As you study the book of Revelation and come to understand what will happen in the end times, one practical result should be renewed passion to share the Gospel. I will be a witness for my Lord, ladies and gentlemen. It's more than a lyric.
It is a lifestyle. We can sing with great enthusiasm. Oh, for a thousand tongues to sing my great Redeemer's praise, but know that technically what that means in our heart is we'll sing about him in here.
We will not speak about him out there. Welcome to Wisdom for the Heart. Stephen Davey has been working through a series entitled The Trumpets of Seven Archangels. As you study Revelation, you see both the reward that God has in store for the righteous and the judgment he has in store for the wicked.
Our response should be to testify to our generation about the truth. Today, Stephen comes to Revelation chapter 11. We'll see a prophecy regarding one of the most disputed issues of our generation, Jerusalem.
Jerusalem is considered a holy city by both Jews and Muslims. So let's see what the Bible says. If I were to ask this congregation the question, have you ever shared the Gospel of Jesus Christ with an unbeliever at work, at school, wherever, at any point in your life, I wonder how many could raise their hands and say, I have. Not only that, I'm committed to being used in some way to get out the message of the Gospel to those around me.
Let me back up even further. I wonder how many people acknowledged to their world on Monday morning that they were in church on Sunday. When you're asked, well, what did you do over the weekend?
You say, well, I worked in the yard and did a little thing here and there and not even own up to that. Or furthermore, hey, why don't you come with me to church? It's interesting, according to one survey I read recently by Tom and Sam Rainer, 82% of the people they surveyed who were unchurched said that they would more than likely attend a service if they were personally invited by a friend. The Rainer survey then flipped the question around and discovered that typically less than one in four church goers ever invite anybody to come with them to church.
82% might come, yet one in four are only the ones asking. Harnack, the great German church historian wrote that the early mission of Christianity was accomplished by means of what he called informal missionaries. That phrase, informal missionaries, was actually coined by Justin in the second century, a church leader who was martyred for his faith. He said that the spread of the gospel came because the believers all believed that they were informal missionaries.
So how far have we come from that? Another pollster wrote in his book the results of a survey where people who claim to be born again, that is, they actually accepted and adopted that terminology, that they were born again. He asked the question or the survey asked the question, do you believe you have a responsibility to explain your religious beliefs? And 60% of those people said they did not feel it was their responsibility to be a witness.
Imagine that. I fear that for the most part the church today is growing by transference from one church to the next rather than by conversion. People who are coming to faith in Jesus Christ because more and more Christians are refusing to believe that it is their responsibility to share their faith with others.
A rather humorous comic I read about some time ago that kind of put this in excellent words. It's funny but convicting at the same time. He was asked about his religion and he said, well, I don't talk about that to people. Oh, you don't talk about it?
No, I don't talk about my religion to people. He was then asked, well, what are you? And he said, well, I'm a Jehovah's bystander. The man said, I've never heard of such a thing.
Well, he responded, well, maybe not. I'm just more comfortable being a bystander than a witness. Well, I'm not endorsing the Jehovah's Witnesses, by the way, with that story. But I am deeply disturbed about the growing number of Christians who could easily be called Jehovah's bystanders. That's not a spiritual cult.
But I do believe it is a spiritual condition. Perhaps of the church today. We can sing with great enthusiasm. I know for a thousand tongues to sing my great redeemer's praise but know that technically what that means in our heart is we'll sing about him in here.
We will not speak about him out there. I will be a witness for my Lord, ladies and gentlemen. It's more than a lyric.
It is a lifestyle. Now, if you've been studying for very long with me through the last book of the Bible and the revelation of the future, you can't help but be struck by the faithful witnessing of so many people. And I want you to know this is convicting to me.
I'm just preaching to myself like I'm preaching to you. In fact, it's convicted me throughout my study and I'm just so glad to be able to finally deliver it and be done with it, right? This is convicting to me, too. But we've been marked by the testimony of faithful people whether it's the 144,000 Jewish evangelists who are fearlessly, tirelessly delivering the gospel to the world or maybe those who've come to faith in Christ after the rapture who've heard the gospel testimony primarily of these evangelists who are coming to faith in Christ and the millions who will be martyred because they will not be silent about their relationship with Jesus Christ. Now, two of the most dramatic witnesses ever to appear, I think, on the planet's surface are about to be introduced. Before they're introduced, we have to go first to where John is asked to actually take part in the unfolding drama of Revelation. So let's start with verse one where we left off at chapter 11. And notice what John is asked to do and eventually we'll get to these two special witnesses. Revelation chapter 11, verse one. Then there was given me a measuring rod like a staff and someone said, I believe that someone is God, get up and measure the temple of God and the altar and those who worship in it.
John here was given a calamis, it's the Greek word for a tall hollow cane that could grow as high as 12 feet, it could be whittled down to make quills, it could be used as walking canes and it could also be used in its entire length as a surveyor's ruler or measuring rod. God is asking John to do just that, to take the surveyor's reed and go and measure the temple. The Greek word for temple is naos, that'll be significant later on. This is the inner part of the temple. This is the place where we refer to as the holy place which includes the smaller compartment of the holy of holies. The word naos does not refer to the entire temple complex. Now what we tend to miss as we read that one little verse is the proverbial elephant in the room.
The obvious thing that we just gloss right over. John has just been asked to measure the temple. There is no temple standing in Jerusalem when John writes the book of Revelation. It has been destroyed, in fact it was destroyed 25 years earlier. The history in fact of the temple is a rather sad tale of the unfaithfulness of God's people and the ongoing commitment of God to his people and the temple eventually will be rebuilt as I'll tell you in a moment. But the first temple as you may remember was built in all of his magnificent glory by Solomon.
It was destroyed. The second temple was reconstructed by Zerubbabel after the exile, but that was destroyed. The third temple that was built was built by Herod as a gift to the Jews that he wanted to win favor with. That was the temple that Christ was at as a 12 year old boy questioning the Jewish leaders. This is the temple of the apostles as they stood on the porch on the day of Pentecost and delivered the gospel.
This is the temple we most often think of. But Jesus Christ predicted in Matthew 24 verse 2 that that temple would be destroyed. Herod's temple, not one stone left upon another. That prediction came true in AD 70 during the lifetime of John as Titus, the Roman general, came and besieged Jerusalem and overran rebellious Jerusalem, burning the temple to the ground.
Tradition informs us that the flames were so intense that the gold and silver adorning the temple melted and ran between the cracks. The only thing left standing in Jerusalem, dating back as a portion of the western wall, most often referred to as the wailing wall, where Orthodox Jews come to this day, in fact day after day after day, especially on the Sabbath, and they stand before that wall and they pray this, and I quote, may it be thy will that the temple be speedily rebuilt in our time. That temple has not been rebuilt. John's being told to go measure a temple that's been rebuilt. We know from Revelation, as we'll look later, that there is a millennial temple in all of its glory, not just the naos, but the temple courtyard is built.
So what we have then is in between Herod's and the millennial kingdom's temple, a fourth temple. John sees a temple that was reconstructed in Jerusalem, perhaps just prior to, and certainly now lasting through the tribulation period. In fact, we know that the antichrist is the one who initiates the rebuilding of this naos, this holy place and holy of holies. It's his desire to be viewed as God. He sets the Jewish nation up with his false peace, rebuilds this portion of the temple, but then, as we know, in a fit of rage and jealousy and blasphemy, he will desecrate that temple, much like Antiochus Epiphanes did centuries early, by sacrificing a pig on that altar, thus making that temple null and void, can never be used again.
In fact, Paul clearly speaks of the antichrist's blasphemy and the idolatry built around him to the Thessalonians in 2 Thessalonians 2, and I read, The man of lawlessness will be revealed, the son of destruction that is the antichrist, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, and he takes his seat in the naos, the temple of God, displaying himself as being God. Here you find John being commanded to measure the tribulation temple, which will have a very short lifespan. He is literally to measure the holy place, the naos, which included the holy of holies.
Now, evidently, this wasn't an effort to determine its physical dimensions, because we're not even given them. This was an act that signified ownership. God is measuring out this spot, and the worshipping ones, predominantly Jews, we would believe within its naos, within this property. If you have any doubt, you do this yourself, if you have any doubt about your property line, you're concerned that your neighbor is cutting more grass than he should.
Right? You call the surveyor and he comes out and he measures your property and drives down the stakes that have been lost, and you're able to tell your neighbor you're taking care of way too much lawn, let me do that, that's actually my property. What's happening here is the same thing. This is ownership. God is saying, this really is my property, designated for my people for a special purpose yet to be seen. Now, I want you to notice something very interesting. Obviously, this is stunning news to John.
There's a temple. He sees it. He had seen the other one destroyed.
Now he's told to go and measure this one. God's promises are certainly going to come true with this tribulation and his own revelation of that tribulation period, but there is obviously then going to be a Jewish people that still care. There's the implication of a Jewish state. A literal temple will be marked out here with a literal measuring reed in a literal city of Jerusalem, as we'll see in a little bit.
But now I want you to notice even more significantly an omission by John. God tells John not to measure something else. Look at verse 2. Leave out the court which is outside the temple. Do not measure that, for it has been given to the nations and they will tread underfoot the holy city that is Jerusalem for 42 months or literally three and a half years. Now this court outside the temple represents the court of the Gentiles, the court to which Gentiles have access. And the command of God to John is not to measure this outer court.
In fact, it is designated in the Greek language as something outside of God's favor. You could understand it literally to have been abandoned by God, even though it's still on the temple mount. This omission has become even more fascinating in light of the findings of archaeologists in our lifetime.
In fact, just in the last few decades. Let me explain. Have you ever wondered how the tribulation temple could be rebuilt on the temple mount? If you were to visit the temple mount, what you would find is anything but a Jewish temple, right? You would find Islam's, one of Islam's most famous and most sacred sites to their religion, a Muslim mosque and a shrine called the Dome of the Rock.
It's in all of the postcards and all of the pictures with its shiny dome. Muslims believe this is the cornerstone of creation. They believe under that dome is the place where Abraham offered or nearly offered up his son, although they believe it was Ishmael and not Isaac. And they also believe that from that very spot, their prophet Muhammad ascended to heaven without dying. And so that is to them a most sacred spot. In fact, since 691 AD, this Dome of the Rock, with now its golden brilliance sort of just shining in the Middle Eastern sun, has stood on the temple mount, which is the sacred place for the Jews.
This 35-acre plot of ground. Now John sees a reconstructed temple for Jewish worship on the temple mount. And furthermore, its claim to legitimacy, as all of the previous temples, its claim to legitimacy is that the Holy of Holies is on the very spot of Solomon's Holy of Holies and that original temple. Well, how do you get Jews to rebuild the sanctuary on the temple mount without World War III taking place? I mean, for 2,000 years, Jews and Muslims and Christians have been slaughtered in their attempts to control that little plot of land. And even today, that's the most famous 35 acres on the planet, and world attention is still focused on it, isn't it? You don't mess with that land.
And that's a political hot potato if there ever was one. How will the Antichrist ever bring about peace and allow the Jews to rebuild this temporary sanctuary? Well, with the help of archaeologists and surveyors, there is good reason to believe that the Muslim's dome of the Rock is not on the actual spot of the Neas, the sanctuary which housed the Holy of Holies. That spot, according to one engineer and many others, this one particular one who has really passionately pursued this by the name of Asher Kaufman and others with him, says that that actual spot is literally 100 yards north of the dome, still on the temple mount, but not where the dome of the Rock sits. There are numerous scholarly findings.
In fact, I spent time this week researching the drawings of Kaufman and his topographical maps to see what he and his teams and other teams and engineers have accomplished. As faithful Jews committed to Jerusalem, there are now numerous scholarly findings to give serious doubt to the fact that the dome of the Rock is actually sitting on the site of the original Holy of Holies. And if this research is correct, you could easily see your way to a Middle Eastern solution, or at least a partial solution, right? The Jews could have their sanctuary rebuilt, the holy place and the Holy of Holies, without having to tear down the Muslim's sacred site.
I mean, you see the bumper stickers coexist, and that's what the world is rushing toward, and that will be the message of the Antichrist, and he will make it happen there on that temple mount. But even with that in mind, there is still a problem. If the reconstructed temple would have the ability to build out those courtyards, the courtyard surrounding the temple would encompass the Dome of the Rock.
Then you're back to the same problem. How interesting it is here that John in Revelation 11 is told, you don't have to measure the area outside the naos. You don't have to measure the courtyard because verse 2 says, that has been dedicated to the Gentiles.
That's already been given to the unbelievers. So the tribulation temple, which houses the Holy of Holies, which John will measure, isn't going to measure anything else built beyond that, and that will be part of the Antichrist's strategy to bring peace to the Middle East, although it will be temporary. Today, committed Jews are involved in organizations such as the Temple Institute.
In fact, even as we speak, they're involved in weaving clothing for priests to wear. Jewelers and artisans are recrafting, according to the specifications given in the Old Testament, the vessels of silver and gold for that day when temple worship is to begin. You may remember reading about a year ago the hubbub when somebody tried to lay the cornerstone for the naos.
Are you talking about World War III? It will happen until this day, probably with the revelation or at least the belief that in fact the naos isn't where the Dome of the Rock is currently located. Right now, ladies and gentlemen, men are being trained in Levitical rituals, according to the Old Testament systems of sacrifice and worship. It's interesting to me to think that we're living in a generation where plans and preparations for a functioning Jewish temple although temporary, albeit not the temple that we would consider the temple, of course, of the millennial kingdom, but here they are preparing and planning, awaiting, as it were, the world's permission, the world's permission to build. And we know from scripture that that permission will be given to them by an amazing peacemaker, the Antichrist, who will make it happen. Now, when John sees in Revelation 11 this temple sanctuary and he measures it, by this time it has already been desecrated by the Antichrist.
It's a place where Jews are gathering, no doubt, but it is without the potential of genuine and true sacrifice, certainly because it has been desecrated by the Antichrist and is fit of rage and jealousy. So in this latter three and a half year period, God stations two rather unusual witnesses. And these witnesses are going to testify to the gospel of God, the Antichrist's coming doom, and the doom of the world that dares to follow this false messiah.
So that is an introduction. Let's look at verse three. And I will grant authority to my two witnesses and they will prophesy for 1260 days, or literally three and a half years, clothed in sackcloth. These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth. Now, the same symbolic terminology appears in Zachariah 4 where olive trees are dipping their oil as if there's a continual flow into a lampstand as a witness to Israel in Zachariah's day. Oil is a consistent reference in the Bible to the spirit of God and since the oil here is directly connected to the lampstands in Zachariah and in Revelation, the testimony of the witnesses have great spirit power and it will not go out until their time is up. In fact, it is the often quoted text in Zachariah related to this particular image we're given here in Revelation that refers to spirit empowered witnessing and being a testimony. Of course, in our day, to what we know as the gospel of Jesus Christ and this is the text that's often quoted.
It's related to this context. Not by might, nor by power, but by my what? Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts, Zachariah 4.6. Never will that be more clearly applied than in the lives of these two indestructible witnesses empowered uniquely by God's spirit. So who are they?
We don't know. There's not a verse that tells us, which gives us good reason to spend a lot of time guessing, right? Well, really, we can put together some clues to come up with these two men and I believe personally that they are Elijah and Moses simply because of what God will have them do. Some believe it might be Elijah and Enoch because those two men never died, although we know from scripture that many people who never die enter the eternal state from the tribulation into the kingdom and from the kingdom into the eternal state. I think they're Elijah and Moses. Like Moses, as we'll see, they have the power to turn water into blood.
God gives them this power to touch the earth with plagues. Like Elijah, they have the ability to call down fire, as it were. In fact, here it's literally coming from their mouths and that sounds a lot like Elijah. You may remember back in the Kings and Chronicles where that delegation came from a rebellious king. They found Elijah sitting up on a hill and the delegation of soldiers came up to him and the leader said, The king wants to see you, O godly man. And Elijah says, Well, if I'm a godly man, let fire come down and incinerate you.
And fire comes down and incinerates them. So the king sends another delegation. The second delegation comes, the leader goes up the hill and he says, Elijah, O man of God, the king wants to see you.
Come now. And Elijah says, If I'm a man of God, let fire come down from heaven and incinerate you. And they're incinerated. A third delegation comes, by now you're thinking, How slow is this king? A third delegation comes and that leader crawls up the hill and says, O Elijah, man of God, I know it's happened before, please, don't do it to me. God tells Elijah to go with him. Well, here you have these witnesses.
In fact, look at verse five in the description. If anyone wants to harm them, fire flows out of their mouth and devours their enemies. How's that for a witnessing technique? If anyone wants to harm them, he will be killed in this way. These have the power to shut up the sky so that rain will not fall during the days of their prophesying, which we're told was literally three and a half years, and they have power over the waters to turn them into blood and to strike the earth with every plague as often as they desire.
Now you can only imagine how they will be hated by the world. We'll come back tomorrow and learn more about these witnesses. And Stephen will further challenge us regarding the fact that just as God sends those two witnesses to that future generation, he sent us to our present generation to share the light and life of the gospel. Thanks for joining us today here on Wisdom for the Heart.
This is part one of a message called George Street, Your Street. As I said, Stephen will bring you the conclusion to this message next time. If you haven't already, I encourage you to sign up for Friends of Wisdom, a free membership designed to help you grow in your faith. Each week, on Tuesday, Stephen sends out an email packed with biblical insights, encouragement, and answers to questions that he's received from others.
I suspect that many of the questions are the very same ones you've been wondering about. As a member, you'll also receive our free resource of the month. These are carefully selected to help you walk wisely in your spiritual journey. It's a wonderful way to stay connected and to keep growing. Joining Friends of Wisdom is completely free and very simple. All you need to do is visit wisdomonline.org forward slash friends. You'll fill out a brief form and then you'll start receiving these valuable resources. As a special gift for signing up, you'll get two of Stephen's most popular booklets immediately. Blessed Assurance helps believers find confidence in their salvation. You'll also receive the booklet, The Coming Tribulation, which answers common questions about the end times. If you've ever wondered about these important topics, now's your chance to get these resources. Signing up is quick and easy. Just visit wisdomonline.org forward slash friends. Join us back here next time for the conclusion of today's message. Thank you.
