Letters to the Churches Part 15

Okay, all right, let me start the video, and there we are. Always, you know, you always have such limited real estate on here. And then let me make sure that people can turn their, yeah, they can start video.

Allow participants to start video. I selected that. Those of you who would like to turn your video on, it's always fun to see. Oh, there's Luis and Bill. Hello, hello. All right, I saw Bruce Burns in the chat today.

Oh, boy. Danger, danger. Yep, all right, and there's the Sylvester family. Good to see you, Stephen Elliott. Good to see you, sir. Always a pleasure. Let's see here. All right, so let's pray, and we will continue working our way through the book of Revelation.

Granted that we don't have an interesting topic come up as a result of questions from our online congregation, which are always welcome. I want you to know that.

Let's pray.

Prayer for Rightly Believing and Enduring in God’s Word

Lord Jesus, we pray through your spirit that we may rightly believe, confess, do, so that we may hear, mark, read, learn, inwardly digest what you have revealed in your holy word, so that through it our faith may be sustained, that our sins may be made known to us, that we would be properly brought to repentance on a daily basis, Lord, and that continue, that the Holy Spirit would continue to bear the fruit of the spirit in us as you sustain us in this sojourning here as we journey towards the new Jerusalem.

We ask in Jesus' name. Amen. Okay, so let's see. Bruce says, right in my place with a bright smiley face. Have you noticed that I developed a twitch, Bruce? It goes away on Mondays, but it shows up on Sundays.

Good to see your face, sir. Good to see your face. Okay, so if you remember last week, we've been working our way through the book of Revelation. We were in Revelation chapter 14. And in Revelation chapter 14, we took a little bit of a digression to note the fact that, number one, we learned earlier in the chapter, when you consider the cross references, that everybody who is marked with the name of God, they stand in contradistinction with those who are marked with the sign of the beast.

And the sign of the beast, there have been people who've been taking that sign for millennia. In the same way that God's name is put on your forehead in an invisible manner when you were baptized into the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

And we learned in the beginning part of this chapter, that's really what this is referring to. So there are people who, every one of us born under the dominion of darkness, who follows the ways of this world.

And you'll note when you consider the life of somebody who is an impenitent, somebody who doesn't trust in Jesus, what hope do they have for eternity? What hope do they have? I mean, so everything is focused on this life.

And what is it that we are tempted by always and again in this life? Temptations of the eyes, temptation of the flesh, temptation to power, temptation to sexual immorality, temptation to feed our sinful passions.

And so you'll note that if you're not sure what the world is all about, just look at the magazine rack at Walmart as you're getting ready to check out. I mean, that should be a stark reminder of the catechism of the world.

And that's one of the things that we have to take into consideration here, is that we are either being catechized by the Word of God, or we're being catechized by the world. And the catechism of the world over and again is done quite overtly, yet done very entertainingly on television.

And so, you know, I hate to say this. It's just a drudgery at times to follow a new series on Netflix. And part of the reason why is because the world has decided that they're going to embrace and celebrate same-sex marriage.

And so I always hate it when you have a romantic subplot between two girls or two guys. And of course, you know, they always have to show how those relationships develop. And quite frankly, I don't want that in my home.

But you're going to note then that even the Disney Channel catechizes our children. And I hate to say this, but pretty much the theme of Disney, as well as all the other children's programs, fall along the theme of what basically is the Barbie movie.

You know, you know, follow the dreams of your heart. You know, and so, you know, I want to be a dentist. Anyway, so the idea here….

Being a dentist is at least an aspiration on some monetary value.

Yeah, being a dentist is an actual good vocation.

It serves as a neighbor.

Yeah, but the idea here is that you've got to be authentic to who you are, and who you are is what you have the feels for in your heart. That's pretty much how it's all determined. And you'll note that true Christianity runs totally opposite against this.

Your sinful passions, as identified by Scripture as to what is sinful, although you feel those things strongly, they are not your identity in Christ, and they must be recognized as sin, even what you feel.

So in our society, what you feel is considered to be sacrosanct. It's sacrosanct. You cannot tell anybody that their feelings are wrong. But Scripture would beg to differ. Scripture would beg to differ.

And so one of the things I've been telling people is something I heard not that long ago, but something that just really helped, and that is that all of our feelings are real, but they're not always true.

All of our feelings are real, but they're not always true. So you have to make a distinction between what is real and what is true. And so when we follow our sinful passions, we get into all kinds of trouble.

And then you're going to note there, as we work our way through this next section of the book of Revelation, that the world and its passions and its pursuits and what is important to it really are going to start coming to the forefront of the texts that follow from where we are now, where you can see what's in operation, and you can see that when God begins to execute judgment, people are completely oblivious to what's going on.

And despite the disasters and the calamities that God sends for the purpose of waking people up and for them to see and experience and know firsthand the consequences of their sins, they dig in and pretty much curse God.

That's a fascinating thing, right? And then you're going to note that we're in this next section, we're also going to hear the major theme of Revelation again reiterated. And this is a message of hope for us all, all Christians in all generations, even if we're not the final, final, final one.

Because I don't know when the final generation is. It could be ours, I don't know. It could be the Millennials. I hope it is. That would be just justice. Here's the reason why, because it's the Millennials who brought us the cancel culture.

I just think it would be mwah if Jesus canceled the whole culture. It was the Boomers? The Jesus freaks were all about bringing those things in. The Southern California Jesus freak scene, man, they were total hippies.

Maybe the Southern Baptists then. They were all about canceling everything. Cancel all the movies, the video games, everything.

Okay, so here's the question. So Bruce Brooms, he apologizes and says, I was going to be good. He says, but Pastor, you don't want the homosexual romance, the sexual immorality on your screen, but what about all the heterosexual immorality?

That's true too. I'm glad that you brought that up, because my wife is my witness here. Anytime we were watching a movie or a show, and they highlight an adulterous affair and a romance, and whenever they come together just to kiss, I can't look at it.

I literally hold my hands up. I don't want to see it. I don't want to see it. So you're right. We should not just only highlight the homosexual. I would just say this. That's one of the things that just rubs me totally the wrong way.

But so do adulterous romances. I have no celebration of any kind of a romantic subplot that involves sexual immorality or adultery or anything like this, which the world's idea is pretty much love the one you're with.

That's how they say it, love is love. But he continues on. So when was the last time we heard a Christian preacher groan about the fact that almost all the heterosexual romances on television invariably leads to sexual immorality too?

You know, I think you bring up a great point, Bruce. I think you bring up a great point, and I am rightfully chastened. I don't think I complain enough about that. Well, if you're going to complain about that, what else are you going to complain about?

I have to start complaining about everything. We've got to call sin, sin. And here's the thing. I hate to say this, is that the church itself, kind of in general, I'm talking about the visible church at large, not only are they now kind of warming up to and giving tacit approval, in some cases approval to homosexual relationships, but the church barely bats an eye.

There's no church discipline when you have couples shacking up together and giving each other a test drive, if you would. In fact, it's kind of to be expected. And within Christian congregations, nobody says a thing.

And yet, Scripture says that sexual immorality must not be named among Christian congregations. Right. So when somebody is breaking that commandment or commandments related to sexual sin, I will say this.

I have had conversations with those people and have called them to repentance. And I will say that I've had some pushback in the past regarding that. So, yeah, loads of fun. But the reality is that a pastor, I don't have the idea, I don't have the luxury of smorgasbording which sins we're going to address.

So note this, that we do have a precedent here at Kongsfinger. If people are living in sexual immorality, they will be hearing from the pastor. And they will be hearing the words, repent. And they will also not hear the gospel held out to them until they repent.

That's the other part of it.

So their response has been?

Well, I got, let's just say that I got chewed out. Yeah, that's a polite way of putting it. I got chewed out when I did that. So, that's okay. Goes with the job, right? So, let's see here. Fornication.

We can't poo-poo the sins that don't tempt us while ignoring the ones that do. I completely agree. Again, Bruce, great point. So Hannah says, I don't ignore those sins on TV either. It's all hard to tolerate.

It goes without saying. Yeah, exactly, it does. And then you think about the great romances that I was, Han Solo and Princess Leia, that was awesome. I love you.

I know.

Sound of music.

Yeah, the sound of music. Right, exactly. And then Mary says, sex is very common amongst Christian singles, but I rarely hear from the pulpit in general that it is a sin. Well then, Mary, I want to make this clear.

Every sexual thing that occurs outside of a marriage is sin. God has made that clear. And here's the thing. I know that in saying that, that because of how things work out, that there are many of you who are going to hear this and knowing that you've broken these commandments.

And then you need to know this. There is forgiveness and mercy in Christ. You see, Christ died for the ungodly, and so when you hear me say that that's a sin, well, Luther used to say that when the devil would remind me of my sins, Luther would say.

So there's the devil kind of trying to torment Luther. So the devil would say, oh, you call yourself a Christian. I saw you do that thing that you did. And Luther says to the devil, thank you for reminding me of that because the scriptures are clear that Christ only died for the ungodly.

And since you reminded me of how ungodly I am, that lets me know what a good candidate I am for the forgiveness of sins. So you'll note that law and gospel always come together. But I would also remind people of this, is that pastors in the past and also in the present in some denominations are required to take ordination vows.

And in my ordination vows, I vowed that I would absolve the sins of the penitent and that I would withhold forgiveness for the impenitent. For me to act otherwise is not only contrary to scripture, it's contrary to what I vowed.

If I don't want to withhold forgiveness and an absolution for those who persist in impenitent sin, then I have no business being a pastor. I can go find something else to do. Maybe I should take up photography full time.

I'm sure I'd do okay at that. But the point is this, is that over and again, so many pastors, they take these vows and they treat them with contempt in much the same way that many people treat with contempt their marriage vows.

And this is the society we live in. And the reality is that this has all got to stop. This has got to stop. And we look at the sickness that's out there. We want to talk about sickness out there. But the reality is this, is that our Western civilization was built, the very foundations of Western civilization as we know it today, were built by people who held to the scriptures and believed in the morality revealed in God's word and the law of God.

But ever since the 1900s and the rise of liberalism and Darwinism and all this other nonsense, the church has lost its backbone. It's lost its backbone, and it refuses to proclaim God's word as if it's authoritative, as if it's inerrant, as if it's true.

In fact, I would say this, people who confess that God's word is inerrant, authoritative, and true, that within the visible church, that position has become the minority. A contemptible minority. I note that Bruce Burns was the one who informed me that in the ELCA, if anybody who applies to go to an ELCA seminary today who believes that the Bible is the inerrant, inspired word of God, will have their application rejected.

They will not be allowed to enter the seminary. You can't come here. You believe the Bible's the word of God. No way. That's grounds for dismissal. That's grounds for church discipline.

Yeah. All right.

Let's see here. Mary says, I know it's sin, but I quit dating because there are so many single Christian men who seem to be unaware, and I live in the Bible belt.

Whoa. Yeah.

You know the reason why they're unaware? Because pastors ain't preaching the word. They don't preach the law and gospel. So what does the ELCA use as a guideline for the Reader's Digest? No, no, no, no.

It's worse than that. Let me explain it to you this way.

Feelings. Nothing more than feelings.

Anyways.

Luis, you look like you didn't like that. I tried to sing it. But I love that version of feelings where the guy goes,.

Feelings. Whoa. Feelings.

That's my favorite line ever. All right. Let's continue on with Scripture, shall we? Okay. So a little bit of backup here. We're going to read Revelation 14, 9 again and then kind of pick back up. So another angel, a third, followed them, saying with a loud voice, If anyone worships the beast in its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he will also drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.

The smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name. Now I'm going to point this out here.

Is there any substantive qualitative difference between what these people here described as receiving their punishment in the lake of fire than every other sinner of all time? There is no qualitative difference.

It's not like, well, everybody who died in sin and unbelief prior to the great last days before Jesus returned, they have a less smoky, less tormented, less fire-filled eternity. This is describing the same punishment that all the damned received.

And I would point that out since this is not like some special punishment. This is the same punishment that Christ describes that the goats receive when they are tossed into the lake of the fire with the devil and his demons.

It's true equality.

Okay, and so I want you to hear this statement. This is one of the—so I've noticed that people have been collecting up Roseboro-isms.

All right?

Okay, yeah. And so, like, you know, I'm thinking of one particular person whom I'm looking at right now who sent me a really nice needlepoint that had a whole bunch of Roseboro-isms in it. And so—but I would say this in my defense.

That before there were Roseboro-isms, I learned a whole lot of Rosenblatt-isms.

All right?

So I make no bones about the fact that I was blessed to have mentors. The way I was educated, in part, was using kind of an old-school model of education, not one of sitting in a classroom with a bunch of people, but sitting one-on-one and actually having mentors.

And so Dr. Rod Rosenblatt, who many of you may know, has been a long time one of the co-hosts of the White Horse Inn, also the one who delivered that amazing message called The Gospel for Those Broken by the Church, that Dr. Rosenblatt—there were certain Rosenblatt-isms that I would collect up, and one of his Rosenblatt-isms was this statement.

And it seems obvious on its face, but let this one sink in. A difference that makes no difference is no difference at all. A difference that makes no difference is no difference at all. And so you'll note, then, when we talk about the punishment of those who receive the mark, there is no difference between their punishment and the punishment of the damned, which Christ describes in the Gospels, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, and there will be fire, and they will suffer for eternity.

Christ describes the same thing using different words, and you'll note, then, that this is another reason why we shouldn't be sitting there trying to figure out whether or not UPC codes or RFID chips are the mark of the beast.

Because this is talking not about a specific thing at the very, very end. This is talking about a reality that exists in the entire last days, and if you've forgotten, the last days began when Christ ascended.

The last days end when Jesus returns. So that being the case, a difference that makes no difference at all, I look at the result of those who persist in sin and unbelief and have the mark of the beast, it's the same punishment.

And you'll note, then, that earlier, talking about the rewards, that those who are marked with the name of God, their reward is no different than the reward of those who are saved. A difference that makes no difference is no difference at all.

Correct. Correct. Yes, so Marilyn here says, so you're saying that those who are not saved, they are the ones taking the mark of the beast? Exactly. You have neighbors right now who have the mark of the beast.

You have neighbors right now who worship the beast. That's just the reality of the situation. They go, well, where's the chip? Where's the thing?

Okay. Okay. Yeah.

I watched that movie about the omen and Damien and all that kind of stuff, and that one movie about The Shining where the kid said, rad ram, rad ram. Stop getting your theology from Hollywood, okay? All right, now here comes again the theme of this book.

Here is a call for the endurance of the saints, those who keep the commandments of God and their faith in Jesus. The whole book is written to alert you to the present situation that you find yourself in now so that you would have patient endurance.

You sit there and go, there sure does seem to be a lot of hurt heading our way, a lot of hurt heading our way politically and stuff like that. Yeah. Well, what do you do in the face of all that? Pray and patiently endure in your faith and continue to keep and guard the commandments of God.

Yeah. All right. So we continue. So then I heard a voice from heaven saying, write this, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Okay, now question for you. All right. Remember what Rosenblatt said, the difference that makes no difference is no difference at all.

Where's the from now on begin? Are we to say that Stephen, the first martyr, that he's not part of that group because he was the first guy to die and he didn't wait to be martyred until the last of the last last days?

It doesn't make any sense. Okay. So blessed are those who die in the Lord from now on. Well, when was this written? Really early in Christian history, right? Oh, blessed indeed, says the spirit, that they may rest from their labors for their deeds follow them.

Is that only the people who die in the great tribulation in the last of the last days? No, it's us. It's you. It's me. So then I looked. Marilyn has that look on her face.

David. Yeah. David. Yeah.

Right. Has David rested from his labors? Abraham. How about Peter, James and John? Uh-huh. Yeah. Okay. Are they not blessed? Are they up in heaven having to toil and do work? No. You'll note, again, that the punishments and the blessings show the universality of these things for all believers and unbelievers from the time of Christ's ascension forward.

So then I looked, and behold, a white cloud. And seated on the cloud, one like a son of man, with a golden crown on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand, and another angel came out of the temple, calling with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud, Put in your sickle.

Reap, for the hour to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is fully ripe. So he who sat on the cloud swung his sickle across the earth, and the earth was reaped. This sounds like the end of the world again.

Here we go again. It's the end of the world as we know it. This is the end of the world, right? Oh, and by the way, I want to let you guys know this. If we make it to March, those of you who make it into the month of March, congratulations, you've survived the end of the world again because a major false prophet from India has prophesied that Jesus will return before the end of March of this year.

So congratulations, if you make it to March, you have again survived the end of the world. This will be my 15th time surviving the end of the world. I'm keeping track. Remember when they had the four blood moons?

We put a t-shirt together when the four blood moons finished up, and the t-shirt said, I survived the four blood moons, and all I got was this lousy t-shirt. It makes more sense than microchips. It's going to take us that long to dig out of the snow.

Yeah, well, you guys got it worse than we have it up here. We have barely any snow on the ground, but it's too cold to snow right now. It won't be warm enough until March at this rate. Bummer for us. That means everything will just have to keep riding on the lower horizontals and head towards Pennsylvania and New York and all you guys.

I'll be praying for you. If you need to borrow my snow blower, you can just come pick it up. Okay, let's continue. So then another angel came out of the temple in heaven. He too had a sharp sickle, and another angel came out from the altar, and the angel who has authority over fire, and he called with a loud voice to the one who had the sharp sickle, put in your sickle, gather the clusters from the vine of the earth, for its grapes are ripe.

So the angel swung his sickle across the earth, gathered the grape harvest of the earth, threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trodden outside the city, and blood flowed from the winepress as high as a horse's bridle for 1 ,600 stadia.

1 ,600 stadia, that's about 184 miles. Yeah, river of blood. And that's a picture then, a note then, the winepress of the wrath of God. And to which we have to sit there and, number one, acknowledge, we all deserve to be one of the grapes squished in that thing.

And you shouldn't whine about it if you were.

Sorry.

But, see, I shouldn't do that. I really got to stop doing that. One of the passions of my sinful flesh is telling torturous jokes.

Okay.

But note then this, that this is what we are saved from. Again, when we talk about salvation, salvation from what? The just wrath of God against our sin and against us who have taken his word and provoked him by our unrighteousness and despising of his word and despising of his commandments.

That's the picture. And so here it's depicted. Everything is taken, big winepress, and then just the smooshing of it all.

All right.

So there we go again. The world has ended yet again.

All right.

And here comes the next part of the picture. And you're going to note that over and again, in the book of Revelation, we've seen this happen. Where the end of the world has come, there's then usually a picture of what's happening in heaven.

And then we come back down to earth, and then we go up the next level of the spiral staircase. And we're going to, again, look at the end of the world from a different perspective, different metaphors, different pictures.

So here we go back to heaven. Then I saw another sign in heaven, great and amazing, seven angels with seven plagues, which are the last for with them the wrath of God is finished. So now this is the last of the pictures that we're going to get of what's going on.

And let me check this question. Bruce Byrne says, Some terrible theoretical editor of the original text of Revelation removed dad jokes as a sign of God's punishment in the end times. I have no evidence of this, but I have my suspicions.

Understood. Understood. Let the archaeological digging commence. So we found the Egyptian book of the dead. We found the Gnostic Nag Hammadi library. And oh my goodness, the most horrible thing of all, the lost library of dad jokes written by Thucydides.

No wonder Alexandria was burned down.

Yeah, that's right. If we hadn't have lost the library in Alexandria due to that fire, we would have the ancient scrolls of the dead. I just refuse to take myself seriously. There's like no reason. I'm a total train wreck.

All right, let's continue.

All right.

Now here's the next part of this. And I need to explain this metaphor just a little bit, the way this image works in scripture. And then I saw what appeared to be a sea of glass mingled with fire. And also those who had conquered the beast and its image and the number of its name, standing beside the sea of glass with harps of God in their hands, and they sang the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and amazing are your deeds, O Lord God, the Almighty.

Just and true are your ways, O King of the nations. Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify in your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship you, for your righteous acts have been revealed.

And here I would argue this is a huge picture of what's going on in heaven and one of the major themes of scripture. Let me explain. So here we have what near the throne of God? The sea of glass. We all know what a sea of glass looks like, right?

This is this amazing body of water that oftentimes becomes a reflection pool. But you're going to note a sea of glass is the epitome of the opposite of the sea of chaos.

All right.

So let me do this a little bit from memory, but we'll go to Genesis 1 real quick.

All right.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form, tohu, and was void, vabohu.

All right.

That's where the tohu, vabohu come. And darkness was over the face of the tahom, over the deep. And the Spirit of God was brooding, merakafet. He was hovering like a bird over the face of the waters.

All right.

So you'll note that the earth itself begins, the universe itself begins in the chaotic waters of the tohu, vabohu, and the tahom. And you have this picture, then, of all of this chaos. And what does God do?

He begins to create and change the chaos into order. And everything at the end of it is tovme 'od in Hebrew.

Very good.

Tovme 'od.

Tovme 'od.

It's very good.

But what did sin bring into the creation?

Chaos.

All right.

So you'll note, then, here we've got this major theme. Now, fast forward. Fast forward to the Exodus. And I've got to find the right chapter here. I think it's going to be either 13 or 14. Let me hunt this down.

14, let's see.

All right.

So, no, we're almost there. 15.

All right.

No, it is 14.

Hold on.

All right.

So, but Diane says, wait, wasn't that before the fall? Well, the chaos begins before the creation. And then when the creation is completed, all the chaos is gone. God takes chaos and turns it into order.

Our sin brings it back into chaos.

All right.

So here's another kind of water picture, if you will. We'll do a little water picturing here just to kind of work out. So when Pharaoh drew near, the people of Israel lifted up their eyes. So there's the children of Israel.

They are camping right on the edge of the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aqaba. And Pharaoh's army begins to draw near. And there's only one way in and one way out of this particular beach, and that's through a wadi system that's created in there naturally.

Everything else is these rock faces. So when Pharaoh drew near, the people of Israel lifted up their eyes. And behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they feared greatly. And the people of Israel cried out to Yahweh.

And I love this. They said to Moses, Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you've taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us, bringing us out of Egypt? Is this not what we said to you in Egypt?

Leave us alone so that we may serve the Egyptians. They are the biggest grumblers of all time. The only two close second are children in the back of an SUV on a family driving trip.

So.

Are we there yet? Mom, he's touching me.

Anyway. All right.

So Moses said to the people, Fear not. Stand firm and see the salvation of Yahweh, which he will work for you today for the Egyptians, whom you see today you shall never see again. And then the Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.

And so the Lord said to Moses, Why do you cry to me? Tell the people of Israel to go forward. Lift up your staff. Stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it, so the people of Israel may go through the sea on dry ground.

I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians, so that they shall go in after them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, his chariots and his horsemen. And the Egyptians shall know that I am Yahweh, when they have gotten glory over Pharaoh and his chariots and his horsemen.