories begin with setting up a conflict, and once the conflict
has been set up, it gets resolved. And somewhere in that story,
something happens that turns the story from a growing conflict
to a resolution. Often, this point is not even
noticed when you're reading it. And you don't realize where it
was until the story's over. And then you see the whole sense
of the story and say, oh, back there in chapter so and so, when
such and such did this and that. That's how we got from that mess
to this beautiful ending. In this story, the turning point
is in chapter five, verse seven. And there we read, and He, and
that's the Lord Jesus Christ, came and took the book out of
the right hand of Him that sat upon the throne. Now friends,
that is the turning point of history. Whatever that verse
means is what changes this scene of conflict in which you and
I live, this scene of frightening things, This scene of trouble
and dismay, whatever chapter 7 refers to, I mean verse 7 of
chapter 5 refers to, that's what changed it all into a wonderful,
glorious message that if it grips us, it'll thrill our hearts,
enable us to look the world and all that's going on, look it
right in the face, Say, it's okay by me. Everything's going
exactly as it should. Nothing to be afraid of here.
It's all good. Now let's take note of the conflict
of the story. There was a conflict of expectations. When the Lord Jesus Christ ascended
to His Father's right hand, the disciples were filled with great
expectation. And when the Holy Spirit came
down on Pentecost, they saw some of that expectation be realized
because wonderful miracles happened. And they preached the gospel
for the first time in its full-blown version. with all the details
filled in. They preached it and 3,000 people
believed it on one day and believed it sufficiently that they would
publicly confess it in baptism. Now, I don't know the last time
3,000 people were converted in one spot in one day. Can you
imagine what they felt like at the end of that day? Boy, everything
our Lord said, it's actually true. Here it is coming to pass.
The power of the kingdom of God has come upon us, and we're going
to come out of here like a racehorse charging for the end, and it's
just going to be clear sailing from here until all things are
made perfect. Well, they started to suffer
a little persecution, but the Lord had said that would happen.
And so that didn't knock them down too bad. But all that was 60 years previous
to what's written here in the book of Revelation. 60 years go by. And during this
60 years, we do not find any more occasions when 3,000 people
believed on one day. We don't read any more of people,
a group of people hearing wonderful works of God declared to them
in their own language by people who never naturally learned that
language. Instead, we find growing troubles. The church began to suffer severe
persecution, first from the Jews and then from Rome. As someone said, whenever an
apostle went into a new town, he didn't look for where the
motel was, he scoped out where the jail was because he knew
that's where he was going to end up. And 30 years before the book
of Revelation was written, when the apostle Peter was still alive,
there were already people saying, where is the promise of His coming? Because everything is going on
just like it always has. People were discouraged. The church suffered periods of
intense persecution. Worse than this, the churches
themselves have become places of division and strife. There
was false doctrine. When we read the errors that
the apostles had to correct in the scriptures. In Corinth, they
were putting a question mark on the resurrection of Jesus
Christ. In Galatia, they were heading back to the law. You
say believers wouldn't do that. Well, now, Paul wrote to these
people, corrected their error, and never said, well, you know,
you all must be lost. Believers can have some awful,
awful error. If they couldn't have error,
there wouldn't be any need for us teachers. And there was not only division,
false doctrine, There was gross and horrible immorality. In Corinth, one fellow was doing
something, Paul said, it's so bad not even the Gentiles do
that. And not only was it going on
in that church, the Corinthian members were celebrating it,
thought it was great. He said, you should have been
brought down with grief, and instead you brag about it. I hear people say, well, we need
to be like the early church. Really? Which one of them? Which one of them? By the time this book was written,
and most people think it was AD 95, somewhere in that area,
it looked as though nothing The Lord had promised was coming
to pass. They couldn't see any kingdom.
They didn't see any glory. The church was small and insignificant
in the world. And John also must have been
discouraged. After all, even the church he
was associated with, the church at Ephesus, had been rebuked
for forsaking its first love. How would you like that said
about your church? You have forsaken. And that was said by the Lord
Jesus to the church. You have forsaken your first
love. Oh, you got your doctrine right, and you don't put up with
anybody that has false doctrine. And you've endured some tough
times and all that, but this I have against you. He didn't
say, you lost your first love as though they misplaced it.
He said, you've forsaken it. And that was John's church. And not
only this, John's an old man and he's exiled out on an island,
a prison island, cut off from the other people of God. And
he's, so far as I know, the only apostle still living. And the
last word he heard from his Lord was 60 years ago. He said, well,
I wouldn't be discouraged. Oh my, oh my. Why do you think
the Lord designed it for us to get together every week? Because
if we go any longer than that without hearing the truth, we
start falling apart. Well, what did God do about this
discouraged state? God sent him a message of comfort
and strength in the midst of his discouragement and the discouragement
in the churches. It's called the book of Revelation.
And in this book, God shows John that all that Christ had promised
was indeed happening. at that time and would continue
to happen exactly as Christ said it would until the end when He
comes and what we call history comes to a close. What they could see with their
natural eye might look like defeat, but it was actually victory.
And He shows it to John here in this second vision by several
symbolic visions. Now, I'm kind of a visual thinker.
That's why once I understood somewhat of how to approach this
book, it became such a blessing to me because the scenes set
before us are glorious scenes. So what did God uncover for John? Isolated, old, discouraged John. What did he uncover for him?
Chapter 4 verse 1, After this I looked, and behold, a door
was opened in heaven. And the first voice which I heard
was as it were of a trumpet talking with me, which said, Come up
hither, and I will show you things which must be hereafter. Now
He goes showing some things. What's the first thing He shows
him? And immediately I was in the
Spirit, and behold, a throne was set in heaven. and one sat
on the throne. The first vision of comfort and
encouragement given to John is that there's a throne in heaven
and there's somebody sitting on it. Now a throne might be
a good symbol, but an empty one's hardly useful, is it? People say they don't like the
sovereignty of God. I do. I don't know how I would
make any sense out of this world at all or find any hope in this
world at all if I did not believe there was a throne in heaven
and there's somebody sitting on it. And because it says there,
this throne is in heaven, and you know, some open this Bible
and they keep thinking Jesus Christ is going to come back
to Jerusalem and sit on a throne over there. What's the use of
that when you're already on the throne of the universe? Heaven
is above the earth. And by calling it a throne in
heaven, He says, this is the throne that rules everything
that's going on in the universe. Because the heavens, as they
perceived it, were above all that is. Truly, God's throne
is above it all. Nothing down here affects His
throne. His throne guides everything
down here. That's good news. Isaiah 52,
Paul quotes it in Romans 10, but, "...how beautiful upon the
mountains are the feet of Him who brings good news." You know
what that word good news means? Over in the Greek, it became
the word euangelion, which we call gospel. It brings good news. In tidings of peace, who says
unto Zion, what? God loves you and has a wonderful
plan for your life. Here's the good news to Zion, your God reigns. That psalm you read, I thought,
man, that's like Revelation chapter 4 put in a poem. God's upon the
throne. What good's a God that's not
in charge? And so that was the good news
there. That's the first thing he showed him. And the person
on this throne said he was like Jasper and a sardine stone. And when you translate in these
ancient languages, sometimes it's not altogether certain.
Some of these names of animals and names of stones, they're
not completely sure. It really doesn't matter so much
except this. that it was precious stones talking
about, glorious, like our God is like a sparkling, glorious
stone of the greatest worth. And he said, and there was a
rainbow around the throne in sight like unto an emerald. Now
a rainbow, the first time you ever find a rainbow in the Bible
is after the flood and what was it put there for? It was put
there as a token from God to Noah of a covenant that he would
never again destroy the world by a flood. And what a good token
for that, because you can imagine what it was like to Noah the
first time it rained after the flood. Oh no, here it comes again.
But right at the point when you might think judgment's coming,
the very thing that makes you think judgment's coming is what
creates the rainbow. It's that rain coming down through
the sky, and the sun shining through it. We know the science
of it now. I doubt Noah did, but still, once you know the
science, you think, boy, the wisdom of God. He set up a sign
for Noah that appears at the exact point it's needed. But here we have rainbows multicolored,
but here we have one that's all green. Why does he say that? Well, green is a symbol of life.
And so he's saying that this throne has this covenant of life
symbol around it, which indicates that all the decrees that come
from that throne are for the purpose of fulfilling the covenant
of life in Christ Jesus. Do you know that everything that
happens is happening to bring about the fulfillment of the
salvation that our Lord Jesus Christ paid for by His blood?
When Paul says, all things work together for good to them that
love God, that doesn't mean that if something bad happens to you,
you can expect in another day or two, something good will happen
to make up for it. The good He's talking about is
our eternal salvation. Your whole life may be spent
in ill health, one trial and trouble after another. You may
have what the world would call a very sorrowful life. But if you're in Christ, once
the end of it comes, my word, what good? Do you realize that there's nothing
that happens, now you think on this, there's nothing that happens
anywhere in this universe that doesn't have something to do
with the salvation of God's people. Because he said all things work
together. There's a universe we don't even
know about. Whatever's happening there is playing into the salvation
of God's people, all because of this throne. And then we see
this part of the vision, verse 4. And round about the throne
were four and twenty seats, and upon the seats I saw four and
twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment, and they had
on their heads crowns of gold. Now these twenty-four elders
represent all believers from at least as far back as Abel.
I don't know whether Abraham and Eve were actually true believers. I mean, nothing in the Scripture
would give us an indication one way or the other. But we know
that Abel was. So at least as far back as Abel, all the way
to the very last one of God's chosen, who lives on the earth. These 24 elders represent them.
And you say, how do you get that? Well, the believers in the world
were represented in the Old Testament by the 12 patriarchs, the sons
of Jacob, because they represented the whole house of Israel. And
the whole house of Israel, we later learn, is the church of
the Lord Jesus. And then the 12 apostles. were the heralds
of the truth to the people of God in those days. And you add
that up, you get 24. And what I like to say, there are 24 seats
and 24 elders. There weren't any empty seats.
I remember being told about all the empty rooms up in heaven. No, no empty rooms, no empty
seats, 24 and 24. 24 seats, 24 elders. And look what
they got on. They're wearing white robes.
White robes of pure righteousness. And notice that these 24 which
represent all believers in all times in the vision are already
there in white robes. It doesn't say there was, you
know, 24 seats and so far we got 18 of them filled. And we're going out for more.
You know, there's more to be brought it? No. In heaven, they're
already there. They're already filled. And they
are already dressed in the pure white linen of the righteousness
of Jesus Christ, without spot, without blemish, without fault,
right there at the throne of God. See, I can't wait to get to heaven.
I understand exactly what you mean. But I want you to know,
according to the scriptures, in a very real sense, you're
already there. What we experience as reality
is just heaven's reality being played out in time and space.
That's all it is. And what were those crowns? People
read the word crowns and they immediately think, I'm going
to be king of something. Well, the Greek language has
two words for crowns. One of them, we get our word
diadem from it. And that's the crown that kings
wear. But there was one called the Stephanos. We get the name
Stephen from it. And it was generally speaking,
sometimes it was nothing more than an actual laurel wreath
that they gave to the winner in a race. And then, you know,
as races became more popular, you know, more money was involved,
they started making them out of gold. So essentially this
gold crown, this gold stephanos was the gold medal. You win. Every one of the 24 elders was
dressed in pure righteousness and declared to be the winner. The gold medalist in whatever
race it was they were in. Oh, it didn't look like anybody was
winning on earth. It looked like they were losing.
I said, no, you're winning. Now it's a victory that we win,
and yet it's a victory that's given to us. Thanks be to God
who gives us the victory through Jesus Christ. And what does that
victory look like? John says faith is the victory
that overcomes the world. And some people think that that
means faith brings the victory. You know, by faith I win the
victory. No. Faith is the victory. Do you believe? You won. Do you
realize how many enemies are opposed to you believing? People think that victory for
the church means the church keeps getting bigger and there's more
and more Christians and eventually we get to take charge of Washington
DC. Why do we want to take charge
of that place? Seriously, think about it. I mean, you know, it's
a pretty nasty place. No, the devil does not want you
to believe because your faith brings honor to Christ. The world
does not want you to believe because your faith brings condemnation
to them. Your flesh doesn't want you to
believe because your flesh says, I'll believe it if I see it.
And yet here you are, you believe it against all odds. I hear people, you know, that
they accuse me there, and one of the churches did it anyway,
where the town I'm in is full of Dutch Reformed people. Now,
you talk about Calvinists. Remember, the five points of
Calvinism came out of Holland. And these are the descendants
of those people. And one of those churches said
I was a freewheeler and preaching easy-believism. And that's simply
because I called on people to believe. Told them it wasn't
presumption to believe the promise of God. It's just unbelief not
to. And you can't put a virtuous
name on unbelief. It's calling God a liar. And
there's no way you can put a good spin on that. But they call it
easy believism. I said, if it's so easy, why
don't you do it? It's impossible believism. I
preach only believism. But it's not as though I believe
that any man has the capacity to do it, and yet they do. You notice when our Lord stood
there at the tomb of Lazarus, he told Lazarus to do something
he couldn't do. Lazarus, come forth. Why would
you say that to a dead man? Because when the Lord Jesus Christ
gives the command to come forth, with that command goes the power
to do it. And one day the Lord Jesus said
to you, believe, and you did. And all of earth and hell have
opposed you ever since. And you still believe. And if
indeed the Lord told you to believe, if that's where your faith come
from, you will be like those people in Hebrews chapter 11. These all died in faith. That's the victory. They couldn't
make you leave Christ. Not by any threat, not by any
promise. Now there are some who do, but
what we realize is what they had in called faith was that
some preacher convinced them of it. And another preacher convinced
them of something else. Or trouble came their way that
they could not reconcile with their expectations of what God
was supposed to do for them, they got mad at God and left.
What they had looked like faith, but it wasn't. If you've been given that faith,
it's the gift of God. They may as well put this golden
crown on you now, because you will persevere, because the Lord
will perfect the work He began. And you're already there in white
with a golden crown, and someday you'll get there and see yourself
there in white and a golden crown. The enemy is growing in our country
right now, getting bolder anyway, causing more trouble to professing
Christians. And the time will come, probably
not too long, when it starts to really cost to believe God
in the United States. We've had it pretty easy in the
United States. For three or four centuries, I realized the United
States wasn't here, but you know what I mean. That ease is disappearing. And
people say, oh, I don't want that to happen. And I know what
they mean. In one sense, I don't want it to, but you know what
I'm going to like? If I live long enough to see it get severe.
You watch the phonies fall away. You watch the big celebrity preachers
disappear. You watch the ones that are preaching
a false gospel. and raking in all the money.
When the name of Christ becomes expensive, they're not going
to be willing to pay the price for it. And out of the throne, verse
5, proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices, and there were seven
lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the seven
spirits of God. Actually, this imagery is based
on the temple, because the temple was a symbolic illustration of
the world and heaven. All temples, even the pagan temples,
they understood that. When they built the Tower of
Babel, what they were building as a temple at the top of it would
be something similar to what the Jews called the Holy of Holies.
It's where they thought their God was, and they called it heaven. And the Jewish temple, while
it didn't go up, because you can't climb up to God, but you
can walk in. And so it was a horizontal thing.
And back in that back room, what was that? That was representative
of heaven. You say, how do you know? Well,
because God was there for one thing, and that Ark of the Covenant
was considered to be the throne of God. He sits enthroned between
the cherubim. And there's only one person that
really knew what it looked like back in there, and that was the
high priest, because he was the only one that ever went in there.
Nobody else got a peek behind the scenes except him. But out
in the holy place, remember, was that seven, well, it looked
like what we call a menorah in our days. It was the lamp stand.
And it had seven, well, you know, one going straight and up three
on each side, and on the top of each one was a lamp. And they'd
light that, and that was the light of that place. And what he's talking about here
is the same thing, seven lamps. What does it represent? Well,
we know that seven is the number of perfection or completeness,
that the lamps represent the light. Who is it that sends the
light into the world? The Spirit of God. So when it
talks about that these seven lamps are the seven Spirits of
God, what it actually means is the fullness of the Spirit of
God. People these days, oh, we need an outpouring of the fullness
of the Spirit. We've got it! Of course, what
they're looking for is they want some hoop-dee-doo miracles going
on and people being healed. They call that the fullness of
the Spirit. You know what the fullness of the Spirit is? It's the preaching
of the fullness of Jesus Christ. Wherever Christ is being preached,
the Spirit of God is there in His omnipotent, irresistible
power. Because nothing else can make
that happen. People get all excited if they
see somebody that was lame start walking. Well, I suppose it'd
get my attention too, except I probably think he wasn't lame
when he came in. But if it really happened, I
guess I'd be impressed. Do you know what's the greatest
miracle of all going on in the world today? There are men like
me preaching the gospel. That's amazing. How could that happen? It takes
the fullness of the Spirit to make that happen. And brethren,
he's here as much today as he was on the day of Pentecost.
He has not withdrawn his influence one iota. No one has shut him
down. He was sent to make Christ known
to his elect, and he's still doing it, and he's not missed
one of the elect yet. Not one of the lamps has been
put out. And it said that the word, you
know, the throne preceded lightnings and thunderings. That's light,
power, and voices. A message. That's the gospel of God's sovereign
grace. Going out under the power of
the Spirit. Who'd have thought that this
little group would be here? God. That's who thought it'd
be here, and that's why it's here. There's some encouragement. And
then before the throne, verse 6, there was a sea of glass like
unto crystal, and in the midst of the... Well, we'll stop right
there. In the temple, you'll remember, when they first built
the tabernacle, there was this little laver. And it was about
like those little fonts they used to sprinkle babies in some
churches, you know. Where was the priest would wash
his hands there. Because the priests, though they were pictures
of Christ, they were still sinful men, so they had to be cleansed. Of course, Solomon comes along
and he does nothing by halves, so he makes such a big thing,
they called it the great sea or the bronze sea. I mean, you
know, the labor for the priests to wash their hands in Solomon's
temple, you probably could have taken a whole bath in it. It
is a really big thing. Here's the reality in a symbol. A real sea. And notice two things
about it. It's clear as crystal. What's the significance of that?
Well, remember this, the 24 elders are already there, which means
they've already been washed. And yet all the sins for which
they were washed, or from which they were washed, did not sully,
pollute this sea. I remember when I was a kid,
my dad would come home from work, and I'd watch him clean up. I
don't know why it fascinated me, but he worked in a steel
fabrication plant, and he'd come home, and his hands would be
dirty, and his face would be dirty, and he'd wash his hands in the
sink. He'd put clean water in there, but boy, once he got done,
It was nasty, because all that dirt was in the water, and the
soap scum, and all that. And I remember thinking I was
a real man when I could make the water look like that. You
know, I'd done some real work if I could really sully the water.
Because when you wash in pure water, you make it impure. But
you wash in this water, you'll be made pure, but the water won't
be made impure. How can that be? Because this
water doesn't just wash the sins off of you, it washes the sins
away, and they don't exist anymore. And here's another thing, it
said it's like glass. When they talk about a sea being
like glass, what do they mean? Absolutely calm. That means there's
nobody still splashing around in it. Why? Everybody's already
been cleansed, it's done. Our Lord said it's finished,
and it was, and the sea went... They aren't throwing anybody
else in there. Why? Because those 24 elders are already
in twenty-four chairs seated around the throne. And then there
were four beasts full of eyes before and behind, and the first
beast was like unto a lion, and the second beast like a calf,
and the third beast had a face as a man, and the fourth beast
was like a flying eagle. And the four beasts had each
of them six wings about him, and they were full of eyes within,
and they rest not day and night, saying, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord
God Almighty, which was and is and is to come. Who is this? These are four ugly beasts, I'll
tell you that. What would you think if you saw
a beast covered in eyes? You'd think it's something horrible.
What these represent? is those men that the Spirit
of God has sent out under His power to preach the gospel of
the Lord Jesus Christ. You say, how do you know that?
You know, because I've never seen any of the preachers look like
that. Well, the four faces characterize them. And just quickly to go
through it, the first was like a lion. God's preachers are bold. You can't make them back down.
You make a man change his message either by threatening with firing
him or by promising him more money. If you can get him to
change his message, he wasn't sent by God. Second was a beast like a calf,
a beast of burden. God's preachers work. Some people
think the ministry is an easy job, and I'm not trying to brag
here or anything. It's not easy at all. In fact,
it's so difficult there isn't a man in the world who can do
it. That's why it considers the job pastor-teacher to be a job
that requires a gift from the Holy Spirit to do it. They work. The third beast had a face as
a man. They've got wisdom. They know something. And not
the wisdom of the world. The world may figure they're
dumb as a box of rocks. They may not speak good English,
but they know how God saves sinners. And there's not many people in
the world that know that and are able to tell it to somebody
else. And then they face like an eagle. They soar above, and
you know, an eagle's a bird of prey. And they watch over their
young with a fierceness. And those men that God sends
to be shepherds of the church, they watch out for the church.
They're jealous. Paul said, I'm jealous for you to present you
as a pure virgin to Christ. Anybody comes in here and tries
to take your purity, they got me to deal with. Now, he wouldn't
have taken up a steel sword or anything like that, but he'd
have come down on them with the Word of God, what he'd have done. And how do I know that these
are preachers? Well, look what they say, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God
Almighty, which was and is and is to come. Now that's not the
only thing that God's preachers say, but that's the foundation
of everything they say. Why do we preach the gospel of
free and sovereign grace? Because holy, holy, holy is the
Lord God Almighty. He's the eternal God. You can't
change Him. You can't change Him. You can't
change you. So we believe this gospel that's laid out says God
does the changing. He doesn't change Himself, He
changes you. Why do we believe in a gospel
of atonement? There's people think, oh, it's
just so backward and primitive. That's a primitive God that would
require blood for sin. No, that's a holy God that requires
blood for sin. Because blood's a symbol of life,
and to Him, every sin is a capital offense. People think, and I call them
evangelical atheists because they aren't like the atheists
of old. They were just content to be atheists and leave everybody
else alone. Nowadays, atheists in the United States are trying
to make more atheists, so they're having atheist revival meetings,
trying to convince people there is no God. To be honest with
you, I think they're trying to convince themselves there isn't
any God. But at any rate, They despise God because, for
one thing, God doesn't like what they do. Or they say, well, I
can't believe in a God that would let children die of cancer. I
can't believe in a God that would allow all the violence in this
world. And I'm saying, well, then you just can't believe in
a God. That's your problem. You think that God's answerable
to you. Well, I don't believe in the
God that's answerable to you either. But I believe in a God
who does as He wills among the armies of heaven and the inhabitants
of the earth, and none can stay His hand or even question Him
saying, what in the world do you think you're doing? I believe
in that God. He's holy. He does as He wills.
He's holy, He requires an atonement for sin. He's holy, so every
promise He's made is good. I know He's sovereign, so all
that the Father gave to Christ will come to Christ. But I also
know this, He's holy, so He's faithful to the promise. And
He that comes to me, I want to know why He's cast out. Now,
I've got no idea who it is that the Father gave to the Son. It's
not my job to try to figure out whether the Father gave me to
the Son. You know what my job is? To come to Him. And I realize
if I do that, I do it only because God worked in me to do it. But
still, we're called on to do that. And we're called on to
do it with this promise. If you come, I'm not going to
tell you, no, I didn't choose you, sorry. No. You come to Him,
He will not cast you out. You trust Him, you will not die. Because that's what He said.
And why do I know that what He said is going to happen? Because
He's holy, holy, holy. He's the Lord God Almighty. None
can stop Him. None even has a right to question
Him. That God gives me comfort. And here's another reason I know
that these four beasts represent preachers. And when those beasts
give glory and honor and thanks to Him that sat on the throne
who liveth forever and ever, this is verse nine, the four
and 20 elders fall down before Him that sat on the throne and
they worship Him that liveth forever and worship Him and cast
their crowns of victory before the throne saying, Thou art worthy,
O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power for Thou has
created all things and for Thy pleasure they are and were created.
Whenever a preacher sent by God preaches the gospel of God, all
the church bows down and worships God and says, the victory was
not mine. You gave it to me. These crowns
belong to you. Christ won the victory. That's
why we get it. That's why it's given to us. And so where's the comfort in
all this? These four beasts, ugly as they are, they accomplish
wonderful things by the Spirit of God, and they'll always be
there till the end of days. I was talking to these preacher
brethren this afternoon. I said, you know, it's hard for
me to believe that now I'm of the generation of the old-time
preachers. I'm the generation that's starting
to die off. And I'm sure there might be some
people, well, who's going to preach to us when these men are
gone? I'm not trying to exalt us. I just remember what I thought
back when I was in my 20s and 30s. I don't know who's going
to preach when I'm gone, but I know this, somebody will. I've
heard people say, well, what the church needs is more preachers.
No, it doesn't. At all times, it has exactly the right amount.
Now the Bible teaches us, pray the Lord of the harvest to send
forth laborers, and we pray to Him, and He sends out all the
laborers that's necessary to get all the harvest there is.
And what doesn't get brought in? Wasn't the Lord's harvest. You say, but there's so few. I don't know how many there are,
but I know it's exactly the right amount. And it always will be. Well, I didn't get finished.
Ran out of time before I ran out of sermon. Didn't even get
to the turning point, but that's okay. I got one more shot at
y'all tomorrow. But I'll just give you a preview.
You know, after you watch TV series, once one episode's done,
stay tuned for scenes from next week. Well, here's scenes from
tomorrow. Another conflict arises. John sees all this wonderful
stuff, and then he sees one more thing. In the hand of him that
sits on the throne is a scroll. And it's full of writing. No
room to write anything else. But it's sealed up with seven
seals. And John knows what that scroll is about. It's about the
salvation of God's people. And he began to cry, because
there wasn't anybody found worthy to open it up. And here he sees
these 24 elders, and the throne, and the Holy Spirit, and the
preachers, and he's saying, how did all that come to pass? That
doesn't make any sense if there's nobody could open up that scroll. And one of the elders said, John,
stop your crying. There is one. The line of the
tribe of Judah has prevailed and he is worthy to take that
scroll and unseal it, which means to bring to pass everything that's
written in it. And John said, and I turned and I beheld a lamb
as if it had been slain. The lion of the tribe of Judah,
when John saw him, he didn't look like a lion. He looked like
a lamb with his throat slit. Why? Well, the world never could
see the cross as a victory, but such is the Lord. He could take
an object of shame and defeat and turn it into a symbol of
victory and fulfillment and glory. And it says that that Lamb approached
the throne and He reached out His hand and He grasped that
scroll. And the one on the throne didn't
stop Him. And that's when our Lord ascended
on high, took captivity captive, gave gifts to men, and sat down
at the right hand of God. And that moment changed the world. And that moment took all this
conflict and confusion and turned it into wisdom, took all this
destruction and turned it into salvation. Took all this grief
and turned it into joy. Took all of this, it's not happening,
and turned it into, it is finished.