I invite you to turn with me in God's Word to Revelation chapter 16. Final book of the Bible, the 16th chapter, Revelation chapter 16. And you may have noticed, if you were looking at the bulletin ahead of time, or if you're looking at the overhead right now, that there's a bit of a peculiar outline to this sermon. You'll see that we look at verses 1 through 4 and 8 through 9 in the first point, and then we hop back to verses 5 through 7. And then the same thing in the second half of the sermon, we look at verses 10 through 14 and then 16 through 21, and then we hop back and look at verse 15. The way that this text of Scripture is designed is we do have those two halves of the passage where judgment is poured out, but in the middle of each of those sections of the pouring out of judgment, we have the gospel. We have a declaration of the good news that it is Christ who is the judge and that believers will not be judged along with the wicked, that believers have faced their judgment already because Christ has been judged on their behalf. Let's begin reading Revelation chapter 16 at verse 1. We'll read the entirety of the chapter. Then I heard a loud voice from the temple telling the seven angels, go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God. So the first angel went and poured out his bowl on the earth and harmful and painful sores came upon the people who bore the mark of the beast and worshiped its image. The second angel poured out his bowl into the sea and it became like the blood of a corpse. And every living thing died that was in the sea. The third angel poured out his bowl into the rivers and the springs of water, and they became blood. And I heard the angel in charge of the waters saying, just are you, O Holy One, who is and who was, for you brought these judgments. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and you have given them blood to drink. It is what they deserve. And I heard the altar saying, Yes, Lord God, the Almighty, true and just are your judgments. The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and it was allowed to scorch people with fire. They were scorched by the fierce heat, and they cursed the name of God who had power over these plagues. They did not repent and give him glory. The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast and its kingdom was plunged into darkness. People nod their tongues in anguish and curse the God of heaven for their pain and sores. They did not repent of their deeds. The sixth angel poured out his bowl on the river Euphrates, and its water was dried up to prepare the way for the kings of the east. And I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs, or they are demonic spirits, performing signs who go abroad to the kings of the whole world to assemble them for battle on the great day of God the Almighty. Behold, I am coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake, keeping his garments on, that he may not go about naked and be seen exposed. And they assembled them at the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon. The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came out of the temple from the throne saying, it is done. And there were flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, and a great earthquake such as there had never been since man was on the earth. So great was that earthquake. The great city was split into three parts, and the city to the nations fell. And God remembered Babylon the great to make her drain the cup of the wine of the fury of his wrath. And every island fled away, and no mountains were to be found. Great hailstones, about 100 pounds each, fell from heaven on people, and they cursed God for the plague of the hail, because the plague was so severe. Thanks be to God for his word. It's a question among historians. What exactly we should focus on when we study history? What should be the underlying assumptions that we make when we study the broad course of history? Should we study it, as many have contended in previous generations, should we study it through the lens of the great men? who have arisen throughout history as leaders of men or movements? Or should we study the little people who followed them, finding the meaning of history in their individual lives? You might wonder, why are you beginning this sermon in this way? It seems like a very academic question, and in some ways it is. It's a very academic question. When I was in university, both at Brock and at Redeemer, my history professors were quite proud of the fact that the whole study of history had moved away from studying the lives and the thoughts and the influence of great men and had become a study of the everyman and everywoman who make up the great streams of history. Regardless of which you look at, the fundamental problem remains. When we look at history, we have this tendency to look at men, to look at people, assuming that they hold the reins of history and they decide the course of history. It's the great rulers and the great philosophers that determine the flow of history. Men like Napoleon or Caesar or Thomas Paine or Thomas Jefferson. But the fundamental problem remains, we're still looking at men, assuming that they hold the reins of history. Revelation, the book of Revelation, serves as a necessary corrective to this tendency. It tells us that we shouldn't worry too much about the great men of history or even the everyman of history. Our eyes should be on the Son of Man and what He is doing, what He has done, what He has promised He will do. And this is important. It's not just an academic question. If history is all about people, and only about people, what people accomplish, what people manage, where people go, what people make, and so on, then our confidence in the end of history or even the current times, will rise and fall depending on which people are in power, which people are holding influence, which ideologies or philosophies are holding sway. But if we raise our eyes, as we ought to, to heaven, where Christ is looking down on the sons of men and sovereignly guiding all the currents and courses of all of history's great nations and civilizations, our faith will have what it needs to remain steady, to stay rock solid, Because history does not depend on the thoughts and the actions and the accomplishments of people. History depends on the foundation of Jesus Christ. History has a point. And despite what people may do or say or think or write, everything is leading up to that point. to the return of Christ, to judge the living and the dead. Throughout the history of the world, there are cycles of nations rising and falling and rising and falling and rising and falling, not according to, as we often think, not according to the whims and the power and the personality of conquerors and kings and generals, but according to the will and the purpose and the power and the judgment of God. In Revelation 16, themes and judgments and plagues that were used and described all over the Old Testament are picked up and concentrated here in this final display of God's wrath against nations and kingdoms. They're picked up to describe the cycle of judgment reaching its conclusion at the end of every anti-God civilization. Every time a civilization falls, Revelation tells us, we are brought one step closer to the final battle, the final fall, the final judgment, when Christ, the Son of Man, returns in the clouds of heaven, sets up His throne to judge the living and the dead, and replaces their kingdom with His kingdom that will never end. The first thing that we're going to see in this chapter is escalation. The trumpets of God have been ignored, and now God thunders forth with His with his awesome judgments. The second thing we'll see is vindication, as the angels and the altar cry out to God and say, you are doing what is right. They praise God for his judgments. The third thing we'll see is execution. As the enemies of Christ and his people, the dragon, the beast, the false prophet, and even Babylon herself are all cast down. And the fourth and final thing we'll see as we go back to verse 15 is benediction. Benediction, the blessing that is promised for those saints who stay awake, who are ready, who are prepared for Christ's judgment. Revelation 16 begins where Revelation 15 ended. with the temple of God. You'll remember that at the end of Revelation chapter 15, the glory of God, the great cloud of the glory of God filled the sanctuary in heaven and no one could come into it until the judgments had been poured out. God is going to act and nothing can stay His hand. Revelation 16 begins with a loud voice coming out from the temple saying, go, angels go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God. This image of bulls, as we saw last week, it comes from the Old Testament. Nations that rebel against God, that rebel against God's commands and His Word, who persecute His people and blaspheme His name, they're pictured throughout the Old Testament as filling up the cup of God's wrath. His final judgment on them is held off until the cup is all the way full. And this is mercy before judgment. In mercy, God holds off judgment, and He sends warning after warning until the iniquities of a nation are, in His judgment, complete. And again, in mercy, He blows His warning trumpets before He comes to judge a nation. But when a nation's iniquities are completed, He comes to judge that nation, to pour out the cup of His wrath. warnings are done, judgment has come. And if we compare the trumpets that were blown and the bowls that are now being poured out, there's a marked escalation from the trumpet judgments. Wrath has come upon the nations at last. Now, as with the seals and the trumpet judgments, the plagues fall in two groups, the first four and then the last three, but even within the first four, there's a pattern. There's a pattern that actually draws our eyes to the vindication of God. The first and fourth plagues, that bracket, the other two, which we'll look at first, they deal with a preview of judgments to come. They show the nations that are to be judged what the eternal punishment of hell looks like. The second and third plagues deal with the reason that nations are judged. So the first bowl is poured out, and everyone who bears the mark of the beast and worshipped its image is afflicted with these terrible sores, these horrible, painful, disfiguring skin diseases. But notice, this plague does not affect the saints. It does not affect the saints. It only comes on those who worshipped the beast. You might remember how many of the plagues in Egypt, when the 10 plagues were sent on that nation, they affected the Egyptians, those who were under the power of Pharaoh, but not the Israelites who were living in the land of Goshen. God's wrath never comes upon his saints. His wrath has been borne by Christ. This is in keeping with God's judgment. God disciplines His saints in love, yes, but He never unleashes His wrath on them. All of His wrath against their sins, again, has been poured out on Christ. It would be unjust for God, in the pouring out of this bowl, to pour out His wrath on the saints, to punish them again for the sins that Christ died for. In this plague, though, He's giving the world a sort of preview of the fires of hell, the pain of that awful, final, eternal judgment. And you might think that in the face of this preview of divine judgment, when God says, well, this is what's going to come, people would say, well, I don't want that. I don't want that. I'm going to repent. You'd think that people would do all they could to avoid the agony, the reality of hell. And this would be the sensible thing to do. This would be the sensible thing to do. But look at what happens when the fourth bowl is poured out. The other bowl of hellish agony, the fourth bowl is poured out on the sun and it was allowed to scorch people with fire. But what happens when people are scorched by the fire of the sun? which burns with a much gentler heat than the fires of hell do." What happens? They were scorched by the fierce heat, and they cursed the name of God who had power over the plagues. They did not repent and give Him glory. See, people who've been willingly sinning against God all their lives and ignoring the warnings written on the pages of Scripture, ignoring the warnings preached to them, given to them in all kinds of different ways, For all their lives they will not repent, even when a foretaste of God's eternal judgment comes on them." There's this sort of senselessness that sin creates in people's minds. Proverbs 19, verse 3 says this, when a man's folly brings his way to ruin, his heart rages against the Lord. You might think when a man's folly brings his way to ruin, he might think, oh, I'm a fool. I should stop being a fool. But that's not the way the fallen hearts of men work. For those who are opposed to God, even when it's their own sin that's making them miserable and making their life a living hell, all their blame falls on God. not on themselves. They are blind to the truth. They are deaf to the promises and the threats of Scripture. They call bitter things sweet. They call sweet things bitter. They will not come and be healed, regardless of what they're suffering from. They'll just sit on the ground in self-pity, cursing God until the day they die. That's what persistent sin does to a person. It makes them blind. the glories of God. It makes them deaf to the call of the gospel. And even when their sins are dragging them bit by bit into the fires of eternal punishment, even when they begin to feel the heat of the flames looking around their ankles, they'd rather blame God for what they have done than turn to Christ and be saved. There will be no people in hell who are sorry for the sins they committed against God. There will be no people in hell who will wish for a second chance. There will be no people in hell who say, oh, I was wrong, God was right, I repent. This preview of hell then brings us to the internal part of this section, the second and third bowls. They're poured out and they also have a very similar effect to one another. The second bowl is poured out on the salt water of the sea, and it's depicted as turning into blood, like the blood of a corpse, killing everything that's living in the sea. Then the third bowl is poured out as well, and the fresh water of lakes and rivers and springs becomes blood as well. And these plagues are, of course, reminiscent of the first plague that fell upon Egypt. The waters of the Nile, the lifeline of the Egyptian civilization, were turned to blood. They were made undrinkable, they were made unusable for any purpose. The whole place reeked of death. It stank of blood. The most important natural resource there went from being a source of wealth and life and power to a source and a reminder of death. And to understand the full significance of these plagues, we'll turn to verses 5 through 7, the words of the angel and the words of the altar, where they give their vindication, where they say, Lord, you have done what is right. The wicked people of this earth we've seen who hate God, who hate His Word, who rebel against His Son, who shake their fists at heaven, those who love their sin, they willfully misrepresent God's judgments. They say God's judgments are wrong. God is not doing what is right. The fires are burning too hot. They curse the name of God. They don't repent. They don't give Him glory. They take God's judgments as an opportunity to curse God. But the angel who's carrying out these judgments, or perhaps the angel who is in charge of all the waters on earth, he knows exactly what's going on. He doesn't react the same way. No, he justifies God's actions, and the altar does the same thing. Yes, Lord God Almighty, true and just are your judgments. You are only doing what is right. See, sinners, they blaspheme God the judge, but saints and seraphim, they bless Him for His judgments. You have given them nothing less than what they deserve. And notice for a moment the titles that God's servants use to describe Him. The sinners that refuse to turn from their sin, they blaspheme God. But the angels and saints, they glorify God. They call Him the Holy One, the One who loves holiness, who is the source of holiness, who is, as the angels cried in Isaiah 6, holy, holy, holy. Even in His judgments, Even in his judgments, he shows that he is the Holy One over all the earth. He cannot stand the sight of sin. He hates sin with a burning passion precisely because he is the Holy One. Nothing is more, nothing is more dark, nothing is more evil in the sight of God than sins committed against his supreme majesty. He is the Holy One. He must judge sin. Secondly, the angels call him the one who is and who was. He's unchanging. God is not like the mythical gods of the nations, changing from day to day, sometimes waking up in a spiteful mood, ready to hurl down thunderbolts, sometimes generous, sometimes full of wrath. God is the unchanging one. And this matters if God is gonna be the judge over all the earth. His standards of judgment do not change. Why is it that we read the Ten Commandments every Sunday, or most Sundays, instead of going to the New Testament for something fresher, something newer? Well, it's because God's law has not changed. God's standard of righteousness has not changed because God Himself has not changed. He judges the nations according to His standards. He doesn't even take their standards or opinions into account. So really, neither should we. And third, the saints under the altar, or the altar itself, calls him the Lord God Almighty. Not only are his standards of justice unchanging and altogether holy, but when his judgment is carried out, it's the might of the judge of all the earth that carries them out. He works through his angels, yes, and he works in response to the prayers of his suffering saints, but the bowls are filled with his wrath, not theirs. We sang from Psalm 7. which is a psalm that talks about the bringing of the wrath of God. And in that psalm, we pray, God, God, send your wrath. We don't say to God, God, this is what I'd like done to the nations. We say, God, carry out your judgment, carry out your wrath, send your arrows where you want them sent. Judge them according to your standard, according to your wrath, not ours. Also, look at how His judgments are described by the saints. In verse 7, they say, "'Yes, Lord God Almighty, true and just are your judgments.'" God's judgments are true. He does not judge by what men can see, but He tests the souls and the hearts of men, the invisible intentions of their hearts, bringing to remembrance every secret and every hidden sin. Nothing is hidden from His sight. His judgments are true. but his judgments are also just. He does not favor one kind of person over another. He does not rank sins and offenses like we do. He does not punish anyone too much. He does not withhold judgment in such a way that betrays his holiness. And the assurance of pardon, what did we hear? He is faithful and he is just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. When he forgives sinners, it's not because he set his judgment aside, Because the demands of his judgment have been met. God is just. But there's one more thing that I want you to realize about these judgments that are being sent. Who is it? Who is it that is sending these angels? Who is it that is telling them to pour out their bowls of judgment? Who is it that's telling them that it's time to pour out the wrath of God against the earth? You might say, well, it's God, of course. It's the loud voice coming from the temple. Listen to what Jesus says in John 5, 22. He tells his disciples, he tells us, the Father has given all judgment into the hands of the Son. The Father has given all judgment to the Son. These angels are being sent out in judgment against the nations by Jesus Christ. And as these judgments are being carried out, do not begin to think that they are being carried out by the command of a cold and calculating and far-off deity who is calloused to the sufferings of men, who understands nothing of the punishments that he's meting out on the earth. Because the one to whom judgment is given is the one, first of all, who wept over Jerusalem when he saw her judgment approaching because of her stubborn sinfulness. You'll remember how he cried out over Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that killed the prophets and stoned those sent to it. How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings and you were not willing. As God says through His prophet Ezekiel, I do not delight in the death of the wicked. But at the same time, remember and recognize that every punishment that Jesus Christ sends against the world is a punishment that He Himself bore. You remember that Jesus Christ, who knew no sin, He became sin for our sakes and was subjected to the wrath of God. Remember His words to His disciples, again, in the gospel according to John, John 18, verse 11, shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me? Jesus drank a cup. We saw at the beginning of this sermon that the cups that are being poured out or the bowls that are being poured out on the nations are bowls that are filled with the wrath of God against the sins of the nations. What cup did Jesus drink? He drank the cup of wrath against my sins. He drank the cup of God's eternal, infinite wrath against my sins and your sins. The wrath of God that is poured out in Revelation chapter 16 is a cup of wrath that Jesus Himself also drank. He knew how it tasted. He was beaten by men and scourged by God as He bore the hellish wrath of God against sin. He did not just endure a preview of hell. But when he was hanging on the cross, he cried out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Because he knew in that instant what it was to be a man outside of the presence of the grace of God and the mercy of God. He tasted hell, he experienced hell. Though he had spilled no blood, his blood was spilled. Though He was the Father's beloved Son and the sweetest thing in all creation, He drank the bitter cup, He drank the gall, the poison. Though the glories of heaven belonged to Him, He was swallowed up by the darkness at midday as creation herself. hid her glories from her creator. The king of kings was sacrificed, was crucified by lawless men as they gathered together and conspired and committed the greatest act of cosmic treason that men or devils could have imagined. The very earth shook as he was broken. At the end of his suffering, the same cry of, it is finished, that we see in verse 17, came forth from his lips. Because he had taken the cup. He had taken the wrath of God, the full wrath of God, that Babylon and the nations are being forced to drink now, and he took it so that in its place we might have a cup of blessing instead of a cup of wrath. So that we, as his chosen and beloved, the saints for whom he died, would receive mercy instead of judgment, the judge, that pours out the wrath of God upon the nations is your bridegroom, beloved Christian. He is your dearest and your closest friend. The judge of all the earth is the savior of your soul. So even when you see these judgments being carried out, you'd best believe that he will do what is right and just and good and holy. This brings us to the last three bowls of judgment. And in these bowls, we see the cycle of nations and their judgments being played out as empires and nations and civilizations fall. But we're also given here a picture of the very end of history. The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast. and its kingdom was plunged into darkness." And you'll remember that this image of the beast in the book of Revelation stands for the binding together of all national power into the arms of political leaders. He stands for every tyrant who has said throughout history, you must worship me and honor me and not God. But here the beast himself is plunged into darkness, unable to reverse it. This happens throughout history when the power of political parties and politicians and world leaders is removed from them. And the sway they hold over their nations is suddenly removed from them. And you'd expect those who followed them to respond to their exposed impotence by disavowing them and turning to the Lord of life, but again, they don't. Instead, people nod at their tongues in anguish and curse the God of heaven for their pain and their sores. They don't curse the beast, just like they wouldn't curse their sins. They curse the God of heaven because he is punishing the kingdoms of the earth. They love the world and the things of the world. They love the beast and the power and the influence that He promises to give them. They are blind to the glories of heaven. They would rather pull out their eyes, as it were, and bite off their tongues than see the glory of God and admit that God is righteous and holy and they are dead wrong. They did not repent of their deeds. And the sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up to prepare the way for the kings from the east. When I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs. They are demonic spirits performing signs to go abroad to the kings of the whole world to assemble them for battle on the great day of God the Almighty. And they assembled them at the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon. the unholy trinity here, the dragon, the beast, and the false prophet in verse 13 and 14. They send out their messengers, their demonic messengers, their unclean spirits, to go throughout all the nations, to gather all the nations under their control, to wage a final war, which they believe will finally wipe out the saints. And they gather them all together, verse 16, at a place called Armageddon. But they've been gathered together, not so that they will be enabled to destroy the saints, but so that they themselves will now finally be destroyed. And if you know your history, you'll remember what happened when God split a body of water and God's enemies walked through. You'll remember what happened at the Red Sea. God divided the waters of the Red Sea. Israel fled through the midst of the sea. Egypt tried to follow them, but they were destroyed. And that's what will be described in chapters 17 and 19 and 20, not the final victory of the persecutors, but God's victory over the persecutors. Because you see at the end of verse 14, they assemble them for battle on the great day. The great day of who? The great day of the dragon? No. The great day of the beast? No. The great day of Babylon? Not even close. gather them together on the great day of God the Almighty." This will be a victory of God over the persecutors of the church. And actually, the drawing of the Euphrates River hints at this. It's likely a reference to the way that in history, it's recorded in the book of Daniel, The king from the east, Cyrus the Mede, and his Medo-Persian army came and conquered Babylon during the time of Daniel the prophet. Babylon relied on its massive walls and its economic strength and its great armies, but also on its position on the Euphrates River for its defense. In fact, the Euphrates River flowed right under the walls of Babylon. providing it with a constant source of fresh water, but its pride and its ingenuity proved to be its undoing because Cyrus's engineers figured out a way to actually divert the waters out of the river so that his troops could march along the dried-up riverbed, enter the city, and bring down Babylon the Great. In the same way, it's often Satan's servants who bring down Satan's other servants. When God's enemies amass against his saints, their power cannot stand. Often, because their kingdom is based on lies and deception and betrayal, they lie to one another, they deceive one another, they betray one another. Next week, Lord willing, in chapter 17, we'll see that it's the kings of the earth that had served Babylon the Great that bring her down. The saints, as God told Moses and as God told Jehoshaphat, The saints need only stand still and see the salvation of their God. He will fight for them. And finally, the seventh bowl is poured out. The cycle of judgment reaches its end, and we have pictures here also of the final judgment. The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came out from the temple, the same voice, you'll notice, where the command to begin the pouring of the bowls began. A loud voice came out of the temple from the throne saying, it is done. And what follows, that cry of finality, is a dreadful picture of uncreation. It's like the reverse of Genesis 1. It looks like everything in the world is falling apart, is being unmade. John borrows language from Jeremiah's prophecy, particularly I'd point to Jeremiah chapter 4. Or Jeremiah says that as Jerusalem is judged, it becomes like the earth was at the very beginning, formless and void. The solidity of the world is threatened by an earthquake greater than any that has ever been seen. There are flashes of lightning and rolls of thunder as God's wrath is finally being fully unleashed and the cities of the nations crumble and the cup of the wrath of God's fury is drained at last. And even the islands and mountains are pictured as hiding themselves from the wrath of God. And massive hailstones are sent down, and people are crushed under the weight of them. And again, as we've seen twice before already, they curse God and die. Creation is falling apart around them at the command of the creator and judge of the earth, and all they can think of is how much they hate him. Great hailstones, about 100 pounds each, fell from heaven on people, and they cursed God for the plague of hail because the plague was so severe. And here in verses 17 through 21, we have not just a picture of the end of every anti-God civilization and kingdom that has ever or will ever exist. Every one of them will be broken down and will fall down. We have also a picture of the end, the final judgment as Christ comes and all things that are evil and wicked flee from his sight. But before we close, let's go back to the words that we heard in verse 15. There's a parenthetical statement there, a sentence that just doesn't seem to belong where it is, but it's placed very deliberately right in the middle of the chaos and the rebellion of the world. The demonic spirits have been sent out, the kings are gathering together, and after the parenthetical statement, verse 16, they assemble them at the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon, but in the middle of all this chaos, in the middle of all this rebellion, this persecution, Jesus speaks to his church. It was Jesus who commanded the angels to pour out their bowls and bring the wrath of God, the judgment of God. It's Jesus who now pronounces a blessing for His saints in the midst of judgment for you and for me. And He says, behold, I am coming like a thief. If you know the Gospels, you know that. You've heard Jesus say that before, I'm coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake, keeping his garments on, that he may not go about naked and be seen exposed. And of course, Jesus is not talking about keeping our literal clothes on. He's telling us to be ready. To be ready. Ready for the fall of the Babylon that we live in. The Babylon's in which God's people have always lived. We live in Babylon. But Jesus is telling us that we may never become Babylonian. Remember Jesus' Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24, there he predicted the fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD. And according to the church historian Eusebius, the Christians living in Jerusalem and in the towns around Jerusalem, they remembered Jesus' warning, that they would see Jerusalem surrounded by armies. that it would fall, that they should be ready to flee as soon as Christ calls them to. And when they saw Titus' armies approaching, they fled to the mountains of Pella, and they were spared. They were ready to leave that city under judgment. They kept their garments on, like Israel getting ready to leave Egypt on the night of Passover. This also recalls Lot's flight from the cities of the plains in Genesis 19. He fled the city of Sodom before the judgment came, and it also reminds us, doesn't it, of Lot's wife. She left Sodom behind, but her heart was still tied to that city, and because of her love for that city, she shared in that city's judgment. The call to Christians here in Revelation 16, verse 15, is to not love the world or the things of the world, is to not be so in love with the city of man that we will not be ready to come out and flee when the day of judgment comes. You know, patriotism is good. The prophet Jeremiah, you might remember, wrote to the exiles in Babylon. He told them to seek the good of this city because in its blessing they would be blessed. But they were also reminded that Babylon was not their home. The city of man is not the home of the citizens of heaven. As a Christian, you cannot be so in love with Canada that you long more for this land than you do for the city with foundations whose builder and maker is God. To paraphrase Psalm 84, blessed are those who are ready to leave, in whose hearts are the highways to Zion. The kingdoms and the nations of this world will be judged again and again and again, as throughout history the Lord Jesus visits them with judgments in time again and again. The call to Christians in those nations is to hold on to their possessions, their influence, and even their homes lightly, to be ready to give them up when the Lamb calls them to. Because these judgments throughout history that will be visited upon every rebellious nation and every rebellious kingdom and empire, they are preparing the world for a final judgment, for the final judgment, for the day of the Lord, when Christ will come with the clouds of heaven, when all will see Him, even those who persecuted His church. And some will mourn and weep, and some will shake their fists at the judge, even as his judgments begin to fall on them, and they will curse him with every breath they have left. But Jesus has a promise here. Blessed, blessed is the one who stays awake, keeping his garments on. For those who have stayed awake, for those who have stayed ready, for those who have kept their lamps burning throughout the darkness of the night, for those who have loved and longed for his appearing, they will enter into his joy. They will sit at his banqueting table and they will drink the cup, not the cup of wrath, but the cup of blessing at the wedding supper of the lamb in the kingdom of his father. Blessed are those servants, Jesus says, whom the master will find awake when he comes. Truly I say to you, he will dress himself for service and have them recline at table, and he will come and serve them." Which cup do you want to drink? Which cup do you want to drink? Which city do you want to live in, the city of God or the city of man? Whose honor do you want, the honor of the beast or the approval of God? These are the choices that Revelation lies out, holds out to us, and lays out for us. Every one of us needs to decide where we stand, what we love, what we will seek. Do not love the world and the things of the world, but love the land of glory, the beautiful land, and the king that reigns there. Let's pray.