If you have your Bibles, let's open to the last book in the canon of Christian scriptures, the book of Revelation. Of course, in these recent days, we've been looking at Genesis, the first book in the mornings, and then turning to Revelation, the last book in the afternoons. And we're continuing this chapter by chapter series that we've been doing through Revelation. Today, looking at Revelation 14. Hopefully we'll look at the entirety of the chapter. But to give us a starting point, I just want to read the first three verses aloud. And so let me invite you, as you're able, to stand in honor of the reading and hearing of God's Word once again. Again, I'm reading from Revelation 14, verses 1 through 3, wherein John writes, and low a lamb stood on the Mount Zion, and with him a hundred, forty, and four thousand, having his father's name written in their foreheads, and heard a voice from heaven as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder, and I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps, and they sung as it were a new song before the throne, and before the four beasts and the elders. And no man could learn that song but the 144,000 which were redeemed from the earth." May God bless today, once again, the reading and the hearing of his word. Let us join in prayer. Lord, as we stand again before the open Bible and we think of John, thy servant, who was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, on the island of Patmos for the cause of the gospel. And the Spirit led him to write these words. And then the Spirit has also preserved these words down through the ages. No matter the onslaught of men, men who tried to burn the scriptures, men who tried to twist and to distort the scriptures, but the scriptures remained. place thy hand upon thy word and protected it. Help us to be faithful recipients of thy word in this age and not merely to keep the words themselves, but to understand the content and to know Christ better. Indeed, we know that this book is the revelation of Jesus Christ. Help us to know Christ better and serve him more fervently and find in him the greatest satisfaction. We ask this in Christ's name, Amen. You may be seated. Well, with this chapter coming to Revelation 14, in this bird's-eye view that we've been doing in the book of Revelation, hard to believe, but we're about two-thirds of the way through the book, chapter-wise at least, a little shy of two-thirds of the way through once we look at Chapter 14. And Chapter 14, I've noted is kind of a piece with chapters 12 and 13. And they stand between two sets of sevens. From chapter 8 through chapter 11, there was a description of the seven angels sounding the seven trumpets. And when we look at chapter 15, you'll see in verse 1, there are going to be seven angels having the seven last plagues. And they will have seven vials or bowls. So in between the seven trumpets and the seven vials, there are these descriptions in chapters 12, 13 and 14. And it describes, first of all, in chapter 12, the red dragon, who is the devil and Satan, who is making war against the saints in this age. And then in chapter 13, as we saw last week, there are two servants of the dragon. They are two beasts. The first of those is described in chapter 13 in verse 1. John says, I stood upon the sand of the sea and saw a beast rise up out of the sea. And I suggested that that first beast represents all civil government, civil magistrates throughout church history who have tried to oppose the cause of Christ, who have made martyrs of godly believers. And we feel as long as Christians are in the world, they will have this kind of tribulation, even to the coming of Christ. And then there was the second beast. You remember he's described in verse 11 of chapter 13, I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth. And he had two horns like a lamb. And he spake as a dragon. And I suggested that that second beast represented a false religion. And so what is opposing the cause of Christ in this age? hostile, antagonistic, beastly governments that will fight against Christ and the gospel, and false religions that will have the look of a lamb but the voice of the dragon. And this is something that we're encountering throughout this present evil age as we live between the time of Christ's first coming and his second coming. And so we saw that. And now as we turn to chapter 14, We're going to see that John records seeing a greater power arise than the dragon and his two underling beasts. And the greater power that John is going to see is the Lamb, as it says in verse 1, the Lamb who stood on the Mount Zion. And so it's going to describe for us, I think, really in the end, no matter the sufferings that the saints have to endure in this age, that in the end, the Lamb stands on Mount Zion. And the Lamb of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, will triumph. There's kind of in this chapter a sensory overload. John sees at least two visions, as we saw there in chapter 14, verse 1, the lamb on Mount Zion. He has another vision of Christ in verse 14, as one like the Son of Man sitting on a cloud. That's Christ returning in power and glory. He has two visions of Christ in this chapter. Three times, he says, I heard a voice from heaven in verse 2, verse 7, and verse 13. And he sees no less than six ministering angels within this chapter. So it's kind of a sensory overload of all the things that are taking place. And so as we have done in the past, I want to pose, if I can, seven questions and seven answers as we work through a little catechism of this chapter together. So the first question is this, what does John initially see? And the answer is there, as I've already alluded to it in verse one, he sees the lamb. Look at verse 1, And I stood, and lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Zion, and with Him a hundred and forty and four thousand, having His Father's name written in their foreheads. And so He sees at the end of all things, He sees not the beasts in their supposed glory, but He sees the Lamb. He sees Christ, the Lamb who was slain from the foundations of the earth. And with him are 144,000 saints who have the Father's name written in their foreheads. They are the blood-bought saints. And it seems that this picture is of the heavenly Zion. And the 144,000 here seem to picture believers, perhaps a perfected number of believers, who are at rest with Christ in glory. And so the 144,000 represent all the believers who have died and gone on to glory and are with Christ awaiting the time of his second coming, awaiting the time of the final judgment and the final resurrection. Second question, what does John then hear? And the answer is he hears a divine voice and also the sounds of heavenly worship and the singing of a new song to Christ, as he says in verse two. And I heard a voice from heaven as the voice of many waters and as the voice of a great thunder. Well, that's the voice of God. Again, many thunders. You ever heard thunder and it nearly makes you jump out of your boots? Imagine hearing many thunders. That's the power, the magnitude of God. And it's a voice from heaven. This is God speaking. So here's the voice of God. And also he hears that those who are worshiping God in heaven, whether they be the angelic hosts, whether they be redeemed men in heaven, he says, I heard a great voice of harpers harping with their harps. And maybe this is where people get these sort of immature views of heaven as people floating around, plucking on their harps. Well, this is going to be a resounding sound that's going to be a lot more than a plucking of little harps. It's going to be a wall of sound displaying the beauty, the majesty, the awesomeness of God. And then they are also singing a new song. And they are singing this song before the four beasts and the elders. This is why I say this is a heavenly vision. This is John seeing the worship of heaven. and they're singing a song that no one can learn but that perfect church at rest. You know, the church at rest, which has been redeemed from the earth, they are given access to worship songs that we don't yet know, but we will learn one day when we are in heaven and we are singing the praises of our God. These worshipers, I believe, it's shown to us in verses four and five that they are indeed glorified saints because they've already reached the stage of glory. I know some of us were talking today about, you know, in this life, we have remaining corruptions. We are not now what we one day will be. But when we enter into the glorified state, our battle with sin comes to an end. And we are no longer able to sin against God. We have a perfect freedom to obey God. And he says of these that are that church at rest, these are they, verse 4, which are not defiled with women, meaning they have overcome any gross sexual temptations. They are chaste. They are pure. For he says, they are virgins. They are virginal. They are purified in their vision. These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth. In this life, we follow the Lord. We try nearly to follow the Lord. But there's coming a time in the glorified state where we're able to follow the Lord wherever he goes. These were redeemed from among men, being the first fruits unto God and to the Lamb. Verse 5, and in their mouth was found no guile. But when is the time we're going to have no guile? It's when we're in the glorified state. For they are without fault before the throne of God. They had faults when they were sinful men. And those faults were overcome by the perfect and sinless life of Christ. And now they are enjoying the glories of heaven. And so this is what John hears. He hears this magnificent worship of God in heaven. Third question, what does John then see? And the answer is that John next sees the first three of six angels, which will appear in this chapter. And the first three of these six angels are described in verses 6 through 12. It says of the first angel that he sees in verse six, and I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth and to every nation and kindred and tongue and people. And so the first angel, the first messenger represents the preaching of the gospel, the preaching of the everlasting gospel, the gospel that will never fail. And it's preached to all that dwell on earth, men from all nations. And what this is describing is what we're experiencing right now in this age. That is, the gospel is going out. The Great Commission is continuing. And there's a need for the preaching of the gospel to bring men to obedience. And so here we have the gospel going out, and it's represented by this angel as he goes out. And the command of this messenger, the message that he's preaching, is given to us in verse 7, saying with a loud voice, fear God. and give glory to Him. For the hour of His judgment is come, and worship Him that made heaven and earth and sea and the fountains of waters." What is the message that goes out in this age? Fear God. Have reverence for God. And give glory to Him. God demands that we give glory to Him, that we are not self-glorifying. that we're not glorifying the creature or the creation, but we are giving glory to God. And there's also the warning that judgment is to come. Time is short. We must begin now to worship God and serve him. Worship the one who made all the cosmos, the heaven, the earth, the sea, and the fountains of water. I've recently been listening to a book written by a man in England that just came out this year. And this fellow is talking about the living in this age of a lot of cultural problems and dealing with problems of the digital age and so forth. And this fellow, I wasn't sure when I started listening to the book whether he was a Christian. I'd heard about the book, started listening to it. And at one point in the book, a couple chapters in, He starts talking about his life, and he said, you know, I grew up in sort of post-Christian England, and my parents aren't Christians. They didn't take us to church. And he said, you know, I got into my young adulthood, and I kind of had a spiritual interest. I don't know where it came from. I started looking around. I wanted to have some kind of a spiritual life. I was wondering if there really is a God. And so, you know, he ended up falling into Buddhism. And he started trying to read Buddhist writings and take up Buddhist meditation practices. If you know Buddhism, there's actually no God in Buddhism. It's really just about bringing yourself to overcome the evils of the natural world. And he said, I found that wasn't very satisfying. And then, believe it or not, he says, he started practicing Wiccan practices. He started being a witch, literally. It's a modern man living in, he's English, lives in Ireland now. And he said, I started going, I got involved with a little Wiccan covenant. And we would go, we would have a little Wiccan temple, and we would go through these rituals. And he said, I started to pursue that. He said, but after a while, he said, it just didn't seem real. It didn't seem real what we were doing. He said, you know, I started thinking about Christianity. And he said, that was the last thing I would have chosen. He said, no one who's like me, a sort of person like me, left-leaning politically. He had been an environmentalist. He said, it's embarrassing to think about being a Christian. He said, but I just got into it. I would drive by a church, and I would pull into the parking lot. And I would sit there hoping that someone might come out and talk to me about Christianity. I knew nothing about it. He said, I kept hoping that maybe a priest would come over and say, do you want to learn about Christianity? Let me explain something to you about it. And anyways, finally, he ran into some people who began to talk to him about Christianity. Now, I must say, it's a sad indictment of the state of things in England and Northern Ireland. The only people he found who would talk to him about Christianity were Eastern Orthodox people. And he's part of the Eastern Orthodox Church. But at least he left Wiccanism and Buddhism. You know what the sad thing was? That there weren't any Bible-believing Christians that got in his path and opened the Bible and taught him the gospel. I'm still praying for him that he will advance beyond this entry point that he's found. But at the least, here was a man that was looking for some truth, and meaning in his life. And this is why, in this age, the angel is prompting the preaching of the everlasting gospel. And there are people out there, or I think You may know Rosaria Butterfield, the story of this woman who was an English professor at Syracuse University. She was a lesbian. She was completely secular in her living, and she ran into a Presbyterian minister and his wife, and they were gracious to her. They had her into their home. They had a meal with her, and they began slowly to witness to her, and she tells a story in her little autobiographical account of how she became a Christian, of that morning when she got out of bed on a Sunday, and she said, I just want to go to church. And she wandered into this little Presbyterian church with a psalm singing, exclusive psalm singing church that didn't have a lot of worldly entertainment, didn't have a high quality musical program or anything, but the Lord was working in her life. And now, guess what? She's a Presbyterian pastor's wife. in North Carolina. She's a mother, and the Lord brought her to be a homeschooling mom who had once been an English, a lesbian English professor at a university. The gospel is going out. And the gospel is being preached in this age. And the Lord is using it to awaken many. Now, there's also a warning of destruction. The second of these six angels that he sees in verse 8, it says, and there followed another angel saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. So the good news is going out. But also, in the end, there will be the destruction of Babylon. And Babylon represents really the city of man, the city of sin. And there's going to be a much longer description in Revelation 18 of the fall of Babylon. Then there's a third angel. And this angel announces God's just judgment on those who reject Christ. Look at this in verse 9. And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead or in his hand, The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation. And he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever, and they have no rest day or night who worship the beast and his image, and whoever receiveth the mark of his name." And, you know, the gospel is the good news. But if there's good news, there's also bad news. that those who reject Christ are facing a life of judgment, a life of eternal conscious punishment, a life of no rest, a life of drinking to the dregs, the wrath, the just wrath and chastisement of God throughout all eternity. The gospel is always a double-edged sword. It's good news for the saints. It's bad news for the wicked. The Apostle Paul said in 2 Corinthians 2 verse 16 that the preaching of the gospel was the aroma of life unto life to them that are being saved, but death unto death to them that are spiritually perishing. In verse 12 we have those words of comfort that we an exhortation that we heard back in chapter 13 in verse 10, and now there's sort of a repeat of this, verse 12. Here is the patience of the saints. Here are they that keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. And what I think the Spirit was saying through John here is that we who are believers living in this present age with the Gospels being preached, the warnings of judgment to come are being heralded as well. Our task is to be patient, to be long-suffering, and also to be faithful, to keep the commandments of God. This leads us then to our fourth of seven questions. What does John next hear? And the answer is given to us in verse 13. And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, write. Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth. Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors, and their works do follow them. And so what John was told to write, basically, was the promise, the promise that is for those who die in the Lord, those who become believers, and by God's grace, they persist in the faith, They may go through difficult seasons. They may go through times where they ride on the high hills. They may even face times where they backslide. But if they are truly saved, they will persevere in the faith. And it's a blessing to come to the end of your life and to be there on your deathbed and to say, I have finished my course. I have kept the faith. There is now stored up for me a crown of righteousness. And blessed are those who die in the Lord, for we will have rest from our labors. And the things that we have done that have been to the glory of God and the glory of Christ, those things will never be taken away. They will be remembered of God, and so they will follow us. And so this is what John is told to write. What a great verse that would be to read at the funeral service of a saint, wouldn't it? Great verse to read and to reflect upon, for all of us to think upon, because the day of our death will come one day. Fifth question, what does John next see? This is given to us in verse 14. And I looked, and behold, a white cloud. And upon the cloud one sat, like unto the Son of Man, having on his head a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle. Of course, the Lord Jesus Christ, when he was teaching on the Mount of Olives, he said, you'll see the Son of Man coming in a cloud. And even when he was being interrogated by the chief priests before he was handed over to Pontius Pilate, they said, are you the Son of God? And he said to them, I am, and you will see the Son of Man coming on a cloud. in glory. And so this is John's second vision. First he sees the Lamb that stands on Mount Zion. Now he sees the Son of Man. He sees the second coming of Christ. This is why the book of Revelation isn't easy to lay out in one chronology, because it speaks constantly about the second coming of Christ. And here's a place where it talks about the second coming of Christ. This is the blessed hope of believers. Sixth question, what more finally then does John see? The answer is in verses 15 through 20, he sees yet three more angels. And these three more angels have to do with the harvest or the reaping at the end of the ages. Remember, in places like Matthew 13, Christ told various parables. about what the second coming will be like. He told the parable of the wheat and the tares. He told the parable of the great dragnet. And in those parables, like the wheat and the tares, he says, at the end of the ages, there's going to be a great sorting out. And the wheat will be put in one bundle, and the tares of the weeds in another. And then when he explained that parable, he said, at the end of the ages, the angels will be like God's reapers. and they will come and sort things out. And here, John has a vision of this. First, he sees this angel in verse 15, which is now the fourth angel we've encountered in this chapter. It says, And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle and reap, for the time is come for thee to reap, for the harvest of the earth is ripe. And this servant, this angel from the temple, is crying to Christ. And really, it's a prayer that he's giving to Christ. Bring about the harvest. He's saying really, Maranatha, come Lord Jesus, let thy coming take place so that the harvest can be gathered in. And in verse 16, we read, he that sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth, and the earth was reaped. This is John having a vision of what will take place at the end of the ages with the coming of Christ. Then in verse 17, he sees another angel, a fifth angel, and another angel came out of the temple, which is in heaven. He also having a sharp sickle. And then there's the sixth angel, then in verse 18, and another angel came out from the altar, which had power over fire and cried with a loud voice to him that had the sharp sickle, speaking to the other angel, saying, thrust in thy sharp sickle. and gather the clusters of the vines, vine of the earth, for her grapes are fully ripe. And so here we have, again, John's vision of that final harvest at the second coming of Christ. And again, it's a it's a wonderful thing for those who are believers, as those who who die in Christ and those who are even who are alive at Christ in his second coming are able to enter into their rest. But sadly, it's a horrible situation for those who are wicked, those who are unbelievers, those who are outside of Christ. Verse 19 says, And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth. and gathered the vine of the earth and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. And here, John has this picture of a winepress. They would gather the grapes, and they would press the grapes to make the wine. But this winepress of God's wrath is there to press those wicked whose lives are caught up and getting the just judgment of God who have rejected Christ. And there's this very vivid image for us there in verse 20. And the wine press was trodden without the city and blood came out of the wine press, even unto the horse bridles by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs or one thousand six hundred stadia is the word used in the original. And so can you imagine the winepress of God's wrath where the wicked, those who have rejected Christ, are crushed in it and the blood rises so that it rises to the height of a horse's bridle for 1600 stadia, which some modern translations render that as 200 miles. Can you imagine an ocean, basically a 200-mile lake, maybe, where there's blood that reaches to the height of a horse's bridle. And of course, the language here is figurative. It's meant to say that there will be much suffering for those who reject Christ. In Psalm 75, it speaks of the Lord having the cup of his just wrath in his hand, and how the wicked of the earth are made to drain it to the dregs. Well, we've looked through the chapter. The seventh and last question is this. What do we learn from this chapter? I think the answer is this. We are reminded in this chapter of our calling in this age as believers. We are to proclaim the everlasting gospel to all men who dwell on the earth. And sometimes they will be the most unlikely suspects. How many people do you think you may encounter on a daily basis who may be someone like that man in Ireland or England who really wants someone to talk with him about Christ, who really wants someone to talk with her about Christ? We shouldn't assume that everyone who is not a believer, who's indifferent to Christ, is going to be hostile. Some people will. Or that Rosaria Butterfield, if you had made a list of the people who are most likely to come to the gospel, she would probably be way down on the list. Who would have thought that such a person would want to hear about the gospel? But we are called to promiscuously cast the seed of the gospel. And so that's our task, that's our calling. But we're also reminded within this passage that we are awaiting the time of Christ's glorious return, as it's spelled out there in verse 14. And we're also told as a matter of warning that there is a great wine press of God's wrath, which is to come. And many will be crushed for eternity in that great winepress of God's wrath. And guess what? Were it not for Christ, that's where we would be, too. How are we saved from God's just wrath? We are saved only by faith in Christ by the grace of God. Two verses, two verses to keep in mind, both Our chapter 5, verse 9, Romans 5, 9, much more than being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. And 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, verse 9, for God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ. Friends, there is a Lamb who stands on Mount Zion. And we have been saved from God's just wrath by His blood. All praise be given to Him. Amen? Let me invite you as you're able to stand together. Let's join in prayer. Gracious God, we thank Thee for Thy Word Revelation certainly has some parts that are difficult for us to understand and help us to grasp the main points that are being conveyed here. The hope of the gospel, the warnings of how horrible it is to stand outside of Christ on the last day. And let us be drawn unto him and let us rest in him so that the end of our days we might enter into a rest, we might enter into the worship of heaven, and we would know the song of the 144,000, and we would join with many saints and angels in heaven, worshiping the lamb who stands on Mount Zion. We ask this in Christ's name, amen.