Route 66: Revelation - Christ Reigns, We Endure

If you would, in your Bible, Revelation chapter one, last book of the Bible.

We're in this series.

If you're visiting with us tonight, we've been going through in the evenings one book of the Bible at a time, one message per book.

So this is the last message.

We're going to have one more in the series next week where we try to wrap up and review and do the whole Bible in one message.

Yeah, wow, that was right.

And we're going to try to keep it still not, although we could do an all-night session.

I'm not opposed to that, but we're going to try to keep it the same time frame.

So we're in Revelation tonight.

Let me put in a plug while you're turning to Revelation chapter one.

After we finish with this series, we're going to be off for some Christmas events, Carolyn and the community.

In the new year, Pastor Doug mentioned he's starting up a series on the image of God.

So that's going to be great.

We're going to be hitting different themes on what it means for humans to be made in the image of God.

Another way of asking that is what does it mean for us to be human?

To be workers, to be male and female?

These are questions that our world really is concerned about.

And there's also some important questions that our world isn't concerned about, that they should be, like, how does Christ actually restore the image of God in us?

So stay tuned for that.

But we're in Revelation tonight.

I'm going to start with Revelation chapter 1, verses 1 through 6.

Revelation 1:1–6

The revelation of Jesus Christ that God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place.

He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who testified to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, whatever he saw.

Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear the words of this prophecy, and keep what is written in it, because the time is near.

John, to the seven churches in Asia, grace and peace to you from the one who is, who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits before his throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth, to him who loves us and has set us free from our sins by his blood, and made us a kingdom priest to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever.

Amen.

Lord, please help us tonight.

We need your more than just your aid.

We need your illumination.

We pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

The book of Revelation is one of the most underappreciated books in the Bible, I think.

Sometimes people are confused by it, so they just avoid it.

But it's also underappreciated by some of the very people who seem the most excited about it.

Why do I say that?

Well, if you listen to how people refer to the book of Revelation, they sometimes call it the book of Revelations.

It's a small thing, but look again at verse number one.

The revelation singular of Jesus Christ.

Sometimes people get so caught up in this vision and that symbol, they lose sight of Jesus Christ.

And that's what the book is all about.

Yes, there are many visions and symbols, but it's meant to build one comprehensive picture of the glory of the Son of God, our Savior.

So let's look at the central place of Jesus in the book.

It begins as the revelation of Jesus Christ.

The first voice that John hears is Jesus Christ, the faithful witness.

The first vision he sees here, if you look down in chapter one, starting in verse number 12, he turned and saw he sees these lampstands.

Then the first figure he sees is this glorious figure of the Son of Man.

And then I'm going to be hitting a lot of passages, so feel free to turn, or if you want to write them down or just listen, you can.

It starts with Jesus, then it also ends with Jesus.

Revelation 21, 22.

I did not see a temple in it, because the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.

Not only does the book begin and end with Jesus, the structure of the book points us to Christ.

So after John's opening vision of Jesus, he records seven letters to seven churches.

And then after he writes those letters, John's given seven different visions.

One of those visions is about seven seals, one is about seven trumpets, one is about seven bowls.

All right, Mike, you're already losing me.

It's too many sevens, too many weird things going on.

But all of those letters and visions center on the Lord Jesus Christ.

Just I'll briefly survey that for you.

The very first letter, Revelation 2, verse 1, opens this way: Write to the angel of the church in Ephesus.

Revelation 2:1

Thus says the one who holds the seven stars in his right hand.

That's Christ.

The last letter, Revelation 3, verse 21.

Revelation 3:21

This is how the last letter is taking up.

To the one who conquers, it ends, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne.

Who is that?

It's Jesus Christ.

We get to the seven seals.

Who can open the seals?

Revelation 5, 5.

One of the elders said, Don't weep, the lion from the tribe of Judah, the root of David, he has conquered, so he's able to open the scroll and it seals.

We get to the seven trumpets.

What happens with the last trumpet?

Revelation 11:15.

Revelation 11:15

The seventh angel blew his trumpet.

There were loud voices in heaven saying, The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he will reign forever and ever.

The seven bowls deal with God's judgment, his wrath being poured out like a bowl of water.

Who executes God's judgment?

Revelation 19, 11.

I saw heaven opened, and there was a white horse.

Its rider is called faithful and true.

That's Jesus.

With justice he judges and makes war.

So from beginning to end, the book is about Jesus.

If someone says, I don't really understand Revelation, you say, Oh, that's easy.

It's about Christ.

And they laugh at it.

No, no, really.

Like that's that's who it's about.

You've got to understand, it's all about the glory of Christ.

What is Jesus doing in Revelation?

He's reigning.

There's many things about him, but that's a main thing in Revelation.

He's reigning.

I'll give you a quick survey of that.

So he's described as the firstborn from the dead in Revelation 1.5 and the ruler of the kings of the earth.

In the letter to Smyrna, Christ offers a crown of life.

Who's giving crowns?

But rulers, kings.

Revelation 5, 5, he's the conquering root of David.

David, the king, the ruler from the Old Testament.

Repeatedly in this book, there's creatures and angels gathering around his throne.

Again, it's kings who rule from thrones.

If we fast forward to Revelation 22, verse 1, it speaks of the throne of God and of the Lamb.

Revelation 22:1

So Revelation portrays vivid colors, awesome symbols, the reign of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And it also intersects with our own lives.

Not that we need more than a vision of Christ, but it intersects with our own lives because Revelation is written for suffering Christians.

If you're in chapter one, look at verse number nine.

I, John, your brother and partner in the affliction, kingdom, and endurance that are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.

Your partner in, and then I'm reading the CSB, that's the Pew Bible, says the affliction.

If you've got a different translation this morning, it might use the word your partner in the tribulation.

Same Greek word is used there.

Like, are we in the tribulation?

Well, according to John, yeah, we are.

He was.

The people he's writing to were were as well.

And he could have said, Hey, I'm in exile.

I wish I had it like you guys.

You guys have it easy.

He said, No, we're we're suffering together.

Chapter 2, verse 3.

This is what John writes to Ephesus, the church, at this time.

I know you have persevered and endured hardships for the sake of my name and have not grown weary.

It's going to get better.

Well, in Revelation, it gets worse in some ways.

Revelation 6, verse 9, he opened the fifth seal.

Revelation 6:9

I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slaughtered because of the word of God and the testimony they had given.

That's intense.

So some Christians' tribulation is smaller, some is costing a life, but there's suffering for believers.

Throughout Revelation, there is this great dragon figure warring against God's people.

And the dragon has two henchmen.

He's got the beast and the false prophet.

Sometimes in the Bible, governments are compared to animals.

Nebuchadnezzar's visions compared to beasts.

One of the reasons why Christians suffer is because often governments attack Christians under under Satan's grand and wily designs.

And then there's there's the false prophet.

There's all kinds of religions in the world making all kinds of claims about truth that oppose Christ and oppose his message.

Some under the very banner of being lambs, but actually being wolves in sheep's clothing.

Are you hurting today?

Are you tired of a world that seems so opposed to Jesus Christ?

Revelations for you.

Suffering Christians, a reigning Christ.

And then there's one more major threat I want us to survey here.

It's the threat of worship.

We suffer not because we're such amazing people of stamina and ability, because if we're understanding rightly who Jesus is and we're before his throne, that's what enables us to endure suffering.

Revelation has those who worship the beast in his image, and it has those who worship the Lamb.

That's the two great categories of people.

For those who are worshiping the Lamb, we can endure suffering because of the vision we see of Christ.

Revelation 5, verse 13.

Revelation 5:13

I heard every creature in heaven, on earth, under the earth, on the sea, and everything in them, saying, Blessing and honor and glory and power be to the one seated on the throne of the Lamb forever and ever.

Revelation 7, 9, after this I looked, there was a vast multitude from every nation, tribe, people, and language come to Sunday school next week to hear more about that from Billy.

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Revelation 14, 7.

He spoke with a loud voice.

Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come.

And then in Revelation 22, one other example of this, John falls down before an angel, and the angel says, Don't do that.

I'm a fellow servant with you.

Worship God.

So let's try and put all this together.

If you only remember one thing from tonight, if you only remember one thing from the book of Revelation, remember this.

Worshiping Christians will endure to the end because Christ is reigning to the end.

I'll say that again.

Worshiping Christians will endure to the end because Christ is reigning to the end.

Having established that, let's drop down into some further considerations about this book.

Say, wow, Micah, that was a long introduction.

That wasn't the introduction.

That was the main thing.

Like I said, if you that was the main course.

If you've got that, that you're good.

This is gonna be more like a mix of appetizers and side dishes and desserts, okay?

If we're using the the the holiday food analogy here.

So think about this maybe as an as an appetizer plate that has like four dishes on it.

Now you sample one inside what you like.

Don't just decide what you happen to like, which one best fits what God is trying to do in Revelation.

But there's four main interpretive approaches to some of the symbols in the middle of Revelation from chapter four and into chapter 20.

First approach is called the preterist approach.

That's a word that means past.

For preterists, most of these symbols deal with events from our vantage point from the past that happened around AD 70 with the fall of Jerusalem.

They would say, well, doesn't John say these things are near, it's about to take place.

He meant it.

It was like about to take place, not 2,000 years later.

I think R.C.

Sproul held that particular view.

There's a guy named Kenneth Gentry today who has some stuff on that particular viewpoint, Prater's viewpoint.

Number two is the futurist viewpoint.

John MacArthur's an example of someone who held this particular view.

Futurists would say many of these symbols are dealing with events still future from our lives right now.

So still more in the future.

They would point to, even in chapter one, verse 19, write what you have seen, what is, and what will take place after this.

This is a nice template for the book.

John sees a vision of Christ.

He writes about the churches that are happening right now, and then in chapter four, it's what takes place later, after.

Third is called the historicist viewpoint of revelation.

You hear the word history in that, right?

So for historicists, they don't think these symbols are mainly about a small window of time around 8070.

They don't think it's about some smaller window of time in the future.

They see the events as different specific events throughout history.

So the third trumpet might be the bubonic plague.

The fourth bowl might be the French Revolution, that kind of a thing.

This is not as popular today.

I've never personally met anyone that held this viewpoint.

If that's you, come talk to me afterwards.

I'd love to hear more about your thoughts on this.

It was, uh it used to be a little bit more popular.

Jonathan Edwards held this viewpoint.

Arguably the greatest American theologian.

Who am I to disagree with Jonathan Edwards?

I mean, come on.

And then the final viewpoint is called the idealist viewpoint.

And for idealists, the symbols in Revelation are not primarily about window of time in the past or the future or specific events along the way, but rather they're about the cosmic conflict between good and evil that's happening all from Christ's first coming to his second coming.

And they would say the nature of apocalyptic literature is not so much to give a timeline as it is to give surround sound speakers different vantage points on the same type of climactic events that have been taking place since Christ came into the world.

However, I think all of those viewpoints can still agree on the big idea I put forward.

Worshiping Christians will endure to the end because Christ is reigning to the end.

So let me move on here.

Let me give you some resources.

There are some great sermon series.

One sermon, I obviously can't cover everything in Revelation, but I'll give you a couple of names.

There's a man named Tom Schreiner who preached through Revelation, and you can find his sermon series online.

That's excellent.

There's another former pastor of mine named Brad Baum.

He recently preached a number of messages in his church through the book of Revelation, so you can check those out.

Commentaries, there's a guy named GK Beale.

Now, his commentary is like a thousand pages.

It's not easy to read straight through, but to dip in at a specific point and try to see what's going on, it's helpful.

If you want to look at the shorter commentary, it's still 500 pages.

But if you get one of those books and tell Kevin Cooney, I want to try to work through a little bit of this.

He'll love you forever because Kevin loves the book of Revelation.

Kevin Cooney, our missionary in Indonesia.

Why does he love Revelation so much?

Because Kevin loves to speculate about whether the coronavirus vaccine is the mark of the beast or not.

That's not true.

That's not why he loves it.

I made that up.

Kevin loves revelation because it's about suffering Christians who are enduring and worshiping.

And isn't that what he's experiencing right now?

And yet isn't Christ reigning right now in Indonesia as much as he's reigning here, too?

Next tidbit, if you want to think of this as uh the Greek salad, um, you don't have to know the Greek language to appreciate the book of Revelation, but I would plead with you as a tool, when you come to the book of Revelation, first interpret the book of Revelation in light of the rest of the Bible.

Don't interpret it first through the lens of the European Union.

You want to see what's going on here.

G.K.

Chesterton said, though Saint John saw many strange monsters in his vision, he saw no creature so wild as one of his own commentators.

This is a book that is first and foremost about Christ and his reign.

It's not first and foremost about America or Russia or Iraq.

Let's dip into chapter 12.

Let's just sample so you can just kind of see one example.

We'll try to put some of these principles into practice a little bit here.

Revelation 12, turn over there right in the middle of the book.

Verse number one a great sign appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet.

And a crown of twelve stars on her head.

What's going on there with this woman?

So you think, wait a minute here.

I remember at the last Olympics, the opening ceremony, there was some horrific, you know, scene where there was a woman that had this celestial headdress on.

Oh my goodness.

This means there it is.

Jesus is gonna come back within seven years of when the Olympics happen.

Don't do that.

Stop.

Stop.

Interpret first the Bible in light of the Bible, not in light of what happens to be the current event for you, whether you lived in 1500 or today or in as long as the Lord tarries.

Where in the Bible do you see a sun and a moon and 12 stars?

Joseph's dream.

Joseph has a dream where the sun and moon and 11 stars are bowing down to him, his father, his mother, and his brothers.

There's a lot of Old Testament illusions in the book of Revelation.

So with that in mind, I think that sounds kind of like mom, dad, 12 children of Israel.

That sounds like kind of like the nation of Israel.

Hmm.

Isn't Satan often in the Old Testament attacking the nation of Israel?

Yeah, yeah.

Now let's look at verse number three.

Another sign appeared in heaven.

There was a great fiery red dragon having seven horns and seven heads and ten horns.

Well, wait a minute, that sounds a lot like Satan.

Okay, it sounds like Satan.

How do you know it's Satan?

Well, look at verse number nine.

The great dragon was thrown out, the ancient serpent who was called the devil and Satan.

So this is a little easier.

Tells you right here in the passage, hey, it's Satan.

Yep, you're right.

So Satan is persecuting this woman.

And then, verse number five.

She gave birth to a son, a male who is going to rule all nations with an iron rod.

Her child was caught up to God and to his throne.

That is language that's used in other places to speak about Jesus Christ.

Born, gonna come back to rule with a rod of iron, ascended to God and to his throne.

Well, wait a minute, then that's but the mother of Jesus is Mary.

But what about the twelve stars and the crown in that?

Hmm.

Let's look all the way down in the chapter, towards the end of the chapter.

Verse number 17, how the chapter ends.

The dragon was furious with the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring.

Did Satan wage war especially against Jesus' immediate family, Mary's other biological children?

Well, maybe.

Again, did Satan make war against the people of Israel?

Yeah, under Pharaoh, he tried to stamp them out.

But then look what it goes on to say.

The rest of her offspring, those who keep the commands of God and hold firmly the testimony about Jesus.

Well, that's that's sadly not ethnic Israel today.

They're not doing that on the whole.

That's the people of God, that's Christians.

So it's a it's a it's a complex symbol.

You start with Israel persecuted by Satan, to whom the promises came.

You move to the birth of Jesus Christ, who comes through the nation of Israel, through the womb of Mary, and now all of us who by faith are united to Jesus Christ are part of the offspring of God, and Satan's trying to assault God's people.

So, do you have in this chapter suffering Christians and a reigning Christ?

Yes, you've got it there.

Let's turn over to Revelation 20.

Revelation 20.

This is, if you want to think of this as uh, if you're thinking in the holiday terms, this is like the fruitcake.

What exactly is in a fruitcake?

It's hard to say.

It's a little controversial.

Um, why am I going here?

Because I have a fear of man.

And if I don't say something about Revelation 20, people are gonna pounce on me, and I just, I'm a people pleaser.

What can I say?

Uh Revelation 20, the first 10 verses, you can divide it up into three scenes.

Verses 1 to 3, John sees Satan being bound.

Then verses 4 to 6, John sees saints reigning with Christ.

And then in verses 7 to 10, he sees a final battle.

Multiple times in these verses, there's a reference to a thousand years.

That's where we get the term millennium from.

It's not the major theme of Revelation.

Christ's reign is, although this is a this is a feature of it, an element of it.

And to summarize in brief, Christians see these thousand years, and some Christians see Jesus returning to earth before these thousand years takes place.

He returns a second time, and then there's this thousand-year period of Christ's rule, and then we get to the final eternal state, new heavens and new earth.

Other Christians see these thousand years as happening in some sense before Jesus returns again.

That it might even be going on right now, and then Jesus comes back, and there's the final new heavens and the new earth.

So this is something that's our church's statement of faith intentionally doesn't take a stand on this.

It's not the easiest question.

Not all the elders even agree on this question.

And you notice, Bonner, thank you for being here tonight.

The rest of the elders fled the scene.

They didn't even want to be here.

They left me and you to face the sharks afterwards.

And, you know, but but since I'm here and I'm on the firing line, I'll give just my personal opinion.

I think that the millennium is actually going on right now.

Why do I say that?

Well, let me give you just three reasons.

Reason number one, the Bible already talks about Satan being bound before we get to Revelation 20.

Mark chapter 3, 27, Matthew 12, 29, Jesus speaks of binding the strong man in order to plunder his house.

Mark 3 · chapter mention

Number two, up to this point in the book of Revelation, every scene of Christ ruling is a heavenly scene.

John's taken up into heaven where Christ is seated and ruling.

I don't find the compelling evidence to see a change of scene here.

I think what's been going on throughout Revelation is still going on here.

Christ is ruling from heaven, yet when believers die, those who belong to Christ, they're going to be right with him in the intermediate state, ruling alongside of him.

And then, third, just give one more reason, I think that viewpoint better fits with the rest of Scripture, where in other places of Scripture, it connects Christ's second coming with a final judgment, with resurrection, with the new heavens and the new earth.

There's not this specific statement of this intermediate period where there's people that are sinful, living with glorified saints.

It doesn't fit, I think, as well the rest of Scripture.

But let everyone be fully persuaded in their own mind.

All right?

Regardless of how you view that particular thousand years, do we see Christ reigning?

Yes.

Do we anticipate worship?

Yes, we do.

So let's turn to Revelation 21 and 22.

This is the end of Revelation, the end of all things.

And I really will, I think, talk about this a little bit next week.

Um, there's an image that didn't take as much time with tonight.

Revelation 19, the marriage supper of the Lamb, and then even the new Jerusalem is described as a bride adorned for her husband, where God is dwelling with humanity.

So I want to just read from you as we close tonight.

This is like, you know, this is like ice cream.

If you can't enjoy this, there's just no hope for you.

I don't know what to tell you.

But this is Revelation 22, verses 1 to 5.

Revelation 22:1–5

Then he showed me the river of the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb.

Down the middle of the city's main street, the tree of life was on each side of the river, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit every month.

The leaves of the tree are for healing the nations, and there will no longer be any curse.

The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will worship him.

They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads.

Night will be no more, people will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, because the Lord God will give them light, and they will reign forever and ever.

Because he reigns, we reign.

And this is so personal.

Um Christ reigns in a way that's different from the kings of the world.

That some of the kings of the world might have their own immediate personal acquaintances, but Christ invites all of his people to draw near to him and to be subjects and to be bride, to be servants and to be sons and daughters.

We get to be part of his family.

That's the glory of the future.

That's the glory that begins right now.

Worshiping Christians will endure to the end because Christ is reigning to the end.

Let's pray.

Lord God, we adore you.

We say, Lord, help us understand.

There are things in your word that at times we're perplexed by, but we want to steady to show ourselves approved.

We don't want to discount any of your word.

It's all profitable, it's all there, it's important for us.

And we thank you that we grab hold of Christ and we move from there.

We move out into the world, into the page of Scripture, into our own hearts and the hearts of others, knowing that you're reigning right now.

And though we suffer, we can endure, we must endure, we will endure.

There's joy that awaits us.

And even right now, we've experienced that joy in a significant degree.

Even right now in this life, houses and mothers and brothers multiplied to us.

And in the age to come, eternal life.

This is eternal life that we might know you.

Thank you for giving us this revelation of Jesus Christ.

What a fitting capstone to your word, the glory of our Savior on full display.

And we sing praising you for the joy that is in our hearts that cannot be taken away from us, no matter how governments or false teachers attack us, no matter what kinds of suffering that we might face in the future that we have no idea about right now.

Yet we endure all things for the sake of your chosen ones.

We endure all things, knowing that we're more than conquerors of the one who loved us and gave his life for us.

Thank you, O Lord, for your son, how we adore and worship him tonight.

May we worship him as we sing now in Jesus' name.

Amen.