Revelation: The Warnings of Heartache as the Wooing of God

So, church, we are studying the book of Revelation.

So, if you remember, this is John's poetic letter to seven churches.

It's that last book of the Bible that so many of us avoid because it's strange with weird language.

We can get lost in it a lot of times.

A lot of views on the book of Revelation.

Maybe you have a particular view.

We welcome you, glad you're here.

We're taking the covenantal, amillennial view.

Big word, you don't even have to remember it.

But here's sort of what it means: a little bit of a summary.

Is that we see the end times of Revelation, that tribulation, we see that as being the suffering we're actually experiencing right now.

That John is describing life in between the first coming of Jesus and the second coming of Jesus, which is where we live right now.

And so when we talk about the suffering of the world, we're not talking about all of a sudden the end times just started right now.

It's been since the first coming of Jesus, all the way to the second coming of Jesus.

It's a world, it's a world that is not perfect.

It's a world that has suffering, being beat down or shut up or pushed around.

Doors closing over and over and over again.

Feeling like you're never enough, financial anxiety, a spouse that won't cooperate, loved ones who die, a loved one who's sick, a mother who won't talk to you.

Your hair's falling out, all of a sudden hair starts to grow in your knuckles, which is destroyed.

It's like I can't grow it here, but then the knuckle all of a sudden, it's amazing how much hair you have.

It's like that's personal, but you know it's true.

You know it's true.

Your leg hurts.

You don't know why.

Just started hurting.

Can't figure that one out.

Your back hurts, your neck hurts.

We still have wars.

There's genocides, there's still slavery, racism, divisions.

Families not always easy.

There's hurricanes, there's earthquakes, there's tornadoes.

And then just the stuff going on inside of us.

It's like the mess of being a person, of anxiety or hurt, or old traumas, or your own sin, your own mistakes, your guilt, your shame, your fear.

So, hey, glad you came.

I'm really happy you're here this morning.

You came for fifth grade graduation recognition.

Um, glad you're here.

Well, before you walk out, let's head into Revelation 8, 1 through 4.

We're gonna cover a lot this morning, so I'm gonna be jumping through.

We're actually covering chapter 8, 9, 10, and 11.

So I'm gonna summarize a bit.

If you want to dig in more on your own time, there's a great Bible study and commentary by John Stott of the book of Revelation.

You can look into that.

Revelation 8, 1 through 4.

When the Lamb opened the seventh seal, now we've already talked about seals 1 through 6, okay?

So you gotta go back and listen to that.

The Lamb opened the seventh seal.

So this is Christ, the Lamb, opening the seventh seal.

These seals are these descriptions of what the world is like.

Now, when this seal's open, this is different than 1 through 6, and that's why I held it for this week.

There was silence in heaven for about half an hour.

Then I saw these seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them.

So that's where we're headed to these trumpets.

And another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer, and he was given much incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar before the throne, and the smoke of the incense with all the prayers of the saints rose before God from the hand of the angel.

Here's point number one, amidst all this symbolic language, poetry.

John's a pastor, and he's a poet.

Point number one is this all of heaven stops as God listens to our hearts' praises and burdens.

The seventh seal's open, and what we get in this moment is that heaven, all this praise to God, it just stops.

All of heaven stops for your prayers and my prayers to be heard.

That's good news.

I have all sorts of prayers.

A lot of them are ridiculous, selfish, limited for sure, right?

Just like yours.

But they are my burdens, they are my cares.

And it's such good news to know that God hears them.

He hears them.

And in time, often painfully slow, he guides and he fathers us toward the full restoration that one day we will know in heaven.

Two weeks ago, when I was on that Westside Elementary, fifth grade retreat with a few of you dads, I talked about it last week a little bit.

It was the end of the first day.

Reed Weigel and I had a cabin full of fifth grade boys.

So it's the end of the first day.

We get in the cabin, we've run these kids, just run them to the ground outside with four square football and everything.

I mean, our theory, just get them as tired as possible before you get them in that cabin.

You know, because you don't want them with energy in the cabin.

And we get in the cabin, they still have energy, you know, but we're like, there's not much left.

We're pretty close to the end.

And we're like, guys, please take showers.

You'll smell so horrible.

You've got to go take, go take your showers, get on your pajamas, please take showers.

Go.

And so they're showering up, they're putting on their pajamas, and finally, you know, I'm sitting on my bed, Reed's on his bed.

We've been ready for bed for like 20 minutes, just sitting there kind of waiting for them to calm down.

And let's call the boy Randy, because that's not his name.

And he goes over to his bed and he pulls back his sleeping bag, and there lay two long stinky socks.

And Randy goes, which, by the way, are not his socks.

Okay, that's key to this story, and which are the worst kinds of stinky socks, not your own, somebody else's.

And he goes, Oh, come on, guys, you know, you know, guys, who did Johnny?

Did you do this, Johnny?

Because it wasn't that's not the real name.

Johnny, did you do this?

Johnny, did you put the stinky socks?

Johnny is laughing.

Johnny's having a great time over in the corner as he's been waiting, and the rest of the cabin, they've been waiting for Randy to come over there, pull back the sleeping bag to see the stinky socks.

Read and I, and it's new to us, it's still pretty funny, but we gotta kind of hold back a little bit.

We're holding back a little bit, but it's funny to put stinky socks in somebody's sleeping bag.

We're like, hey, Johnny, get the stinky socks.

Randy's over there, like, Johnny, you always do this, you know, and Johnny's having a great time, the other kids are laughing, right?

That's my point of view from the story.

That's just my point of view.

I didn't see Johnny put the stinky socks there, I didn't see other kids wait around.

I don't know how Randy felt when he pulled it back and saw the stinky socks.

We could retell the story from Randy's point of view.

I could waste your time doing that.

I could waste your time retelling the story from Johnny's point of view, we could do that.

And that way of storytelling, like we said two weeks ago, is called recapsulation.

Right?

Maybe you've read a novel that did this.

This is what John is doing in Revelation.

He describes the world with these seals, and then he recapsulates, tells the same thing from a different point of view, a different angle, different perspective with trumpets.

And then again, we're gonna do it with bowls.

And so that's what's going on here when we enter this idea of trumpets.

Now, while the seals are about description of our pain in this world as believers, the new perspective that John takes when he tells it over again, when he heads into these trumpets, is the idea of a trumpet being a warning.

So now the suffering of the world, the difficulty, the heartache, the hurt, the trauma, the sin, the shame, all of it that we deal with, now let's see it from the point of view as a warning.

Last night, Christy and I and some friends went to the Kenny Chesney concert.

You know, a good cultural experience for us to go.

We went with some friends.

We got there a bit late.

We walked up to the Mercedes-Benz Stadium, and I mean, we're not even in the building, and you could hear and feel the music coming through all that steel and concrete.

So, right, warning number one, it's gonna be loud.

Okay, just real basic, nothing profound, but very clear.

Warning number one.

We walk in, Kenny Chesney concert.

No judgment, I'm there.

You're probably judging me.

I don't know what's going on in your head, but no judgment for me.

But here's what we see when we walk in, right when we walk in by the concession stand, up against the wall, two adults, adults making out, just going for it.

Like strong, really smooshed faces stuff.

Really going for it.

So, warning number two, you're gonna see some things.

Okay?

You're at a Kenny Chesney concert, you're gonna see some stuff.

That's warning number two.

And then Kenny comes out, he's working the crowd, and no matter how you felt, we all kind of know some of these songs, just walking around in the world or shopping in the world, you hear these songs, and before long, fifth, sixth song in, you're singing along.

You are caught up in it.

Everybody is singing along.

We can't even help it.

So there's this like warnings, heads up, here's where you're at, here's the reality of where you're at.

And before long, you are wooed in, and before long, there's this sing along.

Strangely, don't overanalyze the illustration, please don't do that.

Revelation 8 through 11, a little bit similar.

You have these warnings of the reality of where you're at.

That's what John's giving us, these warnings.

Hey, here's where you're at.

Pay attention, here's some summaries.

He's painting it for us with this symbolic language, these images.

And what we get is we get the first four trumpets, which symbolize the brokenness of the natural world.

We see that all over the place.

Here's how it breaks down.

The first trumpet symbolizes the stricken earth and natural disasters.

The second trumpet symbolizes the stricken sea and financial need, uncertainty, and anxiety.

Has anybody checked their investment account?

Right?

The third trumpet symbolizes the stricken river and affected natural resources.

The fourth trumpet symbolizes the stricken sky, barbarian behavior, and humanity's lack of vision for what is right.

It's just a summary of the world, of the brokenness of the world.

And John's saying, hey, these are warnings.

These are warnings.

The final three trumpets symbolize the brokenness of people who live in and of the world.

So this is God's judgment on a sinful people.

Now that can be tough to swallow.

After last week's sermon, I received an email from one of you.

Here was a really key sentence within the email.

I thought it was profound.

A core truth is God's wrath burns against injustice, including and especially my own, for my sake, and not against me for injustice's sake.

There's a lot in that sentence.

Here's what I think it means.

That God is just to burn against my injustice.

And that just burning against injustice, especially my own, that's in me, is actually for me.

Because that injustice in me is broken.

And it causes brokenness.

And what kind of love doesn't burn against that kind of injustice?

Now we can go to the cross for our relief.

Because in the sufficiency of Christ's word for us, all of our injustice and our sin is handled by God's grace and God's love.

So we have a just God that handles our injustice upon himself, and that's why we always say God's grace is sufficient.

And it's also why this same writer, John, when he summarizes God in 1 John, he says, God is love.

Revelation 9, 1 through 6.

And the fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star fallen from heaven to earth.

And he was given the key to the shaft of the bottomless pit.

He opened the shaft of the bottomless pit, and from the shaft rose smoke like the smoke of a great furnace.

And the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke from the shaft.

Then from the smoke came locusts on the earth, and they were given power like the power of scorpions of the earth.

Now don't get caught up thinking this is something to happen in the future.

John's symbolically, poetically describing how what this life is like, suffering and evil in this world.

Verse 4.

They were told not to harm the grass of the earth, or any green plant, or any tree, but only those people who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads.

They were allowed to torment them for five months, but not to kill them, and their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it stings someone.

And in those days, people will seek death and will not find it.

They will long to die, but death will flee from them.

So the fifth trumpet symbolizes the emergence of Satan.

We can think of Satan as a force or better a personhood of lies.

It's the functioning of lies in the world.

And yet John gives us a Satan limited in power and scope, that evil has a limitation upon it.

So we don't build or live a life of faith, of fear, but just recognition of the reality of evil in the world and falsehoods.

And the reason why we don't is because we have verse four.

That in the middle of this warning, John gives us verse four.

Because we remember who we belong to, that we've been marked.

Obviously, I don't have anything on my forehead right now, and neither do you.

This is imagery of saying you are forever and always God's.

You're not your own, and you're not the devil's, you're not evils.

Your life doesn't have to be founded on falsehoods.

You are sealed, safe, and secure when you are in Christ, when you surrender to Him.

Now the warning here is true.

The longer we fight to be our own Savior, the more we resist surrendering to God, the more torment we will know.

Because it is exhausting to try to be your own God and your own creator and your own savior.

It's a trumpet call.

It's a warning.

You were created by God and for God.

The sixth trumpet blows, more of mankind is dying.

And then John writes in Revelation 9, 20 and 21 the rest of mankind who were not killed by these plagues did not repent of their works, of their hands, nor give up worshiping demons.

And you're going, ah, you know, I don't, maybe you struggle with that, I don't know.

But this next part hits me.

And idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood.

See, we could just keep adding to that list and say, and houses and cars and investment accounts, which cannot see or hear or walk.

Nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.

So here's a group of people who just never turned to God, but to their creator.

Resisted all the warnings, all the wooing of God to Himself to say, I have all welcome for you and all love for you.

All my justice is even for you.

The six trumpets symbolizes the refusal of people to God's call.

Point number two, ultimate foolishness is desiring human independence.

We could say autonomy.

We could also say love of idols.

Ultimate foolishness is desiring human independence over relationship with God or over trust with God.

Now, just before the seventh trumpet, John tells two stories.

It's like John is constantly flipping back and forth through these chapters of giving a warning and then reassuring those who have a relationship with God and Jesus.

The first story comes, and John tells a story about a large and splendid angel that comes down and legs straddle the earth and the sea.

It's an image of Jesus being enough for all the hurting and the foolish of the world.

And then in Revelation 10, 8 through 11, we get this.

Then the voice that I had heard from heaven spoke to me again, saying, Go take the scroll that is open in the hand of the angel who's standing on the sea and on the land.

So I went to the angel and told him to give me the little scroll, and he said to me, Take and eat it, it will make your stomach bitter, but in your mouth it will be sweet as honey.

And I took the little scroll from the hand of the angel and ate it.

And it was sweet as honey in my mouth.

But when I had eaten it, my stomach was made bitter.

Then it was told, You must again prophesy about many peoples and nations and languages and kings.

Here's the point we get out of it.

The gospel's always bittersweet.

Right?

It's bittersweet for me to say, I or we are sinners, yet we're perfectly loved by God in Christ.

There's a bittersweet to that.

Well, it's really sweet to know you're loved perfectly by God.

It's bitter to have to come to grips with the fact that we're not perfect and that we're sinners.

As well, the idea of being a Christian is bittersweet.

The idea of even sharing the gospel with somebody can be bittersweet because it's such good news and relief to somebody who's hurting or exhausted or in sin or they're ashamed or they're just struggling with condemnation or guilt, and yet at the same time that very person might reject it.

And that's bittersweet.

John then tells the second story.

There's two witnesses.

One is represented by olive tree, and the other by lampstand.

Now, if you remember back to chapter one, lampstands symbolize the church.

So we have the church.

Now we know from Zechariah chapter 4, olive trees represent those who serve the Lord.

Zechariah 4 · chapter mention

So we have the church and those who serve the Lord.

John's being pastoral to any of us that are believers and that we're suffering.

Or we have some fear of eternity.

Or any of these warnings that might fear these churches when they read this letter.

And John's just assuring them, saying, Hey, you are secure.

You are secure if you're in Christ.

Revelation 11, 15 through 19.

Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, last trumpet.

And 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 shall reign forever and ever.

And the twenty-four elders who sit on their thrones before God, and remember, the elders represent us, the church, fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying, We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, who is and who was, and for you, have taken your great power and begun to reign.

The nations raged, but your wrath came, and the time for the dead to be judged, and for rewarding your servants, the prophets and saints, and those who fear your name, both small and great, and for destroying the destroyers of the earth.

Then God's temple in heaven was opened.

The ark of his covenant was seen within his temple.

There were flashes of lightning, rumbles, peals of thunder, an earthquake, and heavy hail.

Seventh trumpet symbolizes the ushering in of a new existence of Shalom.

A new heaven for us one day.

One day.

One day.

Point number four is this awe and gratitude.

See, I don't know how much we're gonna be able to figure out everything and all that all that language.

I don't know how we're gonna be able to figure out all that.

But I do know this.

Point number four, awe and gratitude is our response to seeing our God who seeks and redeems and restores.

That's the response of the heart.

On May 8th, just two weeks ago, maybe you saw this in the news.

U2's Bono and their guitarist, The Edge, they traveled to Kiev in Ukraine, into the war zone.

They went down into the subway station where people have been living in the subway station.

Here's a couple pictures of them in the subway station.

To give these people a concert.

It's not even fair to say perform a concert, to give to these people the gift of music.

He opens with the song Sunday Bloody Sunday.

I mean, that's a profound choice to open for these people who are living in a subway station in the middle of war.

The amount of heartache, the loss, the trauma of these people.

And you don't have to just think about these people and think, well, you know, this kind of talk is for people that are in that situation.

We don't have to comparatively suffer.

We don't have to do that for your heartache to be real.

Because there's something going on in you, right?

You have some loss or frustration or exhaustion, some shame, some guilt, something, some mess.

You want it so badly to be better or to be set right.

I mean, Bono just showing up in the subway station.

That's enough for a whole sermon illustration.

Just the idea.

He could be anywhere in the world.

I mean, a man of wealth and power and prestige, and he goes to them.

He doesn't wait for them to have the ability to buy a ticket to come to his tour in a safe London, right?

No, no, no.

He goes to them in their pain.

What a gospel image for us.

He sought them in their pain.

He didn't wait for them to be able to afford it.

And then he sings to them.

Listen to the lyrics of the song.

He sang to them.

He opened up with it.

How long, how long must we sing the song?

How long, how long?

Wipe the tears from your eyes.

Wipe your tears away.

I'll wipe your tears away.

Sunday, bloody Sunday.

We eat and drink while tomorrow they die.

The real battle just begun to claim the victory Jesus won.

This is where John takes us over and over again in the book of Revelation.

Because as believers, the warnings are real.

But what John is rooting us in is the sufficiency of Jesus, the comfort of that.

Over and over again for the suffering that we are in now.

And for any reality of the day of our next life.

And where John takes us over and over again is the way that the elders are responding.

Because remember, the elders are us.

It's us.

Revelation 4.11, they begin to sing, worthy are you, our Lord, and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.

Remember when we sing, worthy are you, we're singing, Jesus, you have rightful and enough significance for my life.

You are befitting to my life.

See, that's the response when we hear the warnings of the trumpets.

It's for us to say, Worthy are you.

That's our response.

Worthy are you?

No, no, nothing else is, nobody else is.

In chapter 5, the elders began to shout, 512, worthy is the Lamb who is slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.

And then now here at the end of the trumpet warnings, again we find them, not a fear-filled church in response to warnings.

No, they fall on their faces in worship.

They proclaim thanksgiving.

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We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, who is and who was, for you have taken your great power and begun to reign.

Let's pray together.

God, we thank you that you warn us in your love.

That it is not warnings because you are vindictive, it is not warnings because you want to smite us or crush us or condemn us.

No, it is warnings to woo us into your love and welcome.

And that you lavishly love us, and even all of your justice upon our injustice is out of love for us.

And help us to hear your call even more.

Help us to see the warnings of this world that we were made for something more than this world.

That's why our hearts desire and crave restoration.

That we were made by you and we're made for you.

Help us to be the repentant, that repent of all the behaviors in our lives that are broken, and all the motives of our hearts that are broken, and all the idols that we rely on that ultimately never deliver.

And that we just keep running idol to idol, running in circles, and help us to finally surrender, give up to rest in you, to hear the words that you said, Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.

We pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.