Revelation 19 Continued

I think we're about to start. Well, good morning. Andy, would you open us up with a word of prayer? Yeah, sure. Excuse me, ladies.

Father, again, we're so thankful that we get to come and to hear your word. We pray, Lord, that you would bless Brother Mike and his thoughts and his words. You would bless our ears, Lord, in our lives, that we might become more like the one who so loved us that he gave himself for us.

So be with us now as only you can. In Christ's name, amen.

It's too late now, Andy. I know, it's too late now. All right. Let's open our Bibles up to Revelation 19. Beginning in verse 1. Read through the chapter like normal. It says, And after these things I heard something like a loud voice of a great multitude in heaven saying, Hallelujah, salvation and glory and power belong to our God because His judgments are true and righteous.

For He has judged the great harlot who was corrupting the earth with her immorality, and He has avenged the blood of His bondservants on her. And the second time they said, Hallelujah, and her smoke rises up forever and ever.

And the twenty-four elders and the four living creatures fell down to worship God who sat on the throne saying, Amen. Hallelujah. And the voice came from the throne saying, Give praise to our God, all you His bondservants, you who fear Him, the small and the great.

And they heard something like the voice of a great multitude, like the sound of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder. Hallelujah. For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give the glory to Him for the marriage of the Lamb has come.

His bride has made herself ready. It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. Then He said to me, Write, Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

And He said to me, These are the true words of God. And I fell at His feet to worship Him. But He said, Do not do that. I am a fellow servant of yours and your brethren who hold the testimony of Jesus.

Worship God for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. And then I saw heaven open, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it was called Faithful and True. And in righteousness he judges and wages war.

His eyes are as a flame of fire. On his head are many diadems. And he has a name written on him which no one knows except him. He was clothed and arobed, dipped in blood. And his name was called the Word of God.

And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in white linen, white and clean, were following him on white horses. From his mouth comes a sharp sword so that he might strike down the nations. And he will rule them with a rod of iron.

And he treads down the winepresses. The fierce wrath of God be almighty. And on his robe and on his thigh he has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords. And then I saw an angel standing in the sun.

And he cried out with a loud voice saying to all the birds which fly in midheaven, Come, assemble for the great supper of God so that you may eat the flesh of kings, flesh of commanders, flesh of mighty men, the flesh of horses, and those who sit on them and the flesh of all men, both free and slave, small and great.

And I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies assembled to make war against him who sat on the horse and against his army. And the beast was seized. And with him the false prophet who performed signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshipped his image.

These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone. And the rest were killed with the sword which came from the mouth of him who sat on the horses. And all the birds were filled with their flesh.

Tasty! What's the structure of the book? We said it. Progressive Paralelism. Thank you for translation. Epiphany of the appearance of God. Final judgment. Focused. I'll put the other one up here in a minute.

Progressive Parallelism and Repeated Final-Judgment Scenes

The reason being is because we have already seen multiple times final judgment saints. And as they progressively, the final judgment saint, we get more information as we get to it. So if you remember when we hit the seventh seal, it was just quiet.

It was quiet for, I think it said an hour in heaven. I tried to be quiet for 15 seconds and Andy said, what are you going to do? Wait for an hour or 30 minutes? And that's the point. We're not used to being quiet.

So when it was quiet in heaven, how often have we seen in the book it was quiet in heaven? Very little. It's been always very, very loud in heaven because there's this constant praise. But when silence in heaven, it then led to lightning, peals of thunder, which I see as a final judgment saint.

Because why? Lightning, thunder, smoke, those are all signs of what? A theophany, which is the appearance of God. Same thing here. We went through all of these. And when you get every judge, every time we get to every end, the end of the seventh seal, seventh trumpet, the seventh bowl, there was this continual pattern of lightning, smoke, an earthquake, and thunder.

And they increased. So when we get to this one, we have, there was an interlude that if you remember the little book, everybody remember the little book, the little scroll inside the book? A smaller prophecy, but then it happens in between here.

So you basically have an interlude. And then you have lightning, peals of thunder, crazy earthquake. And then the kingdoms of our Lord become the kingdom of our Christ. I don't think anybody would doubt that that was a final judgment saint, right?

Then some say, what is it? Boils? I think I say something else in there too. Malignant sores or something, but that's the first one. Some say it's boils, some say sores. Then you have the flood and the sea, rivers again.

All of this kills everything. Remember it was one quarter, one third. Now when you get to the bowls, it kills everything. So you have the blood and the sea kills everything. The rivers that were bitter now kill everything.

And then when you get to, you got the blood, bowls, rivers. What was the next? Somebody turn over there. What was the next one? You may not, you may not. What was the one after the rivers? Help, help, help.

That was that one, the sun. Help. Oh, sunburn, sunburn. What happened there? Sun scorched everybody. I mean, burned everybody up. Then you have blackened, kingdom of the beast, dry Euphrates, final judgment.

This got, this should actually, this should go to here because it gets all of them too. So once again, these intensifying as you get down, then you get the dried up Euphrates to make way for the kings of the earth.

Remember, if you don't remember that, it says making way for the kings to come. What was on the other side of the Euphrates? What was on the other side of the Euphrates? Kingdom of that. Anything evil.

Anything that came from the, that's why when we get to the next chapter, we're going to fix and show some more parallels when we get to the next chapter. Gog and Magog come from that direction. And it's not, look, you can get on the internet now, and they'll talk about the nations of Gog and Magog.

They don't know what they're talking about. They can read their Bible. Gog is the prince of Magog. So if anybody tells you on TV, this is the battle between the nations of Gog and Magog, they don't know what they're talking about.

They need to read their Bible. Hey, because Gog is the prince of Magog. And that's in Ezekiel 38 -39. So final judgment scenes. This would mean if you got just right here, we've had three judgment scenes.

That's why you have to at least come to the conclusion that if this, if the book was chronological, we have a huge problem. The kingdoms of the world become the kingdom of our Christ has happened here and have happened here.

So now you have at least two judgment scenes just in the sequences of seven. Okay? That's why I don't believe it's chronological. I think there is some chronology within the book, and we're going to talk about that here in just a second.

I do believe there is some chronology, but it's not in the structure of the book as a whole. It is giving you the same thing from a different angle and intensifying. Flip back up to take your Bible and turn back to chapter 11.

The Two Witnesses as a Picture of the Church Age

Remember chapter 10, we had the angel that came down. He was standing in the rainbow. He was very majestic. Some people believe that's the picture of Christ in heaven, but I said it can't be because Jesus has never been called in the New Testament an angel, and it actually says this was an angel, and he gets to the end of verse 11 of chapter 10, and he says, I'm now going to prophesy again to you concerning many peoples, nations, tongues, and kings.

So there's a shift in the book to now this little book. Well, when you get to 11, 12, and 13, does anybody remember what I said there was three? Set to threes again. Three pictures of what? I know you all weren't expecting a pop quiz today.

Huh? It was three pictures of what I believe is the church age, the gospel age. You had the two witnesses, and here's why. The two witnesses are going to prophesy, and they're going to prophesy, and then when you get to verse 11, remember they prophesy for a time, time, half of times, and then it says in verse 9, those from the peoples, tribes, nations, and tongues, they will look at their dead bodies.

Remember, these two witnesses were going to testify that we're going to prophesy, and then we're going to prophesy for how long? Time, time, half a time. And they were basically indestructible. They could do whatever they want.

Remember, they were calling down fire from heaven, and they were doing all these things until it says basically, the might call your paraphrase is they were indestructible until their time of prophesying is over, and then when their time of prophesying was over, it says they were killed and their bodies lay dead in the street for three and a half days.

They were not permitted for their bodies to be laid in a tomb, which means they were basically not having a proper burial, was to desecrate and disrespect and show disdain. That's another reason why he's calling down in chapter 19 for the birds to come feast on their flesh.

These people aren't going to get a proper burial. Here it says, and those that dwell on the earth, they will rejoice over and celebrate, and they will send gifts to one another, because these two prophets were tormented for those that dwell on the earth.

So look, here it is. These two witnesses, which I believe is a picture of the church, have been prophesying. People are going to be so excited. They're going to send Amazon gifts to one another all over the world.

That's what it says. They're going to be sending them gifts. But after that three and a half days, the breath of life came to them. They stood up on their feet. A great fear fell on those who were watching, and they heard a voice in heaven say, Come up here.

I believe that that right there is a parallel picture of what happens in Revelation 19 when you see the Son of God coming on the horse with his army. It says the dead in Christ in Thessalonians. It says the dead in Christ shall rise first.

Okay? Right? Follow me? Then what happens? Those that are dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we all meet with them, and we do what? Forever we shall be. But then you've got also in 2 Thessalonians, it says, that you have those that are coming on horses with flaming fire to pour out judgment on all those that do not believe in the gospel.

I believe this is the picture of us being resurrected, brought up, coming back, which would go to Revelation 19, 2nd coming, which we looked at last week, and we're fixing to get into the final judgment.

Israel, the Dragon, and the Church’s Persecution

So then you go over to chapter 12. Chapter 12 backs up to the beginning of Israel's history, beginning of the calling them out, and it talks about there's a woman, she's fixing to have a child. You have the red dragon who's waiting there when that man-child is born to devour him.

And who do we believe the man-child was? I don't think there's liberal, conservative. There's no dispute of who this person is. It's Jesus Christ. Okay? No dispute. But you go, wow, they really didn't give us a whole bunch within just like one verse.

It's like, he's born, he's taken up to heaven. It doesn't give us his messianic ministry work. And that's not the point. The point is to paint a picture of what is going on. So then it says that that man-child's taken up.

Once again, it says that's the one that will rule the nations with a rod of iron. And said he's taken up. Then Michael wages war in heaven. He throws out the dragon. The dragon comes down. And we know who that dragon is because it tells us explicitly.

It's the serpent of old, the one who is called the devil and Satan. And what does it say Satan does when he comes down? Deceives the whole world. Deceives the whole world. And makes war with the children of the woman.

Correct. That's his goal. That's his goal. He makes war with the seed of the woman. Because you continue to go down. And it says, and he was thrown down to the word. And his angels were thrown down with him.

And then he hears this voice in heaven that says, Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of God and the authority of his Christ have come. For the accuser of the brethren has been thrown down.

And those whom he accused day and night before the throne of God. It's over. Satan no longer has access to heaven. He has been bound from doing that. And he has been thrown to the earth. But when you get down here to the end of it, it says in verse 17,.

So the dragon was enraged with the woman. And it went off to make war with her children. And then so that there's no confusion on who these children are she's going to make war against. It tells us by giving us a qualifying statement.

It's those who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus. So once again, we have a picture of what it's going to be like in the intertestamental. I mean the interadvent time. And what is it?

The dragon's waging war against the people of God. Now turn over to 13. This is where we get the mysterious picture of the beast. How we understand that. I'm not going to get into all that because that's not the point of today.

But then you get down to verse 7. It was also given to him to make war with the saints. To overcome them. And the authority over every nation, tribe, tongue was given to him. And all who dwell on the earth will worship him.

And everyone whose name was not written from the foundation of the world in the book of the life of the lamb who has been slain. And if anyone has an ear, let him hear. If anyone is destined to captivity, he goes to captivity.

If anyone is killed by the sword, to the sword he must go. Here is the perseverance of the saints. So here, once again, we have a picture of the church having war waged against them from the beast and the false prophet.

My understanding is the beast and the false prophet are types that will go continue on through all of the church age. I believe in its original context, first century reader, they would have understood the beast as being the Roman Empire.

Nero, false prophet. False prophet doesn't actually come being named until chapter 16. But Nero was the cheerleader for the Roman Empire. So, we see in chapter 11, the world wages war against the two witnesses.

They then are overcome, correct? Right? Lie dead in the street. They're told to come up. There's a resurrection. You get to chapter 12. You see there is war made with the enraged dragon against the people of God.

We see that they're going to be overcome. Same thing with 13. We see that the beast wages war against them and it says he will overcome them. But when you get to Revelation 19, this war that's been being waged against the people of God is worldwide against God's people.

He's at that moment of time in which it looks like the church is going to be wiped out. The dead in Christ shall rise first. Those who remain will be called up in the air with him. And so we shall come back with him as he dispenses justice on all those that do not obey the gospel.

The Warrior Shepherd King and the Defeat of God’s Enemies

Now, if I have some postmillennial brothers in here, and we'll get into this in a few weeks, you have a huge problem with these three indications of what the interadvent time is. Where does it show the church overcoming in the picture in 11, 12, and 13?

Does it? No, it doesn't. Matter of fact, it says, though we are overcome, we conquer. That has been the continual pattern of the book all the way back to the seven letters to the seven churches. As you get to earlier in the book, how many of those that were going to overcome by what?

By having their blood poured out. Does that sound like the postmillennial hope? No, it does not. It sounds like the church is under attack from the dragon, from the beast, and the false prophet, and who comes to save the day?

Revelation 19, who comes to save the day? Our shepherd warrior king, who was tithe and shadow in all the Old Testament, that every shepherd, every king of Israel was an absolute failure. The greatest king in conquest was David.

David never lost a battle. You know that? David never lost a battle except for with a woman. Okay, let me back that up. He lost that battle with the lustful eyes of seeing Bathsheba. But as far as going into battle and making war with the enemies of God, David lost no battle.

And then even when you had the over, the Absalom's trying to overthrow an insurrection of the kingdom, many believe he ran in fear. I do not believe that he ran in fear. I believe he ran because David was no coward, and he knew if it comes down to me and Absalom, I'll have to kill my son.

Let's just be honest. Hey, if you don't believe, I taught two years through 1 and 2 Samuel. You can listen to every one of them. David was no coward. But David was a failure as a king to squash and to set up a kingdom where there was no enemy and all the enemies were vanquished.

And that was always in God's design so that when the faithful king that would come, the true shepherd king that would come, that would in imagery descend from Revelation on a white horse to dispense justice on the nations, one, to kill the unbeliever, and then to bring into the fold all up under his wings those who believed, and then he would shepherd the nations forever and ever.

The 144,000 and the Triumphant Church

Now, go to Revelation 14. You have three pictures of the church being persecuted, all overcome. You get to chapter 14, and we see the 144 ,000 on Mount Zion. For those that have been here, what was the 144 ,000 back in the seven seals?

It was a picture of the church. Remember, there were some of those in that list that actually weren't tribes, had Joseph's name in there. I went through all of the reasons why those tribes were listed in that order.

Anybody remember how many times were the tribes listed exactly the same? Does anybody remember that? Probably not. That's two years ago. We're pretty close to it. Two times. Two times. Every other time, they're all different orders, different names you might have.

You might have Issachar here, and then you might have Levi here. You might not have Levi. You might have Joseph. Was Joseph really a tribe? No, Joseph was not a tribe. His was taken away and given to his two sons as a double portion.

Was Levi considered a tribe, but the reason for the tribal distinctions was for land? And did the Levis have land? No. No. So when you see that, you're like, man, this is meaning something else other than land promise.

I understand that as being the 144 ,000 as being collectively the church as a whole. Okay? Disagree with me? Okay. Okay. I'm teaching. You can disagree with me. So when we get to the 144 ,014, if I'm going to be consistent, this 144 ,000 here has to be the same 144 ,000 where?

Earlier in the book. This is a picture of the church collectively triumphant because who are they standing with? They're standing with the lamb, and what do they sing? This is huge. This is huge. What do they sing?

Song of Moses. Yep. Hey, they come through, and then you get to 15, they sing the Song of Moses. When you get to 15, why? Because this was a picture of the greatest act of redemption. Four teams, 144 ,000.

You follow it through. They sing the Song of Moses in 15. So you've got the 144 ,000 triumphed. They're with their lamb. Greatest act of redemption was what in the Old Testament? Who said it? Yeah. Correct.

The greatest act of redemption in the Old Testament was coming out of Egypt. Why? Because he purchased them with the blood of that lamb, which pointed to a greater lamb that would come and then would shed his blood to save the elect collectively of every nation, tribe, and tongue, expanding from Israel, expanding it to the nations.

So when we get to 14, we see them standing there. They're standing there in awe and in thankfulness of what the lamb had done. Then they begin to sing the Song of Moses and the Song of the Lamb, which I believe the Song of Moses was fulfilled totally in Christ.

That's why it's called the Song of the Lamb. So this is all pictures of the triumphant church being saved by their warrior shepherd king. Then, obviously, after 15, you get into the seven vials, as the Beans Bible says, the Beans Bible, vials, or bowls.

And then you get to the final bowl, and that final bowl is the kingdoms of the world have become the kingdoms of our Christ, and that is he is poured out. Here it is. When the seventh bowl is poured out, remember, every one of them ends with this.

There was flashes of lightning, sounds and peals of thunder, and a great earthquake. This earthquake was so big and so mighty that it had never happened as long as men had been on the earth. It split the city in two.

Then it talks about, it brings in that parenthetical statement that God's now going to remember Babylon, and then it says that hailstones came down 100 pounds each, and it blasted those whom blasphemed God.

That is final judgment. Now, turn it over to 19. So, between the three sequences of seven, we've seen three judgment scenes. Agreed? Agreed? Seventh seal, seventh trumpet, seventh bowl ends in a judgment scene.

Revelation 19 and the Final Battle

What did we see? Three judgments at the end of 11, 12, 13. That's six judgment scenes. Now, we're fixing to see another judgment scene. 19, verse 17. Last week, the white horse came, and my favorite depiction of Jesus is this right here.

I don't, for one second, think there are stalls of white horses in heaven. I think this is imagery, imagery of these white horses coming, conquering King, conquering his enemy, and now that king of kings is coming to pour these enemies into the fierce winepress of the wrath of God.

And here's what happens in 17. Oh, I've got to move. Then I saw an angel standing in the sun, and he cried out with a loud voice, saying to all the birds who fly in midheaven. Why is it midheaven? Because they're not flying into the third heaven up there where God and the angels dwell, and it's not down here just above the earth line.

This is where the birds have their domain. And he's saying, come, come, feast. Come and assemble for the great supper of God so that you may eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of commanders, the flesh of mighty men, the flesh of horses.

I don't know why the horses get a bad rap here. The flesh of the horses and those who sit on them and the flesh of all men, both free and slaves and small and great. Do you see how many different distinctions of people are given here?

This is what is called a merism. Merism is everybody. It is including everybody. We have merisms from coast to coast, from head to toe, from bow to stern, however you want to use it. This is putting every distinction of man is included in here, just like it did earlier in the book, so that there is no distinction that someone's going to escape.

And it says that they were all ready to be devoured, small and great. And in verse 19,. And then I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies assembled to make war against him who sat on the horse and against his army.

Like I said, if you go back, this is a parallel to what's going to take place that culminates in the final battle of Armageddon. Battle of Armageddon is the same picture as what we're seeing right here.

Who did they assemble to make war with? Battle of Armageddon. Christ and his people, or his followers, those who were sealed by the Lamb. And then you get to verse 20. It's interesting how quick this battle is over.

I love combat sports. The fastest MMA fight was five seconds. You realize how fast five seconds is? You've got two people here on each side, and they have to then collide. In five seconds, with one flying knee, it was over.

Jorge Mazdaval flattened Ben Askren, probably the best flying knee in the history of combat sports. This happens faster than that. And not only is it faster than something like this, this is more brutal because all it says is basically Jesus shows up on the scene in all of his glory with all of the diadems of the world on his head, and he's already got a robe drenched in the blood of his enemies, and he speaks a word, which is the judgment and the sword that comes out of his mouth, and it's over.

You know, you think about any type of boxing match, any type of big game, any type of big contest, there's this huge buildup. I mean, you take a boxing match. I mean, I loved boxing growing up, and as a little kid, it was always, man, there's going to be this big, you know, you've got the undercard fight, and then you've got all this buildup to this big fight, and then sometimes you go use the bathroom or get a bag of Doritos, and you come back, and it's over.

It's over. Well, in this case, there's this big, huge buildup, and it's over in a nanosecond. It says, and the beast was seized, and with him the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence.

The Beast, the False Prophet, and the Lake of Fire

Okay. The beast is what? What is it? What is the beast? Governmental political structure. What is the false prophet? Technically, he would have been the second beast, but you know that? Because maybe you had the beast that come up out of the land, one come out of the sea, one come out of the land.

You had two beasts, okay? But when you get to 16, that second beast winds up being the false prophet. It tells us that, okay? And so the false prophet points back to the governmental structure, worship him, follow him, and what does God do?

What does Jesus do when he ascends to save his people? He takes the very things that the dragon has used to persecute, abuse, and to hurt not only his people, specifically his people, but generations of people, even unbelievers, and he seizes that governmental structure, okay?

The beast. He seizes that false prophet, the rah, rah, rah, the cheerleader for the beast, and throws them, hear what it says here? It says, and those who received those, he took them, performed signs in his presence, by which he deceives those, the mark of the beast, and worshiped those, and they were thrown alive into the lake of fire.

It's the first time we hear the lake of fire. We do understand that hell and the lake of fire are not the same. Agree? What's the difference? Good. Anyone? Anyone? It's like Ferris Bueller. Anyone? Anyone?

The lake of, oh, good. Well, one's holding before the final judgment,.

And one's after the final judgment. Yeah, and this is when we have to tiptoe so we don't sound like the Roman Catholic purgatory. We have to be faithful to what the Scripture says. The Scripture does make a distinction between the intermediate state and the final, almost said resting place, but you can't say resting, the final place of punishment for the unbeliever and every demonic, every evil structure.

Eternal Conscious Torment and the New Heavens and New Earth

So the final resting place for the believer is not heaven, guys. That's not. You know what? Our goal is not to get to heaven. Our goal is to be in the new heavens and the new earth, and we'll get there in six more months.

That's our goal. We often go, man, I just can't wait to get to heaven. That's not the goal. If we just go to heaven, we are just disembodied spirits. The goal is to be in the new heavens and the new earth with a redeemed body where our soul is reunited with our renewed creation.

Remember, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. Does that mean that new creation starts now or down the road? It starts now. It's a new creation. That's what we're longing for. Well, for the unbeliever, when he dies, he does go to a place of conscious eternal torment.

We take, I don't believe it's a parable in Luke 16. I believe it is a real situation because he uses real names, Lazarus and the rich man. Now, was that normative for an unbelieving person to be able to holler over at Abraham's bosom and say, yo, can you send Lazarus back?

Was that normative? No. So we do get an insight into what God did so that we would have a clear indication of what that intermediate state is for the unconverted. And that intermediate state of the unconverted is a place of punishment.

It says there's weeping and there's gnashing of teeth. Where the worm never died and the fire never quenched. It's dark and it's hot. I don't know how all those come together. God does. Those are descriptions.

It's hot, dark, and lonely. Has anybody ever here been in a room where it's dead quiet? That's the correct answer because none of us have. There's always a sound. Imagine being separated from all that is good from God and being in complete, utter loneliness.

Why do you, even before the fall, God told Adam, it's not good for man to be alone. Alone. When a man or a woman dies, they're in eternal conscious torment and a place of absolute loneliness. You're not going to be able to go, hey, there's someone over here being punished and find some type of respite or comfort because someone's going through the same thing you're going through.

That's not the case. It's lonely. No one there. This here, when I believe why it says they were thrown alive into the lake of fire, did y 'all catch that? It said alive. They were thrown alive into the lake of fire is because this is to let you know, again, that this is not annihilation.

Alive. Eternal conscious torment. And I don't know if anybody is aware there is an attack on eternal conscious torment because people don't like it. I'll just let you know, God ain't interested in what you do or do not like.