Revelation: Worthy is the Lamb (5:1-14)

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.

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The second lesson is from the book of Revelation, chapter 5, verses 1 through 14.

Revelation 5 · chapter mention

Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals.

And I saw a mighty angel proclaiming with a loud voice, Who is worthy to open the scroll and break in seals?

And no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look into it.

And I began to weep loudly because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or to look into it.

And one of the elders said to me, Weep no more.

Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.

And between the throne and the four living creatures, and among the elders, I saw a lamb standing, as though it had been slain, with seven horns and with seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth.

And he went and took the scroll from the right hand of him who was seated on the throne.

And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.

And they sang a new song, saying, Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.

Then I looked, and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.

And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea and all that is in them, saying, To him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever.

And the four living creatures said, Amen, and the elders fell down and worshipped.

This is the word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God.

Worthy is the Lamb who is slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.

Amen.

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, worthy one, we pray that you would send out your light and your truth and let them lead us.

Let them bring us to your holy hill and to your dwelling.

It's in Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

So a couple years ago there was a video that kind of went viral, at least it was getting passed around the campus of the Bible college I was uh studying at, which I guess there is a big difference between a video going viral and getting passed around a Bible school campus, now that I think about it.

But nevertheless, this video, you know, was making its rounds, and I eventually got to see it, and it was a a figure who was pretty prominent in some circles of the Christian faith, and uh and and a pretty influential voice uh for what they do.

And they were leading uh the uh praise in a congregational setting, and they were making the point that God takes pleasure when we're happy.

And you know, that's true, like we could probably unpack that more.

Like, God's not happy because we're miserable, you know, but we probably need to unpack that.

But this is the conclusion that this particular person made from this principle is this that when you come to church, when you worship him, you're not really doing it for God, really.

You're doing it for yourself, you know, because it makes you happy.

Because that is what makes God happy when you're happy.

When you come to church, when you worship him, you're not doing it for God, really.

You're doing it for yourself.

So, how does that land on you?

You know, I guess I have a few thoughts that come to my mind, but one of them is I think about Job.

I think about Job sitting in the ashes of what his life used to be, uh encouraged by the person closest to him to just curse God and die already.

And what does Job have to say?

He says, The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.

Blessed be the name of the Lord.

You'll have to pardon my KJV.

There's just something about that verse that deserves to be quoted in the King James.

The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away.

Blessed be the name of the Lord.

See, it's Job's response to worship, not because he's happy, but in the very midst of his suffering, that really strikes me as profound.

And to me, this principle, this video and measuring it up against Job, it raises some questions.

It raises some really fundamental questions like why do we worship?

And what do we worship?

What is the object of our worship?

And I think this is especially important for us to consider as a parish at New Song, if our mission is to lift high Jesus Christ as we worship, grow, and serve.

I think we can break down this English word worship, maybe roughly but fairly, to say worship is worship.

It's ascribing worth, importance, value, significance to one thing above all else.

And I think in this sense, we're all of us worshipers, regardless of our faith commitments or seeming lack thereof of faith commitments.

Human beings are worshiping creatures.

We have to find something significant to give us value and meaning by which we set our lives upon.

See, I think it's this question, what do we worship and why do we worship, that takes us right to the heart of our passage in Revelation chapter 5.

Revelation 5 · chapter mention

Why do we worship?

I think the answer that Revelation 5 gives us is we, brothers and sisters in Christ, worship because Jesus is worthy.

Jesus is worthy, therefore we worship.

Now, this might seem kind of intuitive, but I think if we pause long enough, if we meditate on what's going on here in this heavenly vision, we're going to come to the very heart of our worshiping life.

I think we're going to discover something of the meaning of our Christian life.

And I think we might be even brought to the very center of eternity, the very goal of all history.

We worship because Jesus is supremely worthy.

So here's what I'd like us to do for our time together.

I'd like us to ask what's going on in the context of this passage in Revelation.

I'd like us to ask what makes Jesus worthy, and look at the first seven verses of chapter five.

And then I want us to ask a follow-up question, which is how do we live in the light of his worthiness?

And have a brief look at verses 8 to 14 here.

So what's going on in Revelation?

Well, last Sunday we um cracked open this wonderful and puzzling book called Revelation, The Revelation of Jesus.

And we talked a little bit about what Revelation is and what it isn't.

And we acknowledge that revelation isn't a sort of cryptic code that predicts future events or kind of gives us a cryptic map to determine what the future looks like.

But it is a divinely inspired and a densely symbolic book of prophecy.

It belongs to the genre of biblical prophecy.

It provides a heavenly perspective on our present history and suffering in light of history's final outcome.

And the final outcome of history is simply this: Jesus is one.

So in chapter one, we saw that Revelation has good news for Christians who presently suffer, whether in John's day, the author, or in ours.

And the good news of Revelation is this Jesus is the returning king.

He will come in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.

So chapter 5 picks up on chapter 4.

In chapter 4, Jesus, or pardon me, John has been given spiritual eyes to see God's heavenly throne room, a densely symbolic vision of God's heavenly throne.

And he sees the one sitting on the throne, on the throne of everything, all of history, all of creation.

And God sitting on the throne is surrounded by heavenly creatures, angelic creatures, and 24 elders who represent all of God's people.

And they are ceaselessly praising him, saying, Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and praise.

Above all else, God is worthy of honor.

He is worthy of our praise and our worship.

And as we pivot into chapter 5, as this vision of God's heavenly throne room continues, John catches a glimpse of Jesus.

And the question we want to bring with us into chapter 5 is what is it that makes Jesus worthy?

Chapter 5, verse 1, John says, Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals.

So this scroll is a big deal, and a big deal is made of it throughout this chapter.

The description of the scroll matches a description of a Greco-Roman will or a contract.

It would have the contract or someone's will written on the inside, and it will be, of course, rolled up, and then on the outside, a kind of a brief description of its contents, or the one to whom this will or this contract is intended for.

That would be written on the outside.

John sees this scroll, and based on passages like Daniel chapter 12, Isaiah 29, he intuits what this scroll contains.

Daniel 12 · chapter mention

And we can safely conclude that this scroll is unlike any other scroll in existence.

It's a symbol for God's will and the purpose of all history.

God who reckons with evil, God who realizes his salvation on earth as it is in heaven.

Preacher Daryl Johnson writes that this scroll contains the completeness of God's plan for rectifying what is wrong and establishing his gracious rule in the world.

This scroll contains God's plan for bringing the kingdom of heaven to earth.

What more important document could there be than God's plan for history?

Don't you want to know what's inside?

This scroll is sealed with seven seals.

Now a seal was a wax imprint in it, made sure that only the person for whom this document was intended could open it.

So this scroll being sealed with seven seals, seal seven being the number of completion, this scroll is perfectly secure.

It requires the one for whom it is intended, one who is worthy to open it.

So the question that drives the rest of the passage is who's going to open God's plan for history?

Who's going to crack it open and realize God's kingdom on earth as it is in heaven?

Chapter 5, verse 2.

Follow along with me if you will.

John says, I saw a mighty angel proclaiming with a loud voice, here's the question: Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals?

And get this.

And no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or look into it.

And I began to weep loudly, because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or look into it.

No one is worthy.

I find this kind of unsettling.

And maybe we find it unsettling, maybe in our particular moment in culture and in history where we have a real preoccupation with our sense of self-worth.

And not wrongly so.

I think it would be wrong for us to conclude that a mature Christian faith or a faithful reading of the Bible leaves us with little excuse for self-esteem.

That's been said by even by some preachers from the pulpit that the problem with Christianity is that it crushes our sense of self-worth.

I don't think that that's true.

In fact, I think a truly gospel-centered reading of Scripture leaves us with every sense of how precious and treasured we truly are by God.

But the Bible invites us to consider where our sense of worth is founded.

Where is it grounded?

What grounds our sense of what we're worth and our worthiness?

So I think a truly gospel-centered understanding of Scripture, a maturing Christian faith, understands that we are, we have, we have a tremendous worth to God.

We are image-bearers.

We are those who are redeemed by God, those loved so dearly that God the Father sent his only Son into the world to save us.

But the Bible invites us to understand that our true worth is not something we ascribe to ourselves, something we generate from within, but it's something that we receive like a gift.

But before we can receive the gift, we have to grapple with our own unworthiness apart from grace.

No one is found who is worthy to open up this scroll.

Why is that?

I think it's because all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

We have all of us in our unworthiness, apart from grace, participated in a kingdom that opposes itself to God's purposes.

We, through our selfishness or through our rebellion, have aligned ourselves with those forces that have opposed God and rebelled against him, and so we are disqualified from cracking open this scroll of God's purpose for history.

We cannot realize the kingdom ourselves.

We are left unworthy.

And so, right on the precipice of seeing the kingdom realized, John sees it slip away, seemingly.

And he weeps.

I think those of us who know the end of this story might be tempted to gloss over this detail.

See, John doesn't shed a single, you know, dignified tear like someone looking at the Grand Canyon, you know.

He cries ugly tears.

He weeps loudly because humanity in this moment seems like a tragedy.

For all that we can do, for all we've accomplished, when it's counted most, we're unworthy to realize the kingdom on our own.

It's a scroll away.

But because of our transgression, paradise seems forever lost, and there's nothing we can do about it.

But friends, there's good news for John, and there's good news for us as well.

This tragedy becomes a divine comedy.

Verse 5.

One of the elders said to me, Weep no more.

Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.

John, you are not worthy.

And you stand with a people who are unworthy, but there is one who is worthy, the Lion of Judah, which takes us back to Genesis 49.

Jacob's blessing his sons, and he blesses Judah with this royal blessing, an overcomer's blessing.

He likens him to a lion's cub.

And this blessing of being a royal conqueror resonates through the generations to one of Judah's descendants, David, who is remembered as Israel's ideal king, with whom God makes a promise that he will establish an everlasting throne, that there will be an heir to David's throne who will bring everlasting justice to bear on the earth.

Why is this lion of Judah worthy?

Because he's conquered.

Like David conquered the enemies of Israel, this lion has conquered par excellence.

Once for all, trampling hell and Satan under his feet.

But how has the lion conquered?

This is where things get really interesting to me.

Verse 6.

What do we expect to see?

This is a very symbolic vision.

John hears a voice proclaiming that there is a lion on the scene who is conquered, who's worthy to open the scroll of God's plan for history.

What do you think John expects to turn and see?

I think he expects to turn and see a lion.

And all his power and all his fury, like Aslan galloping into the battle.

But what does he see?

Verse 6.

Between the throne and the four living creatures, and among the elders, I saw a lamb, as though it had been slain, with seven horns and with seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth.

How has the lion of Judah conquered?

By being slain like a lamb.

You could better translate that perhaps as slaughtered.

This takes us back to Exodus 12.

We remember on Maundy Thursday this reading.

It takes us to the Passover lamb, God's chosen substitute in the feast of his deliverance.

It sets up the whole Old Testament sacrificial system that a lamb stands in for the sins of God's people and takes away their punishment and penalty.

And it takes us to Isaiah 20, or pardon me, 52 and 53, which understands that we, God's people, like sheep have gone astray.

But on him, this suffering Savior, was laid the iniquity of us all.

This is a lamb that takes away the penalty of sin.

But this is no ordinary lamb.

This lamb has seven horns, which is to say he is all powerful, and he has seven eyes, which is to say he is all seeing by God's sevenfold spirit.

This is a divine lamb.

And there's no doubt for us who this lamb is.

He is the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

Jesus.

See, Jesus is worthy because he's the conquering lion.

But he didn't conquer in the way that we would have expected them to.

He's conquered through his sacrificial death, through paying the penalty for our sins.

And out of love, he's borne the weight of our unworthiness, so that we might become, by grace, worthy of his kingdom.

He became sin, who knew no sin, so that we might become his righteousness.

And he went and he took the scroll from the right hand of him who is seated on the throne.

Because Jesus alone is worthy.

He alone is worthy to open up the scroll and inaugurate God's kingdom.

Because he is the divine Savior who's conquered our enemies like a lion by being slain for our sin like a lamb.

He is supremely worthy.

Friends, let's not miss the gospel here.

We are not worthy so much to gather up the crumbs from his table, and yet because of his great love for us, Jesus made satisfaction for our sin so that we might have a seat at the kingdom feast.

He is worthy.

So how do we live in the light of his worthiness?

This is where I'd like us to land for this morning.

I want to say there's two things in particular we're called to do in light of his worthiness.

One, we should begin by considering what it is that makes Jesus worthy.

Is it the fact that he's the lion or the fact that he's the lamb?

Well, it's both, isn't it?

It's not either or.

It's both and.

He has a lion, he claims a lion-like victory by a lamb-like self-denial.

And friends, if we endeavor to be disciples of his, we ought to be lion-like, lamb-like Christians.

Sometimes I wonder if Christians are inclined towards a lion-like approach to the faith.

Growling and stomping our feet and marching forward towards realizing political ends of the kingdom, whatever that looks like.

When perhaps we're called to a certain gentleness as well, a certain meekness that inherits the kingdom of God, to be poor in spirit and hunger and thirst for righteousness as Jesus teaches us.

And yet some of us perhaps are more inclined to be lamb-like Christians that just sheepishly want to retreat from the world and its evils.

And perhaps God calls us who are inclined to be lamb-like Christians, to have a lion-like confidence in Jesus' secure victory.

To march with confidence, not in ourselves, but in the victory that He's claimed on our behalf.

The imitation of Christ is to take on his lion-like victory with a lamb-like self-denial.

And so we live for the sake of the world.

We also worship, not simply because it makes us happy, but because of how supremely worthy Jesus is.

That's what the elders and all of these living creatures do.

Revelation 8 to 10, when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the 24 elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and with golden bowls of incense, which are the prayers of the saints, and they sang a new song.

Hey, that's a pretty good name for a church.

What are they singing?

Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals.

Why are you worthy?

For you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.

And then we see like three concentric circles through all of creation, more and more creatures joining in this song of praise, ascribing worthiness to this lamb.

See, worship is not less than singing to God, but we need to catch that it is so much more.

In the words of our prayer book, we show forth God's praise not only with our lips, but in our lives.

We become a living sacrifice, which is our spiritual act of worship.

The whole of our Christian life, in light of the outcome of history, is meant to lift high Jesus Christ.

This is what we'll be doing for all eternity.

So the question is: what do you worship?

If it's true that we all worship, what do you hold as supremely worthy above all else in your life?

Hear the heavenly chorus.

Worthy is the lamb who is slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.

We worship because Jesus is worthy.

Jesus is worthy because he is the conquering lion whose victory was secured by his lamb-like sacrifice.

Jesus is supremely worthy, and therefore we worship.

Amen.

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