I'm gonna be reading in Acts
chapter 4 verses 23 through the end of the chapter Just to give
you a context around what we're going to be dealing with tonight.
We began to address the Significance of the preaching that Peter and
John are doing and how that this is the beginning of persecution
that is going to be taking place in the church even as our master
said If any man follow me he will have to take up his cross
and deny himself not to be willing to suffer for the cause of Christ
a very a very unusual thing a very abnormal thing for most of us
we live in such a free context and I think the danger for us
is not to be able to Derive from the scriptures all that they
are worth Because we are so free from trouble free from conflict. I think the danger is for the
church in the present day, particularly here in the West, is that we
are seduced by prosperity and seduced by materialism and seduced
by just comfort and ease. And what that does is it really
diminishes our capacity to actually grasp the importance of biblical
texts sometimes. You know how when you have gone
over passages of scripture and you think you understand them,
and then you go through some trouble, and you go back over
those passages, and now all of a sudden those passages open
up and have a greater, much more profoundly significant application
to you. Well, it was because in your
initial reading, you weren't positioned in your heart to actually
appreciate what the text was saying. And sometimes that's
just the work of God. We know that. He gives us revelation
accordingly. But I want to spend the next
hour and a half. Maybe I can get through this
PowerPoint. There are five aspects to the PowerPoint. We'll be pulling
up after I read to show you the relationship between the things
that take place on earth and the things that take place in
heaven. Now, some of you have been in our class for years and
you have a pretty good handle on the simultaneity of the book
of Revelation with the events that transpired in the days of
our Lord Jesus Christ. and into the book of Acts, meaning
that there's a parallel chronology that you must recognize between
the events that took place when our Lord came into the world
and even when John the Baptist came into the world. We'll see
that when we deal with some of the terminology in Revelation,
a simultaneity of events happening in heaven while they were also
happening on earth. This is where our Master said
in Matthew 6 and in the Gospel of Luke where the disciples asked
them, to teach us how to pray. He said, this is how you pray. Our father who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be
done on earth as it is in heaven. So for Jesus Christ, he operated
with the bifocal reality of earthly things and heavenly things. He
could see the events that were taking place in heaven corresponding
with the events that took place on earth. And when you understand
the book of Revelation, you understand that the book of Revelation is
merely access into things that were already happening in heaven
as they were also transpiring on the earth. So that when you
work through your theology of the book of the Revelation of
Jesus Christ, it would be a fallacy and an error to believe that
the book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ was purely a futuristic
book, having no real application to the events that were transpiring
in the days of Jesus and John, nor the events that transpire
in the book of Acts. And certainly, it would be very
short-sighted and dim-witted on our part to believe that the
book of Revelation is not speaking to us right now. And so one of
the strongest arguments for a sound position in the book of Revelation
is a historical interpretation of the book of Revelation with
a grand central Crystal centric theme and a a very church centered
theology that we have an ongoing Simultaneity between what is
happening on earth and what's happening in heaven and one day
the dividing line between what's happening in heaven and what's
happening on the earth will be removed and We will see earth
the same way heaven Caesar That will be at the last trump. We
are dealing with seven trumpets. We're dealing with seven vials
and we'll be dealing with seven seals. Those are categories of
God's actions in the world under a temple analogies, trumpets
and vials and seals are all tabernacle temple articles that deal with
things on a spiritually sort of religious level. That's the
nature of the book of revelation. And the Bible is very clear that
we are living in what is called the sixth trumpet. We are waiting
for the last trumpet to blow. The last trumpet that blows will
be the blowing of the trumpet when Christ himself comes. So
one has to be able to understand that kind of chronology in the
book. I'm giving you that premise so
that when I read through Acts chapter four, verses 23 through
36, I want you to have the flavor and the sense of heaven all on
top of and working through this text. And then when we go to
Revelation chapter 11, I'll be doing an exegesis tonight on
Revelation 11, and I hope to persuade you that Revelation
chapter 11 is a contemporaneous text applying both to the first
century church As well as to where we are today if I get done
in an hour, I'll open the floor for questions I would recommend
that you be ready to write if you know anything about The book
of Revelation or you have questions write them down. So don't be
too passive You're getting ready to get a lot of information because
I'm gonna work run through these points fairly quickly But I think
they will bless us all as we understand the significance of
Christ working through his church to bear record to the glory of
his father for the salvation of his people. Acts chapter four,
verse 23. And being let go, they went to
their own country and reported all that the chief priest and
elders had said unto them, that is the apostles. And when they
heard that, they lifted up their voice to God with one accord
and said, Lord, you are God, which have made heaven and earth
and the sea and all that in them is, who by the mouth of your
servant David had said, Why did the heathen rage and the people
imagine a vain thing? You see how Peter under inspiration
of the Holy Ghost is taking Psalm 2 and applying it to his present
day scenario and not sometime in the future. You see how he's
understanding a very crystal centric conflict between the
rulers of the world and the gospel of Jesus Christ as he's developing
it here in the text. This is not future. This is for
us. It's the past. For Peter, it's
the present. The kings of the earth stood
up and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and
against his Christ. For of a truth against your holy
child, against his holy child Jesus, whom you have anointed,
both Herod Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of
Israel were gathered together." Now, if you go to Psalm 2, you
won't see these distinctions because the Old Testament passages
still needed to be fulfilled in a New Testament context to
understand what was taking place. Peter has just admitted here
that it was Jews and Gentiles collaborating together under
the Roman Empire to put to death the Son of God for several reasons.
For to do whatsoever your hand have and your counsel have determined
to be done. In other words, God sovereignly
devised and purposed the crucifixion of Christ, both by the Jews and
Gentiles. And now, Lord, Behold their threatenings. This is where
I want you to grasp that the importance of what Peter is praying
for now is because the church is about to go through the kind
of persecution and tribulation that's gonna be clearly depicted
in Revelation chapter 11. And now, Lord, behold their threatenings.
And grant unto your servant that with all boldness they may do
what? Speak your word. All he wants is grace to speak
in the midst of persecution. That's all he's asking for. Now
notice what he says, by stretching forth your hand to heal, and
that signs and wonders may be done by, in the name of your
holy child, Jesus. And when they had prayed, the
place was shaken where they were assembled together. Now I want
you to mark verse 31. And the place was shaken where
they were assembled together. And they were all filled with
the Holy Ghost. And they spake the word of God
with boldness. I'm going to stop right there
with boldness. Now we have a very marked event
that corresponded to the prayer of Peter, don't we? And that
is God responded to Peter's prayer by bringing about an earthquake.
That was an actual act, a sign of God's presence and approval
of the resolve of the apostles to preach the gospel in the face
of opposition. the earthquake is going to be
significant for us. So pull our PowerPoint up and
you guys can go in your Bible to Revelation chapter 11, because
I'm going to now share with you the corresponding nature of the
events that took place in the book of Acts, particularly starting
here in chapter four, where Peter now and John, who are representatives
of the whole band, will be preaching the gospel preaching the gospel
in Jerusalem, and they will be opposed by the leadership in
Jerusalem, and they will suffer at the hands of the leadership
in Jerusalem, and some of them will be killed by the leadership
in Jerusalem, but they will continue preaching the gospel in Jerusalem. Let's see how similar it is with
our outline and with our text in Revelation chapter 11. Are
you in Revelation 11? So in Revelation chapter 11, verses one through four. I'm
going to read these words. We'll go back and deal with our
PowerPoint. This PowerPoint should have had
more on it up on the board. We'll see. All right. And there
was given me a reed like unto a rod. And the angel stood saying,
rise and measure the temple of God and the altar and them that
worship therein. But the court which is without
the temple, leave out and measure it not. For it is given unto
the Gentiles, and the holy city shall they tread underfoot. Forty
and two months and I will give power unto my two witnesses and
they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and three score days
clothed in sackcloth These are the two olive trees and the two
candlesticks standing before the God of the whole earth now
my first point is as we deal with the temple and the witnesses,
the warfare, and the triumph. That's the theme of this study.
It's in your outline. The temple, the witness, the
warfare, and the triumph. My first point is this, is that
the temple is ground zero. But we've said that before, haven't
we? The temple is ground zero. And you guys keep the PowerPoint
up unless I ask you to go to the verse. The temple, because
they have Bibles and they have their outlines as well. The temple
is ground zero because Jesus said, Start at Jerusalem with
bearing record with who I am, correct? And so the temple is
ground zero because we are establishing a whole new message, a whole
new ministry, a whole new paradigm in the midst of an old paradigm.
We've been talking about that for weeks, right? Look at the
boldness of Christ to take his disciples and place them right
smack dab in the old system, the temple, and tell them to
tell everyone that I am risen. because he's going to have them
bear record of who he is, even as he said he was in the midst
of the temple first, because the temple is the great archetype
or paradigm of what God is doing in terms of gathering a people
for himself for all eternity. And you and I have been meditating
on this reality that at this present time, you and I are the
temple of the living God. Are we not? that the true and
the living God does not dwell in temples made with hands. That
God does not dwell in temples made of stone and of wood and
even of fine gold and things of that nature. So I want you
to mark that what we are seeing in the book of Acts will correspond
with what's taking place in the book of Revelation. And so in
your outline under ground zero, the temple, Revelation chapter
11, verse one and two, Acts three, one, And 11 and then acts 4 1
and you'll see the term temple used several times I'll talk
about that in the in a moment But you'll notice in Revelation
chapter 11 3 that he says over in verse 3 and I will give power
unto my to what? Now in your outline the question
is going to be raised the two witnesses in this context correspond
to what when you look at the vision there and you see how
The writer is explaining, John is explaining to us that God
is going to give power unto his two witnesses and they shall
prophesy 1,203 score days clothed in sackcloth. And then he says
over in verse four, these are the two, what? Olive trees and
the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth.
So we are conflating imagery, the imagery of a witness with
the imagery of two olive trees, right? So what would these witnesses
be who are also called these two olive trees? What is the
imagery? What is the symbol that God is calling our attention
to? The candlestick. The candlestick. You can write
that down so you can get it. The candlestick. These two witnesses
are the candlestick, the menorah. The menorah. Corresponding to
what? The menorah. Now, what John is
doing is he is revisiting under inspiration of the Spirit and
by the angel of the Lord, who's giving in the book of Revelation,
two Old Testament profound visions. One in the book of Zechariah,
chapter 3 and 4, and the other in the book of Ezekiel, chapters
40 through 48. We'll talk about both of those
tonight and show you the distinctions. But when I say corresponding
to what, Zechariah chapter four verses one through six explains
it for us. Go to Zechariah chapter four.
I want you to see this so you can understand the vision. Now,
if you want to on the PowerPoint, you can go there, but you got
to be ready to go back. In Zechariah chapter four. Now, this is where
Zechariah receives the vision again from the angel about the
candlestick and about the power source behind it. So we read
in Zechariah chapter four verses one through six, these words,
are we there? And the angel talked with me and came again and waked
me as a man that is awakened out of his sleep. And he said
unto me, what do you see? And I said, I have looked and
behold a what? A candlestick, you guys got that?
I have looked and behold a candlestick. And he goes on to say, all of
gold, now watch this, with a bowl upon the top of it and his seven
lamps thereon and seven pipes to the seven lamps which are
upon the top thereof. Now watch this, and two olive
trees, you saw that in Revelation 11, right? And two olive trees,
one upon the right side of the bowl and the other upon the left
side. Now watch this. He has a vision that he saw. The angel demanded that he give
a clear description of the vision. Now he's going to get the interpretation
of the vision. The interpretation of the vision
is always the net result of understanding the symbolism. Because symbols
are like signs that point to something else. In other words,
we're not done because we merely are able to express what we see. And every one of the prophets
always admitted when the angels asked the question, do you understand
what you see? They say, no, I don't. I see
what I see. And I can express to you in words
what I see, but I do not understand what I see. But the revelation
is about to be given in verses four through six. And I want
you to hear it because it's going to correspond to your outline
in our PowerPoint. Here it is. So I answered and
I speak to the angel that talk with me saying, what are these,
my Lord? point of application when you
are studying the Word of God, ask God for understanding. You ask him for understanding
so that we don't presume upon an interpretation that we didn't
get his assistance from. None of the prophets that played
a major role in the writing of the scriptures ever presume they
understood what was taking place. So here Zachariah is He's body
deep, mind deep in the revelations of Christ by the ministry of
the angel and he's free enough to say, hey, can you tell me
what this means? Can you tell me what this means? Which as
Joseph said in the book of Joseph, ladies and gentlemen, interpretations
come from whom? God. You and I with all of our
intellectual faculties cannot properly interpret scripture.
God has to reveal these things through us by a sound process
of biblical hermeneutics At the same time, a complete dependence
upon God making those things known to us. Now watch what he
says, because I want you to understand what Peter prayed for. What did
Peter pray for? Here it is. What are these, my
Lord? Then the angel talked with me
and answered and said unto me, do you not know what these be?
And I said, no, my Lord, I don't know. That's why I'm asking you.
No, he didn't say that, and I wouldn't either. I'd be too scared to
death. Then he answered and spoke unto
me saying, I want you to hear this saint. This is the word
of the Lord unto Zerubbabel saying not by might nor by power, but
by my spirit saith the Lord. Do you see that? Verse six becomes
the key and principle interpretation of verses one through four. The
key and principle interpretation of verses one through four. Now
the angel is speaking to Zerubbabel. Zerubbabel is the governor of
Israel. Joshua is the high priest, chapter
three. And yet Zechariah is the prophet
receiving the vision because God is about to restore the kingdom
so that Messiah can come 400 years later. But it's all taking
place in a vision. And so what Zachariah is called
to do is to go tell Zerubbabel, now this is gonna be key for
you and me. Go tell Zerubbabel, I raised you up as a governor,
but your political authority will not be the means by which
my people get established. I raised you up as a political
leader, but it won't be by the strength of the sword or by the
strength of policy by which my people will be established, brought
back into the land, secured as the people of God, making the
way for Jesus to come. The way my people will be established,
brought back into the land and made secure for the coming of
Christ is by the power of my spirit represented in the candlestick
receiving its supply from the olive oil. Are you guys hearing
me? In other words, what God was
saying is I will work through the witness of my church to bring
to pass my will and the political authority in Israel is to work
in concert with that authority. not to feel like your job for
establishing the political stability of Israel will come through politics,
it will come through the ministry of the church. Thus, when we
say my two witnesses corresponding to what? What's the answer? The
candlestick, the menorah. Emphasizing what? According to
verses five and six of Zechariah four, what is the emphasis? The
emphasis is power. The emphasis is power. The emphasis
is power, authority, but the agency will be what? The Spirit
of God, the Spirit of God. Now, who is the Spirit of God
represented or what is the Spirit of God represented by in our
context? The olive tree. You guys got
that? The olive tree, the olive tree. Pull up the next PowerPoint.
The olive tree. So ground zero is the temple.
Now this is the proper one. What is the candlestick? It's
an extraction of the temple, isn't it? Is the candlestick
an extraction of the temple? Is it an article in the temple?
How many of you guys are familiar with the basic articles and structure
of the Old Testament tabernacle? How many of you have seen a vision
of it? Good, it's important for you to know. The outer court
and the outer temple, and then the Holy of Holies, which I'm
gonna talk about here, and the articles that were inside of
it. Do you know that the menorah was on the inside of the holy
place right up against the holy of holies to give light in the
holy place and make manifest the table of show bread the altar
of incense and prepare the high priest to enter into the holy
of holies and so the menorah is the only light in the holy
place And so do you also know that the book of Revelation from
Revelation 1 to Revelation 22 is a full panoply of the whole
temple of God in a heavenly scenario? And that when we have what we
call that first inaugural vision of Revelation chapter 1, that
the first thing we see is Jesus standing in the middle of the
menorah. Do you guys know that? This is
the first vision. This is called your introductory
vision into the book of Revelation. Revelation chapter 1 gives us
the picture of the menorah and Christ in the middle. Now, according
to Revelation 1, that menorah represents what? The seven churches
of Christ. Is that true? The seven churches
of Christ. Now, what is a candlestick? What is a menorah? It is a witness. You and I are witnesses. to the
glory of God in Christ. Every believer is a candlestick. Every true gospel church is a
candlestick. This is why Jesus said in Matthew
chapter five, let your light so shine among men that they
may see your good works and glorify your father, which is in heaven.
You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill that cannot
be hid, that the dark world might have some light and be led into
the kingdom of God. You guys follow what I'm saying?
So the imagery of Revelation chapter 11, and I want you to
think this through, is that those two witnesses are serving as
light in the world. They're serving as light. And
we're getting ready to unpack that more fully. What is the
candlestick? It's an extraction of the temple.
It's interesting. That's number 17, verses 7 and
8. You read it in your own time if you haven't read it. And then
numbers 18 too. In number 17, 7, 8, what God
tells Moses to tell the leadership to do is to make sure that the
candlestick is made of pure gold, beaten and shaped in form in
the form in which is described in Zechariah chapter four, as
well as Revelation seven. And then also in number 17, verses
seven and eight, and you're gonna get this in a moment, God says
that the light of the menorah in the holy place must burn continually. It must never go out. It must
never go out. And that is significant here
in a moment. What was the law of the temple? Exodus 27, verses 20 and 21,
Leviticus 24, one through four, to make sure that the candlestick
never goes out, that the light stays burning. Now what that
means is that the supply of oil from the olive trees, which gives
light to the candle because the menorah was lit by olive oil,
and that olive oil ran into the pipes and the pipes had stems
at the top with wicks, kind of wicks, where they were lit by
the high priest and those menorah lamps stayed burning continually,
which means that the supply from the olive trees had to be consistent
and unending. which points to the nature of
the work of the Spirit of God in the life of the people of
God to do ministry without failing. Only the Spirit of God can keep
our candle lit. Am I making some sense? Only
the Spirit of God can keep our candle lit. And the law of the
temple was never let the light go out. Never let it go out. So I want you to understand that
because we're getting ready to ask the subsequent question. What
is the implication spiritually? Here you can mark this down.
Paul addresses this twice, once in the book of Ephesians chapter
four, and then once in the book of Thessalonians chapter five,
verse 19. With regards to the spirit of
God, which is given to the church, this is a statement Paul makes
frequently, and the spirit which was given unto you, and the spirit
which was given unto you. Here's what he says first and
foremost in Ephesians chapter four, verse 30. Do not grieve
the spirit. Do not grieve him. You guys got
that? Do not grieve him. And he's talking about the characteristic
and behavior of carnality that can rise up among professing
Christians where we are so vain and so foolish and so sinful
and so worldly that we can grieve him because we are not walking,
as it were, in accordance with who we are in Christ. Now, we
all know that we can grieve him, don't we? Now, if you can grieve
the spirit, that means that the spirit is a person. because you
can't grieve a non-personal entity. If you can grieve him, that means
you are vexing his will, vexing his conscience, vexing his volition,
vexing his desires, vexing his purpose in your life. Like when
you love someone and that someone does you wrong, they grieve you.
Our children can grieve us. Our husbands can grieve us. Our
wife can grieve us. Our parents can grieve us. Our
friends can grieve us. And I've often said grieving
is a kind of expression of care and love that that person have
towards you. If I don't like you, I don't care what you do.
You're not grieving me. Am I making some sense? So it
presumes a loving relationship between us and the spirit of
God. because the Spirit of God has an aim for his people. Is
that true? So what the Spirit of God says through Paul in Ephesians
4.30 is to make sure that you don't live in such a way as to
grieve him because then he will have to operate in covenant principles
and chastise you in several forms. And you know what they are, don't
you? Now, well, not you new believers, but you older believers know
how the Spirit of God will distance himself from you and leave you
to yourself. until you fall on your knees
and ask for mercy so that he can give you strength to get
up out of the cords of sin and vain thinking that we often fall
into when we grieve the spirit. And when we grieve the spirit,
we're basically saying to him, I don't care how you feel. I'm
going to do what I'm going to do. Am I telling the truth? until
he deals with you. That's what happens when you
grieve the Spirit of God. The other thing he said in 1
Thessalonians 5.19 is do not quench the Spirit. Now you have
your analogy of the fire because the Spirit is represented by
fire, is he not? And in 1 Thessalonians 5.19 He
says, do not quench the spirit. I'll be going in a few weeks
to a conference and I'll be preaching on that very subject, what it
really means to be a spirit-filled church. And so we have the spiritual
implications given by the law in the temple. If God is saying
to the servants in the temple, never let the candlestick go
out, Never let it go out. Make sure the oil is burning
continually. That means the people of God are walking by faith They've
got their eyes fixed on Christ. They are committed to the priorities
of their calling They understand who they are and whose they are
and they're not playing games with God Let me give you one
more Passage of Scripture to help you understand that and
you'll see this more fully developed when we deal with the seven churches
of Asia Minor Jesus said to the church at Ephesus You have left
your first love. Repent, therefore, in return,
or I will take your candlestick away from you. Do you guys remember
that? So the idea there was he would
no longer allow them to be a witness in the culture in which they
were in. Now, that's fascinating, isn't it? Because really what
he's talking about in Revelation chapter two, where he raises
that particular warning and proposition is that he cares about how we
think about him. I am he that he gives a very
clear description of a certain attribute consistent with the
church at Ephesus. And I know your words. I know that you're
zealous for this, that and the other thing, but I have one thing
against you. You have left your first love.
What an indictment. And then he says, repent, therefore,
and do the first works over, or else I will come and take
your candlestick from you. So what I'm saying is that it's
possible for a believer and a church to become ineffective in their
witness if they play games with God. So now I want us to take,
well, now go to the next PowerPoint. The Seven Imperatives of First
Thessalonians 5.16. I'll leave for later. Go to our
next PowerPoint. And this is in your outline too. This is
the next thing I want us to think through. The mystery of the inner
and outer temple. Show you something that I shared
with the saints here several years ago. So we have the physical
earthly temple that has been built three times. First in the
days of King Solomon, 967 BC. and it was done in 960 B.C. It
took seven years to build. You can go read it for yourself.
That was a gorgeous temple, but that temple was destroyed in
587 B.C. So from 960 B.C. to 587 B.C.,
it went a couple hundred and something years. It was the glory
of the world. Pagans came to Solomon's temple
from all over the world. It was a gaudy thing. It was
it was magnificent It was it was splendid in his vision that
physical temple But I think I told you a little bit already earlier
that God does not dwell in temples made with hands. So a Christian
would be Woefully deficient in his or her understanding if they
thought that simply going to Jerusalem and Traversing all
of the rooms in the temple would mean you were getting closer
to God. And then we go to Herod's temple
and the days in which our master was doing ministry. This is AD
29 through AD 33. And remember the disciples were
all enamored in Matthew 24. I'm gonna talk about that a little
bit more. Look at all the buildings of the temple and look at the
gold and the silver. Look what Herod has done. And
our master said, look, look, because it's coming down. Remember
that? In other words, he was teaching his disciples that They
are not to make the same mistake that Israel did in the book of
Jeremiah chapter 7 and following where they said the temple of
the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord are these.
When a man or woman or when a congregation or a denomination Or when a church
group starts really thinking that God is with them because
of the, um, uh, the, the, the august nature or the beauty or
the wealth or the prominence of their ministry or their church,
they have completely missed the character and nature of God.
When a church thinks that God is with them because they have
built, listen, the Mormons build better tabernacles than anyone
on planet earth. The Mormons. Most of us have
lived in the Bay Area, have seen that city on the hill lit up
ever since we were born. And we know that God does not
dwell in that thing. Do you know that? And he doesn't
dwell in any of the cathedrals and tabernacles of the evangelical
church either. For the man or the woman to fall
prey to assuming that God is to be found in a building means
we have totally missed the gospel. Am I making some sense? But I'm
going to show you something even on Sunday, how apostasy will
lead you from the spirit to the flesh. It will lead you from
understanding the things unseen to craving for and cleaving to
and finding your confidence in things seen. Carnal religion
always gets caught up in what it can show, what it can demonstrate,
what it can manifest. True religion is always authentically
spiritual in nature. And thus Jesus told the woman
at the well who was also trapped by the idea that we worship on
this mountain. Y'all worship in Jerusalem. He
says the hour is coming when you will need the worship on
this mountain, nor at Jerusalem for all that worship my father.
will worship Him in spirit and in truth. That is the designated
place where God dwells. He dwells authentically in the
hearts of men and women through the gospel. You know what that
means, ladies and gentlemen? That means that there is no amount
of money or no amount of physical effort of which we would put
together a building as elaborate as it might be to woo God into
it. We are completely carnal and
earthly and probably devilish, I think I'll prove that tonight,
for us to fall prey to thinking that God is with us because we
have built some ornate edifice. I say that to say this, the grammar
of the New Testament is so wonderful because it makes clear when we
understand the difference between the outer temple and the inner
temple, that this truth shines through. The mystery of the inner
and outer temple, the two words are naos and hyron. Do you guys
see that? Those are the only two words in the New Testament
corresponding to the nature of the temple. The outer temple,
our temple proper, is where the devil works, is where sin reigns,
and is where judgment comes, the outer temple. The carnal
temple, the material temple. Let me see if I can make that
proposition good. And I want you to understand that The outer
temple corresponds to the Greek word higher on. Do you see that?
See the word higher on? Everywhere you read in your Bible
where the term temple is referring to the physical temple in Jerusalem
in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and then all the way through
the book of Acts, and then all the way through the epistles, and then
all the way into the book of Revelation. Listen to me, from
the New Testament on, or Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, all the
way to the book of Revelation, when you understand the language,
wherever the word hired on is used, it's speaking to the physical
temple, and it's speaking to the external temple. the outer
court where the Gentiles would traverse and where the common
people would hang out, it never speaks to the holy of holies. So you guys remember in Revelation
chapter 11, where it says that the angel said, measure the altar
and measure those that worship therein, but the court of the
temple leave out. We're getting ready to talk about
that. The angel gave John instruction to make a distinction between
the true holy place and the mere externality of religion represented
by the physical temple. Did y'all get that? Okay, good.
Now, the language here is to raise the question, do we comprehend
what scripture teaches about not trusting in the things that
we make with our own hands? Do you remember when our master
was initially called into ministry? One of the first things the devil
did was take him to a pinnacle on the temple. Isn't that remarkable? The creator of the universe is
being led by the hand of the devil into the temple. Are you hearing me? Now, why
I'm emphasizing this is to drive home the point that the devil
has free reign everywhere in the world where God has not put
his mark. He has free reign everywhere
in the world where God has not marked out his own. Even the
temple. The temple in Jerusalem was controlled
by and governed by the devil. The devil ruled in the hearts
of the high priests. and the Sadducees, and the Pharisees,
and the scribes, and the Herodians, those people that frequented
the temple, selling and buying and making all kind of money,
and ripping off the people, and forbidding the true preaching
of the gospel, as we're seeing it in the book of Acts, they
were all emissaries of whom? The devil. And the devil is so
calm and cool about external religion, he brings Jesus to
a pinnacle on the temple and says to him, if you be the son
of God, jump down. Now that vision was given to
us about the temptation of Christ to help us understand our own
temptation as well. That we must never get caught
up in presuming that somehow we can negotiate with temptation
just because we're a child of God. As Jesus plainly said, he
plainly said, it is written, thou shalt not tempt the Lord
thy God. Just because you're a child of
God does not mean that you and I have right to tempt God. But
the devil had access, didn't he? He had clear access. The
outer temple are the temple proper where Jesus and the disciples
went frequently. Jesus taught in the temple. Jesus
ministered in the temple. The apostles continued going
to the temple in the book of Acts all the time. They kept
going all the way up to Acts 28. They were in the temple.
Why? Because God is bringing his true witness into the midst
of a false witness in order that he might save his elect out of
that false witness. Are y'all hearing what I'm saying?
He's bringing his true witnesses in like he brought Jesus in and
he's going to witness to them about the truth of the gospel
and they're going to come out because the church had gone apostate
by the time John and Jesus got there. So the second time we
read about Jesus going to the temple in any remarkable way
is in Matthew 21 12 But it's also in the gospel of John chapter
2 when Jesus goes into the temple the first time after he starts
his ministry Guess what Jesus does he he makes a cord of switches
a whip And he goes in there and whips all the money changers
out of the temple. It was an act of absolute violence
on the behalf of his father because of the atrocities and treachery
taking place in the church of God. Do you remember what they
asked him when he whipped all those cats out the temple? Show
us a sign of what authority you have for what you're doing. Listen,
if one man could whip that many folks out of the temple, You
ought to just pay him some respect right off the top without even
trying to figure out what authority. Obviously he has some authority
with those many cats out of the temple, but he was prospect.
He was prophetically speaking to this reality. He was fulfilling
Malachi chapter two, the Lord of the temple, the Lord of the
messenger of the covenant will suddenly come to his temple and
he will purge the sons of Levi. He will purge them with fire.
He will purge them. He will drive them out and he
symbolically was showing that he's going to drive out all of
the hooksters and robbers and crooks out of the temple. He
did it twice. He did it at the beginning of his ministry and
he did it right at the end of his ministry. Are you guys hearing
me? And he was indicating that the temple could be penetrated
and could be corrupted by false religion. I just want you to
know that Matthew chapter 24, one is when he finally leaves
for the last time. And he tells his disciples, look,
not one stone shall remain upon another in this physical temple
called the higher on you guys got that that's the higher on.
Now the word now is referring to the Holy of Holies of which
wherever you read of the term, Neos. I want you to get this
saint. It's speaking to Jesus Christ
and is speaking to all true believers. So if you were doing a word study
on the word Neos, you would find it in John chapter two, where
Jesus said in John chapter two, destroy this temple and I will
raise it up when in three days. And he was speaking of the temple
of his what body. And when you go all the way through
the New Testament, and you have this in your outline, when you
go all the way through the New Testament, whether it's 1 Corinthians
3.16, you are the temple of the Holy Spirit. Whether it's 1 Corinthians
or 2 Corinthians 6.16, which is our New Year's theme, you
are the temple of the living God. Or Ephesians 2.21, that
we are the temple of God, the foundation being the apostles
and Jesus Christ, the chief cornerstone. The true high priest and communion
with God through Jesus Christ, our Lord, is what constitutes
what we call the naos, or the holy of holies. The holy of holies. That's where the real work of
spiritual activity is taking place, in the holy of holies.
I wish I had a picture of that for you. But if you've seen it,
then you understand that there's the outer temple and then the
inner temple. And the inner temple, and I'm
gonna say it again before I go to my next point, The inner temple,
the Holy of Holies, in the New Testament, from the time we start,
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and go all the way through to
the book of Revelation, refers to the true temple of God being
the true believers, worshiping the true and the living God,
starting with Jesus first, with the exception of one enigmatic
account. There's one account wherein the
Holy of Holies is depicted as being occupied by Antichrist. That's 2 Thessalonians chapter
2. Go with me there. 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. I want you to hear the language
and then we're going to build something here. I just want you
guys to bear with me. I'm going to try to make my way
through and then I'll open the floor for some questions. But
in 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 where most people and most scholars
speak to this as being the text underscoring the great apostasy,
the final apostasy where the apostle Paul is warning the church
about the man of sin, the son of perdition. So we read over
in verse three of 2 Thessalonians 2, let no man deceive you by
any means for that that day shall not come except there come what?
A falling away first. That phrase falling away is our
apostasia. It's the departure that we're
talking about in the book of Hebrews right now. And I want
you, I'm gonna kind of contextualize this a little bit. And that man
of sin be what? the son of perdition. So now
notice what he says. When the falling away reaches
a threshold, the man of sin who is also the son of perdition
will appear. There's a corresponding relationship
then that I want you to grasp. And I'm gonna show you an example
of it here in a moment. There's a corresponding relationship
with growing apostasy in the church that when apostasy reaches
a threshold, The man of sin, the son of perdition, who was
always in the church, will then be manifested because he will
have the necessary numbers of apostate people on his side. This is why Paul speaks here
in 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 about how the mystery of iniquity is
already working, only God is restraining the mystery of iniquity
until a certain time. And when it reaches a threshold,
the mystery of iniquity manifests itself. Can I give you a model
as an example? Judas Iscariot. He's always the
quintessential example, and that's why Jesus used the same epithet
that Paul is using, calling Judas the son of perdition. That's
John chapter six. No, sorry, John chapter 17. All that you have given me, I
have kept and lost nothing except the son of perdition in order
that the scriptures might be fulfilled. And what is the meaning?
Remember Judas, He's covert, he's unseen, undetected
for his objectives and his goals, his hostility towards Christ,
his carnal purposes and passions. His agenda was not God's agenda
and he was only seen at the end. When was Christ made it very
clear that he's going to Calvary and not Rome? Judas Iscariot
could not handle the idea that Jesus would not actually turn
over the political powers and establish Israel as a premier
theocracy and so he sold Christ out, right? Ladies and gentlemen,
Judas Iscariot is a marked lesson to teach you and me that the
greatest danger that exists in our life is us wanting to have
our own wills done rather than the will of God. Please hear
what I'm saying. that you can get as close as
Judas Iscariot did to Jesus Christ and still not know Christ in
a saving way and still not have a vital walk with God and not
actually be on the same team. Jesus always knew he was a devil. He always knew that Judas was
not with him. but he had to teach his disciples
how to exercise discernment so that when ministry would take
place in their life, they would know that you have to really
examine people and vet people well, particularly talking about
putting them in leadership because they could very well have a heart
that's in complete antagonism to Christ. Listen, and whenever
that's the case, all it's waiting for is the right time. All it's
waiting for is the right time. Like right now, we would say
that our, our, especially our Western church, the church in
Europe is fundamentally dead, has been dead for many, many
years. We would say the Western church is completely dead with
the exception of a handful of congregations. The Western church
is completely dead. Now listen, and this will go
on the air and I'll get some emails. I understand all that.
Listen to me very carefully. When the church is dead, The
people in the church don't know it. When we go through the seven
churches of Revelation, when we go through the seven churches,
I'll help you understand that. The church at Sardis lived on
reputation. Jesus came and said, I know you
have a name that you are alive. And everybody's still talking
about all of the historic successes and achievements that you have
made a hundred years ago or 50 years ago. But right now at this
present moment, and I know what I'm talking about, Jesus says,
you are dead. So human opinion, public opinion,
consensus opinion, people's opinion about the state of a church means
nothing. The only opinion that matters
is Christ's opinion. Are y'all following me so far?
I want you to get this now. Especially you babies, y'all
gotta put your seatbelts on because you guys are learning something
about warfare now. You're learning something about warfare. That
you will have to labor to make sure that you don't default to
religion. If I could just, if I could press
home to the new Christian among us, the one thing you must make
sure you never fall prey to is merely being religious. Do not
play games with God. Keep it real with God. Because
it's easy to hide from God in the church. There's all kind
of people will help you continue to deceive yourself into thinking
you're all right with God in the church. And when the church
is in a way of apostasy, every essential gospel truth necessary
to free you from having to pretend Removed did you hear what I just
said? When a church is going apostate
and when a nation is going apostate and when denominations are going
apostate and this I am I'm infringing upon my Sunday's message They
have already systematically Dismantled every necessary glorious Christ
exalting sinner-saving soul redeeming doctrine essential for you to
come to God freely and The doctrines of grace, the gospel of Jesus
Christ allows a sinner to come to God freely just as he is to
receive from Christ what only Christ can give to him to make
him right with God. When we move into apostasy, the
churches start systematically removing every essential God-exalting,
Christ-glorifying, Bible-based teaching essential to humble
the sinner and exalt God and bring the two together on the
grounds of the blood and righteousness of Jesus Christ. And when you
remove the gospel, the only thing you have in the church is words.
Can I keep going? When you remove the gospel, the
only thing you can have now going on in the church is works. Let
me give you several categories of works that take place where
there's a vacuum of biblical gospel preaching. You have the
works of intellectualism, where people are noted for their highfalutin
philosophical interpretations of scripture, their scholarship,
their hyper-authoritarian wisdom over the Bible. complex and so
sophisticated in their understanding of the Bible. Can't nobody understand
them. And because can't no one understand them, they must be
right. Okay. Now there's only a few churches
like that because most of our churches depict our culture and
our culture is this. You and I live in a downgrading
culture of lack of rational, reasonable, logical thinking. We have been dumbed down so much.
that for us to have to think for more than 15 minutes causes
fuses to short in our brains. Are you hearing me? This is why
in your churches, the services are filled more with entertainment
than it is with the exposition and development of the biblical
texts, because they are afraid that people are not capable of
listening to the word of God for an hour in order that their
souls might be taught the truth. And so in most of your churches,
it's 10, 20 minutes of a little soliloquy that don't have anything
to do with the depths of the riches of the glory of God in
Christ to get a hold of the soul and give him something to feed
on for the rest of the week. And then you got all of the other
entertainment fluff as a peripheral element in the worship. This
is apostasy in the church. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
This is apostasy in the church. And what you do when you allow
people to feed on that for weeks and months and years is you train
them not to endure sound doctrine. You train them not to be able
to endure sound doctrine. And so people come to church
to be entertained. And as soon as somebody goes
to seriously preaching, they go, what's that? Are you hearing what I'm saying?
This is very important. And so in our text, he's warning
us about the man of sin being revealed, the son of perdition,
when apostasy reaches a threshold. And I can tell you this, as we
continue to develop this, when God gives you eyes to see and
ears to hear, and he teaches you the resume and the portfolio
of the man of sin, those of us who have eyes to see, we can
see the man of sin. We see him in the pulpits. We
see him in the leadership of the church. We see him in the
world of scholarship. We see him in the seminaries.
We see him in the denominations. We see him in the Bible colleges.
We see them. Those of us who have discernment
can see the man of sin in all these places and the by-product
of their teachings and their doctrines as it disseminates
down into the pulpit and then among the membership. You shall
know them by their fruits. Are you hearing me? Now the beautiful
thing about God and his love for his little lambs, that's
his new people. The beautiful thing about God
and his love for his little lambs is that he puts a mechanism in
them at the time of conversion that keeps them from being destroyed
by the devil. Do you know what that mechanism
is? That mechanism is called discernment. There's a little
mechanism that God puts in his sheep, in his lambs. And so in
their ignorance, because they hadn't been taught correctly,
they start going to these false churches. But over time, they
get agitated because they're actually coming to discover they're
not hearing the voice of the shepherd. And they start getting
troubled by the teachings. And over time, their soul starts
searching for his voice. And his voice is always found
in sound Bible-based teachings. That's where the soul settles
down and says thank you Lord for someone that's just telling
the plain true Are you hearing me? This is this is what John
chapter 10 means when he says my sheep hear my voice now mark
this when you're not a sheep and you're just a religious person
you will feed on anything and You will perish under it too.
And it's a sad reality. It's not something to laugh at.
It's a sad reality Because many of the people that you would
seek to help understand the truth, they can't hear you. Because
they're not of God. He that is of God, heareth God's
words. He that is not of God does not
hear them. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? This is one of the reasons why you got to stay under gospel
preaching is so that you can continue to make your calling
and election sure. Because if you can handle the
gospel, you can handle anything. Because the gospel is going to
keep you low and keep you looking to Christ. And it's not going
to give you a false refuge or a false hope or a false calling
or a false ministry to lift you up. It's going to always demolish
everything that seeks to exalt itself against the knowledge
of Christ. Always. And you're going to say, thank
you, Lord, for keeping me from losing my new mind in Christ,
falling prey to the idiocy of religion just so I can be made
known or made popular, made wise. So I want you to mark what it
says. Then we'll go on with the rest
of our points. For the mystery of iniquity, let me go back to
verse 4, verse 3. And that day shall not come except
the falling away come first, and that man of sin be revealed,
the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all
that is called God, or that is worshiped, so that he, as God,
sits in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. Now that's
audacious, isn't it? Now remember you not that when
I was with you, I told you these things. So every faithful gospel
church, would do like Paul is doing with the church at Thessalonica,
always warning about apostasy. Every faithful church will always
warn about apostasy. One thing happened to me, I can
tell I'm not gonna get done with this tonight. One thing happened
to me about seven years ago, I was doing some pastoral ministry
with a bunch of local pastors. We would do what is called the
Whitfield fraternity. And George Whitfield was a fiery
preacher in the early New England days in America, him and Jonathan
Edwards and others. faithful preacher of the word.
And so a Whitfield frat is where local pastors of the same mind,
understanding the doctrines of grace and the pure gospel would
come together and encourage one another and kind of strategize
about doing ministry. Well, one of the pastors called
in a cat from a seminary in the Bay Area here. Now, whenever
I use the word cat, you know, I'm getting ready to talk bad
about somebody, you know, I just want you to know that. So he called
in one of these cats from the seminary, and the cat was talking
to us about missions. And I love missions. I can't
wait for us to grow up. We're only 19 years old, so we're
a teenager at Grace. When we grow up, we will be known
for missions all around the world when we grow up. One of the highest
callings to be able to send out missionaries around the world.
So Lord, grow us up so we can hurry up and do that. But the
guy came in and he's a professor at a local seminary, a local
seminary in the Bay Area here. I'm not going to name the seminary
because people get mad at me when I do the naming stuff. So
I'm going to spare him this time. But anyhow, he got to talking
about how God was saving people all over the world in India and
all around. And he started talking about
how God was saving them apart from the scriptures and how God
was saving them apart from the gospel. And I was sitting there
really laboring on how to be nice when I raised my question. You know, because I'm looking
and the other pastors are kind of quiet. And I'm saying to myself,
who invited this nut to come encourage us in missions? But
what it showed me was the kind of entrails into our seminary
that heresy has been making. And see, this is part of your
postmodern Pluralism that's going on in the evangelical church
watch this now. Here's pluralism pluralism is
Every way of man is right in his own eyes That mean there's
multiple ways by which God can save people. So what he was teaching
was we don't need the gospel We don't need the Word of God
God was saving people by people simply having dreams and revelations
of God like you will hear this frequently there are some websites
that I think I thank God for their apologetic websites that
are rising up now against this foolishness that people are buying
into. See, the American Western Christian church is really dumb.
We're really dumb. Like we believe stuff that's
overtly and explicitly contrary to the word of God. Like the
little boy going to heaven and being able to talk about heaven
and come back and tell us about it. Or some man going to hell
and talking about hell and coming back and they're writing books.
Hint, hint. You understand what I'm saying?
in the Christian church is going to put him on the radio and talk
to him about, so now tell us what heaven was like. And when
they go to talking about heaven, they don't tell you nothing.
They give you white glowy things. And Jesus had long hair and a
white robe, man. You got that out of one of Michael
Angelo's books. There was no biblical insight,
no revelatory insight, no advanced insight. This child was either
demonically possessed. and driven into a dream trance
so that he could perpetuate the lie of folks believing that God
would take you through these kinds of experiences in open
and stark violation against his word. Remember the parable of
the rich man and Lazarus? You remember what Jesus set down
as a clear parameter? They're not coming back. They're
not coming back. You got the book. What what you
want to throw my book away and believe people's stories about
me Are you hearing what I'm saying? But this is the attack that's
going against the Word of God right now in all these fears
These are the signs and the wonders that the devil is doing to deceive
masses into believing these things are true Very important for you
know, so he sits in the temple of God showing himself as if
he were God and it goes on to say I Verse five, remember ye
not that when I was with you, I told you these things and you
know what is withholding that he might be revealed in his what?
So there's always a time when the Antichrist is revealed. This
is the Antichrist in the days of John, Antichrist in the days
of the first century, Antichrist throughout all of church history.
And in fact, let me say this to kind of establish a caveat.
We have always had Antichrist in the world. And Antichrists
are designed to prove those who are truly God's elect. You and
I are always going to be tested by men and women who come with
signs and wonders and great intellectual powers and influences to draw
away, if possible, even the very elect. This is Matthew 24. So
you're never going to be in the world where you're not going
to be tested by someone's doctrine. And that's why those of you who
are more mature in doctrine, when the baby Christians come
to you and say, you know, I was listening to this man and I was
listening to that woman. And you know, that person was
a crook. Let them know you're listening to a crook because
their discernment level is not high enough to pick up on the
error in their subtle doctrinal teachings. So you just in love
say, hey, I wouldn't listen to him. I wouldn't listen to her
because their theology is very, very bad. Am I making some sense? This is critical. I know, see
today, we don't want to call anything for what it is. We don't
want anyone to be proven to be a false prophet or a false teacher.
You don't hear it on the radio anywhere today. You don't hear
these folks being called out. You don't hear this kind of apologetic
set forth. And yet the Bible is filled with
it. Let me go on. Verse 7. For the mystery of iniquity
doth already work. You see how it was working in
that day? Only he who is now holding it back are restraining
it Literally the greek word means to hold down until he be taken
out of way and then show that wicked one be what? Whom the
lord shall consume with the spirit of his what that means by his
word Whom the lord shall consume by his word. He shall speak his
word And I want you to see that in a minute when we go back to
revelation chapter 11 By the spirit of his mouth with the
brightness of his coming i'm going to stop right there go
back to Revelation chapter 11. Let's pick it up now. So I have
stated to you that when you understand the term the temple there are
two kinds of temple in view the external temple and then the
internal temple the external temple being the higher on temple
where the devil can roam freely and the internal temple which
we have in verse 1 of chapter 11 is which is the holy of holies
or the holy place connected to the holy of holies, verse one.
And there was given me a reed like unto a rod and the angel
stood saying, rise and measure the temple of God and the altar
in them that what? Worship therein, verse one. So
now we are moving into understanding the ministry more fully. Go back
to our PowerPoint. Going back to our PowerPoint
so our people can see this. So John was given instructions
to measure the temple, which would bring us to our next PowerPoint.
The mystery of the inner and outer temple. All New Testament
references to believers is the naos, that is the holy place.
And I've given you a verses. True priesthood and communion
with God through Christ, through our high priest Jesus Christ,
with the one exception which we've just talked about, right?
Give me the next PowerPoint. All right. So now, I want you
to mark what John is told, what John is told in verse one. He
says, and there was given me a what? A reed like unto a what? Now it was given to John to measure,
to measure, to measure. So I want you to get the vision
of just a measuring tape. You got that? That's one vision. In that day, the measuring tape
was a literal rod that was made out of material. It was so long
in length and so wide in width. A measuring rod, a reed like
a measuring rod. Those are actually two different
words And the read was given or the measure was given in order
to test something. I'm going to let you allow, I'm
going to allow you to work through this on your own throughout the
course of the week. Whenever there was a measure,
a measuring line given, it was to test the orthodoxy of a thing,
the rightness of a thing, whether the thing was straight or whether
the thing was off. It was also designed for two
other things to preserve and protect. or to judge. So here's what God is teaching
John and teaching us. That as God's representatives
on the earth with the truth of the gospel, we are to test everything. We are to judge everything. We
are to see and use with a proper measuring stick, and I'll talk
about that in a moment, whether a thing actually lines up with
biblical truth. Now what John is doing now is
occupying the office of Ezekiel. It was Ezekiel who had received
from the angel the ministry of the restored temple in chapter
40 through 48 of the book of Ezekiel. That's why you will
have some of the Ezekiel language in the outline, the reeds and
the scales. Do you see me saying that? The
reeds and the scales? So here's, to measure is to test,
to determine orthodoxy, obedience, faith, and love, everything The
world, the tabernacle, Jerusalem, the temple, the church, the leaders,
and the people. He is the judge. Who is that?
God. And he has his what? Standard.
Now I want you to think about this with me. Is God the judge?
Does God test everything? Does he measure everything? Yes,
he does. And the verses you have will
correspond with what I stated up there. He measures the world.
He measures the tabernacle. He measures Jerusalem as a whole.
He measures the temple. He measures the church. He measures
the leaders of the church and the people. He is the judge and
he has his standard. What he does is over time, he
determines whether or not human beings who are occupying certain
offices are doing what he's calling them to do. And when they don't,
he judges them. I'm gonna give you one Old Testament
example, and then I'm gonna share with you a few in the New Testament
around the area of the reeds and the scales that are being
used to judge. Do you remember the son of Nebuchadnezzar? Belshazzar,
Belshazzar. And how that after his father
passed away, he took over the ministry of Babylon. And in his
audacity, he took the cups, the golden cups of the temple of
God and started having a party. And he was drinking out of all
those utensils. And remember, I told you that was the first
time they had the big motion screen movie in the Bible. The
big motion screen, too, because on the wall, God showed up. Remember,
that's Deuteronomy, that's Daniel chapter 5, verse 25 and 27. Pull that up for me. This is
what we call the first big motion picture movie. And the name of
the movie was called The Finger of God. So he's sitting there
having a drunken party, getting high out of the utensils of God,
right? And then all of a sudden he sees,
go back two verses, all of a sudden he sees, But you have lifted
up yourself against the Lord of heaven and earth, and they
have brought the vessels of his house before thee. And you and
your lords, your wives, and your concubines have drunken wine
in them. And you have praised the gods
of silver and of gold and brass and iron and wood and stone,
which see not, nor hear not, nor know. And the God in whose
hand your breath is, and whose are all your ways, you have not
what? See, now this is a pagan king.
Didn't we learn, ladies, last night in biblical theology that
even the pagan kings are to obey God and his moral laws? And so
it was at Gerar that the king knew that God required a moral
and ethical standard of obedience and that he would not violate
that and take Sarah, Abraham's wife. And so he lived. God uses
that same standard in our world today. So now notice what the
next verse says. Then was the part of the hand
sent from him. And this was the writing. So
he saw a hand writing on the wall. Big old hand. Told you
it's called the finger of God. First video movie. Only lasted
five minutes. Because it shook him up so much,
his knees started knocking together. He started having convulsions
and fits. Scared to death. And he ought to have been. God
showed up at his party. listen to what it says. There
was the part of the hand, there was the part of the hand sent
from his hand, and the writing was this, and I want you to mark
it now, here it is, verse 25, and this is the writing that
was written, mene, mene, tekel ufarsin, and most of us who have
studied that language understand literally what it's talking about.
God has measured you, he has weighed you out, He has tested
you. He has determined whether your
office is functioning properly or not. And he has found you
lacking, found you wanting. Like if we use the measuring
stick and you were supposed to be 18 inches long, but you're
only 16 inches long, you are found wanting. If we use a scale
and you are to weigh five pounds, if you're only weighing four
and a half pounds, you are found what? Wanting. Because God demands
proper judgment. when you are occupying an office
of authority. The next verse. This is the interpretation
of the thing. Meaning, God hath numbered thy
kingdom. See the word numbered? You can
translate that measured. Because measuring is numbering.
You know that, right? You can translate that measuring. This
is what God does in Jerusalem. This is why we're dealing with
a combination of the Ezekiel temple measurement and the Zechariah
measurement. Because in Zechariah, God measures
Jerusalem. He says God has numbered your
kingdom and finished it. You're done next verse Tickle
you are weighed in the balances and are found wanting so, you
know what the proverb says, right a just balance is the Lord's
delight a false balance is an abomination to the Lord and what
that means is when you when you use a scale and this is this
is what takes place in almost all of our third world countries
it takes place in the Middle East frequently and where when
you're buying goods and you set them on the scale, if the scales
have false balances, where those goods are made to weigh less
than what they really are, so that you end up having to pay
more than you should, then what you're doing is ripping off the
people. Those are unjust balances. And I want you to understand
that all of the scales and all of the balances represents God's
word. It's God's word that he uses
to measure everything. Go back to our PowerPoint. Get
ready to demonstrate this a little bit. I want you to see this,
because this is preparatory to why the two witnesses are going
to have the problem that they do. To measure is to test, to
determine orthodoxy, obedience, faith, and love. Everything is
measured in the world. So we have what are called reads
and scales. And so we have looked at the Daniel text. You have
in your outline Deuteronomy 25, 15, Ezekiel 40. Zechariah 2 1
Habakkuk 3 6 talks about God measuring the world, but go with
me in your Bible to Matthew 7 2 Matthew 7 verse 1 and 2 and you will
have heard this verse quite frequently too, especially by people who
tell you don't judge me But I want you to think it through
with me what they are basically saying because Christ is going
to Going to actually affirm this here Matthew 7 to listen to what
Jesus says. Now this is going to give us
a description of the nature of the word as a measuring rod by
which we determine what's right and wrong. Judge not that you
be not judged for with judge with what judgment you judge
you shall also be what now watch this and with what measure you
what it shall be measured unto you. See what he's saying. When
you test a thing, or when you examine a thing, or when you
measure a thing, you have to make sure that your measurement
is right. And if you're not measuring right,
that same unjust measurement is gonna come back to you. Now,
when folks use the term, judge not lest you be judged, they
fail to remember the other verse where Jesus said in the gospel
of Luke, judge righteous judgment. To make sure that your judgment
is not a human judgment, but that your judgment is according
to the word of God. So it's not saying that you and
I aren't to judge things. It's simply saying that you and
I better be careful that the criterion or the mechanism by
which we judge things is indeed the word of God. That we don't
have a right to judge without using the word of God. Go with
me in your Bible to Luke now, chapter 12, 57, to mark this
again. Just a couple more verses, and
then we'll go back to our text. We've got about 10 minutes. So
this is the same idea here too and I and then Luke chapter 12
verse 57 I'm not sure if I want to use that one. I think I'll
use John 7 24 go to John 7 24 That'll be the one that we're
talking about Luke Luke's gospel. Jesus is doing the same thing
As he tells them, you guys have the ability to discern how the
weather patterns work. You are able to determine when
the clouds are low and heavy that it's about to rain. But
what you don't have the ability to discern is what's taking place
right now with regards to Messiah showing up. you don't even know
that your salvation is at hand in the person of Jesus Christ.
So that even though you have the ability to discern and measure
the weight of the clouds, you don't have the spiritual ability
to discern the presence of the Lord in your midst. But here
in John's Gospel, chapter 7, verse 24, here's what Jesus said. I'm going to start at verse 23.
And then here's, here's what he says in verse 24. If a man
on the Sabbath day received circumcision, that the law of Moses should
not be broken. Are you going to be angry at me because I have
made a man every withhold on the Sabbath. You guys see his
argument. Watch this. And then we're going
to get to verse 24. We are, we are making judgments
here. The rulers are making a judgment.
Jesus made a judgment, didn't he? The rulers made a judgment
that Jesus judgment was wrong. What Jesus just said is my judgment
is actually right and your judgment is actually hypocritical Because
your judgment emphasized keeping Sabbath But your judgment fail
to realize that on many Sabbath days you circumcise your children
because the Sabbath falls on the eighth day and the eighth
day falls on the Sabbath in order to keep God's law on both ends
you have to circumcise on the Sabbath That's called righteous
judgment being able to harmonize two laws that appear to be conflicting
with each other. But here I am healing a man on
the Sabbath day and you fail to realize that I am exercising
just as much righteousness in healing this man on the Sabbath
so that he can truly rest from the afflictions of his body and
enter into the joy of the Sabbath. Whose judgment was wrong and
whose was right? Christ was right and theirs was
wrong. Now mark this, And they were
both using the Bible. See what I'm getting at? And
so measuring requires discernment. Discernment on how to righteously
judge a thing. For as you guys know, a person
can use the Bible and make judgments and declare certain conclusions. And those conclusions can be
so wrong, it's not even funny. And unless you are able to discern
righteous judgment, you can't even detect whether they are
wrong. So what Jesus says in verse 24 is judge what? Righteous
judgment. Listen to what he says. Judge
not according to appearance, but judge righteous judgment. So my argument for you, and going
back to our PowerPoint, because this is where I'm going to stop
tonight, my argument is that when John is told to measure
the temple, he's told to measure the temple for one thing, to
demonstrate its orthodoxy and also to preserve it because remember
what he says over in verse two, but the court, which is without
this verse two of revelation chapter 11, but the court, which
is without the temple, do what leave out. Do you see it? And
do not what measure it for it is given unto the Gentiles and
the Holy city. Shall they do what tread under
foot 42 months. So stay with me now. I want you
to Mark what he just did. I thought I was gonna be able
to get through this and we'll pick this up next week. He tells John to measure
the holy place. That's the naos. That's where
the true believer is. But he says, do not measure the
outer court, the regular temple, of which we have already stated,
that's where the enemy can come in. That's where false religion
can come in. We're making a distinction between
true worship and false worship between these two systems, right?
And when he says, do not measure that, what it means is do not
protect it, do not preserve it, leave it alone. That means leave
it exposed to the adversary's assault. Actually, the literal
word is not leave it out, but cast it out, throw it out. And the idea is that the external
temple and external religion would be trodden underfoot of
the enemy to demonstrate that it's not protected by God. So
what you're gonna do over the next week, between now and next
week, is you're gonna be able to, let me see here, you're gonna
be able to study through, and I thought that, pull up your
next PowerPoint, if you will. I wanna make sure that they got
this on there. Let me see, no, so you can go back to the previous
point. So if they don't have this in
their outline, go back to the previous PowerPoint. If they
don't have this one, in my outline, I have the word of God is the
means of measure. You guys got that? The standard
is Jesus Christ himself. Do you guys have that? So say
that so if that's not on the PowerPoint, that's a that's a
that's something that they shouldn't have left out But they did so
that proposition. I want to establish right now
and then I'll open the floor What do I mean by the Word of
God is the measure what I mean by that is God will judge everything
in the universe by his word His word becomes his standard of
judgment of testing everything that's taking place in the world.
This is the way God will be able to tell a person what's right
and what's wrong. Now, the standard of God's word,
the means of God's measure is his word, but the standard is
Jesus Christ himself. Now this is quite interesting.
Let me just show you, I'm gonna show you two verses and then
we'll come back next week and you'll see what I'm saying. Go
with me in your Bible to Revelation 21, 16. This is the last time
you're going to see the measuring rod used. And then I'm going
to take you to Ephesians 4, and we're going to close right there
for today. Now, in Revelation 21, we have the vision of the
new Jerusalem, the holy city coming down out of God. That
needs to be explained, but we won't. But mark what John describes
in chapter 21. Verse 16. Are you there? Well, let me start back at verse
15. And he that talk with me, being
the angel, had a golden what? To do what? Measure what? And the gate thereof, right?
And the wall thereof, right? And then he began to measure.
Notice what he says. And the city lieth what? Four square.
And the length is as large as the breadth. And he measured
the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs, the length
and breadth of it are equal. And he measured the wall thereof,
144 cubits according to the measure of what? That is of the angel. So he uses the language of measuring
the temple, measuring the city according to the measure of a
man that is of the angel. And I would submit unto you that
this man that he's using as the measuring standard is Jesus Christ. Let me see if I can help you
understand that a little bit. Go with me back to Ephesians chapter
four. This is where we will stop tonight, but I just want you
to see this. Now this is going to be interesting to you, but
it will resonate with you over the course of next week. And
then we'll come back and see the parallels between what happens
to these two witnesses and what's happening to the apostles. So
in chapter four, we are dealing with the church of Ephesians
chapter four. And in Ephesians chapter four,
we are, we are being told that Jesus has, giving gifts to the
church, and we read in verse 11, and he gave some apostles,
some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors, teachers. You and
I operate with pastor-teachers today. We operate with evangelists.
And only in the small sense do we operate with what we call
prophets, but those are people who simply teach and explain
and declare the Word of God. No apostles today. No prophets
in the classical sense today. Those were foundational gifts
in chapter 2, verse 21 through 24. Verse 12. But these are given
for the what? Perfecting of the saints. Now
the word perfecting can be also translated what? Maturing. They're
given for the maturing of the saints. In order for the saints
to do what? The work of the ministry. And
it's designed for the what? Edifying of the what? Now stop. Verse 12 is actually describing
the measuring process and the building process that goes in
to putting up a building. When you build a building, you
are both measuring and building. Everything that gets placed in
any building is measured. Everything is measured. And what
now Paul is using is the metaphor of a building corresponding to
the body of Christ being edified through the ministry of the teaching
of the Word of God. So the Word of God becomes the
means of the measure and the standard is going to be Jesus
Christ himself. Watch this now. Now watch how
it goes. I want you to see this and I want you to think it through.
So God gives us the gifts of teacher, pastor. He gives us
evangelists. He's given us apostles and prophets. They are the ones
that handle the word ministry, don't they? They're the ones
with the word ministry. And I'm going to quote Ecclesiastes
12 to close with you on this metaphor, this analogy of the
reed, the rod being the word of God, and that the standard
for measurement is Jesus Christ. Here it is for the perfecting
or maturing of the saints for the work of the ministry, for
the edifying of the body of Christ. What would you think edifying
of the body of Christ means? Building up, right? Building up, that's what the
word edify means. So stone upon stone, brick upon
brick, board upon board, the church is built up under the
ministry of the word. Can you see that imagery? It's
built up under the ministry of the word. It's built up under
the ministry of the word. Now watch this. till we all come
into the unity of the what? That's a proper biblical understanding
of the doctrines of the faith by which we come to know God
in Christ, the latter part, and of the knowledge of whom unto
a what? And unto what the measure of
the stature of the fullness of Christ, the measure of the stature,
meaning what? All that Christ is in the fullness
of his person manifested in the church is the measure. We are
measuring by the word of God every member that comes into
the body, every person that's placed into the body. Every member
becomes part of the body of Christ and the body of Christ comes
into full stature when the last of God's elect are brought in
through the preaching of the gospel and are brought to full
maturity in Christ. So when that occurs, Jesus will
come. Until that occurs, we are still
building the body. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? We are still building the body. Go with me to 1 Peter
as I go to one more verse. 1 Peter, I believe, deals with
this in the imagery of the temple. And you guys have heard this
language before, but this will also help affirm what I'm getting
at in 1 Peter 2. As he says in 1 Peter 2 verse
1, Wherefore, laying aside all malice and all guile and all
hypocrisy, Envying and all evil speaking as newborn babes desire
the sincere milk of the word that you might what? If so be
that you tasted that the Lord is gracious to whom coming as
unto what kind of stone? Disallowed of men who is the
living stone here Christ? He's disallowed of men. That
is the Jewish people right but chosen of whom and what is he
to God? you also as living stone built
up a spiritual house. What is a spiritual house? A
temple. You got it? You and I are built
upon the apostles and the prophets, Jesus Christ, the chief cornerstone. How we built upon it? By the
measure of God's Word. God's Word is the means and Christ
is the standard. The goal of the preaching and
teaching of the gospel is is to bring men and women into the
fullness of Christ. How did the preacher put it in
Ecclesiastes 12? This is how I'm going to close it. He says
in Ecclesiastes 12, the words of the wives are like nails and
golds given unto the masters of assembly. How many of you
guys remember that Proverbs? The words of the wise are like
nails and gold. Since y'all don't remember, you
better go to Ecclesiastes 12. So I could be just talking to you
out of any old book. And I'll close it here so that
you can see the imagery. Even Solomon understood the church
in this metaphor. Ecclesiastes 12. I'm in Ecclesiastes
12, verse 10 through 12. Are you there? 10 through 11. Ecclesiastes 12 verse 10, the
preacher sought out and found out acceptable words and that
which was written was upright, even words of truth. Now watch
this, ladies and gentlemen, the words of the wise are like what? And then they're also as nails
fastened by the masters of assembly. What is the imagery? Carpenters
building a building, right? Which are all given by one whom?
Who is that shepherd? Now who are the masters of assembly?
the prophets and the preachers and the teachers of the Word. And what is the Word? It's the
nails and the boards are the means by which the church is
built up and made a spiritual house in the Lord. The measure
we use to judge what's right and wrong is the Word of God.
That's our rule. We have no other rule. And the standard is Christ. That's our standard. We have
no other standard. In other words, we can have the
rule without the standard, and it can still be lopsided. You
can have a church where they're studying the Bible, but if they
don't understand that the centrality, that the focal point is a person,
and that person is Christ, that church can be all over the place.
The standard is Christ. What we are seeking to realize
in the ministry of the word He is that to which we are all ultimately
coming to if we are his And the work of the Holy Spirit is to
bring every member into that reality now next week What we
will do is we will come back and we will look at these two
witnesses And answer the questions What does it mean? for them to
cause fire to come down from heaven or come out of their mouth
and consume their adversaries. And what does it mean that they
have power to turn water into blood? And what does it mean
that when they are killed, they'll rise again the third day? And
how does this correspond with the book of Acts? Because it
do, I want to persuade you that it does. All right, let's close
in prayer. Father, thank you for this time.
Thank you for my brothers and sisters. Thank you for getting
us to another week. These truths can be challenging
to us, oh God, but help us to understand them. We are so far
removed from some of the imagery here, like as we said earlier,
our brothers and sisters around the world, they know something
about tribulation. They know something about persecution.
They know something about the beast that rises up to oppose
the people of God and to kill them for the gospel. And as someone
said a couple of weeks ago, we are on the harbinger of that
as well here too in America, with all of the different policies
rising up. that would seek to stop us from
being able to tell the truth as it is in Christ. We ask, oh
God, that you would strengthen your church, strengthen every
believer, to stand on the word of God, to be committed to the
glory of God in Christ, to look to Christ alone for all their
hope and all their salvation, and to be able to do that with
the greatest of confidence, knowing that you said you would build
your church and the gates of hell would not prevail against
it. As we go our way, give us traveling mercies, we pray in
Jesus' name, amen. God bless you guys.