Justice Served in the Judgments

Transcript

GR 2014
09/24/2017
Justice Served in the Judgments
Revelation 8:8-13
Gil Rugh

We've been singing and praising the Lord for the greatness of His grace, His work in our lives. And all this in anticipation of the fact that there is a time coming when He will return to this earth and He will come in power and great glory and establish a kingdom that shall never end. God in His grace has given us His Word and as His Word was being completed God graciously gave a final word of revelation to His servant John. Think about it! The Apostle Paul, the Apostle Peter died under persecution around 68 A.D. Then over twenty-five years later God gave a final word of revelation to the aged disciple John as he was suffering in exile on the island of Patmos. It's the book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ, the final word from God to His people.

So if you turn in your Bibles to the book of Revelation, we are in chapter 8. The Bible simply is about the character of God and the condition of man. God is a holy and righteous God and He must deal with sin. Man is in the condition of sinfulness and in his sin he is in a state of rebellion against God. The Bible is about a holy God dealing with sinful man. And God is a God of holiness, of righteousness and justice, but He is a God of mercy, love and kindness. So we see both running through the Scripture. God will bring to ultimate conclusion His dealing with mankind, both by manifesting His holiness and righteousness in judging sinful humanity and in saving and rescuing those who have responded to His love, experienced His grace in cleansing them and making them new. That's what the message of Jesus Christ is all about. We are lost and without hope in the world, we are dead in our trespasses and sins, we are the enemies of God, we are in rebellion against Him. But God in love and mercy sent His Son to pay the penalty for our sin so that we might have life in Him.

Now what God is doing in the book of Revelation is sending a message to His people, the church, individual local churches, seven particularly selected out in Revelation 2-3, and He is telling them how it all will now end. Old Testament prophets talked about this, Jesus talked about it during His earthly ministry, but now God is going to lay out in greater detail and in greater and more clear order how things will end. And beginning with Revelation 6 we have the unfolding of events that start seven years before Christ returns to earth, the 70th week of Daniel, God's concluding events in dealing in judgment on an unbelieving world and bringing His people Israel finally to their knees where they recognize that indeed Jesus of Nazareth, the One they crucified on the cross is their Messiah, is their Savior. And then in Revelation 19 Christ will return to earth in power and great glory and we will have a kingdom established. We have events then related to that in Revelation 20-22. And there we will have the last judgment of Scripture, the Great White Throne, at the end of Revelation 20.

The book of Revelation unfolds in a series of judgments. Chapters 4-5 we had a scene set in heaven and in chapter 5 we saw a scroll sealed with seven seals. And there was no one in heaven or on earth that was qualified to open the seals, to unfold what was in that scroll. But there was One, the Lamb of God. He is called the Lamb of God because He is the One, Jesus Christ, who was sacrificed to provide salvation for sinners so that there could be an eternal kingdom of glory established, populated by the redeemed. Without the work of Christ we could have all the judgments recorded, but it would end in judgment with no salvation. So that seven-sealed scroll unfolds now the finality of God's program in dealing with sin and establishing an eternal kingdom. Seven seals. Now those seven seals contain everything right on through basically chapter 22, except for the words of conclusion. The bulk of it is about the judgments.

Now out of the seventh seal will come the rest of the book. I say that because you'll note Revelation 8:1 began, “When the Lamb broke the seventh seal.” Now this scroll only has seven seals, so everything from Revelation 8:1 through the rest of the book, Revelation 22, is contained within this seventh seal. Christ was the only One qualified, and He is the One who has opened each of the seals, right down to this last, the seventh. The Lamb broke the seventh seal. He is the One, He is the only one qualified. Now the judgments that come out of the seventh seal and the culmination with the new heavens and the new earth all come out of the seventh seal. That's important, even the new heavens and the new earth because that is a result of His redemptive work. So we have a series of judgments that move us through this seven-year period. Seven seals, seven trumpets, seven bowls. But keep in mind, out of the seventh seal come seven trumpets, out of the seventh trumpet will come seven bowls. Then will come the kingdom. Just summarize it that way. So when each seal was broken, there were judgments that came out of each seal. So you break a seal, then a judgment comes.

Now with the seventh seal, out of that is going to come seven trumpets, starting in Revelation 8. When a trumpet is sounded, a judgment will come. But Christ doesn't sound the judgments, He opens the seventh seal, and out of that seventh seal will come seven trumpet judgments. Every time a trumpet is sounded, one after another, a judgment will come upon the earth. When the seventh trumpet is sounded, out of that seventh trumpet will come seven bowl judgments. Again angels sound the trumpets, angels turn over the bowls. Every time a bowl is turned over on the earth in the picture, a judgment comes on the earth. So what we are doing is moving through this seven-year period, called the 70th week of Daniel, to the climax with the return of Christ. These judgments get progressively more severe. The seven seals, then the seven trumpets, they are more severe. The seven bowls are the worst. That brings us to Revelation 19, the return of Christ, Armageddon, and so on.

This matter of God's judgment, dealing with wrath….there has been preparation for it throughout the Old Testament. The greatest example was the judgment of the flood in the days of Noah. It gave a picture of when God's wrath is poured out in judgment, it is devastating. But these final judgments have more mercy in them than the flood did. The flood destroyed all humanity except for Noah and his immediate family. In these judgments in the tribulation, they are going to be tremendous, but there will be a number of people saved, including by and large the nation Israel. So it's like the judgment in the days of Noah, it will encompass the entire world and bring judgment beyond what we can really imagine. But it is not as complete as it was in the days of Noah because when all is said and done, there will be the nation Israel and nations of the earth that have survived. “But mankind,” the Bible says, “will be scarcer than pure gold.” So we are talking about billions of people dying under the judgments of God.

Even the judgments we see, we've had hurricanes, earthquakes… they are reminders. We need to be careful, as I mentioned before, we need to be careful about saying this is a judgment because of this particular sin of this country. I don't think we can say that. But remember God asks the rhetorical question—does calamity happen to a city and I have not done it? No. So we ought to be careful, we are not apologizing for God, in fact in talking about these it provides an opening for us. The Bible says these are just indications of what is going to come upon the world in a greater way, these are brought about by sin, the result of man being in sin and rebellion against God. Judgment comes upon the world, sometimes in limited ways, sometimes in greater ways.

Come back to Genesis 15. I want us to be clear on the context. People have the idea that God is up there and He wouldn't want anything “bad” happening. And we don't want to think God would cause the kind of destruction that encompasses men, women and children. But God is serious about sin, it is a serious thing. The most serious thing is opposition to God, that man would stand in opposition to Him. So God is giving a promise to Abraham and his descendants in Genesis 15. I just want to pick up the end of verse 13, “God said to Abram, ‘Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed 400 hundreds.’” So Abraham's descendants will go down into Egypt for 400 years. “But I will also judge the nation whom they will serve, afterward they will come out with many possessions.” But for you, Abram, you're not going to see this, you'll die, be buried. “But in the fourth generation,” verse 16, after 400 years, so God is using a generation of 100 years at this point, “they will return.” Now note this, “for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete.”

You see what happens here. We had the flood of Noah and “the iniquity of the world was so great,” Genesis 6 says, “that God brought judgment on the whole creation, all the world.” But here you have a more limited context, the land of Canaan. God had promised it to the Israelites, for the Israelites to have it He will have to remove the Canaanites. But He says it is not time for that, the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete. So it is going to take 400 years for the people of the land of Canaan to continue in their sinful rebellion against the living God. Then God says, judgment. You know what happens when God sends the people of Israel into the land, you can read the book of Joshua. God's instructions, you are to destroy every man, every woman, every child. They are to die. So there you see something of God's judgment in a limited scope, in this particular area. Through the Old Testament all of God's judgments become something of an indication of His anger toward sin. A reminder, He is a God of righteousness who deals with sin.

Again, be careful about saying because of this particular sin God is bringing judgment on America. And if we would stop that sin, then He would withhold judgment. We never stop sin, it is persistent. It is the heart that is in rebellion against Him, it manifests itself in more clear ways, more openly, more defiantly. But we are moving toward ultimate judgment.

Come over to the New Testament, the book of Romans. Romans 1 draws a contrast that is going on, we're really going to Romans 2, but stop at Romans 1:16-18 where Paul says, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes. To the Jew first and also to the Greek. For,” note verse 17, “in it the righteousness of God is being revealed,” present participle, “is being revealed from faith to faith, as it is written that a righteous man shall live by faith. For the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.” See the contrast. God in grace is revealing the provision of His righteousness in Jesus Christ. That's why it is good news, the Gospel. There is hope, there is salvation, God has intervened to do for us what we could not do for ourselves. But this Gospel also reveals the wrath of God, there is no toleration for sin. And those who do not avail themselves of the provision of what God has done in Christ are under the wrath of God, unless they turn to Christ and place their faith in Him they will bear the full brunt of that. We'll get to that in Revelation 14 when God says “the smoke of their torment in hell rises up before Him into the ages of the ages,” eternally. We see the appointment to that in Revelation 20 at the Great White Throne.

You'll note these men suppress the truth in unrighteousness. At their very heart man knows his guilt and accountability but he is defiant toward God. He lists all the manifestation of sin and God's judgment on man is to turn him over to his sin, if you continue to defy Me, rebel against Me. So verse 24, “God gave them over in the lust of their heart to impurity.” Doesn't say He caused them to commit impurity, He turned them over, allowing them to pursue their own defiant, sinful rebellion. Then down in verse 26 he repeated, “for this reason God gave them over to degrading passions.” We look around and say, what is going on in the world? We see something of the more evident manifestation of God's wrath being poured out on a world that has continued and becomes more open and defiant in its rebellion. God's judgment is pursue your sin. Then again he says it in verse 28, “they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved.” And all kinds of sinful activity comes out of that, it grows. What is happening in the world today? Can you believe the open, arrogant, defiance of God?

Well “they know,” verse 32, “the ordinance of God that those who practice such things are worthy of death. They not only do the same but give hearty approval to those who do them.” They applaud those who openly speak of their sin, they are people to be honored. Come to tell them the truth of God, the seriousness of their sin, the graciousness of God in providing a Savior and it is quickly shut down. That's not appropriate. They know, they were created in the image of God, that image has been defiled and marred by sin but it hasn't ceased to exist.

So you come down to Romans 2:4, “Do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?” Why hasn't God intervened and brought destruction? Why does God let this go on? God is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to the knowledge of the truth. These are days of salvation, another day for a person to hear that God loved the world and gave His Son and be convicted and turn from that sin and place their faith in Christ. But you continue to say no to that. “Because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.” Make no mistake, no one gets away, so to speak, with anything. No one escapes judgment because judgment is delayed. That may happen in the human realm, it does not happen when you are dealing with the living God.
So God delays judgment, giving men and women an opportunity to place their faith in Christ and be delivered from judgment. When they don't, they are just storing up, then adding. It's like the Amorites, we read in Genesis 15, their sin wasn't yet ripe. The world is going and ripening for judgment. When we come to the events of Revelation 6 and following, now the fruit is really ripe, culminating with the final judgment that Christ will bring.

So that's what we see going on in the world when we come to Revelation, come to chapter 8. Remind you of this because people have in their minds an idea that God, all He wants to do is good things and that's all He will do. And even the church begins to minimize the seriousness of sin and weaken their view of sin, and soon we have nothing to say to a world that denies what they know—they are sinners and guilty. But we come to go along with them as though it is not so serious. It could not be any more serious, it is fatal, eternally fatal, the disease of sin. That's why only God's Son could come, that's why all heaven rejoiced, remember, in chapter 5, that the Lamb, He has been the sacrifice, He can open the scroll, it brings judgment but the ultimate end of it will be redemption. Not for everyone, for some, they will end where their sin takes them in an eternal hell. But by the grace of God there is redemption.

All right, the Lamb broke the seventh seal, out of that seventh seal we are ready to have seven angels, holding trumpets. And they're going to blow a trumpet, and every time an angel blows a trumpet judgment is poured out on the world. And the first four judgments are serious, the last three of the trumpet judgments move it to a different level. And you being to think, is there anything left to the world? And you appreciate the Old Testament prophet is used by God to say, “I'll make mortal man more scarce than gold, pure gold.” Jesus said if He didn't intervene at the end of seven years there wouldn't be a person left alive on the face of the earth. This is where we are going.

All right. So the angels are ready. But first the prayers of the saints come up before the throne of God. We've already looked at this section, God answers the prayers of His people on His time schedule. Now He is ready to answer the prayers, we saw something of the martyrs back in chapter 6 when they ask how long would God delay bringing judgment on those who are killing His people. And we looked back in Luke where Christ told the parable that God will respond to the prayers of His people who ask for God to avenge their deaths. So now God is pouring out wrath on the earth. And so the prayers ascend to the Father and a censor filled with the coals from the fire of the brazen altar, as it would have been, thrown to the earth. “The seven angels,” verse 6, “then “who had the seven trumpets sound.” We looked at the first trumpet just to get ourselves started. And when that trumpet sounds hail and fire mixed with blood were thrown to the earth. The impact of that—a third of the trees were burned up, a third of the earth, green grass is burned up. It's a devastating judgment

You'll note, remember we said twelve times they are going to say a third, a third, a third. There is mercy here, that means two-thirds of the earth is not destroyed in these judgments. But the scope of it when you think of it, we won't get there in this study, before we are done with the trumpets we'll be told that under one of the trumpets a third of the earth's population dies. Well we already saw back under the fourth seal in Revelation 6:7-8 that a quarter of the earth's population died. And then you add into that all the people dying in these other judgments. People are dying on a scale, we're already into the billions. And we haven't gotten to the worst yet.

So here a third of the earth is burned up and the trees and the green grass is burned. What a devastating judgment that is going to bring. We noted the connection of that with the judgment in Egypt. Some of these judgments, as we have talked about, are previewed on the judgments God, poured out on Egypt when He was preparing to have Pharaoh let His enslaved people go. So there again you get a preview, something of judgment, and God is behind it. In Exodus 9 a third of the earth's vegetation was destroyed by hail and fire in the fourth plague. That hail and fire was poured out on Egypt, so you had that destruction by hail and fire. And everything that didn't heed what God had said through Moses, all the people that weren't in safe hiding and hadn't taken their animals in, they all died under that, too. So it doesn't say here that a third of the people died, but when this hail and fire is poured out from heaven along with the blood a lot of people are going to die. Just poured out on the earth. So a devastating judgment and the consequences of that.

And there is a parallel in Egypt, again we talked about that, I remind you. God was bringing judgment on Egypt so He might ultimately deliver His people and they would be able to take possession of the land He promised. Now we are getting ready for the ultimate realization, the judgment on the unbelieving world, and we will see the devastating persecution of Israel as the world attempts to annihilate the Jews, as we move further in Revelation 12-13, particularly, but God is preparing Israel. He will bring deliverance to them and then ultimately, those who survive and come through will be delivered and take possession of the land and be the key people in the kingdom that the Jewish Messiah will establish.

So let's look at the second trumpet. “The second angel sounded, something like a great mountain burning with fire.” Now he doesn't say it is a great mountain burning with fire, but the only way John can describe it is it looks like a mountain on fire descending. Let me just say about these judgments, they are all miraculous. Some are more directly caused by God, some God is using. Like in Egypt when the locust plague comes, it said He had a great east wind come and blow the locusts in and then a great west wind came and blew them out. He was using forces but it was direct involvement of Him in using the wind, in using the locusts.

If you read some of scientists who are Bible believers, they will sometimes give explanations of the way God could be using natural things. The point here is, it is clear God is doing it. And you'll see how many of these come down from heaven, indicating . . . And the unbelievers in the world know what is happening. We go to the end of Revelation 6, “even the great and mighty men of the earth, hide us from the wrath of God who sits on the throne and of the Lamb.” Later in Revelation, we've jumped ahead and looked in our previous studies, people curse God for their suffering. So there is a recognition of God's hand in this. That doesn't mean men will bow before Him anymore than Pharaoh did under the constant plagues in Egypt. He couldn't account for it, it had to be from God, it had to be supernatural, but he hardened his heart. There is no explanation rationally for sin, it makes no sense, it is self-destructive. But yet we'll pursue it. That just shows how sin enslaves us.

So something like “a great mountain burning with fire is thrown into the sea.” Supernatural result of this, God does this in a visible way so it can be seen. A third of the sea became blood. That is similar to the plague in Egypt when God turned the waters to blood. Here you have a third of the oceans turned to blood. I mean a third of life in the sea dies, a third of the ships are destroyed. One commentator did a study, he goes back to 1981, says there were almost 25,000 ocean-going merchant ships registered. Well if a third of them are destroyed, there are over 8,000 ships destroyed there, the life that goes with that. Then what? How much of the food source comes . . . Now as I mentioned there are different views in commentators. Much of the book of Revelation is clear and understandable, we just take it at face value. That doesn't mean we understand every detail and how it will be worked out. In other words a question comes up, does this third of the earth, is it limited to God doing it in one particular part of the world, the earth? Or is it spread evenly over everything? Good men hold different views and I'm not sure which it is, it could be either. I don't know, maybe there is variation. I know it will impact a third of the oceans. Is that just in this part of the world? I don't know. Under these judgments it could go either way.

I shared with you back in Revelation 6:8 where “a fourth of the earth is killed.” Well, what is it going to be? As I mentioned one prophetic writer said, “Maybe that is North and South America,” which would be about a fourth of the earth. I don't know, maybe that's where the United States goes. You say, how does the United States fit into prophecy? Maybe it doesn't, maybe it is wiped out. We don't know. So in these judgments, just exactly how they are spread out, whether much of it takes place under a third in this part of the world, and another in this part or whether God is . . . We know normal life is going on in a lot of places.

You read this and say there couldn't be anybody living a normal life. But you are. Watched a little bit of the news on what happened in Puerto Rico while I ate dinner. I'm sorry for those people, if I skipped dinner it doesn't help. I'm not saying we don't send help, but what goes on in other parts of the world . . . Here you are, comfortable, enjoying your house. There are people in Houston who can't go back into their homes, they are covered with mold. That is too bad, and I hope we can do something to help them. But we go on. I say that because Jesus said they will be marrying and giving in marriage and much of that life will be going on, even as it did in the days of Noah until destruction overtook them. And so this will be going on. One-third of the earth gets destroyed and if it is over in Asia or someplace it doesn't directly affect me, we would go on pretty much. So at any rate a third of the oceans destroyed. A lot of people are going to die, a lot of the food source for a lot of people would come out of this. The consequences are great.

The next angel takes his trumpet, the third angel, and there is a star. So you see another heavenly body, meteorite, asteroid, who knows. Is it maybe something God casts down from heaven? Obviously it is not a normal meteorite or something because it has a name, Wormwood. It is something that is poisonous. In the Old Testament something would be bitter, poisonous, can't drink it. And that is clear here. A third of the waters became Wormwood, many men died from the waters because they were made bitter, undrinkable. They are poisonous. Now think about that. You can see on TV, they will advertise because of coming disasters you might want to buy a special kind of food, they say it will last 25 years, so you will have food to eat. I don't know if you could store 25 years' worth of water to get you through.

The problem here, one-third of the fresh water is destroyed. Now what do you do? I mean, how do you get to it? Where do you get it? Well, we ship water in, we're finding out how difficult that is in just a little portion of the world, how do you get what they need there when so much of it is destroyed? We can't even communicate, we don't even know what the situation is. Then there is greater disaster, a dam may break but we can't get word to anybody there because there is no communication able to go on. So those 70,000 people don't know the dam is going to break and flood them all out and we can't tell them. But here you have one-third of the world now without fresh water. And a third of the ocean has been destroyed. Things are happening at a catastrophic level.

Come back to Exodus 15. In Exodus 7 in one of the plagues in Egypt, fresh water was destroyed, it was turned to blood. So here. Exodus 15 you have a situation where Israel is out in the wilderness, Exodus 15:22, they have left Egypt. Moses led Israel “from the Red Sea, went out into the Wilderness of Shur. They went three days into the wilderness, found no water. They came to Mara, they could not drink the waters of Mara, they were bitter.” That's why they named them Mara, bitterness. So you remember it's like the Wormwood, bitterness. It is undrinkable. God performs a miracle through Moses to make the bitter waters drinkable. Now we have the reverse of that miracle, for a third of the earth the drinkable waters are going to be made undrinkable, poison. You can't drink it. That doesn't mean people won't because it is like somebody floating in a raft on the ocean, can't drink the salt water but finally they can't help themselves, you know thirst. But when you drink it you have just caused a greater problem.

Come over to Jeremiah 9. We can't look at all the allusions to the Old Testament, there are hundreds of them as we have noted in the book of Revelation. You come to Jeremiah 9:13, “The Lord said, ‘because they have forsaken My law which I set before them, have not obeyed My voice nor walked according to it, have walked after the stubbornness of their heart, after the Baals as their father taught them;’ therefore, thus says the Lord of Hosts, ‘the God of Israel, behold I will feed them, this people, with Wormwood, give them poisoned water to drink.’” The judgment that He would bring upon Israel. Some of these judgments had a preview of that happened to them when nations came in and defeated them. But the ultimate fulfillment will carry us to where we are in Revelation.

In Jeremiah 23 it says a similar thing. Verse 15, “Thus says the Lord of Hosts concerning the prophets, ‘I am going to feed them Wormwood, make them drink poisonous waters. From the prophets of Jerusalem pollution has gone forth.’” You see there is a justice in the judgments, the vileness of man is now being given back to him in his life and what he has said, all of that. You had poisonous speech, now He poisons the waters. So the fitness of the judgment.

Come back to Revelation 8. We are told, verse 11, “many men died.” I mention this because we have specific numbers with specific judgments. Under the one seal we saw a quarter of the earth died. In a future trumpet we will see a third of the earth, but don't think that is all. We have many people dying under the other judgments as well, but some that have a particularly devastating effect in causing death, we have a number associated with it. But there are people dying all over the place. How do you even handle this? We haven't gotten to the worst yet, and we have billions of people dead on the earth. That becomes its own health issue. You can see the world is becoming overwhelmed. It's the grace of God that keeps it from complete destruction.

All right, verse 12, you have the fourth angel sounded. “A third of the sun, a third of the moon, a third of the stars were struck so a third of them would be darkened. The day would not shine for a third of it, the night the same way.” Now we have reduced light, and some again that bring more scientific stuff in talk about some of the devastation, what this would do to the temperature of the earth. We're worried about global warming, and here God is going to reduce the light, reduce the heat from the sun. But then later we are going to find Him scorching the earth by turning the temperature up with the sun so that men are cursing Him because of the heat. God is in control of everything, He is sovereign. It could be no more serious than to be the enemy of the holy almighty, all powerful God. This is not a game. We like to draw this picture of what God is like, my God is like this, my God wouldn't do that. Let's come to the only true and living God, He is a God of infinite love. Then why would He do this? Because he is also a God of infinite holiness, infinite anger. So He can provide for people an infinite salvation that will have no end. He can also provide them an infinite hell that will have no end. We reduce God to be like us. That's what He said in the Old Testament. “You thought I was like you.” He is not like us in that sense. So, serious matter.

These signs in the heavens. There was a judgment on Egypt, again in Exodus 10, where God brought a darkness that could be felt over the land of Egypt and nobody did anything or went anywhere. I encourage you, if you haven't recently, read the plagues in Egypt. It will give you a connection, a foretaste of what happens here. The darkness that could be felt. Just think, a third of the light in day and night cut off and the impact of that.

We'll do a couple of verses, Isaiah 13. This is as far as we will get in the trumpets. Isaiah 13, just an example, and again all the judgments that happened through the Old Testament, they are all a preview and a foretaste. The judgments we see going on in the world today are a reminder of what God can do, just a little foretaste. There is no hiding, escaping. Look at Isaiah 13:6, “Wail, for the Day of the Lord is near, it will come as destruction from the Almighty. Therefore all hands will fall limp, every man's heart will melt, they will be terrified.” God wants to terrify you.

I watched one man who had ridden out the hurricane. He said, “I would never do that again, that was a mistake. I thought I could do it.” When God wants to bring down, you see people running in terror, He shakes the earth, people running and screaming. Where do I go? What does He say here? “They will be terrified, all hands will fall limp, every man's heart will melt, they will be terrified. Pains and anguish will take hold of them, they will be like a woman in labor. They will look at one another in astonishment, their faces aflame.” Terror. “Behold the Day of the Lord is coming, cruel, fury and burning anger to make the land a desolation. He will exterminate its sinners from it. The stars of heaven, their constellations will not flash their light, the sun will be darkness when it rises, the moon will not shed its light. Thus I will punish the world for its evil, the wicked for their iniquity. I will also put an end to the arrogance of the proud, the base, the haughtiness of the ruthless. I will make mortal man scarcer than pure gold.” The anger of God is something to be feared.

Verse 13, “Therefore I will make the heavens tremble, the earth will be shaken from its place at the fury of the Lord of Hosts in the day of His burning anger.” You can talk about the love of God, and it is wonderful. We sing of it. It is beautiful but rebellion against God is something awful. We cannot conceive. It will result in men and women spending an eternity in the fires of hell. We can't grasp that. We believe it because God says it. It has no end. We will be enjoying the glory of His presence forever. You would think people would be knocking on your door so you couldn't get any sleep—“tell me about that good news that will spare me from wrath to come. Tell me of the salvation God has provided so I can be cleansed and become His child.” That just does not happen. Why? We go out and tell them, they don't want to hear that. God says the day comes, I withdraw My grace, I bring My judgment, and it is fierce.

Come over to Joel 2. We think of the book of Joel as the book of the Day of the Lord, that's what it is about. So if you haven't read Joel lately, sit down and read the book of Joel, you can read it briefly in one sitting, it’s a short book. Look at Joel 1:15, “Alas for the day, for the Day of the Lord is near. It will come as destruction from the Almighty.” Chapter 2 opens, “Blow a trumpet in Zion, sound an alarm on My holy mountain. Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the Day of the Lord is coming. Surely it is near, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness. There has never been anything like it, nor will there ever be again.” This is a day of judgment, destruction.

Back to Revelation as we conclude this. We have had the six seal judgments, then the seventh seal which brings out the seven trumpets. We have seen the four trumpets and their devastation of the earth. Now we are ready to kick it up, now it can get bad. So God is going to send an eagle to fly through the heavens so all the earth can hear what this eagle announces. “Woe, woe, woe” for what is about yet to come, for the remaining three blasts of the trumpet. Can it get any worse? And he doesn't just say woe, he just doesn't say woe, woe. This is going to be so bad—woe, woe, woe. The woes that are coming on the earth now are going to be of greater impact, more devastating than anything yet. And then those last three trumpets, out of the last of the trumpets is going to come the seven bowls and they will be on a level the world has never seen. If think it could never get any worse than this, it's going to get worse.

So we have had deaths in the billions, much of the earth destroyed, now God says, I am going to make it really bad. “Then I looked and I heard an eagle flying in mid-heaven saying with a loud voice, ‘woe, woe, woe to those who dwell on the earth because of the remaining blasts of the trumpet of the three angels who are about to sound.’”

So we have a break here. Here we are in the church, and my understanding is the church will be removed before this seven-year period. Well, what do we care? Some people think the book of Revelation is difficult, has a lot of symbols. It's about the future, I won't be here and I'm happy with that.

But come back to Revelation 1 again, read verse 3. “Blessed is he who reads, those who hear the words of the prophecy and heed the things which are written in it, for the time is near.” Heed, keep, tereo, so now to live in light of these things. And a reminder, in God's grace, the end of verse 5, “Christ is the One who loves us and released us from our sins by His blood.” But He is coming again to set up a kingdom, verse 7, that's what the book of Revelation is about.

Come to the end of the book, Revelation 22:6, and here we end with the servants of the Lord, those redeemed by His grace reigning forever and ever in that eternal kingdom. Verse 6, “He said to me, these words are faithful and true.” And what God has done, the end of the verse, is “sent to reveal the things which must soon take place. Behold, Christ says, ‘I am coming quickly. Blessed is he who heeds the words of the prophecy of this book.’”

The angel who serves God day and night says I am a fellow servant with those who serve Him on earth. “Those,” the end of verse 9, “who heed the words of this book.” God expects us to know this, He didn't say it is so confusing I don't intend you to understand. I intend you to pay attention, I intend this to be something you keep, it shapes your behavior, it guides us. We understand, Peter talks about, we'll be there at a later time, in 2 Peter 3. People think, where is the Lord? Why doesn't He come? Where is the judgment, you are always saying judgment is coming, judgment is coming. But the Lord is patient. What do you mean? “He is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to the knowledge and the truth.”

We can tell people there is judgment coming, God says you are His enemy but He invites you to be His friend, His child. God says “you are on your way to destruction and an eternal hell,” but He says, “I loved you enough to have My Son intervene to pay the penalty for your sin. Turn from your sin, place your faith in Him. I will cleanse you, I will forgive you, I will make you My child, the heir with My Son of a coming kingdom.” People say, “no.” They get what they deserve, they get what we all deserve. I don't want what I deserve, I want mercy. I know what I deserve, I deserve the judgment of God, I deserve to be punished for my sin. It is mercy, it is grace that Christ should take my sin, your sin in His body on the cross, that we through faith in Him might be identified with Him and die to sin and live to righteousness. I can't understand why people aren't lined up for ten miles down the road, trying to get in and hear the message. Reveals how stubborn we are and how great the grace of God is, because you are a bunch of stubborn people, I'm looking at. But God saved you. And you are hearing from a stubborn preacher, but God saved him. It is mercy.

So we want to live in light of this, be ready to tell people there is hope, there is life, there is light in darkness. There is a Savior.

Let's pray. Thank You, Lord, for the riches of Your grace. We look at the revelation You have given and the destiny of this world and the people in it and it is awesome, it is frightening, it is fearful. And yet, Lord, in the midst of it You graciously invite people to salvation, a free gift. You have paid it all. And Lord, may we as Your children not be lax with these truths, may they grip our hearts, may we keep them, may we not forget, may we live in light of them, may we be lights in the darkness, may we be bold in telling others the truth of the righteousness provided in Christ and in no one else and no place else. Thank You for your love, thank you for your provision. In Christ's name, amen.