Revelation 10

Revelation 10 and the Little Book Between the Trumpets

Andy, you'll open us up with a word of prayer?

Sure.

Father Gamblin, I'm so thankful to be able to come and to open your word, to look at it, to consider it, and I pray the Lord to be with Brother Mike, to be with us. Lord, help us to see you as you truly are.

Bless our time, bless our thoughts, bless our conversation. May Christ be glorified in it all. In his name, amen.

Amen.

Let's open our Bibles up to chapter 10 of Revelation. We begin in verse 1. And I saw another strong angel coming down out of heaven, clothed with a cloud. And the rainbow was upon his head, and his face was like the sun, his feet like pillars of fire.

And he had in his hand a little book which was open. He placed his right foot on the sea and his left on the land, and he cried out with a loud voice as when a lion roars. And when he cried out, the seven peals of thunder uttered their voices.

And when the seven peals of thunder had spoken, I was about to write. And I heard a voice from heaven saying, Seal up the things which the seven peals of thunder have spoken, and do not write them. Then the angel whom I saw standing on the sea and the land lifted up his right hand to heaven and swore by him who lives forever and ever, who created heaven and the things in it, and the earth and the things in it, and the sea and the things in it, that there will be no delay any longer.

But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he is about to sound, then the mystery of God is finished, as he preached to his servants, the prophets. Then the voice which I heard from heaven I heard again speaking with me, saying, Go, take the book which is open in the hand of the angel who stands on the sea and the land.

So I went to the angel telling him, Give me the little book. And he said to me, Take it and eat it. I will make your stomach bitter, but it will be sweet as honey in your mouth. I took the little book out of the angel's hand and I ate it, and in my mouth it was sweet as honey, and when I ate it in my stomach it was made bitter.

And he said to me, You must prophesy again concerning many peoples, nations, tongues, and kings. Well, this begins a new section, actually. So you had an interlude, and then the seventh seal was open.

Same thing here.

You're going to have, we've got one through six trumpets. Now we come to an interlude or a respite, however you want to, I think most everybody's Bible has headings, and then you're going to have the seventh trumpet.

So this is where we're at right here. So just as when we did the sixth seal, you get to the sixth seal, and you think, good morning, and you think that, Wow, we just heard all of this destruction. Remember when there was two questions at the end of the sixth seal, the five and sixth seals is how long, and it was how long, and it gave an extended period of time of how long it would be.

It would be until when the last martyr was martyred. And then what happened after that? The seventh seal was open, and what did we see? We saw heaven, basically. It was final judgment. So now in the sixth trumpet, we had come to the sixth trumpet last week.

We saw destruction, which I believe was the destruction of Jerusalem, and if that destruction, just like the sixth seal, was so pervasive, if it's so bad, what's the immediate response? Is this the end of time?

Well, now we're coming to that interlude. The natural response should be, hey, if this destruction is so bad, this should be the end. Well, the same thing happened here, and then you remember what that interlude contained?

And it's been a number of weeks ago. What did the interlude contain in the seven seals? Two pictures of the church. Do you remember what they were? Church of heaven, the church on earth. Correct. What were they categorized as?

One was the 144 ,000, and this would have been the ones on earth. You would be correct. And what was the one in heaven? Yep, the innumerable multitude. So now we're getting to this interlude between the sixth and the seventh trumpet, and we're going to see two pictures of the church again, but it's going to be in two different ways.

Remember, their progressive parallel is how I understand the book, and as you get to one, you're going to see different aspects or different descriptions of the same thing. So as we go through, remember, too, the categories of...

What's cool about Revelation is chapters 1 through 9,.

Then you have 10.

If you were going to categorize it into threes, you have 1 through 13, then you have 14 through 22. Hey, right dead center of the main revelation, meaning the book.

What does he put right here?

He puts the little book, which contains the interlude. It's going to contain the seventh trumpet being blown, and then at the end of the seventh trumpet's blown, you're going to go, okay, well, this should be the end of the little book.

Well, not so quick. There's an appendix, and he gives you an appendix from 11, I think, 15 or 16 on to the end of chapter 13 of what continues to go on inside this little book of prophecy. I will say that this little book, and we're fixing to start chapter 10, it is coined as 1 ,260 days, 42 months, and I'm going to put up here three and a half years, four times time and a half a time.

It's going to describe this time frame. That's what it's going to describe. Now, when we get to what this is, we'll talk about what I believe that is. If anybody knows anything about what I've been teaching, you'll know that this right here, if this is the gospel age, what would that be?

This would be the millennium. When we get there, I'll let you all throw chairs at me because you'll disagree with me, but that's okay. So, let's get to the disagreeable part right at the beginning here.

It says here, I saw another strong angel coming down out of heaven. Let's look what this angel's clothed with. We've got to because who is this angel? It says clothed with a cloud. What does the scripture say?

Who's clothed with a cloud? Who in the Old Testament is considered the cloud rider? Who comes riding on the clouds in the Old Testament?

Son of man.

And some of the prophets, I'm saying Daniel certainly, and some of the other prophets and even in the Psalms, Yahweh is called the cloud rider. He says he comes in the cloud bringing judgment when he was bringing the Assyrians to come and wipe out the northern kingdom.

So, here it is. We see that this angel is clothed in a cloud. Which points this could be a demonstration of Yahweh. Could be. Then it says, and the rainbow was upon his head. Where have we seen the rainbow?

Upon someone's head or around the throne already in the book of Revelation. Back when we were seeing the throne room in heaven, chapters 4 and 5, what was around the throne? It was the rainbow. What did the rainbow represent?

The promise.

Yeah.

God's covenant promise to his people to never destroy them by water again. But it was also pointing to that God was going to one day redeem his people. That promise never ended. And when we see this rainbow around the head of this person, it certainly looks like who at this point?

It certainly could be Christ by the looks of it. And then here it goes, and his face was like the sun. Man, this is really getting difficult. It says that his face was like the sun. He rides on a cloud.

And it says he's got this covenant promise glowing around his head. And here it comes again. And his feet are like the pillars of fire. Where have we seen that? Or something pretty close to that already in the book of Revelation.

Back in chapter 1, when Jesus comes on the scene, what does it say? He had hair like wool. His eyes were like fire. It said he had a sword coming out of his mouth. And what did it say about his legs and his feet?

They were like burnished bronze that's glowing in the furnace. What does bronze that's polished look like? It looks like gold. It looks like gold. So once again, man, what does this guy look like? This really does look like this could be the Son of Man.

And it said he opened up the little book which was open in his hand. He had in his hand a little book which was open. So here it is. We've got somebody list again to me the attributes or characteristics that were already here so I know you're listening.

What were they? What was the first one?

Cloud.

Cloud.

He cloud rider, right?

Cloud. What else? What else?

Son.

Son.

Face like the sun.

I mean it's glowing. Where else did we see somebody's face glowing when he was up on the Mount of Transfiguration? It was Jesus. What happened to Moses when he came down from Mount Sinai.

Or meeting with the Lord?

What did he have to do because the glory of God shone upon him so much? What happened to him? He had to wear a veil because his face was glowing. People couldn't dare to look at him without staring at him and gawking at him because his face glowed from being in the presence of God.

What was the last one? What was it? Handsome. When we look at those, those are all characteristics of who?

Christ.

Now, in order for us to understand who this person is and these characteristics, we have to say, okay, but what else does Scripture say? It says this is the angel. In the Old Testament, the angel of the Lord,.

Who was that?

Let's just be honest. Or how did we understand in the Old Testament who the angel of the Lord was?

One thing I want to point to is that in the second chapter of Judges, when it says the angel of the Lord came down and spoke to Israel and said, I am the God that led you out of Egypt. So there's times where I read it as a picture of Christ.

And I would agree with you. I think the majority of you guys who have taught the Bible longer than me are more than welcome to correct me, but my estimation, I would say 90 to 95 of the theophanies in the Old Testament are actually Christophanies.

So when we see, as you said, in Judges, the angel of the Lord, whether it was with Abraham or whether it was when he came down to meet with Abraham more than once, then he sent the two angels to Sodom and Gomorrah.

I believe that was the pre-incarnate Christ. Or whether it was when Joshua saw the armies of the Lord, the leader of the armies of the Lord. Or when Mr. and Mrs. Manoa were told that they were going to have Samson, and he said, I'm not sure I understand, Mrs. Manoa, what you're telling me.

He's going to have to come talk to me. And he shows up, hey man, listen to your wife. I already told her, I'm not telling you again. So those were pictures of what I would say Christophany. And when Daniel was in the lion's den, it says the angel came and shut the mouth of the lions.

That certainly could have been. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Certainly could have been a pre-incarnate Christ in the fiery furnace. Not sure. Could be. We do know this, that whether it's in Daniel and in Daniel in the lion's den or Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, whichever situation you want to look at, whether you believe that was Christ or not, pre-incarnate, we know this, that that person that appeared was the preserving power and presence of God because there was a physical manifestation of who that was.

Now, we can argue who it is or who it ain't. But when we see the angel of the Lord in the Old Testament appear, Christ in the Old Testament, once Jesus Christ comes on the scene as a little baby in the womb of his mother, do we ever see this again?

No.

So, as we're doing our... No need to look at commentaries. You have two things when you're doing biblical interpretation. One is your biblical theology and your other is your systematic. And these should inform us of who this is in this passage.

This angel, is it this person? Well, our biblical theology, Ted, let's remember what biblical theology is. It's the unfolding of biblical revelation from Genesis to Revelation and how it unfolds to us as God's revealing His plan through the prophets, through the writers, through the authors, and how it unfolds.

So once we come to the New Testament, the angel of the Lord is X'd. You don't hear about it anymore. In our systematic theology, the angel of the Lord, we said, was a picture of Christ. But once Christ...

You know what systematic theology is? It's taking the biblical data as we read and synthesizing them into categories so this, when we look at Christ under a systematic theology, it would be Christology.

And we would say in the Old Testament, it is the angel of the Lord. In the Old Testament. But under New Testament theology, is Jesus ever called an angel? Never again. Never again is Jesus ever called the angel.

And if you want to go and read the knock it out of the ballpark, go read Hebrews chapter 1. Did I ever say to an angel, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool? Did He ever say to Jesus, He is an angel?

Now there was a time when Jesus, it says, He was made lower than the angels. And why was He made lower than the angels? Because He must suffer and die and be perfected. Meaning, not that Jesus was lacking anything, but in His human experience, He had to be made perfect through suffering.

That's what that means. So, as we look at our biblical theology and look at our Christology part of our systematic theology, this angel is not Jesus Christ. Just want to be clear. This is another angel.

This is an angel that is big and mighty and the Greek word is Escharon. And it means huge, powerful, mighty. And we've already seen one angel back in chapter 5 that said the same thing. We said there was a strong angel.

It's the same word that's used here. Here, strong, mighty, and the other. Passage in chapter 5. So here it is, another one. But I'll say this, whoever this angel is, he is very, very, very close to the throne of God.

Why?

Because he's bringing with him attributes of deity to confirm the word that he's fixing to give John to write again. You see the parallel in this that we saw earlier in the book? Earlier in the book, we were around the throne room.

There was all these people worshiping. You had the 24 elders. You had the four living beings. And then there was a scroll in the hand of God. And what happened to John at that point? He began to weep.

Because there was nobody to open the scroll. So we're seeing a parallel here of okay, here was the larger and the big scroll that's being opened, but it needed to be opened by someone and who was worthy to do that?

Only Christ. Once again, Christ is never looked as an angel, certainly not in the book of Revelation.

Or anywhere else.

He is looked as the Lamb. He is looked as the Lion. He is looked as the one who was slain before the foundation of the world. And you say, well, why are you hammering on that so hard? Because there is commentaries out there and Bible teachers that say this angel is Christ.

And I say they're wrong.

If you want a list of them, then you probably know. I will give them to you. This is another angel commissioned from the throne room of God, commissioned by the Lamb Himself to come and bring this little book of prophecy to John.

This little book is intentionally done to describe this time of the church. This little book is going to give a description of not only the suffering of the church, it's going to give the power of the church, it's going to give the protection of the church, and it's going to give the purpose of the church.

That's what's going to take place in these next four chapters. You're going to see the people of God suffer. You're going to see the people of God in power. I mean, come on. We're going to get to a passage where it says, hey, I'm going to give them power to come out of their mouth and consume them with fire.

Now, we're going to talk about it. It's not like these two prophets are going to have bad breath. This is actually pointing back to something in the Old Testament in which God gave the power of His people to preach the Word of God which condemned those that did not hear.

And you're going to see the protection of those people. You're going to see the protection of the two witnesses and the church. You're going to see the protection of those people because they're absolutely indestructible until their purpose is done.

Think about Jeremiah. God tells Jeremiah, this is what's going to happen to you. He didn't tell him exactly how long. He just said you're going to preach, but he preached for 41 years. And he said you're going to carry out my purpose and you're going to preach and it's going to stink.

It's going to stink. They're going to hate you. Everything you say, they're going to despise you. And just to be honest, Jeremiah, you're probably not going to see any converts over the 41 years that you preach.

You'll have a guy that goes with you that writes everything down, but we don't know if he's converted either. Baruch. 41 years.

He's beaten.

He's imprisoned. He's thrown in a well. He is beaten, imprisoned. He's starved. Even Nebuchadnezzar takes care of Jeremiah because he knows that he is preaching the Word of God.

Can you believe that?

God used a pagan king to take care of Jeremiah. In Jeremiah's ministry, he was completely protected from death until his time was done. That's what we're going to see with the church right here. Is the church going to suffer?

Is the church going to suffer? You better believe it. In this world, you will have tribulation. Now, it doesn't mean that we're all going to go through the same thing.

Okay?

It doesn't mean that every one of us will suffer in the same capacity.

But you will suffer.

And you will go through tribulation. If you're not going through tribulation as a believer, like I said a few weeks ago, it's because you're not running the race. If you're not tripping and falling over the things that entangle you, it's because you're not running.

Okay? Now,.

We're also going to see the purpose of the church through this. And what's the purpose of the church? To proclaim the Word of God. That's what we're going to see. We're going to see the church militant, meaning knives and picking up swords and going out and fighting, but the church militant as going out and combating the prince of the darkness and the power of the air and fighting against evil, whether it be in the open square, whether it's fighting against, which will be called in chapter 13, the beast, or fighting against just the evil darknesses, the darkness that entangles us through the sinfulness of this world.

That's what we're going to see. And the church's responsibility is to preach the Word of God, to make disciples, and that's what we're going to see as we go through this.

So,.

This angel is a big strong angel, but make it very clear, he's another angel. He's got all these characteristics that look like he is coming from deity. And it says that in his hand he had a little book, and it was open.

What's the difference between this little book? I prefer scrolled. The word that's used here is bibliodarion, which is the diminutive form for biblion. The first scroll was biblion. The Greek word was biblion, meaning small scroll, I mean big scroll, big book.

This one's bibliodarion, the diminutive form of that meaning small. Hey, what's up with this one?

This one's different.

This one's already open. He doesn't need somebody qualified to come open it. Why? Because the one who gave it to him, gave it to him commissioned already open. And then this angel has this little book in his hand, and it says he placed his foot on the sea, his right foot on the sea, and his left on the land.

This is an enormous angel.

Huge.

It's not like he's out there at the beach, he's got one on the shoreline and one on the sand. No, no, no, no. This is an enormous angel, and he is standing like an A-frame over the earth. Why over the land and the sea?

Correct. Yeah, dominion over both, and whatever's in this little scroll, I know y 'all were sanctified to me when I was thinking about this angel. This is a little book. It must look like a chiclet in his hand.

You know, a little old thing. It's got to be small because John's fixing to eat it.

Okay?

So here it is.

You've got this gigantic angel, and he's got a thing that looks about the size of a chiclet in his hand, and he's fixing to give it to John to eat. And this message is for the whole world, land and sea, meaning it's going to encompass everything, which is also in contrast to the big scroll.

That's been opened,.

Which was primarily talking about a very specific time to a very specific group dealing with the destruction of Jerusalem. And he cried out with a loud voice. Verse 3, and he cried out with a loud voice as when a lion roars.

Once again, we're hearing these Christ-like, deified descriptions. He roars like a lion. What happens when a lion roars? It is certainly loud.

Yeah.

I like National Geographic, so you can hear when they think, that probably don't sound right, but anyway. And they hear it, and it just echoes. When the lion roars in the jungle, everything shuts up. Albert Martin, he's an old preacher.

I used to love hearing him. He used to come on way radio when you had to listen to it on radio, and then sometimes he would come on Saturday afternoons on, I think it was 1050. And I was listening to him preach one time, and I guess there was some kids or young people cutting up in the front.

And he said,.

Sir, tell your girlfriend when the lion roars in the jungle, everything shuts up. He said, so when the Word of God is preached, she should keep her mouth shut. I was like, right on, dude.

Like, that's awesome.

He's right.

This guy's roaring because here comes a revelation from God, everybody should shut their mouth and listen. No comments yet. Listen to what he says. And then when he cries out, it says the seven peals of thunder uttered their voices.

Now, with all the rain that we've been having lately, there's been a lot of thunder, but I ain't never heard no voices in it. I've heard a lot of thunder bumping, a lot of lightning, a lot of shaking, but never have I heard voices come from it.

But just like in the past, we've heard voices come from eagles and Daniel, the bear talked. Hey, in apocalyptic literature, I guess thunders can talk. So, something is thundered out of these voices, out of this thunder, something comes.

And in verse 4, it says, and when the seven peals of thunder had spoken, I was about to write. So, here John is. This thunder goes off. What's John's responsibility as he is getting the revelation from the beginning?

What was he supposed to do? He was supposed to write down these things which would soon come to pass. His job was to hear and see and write down what you hear and see. So, he takes his quill or whatever it is and he's fixing to write down what is said and listen to what it says to him.

I was about to write it down and I heard a voice from heaven saying, seal it up. The things which the seven peals of thunder have spoken, don't write it. That should be odd because what is the whole book of Revelation?

The whole book of Revelation is an unveiling of what has been sealed up. Remember, what led us to the book of Revelation was Daniel and Daniel was given revelation at the, not the book of Revelation, but was giving revelation from God in chapters 10 through 12 of his book and when he got to the end, he said, seal it up.

He said, seal it up. The time is not at hand. When the time comes, it will be unfolded. Well, the time has come and what Daniel was supposed to seal up is now being unfolded in the book of Revelation.

But now, John gets something and God says, tells him, because where does this voice come from? It comes from heaven. Seal it up. Now, if anybody writes a book, if anybody on YouTube or anybody on TikTok tells you they know what the seven thunder said, they're lying.

We don't know. Now, we can do some sanctified speculation. We can say what possibly it could be. I'm going to give you what I think it is because we really don't know, but as we're seeing this unfold, we have had seven seals, seven trumpets, and what comes after the trumpets?

Seven bowls.

So, in this little book, these seven thunders that thunder, in my conclusion, and it is completely opinionated, that the reason why he is told to seal it up because it ain't nothing new than what has already took place in the first two sevens and what will take place on the last two sevens.

It is going to be the judgment of God. And because I believe that this little book deals with the Gospel age, you're not going to see anything different than wars and symbols of war. Natural disasters.

That's what you're going to see. You're not going to see anything else other than God pouring out His judgment on apostate nations and people. What did the seals and the six trumpets show? That God was going to pour out His judgment on the apostate and those who rejected His final revelation.

Correct?

Okay, that's why I believe the seven thunders are pointing to that. Hey, you disagree with me, that's fine.

We don't know.

But if anybody says they do know, don't listen to them, they're lying. Because it tells us right here we're not sure. We don't know. He was told to seal it up because it doesn't have anything. Oh no! He is told to seal it up because the time really ain't at hand.

The time that's at hand is technically dealing with the destruction of Jerusalem. He says here in verse 5,. Then the angel whom I saw standing on the sea and on the land lifted up his right hand and swore by Him who lives forever and ever who created heaven and the things in it and the earth and the things in it and the sea and the things in it that there would be no delay any longer.

I'm going to stop right there. Okay, so this angel, now who's straddled the land and the sea, sprawled across the earth, he's going to raise his right hand and he's going to swear to God. Not swear to God as in he's cussing.

He's swearing to God, making an oath. He's making an oath. Where have we seen this take place in the past? Anybody remember in Daniel? There was a man in Lennon and we believe it was a Christophany. He was standing over the river Tigris with Daniel and what did he do?

That guy raised both hands. He got charismatic. He raised both of his hands and took a swear to God. This guy here, he is taking an oath before God who lives forever, and he is making it very clear why this angel could not be Christ.

Who does he say he's swearing to? The one who created heaven and earth. Who created all things? Christ did. And where do we know that from? Because nothing was created that wasn't created by Him. Yes, who was the instrument by which the decree of God to carry out the creation of all things?

He used His Son to do so. The Trinitarian act. Then having the Spirit hover was the face of the deep. He said who created heaven and earth? The things in it. The things in the sea. And the things in it, that there would be no delay.

But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, he is about to sound, then the mystery of God is finished as he preached to his servants the prophets. And we'll stop there. So he is telling us this little book is going to span a specific time, but when that time frame is over, what does he say is going to happen?

Anybody see it? What the seventh angel is going to do? He's going to sound his trumpet. And it says the mystery of God will be done. Anybody know what Ephesians says about what the mystery of God is? The mystery of God in Ephesians is that Jew and Gentile would be brought into one people.

Who's that one people? The church. So, between the sixth trumpet and the seventh trumpet, what's taking place in that time frame? The mystery of God, which is the Gospel age, bringing in Jew and Gentile into one people.

Becoming one bride. Not made up of two separate people. Look, you don't have the Jewish people who are going to come one way and the Gentile another. Matter of fact, the Jew and Gentile are brought into one people, which is the true Israel of God.

That's how the Scripture is stated. I had a conversation, well, multiple. If I was to say his name, some of you in here would know,.

So I'm not going to say it.

I don't want anybody to think I'm demeaning his character. But he was a master seminary professor.

And my interaction with him.

Was a little heated on this. Because he didn't believe that the Scripture uses anything close to the true Israel of God. I was like, are you crazy? It says those who are of the true circumcision are those who are the seed of Abraham.

So, who are the true descendants of Abraham?

The elect.

It's the elect. Made up of who?

Anybody that believes by faith. Yeah, anybody that believes by faith. It doesn't matter.

It's no longer Jew or Gentile. And this guy had epiplexy.

He's like, no, no, no.

You've got the people of God here in the Old Testament, the Jews, and you've got the church here. I'm like, no, no, no. You've made two distinctions where the Bible doesn't make that distinction. You have one people of God.

It's the elect of God. And it began when He chose to redeem Adam and Eve in the garden. And it carries on until the last martyr and the last person saved and that last trumpet is blown and the dead in Christ shall rise first.

That's the people of God. So it tells us what this time frame is. It tells us that it will be between the sixth and the seventh trumpet that God will then reveal the mystery of God. Hey, it even says here that was preached to us by the servants, the prophets.

So even in the Old Testament, when the Word of God was preached, it was preached knowing that God was going to bring in the Gentile. Matter of fact, if you go in to read the first part of Matthew, it talks about a light had shone in Galilee of the Gentiles.

That was the prophetic word that came to that Jesus was going to be born and come from Galilee and that He would be a light into the Gentiles.

What was that about?

Knowing that the Gentiles were going to be brought in. And even what did Jesus say about Abraham? He says Abraham would be through his descendants, all the earth would be blessed. All the earth. Not the Jew.

Look, I'm not an anti-Semite.

Dude, I love Jesus. He's a Jew.

Okay?

But it's not about Jew and Gentile anymore. It's about those who believe and place faith in Christ. There's no two peoples of God. There's one people of God. And it's those that trust in Jesus Christ for full redemption in His Son.

I've got three minutes.

I'm not going to start verse 8. So, do I need questions, comments? Do I need to clarify anything? Confusing, because there's no way I'm going to start verse 8 because it's up to another section. Clear as mud again, eh?

Closing Prayer and Dismissal

Close us from here.

Heavenly Father, we thank You so much for this opportunity. We had to open Your Word and just read truth, Lord. Just ask as we depart from this room and into the main sanctuary, Lord, that You just sanctify our hearts and open our ears and eyes to Your truth.