And I will say, this series through the book of Revelation is probably going to be the longest series we've ever, at least that I've ever preached here at our church. And I told Pastor Bailey that yesterday when I was prepping for this because I told him, because I keep track, this is week number 10. And we're only in chapter four, okay? And so I think this could be a really long one. And I hope you're enjoying this.
And I know I'm enjoying the study and prep and things. I'm learning so much as your pastor. And I'm grateful that I get the opportunity to be able to study, to just share some things that I'm learning. And as we go throughout Revelation, if you're joining us for the first time, I know some of you might be here and you're not as familiar with our Wednesday. I say this when I teach through Revelation.
This is my first time through it, but I've said it every week of the series. I think I never want to come across arrogant like I know exactly how everything is going to happen. I don't. And I'm going to give you what I think and what I believe Scripture supports, but there is a lot of futuristic stuff here in the book of Revelation that I can't definitively say this is exactly how everything's going to go down. And so I hope that you would give some grace as we work through that.
But I'm definitely looking forward. Forward to this.
So, Revelation chapter 4, if you have your Bible here tonight, that's where we're going to be. And we've entitled this series. The returning king, the returning king, because that's really what the whole book is about. Just a little bit of review. The Apostle John is writing the book of Revelation around, he's about 90 years old, so it's about AD 90, somewhere in there.
He's writing this. And so he's about 90 at the time. He's exiled on the island of Patmos. He's not there on vacation. It's important that you know that.
He's there because that was like Rome's prison camp, if you would. This is where they would take people that believed in the resurrected Jesus and they would take them and exile them there because if they exile them on this island, they could not be used to further the good news of the gospel.
So he's there, and while he's there on the island of Patmos, he receives a bunch of visions. You can almost say that there's several different clusters of visions throughout the book of what Christ is revealing to him. And I want you to know this is not John's revelation. This is Christ's revelation to him. And he is revealing.
Revealing who he is. Christ is revealing who he is, but also some things that are to come. I want to show you our timeline here on the screen. I think we have this on here. Do we have the timeline, the picture?
Yep. Many of you, I told you, we've passed them out several weeks. I need to get another stack of them and put them out here.
So if you haven't received one yet, that's bigger. I know it's small here, okay? And but if you have one in your Bible, you can kind of work through. This is the timeline of the entire book of Revelation, all right?
So this is what we're working for. And so when you see this, When Christ resurrected, so on that third day when he walked out of the grave, there was about a 40-year period where he revealed himself and showed himself to the apostles, to 500 men, showed himself to the apostles again and several more people along the way. But there's about a 40-day gap from his resurrection to when he ascended. When he ascended, if you remember, when he was ascending up into heaven, he told the apostles to wait for the comforter is to come. That comforter is the Holy Spirit of God.
And the Holy Spirit of God would come and indwell, literally make his home in people's lives, in their hearts, make those his home. And the Holy Spirit would come in and he would indwell the believers. That happened in Acts chapter number two at Pentecost. At that point, the church age, if you would, was born. And that's where we are today.
That's why I have that circled in green up here: the church age was born at that moment. That's where we exist today. And that's where a lot of your New Testament was in, in the church day, after the gospels, after Christ ascended, a lot of the letters to churches and different things about that. And what you have is Revelation 1 through chapter 3. Are really about the church age.
That's why, when we looked at the seven churches of Revelation, each church kind of represented, if you would, a different period in church history. And we could see that. And so today, the periods represented, if you want to ever look back at this, it's the church at Laodicea, which is what we would call the compromising church or the apostate church. That church exists today. You can probably think of churches that fit that mold.
And then there's also this other stream of churches represented today, which is more like what we saw in the church at Philadelphia. That is what we would call the revivalistic church. And so you still see that as well. And that's what we want to be a part of. We don't want to be the Laodicean church.
We want to be more like the church at Philadelphia. And so at the end of chapter three, when we got into chapter four, this is what we looked at two weeks ago. We see something very interesting because chapter four is a transition chapter.
Okay.
So chapters one through three, church age. Chapter 4, he gets a vision and he's taken up into the heavenly realm. John is taken up into the heavenly realm. And in chapters 4 and 5, it is a view from heaven. The reason why that is, and this is just one of the, what I think, many occurrences in scripture that support when we are going to be called up together with him, is I don't think it's by accident that chapter 4 and 5, which is after the church age, is actually the view from heaven before chapter 6, which is what's going to happen in our world, the tribulation period.
It's because I showed you this two weeks ago, is that I think that when Christ comes back and what we call the rapture of the church, the calling up, what 1 Thessalonians 4 talks about, that moment, it's going to happen before the seven-year tribulation. And that's why in chapters four and five, the views from heaven, because the church is going to be at heaven and we're not going to have to endure the seven-year tribulation.
So in chapter number four. Oh, by the way, I do have a definition of the rapture, which is going to, that's the next event in front of us on the timeline. This is what we looked at two weeks ago. Here's what it is. It's the sudden return of Christ in the clouds, not to the earth, very specific, because don't get the rapture confused with the second coming in Revelation 19.
That's when he's going to come back to this earth. But this is the rapture. We're going to go up to him in the clouds if we're left here, where he will snatch the Christians who are still alive from the earth to prevent them from having to endure the devastating events of the tribulations. That's the next event that we're waiting for.
So in chapter 4, we get a view of... Of heaven here in chapters 4 through 5.
So let's look at it. We're going to just tackle chapter 4, 11 verses. I'm going to read it straight through without stopping, and then we'll come back and do some commentary on this and work through your notes.
So stick with me here as we read 11 verses. After this, verse 1, I looked, and behold, a door was opened. in heaven. That's because the church is going to be going up at the rapture. That's why the door is open.
And the first voice which I heard was, as it were, of a trumpet talking with me. By the way, I mentioned this two weeks ago. The opening of heaven, the only other time that you see this is when Christ returns at his second coming.
So it's open here because I believe the church is going up after the church age. And it opens again in Revelation 19 because Christ is coming back down to earth. Just pointing that out. Which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me, which said, Come up hither. And I will show thee these things.
which must be hereafter. And immediately I was in the Spirit, and behold, a throne was set in heaven. And one sat on the throne. And he that sat was to look upon like a jasper and a sardine stone, and there was a rainbow round about the throne and in sight like unto an emerald. Round about the throne were four and twenty seats.
And upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders sitting. clothed in white raiment, They had on their heads crowns of gold. And out of the throne proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices. There were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne. which are the seven spirits of God.
Before the throne there was a sea of glass like unto crystal, And in the midst of the throne and round about the throne were four beasts. Full of eyes. before and behind. In the first piece, verse 7. was like a lion, and the second beast like a calf.
And the third beast had a face as a man, and the fourth beast was like a flying eagle. And the four beasts had each of them six wings about him. And they were full of eyes within. and they rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy. Lord God Almighty.
Which was and is and and is to come. When those beasts give glory and honor And thanks to him that sat on the throne, who liveth for ever and ever. The four and twenty elders fall down before him, that sat on the throne and worship him that liveth forever and ever. and cast their crowns before the throne, saying, Verse 11. Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory.
and honor and power for For thou hast created all things. And for thy pleasure. They are and were created. Father. Lord, we need your help tonight.
I need your help as we look to this. There's a lot of things here. But God, ultimately, as we see this view of heaven, I pray, Father, for our hearts to be fixed upon you and that you would give us a little bit of a glimpse of heaven. That we could see exactly what this is and look with just this longing in our hearts for this moment, but not forgetting that we have the Holy Spirit of God with us tonight. You're here.
And God, as we look at the throne room, if you would, this picture of heaven. God, we know that today we get to worship. the God that is on the throne. What a privilege. What an opportunity.
God, bless this service. Bless your word, for it's in your name we pray. And all God's people said. Amen and amen. Here in chapter four, We have Uh a picture of heaven.
A picture of what is happening. in heaven. John was taken up. and spirit to heaven to get a glimpse of really this heavenly Realm. Um The word, so we get like what I would call the throne room.
And we see here the word throne. And I want to talk just briefly, just to give you an idea here, is that the word throne is really a repeated word that you're going to see in chapter 4 and 5. And I don't think that's by accident, because here's what I'm going to tell you. The center of heaven. And the most important thing in heaven.
is not the streets of gold. It's not the mansion. It's not all of these different things that you and I dream about what it's going to be like to be there. The most important part of heaven. is the throne.
is the throne. And I don't want you to miss that. It's mentioned 17 different times. in chapters 4 and 5. And those two those two chapters are all about heaven.
In chapter 6, We come back down here to earth to see what's going to be happening on earth. Chapters 4 and 5, all about heaven. And there is a predominant theme. And the theme is the throne. The word throne is mentioned in scripture in the New Testament.
It's mentioned over 60 times. Times. and over 45 of those times is mentioned in the book of Revelation. The reason is, is because the focal point and the reminder. Is that God is in full control and that God is in charge?
And God is sovereign. Over all things. And that when we get this view of heaven, I want you to know that we long for a lot of different things about heaven. And that's okay. Like, I'm not trying to make you feel guilty if you long for all these other things.
But the most important thing that we're gonna be focused on when we get there is the throne room. And don't forget that because he gives us a glimpse of what that looks like here. And so I want to give you a description tonight, a description of the throne. And John does just a phenomenal job here when we see this, the description of the throne, because what you see here, and I've never noticed this before.
So, this is the privilege of being a pastor because I get to like live in Revelation 4 for the last couple of weeks and just read it every day and study it and see things, and I learned so much. But what I've never noticed is when he describes the throne, there are several prepositional phrases.
Now I was never a big English person.
So I wish my English teacher was tuning in. She'd be surprised that I even knew what a preposition was. All right. But when you see his description of the throne room. It's described with prepositional phrases.
It's described with what is happening. In front. Around in the midst and on. And what we're going to see tonight is these series of prepositional phrases in Revelation 4 that really describe the throne. And that's going to be our outline tonight.
So it's very simple, but I want you to see that. And I wanted you to note that because I've never noticed that before, that that's how it was described. And so as we work through this, you're going to see that that's how John described this here in Revelation 4.
So the first thing we see about the description of the throne, it's on your notes, is the prepositional phrase, on the throne. On the The throne. And what you have here in verses 2 and 3 is this. It says, And immediately I was in the Spirit, and behold, a throne was set in heaven. And one Sad.
On The throne. And he that sat, verse 3, Was to look upon like a jasper and a sardine stone. There was a rainbow round about the throne in sight like unto an emerald.
So on this throne That's in heaven on the throne in heaven. There's one that sits on the throne, and here's who that is. It is God Almighty. It is God Almighty sitting on the throne.
Now, it's important that you understand we serve one God, but He exists in three Three persons. And I know for our minds, it's hard to really wrap our minds around that. And how does that look? One God existing in three people. That is God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit.
We call that the Trinity. And you see that throughout Scripture. From Genesis on, you see this, okay? And they all do different things. They have different, you know, responsibilities, if you would, if I could use that word.
But here on the throne, it's important that you notice that this is God. God the Father. This is God Almighty on His throne. In fact, we will be introduced to Jesus, the Son, in chapter 5. And so we'll see that next week.
But here, you see this supported in verse number 8. When you see, like, when the four beasts are flying around, and we're going to talk about that, when they're going, they're saying something very important. They're saying, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. This is God the Father. And he's sitting on his throne.
I almost said phone. Yeah. There ain't gonna be no phones in heaven, alright? God Almighty is sitting on his throne. And it describes God Almighty like this, like a Jasper.
And a sardine uh stone.
Now What does that mean? And there's a lot of symbolism here in chapter four and a lot of different things.
So, a couple of things, and you can take these notes down if you would like. A Jasper and a sardine, both of them are red, which I thought was interesting. And I think that's a reminder that John was seeing this as just a reminder of Christ and his sacrifice and how God sent his only begotten Son from heaven to earth to redeem you and to redeem me, to redeem the Apostle John.
So you could say that that's what it is as well. It's also a picture of God's beauty. And and his worth. One thing just that I thought was interesting when you follow these two stones in particular is you could see in the Old Testament, we did a series on this, and you can go back and look at it in the tabernacle if you remember that. And one night we had Pastor Bailey dress up in priestly garment.
Okay, he was the most spiritual person I could find to wear it. And so I just was like, hey, could you do this? And he did this. And what you've got to understand is in the Old Testament on the priest, they had all of these stones right here on their breastplate. And these stones represented the 12 tribes of Israel.
And what's interesting is, I thought this was just something to add to this that is important, is that the first stone was the Sardis stone that's mentioned here. That was the first one. And that the last one was the Jasper stone. And so I think you could also say that this is John when he was seeing this, he likened them to the Sarvas and the Jasper as a reminder that God has always been and God will always be. He is the first, He is the last, He has no beginning, and He will have no ending.
And I think you can see all of that sitting on the throne. And can you imagine for just a moment what John was experiencing? Like, I don't know how he even described it in the chapters that we have. Because there's so much that he's probably seeing, and so much he's taking in. And here he's watching this and he's describing things of what he can see.
But on the throne sits God Almighty. It was like a Jasper And a starting stone here. But then you also see, so you see the one that sat on the throne, but the second prepositional phrase that you see in verse 3. And also again in verse 6. is around the throne.
So we see the one on the throne. And now we see the one around The the throne. In verse three, it says, And he that sat. was to look Upon like a Jasper and a sardine song, sorry, after that. And there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald.
If you drop down to verse six, it says, And before the throne there was a sea of glass like unto crystal, and in the midst of the throne, and there it is again, round about the throne, were four beasts full of eyes before and behind.
So, um.
So, a couple of things. There's a lot of stuff here. Around the throne, here's what we have: an emerald. The first thing that you see there, I think it's on your notes. I can't remember if I put a blank there.
An emerald. Rainbow. An emerald. Rainbow. A rainbow was kind of first introduced to us.
You would know this in Genesis chapter number nine. After the flood and things like that, you remember that. And I really hate, and I'm not going to get into this, but I hate how our world has changed what the rainbow means because it was really instituted by God as a promise to us, as a promise to us. And I hate that we have to worry about, you know, the rainbow and what that looks or whatever. The world has just, and that's what the enemy always does.
He tries to, you know, pervert and change what God meant. And so, but what you find in Romans chapter and Genesis chapter number nine is the rainbows after the flood. What's interesting about this is that this rainbow of what John saw. is when we see rainbows, they're usually after the storm.
So, like, you know, in chapter nine, it was after the flood. Right. And when you see a rainbow, it's usually after a massive storm and stuff. It always shows up afterwards. But what's interesting here is the rainbow is always a reminder of God's mercy to us.
And here's what I'll tell you: what stuck out to me here: is that in chapter six, you're going to see God's wrath and judgment poured out to us. You could call that the storm of God's wrath. And what's interesting to me is here in chapter four, we see the rainbow, here, the rainbows before the storm. The rainbow is before the storm. And here's why that's important for you to understand.
God's mercy always precedes God's judgment. A lot of people will say this: like, how in the world could God destroy the face of the earth back in Genesis? Like, how in the world could a good Loving God, do that. You ever heard the world kind of say that or whatever?
Well, here's what they're forgetting. Yeah, he deser he like he destroyed the whole world. Because of their sin. But here's what they forget. He provided.
An art. He always provides. Away. out of the storm. He always provides a redemption.
From The storm. And that's what you see here: this emerald rainbow. It is a reminder of God's mercy. And God's faithfulness. Listen, here's what I'll tell you.
God is merciful. Even though judgment is going to come here in chapter 6. And so I love talking about God's mercy, but eventually we're going to have to talk about God's judgment as well. But the emerald green rainbow is a reminder of the mercy of God. But also, what you see here is the 24 elders.
Around the throne. And the 24 elders, here's what I'm going to tell you. They represent the stance. And I think the scripture is clear on that. And they represent the the saints.
And so um and some You know, without going too deep into this, basically, some believe that the 24 number. Is um Is picturing the 12 tribes of Israel, so Old Testament, think that, God's chosen people, and then the 12 apostles, which would make up your 24, which would be a reminder of the saints of God from cover to cover for all of us. And so I think the safest thing is, and most scholars would agree to this, is that the 24 elders mentioned here that are sitting in these 24 seats. Is a picture not of elders in terms of pastors, like the New Testament sometimes uses that word. This is.
The saints that have gone on before. In other words, every person that you have lost that new God. They're around the throne right now. Think about that. You've you've lost loved ones.
Parrots You've lost A child? You've lost a spouse. And here's what I'll tell you. If they knew Jesus... Right now.
They're gathered. They're gathered around What's wrong? And they're praising God. And I hope that provides you comfort tonight. I know it does me.
But that's what these 24 elders represent. But there's a couple things that I thought was interesting about this, they're all wearing crowns. And um One interesting note, and this is why I'll just tell you, and by the way, there's a lot of resources. You can always do this and find stuff, or and I can help you point you in directions. But what I'll tell you is the word crown Here in chapter number four, at the end of verse four, when it says that they were wearing crowns of gold, the word crown in the Greek.
is the word Stefanos. It's almost like a wreath. type of crown is what that word literally means. What's interesting here, so don't miss this, is in Revelation 19, when Christ comes back at his second coming. He will be wearing a crown.
And this is why word studies are so important, because In their original language. The word can mean, in English it can mean different things, but the same word. But there were different Greek words. The word crown that we find in Revelation 19 that describes our Savior, the King of Kings, coming back to earth to rule and to reign. When he's wearing a crown, that is a different Greek word.
It is the word diadema. I think I'm pronouncing that right. In other words, that's where we get The song, right? Where we're worshiping him. And that word diadema is it implies that he is king.
It's a different type of crown.
So, what you have here in chapter 4 is more of a wreath type of crown. And in diadema, in Revelation 19, it is actually a different crown. Here's what I want you to know: our crown is inferior to his. He is king, we are not. And there's something interesting.
We will be laying down our crowns. That's the picture here. No one's going to be arguing about your crowns.
Okay.
No one's going to be, you know what we do here in church in modern day. We're like, man, I do more than so-and-so. We size ourselves up with everybody. I must be more spiritual than that person because I do more and I serve more and I do all this. Let me just tell you this: there ain't gonna be any boasting in heaven.
We're not going to be boasting about anything that we have done. We are going to be completely undone, 100% all struck by the one that sits on the crown on the throne. And what we're going to be doing is: yes, there are crowns in heaven, and yes, what you do, we're not saved by our works, but you will get crowns based on what you have done with the gospel and things in your life after salvation. And when you get those crowns, the only response in heaven is for us to lay our crowns. at the feet of the one that sits on the throne.
And that's what you have here: the saints of God laying their crowns down. They were in white raiment. These 24 elders are described in white raiment. When you see white, In Scripture, it is always a reminder of the righteousness of Christ. What happens at salvation when you trust in Christ as Savior?
What happens? There's a lot of things, like your name's written up in heaven, right? And all these different things. But here's what you got to remember. The reason why you can't have a relationship with God in the first place is because you're sinful and He's holy.
And he can't accept your sin. And so, for that, you could never live a perfect life worthy of a relationship with a perfect father. And a perfect creator.
So what you had to do was You had to trust in Christ. Christ came, and what he did was he lived the perfect life that you and I could not live. A righteous Sinless life. And what happens at the moment of salvation is that the righteousness of the Son of God. It's placed into your life.
And one day, now we still have the flesh and we still sin and we still make mistakes, but one day we will be clean. clothed in white. Casting our crowns at his feet. And that reminder of being clothed in white. The only reason you're clothed in white up there is because of what Christ did here for you.
And that's what these elders are representing. Then you have four beasts Around the throne. And you see these four beasts, and here's what I will tell you: the beast represented. Here Um There's a lot of different things here. They were full of eyes before and behind.
The first beast was like, verse 7. The first beast was like a lion. The second beast like a calf. The third beast had a face as a man. And the fourth beast was like a flying eagle.
The four beasts had each of them six wings about him, and they were full of eyes within. And they rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was and is and is to come.
So these four beasts, here's what I'll tell you: they're angelic beings. They're angelic beings, and I'll explain a little bit about what they were. Um they had eyes. All around, literally, eyes in the front, eyes in the back. I thought my mom was the only one who had that, but apparently there's more.
And so they had eyes in the front, eyes in the back. And one interesting note, they're crying out, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty. This is the only word in Scripture that is used three times consecutively to describe our Lord. And I think there's something there for us to learn. He is many things, and we all have our favorite attributes, but above all, He is holy.
Above all, he is holy. There's an emphasis on his holiness. In heaven. These four beasts, they're always watching. And they're always worshiping.
They're always watching without ceasing. They're always flying around and they're always watching and they're always worshiping. Adrian Rogers calls them God's heavenly cheerleaders. These four beasts You get a similar picture of this in the Old Testament with Ezekiel. Ezekiel chapter number one describes a similar vision of heaven.
And in Ezekiel's vision, he saw four living creatures that had four heads. Uh and he said the face of a man Very similar to here: the face of an ox, the face of a lion, and the face of an eagle. Very close to what we have described. Here, the only difference is the wings. In Ezekiel, they're described as having four wings.
And in John's vision, they're described as having six wings. Ezekiel's description Is a reference to the cherubim, which was known as an angelic being with four wings. And John is more signifying a seraphim with six wings. I don't exactly know if this was the same vision. I have no idea, but it's very close.
And so the picture, though, don't get caught up in all the different numbers and stuff. Here's what I'll tell you: in heaven, and this is right now, and this is what we will experience one day, as the saints of God, we will join the elders around the throne. And we will join the elders around the throne, laying our crowns at his feet. And in that moment, are these beasts flying around not scary beasts, but these beasts flying around, and they are worshiping and almost leading us in worship. to him and they're focused on him and they're always watching.
and they're always worshiping. They're saying, holy, holy. Hold on. is the Lord God all. Almighty.
And that's what they're saying.
So you have these four beasts, but then as we move through this. You have out of the throne, the next prepositional phrase we find in verse 5.
So we see around the throne, we see on the throne, and here in verse 5, we see out of the throne. The throne. And what you find here is that there's lightnings. Thunderings. And voices.
I'll read it to you. And out of the throne, verse 5 proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices. And there were seven lamps. Burning, and that's before the throne. We'll get to that one next.
The lightnings, it's on your notes, the lightnings, thunderings, and voices represent the judgment of God. And even though he is holy, and you could argue that's the most important attribute of our Almighty God that sits on his throne. But there is judgment. And we're going to see that in chapter 6 through 18. But, and I put it this way on my notes: we love to focus on the rainbow.
The mercy of God. But listen, let me tell you this. When you get a glimpse of God, you can't ignore the judgment of God. You can't ignore it. And so he's perfectly holy and perfectly...
Just at the same time. This idea of thunderings and lightnings and voices, it's a picture. Of really the presence of God. I mean, you see this in Exodus chapter number 19. When Moses on Mount Sinai was in the presence of God, there were thunderings and lightnings.
You also see this same phrase repeated several times in the book of Revelation about the presence of God. You see it in chapter 8, verse 5. You see this phrase, lightnings, thunderings, and voices in chapter 11, verse 19, as well as chapter 16, verse. Verse 18. When you see this description, it is just a reminder that God is just And that's not anything crazy for you.
Like in our world today, we love justice. You hate to You know, watch a TV show where somebody deserves and did something wrong and they get away, right? Why do we hate that? We want justice. Or you hate to watch the news and you see somebody that walks for a crime that they did, and that bothers you.
Why? Because we want justice. All of us at the heart of who we are, we want justice for everybody. L's. We don't like justice for ourselves, though, do we?
None of us do. My kids hate it.
Okay.
We don't like justice for ourselves, but we all want justice. And here's what I'll tell you: it would be a very unjust thing for God to let your sin go unpunished. And because we love justice, and because he's holy. He has to be just. He has to punish your sin.
So out of the throne came lightnings and thunderings and voices. But then we see before the throne. At the end of verse 5, there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne. Which are the seven spirits of God? And verse 6.
Before the throne there was a sea of glass. like unto crystal. Before the throne, what you see is seven lamps of fire, and you see a sea of glass. The seven lamps of fire, I talked about this early in our series. It's representing the fullness of God's Spirit.
The completeness. The number seven in scripture is the number of completion. It's the number of perfection. And so when it says the seven lamps of fire and they represent the seven spirits of God, you say, what does that look like? It's probably a direct reminder.
And by the way, it's one spirit, but he has all these different attributes. And what you can see is in Isaiah chapter number 11, you see these listed out. It's like wisdom, understanding, fear of God, and different things. And you see seven spirits of God represented in your Old Testament. It's probably just a reminder of the fullness of that one spirit here in these seven lamps of of fire.
But then you see a sea of glass. And you see a sea of glass, and you have to ask the question: is there an actual sea in heaven? I mean, yeah. I I think this is figurative. It represents the sea of glass.
represents the peace. of God. It represents the peace of God. Here's why I believe that. Um when I was growing up Um I loved Just ski.
My dad had a boat my whole childhood. And he loved to fish. But I was not patient enough to be his fishing buddy.
So when he would get up and go fishing, he would ask me if I would like to go. And I would always say. If you let me ski a little bit, then I'll be happy to go with you.
So we grew up going to the lake, Jordan Lake is where we did most of our skiing. And I used to love to ski and be a part of it. But, and I know the Coopers are here. Mason loved to, he's the student that passed away in our school. He loved a wakeboard, gifted at it.
And so I thought about him when I thought about the sea of glass. But I don't know if he was like this, but for me, there was one time that was the best skiing that I could ever do. It was late in the evening. The late in the evening. Here's why: is because, you know, if you go out at Jordan Lake in the middle of the summer and you're trying to just have a good time skiing out there, right?
There's boats everywhere. There's waves. It's choppy. It's wild. It's wild.
Much like our world, it's very chaotic and different things. There's waves, there's problems, there's different things, there's trials, there's storms, all this stuff. The middle of the day was always the worst time for me to ski. But I would always say, it was always be after dinner when we would be camping at Jordan Lake. I would always be like, Dad, or I like to tube and stuff.
And so I would say, Dad, could you pull us at around 6:30 in the evening? Here's why. Most all those boats, they're inside, you know, they're parked, their families are eating, and no one's on the lake. No one. And so I would go out there and the lake was like.
Slick as glass. I didn't have to worry. I could do anything and everything. I could try new things. I could try to do fun things on the water.
And there was something about when the sea or the lake in this example, when there's a sea of glass or a lake of glass, there's something incredibly peaceful about it. That and what you see here is in the midst of lightnings, in the midst of thunderings, you would think, like, man, is this chaotic? Is this chaotic around the throne of God? But then, in the midst of this, as he's seeing thunderings and he's seeing lightnings and he's seeing these four beasts and he's seeing these elders worshiping our Savior and laying their crowns, he notices a sea of glass that was before the throne. And I think this is a reminder that in the midst of our chaos, there's always peace.
in the presence of God. There is always peace. In the presence of God. Here's how I said it. In a world That is so loud.
Busy Chaotic, and much like Jordan Lake in the middle of the summer, in the middle of the day. It is comforting to know that in the presence of the one that is on the throne. There's a calmness. There's a peacefulness. And in that throne room, We R Safe.
We're safe. This world You might think you're safe. This world is just full of just storms and problems. And for us, When we look at life, it's just like, man, I know many of you have gone through such heartache. In grief?
And problems and storms. And you feel sometimes like your life is that guy trying to ski in the middle of the day at a very busy lake. And when you're out there, you're just like, man, every time I turn around, there's a wave. Every time I turn around, there's a boat in my way. Every time they're turned around, and that kind of thing.
And here's what I want you to know: in the presence of Almighty God. We're we're resting. There's a peacefulness and there is a calmness.
So we see on the throne. We see before the throne. We see around the throne. And we see all that. And here's what I'll tell you.
This is a reminder. That we're going to be out of here when the events of the tribulation start in chapter number six. And What is happening in heaven? is something that we should Expect Here. Not in a perfect sense because we haven't received our glorified bodies.
But I do think sometimes we miss out on what God has for us here. Because we're so busy. And we have all these different things. And I have two things I want to tell you as we close this thing. Is this.
If you are in here tonight, and I know it's a Wednesday, so we just assume you know Christ a lot of times, but here's what I want you to know: if you're in here tonight and the futuristic events scare you, And you're in here and you're terrified by what's going to happen when we get into chapter six and these moments and different things or whatever. It could be perhaps that you don't know. The one who has provided rescue for you. The one who has provided salvation. The ark of salvation, if you can let me use that phrase.
That has been provided for you. And here's what I want you to know. Just like John saw in this moment that the heavens opened, here's what I want you to know. That door to heaven is open for you. That door is open.
And if you're in here tonight, stop fighting it. Stop looking for it in the chaotic things that our world has to offer. And remember that the door to heaven is wide open for you. Say, what do I have to do? You don't have to do anything.
The work has already been done by Christ on the cross, giving his life for you, shedding his blood for you. And then he says, before he dies, he says, I am. The door. You see, he's the door. The only way you get through into heaven and in the presence of the throne room to worship and to lay your crown at the feet of the one that sits on the throne.
is by only trusting in the blood of Jesus Christ. There's nothing good you can do to ever get there. He's done all the work. You just got to believe. You just gotta believe in him.
and trust in him. But for us that are Christians, Here's what I'll tell you: is this this kind of convicted me a little bit? We're in the presence of God right now. And sometimes we miss out. And we think that this, and I know it's not going to look like this on heaven, and I'm not looking for anything crazy and stuff.
But here's what I'm going to tell you: is that we miss out on heaven on earth sometimes because we're so busy and we're so routine and all these different things. And God wants us to experience His presence right now. That's why He gave us the Spirit of God to indwell in us. And so, my question to you is this: Are you, when you come into this place or when you get into the presence of God, are you going through the motions or are you actually here tonight to encounter glory? Are you here because this is a habit to you?
It's just what we do. Are you here when you come into this place to encounter glory? Are you here to encounter God? Or are you just here out of Out of routine. And one day, here's what I'll tell you.
We're not going to be looking at our watches. We're not going to be looking at our phones. No one is thinking about what they're going to be eating. No one's gonna be bored. And no one's gonna complain about the song being sung.
No one's going to be worried. No one's going to be worried about how they sound. We all will be gathered together. as the saints of God. Loved ones that have gone on before.
And ones That might still Be saved in the future. And we're all going to be gathering. And here's what's amazing: every tribe. Every tongue, in every nation. It's not gonna be just you.
It's gonna be people from all over the world, people that when you give to missions, That they took the gospel to somewhere across the world. And through that, someone gets saved. And now that person that might not even speak your language, we will be standing next to these people. And all of us will be together casting our crowns at his feet, beholding the one that is forever. on his throne.
Mm-hmm.
