The title of the lesson is The
Two Witnesses of Jesus Christ. And I began this chapter last
week with just the first two verses concerning measuring the
temple. And today we're going to cover
the next two verses. Now, I'm not going to go two
verses each time through Revelation. But some people think, and that
may be so, that this is, if not the most important chapter, one
of the most important chapters. I know this, that however you
see this, it really affects your understanding of the rest of
the book. And so what the Apostle John is writing here is the vision,
the words, that were given to him by Christ while John was
exiled on the Isle of Patmos concerning the last days, the
last age. And if you're going to learn
to think biblically, don't think of the last days as something
totally future. Now, there is a future, but a
lot of people when they talk about, well, we're living in
the last days. Well, if you think biblically, You'll understand
that we've been living in the last days since the ascension,
the death, burial, resurrection, and the ascension of the Lord
Jesus Christ. That is the last days. That's
the last age. And John said that, the Apostle
John in the book of 1 John, you know, he said it's already here.
You know, people talk about Antichrist shall come. And John said, well,
the spirit of Antichrist is already with us. That was before he even
wrote Revelation. So think of the last days as
the New Testament age. Now, things are going to progressively
get worse and worse and worse up until the time that Christ
comes again. But a lot of people don't think
biblically on that issue either. Most people, when they think
about things getting worse and worse and worse, what do they
think of? They think about the immorality that pervades the
world. Well, I think a lot of that is,
in our day, we're just confronted with it more because we have
television, the internet, and all of that. But, you know, as
far as those things are concerned, Christ told the disciples that
as this age progressively gets worse and worse, things are going
to go on just about like they always have. I mean, when has
there ever been a time on earth since the fall of man that righteousness
existed in this world as far as men and women are concerned? Well, it's never been. I mean,
things have always been bad. Things have always been... We
live in a sinful, cursed earth. But we could say, well, things
are going to get worse and worse morally. But here's the point
of revelation, if you're going to understand. And this is the
point of the two witnesses. Things are going to get worse
and worse because what you're going to find is the truth of
the gospel of God's grace in Christ, the truth of salvation,
totally by the grace of God, is going to get less and less
and less, and false gospels, false religion, are going to
get more and more and more. And that's what the Bible means.
You know, you've heard about Satan being loose to deceive
the nations. That's what that's talking about.
How does Satan deceive the nations? Well, we don't have time to go
there this morning, but look at 2 Corinthians chapter three
sometime, or chapter four on that issue, where he talks about,
if our gospel be hid, it's hid to them that are lost, in whom
the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe
not, lest the light of the knowledge of the glory of God should shine
into their hearts. Satan's goal is to keep sinners
from hearing and believing the gospel now we know that he has
no success of totally keeping the elect of God the chosen ones
of God from hearing and believing the gospel because whenever it
pleases the Lord to bring his sheep under the preaching of
the gospel and reveal it to them and in them by the Holy Spirit
that's a done deal it's going to be done Satan can't stop that
but he tries And he's deceived a lot of people. And I think
one of the pervading heresies that we'll see growing worse
and worse up until the time of the second coming is false religion
that comes in the name of Christianity but denies the doctrine thereof.
Now that's how it's going to get worse. John in second John
when he said he that transgresses and abides not in the doctrine
of Christ hath not God that kind of thing Well, that's the issue
here of the two witnesses. You remember in the first two
verses John was told to measure the temple He was given a measuring
rod a measuring stick. The temple is the church. That's what he's talking about
He's not talking about a physical temple in Jerusalem And you can
go through the New Testament. I gave you, in the lesson last
week, you have a lot of verses that prove that. Paul wrote to
the church at Corinth, you are the temple of God. The temple
of God is where God dwells in the midst of his people. And
that's the church. And he's talking about measuring
the church. He says, measure the church, measure the altar
and them that worship therein. Measure the altar because the
altar is the place of sacrifice. The church is identified with
how it relates to and understands by the power of God, the person
and work of Jesus Christ. Who is Jesus Christ? Think about
it now. There's a lot of places that
say we're a church. We're a Christian church, all
right? Well, here's where you have to
start to find out if they're a Christian church. Who is Jesus
Christ? Who is your Christ? The scripture
talks about false Christ. Remember what is 2 Corinthians
chapter 11? If he that comes preaches another
Jesus, all right? Jesus Christ is God in human
flesh. That's who he is. He is the God-man,
and though we step back at that truth and just marvel, don't
we? I mean, and we really can't explain that in a way, you know,
in any physiological way or anything like that. It's just so. The
Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Now, that truth of
who Jesus Christ is is vitally connected to not only that He
died on the cross, but what did He accomplish on the cross? Christ
in him crucified. And you can read the book of
Hebrews chapter two to find that, you know, how he was made like
unto his brethren without sin, and how he took upon him the
nature of the children, that's the elect of God, the seed of
Abraham, and not the nature of angels, to do what? To make propitiation. That's an important word in the
scripts. Only found in that form in the King James Version, like
three times in the New Testament, but it's in other forms. Sometimes
it's translated reconciled. But it simply means that Jesus
Christ, when he died on that cross, he did not die to make
you, me, or anybody savable. He didn't die to bring a possibility
of salvation if we would rise above the mire of human sin and
cooperate. You see what I'm saying? That's
not why he died. That's not scriptural, folks. He died to save his people from
their sins and his death is the establishment of righteousness
whereby God justifies his people and gives them life from Christ
by the power of the Holy Spirit whereby he calls them into the
fold through the preaching of the gospel. So the measuring
of the temple, the measuring stick is the gospel. It goes
down. What is the gospel? Now, one
of Satan's most deceptive tools is watering down the gospel.
Water it down. Over in the book of Isaiah that
I've been preaching from, Isaiah chapter 1, He talks about how
your silver is corrupted, your wine is full of water and things
like that. That's what that is. It's corrupting
the redemptive work of Christ and watering down the gospel
to where it has no power, no substance. You know, what is
the gospel? You know, a lady told me one
time, she was going out the back, and the title of my message that
morning was, what is the gospel? And I went to Romans chapter
one and Romans chapter three, And she looked at me, she said,
well, I thought the gospel was the death, burial, and resurrection
of Christ. Well, those are historical facts that are included in the
preaching of the gospel. But it's not just that he died,
that he was buried, and that he rose again. Those are true.
And you can't believe the gospel without understanding and believing
that. But why did he die? What did he accomplish when he
died? That's the key. And that's what the scripture,
that's what redemption is all about. That's what propitiation
is all about. That's what salvation is all
about. That's the measuring stick. Now look at verse three of Revelation
11. He says, and I will give power unto my two witnesses. Literally, it said, I will give
unto my two witnesses. What he's talking about, he will
give them everything he needs, these two witnesses. And they
shall prophesy 1,203 score days clothed in sackcloth. That 1,203
score, 1,200 and three score days is the equivalent
of the four and a half months, the three and a half years, it's
all symbolic here, talking about the church going out into the
world to preach the gospel under persecution. We know the, I mentioned
last week about Daniel chapter nine and I don't, we don't have
time to go into all of that, but talking about the 70 weeks
of Daniel, you know, 490 years, that's 77, you know, all that.
I'm not going to get into all that math today. But what he's
talking about from the time that Judah went back to the promised
land and retook Jerusalem, or not retook it, but they really
reoccupied it. under Zerubbabel, you remember
Zerubbabel? We'll look at that in Zechariah.
And how they rebuilt the temple. From that time to the time of
Christ, 490 years, and then he talks about the 70th week, the
seven year tribulation. First three and a half years,
that's the public ministry of Christ from his baptism to his
cross. And then from that time on, the
church, the New Testament church was established in Jerusalem,
Acts chapter two. And it was persecuted for three
and a half years up until the time of Stephen, and then it
was shot out all over the world. And that time of persecution,
what he's saying here, is indicative of the whole New Testament age.
In other words, the church in the New Testament age has a glorious
beginning. Christ built his church. And
you think about it, Peter's standing at Pentecost. There was a time
when Peter and the apostles, they thought they were all by
themselves. And he stood there on the day of Pentecost in Jerusalem,
preached the gospel, and over 3,000 souls were saved. Could
you imagine being in a place where 3,000 people were brought
to Christ? We can't even imagine what that'd
be like. And then later on, 5,000. So it had a glorious beginning,
but then it began to be persecuted. And it was dispersed throughout
the world. And what he's teaching us here
is this, these two witnesses preaching the gospel. And let
me tell you again, now I mentioned this last week, you can get bogged
down in trying to identify two men, you call two witnesses,
but if you do, you're going to miss the point. The point of
this is not who they are as individuals. The point of this is what do
they preach? They're witnesses. What does a witness do? He testifies
of the facts. So what are they testifying to?
Christ and him crucified. They're preaching the gospel,
and they're going to be persecuted. And what happens in those three
and a half years, that's indicative of what's going to happen throughout
the New Testament age to the New Testament church, and it's
going to get worse and worse and worse. That's what he's saying. All of this, you see. I believe
this power that he's talking about is the word of God in the
preaching of the gospel under the power of the Holy Spirit.
The gospel is the power of God. It's not the same word as the
word in Romans 116, power here. But it talks about, and I believe
refers to the same kind of thing. The gospel is the power of God
unto salvation to everyone that believeth. to the Jew first and
the Greek also, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed.
So it's the preaching of the gospel, which is the preaching
of the righteousness of God, which is the imputed righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And most people who call themselves
Christians, they don't even know what that is. All they know is the
four spiritual laws or something, or step one, step two, step three,
bumper sticker religion. You know, oh, I don't need to
know all that, just give me something simple, you know. Well, it is
simple. You're not saved by your righteousness.
You're not saved by your works or your will. It's by the righteousness
of God, the merit of the obedience unto death of the Lord Jesus
Christ. And that's a simple message, but it's impossible for the natural
man to receive and believe because he hates that message. It doesn't
give him room to glory. It doesn't give him room to boast.
But that's what the two witnesses are about. I believe the two
witnesses stands for the church. That's what I believe. Now you
can disagree with me. It's all right. You have every
right to be wrong. I'll give you that right. I don't
give it to you. But I believe it's the church.
You say, well, why two? Well, under the law, the requirement
of a sound, responsible, authoritative witness was how many? Two. And I believe that's what it's
symbolizing. Some people say, well, he's talking about the
Old Testament and the New Testament. Well, that's two witnesses. And you know, I've got in your
lesson here all the others. Some say Moses and Elijah. Some
say Enoch and Elijah. There's nothing in the text that
would support that. But these two witnesses, whoever
they are, whatever they are, which I believe they're the church,
they're the witness of the gospel throughout the New Testament
age, two, because that's what it takes to be an authority under
the mouth of two or three witnesses, two is the minimum. And that's
what it's talking about. And they go throughout, and they
go throughout this age prophesying, which means preaching. And look
how they do it, verse three. clothed in sackcloth. Now that
shows you the nature of their message. What does sackcloth
mean in the Bible? It means sorrow, mourning. What
he's talking about is this is a message of repentance. It's
a message that brings sinners in the hands of the Holy Spirit.
It brings sinners to mourn over sin. It's blessed are the mourners. It's a message of sorrow. It's
a negative message to the natural man. Why? Well, because first
it exposes every hope of salvation based on the works, the power,
the wills of men to be false. The preaching of the gospel is
a judgment on this world. That's always been. You remember
in Hebrews chapter 11 talks about Noah preached? And his message
of grace pointing to the future Messiah for salvation, for righteousness,
it condemned the world. Noah wasn't the judge. We're
not the judges in that sense. We're not the supreme judge.
But we preach the gospel of judgment. He that believeth not, what? Shall be damned. And here's what
I'm telling people. If you don't have Christ, the
true Christ, as he's identified and distinguished in the scripture,
if you're not washed in his blood and clothed in his righteousness,
you will be damned. Isn't that right? That's a judgment. That's a judgment from God. So
the world hates it because it exposes all their false hopes
and their false grounds of salvation. Secondly, It's a message of sorrow
because it calls on sinners not only to turn to Christ for salvation
and righteousness and forgiveness, but to turn away from everything
you thought recommended you unto God. Now, now listen to me. We
can talk about sinners who come to Christ. You say, well, you've
got to turn away from your sin. That's right. That's right. But
don't fail to understand that turning away from your sin doesn't
only mean turning away from the immorality of your life. We're
in a warfare against that, aren't we? If we're saved. It's also
turning away from false religion in your life. Repentance of dead
works. What were those dead works? Well,
they were works under the law. They were things that sinners
by nature think recommend them unto God other than the blood
and the righteousness of Christ. Paul said it this way. He said,
when I was in the flesh, he said I was a Hebrew of Hebrews. He
was proud of that. I used to say I was a Baptist.
I really was, I was, I was proud of that. I did this, I did that,
I joined the church, I got baptized. Lord, Lord, haven't we prophesied
in your name? Haven't we cast out demons? Is
that what you think recommends you to God? You need to repent
of that. That's what John spoke of in
John chapter 3. when he's talking about the light
that come into the world and men love darkness and hate the
light because their deeds. The deeds there is what men by
nature think make up their righteousness with God. Recommend them unto
God, you say. Their deeds are evil. And they're
evil not because they're immoral in the sight of men or even insincere. They're evil because they're
self-righteous. They deny the person and work of Christ. They
seek to bring his work down and man's work up. You see what I'm
saying? And that's what repentance, you see. One of the reasons that
people by nature refuse to believe the gospel is because the gospel
is a gospel of repentance and not assimilation. Now what do
I mean by that? Well, I'll believe what you preach
as long as you'll let me hang on to my dead works. You see what I'm saying? People
don't wanna, they don't wanna let go of the self-righteous
past. Oh, you all, we've been called
hyper-Calvinists because of that. Of course, you know when people
use that term, you gotta find out what they mean by it. You
know, well, we're not. We're just preaching the gospel.
I mean, look, it's either all Christ or it's no Christ. That's
the way the scripture is. There's no in between. There's
no middle ground there. Somebody said, well, I just come
into a higher knowledge. Oh, no, you need to repent. We
preach repentance. And that's what these two witnesses
are doing. Now, look what happens in verse four. Now, this will
be the last verse. Here, really, he identifies the
two witnesses. And this is a quote from Zechariah
chapter four. Look at verse four. These are
the two olive trees. These witnesses, they're the
two olive trees and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the
earth, standing before the God of the earth. Now, first of all,
what are the candlesticks? I mean, that's, that's in revelation. He told us what the candlesticks
are, didn't he? Look over there in revelation
one verse 20. Now you know what a candlestick
is, it gives light. And the candlestick here is,
now what he's talking about is not like a wax candle with a
wick in it that we light. It's like that candlestick that
was in the tabernacle in the holy place. It was made of gold
and they had the oil that went to it. The olive trees provide
the oil. That's the oil. So you have the
oil and the candlesticks. And look at verse 20. He says,
the mystery of the seven stars, which thou sawest in my right
hand. He says, and the seven golden candlesticks, the seven
stars are the angels or messengers of the seven churches. That's,
that's the ministers. That's what he's talking about,
preaching the gospel and the seven candlesticks, which thou
sawest are the seven churches. Now, what are the candlestick?
That's the church. These two candlesticks, see, they represent
every true church of the living God where the gospel is preached. Now, there are false churches,
remember. They're not candlesticks. You're not a candlestick unless
you shine forth with the light of Christ and his truth. Where
a false gospel is preached, somebody said, well, they have a little
truth. You know, somebody said, you know what a little truth
is? It's a lie. A little truth mixed with this,
mixed with that. I remember old brother Scott
Richard, he's somebody, I was talking about going to a church
where, you know, they had a little truth, you know, and he said,
they said, well, you know, even a rat can find a piece of good
food in a garbage can. And Scott said, well, I know
there can be some good food and garment, but I'm not going down
there to get it. So that's not the issue. Where the gospel is,
that's the candlestick. Now the oil that is supplied
there is the oil of God's grace in the preaching of the gospel
under the power of the Holy Spirit. In other words, that light, the
candlestick, which is the church, doesn't shine with its own power,
and it's not the source of the light. That's the olive tree,
that's the grace of God in Christ. It's kind of like, go back to
the analogy of Christ, he says, I'm the vine, you're the branches,
and you bear fruit of the vine. You see, the branches don't bear
fruit of themselves, they're bare from the vine. Christ is
the source. He's our righteousness, he's
our life. Now look back at Zechariah chapter four. with me. Zechariah, you remember, he was
a prophet during the days of Judah's return from Babylon.
And in that return, there were several prominent men, but in
the book of Zechariah, the two prominent men, one was named
Zerubbabel. Now, Zerubbabel, he was appointed
to be the governor of the province of Judah. And he was from the
line of Judah, he was from the kingly line. Zerubbabel was like
the overseer, building the city, rebuilding the temple. And he
was a type of Christ, a type now. The king who builds the
church. Christ said, upon this rock I
will build my church. That's what Zerubbabel is. The
next prominent figure was a man named Joshua. Now, you know Joshua
was a prominent name. That's the Hebrew pronunciation
or transliteration. It might be like Yeshua, and
it's Jesus. And Joshua was the high priest
of Israel. He was a type of Christ, our
high priest. And you can go through the book
of Zechariah. Now what he's doing here, he's showing here as they're
going, he's trying to encourage the people who go back from Babylon
to Judah to Jerusalem. There's about 50,000 of them,
which by the way wasn't a very, there was a whole lot more who
stayed in Babylon. But there are about 50,000 of
them who came back and they came back and they started rebuilding
the temple, started rebuilding the city, but then they got lax
and they got selfish. They left off of that and they
began building their own houses, elaborate houses, rather than
dealing with the temple and the city of Jerusalem. And so what
he's trying to, what Zechariah is telling Zerubbabel and Joshua
is you've got to encourage these people to do what God said to
do. And how does he encourage them? He points them to a bright
hope in the future. The future of the true people
of God, the elect of God is bright. Though we will go through much
persecution, though we will go through many trials, our future
is bright. You'll have trouble in the world,
but Christ said, be of good cheer, I've overcome the world. But
their bright future was not in a physical city or a physical
temple or a physical nation. Their bright future was wrapped
up in the promise of the coming of Jesus Christ, the Messiah.
That's the bright future. That's all through the Old Testament.
And so look what he says, look at Zechariah 4.1, I'll hurry.
And the angel that talked with me came again and walked me as
a man that is wakened out of his sleep and said unto me, what
seest thou? And I said, I have looked and
behold a candlestick all of gold and a bowl upon the top of it
and his seven lamps thereof and the seven pipes to the seven
lamps which are upon the top and two olive trees by it, one
upon the right side of the bowl, the other upon the left side
of the bowl. And he asked him, he said, what are these? And
he said, do you know what they are? And he said, no. Look at
verse six. Then he answered and spake unto
me, saying, this is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel,
saying, not by might nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord
of hosts. This is the word of God. Here's
the light, the candlesticks. You're coming back here. You're
going to build this temple. You're going to rebuild this city. But
let me tell you something, it's not by the power, not by might
of man. It's not by the goodness or the
will of man. It's by the grace of God. That's
what it's by. Look at verse seven. Who art
thou, O great mountain, before Zerubbabel, thou shalt become
a plain, and he shall bring forth the headstone thereof with shoutings,
crying, look at it, grace, grace unto it. It's all of grace, that's
what he's saying. Salvation. The building of the
church. The true people of God. Not just,
not the nation Israel now, that's all by the power and goodness
of God too. But what he's talking about is the church. And here
you have these seven lamps, and you have this bowl on top, and
you have pipes going to each lamp, seven pipes, and they're
connected to these two olive trees, and the oil's going to
the lamps, and the light's burning. And it's not by our power, it's
not by our goodness, it's not even by our will. It's by the
grace of God in the Lord Jesus Christ and through him alone. Grace reigns through righteousness
unto eternal life by Jesus Christ, our Lord. All right.