Well, we come this week to Revelation
chapter 16. We looked at 15 last week. And
chapters 15 and 16 together form the fifth vision of the seven
visions of the book of Revelation. Remember, the visions are different
perspectives of how God recovers his kingdom from Satan, who usurped
that kingdom in the Garden of Eden, in the Fall, back in Genesis
3. And ever since, the whole of Scripture, the story of it,
the story of Christ coming from the right line of his people,
it is all about the recovery of God's kingdom from the clutches
of Satan. Now this fifth vision, which
is chapters 15 and 16, is focused on the very end of this creation. It's focused on the very end,
to the extent that the people of God, the Church of God, the
elect of God, the multitude for whom Christ died, and for them
alone did He die, they are taken out of this world before these
things fall. They, we see in chapter 15, they're
already taken out of this world. This is the end of this creation,
the end that we've been building up to. You say, well, there are
several more chapters to come. Yes, I know, we'll get more details
of certain aspects and we'll get different pictures and different
perspectives. on different aspects of it. But
this is the culmination. This is the actual arrival of
the end. In chapter 10 and verse 6, we
see the mighty angel, who no doubt is Christ. In that picture
there in chapter 10, the mighty angel is Christ. He stands with
one foot in the sea and one foot on the land with a little book
in his hand. And then when we get to verse 6, he swears by
him that liveth forever and ever. by God in heaven, who created
heaven, and the things that are therein, and the earth, and the
things that are therein, and the sea, and the things that
are therein, that there should be time no longer. In other words,
it's not long until the end comes. The end is coming, and today
that message would apply. The end is coming, and it will
not be long. He declared there the certainty
of imminent and final judgment. Whatever delusion Satan's false
prophet, you know, we saw him back in chapter 13, the second
beast, the beast from the earth, the one that does all the magical
wizardry things that make the people of this world absolutely
adore him and his kingdom. Whatever delusion that false
prophet might spin you, Just divine judgment is about to fall
on this world. It might be today, I don't know.
It might be years, I don't know. But it is imminent, it is imminent.
It is like, as I wrote in the article in the bulletin, I was
reminded of the Titanic, that great ship of 1912 that set off,
built in Belfast, set off from Southampton to New York, made
one or two stops on the way, but it was, filled with people
whose hopes and aspirations and wealth and everything was tied
up in that ship. It was going to take them to
what they thought of as the promised land. All their hopes were there.
The rich were going to get even richer and the poor people cramped
into the lower decks were going to have opportunity open to them.
But in one night, in just a couple of hours, you've all seen the
movie, I know. You've all read the story, you can't have missed
it. On that April night, the Titanic, the unsinkable ship,
remember they said that? They proudly proclaimed it was
an unsinkable ship. Ooh, whoops. First journey, first
voyage, it hit an iceberg. It hit an iceberg not far from
Newfoundland, and it sank, and it now lies under four kilometers
of freezing, crushing ocean. It's pleased God in this chapter
16 to reveal how the end shall come. You say, well what's he
got to do with me if I'm out of it? Why has he given all this
detail in chapter 16? It has pleased God to reveal
how it shall come. Turn back to chapter 1, just
for a moment. Revelation chapter 1 and the
first three verses, just let me remind you of this. You've
got to always keep this in mind whenever you look at the book
of Revelation. It is the revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave
unto him. Who is Jesus Christ? He is the
manifestation. of the eternal unknowable God.
Nobody can know God outside of Jesus Christ, it's only in Him.
There are not many ways to God, there is only one. He is the
way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but
by Him. It's the revelation of Jesus
Christ which God gave unto Him. Why did He give it? To show unto
His servants, those who believe Him, the things which must shortly,
shortly, come to pass. And he sent and signified it,
he put it in pictures, in images, by his angel, his messenger,
unto his servant John, who bare record, John bare record, John
told what he'd seen and heard of the word of God and of the
testimony of Jesus Christ and of all things that he saw. Now
listen, how are you to react to it? Blessed is he that readeth
and they that hear the words of this prophecy and keep those
things which are written therein for the time is at hand note
it doesn't say understand everything there's things that are hard
to understand but blessed is he who with an open mind waiting
on God, reads and hears and seeks to keep the things that are written
in here. For the time is at hand. The
time is at hand. Don't ever forget that. It's
a call. in here, in this chapter 16,
the warning of what things will be like when God winds up this
creation is a call to use the parable to get off the Titanic
into the only lifeboat, which is Christ. Someone wrote to me,
a dear friend wrote to me and said he appreciated the article,
but he said he didn't get off the Titanic into the lifeboat.
He was dragged against his own choice. by God into that lifeboat. God put him in that lifeboat,
and that's true, that's the way it is. Oh, that God would put
you in that lifeboat, which is Christ. You see, in the book
of Revelation, already three times, the end of this world
has been signified in previous visions. In the second vision,
in Revelation 6, there the end was described in chapter 11,
again there it was described. In chapter 14 we saw the harvest
of the wheat and of the grapes, there again the end was described,
was pictured, was signified in in these words here that God
has given us. Different perspectives, increasing
intensity. You know we've seen seals and
trumpets and finally now it's vials of wrath. In chapter 16
it's the seven last plagues, the seven last vials of wrath
poured out. The wrath of God is God's holiness
in relation to the world of sin. We've seen these different perspectives
increasing in intensity. Not sequential necessarily, they've
been happening all throughout history to varying degrees, but
as the end approaches, they become more and more focused on this
world of sin, even to the extent that by chapter 16, The people
of God are taken out of the world and view it from a heavenly perspective. So in chapter 15, just to recap
last week, that is the perspective from heaven. Look at verse 2
of chapter 15. And I saw, as it were, a sea
of glass mingled with fire, with them that had gotten the victory
over the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and
over the number of his name, stand on the sea of glass, having
the harps of God. This is God's people, removed
from the earth to heaven. We've seen that before in chapter
11. There was a summons, come up to heaven, and they all went
up to heaven, taken out of this world before the final judgments
fell. This is victory over the beast. They have the victory over the
beast. How do they have it? The beast is the beast of Antichrist.
the worldwide kingdom and his technological wizardry that fools
people into following him. But they've got the victory over
it. That beast sought to make their life incredibly difficult,
to destroy them, to remove them from this world. But they get
the victory. How do they get the victory? We're told. We're
told again and again, but we're told clearly. In chapter 12 we're
told it's by the blood of the Lamb that they overcame him.
By the blood of the Lamb, for the blood of the Lamb disarmed
Satan and all of his forces. It took away his power to accuse
and to condemn to eternal hell. That was taken away in Christ
by the blood of the Lamb. And this scene that John sees
in chapter 15 is just and true. Verse 3, just and at the end
of it, just and true are thy ways. God is a just God and a
saviour. He doesn't save by breaking the
rules. Every sin receives its just balancing. And for the people of God, that
balance was achieved in the Lord Jesus Christ and His death at
the cross of Calvary when He shed His blood there to satisfy
the justice of God. Just and true are thy ways, thou
King of the saints. This is a great and marvellous
thing. In the middle of verse 3, great
and marvellous are thy works. This is the preparation for the
final destruction of the world. And when we get in chapter 15
down to verses 7 and 8, one of the four beasts which speaks
of creation, the creation which I told you last week in chapter
8 of Romans, is groaning and longing. for the redemption from
the curse of sin. One of the four beasts gave unto
the seven angels seven golden vials full of the wrath of God
who liveth for ever and ever. And the temple was filled with
smoke from the glory of God and from His power. And no man was
able to enter into the temple till the seven plagues of the
seven angels were fulfilled. The effect of these vials of
the wrath of God, remember, wrath is God's holiness in relation
to a world of sin. The effect of these vials will
be truly horrendous on the kingdom of Antichrist. The words in chapter
16, you know, This is bad, this is what's going to fall. But
those redeemed from the curse of sin, those redeemed by the
Lamb of God and His shed blood, are removed before the vials
are poured out. Is that not a glorious hope? Do you believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ? You have life. You have everlasting
life. And we should look at these things,
seeking to see them from the perspective of God's just and
holy glory. If you have unbelieving neighbors
and colleagues and family members and friends who don't believe
God, they're in that camp of the kingdom of this world. And
all of these vials of wrath are going to fall on them and affect
them. And you think, oh how dreadful, oh how awful. But look at it
from the point of view. of the justice and righteousness
and holiness of God. Try to see it. Pray that God
will show us it from the perspective of His just and holy glory. Now what is it doing in chapter
16? In chapter 16 we need to contrast that with chapter 13
or at least look at it in the light of chapter 13. Do you remember
in chapter 13 we saw the beast from the sea? When Satan was
cast out of heaven and he comes down to earth full of fury seeking
to persecute the woman which is the church and to destroy
her children and to flood her back into conformity with his
evil world. Then we see in chapter 13 this
beast from the sea. The beast from the sea is not
from the sea of salt water like that one mile down the road.
No, this is the sea of humanity, the boiling turmoil world of
humanity, the worldwide confederation of godlessness in which we live
today. supported by the beast from the
earth, two beasts forming the antichrist of Satan. The beast
from the earth is all the technical wizardry to seduce people into
willing submission and worship and support for this kingdom
of Satan. He wants a global kingdom with
no thought for the justice and righteousness of God. with no
thought for that which is just in the eyes of God, but a worldwide
kingdom, a sort of a utopia. We don't need God and His righteousness. And they exploit every attraction
of this creation. They exploit everything that
they can do, all of the technical wizardry. that can get them from
place to place in no time, that can enable them to communicate. I was reading somebody, the best
commentary I've ever read on this book, and he was writing
probably, what, 70 years ago, something like that, maybe a
bit less. And he said, do you know the
day will come, I can see it, when people will instantly be
able to communicate with each other face to face on other sides
of the planet. We can do it now. That which
was completely beyond the realms of possibility when he wrote
that, in the light of what he read in Revelation, it's an everyday
thing. We do it now. You can do it on
your phone, on your computer. You can talk to people in Australia
and New Zealand. And there's no delay. It's all
here. And all of this makes the people
of this world, who have no knowledge of the God of truth, They worship
the beast, they worship this world. All of their hopes and
their aspirations are bound up in this world. But it's all without
the righteousness and justice of God. It's a kingdom in which
only those who adhere enthusiastically to the principles of that kingdom,
can flourish. And that's pictured in chapter
13, that they have a mark on their hands and in their foreheads,
and that speaks of the works that they do, and the thoughts
that they think, and they conform to this world, and they happily
go along with it. But those that don't, are those
that are marked with the seal of God. They don't have the mark
of the beast in their hands and in their thoughts. Because why?
They have a new mind. They have a new man within, created
by the Spirit of God. And that new man within, created
by the Spirit of God, cannot trade in this world of Antichrist. Increasingly cannot trade. And
it's going to get worse. I tell you, it will get worse.
It is now the case that many occupations for which Intellectually,
a true believer may be more than capable and very well qualified,
will be barred from it because he doesn't think or speak like
this world requires him to speak. God's people only survive in
the separated wilderness place that God has prepared for them.
We saw that again in chapter 12. God has prepared a wilderness
separation for the woman, for his people in this world, and
there he feeds and nourishes his people, and Satan cannot
reach them as long as they stay in that wilderness separation.
And he bids us wait patiently there until his justice takes
its course. We shouldn't try to reform this
world. You can By all means, call out
falsehood and lies when you see them, and there are plenty around.
But we shouldn't make it our mission to correct these things
and put them right. Because God says, in Romans 12,
19, the apostle writes, vengeance is mine. Quoting the Old Testament
in a couple of places. Vengeance is mine. I will repay,
saith the Lord. You don't need to do it, believer.
Just watch. Yes. Point out evil when you
see it, but you don't have to correct this world. In Revelation
16 is where we see God's just recompense for the evil of the
kingdom of Antichrist. You hear that? Chapter 16 is
God's just recompense for the evil of the kingdom of Antichrist.
This is God's righteous revenge on the godless world of Antichrist. Look in verse 5, as the vials
are being poured out, after the third vial is poured out, and
we'll come back to it in a moment, It is just. What God is going
to do to this world is just. Are you a believer? Are you a
true child of God, victorious over the beast by the gospel
of grace and the redemption that Christ has accomplished? Then
come and observe from the standpoint of heaven, from chapter 15, God's
glorious justice poured out exactly... Do you know, for Him to be just,
every sin must be perfectly balanced with its double in retribution.
You know when it says in Isaiah 40, comfort the people of God,
tell them they have received double for all their sins. It
doesn't mean a double punishment, it means the exact image of it,
the exact requiring balancing. In the death of Christ, every
sin was perfectly balanced such that the justice of God is satisfied
and there is no more left outstanding. The balance sheet of the justice
of God is contented. The sin and rebelling is entirely
balanced by chapter 16. So let's look then. This judgment
of God, bringing this world to an end, is pictured in seven
plagues, seven vials of wrath, seven vials of the holiness of
God meeting out the just retribution on the sin of the world. And
remember, it is revenge, just and righteous revenge, for that
evil kingdom of Antichrist in which we are living today, of
chapter 13 of Revelation. It is revenge of God's justice
for that evil kingdom. Vengeance is mine, he said, I
will repay. In verses 1 to 9, we see Do you remember the trumpets?
Just as the first four trumpets made the earth a less habitable
place in which to live comfortably, just as those trumpets did that
to the earth, These vials, these first four vials, completely
destroy, not partially, completely destroy the earth's ability to
support comfortable life. The first went, verse 2, the
first went and poured out his vial on the earth. And what was
the result of that? A noisome and grievous sore upon
the men which had the mark of the beast, and upon them which
worshipped his image. Disease. Disease. A noisome and grievous sore. The second one, the second angel
poured out his vial upon the sea and it became as the blood
of a dead man and every living soul died in the sea. Do you
know in the seals and the trumpets we saw a third and a quarter,
well a quarter first of all and then a third which is a bit more
but now, now when we get to Revelation 16 it's all of it. The whole
sea becomes rather than a source of food for man and the means
of transport of goods around this world. You know, the trade
that goes on, the ships, you just go down the lane and get
your binoculars out and you see the shipping going to and fro.
It becomes utterly poisonous for that. It's cursed. The vial
has been poured out. Verse four, the third angel poured
out his vial on the rivers and fountains of waters, and they
became blood. They became poison, fresh water
poisoned. And it's just, it's just, it's
just. Why? Verse six, they have shed
the blood of the saints and the prophets, and thou has given
them blood to drink, for they are worthy. They deserve it,
it's just. And I heard another out of the
altar say, even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous
are thy judgments. Then the fourth angel pours out
his vial upon the sun, and power was given to the sun to scorch
men with fire, and men were scorched with great heat. And what was
their reaction? They blasphemed the name of God,
which had power over these plagues, and they repented not to give
him glory. So you see, look, All who have
the beast's mark are affected, verse 2, on them which had the
mark of the beast, them which were not in heaven, sealed by
the Spirit of God. These are not necessarily sequential,
that the one happens and when that's finished the next happens,
no. in varying degrees, together I think is the picture here,
but pictures of disease, of poisoned sea, of poisoned fresh water,
of a scorching sun, total disruption of the felt blessings of Satan's
kingdom of Antichrist. You know, Satan's kingdom of... Oh, people love it. Oh, look,
look. You know, the things that we get from this creation, exploiting
it. Satan's kingdom exploits this
creation. Look at this, look at that. The
result of all of that being taken away is blasphemy against God,
is no repentance. The world is striving to save
this godless kingdom. The world today can see the signs
of some of these things coming. They wrongly interpret them,
but they can see signs. And so we have groups who are
striving to protect this world from environmental disaster.
You know, the eco-warriors. They're so up in arms about impending
climate catastrophe. That's not because of what they
say it is. If it's coming and when it comes, it is the work
of God. It is the vials of God's wrath
being poured out. The fact is that this world striving
can do nothing other than self-harm, as they're doing with their net
zero nonsense and all of this other stuff. They're just doing
self-harm. God's justice demands that these vials be poured out.
And I think there are some signs that some of them are, to some
extent, being poured out, but not completely yet. What's your
reaction? Will you continue, as the passengers
on the Titanic did, you know, the rich passengers on the Titanic,
even after the ship had struck the iceberg, the banquet went
on, the dancing in the ballroom went on, oh, it'll be alright,
it's an unsinkable ship. Will you carry on with the Titanic's
evening entertainment, dancing the night away until it's too
late, or will you flee from the wrath that is to come? Are you
waiting and hoping for a great big revival in this world? I'm
telling you, the scripture doesn't say that there's going to be
one. This is what's coming. Are you aiming to fix the world
by reason, by good arguments, by politics, even by your church
doing good works, it isn't going to happen. God's justice is going
to fall. It isn't possible for any of
those things to work because God has decreed it this way. This is the way it's going to
be. Then look with me at the fifth vial in verse 10. This is Antichrist's throne,
the kingdom of Antichrist, the symbol of power, the seat of
power, the object of the world's worship. You know, you say, well,
they're not worshipping this beast. Yes, they are. They are. Can't you see it? Metaphorically,
can't you see it? The people of this world are
worshipping this kingdom of Antichrist. It's where all their hopes and
aspirations reside, and nowhere else. It's cursed with God's
justice. cease to worship and trust and
hope in the kingdom of Antichrist when this fifth vial is poured
out. It's poured out on the seat of the beast and his kingdom. His kingdom was full of darkness.
They used to ask, if you look at Revelation 13 verse 4, they
used to ask the people of this world, who is like unto the beast
and who is able to make war with him? In other words, oh, he's
wonderful, isn't he? Nothing can make war with him.
But now they don't. His kingdom's full of darkness.
The first four vials have destroyed the basis of their worship. This
world is a terrible place in which to try to live. The power
of the beast's kingdom is darkened. You know when the fifth trumpet
blew in chapter nine, there was that plague of locusts which
was symbolical of an agonizing pessimism which comes over man. And they were longing to die
and they couldn't die. Well, this fifth vial causes
people to lose their only God, which is Antichrist. He's gone.
There's no reason. The very thing that he provided
for them, the benefits of this creation, which he stole from
God, they're all now poisoned. He can't give them that. And
the seat of his power is turned to darkness. They've lost their
only God. And then, in verse 16, We'll
come back in a minute to verse 12, but in verse 16 we see the
battle of Armageddon. I'm sure you've heard of it.
I'm sure you've heard of it. And there are some very weird
things written about this part of the book of Revelation. It's
there in verse 16. He gathered them together into a place called
in the Hebrew tongue, Armageddon. Armageddon, what's this about?
It's the sixth and seventh seals being poured out. Verse 12, the
sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates
and the water thereof was dried up that the way of the kings
of the east might be prepared. We've seen effect on the Euphrates
back in which chapter was it was it gosh I can't remember
nine I think it was chapter nine that was it and the four angels
that were in the Euphrates were released and it became possible
for the kingdoms on the other side of Euphrates to cross it.
Euphrates is symbolical. I mean there is a literal river
Euphrates in the Middle East, but it doesn't mean the literal
river Euphrates. That river was in the days of
Old Testament Israel, it was the boundary of the land that
God gave to His people from the rest of the world. There was
the sea, and then down to Sinai and Egypt, and then to the east
was the river Euphrates, and then all the peoples that lived
beyond that, where the white horse of God's gospel had never
gone forth. And the four angels came out. Now here, when this sixth vial
is poured out, the river Euphrates is dried up. All barriers are
removed. All barriers to movement of people
around the world are removed. Has that not happened very much
in the last 70 years? I mean, maybe a little bit longer,
but for the majority of people, for the majority of people on
the planet, that freedom of movement is a phenomenon of less than
that in the last 40 or 50 years. You know, when I was young, hardly
anybody went any distance. It was a tiny proportion of the
people of the world travelled any distance apart from the military.
No, it wasn't widespread like it is today. All barriers to
movement have been removed. Now, What this does is it prepares
the way for the kings of the east that they can come. As that
sixth vial is poured out, the Euphrates is dried up, all barriers
are removed, the kings of the east, which are called elsewhere
in scripture Gog and Magog, in fact even in Revelation 20 we
read about Gog and Magog, the peoples where the white horse
of the gospel has had little effect in history, they're able
to move freely. And we see in verse 13, I saw
three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the
dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the
mouth of the false prophet. That's the false satanic trinity. He always tries to mimic God,
and here's his trinity, the dragon himself, the beast from the sea,
the beast from the earth, the false prophet. And out of their
mouths come frogs, evil spirits, unclean spirits, and they try
and summon the godless forces of the East, those forces which
were never affected by the gospel of Christianity, the gospel of
God, they summon them to come, seeking to destroy what Satan
thinks is Christianity. What Satan thinks is Christianity
in the land that Israel was given. I know it's difficult. I know
it's difficult. Just try and hang in with me, please. But
it pictures This Armageddon pictures battles in the Old Testament,
Judges 4 and 5, Deborah and Barak at the valley of Jezreel near
Mount Megiddo, that's Armageddon. And Ezekiel 38 also refers to
it. The victory of the forces of
God over the forces of the godless world is what is pictured in
the battle of Armageddon. But Satan summons, by this vial
being poured out, Satan thinks he's summoning the forces that
are against Christianity to come and fight Christianity. This
is the removal of the barrier of the river Euphrates. And he
thinks this will deal with it, but in actual fact, all it's
doing is fomenting his own destruction and the destruction of his own
kingdom of Antichrist. Because what he regards as Christianity
is, as we'll see in chapter 17, actually anti-Christianity. So, the seventh vial is poured
out in verse 17. The seventh angel pours out his
vial. And there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven
from the throne saying, it is done. Now, the battle has already
taken place. Mutual destruction. A battle
like has never been seen in the history of the world. There's
mutual destruction. And then the seventh one is the
end of the wrath of God. It is done. The debt of sin has
been completely balanced by the just retribution of God. Justice
has been satisfied. I want to spend a little moment
just thinking about this phrase, it is done, it is done. I looked
up the Greek word in the Interlinear Bible. The Greek word is one
which is pronounced as, it means, it is completed, it
is finished. There's nothing left outstanding.
It's very close to the word that Jesus used in John 19 verse 30
from the cross, it is finished. The word he used there was tetelestai,
which means it is paid in full. These two words, it is done,
gegonon, and tetelestai, it is finished, it is paid in full,
are very close because they both refer to the justice of God being
satisfied with the balancing of the wrath of God against the
sin of this world and of the people in this world. It's finished. The final Destruction of civilization
and of Antichrist's kingdom is here. And the result of it all
is blasphemy, as we see in the last few verses. In verses 18
to 21, there were voices and thunders and lightnings and there
was a great earthquake. such as was not since men were
upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake, and so great. And
the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of
the nations fell. And great Babylon came in remembrance
before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness
of his wrath. And every island fled away, and
the mountains were not found. And there fell upon men a great
hail out of heaven, every stone about the weight of a talent.
And men blasphemed God because of the plague of hail, and for
the plague thereof was exceeding great. That is what it is, the
final destruction. of civilization. God's justice
has been perfectly satisfied. Satan's attempt to destroy Christianity
with the nations of the East, through that, pouring out of
that sixth vial, thinking, ah, ah, God's committed an error
here, here come the forces to achieve Satan's purposes. No,
it was mutual destruction. Do you know In the Old Testament,
there are accounts where enormous forces arrayed against the forces
of Israel. were caused, in the purposes
of God, to turn on each other, and to kill each other, and to
destroy each other. And the threat to them went away
because they killed each other. And is it not like that here?
This is what God is going to ferment with these vials, with
this sixth vial, and then the seventh vial is it. You know,
we never got to the 7th seal because it opened as 7th trumpets
and we never got to the 7th trumpet because it opened as 7 seals,
but now the 7th seal has poured out. This is the final destruction
of civilization, of Antichrist's kingdom. And the result? Repentance? No. Blasphemy. But before we
leave it, just in 2 or 3 minutes, blessed are God's people. Do
you see what a Horrendous picture that is, that God has chosen
to reveal to us of the way that this creation is going to be
drawn to a just end because of its rebellion against God, the
way the kingdom of Antichrist is going to be suitably paid
for its evil in all of these vials. But in verse 15, look
there, just inserted in there. Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed
is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked
and they see his shame. Isn't that odd? Just to pop that
in the middle of all these vials and the evil that comes. In that
day, when the vials of wrath fall to the full, All Satan's
kingdom, all of its people, marked with his mark, will be stripped
naked in their sins against God's righteousness. And their shame
under that stripping naked, their guilt will be obvious, and there
will be disgrace, and their moral poverty will be seen by everyone,
including themselves. That's just and that's coming.
But there is a company a company that no man can number, that
is blessed. Blessed. Behold, I come as a
thief. Blessed is he that watcheth.
There is a company that is blessed in being excluded from that nakedness
and shame. They watch. They keep their garments. They're ready for it coming.
They watch for the fulfilment of God's Word. They believe His
Word. They trust His promises. They're
clothed, as we read right at the start, Isaiah 61 verse 10,
He has clothed me with the garments of salvation. Result, I will
greatly rejoice in the Lord. My soul shall be joyful in my
God. He's clothed me with the garments
of salvation. He's covered me with the robe
of righteousness as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments
and the bride adorns herself with jewels. Because there's
a wedding coming, as we shall see later in Revelation. We don't
know when. We don't know when the seven
vials will finally be poured out. But we're blessed in patiently
believing God. in watching. Would you be blessed
by God? Watch and wait and believe Him. Believe what He says. We read
it in the first few verses of Revelation. Rest under the salvation
accomplished by Christ. Because under that salvation
you will not be found naked. You will not be found to be shamed. Because that salvation has accomplished
everything needed. Where are your hopes and your
ambitions and your treasures? Are they in Satan's kingdom of
Antichrist, this world in which we live? Or in God's kingdom
of truth and grace and peace? Let me just say this, today is
still, even today is still the day of salvation. Seek the Lord
while he may be found. Amen.