Alright, Revelation chapter 1,
the glorified Christ and His churches. We often refer to the
church singular in speaking of the whole body of Christ, the
redeemed of the Lord, the elect of God, those who are called
out of the world, and then in each generation, of life here
on this earth, the Lord has raised up his churches in specific areas
as beacons of light. And we're going to talk about
that. But we're going to begin in verse 9 where John begins
in his letter to address the seven churches that are in Asia
Minor. He even names them here. And
it's interesting to note, first of all, how John and, in essence,
all the prophets and apostles referred to themselves, how they
described themselves. You know, men today, especially
preachers, they love highfalutin titles. They love, you know,
the reverend so and so. I don't, you know, you all know
I don't like to be called reverend. And I've had it happen, you know,
like if I was preaching a funeral, the funeral home would put reverend
Bill. Holy and reverend is his name,
not my name. God is the only reverend. And,
you know, I just, I tell people, just call me Bill, you know,
if you want to say pastor, that's okay, that's what I am. But John
refers to himself here in a humble way. Now sometimes the apostles
refer to themselves as apostles, but apostle is a messenger, that's
what the word means. messenger. Other times they referred
to themselves as servants or bondservants of Christ. Paul,
that was one of his common names for himself. I'm a bondservant
of Christ. I'm a servant of the church.
That's what the word minister has to do with. But here John
says in verse 9, I John who also am your brother and your companion
in tribulation, in trials, And in the kingdom, the kingdom of
Christ, and the patience of Jesus Christ, that word, that patience
means endurance. And what he's talking about is
that as a citizen in the kingdom of Christ, we are preserved in
that kingdom by the faithfulness of Christ as our mediator. We
have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And
when you see terms like that, that is why we believe the Bible
teaches the eternal security of the believer, the eternal
security of the saved. This notion of being saved now
and lost tomorrow is not a biblical gospel notion, it's a lie. And so John says, I'm your brother.
We're fellow citizens. We're in the family of the kingdom
of God. We're adopted into his family. We're redeemed by the blood of
Christ. We all have the same exact equal
position in our standing before God in Christ. There's not one
person who's above another because we're all there by grace. We're
all there based on the righteousness of another. So whatever gifts
you have or whatever gifts you don't have, that has nothing
to do with your standing before God. John had the gifts of an
apostle. He was appointed. He had the
office and the authority of an apostle. But as far as his standing
before God, speaking to other believers, I'm your brother.
That's what I am. I'm your brother in Christ. You're
my sister in Christ. You're my brother in Christ.
I'm your companion in trials. I have tribulation. I have troubles
and trials just like everybody else. Saving faith is going to
be tested. I'm a citizen of the kingdom
and I'm here by the endurance of Jesus Christ. And he said,
in verse nine, he said, I, John, was in the isle that is called
Patmos. That's the island that the emperor,
the Roman Caesar Domitian had exiled John there as a punishment. And he, but now listen to what
John said. And I love this because it's
similar to what Paul told the Philippians. You remember when
Paul wrote the letter to Philippi, Paul was in bonds, he was in
chains. But he called him, and he was
put there by the Roman government, by Caesar. But Paul referred
to himself this way. He said, I'm a prisoner of the
Lord. He knew that he was there by
the providence of God. Somebody said, well, God wouldn't
do that to one of his children. God did that to Paul, and Paul
said it worked out to further the gospel. So the fact that
he was providentially in change worked out. You see, God's in
control. All things do work together.
Well, John says here, I'm on the Isle of Patmos for the word
of God. Now, first of all, for preaching
the word of God, that's why he was there, but it was also to
further the word of God because it was on this isle that he got
this revelation. the book of Revelation, and he
said, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ. In other words,
what Christ is going to say to me, I'm gonna write down, and
look in verse 10, he says, I was in the Spirit. Now what he means
by that is he was being inspired by the Spirit. You know, the
Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is the sovereign agent of the new birth. It's the Spirit that quickens.
And the Holy Spirit indwells every true believer continually. Now we can grieve the spirit
and even quench the spirit and we can talk about that. I don't
have time to define all that right now. But he continually
indwells the people of God. But what John is talking about
is a special revelation from the Spirit in which he was inspired
to see these visions and to hear these words and to write them
down. So I was in the Spirit. And he said, on the Lord's Day.
Now, normally in the New Testament, the Lord's Day refers to the
first day of the week. It's the day that commemorates
the resurrection of Christ. It's the day that the church,
the New Testament church is commanded to gather together and meet.
to worship the Lord. That's why we're here today,
the first day of the week. And so on the Lord's Day, it
says, he heard behind me a great voice as of a trumpet. Now the
trumpet there is like the clarion call. There's a great, important
announcement, pronouncement of truth that's coming. And it's
gonna involve a lot. You can think about trumpets
being blown in an army. And there's the trumpet that
wakes you up, the trumpet that puts you to sleep, the trumpet
that calls you to arms, the trumpet that warns you that danger is
coming, all of that. It's the gospel trumpet. It's
the announcement from the king. And he says this voice, here's
what he said, look at verse 11, saying, I am Alpha and Omega,
the first and the last. Well, we've already seen those
words, haven't we? The Alpha and the Omega, that's the first
and the last letter of the Greek alphabet. Talking about how he's
the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Christ is
the author and finisher of our faith. Christ is our all and
in all. He is all our salvation from
beginning to end and everything in between. He's all our righteousness
before God. I don't have any other righteousness
before God but Jesus Christ. He's the Alpha and the Omega.
He's the first and the last. He's the first word, he's the
last word. He had the first word. Let there
be light, he'll have the last word when he comes again to judge
this world. And he says in verse 11, and
what thou seest, Christ commands John, he says, what thou seest,
write in a book, that's the book of Revelation that we're reading
now, and he says, and send it into the seven churches. Now
we talked about the number seven. So what's represented here is
the complete church of the living God, the perfect church. And what he's saying here is
this is a message to his churches and the seven churches which
are in Asia, and then he names them, Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos,
Thyatira, Sardis, and Philadelphia, and Laodicea. And we'll see what
message he has to each local assembly in chapters two and
three. And then he says in verse 12, and I turned to see the voice
that spake with me, and being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks. Now these golden candlesticks,
the reference, and there's so much symbolic language in the
book of Revelation. And I'll just caution you right
now, you'll have a lot of people who read the book of Revelation,
and when you get to certain passages, They say, well now, you either
interpret those spiritually or literally. All right? And you
gotta be careful about all that. For example, the seven golden
candlesticks here refers to the churches that he just mentioned.
Now a candlestick, you know, where do you remember reading
about a candlestick? It goes all the way back to the
tabernacle, doesn't it? And you had the golden candlestick. And that was the light shining
forth with the light of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
So you know that this is not talking about literally physical
candlesticks. This is symbolic language. It's
kind of like Christ said, I am the door. Now what did he literally
mean by that? We meant he's the way to God.
He's the doorway into salvation. He didn't mean he was a door
with knobs and hinges and things like that. So don't get bogged
down in this literal spiritual thing. Another thing that you
gotta be careful of is a lot of people, they pick and choose
what they want to say is literal and what they say is spiritual.
And they don't have any scriptural rule of interpretation that tells
them how you decide that. Well, we just look at it as it
lays. And that's what I'm gonna do. The candlestick, it goes
back to the candlestick in the holy place, the tabernacle, and
that candlestick was a type of Christ, the light of the world.
And what he's saying here is that these churches, like any
true church, where the gospel is preached without compromise,
shines forth like a candlestick with the light of Christ. We
preach the gospel. We preach the glory of God revealed
in the face of Jesus Christ, the light of the knowledge of
the glory of God. Christ said, you're the light
of the world. Let your light so shine that
men may see your good works and glorify your father, which is
in heaven. The light is not our good works. The light is the
truth of the gospel of Christ. And we want our light to shine
forth. They see our good works, not to draw attention to ourselves,
but to glorify our father, which is in heaven. Paul wrote to the
church of Philippi and he said, you shine as lights in a dark
world. Light is Christ. In John chapter
one, he's called the light. And his churches are called lights. We shine forth like a candlestick.
You know, a candlestick is not the source of its own light.
Somebody has to light it, you say. And that's what happens
when we're enlightened by the Holy Spirit to the glory of the
person of Christ, who he is. He's God in human flesh, he's
Emmanuel. And when we're enlightened to
the way God justifies the ungodly, the gospel, when we see our sin
in light of the holiness of God, like Isaiah of old, I'm a man
of unclean, how do I know what I am? as far as sin and depravity. Well, I see it because the light
has shined, the light of truth. Christ shines forth with his
own light. He's the source of light. That's
what John meant in John chapter one when he calls Christ. We
don't shine, we're not the source of our light. We don't shine
forth with our, we shine forth with his light. It becomes ours
because he gives it to us. Well, look at verse 13. He said,
and in the midst of the seven candlesticks, one likened to
the Son of Man. That's a messianic title of Christ. And this is the vision that John
has seen. He's likened to the Son of Man.
He's clothed with a garment down to the foot. Now that garment
is representative of the righteousness that he established, which he
imputes to his people, And it's complete, it's down to the foot.
It's not a partial garment here. We have a full, complete, perfect
righteousness before holy God. And he says that this garment
which represents the garment that he himself wove by his obedience
unto death as the substitute and the surety of his people.
Salvation itself is likened to a garment in scripture. Isaiah
61, a wedding garment. We'll see that over in Revelation,
I think, over in the latter chapters of Revelation. and how we're
clothed. You remember the vision that
Zechariah had back in Zechariah, what is that? I think it's chapter
three of Joshua the high priest standing before the Lord in filthy
garments. Now that symbolizes man's sinfulness. That's what we wear. And here's
where darkness comes in. We think that garment's clean,
but it's not until the Holy Spirit shines the light on it. And remember
what the angel of the Lord, who was Christ, his defense attorney
stepped in and said, take that filthy garment off and put on
a new garment, put on a new clothes. All that's symbolic of the imputed
righteousness of Christ, which is the only ground of our right
standing before God. Christ wears it as a robe of
his own making, and he puts it on his people, and we'll see
that later on. It says in verse 13, he's girt about the paps
with a golden girdle. There was a golden belt around
his chest, is what it's saying, and that golden band His chest is significant, the
golden, and of course, anytime you see gold, that's the dignity
of the deity of Christ. Gold represents deity. And this
is his majesty. This is the majesty of his person. His lordship. And it's his strength. His power. to save his people. He's able to save to the uttermost
them that cometh unto God by him. Paul said, I know whom I
have believed and I'm persuaded that he's able to keep that which
I've committed unto him. That's what that golden girdle,
that golden band or belt around his chest represents. And then
look at verse 14. His head and his hairs were white
like wool, as white as snow. Now you know what white represents,
that's the purity of his nature, his wisdom, the white hair, the
hoary head, you know, that Proverbs talks about, that's gray or white. And he is infinite wisdom. I'm gonna talk about that in
the message this morning from the book of 1 Corinthians, how
Christ is the embodiment of the wisdom of God. He is the answer,
you know, people say, well, he's the answer to all your problems.
Well, that doesn't mean by looking to Christ we can get everything
figured out. But here's the issue of this
vision. What is the most perplexing problem
that faces mankind as far as a relationship with God? Well,
it's stated in the book of Job, how can a man be just with God? How can a sinful person appear
before God who is holy and just and righteous and who must punish
sin? How can that person stand before
a holy and just and righteous God and be forgiven? Because
God cannot just look over or ignore or deny those sins. He
must punish sin. Now, I know it's an easy answer
in religion. They say, well, God loves you,
God's merciful and all that. Listen, any notion of God's mercy
and love that does not settle the question of how can a sinner
stand before God and be justified is empty love. It's empty mercy. You see, it's kind of like this.
You think of a person who committed a crime who stands before an
earthly judge. Well, ask yourself the question,
how could a judge be merciful to that person, an earthly judge,
and let them off and justice be done? It's impossible. In
other words, if that judge looks upon that person and says, anything
other than strict justice, the penalty must be paid, and people
might say, well, he had mercy. He threw himself on the mercy
of the court, and the court said, mercy, well, they may do it. And the prisoner may like it,
and his family may like it, but justice has been perverted. God
cannot do that. And this is the wisdom now that
we're talking about here. This is the wisdom of the Bible.
This is the wisdom of the gospel right here. How can God do that? Well, there's only one way and
that's by his sovereign grace based upon the person and finished
work of the Lord Jesus Christ as the substitute and surety
of his people. Christ took my punishment. The
justice of God in my case was fully satisfied, not in my person,
not by what I've done or suffered, but by Christ on the cross. And
that's the wisdom that he's talking about. Look at verse 14 again. In other words, this is purity.
This is mercy, but it's mercy right in line with justice. This
is grace, but it's grace that's right in line with righteousness.
Grace reigns through righteousness by Jesus Christ our Lord. This
is love of God to his people, but it's not love without justice,
it's not love without truth. You see, it's white, it's pure,
it's righteous, it's just, it's everything that God is. He's
both a just God and a savior. He's a righteous judge and a
loving father. That's the wisdom of God. And
here's the thing about, if you want to talk about the Christian
religion, true Christianity is the only religion in the annals
of human history and human society and human religion that has ever
even posed the question, let alone come up with that answer.
That's what sets us apart. All right, he says his eyes were
as a flame of fire, and of course that talks about his omniscience.
It talks about his ability to see into the hearts of men. One writer stated this, I've
got this in your lesson, his eyes burned with love for his
sheep to melt their hearts, but also his eyes burned with wrath
and vengeance against his enemies, the enemies of the church. Look
over at verse 15. It says, his feet like unto fine
brass as if they burned in a furnace. That brass or bronze represents
judgment. This is judgment. You know, back
in the Old Testament, you had the brass or brazen altar. That's where the sacrifice was
slain. That's where the blood was shed.
That's the justice of God. falling upon our substitute for
sin. Christ is the Lamb of God who
was slain on the brazen altar under the justice of God for
the sins of his sheep, his church, imputed, charged, accounted to
him. That's what the Bible means when it says he was made sin.
Here, his feet, he's walking in justice, strict justice. And it will be justice. It will
be justice of wrath upon his enemies. But it will be justice
of justification upon his people. We don't have to fear God's justice.
You know why? Because we're in Christ. And
he took the full measure of God's justice. So as he walks in this
vision, he walks in strict justice. And it says in verse 15, his
voice as the sound of many waters. And that's the preaching of the
gospel. That's the preaching of his grace. That's like a,
you go back to Matthew five there where it says, blessed is he
that hungers and thirst after righteousness, he'll be filled.
We thirst for righteousness. Well, we hear the sound of many
waters. when we hear the gospel because
everything that God requires of us in order to be saved, in
order to be accepted with God, in order to be maintained and
kept and preserved and glorified, we find in Christ. All the blessings,
many waters, that represents all the blessings. that we have
Ephesians 1.3, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ. He that spared not
his own son, how shall he not with him freely give us all things? You see, everything that God
requires, we find fulfilled in Christ. And it's a multiple,
multiple blessings. And when we hear the gospel,
that's what we hear. The sound of many waters that quenches
our spiritual thirst. Verse 16, he had in his right
hand. Now his right hand is the right
hand of justice, his right hand of acceptance. We extend the
right hand of fellowship. He had in his right hand seven
stars. Now these stars are the ministers
of Christ who shine with the light of his glory and truth
not pointing to themselves, it's not like movie stars, but they're stars in the sense
that they point sinners to Christ. They're like the guiding light.
You see, now the church as a whole is that, but he has set up ministers,
and he said he had in his right hand the seven stars. His ministers,
his preachers of the gospel, who point sinners to Christ.
You know, back in the old days, that's how they navigated ships
on the ocean, by looking at the stars. And they were trying to
get to their destination. Well, that's what these stars
do. They shine with the light of Christ, pointing you to Christ.
Like John the Baptist, don't look to me, look to Christ. If
you wanna know about salvation, now I can, listen, if you're
a believer, you're commanded of God to be baptized in water. That's the confession. That's
not salvation now. That's confession of salvation,
right? Now here's what I can do for
you. I can baptize you in water. Here's what I can't do for you.
I can't give you a new heart. There's one who can baptize with
fire. That's a symbol of the work of
the Holy Spirit in the new birth. I can't do that for you. I can't
even do that for myself, but I can baptize you with water.
What my point is, is this. These stars here, don't look
at them like they're some kind of a celebrity. That's not what
it's talking about. That word has taken on new meaning
today. He's a star, or she's a star,
you know. No, I'm just a light showing
you where life is, where salvation is, where righteousness, it's
in Christ. And so look there at verse, Verse 16, had the seven
stars. Out of his mouth went a sharp
two-edged sword. You know, that's the word of
God. The two-edged sword, it cuts both ways. Cuts asunder in conviction. Cuts the circumcision
of the heart, cutting away the filth of the flesh. Cuts into
the very soul of man. Hebrews 4 talks about that. His
countenance, that's his appearance in his face, was as the sun shineth
in his strength. He's the son of righteousness,
Malachi said, who comes with healing in his wings. He shines
forth in his power to save. The gospel is the power of God
and the salvation to everyone that believe it, to the Jew first,
the Greek also, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed.
Verse 17, when I saw him, John says, I fell at his feet as dead.
That's the only proper response. And what this symbolizes is that
John is a sinner saved by grace. I have no power. I'm like a dead
man. I can't save myself. I can't
make myself righteous. I can't wash away my sins. I
can't give myself a new heart. I'm totally dependent upon Christ. That's what that means. And you
followed his feet as a dead man. And it says, and he laid his
right hand upon me. His right hand of power. Salvation. His is the power, his is the
glory. He said unto me, fear not, I'm the first and the last.
I'm the first word, I'm the last word, I'm the author, I'm the
finisher, I'm the completeness. Verse 18, now here's the ground
of it now. Verse 18's the ground. I am he that liveth and was dead,
and behold, I'm alive forevermore. Now what's that talking about?
It's his life, his death, his burial, his resurrection, his
righteousness. That's what it is. I fall at
his feet as a dead man. I don't have any power to do
anything. But he extends his right hand and he pronounces,
I am the resurrection and I am the righteousness that demands
life. I took the sins of my people. That's what Christ is saying.
He said, Amen. He said, I have the keys of hell and of death. He opens the way. what it's talking
about. He has the way to understand
how God can save a sinner. He's the way of salvation. He
has power over hell and death. And He alone has that. We don't
have it. But He does, that's why our salvation is in Him.
And so look at these last two verses. He says, write the things
which thou hast seen and the things which are and the things
which shall be hereafter. These are things past, things
present, things future. So in the book of Revelation,
you're gonna have all that. Remember I told you, the Revelation
is seven visions consists of seven visions which give us different,
you might say, angles or views, viewpoints, of the whole period
of time called the New Covenant Age, the Gospel Age, the Church
Age, between the time of Christ's first coming and his second coming.
And so there will be things that, when we read this, that are past.
In fact, we'll even go back to the Old Testament to find out
what some of these symbols mean. We'll read about the seven churches. They're not there anymore as
far as the way they existed here, but that's past. We'll read about
things present and understand that we're not going to go to
the local newscast or the newspaper headlines to interpret Revelation.
That's not the way you do it. But things that we're going through
right now, we'll read about here as a gospel church. And then
things future. So he says in verse 20, he says,
the mystery of the seven stars, which thou sawest in my right
hand and the seven golden candlesticks, the seven stars are the angels,
the angels of the seven churches. Now the word angel, you gotta
understand now, when you see that word, Literally, it means
messenger. Sometimes it refers to an angelic
being, and sometimes it refers to a preacher of the gospel.
And it simply means messenger. It's not saying that I'm up here
and I'm an angel and you all aren't, or anything like that.
It's just simply saying I'm a messenger. And these men who were messengers
of the churches, they were preachers of the gospel. And then, you
know, sometimes angel of the Lord refers to Christ himself,
the angel of the covenant. How do you know the meaning of
it? Context will tell you the meaning of it. So he says, these
are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven candlesticks which
thou saw'st are the seven churches. So there's the ministers, there's
the glorified Christ, that's what John saw in that vision,
and there's his churches.