And in Jesus' name we pray, amen. I invite you to turn with me in your Bibles this morning again to the last book of the Bible, Revelation, and we find ourselves in chapter 14. We're going to read that chapter and then the first four verses of chapter 15, Just a note, one of the reasons that we are committed to expository preaching, which is books of the Bible ordinarily, verse at a time, chapter at a time, is because we want the totality of God's revelation to meet us. It's tempting, I think, for us sometimes as preachers to cherry pick, and these sorts of texts just keep us from doing that. So as we go through a book like Revelation, I know it's Mother's Day, and I don't think it's wrong to preach Mother's Day sermons. I've done that before, but I'm just thinking here, before I read the text, there's some weighty things, but this is something for all of us, men, women, boys, and girls, religious, non-religious, whatever your background is, and just to know that there would be nothing more delightful for our moms than if we were to take seriously what God has to say to us today. So, let's lean in. Revelation chapter 14, beginning at verse one to these glorious words. Then I looked, says John, and behold, on Mount Zion stood the Lamb, and with Him 144,000 who had His name and His Father's name written on their foreheads. And I heard a voice from heaven like the roar of many waters and like the sound of loud thunder. The voice I heard was like the sound of harpists playing on their harps. And they were singing a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and before the elders. No one could learn that song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth. It is these who have not defiled themselves with women, for they are virgins. It is these who follow the Lamb wherever He goes. These have been redeemed from mankind as firstfruits for God and the Lamb. And in their mouth no lie was found, for they are blameless. Then I saw another angel flying directly overhead with an eternal gospel to proclaim to those who dwell on earth, to every nation and tribe and language and people. And he said with a loud voice, fear God and give him glory. because the hour of his judgment has come and worship him who made heaven and earth the sea and the springs of water. Another angel a second followed saying, fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, she who made all nations drink the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality. And another angel, a third, followed them, saying with a loud voice, if anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever. they have no rest day or night. These worshipers of the beast and its image and whoever receives the mark of its name." Here is a call for the endurance of the saints, those who keep the commandments of God and their faith in Jesus, And I heard a voice from heaven saying, write this, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Blessed indeed says the spirit that they may rest from their labors for their deeds follow them. Then I looked and behold a white cloud and seated on the cloud one like a son of man with a golden crown around on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand. And another angel came out of the temple calling with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud, put in your sickle and reap for the hour to reap has come. for the harvest of the earth is fully ripe. So he who sat in the clouds swung his sickle across the earth, and the earth was reaped. Then another angel came out of the temple in heaven, and he too had a sharp sickle. And another angel came out from the altar, the angel who has authority over the fire, and he called with a loud voice to the one who had the sharp sickle, put in your sickle and gather the clusters from the vine of the earth. for its grapes are ripe. So the angel swung his sickle across the earth and gathered the grape harvest of the earth and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trodden outside the city and blood flowed from the winepress as high as a horse's bridle for 1,600 stadia. Then, John says, I saw another sign in heaven, great and amazing, seven angels with seven plagues, which are the last For with them the wrath of God is finished. And I saw what appeared to be a sea of glass mingled with fire. and also those who had conquered the beast and its image and the number of its name, standing beside the sea of glass with harps of God in their hands. And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, great and amazing are your deeds, O Lord God, the Almighty. Just and true are your ways, O King of the nations. Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship you for your righteous acts have been revealed. Ends the reading of God's holy word this morning. Well, it's past a week or so. I was on the road on the highway by Burger King here in Zealand and came up behind a car in front of me at a red light and couldn't help but read a bumper sticker. said something along the lines of, I didn't catch it exactly, but something like, don't worry, in hell, everybody is accepted. And it got me thinking how flippant we are, how flippant our culture is when it comes to hell, how flippant sometimes we even are in the church of Jesus Christ when it comes to everlasting torment. It's either in our culture or in the church sometimes denied altogether, or it's made to not sound that bad. Maybe even enticing. That's one of the ways the great red dragon deceives the world by blinding the minds of unbelievers from keeping them from seeing the truth of eternity. take these bumper stickers that you can buy on Amazon and put in your car. One says, I may be going to hell, but at least my friends will be there. Another says, I already know I'm going to hell. At this point, it's really go big or go home. Or, This one, it's meant to be funny and meant to be a little bit mean. If you're going to heaven, send me to hell. If they only knew. This morning we come to Revelation 14, the beginning of Revelation 15, where John receives a number of visions. And the visions that he receives and the realities that he sees with his eyes and hears with his ears show the staggering difference between the inhabitants of heaven on the one hand and the inhabitants of hell on the other. This text pulls no punches. It's not a bumper sticker meant to make us laugh. It's a reality meant to make us think. meant to call us to know the true and only true living God and to worship Him, to make sure that our hearts are right before Him. The title of my sermon is then, The Difference Between Heaven and Hell. We're going to look at it under two headings, very simply, but profoundly, the inhabitants of heaven on the one hand and the inhabitants of hell on the other. So we begin by considering the citizens of heaven, Chapter 14 is a major shift from the previous two chapters, where we came face to face with, remember, the three-headed monster. He's looking for mom and dad. He found him. Fantastic. We came face to face, right, with the three-headed monster, the great red dragon, the beast that rises out of the sea and the beast that rises out of the earth, trying to mimic the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. But now suddenly, as chapter 14 begins, John is given this new breathtaking vision of Mount Zion. And what he sees there is amazing. He sees on Mount Zion a lamb standing. Now, boys and girls, who's the lamb? The lamb, of course, is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. And I was just reflecting on this this morning, that it's the same John who said, behold, the Lamb of God who came to take away the sin of the world. That's who John sees standing on Mount Zion. But he's not standing there by himself. Surrounding him alongside with him are 144,000 we are introduced to this group back in chapter seven. This group represents symbolically the totality of the redeemed, men and women, boys and girls from both Old and New Testaments all the way up to today. All of God's blood-bought elect children saved by grace, men and women, boys and girls, made up in this 144,000 surrounding the Lamb on Mount Zion. Notice who had his name, the name of Jesus, verse one, and his father's name written on their foreheads, which is in direct contrast to what we saw last time in chapter 13 and the mark of the beast. So the apostle sees these things and then he hears things, so his senses are firing. And this is what he hears, verse two, a voice from heaven, like the roar of many waters, and like the sound of loud thunder, the voice I heard was like the sound of harpists playing on their harps. Notice the interesting blending of this heavenly orchestra. a loud volume, thunder on the one hand, and on the other hand, this note of beauty, of loveliness. And what is it that he's hearing? He's hearing singing. That's the first trait of the inhabitants of heaven. Those who dwell there love, to sing. And notice, it's a new song. In fact, it's unique only to them. Verse three goes on to say, no one could learn that song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth. The question is, why? Why just them? Why not, for example, the angels? Why not, for example, the hosts of heaven? Why not, for example, all of creation? And we know that all of creation waits and groans and can't wait and anticipates the day that Jesus returns to offer him worship. But why here does it say only these 144,000, only the redeemed can know this song? Why is that? Well, as one of my professors said, Dennis Johnson, the purpose of the secrecy is not to keep God's glory veiled, but to symbolize the astonishing truth that sinful people redeemed by the lamb are qualified by that experience of salvation to extol him in a way that even the purest, highest angel cannot. Think about this with me. That's what Peter means when he says in his letter that these things are things that even angels long to look into. They are straining, as it were, their necks to understand and appreciate what's happened to us humans, sinners. And only the redeemed, only Those who have been bought by Jesus Christ can know what this song is like. No wonder this group on Mount Zion loved to sing. They had been redeemed. They had been forgiven. They had been given the righteousness of Jesus Christ imputed to their account. Let me ask you something this morning. Honestly, do you love to sing? Do you love to sing? Not just are you willing, not just do you move your mouth, but do you love to? How about your family? Does your family love to sing? If a guest, a visitor, would just stay in your home for a day or spend the night and have meals with you, would that guest say, now that family loves to sing? Do we as a church love to sing? When people come and visit, do they get a sense that here's a church that has been redeemed, something has happened to them, they've experienced something, they know something, something's up, we would say. And they can tell, it's palpable, it's real, it's tangible. Do you, do we love to sing? I mean, our goal should be to sing so well that our children are at least tempted to be embarrassed. I don't want to boast, but I've definitely achieved that status. Do you love to sing? The redeemed sing. Kevin Young says, saved people love to sing because the truth has so captured our hearts. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that vibrant, joyful, robust, heartfelt singing where everybody participates, not just a band up front, but everybody's engaged, everybody's singing, everybody's reflecting on the truths, is one of the best signs of a healthy church. It's not the only sign, but I think it's one of the best signs. Nothing worse than a church that doesn't sing Few things better than a church that sings. And what a stabilizing, a galvanizing, mobilizing thing it must have been for John's audience to hear this, that one day they too, through endurance, in the face of suffering, by faith in Jesus, would join this chorus of the redeemed. Chapter 15 includes another such scene. We've read it already. It says in verse 3 that they sing the song of Moses' notice and the song of the Lamb, joining both testaments, saying, Great and amazing are your deeds, O Lord God, the Almighty. Just and true are your ways, O King of the nations. Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship you, for your righteous acts have been revealed. One of the ways we actually participate in the heaven to come is by singing the songs of redemption here below. One of the ways we can tell if our hearts are really ready for heaven is the degree to which the songs that we sing about the lamb fill our heart with delight. So that is the first characteristic of the inhabitants of heaven. They absolutely love to sing, but there's more. They also can't help but be near Jesus. That's what our text says. It goes on in this first section, talking about those who have been purified and offered up to God as first fruits. But look with me at verse four, notice what they naturally do. It is these, we're told, who follow the Lamb wherever He goes. That's beautiful, I love that. They follow the Lamb, they're in heaven, and they're following the Lamb wherever He goes. They can't get enough of Jesus is what that means. They don't get bored listening to him. They don't get bored watching him or worshiping him or simply being in his presence. For them, being with Jesus is the most wonderful and natural thing that they could fathom doing. Better than the best thing in this life. I'm reminded of the story recorded in Mark chapter five. It's one of my favorite stories, the man of the Gerasenes. Mark chapter five, we're told in verse three that this man had lived among the tombs. Remember this story? And no one could bind him anymore, not even with a chain, for he had often been bound with shackles and chains. But he wrenched the chains apart and he broke the shackles in pieces. Night and day, among the tombs and on the mountains, he was always crying out and cutting himself with stones. No one had the strength to subdue him, except, that is, Jesus. Jesus had the strength to subdue him. Jesus, boys and girls, is Lord over all, including Satan and the demonic realm. Do you remember what happened? Jesus sent these unclean spirits into 2,000 pigs who then ran off the steep bank and fell and drowned in the sea. And here's what we hear after that. And the herdsmen fled and told it in the city and in the country, and people came to see what had happened. And they came to Jesus and saw the demon-possessed man, the one who had the legion sitting there, clothed and in his right mind. And notice, they were afraid. And they began to beg Jesus to depart from their region. As he was getting into the boat, listen, the man who had been possessed with demons, it's a play on words, begged Jesus that he might be with Jesus. This man had been completely transformed. And now all he wanted to do was be with Jesus. That's what happens when Jesus gets your heart. You wanna be with Him. You wanna follow Him wherever He takes you. That's what discipleship looks like. Wherever Jesus is, we follow. We read His word, we pray to Him, we sit at His feet. We participate in the age to come by following Him wherever He takes us. Why is He so magnetic? Well, because of who He is, because He's our Savior, because He's fascinating, because He's full of wisdom, because He's the best friend, He's loyal, He's gentle. We want to be with Him. He wants to be with us. And so there's this beautiful relationship that only increases in the heavenly places. The more we're with Him, the more we will want to be with Him even more. He is, Jesus is the inexhaustible riches that Paul talks about, Jesus Himself. And we will never exhaust understanding who He is and wanting to be with Him in His presence for all eternity. So the inhabitants of heaven love to sing, they can't help but follow the lamb. And there's a third thing about them, and it's found in chapter 14 and verse 13. And it says this, and I heard a voice from heaven saying, write this, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Blessed indeed, says the Spirit, that they may, here it is, rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them. The inhabitants of heaven are at rest. Again, what a boon for God's weary people. One day we will all, in Christ Jesus alone, be at perfect rest. In the words of Nancy Guthrie, she writes, the blessing is not that their lives will be comfortable or easy in the here and now. This blessing is far greater than that and will last far longer than that. She says the promised blessing is that they are going to be gathered by Jesus to Jesus. All the struggles of this life, everything it costs them to stay in the fight, to remain faithful in their allegiance to Jesus Christ, will have proved worthwhile. The battle with the enemy, she says, is likely to rage throughout their lifetime, but it will come to an end. The day will come when they rest and enjoy their reward and the presence of their king. You see, the application for us is right there for the taking. We are called to struggle, endure patiently the suffering of this present evil age in the hope and with the confidence that one day all of that will be over and we will rest in the presence of the Lamb forever, not to lay around doing nothing but to reign with Jesus the King, to steward his gifts in the new creation to the glory of God. And of course, that starts now too, doesn't it? I mean, what's the Lord's day but a gathering, a festal rest in the finished work of Jesus Christ? And what are we called to do but to labor in this world to the good of our neighbor as we place our anxious hearts into his, knowing that he paid it all for us? So those are the inhabitants of heaven, brothers and sisters. They sing and they love to sing. They wanna follow Jesus wherever he goes, and they are at perfect rest. How completely different the inhabitants of hell. The inhabitants of hell don't sing. They groan. In verses six through 11, John hears three angels who are messengers to earth. Here's how he describes the first in verse six. Then I saw another angel flying directly overhead with a gospel to proclaim to those who dwell on earth, to every nation and tribe and language and people. And he said with a loud voice, fear God and give him glory because the hour of his judgment has come. And notice this, here's a call to worship him. who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all the springs of water. So the first angel comes to the earth and calls the earth to worship the true and living God. But this call to worship is ignored by many. The problem is not a lack of worship, as we saw last week. Everybody worships something. But if you don't worship God, you worship the dragon and the beast in some form or another. To what result? Well, the third angel then tells us In sobering words, verse nine, and another angel, a third, followed them, sang with a loud voice, if anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur. Tormented also means tortured, miserable. See, the last thing the inhabitants of hell do is sing for joy. There's no hope in hell. Only misery, only groaning, only pain, only condemnation. Notice where this takes place, this agony. Verse 10, in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the lamb. I don't know how that all works out. Jesus is in heaven. But according to his divine nature, he is present everywhere. And in hell, they will know that they suffer before the face of God. They will know. Coram Deo. It's the very opposite of those in heaven. Heavenly inhabitants follow Jesus wherever he goes. In hell, they will run away, but will be unable and his wrath will not diminish. And unlike the rest promised to the redeemed, notice it's the absolutely reverse for the citizens of hell. Verse 11, we're told, and the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest day or night. They have no rest day or night. There's no sleep in hell. There's no way to sleep it off to make it go away. Spurgeon said, what a blessing it would be if sleep could enter the habitation of the damned. If they could but sleep it off for a while. Just this past week, I was in the car, van, on my way to a meeting or something, and I turned on one of the stations, Christian radio stations, Charles Swindoll. And he was quoting Jonathan Edwards, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, this week as I was preparing for this message. Here's what Edwards said. He's addressing unbelievers. And Edwards said this, oh sinner, consider the fearful danger you are in. It is a great furnace of wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of wrath that you are held over in the hand of that God whose wrath is provoked and incensed as much against you as against many of the damned in hell. You hang by a slender thread with the flames of divine wrath flashing about it and ready every moment to singe it and burn it asunder. It would be dreadful to suffer this fierceness and wrath of Almighty God one moment, but you must suffer it to all eternity. There will be no end to this horrible misery. When you look forward, you shall see long forever abound this duration before you, which will swallow up your thoughts and amaze your soul, and you will absolutely despair of ever having any deliverance, any end, any mitigation, any rest at all. Edward said, you will know certainly that you must wear out long ages, millions of millions of ages in wrestling with this almighty, merciless vengeance, and then when you have done so, when so many ages have actually been spent by you in this manner, you will know that all is but a dot to what remains, so that your punishment will indeed be infinite. Oh, who can express what the state of a soul in such circumstance is? All that we can possibly say about it gives but a feeble, faint representation of it. It is, he said, inexpressible and inconceivable. Verses 14 through 20 speak of two harvests. One of the grain is Jesus gathers his blood-bought people who worship the true and living God through faith in Christ. The other, the harvest of grapes. Verse 19, so the angel swung his sickle across the earth and gathered the grape harvest of the earth and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. So that's the difference between heaven and hell and its inhabitants. The difference could not be greater. One is full of singing. joyful singing and following Jesus and resting in His presence while the other is full of groaning and hatred and misery. But how do we know who goes where? How do we know who goes where? Our culture will tell us either that everybody gets to heaven and hell isn't real or that good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell. There's another bumper sticker, this time that is, I think, spot on in its own way, which says, meant to jar us, hell will be filled with good people. Heaven is full of sinners, saved by Christ. Or as Ray Ortlund has so perfectly put it, hell is filled with people, listen to this, who think they should be in heaven. Heaven is filled with people who know they should be in hell. That's the difference. The difference is not that some are good and others are bad. The difference is Christ, as our text in Revelation 14 verse six refers to as the eternal gospel. Spurgeon said, morality may keep you out of jail, but it takes the blood of Jesus Christ to keep you out of hell. that eternal gospel, that gloriously good news, that there's a way to be forgiven of our sins, and it's not by being better. It's by throwing yourself upon the mercy of God in Jesus Christ. It's the language of Revelation 14, verse 12. It's only and always and has ever been by faith in Jesus. That's it. That's the way in. That's the way to be saved. That's the way to be redeemed. That's the way to be among the 144,000. It's not about being good. It's not about being better. It's about realizing your sin and weakness and need and depravity and inability to save yourself and then casting yourself upon the mercy of God, which is offered to you and to me in the gospel this morning. That is the difference. We're either in Adam or we're in Christ. The one who drank every last drop from the goblet of his father's divine wrath for us. That anyone, we who deserve unending anguish and torment could know God through Jesus Christ and be welcomed in his presence and loved and cherished, and then sing for an eternity with joy, where all we want to do when we get to heaven is be wherever Jesus is. That's it. That's heaven. That's eternal life. This is eternal life, John 17 three says, that they might know you and know the one that you've sent. And so we already begin participating in eternity now by knowing and loving Jesus Christ. That's the difference. It couldn't be any greater. Which inhabitant are you? May we be those who are citizens of heaven by coming to Jesus Christ. Do it and keep resting in Him, enduring by faith in His promises. Let's pray. Father, You've led us to this text at this time for reasons that are beyond our understanding. Lord, there are things that are difficult for me and us to wrap our minds around. There are things that, Lord, we simply bend the knee in awe. But Lord, as we mature, as we grow, we begin to see what we deserve. We begin to see your justice. We begin to see and appreciate the mercy that is found in the gospel. Lord, why would you do that? Why would you save us? Why would you come to us and deliver us and redeem us and set our feet upon this Mount Zion? And why would you give us a song in our mouth, a new song that no one else knows? Lord, you are so good to us. Father, we have just scratched the surface of understanding our sin and your holiness. Lord, even right now, some of us are really wrestling with this whole idea of hell and how it fits. Yet, Lord, it's in Your Word, it's a reflection of Your character, that You don't take sin lightly, that every sin will be punished. Oh God, I pray that for us, for every single person here and everybody listening, that our sin might be covered and dealt with on a cross so that we don't have to face that wrath that we deserve. Lord, thank you for giving us texts that just lay it out as clearly as we can possibly imagine it. Lord, give us peace today. Give us peace in Jesus. Lord, it's not up to us. It's not about being good or being better or trying harder. It's about resting fully in the work of another. And Lord, we thank you for the power of your Holy Spirit. We thank you for those who have gone before us, those who now already are at perfect rest, who are truly blessed because to live is Christ and to die is gain. So Lord, help us bring this message to our hurting world and to one another that there is a Redeemer who delivers us from hell. Thank you that that's Jesus and that all of this is true and that anyone here this morning can be forgiven by casting himself or herself upon Jesus Christ. Make it so, Lord. In Jesus' name, amen.