Revelation chapter 11. Randy and Jim were telling me,
and I already, I knew that when the men preach here that you
have their scriptures on a screen and sometimes their points and
outlines, and that's a good thing. I mean, it helps. And I never
send Jim my notes for him to do that. And maybe I ought to
start doing that. And I thought about this message
here, but it would have been a good one to do that, really,
because there's a lot of scripture here, and I'm really not going
to have time to turn to all of it. It just takes so much time.
But I do want you to open your Bibles to Revelation 11, and
then be ready to turn to Zechariah, the book of Zechariah, chapter
four. And we'll go there in just a
few minutes. The title of the message is The
Gospel Witnesses. Look at Revelation chapter 11
verse 3. Now this is the Apostle John
receiving the revelation, the uncovering, the revealing of
the Word of God for the last days. And while he's on the Isle
of Patmos, And here's what is told to him, it says, this is
an angel, a messenger of God, sent from Christ, sent from the
glory of Christ to give John this information. And he says
in verse three, he says, I will give power unto my two witnesses,
and they shall prophesy 1,203 score days clothed in sackcloth, These are the two olive trees
and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth. And if any man will hurt them,
fire proceeded out of their mouth and devour their enemies. And
if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed.
These have power to shut heaven that it rained not in the days
of their prophecy, and have power over waters to turn them to blood
and to smite the earth with all plagues as often as they will."
Now you know as well as I do that so many people are intrigued
with the book of Revelation. And we've been, I've been going
through it in our Sunday morning Bible study lessons. I was trying
to think as I was studying this. I've had this on my mind for
quite a while because, number one, it gets people's attention. And, you know, we're not in the
business of trying to impress people with curiosities and things
like that. But, you know, any time I preach
in the book of Revelation and it goes up on Sermon Audio or
something, we usually get a lot of listeners because people are
just intrigued by it. And there's so much written about
it. Everybody believes, well, we're living in the last days.
And we are. We've been living in the last
days, incidentally, since the ascension of Christ into the
glory of his father. I've often told people, I say,
I believe we're living in the last of the last days. And sometimes
I feel as I'm getting older, it's kind of a race. Am I gonna
die or is the Lord gonna come back before I die? I don't know.
We don't know when he's coming back. There have been people
who've tried to figure that out. That's an exercise in futility. And there's nothing good that
can come out of it. We live in expectation of his
coming, knowing that he could come any time, knowing that he's
going to come. And we, like Paul, the apostle,
if we know Christ, if we know the reality of sin and righteousness
and the holiness of God, We like Paul, and as he expressed it
in Philippians chapter three, he said that I may know him and
be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of
the law, but that which is through the faith of Jesus Christ, the
righteousness of God, which is by faith. And so my concern is
not the when, but my concern is that when he does come, that
I be found in him and not in myself. that I be found as a
sinner saved by the grace of God, a sinner washed in the blood
of Christ and clothed with his righteousness imputed, and that
I've been made to see the glory of his power. But as I was going
through this, I was trying to think back on the first time
I went through Revelation was here, and I remember my office
was over here. That's been a while back, hasn't
it? And it's basically the same,
but what he's talking about here is the gospel witnesses. And in the last days, the Lord
has sovereignly decreed and provided that on this earth, on this earth,
all through the last days, from the time of Christ's first coming
to the time of his second coming, He will have his witness on this
earth. Now, the witnesses will preach
the same message, the message of God's grace in Christ, Christ
in him crucified. Justification by the blood and
the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. They'll not preach
different messages. You won't have one preaching
salvation by grace and then one preaching salvation by works.
Anyone who preaches salvation by works is a false witness. That's a false gospel. It's a
false message. And it's deadly to the souls
of sinners. And man by nature doesn't see
it and he doesn't believe it. But God's going to have his witnesses.
Now, it may be a small group like you all in this town. It
may be a larger group like our group in your town. But, you
know, we're small comparatively. You know, we're a little bit
bigger than you all as far as numbers go, but we're still small.
And I believe as you read the scripture and see the preponderance
of scripture as we go through the last days, that the witness
is going to be here. There'll be God's witness, the
church of the Lord Jesus Christ, the ministry of the gospel, the
witnesses preaching Christ, setting forth Christ in this earth. But
I believe it'll get smaller and smaller and smaller up until
the time that Christ comes again. and uh... almost to the point
where it seems dead i'm not going to get to this today but it talks
about how these two witnesses whoever they are whatever they
are how they are uh... assumed dead by the world they're
looked upon as being dead by the world and you can see that
in verse eight verse seven and eight it says when they shall
have finished their testimony now this is at the very end the
beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit that's satan and
his his minions, shall make war against them and shall overcome
and kill them. And their dead bodies shall lie
in the street of the great city, which spiritually." Now, one
of the things you're going to see about this is all these things
are symbolic. Listen, he says, which spiritually
is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.
Now he's talking about Jerusalem, but he's comparing Jerusalem
in that day with Sodom and Egypt. Now you know about Sodom and
Egypt. So this is going to be a time when the witness is going
to soon be dead, and then later on it rises back up, right just
prior to his second coming. But what I want to talk to you
about this morning is the gospel witness. This is the important
thing. Now you may have studied this. You may have read books
on it. You may have your ideas of who
the two witnesses are. You know, a lot of people have
ideas about trying to find out who these are. Some say that
these two witnesses are Moses and Elijah. Moses representing
the law, Elijah representing the prophets. Some say that it's
Enoch and Elijah because Enoch and Elijah didn't die physically
but they were translated into glory and then they'll come back
and then they'll die. I don't believe, there's nothing
in the text that would tip us off to that. The only thing we
have in the text that tells us what the two witnesses are is
verse four. And it says, these are the two olive trees and the
two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth. And what's
that reference to? Well, it's a reference back to
Zechariah 4, and we'll look at that in just a minute. But look
at verse 3. Look back up at verse 1. The
context of this is the context of measuring the temple. And
so the first thing that you've got to understand is what is
this temple? Look at verse one. There was given me a reed or
a reed likened to a rod. That's a measuring rod. He's
talking about something to measure the dimensions of something.
And he, like we use a tape measure. All right. So this reed is a
measuring rod. And he says, and the angel stood
saying, rise and measure the temple of God. Now what is the
temple of God? You know what the temple of God
is symbolically? The temple here is the church
of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what the temple is. He's
not talking about a physical temple that's rebuilt in the
city of Jerusalem. He's talking about his church.
Christ said, I will build upon this rock, I will build my church. Christ is the foundation of this
temple. Christ is the glory of this temple. Within this temple is the dwelling
place of God, the Shekinah glory of God, which is shown forth
in the message that answers this question, how God can be just
and justify the ungodly. How God, a holy, righteous God,
who must judge according to truth, can take sinful human beings,
depraved spiritually dead human beings who cannot save themselves
and who deserve nothing but death and condemnation and who have
earned nothing but death and condemnation, how that God can
be reconciled or reconcile these people, such people unto himself
and come together on some common ground. That's the good news
of the gospel witness, the gospel message. And so, and the answer
to that is Jesus Christ and Him crucified. It's wrapped up in
the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, who He is.
And the reason, the reason is who He is, the glory of His person,
the reality of His person is included in that message, is
because of His identity and His glory and His ability. What does
it take for God to justify a sinner? Well, the wages of sin is death. See, the law and justice of God
has to be satisfied. You see, this is where people
miss it today. They don't start with the law
and justice, the holiness of God, the honor of God. You see,
everything in today's false Christianity and false religion starts with
man and his felt needs. And that's why people, when they
look for religious gatherings to go to, Well, what's going
to meet my felt need? Well, if you've got children,
you want to get them involved. You want to keep them busy, you
know, keep them away from drugs. And we all want to keep our children
away from drugs and stuff like that. And you know, that's no
argument there. I don't want them sitting under
a false gospel in order to keep them away from drugs. I don't
want them sitting under a message that is poison to their souls
to avoid the poison of drugs. To be poisoned in your soul is
to spend eternity alienated from God. That's why this thing of true
Christianity, this thing of understanding the gospel has to do with getting
our priorities straight. I want to do everything for my
children and my grandchildren to give them the best in this
life and to do the best for them, to keep them away from the perverted
elements of society, all of that. But I'm not going to sacrifice
their soul in order to do that. And so we have to keep it in
perspective there, you see. This message of salvation that
exalts Christ in his glory as the God-man. His name shall be
called Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. His
name shall be called Emmanuel, which being interpreted as God
with us. The glory of the church is Christ,
God in human flesh. And then it involves what he
accomplished on Calvary, not what he tried to do at Calvary.
But what he actually accomplished on Calvary, he saved his people
from their sins. He satisfied the law and justice
of God. He brought in an everlasting
righteousness. The righteousness of God had
to be the righteousness of God because the righteousness of
man will not do. The righteousness of man must
be excluded. First of all, man in sin has
no righteousness. So what do we need? We need the
righteousness of God. And that's what Christ accomplished.
I love that passage in Daniel chapter 9 and verse 24 that just
kind of delineates it all there. It said he made an end of sin,
he finished the transgression, he brought in everlasting righteousness,
he sealed up the vision and anointed the most holy. All of that, that's
what he accomplished. And so the justification of his
people You see, God's people, chosen before the foundation
of the world, given to the Son of God, redeemed by His blood,
justified by His righteousness imputed, and then given life
by the Holy Spirit in the new birth. And that's what makes
up the temple of God. We're each stones in that temple. Christ is the foundation stone
and the chief cornerstone. Christ is the heart and the head
of that temple. And look here in verse 1, it
says, and the altar, the temple of God and the altar. You see,
the altar is the altar of sacrifice there. So whatever he's talking
about as far as this temple and this witness, it revolves around
this altar and that's indicative or symbolic of the death of Christ,
the Lamb of God slain for his people. He died on that cross. He was buried. He arose again
the third day. And that's how we worship, he
said, and them that worship therein, in that temple. We worship together
under the preaching of Christ. Now look at verse two. Now he's
talking about measuring that temple. How do you measure that
temple? Well, everything that the temple
is measured by revolves around the gospel message. That measuring
rod, that reed like unto a rod, is the gospel message. which
sets forth Christ and him crucified and risen again as the Lord our
righteousness. The Bible says in Acts 17 and
verse 31 that God's gonna judge the world in righteousness by
that man whom he hath ordained in that he hath given assurance
unto all men and that he hath raised him from the dead. So
the measuring read in essence is the Lord Jesus Christ as the
one who is the Lord our righteousness. Am I part of this temple of God? That's a question. Well, how
do I stand with Christ? He's the measuring rod. And the
gospel message sets him forth. That's what we're doing. We're
measuring. But look at verse 2. He says, but the court which is without
the temple, that is outside the temple, leave out, cast out literally,
and measure it not. It's not included, you see. It
doesn't measure up. Now listen to what I'm saying
here. You see, this is the whole idea here now behind justification. Do I measure up to God's standard
of holiness and righteousness? Now the answer to that question
is this. In myself, no. But in Christ,
yes. So that if I don't have Christ,
if I'm not washed in his blood and clothed in his righteousness,
I don't measure up. I don't care how religious I
am. I could be preached in his name and cast out demons and
done many wonderful works. But that still doesn't measure
up to the standard of the measuring rod, you see. I don't measure
up. I can join a church, walk an
aisle, get baptized, I can give to charity, I can give to the
church, I can go on missionary journeys, I can preach messages,
but I still, in all of that, put together and be just as sincere
as I can be, but I still don't measure up. If I think I measure
up based on those things, Then what does that prove? It proves
that I'm ignorant of God's righteousness and going about to establish
one of my own. Christ is the end, the fulfillment, the finishing
of the law for righteousness to everyone that believe it.
And he says, for it is given unto the Gentiles. Now the Gentiles,
we know that God has an elect people out of every tribe, kindred,
tongue, and nation, Jew and Gentile. Who are they? They are all who
come to faith in Christ. all who come to repentance of
dead works and idolatry. But Gentiles here is symbolic,
taken back from the Old Testament. A Gentile is equivalent to an
unbeliever here. And what he's simply saying here
is, listen, if we're members of the temple of God, you know
what we really are? We're spiritual Jews. We're spiritual
Israel. How does a spiritual Israelite
walk? He walks in this way, God forbid
that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Galatians 6, 14. And so we're spiritual Israelites.
Now, a Gentile here is an unbeliever. Physically, we're all Gentiles
here. But spiritually, we're not. Spiritually, we're Jews. Read Romans 2 and verse 28 sometime. Read Philippians 3, for we are
the circumcision which worship God in spirit. We rejoice in
Christ and have no confidence in the flesh. We're spiritual
Israel, the people of God. If you know Christ, if you rest
in him, if he is the Lord, your righteousness. You're a spiritual
Israelite. You're not a spiritual Gentile.
So these spiritual Gentiles, they're to be left out. In other
words, when you measure with this measuring rod, they have
to be left out. You can't speak peace to them.
You can't include them in your fellowship, you see, because
they don't know Christ. They don't know the power of
God and the salvation. And then he says, in the holy
city shall they tread under foot 40 and two months. I'm not going
to go through these scriptures and show you about all these
numbers and things like that, but I'm just going to mention
them to you. If you disagree with me, that's
up to you, that's all right. But if you disagree with me,
I'm just going to tell you right now you're wrong. You can just
mark it down. But here's the point. The point
is this. The point is it really, I mean,
don't get bogged down in those things. That's not the message
here. The message here is not for you to figure out in some
kind of a Hebrew way, the Hebrew mathematics. That's not what
it's all about, or prophecy mathematics. If you want my opinion, the 42
months is a symbolic way, and I could go through Revelation
and show you how I've come to this, but I'm not going to. It
symbolizes the time of persecution of the church here on this earth
in the last days. In the last days, the church
is going to be persecuted by spiritual Gentiles. Now let me
emphasize this point. Here's a Jew. a physical descendant
of Abraham, all right, who doesn't know Christ, who doesn't believe
in Christ, who has rejected Christ as the Lord, his righteousness,
his salvation, all right, that Jew is a spiritual Gentile, all
right? And you know the Jews persecuted
Christians in the early days, also physical Gentiles. Well,
they're all together spiritual Gentiles. So that 40 and two
months there is a symbolic way of describing the last half of
what I see as the seven year period that Daniel described.
And that's the persecution of the church. The first half was
the part that Christ took in three and a half years to do
his work up to the cross. And then the second half of that
is the 40 and two months here which signifies the time from
Stephen, when Stephen was killed in Jerusalem, And then the gospel
was catapulted out into the Gentile world. But that persecution continues. Christ told his disciples that,
John 15, 18, he said, if the world hates you, marvel not.
They hated me before they hated you. He said, blessed are you
when you're persecuted for righteousness sake, didn't he? He told them,
he said, they'll throw you out of their synagogues. And so where
was John when he was receiving this revelation? He was being
persecuted, he was isolated. Abandoned on the Isle of Patmos
So that's what I believe it is. But look what he says now during
this time He says I'm going to give power unto my two witnesses
Now, what are the two witnesses? Well, I believe this power that
he's talking about is the authority and power of God's Word in two
ways Number one in the salvation of his people The gospel is the
power of God unto salvation. This is the same word power that's
used in Romans 1 16. It's dynamite. Whenever, when
the gospel is preached, the witnesses, this witness of truth goes out
and God empowers it with the Holy Spirit to bring a sinner
in conviction, to see the holiness of God and to see his sin and
to see his need of Christ. and the blood of Christ and the
righteousness of Christ imputed for all his salvation. And he
brings that sinner, he draws that sinner. Christ said, if
I be lifted up, I'll draw all unto me. He draws that sinner
with an invincible sovereign power in the new birth, the regeneration
and conversion. But the second way that it gives
us power is the power of authority to tell men and women who reject
Christ that there is no salvation. It's the power of damnation.
We can't damn anyone or condemn anyone. That's God's business.
But we relay the message. We preach the message. That's
what the Great Commission is all about. He that believeth
and is baptized shall be saved. He that believeth not shall be
damned. So in other words, when we go out as witnesses, we preach
that God will save sinners for Christ's sake, but God will damn
sinners for every other reason. Christ is your only hope. He's
the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by Him. So that's the power. Now why
does he say two witnesses? Now some people, as I said, they
believe that that is a literal number two, that in the last
days during what they call the tribulation period, and I believe
we're in the tribulation period now, and I believe it's going
to get worse. But either way, they believe that two witnesses,
two men, are going to reappear on earth. As I said, some say
Moses and Elijah, some say Enoch and Elijah. But I believe that
the number two here is symbolic because what the Lord taught
his disciples in the Bible, it was established under the law,
for example, that two witnesses were always required under the
law to be a sufficient and complete witness. Let everything be established
in the mouth of two or three witnesses, and two was the least.
And you remember the Lord sent his disciples out two by two.
to preach the gospel. And I believe that's what this
represents. The two witnesses represent the complete, sufficient
witness of God on this earth in the last days. Whatever it
is, however it appears, it's going to be the full, final,
complete, finished witness of God. In other words, it's going
to be enough. It's going to be enough for God
to save his people from their sins and bring them into the
kingdom. And it's gonna be enough to damn everyone else who rejects
Christ. He says here, look in verse three,
he says, they'll prophesy 1,203 score days, 1,260 days. I believe that's symbolic of
the whole period of the last days. And as I said, I'm not
gonna go into how I arrive at that. We can talk about it sometime. But that's what that represents,
that 12, it's another way of saying it in the book of Revelation,
it's called a time, times, and time and a half. And that's what
that represents, the whole period of time, all right? And then
he says, they're going to, these two witnesses, they'll prophesy,
that means they'll preach, they'll tell forth, that's what, That's
what prophesy means. It's really not foretelling as
much as it is forth telling. Telling forth the gospel. And
they're gonna do it clothed in sackcloth. Now why is that? What does sackcloth represent?
Well, it describes the nature of their preaching. And it's
the preaching of repentance. That's what he's talking about.
That's what sackcloth represents. Sorrow over sin. Christ began
his earthly public ministry with the Sermon on the Mount. Do you
remember the first words that came out of his mouth? He said,
blessed are the poor in spirit. He said, blessed are they who
mourn. And he's talking about those
who are poor, who recognize their poverty of spirit, who recognize
that they have no righteousness. or nothing to recommend them
unto God. That they have no way of achieving
one by their works and their efforts. That if God were to
mark iniquities, they wouldn't stand. That recognize that we're
in need of mercy and grace. We're in need of a righteousness
we cannot produce. And that's what poverty of spirit
is. And then it's sorrow over the world. Even Christ in his
humanity expressed that when he said, oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem. We all experience that in some
form. Think about our families. Think
about your families who have no interest in the gospel. It breaks your heart, doesn't
it? And that's what brings so many
to compromise. That's what brings a lot to leave
the gospel. because of that right there.
But these two witnesses, their ministry is characterized by
sackcloth. Now that doesn't mean that we
as believers have to go around all the time crying and sorrow
and sobbing. No, we can enjoy our lives to
a point if we keep things in perspective and glorify and honor
God. But this ministry, now this is
what he's talking about, the two witnesses, the gospel witnesses
in the presentation of the gospel. It brings people to sorrow in
one of two ways. It'll bring them in conviction
by the Holy Spirit to sorrow unto life and repentance. And
what does that do? It brings them to Christ. So
at the end of that sorrow, there's joy, there's peace, there's glory
when it brings you to Christ. It's like God breaking you down
to bring you up. It's like God stripping you naked
to clothe you in the righteousness of his son. bringing you to be
hungry, but feeding you with the bread, eventually feeding
you with the bread of life, all that. But it also brings sorrow
in another way. Remember the rich young man went
away sorrowful. He went away sorrowful. And that's
the sorrow of the lost. Now, not all the lost will sorrow
immediately. It may come later when it's too
late, but that's the key. Well, let me get over here now.
Here's what he says, verse four, he says, these are the two olive
trees and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the
earth. Now, I want you to turn to Zechariah
chapter four, and I'll conclude with this. And that's one thing
about it now. You know, I realize that when
you preach from the book of Revelation, if you don't have a whole lot
of time, you kind of leave people with a lot of questions. And
that's okay. I don't mind leaving you with
questions. In fact, I'm glad when you do question it. You
know, I think it's a healthy thing. Hopefully it'll lead you to questions that'll
make you search and seek into the word of God. And so, but
I don't have time in one message to answer, you know, I can't
tie this thing up in a neat little package, you know, and hand it
to you. But what we're seeing here is
that we as a church are symbolized in these two witnesses. Preaching
the gospel to a lost world. Well, look at Zechariah chapter
4. Now, I've often said that if you're going to understand
Revelation, that you have to understand the references that
you take from the Old Testament. And as far as that's concerned,
in this passage in Revelation 11, the only place that I found
that references this, that is, goes back, alludes to this two
witnesses as described here as the two olive trees. He says
the two, and the two candlestick is Zechariah chapter four. Now,
you remember Zechariah. Now what was Zechariah? Zechariah
was a prophet. And he prophesied in the days
of the return of Israel from the Babylonian captivity. And
under his prophecy, the people were rebuilding the temple and
they were rebuilding the city and the walls of Jerusalem that
had been destroyed, what, 70 years before by Nebuchadnezzar
and his army. And so Zechariah was prophesying
in their return from that captivity. And the people, just like Israel,
just like all men by nature, the people were lax. They didn't
put their nose to the grindstone. They didn't get up to the task,
and they quit. For example, in building the walls of Jerusalem,
instead of doing that, they started building big houses for themselves,
and they left the walls of Jerusalem. Instead of building the temple,
they went off and did other things. And so the prophet Zechariah,
and there were two other prophets during that time, They came and
they preached to the people. They chided the people. They
admonished them. Well, there was a man named Zerubbabel,
and he was the governor at that time, appointed by the foreign
ruler, and he was kind of like the king. He was from the tribe
of Judah. He was like the king. Well, listen to this with that
in mind. Verse one of Zechariah 4, it says, and the angel that
talked with me came again and waked me as a man that is wakened
out of his sleep. He said to me, what do you see?
What seest thou? And I said, I've looked and behold
a candlestick, all of gold and a bowl. That's he said up on
the top of it, like the candlestick with a little bowl there where
they put the candles down. And he said in his seven lamps
there on and seven pipes and the seven lamps, which are upon
the top thereof, you see this picture of this candlestick seven
mean the number seven is symbolic of the finished work, the completed
work, the perfected work. You see seventh day Sabbath,
you know, That's the finish, where Christ is our Sabbath,
he finished the work of redemption. And then he said, and two olive
trees by it, one upon the right side of the bowl and the other
upon the left side thereof. So I answered and spoke to the
angel and he talked with me saying, what are these, my Lord? What
is this candlestick? What are these two olive trees? And he said, verse five, it says,
then the angel that talked with me answered and said to me, knowest
thou not what these be? And I said, no, my Lord. And
listen, then he answered and spake unto me saying, this is,
now listen, this is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel. This candlestick and these two
olive trees, it's the word that God spoke to Zerubbabel. What
did God speak to Zerubbabel? Well, it had to do with rebuilding
the temple and rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. What is that
symbolic of? What is this temple? That's in
the New Testament days. It's the church. The walls of
Jerusalem, that's our salvation. Remember Isaiah said that, thy
walls are our salvation. That's our salvation, Christ,
you see. And he says, not by might, that's
not by human power, But by my spirit, by the spirit, what's
he talking about? Preaching the gospel in the spirit of God,
saith the Lord of Hosts. In other words, these things,
these two olive trees, why is it two? Because it's the complete
witness. It's all it takes, he said. The
candlestick, that's the, remember he called the churches in Revelation
the candlestick, the candlestick in Smyrna, the candlestick in
Pergamum, the candlestick in Laodicea. That's the witness
through the church. And it's the church preaching
the gospel of God's free and sovereign salvation by the Lord
Jesus Christ in the power of the spirit. Olive trees, that
olive oil, that represented the power of the spirit to keep the
flame burning. And that's what he does. The
spirit of God keeps the gospel going forth. And he says in verse
seven, who art thou, O great mountain? Before is a rubble,
thou shalt become a plain, and he shall bring forth the headstone,
the headstone there's not a gravestone, that's like an identification
stone. Thereof with shouting, crying,
listen, grace, grace unto it. There's the witness. Grace! Salvation by the grace of God.
Salvation by the power of God in Christ. Grace, grace, grace
reigns through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ
our Lord.