The Seven Seals

I have a confession to make. That is when I was mapping out the series in the book of Revelation a few months ago.

It did not occur to me that we would be preaching on the four horsemen of the apocalypse on Mother's Day.

So I apologize for that. Happy Mother's Day, by the way.

I actually think it fits.

I do.

I do. Strife, famine, pestilence.

Sounds like being a mother of a preschooler.

Sounds like a typical day in the life.

We are looking at the book in Revelation.

We've been looking at it for a few weeks.

I want to start this week with a reference to somebody that some of you probably are familiar with.

Viktor Frankl was a psychiatrist who was alive during World War II

and experienced firsthand the horrors of the concentration camp.

And being a psychiatrist, one of the things that he noticed during his time there

was that there was a vast disparity between how people responded to and handled the horror and the suffering of those camps.

He saw people who were smart and strong and tough crumble into dust.

And he saw other people, very unlikely people, actually not only survive but in a few cases thrive in inexplicably horrible conditions.

And one such young woman he talks about in his book, which is Man's Search for Meaning.

A young woman who was cut off from her family, had been taken, separated from them.

She had been subjected to all kinds of torture and horrible experiences.

And she knew that she would probably be dead within the week.

Nevertheless, she was cheerful.

And he realized that she was in her right mind.

And so he asked her, how could you possibly be cheerful?

And she said, well, it's because I've had what can only be described as a spiritual awakening.

I'm alive, spiritually alive in a way that I've never been before in my life.

I never even thought something like this was possible.

And she said, it's only possible because of the suffering that I've endured.

And it led to a great realization in Viktor Frankl's life.

And that is this, that suffering is inevitable.

But the thing that makes the difference between whether suffering crushes us

or leads to our not only surviving but possibly even thriving,

it doesn't matter how smart you are, how strong you are, how tough you are.

The thing that matters most is this, how do you answer the question of meaning?

When you look at the suffering that you're experiencing in your life, what does it mean?

Some religions say that suffering is divine punishment.

Some religions say that suffering is merely an illusion.

Secular humanism in the West says that there is no meaning.

It's all meaningless suffering.

Christianity says something very, very, very different.

Christianity says that it is only possible to make sense of our suffering,

it's only possible to make sense of our story,

by looking at God's story.

By seeing how our story and our experience fits into this much bigger story.

That's the only way we can do it.

And that's why we're looking at the book of Revelation,

because this is where we see the story laid out.

Revelation was written to people who were suffering.

They were facing persecution.

They really felt as though they were powerless in their society.

They felt as though the end was near, that there was really no hope for them.

And Revelation is written poetically, with vivid imagery,

because it's aimed at the imagination.

Revelation is, it's meant to help people who are suffering and struggling,

reimagine that suffering in light of God's story.

It's meant to reveal the truth about what is really going on,

despite appearances.

It's meant to help us make meaning out of the suffering that we experience.

And so that's why we're looking at it.

And this week we're going to be looking at Revelation 6, verse 1 through 8, verse 5.

Revelation 6:1–8

We heard most of that read beautifully by Ellen a little while ago.

We had to omit some of it for the sake of time, but we'll cover all of it.

And this is the place in Revelation where the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ,

has taken the scroll, which is the purpose of God in the world, God's will,

and the Lamb has begun to break the seals open.

Seven seals.

And you know, in the book of Revelation, seven is a very important number.

It's structured all around multiple series of sevens,

just like the seven days of creation.

And so what we have here in the seals is the summation of the history of God's people.

This tells us the whole story.

Past, present, and future.

And this is a pattern that we look at, and we might think of it like this.

This is the life cycle of Christians.

It's the life cycle of the church, beginning, middle, and end.

And it's the life cycle that plays out all through history,

but it's also a cycle that plays out in the life of every Christian.

It's a cycle that was mirrored in the life and ministry of Jesus himself.

And so as we look at these seals being opened,

we're going to see six phases of the Christian life cycle.

First, there is victory.

It all begins with victory.

And then there is conflict.

Conflict ensues.

And then that leads to martyrdom and death.

And then that ultimately gives way to resurrection.

And then lastly, this all produces worship, Sabbath worship.

So those are the six phases of the Christian life cycle.

Let's pray, and then we'll open God's Word together.

Lord, we thank you for your Word.

And we thank you that there are places in Scripture aimed not only at our intellect,

not only at our hearts,

but that there are entire sections of Scripture aimed squarely at the imagination.

Your Word tells us that you're a God who's able to do far more abundantly than we can ask or imagine.

And so we need bigger imaginations so that we will be able to fathom all that is possible with a God like you.

It's in your Son's name that we pray.

Amen.

So first we look at victory.

The first four seals that are opened, each of the first four seals releases one of the famous four horsemen,

so-called four horsemen of the apocalypse.

Now these are very well known in pop culture.

Sadly, I think that they're often misunderstood.

The key to understanding the four horsemen is to understand the context.

If you were here last week, we saw that all of this is taking place in a great heavenly worship service.

And previously, what we looked at last week in chapter 5,

the Lamb of God has just ascended to the throne.

Remember, all heaven was waiting and then the Lamb arrives and all heaven breaks out singing in worship.

And we said, this is the ascension of Christ from the perspective of heaven.

Jesus died, He rose, He appeared to His disciples, and He ascended into heaven.

But before He ascended, He made a promise.

He promised that after He departed, another would come.

The Comforter, the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit.

And so the key to understanding the four horsemen is to understand this.

If Revelation chapter 5 shows us the ascension from the perspective of heaven,

Revelation 5 · chapter mention

what comes after the ascension?

Pentecost.

Pentecost.

The four horsemen are Pentecost.

This is the unleashing of the Holy Spirit.

These are heavenly warhorses of the Spirit-filled church going out into the world to proclaim the gospel.

And you say, well, that's an odd image.

But it's not if your mind is saturated with Old Testament imagery.

And you thought back perhaps to Zechariah, the prophet, who had a vision, a strange vision of God turning His people into His warhorse.

That's exactly what's happening here.

God's warhorse, His people, His Spirit-filled church going out into the world to proclaim and enact the victory of the gospel.

And we see that very clearly with the white horse.

It says in verse 2,

And I looked, and behold, a white horse.

And its rider had a bow.

And a crown was given to him.

And he came out conquering and to conquer.

You know, back in the days of Noah, after the flood, God promised that He would never bring that kind of judgment again.

And to give His people a symbol of His promise, He hung His warbow in the sky.

He's taken that warbow back down again.

He's taken the crown.

And He's gone out as a conquering king.

And the gospel will be proclaimed to the four corners of the earth.

And if there was any doubt that this white horse is not the victorious Christ, we see the white horse show up again in Revelation chapter 19.

Revelation 19 · chapter mention

This is the victorious Christ announcing the victory of the gospel.

And it's very important for us to remember this.

That the Christian life begins with victory.

I know some of you are struggling right now.

You feel hopeless.

The great battle has already been won.

Everything that we do as Christians,

everything that we face, everything that we experience,

is done in the light of a victory that has already been accomplished.

We're living between the victory and the culmination,

when the victory has been fully enacted in every corner of the universe.

It all begins with victory.

Everything we do is a response to that victory.

So that's the white horse.

This is the victory.

The beginning of the Christian life.

Now, what do we do with the remaining horses?

You say, well, it's easy to do that with the white horse.

But are you really going to say that these other three horses are the spirit-filled church going out into the world?

And I would say, absolutely.

If we look at the victory, the victory then leads to conflict.

All of God's people should expect conflict in our lives.

This is part of our story.

It's part of the story.

The red horse comes as the seal is broken and takes away peace and brings a sword to divide people.

Jesus himself said in Matthew 10,

Do not think that I've come to bring peace.

I've not come to bring peace.

I bring a sword.

Jesus divides people.

The gospel divides people.

The gospel divides friends.

It divides families.

It divides governments.

It divides institutions.

The gospel divides.

And that's good news.

Because Jesus is shaking up all the old alliances.

He's shaking up all the old loyalties.

He's turning families and racial groups and ethnic groups and socioeconomic classes and political alignments.

He's turning all of that upside down.

And the reason is what we see in the next chapter.

It's because his plan is to build one great worldwide global family.

And so those old loyalties and alliances, they have to give way to the new global family of God.

So the gospel brings division and strife between people.

Then the black horse is released.

And the black horse carries scales.

And there's a reference to wheat and barley prices.

And then there's a reference to oil and wine being left untouched.

And it seems kind of odd until you understand the context.

This is describing a kind of famine.

A partial famine.

Where it costs so much to buy wheat or barley that an entire day's wages will only buy enough food for that day.

So this is describing a kind of subsistence, hand-to-mouth existence of just scraping by, barely having enough to eat.

And yet the stores of wine and oil remain untouched.

This is describing the situation that we're in now that God has released the Spirit-filled church into the world.

There is a choice that every human being has to make.

Do I live apart from that reality and subsist and scrape by, hand-to-mouth, hoping just to break even?

Or do I come into the church, the place of anointing, the place where God's people are anointed with the oil of the Holy Spirit?

Because in the church, at God's table, the Lord's table, there is plenty to go around.

There's plenty of wine.

There's plenty of subsistence for people who come hungry.

There's a place for you at the table.

And so the choice that we're given with this horse is famine or feast.

Which will it be?

Famine outside on your own or come into the church and feast at the Eucharistic table.

And then, of course, after that, there is a pale horse who comes.

The pale horse named, the rider's name is Death and Hades.

In chapter 1, we see that the risen Christ holds the keys of Death and Hades.

They are under His control.

And the hard truth that we need to face, Christian or not,

is that the gospel is not simply a set of propositions, a belief system, a way of making sense of life.

The gospel and how we respond to the gospel is life or death.

People who respond by accepting Christ awaken to new life.

The people who reject Christ and the message of the gospel face only death.

It's life or death.

And so in all of these ways, these first four seals, the four horsemen,

show us that wherever the church proclaims the gospel,

wherever the gospel is announced,

conflict inevitably follows.

You know, I remember when I first became a Christian when I was 22,

I actually thought it would make my life easier.

I actually thought it would be easier.

I thought, well, now that I have a church,

and now that I have Christian friends,

and now that I can pray,

and now that I am reading the Bible and doing all of this,

and now that I know that I belong to God,

certainly my life's going to get easier.

And it's been the exact opposite.

From the moment, I would say from the moment that I became a Christian,

my life has been significantly harder.

And it's remained harder.

It disrupted many of my friendships.

It disrupted my whole plan that I had worked out for my life.

It disrupted my sense of identity.

It brought an enormous amount of disruption.

And anybody who says that when you follow and obey Jesus,

that brings peace into your heart is misreading that Bible verse.

Following Jesus is extraordinarily challenging most of the time.

It requires painful sacrifice.

It makes our life harder.

It brings conflict because Jesus doesn't brook competition.

Jesus brings conflict into our lives because we have to choose.

Am I aligned with Him or not?

Do I want feast or famine?

Do I want to choose resurrection life or death?

That's the kind of conflict that follows the gospel.

And there's great opposition outside and within our own hearts

to the message of the kingdom

because it means our kingdom has to crumble

to make way for His.

So the gospel brings conflict,

but it doesn't stop there.

The next phase of the Christian life cycle is martyrdom.

And the fifth seal, as it is cracked open,

reveals the souls of martyrs.

And they begin to cry out the souls of the martyrs.

And it says that these are people, quote,

who had been slain for the word of God

and for the witness they had borne.

The martyrs cry out for justice and vindication.

When will you come?

When will you bring us justice?

And look how God responds.

Verse 11,

Then they were each given a white robe,

or you could translate it stole, white stole,

and told to rest a little longer

until the number of their fellow servants

and their brothers should be complete,

who were to be killed as they themselves had been.

You know what this is saying?

Vindication has to wait

because there are more martyrs.

More people are going to be martyred.

And you must wait

until everyone who is going to be martyred

has been martyred.

Who's this talking about?

It's talking about us.

It's talking about us.

Jesus Himself said in John 12,

Truly, truly, I say to you,

unless a grain of wheat falls to the earth

and dies, it remains alone.

But if it dies, it bears much fruit.

And listen, He was not just talking about Himself.

He was talking about His people.

He was talking about all of His people.

You know, martyrdom,

which means dying for your faith

and for your witness,

martyrdom is not just one possible fate

of Christians.

It is the only possible fate

of Christians

because to follow Jesus

is to walk the road to Calvary.

And there is no other way.

There is no fork in that road.

There's one road

and it leads to the cross.

So that's why He said,

if you want to follow Me,

you need to count the cost

and you need to be willing

to take up your cross

because I'm going to Calvary.

So it may be, in your life,

a physical death.

That's not totally out of the question,

like the innumerable countless people

over the centuries

who have been killed for their faith.

Or it may be, as Paul says,

living your life as a living sacrifice,

a living martyr.

It may be the kind of death

that the first disciples had to die

when they left their job

and their friends

and their family

to follow Jesus

wherever He took them.

It could be the kind of death

of being disowned by your family

because you've become a Christian.

Some people in our church

have experienced that.

It could be the kind of death

of giving up the possibility

of ever having a family.

Some people in our church

have experienced that.

It may be the kind of death

of losing your social standing

or your reputation,

which some people in our church

have experienced.

It may be the death

of passing up

a professional opportunity

because it would call you

to compromise

your faith and your values,

as some people in our community

have experienced.

But one way or another,

the Christian life

is a path of martyrdom.

And I think perhaps

maybe one of our biggest needs

as Christians in this country,

specifically at this point in history,

is to recover a theology of martyrdom.

You know,

between our prosperity gospel

and our persecution complex,

we simply assume

that everything should be great,

that we should live lives

that are largely pain-free.

We're woefully out of touch

with the vast majority of Christians

who have lived across the centuries

when we think that,

when we think that

that should be normative.

I think we've lost sight, perhaps,

of what discipleship really means.

You know,

it reminds me of Dietrich Bonhoeffer

who was a martyr.

He was hung.

And he said,

when Christ calls a man

or a woman,

he bids him come and die.

So if you're a Christian

and you're here

and your faith feels flat

or fruitless

or uninspired

or empty,

if you feel like it's waning,

if you're feeling a sense

of disconnection from church

or from your Christian life

and you're just kind of

not quite sure

what you believe,

I want to suggest,

and this may not be true,

but I want to suggest

that the problem

may not be intellectual.

It may not necessarily be

the church that you go to.

It may not necessarily be

anything that you're doing

or not doing.

The problem could be

your self-preservation instinct.

Is it possible

that you're trying

to have your cake

and eat it too?

Is it possible

that you're trying

to buffer yourself

against the cost

of discipleship?

Is it possible

that you're that grain of wheat

that has not yet

fallen to the ground

that is safe

and not vulnerable

and well-protected,

but it's alone

and it's fruitless?

Is it possible

that you need to fall

to the ground

and die in your faith?

Allow yourself

to be martyred for Christ.

If your faith

has not cost you anything,

how could it be worth

anything to you?

The good news is

that the road leads

to Calvary,

but it doesn't end

at Calvary.

The road goes

through Calvary

and it keeps

right on going

because after martyrdom,

the next phase

in the Christian life cycle

is the glorious resurrection.

And this is what we see

during the opening

of the sixth seal.

At first,

it doesn't seem like

good news.

It seems like

the entire world

is falling apart.

The stars are falling

out of the sky,

earthquakes,

the sky being rolled up

like a scroll.

This is the famous

apocalyptic language

from Revelation.

But we know

that even though

it seems like

the end of the world,

it is not the end

of the world.

And the reason we know that

is because this language

exactly parallels

Jesus' own teaching.

What we heard

in our gospel lesson,

what we call

the Olivet Discourse.

Jesus talks about

the stars falling.

He talks about wars

and rumors of wars.

And here's what he says.

Verse 6,

You will hear of wars

and rumors of wars.

See that you're not alarmed.

The end is not yet.

Verse 8,

All of these

are but the beginning

of the birth pains.

He says,

It seems like

the end of the world.

What's going to happen

will seem like the end,

but it's not the end.

It's the beginning.

It's the beginning

of something new.

And so what seems

like the end of the world

is simply the end

of a world.

It's the end

of the old world order.

It's the end

of the old way

of doing things.

It's the end

of the old covenant.

It's the end

of the temple

sacrificial system.

The priests,

as the author

of Hebrews tells us,

serving day in

and day out,

offering sacrifices

that never atone

for the sin

they claim to atone for.

The ineffectual

way of religion.

That's crumbling

to the ground.

And of course,

in the Olivet Discourse,

Jesus is specifically

talking about

the cataclysmic,

earth-shaking event

of A.D. 70,

the destruction

of the temple

in Jerusalem.

Which, if you were

a Jewish person,

that was the end

of the world.

It was the end

of everything you knew.

That was it.

The temple comes

crashing down.

Not one stone

left on the other.

These are all

birth pangs,

however,

because they're signs

that God is bringing

something new

into the world.

So even though

it seems like the end,

it's not.

And here's what

we discover.

The angel cries out,

do not harm the earth

or the sea

or the trees.

So it seems like

everything is going

to be swept away

and the angel says,

stop!

We have to seal

the servants

of our God.

We have to seal them

on their foreheads.

And then something

amazing happens.

John hears

one thing

and then he sees

something else.

Remember,

for those of you

who were here

last week

in chapter 5,

John heard

the announcement

that the conquering

lion had arrived

and when he turned,

what he saw

was not a lion

but a lamb

standing as though

it had been slain.

And we are meant

to surmise

that the lion

and the lamb

are the same thing.

The exact same thing

happens here.

John hears

144,000 Israelites

have been sealed.

Right?

That's the complete number

from all of the 12 tribes.

They've all been sealed.

All of Israel

is here.

So he hears

and then he expects

that when he turns

he's going to see

Israelites,

old covenant Israelites.

And then he turns

and he looks

and what does he see?

Not Israelites,

not only 144,000,

he sees

an innumerable

multitude

of people

from every tribe,

tongue,

and nation.

And what are we meant

to surmise from this?

They're the same thing.

Israel,

the true Israel,

has now gathered.

They've been sealed.

And it's not just Israelites,

it's everybody.

It's people

from every country,

every language,

every tribe,

every religious background.

They're all here.

They're all here.

This is the true Israel.

The true children

of Abraham

by faith.

faith.

They've all come.

And it says

of these people

that they have washed

their robes

and made them white

in the blood

of the Lamb.

This is an army

of martyrs

wearing white robes

that have been washed

in the blood

of the Lamb.

Anyone who wants

to be a part

of God's great

global family,

there's only one thing

that matters.

The old covenant

has been done away with.

The covenant of works.

The covenant of sacrifice.

It's been done away with.

There's only one thing

that matters.

Have you been washed

by the blood

of the Lamb?

Have you been washed

by the blood

of the Lamb?

There was a thread

on Reddit recently

that got attention

and was actually

written about

in the Washington Post.

Somebody posted

in D.C.,

where are good places

to cry

in D.C.?

And what's interesting

and kind of touching

is that this was

a question

just kind of put up there

like a lot of things are

on a site like Reddit,

but it got a lot

of very poignant responses.

People actually

had a lot of thoughts

about the best

public places

to cry

in Washington, D.C.

But what,

if you began

to read the posts,

you realize

that this got

a big response

because a lot of people

live a lot of their life

in this city

feeling like

they want to cry

and needing a place

to go

where they can cry

because people posted

about the difficulty

and the pressure

of living

in Washington, D.C.

And a lot of it

is connected

to the kind

of drivenness,

the success-oriented

meritocracy,

the achievement culture

where you're only

as good

as your last accomplishment,

where you always feel

like everyone around you

is smarter

and more successful,

where you feel like

your job doesn't matter,

where you feel like

you don't matter,

where you're constantly

having to produce

and it's a kind

of never-ending

hamster wheel

of achievement.

And that makes people

want to cry.

And so there are a lot

of people who cry

in parks

and in open,

empty churches

and on street corners

and in the basement

of Macy's

and all kinds of things.

There are people

who go

and they cry

because of the hopelessness

of living

in such a culture.

And what we need

to see here

is that when the angel

opened the sixth seal,

when all the world

seemed to be crashing down,

that was the world

that was crumbling.

It's the world

that says you were

only worth

what you can accomplish.

It's the world

that says you're

only worth

what you've achieved

or what your resume

says you're worth.

That world

came crumbling down.

The world

of earning

and striving

and proving ourselves

to God,

to other people,

is no more,

not one stone

left upon another.

In God's kingdom

only one thing matters.

Have you been washed

in the blood

of the Lamb?

In our baptismal liturgy

we say to kids

who have been baptized,

we baptized some kids

this morning,

you've been marked,

you've been sealed,

you've been sealed

with the Holy Spirit

and you're marked

as one of Christ's own

forever.

What we're saying is

you will be standing

in that great multitude,

not because of

what you've done

but because of

what Jesus Christ

the Lamb

has done for you.

And this leads finally

to the seventh seal

because of course

this gives way

and gives rise

to the seal of worship,

the culmination

of the Christian life cycle,

what it is all for.

Everything stops

in the heavenly worship service,

the liturgy pauses

and there's this period

of silent reflection

in chapter 8

on the awe

and the grandeur of God

and then get this,

the prayers of the saints

are mingled

with incense

and they're lifted up

before the Lord

and this shows us

that the Holy Spirit

intercedes for us,

gathers our prayers

and brings them

into the heavenly throne room

before the Lord.

The Spirit,

knowing what we know,

praying what we need to pray

even when we don't know

what to pray,

that the Spirit intercedes

for us,

guarantees

that our prayers

are heard

by the Lord.

This is one of the reasons

we like to have

incense from time to time

in our service.

It's one of the things

this does.

It reminds us

that as we are gathered here

praying and singing

and confessing

that the Holy Spirit

is interceding,

that our prayers

are being heard,

they're going to heaven,

right?

It's a symbol.

And then something

even more amazing happens.

The censer,

all of the prayers,

the censer is filled

with fire

and then that fire

in response

to the saints' prayers,

that fire is cast down

on the earth.

God answers the prayer.

The prayers of the saints

are effectual.

They are powerful.

The prayer of God's people,

when we gather together

and when we pray,

all hell trembles.

All hell trembles.

The most important thing

that we do as God's people,

our greatest resource,

is prayer.

And when we pray,

this shows us

we should be bold.

Bold in our prayer.

We should know

that God hears us.

We should know

the truth of James 5.16.

The prayer of a righteous person

has great power

as it is working.

And by the way,

Revelation as a whole,

this entire book,

is about the Lord's prayer

being answered.

We pray it every week.

Our Father who art in heaven,

hallowed be your name.

Thy kingdom come,

thy will be done

on earth as it is in heaven.

That's Revelation.

God's kingdom coming.

God's will being done

here as it has eternally been done

in the heavenly realm.

So this is the life cycle

of the church.

It's the life cycle

of every Christian.

This is something

that is not only enacted

throughout history

across the centuries,

but it's something

that we experience

in our own walk of faith.

In some of us,

it's a cycle

that plays out again

and again

and again.

It begins with victory.

The victory that Jesus Christ

has accomplished

and our willingness

to accept that.

it leads to conflict.

It leads to the kind of conflict

that forces us to choose

where our loyalties really lie.

That gives way

to the call for martyrdom.

It's not enough

just to acknowledge Jesus.

He calls us to Calvary

to be that grain

that falls to the ground

and dies

so that it can bear much fruit.

Ultimately,

martyrdom is not the end.

We have the resurrection promise.

Out of death,

God brings resurrection life,

renewal,

and then that new life

produces worship

and effectual prayer.

This is the shape

that Jesus' ministry takes

and it's the shape

that His church

in her ministry will take

and it's the shape

that our lives

in our ministry will take.

So it's worth asking yourself

as we prepare to move on

in our service,

where do you find yourself

in this cycle?

If you're somebody

who's here

and you're not sure

what you believe,

you wouldn't consider yourself

to be a Christian,

perhaps you're considering

whether or not

this is a victory

that has been accomplished

on your behalf.

That Jesus Christ

has overcome sin and death

and desires to overcome

sin and death

in your life.

Maybe you're a Christian

but you're facing

massive conflict.

Don't think that God

has abandoned you.

Don't think that God

doesn't hear your prayer.

Don't think that all of this

is for naught.

If you're experiencing

conflict as a Christian,

it means you're right

where you belong.

This is exactly what

the story tells us

is going to happen.

That's what it means.

That's all it means.

Are you in a place

of martyrdom

where God is trying

to put something

in your life to death?

He's trying to kill

something in your life.

Are you holding on to it,

protecting it,

or will you let him take it?

Because one of the things

that we recognize

as we see this story unfold,

here's what the story shows us.

We all want resurrection life.

We all want effectual prayer.

We all want authentic worship.

We all want the joy

that comes with that.

But resurrection life

and worship,

effectual prayer,

those are things

that are only found

on the far side

of conflict

and martyrdom.

That's the road

that we're called

to walk.

Let's pray.

Amen.

Let's pray.