Let's open our Bibles to Revelation
chapter 8. Revelation chapter 8. Revelation chapter 8. Let me
read the first two verses to you. And our subject is the introduction
to the seven trumpet judgments. Revelation chapter 8 verse 1,
and when he had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven
about the space of half an hour. And I saw the seven angels which
stood before God. And to them were given seven
trumpets. These are the seven trumpet judgments. The book of the revelation of
our Lord Jesus was written to encourage the children of God
especially those of the very first century who were experiencing
severe opposition from the heathen world powers as well as the religious
world powers. But it wasn't written just for
the persecuted of the first century. It was written for all of the
people of God, God's children, of every age, of every era, to
lift our spirits and to speak to us and tell us that regardless
of the opposition of the world, that is the opposition of the
heathen world and the opposition of the false religious world,
regardless of the opposition to the cause of Christ Jesus,
In spite of the hostility of the natural man to the cause
of God and truth, the Lamb of God and all of his followers
are victorious. We are more than conquerors through
him who loved us. I say to all of you who have
been brought by the Spirit to rest in the Lord Jesus for your
salvation. I say to you upon the authority
of the Word of God, be much encouraged and don't ever be distressed
because that one who is our Savior rules the world to fulfill the
Father's will and he's working all things together for the good
of his chosen people. The Lamb of God and his followers
are always victorious through this one who loved us. You see,
the war has already been won by our great Savior. Every enemy of our soul has already
been defeated by his death upon the cross. your great enemy of
sin that wars against the soul, sin which when finished, bringeth
forth death. The Lord Jesus, our Savior, the
very crux of God, has already put that sin away. He has already
settled the issue. And so that our God says to us,
your sins and your iniquities, I will remember no more. God has forgotten them. He's
cast them behind his back. He's buried them in the depths
of the deepest sea. In fact, all of the sins of all
of God's people have been separated from us as far as the east is
from the west. Like you, I'm still very much
troubled over my sin. I can say, as did David in Psalm
51, my sins are ever before me. I can't forget them. They bothered me. They troubled
me. But they don't trouble God. because
he's put them away and there is a sense in which in that way
they don't trouble me anymore. That is, I'm not troubled by
the fact that, I'm not troubled with the thought that someday
I'll be judged for my sin because I'm not going to be. But I'm thankful that all of
my sins have been washed away. in the blood of the Lord Jesus
Christ. And maybe I'm speaking to some
child of God this morning who bears a very heavy burden of
your own sinfulness. As you look to the Lamb of God,
remember He took away the sins of the world of His people. And
He'll never remember them against us. Never ever. The war has been
won. The war against sin. The war
against Satan. Oh, what an enemy of our souls. He's the roaring lion who goes
about seeking whom he may devour. And we're easy pickings for him.
We're no match for him. But there's another lion. And that is the lion of the tribe
of Judah. And he has conquered that lion. He did so on the cross. Our Lord
Jesus, in fulfillment of Genesis chapter 3 and verse 15, has crushed
the head of the serpent. His days are numbered. And though
he is a thorn to us, as are his demonic hosts. Yet he's a defeated
enemy. And he can't defeat you. He can't
defeat the people of God. He can harass us. He can bother
us. But he can't defeat us. Because
he's been defeated. That same death that put away
our sins, that's what defeated Satan. You see, our Lord Jesus,
in his death, he defeated every enemy of our souls, and in his
resurrection, he defeated death itself. He defeated the grave. I'm looking into the faces of
people who are very mortal. We're a dying people. unless the Lord comes back very
soon, which He may, and we welcome His appearing. Our Lord Jesus
said there in the end of the book of the Revelation, Behold,
I come quickly, and John speaks for all of the elect of God,
we say, even so come Lord Jesus. It would be wonderful if He would
come today. But if he doesn't come soon,
there is no question but what each of us will have to walk
the valley of the shadow of death. And death won't even be a shadow
to us anymore. It'll be real. We're always in
the very shadow of death, but a shadow can't hurt you. But
one day, death is going to come for you. And when it comes for
you, You who are God's people, you who are God's elect, you
who are redeemed by the blood, you who are saved by His grace,
quickened by the Spirit, brought to believe the Lord Jesus Christ,
when death comes to you, it will, as it were, say to you, the Master
says it's time to come home. And the angels of God will gather
around your soul as they have been gathered around your soul
throughout the years of your existence in this world. And those angels will take you
into the presence of that one who loved you and who gave himself
for you. You see, death, death just takes
us to be with our Christ Jesus. That which we fear. We fear death in this sense. We've never experienced it before.
We just don't know. We don't know about it. I know
what's on the other side. But it's that little kind of
hallway that we've got to go through to get to glory. But
listen, that'll be okay. That'll be okay. Because the
Savior, he's conquered the grave and he's conquered death. Our Lord has already taken care
of the sin problem. He's already crushed the head
of the dragon. That is Satan. And he's already defeated death
and the grave. So Christ Jesus and his followers,
we cannot be defeated. The purpose of God cannot be
defeated. The Lord says, my counsel shall
stand, I will do all my pleasure. Everything God has set out to
do, he will do. Nothing can hinder him, nothing
can frustrate him, nothing can interfere with that which he
is determined to do. All things are moving at his
command. And he has given into the hands
of our great Mediator all of his eternal purpose. And he has
said to our Mediator, to the Lamb of God, to our Savior, execute
my will in the world. And so all things are being governed
by Christ Jesus, our Lord and Savior. Yes, the book of Revelation
has been written to encourage and lift the spirits of God's
people, because all of God's people experience tribulation
in this world. Back in the seventh chapter of
Revelation, we've already studied this. The question is raised,
who are these people? There they are, blood-washed.
There they are, robed in the garments of Christ Jesus. Who
are these people? These are the ones that came
out of great tribulation. All of God's people experienced
tribulation. And I'll say to you, when you
met the Savior, when the effectual work of God was done within you
and you were drawn to the Lord Jesus, there is a sense in which
your troubles That's when they really began because you had
a conflict with your own nature. You had a conflict with Satan.
You're in a conflict with this religious but lost world. That's when your tribulations
began. I say to those of you who are lost
today should there be those in our congregation and surely there
are in a congregation of this size, those who know not the
blessed Savior, and perhaps those who are watching on the Internet
or listening to this message later on, if you don't know the
Savior, the only one who can help you is Christ Jesus the
Lord. The only one who can relieve
you of the burden of sin is the blessed Savior. But don't think
for a moment that if you come to Christ, then all of your troubles
in this world and all of your trials will be over. That's just
not true. That's just not true. Those who
say to you, oh, if you come to Christ, you'll have a rose strewn
pathway all the way to heaven. You'll never have any more problems. You're going to have problems.
I guarantee you that. Because all of God's people come
out of great tribulation. But this is the key. We're going
to come out. We're going to come out of great
tribulation. Because our Lord Jesus, He is
ever enthroned. He is exalted. And He's guiding
us. He's bringing us through this
life. Sometimes do you feel like your
life is like a maze? Is there any order to this? I'm up and down. It seems like
I'm in and out. Sometimes I feel good. Sometimes
I don't feel good. Sometimes I have the assurance
of my salvation. Sometimes I have my doubts. Is
there any order to this? I tell you, there is. There is
order in the world. In the midst of what to these
eyes appears to be disorder and disorganization, it seems like
things are They're kind of apart, but they're not. They're not. Things are rolling along right
on schedule according to the will of God. Our Lord Jesus,
He's keeping all things, all things on their directed path. This one in Colossians chapter
1, who made all things, it says, by Him all things consist. That means all things are held
together by Him. I tell you, things would all
fly apart if it weren't for the Lord Jesus Christ and His sovereign
authority over all things. And that sovereign authority
over all of the universe, over all of His creation, over all
of the things in this world, His sovereign authority is effected
in your life. Your life. And you see, the book
of the Revelation was written to lift up the spirits of God's
people. Oh, why did this have to happen? Oh, why was this trouble? Why did this trouble come my
way? Because God deemed it best for you. And it will work with
all other things for your good. That's what the Scripture says.
And in the book of the Revelation, John is given this This inspired
body of work. John, who is himself, as we've
already stated, exiled on a lonely island. He's by himself. He's working hard labor, busting
rocks. And the only thing he's guilty
of, the only crime he's committed is preaching the gospel. He said,
I'm over here in the Isle of Patmos for the Word of God and
the testimony of Jesus Christ. Because I preach the gospel,
that's why I'm here. He needed to be encouraged. He
needed his spirits lifted. And all of God's people do. There's
not a one of you here today to the Lord's people. There's
not one of you who is either not coming out of a trial, in
the midst of a trial, or ready to go into a trial. That's just
so of all of us. This is nothing new. That's why
the apostle wrote and said, don't face these things as though they've
never happened to anybody else. These fiery trials, they've happened
to others before you. They're going to happen to you
and they're going to happen to people after you. But here's
what we rejoice in. Our Lord Jesus, Malachi says
this, He is the great refiner. He's the one who puts us in the
fire. Do you sometimes feel like I'm in the fire? I'm in the fire. Well, that fire, it's good for
the dross. But the Lord says there in Malachi
chapter 3, I sit as a refiner. He doesn't sit with disinterest. You see, a refiner the precious
jewels, gold and silver and so forth. He turns up the flame. He turns up the heat or turns
it down according to that which he sees fit. And your great refiner,
he has you in the fire, but his hand is on the thermostat, as
it were. It's not, hey, you'll survive. You'll survive. And you see,
all of these difficulties of life, all these trials, you know
what they do. I don't have to tell you. You
know what they do for God's people? They drive us to the throne of
God. They just force us to the Lord.
And that's always good. Whatever drives us to Christ
Jesus, whatever drives us to the throne of God, whatever forces
us to our Heavenly Father, to cry out to Him in our time of
need, whatever it is, that's good for us. It's good for us. So in light of the circumstances
which were the daily experience of these people of God who lived
back then in the first century, The Lord Jesus gave John this
revelation. And it's a revelation of two
things really. It's a revelation of our victory
in Christ Jesus and that all is well. But it's also a revelation
of the destruction and the devastation and the judgment of God upon
the wicked. That's going to come. It's going
to come. We've already said that the book
of the Revelation divides itself into seven sections, seven visions. So far, we've covered two of
them. In chapters one, two, and three, we see Christ Jesus with
his people standing in the midst of his churches, the seven golden
candlesticks that are in this world of spiritual darkness. The Lord is with His people. In teaching through this, in
preaching through the book of the Revelation, in each of the
visions, I want to give you something that you can kind of take hold
of and remember. And in the first vision, chapters
1, 2, and 3, this is what you want to remember. Our Lord Jesus
is always with His people. That's what you take away from
chapters 1, 2, and 3. He's always in the midst of His
people. How is it that John introduces
the Savior there in Revelation chapter 1? He's in the midst
of the seven golden candlesticks. He's always with us. He's with
us this morning. We've got His Word on it, and
I mentioned it when I sought the face of God in prayer. Because
He said where two or three, the Lord Jesus said where two or
three are gathered together. Gathered, that means somebody
has gathered us. He has brought us in here. Who
do you think directing our paths into this building? You say,
well, I decided to come to church. I know you decided to come to
church, but you decided to come to church because before the
world began, another decision was made, and that was that you
be here this morning. He has gathered you together. Where two or three are gathered
together, we've been gathered together in His name. We're here
for the name of Christ Jesus. We're here to exalt our Savior
and He says where two or three are gathered together in my name,
I'll be in the midst. I'll be in the midst. This is
like a golden candlestick. Golden, valuable to God. Valuable to God. We've been purchased. Not with gold or silver, but
with the blood of the Lord Jesus. And that One who saved us, who
has made us righteous, who has washed away our sins, He has
gathered us together and He says, where two or three are gathered
together in My name, I will be in the midst. He's with us this
morning. This is our great encouragement.
This is my encouragement. He said, I'm not going to leave
you. I'm not going to leave you. Over in the book of Joshua, When
Joshua was reflecting upon the thought of Moses had led the
children of Israel, and then he's thinking about,
oh, what a task I have. Oh, what a task I have. Moses was the preacher, and now
it's me. You know how the Lord encouraged
Joshua? He said, as I was with Moses,
so I will be with you. When I came here to be your pastor,
I thought, Brother Mahan, Brother Parker. Big shoes to fill. In fact, you
can't fill them. I just have to wear my own shoes. But that was the passage of scripture
that encouraged me. As I was with Moses, as I was
with Brother Mahan, as I was with Brother Parker, so I will
be with you. This is our encouragement. The
Lord is with us. The Lord is with us. That's what
we take away from the first vision. I know there's a lot of things
to be remembered from chapters 1, 2, and 3, but this is what
really blesses the hearts of God's people. I'm never alone! The Lord is always with me. This was David's confidence in
that great psalm to which we go for consolation. Psalm 23. He said, yea, though
I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear
no evil. And we say, David, how can you
make such a statement? He says, here's the reason. Thou
art with me. Thou art with me. This life,
we're always walking in the valley of the shadow of death. I don't
know when it's going to happen. And you don't know when it's
going to happen. The very person that we think will be the next
one to die might not be the next one. It might be one of us who
enjoys pretty good health. Nobody knows. But here's what
we do know. He's with us. He's with us. Somebody said of a dear brother
who died several months ago. I hate that he died alone. I
feel bad that he died alone. He didn't. He didn't. Brother Joe Bryson didn't die
alone. The Lord said, I'm with you.
I'm with you. He's there to put his hand under
your head and comfort you. He's there. Whisper into your
mind and in your conscience and in your heart, all is well. You're one of my children. I
saved you by my grace. I'm taking you home to glory.
It's time to go. Time to bid this body goodbye.
David said, I'll fear no evil. The reason is because thou art
with me. This was Isaiah's confidence. He said in Isaiah 43, the Lord
said to Isaiah, when thou passest through the waters, I'll be with
you. Any of you gone through some
deep waters recently? Any of you in deep water now? He said, I'll be with you. He said, though the rivers Through
the rivers they shall not overflow thee, and though thou walkest
through the fire, thou shall not be burned." Isaiah 45, he
said, Fear not, for I am with thee. Three Hebrew children,
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and Nebuchadnezzar said, Didn't
I throw three men in that furnace? He said, You sure did, but there's
another in there now. Because He said, I'll never leave
you and I'll never forsake you. And when you're in the very hottest
fire of all, I'm right there with you. That makes a big difference
when you're going to have surgery, doesn't it? Some of you know,
you've been through some trials. Everybody kisses you and hugs
you and says, we're praying for you. And they wheel you off to
surgery and you watch those lights as they roll you on that gurney
down to the emergency room or to the operating room. Then the
Lord says they all had to leave you, but not me. I tell you, that helps me. Don't
that help you? See, that's what the book of
Revelation is about. You're going to have these troubles.
You're going to have these troubles. But he says, I'm with you. And
in chapters 1, 2, and 3, this is what we take away from that.
The Lord said, I'm with you. I'm with you. When Jacob found
himself opposed by his enemies, the Lord appeared to him and
said, I'm the God of Abraham, thy father. Fear not, I am with thee and
will bless thee for thy father Abraham's sake. Again, referring to the words
of Joshua, When he assumed the leadership of Israel, the Lord
said to him, There shall not any man be able to stand before
thee all the days of thy life. As I was with Moses, so I will
be with thee. I will not fail thee, nor forsake
thee. I may very well fail you. I hope
I don't, but I probably will. I fail you. I might let you down,
probably will. But I'll tell you somebody who'll
never fail you and they'll never let you down. And they'll never
forsake you. That's the Lord. The Lord called
Jeremiah to be a prophet. Jeremiah said, I can't speak,
I'm just a child. That's what he said, I'm just
a child. God said, don't you say I'm a child. For you'll go
to those that I send you, and whatsoever I command thee, thou
shalt speak. And don't you be afraid of their
faces, because I'm with you to deliver you. I'm with you to deliver you. In Jeremiah 30, 11, the Lord
said, for I am with thee, the Lord said, to save thee. The
apostle Paul went to Corinth. He must have been fearful of
the opposition. The Lord spoke to him at night
by vision, said, be not afraid, but speak and hold not thy peace,
for I'm with you. I'm with you. No man's going
to hurt you. I got much people in this place.
You just go preach. I'll protect. Don't you worry
about your enemies. You just concentrate on preaching
the gospel. David said in 1 Samuel 12, 22,
for the Lord will not forsake his people for his great name's
sake, because it had pleased the Lord to make you his people. And we read in Philippians, he
who hath begun a good work in you will finish it to the day
of Jesus Christ. So don't you worry, and don't
you be afraid. The Lord is with you. I think
you can take that home and get a lot of good out of that. At
least I can. I can. The second vision, and
I've got to go quickly here. I won't even get to this third
one at all. But the second vision is chapters 4 through 7. And
this is what we take away from this. Our Lord Jesus is the Lamb
of God who is executing God's will in
this world today. Remember, John saw a book in
the hand of him who sat upon the throne. The book was sealed
with seven seals. And we've already looked at six
of these seals, and we're going to begin to look at the seventh
seal. The opening of the seventh seal is the seven trumpet judgments. He's already opened six of them,
and he is opening the seventh. and the one who's opening the
seals of the book, that is, and the book is all of the decrees
of God, all of the purpose of God, the one who is opening the
book is the Lord Jesus Himself, the Lamb who was slaughtered,
the Lamb who was slain, who redeemed us to God by His blood. You see,
by that He saved us and by His death He earned the right to
rule the world. He's the Lord of all. That's
what Peter said in Acts chapter 2, preaching on the day of Pentecost.
He said to those people who had lifted their hands against the
Lord's Christ, he said, Him hath God exalted to be a Prince and
a Savior. He says that in chapter 3. But
in chapter 2 he says, God has made this same Jesus whom you
crucified both Lord and Christ. He's the Lord. And that's what
chapters 4, 5, and 6, and 7 are about. The Lamb is the Lord who's
bringing to pass the will of God. My Savior, the Lamb who died
for me, the Lamb who was slaughtered, that God might be just and justify,
the Lamb of God. He's looking out for all His
people and bringing to pass the will of God. And as He's opening
these seals, as He's executing God's eternal purpose,
He's doing it always with an eye toward his elect. That helps us. He's with us. That's the first
vision. He's with us. And the second vision, the one
who's with us is the lamb who was slaughtered. And he's executing God's will.
Things that must shortly come to pass. He's the Lamb of God. You know, we get to the end of
chapter 6. The sixth seal. We've already
spoken about that, but this one who is the Lamb is the judge. All these different people were
gathered together. They cried to the rocks in the
mountains to hide them from the face of the Lamb who sits upon
the throne, from the wrath of the Lamb. The wrath of the Lamb. My friends, John is taking us,
and he does this In this vision, he takes us right up to the final
judgment, and he shows us the scene. Here are people without
the Lamb of God, standing before the Lamb of God, who is the judge. And they're going to die like
they lived. You better listen to this. They
lived graceless, godless, and Christless. They had no interest
in the gospel. They had no interest, no real
interest in the welfare of their never-dying souls. They died
unwashed in their filthy rags of self-righteousness. And that was it. Their doom was
sealed. And they said, hide us from the
face of the land. I don't want to be hidden from
the lamb. I want to hide in the lamb, don't
you? I want to hide in the lamb. There's
no hiding anywhere else, because I guarantee you this, the storm
clouds are gathering. And that brings us up to chapter
8, to the trumpet judgments. And I'll tell you, and my time's
about gone, but I'll just kind of whet your appetite, I hope,
a little bit for the messages that are going to come. Here's
what the trumpet judgments are about. The first six trumpet
judgments are judgments that God sends into this world, judgments,
if we would listen to them, that call men to repent because there's coming a day
of judgment. That's the seventh trumpet. In
the Bible, what are trumpets used for? Well, they're sounded
out to get men's attention. That's what Israel used, and
actually as you read through the Old Testament, you'll find
trumpets were used to sound out both warnings, as well as there
were notes that were played to indicate festive times, joyful
times. And isn't it interesting that
when we think about the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ,
and you can read about this in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, And
also in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, when the Lord Jesus comes
back, there'll be a shout and there'll be the trump of God. You know what that is? That's the seventh trumpet. That's
the seventh trump. The trump of God shall sound.
And when that trump of God sounds, it's good news for some and bad
news for others. It's good news for all the blood-washed
saints of God. The end has come. We'll be with
the Lord. We'll be done with sin forever. We'll be with Him in His presence.
Oh, that I could hear the trumpet sound, the seventh trumpet sound. But the seventh trumpet also
means the judgment of God upon those who die in unbelief. And those six trumpet judgments
that precede that seventh one. And we'll begin to get into those
next Lord's Day. But they all warn us of that
final judgment. You see, every day and in many
different ways, God sends judgments upon this world. Troublesome times. for unbelievers,
fearful times. And they're all sent, and they
should get our attention. They should arrest our attention
when we say, I better listen to that trumpet. Because I tell
you what, if you don't listen to one of these first six trumpets,
you gonna hear the last trumpet. You will hear that. When God
sends sickness, when God sends a hurricane, when God sends trouble
into this world, trouble into your family, you better get your
attention. You better stop and think, hey,
this is all a foretaste. This is just a little taste of
something bigger is coming. Something bigger is coming. It's
like a little storm before the big storm. Trumpet judgments. Do you know the Lord Jesus Christ? John the Baptist said to the
people, he said, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath which
is to come? And I'm warning you, there's
a wrath coming. There's judgment coming. And
the only way to be hidden and to be safe in that day is to
hide in the lamp. There's no safety anywhere else. There's no safety in the church.
There's no safety in the baptismal water. And I'm going to tell
you something, death's going to come calling for you someday. I guarantee you. And then you're
going to face God. Say, preacher, you trying to
scare me? I wish I could scare you a little bit. But of course,
if I just scared you, that ain't going to do no good. I pray that God puts some fear
in your heart. Fear the Lord. Fear the Lord. Flee to Christ Jesus. I tell
you, I want you to, as it were, come with me, because as fast
as I can, I'm running to the Savior all over again. I'm going
to run into Him. There's no salvation anywhere
else except in Christ. Christ and Him crucified. And
that's why we're going to observe this Lord's Supper this morning,
because we love Him who died for us, who answered the demands
of justice for us, who put away the sins of all of God's people,
who justified us before God. We come to thank Him, praise
Him, and rejoice in Him. He's the one we trust. You trust
Him? If you trust Him, this Supper's
for you. Now, if you don't trust Him, Don't eat the bread and
don't drink the wine. You can watch, but don't partake
because it's not for you. It's just for God's people.