If you'll turn with me now over to the book of Revelation, chapter 15. And we've come to verses 5 through 8. The Apostle John records for us under inspiration, And after that I looked, and behold, the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven was opened. And the seven angels came out of the temple, having the seven plagues, clothed in pure and white linen, and having their breasts girded with golden girdles. And one of the four beasts gave unto the seven angels seven golden vials, full of the wrath of God, who lives forever and ever. And the temple was filled with smoke from the glory of God and from His power. And no man was able to enter into the temple till the seven plagues of the seven angels were fulfilled. Let's pray. We thank You again, Father, for Your Word. Help us this morning to understand it and to apply it loose my lips and my tongue this morning that I might say those things which would be true, that would be faithful to the text that is before us, that would help your church to beware of the deceitfulness of sin, to glory in the preeminence of Jesus Christ, and to ever walk worthy of the calling wherewith we have been called. Those things which would be In error, through ignorance or carelessness on my part, may they quickly fall aside and be forgotten. But by Your Word, may the Spirit speak to the church this morning. For Christ's sake we ask it. Amen. Thank you for standing. You can be seated. So the last time we were together, we saw the first half of this short chapter, verses 1 through 4. And we saw the saints in heaven, around the throne of God, worshiping God, singing the song of Moses. And the song of Moses seems to flow from the fact Verse 1, that the seven angels who had the seven last plagues, for in them is filled up the wrath of God. This seems to be the impetus which drove these saints to sing this victory song to God. It says they sang the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb. And we looked at the song of Moses after Pharaoh and his armies were overwhelmed in the sea. And Moses' song was filled with rejoicing and thanking God for destroying Pharaoh and his armies, sinking them under the waters, leaving not a one left behind, and in turn rescuing God's people out. from that persecution. The Song of the Lamb, then, seems to be the New Testament version of that same story. That the enemies of God, which had stood against the Lord and His anointed, had stood hand in hand against them, taking counsel together, saying, let us break their bands asunder from us. The Lord who sits in heaven laughed. He had set His King upon Mount Zion, and He broke the nations with a rod of iron. These saints in heaven, we're told, they had gotten victory over the beast, and his image, and his mark, and the number of his name. But they had not gotten victory through physical means, through carnal means of warfare. It was not that the church of God had overthrown the Roman army, or had destroyed their Jewish persecutors, but rather they themselves had been martyred. The first and second beast, the empire of Rome and the false religion and empire of Israel. had destroyed these Christians in many cases, had martyred them, but they got the victory through Jesus Christ. Through their faith, they stayed faithful to Jesus Christ by the grace of God, and now as God begins to pour these judgments out upon the enemies of Christ, the saints of God sing the song of Moses and the song of the Lamb to God. Now we come to the second half of this chapter, which begins to tell us about the seven plagues which are about to be poured out in succession upon the earth. This is the introduction to them. We will get into more detail about these particular plagues in the next chapter. But this afternoon I want to take more of a big-picture, bird's-eye overview, because that's what the text gives us here. The first thing I want you to see here is the origin of the plagues, where these come from in verse 5. And after that I looked, and behold, the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven was opened. It is from here that the seven angels come. They come out of that temple, but it's not merely called the temple in verse 5, it's called the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony. Now, perhaps that sounds redundant to you, but I think God is intentionally making an emphasis about where these plagues originate from in response to the reason that they're being poured out upon the earth. The first mention is the temple. This is the biggest of the three. If you want to look at these three things like Russian nesting dolls, one inside the other, you have the temple. We've seen already in the book of Revelation, as we saw in the Old Testament and in other places in the Scriptures, that the temple, and particularly the Holy of Holies, the temple proper, was the throne room of God. This is where God sat. This is where the high priest, once a year, would come before God Himself with the sacrifice. This heavenly temple is the model after which the earthly temple was patterned. And so as in the earthly temple on earth God sat, so we see this representation here that this heavenly temple is the throne room of God. But why were these judgments falling on Israel and on Rome? It is because they had rejected Jesus Christ as King. If you have one of the handout notes, children, that's the first blank there. Jesus is King. The temple of God, the Holy of Holies represented where God met with man. But God met with man in Jesus Christ. The destruction of the temple on earth. In 70 AD, when those Roman soldiers disregarded all the orders that had been given them, and overran the city of Jerusalem, and destroyed that temple stone upon stone, that was not the ultimate horror. The ultimate horror is what it represented. The symbol of the fact that God no longer dwelt with them. From the time that they wandered in the wilderness, the Israelites had a cloud of smoke by day and a pillar of fire by night, which represented the fact that God was with them. After He gave them instructions as to how to build the more temporary tabernacle, the tent where He would meet with them, it was a representation there in the center of the camp that there was a place where man could go and meet with God. After that, God gave the instructions, and David gathered the materials, and Solomon built a more permanent temple. And it was the place where the Jews could go on every feast day, and on every day of atonement, and know that they could meet with God. But in Immanuel, they had God with us. They had the true temple of God there dwelling among them. They had that place where God as King would truly be represented to them, not merely by the high priest being able to approach to Him, but any of the people, the little children, the sick, the demon-possessed, could come face to face with God in the man Jesus Christ. And though at one point they acted as though they wanted to take him by force and make him king, though at one point they paraded him down the street and cried, Hosanna in the highest, the son of David, glory to God. Yet when he was presented to them at his judgment, as behold your king, they said, we have no king but Caesar. crucify Him and give us Barabbas. If they would not have God dwelling among them in Jesus, if they would not have Jesus as He truly is and not merely as they wanted Him to be as their King, then they would not have God dwelling among them in a temple built out of wood and stone. That was a forerunner. That was a shadow. That was a picture of the way that man could meet with God. The fullness was Jesus Christ. So when Jesus Christ was rejected, the very place where man could once go to meet with God is now the place where the curses and plagues of God are coming out of upon those people. You didn't want Jesus. You don't want the temple. They imagined they did. It was their whole world falling apart when it fell apart on this earth. But it is the heavenly temple where God dwells that these judgments proceeded out of as this procession of seven angels begins to file out and make their way to pour their judgments upon the earth. The second piece in this collapsing image, it is the temple of the tabernacle. Now if we merely took that word tabernacle by itself, as I mentioned to you, we might think of that tent that was used as a precursor to the temple which the children of Israel constructed. But the tabernacle was not inside the temple. The temple on earth is never called the temple of the tabernacle. They were two distinct buildings. But the idea of a tabernacle is a housing. And I believe what is being talked about here by the tabernacle of the testimony, what was it that housed the testimony? It was the Ark of the Covenant. That was the tabernacle of the testimony. That's where the testimony of God rested and dwelt, which is the idea of tabernacle. It's the same root word that is used when we're told that Jesus dwelt among us in John chapter 1. And so the dwelling place, the resting place of the testimony was the Ark of the Covenant. I believe that is what is being spoken of here by the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony. On the top of that ark, on the top of that housing of the testimony was the mercy seat. This is where the high priest would bring the blood of the Lamb every year and sprinkle it before God for the atonement of the people every year. It was the apex of the high priest's duty every year to bring that blood and to sprinkle it and have the sins of the people atoned. But once again, that mercy seat and the blood of that Lamb was merely a shadow, a picture, a representation of the one whom John the Baptist said, behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sins of the world. Jesus said, this cup is the New Testament in my blood. And this is what they had rejected. They had rejected Jesus Christ as the sacrificial Lamb. This is the blank there on your handout. Jesus is priest and sacrifice. He's both. He's the high priest after the order of Melchizedek and He is the spotless Lamb of God which would be slain for the sins of the world. It is almost unfathomable to wrap our minds around the fact that the place where the sins would be atoned is the same place where the judgment of God would come to destroy those who had rejected that atonement. But this is exactly what Paul tells us in Hebrews chapter 10, what the Holy Spirit tells us in Hebrews chapter 10 about those who would reject the blood of atonement. If you have your Bibles with me, turn over to Hebrews chapter 10 and verses 26-31 and look at these verses with me. This is a retelling of that truth we heard in Sunday school about the presumptuous sin. For if we sin willfully, after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries." He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses. Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy who has trodden underfoot the Son of God, and has counted the blood of the covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing, and has done despite unto the Spirit of grace? For we know him that has said, vengeance belongs unto me. I will recompense, says the Lord. And again, the Lord shall judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Now this verse, most certainly, continues to carry weight and authority and application to all those today who would hear the gospel, who would understand what is said in it, who would give mental assent to the historical person of Jesus Christ, who perhaps was raised in the church and heard hundreds, yea, thousands of sermons preached from the whole counsel of God, and yet turns away and rejects it. There's no salvation out there for them. There's only one place where salvation is found, and that is in the blood of Jesus Christ. And if they've turned from that, there's nowhere else to go. As Peter asked, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. But don't you think there was a particular first century heaviness of this passage on those original readers who would read it. Who is this book written to? The Hebrews. The Jews, the children of Abraham, they get a copy of this letter and they realize, if you despised the blood of the covenant, if you counted that an unholy thing, if you've trodden underfoot the blood of Jesus Christ, All you can look for is a certain fearful judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries. Those who stood against Jesus Christ while He was here on this earth. Those who had the privilege of Him dwelling among them. He came unto His own and His own received Him not. The book of Hebrews tells us, There's nowhere else for you to turn. In fact, that place where the blood of the atonement was once sprinkled, that's the place where fiery indignation is going to come from. It's the temple of the tabernacle. of the testimony. And this is that third narrowing down. You have the temple, the Holy of Holies, you have the Ark of the Covenant within the Holy of Holies, and you have the testimony within that tabernacle, within that housing. We know what the testimony in the Ark of the Covenant was. It was the Law of God, written on two tables of stone. It was the Ten Commandments. which were placed there inside that ark. It was the core of everything that God had given to the Jews in His revelation. It was from what everything else had grown out of when Paul says, the Jew has a great advantage in that to them first were the oracles of God given. This is the basis of that. The testimony, the law of God, the Ten Commandments are there. Now the Jews in Jesus' day loved to give lip service to the Law. Not only did they love to give lip service to the Law, but they'd added their own teachings and put them as paramount and right up there with the Law of God. But the Word written on tables of stone, just like the temple, just like the mercy seat, was a shadow. a forerunner, a precursor. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God, and that Word of God became flesh and dwelt among us. John chapter 1 tells us, this is the Word of God, God who at times passed and in sundry manners has spoken unto us by the fathers through the prophets has now in the face of Jesus Christ spoken to us. Revealed Himself to us. Jesus is the Word. And when they rejected the Word, they rejected the Law. They rejected every Word of God. You cannot say, I believe the Old Testament, I believe the Bible, I try to follow the good principles in the Law of God, but I don't know if Jesus was who He said He was. No, He is the Word of God. He is the full, final representation of God, speaking of God to man. They had rejected Jesus as King. And so these judgments come out of the temple. They had rejected Jesus as priest and lamb, and so these judgments come from the mercy seat. And they had rejected Jesus as prophet. Would be your third blank there. And so these judgments come from the testimony. The very things that God had placed to help them understand the Messiah when He came, they made idols out of and rejected the Messiah. We saw the forerunner of this when they made that brazen serpent an idol. And Jesus said, as the serpent was lifted up, so must I be lifted up. And if I be lifted up, I will draw all men unto Me." So, this is the pattern that we're seeing. That those who have a hard heart, those who have not been granted faith and eyes to see and ears to hear, they take those things which are supposed to be patterns and schoolmasters to lead them to Christ, and they become blinders to keep them from Christ. Turn over to John chapter 12. Now look at verses 47-50. Jesus said, "...if any man hear My words and believe not, I judge him not. For I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. He that rejects Me and receives not My words has one that judges him. the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day. For I have not spoken of myself, but the Father which sent me. He gave me a commandment, what I should say and what I should speak, and I know that His commandment is life everlasting. Whatsoever I speak, therefore, even as the Father said unto me, so I speak." Jesus' words was God speaking to man. And He had told them while He dwelt there among them, if you reject My words, you reject God. And it is not Me here on this earth that you have to worry about bringing judgment, but My words will judge him when the Father judges him on that last day. So this statement here in verse 5, as the angels proceed from the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven, I believe this is speaking of Jesus as King and Priest and Prophet in which office He had been rejected while He was here on this earth. And now, from heaven, the judgments proceed from those offices against those who had rejected those offices. Verse 6 tells us about the agents of delivery. The seven angels came out of the temple, having the seven plagues, clothed in pure and white linen, and having their breasts girded with golden girdles. We know in a very picturesque, illustrative book that nothing is done by accident. The number 7, we know, very often pictures perfection and fulfillment. Now what did we see in verse 1 of Revelation chapter 15? It is from these seven angels who have the seven last plagues. They're called the last plagues, for in them is filled up the wrath of God. This is the finality, the fullness of it. He's been bringing judgment after judgment upon them, and in these seven, the fullness of it will be poured out. And certainly, when these plagues were poured out, when the wrath of God was poured out upon Israel, Not only did their method of worship cease to exist, their national identity ceased to exist, even their bloodline became compromised. It was an end of that old covenant way. of the people of God being sequestered into this nation and this people. God puts a finality to the end of this, and these seven angels represent that. Picture that to us, that this is the fullness of the wrath of God in this aspect of fulfilling the prophecy of Psalm chapter 2, that He would break the nations with a rod of iron. The seven plagues are carried by seven angels. These seven angels are the ministers of God in heaven. We know that's what the scriptures tell us that angels are. They're awaiting His commands. They're ever ready to do their part when called upon to do so. But these plagues do not originate with the angels. It's not like God gave the angels some free reign to, hey, go take care of some things down on earth for me. They're merely doing what they're sent to do. God has given them these plagues, God has sent them from His temple, from His throne room, to do these things, to pour this wrath out upon the earth, and they are willing and able to do what God has called them to do. And these angels are garbed in the same way that Jesus is pictured to us in Revelation chapter 1. In a white linen with a golden girdle around their breasts. These garments represent the way that the priests of the temple were adorned. The priestly garments of white linen and the golden ephod and all the things that the Old Testament represents to us. as the ministers of the temple would be adorned, so these angels coming out of the heavenly temple, following in the pattern of Jesus, the great high priest, it would be expected that they would be represented in a very similar way. Verse 7 indicates to us the method of transfer, how these angels received these plagues. One of the four beasts gave unto the seven angels seven golden vials full of the wrath of God who lives forever and ever." Now the dragon had his two beasts. Remember that in chapter 13? You had the first and the second beast. You had the first beast of statism in the Roman Empire, and you had the second beast of the false worship and false religion of Israel in the second beast. But the four beasts we were introduced to earlier on in the book, and I was never very dogmatic as to exactly what those beasts were or represented, but I told you I thought they very well may represent the providence of God in His workings among men through time and space. So we might see a contrast here. While the dragon seeks to persecute the people of God through the beast of statism and false religion, yet God is not conquered. He uses His beast in the providence and the workings of men to judge those beasts. The beast of Rome and Israel of statism and false religion are overthrown by God's beast. It's interesting, in the Greek, those are two different words. The first and second beast in Revelation chapter 13 is literally a ferocious beast, a dangerous beast. And the beast of the four beasts that are mentioned earlier in the book, and then again here in chapter 15, is just the word Zoan. It's just a creature. It's the good beast, if you want to look at it that way. So God is not overthrown by the workings of Satan, but he has his own counteraction to the works which will eventually overcome Satan's schemes, and God and Christ and the church will be victorious. The golden vials are holy and pure. They're golden. The word vial, perhaps you think of it in a very sterile setting. Many times when we think of a vial, we think of a long, thin glass tube, right? But the Greek word phiale, which is literally where we got the word vial from. It's the etymology. You can hear the closeness there, phiale, vial. It has to do with a shallow, wide vessel, like a goblet or a bowl or something of that nature here. But what I think is very interesting is that they are golden. The scriptures tell us that God in His sovereignty is able and has the authority, without anyone questioning Him, to make some vessels unto honor and some vessels unto dishonor. And the clay or the material being worked has no right to say to God, why are you making me a vessel to honor and why are you making me a vessel unto dishonor? But I find it very interesting that these vials, which carry plagues, and the wrath of God are not vessels of dishonor, but are vessels of honor. They're golden vessels. They're vessels that are not merely made to be disposable, but to last through time. Vessels which will endure, and as they endure through the preservation of the Holy Scriptures, they show to us that the wrath of God is a holy and pure thing. When God's wrath, His judgments, are poured out upon men, whether they be spiritual judgments or physical judgments, it is holy and right and good and consistent with the character of God that He would judge His enemies in this way. These vessels being carried out of the temple are like the vessels that were in the earthly temple. Holy, sanctified, set apart to God. golden, displaying His honor, His glory, His splendor, His preeminence. But we're told that these vials were filled with the wrath of God. These judgments we're going to begin looking at in chapter 16 are not some dispassionate, calculated act which God is going to do in order to work history out the way He wants it to go. These plagues represent to us that God is angry at sin. He has a holy, righteous, pure anger, wrath, which burns against His enemies. The Psalms tell us, we looked at it a couple of weeks ago, that God is angry with the wicked every day. These churches which would represent to you God's not angry at you no matter what. These denominations or these pulpits which would express that anger is somehow an emotion that is beneath God. I haven't read the scriptures. You may look around you, and I mentioned this a couple of weeks ago when we were looking at the first half of this chapter, how it's easy in a very free, relatively Christian society to not get righteous anger against the wicked. But when they have authority, when the wicked rule, the people mourn, when the children of God are being oppressed by statism or false religion or paganism, then we begin to feel in our breasts that cry of, how long, O Lord, holy and true? Perhaps you look around on us at the insanity of sin as it becomes bolder and bolder in showing its ugly, monstrous face in society around us, as people dance and sing and celebrate the freedom to kill their children, to mutilate their bodies, and it disgusts us to our core. Know this, God is angrier with a purer, more righteous anger than you are. And so when He tells us, vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord, you don't have to worry that God doesn't see. You don't have to fret yourself against evil doers. Every child of God should be regularly reminded and comforted in knowing that God loves them more than any other being on earth could love them. More than they could imagine being loved in their minds. And every enemy of God needs to know that God is angrier at them than any person they've ever met here on this earth. More than they could ever imagine someone being angry. The fury and the wrath of God is stored up against those who hold the truth in unrighteousness. And this wrath is from the God who lives forever and ever. That's what verse 7 tells us. It's full of the wrath of God who lives forever and ever. We're so finite. We're so temporal. We're so limited in our scope of history and the world and the universe. God, how could this go on for four years? God, how could you allow this to go on for 10 years? God lives forever and ever. He sees people and nations and history in a completely different way than you and I do. There were 40 years between the crucifixion of Jesus and the destruction of Jerusalem. There was a hundred years before the crucifixion of Jesus and that final wrath and dissolution of the nation of Israel in 136. God is outside of time. It's not like as years or decades or centuries pass, he somehow becomes placated or immune to the sins committed against him. As if the passage of time somehow made the sins less offensive. He sees the end from the beginning. He planned and mapped out the end from the beginning. The Lamb of God was slain from the foundation of the world. God knows exactly what He's doing, exactly when He's doing it, and His vengeance and His justice will be more perfect, and more fitted, and more holy, and more right than anything you could ever imagine doing to the enemies of God. Individuals will receive their just desserts in this life or the next. Nations will receive their just reward in this generation or following. In every place and in every way, God will be vindicated and His enemies will be exposed as the frauds that they are. Fourthly, we see in our text the circumstances surrounding the giving. In verse 8, And the temple was filled with smoke from the glory of God and from His power. And no man was able to enter into the temple till the seven plagues of the seven angels were fulfilled." This probably draws your mind back to Isaiah chapter 6 and verse 4. As God's about to tell Isaiah about the judgments that are coming upon Israel, And the Scriptures tell us in verse 4, the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. Or perhaps you thought about Mount Sinai, when God came down and gave the law. In Exodus 19.18, Mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire, and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly. There's something about smoke which represents to our temporal senses glory and awe and wonder and weightiness. It's the reason they use smoke machines in concerts and magic shows and sporting events. It's a reason that many false worship seeks to bring in temporal smoke. whether it be the incense of the high church or the smoke machines of the charismatics. There's something about the smoke to our senses that stirs up this wonder and awe. But God made us that way. Because when God comes on Mount Sinai and when Isaiah sees God in the temple and when John sees these judgments coming from the temple, it's the glory and it's the power of God which fills it with smoke. Psalm chapter 104 says, God looks on the earth and it trembles. He touches the hills and they smoke. Psalm 144.5 says, Bow thy heavens, O Lord, and come down. Touch the mountains and they shall smoke. This is picturesque of the power of God when but His finger comes and touches the world. Remember those magicians as Moses was bringing the signs and the wonders, and they said at a certain point when they could no longer reproduce the miracles, this is the finger of God. When God stretches forth His powerful arm, when His hand reaches down to judge the nations, it is smoke and fire. It represents just how powerful He is. Just how glorious, how weighty, how awesome and wonderful His presence is. Creation itself, it's as if it spontaneously combusts at being in the presence of such power and glory. The end of this verse has caused much discussion and consternation among all camps of interpretation, of revelation. No man was able to enter into the temple till the seven plagues, the seven angels were fulfilled. Pre-mill, omni-mill, post-mill, regardless of how you're representing this, it's hard to imagine what that could mean. Was there a time in heaven when the saints of God couldn't approach the throne room of God because of the judgments on earth? Or if this is going to happen in some future date, what does this mean? That there'd be a temple but nobody could go into it? It's a problem for all interpretations, but I think the best understanding of it is the idea that the man entering into the temple would be like that high priest who would bring an appeasing atonement to God. This is not merely talking about whether you were able to traverse or not, but it had to do with the reason why a man would come into the temple, and it would be to appease the wrath of God. And I believe the indication here in verse 8 is that these nations have gone beyond being appeased. God is going to judge them. It's set in stone at this point. He will not be turned back. It's not like Nineveh, who will be given 40 days to repent. It's not like Sodom and Gomorrah, who if there is a certain number of righteous men, those cities will be spared. No, God has determined that He will judge these nations, He will break them with a rod of iron, and no prayer from any man on heaven or on earth is going to stop it, because the Trinity, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, has determined. Now this is not merely my imagination, but we know that God has spoken about His judgments in similar ways, most notably in Ezekiel chapter 14. in three different places in Ezekiel chapter 14 as God is decreeing His judgments that are about to come. He says this in verse 14 and He repeats it two more times in the chapter. Though these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job were in it, they should deliver but their own souls by their righteousness, says the Lord God. The judgment that He had decreed to come upon that nation in that time, He said Noah, Daniel, and Job couldn't save this city. I'd rescue them, they're my children. By grace I'd deliver them like I delivered Lot out of Sodom, but they would not stay my hand of judgment upon that city and upon that nation because they've passed that point. I've determined to judge, and judge I will. And I believe that's the indication here that no man was able to enter into the temple until the seven plagues of the seven angels were fulfilled. As they begin these judgments upon the earth, there will be no stay. There will be no intercession. The judgment will fall in full power and glory. Now in the last five minutes we have together, let me give you some application. What can we take away from this heavenly scene that has so many historical important functions? This is still a passage that is applicable to us. As we consider that God judged them for rejecting Jesus as King, as Priest, and as Prophet, we need to be reminded, and we need to remind our children and the lost world around us, that to reject Jesus in any way as He has revealed Himself to us to be in the Word of God, is to reject God. This has been the basis of so many heresies down through the years. I accept this about Jesus, but I reject that about Jesus. I accept that He was human, I don't accept He was really divine. I accept He was divine, I don't accept He was really human. I accept He was a good prophet, I don't accept He was the Messiah. I accept He was a good moral teacher, I don't accept that He rose again from the dead. No, Jesus is who He reveals Himself to be to us by the Spirit, through the Scriptures, and you either take all of it or you reject the Triune God. They are three in one. You don't get to keep God the Holy Spirit and jettison God the Son. You don't get to keep God the Son and jettison God the Holy Spirit. You don't get to keep God the Father and jettison God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. As 3 in 1 revealed to us in the Scriptures, we must receive Him as He presents Himself to us, or we reject Him altogether. Secondly, as verse 6 shows us that the angels of God in heaven are ready to do their part in the service of God, so we too must be willing to receive the word of God and the duties that God has put before us and execute them faithfully by the grace of God to the best of our ability for all the days of our life. These angels were not given the most pleasant, most fun task. This wasn't the job to show up at Jesus' birth and sing in the heavens, peace on earth, good will toward men. This wasn't the job of the angel who got to come to Mary and say, blessed art thou among women. No, these angels are given the job to bring the plagues of the wrath of God onto the earth. And they do it. Faithfully. Happily. Dutifully. You may not like the duties that God has put in front of you. You may think you just can't do it. I've had people tell me in Council, I just can't do this anymore. What do you mean you can't do this anymore? I just can't keep being a good wife to this man. I just can't keep being a good father to these children. I just can't keep being an obedient child to these parents. I just can't do it anymore. Oh, you can, by the grace of God. You can continue to do your duty to be obedient to the scriptures, to not allow the actions of others to dictate your actions. The duties that God gives us is not always picking sunflowers and dancing in happy sunshiny fields. Sometimes God sends us to deliver plagues. Sometimes God gives us the less than enviable tasks, and we ought to take our cue from those faithful messengers of God in heaven to be obedient to the task laid before us. Thirdly, do not fret yourself because of the wicked. We see in verse 7 that these vials are full of the wrath of God who lives forever and ever, God will avenge and His vengeance will be perfect. Do not imagine that because in your lifetime, you've only seemed to see the wicked prosper. You look back and you say, well, it just seems like for the last 50 years, this nation's just been on a decline. Well, I just know in my personal life, it always seems like the people who, X, Y, Z. You have a God who lives forever and ever. You have a God who the Scriptures tell us a day is as a thousand years. He's not on your timeline. And you ought not put Him on your timeline. God will judge the wicked when they need to be judged. It may be long after you're gone. You may never see it. The dissolution of the nation may be a hundred years after the egregious offense against God has taken place. But God will not be mocked. Fourthly and lastly, in your prayers be resigned to God's will in judgment or in mercy. If verse 8 means what I think it means, then we can pray for national repentance, and I believe we ought to. We ought to pray for kings and all those who are in authority, that we may live peaceable and quiet lives in all godliness and honesty. But you need to be resigned to the fact that if God is going to destroy the nation, Nevertheless, not my will, but thine, be done. Let us follow the pattern in prayer that our Lord Jesus set for us. If it be possible, let this cup pass from me nevertheless. Not my will, but thine, be done. Let us not be like Jonah, who preaches the holy justice and destruction of God, and then despairs when repentance comes. I knew you were a long-suffering God full of mercy. No, but in judgment or in revival, let us trust the holy perfect will of God and His providence on this earth, His workings among the sons of men, to ultimately and finally exalt Jesus Christ as preeminent over all, to give His church a victory in their advance that the gates of hell will not prevail against, that we would be faithful in our duty till the day that we die, If you've not believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and you're here this morning, the wrath of God is reserved in heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. The wrath of God will either be appeased in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ on your behalf, or in your final and ultimate destruction. Repent and believe the gospel. Let's stand to our feet and we'll be dismissed with a prayer and a song. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank You for its continued relevance to our day and age. We thank You for Your power, Your authority. Not only that You have it, but that You've revealed to us that You have it in Your Word. Give us strength, give us grace to do our duty. According to your will, Father, we ask again that you would be gracious to save those who are unconverted among our families, even some here in this sanctuary this morning, that you would humble their hearts and grant true faith and repentance unto life. For Christ's sake, we ask these things. Amen. Praise Him above, ye heavenly hosts. Praise the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. I want to invite you to stay with us. We have lunch over there. We'll be back again this afternoon at 1.30 service. Also, if you haven't done so yet, there is a sign-up sheet for our annual Thanksgiving lunch, which will be held a couple Sundays. It is back there on the table. Go ahead and start volunteering for what you're going to bring so we kind of know what to expect. And more than crackers and peanut butter, please. And we'll have a good time. meal together. Brother Danny Springer, if you would dismiss this in word prayer and ask the Lord to bless our time of fellowship. Amen.