Revelation: The Marriage Supper (19:1-9)

Hello, friends.

This is Pastor Creighton.

Thank you for tuning in to Newsong Church's Sermon Podcast.

At Newsong Church, we want to see Jesus lifted high in Port Perry, Ontario, as we worship, grow, and serve.

You can learn more about us and find contact info at newsongportperry.ca The second lesson is from Revelation chapter 19, the first nine verses.

Revelation 19 · chapter mention

After this, I heard what seemed to be the loud voice of a great multitude in heaven crying out, Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our God, for his judgments are true and just, for he has judged the great prostitute who has corrupted the earth with her immorality, and has avenged on her the blood of his servants.

Once more they cried out, Hallelujah! The smoke from her goes up forever and ever.

And the twenty-four elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshipped God, who was seated on the throne, saying, Amen, hallelujah! And from the throne came a voice saying, Praise our God, all you his servants, you who fear him, small and great.

Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters, and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out, Hallelujah! For the Lord our God, the Almighty reigns.

Let us rejoice and exalt and give him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready.

It was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure, for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints.

And the angel said to me, Write this.

Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

And he said to me, These are the true words of God.

The word of the Lord.

Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

Let's pray.

Lord Jesus, because of the great love with which you loved us, you endured the cross, scorning at shame, and are now seated at the right hand of God the Father, and you promise to come again in glory.

So, Lord Jesus, would you show us your love for us afresh in such a way that we cannot help but love one another and be your disciples?

So, Lord, we thank you for the gift of your word.

We pray that your Holy Spirit would illuminate to our hearts and give us hope and set our eyes on your table.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

Please be seated.

So, what's the best meal you've ever had?

That might be a cruel question to ask if your mind is already set on lunch.

What's the best meal you've ever had?

Are you picturing a plate in front of you right now?

What's on that plate?

Maybe it's a nice T-bone steak, maybe it's a smoked salmon.

Whatever it is, we can think perhaps of a uh perhaps we can visualize our favorite meal, perhaps a memory comes to mind.

But when I start to think about favorite meals of mine, I start to think there's more going on than what's on my plate or what's on the menu.

Some of my favorite meals are spent in an occasion of celebration.

One particular meal that comes to mind is uh just finishing up my undergraduate studies, uh, my family came into town, came into Chicago, uh, along with gathered with a bunch of my friends and a pat and my pastor, and uh the lot of us went out to this Polish restaurant right near my apartment where I was living in Chicago, and that was a joyful meal.

That was an excellent meal, more than just the pierogies we ate.

It was the occasion, it was celebrating, um overcoming, as it were, the tribulation and trials that come with all of your college studies.

We were setting that behind me for six sweet weeks before I started my graduate studies, and uh and that was a joyful occasion.

But even in sharing that, we can see there's more going on than just the occasion of this meal, isn't it?

We spend the best meals, perhaps, with the company we love the most, perhaps those who love us the most as well, gathering with family, gathering with friends, gathering with those who are so near and dear to our hearts that we wouldn't want to be without them.

That makes me think that perhaps another one of the best meals of my life was my wedding reception, where I had probably two bites of salad and two bites of the mane, but nevertheless it was one of the best meals I had because here is my bride who I love the most, here are all the people we love the most and love us the most, all together in one place.

So there's a menu, there's an occasion, but there's the company we keep.

There is so much more to our best meal than just the food in front of us, isn't there?

Consider all the thoughts and feelings that come with thinking about the best meal we could ever have.

Now think about all the thoughts and feelings that come to the mind when you think about the phrase, it's the end of the world.

Those are two very different thoughts and feelings that come to mind, aren't there?

I think it's because we've been, at least I've been, so thoroughly catechized by Hollywood's vision of the end of the world, which probably involves exploding buildings and nations collapsing and uh the climate uh becoming just completely uninhabitable, and Nicolas Cage is screaming the whole time.

The end of the world evokes a lot of fear and anxiety for me.

But what's remarkable is how different God's word, the vision that God's word gives us, of the end of the world.

I was almost tempted to call this sermon, it's the end of the world and we will dine.

But exactly, I'm not gonna go there.

See, this phrase the end of the world isn't strictly speaking a biblical phrase.

The Bible doesn't envision a cataclysmic end to human life and the world we occupy.

Rather, the Bible sees a renewed earth as this present age, characterized by tribulation and trial and suffering and sin and death, gives way under the Lord's sovereignty and a full realization of his reign and rule in all of creation.

This present age of tribulation gives way to an age to come, an age of shalom, an age of peace and celebration and joy where God will dwell with his people forevermore.

And at the center of God's renewing work, the goal of history, we see a table.

We see a feast, we see a marriage supper, we see a meal at the center of God's goal for history.

That's what we read in Revelation 19.

Let us rejoice and exalt and give God the glory.

Why?

For the marriage of the Lamb has come.

Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

See, God's goal for all of history is to bring us to his table.

Maybe this suggests something of the significance of sharing meals with one another.

The fellowship and friendship we enjoy uniquely over food says something about that table we all anticipate, whether we know it or not.

Here's what I'd like us to do.

I'd like us to understand this meal, this meal that's at the center of all of history.

I think that Revelation tells us this is a victory feast.

And I also think it tells us it's a wedding feast.

This is God's goal for all of history.

And this is his invitation to you and to me.

This is a victory feast.

If you have your Bibles, or if we have your order of service, I encourage you to turn with me to Revelation 19.

John is having a heavenly vision given to him while he's in exile in the island of Patmos at the end of the first century.

John sees this.

After this, John says, I heard what seemed to be a loud voice of a great multitude in heaven crying out, Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our God, for his judgments are just and true.

For he has judged the great prostitute who corrupted the earth with her immorality, and has avenged on her the blood of his servants.

Once more they cried out, Hallelujah! The smoke from her goes up forever and ever.

And the twenty-four elders and the four living creatures, we've met them in previous readings in this series, they fell down and worshipped God who is seated on the throne, saying, Amen.

Hallelujah.

So if there's one word here that really sticks out to you, what would that word be?

For me, that word is hallelujah.

We see it three times here.

We see it four times total in our complete reading this morning, with one Greek variant in verse five.

This word hallelujah means praise the Lord.

More specifically, it's a second person imperative.

It's saying, Hey you, you praise the Lord.

Hallelujah.

Now, uh for us Anglicans in our liturgy, we see that hallelujah's often transliterated uh hallelujah.

We drop the H and the J.

I'm not sure why.

I think there's a copyright issue with the Baptists who own the H and the J.

But the point is this isn't an English word, it's a transliteration of a Hebrew word that means praise the Lord.

And the remarkable thing about this passage is it is the only passage in the New Testament where you will find this phrase hallelujah.

Did you know that?

That really struck me in my reading this passage and reading about this passage this week.

You will find the word hallelujah only here in the New Testament, and you won't just find it once.

You'll find it said in rapid succession, one after the other.

This high concentration of hallelujahs, I think, is very intentional for John.

He wants his readers to catch a glimpse of what he's talking about.

He's assuming his readers, of course, are very familiar with the Old Testament scriptures.

They've heard this word hallelujah many times over.

They know that the word hallelujah is scattered mostly in the book of Psalms.

And within the Psalms, you'll find the most concentrated uh uh the most concentrated amounts of hallelujah in Psalms 113 to 118, which are called the Hallel Psalms.

And they were read in and around the Passover feast.

Psalm 113 and 114 were read before the Passover feast, and then 115 to 118 were read afterwards.

In other words, the word hallelujah, which we see in rapid succession through all these psalms, is connected to God's saving, delivering action in the Passover.

God has rescued his people from Egypt and brought them to the promised land, so what can God's people say but praise the Lord?

See, it's this connection with God's delivering action that God wants us to catch.

This is a victory celebration following God's mightiest act of deliverance.

And we know that from verses one and two.

He is judged the great prostitute, who has corrupted the earth with her immorality and has avenged on her the blood of his servants.

So that's crystal clear, right?

I don't need to comment on that any further.

What does that mean?

Well, we need to zoom out just a little bit.

Our lectionary is leading us through Revelation, and last week we were in Revelation 7, so we've had a big jump to Revelation chapter 19.

Revelation 19 · chapter mention

In Revelation chapter 7, we saw a great multitude called out from the world praising God in his throne room.

Revelation 7 · chapter mention

And since chapter 7, we have seen recapitulations of judgment and tribulation and trial and all the things that result when the kingdoms of earth oppose themselves to the kingdom of God which is coming in Christ.

And so we come to a head in chapter 17, where John says, I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that had seven heads and ten horns, which is kind of an evil contrast to the description of the lamb in chapter five.

And blasphemies against God were written all over this beast.

And he goes on to say, a mysterious name was written on her forehead, Babylon the Great, mother of all prostitutes and obscenities in the world.

That's a little wordy, but the point is this: this is a personified Babylon.

It's a personified kingdom that stands in unrelenting opposition to God's purposes in history.

And it's a kingdom that entices his people to forsake the promises of God and wander into the kingdoms of this world with all of its purposes and enticements.

It's a kingdom that says, not your will, God be done, but my will be done.

Which we especially see in the slaughtering of God's people in chapter 19.

I was reading a book recently about priests who opposed fascism in the Second World War.

And I was actually just having a conversation with someone telling me about how their parents smuggled in Bibles behind the Iron Curtain back in the 1970s.

See, we think that persecution might be something that's ancient, but generation after generation we're reminded that we live in a Babylon of sorts, that the purposes of uh our earthly purposes are so often set against God.

We say, My will, not yours, be done.

And the persecuted church in many parts of the world knows that so well for themselves today.

But there's good news for God's people.

Chapter 18, Babylon falls.

Babylon is fallen, John sees.

That great city is fallen, and God calls out, Come away from her, my people.

Do not take part in her sins, or you will be punished with her.

See, God's victory over evil, over suffering, over death, over oppression, over suffering, it's at hand.

His victory is being realized.

Evil will come to an end.

And now it's time for celebration.

Hallelujah, God's people, cry out.

See, isn't this hope for those of us who suffer?

It's hope in John's day for a church enduring such fierce persecution by the Roman Empire, who's tempted to give way and bend the knee to Caesar.

John is calling them to say, No, there will come a day where all evil and opposition will be answered by God.

It's hope for our day as well, in all the ways that we know suffering for ourselves, in all the way that we feel the temptation to compromise and give way.

There is hope that one day Babylon will fall, that God's kingdom on earth will be realized as it is in heaven.

So God calls out to us, come away from her, my people.

God desires for us to come away from Babylon and share in his victory, which he's won through the cross, through the resurrection, and through the ascension.

But the question for God's people is what is our heart set upon?

Is it set upon our will be done or thy will be done?

We are called, friends, out of Babylon and to the wedding feast.

And here's where I want us to land.

This is a victory of celebration over evil and oppression.

This is a celebration of the greatest union ever to be realized.

Then John says, I heard what seemed to be a voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out, Hallelujah! There it is again.

For the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigns.

Let us rejoice and exalt and give him the glory.

Why?

For the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready, and it was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure, for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints.

And this identifies the bride as the church.

This is a happy ending to the greatest love story ever told.

God has loved his people like a spouse, and here is the union, the wedding day.

This is not an image that's unique to the book of Revelation.

This is an image we've seen throughout Scripture.

We see it especially in the prophet Isaiah in chapter 54, when Isaiah writes, Fear not, you, God's people, will not be ashamed.

He says, Be not confounded, for you will not be disgraced.

Your maker is your husband.

The Lord of hosts is his name, and the Holy One of Israel is your redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called.

For the Lord has called you like a wife, which is to say he's loved you, and he's called you to himself, and he wants you to know his great and enduring and unfathomable love towards you.

It suggests something of the significance of Christian marriage.

It's supposed to be an icon, something that gives witness and radiates God's love between spouses, but outwardly through the church as well.

See, God has loved his people with an unfathomable and enduring love, and he longs for them to know his love for themselves.

But God's people have not loved him back with the same faithfulness that he's shown.

So you read elsewhere in the prophet Ezekiel chapter 16, you, God's people, thought your fame and beauty were your own.

Ezekiel 16 · chapter mention

So you gave yourself as a prostitute, there's that word prostitute again, to every man who came along, which is to say you were so unfaithful to God's promises towards you.

Your beauty was theirs for asking.

You used to love lovely things and I gave that I gave you.

Pardon me, you used the lovely things I gave you to make shrines for idols, where you played the prostitute.

Unbelievable.

How could such a thing ever happen?

You took the very jewels and gold and silver ornaments I had given you and made statues of men and worshipped them.

This is adultery against me.

God goes on to conclude, What a sick heart you have, says the Sovereign Lord, to do such things as these, acting like a shameful prostitute.

See, the love story of the Bible is not that we first loved God, but that God first and committedly loved us when we spurned his love and preferred to live in a Babylon of our own making, when we deserved his rejection, he kept on loving us with a steadfast and redeeming love.

And that's who Jesus is.

God who so loved the world gave his only begotten Son.

Jesus, God in the flesh, came to redeem us, his people, from Babylon, through his cross and through his resurrection, so that we can share an everlasting union with him.

And now in Revelation 19, the fullness of his love for his people is realized, and Jesus steps into the role of the bridegroom, to wed himself in perfect loving union to his great love, his people, the church.

This is where all of history is heading.

The perfect union of God and his people.

This is the marriage supper, the occasion of God's love realized for his people in perfect, eternal union.

And the angel turns to John and says, Write this.

Get this on paper.

Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

Is this an observation?

Hey, people are really lucky if they get into that supper.

It's an invitation.

It's an invitation to John.

John, you are blessed because you are invited to this marriage supper, not as an observer, but as a participant.

Jesus loves you enough that he wants to call you out of Babylon and to himself.

And it's an invitation by extension to John's readers and to us here at New Song Today.

God wants you to.

At the marriage supper.

Don't you want to spend forever with your unfathomably loving Maker who loves you with an unyielding love in Christ?

See, God's goal for history is to bring us to this table, to celebrate his victory over evil, and to join him in a wedding feast.

Well, that's really nice, Creighton.

That's something to look forward to.

What does that mean right now?

Let's land right here.

I don't think God leaves us without a meal.

God feeds us even now as we anticipate that great feast to come.

See, on the night that he's betrayed, our Lord Jesus took bread, and when he given thanks, he broke it and said, Take this, all of you, for this is my body which is given for you.

I'm blanking on the words, but you know what I'm talking about.

He institutes a holy meal, doesn't he?

He takes bread, he takes wine, he gives us this sacrament, a participation in God's redeeming love for us.

See, in a way, I think in a very real way, communion is like an ingested sermon.

Thomas Watson, a Puritan preacher, says this that a sacrament, the Lord's Supper, but you could say the same of baptism as well.

The Lord's Supper is a visible sermon.

When we see Christ broken in the bread, it is as if he is crucified before us.

And this does more affect our hearts than bare preaching of the cross.

Why is that?

He says the word brings us to Christ, and the sacrament builds us up in him.

What is a sermon?

Why do I get up and preach Sunday for Sunday?

Why do pastors preach?

It's because a sermon is God's word proclaimed to God's people.

And what is God's word to his people?

His word is this you are a sinner, but in Christ your sins are forgiven.

Though left to yourself you live in Babylon, in Christ you are called out to his kingdom.

On your own you have no share with Christ, but in Christ you are invited to his table.

Though you die, yet in Christ shall you be made alive.

See, preaching is God's means of putting his word of hope, his gospel, into our hearts through the ears.

But the Lord's supper is God's means of doing much the same by putting his words into our hearts, except through the mouth and through our digestive system.

See, it's no accident when we come to receive communion, we hear these words Sunday for Sunday.

Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

This is the word that God wants you to chew on, to ingest, to strengthen you.

This is why Jesus institutes his supper.

He wants you to eat from this table, consuming a sermon, good news, as often as we gather.

And the good news is that you are invited to a greater table to come, this eternal feast of victory and union with God Himself, of which this table is only a foretaste.

So come and eat by faith, because you are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

See, in Christ, this is the best meal, or pardon me, in Christ, we know that the best meal we will ever have is yet to come.

The menu, Isaiah tells us, is of rich food, of well-aged wine, well refined.

The occasion of this best meal is victory over all evil and suffering.

And it's occasioned by the marriage of the Lamb with his bride.

And the company we'll keep at this meal is that we will be with Christ, our Savior, who loves us with an enduring love forevermore.

So so, dear brothers and sisters, let us rejoice and exalt and give God the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come.

Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

Come and eat by faith.

Draw near to Christ your Savior.

Amen.

Thank you for listening today.

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May God bless you and keep you today and every day.