Revelation 19, we see now a picture
of the judgment of the earth, which is called Babylon. And
in this judgment, we see the person who is bringing judgment.
This is something that's sort of where I ended last Tuesday.
The one who brings judgment, a lot of times in our culture,
you'll see people talk about hell. And so people communicate
the idea that the devil is in hell, and he sort of runs the
show. You see people sort of illustrate
throughout history that hell is a place where people who do
not believe or bad folks end up, and the devil's punishing
them. Well, friends, the Bible teaches that the devil, that
Satan, is in hell with unbelievers. That the Punisher is Jesus Christ. It contradicts the caricature
of Christ that the world has. It contradicts this passiveness
that we see trying to be pasted over the rule and the kingship
and the lordship of Jesus. But see, He was so passive, He
was so sweet, He was so kind, He was so generous. Was Jesus
kind? Yes. Was He generous? Absolutely.
Was He quiet and passive in the context of His obedience? to
the powers that be. Yes, He spoke not a word in His
defense, though He had a defense. But that is not supposed to be
to the detriment of His lordship, the detriment of His kingship,
the detriment of His authority and of His rule. Jesus Christ
is the only One who by any standard has the authority to make judgment. Jesus is the Righteous One. Jesus
is God. So therefore, His holiness is
the standard through which He will judge and He is good and
kind and generous and loving in the judgment of the wicked.
Jesus is shown in Revelation 19 in such a way, the writer
is shown this vision by the Lord so that we can understand just
how intimate the judgment of God is. See, it's different. It's sort of like incarceration
in our day. If a judge sentences a man in the courts to life in
prison, then the officer takes this man and puts him into a
containment cell, and then when his sentencing is through and
all that, he's sent into prison, and then somebody else sort of
takes care of him. It's sort of like a place where
he's supposed to think and meditate and rehabilitate and all of these
things. But the judge never goes back to the prison. The judge
has nothing to do with it. It's just one file now, moved
on to the next, moved on to the next, moved on to the next. When
it comes to the economy of God's holiness, when it comes to the
court of Christ, Jesus Christ is the judge and Jesus Christ
is the one who carries out judgment. And so the picture that we see
in Revelation 19 of Jesus actually treading the winepress of the
wrath of the fury of God is supposed to show us that there's no closer
space, there's no closer ability or no closer opportunity that
the reprobate have with Jesus than that. It's often been said,
you know, what the Bible talks about, to be out of the presence
of God. That God's not in hell. God is in hell. God created hell. And God is the one who effectually
perpetrates the justice. That's absurd to think that God
is just not going to be anywhere near His judgment. And that's
why this picture of Jesus, He's barefooted, stepping on the stone
that crushes His enemies. How much more intimate can we
be? Jesus Christ is the judge. Jesus Christ is the one who brings
judgment. And this judgment is eternal.
It does not quit. You don't just get condemned
and the sentence of annihilationism and all of a sudden it's over.
This is an eternal and it's a right judgment. It is a right vengeance. It is a right wrath. Beloved,
there is nothing we can do to obey God enough to escape that
wrath. There is nothing we can do to
love enough to escape that wrath. There is nothing we can do at
all And if you remember what we learned last week, that as
this is taking place, that heaven is rejoicing, heaven is celebrating,
heaven is cheering, heaven is on fire with worship, praising
God for His everlasting judgment against the world. Is that our
heart today? We learn that Jesus Christ would
judge by the measure of His Word. He would strike down by the authority
of His Word. He would rule the nations with
an iron rod. And then in verse 17 of chapter
19, look there, that's where we are tonight. He says these words. And then
I saw an angel standing in the sun. with a loud voice, he called
to all the birds that fly directly overhead, come, gather for the
great supper of God to eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of
captains, the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses,
and the flesh of their riders, and the flesh of all men, both
slave and free, both large and small. Now, what is the significance
of this? Throughout Scripture, we've seen, especially in Ezekiel,
and in Deuteronomy 28, Ezekiel chapter 39, we see these words,
and I'll just read the text. As for you, son of man, Ezekiel
39, Thus says the Lord God, speak to the birds of every sort and
to all the beasts of the fields and say to them, assemble and
come gather from all around to the sacrificial feast that I
am preparing for you. A great sacrificial feast on
the mountains of Israel and you shall eat flesh and drink blood. You shall eat flesh. the flesh
of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth,
and drink the blood and the flesh of rams and lambs and he goats
and bulls and all of them fat beasts of Bashan. And you shall
eat fat till you are filled and drink blood till you are drunk
at the sacrificial feast I am preparing for you. And you shall
be filled at My table with horses and charioteers and mighty men
and all the kinds of warriors, declares the Lord God." This idea of birds devouring
the flesh of the enemies of God is a depiction of utter annihilation. This isn't some, let's just put
people to sleep. This is, let's massacre them
because it is righteous. Oh, I just don't think I can
handle the God that does that kind of stuff with, and you can't
handle the God of grace. You know why people say they
can't handle the God that does such things? It's because deep
within their being, they feel like they're not worthy of that
judgment. That's why it's so damnable. And I say that very
humbly. It is damnable for a person to
say that human beings are innately good and righteous. You cannot believe in the Gospel
of Jesus Christ and believe in the innate goodness of humanity.
You cannot believe that we are not worthy of such judgment. And the allusions here go on
in Deuteronomy 28. It talks about the dead body
shall be food for the birds of the air and the beasts of the
earth, and there shall be no one to frighten them away. I don't
know about you, but for me, one of the horrible dreams that I've
had as a child is being consumed. I have an unrealistic fear of
sharks. I have an unrealistic fear of
large snakes, Amazonian-type snakes. I have a large unrealistic
fear of crocodilia and alligators and things of that nature. I
tried to watch Jurassic Park when it came out and I left the
theater. I can't deal with the idea of
being consumed by a beast. It's a horrifying thing to think
of. Jaws, not going to touch it. I watched it, not gonna touch
it. Wouldn't take a shower. I mean,
I'm just, you know, burning my eyes. I didn't care if it was
tea tree soap or not. I mean, I'm not scared to death of being
consumed. King Kong as a kid, remember
the old King Kong? What year was that, like 1940s?
And he bites that guy. It's like claymation. It's not
even realistic. Yeah, because I mean, I've watched
King Kong. I'm not gonna look at the 12-year-olds
over here. I'm looking at Trey. Anyway,
King Kong, I remember that like it was yesterday when I was a
kid. Seeing King Kong bite this man and throw his body away.
I'm like, this is horrifying. But now the Bible is showing
me a depiction of something just as horrifying. Alfred Hitchcock,
the birds. A terrifying thing. And they
were just like pecking people. They weren't devouring them.
They were just pecking them. Imagine being devoured by something.
This is an example. This is what the Bible is teaching.
This is what Jesus Christ is revealing to His church. about
the consequence of unbelief, and the consequence of the human
condition, and the consequence of unrighteousness, and the consequence
of evil, and the consequence of all the things that we do
in the name of ourselves on the earth. And that if it were not
for His justice, I mean for His graciousness, His justice would
prevail against us. Let me say that again. If it
were not for God's graciousness, His justice would prevail against
us. What's that mean? That means
that God would be absolutely right and He would fulfill His
righteous requirements of justice and wrath and condemnation against
every human being had He not satisfied His wrath for some
of them on the person of Jesus. Jesus is not worthy or would
not be worthy, rather. That sound about to get you in
trouble. Jesus would not be worthy to satisfy God's wrath had He
not become a man and obeyed God perfectly on the earth. When we see this, that's the
picture. Jesus Christ destroying His enemies
and sending the birds. This is not literal, y'all. Hell
is not birds picking away at the flesh. This has nothing to
do with the earth, has nothing to do with some kind of trial
and tribulation, some kind of crazy stuff going on. We've read
this. We've seen picture of the world. We've seen picture of
the fall of Satan. We've seen picture after picture,
after picture, after picture, after picture. And now is the
picture of the symbolic expression of the Lordship of Jesus and
His justice, condemnation and wrath. And then when we look at the
very next verse, well, where are we here? I've lost it. What verse am I
in? 19, there it is. Oh, see, I can't
see this tiny little Bible. And I saw the beast. What beast
is that? This is the work of the devil. The satanic enterprise. And the
kings of the earth. What kings are those? All kings. All leaders. All nations. And the earth with their armies
gathered to make war against Him who is sitting on the horse
and against His army. And we've already seen this, right? So here's another
picture of just showing how wicked the earth is. It's not saying
this happens in this sequence. This is not a narrative. This
is a picture. Revelation has never been meant
to be taken, this is going to happen and then this is going
to happen, because it makes no sense that way. As you'll see,
all of judgment is about to happen and then in verse 1 of chapter
20 we see something else happening that's contradicting what we
just heard. So we know it's a picture of something that takes place.
It's an explanation of how this stuff is supposed to be understood.
And all the beasts in the armies gathered to make war against
the one who was sitting on the horse and against his army. And
the beast was captured. And the false prophet and his
presence who had done signs by which he deceived those who had
received the mark of the beast and those who worshipped its
image. These two were thrown into the lake of fire that burns
with sulfur, and the rest were slain by the sword that came
from the mouth of him who was sitting on the horse. And all
the birds were gorged with their flesh." You see the picture.
Here's Jesus. Let's take it in a literal sense.
Jesus is on a big bad horse and he's got an army behind him.
And he opens his mouth and a sword slides out and kills people.
And in the midst of all that, he's picking those up by the
sword that comes flying out of his mouth like a power ranger.
He puts them under wine press and as he's shooting the sword
out of his mouth, he's crushing them under wine press. And as
he's doing that, there's some other birds out there pecking
people all to death and eating, getting fat and drunk on their
blood. And all the while this is happening,
there's this army gathering going, oh, we got him now. He's so weak,
he shot so many swords, he's crushed so many grapes, and he's
got birds. Let's get him. I mean, see how silly that sounds?
This is not a depiction of a narrative. This is an image of a presence,
of an essence, of a being, of an authority and of a condemnation
that is like no other condemnation. Verse 1. And then I saw an angel
coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless
pit and a great chain. Now let me stop. Have we seen
a literal narrative to this point at all in Revelation? Yes or
no? No. Why now, pray tell, do so
many people go, oh yeah, there's an angel with a chain. What is
he like? What is that, Junkyard Dog? Back
when I used to watch wrestling. When I was a kid, junkyard dog
had to chain, you know, he had to put the chain, so we'd herd
above a chain. You know what I'm talking about? You know what I'm talking
about? Okay, I mean, absurd. I'm wasting air time here. But
here's this chain, this angel, this great chain. and a key to
this bottomless pit. We've already seen the depiction
of pit. It's a symbol. It's a symbol of the depths of
the wickedness of evil. It's a place in the context of
where God keeps the reins on Satan, that he only does that
which God tells him to do and permits him to do, and better
yet, decrees that he does. And he sees the dragon, the ancient
serpent, Satan, who is the devil and Satan. And he bowed him for
a thousand years. So, what is a thousand years? It's an illustration of a time. It's an illustration of a season. It's an illustration of, in some
sense, eternity. A lot of people come to this
place, and it didn't start until the 19th century. Nobody ever
said this before the 19th century. Nobody ever in the history of
the world ever said, and that may be hyperbolic, but I'm pretty
close to anybody that wasn't burned alive, did not come to
the place of saying back in the days of the church fathers, saying,
oh yeah, there's a thousand years, Jesus is going to come back and
lock the devil up in a cage. You don't see that. That's not
what he's trying to teach. It doesn't go with anything else
we've heard. So all of a sudden now is everything symbolic except
the thousand years. That doesn't even make sense
in syntax, does it? Now this is where people get
upset with me. Well, my whole life I've heard about the thousand
year reign and that's where after the tribulation Jesus comes back
and He sits on the throne of David. Why would He do that?
And they're going to reinstate sacrifices. Then Paul's a liar.
And Jesus is a liar too. Jesus says, there'll come a time
and it is now here where you will not worship on that mountain
or that mountain. You think He's going to reinstate the very thing that He destroyed?
You know, 42,000 people died in the destruction of the temple.
42,000 people died historically, according
to the record, at the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem in
70 A.D. Jesus Christ destroyed the temple of Jerusalem because
the shadow was over. The Bible. The Bible. does not teach, does not teach
that there is any purpose in the sacrificial system. So then
why would there be a thousand year reign where Jesus sits in
a temple and gets sacrifices brought to Him? Why? It doesn't
make any sense, does it? So what is this thousand years?
It's supposed to be symbolic of a season and a period that
is a long time where the Lord has the devil seized. It says, "...and He threw him
in the pit and shut it and sealed it over him, that he might not deceive
the nations any longer until the thousand years were ended.
After that, he must be released for a little while." Now this
can be confusing. It can be confusing because we
want to actually impart some type of literal reading to this. But how can you? If the little
while, if the chain is real, and the thousand years got to
be real, then it's got to be a dragon too. It can't be Satan. It can't be an angel. It's got
to be a dragon. So maybe then, if we're going to take this a
step further, God transforms the devil into a dragon and chains
him up. So where do we go from here?
Well, let's keep reading and maybe we'll get a better picture.
Then I saw thrones. and seated on them were those
to whom the authority to judge was committed. And I also saw
the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of
Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshipped
the beach or the image and not received the mark on their foreheads
or their hands, for they came to life and reigned with Christ
for a thousand years. The rest of the dead are not
coming to life until the thousand years were ended. This is the
first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who
shares in the first resurrection. Over such the second death has
no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they
will reign with him for a thousand years. So now all of a sudden
we see the word thousand years and the terms thousand years
looked at in two different ways. We see the season where Satan
is bound, and we see the season after the resurrection of Christ,
after the judgment. But this is not to be chronological.
This is not chronology, it's theology. What is being taught
here is to show us the overarching superiority of Christ and His
kingdom. And the finished work of God,
because this is just a recapitulation in small pieces, what happened
then to the devil? What happens to the saints? What
happens in heaven? This is another picture of some
of the same stuff that takes place in the previous chapters
that we've already read. But what it's doing is it's culminating.
It's coming to an end picture. It's coming to a final conclusion. So what does it mean? What's
the best application here? Well, beloved, I believe that
Satan is bound today. How many people came to the knowledge
of God from Malachi to the birth of Christ, to the birth of John
the Baptist? How many people came to the knowledge
of God after Babel? Just think about it. How many
people were taught the oracles of God and the prophecies before
John the Baptist? How many years? Do you know how many years of silence
there was between the prophet Malachi and when Zechariah heard
from the angel? Do you know how many years were
there? Five hundred. For 500 years, everybody went
to hell. Of course, there were Jews. There
were people who knew the truth. There were probably the Lord
in some sense of like the dark ages of doctrine. There were
people. who probably shared their faith,
but for the whole, the world was cut off. Paul uses that very
language. You were cut off in Ephesians.
Lost, without hope in the world. Did you hear that? Without hope
in the world. How long? How long? Thousands. And the devil, by the permission
of God, according to Job and according to other places and
according to the illustration that we see in Paul in 2 Corinthians
4, by the power and the purpose and the decree of God, the devil
continued to deceive the nations until the man was born, John
the baptizer, who says, Behold, the kingdom of God is at hand.
Behold, Did Rome know of God? Did Rome know of Jesus? Did Rome
know of the oracles of God? No! Where was Judaism in this place?
Enslaved? What was happening in the world?
Who outside of Israel, and we know that Paul says and Jesus
says that Israel got it wrong to begin with. So that part of
the, listen, part of the deceiving of the nations by God's purpose
and design is that the devil hid the truth from Jews. And now Jesus is on the scene. Don't think that the saved of
antiquity is this massive amount of people. Jesus Himself says
that broad is the way, leads to destruction, many will go
there. Narrows the gate that leads to righteousness, few will
find it. It's why people are more apt
to attend a place and a people where they can get some of their
physical and emotional and fleshly needs met and call it church
and worship rather than hearing the truth of God's word and living
as a loving community together. This theological picture shows that all through the ages
that God, since the birth of Jesus, has bound the devil and
he no longer can deceive the nations. What God did at Babel was what? Disperse men where they can no
longer communicate to each other. Were there believers at Babel? If you take a bet, what would
you say? No. And they couldn't talk for a
long, long time. And then all of a sudden, in
Acts chapter 2 at Pentecost, what happens? The Spirit of God
is given to the upper room, to the 120. And then all of a sudden
now, those who could not speak to each other could speak to
each other. Those who could not hear the gospel message of Jesus
Christ could now understand the gospel message of Jesus Christ. Friends, I believe that at the
coming of Jesus, God stopped the overarching freedom that
Satan had for years. And I believe that's what it's
teaching us. And today, right now, Satan is bound to do only
that which God has permitted him to do. And guess what he
cannot do? He cannot stop the church. He's tried to fight against
her. He's tried to devour her since
the beginning. He tried to devour the plant
of God in the garden. I think we need to understand
the supremacy of God in these things. I think we need to recognize
that God's decrees, which is one of the three things that
I'm considering teaching in the next few weeks. I think we need to recognize
that God's decrees is the effectual agent of everything that takes
place in this world. Everything. I'll never forget the first Sunday
after 9-11. I was pastoring a church. I'm pastoral staff of the church
in Brunswick. And that was September. It was packed. Because for the first time in
a long time, America had come under attack. And a lot of people
died. And I remember seeing on the
news, there wasn't a whole lot of internet stuff then. A lot
of YouTube, none of that existed. And seeing on the news all these
big professional large outreach type touch pastors saying, this
is the judgment of God against America. We need to turn and
pray and come back to our faith. Well, where in the Bible does
it teach that any government are the people of God? What I just saw was that the
people of God are those who escape the judgment of God, for they
found refuge in Christ. What's the safest place to be
when the king takes off heads? Right next to the king. What's
the safest place to hide when every kingdom in the world is
being destroyed by a king in the castle of the king? God did not judge America at
9-11. That is the most absurd thing
I've ever heard in my life. And I remember saying that, and
some older folks looking at me like I was crazy. Some of these old pastors, you
know, oh, God's judging America. You better rub it out. Like Billy
Goats. That's an authoritative expression.
You can be more Billy Goatish. It's powerful. But if God had judged America,
there'd be no America to talk about it. If God had brought
condemnation against this nation, there'd be no nation to look
at. When God judges a people, He annihilates them. When God
judged Sodom, there was nobody to tell what was happening there,
because if you look back to see, you died. The only thing that could be
shown was the narrative of what the aftermath looked like. Lot's wife turned around to see,
to get one little last glimpse of the place that she held so
dear, and it's gone. Friends, the purposes of God
in judgment are perfect. The purposes in God of the activity
of Satan and evil in this world are perfect. Everything they
do is bound. The expressions that we see here
in John's Apocalypse, the people who read them had little time
to live. They did not sit in schools. They did not sit under
professors to show them the parallels of this writing so that they
could have a grand understanding of all the theological implications
and cross references of all the writings of the prophets of old.
They read these things in the darkness of night. They heard
these letters on the run. They heard these letters with
the echoes of the screams of their loved ones in their ears
as they were snatched away from them. And they rejoiced. And they heard the words that
there is all this activity of Satan that's being purposed by
God and that God has chained him and He will not take them
away from Him. He will not arrest the church
and drag her away from righteousness. He will not be allowed to harm
the everlasting state of the Beloved. And here in these first
few verses of chapter 20, we see this great explanation of
the final place where the devil in all the world exists, under
the lake of fire, under the hand of Jesus, under His righteous
wrath and vengeance. And we need to understand that
these pictures culminate to a big picture. These little things,
sometimes you have to look at them from back. The old adage
that we can't often see the forest for the trees. Sometimes we have
to leave the forest to see the forest. When we read Revelation,
we need to see it from that perspective. The worst thing that ever happened
to this letter is that the verse numbers and chapter headings
were put into it. It was put in there for clarity in the sense
of finding it. But these headings that are in
our Bibles, are awful, because they're not the themes of the
words. But we've taken it for that.
We've taken it to be that. I saw a great white throne, verse
11, and I saw Him who seated upon it. And from His presence,
earth and sky fled away. Have we heard that already? Haven't
we already heard that? That the sky will be rolled up,
that the corners of the world will be folded in. We've already
seen the destruction of the world. So this is yet a recapitulation
of the destruction of the wicked, of the destruction of Satan,
of the rule and the authority of Christ, and of the destruction
of the world. No place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and
small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. I argued with a young man some
few months ago, and I say argue, we talked passionately about
the fact that God does not carry a set of books with him. There's no book. What is the
book of life? The elect. The names of the elect. Those for whom Christ have died.
Those who believe on Jesus Christ. This is a picture of a courtroom. Jesus isn't sitting on a big
throne and we're all going to stand there waiting for the bailiff
to call our name. Judgment is true. It is done.
The authority of God through the mouth of Paul says that the
judgment will be like a twinkling in an eye. We will meet Him and
forever be in His presence and that He will come like a thief
in the night and the judgment is sure and quick and instant. If God created man with a word
and a breath, He shall judge him in the same way by the word
of His mouth, the sword of His mouth. We've already been told
how He's going to be judged, how He would strike down the
nations. And another book was opened, which is the book of
life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books
according to what they have done. Listen to that. You know John
5? But is this not a picture? Man,
I tell you, I cannot wait to get into John's Gospel, y'all.
I should have preached John's Gospel way before I read through this
letter quickly. Because if you get John's Gospel and John's
epistles, this thing comes to life so fast and so perfectly. In John 5, if you did not marvel,
verse 28, Oh goodness, back up. John 5,
verse 25, "...truly, truly, our main, our main, I say to you,
an hour is coming and is now here." What's he mean? The dead will hear the voice
of the Son of God. Who are the dead? Us. The hour is here, Jesus said.
where the dead, you who are listening to His voice, can hear the voice
of the Son of God. And those who hear will live. Those who hear the voice of Jesus
Christ are in the book of life. That picture of this great volume
that's written For as the Father is life in
Himself, so He has granted the Son also to have life in Himself,
and He has given authority to execute judgment, because He
is the Son of Man. Do not marvel at this for an
hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear His voice."
So see, now there's another. And they will come out. Those
who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done
evil to the resurrection of judgment. Now back to Revelation 20. Jesus
is saying, John is saying, I saw the picture of this. I saw the
picture of all life being raised. I saw the picture of all things
coming to the judgment of Christ and that Christ judged rightly.
And there were books, there were volumes, there were records.
That's the point that we want to see here. There is a record,
there is a list, there is a table. In the heart of God, He knows
all things, He sees all things. And those who were dead have
been raised. Those who were dead were judged by what was written
in the books according to their works. Those who had died in the sea
were alive. Those who were dead in the grave, they were alive.
And they were judged, each one of them, according to what they
were done. Then death and the grave were thrown into the lake
of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's
name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown
into the lake of fire. But what do we see there? What do we see? We see that God judges us by
our works. So how are our works? How are
our works? Do you want to be judged by your
works? I don't want to be judged by my works. So how are those
who are written in the Lamb's Book of Life judged? They're
not. They're judged by the righteousness
of Christ. They're not judged at all. Wait a minute, I think you skipped
some stuff, didn't you? I did. I skipped some stuff. Because I want you to see it's
not necessary to read this stuff in order. Because it's not a
narrative of chronology. It's a picture of theology. And
what we just read was the theology of judgment. The same thing Jesus
taught in John 5. And what we read now, verses
7-10, is that as we already see everything
thrown into the lake of fire, we see what happens to those
who follow Satan. He'll be released from his prison
and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four
corners of the earth. Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle.
Their number is like the sand of the sea. What does that mean?
See, now there's some literal something. Then tell me who it
is then, without quoting anybody else but this letter. Who is
it? Does it matter? The point there
is that there are probably a thousand, no, not maybe that many, there's
several dozen different variations of what this could or could not
mean. Do you think that went through the mind of its original
readers? No. But what was happening there?
They gathered for battle. this understandable Semitic style
of writing this picture here of this location that was obviously
a battleground historically in their day. Now we've seen that
the devil, if he is released, if he's given authority, if he's
done... Well, where does the devil give an authority? Anytime
God pleases. Is devil given authority today?
Yes. to blind the eyes of unbelievers,
to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel. So, there's a problem. What are we supposed to do with
this theology then? We're supposed to understand
that the majority, listen to what I'm saying, the majority
of the world hates Christ. We definitely get that, don't
we? The majority of the world hates Christ. The majority of
the world follows the beast. The majority of the world follows
after Satan. And the majority of the people
who follow after Satan say they follow after Christ. Why? Because
Satan is antichrist. He looks so much like Jesus.
Signs and wonders. Miracles and power and speaking
with authority. And we saw in 1 Thessalonians
that God permits these things and He establishes these things.
We see in the Old Testament where God puts lies in the mouths of
the prophets, of the false prophets, that they may deceive the nations.
We see that God purposes that people be deceived. Why? Friends, God has decreed the
beginning from the end. And God has established His number. And God has set apart a people
for Himself. And this is not determinism,
this is deity. This is not about fairness doctrine,
this is about supremacy. We know the outcome of whatever
it may mean. And this is what I want to illustrate
to us. We don't need to know all the
details of the meaning of this letter. We need to understand
the essence of its teaching, of its doctrine. We don't have
to know what phylacteries are to make the parallel. When we
see the idea of the Jews having the Word of God always in their
face and in their eyes and against their heart. And the world marches up over
the broad plain of the earth, surrounding the camp of the saints
and the beloved city. But fire came down from heaven
and consumed them. And the devil had deceived them,
was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur, where the beast and
the false prophet were. And they were tormented day and
night forever and ever." So you know what we see? When Jesus puts His hands on
Lucifer, it's over. It's over. But until He puts
His hands on Lucifer, it's over. Now many people like to argue,
oh, there's going to be a great revival of peace in the world.
Friends, there can be no peace without Christ. And the first
time Jesus came, they killed Him and hung Him on a tree. Why?
Because God purposed that and caused it. He caused it. And if He were to come and hang
out for a thousand years, they'd do the same thing. The world
would hate Him. The world would hate Him. When we come to the end of this
letter, and if we were to take the very next, then I saw, what
does He say, I saw? Then I saw well down past verse 15. Then
I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and
the first earth had passed away and the sea was no more. And
I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from the
heaven of God, prepared as if a bride was prepared for her
husband. And I heard a loud voice from
the throne saying, Behold, the dwelling place of God is with
man. See, the whole outcome of this
is that God will put an end to the wickedness of the earth.
God will put an end to the rule and the reign of Satan, which
He controls perfectly, and He will put an end to it all and
we will rejoice. We've already seen it several times. This is
just another picture from the day of judgment of what it looks
like. We're to be encouraged, we're
to be blessed by this, not confused, not enamored, not overwhelmed,
and certainly not fearful. We're not looking for a time
when the world's going to get better. We're not looking for
a time when Christians are going to be martyred. Friends, Christians
are being martyred as we speak. Christians are being tortured
for the sake of the gospel. Christians are being maligned
and thrown into prison falsely. Christians' tongues are being
burned out because they won't stop preaching. Heads are being
taken off in Afghanistan as we speak. because they found a piece
of the Bible in someone else's bag. The great tribulation of the
church is here and it will continue. Friends, I'm not so sure if it's
the grace of God or the judgment of God that we are so complacent
in our day. I'm not so sure that a good dose
of persecution and death wouldn't fleece the church of Jesus Christ. And it's odd for me to tell you
this, and I've probably said it before, but I do pray that
God would bring revival. And I do pray that God would
bring new life and new birth. And I do pray that God would
bring a hunger for the Word, but you know how it's going to
come. By the activity of the dragon. The persecution of the
truth. And the death of the saints.
You don't believe me? How many centuries did the Jews
have the oracles of God? What nation in the history of
the Old Testament received God as their God and stuck with Him? Repentance in the face of judgment,
any man can do. Repentance in the face of grace,
only those who have been born of God will do. We don't believe. We don't believe except God grants
us faith. We don't see except God grants
us eyes. And we don't rejoice unless Christ
is our joy. We are His beloved. And we find refuge not only in
Him, but most perfectly in Him, but we find refuge in the times
of persecution. And that is the picture that
John is writing for us this day as it has been every chapter
of this letter thus far. So therefore, we fear not. But
let us be on guard. And let us be ready. And let
us be on task of believing on Jesus and teaching each other
and praying and expecting God to bring those who are lost to
faith. Let's pray. We love You, Father. And this text is just frustrating
for me sometimes. And you know that. You know that
it is. Because there's so many variations of interpreting what
we've heard over the last 20 weeks There's so many variations of
how many people on television and in books and in magazines
and sermonize and have tried to explain this stuff to a place
where it stops what we are, that we may respond to what we hear
in contrast to what you've called us to. And Lord, we are also missing
so much. The preaching of this text, Lord,
as you know, would take us months just to do this chapter. But Lord, as we read it, as we
see the essence, let us see the overarching purpose of it without
trying to dig so deeply into it that we lose sight of what
it means. Yes, there's more here. You are
an amazing God. and you're mysterious and you're
majestic and you have purpose to show us things, Lord, and
to teach us even from the Old Testament, from your Scripture,
the perfection of all that you do is never changing. Your pronouncement
of judgment and the symbolism of birds gorging their flesh,
Father, was exactly what you spoke to the enemies of old.
And Lord, their destruction was just temporary. For even those
who have died by the sword of Your people and have died by
the hail coming from heaven will still suffer the second death
at the judgment seat. So Lord, I pray that we are prepared
in heart and mind to be satisfied in the gospel of Jesus alone.
And it's in His name we pray. Amen.