Good morning, everybody. Well, Todd's gone, it's raining,
and holiday weekend, I understand. I'm glad you're all here. This
morning, if you can go ahead and turn to Revelation 14, we're
going to focus on the first five verses. And in these five verses,
just before, I guess we'll just read them first. So, Revelation
14, 1-5, but this is... I hope that this morning might
be a comfort to you all as we hear how God describes His people. And we all need to hear what
God has to say about us because we have thoughts about ourselves,
we have fleshly thoughts, and we need to believe what God says
about us by faith. It's going to be an encouragement.
Revelation chapter 14 verse 1. This is John in a vision, and
he looked, and lo, a lamb stood on the Mount Zion. And with him,
a hundred and forty and four thousand, having his father's
name written in their foreheads. And I heard a voice from heaven,
as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder.
And I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps. And
they sung, as it were, a new song before the throne and before
the four beasts and the elders. And no man could learn that song
but the hundred and forty and four thousand which were redeemed
from the earth. These are they which were not
defiled with women, for they are virgins. These are they which
follow the lamb, whithersoever he goeth. These were redeemed
from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb. And in their mouth was found
no guile, for they are without fault before the throne of God.
Let's pray. Our Father, we ask your blessing
on the preaching this morning and on our brothers that will
be preaching for us. We pray, Lord, that we might
hear your gospel today. Lord, we pray that you would
open up our ears to hear the truth and that you would open
up our hearts to believe and to follow you wherever you go.
Lord, I pray that you would not leave me to myself. Lord, I pray
that this word would be from you. Father, bless us now for Christ's
sake. In his name we pray, amen. I believe that I was led to preach
on these verses this morning because of a need that... of
a need and of a need that I have. The need is that Christ needs
to be preached. Anytime that the gospel is proclaimed,
it is the gospel of God. It's what gives God all the glory. And no glory goes to man. And
I have a need to believe what God says about who I am in Christ
because everything I see with my fleshly eyes tells me otherwise. Everything that seems to happen
in life, it has two ways to look at it. Either it's, well, there's
really only one way to look at it, is that God is putting into
our lives everything that's happening so that he will get all the glory. In these five verses, we have
at least six descriptions. There's actually more, and I
hope that I can get through the six that I have. But there's
six descriptions that I want to talk about, and the first
one is found in verse one. God's elect, these 144,000 that
were redeemed from the earth, they are described as being with
Him. They're with Him in verse one.
And also in verse one, they're shown to have our Father's name
written in their foreheads. And this means that we are marked
by God. We are in the family of God.
And in verses 3 and 4, all of God's elect are shown to be redeemed
by the precious blood of Christ. And fourthly, in verse 4, We are called undefiled, every
one of God's elect being virgins. And this means that we will never
leave the simplicity that is in Christ Jesus. Salvation is
not complicated. It gives God all the glory and
it gives man none. Very simple. And fifthly, in
the same verse. These are they that God's elect
are described as they that follow the Lamb, withersoever he goeth. And this refers to the hearing
ear and the believing heart that God gives us in the new birth.
And then sixthly, I hope we can get there, but there is no guile
in their mouth. This simply means that we don't
try to trick God into saving us like all of man's religion
seems to do. All of man's religion seems to
be trying to get God to do something for us based on what He sees
from me, based on what I can produce. But here they have no
guile and we are faultless before the throne of God. And the Lord
Jesus Christ so accomplished our salvation so thoroughly that
God views every one of His elect as being faultless, without a
fault, before His throne. So first, we're going to look
at with him. But I just want to say, you know,
there's probably a lot of different ideas about the book of Revelation,
and I simply believe that this is just stories of the gospel
over and over and over again, just like all of the scriptures.
And the 144,000 here isn't a special group of God's elect, it's all
of God's elect. It's a certain number that God
chose from before the foundation of the world, and it's pictured
elsewhere in the book of Revelation as, you know, 12,000 or 10,000
were sealed from this tribe, and there were 12 tribes, or
12 times 12, 144,000. So it's a specific number that
God deals with, and it pictures all of God's elect, and even
though John saw this in a vision in heaven. He wasn't seeing people
that don't show us still here right
now. Even though they are without sin before the throne of God,
we are the same right now before the throne of God. This is us. So that first verse here, And
I looked, and lo, a Lamb stood on the Mount Zion, and with Him
144,000. With Him. There are two types
of people in the world. There are those that are with
Him, and those that are against Him. There is no lukewarm, there's
no nonchalant about it. Men either hate God and are actively
working to dethrone Him, or they're with Him. Go ahead and turn over
to Revelation 17, page or two over. In the world there's those
that are saved, there's those that are unsaved, there's those
that are in the world, and those that are of God. In Revelation
17, I believe we're shown how the great whore of Babylon, the
religions of this world, they actually unite with the governments
of this world and the people of this world, and they all unite
against him. In verse 13, we read about the
great whore and the beast and the kings of the earth, and these
have one mind. and shall give their power and
strength unto the beast. And what is it that they do?
These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome
them. For He is Lord of lords and King
of kings, and they that are with Him are called and chosen and
faithful. And if you look down in verse
17, or we'll read verse 16 and 17 also. And the ten horns which thou
sawest upon the beast, these shall hate the whore, and shall
make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh and burn
her with fire. For God hath put in their hearts
to fulfill his will and to agree. This is of God that they all
agree against him. And they give their kingdom unto
the beast until the words of God shall be fulfilled. So, men
and devils agree and have one mind, and that is to war with
the Lamb and with His saints that are called and chosen and
faithful. But again, like we read, this
is according to the will and the purpose of God. Go ahead and turn over to Luke
23, 11. And here is a good example of the kingdoms of this world coming
together against the Lord and against His anointed. Luke 23, verses 11 and 12. And Herod, this is before the
crucifixion when the Lord was abused by these men before He
suffered for sin or during This was his suffering too. Verse
11, And Herod with his men of war set him at nought, and they
mocked him, and they arrayed him in a gorgeous robe, and they
sent him again to Pilate. And the same day Pilate and Herod
were made friends together, for they were at enmity between themselves. For before they were at enmity
between themselves. And here we see an example of
men coming together and unifying against Christ. They are against
Him. Now, God's people are with Him,
so marvel not, my brethren, this is what's written in 1 John 3.13,
marvel not, my brethren, if the world hate you. And then the
Lord said also in John 15, He said, if the world hate you,
you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you are of the
world, the world would love his own. But because you are not
of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore
the world hateth you. So if we are hated by the world,
then we know that we were first hated by Christ. Go ahead and I probably should
have had you keep your finger there, but I'll just read it. Back in chapter 17 of the book
of Revelation, verse 14. And the Lamb shall overcome them,
for He is the Lord of lords and the King of kings. And they that
are with Him are called and chosen and faithful. And I want to look
really quickly at these three definitions of the believer. First, the word called. This
word means to be divinely selected or appointed. And it fits right
in with the way our God does all things. We are not with Him
by an accident. We are with Him. Those that are
with Him are there by divine appointment. God put us there
with Him. We are with Him on purpose, and
that purpose is His purpose. And this calling, it's a heavenly
and an eternal calling that cannot be altered or changed. And in
2 Timothy, 2 Timothy 1.9, the scriptures say,
who had saved us, speaking of God doing the saving, He saved
us and He called us with a holy calling, not according to our
works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given
to us in Christ Jesus before the world began. And not only are those that are
with Him called, but they're chosen. And we should never question
the matter of election or think that we, in some way, influenced
his decision. You've probably heard religious
people, whenever the word election or chosen or anything like that
comes up, they have some really whacked out view that God somehow
saw something that we did and elected us. But that's not true. I hope all of us know that. The Lord said clearly in the
book of John, you did not choose me, but I chose you. And if we
have been called, then we have also been chosen. And if we've
been chosen, then we're also faithful. This is the description
of those that are with the Lamb, faithful. And we know that the
Lord Jesus Christ was the only faithful man to live. But because
he was the only man to perfectly trust his father, and this reason,
this faithfulness that I'm speaking of right now was his faithfulness
to his father. He walked as a man by faith all
his life in this world. And that's what faith does. It
simply believes God. And I have five quick descriptions
here of what faith does. First, faith trusts Christ over
what we see and feel. If we actually believe God, we're
going to do it in the face of what we're feeling about anything,
because faith is a trust in Christ over what we see and feel. Secondly, faith relies on the
Word of God and not the opinions of men. A lot can be said there, but I'll
just use my brother as an example. We were speaking about my other
brother and the fact that he preaches a false gospel, and
he asked me what I thought about it. And it eventually came down
to, well, what is your basis for listening to a man? How do you judge him by? And
he said, by the Spirit. And I said, you know, that's
not what I judge. I judge things by the Word of God. And faith
relies on what is actually written. We don't have to sit around and
think, what am I supposed to think about this? Because it
is written. It is written. And faith is going
to believe what is written. Thirdly, faith trusts Christ
alone and it makes us afraid to look anywhere but to Him for
everything. Fourthly, faith will see that
everything in this life happens on purpose, and it's according
to God's eternal purpose, that in all things Christ should get
the glory. Now just remember, this isn't
some feeling of believing that's going to arise out of our hearts.
This is just simply going to be believing. You believe what
is written. It might have emotions with it,
but it might not. But either way, it's still according
to what is written. And fifthly, this last mention
that I wanted to say about faith, it's how we walk through this
world. Because the scriptures say that we walk by faith and
not by sight. And without faith, it's impossible
to please God. Okay, so that was point number
one. That was the fact that God says
that we're with Him. we're with Him. And secondly, go ahead and turn back to Revelation
chapter 14. Do I really only have 10 minutes
left? Oh, man. Okay. Well, maybe we can get to point
two. Well, I'm preaching next month,
so maybe I'll just finish it up. Okay, well, this is, you
know, this is one of the points that I actually honed in on the
most because, let me go back there. Because I noticed that it didn't
say having his father's name written on their foreheads. And
it actually says having his father's name written in their foreheads.
And I thought about... The example of like, a lot of
you go to festivals. I go to them all the time. And
there's usually a henna artist there. And this type of artwork
actually paints stuff on you. And it stays on there for about
two weeks. And you can wash it off. You can make it stay longer.
And that's a lot different than getting a tattoo in your flesh. You get a tattoo, it's in there.
You get a henna tattoo, you can wash it off. And you know, having
his father's name written in their foreheads, this is a mark
that God gives to his people. And it's not just a mark on them,
it's a mark in them. And what I thought about immediately
is how One, this is all centers around
Christ. He's the one that brings us to
God. And he is the one. This mark
reminded me of like a last name. You're in the family of God. You're marked. You've got his
name. His son died to redeem you. So the father has chosen to put
the child of God into his family by adoption, and has put his
family name, the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, in you. And
it's written in Galatians 4, verse 6, that, and because you
are sons, God has sent forth the spirit of his son into your
hearts, crying, Abba, Father. We are heirs of God through Christ
Jesus. And go ahead and turn to Ephesians
2. And I want to read, I think, 2. Two verses here. This name in
our foreheads means that we belong to Him. That we are children
and as a loving Father, our God assumed all that justice required
of us for our sins. And like that nearer kinsman,
Redeemer, He redeemed all. So if we are in Christ, then
we are the household of God. Let's read this together. For through Him, through Christ,
we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. And now therefore
you are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens
with the saints and of the household of God." I'm going to try to
squeeze in these three illustrations here, but, you know, I started
to think about examples in the scriptures of people that were
brought into the household of God, and I thought about how
the Lord, that coincides with us being delivered. That's usually what's happening.
When we're brought into the household of God, that's because we're
being delivered. out of something. And the first
example I thought of was the harlot Rahab. She was saved in
all of her house by the mark of a scarlet thread in the window. And this pictured Christ and
how he delivers us from the world. So if we are in God's family,
we are delivered from the world, like the harlot Rahab. And everyone,
not only was she delivered, but everyone that was in her house
and everyone else was judged. And so that scarlet thread, picture
in the blood of Christ, that was the mark that this girl is
in the family, this woman is in the family of God. And of
course, as believers do, she went and told her family, this
is where salvation is. It's in Christ. It's in this
house because of that scarlet thread. The second example I
thought of was the Ark of Noah and how all that were in the
Ark were saved. What was the mark there was that
they got in the Ark. The ark was their salvation.
The ark being a picture of Christ and how we are saved because
God put us in Christ from all eternity. They were put into
that ark. If we are in God's family, then we are so in Christ. And the third thing I thought
about was the night of the Passover. where the blood on the doorpost,
that mark of that blood on the doorpost of the house, pictured
that all that are of the household of faith, they share in the same
salvation that comes from God, seeing the blood of Christ, and
being satisfied with me. That has been a great hope for
me lately, is to see that God is looking at His Son for everything
that He requires of me. And it looks like I will be able
to delve into point three here real quick. Actually, I'm going
to skip over that because it's about being redeemed and Todd
preached a great message on that last week. But I wanted to briefly
touch on the back to our Back to our text in Revelation 14.
In verse 4 it says, "...these are they which are not defiled
with women, for they are virgins." What that is, it's really best
said in 2 Corinthians 11 verse 3. Paul was fearful of the Corinthians
that, lest by any means as the serpent beguiled Eve through
his subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity
that's in Christ. We are virgins in Christ because
we have not been corrupted from the simplicity that's in Christ.
The lie that Satan gave Eve in the garden was that you can,
by eating that fruit, you will now have the knowledge of good
and evil, you'll have a free will, and you'll be able to choose
the good. And God will see that and will
reward you for it. That was the lie in the garden.
The lie that man has a free will. The lie that God can accept something
that we do. That is the lie that Paul was
fearful that these Corinthians would be deceived by. And if they are deceived by that,
then they leave the simplicity of Christ. Because Christ is
very simple. The simplicity that is in Christ
here speaks to the singleness that's in Him. If you have Christ,
then you have everything. And a believer does not want
to add anything to Christ because He is all that we need. Let's pray. We'll stop there
and we'll pray. Our Father, we pray that You
would reveal unto us by Your Spirit just what Christ has done
to make us what we just read, to make us with Him, to make us have Your name written
in our foreheads, marked by the blood of Christ, preserved from
the judgment to come. Father, we pray that you would
bless the rest of this day. And Lord, we remember our pastor
at this time, pray that you would give him rest and bring them
back safe to us. Lord, thank you for this time.
We give you all the glory for Christ's sake. Amen. Didn't lay plans.