The Greatest Revival The Church Has Ever Seen! – Part 1

Hi, I'm Robert Jeffress, and I'm glad to serve as your Bible teacher every day on this great radio station.

On today's edition of Pathway to Victory. The tribulation saints will stand in heaven during the tribulation. Who are these multitudes that come from every tribe, every nation?

This is part of the greatest revival the world will have ever seen. These are those who are saved during the tribulation. Welcome to Pathway to Victory with author and pastor, Dr. Robert Jeffress. Throughout history, there have been many great movements of God.

But the greatest spiritual revival the world will ever experience will occur during the final seven years of Earth's history. Today on Pathway to Victory, Dr. Robert Jeffress talks about those who will be saved after God pours out his judgment during the tribulation. Now, here's our Bible teacher to introduce today's message.

Dr. Jeffress? Thanks, David, and welcome again to Pathway to Victory. In just a moment, we'll be looking at Revelation chapter 7.

This teaching series that starts today is called Final Conquest, based on the book of Revelation. But first, let me extend a personal invitation for you to join me on the trip of a lifetime. I'm referring to the 2024 Pathway to Victory cruise to Alaska next summer. There's something wonderful about spending time with God in the great outdoors, and I'd like to be the one who introduces you to God's majestic creation in Alaska. Now, the dates are June 15th through 22nd, 2024. Starting from Vancouver, we'll be cruising the calm waters of the Inside Passage, stopping in quaint seaside villages as Skagway, Ketchikan, and of course, the jaw-dropping Glacier Bay. Also, we'll be joined by special musical guests Rebecca St. James and Michael O'Brien, along with comedian Dennis Swanberg.

All the details for reserving your spot are at ptv.org. Well, as we venture into this subject of prophecy today, I'm thrilled to offer a brand new book I've written for you. It's called Mysteries of the End Times, five little-known truths about God's plan for the future. One of the most common questions I hear about Bible prophecy is this one. Where will America be in the end times?

Have you ever wondered about that? Well, in this new book, Mysteries of the End Times, I tackle that question along with four other questions. My book is brand new, and it's yours when you give a generous gift to support Pathway to Victory.

I'm going to say more about my book and other resources later on. But right now, let's commence with our study in the last book of the Bible, the Revelation. I've called my series Final Conquest, and today in Revelation chapter 7, I'm going to describe the greatest revival the church has ever seen. Two days after Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany in 1933, a 26-year-old pastor and theologian went on the radio to denounce Adolf Hitler and his policies. That pastor theologian was named Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Bonhoeffer was troubled by a number of things he saw happening. The marginalization of the Jewish people long before they were taken to the crematoriums. He saw how the German church began to surrender to the Nazis, even becoming known now as the National Reich Church. The church began to obey godless edicts from the Nazis, such as, quote, on the altars, there must be nothing but a copy of Mein Kampf, Hitler's book, the Bible of Nazism. There shall be nothing but Mein Kampf, and to the left of the altar, a sword. Or another one of the rules, quote, the Christian church and the Christian cross must be removed from all churches, cathedrals, and chapels.

Can you imagine such a thing? The cross must be removed from all churches, cathedrals, and chapels, and it must be superseded by the only unconquerable symbol, the swastika. Dietrich Bonhoeffer couldn't stand to see Bibles being replaced with Mein Kampf or crosses with swastikas. And so he left the German church and established his own church, the Confessing Church, built on the principles of scripture and obeying God unconditionally. A group of seminarians and pastors followed Bonhoeffer and the establishment of the Confessing Church. But soon, when the government saw that it was a threat to Nazism, Adolf Hitler ordered pastors of the Confessing Church to be denied chaplaincies and instead be placed on the front lines of battle in World War II.

Starved the pastoral leadership, the Confessing Church faded away. By this time, Dietrich Bonhoeffer decided that he had to do something radical to stand up against evil. And so he joined the German intelligence agency as a spy. But actually, he was working as a double agent to undermine the commands of the Third Reich. And he even involved himself in an assassination plot to remove Adolf Hitler from office. Many people were critical of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Many Christians were critical of him.

They said, why are you so concerned with politics and who is leading our nation? Just resign yourself to preaching the gospel. That's what Christians are to do.

Preach the gospel and everything else will take care of itself. Sound familiar to you? Bonhoeffer understood that leaders determine policies and policies determine the moral and spiritual direction of a nation.

Ten years later, after Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany, on the tenth anniversary of his assuming that position in 1943, Bonhoeffer explained why he took such radical actions in an essay titled, After Ten Years. Listen to his words, quote, Who stands fast? Only the man whose final standard is not his reason, his principles, his conscience, his freedom, or his virtue, but the man who is ready to sacrifice all of this when he is called to obedient and responsible action in faith and in exclusive allegiance to God, the responsible man who tries to make his whole life an answer to the question and the call of God.

Where are these responsible people? I thought of those words. Who stands fast? I thought of those words as I prepared the message today and remembered how similar those words are to the kings and commanders of the earth during the great tribulation, who after experiencing these horrific judgments, remember what we saw last time? They cry out to the rocks and the mountains and they say, Fall on us and hide us from the presence of the one who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb. For the day of God's wrath has come and who is able to stand?

Who is it that stands fast during times of persecution like Dietrich Bonhoeffer did? Who is it that will be able to withstand the wrath of the Lamb in the judgment day of God? We're going to answer that question today in Revelation chapter 7. If you have your Bibles, turn there as we look at the greatest revival in human history, Revelation chapter 7. John is going to answer the question, who will be able to stand through the great tribulation? Now, remember where we are in our study of Revelation. The church has already been raptured.

It's in heaven, the 24 elders with God worshiping. And now we see the beginning of the final seven years of earth's history when God pours out his wrath on mankind in order to save the elect and condemned the unbelievers. And this is the final seven years that begins with the rise of the antichrist, not by force, but on a promise of peace and safety. And we see in Revelation chapter 6, six of those seven seal judgments. Remember there are three series of judgments, the seal judgments, Revelation 6, the trumpet judgments, Revelation 8 and 9, and the bowl judgments in Revelation 16. When we go through Revelation 6, we see six of those seals broken. But then there is a pause before the seventh seal and the beginning of the trumpet judgments. Now, this is so key to understand the book of Revelation.

I never really understood the book till I understood this. The book of Revelation is not chronological all of the time. For example, we're moving toward the tribulation, through the tribulation, till the second coming of Christ, but occasionally in Revelation, John puts on the brakes. He says, now wait a moment, we're going to back up a little bit in time and there's another aspect I want to talk to you about and explain to you. That's what happens in Revelation 7.

We've almost gotten through the seal judgments, but then John says, I want to explain to you something else. We're going to back up to the beginning of the tribulation before Revelation 6, something that happens here. And it's the 144,000 Israelites who will stand on earth during the tribulation.

This is one group John wants to talk about who will stand firm on earth during the tribulation. Now, look at verse 1, the vision of the restraining and sealing angels. After verse 1, after this, I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth so that no wind would blow on the earth or on the sea or on any tree. Now, critics at the Bible immediately seize on this phrase, the four corners of the earth. Those writers of the Bible were so stupid, they thought the earth was flat and had four corners to it. That's why you can't trust the Bible on anything.

Have you ever heard that before? The earth is flat, the Bible says four corners of the earth. Don't do it now, but sometime go on your iPhone, type in sunset, and it'll tell you the time the sun is going to set today. It'll tell you the time of the sunrise tomorrow morning.

How ignorant, how stupid. The sun doesn't rise, the sun doesn't set, it just appears that way to us. This is the language of appearance. It's the earth's rotation that makes the sun appear to rise and set.

It's the same thing here, this is just the language of appearance. And John says he saw four angels who have been sent to restrain the judgment that's about to come upon the earth. In verse 2, and I saw another angel ascending from the rising of the sun.

That's from the east. It's always an indication of salvation that's about to come. I saw another angel rising from the east, having the seal of the living God. And I want you to underline that, the seal of the living God. And he cried out with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and the sea, saying, do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees until we have sealed the bondservants of our God on their foreheads. Before the judgments could come at the very beginning of the tribulation, the angel says, before you unleash your judgments, angels, we need to seal the bondservants of God.

Now, what does that mean? A seal, and by the way, this is extra, you can write it down on your outlines. In biblical times, a seal signified three things. First of all, it signified authority. If a ruler was going to sign an edict, he would seal it. He would put a seal on it.

Now, we're going to see in a moment that these bondservants of God are going to be sealed with a mark of Almighty God himself. The seal marked, first of all, authority. Secondly, it marked possession.

Many times, if you want to show that something belongs to you, you write your name on it. It was the same thing with a seal. And thirdly, the seal was a sign of protection.

It meant protection. Remember after Jesus was crucified and they put him in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea? Remember Pontius Pilate ordered that a Roman guard unit be placed around the tomb. And not only that, the tomb was sealed. That seal meant it was really a piece of string strung across the boulder that was held on either side by a piece of wax that had the Roman insignia on it, signifying that this tomb was being protected by the power of Rome itself.

That was the meaning of a seal, authority, ownership, protection. By the way, did you know if you're a Christian today, God has put his seal on you, a sign that you belong to him, a sign that he owns you, a sign that he is going to protect you? Anybody want to know what God's seal is? Ephesians chapter 1 tells us it is the Holy Spirit of God in you. In Ephesians 1, 13, and 14, Paul says, In him, Christ, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, having also believed you were sealed in him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who has given us a pledge of our inheritance with a view of the redemption of God's own possession to the praise of his glory. If you're a Christian, you have the Holy Spirit of God in you to guide you, to protect you, to remind you that you belong to him.

And the Bible says that Holy Spirit of God in you is God's down payment that he is going to fulfill his ultimate promise to you. That's the seal for a Christian. But this was a different seal for 144,000 people.

This is the seal of the living God. Who are these 144,000 who are sealed? They are people who are going to survive the tribulation. Remember I said last time, one-fourth of the world will be killed during the tribulation. That could be upwards to 2 billion people using today's population statistics. Many people will be killed, but these 144,000 that God seals with his seal and protects will not suffer death.

You know one way we know that? When we turn to Revelation 14, at the end of the seven-year tribulation, there is a picture in Revelation 14, 1, 3, and 4 of the 144,000 who are standing with Jesus Christ on Mount Zion in Jerusalem. How many are there at the end of the tribulation? Not 139,999, but 144,000.

Not one has been lost. Now the natural question is, well, who are these 144,000? Verse 4, and I heard the number of those who were sealed. They were 144,000. Oh, you can read and read and hear all kind of ideas of who these 144,000 are. The seventh-day Adventists say it's them. They're the ones who are going to be there. The Jehovah's Witnesses say, no, it's us, that we are the 144,000.

You've got some Mormons who think they're the 144,000. Can I share with you a simple rule for interpreting the Bible? It's so simple. When the plain sense makes good sense, seek no other sense. When the plain sense makes good sense, seek no other sense. Read the Bible as it's written.

And unless there's some reason not to take it as symbolically, take it just like it's written. And when you do that, it's very clear who these 144,000 are. These are 144,000, verse 4, sealed from every tribe of the sons of Israel, from the tribe of Judah, 12,000, from the tribe of Reuben, 12,000, from the tribe of Gad, 12,000, and on and on. These are Jews who have been selected and sealed and saved by God at the beginning of the tribulation. Now, today, it's hard to know if you're a Jewish person what your tribe is. The records were lost with the destruction of the temple. Just because we've lost the records, it doesn't mean God has lost the records.

He knows who these tribes are. People say, well, wait a minute. All Christians are raptured and in heaven, you've just got a world of unbelievers. How can they ever be saved? Same way you're saved and I'm saved.

The power of the Spirit of God using the Word of God to bring us to a knowledge of God through Christ. Yes, we'll be raptured, but there'll be Bibles that are left behind, Christian books left behind, perhaps old episodes of Pathway to Victory left behind. Plus, people will remember our words, which, by the way, will be left behind. The witness, the words we've spoken for Christ will be left behind. They will have knowledge of the Word of God.

And although people won't be indwelt by the Holy Spirit during the tribulation, it doesn't mean the Holy Spirit doesn't come upon people and convict people like he did in the Old Testament time. These are the 144,000. What is their ministry? Their ministry is to share the gospel. J. Dwight Pentecost wrote, they, like Saul, will be set apart to be God's witnesses to the Gentiles. Remember, God hasn't finished his plan with Israel yet. He's going to fulfill his purpose for Israel. Now, Romans 11, 1, has God rejected his people Israel?

No, may it never be. And part of God's plan for Israel is that they be used to bring a worldwide knowledge of God through Christ Jesus. That's the reason God set Israel apart. He chose Israel to be a witness to the world of him.

I remember when, about a year and a half ago, when I was invited to give the opening prayer for the opening of our embassy in Jerusalem. In that prayer, Netanyahu and all the Jewish officials were seated before me. And I thank God for choosing the Jewish people, saying that it is from the Jewish people that we receive the knowledge of the one through God. It is through Israel that we receive the prophets. It's from Israel that came the word of God. And it is through Israel the Messiah of the world has come.

God's plan was for Israel to deliver to the world the knowledge of the one true God. And they will ultimately fulfill that promise during the Great Tribulation. You know, Matthew 24, verse 14 says, before the second coming, Jesus said, the gospel must be preached to all nations. And remember, that's before the second coming. There's no condition for the rapture.

The rapture could happen at any moment at any time. But before the final return of Jesus Christ to earth, the whole world is going to hear the gospel. And one way they're going to hear is through this witness of the 144,000 Jewish evangelists. Who will stand in the Great Tribulation? The 144,000 will stand on earth during the tribulation. But there's a second group that will stand in the tribulation. And we see them beginning in verse 9. The tribulation saints will stand in heaven during the tribulation. Now, there is no verse that says this, but it is very obvious. Beginning in verse 9, we see the result of the witness of the 144,000 evangelists. Remember, at the beginning of the tribulation, there are no Christians on earth. The 144,000 are sealed and saved and selected to be a witness. Now, notice what John sees beginning in verse 9.

His vision shifts from looking at earth, and now he's looking into heaven. After these things, after the 144,000, I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the lamb, clothed in white robes and palm branches in their hands. Suddenly, he sees a whole mass of people that can't be counted, Jews and Gentiles alike, who are standing before the throne of God, meaning they are saved. Who are these multitudes that come from every tribe, every nation? This is part of the greatest revival the world will have ever seen.

These are those who are saved during the tribulation. It's going to be something like the world has never experienced before. My hope is that our brand-new teaching series on the book of Revelation has whet your appetite to learn more. The comprehensive study is called Final Conquest, and I've prepared a number of resources to help you dig deeper on your own. First, I want you to have an exclusive book I've just written for our Pathway to Victory family called Mysteries of the End Times, five little-known truths about God's plan for the future. Biblical prophecy is confusing to some Bible readers, but it doesn't have to be. My book will give you helpful background information, and it will help pull back the curtain on some of the mysteries of God's plan. You're invited to request your copy of my book when you give a gift of any amount to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory. And when you do, I'll also include my new booklet called The Major Characters of the End Times. It's conveniently printed, and it'll help you understand key figures in the Bible, such as the great dragon, the antichrist, and even the four horsemen of the apocalypse, plus the four living creatures and the 144,000 witnesses. In fact, my booklet contains 15 different characters for you to know and understand.

Again, it's called The Major Characters of the End Times. Now, in closing, I'd like to thank our Pathway partners and all who generously support Pathway to Victory. You're a real encouragement to me. You put wind in our sails, and you're the ones who have propelled this media ministry to a platform of global impact for the gospel.

Thanks so much. David? Thanks, Dr. Jeffress. To request your copy of the brand-new book Mysteries of the End Times, simply contact Pathway to Victory with a generous gift. Plus, you'll also receive a copy of the booklet called The Major Characters of the End Times. Here's the number to call, 866-999-2965, or go online to ptv.org. And when you give $100 or more, we'll also include the complete CD and DVD teaching sets for this month's series on the book of Revelation.

Plus, you'll get a copy of the bestselling book by Dr. Jeffress called Final Conquest. That's yours as well. Again, call 866-999-2965, or go to ptv.org. You could also write to us, P.O. Box 223-609, Dallas, Texas, 75222.

Again, that's P.O. Box 223-609, Dallas, Texas, 75222. I'm David J. Mullins, inviting you to join us again next time when Dr. Jeffress continues his message called The Greatest Revival the Church Has Ever Seen. That's Tuesday, here on Pathway to Victory. Pathway to Victory with Dr. Robert Jeffress comes from the pulpit of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas.