The Big Guy Upstairs

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Don Filcek; Revelation 4 The Big Guy Upstairs

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You are listening to the podcast of Recast Church in Matawan, Michigan. We do not have a water main out there, so we'd have to supply our own pressure, all that detail that you don't necessarily need to know.
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But through the Providence of God, we've identified a new property that is sufficient for our needs and within the village of Matawan.
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And it would save us all of that money, which would actually help us to step up this process and begin the process of building sooner.
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So, it's an exciting thing, and I'm telling this to all of you right now. I'm not sharing all of the details of how much this property costs.
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All of that is going to be forthcoming within the next week or two. We're going to be getting that information out in time for us in the church to have a vote on whether or not to buy that property.
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Also in that is going to be a vote on paying the builders, Nayan Church builders, to actually do blueprints for us.
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The amount of money that takes to do the blueprints requires a vote from our church, and so we'll be bringing all of that forward to you with details.
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It's probably going to come via email, so particularly if you're a member of Recast Church, be paying attention to your email that you get from us, because in there is going to actually be one that we're going to highlight, we're going to put it in bold, and we're going to put it on a picture so you know it's important.
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We're going to have a vote on those things. Praise God, that's an exciting thing, the idea of us actually getting into our own facility right here at Matalon.
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It's a great location right on Front Street close to Matalon Village. It's a cool location, it's kind of central to where a lot of stuff is going on right now in this elementary.
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It's going in over there, it's fabulous. Again, we're sharing all of the details.
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With that out of the way, kind of as we jump in this morning, I just want to clarify my shirt. It says,
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Ask Me About, and then there's this blank here, and it's really about Compassion International, just the way we are.
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Compassion International is an international Sunday organization that supports and allows us as individuals and families to take on a child in need around the world.
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It's available for $38 a month. $38 a month supports a child in an impoverished situation.
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There are actual cards back there with details about kids who right now are in need around the world.
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So if you're not able to do that, there's going to be a video and announcement about that later as well. This morning we're diving back into the
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Book of Revelation. It's been a while, and the fact of the matter is, when you begin to read the
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Book of Revelation, you feel like you're writing off more than you can chew. Some of you have maybe read it before. If you've read it, those of you who've read it, raise your hand.
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You're like, this is a lot. The Book of Revelation starts off with these seven letters to seven churches.
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You start off and you're like, man, this is easy to understand. This applies to the church, and it's fun.
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A lot of preachers love to preach those first three chapters because you can just take those letters to the church, what
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Jesus taught in the church, and you can apply it, and it's very easy. I think that if you've never ridden a roller coaster before, then
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I think Revelation is a bit like maybe the first time riding a roller coaster. He says, what happens at the beginning of a roller coaster is you're kind of like, you don't know what's coming.
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You're like, okay, there's this clicking sound, and I seem to be going up, but it's like, man, this is easy. Roller coasters are easy, man.
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It's just this clicking sound, and it's kind of moving slow and easy and all that stuff. That's kind of like those first three chapters of Revelation.
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All these people are all talking about roller coasters. It's weird. Click, click, click, click, click, and then what happens when you get to that first hill is like, whoo, and then all of a sudden you're back at the station, and you're like, what just happened?
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I've got to do that again, maybe, or you're like, I don't know which it is, depending on who you are. That's kind of like the book of Revelation.
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It's like, hold on tight, because once you crest the hill of chapter three, chapter four just launches us over that hill of what can be really complex to understand imagery, some of those kinds of things, so we're going to dig in, and we're going to go over this together and jump down this first hill this morning.
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A bunch of stuff is going to happen before we arrive at the end of the book of Revelation.
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But when it comes to this book, I really think there's two kinds of people, maybe even here in the church, maybe even here in the room, there are those who are excited that I'm preaching through this book because they have in their mind this notion that I'm going to give you a timeline of how everything's going to go in the end.
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And so you're like, man, I want to, I remember digging into that back in the 80s or whatever, and it's like, how many of you know that people will come up with timelines of how it's all going to go down, and they've got details, and maybe even suggest who the
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Antichrist is, and all that kind of stuff, and there are those who are looking for that kind of precision to know, like, how's this all going to wrap up?
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And then there are those who wish I wasn't preaching this book because they know how complex and confusing it can possibly be.
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But I want to remind us all here at the start that this is indeed God's word, and as much as we have to wrestle to come to understanding it, how much we have to wrestle to come to grips with it,
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I'm going to recommend to all of you a third way to view this book. More than just summarizing the entire book with the phrase, and if God only wanted us to know that he wins in the end, then the book would be like, you would open it up, and it would be
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Revelation chapter one, verse one, God wins, end, right? That would be the end of it. But he wanted us to know some more than that, and so there's more to it than just God wins, and then being done with it.
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I would suggest to you that the book of Revelation is about the final inbreaking of the kingdom of God.
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That's why I've titled this series Thy Kingdom Come. That's what we're looking at when we dig into this book.
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Jesus told us to pray that, right? We should be praying that regularly. If we're following the example of Jesus Christ, Jesus told us to pray, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
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We're going to get glimpses of heaven. We're going to get a chance even today to see what's going on in heaven, and saying, thy will be done, thy kingdom come, and let it be done on earth as it is in heaven.
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Well, what's it like in heaven? We're going to get a glimpse of that today and see a bit of what is going on up there.
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The book of Revelation is all about that kingdom, there, coming down, and that final collision of his kingdom and the kingdoms of mankind.
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In the end, his kingdom will be established forever and ever and ever.
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But here in chapter 4, we start off right where everything should start, right where we should begin, and we begin with a vision of God himself, with his throne room.
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There is a throne in the center of heaven, and it is occupied.
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It is not vacant, but there is one who sits on this throne, and his kingdom is forever and ever.
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And I have no problem sharing with you the application here at the beginning, particularly as we're going to come and sing some songs, and I'm going to read this text, and then we'll sing, and that is just simply this.
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Here is the application, the primary point of this message. Honor and worship the one who is worthy of all glory, honor, power, and thanks.
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Worship and honor him. Ascribe him worth. Speak of his surpassing value and surpassing excellence.
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So let's open our Bibles to Revelation chapter 4, and let's begin this journey together on this roller coaster of a book.
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So, again, Revelation 4, navigate over there, open your Bibles there. If you don't have a
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Bible on your lap currently, if you'd just do me a favor and raise your hand, Mark has Bibles here to pass out, but we'd love everybody to have a copy of God's word on their lap so that they can follow along and dig in and see that the things that I'm saying this morning are coming from God's word.
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Revelation 4, again, recast, I say this often, but this is what God desires for us to hear from him this morning.
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Powerful. After this, I, that's John speaking, after this I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven, and the first voice which
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I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet said, Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this.
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At once I was in the spirit, and behold, a throne stood in heaven, with one seated on the throne. And he who sat there had the appearance of Jasper and Carnelian.
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And around the throne was a rainbow that had the appearance of an emerald. Around the throne were twenty -four thrones, and seated on the thrones were twenty -four elders clothed in white garments with golden crowns on their head.
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And from the throne came flashes of lightning and rumblings and peals of thunder. And before the throne were burning seven torches of fire, which are the seven spirits of God.
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And before the throne there was, as it were, a sea of glass like crystal. And around the throne and on each side of the throne are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind.
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The first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with the face of a man, and the fourth living creature like an eagle in flight.
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And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within. And day and night they never cease to say,
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Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come.
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And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, the twenty -four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever.
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They cast their crowns before the throne saying, Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power.
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For you created all things and by your will they existed and were created.
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Let's pray. Father, I come before you and there's this image of a deeper understanding that I even have this morning as I think and have contemplated and just been saturated with this text this week in my own study just to recognize who it is that I'm speaking to right now.
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Father, you are glorious, you are majestic, and you are worthy of all worship. And in your throne room there is nothing but worship of you going on.
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And it is all focused on you, rightfully so, because you are the only one who is worthy.
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You are the creator God. And all that exists, exists from your will.
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So Father, I pray that you would move us this morning to recognize that this awesome, glorious, beautiful picture, sometimes mysterious, sometimes confusing to us, but this amazing picture of almost concentric circles of worship that's going on and it's ringing out to where we have an opportunity to participate in that this morning.
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So Father, I pray that in our voices, in our song, that you would allow our voices to be blended with those who are even now spiritually in heaven around that throne, around your throne, singing praises to you.
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Father, I pray that we would see you high and exalted and mighty and worthy of all of our sacrifice.
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And it's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen. Amen. Well, thanks a lot to Dave and Rob and Linda for leading us in worship this morning.
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As we're going to see in this text, worship is what it's all about, so we just got an opportunity to actually apply the very thing that we're attempting to study and to think about and contemplate this morning.
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I'd encourage you to get comfortable. You can get more coffee or juice or donuts during the message.
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It really is all about keeping our focus on God's word as much as possible here. So if that's what it takes, if you need to get up and stretch out in the back, please don't sit there in misery.
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If your lower back gives you problems, just get up and stretch. You're not going to disrupt me, so do that. But also
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I'd encourage you to keep your Bibles open to Revelation 4, your app navigated over there, looking at it, seeing the things that I'm going to walk us through that text.
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You're going to see that what we're talking about is coming verse by verse right through this chapter, so Revelation 4.
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But I want to start off by asking you guys a question, and I think your answer varies really from person to person, and that is who is the
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God that you serve? You might talk about different aspects of him. You might talk about his character. You might talk about his holiness.
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You might talk about Christ. You might talk about the Spirit. There's all different kinds of things and aspects and qualities of him that you might highlight in a description.
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But I think for a lot of people in our culture, they might think of God as the big guy upstairs, the big guy upstairs who you turn to when times get tough.
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Some might call him or think of him as the old man of the universe who has a white beard and welcomes everybody.
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Everybody just comes sit on his lap like a grandfather figure or something like that, and he's just kind of maybe even a bit senile, maybe just a little bit older.
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Well, he's just so generous and willing to forgive all of our sins and just let us go. Maybe he's the lonely
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God who just needed someone to love, and so he created humanity, and you kind of have that kind of notion or that vision of him.
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Or maybe for some of us, we've thought of him as the old angry landlord who lives upstairs that is just looking for the opportunity to kick us out.
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He's just watching, waiting until we are in breach of contract so that he can kick us out and get rid of us.
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And so there's all different kinds of ways that you might think of God, a variety of different ways, and certainly in our culture, there's a lot of caricatures of him.
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The apostle John wrote down the letters to the seven churches that we studied last fall, and now we're picking back up in chapter 4.
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And after that, after that experience of God appearing to John and saying,
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I want you to write some stuff down, he wrote that. And then after that, God began to grant him some visions.
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Visions are like maybe a waking dream of sorts where God is inspiring and is moving in John to show him things and reveal things to him, not verbally, but in picture phrases.
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So what John is going to try to do is he's going to try throughout the book of Revelation, in these visions, to explain with words the thing he sees with his spiritual eyes, if you will.
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And so that's going to create some conundrums for us to understand what is it that John is actually seeing and try to picture that and try to put that.
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So even in our text this morning, there's going to be some metaphors. Well, it was kind of like this. Have you ever tried to describe things to someone that wasn't there present?
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And sometimes you have to say, well, it was kind of like that. Or try to describe something that you ate overseas to your spouse when you get home or to somebody else.
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And it's like trying to describe it, well, you're going to use similes and metaphors and describe it as being like different things.
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But here in our text, he's told specifically, you're going to see some things that are future, some things that are yet to take place.
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And that's where our mind goes immediately. But what's interesting is not all of the book of Revelation is forward -looking.
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Some of it actually records for us things that have already occurred. Like actually, a lot of people don't realize that the birth of Christ is found in the book of Revelation.
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We're going to get there here as we walk through. There's a war in heaven where Satan is cast down.
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Well, that happened previous to the creation of the world. And so we see some things that happened past, present, and future.
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And those things get kind of mixed in here. So it's important for us to kind of understand that. And in verse 1, we see that in a vision, he looked and he was surprised to find a door open to him in heaven.
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There was a door opened in heaven. Now, in ancient Greek mythology, the interesting thing is that there were all kinds of stories of strong men who endured many trials and fought off beasts and overcame traps set by the gods in order to fight their way into the abode of the gods, to try to go up Mount Olympus to the place where the gods lived.
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And there were a lot of thoughts about that and a lot of legends and myths about men trying to overcome and trying to gain immortality by sneaking in the back door of heaven, so to speak.
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Well, it's interesting that that's the very context in which this says, well, there was a door open and I was invited in, and so I went in.
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See how that might be a little bit snarky? John is actually saying, well, this is the way it went down. I didn't fight my way.
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The Greeks reading this would have been like, where are the beasts? Where are the traps? Where's all the adventure? Where's the swords and the helmets and the spears and all that?
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And he's like, there was a door open, and I heard a voice, and it said, come on in. And I went in, and all this stuff was revealed.
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So there's something going on already in the culture that's kind of interesting in the way that God brought this all about, this door in.
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And so he's invited in the spirit, and he's brought into the throne room of the
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Almighty, the God of the universe, to catch a glimpse of that and share it with us. Now, the reality is nobody will ever force their way into heaven.
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Entering his throne room is by invitation only. Did you know that? Nobody shows up there on accident.
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Everybody is there fully and completely according to his will. In his grace,
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God invites John to come and check things out so that he can report to the church, and yes, even us, what he sees when he arrives there in heaven.
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And the first thing that John records for us in that vision, and what he sees is pretty simple and easy to overlook, and it's kind of like, well, all this other stuff grabs our attention really quickly, but I don't want to brush over the glory and the weight of the first thing that he sees.
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If what John experiences and sees first in just verse 2 is accurate and true, if what he says in verse 2 is accurate and true, then it must have a radical impact on our lives.
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If we believe it and it is true, then it will have a radical impact on our lives because in the center of this spiritual sight, the first thing that he sees, the first thing that draws his attention, is the throne.
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He doesn't take the time to describe that throne, but it's placed in such a way that it immediately is central and it attracts his attention first and foremost, the throne and the one seated on it.
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And that's the point. There is one seated on the throne of the universe.
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There is one there. In heaven, at the center of the spiritual realm, there is an occupied throne.
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If that is true, it has radical implications for you and me. If just that one fact from the book of Revelation is true, then we have some soul -searching to do in regard to who we worship, the way we roll, the way that we understand our obligation and our understanding of relationship to this one who rules and reigns over all.
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Who sits on a throne? A king. A ruler. One who has power and authority over others.
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And that's the first thing that he sees. The significance of that should be radical for you and me.
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But consider for just a moment, we're going to get a glimpse here for just a second, but who sits on this throne?
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It's important for us to know who doesn't. Start off there. It isn't you.
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It isn't me. It isn't any political candidate or ruler among mankind.
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There is one who occupies the throne and rules and reigns over the universe.
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And we simply call him God. God is the one who rules and reigns over all.
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John limits his description of the character who occupies the throne. I think there's some reasons for that.
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But all he can say about the God that he sees seated on the throne is that he had the appearance of Jasper and Carnelian.
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Now you understand what God looks like, right? Jasper and Carnelian, right? Well, Jasper and Carnelian are two stones.
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One is a blood red stone like ruby. That's the Carnelian. And Jasper is a sparkling stone, usually clear like a diamond.
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You can see the pictures that are up there. I believe that what John saw was a brilliant light emanating from the one who occupies the throne.
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White and red light flooded his eyes as he saw the throne and the one who was seated there.
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Paul clarifies for us and explains that when he's speaking to Timothy about our
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God, he talks about our God who dwells in unapproachable light. Our God who dwells in unapproachable light.
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And John had a chance to glimpse, to glance at this unapproachable light. And consider
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Moses also experienced that unapproachable light. And in the book of Exodus, when he would come down from the mountain after having a conversation with the
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Almighty, his face, Moses' face, shone with the brilliance of having been in the presence of the
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Lord to such a degree that it terrified the Israelites. And he had to put a veil covering over his face lest they become terrified of the glory that was emanating from Moses from just having been in the presence of the
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Almighty. That's the kind of light that we're talking about here. How does that work? I don't fully get it. I don't fully understand.
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But there's something about the light emanating from God himself and his glory that is overwhelming to the human senses.
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We might be surprised that John doesn't give us more description. You might be going, okay, well he's there. He's in the throne room, man.
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Why doesn't he just give us more detail about God? But I think if you were there, you might also just merely catch a glimpse because the light of God himself, as Paul, as the book of Acts clarifies for us, outshines the noonday sun.
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So I don't think you're going to be gazing at him trying to discern an outline and trying to figure out what he looks like.
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But here in this throne room vision, John shares the setting with us and goes on to clarify. I mean, he can't speak a whole lot about the one who is on the throne, but he's going to share what's going on in the presence of the
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Almighty, the one who occupies the throne of the universe. And there surrounding the throne is a brilliant green halo.
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And I say brilliant green halo. If you look at the text, it talks in terms of there was a rainbow that had the appearance.
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All the way around the throne was a rainbow that had the appearance of an emerald. And when you think rainbow, how many of you memorize
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Roy G. Biv? Any of you know what I'm talking about? Roy G. Biv, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet, right?
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The colors of the rainbow. And you got that sometime in your schooling, and it's stuck, wedged in there.
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But don't think Roy G. Biv in this sense. There's this circle of light, but a rainbow all the way around, like double rainbow all the way.
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I had to say that. But a couple of you know what I'm talking about. It's green in its hue. It says it's like an emerald.
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Do you see that in the text? Like an emerald. This is more like there's not a Greek word for halo. So he says there's this light that's encircling the throne, and it is green.
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It's emerald. It's like an emerald. And we need a reminder that John here is groping for words to describe the things that he sees.
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And we quickly come to the end of our ability to discern what is literal and what is figurative. And so we have to look at cues in the text.
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Sometimes John helps us by saying things like, look at the text. It had the appearance of an emerald.
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Well, there's one thing we know for sure. It wasn't an emerald. Because he says it was like one. And so if it was an emerald, he would have said it was an emerald.
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But he chose to actually say it's like that. So there's a quality about this light. It's encircling the throne of God.
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It's like an emerald. And most scholars would agree. It's the color. The color is what he's driving for here.
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So there's this green light that is emanating from the throne of God. But remember that God himself is in the text.
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The light that he's emanating is this red and hot white light that is emanating from him.
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And then around him is this green halo. Surrounding the throne are 24 other thrones with 24 elders who are clothed in white garments.
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And it says they had golden crowns on their heads. Just, again, a regal, noble view of what is going on in this place.
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There are 24 what I picture in my mind to be smaller thrones. And I think that's a reasonable assumption.
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But now in identifying these elders, I want to be clear that I am not sure who they are.
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I'm going to be honest. I don't know what that does for your confidence in me as your pastor.
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Maybe you expect me to have all the answers and know everything. I will tell you who I think they are, but I don't know for certain.
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And so I would not go to the grave over this one. I'm not going to die on this one. Who do you think they are?
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Angels or men? I don't know. I don't know. That would be a really weird scenario, wouldn't it?
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I don't know when that happens. Where does that happen? But here's the thing. There are scholars that I highly respect, deeply respect, that believe that these are angelic beings.
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These are a unique created being of God. They're angels. They are not humans who have died and have gone on before us and are now seated around that throne.
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Remember, John in the past is seeing this happen. And by some things that we're going to see here in the text, it's presumed that this is still going on here today.
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So it would have to be people who have already died or something like that, even in John's time. So some have identified these 12,
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I mean rather the 24, as the 12 apostles and the 12 tribes of Israel.
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One really intriguing thing is that one of the 12 apostles is the one seeing this unfold.
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And he'd be like, hey, there I am. It doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense that John is one of the 12 who is around the throne, or rather one of the 24 around the throne when he's standing there watching this all unfold.
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So that's one of the things. But there's a few things that lead me to conclude that these are angels. By the way, there are scholars that I really, really admire who believe that these are humans.
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So it's like, you know, I mean you kind of go, okay, that's why I'm a little bit on the fence about this.
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But I lean on the direction of these being angelic beings. Because of the ongoing nature of their worship, without rest and without end.
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Now we were created for rest. What is heaven going to be? It's often imaged as a rest for you and I.
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And it's clearly stated in this. These beings, whatever they are, these 24 elders, have no rest.
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Even God took a rest on the seventh day, right? But not these.
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These beings worship day and night. They never stop singing the praises of God.
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And they're close ties with the four living creatures that we're about to encounter. I lean towards seeing them as 24 angelic worshipers.
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Who were likely created strictly for this ongoing, specific worship of God in his throne room.
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Humanity as the image bears, by the way, are created to worship God in ways that are unique. Where angels were created to worship
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God in a different way than mankind does. It's more consistent with the things that we see them doing here.
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Let me explain. The things that they're doing. Could we bow? Yeah, and we should.
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We should bow at times. Can we sing? Yeah, and they're singing. Can we cast crowns before him?
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Yes, we could. Could we sit on thrones? Yes. But we also are unique in that God has for us a method of worship that also includes creating things.
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Cultivating things. We multiply. We create culture. We are relationally driven and we worship him in a whole multitude of ways and manifestations of the way that humanity worships.
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And these beings do not exist that multitude of ways. They do the same thing repeated over and over and over again.
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And God has not, as image bears, he has not instilled that repetition in you and I, but rather has instilled in us creativity in our worship of him.
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That we can worship him while we are working. We can worship him while we are jogging. We can worship him not just while we are jogging, but through jogging.
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We can worship him not just at work, but through the way that we work. And the very nature of the things that we create can be rendered unto him service to the almighty.
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Even if it's a drill for surgery or whatever it is that you create, it can be something that is honoring to him just in the part that you play in that creative process.
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So is that making sense to you? Are you getting why I think that these are a specific, unique, created? And again, I emphasize that I have some reasons that I believe that, but I could be wrong and I'd be okay with being wrong.
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And God will set that straight when we get there. I have to be honest in my mind, having been in the throne room of God, in my mind has been more like a respectful, stately, and peaceful place.
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Anybody agree with me on that? Like that's been your mindset of the throne room of God, respectful, regal, kind of just honorable place and location.
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But verse 5, in verse 5 we find that it is anything but quiet. It is not a quiet place.
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Not only is there dazzling red and white light and green halos, but it's loud. There's flashes of lightning and rumbles and peals of thunder that are emanating from his throne.
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Ongoing. Remember when he came down and settled on Mount Sinai, what did the people see and hear?
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They saw a storm. They saw lightning. They saw thunder. Often in his manifestation there is indeed a show and display of power and loud noise and trumpets blaring and that kind of stuff.
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There's the fire and the smoke of seven torches that are called here the seven spirits of God, which needs a little bit of explanation.
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Seven spirits of God. I thought there was one Holy Spirit, and there is indeed one Holy Spirit, but often described in a perfection, the number of perfection being seven.
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And the menorah is a seven -wicked lamp that is described in Zechariah 4, 1 through 10 in the
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Old Testament, in that Old Testament prophetic book. And there the Holy Spirit is described as the power of God to accomplish his work.
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In that context he's describing the menorah. And it's not by human might, it says in that context, and not by human power, but by the
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Spirit. And so in that context there's these seven lit torches or candles, and it's referenced to the
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Spirit, and the Spirit that goes about doing the will of God on the earth. And here we see a reference to that.
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The Spirit of God and the Almighty Father are together in the throne room of heaven. Of course the
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Spirit is omnipresent and is able to be both there in manifestation of fire, and equally be here dwelling with us simultaneously.
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And so there's this imagery or this picture, this sight that John is given of the actual
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Spirit himself there in the presence of the Almighty. But before we get lost in the chaos, and it'd be very easy for us to get caught in the weeds here, the chaos of the elders, the blinding light, fires, and thunder, and lightning.
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John also describes a serenity about the whole thing. There's a bit of serenity right here in the middle.
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Leading up to the throne is an expansive sea of glass. Interestingly it's very unclear whether it's actually glass or whether it's water that looks like glass and is so serene.
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But either way, the idea of sea and chaos all throughout
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Scripture, and particularly in the New Testament, is an imagery of chaos and disorder. And here he says there is none of that chaos anymore.
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The rippling and the waves are gone completely. And it is a peaceful setting.
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No ripples, no waves, no more chaos of turbulence and disturbance. But none of what we have seen by the way so far has been described for the sake of chaos.
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There is not chaos in God's presence. But it is all for the sake of awe.
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It is for the sake of worship. That we might be moved in our hearts to a severe reverence for this one who is seated on the throne.
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I hope you can see that here in the throne room, everything is meant to center on the
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God who is seated on His throne. It's all centered on Him. He is full of wisdom.
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He is full of power. He is full of authority. He is completely higher in degrees, higher in knowledge, higher in authority, higher in perfection than anything that you and I will ever encounter.
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And I confess to all of you that I've been kind of haunted and mystified. I mean that in a good way throughout this week as I've dug deeper into this vision.
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And I confess that this is not what I have most commonly imagined the throne room of God to be like. But we're still just getting started.
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Because positioned at each side of the throne of God are these four living creatures. Be honest, have you ever read about these four living creatures and it's been like, okay, move on to the next day in my
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Bible reading, right? Like I don't know what's Don gonna do with this. I don't know. I'm gonna figure it out here as I go.
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Actually, I know where this is going. But it is a strange thing.
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The emphasis on their life that they're called living creatures has led me and many scholars to conclude that these are actual beings.
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That this isn't just a figurative thing that he's seeing here, but these are real genuine beings. This isn't just meant to be mystical or metaphorical, but rather the emphasis on them being called living beings is to identify that they are real.
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These are not just kind of, well, you gotta figure out what the metaphor, what's the ox about or what's the eagle about?
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Well, eagles are really fast, so it just means that the spirit of God is fast or something like that. But I believe that there's something literal going on here that he sees spiritually.
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These beings in heaven and they are actually there even now. And they seem monstrous to us in their form, right?
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One looks like a lion. One looks like an ox. One has the face of a human.
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One looks like an eagle. And remember, he's using his own words to describe them.
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And he doesn't see a lion. He doesn't see an ox. He doesn't see an eagle. He doesn't see a human.
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But the closest approximation he can come to describing these beings that he sees around the throne is ox, eagle, man, and lion.
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That's the closest he can get to it. But that doesn't mean that that's what he saw, because how many of you know that understanding what a lion is, he could have just said,
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I saw a lion standing there. But it's not a lion standing there. It's something like a lion. It's a different kind of creature.
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So he uses these words to describe them. And then further he goes on to say, well, here's one thing that was different. Here's something that was a little bit strange about this ox -looking creature and this lion -looking creature.
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They are covered with eyes. Anybody ever found that a bit macabre and strange?
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It just got kind of monstrous all of a sudden, like eyes everywhere. Is that a little bit weird? It's the stuff that little kids' nightmares are made out of.
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It says it very explicitly in verse 7 and in verse 8, because this took John by surprise, and I think it was just as weird to him as it is to you.
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And so he says it twice for emphasis. He said in front, behind, underneath, all around, surrounding.
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When he says within, many people, it's understood to be even under the wings. I mean, these things have pit eyes.
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I mean, they've got eyes everywhere, okay? And they are just covered front to back with eyes.
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Great. Part of the point, I think, in the creation of these creatures and what they are, nothing escapes their notice.
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They have no blind spots. But they are there in the presence of God, always taking him in, always there.
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No matter where they turn, their attention is always to God, and they are never outside of the vision of him.
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Now, I fear that we can get caught in the weeds again, because sometimes in the book of Revelation, the fairway seems unfairly small, okay?
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And so it's like we can get out here, and these creatures are over here, and this, and we can miss the main point and never even get to the green because we're stuck out here, just really close to the out -of -bounds markers, going, well, what is this creature?
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What are these elders? Who are these? What's this? And how many of you ever found that in the book of Revelation? You're like, I get so caught up in the things that sometimes
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I give up on what the main point is because I can't figure out what the main point is because all of these things are going on. So getting caught up in the image of the four living creatures can interfere with the point of this chapter in the book of Revelation.
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We are being given this bizarre vision of the throne room for one primary reason.
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We are to be moved to awe, moved to wonder, mystery, and ultimately driven towards worship.
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These four living creatures are divinely ordained worship leaders in the throne room of God.
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That's what they're doing. They're leading worship. However bizarre or strange they look to our eyes, in their many eyes, however, whatever we understand them to be, they are there leading worship.
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That's what they are doing. They have six wings. Ezekiel calls them. Ezekiel saw them, too, and he talks about them.
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Having seen the throne room of God in Ezekiel 1, he talks about them and uses the word cherubim for them. Have you ever heard the word cherubim?
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Some have just identified them as a unique species of angel, a type of angel or something. I don't really know what they are.
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They are some order of creation that we know very little about, which in itself is humbling, right?
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That there is some created order, some created nature, some created thing, living being, that you and I just really know so little about, that God has created things like that for His honor and for His glory.
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I wonder sometimes, like I read this and I wonder, are there just four of them? It's possible. Maybe there are four unique created creatures to just attend to the worship of God centrally in that inner circle of His throne.
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It seems like God, what I know of God, that that might very well be the case. Maybe there's a whole race of them.
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Maybe there's a whole planet of these beings and four of them were redeemed and now are in the throne room. I don't know. Maybe they've been created solely for this purpose, and I like to think that.
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I think that's kind of a cool thought, even though I don't know that for sure. But regardless of what is true of their origin, regardless of where they come from, we know they come from God, but they are going to lead us in worship.
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And they're going to lead us in worship right now. Right now as we take in the words that they sing.
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They are seeking right now through the revelation of John to lead you in worship because of the things that they're saying.
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Look at verse 8. They are calling and beckoning you to repeat these words along with them for eternity.
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Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come.
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And they never, ever cease uttering this word.
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It's like a cycle of worship going on in the throne room of God. These beings that have such close access to the throne of God never stop singing
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His praises. Many of us are going to be surprised to find that the book of Revelation really is, in essence, a big song book of praises that are sung about the coming of the final king.
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I have a book that's out there on the table. It's out of print and so I actually found some used copies and I still bought them and they're still out there for a suggested donation.
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It's only a few bucks. My favorite book on the book of Revelation, a very attainable, easy to read commentary.
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It's very short and it just talks about it from the perspective of worship. It revolutionized my understanding of this book back when
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I was in college and I love this book. If you're looking to kind of read something alongside of this, you can check that out there.
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I do want to let you know there is a PDF available and we'll try to get that in the e -cast but there's a PDF of it free because it's a book that is out of print and so it's actually been released.
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I just, again, bought a couple of copies because I know some of you are going to want to have a paper copy of it. But it just highlights this nature of this book being a song book of praise to God.
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And I don't think you, I would dare say that most of us have never thought of it that way. But when you read, almost every chapter contains a hymn to God.
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Almost every chapter contains some kind of singing. Someone's singing all throughout this book. Why? Because the kingdom of God is breaking in and that's worthy of rejoicing.
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You get into this book and you think about the trumpets and all of the devastating things that are going to come on the earth.
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How many of you, that grabs your attention pretty quick? How many of you know that this book is about worshiping the one and him giving a final shout out, a final chance for humans to come into his kingdom?
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One final opportunity. That's what all those plagues are about. All those difficult times. Often it takes difficulty for us to be drawn in, doesn't it?
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And so that's what's going on here. But you're going to find that this is more about that than it is about our silly western desire to make the book of Revelation a road map for the end times.
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A big flow chart, if you will. And that's not the point. So some of you might be disappointed.
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You're like, ah, I'm signing up for this series because I want the road map. And I think we're going to just get it chapter by chapter.
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You're going to see that there's a lot more to it than a road map to the end. To paraphrase the song of the living creatures, they are singing to you and me.
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They are singing to God. They are singing throughout eternity. Something paraphrased like this.
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Uniquely better. Uniquely better. Uniquely better is the divine all -powerful king.
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He was always there. He is right now. And he always will be.
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That's the nature of their song. And that is happening right now in the throne room of heaven.
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Right now as we breathe air, they are there singing his praises. These bizarre worship leaders shout out a song over the peals of thunder.
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Louder. Loud enough for John to take them in even though there's sounds of thunder and there's lightning going all over.
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There's the green halo. And he's hearing this song that emphasizes the holiness of God. The omnipotence, that is the all -mightiness of God.
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And the eternality of God, that he has no beginning and has no end. They are teaching us theology in their worship.
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Teaching that God is not like us. He's uniquely better than anything you'll ever experience.
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Holy, distinct, different, higher, unique, better. He's not like us and he's all -powerful just in that alone.
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That alone distinguishes him, doesn't it? And he has no beginning and no end. And whenever these living creatures give this glory, honor, and thanks to the one on the throne who exists forever, the text says, the 24 elders, who again
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I believe are angels, fall down before him and cast their crowns before his throne. The Greek grammar and syntax as I studied it this week appears to indicate that this is not a one -time occurrence, but an ongoing form of worship in the throne room of God.
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So yes, you're wondering to leave the crowns there. They take them back up again and throw them down again, take them back up and throw them back down again, and it's a constant cycle of honor and worship due to his name forever and ever.
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Day and night, the living creatures never cease this song. And at the end of every cycle, 24 elders bow down and cast their crowns again.
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In reality, I wonder if some of you would be honest, I'm not going to ask for a show of hands on this one at all, but I wonder if any of you are uneasy about this worship.
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How do you feel uncomfortable about the cycle, the repetition of it, the just kind of ongoing nature of it, that God might create beings just solely to bow before him day and night, forever and ever, without end?
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Even God took a break on day seven, but these creatures he's created to never cease honoring him.
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When the eye -encrusted song leaders sing and finish the chorus, the elders bow, they cast their crowns, and finish this scene with a chorus of their own.
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And it starts with the word that answers and ought to solve any uneasy feeling that we would have about this method of worship in his presence, and it is this one word.
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Worthy. Worthy. Worthy is our
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God. There is no worship that is too extreme for our God. There is no sacrifice that is too much for him.
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He's worth it all. Whatever you can imagine sacrificing for that king, it is small in comparison.
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There's a lot of things that we might be called to sacrifice in our lives. I think of just obedience in the day and day of the way that I want, the things that my flesh wants, and that's a sacrifice in itself is just denying my flesh every day, right?
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Is that a sacrifice? We live in a culture that says God would never ask anybody to sacrifice their sexuality, their expression of sexuality, and that would be a reasonable sacrifice.
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That would be an acceptable sacrifice, would it not? To this one who deserves and is worthy of all honor and power.
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He is. Worthy are you, Lord God. You are worthy to receive glory and honor and power, the text says.
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Why? Why is he worthy? Everything that exists does so according to his will.
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All things are his possession. People speculate all the time, wondering this question, why did
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God create? Or another way to ask the question is, why is there something instead of nothing? Why did
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God create? And some of you have heard creative answers to that. He wanted creatures to either show his glory to, or he wanted to be loved, or wanted to show his love, or whatever.
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And I understand all of those answers, but at risk of being trite, the answer is found in our text.
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It's very simple, it's profound, and it may sound unsatisfying to us, but it is simply because he wanted to.
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Why does anything exist? Why is there stuff? Why are we here? Because he wanted it to be this way.
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His will. Look, his will is the reason that stuff exists. And since he made it all, and owns it all, the elders sing, his worth.
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He is worthy to receive glory, and honor, and power. Look at verse 11 with me. Very end.
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Worthy are you, O Lord and God, to receive glory, and honor, and power. Why? For you created all things, and by your will they existed, and were created.
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By his will. Because he wanted it to be this way. If you walk away with one thing this week from this message,
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I believe that God wants you to walk away with an understanding of his great worth. In English, the word worship is actually an
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Old English combination of two different words. In Old English it was worth and Skype. Now that's before the whole video phone thing happened.
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I don't know if they got the word from that. The word Skype in Old English means to ascribe something. So I don't know where that comes from, if that's related.
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But to ascribe worth, to basically, in other words, declare the value of something is what worship really is about.
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Declaring the worth of it. When we're worshiping God, we are describing, conveying, and living out his worth.
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What's happening in the throne room of God is an ongoing declaration that God is more valuable and more worthy than anything else.
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That means that anything that you and I would sacrifice for him is a good and wise sacrifice.
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I hope that you can look past the confusing, bizarre, and potentially disturbing images here in the text to see the main point.
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God is on his throne. He is surrounded by worship, including beings that have likely been created solely to be present before his throne, worshiping him eternally.
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And John was invited to bring that image to the church and, of course, to you and I, so that you and I might be moved to see him in his glory, that we might be moved to fall on our faces before our glorious king.
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I'm hopeful that a byproduct of this vision is to consider the petty insignificance of some of the cheap imitations we are often moved to worship.
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Don't show your hands, but I know that many of us are moved to worship things that are not God. To ascribe worth to them.
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If worship means declaring the worth of something, then consider what does your life show worth toward?
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Are you offering glory to God? Or are you giving glory to yourself?
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Are you giving glory to an athlete? Glory to an artist? Glory to money? Glory to entertainment, or cars, or houses, or fame?
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Further, what do you honor? What do you give honor to? To what do you ascribe power? When the elders and the four living creatures are talking about how he is worthy to receive power, do we ever add to the power of God in our worship?
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Do we make him more powerful when we worship him? No. Thank you, I appreciate this.
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Don't do this. The answer is no, we do not add anything to the power of God when we worship him.
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That doesn't happen. So how do we ascribe power to him? Letting him have his rule and reign in our lives.
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So what are you letting rule over you? It's another way of asking this. What are you letting rule and reign over you?
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Sex, promotions, fitness, or diet, entertainment, all kinds of things can be given license to rule over our lives.
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What is it? When I consider this image of the true and living God in resplendent light that John can barely describe, halos of green, thunder, lightning, the expanse of the sea of glass, the elders, the living creatures, the crowns, the flames of the spirit, the awesome songs of deep and rich understanding of the glory that is due to our
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God, and then I consider what the image looks like of when
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I put myself on the throne. It's kind of silly. It's kind of strange.
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I think an appropriate image, if we're talking about the imagery of the worship of God and what it looks like when we worship ourselves or put ourselves on that throne, it's like this.
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There I sit in a lonely room on a wooden stool, singing my own praises alone.
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Not 24 elders surrounding me, no living creatures, nobody else singing, but me, singing alone to myself.
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I imagine, I'm not talking literally, but figuratively, I imagine hell being something like that.
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In a lonely room on a wooden stool, singing my own praises, and nobody there to believe the song that's being sung.
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And I think we know it. When we sing our own praises, do you even believe it yourself?
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Do you believe it yourself? I don't think you do. I think you know that there's somebody else that's worthy of the praise that we give to ourselves.
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So chapter four leaves us in awe and wonder, but intentionally just shy of redemption. We have a vision of the
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Father, we have an appearance of the Spirit, but where is the Son? And I'd encourage you to come back next week.
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That's a nice segue, right? A little bit of a hook, but come back next week for the glorious revelation we are going to see in chapter five because there's no mention.
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He's not here. You're supposed to finish chapter four going, awe, wonder, lightning, thunder, holiness, power.
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It sounds hopeless. And you're supposed to end chapter four with a sense of fear and reverent awe.
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And that's why chapter five of Revelation is one of my favorite chapters in this entire book, and actually one of my favorite chapters in the entirety of the
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Bible because of the twist there. It's beautiful. It's poetic in the way that it brings us forward to an understanding of redemption.
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And so as we come to communion this morning, I'm going to have to take a little spoiler alert from next week's sermon, but we celebrate the sacrifice of the
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Lamb of God who was slain from the foundation of the world. We celebrate the sacrifice of the
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Son of God so that we can be reconciled to the almighty God that we have read about today, that it is reasonable for us to tremble in awe and reverent fear of this one, the one who sits on the throne, the one who is worthy of all worship, the one who lives forever and ever, but he has loved us enough to send his son
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Jesus to die for us. And so we do the simple thing each week. We take a cracker. We take some juice.
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As Jesus told us to, to remember his body and his blood that were given up for us on the cross.
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He became a sinner who knew no sin and died taking our punishment so that any who have faith and trust in Jesus might have hope of eternity with him.
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Not in that throne room, but on a new earth where Jesus will occupy a throne and will rule and reign over his people forever and ever.
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So if you've asked Jesus to be your Savior and Lord, then as Dave comes and plays a song for us, please feel free to come to one of the tables in the four corners of the room and join the church in remembering the sacrifice of Jesus.
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But if you're still working through an understanding of these things, you're still unsure about what Jesus Christ has done for you, you haven't asked him to save you, then
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I'd encourage you to sit back and take in this song as we close out this service. But if you'd like to know more about how to enter into a relationship with God through his son
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Jesus Christ, come and talk with me afterwards. I would love to have that conversation about the new life that you can have and forgiveness that you can have through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
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Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for this imagery, this picture that we have and this awesome book of Revelation.
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Father, just chapter four of this rich understanding of your presence and all that's going on around you, even as we are talking to you, that you're taking in all that worship and you're listening to my voice even now.
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Father, it's more than I can comprehend, your holiness, your omniscience, your omnipresence, your omnipotence,
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Father. All of these amazing character traits that are yours, your eternality that you are forever and ever.
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Father, I thank you for your love. This image of who you are and this brilliance and this light and this inability to even take you in and then you would reveal yourself in your son
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Jesus who died for us. Father, I pray that we would honor you as we take communion together. Father, if there's anyone here who doesn't understand what you have done for them or has not asked you to save them, that even now might be a time of them praying and asking you to save them from their sins.
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Pray that you would give us boldness this week to go out in the delight that we've seen of you, to praise you, to worship you in the things that we do.