I can do that. The millennial views you what you're going to be getting mostly for me. We talked about the four main ways of interpreting the book of Revelation last week from the futurist view to the historicist view in the preterist view to the idealist view. What you're going to be getting from me is the idealist view mostly what what you've probably gotten. Most of us, at least when we were growing up in an evangelical church such as this, was more of the futurist view. You don't need to worry too much about those kinds of distinctions and all of that. But what I'm going to be trying to trying to do is take that idealist approach to understanding the messages and the themes theologically of the book of Revelation. So don't concern yourself too much with those interpretive approaches but which what you will see coming out will have bearing on the question of the millennium and whether Christ's return is prior to the millennium or after the millennium or whether the millennium is a literal 1000 year period that you could mark out on a calendar or not. And those things will come later, those discussions of those different positions will come later in the book. And I will offer an issue with some summaries of those various positions. So yeah, if that will be helpful, then I will try to do that for you. Last week, as we started out and finished up some of the background and looked at basically verses 1 through 3 in the introduction about the time being near in these events which must soon take place, we started to get a feel for the kind of literature that we have here in the book of Revelation. and how these symbols and images and visions and even numbers that John speaks of frequently communicate to us deeper things than just visual imagery or deeper things than just what things look like. John's intention is to communicate to us what things are like. He wants us to understand the nature of evil, the nature of Satan, the nature of Jesus Christ and the power of His Word, the character of God and His holiness. The nature of the church and the nature of the battle that exists between Satan and God and between Satan and God's people and the nature of the victory that we have in Jesus Christ and ultimately will be realized in Jesus Christ in the last day when Christ returns and the dead are raised and final judgment is poured out. John wants us not so much to be able to anchor these visions and these symbols to historical events. There are going to be historical events, of course. But John doesn't want us to necessarily be able to line those up in an order so that we could graph chronologically the course of the history of the end times. What John wants us to do is more than getting a chronology of the end times, to get a theology of the end times, an understanding of The fact that these are the last days and what our place in the last days are or is rather and how we are to persevere how we are to endure how we are to remain faithful in the last days by putting our trust in Jesus Christ. So the themes of salvation and judgment. The themes of God's sovereignty and Satan's counterfeit attempts to mimic Christ and lead us astray. All of these kinds of themes the themes of prayer and our dependence upon God as we see very difficult things happening around us and understand them not only to be the work of the devil but in fact the results of God's sovereign punishment. and judgment over the nations of the earth. All of these things are going to be recycled over and over and over again. We're going to be looking at all of those themes, like I suggested to you last week, as if we were looking at the various facets of the same diamond. If we were looking at the same events or the same situations through different lenses of a camera, different angles, and zooming in and panning out to be able to understand with greater and greater clarity. the theology of the end times, the theology of the Christian life, the theology of God's purposes for all of history that he wants us to get. As Sinclair Ferguson, I told you, compares it to walking up a spiral staircase as you dive into the book of Revelation. You go around and around and around the same themes, the same events, the same history, the same structures, all of these same situations you go around. But as you go around, you're ascending, you're climbing higher and higher up that staircase to be able to get a broader and greater and deeper view of what's going on. God wants to increase our understanding theologically of who he is and how he has secured victory over the evil one and all of the enemies of God in Jesus Christ and how that victory is finally going to pan out in the end and what is it going to look like. Revelation, if you try to think of it this way, the first three chapters that we're going to get into, we're going to finish chapter 1 hopefully tonight, and then chapters 2 and 3 consist of these letters to the seven churches in Asia Minor that John is instructed to write to and to give the vision of the book of Revelation to. And it starts out in Ephesus and makes its circuit throughout those seven churches as the Word of God here is delivered to them. But the rest of the book becomes starkly different from the form of a letter, the form of an epistle. As soon as we get into chapter four, John starts having these images of what's going on up in heaven. And in chapter six, then, as the seals of the scroll are broken, John moves from being given a perspective of what's going on in heaven to a perspective of what the judgment of God in heaven looks like now down here on earth and why the things that we're seeing on around us are going on around us and who's in charge of them and who's sovereign over them and what the purposes of them are. So we're given this great heavenly perspective of redemptive history through the book of Revelation. And if you try to think of it that way, it'll help you to understand it. Also, if you try to think of the book of Revelation as sort of portraying history in terms of a drama, And I don't mean not to take it literally, not to understand that God is working historically, literally among his people in order to save his people and judge his enemies. Of course, God is. But think of of God as as. orchestrating all of history, actual history, in a way that is like unto a drama and portraying all of that redemptive history and all of his purposes in the Book of Revelation by way of a drama as it progresses through various different acts, utilizing all of this symbolism and all of these stark contrasts between good and evil that are imaged for us in the symbolism and in the visions and images. We're moving through these successive acts of a play almost even though it's actual history to increasingly amplify these theological themes that God wants us to understand. God has laid history out in this way hasn't he. Between Old Testament and New Testament there's this shadow and fulfillment paradigm. that we see in Jesus opens our eyes to. And remember in Luke 40 is the disciples are walking on the road to Emmaus and Jesus has just been crucified in their morning. They're grieving that he's been crucified and he comes up alongside of them because he's he's risen now from the dead. And he says why are you weeping. Why are your hearts downcast. Well haven't you heard where you know where have you been. The one that was the Lord, the one that we put all our hope in, was nailed to a cross and was killed. And then when they get where they're going, Jesus reveals to them who He is. And it says He begins to explain to them where He is in the Scriptures, from Moses all the way through the prophets and the law, from the Psalms, every place in the Old Testament where Jesus is foreshadowed. And all of a sudden their eyes are opened and they start to understand the sacrificial system, the temple, the very nation of Israel, the people of God, all of these pictures, historical pictures that God put into place historically in the Old Testament were intended to foreshadow Jesus Christ in the New Testament, where they find their fulfillment. And God works this way. There's a beauty and a harmony and a symmetry to history and to God's providence in history as he sovereignly, I love the word, orchestrates all of the events of history to accomplish his purposes. And if we look at Revelation as sort of God's divine peak, God's divine perspective on that sort of dramatic unveiling of how history works and what history is intended to do, it will help us to be able to understand and appreciate the book of Revelation more. There's some continuity that we can gain there. And we'll see that the main plot really is Christ's victory over all of His enemies. That's what's been going on ever since Genesis 3.15, right? When man and woman fell in the garden and the promise was made Seed would be born of the woman who would come and crush the head of the serpent, bruising his heel as he did so. All of history has been the outworking of that great dramatic purpose of God. And the emphasis in the book of Revelation comes to be on the present age that we live in. It's the age that Daniel refers to, remember, in chapter 12 of his vision of his prophecy as the age of the great tribulation unlike the earth has ever seen before. And it's the age that the New Testament calls these last days. It's during these last days, it's during these days between Christ's ascension and His second coming that God is, in fact, working to complete. and bring to fruition and fulfillment all of his redemptive purposes. All of the things that the Old Testament history and historical events and prophecies all of those things that were foreshadowed and anticipated in the Old Testament are now being brought to fruition before our very eyes. And the book of Revelation is giving us a heavenly perspective on that again from Genesis 3 15 to the flood to the exodus event to the covenants being between God and Abraham and Moses and David to the sacrificial system and the building of the temple and the Babylonian captivity and the prophets and the anticipation of Messiah to the coming of Messiah. All of this is a sequence of historical events with redemptive significance where God is displaying his glory to his people. And that's how we have to learn to understand the Old Testament, not merely as a series of events where Human history was sort of taking its course willy-nilly and God would occasionally intervene to keep it from going completely off the cliff. Sometimes that's how people want to look at the Old Testament. The Israelites, man, they were just going straight towards the edge of the cliff there and God stepped in the way to prevent them or diverted their path so that they would be saved another time. Everything that happens in history is a part of God's grand scheme to glorify Himself, is a deliberate part of God's purposes and sovereign orchestration of his creation. So it's not merely this series of events where God intervened. It's certainly not the Old Testament isn't a record of a failed covenant a failed period where God decided to try something this grand experiment of a theocracy with Israel and it fell apart the wheels came off it didn't work. God hadn't anticipated how sinful and stubborn and stiff necked and hard headed these people would really be. And so now he has to bring about a new era under Messiah where everything's if you want to get it done you got to do it right yourself. Right. That's not what the Old Testament is either. Again it is a deliberately structured period of history where God is paving the way. for the birth and the death and the resurrection and the ascension and eventually the return of His Son Jesus Christ to culminate all of His purposes for history. And there are parts of that redemptive drama, that redemptive story that were mysterious in the Old Testament times. They haven't been revealed yet. You see the ambiguity and the general nature of Daniel's revelation where he's talking about the resurrection of the dead right alongside with the coming of the Son of Man who is brought before the Ancient of Days. There's no time gap there. He's not sure how these events are going to transpire. All he's given is that the one like a Son of Man is going to be presented and the dead are going to be raised imperishable. He doesn't know that there's going to be a long period of time intervening the death of the Messiah and the return of the Messiah and the resurrection that that will bring. So there's mystery. There are loose ends to the story, plot lines that have not been revealed yet, if you will. And Revelation finishes the story. Revelation wraps up all of those loose ends. And so in a very real sense. Revelation is God's commentary, divinely inspired commentary on the themes of His purposes in redemptive history. They're the themes that were introduced in the Old Testament but will not be completed until the second coming of Christ. If we look on the book of Revelation in those ways and with that kind of an understanding, it's going to help us to be able to glean more from its pages. Our text tonight, I want to finish out chapter 1. So let's look at verses 4 through 20 together. John to the seven churches that are in Asia by Asia. He means Asia Minor what we know as modern day Turkey. John to the seven churches that are in Asia. Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come and from the seven spirits who are before his throne and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness the firstborn of the dead and the ruler of the kings on earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom of priests to his God and father to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Behold he is coming with the clouds and every eye will see him even those who pierced him and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him. Even so. Amen. I am the Alpha and the Omega says the Lord God who is and who was and who is to come the almighty. I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance that are yours in Jesus Christ, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. I was in the spirit on the Lord's Day and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet saying, write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna, to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea. And then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me. And on turning, I saw seven golden lampstands. And in their midst of the lampstands, one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. and the hairs of his head were white like wool as white as snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire. His feet were like polished bronze refined in a furnace and his voice was like the roar of many waters. In his right hand he held seven stars from his mouth came a sharp two edged sword and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. When I saw him I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me saying fear not. I am the first and the last and the living one. I died and behold, I am alive forevermore and I have the keys of death and Hades. Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this. As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand and of the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches and the seven lampstands are the seven churches. So right away we get into this visual imagery whereby God wants to communicate something of great comfort and compassion to the church. The first thing that we notice in verses 4 and 5 is that Revelation is written to these seven historical churches in Asia Minor. In other words, Revelation is not simply a book that is dealing with abstract concepts in general. It's written to real people. in real churches dealing with real problems. You can go today and see the ruins of these churches. You can go today and see the places where they existed. They were flesh and blood Christians living 2,000 years ago in churches in Asia Minor that received a messenger who read this book to them while they were being persecuted, while they were suffering, while they were dying, while they were shedding blood in the name of Jesus Christ and being martyred, while they were being tempted to abandon their faith because of the persecution, where they were losing their first love, where they were entertaining false doctrine where they were allowing false teaching and idolatry into their midst. Jesus Christ comes and speaks to them as the omniscient, omnipotent, almighty son of God. Revelation is a book that is written to these seven churches who are struggling, in other words, with things that the church at large throughout history struggles with. Revelation is a book that was not just relevant to those people in those churches in that time, but is relevant to all of us now. The number seven is a number that has symbolic significance. When we say that, I don't mean that there weren't seven actual historical, literal, physical churches. There were. But it's, I think, a part of God's providence and a part of God's orchestration of history that he wrote to seven churches. God created the heaven and the earth and he rested on the seventh day bringing his creation to perfection Bringing his creation to completion and ever since that the number seven has indicated perfection and completion wherever it is used throughout scripture and certainly in apocalyptic literature like this and that is what it indicates is we're going to see with a reference to the seven spirits of God and the seven lampstands and the seven stars and Sevens all threats not a coincidence in other words that there are sevens and these repetitions of significant numbers all throughout the book of Revelation they're real churches. But again the number of them is intended to reflect the fact that the messages to them apply to the complete church to the whole church geographically and. Historically, the church that God is working through Jesus Christ and through his spirit to make perfect revelation is as much for every church that has ever existed since the days that this book was written until now. It's as much for us as it has been for them. And the second major thing to notice about the greeting here, the sort of salutation in verses four and five, is that it's a Trinitarian salutation. Remember, first Peter, when we were going through first Peter and that wonderful Trinitarian greeting that Peter gives to the people, speaking about the work that God has redemptively accomplished on our behalf through the Father and by the work of the Holy Spirit according to what was accomplished by the Son on the cross. In other words, the great hope that that gives to the Christian is what? Why emphasize the Trinitarian nature other than to just glorify the Trinitarian God, which is good enough reason. But what is Peter and John's other reason for emphasizing the Trinitarian nature of God's blessing upon us. It's to emphasize to us that the work of all three persons of the Trinity and the work of no one else. It is wholly the work of God entirely the work of God and the work of the entire Godhead that our salvation rests upon and that gives us great comfort. It can't be undone. It can't be thwarted. There can't be disagreement among the three members of the Trinity. That wonderful word that has fallen out of usage by the Western church, but the Greek Orthodox like to use is the word perichoresis. Remember, it means a circular dance to describe the work of the Trinity. They're always they do different things. They they operate in different modes sometimes, but they're always working towards the same ends and towards the same goals. So God the Father decrees your salvation since before the foundations of the world and sends the Son, Jesus Christ, historically to be incarnate and accomplish that work on the cross. And when Jesus leaves this earth and ascends up into heaven, He sends the Holy Spirit to apply that work to you, that you might experience the reality of it, not just the theory of it, not just the theology of it. all of the Godhead working together to secure your salvation. It can't be undone. It can't be thwarted. Nothing can stand in the way of that or undo that. And similarly, John says, grace and peace to you, verse 4, from Him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who were before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. that greeting, grace and peace, we looked at a little bit this morning even in Philippians. It's a pretty standard greeting for the apostles to give a blessing in the name of God. And John is telling us that God who gives that blessing of grace and peace is the one who is without beginning and without end. He is the eternal sovereign God, not only of the past, not only of the present, but also of the future. Every event in history transpires according to His sovereign purpose. and His sovereign will. Isaiah 46.10 says that He has decreed the end from the beginning. And by definition, that means that every event in between the end and the beginning is underneath God's sovereign control. Because if it's not, then you can't guarantee the end that God has decreed, can you? If something else is in charge of an event after the beginning, then the end may end up in any number of places that God has decreed the end. And it's an absolute certainty that the events that transpire to get us there are underneath God's sovereign control. Dorothy? The seven spirits? Yeah, we're going to get to that. Well, I think that the hymn in verse 4, the hymn who is and who was and who is to come is God. Not specifically the second person of the Trinity, but God. God the Father, if you will, the eternal God in other words, the almighty sovereign God of the universe. The seven spirits, before God's throne are not a reference to seven angels or seven angelic beings, seven created beings before the throne of God. Why not? Why couldn't they be seven angels, seven spirits? Maybe the word Angolos could have been used. That's not a it's yeah, that's a possible answer. They're referred to in the same way that the eternal everlasting God is referred to, sandwiched right in between the one who is and who was and who is to come and Jesus Christ, the ruler of the kings of the earth. The seven spirits are referred to in the same exact way that the everlasting God is, and they're referred to as participating in the extension of grace and peace to the seven churches, something that only God has the prerogative to do. Grace comes from God and God alone. Now, does that mean that we believe as who teaches that the Trinity is composed of nine members? Somebody teaches this, don't they? Is it Benny Hinn? All right. Because of verses like this that refer to the seven spirits and he believes it is a reference to the Holy Spirit and that there are seven persons to the Holy Spirit also. And therefore, you have the Father and the seven Holy Spirits and the Son and you have nine. That's not at all what John means. Yeah. Right. Right. And there's there's reasons why we can understand that in such a way, primarily, as we said last week, when we see symbolic references, whether they're in numbers or in visions and images in the Book of Revelation, oftentimes, almost every time they are tied back to something in the Old Testament, some prophecy that's already happened, oftentimes even some historical event that's already occurred, that when a New Testament Jewish reader, a first century person, would read the book of Revelation, he would immediately know in a way that we don't immediately know because we're American, we're not as familiar with the Old Testament, on and on and on. They would immediately know what the reference to the seven spirits of God was, for example. John is thinking back for one thing to the prophecy of Zechariah in chapter four that we talked about last week, the prophecy of the menorah with seven lamps on top of it and the olive trees that flanked it on either side. He's given this vision of a giant menorah flanked on either side with these olive trees. And what was the importance of that vision or the purpose of that vision in Zechariah chapter four, do you remember? The history of Israel at that point is that they have been released by the decree of Cyrus from their captivity in Babylon and allowed to go back to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple. And they've been trying and trying and trying to rebuild this temple. But the Persians and various other marauding groups keep coming and taking advantage of their weakness and preventing them from rebuilding the temple and then they get complacent. And kind of greedy and selfish, too. They say, well, it's more important for us to build our houses and build the fences around our houses than for us to build the temple. And God is saying, no, no, you don't understand. You must rebuild the temple first and worship me rightly, and then I will protect you. You don't have to worry about protecting yourself. You have to worry about worshiping me, and then you trust me. See? And in the midst of that theme, you need to trust me. You need to build the temple. God gives them this vision of the menorah, one of the pieces of furniture in the temple that was supposed to shine light upon the priestly work. And hooked up to the menorah are these olive trees that grow. Remember, olive oil being the fuel for the lamp stands. And there's these spouts coming from the trees tied into the menorah so that it has a perpetual source of fuel. You're not going to have to work to supply oil to the lamp, in other words. And at the end of the vision are those wonderful and famous words that we sing and often hear quoted, not by might, not by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord. You're not going to finish the temple. You're not going to guarantee your own safety. You're not going to reinstitute the worship of Yahweh by your strength, by your power, by anything but the spirit of God. And that whole vision symbolized that for them. that it would be God Himself who supplies the oil that they need. And all of that, not only for their physical protection, which is what God immediately had in mind to teach them, but not only that, that historical event even became symbolic itself of the spiritual provision of God that the Holy Spirit brings us. You can't earn your salvation by your might or by your power, but only by the Spirit of God, says the Lord. And John is now leaning upon that Old Testament passage in Zechariah 4 in order to lay hold of the same meaning that was at stake there and carry it into the situation of the seven churches here. So again, Holy Spirit being depicted in perfection in Zechariah by way of the number 7. And John uses the same kind of language here. verses five through seven from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, the ruler of the kings of the earth to him who loves us first and who has freed us from our sins and made us the kingdom and priests. OK, what what the seven spirits connected the lampstands symbolize for us is God's presence among the seven churches, God's presence and power. This is how they exist as churches. This is how the menorah gives off light because it's hooked up to these olive trees, which symbolize the spirit and the oil that the spirit is the basis of their witness. The reason that they are the light of the world is because the Holy Spirit is with them and is empowering them and is working through them and. As we go on, we're going to see that some of the churches that are written to here, some of these seven churches in Revelation that are written to here, are guilty of such grievous idolatry and sin or complacency and apathy that Jesus says your lampstand is about to be removed. In other words, I'm about to constitute you a non-church, to pull my spirit from your midst so that you won't be effective anymore. You're going to cease to be a church if your lampstand is removed. The spirits that are these lights Zechariah and Revelation are a reference to the perfect presence and the perfect provision of the Holy Spirit of God for his church. Yeah. No, I don't think so. Exactly. And that's that's what he says. You're about to be have your lampstand removed. The spirit of God is about to be removed from your church. So you still have people you may still have Christians there born again, regenerate spirit filled people. But God is not going to be working in your midst if you continue to sin against him. Therefore, repent and be faithful and persevere and so on and so forth. So the message, again, is for them to do that, to persevere and to remain faithful. not by might, not by their own power, but by relying upon the spirit of God, the word of God, the testimony of Jesus Christ and the power of the spirit in order to proclaim those things, to be the light of the world, as Jesus says that we are. Yes. The sevenfold spirit. It just says seven spirits. But I think that's probably an interpretive move to to convey in English what that phrase would have conveyed to the mind of a first century reader or hearer of this of this text. Sevenfold fullness doesn't say spirit. There you go. So that's a that's a that's a good footnote. Not a textual thing but a footnote right. Commentary type note there. So the Holy Spirit I believe is what is being referred to or who rather is being referred to there as the seven spirits who are before his throne and from Jesus Christ. So we move then from. the declaration of God to the declaration of the Holy Spirit to rounding out this Trinitarian greeting where Christ is centralized. It says that he is the the firstborn from the dead and the ruler of all of the kings of the earth. Christ alone is the one who conquers death. No one raises from the dead unless Christ causes them to be raised from the dead. And that's a wonderful encouragement isn't it for the persecuted church of the first century. People are being martyred. People are losing loved ones. All kinds of death and mayhem are going on in the church. But standing amidst all of the churches is the one who has the power of death himself. The one who later we'll see holds the keys to death and Hades in his hand. Conqueror of death himself is greeting you with grace and peace in the midst of your great tribulation. In other words, that's a wonderful greeting for the churches of Jesus Christ and his message is it's a trustworthy message. The reason it's a trustworthy message is because Jesus Christ alone is the faithful witness and the rulers over all of the kings of the earth, even over Nero, even over Diocletian, even over all of the Roman emperors who would ever persecute Christians. Christ is the ruler over all of them. And surely, therefore, his purposes, which will be revealed to us here in the book of Revelation, will be fulfilled. Nobody can thwart them. So don't be tempted to think that if Nero or Diocletian are persecuting Christians and causing them to to suffer and putting them to death and trying to eradicate them. Don't be tempted to think that Christ's purposes for his church are failing. Don't be tempted to think that the gates of hell are now prevailing against the church. It cannot happen. They're given this assurance that that Christ is sovereign over that. And notice in that that the prophetic and kingly offices of Christ are emphasized there highlighting Christ's commission from God. In the Old Testament, it was the prophets and the priests and the kings who were all specially anointed by God and enabled to minister to the people in unique and divinely empowered ways. And in Christ, all of those three roles are summed up. He's the great prophet, the great mouthpiece of God, because He is God. He's not just receiving revelation from God. He's giving revelation as God. He's the great prophet, the one here mentioned the faithful witness. He is the king of kings, the ruler over all of the kings of the earth, as John says. And then, verses 5 and 6 again, the end of verse 5, He loves us and has freed us from our sins by His blood and made us a kingdom, priests to His God and Father. To Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. He is also our great High Priest. All three of those very, very important Old Testament offices, prophet, priest, and king, that were central, that were indispensable in the life and the construction and the existence of the nation of Israel. If you stopped having any of those, you stopped having a nation of Israel. All three of those are summed up and exemplified and perfected in the single person of Jesus Christ who epitomizes all three of those roles. And there's, again, great comfort at stake there for Christians, isn't there? With Jesus Christ as your prophet, how can you deny or doubt at all or not have anything but confidence in this message that He's about to give? He's not just a prophet. He's the prophet. He's God Himself giving you the message. He's the King over the rulers of the earth. He's the great High Priest who has made intercession for you that cannot be undone. There's no greater comfort than for Christians to know exactly what verse 7 proclaims that this one who is prophet, priest, and king, God of gods, king of kings, behold, he is coming with the clouds and every eye will see him. Even those who pierced him and all the tribes of the earth will wail on account of him. Even so, amen. He's coming. Great comfort for first century Christians. He's coming. And it says not only is he coming, but everybody's going to see him. Every eye will see him. Even those who pierced him will see him. And all of the tribes of the earth, not just the tribes of Israel, all of the tribes of the earth, all of the nations, in other words, of the earth, will mourn over Him. What's that a reference to? The mourning of the nations of the earth over seeing Christ return? Mitch, why are they mourning? Because He's come in judgment. They realize, uh-oh, He's come, but this time He's not come as a Savior. Now He's come as our Judge. That's right. Time's up. No, no more patience. God's patience has run out at this point. The elect have been saved. The martyrs will now be avenged. And the blood that has been shed by all of the enemies of God's people and God's purposes will be avenged with the second coming of Christ. And that will cause a lot of mourning and a lot of terror. The background of this, again, is the Old Testament. Daniel, chapter 7, verses 13 and 14. Let me just read it to you. Daniel says, I saw in the night visions and behold with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man. And he came up to the ancient of days and was presented before him. And to him, the one like a son of man, was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all people's nations and languages should serve him. And his dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away. And his kingdom is one that shall not ever be destroyed. That's Daniel's vision of the end times as Christ what? Daniel's vision of the end times is Christ ascends up into heaven. He's caught up and is presented before the ancient of days. And now he sits at God's right hand and he makes intercession and he is building his church, living stone by living stone. And John speaks of the same period of time, but now of Christ's descent. He speaks very, very similarly to the way that Daniel spoke of Christ's ascent as he speaks now of Christ's return, of Christ's second coming, the time of full and final judgment when all of those who pierced him, in other words, all of those who were guilty of his blood, all of those whose sins caused him to be pierced and caused him to be crucified, they will mourn his coming Because for them it will mean that the patience of God is run out. In other words, every knee will bow. Every tongue will confess that Jesus is the Lord. Zechariah, another Old Testament prophet, prophesies it and says it this very thing in this way in chapter 12 and verse 10 of his book. When they look on Me, on Him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn as one mourns for an only child. They shall weep bitterly as one weeps over the death of a firstborn." It's going to be a terrible day. Yeah? Zechariah 12.10. I guess I've had the wrong reading of the passage in Zechariah. But it seems to me like that was more of a... Well, they're mourning and they're weeping over the return of Christ. And I think as John's quoting that, it's in the context, not of repentance, but of judgment. So maybe there's a difference of interpretation out there. I've always understood it to be more of a judgment passage. Yeah, the pierced one of Zechariah's prophecy is the same one of the son of man of Daniel's prophecy. And I believe what is causing the nations to mourn is that the one who approaches the Ancient of Days and who will come to bring judgment to his enemies will do so when he returns, when he comes in glory. Whichever way you interpret it, I think what John wants us to understand is that there is full and final judgment coming for the enemies of God at the return of Christ. OK, so John seems to be using it in a little different way and perhaps both are at stake. This final, final redemption and final judgment are subsumed in the second coming of Christ. So how is this hope for a persecuted and beleaguered and martyred church, whether it's a reference to repentance and salvation, final and full, or a reference to judgments and destruction, or both? What does it communicate to Christ's church? Mitch? That God has heard their prayers. He has heard their promise. He has established a time when He will accept So his redemptive purposes for his people to pour out grace and mercy upon the house of David are complete. But also his purposes redemptively in terms of pouring out judgment against their enemies the ones who have persecuted them and the ones who are guilty of Christ's blood and of their blood are complete. In other words God. God's judgment is not asleep, it is coming surely, and it's coming at the hands of the one who is called the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. What's significant about that reference? The Alpha and the Omega. Again, it's significant of Christ's deity and his sovereignty, Alpha and Omega being the first and the last letters of the Greek alphabet, the beginning and the end of the Greek alphabet. He's sovereign over everything. He's sovereign over the beginning and over the end. And therefore, everything, as we said before, in between. He is the one who is, it says, and who is to come and who was identifying himself as being God. This is a very potent verse for identifying the deity of Jesus Christ as God the Father or God in general is referenced as the one who is and the one who is to come, the one who was in verse 4. And Jesus Christ takes that same title for himself later, identifying himself clearly with God and attesting himself to be God. And it is this Christ God of Gods, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Alpha and Omega, who is testifying through this vision, and who is proclaiming this news to Him, just as God declared Himself to be superior, remember, to all of the idols of the Old Testament. He did so in the Psalms. He did so in the book of Isaiah. Over and over again, He says in Isaiah 46, and that whole section between Isaiah 40 and 48, where He's demonstrating his superiority to the false gods and to the idols that people make. Remember the kind of the funny language that he uses, they create this great god of stone and then they have to carry it around on a cart. A lot of good your god is, you have to haul it around on a cart. It can't even move itself. But God is the one who bears you up. The true God is the one who bears you up and who lifts you up. By contrast, he says in the midst of those passages in Isaiah 48 that I am the first and I am the last. So Jesus Christ is declaring his ultimate sovereignty, his ultimate superiority, his ultimate authority and his ultimate rule. not only over his people, but over everybody who rebels against him. This is the person, this is the one who sends the message and therefore the veracity of the message is underscored, the import of the message is highlighted. And furthermore, it is highlighted by this vision that John is given in verses 12 through 20. He hears a voice telling him to write down what he sees and to send the letters to these seven churches. And he turns to see the voice that is speaking and he sees, verse 12, seven golden lampstands. And in the midst of the lampstands, one like a son of man. And it goes on to describe him as being clothed with a long flowing robe and a sash over his chest. His hair is white as snow and His eyes are blazing with fire and so on and so forth. The sword that is coming out of His mouth and His voice is like the sound of many waters. What do all these things indicate? What is Jesus revealing Himself to be through those things? Yeah, that's part of it. And John's response to the vision indicates that. He falls on his face as a dead man, prostrates himself completely before this one and worships him. Not worthy to look upon you, you're so glorious. And he's completely overwhelmed by that. Hold on. Yeah, I think so. The white hair specifically, right? And the burnished feet of bronze. I think so. He's clearly identifying himself as divine in that way. There's a connection with the Ancient of Days there. I think that there is. Most commentators that I've ever read think that there is, that that's a clear and deliberate attempt to associate the Son of Man or the one like a Son of Man, Christ, with the Ancient of Days himself, with deity. Mitch? Right? Exactly. Again, emphasizing His intercession on our behalf and the atonement that He brings. So, again, John turns to see this One who is speaking with him and he sees this vision. In Daniel chapter 7, that passage that we just read, Jesus is referred to specifically as the Son of Man. So that's language that's taken right out of that Old Testament text. In Exodus 25, as Mitch is referring to, The passage that describes the construction of the tabernacle and the lampstands of the temple are spoken of in terms of their place in the acceptable worship of God and also the priestly garments that would have been worn in the temple service are described there. And then as we said in Zechariah chapter 4, the lampstand is again portrayed symbolically in order to indicate the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit with God's people in order to encourage them that they will survive, not by might, not by power, but by the Spirit of God and by His enablement of them. All of those messages are conveyed here. And the central theme is that message out of Zechariah 4, that the Spirit of God is present with the churches as the lampstands, the source of light, the source of guidance. And Christ the High Priest, the great prophet and the ruler of the kings of the earth, the King of kings, is also present among the churches. He will be with us, he says, remember, in Matthew 28, even until the end of the age. So, Jesus' description here of Himself portrays Him as the Lord of the church, walking among the churches as they, by the Spirit's power, seek to function as these light bearers in this dark, sinful world that needs the truth. Those are all words and images that the Bible uses constantly to refer to the sinful world, right? It's the darkness and Jesus in John's gospel is the light that has come into the darkness and the darkness did not overwhelm the light or comprehend the light. However you interpret that word, I think it's overwhelm. The darkness could not overwhelm the light. But men loved the darkness more than the light, and so the Son of God was crucified. All of these descriptions that are spoken of here again in the book of Revelation. So, the robe and the sash, in verse 13 again, as Mitch was saying, is a reference to the priestly garb of the Levites in the Old Testament. They were the ones who made intercession on behalf of the people, the ones responsible for the sacrificial work the ones who performed the work of atonement upon which the spiritual life of the Israelite people and the Israelite nation depended. And Jesus is portraying himself here to be that priest, to be the great high priest, as Hebrews declares him to be. And his clothes indicate that priestly office. Every deficiency that was inherent to the Old Testament priesthood is absolutely eradicated in the high priest that Jesus Christ is. He is no longer mortal. Remember, Old Testament priests used to die all the time. You had to get yourself a new high priest. Not only were they mortal, they were fallible. Not only were they fallible, they were sinful. And so they had to atone for their own sins before they could atone for the sins of the people. It was a system in the Old Testament that was full of deficiencies, but by design, in order to show that something greater is needed than anything on this world, anything on this earth can supply or provide. Fulfilled in Jesus Christ. The same way that the sacrificial system that the priests were responsible for was consummated fulfilled in the person and in the work of Jesus Christ for the same reason that we don't need to continue to slaughter bulls and goats for the atonement of sins because Christ died once for all. We don't need high priests. In fact, John goes even further than that to say that our great High Priest, by His own shed blood and by saving us, has constituted us as a priesthood. Not that we need to go and sacrifice bulls and goats. What are the sacrifices that we make, according to Hebrews? Yes, sacrifices of praise. So everyone who belongs to Christ, everyone who is united to Christ, composes that priesthood of believers that are in Christ. White hair, verse 14, indicates Jesus' purity, indicates His holiness, as white often did. We'll see that again in chapter 7 as we see the great multitude coming out of the tribulation with their robes washed white by the blood of the Lamb. Whoever you think that multitude is, we can all agree that the whiteness of their robes indicates the purity that Jesus' blood has accomplished for them and created in them. And I think as Mr. Powell also indicated, His description there of the white hair and the feet of bronze connects him with the ancient of days and Daniel's vision because the same attributes are spoken of in terms of the ancient of days. So they share attributes of holiness and purity. But I think also you have to see the connection of Jesus with God there. Brass, in the Old Testament, references to fire and shiny metal objects that were made shiny or purified in fire are a reference again to purity or to the purification services of the temple or the sacrificial services also. The temple, the entrance to the Holy of Holies was flanked by these huge bronze pillars made of polished bronze that reflected, that radiated light and I think The idea of radiating and mirroring and reflecting the glory of God is at stake here too. Shining forth the glory of God and the attributes of God is at stake there. And also the purification that God's holiness affects on his people. The refiner's fire and that kind of purifying influence that Jesus' holiness has. And so John sees those signs of glory and of purity and holiness in Christ who is among his churches in order to purify the churches. What about the flaming eyes? Why are his eyes specifically aflame? Yeah, I think so. Again, holiness and purity indicated by fire. but specifically associated with the eyes, which are responsible for seeing. And I think that the import there is to emphasize the searing sort of soul-searching, piercing, omniscient gaze of Jesus Christ as He looks into our hearts and sees us for who we are, sees our sinfulness, sees the sinfulness of God's enemies. He knows you. He knows every wicked deed ever committed by any man, and none of them will go unpunished. None of them will go unnoticed. In connection with that, there's probably some relationship. There's a book by R.C. Spoole, There's a God, Why Are There Angels? And he deals with Sartre's line that hell is others. Basically, God is ultimate other because he knows everything about you. It's kind of a piercing thing. Right. Right. And so what else to do but to deny his existence altogether, to pretend that he's not there? Yeah. Good point. Good point. What about his voice? He's got this sword coming out of his mouth. We talked about the importance of that from Isaiah's prophecy in the book of Hebrews, for example. His word is sharper than any two-edged sword. What about the sound of his voice, like the sound of many rushing waters? OK, the ancient of days again is is said in Daniel to speak with a voice like the sound of many rushing waters, power, purification, power also. Remember also that in Daniel chapter 12, we looked at that a little bit last week. Daniel is given this prophecy about the end of time, the end of days, but he's told to shut up that prophecy for a later time. And now Jesus comes appearing as he does here. And his voice is like the sound of rushing waters as he's told to reopen that prophecy and to give it now and to fulfill it and to complete it. The time has come. And Christ has come to reveal the vision of the end and he does that through the book of Revelation In other words, I think what John wants us to understand is that is that the voice of Christ is the voice of God himself? It's the same voice that spoke to Daniel And it is now revealing the same prophecy that Daniel was told to to keep under wraps until a later time Verse 16 says that In his right hand he held seven stars and from his mouth comes the sharp two-edged sword, his face like the sun shining in full strength. What about the stars? Verse 20 explains them. As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the seven angels of the seven churches. and the seventh lampstands are the seven churches. Yeah, that's right. So that clears that up, right? He's holding these stars in his hand that are the angels of the seven churches. There's debate here. As to whether or not John intends to say that that each church, each congregation has a sort of angel, a guardian angel, an angelic presence protecting and providing for it. Certainly, that wouldn't be unfeasible, whether it's another reference to the Holy Spirit in a veiled way or whether the word angolos, which simply means messenger in the Greek, might be a reference to those people who are divinely appointed in the church to be the messengers of the gospel. Maybe the pastor of the church, the elders of the church, the teachers of the church. I don't know. What do you guys think the teachers and the evangelist Dorothy votes for? Yeah, well, it says Angelos says messengers, you know, it could. So most of your I think New Testament translators have opted for angels because that's the the word they pick indicating that they think that the context in the usage of the word and the frequency of the usage of the word probably indicates angel more than it does human messenger. And I think that that's probably a little bit more compelling. I think that whichever way you go there isn't really as important as the message that Christ is the Lord of the church that whoever they are whether they're angels who are given charge over the protection of the church or shepherds, human shepherds who are given charge over the teaching of the Church, Christ holds them in His right hand. The Church is Christ's Church and Christ is the Lord of His Church, I think is the most important part of the vision there, that the seven stars belong securely in Christ's right hand. And then having seen all of this, John can only do one thing. Verse 17, I fell at his feet as though a dead man, but he laid his right hand on me saying, I am the first and the last and the living one. I died and behold I am alive forevermore and I have the keys of death and Hades right there for the things that you have seen and the things that you will see on and on and on. John is absolutely in awe of Christ here as you and I would be if we saw anything like the vision that John saw. We would fall on our faces as dead men also if we were given this revelation for God. So he throws himself down in reverence. He prostrates himself in worship, but recognizes that Christ is also the tender, sort of shepherding Savior, Pastor here to John. Fear not. I am the first and the last and the living one. I died and I'm alive forevermore and I have the keys of death and Hades. In other words, you will not be consumed. You will not be destroyed by my glory and my radiance and my holiness. In fact, you will be protected by it, I think is the message. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Sovereign of all of history, and I have ordained to save you by the blood of My Son, Jesus Christ, and to make you a messenger to the church." So we're saved by the One who has the power over death itself. He holds the keys to death, the keys to Hades in His hands. Satan doesn't hold the keys to death. Satan doesn't hold the keys to Hades. Satan doesn't control who gets in and who doesn't get into hell. All of that is submissive to the judgment of God alone. So, again, all of this is intended, I think, to communicate great hope to the Church of God. Jesus Christ sees all things. Jesus Christ is brilliantly holy. Jesus Christ is absolutely sovereign, and you can rest in Him. You do not need to fear. He is the first and the last. He is the living one who has conquered death. Jesus Christ is the one who says in Matthew 28, as He's preparing to leave His disciples, as He's preparing them to carry on the ministry that He has started. He says, Go therefore and make disciples of all of the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And lo, I will be with you always, even to the end of the age. This vision is a very graphic representation of that promise that Jesus Christ is with us as we step our feet forward to evangelize and to do outreach to minister to needy people in our community as we seek to preach the Word and to worship God in purity and in truth and in spirit and in truth, that Jesus Christ is with us. As we seek to stand against the world and stand against the culture that hates God as we love God, Jesus Christ is with us. We have nothing to fear. He is faithful even when we are faithless. There are no conditions, right? We will see in terms of these churches in chapters 2 and 3 that even though a Christian cannot stop benefiting from the faithfulness of God. Because if you have been made alive in Christ, if you are a new creature, then Christ is being formed in you. Even though that is true of a Christian, it may be true of churches that they become so faithless that Christ pulled the lampstand out. And we'll see that as we go on next week, we'll look at the first church that is written to here in chapter two, the church in Ephesus. And I think the church in Ephesus is very much like the church in San Lorenzo Valley or churches like the church in San Lorenzo Valley. It's got the same kinds of strengths, but also the same kinds of potential weaknesses that we need to be careful of. We'll look at that next week. Okay. Further questions? Closing comments? No one can snatch you away. They're either the human messengers or the angels. Again, it's just a visual sort of a way to depict that security, that absolute security. If you're held in God's hands, that's it. Nothing can snatch you out of that. So people, in other words, in the first century who are fearing that what they have may be snatched away from them as the physical lives of Christians are snatched away from them, are exhorted and encouraged and reminded that what they have is locked safe and secure in the grasp of Christ. Not all of the scriptures at this point, and certainly not in a circulated fashion necessarily. All right, let's close with a word of prayer and we'll sing a closing hymn together. Father, we thank you for this vision. We thank you for this book of Revelation. We thank you for your son, Jesus Christ, that it portrays to us and reveals to us. We thank you that he is the first and the last, the Alpha and the Omega, the King of Kings, Father, that he is our great high priest, that he is the great prophet. Father, that in Him there is salvation that cannot be taken away from us. And not only our personal salvation, but in Him all of the events of history that you have decreed since before the foundation of the world. in order to glorify Yourself and establish Your Kingdom, Father, are being enacted and are being orchestrated and are being carried out and accomplished. We thank You that there is no shadow of turning with You. We thank You that all of Your purposes are fulfilled in Him. And we thank You for the comfort and the hope and the assurance and the security that this knowledge that comes directly from Him to us affords us. We pray that this assurance and this security, that this hope, that this trust, that this faith, Father, will grant us the confidence that we need to be Your faithful witnesses here on the earth. Salt and light as we proclaim Christ and Him crucified to the nations around us. May we do so boldly. May we not be complacent, Father. May we not be fearful of man who has the ability to kill the body. May we only fear Him who destroys both body and soul in hell. May we recognize who You are and what You are sovereign over. Everything. and give you our full lives and our allegiance because we can do nothing else. So take our lives, Father, and use them for your glory. We pray in Christ's name. Amen. Let's stand and sing number 101 together to close tonight.