WEBVTT

00:00:06.460 --> 00:00:11.200
In chains I was bound, I was a madman on the run

00:00:12.090 --> 00:00:17.120
Through the hills I wandered, I was running from the sun

00:00:18.200 --> 00:00:23.360
But truth found me there, it was in my darkest hour

00:00:23.820 --> 00:00:29.400
I traded my black heart for joy, for something real, something with power

00:00:31.160 --> 00:00:48.420
Truth set me free. Truth came to me. I once was blind and now I see. Truth set me free. Oh, oh, truth set me free.

00:00:48.420 --> 00:00:54.420
Oh, oh, truth set me free.

00:00:58.280 --> 00:01:03.700
Welcome to Tell the Truth, a weekly podcast about faith, current events, and life in general.

00:01:04.080 --> 00:01:10.280
Brought to you from Mountain View Baptist Church, live every Monday night at 6 p.m. Central Time.

00:01:11.540 --> 00:01:16.320
And welcome back this week. We are so glad to be back after having a couple of weeks off.

00:01:17.720 --> 00:01:24.700
It's kind of nice to do all the things that we needed to do with our families and all that stuff, but it's good to be back.

00:01:25.860 --> 00:01:29.020
So we'll get kicked off pretty quick tonight.

00:01:29.150 --> 00:01:29.980
But how are you doing tonight?

00:01:30.500 --> 00:01:31.220
Doing great, brother.

00:01:31.440 --> 00:01:31.940
Doing great.

00:01:32.400 --> 00:01:34.060
Had a good weekend.

00:01:35.700 --> 00:01:40.560
For the most part, the grandbaby was on vacation with mom and dad.

00:01:41.170 --> 00:01:43.360
So we didn't get to see the grandbaby this week.

00:01:43.530 --> 00:01:45.140
But she's coming home right now.

00:01:45.730 --> 00:01:48.620
And as soon as we get done with this podcast tonight, I'm going to be.

00:01:48.780 --> 00:01:50.060
You're going to be spending time with the grandbaby.

00:01:50.080 --> 00:01:51.780
Loving on that grandbaby for a little bit.

00:01:52.210 --> 00:01:52.320
Yeah.

00:01:52.820 --> 00:01:53.420
Well, awesome.

00:01:53.700 --> 00:01:53.880
Awesome.

00:01:54.300 --> 00:01:55.800
And Brother Dennis is out.

00:01:55.980 --> 00:01:57.980
He's getting a little family time in this week.

00:01:58.110 --> 00:02:00.500
So we're grateful he gets to do that.

00:02:00.660 --> 00:02:02.300
I'm glad he got to go spend time with him.

00:02:04.039 --> 00:02:06.920
And we are starting their study on Revelation tonight.

00:02:07.340 --> 00:02:08.840
So we're going to be diving in really quick.

00:02:08.910 --> 00:02:12.740
I do want to quickly touch on a fun little something that came up.

00:02:13.210 --> 00:02:16.200
And this has been brewing for a couple of months, but it came up this week.

00:02:18.120 --> 00:02:20.740
Audible is a very interesting thing.

00:02:20.740 --> 00:02:22.020
I don't know if you know, they're owned by Amazon.

00:02:22.560 --> 00:02:34.880
And so they have this thing where they've just recently launched this new program where for, I think it's $8 a month, you have a select library of books and you just listen to as many of them as you want.

00:02:35.060 --> 00:02:37.060
And it's great.

00:02:37.180 --> 00:02:41.740
And they've upped the amount of money they give to their authors.

00:02:41.940 --> 00:02:48.460
So if you have a book that's on Audible, the author gets a larger percentage of it compared to what they used to get.

00:02:49.220 --> 00:03:02.220
But it turns out the way they give them the larger percentage is they actually take, you would assume that any money you spend on a book goes to the audio book you bought, right?

00:03:02.260 --> 00:03:03.520
I mean, that makes sense to me.

00:03:04.660 --> 00:03:05.980
No, no, it does not.

00:03:06.420 --> 00:03:24.140
In fact, they split that money between if you happen to listen to one of the free books or one of the books that's included in their low plan and you spend a credit on one of the paid books that's not on the plan, the total amount of money you spent is split between the two.

00:03:25.320 --> 00:03:30.640
So they are getting a larger percentage of a significantly lower amount of money.

00:03:32.599 --> 00:03:35.600
And some people have gotten a little, you know, they're talking to them.

00:03:35.660 --> 00:03:37.440
They're like, hey, this is not quite right.

00:03:38.080 --> 00:03:47.600
And I had to laugh because all of the authors that got upset about this, I mean, if you replace Audible with a government, that's how socialism works.

00:03:48.540 --> 00:03:51.260
And all the authors are very big fans of socialism.

00:03:51.580 --> 00:03:54.540
But when it hit their pocketbooks, they're real upset about it.

00:03:55.070 --> 00:03:56.260
They don't like it too much.

00:03:57.700 --> 00:03:59.920
So they're talking about the evils of capitalism.

00:04:00.120 --> 00:04:01.960
I'm like, no, that's literally socialism, guys.

00:04:02.240 --> 00:04:03.860
So that was kind of interesting.

00:04:03.970 --> 00:04:19.519
But I do recommend if you buy audio books, find somewhere other than Audible to purchase them because they do pay their if somebody took the time to write a book and the actors that put it out there and took the time to narrate it and stuff, they get paid very low from Audible.

00:04:20.200 --> 00:04:24.620
They're the largest marketplace and they pay peanuts compared to pretty much all the rest of them.

00:04:24.650 --> 00:04:26.720
And the books cost about the same either way.

00:04:27.540 --> 00:04:32.000
So I do recommend if you're doing that kind, just go searching on the internet.

00:04:32.080 --> 00:04:34.460
You can find about 50 other places that sell audiobooks.

00:04:34.560 --> 00:04:35.580
It's the same audiobook.

00:04:36.880 --> 00:04:41.240
Yeah, Audible has some exclusives, but if it's one of their exclusives, yeah, go buy it from them.

00:04:41.500 --> 00:04:41.820
Why not?

00:04:42.100 --> 00:04:45.440
But most of the others, at least, a lot of them, you can even get the books.

00:04:46.780 --> 00:04:49.680
There's no DRM or anything on it, so you don't have to have a special program plate.

00:04:49.680 --> 00:04:50.760
You just download it and save it.

00:04:51.440 --> 00:04:55.940
And as long as you keep that copy somewhere, you can burn it to a CD or whatever, you've got it forever.

00:04:56.480 --> 00:05:00.780
Versus Audible, if they ever decide that you don't have it anymore, they can just take it from you.

00:05:01.720 --> 00:05:06.940
So, yeah, that was an interesting thing from the past couple of weeks and has been slowly brewing up.

00:05:07.100 --> 00:05:19.060
So I hope to see some of that stuff getting fixed because I really like to – I hate the thought that some of these great, very good authors are not getting paid really like they should.

00:05:19.080 --> 00:05:27.460
And I'm like, man, if you're doing that for a living, if that's how you feed your family, that's kind of rough to be to know that you're just getting nothing for it but peanuts.

00:05:28.100 --> 00:05:31.280
So I really hope that that some folks can stay on that.

00:05:31.420 --> 00:05:33.060
Brandon Sanderson's doing a lot for it.

00:05:33.560 --> 00:05:41.980
If you've never read any of his stuff, he completed the Wheel of Time after Robert Jordan passed away, picked it up from him the last like three or four books.

00:05:42.800 --> 00:05:43.480
Sanderson wrote it.

00:05:44.360 --> 00:05:49.220
And, you know, he's always, you know, he always said that, you know, Robert wrote the book.

00:05:49.330 --> 00:05:54.880
He just put the words down, you know, because the guy had everything planned out for him and and had it good enough.

00:05:54.990 --> 00:05:57.220
He could go back to his notes and go, oh, here's what I need to do.

00:05:57.310 --> 00:05:59.140
So, you know, that was his literal.

00:05:59.730 --> 00:06:04.740
That was one of the first books he ever wrote was finishing one of the largest 14 book series.

00:06:05.720 --> 00:06:06.880
And he tied it up.

00:06:07.100 --> 00:06:08.520
And that was insane.

00:06:08.820 --> 00:06:13.920
And he did a Kickstarter year before last because of some of the Audible stuff and said, OK.

00:06:14.660 --> 00:06:18.300
they think that we can't do it on our own and he just went out and said i'm doing a kickstarter

00:06:18.520 --> 00:06:24.080
and uh by the way depending on how many how much money i raise on it i'll release you know i have

00:06:24.080 --> 00:06:30.040
all these stretch goals he ended up writing like 30 books in the course of like a summer

00:06:31.640 --> 00:06:36.200
and i mean now most of them he had he he did admit he's like okay most of these i've had

00:06:36.520 --> 00:06:42.419
you know swirling around up here for a few years but it was literally he just during it was right

00:06:42.440 --> 00:06:48.720
after covid and he said you know i had nothing to do so i just sat down and wrote and and when i say

00:06:48.740 --> 00:06:54.300
he made money he made good money like i mean that kickstarter went beyond what he ever like he had a

00:06:54.480 --> 00:07:00.040
goal and it blew it out of the water because people were like yeah okay i'll give you 30 40 bucks or

00:07:00.160 --> 00:07:05.660
100 bucks or 200 some people went in here's two thousand dollars and i'm like good lord people

00:07:06.000 --> 00:07:11.059
wow so he he did a very good job on that and really that's the only reason audible finally

00:07:11.080 --> 00:07:12.240
They said, hey, we're going to pay more.

00:07:12.880 --> 00:07:17.240
So, yeah, I really hope those guys can do that because it affects the secular authors.

00:07:17.360 --> 00:07:19.600
It affects the Christian authors that have books on there.

00:07:19.960 --> 00:07:21.820
And I don't like that.

00:07:22.060 --> 00:07:25.460
I want to make sure people can at least put food on the table.

00:07:26.740 --> 00:07:30.600
But other than that, no major news, which is how I like it.

00:07:30.640 --> 00:07:31.880
I like having no news.

00:07:32.120 --> 00:07:32.880
No news is good news.

00:07:33.040 --> 00:07:33.360
That's right.

00:07:33.720 --> 00:07:36.420
And tonight, Revelation.

00:07:36.940 --> 00:07:37.060
Yeah.

00:07:37.100 --> 00:07:44.900
So we're going to start talking about the end times and the scary, scary things that it talks about in the book.

00:07:44.970 --> 00:07:45.080
Right.

00:07:45.340 --> 00:07:48.700
These are things that we we got to worry about because we're going to be here.

00:07:48.760 --> 00:07:50.160
We're going to experience every bit of this.

00:07:50.320 --> 00:07:50.440
Right.

00:07:50.660 --> 00:07:52.160
And and go through it all.

00:07:52.460 --> 00:07:55.860
And I mean, we got to know, you know, what to be ready for.

00:07:56.620 --> 00:07:56.900
Yep.

00:07:57.380 --> 00:07:58.020
No, we're not.

00:08:00.360 --> 00:08:03.840
No, but but but we can share that.

00:08:04.540 --> 00:08:13.440
These things with the rest of the world and maybe those who haven't opened the book of Revelation and seen the things that are to come.

00:08:14.100 --> 00:08:21.440
For those who don't know Christ Jesus, yes, they will face the things that we're going to be studying in the next few months probably.

00:08:23.400 --> 00:08:26.320
So yeah, and we're going to start out in Revelation 1.

00:08:27.940 --> 00:08:36.320
And again, I want to be clear, if you are saved and you know Jesus Christ, the next big event that you're going to see is the rapture of the church.

00:08:36.740 --> 00:08:38.960
And we're going to be out of here before this thing starts.

00:08:39.659 --> 00:08:48.480
And that's really why we're before we get deep into all the happenings of the book of Revelation.

00:08:48.980 --> 00:08:51.540
The first three chapters is to the church.

00:08:52.260 --> 00:08:53.940
It's just to believers.

00:08:54.880 --> 00:09:03.560
And we see this John, the Revelator, writes these things down, the visions that he had, the information that he was given.

00:09:04.000 --> 00:09:11.040
And he writes these things down that the church might read them, might look at them, might compare them to themselves,

00:09:11.600 --> 00:09:15.940
because we'll also get into some judgment of the churches, the seven churches.

00:09:18.120 --> 00:09:27.120
And you can, you know, if you're a churchgoer, maybe you can look at these seven as we study them and say, okay, I can see, yeah, our church is there.

00:09:27.350 --> 00:09:28.180
Our church is here.

00:09:28.310 --> 00:09:30.340
Our church, maybe our church is there, you know.

00:09:30.720 --> 00:09:34.580
And there's some comparisons and there's some things that you'll see in that.

00:09:35.550 --> 00:09:38.040
But, man, the book of Revelation is a wonderful book.

00:09:38.720 --> 00:09:47.160
It is a book where, and we'll talk about this, but those who are reading it can be blessed by it.

00:09:47.340 --> 00:10:00.820
And so, so, yeah, it's one of those things that, you know, I heard, I don't remember a long time ago, because there is a lot of disagreement among Christians about how, you know, what parts of it are we going to see?

00:10:00.940 --> 00:10:02.020
Is it going to be 100%?

00:10:02.350 --> 00:10:02.840
None of it.

00:10:03.150 --> 00:10:09.960
Is it going to be, ah, well, we'll see a little bit of it or we'll see things as it goes in that's going to be leading into this and we'll at least see part of that.

00:10:10.740 --> 00:10:20.240
And I remember somebody one time said, look, at the end of the day, even if we were going to be here from all of it, the one thing that it makes very 100 percent clear is if you're gods, you're gods.

00:10:20.480 --> 00:10:23.060
Christ is coming back to protect his own.

00:10:23.820 --> 00:10:27.780
And there's nothing for us as the church to actually worry about.

00:10:28.070 --> 00:10:37.360
So even and I say that just because I know that we probably do have some people listening that that maybe your church does teach that we're going to be here for all or part of it.

00:10:38.400 --> 00:10:44.900
it's still nothing to be scared of because the things that we have to do are the same things, whether we're going to be here or not.

00:10:45.020 --> 00:10:49.780
Yeah. And don't don't turn us off. This this is from a pre millennial point of view.

00:10:50.060 --> 00:10:54.400
OK, a pre triad. OK, that are a pre triad point of view.

00:10:54.500 --> 00:10:56.780
That's that's that's where we're bringing this information from.

00:10:56.870 --> 00:11:04.280
And I'll back that up with scripture. But but listen, again, you don't have to agree 100 percent with everything that we're saying here.

00:11:04.440 --> 00:11:05.300
We just want you to listen.

00:11:05.980 --> 00:11:08.860
Maybe you'll hear some things and gain some knowledge that you didn't have,

00:11:08.880 --> 00:11:10.860
and maybe you'll say, that guy's an idiot.

00:11:11.440 --> 00:11:14.420
I'm going to stick with what I already know, but that's okay, too.

00:11:15.540 --> 00:11:17.080
But let's dive in together.

00:11:17.300 --> 00:11:17.780
Let's dive in.

00:11:17.900 --> 00:11:20.180
We're going to take this verse by verse.

00:11:21.740 --> 00:11:27.720
I've been through Revelation two times in the 19 years that I've been at Mountain View

00:11:28.180 --> 00:11:29.860
on our Wednesday night Bible study,

00:11:30.900 --> 00:11:44.200
And it always ends up being one of the most interesting studies that we've ever had because of all the questions, because of all the unknown, because of all the sometimes misunderstanding of this book.

00:11:45.460 --> 00:11:50.080
And so we've had a good time diving in when we have.

00:11:50.080 --> 00:11:51.520
And that's what we want to do with you.

00:11:51.580 --> 00:11:52.520
We want to dive in.

00:11:52.900 --> 00:11:54.280
We want you to go along with us.

00:11:54.440 --> 00:11:54.540
Okay.

00:11:54.960 --> 00:11:55.780
So here we go.

00:11:56.800 --> 00:11:57.100
Let's go.

00:11:57.679 --> 00:11:58.480
Verse one.

00:11:59.120 --> 00:12:07.320
The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him to show unto his servants things that must shortly come to pass.

00:12:08.300 --> 00:12:13.720
And he sent and signified it by his angel unto the servant John.

00:12:14.520 --> 00:12:17.380
And so John gets this revelation, right?

00:12:18.480 --> 00:12:22.140
And let's be clear, it's revelation, not revelations.

00:12:22.660 --> 00:12:27.620
I know we hear that a lot, even see it written a lot, but this is one revelation.

00:12:27.920 --> 00:12:32.440
Revelation is the title of the book, and there is one solid revelation here.

00:12:32.860 --> 00:12:38.800
It is in the Greek, the apocalypsis, of course, where we get our word apocalypse.

00:12:39.660 --> 00:12:44.000
And really what it is, it's the uncovering or the unveiling of Jesus Christ, okay?

00:12:44.660 --> 00:12:49.300
This whole book is about Jesus, and especially this last part here.

00:12:49.370 --> 00:12:51.740
This is about Jesus wins, okay?

00:12:52.130 --> 00:12:53.740
He wins in the end.

00:12:53.760 --> 00:13:05.920
And so if you'll stay with us on that and you'll keep that mindset, no matter all these other things that may be happening or going on or whatever, Jesus has already won.

00:13:06.080 --> 00:13:07.500
Okay, he's already won this thing.

00:13:07.940 --> 00:13:29.060
But to show, he says this in that first verse, to show unto his servants, to show John is instructed in Revelation 22, 10, not to seal the sayings or the prophecy of this book for the time is at hand.

00:13:29.390 --> 00:13:32.220
Now, we're going to go back later on and we're going to read in the book of Daniel.

00:13:32.300 --> 00:13:37.640
And when we get into the book of Daniel, Daniel was instructed to seal the book up.

00:13:38.050 --> 00:13:38.180
Okay.

00:13:39.300 --> 00:13:43.260
And John is instructed to reveal the book.

00:13:43.420 --> 00:13:44.160
It's a revelation.

00:13:45.520 --> 00:13:54.900
And so we're in the church age now, and all these mysteries that were before are now being revealed or have been revealed in the word of God.

00:13:55.120 --> 00:13:57.580
So we've got to look at that and keep that in mind.

00:13:58.720 --> 00:14:06.400
Verse two, who bear record of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ and all the things that he saw?

00:14:07.400 --> 00:14:08.120
Who bears record?

00:14:08.280 --> 00:14:12.840
Well, John projects himself to where his readers are.

00:14:13.240 --> 00:14:17.980
He projects himself to our day, to the church age.

00:14:18.060 --> 00:14:20.120
That's where he's bringing this from.

00:14:20.640 --> 00:14:23.220
And then he looks back to his writing.

00:14:23.720 --> 00:14:28.140
Now, when it says of the word of God, this refers to Christ.

00:14:28.360 --> 00:14:31.640
And it refers to the contents of this book.

00:14:31.800 --> 00:14:38.080
And when I say we're going to break this down, we're breaking this down verse by verse and really word by word or words by word.

00:14:39.200 --> 00:14:41.820
But of the testimony, what does that mean, the testimony?

00:14:42.220 --> 00:14:43.800
A testimony is a witness, right?

00:14:44.160 --> 00:14:48.500
Somebody who's seen it, somebody who was there, they're able to describe what they saw.

00:14:49.140 --> 00:14:50.940
That's what we've got in the Gospels, right?

00:14:51.060 --> 00:14:52.700
We read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

00:14:53.160 --> 00:15:01.280
We've got four accounts or four testimonies of these witnesses that actually saw what was going on.

00:15:01.520 --> 00:15:05.260
They saw Jesus as he fed the 5,000.

00:15:05.300 --> 00:15:12.200
They saw Jesus as he worked these miracles and raised the dead and fed the multitudes

00:15:12.740 --> 00:15:15.140
and made the blind to see and the lame to walk.

00:15:15.660 --> 00:15:19.920
that they were with him as he went to the cross,

00:15:20.050 --> 00:15:22.080
or they watched him from afar, some of them,

00:15:22.720 --> 00:15:24.180
as he went to the cross and died.

00:15:25.280 --> 00:15:29.440
And then when he rose from the grave, they actually got to see Jesus.

00:15:29.980 --> 00:15:35.240
These men were witnesses of what Jesus done.

00:15:35.330 --> 00:15:37.640
And so this is what John is looking at.

00:15:37.940 --> 00:15:41.280
He is a witness to all these things, these visions that he has.

00:15:42.180 --> 00:15:50.080
Of all that he saw, the Bible says there in verse 2, this is what John saw with his actual eyes, right?

00:15:50.280 --> 00:15:54.900
I mean, when it says he saw it, it means he saw it with his eyes.

00:15:55.420 --> 00:15:56.100
It's amazing.

00:15:56.500 --> 00:15:58.140
And Tyler, you want to jump in here?

00:15:58.140 --> 00:16:05.140
I started to say I love the New English translation of this because the way they combine these two verses,

00:16:06.420 --> 00:16:11.040
the revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants, which must happen very soon.

00:16:11.280 --> 00:16:12.400
What must happen very soon.

00:16:12.820 --> 00:16:22.380
He made it clear by sending his angel to his servant, John, who then testified to everything he saw concerning the word of God and the testimony about Jesus Christ.

00:16:22.720 --> 00:16:29.440
Because ultimately that is all of John's writings, not just the book of Revelation, but especially this one.

00:16:29.580 --> 00:16:36.380
He is giving testimony of this is what I saw concerning the word of God, which is Christ.

00:16:36.940 --> 00:16:41.140
And so I'm testifying about everything about Christ and everything that I experienced there.

00:16:41.480 --> 00:16:45.800
And, oh, by the way, I'm going to tell you about all these things that I saw.

00:16:45.960 --> 00:16:48.840
And he told me to write down and he told me some things not to write down.

00:16:49.080 --> 00:16:52.760
And I'm going to testify about everything that I saw with my own eyes.

00:16:53.380 --> 00:16:56.540
And, you know, again, these, you know, it was a vision.

00:16:56.600 --> 00:16:57.580
It was something given to him.

00:16:57.600 --> 00:17:06.439
So a lot of the language and stuff as we get on into it, he's seeing these future events and he's having to describe them in a way that he can describe them.

00:17:06.680 --> 00:17:06.760
Yeah.

00:17:06.980 --> 00:17:09.740
So when he's describing some of this stuff, it sounds a little crazy.

00:17:10.500 --> 00:17:17.439
But, you know, hey, look, you know, we're at a point in the modern day where we can see easily how that stuff comes together.

00:17:17.780 --> 00:17:21.339
And some of what he says is completely literal and some of it is figurative.

00:17:21.920 --> 00:17:23.760
And how do we determine that?

00:17:23.760 --> 00:17:26.400
How do we decipher what's literal and what's figurative?

00:17:26.600 --> 00:17:31.600
Well, if it's literal, it will be it'll stand alone.

00:17:32.030 --> 00:17:34.480
OK, there won't be anything to discredit it.

00:17:34.700 --> 00:17:43.420
There won't be anything else but that verse or that particular group of words that describes what is happening there.

00:17:44.460 --> 00:17:47.600
But if it's figurative, then usually there'll be another verse.

00:17:47.600 --> 00:17:51.080
And we'll see an example of that if we get there tonight.

00:17:52.070 --> 00:17:57.760
But we'll see an example of that tonight on something that might be figurative or is figurative.

00:17:57.920 --> 00:18:00.760
So anyway, that's how you want to look at it, right?

00:18:01.360 --> 00:18:05.260
Are there other verses that say, okay, well, this is what that means?

00:18:05.570 --> 00:18:15.200
Can you go back to Daniel or Isaiah or Matthew 24 or some of these other things and see some of that and say, okay, this is what John is talking about?

00:18:15.720 --> 00:18:19.960
Or is it a verse that just stands alone and, okay, this is the way it is?

00:18:21.460 --> 00:18:22.200
Verse number three.

00:18:22.460 --> 00:18:23.800
One of my favorite verses.

00:18:24.070 --> 00:18:29.160
I was about to say we're about to hit one of my favorite verses in the book is this one right here.

00:18:29.220 --> 00:18:29.400
Yeah.

00:18:29.630 --> 00:18:29.740
Amen.

00:18:30.080 --> 00:18:30.300
Amen.

00:18:30.900 --> 00:18:36.320
Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, right?

00:18:36.500 --> 00:18:37.940
That's what I was talking about a minute ago.

00:18:38.430 --> 00:18:44.560
And keep those things which are written therein for the times at hand.

00:18:46.180 --> 00:18:52.620
Both those who read the book, both those who hear it or study it, they will be blessed.

00:18:52.900 --> 00:18:53.720
They will be blessed.

00:18:54.960 --> 00:18:58.300
There's a threefold blessing that we see here.

00:18:58.900 --> 00:19:00.540
And let me read the verse again to you.

00:19:00.900 --> 00:19:04.180
And I hope you got your Bibles out or got it on your phone or something.

00:19:04.230 --> 00:19:08.220
You're following along with us, and then you can mark the place where we stop at tonight.

00:19:09.280 --> 00:19:12.780
Blessed is he that readeth the book and hear the words of his prophecy

00:19:13.010 --> 00:19:16.360
and keep the things which are written therein for the times at hand.

00:19:16.720 --> 00:19:19.680
So here's the threefold blessing that we've got.

00:19:20.020 --> 00:19:21.660
We've got the blessing of reading.

00:19:22.000 --> 00:19:23.520
We've got the blessing of hearing.

00:19:23.890 --> 00:19:25.860
And we've got the blessing of keeping, right?

00:19:26.340 --> 00:19:28.760
We get to read it.

00:19:28.860 --> 00:19:31.600
It's been given to us on paper.

00:19:32.380 --> 00:19:36.360
We get to hear it if we're reading out loud or somebody's reading it to you.

00:19:36.920 --> 00:19:38.700
And then he says to keep that.

00:19:38.980 --> 00:19:40.500
Keep those words in your heart, right?

00:19:40.680 --> 00:19:41.500
That's what it is.

00:19:41.900 --> 00:19:46.480
And so verse 3, there's a threefold blessing in here.

00:19:47.460 --> 00:19:49.520
And he says, for the time is at hand.

00:19:50.700 --> 00:19:56.000
It really just means that once the church age began, the ball started rolling.

00:19:56.400 --> 00:19:57.900
Okay, things started happening.

00:19:58.300 --> 00:20:01.320
We don't look at these things at a rapid pace, but they are.

00:20:01.540 --> 00:20:02.820
They're happening at a rapid pace.

00:20:04.860 --> 00:20:08.220
And really, as far as the rapture of the church goes,

00:20:08.760 --> 00:20:13.720
there's no prophecies left to be revealed to keep Jesus from coming back.

00:20:13.860 --> 00:20:15.060
It could happen at any moment.

00:20:15.130 --> 00:20:16.280
It could happen at any time.

00:20:18.500 --> 00:20:20.120
So look at verse 4.

00:20:20.220 --> 00:20:22.440
John, to the seven churches which are in Asia,

00:20:23.160 --> 00:20:31.800
Grace be unto you and peace from him which is and which was and which is to come, and from the seven spirits which are before his throne.

00:20:33.000 --> 00:20:34.980
So we're going to talk about that for just a moment.

00:20:35.160 --> 00:20:40.460
But his audience, his audience was and is the church.

00:20:40.840 --> 00:20:41.000
Okay.

00:20:41.400 --> 00:20:43.940
That's who he's speaking to, those in the churches.

00:20:44.420 --> 00:20:52.220
And when he says grace and peace, it's the Greek word charis and shalom, right?

00:20:52.460 --> 00:20:54.340
grace and peace to you.

00:20:54.480 --> 00:20:56.840
That's what he's speaking to us.

00:20:58.100 --> 00:21:01.000
And then when it talks about, it describes Jesus,

00:21:01.150 --> 00:21:05.220
and it says he is, he was, and he is to come.

00:21:06.000 --> 00:21:12.059
Really, it means the eternity, the immutability, the unchanging God.

00:21:12.980 --> 00:21:14.000
That's who he is.

00:21:14.030 --> 00:21:15.820
He was, he is, and he is to come.

00:21:16.100 --> 00:21:17.300
He's always been.

00:21:17.960 --> 00:21:21.799
Probably one of the greatest mysteries that we have in the Bible

00:21:21.800 --> 00:21:25.920
that we will never be able to figure out, I don't think, in our human mind,

00:21:26.500 --> 00:21:28.460
is that God had no beginning and no end.

00:21:28.720 --> 00:21:30.540
Jesus had no beginning and has no end.

00:21:31.280 --> 00:21:38.960
For us in humanity to not be able to go back to a specific time,

00:21:39.060 --> 00:21:43.860
a specific date, a specific place where a birth took place,

00:21:44.040 --> 00:21:46.920
where a beginning took place, where that was created,

00:21:47.420 --> 00:21:49.700
But they've always been.

00:21:50.050 --> 00:21:56.000
The Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, they have always, always been.

00:21:56.260 --> 00:21:59.760
So it just describes his power.

00:22:00.080 --> 00:22:03.540
I mean, that this is an eternal being.

00:22:04.060 --> 00:22:05.640
But let me tell you this tonight.

00:22:06.240 --> 00:22:07.440
You are an eternal being.

00:22:08.320 --> 00:22:17.420
Every single person that is listening to me tonight and might hear this study, you are an eternal being.

00:22:18.440 --> 00:22:23.560
Now, the problem is or the issue is in where you're going to spend eternity, right?

00:22:23.700 --> 00:22:25.960
Because everybody's going to spend eternity somewhere.

00:22:26.820 --> 00:22:35.440
You'll either spend eternity in eternal punishment, in fire, in hell, or you'll spend eternity with Jesus.

00:22:35.980 --> 00:22:40.480
If you know him, if you've accepted him, you've trusted him as Lord and Savior.

00:22:41.360 --> 00:22:43.780
But the thing is that you are an eternal being.

00:22:44.540 --> 00:22:49.800
You know, one of the interesting things in that verse from a textual standpoint,

00:22:51.600 --> 00:22:54.760
from him which is and which was and which is to come,

00:22:55.340 --> 00:23:10.600
That which is, which is and which was, that combined phrase is the Greek version when Christ looked at them and said before God was, I am.

00:23:10.970 --> 00:23:17.140
That is exactly what this is, is and was combined together in emi, which was the Greek phrase.

00:23:17.210 --> 00:23:18.400
It's been emphatic.

00:23:19.040 --> 00:23:25.960
John here is being super, super emphatic and very much intentionally hearkening back to that, hey, Christ said this.

00:23:26.080 --> 00:23:26.400
That's right.

00:23:26.800 --> 00:23:28.840
He is hearkening back to that.

00:23:28.960 --> 00:23:34.880
And we do find times where even the disciples at some point said, I am so-and-so.

00:23:35.120 --> 00:23:36.900
And it's a very emphatic thing.

00:23:37.020 --> 00:23:41.420
But here, this reference is very intentional of going back to that.

00:23:41.620 --> 00:23:45.360
And the folks reading this at the time would have gone, hey, why did he use that word?

00:23:45.460 --> 00:23:50.560
And it was the same intentions, like you said, when he said before, Abraham was, I am.

00:23:51.320 --> 00:23:53.060
And he intentionally said that.

00:23:53.440 --> 00:23:57.140
And it was so offensive to the people that day, right?

00:23:57.240 --> 00:24:01.080
Because what Jesus was saying is, I am God in human flesh.

00:24:01.860 --> 00:24:05.040
He was lifting himself up to a deity.

00:24:05.640 --> 00:24:11.120
And it was offensive to them because they're like, no, no, you know, they didn't trust that.

00:24:11.200 --> 00:24:20.200
And it's amazing to me that both the ancient Hebrew language and the Greek language had this concept of a word that was so emphatic.

00:24:20.640 --> 00:24:28.760
It means not only that I am something, it means I always have been, I am currently and always will be something.

00:24:28.880 --> 00:24:29.160
That's right.

00:24:29.460 --> 00:24:31.620
And that is something that we lack in the English language.

00:24:32.800 --> 00:24:42.240
But back then, for some very strange reason, these two different ancient languages had this concept of something that was always and was eternal.

00:24:42.320 --> 00:24:45.360
And it was rarely used in certain.

00:24:45.660 --> 00:24:49.300
It was usually only used to be like, this is me.

00:24:49.980 --> 00:24:50.120
Stop.

00:24:50.940 --> 00:24:52.200
You're testifying in court.

00:24:53.000 --> 00:24:54.240
State your name for the record.

00:24:54.480 --> 00:24:55.560
It's that kind of a thing.

00:24:55.640 --> 00:24:58.400
It was this very emphatic, I want people to know who I am.

00:24:58.860 --> 00:25:08.520
Whereas when Christ suddenly throws this out without following it up with a name and then and here John throws it out in reference to Christ without following it up with a name.

00:25:08.720 --> 00:25:11.260
It's just the one who was and is and evermore will be.

00:25:11.310 --> 00:25:12.460
And it's like, wait, what?

00:25:13.200 --> 00:25:13.360
Great.

00:25:13.580 --> 00:25:13.900
I am.

00:25:14.240 --> 00:25:24.640
And the same thing when when, you know, the the the angel of the Lord was speaking to Moses out of the bush, you know, tell them I am the Lord your God.

00:25:24.900 --> 00:25:25.000
Yeah.

00:25:25.520 --> 00:25:30.660
I always was, I am now, and always will be the Lord your God.

00:25:30.820 --> 00:25:30.920
Yeah.

00:25:31.180 --> 00:25:32.640
Tell them I am sent me.

00:25:32.880 --> 00:25:33.300
Yeah.

00:25:33.580 --> 00:25:34.980
Tell them I am sent you.

00:25:35.240 --> 00:25:37.020
And it was such a strange thing.

00:25:37.120 --> 00:25:38.380
It's like, wait, what does he mean by that?

00:25:38.480 --> 00:25:38.600
Yeah.

00:25:38.780 --> 00:25:42.300
I mean, and that here again is that reference back to that.

00:25:42.340 --> 00:25:45.040
And it's such a beautiful thing that ties all that scripture together.

00:25:45.220 --> 00:25:45.720
It really is.

00:25:46.600 --> 00:25:47.300
I love that.

00:25:47.320 --> 00:25:47.880
I love that.

00:25:48.200 --> 00:25:48.320
Yeah.

00:25:49.519 --> 00:25:54.080
And then we end up in the last part of verse four, and it talks about the seven spirits,

00:25:54.380 --> 00:25:55.040
the seven spirits.

00:25:55.620 --> 00:25:57.600
Now, I don't want you to get caught up.

00:25:57.960 --> 00:26:02.060
So you might be saying, well, I thought there was one Holy Spirit, right?

00:26:02.150 --> 00:26:05.620
And is that demonic spirits besides the Holy Spirit?

00:26:05.620 --> 00:26:07.340
Well, there are demonic spirits out there.

00:26:07.750 --> 00:26:13.020
But when the Bible is speaking of the seven spirits, it's speaking of seven attributes of the Holy Spirit.

00:26:14.320 --> 00:26:20.320
That's a whole different night that we could get into that and talk about those attributes.

00:26:20.530 --> 00:26:21.700
But that's really what it is.

00:26:22.060 --> 00:26:25.380
It's seven spirits or seven attributes of the Holy Spirit.

00:26:26.180 --> 00:26:32.400
But we're going to see John's vision of a glorified Christ.

00:26:32.700 --> 00:26:33.940
That's what we're looking at here.

00:26:34.860 --> 00:26:38.880
Then he follows with the son of the Trinity, Jesus.

00:26:39.100 --> 00:26:45.200
We get to see his titles here in these next couple of verses, starting in verse 5.

00:26:45.960 --> 00:26:51.240
And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness and the first begotten of the dead,

00:26:51.720 --> 00:26:53.600
and the prince of the kings of the earth,

00:26:54.020 --> 00:26:57.620
unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood,

00:26:58.100 --> 00:27:02.040
and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father,

00:27:02.300 --> 00:27:05.760
to him be glory and dominion forever and ever.

00:27:06.080 --> 00:27:06.200
Amen.

00:27:07.080 --> 00:27:08.160
So let's say a few things here.

00:27:08.160 --> 00:27:09.740
I want you to see a few things here.

00:27:10.200 --> 00:27:12.520
Number one, he is called Jesus.

00:27:12.640 --> 00:27:15.120
These are names that were given for him.

00:27:15.920 --> 00:27:16.700
Faithful witness.

00:27:17.080 --> 00:27:19.060
He said it, and you can mark it down.

00:27:19.440 --> 00:27:19.560
Amen.

00:27:20.520 --> 00:27:22.240
Jesus is that faithful witness.

00:27:22.370 --> 00:27:25.400
When he says, this is what's going to happen, this is how it's going to happen,

00:27:25.880 --> 00:27:30.020
this is when it's going to happen, you can mark that down that it will not happen

00:27:30.350 --> 00:27:32.760
any other way besides the way that he sees it.

00:27:32.860 --> 00:27:34.660
So he is a faithful witness.

00:27:35.120 --> 00:27:36.680
He is the first begotten.

00:27:36.840 --> 00:27:38.760
Number two, he's the first begotten of the dead.

00:27:39.220 --> 00:27:43.120
He was the first to rise from the dead and never die again.

00:27:44.180 --> 00:27:46.080
We get to be next, right?

00:27:46.120 --> 00:27:51.740
We get to be the next group of people who will rise from the dead and never die again.

00:27:52.140 --> 00:27:57.900
If you go back and look at the miracles that were performed and the people that were brought back to life in the Bible,

00:27:58.420 --> 00:28:00.880
yes, they were brought back to life, but guess what happened?

00:28:01.620 --> 00:28:05.060
They also lived out their life and they died again, right?

00:28:06.040 --> 00:28:11.940
So Jesus was the first to rise from the grave and never go back to the grave again.

00:28:12.400 --> 00:28:17.180
The prince, he is the prince ruler of the kings of the earth.

00:28:18.200 --> 00:28:22.900
His position, this speaks of his position during the millennial reign.

00:28:23.820 --> 00:28:29.040
If you look at Philippians chapter 2 and verse 9, I'm going to look at my phone just for time's sake here.

00:28:29.480 --> 00:28:34.420
But Philippians chapter 2 and verse 9, I'm going to read down through verse number 11.

00:28:35.540 --> 00:28:41.660
Wherefore, God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name.

00:28:42.180 --> 00:28:44.600
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,

00:28:45.340 --> 00:28:49.120
of things in heaven and things of earth and things under the earth,

00:28:49.480 --> 00:28:55.520
and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

00:28:55.740 --> 00:28:59.960
So you see this position he has as king, right?

00:29:00.100 --> 00:29:01.120
He is a king.

00:29:01.450 --> 00:29:02.320
He is the king.

00:29:03.700 --> 00:29:07.060
And then it says, unto him that loved us.

00:29:07.280 --> 00:29:10.360
Again, we're speaking of Jesus here.

00:29:10.760 --> 00:29:15.460
This is his present tense position to the church right now, right?

00:29:15.880 --> 00:29:20.460
Unto him that loved us, the one that gave himself for us, the one that shed his blood for us,

00:29:20.600 --> 00:29:23.940
the one that died in our place, the one that paid our price.

00:29:24.120 --> 00:29:27.460
We talked about that yesterday, the propitiation for our sins.

00:29:28.120 --> 00:29:29.660
He's the atonement.

00:29:30.430 --> 00:29:36.280
There had to be a payment for your sin and for my sin, and Jesus Christ was the payment for that sin.

00:29:36.800 --> 00:29:38.540
There had to be a perfect sacrifice.

00:29:38.920 --> 00:29:40.780
No other sacrifice would do.

00:29:40.940 --> 00:29:46.540
We've been in the book of Hebrews on Wednesday night, and we've been talking about the priesthood of Jesus.

00:29:46.800 --> 00:29:51.160
We've been talking about that he is the only high priest, right?

00:29:52.140 --> 00:29:56.060
There is no need for another high priest, only Jesus.

00:29:56.230 --> 00:29:58.020
He done what no one else could do.

00:29:58.140 --> 00:30:01.500
He was able to die for our sins.

00:30:01.590 --> 00:30:03.180
He was able to give himself life.

00:30:03.620 --> 00:30:13.460
He was able to place his own blood on the mercy seat of the tabernacle in heaven that nothing could wipe it away, that nothing could undo what Jesus had done.

00:30:14.020 --> 00:30:17.520
And so he is the one who loved us enough to do that.

00:30:17.760 --> 00:30:21.620
And that is his present tense position to the church right now.

00:30:21.800 --> 00:30:23.160
That is that is who he is.

00:30:23.680 --> 00:30:31.360
And then the fifth one that we see here in these verses is that he has washed us from our sins in his own blood.

00:30:31.760 --> 00:30:34.000
He has washed us from our sins in his own blood.

00:30:34.440 --> 00:30:35.540
First Peter chapter one,

00:30:36.660 --> 00:30:37.640
verse 18 and 19.

00:30:38.140 --> 00:30:42.120
For as much as you know that you were not redeemed with corruptible things as

00:30:42.260 --> 00:30:46.460
silver and gold from your vain conversation received by tradition from your

00:30:46.640 --> 00:30:46.880
fathers,

00:30:47.380 --> 00:30:52.940
but with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish or spot.

00:30:53.200 --> 00:30:54.080
That's who he is.

00:30:54.160 --> 00:30:54.300
Amen.

00:30:54.580 --> 00:30:54.920
That's,

00:30:55.040 --> 00:30:56.160
that's what he's given us.

00:30:57.120 --> 00:30:57.360
All right.

00:30:57.500 --> 00:30:57.580
Then,

00:30:57.760 --> 00:31:00.080
then we see in the sixth thing here,

00:31:00.240 --> 00:31:05.880
kings and priests, really, he begins to talk about us there,

00:31:07.210 --> 00:31:13.160
and this should really be translated as a kingdom of priests,

00:31:13.700 --> 00:31:16.480
not necessarily us being kings.

00:31:16.480 --> 00:31:20.000
I think we get caught up in that sometimes and thinking we're royalty

00:31:20.430 --> 00:31:22.340
and we're really not.

00:31:23.130 --> 00:31:26.980
But what he is saying here, and the wording sometimes confuses us,

00:31:27.360 --> 00:31:32.320
But what he is saying here is when he says kings and priests is a kingdom of priests.

00:31:32.860 --> 00:31:33.900
We are never kings.

00:31:34.160 --> 00:31:37.680
There is only one king, and his name is Jesus.

00:31:37.920 --> 00:31:38.040
Amen.

00:31:38.300 --> 00:31:38.880
King Jesus.

00:31:39.440 --> 00:31:44.640
We will rule and reign with him, but he is and will always be king.

00:31:44.860 --> 00:31:49.360
So I don't want us to get confused in that and think that we hold some type of position

00:31:49.480 --> 00:31:50.100
that we don't.

00:31:51.160 --> 00:31:55.780
Now, the seventh thing that we see here is to him be glory and dominion, that phrase.

00:31:56.600 --> 00:32:06.260
this is is it represents what it represents is is an eternal rule and reign of jesus christ it is it

00:32:06.420 --> 00:32:13.960
is that once he once he begins to reign his his his kingdom will never go away his kingdom will

00:32:14.100 --> 00:32:21.160
never be defeated his kingdom will never be uh no one will even try to break it down no one will

00:32:21.210 --> 00:32:25.880
even try to come after it because uh by that time by the end of this whole thing we're going to

00:32:25.900 --> 00:32:28.280
going to see that there's going to be a new heaven.

00:32:28.460 --> 00:32:29.560
There's going to be a new earth.

00:32:29.610 --> 00:32:34.260
And we're going to see the construction of those things and the materials of these things.

00:32:34.370 --> 00:32:38.020
But the biggest thing that we're going to see there is that we're going to be with Jesus

00:32:38.280 --> 00:32:42.680
for throughout all eternity and nothing can touch us from then on.

00:32:43.080 --> 00:32:43.620
Isn't that wonderful?

00:32:44.020 --> 00:32:44.780
I love that.

00:32:45.140 --> 00:32:45.880
Yeah, man, I love that.

00:32:45.960 --> 00:32:47.660
And I love that.

00:32:48.760 --> 00:32:52.060
Oh, boy, I tell you that verse five going into that.

00:32:52.320 --> 00:33:00.540
Another reading of that is to the one who loved us and has set us free from our sins at the cost of his own blood.

00:33:00.880 --> 00:33:00.980
Yeah.

00:33:02.740 --> 00:33:07.560
And to think of that and that he has appointed us as a kingdom of priests.

00:33:07.780 --> 00:33:07.900
Yeah.

00:33:08.240 --> 00:33:14.560
That in our priesthood that we are part, that we are the kingdom that he is, that he has appointed us to.

00:33:14.700 --> 00:33:16.080
We are the people of the kingdom.

00:33:16.140 --> 00:33:19.180
And by the way, when we say that, that doesn't mean the kingdom of God is here now.

00:33:19.400 --> 00:33:19.780
That's right.

00:33:20.100 --> 00:33:20.520
Speak clear.

00:33:20.640 --> 00:33:20.920
Yes.

00:33:21.120 --> 00:33:23.020
I know that's a thing that floats around.

00:33:23.620 --> 00:33:24.660
We are part of that.

00:33:24.750 --> 00:33:27.020
We are the people of the kingdom.

00:33:27.150 --> 00:33:34.620
So it's just like when people would say it's the delineation between Israel, the nation, the country itself, and Israel, the people.

00:33:35.300 --> 00:33:36.900
We support the people of Israel.

00:33:37.200 --> 00:33:42.660
It doesn't mean we necessarily support the nation itself and everything they do, but we always support the people.

00:33:42.920 --> 00:33:43.400
Same thing here.

00:33:43.760 --> 00:33:49.260
The kingdom of God is a thing that God is going to bring to earth at some point, but it's not here now.

00:33:49.540 --> 00:33:50.960
We are the people of that kingdom.

00:33:50.980 --> 00:33:54.100
And I also love.

00:33:57.120 --> 00:33:57.960
Where was it?

00:33:57.960 --> 00:33:59.220
I saw it just a second ago.

00:33:59.520 --> 00:33:59.840
Oh, yeah.

00:34:00.860 --> 00:34:06.760
In verse six, that last part of it, to him be the glory and dominion forever and ever.

00:34:06.960 --> 00:34:07.080
Amen.

00:34:08.080 --> 00:34:11.639
Another reading of that phrase, which I'm not even going to attempt to pronounce.

00:34:11.980 --> 00:34:15.460
So, no, but it's to the ages of ages.

00:34:15.820 --> 00:34:15.919
Yeah.

00:34:16.260 --> 00:34:16.379
Yeah.

00:34:16.580 --> 00:34:19.860
To to to really express and to drive home.

00:34:20.120 --> 00:34:21.960
This is a never ending thing.

00:34:22.120 --> 00:34:26.560
So when we say, oh, forever, that's such a simple phrase, but it's so much more.

00:34:26.700 --> 00:34:33.879
The ages of ages who go on for eternity that never ends, never begins, never has a middle.

00:34:33.970 --> 00:34:34.919
It just is.

00:34:35.429 --> 00:34:39.139
And it's such an amazing thing to know that that is what John's even talking about here.

00:34:39.480 --> 00:34:40.460
That's what's on its way.

00:34:40.720 --> 00:34:41.879
That's where we're headed.

00:34:41.960 --> 00:34:51.860
I love when the Bible, when it reiterates those words or repeats those words, really to say ages of ages.

00:34:53.520 --> 00:34:56.260
You know, he tells about a blessing.

00:34:57.060 --> 00:34:59.140
He's going to give us blessings upon blessings.

00:34:59.720 --> 00:35:01.460
He tells us he's going to multiply.

00:35:01.710 --> 00:35:04.880
He tells Abraham, I'm going to multiply on top of multiplying you.

00:35:05.640 --> 00:35:10.160
You know, and the connotation there is that I'm going to keep doing it.

00:35:10.600 --> 00:35:11.840
It's going to last forever.

00:35:12.080 --> 00:35:13.260
I'm not going to stop.

00:35:13.890 --> 00:35:18.120
And listen, if you belong to Jesus right now, the blessings are never going to stop.

00:35:18.480 --> 00:35:21.780
I mean, we're just getting started.

00:35:21.960 --> 00:35:23.260
We're just scratching the surface.

00:35:23.820 --> 00:35:33.120
We're going to walk into eternity, an eternity of blessings, right, that is going to be from ages to ages to ages to ages to ages.

00:35:33.380 --> 00:35:37.280
That only comes from an eternal God.

00:35:38.720 --> 00:35:39.760
Yes, absolutely.

00:35:39.840 --> 00:35:39.940
Absolutely.

00:35:41.080 --> 00:35:41.340
Yes.

00:35:41.590 --> 00:35:41.720
Amen.

00:35:42.200 --> 00:35:42.360
Amen.

00:35:42.600 --> 00:35:43.380
Verse number seven.

00:35:44.200 --> 00:35:49.060
Behold, he cometh in the clouds or with clouds and every eye shall see him.

00:35:49.210 --> 00:35:54.700
And they also which pierced him and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him.

00:35:55.020 --> 00:35:55.720
Even so.

00:35:55.950 --> 00:35:56.080
Amen.

00:35:56.230 --> 00:35:58.140
That word amen means agree.

00:35:58.500 --> 00:35:58.660
Amen.

00:35:59.840 --> 00:36:00.260
Oh, man.

00:36:00.300 --> 00:36:03.660
And that quickly just to throw this in there, that even so.

00:36:03.850 --> 00:36:04.040
Yeah.

00:36:04.040 --> 00:36:07.220
That is not make it very clear.

00:36:07.400 --> 00:36:09.420
This is another one of those emphatic words.

00:36:09.580 --> 00:36:11.760
this will happen.

00:36:12.000 --> 00:36:12.060
Yeah.

00:36:12.280 --> 00:36:17.000
It's what that phrase nigh or yes is essentially what he's saying.

00:36:17.140 --> 00:36:18.400
He's saying this will.

00:36:18.500 --> 00:36:22.980
It's an emphatic agreement affirmation, putting emphasis on this.

00:36:23.240 --> 00:36:24.420
This will come to pass.

00:36:24.700 --> 00:36:28.980
And this is one of the first times we see John in this scripture.

00:36:29.120 --> 00:36:32.840
And I know it happens other times in Revelation, but right here at the beginning, he's saying

00:36:33.000 --> 00:36:38.920
he's coming with the clouds and every eye will see him and those who pierced him and

00:36:38.940 --> 00:36:43.920
they will wail. They will mourn because of him. And John said, I want to make it very clear that

00:36:44.080 --> 00:36:50.580
is going to happen. This is not a I'm not being flowery with my language. I'm not I'm not trying

00:36:50.780 --> 00:36:56.480
to to overemphasize something here. This will happen. Yeah, absolutely. Because the coming in

00:36:56.480 --> 00:37:02.220
the clouds denotes the personal and physical coming of Jesus Christ. That's what he does.

00:37:02.620 --> 00:37:07.300
Every eye shall see him reveals his coming is to be physical.

00:37:07.560 --> 00:37:09.760
It's a bodily appearance.

00:37:10.740 --> 00:37:13.820
And from what we study in the Word, when Christ comes for the church,

00:37:14.460 --> 00:37:16.140
we'll only see him in the air, right?

00:37:16.240 --> 00:37:17.200
He'll only be in the air.

00:37:17.240 --> 00:37:19.080
And we'll talk a lot about that.

00:37:19.520 --> 00:37:25.860
But right now, when he comes for the church, he's only going to be known by the church, right?

00:37:27.140 --> 00:37:29.820
It's not that the rapture will be some big secret,

00:37:30.460 --> 00:37:37.020
but only those who are saved, only those who are part of the church will recognize that that is him.

00:37:37.250 --> 00:37:41.860
And those are the ones that will be called up, the word harpezo, to be snatched up, snatched out.

00:37:42.420 --> 00:37:45.020
That's what happens during the rapture.

00:37:45.140 --> 00:37:50.560
And by the way, I want to quickly just make a quick detour right here on that note.

00:37:51.240 --> 00:37:52.220
Daniel 7, 13.

00:37:52.640 --> 00:37:59.480
And I was watching in the night visions, and with the cloud of the sky, one like a son of man was approaching.

00:37:59.700 --> 00:38:03.240
he went up the ancient of days and was escorted before him.

00:38:03.380 --> 00:38:04.740
Yeah, yeah, amen, amen.

00:38:04.980 --> 00:38:07.880
So what we're seeing here and what we're talking about here in verse 7

00:38:08.380 --> 00:38:09.720
is not the rapture of the church.

00:38:10.030 --> 00:38:12.720
It is the second coming of the king.

00:38:13.260 --> 00:38:15.620
It is the second coming of Jesus Christ, okay?

00:38:16.080 --> 00:38:18.000
And that's what he's mentioning there.

00:38:18.100 --> 00:38:21.220
That's what he's alluding to there in verse number 7.

00:38:21.490 --> 00:38:22.760
So good stuff, good stuff.

00:38:24.380 --> 00:38:29.620
You'll have to keep me grounded here because we'll go way past 7 o'clock.

00:38:29.680 --> 00:38:30.720
We're not careful.

00:38:31.980 --> 00:38:41.000
Verse number eight, I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is and which was and which is to come, the Almighty.

00:38:41.560 --> 00:38:42.440
So that phrase again.

00:38:42.550 --> 00:38:43.940
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

00:38:45.260 --> 00:38:50.180
So, of course, Alpha and Omega are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, right?

00:38:51.040 --> 00:38:52.680
The beginning and the end.

00:38:53.010 --> 00:38:56.540
He compasses all time and all eternity.

00:38:58.800 --> 00:39:04.480
saith the Lord. What does that mean when it says saith the Lord? I mean, that's affirmation right

00:39:04.600 --> 00:39:10.880
there, right? It affirms the deity of Christ to even be able to make the claim that he's making

00:39:11.120 --> 00:39:17.340
here. To be able to say that I am the first and the last, the beginning and the end. I am all

00:39:17.620 --> 00:39:25.420
these things that we're talking about. When Jesus describes himself to John in this way,

00:39:25.740 --> 00:39:26.760
And these are red letters.

00:39:26.830 --> 00:39:29.360
So this is actually Jesus talking here.

00:39:29.740 --> 00:39:38.360
When he says this, I mean, he is affirming that he is deity, that he is God, that he is creator, that he is all these things.

00:39:38.900 --> 00:39:40.680
He could never make that claim.

00:39:41.280 --> 00:39:42.940
I mean, what a wonderful thing.

00:39:43.380 --> 00:39:46.760
And then he says, which is, which we've talked about this before.

00:39:46.980 --> 00:39:48.280
Like you said, there's those words again.

00:39:48.620 --> 00:40:05.940
which is, that's present time, which was, that's past time, and which is to come, means throughout all eternity, all into the future of the world, the future of existence is in him, and it will last forever and ever.

00:40:06.640 --> 00:40:21.680
So we've got to remember that Jesus, who told John to write this, he said, John was the one that Jesus really loved, right?

00:40:22.020 --> 00:40:23.300
I mean, he cared about him.

00:40:23.760 --> 00:40:29.360
So there's no need to be afraid of anything else that is to follow, right?

00:40:29.660 --> 00:40:33.980
Jesus told John what to write, and he said, look, I love you.

00:40:34.000 --> 00:40:34.880
I love my people.

00:40:35.000 --> 00:40:36.360
I love the church.

00:40:36.980 --> 00:40:40.540
And you don't have to be afraid of the things that are to come.

00:40:41.180 --> 00:40:43.420
It is going to be OK.

00:40:43.840 --> 00:40:44.660
It is going to be OK.

00:40:45.260 --> 00:40:54.720
And he reaffirms this over and over for us, for the church, for his people that we get that affirmation that it's going to be all right.

00:40:54.960 --> 00:40:55.480
Everything's good.

00:40:55.680 --> 00:40:57.540
And I love the ending of that verse.

00:40:58.320 --> 00:41:01.760
The one who was and is and is to come, the almighty.

00:41:02.120 --> 00:41:12.760
And that word almighty, the pantokrator, it translates to Lord of hosts or God of the mountain, powerful and immovable.

00:41:13.420 --> 00:41:13.680
Yeah.

00:41:14.180 --> 00:41:24.580
I mean, for him to say this again, I'm Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, saith the Lord, which is and which was and which is to come.

00:41:25.060 --> 00:41:28.020
The almighty John is going, no, no, no, this isn't just any God.

00:41:28.020 --> 00:41:29.420
By the way, I'm writing to Greeks here.

00:41:29.630 --> 00:41:30.860
They have a whole bunch of different gods.

00:41:30.920 --> 00:41:31.600
They have a whole bunch.

00:41:31.620 --> 00:41:32.500
They don't know what's going on.

00:41:32.780 --> 00:41:34.460
And John says, no, no, no, not them.

00:41:34.740 --> 00:41:35.280
Yeah, no, no, no.

00:41:35.420 --> 00:41:36.940
This is the Lord of hosts.

00:41:37.780 --> 00:41:44.480
This is the God of the mountain, the powerful and immovable, unchanging mountains don't change.

00:41:44.760 --> 00:41:48.100
Once they're there, it takes a long time for erosion to wear them down.

00:41:48.460 --> 00:41:51.800
As far as these ancient people were concerned, a mountain was unchanging.

00:41:52.520 --> 00:41:55.380
And he's saying this is a God that doesn't move and he doesn't change.

00:41:55.500 --> 00:42:00.760
And he is exactly who he was back then and who he's going to be when all these things come.

00:42:00.860 --> 00:42:28.600
Amen. He's not Zeus. He's not Aphrodite. He's not any of these other gods. And listen to me tonight. Those gods are made up. Those gods are fantasy. Okay. There is but one God. He is a triune God. He is God in three persons. But there is one God. And his name is the name above all names. And so don't get confused in that.

00:42:29.780 --> 00:42:36.900
Verse 9, I, John, who also am your brother and companion in tribulation and in the kingdom

00:42:36.910 --> 00:42:43.200
and in patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos for the word of

00:42:43.400 --> 00:42:45.900
God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.

00:42:46.560 --> 00:42:54.260
So now we see this, what we're really seeing here and who is it that is talking to John?

00:42:55.160 --> 00:42:57.300
It is a post incarnate Christ.

00:42:57.780 --> 00:43:02.800
We see all through the Bible, we see little glimpses of Jesus.

00:43:02.970 --> 00:43:03.560
We see him.

00:43:04.020 --> 00:43:05.920
Sometimes he may show up as the angel.

00:43:06.520 --> 00:43:12.720
If you look back in the Old Testament, usually when you see the angel, you're looking at the pre-incarnate Christ.

00:43:12.830 --> 00:43:18.380
And there's several places that you could look back and say, okay, this is who he was.

00:43:18.710 --> 00:43:20.280
But this is post-incarnate.

00:43:20.420 --> 00:43:22.940
This is after Jesus has came.

00:43:23.080 --> 00:43:24.520
He has died.

00:43:25.000 --> 00:43:35.020
And what it simply means is that Christ, this is Christ after he left behind his earthly body and he put on his glorified body.

00:43:35.390 --> 00:43:37.020
And he's about to judge the churches.

00:43:37.390 --> 00:43:38.640
This is what's about to happen.

00:43:38.800 --> 00:43:40.180
He's about to judge the churches.

00:43:40.740 --> 00:43:43.860
And listen, there's a judgment for all of us, okay?

00:43:46.160 --> 00:43:52.280
As we go through and we study the book of Revelation, we'll see two different places of judgment.

00:43:52.520 --> 00:43:57.280
One, for the church, which is the judgment seat of Christ.

00:43:57.540 --> 00:43:59.820
We'll all stand before the judgment seat of Christ.

00:43:59.830 --> 00:44:04.000
The other is the great white throne of judgment that we'll talk about in Revelation chapter 20.

00:44:04.800 --> 00:44:12.660
But he is our judge, and we're dealing in these first three chapters, we're dealing with the church.

00:44:14.420 --> 00:44:18.440
So verse number 9 and 10.

00:44:20.200 --> 00:44:27.120
I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day and heard behind me a great voice as of a trumpet.

00:44:29.560 --> 00:44:33.240
He says the Spirit led him to write this, right?

00:44:33.960 --> 00:44:36.160
John 16, verse 13 and 14.

00:44:36.680 --> 00:44:41.100
How be it when he, the Spirit of truth, has come, he will guide you into all truth.

00:44:41.660 --> 00:44:46.660
For he shall not speak of himself, but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak.

00:44:46.820 --> 00:44:48.540
And he will show you things to come.

00:44:49.040 --> 00:44:54.800
He shall glorify me, for he shall receive of mine and shall show it unto you.

00:44:54.860 --> 00:44:59.940
This is Jesus speaking of the Holy Spirit leading us and guiding us and directing us.

00:45:00.330 --> 00:45:04.840
And so this is where John gets his information from, from the Holy Spirit.

00:45:07.000 --> 00:45:12.040
When it says the Lord's Day here, I believe with all my heart that he means Sunday.

00:45:12.280 --> 00:45:12.980
It's the Lord's Day.

00:45:13.150 --> 00:45:13.300
Okay.

00:45:13.800 --> 00:45:15.480
That's what he's speaking of there.

00:45:15.900 --> 00:45:21.520
There's a lot of textual evidence specifically to support that as well, because they weren't referring.

00:45:21.640 --> 00:45:22.620
He didn't say the Sabbath.

00:45:23.060 --> 00:45:23.140
Right.

00:45:23.240 --> 00:45:24.500
He didn't say the day of rest.

00:45:24.640 --> 00:45:24.880
That's right.

00:45:24.880 --> 00:45:30.140
He said specifically the Lord's day, meaning the day that Christ rose from the grave.

00:45:30.480 --> 00:45:30.600
Absolutely.

00:45:30.980 --> 00:45:31.160
Absolutely.

00:45:31.760 --> 00:45:33.620
And that's why we go to church on Sundays, right?

00:45:33.880 --> 00:45:37.520
And listen, don't say, well, is that the only day you can worship Jesus?

00:45:37.680 --> 00:45:39.480
No, you can worship Jesus any day you want to.

00:45:39.480 --> 00:45:40.860
I hope you worship him every day.

00:45:41.440 --> 00:46:01.820
But Sunday is the day that was set aside, that has been set aside for the church to come together and to worship Jesus Christ as a group, as a people, and collectively come together and just draw off each other and worship with each other and hold each other accountable, all the things this church does.

00:46:03.319 --> 00:46:05.380
So who was the great voice?

00:46:05.820 --> 00:46:06.820
Who was the great voice?

00:46:09.180 --> 00:46:14.380
When he gets into verse 11, he said, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last.

00:46:15.480 --> 00:46:22.620
What thou seest, write in the book and send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia to Ephesus,

00:46:23.400 --> 00:46:30.920
unto Smyrna, unto Pergamos, unto Thyteria, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea.

00:46:31.120 --> 00:46:38.180
Those are the seven churches that we're going to be dealing with going forward that the judgment is going to take place on.

00:46:38.840 --> 00:46:46.580
But he says, I turned to see the voice that spake with me, and being turned, I saw seven candlesticks.

00:46:49.100 --> 00:46:58.720
And in the midst of the seven candlesticks, one likened to the Son of Man, clothed with a garment, down to the foot, and girt about with pats with a golden girdle.

00:47:01.520 --> 00:47:06.860
1 Thessalonians 4.16 really gives us a description of that trumpet sound, right?

00:47:07.040 --> 00:47:08.500
The sound of the trumpet.

00:47:08.720 --> 00:47:11.160
You can go back and you can read that later.

00:47:11.380 --> 00:47:15.180
But we see this description of Jesus clothed in white garment.

00:47:16.800 --> 00:47:20.760
The lampstands are the seven churches that he named there,

00:47:21.000 --> 00:47:23.740
those seven churches that I just named.

00:47:24.740 --> 00:47:28.160
We, the church, are the lampstands themselves.

00:47:29.580 --> 00:47:29.960
Because why?

00:47:30.460 --> 00:47:31.860
Because we hold the light.

00:47:32.090 --> 00:47:33.120
Okay, that's what we do.

00:47:34.400 --> 00:47:36.620
I mean, Jesus is the light of the world.

00:47:37.580 --> 00:47:42.020
So who holds the lie of the world in the present day, in the place that we're in?

00:47:42.220 --> 00:47:42.700
It's the church.

00:47:43.240 --> 00:47:43.860
That's who we are.

00:47:44.180 --> 00:47:47.900
And so we are those lampstands that hold the light.

00:47:49.080 --> 00:47:53.760
John chapter 8 and verse 12, then spake Jesus again to them saying, I am the lie of the

00:47:54.000 --> 00:47:54.160
world.

00:47:54.480 --> 00:47:58.840
He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.

00:47:59.960 --> 00:48:01.840
And so we're holding that life.

00:48:01.980 --> 00:48:02.600
That's our job.

00:48:02.800 --> 00:48:03.900
That's what we're supposed to do.

00:48:04.440 --> 00:48:06.860
We're not supposed to hide it under a bushel.

00:48:07.020 --> 00:48:09.660
We're not supposed to try to dim that light.

00:48:10.200 --> 00:48:16.440
And, you know, when we look at the church today, it's a little bit scary.

00:48:16.700 --> 00:48:20.900
I mean, you know, to think about the condition of the church and the place of the church.

00:48:21.820 --> 00:48:24.000
Now, I think the true church is here, right?

00:48:24.140 --> 00:48:25.360
The remnant of the church is here.

00:48:25.520 --> 00:48:26.560
There's no doubt about that.

00:48:26.860 --> 00:48:28.760
But are we doing all we can do?

00:48:29.120 --> 00:48:31.460
Are we out there evangelizing?

00:48:31.560 --> 00:48:33.440
Are we out there witnessing?

00:48:33.720 --> 00:48:36.820
Are we out there shining the light of Jesus?

00:48:36.980 --> 00:48:40.740
Are we a city on the hill like he describes us to be?

00:48:41.140 --> 00:48:43.600
Are we really doing what he's called us to do?

00:48:43.600 --> 00:48:50.320
And so as we go through this and you see these churches, you're going to see some good attributes of these churches,

00:48:50.440 --> 00:48:55.340
and you're going to see some that pretty much they're not that good, right?

00:48:58.920 --> 00:49:02.660
They are the negatives that you want your church to not be.

00:49:03.680 --> 00:49:08.400
When you look at this, you say, yeah, if that's going on in my church, let's get rid of that.

00:49:08.520 --> 00:49:09.420
Let's stop doing that.

00:49:09.580 --> 00:49:10.700
Let's get back to this.

00:49:11.320 --> 00:49:13.800
So those are some things that we're going to see when we get into the church.

00:49:14.160 --> 00:49:14.340
Yeah.

00:49:14.740 --> 00:49:19.960
When we get into these descriptions of the churches and what he writes to them, you have the warnings and you also have the praises.

00:49:20.080 --> 00:49:23.140
You also have him starting out and telling them, hey, here's what you're doing that's good.

00:49:23.480 --> 00:49:24.580
Here's the good things you're doing.

00:49:24.620 --> 00:49:25.420
And we like to see this.

00:49:25.520 --> 00:49:26.480
You need to do more of this.

00:49:27.080 --> 00:49:31.120
But also, hey, you're over here and you're doing these things and that is not good.

00:49:31.520 --> 00:49:32.760
And that is not where we want to be.

00:49:32.980 --> 00:49:41.660
And so we do have to remember that as we go into those, we get that wonderful balance here where we can see, oh, God is explicitly informing them through John.

00:49:42.240 --> 00:49:44.580
These are the good things you should do more of.

00:49:44.880 --> 00:49:51.080
And he's also explicitly telling them, here's the things that you should be doing less of and you should be avoiding at all costs.

00:49:51.440 --> 00:49:52.700
And what in the world are y'all thinking?

00:49:52.980 --> 00:49:58.980
And the church today, I think we've gotten a little afraid of, again, I think it comes from that fear of the book of Revelation.

00:49:59.420 --> 00:50:04.660
And so people have gotten a little afraid of reading these first few chapters and going, hey, maybe we ought not be doing that.

00:50:04.740 --> 00:50:04.940
Yeah.

00:50:05.260 --> 00:50:05.400
Yeah.

00:50:06.180 --> 00:50:06.260
Yeah.

00:50:06.640 --> 00:50:06.960
Absolutely.

00:50:07.080 --> 00:50:12.820
I mean, when God calls it out and says, don't do it explicitly, maybe it's time to pump the brakes.

00:50:13.040 --> 00:50:13.280
That's right.

00:50:13.580 --> 00:50:13.900
Amen.

00:50:14.180 --> 00:50:14.400
Amen.

00:50:14.880 --> 00:50:19.100
And I do want to say also, man, you know, it says that he stands in the middle of the candlesticks.

00:50:19.400 --> 00:50:20.940
One likened to the Son of Man.

00:50:21.200 --> 00:50:26.600
Again, that reference back to Daniel 7, that description of the Son of Man coming down with the clouds.

00:50:26.840 --> 00:50:26.960
Yes.

00:50:27.040 --> 00:50:28.520
It's that same reference here.

00:50:28.960 --> 00:50:34.840
There's a reason that so many times in the scripture we see Christ referred to as the son of man, one like the son of man.

00:50:34.960 --> 00:50:35.920
There's one like the son of man.

00:50:36.020 --> 00:50:37.420
The son of man is standing there.

00:50:37.800 --> 00:50:42.040
One like the son in the book of Daniel when he's talking about the fiery furnace.

00:50:42.200 --> 00:50:45.160
And he looks down and he says, he threw three in and killed the guards.

00:50:45.250 --> 00:50:48.000
And now there's four men standing in there and one of them looks like the son of man.

00:50:48.140 --> 00:50:56.080
I mean, even these people that were not the children of Israel, they were from a complete, I mean, these were the Babylonians.

00:50:56.220 --> 00:50:56.400
Yeah.

00:50:56.840 --> 00:50:57.820
And they recognized it.

00:50:57.820 --> 00:50:58.460
It was obvious.

00:50:58.900 --> 00:51:01.000
Right. It was obvious that that was Jesus.

00:51:01.260 --> 00:51:09.100
Yeah, that was that he was he was not just some some other person that was walking around in there, but he was the king of kings and the Lord of lords.

00:51:09.360 --> 00:51:13.860
And so when he said the pre-incarnate Christ or the post-incarnate Christ, that's what he was talking about here.

00:51:13.960 --> 00:51:17.240
But the pre-incarnate Christ, when you see those references in the Old Testament, that's what we're talking.

00:51:17.380 --> 00:51:19.160
Yeah, absolutely. That's the pre-incarnate Christ.

00:51:19.440 --> 00:51:23.580
He hasn't been born yet through Mary, so he hasn't come that way.

00:51:24.120 --> 00:51:27.160
But there was something special about him even then.

00:51:27.440 --> 00:51:27.540
Absolutely.

00:51:28.080 --> 00:51:30.500
Every time he gets seen, people go, wait a minute.

00:51:30.840 --> 00:51:30.960
Yeah.

00:51:31.880 --> 00:51:33.040
There's something special about it.

00:51:33.260 --> 00:51:34.400
We don't want to mess with him.

00:51:34.600 --> 00:51:34.880
That's right.

00:51:35.560 --> 00:51:48.440
When you're talking about people that had no problem in ritual suicide and ritual murder and just the horrible things the Babylonians were into, and they took one look at him and went, hey, guys, let's leave him alone.

00:51:48.620 --> 00:51:48.820
Yeah.

00:51:49.820 --> 00:51:50.200
Absolutely.

00:51:50.780 --> 00:51:51.180
Absolutely.

00:51:51.360 --> 00:51:52.680
This is a guy you don't want to mess with.

00:51:53.200 --> 00:51:55.700
And we see him all the way back to the beginning, right?

00:51:55.820 --> 00:52:00.000
Because the Bible says that he made man in our image, right?

00:52:00.640 --> 00:52:07.780
I mean, when he started creation, he created it as a triune God in the very beginning.

00:52:07.980 --> 00:52:10.460
The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were there.

00:52:11.020 --> 00:52:18.200
And now we're seeing this picture of him gird about the cap, the paps with a golden girdle,

00:52:18.540 --> 00:52:20.140
with strength, girded with strength.

00:52:20.760 --> 00:52:23.040
There's a dress of judgment here.

00:52:24.000 --> 00:52:28.200
that he's about to judge these seven churches.

00:52:29.140 --> 00:52:31.560
It goes on in verse 14, and it says,

00:52:31.700 --> 00:52:35.240
His head and his hairs were white like wool and as white as snow.

00:52:35.680 --> 00:52:38.940
His eyes were as a flame of fire, his feet like a fine brass,

00:52:39.520 --> 00:52:45.360
and they burned in a furnace, and his voice as a sound of many waters.

00:52:46.300 --> 00:52:49.820
So white like wool, it speaks of his eternal existence.

00:52:50.020 --> 00:52:51.300
It speaks of his wisdom.

00:52:52.240 --> 00:52:56.360
He is the ancient of days in Daniel chapter 7 and verse 9.

00:52:56.600 --> 00:52:57.480
That's who he is.

00:52:58.340 --> 00:52:59.720
He has always been.

00:53:00.100 --> 00:53:01.640
His eyes were a flame of fire.

00:53:02.840 --> 00:53:12.860
It's his penetrating insight and the eyewitness and the knowledge of the total life of the church.

00:53:13.180 --> 00:53:14.260
I mean, he knows it all.

00:53:14.560 --> 00:53:15.920
He knows where your church is.

00:53:15.920 --> 00:53:17.000
He knows what they're doing.

00:53:17.100 --> 00:53:18.360
He knows what they're not doing.

00:53:18.880 --> 00:53:21.560
He knows us individually that same way, right?

00:53:22.680 --> 00:53:24.500
so he knows all about me.

00:53:24.820 --> 00:53:27.500
I mean, as bad as that is, right?

00:53:27.720 --> 00:53:28.600
He knows all about me.

00:53:28.860 --> 00:53:30.660
I haven't hid anything from him.

00:53:30.880 --> 00:53:32.500
I can't hide anything from him.

00:53:33.180 --> 00:53:35.100
His feet are like brass.

00:53:35.460 --> 00:53:37.920
This is symbolic of judgment.

00:53:38.000 --> 00:53:42.880
The brass or the brazen altar outside the tabernacle proper

00:53:43.600 --> 00:53:46.340
represents Christ's work down here on this earth.

00:53:46.760 --> 00:53:49.080
When he died on the cross, he was there.

00:53:49.540 --> 00:53:55.500
It was there that he bore our judgment and my judgment for my sin.

00:53:56.100 --> 00:53:58.040
He was judged in our place.

00:53:58.320 --> 00:54:12.040
So everything that you've ever done, every bad thought you've ever had, every word out of your mouth that was wrong, everything you've stolen, everything you've—whatever the sin may be, fill in the blank what you've done and what you're going to do.

00:54:12.440 --> 00:54:13.440
He paid the price.

00:54:13.880 --> 00:54:16.420
He was judged for all of that on Calvary's cross.

00:54:17.000 --> 00:54:21.700
And now his judgment is of those who are his own, right?

00:54:22.520 --> 00:54:29.540
He's saying, look, and when we're judged, guys, we're going to be judged by, I believe, missed opportunities.

00:54:29.810 --> 00:54:34.480
We're going to be judged by, look, I gave you this, but this is what you've done with it, right?

00:54:35.560 --> 00:54:38.080
You took the coin and you buried it.

00:54:39.060 --> 00:54:40.580
You didn't multiply it.

00:54:40.580 --> 00:54:41.540
You didn't make it bigger.

00:54:42.130 --> 00:54:46.320
And this is the opportunities that you had, but you didn't take them.

00:54:46.480 --> 00:54:48.520
So those are the judgments that we're going to have.

00:54:49.770 --> 00:54:54.080
The human heart rebels against judgment.

00:54:54.440 --> 00:54:56.360
I mean, it just does.

00:54:57.620 --> 00:55:02.960
But when it is true and accurate, then it is true and accurate.

00:55:03.320 --> 00:55:03.500
Okay?

00:55:03.810 --> 00:55:05.440
I mean, you can't do anything about it.

00:55:05.820 --> 00:55:09.280
It's like, okay, well, oh, yeah, you're right.

00:55:09.380 --> 00:55:10.440
I can't argue that.

00:55:11.080 --> 00:55:14.800
People want to argue, but there's going to be no buts during judgment.

00:55:14.940 --> 00:55:16.220
There's going to be no buts during that.

00:55:16.860 --> 00:55:18.740
I do want to throw out real quick here

00:55:18.880 --> 00:55:20.720
man when it gets to this bottom part

00:55:20.730 --> 00:55:21.800
here his feet were like

00:55:22.860 --> 00:55:24.200
likened to fine brass or

00:55:24.840 --> 00:55:26.560
polished bronze but the actual

00:55:26.820 --> 00:55:27.200
word there

00:55:28.640 --> 00:55:28.900
charcoal

00:55:30.800 --> 00:55:32.420
charcoal ibanos was

00:55:32.780 --> 00:55:34.560
a word that the closest

00:55:34.860 --> 00:55:36.680
thing we can find to it is a

00:55:36.980 --> 00:55:38.340
phrase called orichalcum

00:55:38.780 --> 00:55:40.800
it is not a real metal as far as we know

00:55:41.120 --> 00:55:42.540
but it's something that they talked about

00:55:42.630 --> 00:55:44.339
and they talked about the lustrous quality

00:55:44.360 --> 00:55:46.300
It was like brass.

00:55:46.580 --> 00:55:46.700
Yeah.

00:55:46.760 --> 00:55:49.280
They couldn't really come up with the description.

00:55:49.860 --> 00:55:53.500
And so this word, now the Greeks use this phrase all the time.

00:55:53.510 --> 00:55:54.360
They knew what it meant.

00:55:54.440 --> 00:55:57.220
They had some frame of reference that we don't have today.

00:55:57.560 --> 00:56:01.400
But what they specifically referred to was the strength of it.

00:56:01.710 --> 00:56:03.640
It was nearly indestructible, basically.

00:56:03.820 --> 00:56:03.960
Yeah.

00:56:04.200 --> 00:56:04.980
And it was beautiful.

00:56:05.400 --> 00:56:10.020
And when we say beautiful, be thinking about something that is so gorgeous and so beautiful

00:56:10.240 --> 00:56:12.640
and so incredible to look at.

00:56:12.740 --> 00:56:17.580
That's what it's referring to is that lustrous quality in the times that we see this particular phrase in Revelation.

00:56:18.130 --> 00:56:20.980
But he's talking about his feet were like that.

00:56:21.120 --> 00:56:23.380
And it's refined in a furnace.

00:56:23.490 --> 00:56:25.360
And his voice was like the roar of many waters.

00:56:25.560 --> 00:56:29.360
I mean, you've gone here from this description of, OK, I hear this mighty voice.

00:56:29.450 --> 00:56:34.840
I see these seven candlesticks and standing in the middle of them is my savior.

00:56:35.290 --> 00:56:40.520
And remember that John is writing this from the point of view of somebody that walked with Christ.

00:56:40.900 --> 00:56:45.580
that spent three and a half years traveling with him from one place to the next,

00:56:46.060 --> 00:56:51.680
saw him die on the cross, saw him rise again, saw his ascent into heaven.

00:56:53.440 --> 00:56:57.400
And yet here, when he starts describing him, he's like, this is him like I've never seen him before.

00:56:58.240 --> 00:56:59.420
This is not what I've seen.

00:56:59.540 --> 00:57:05.920
This is not the man that I hung out with and spent nights laying out under the stars

00:57:06.030 --> 00:57:08.760
because we didn't have any tents with us or the tents had gotten destroyed.

00:57:08.860 --> 00:57:25.520
This is not the man who was captured and taken and strapped to a cross, nailed to a cross, and driven nails through him and placed a crown of thorns on his head.

00:57:26.020 --> 00:57:27.900
John is blown away by him here.

00:57:28.200 --> 00:57:28.260
Yeah.

00:57:28.540 --> 00:57:32.200
I mean, and that's something that can't be emphasized too much.

00:57:32.340 --> 00:57:37.840
This is the first time we see in Revelation that John gets a look at Christ and he goes, oh, man.

00:57:38.000 --> 00:57:38.180
Yeah.

00:57:38.440 --> 00:57:38.580
Yeah.

00:57:38.800 --> 00:57:44.020
Yeah, he goes on and he talks about his voice is the sound of many waters.

00:57:44.880 --> 00:57:51.700
It's a voice of authority, the voice that spoke the whole universe into existence.

00:57:52.220 --> 00:57:55.740
That's what he's hearing, the voice that will call his bride home.

00:57:56.420 --> 00:57:58.140
I mean, I want you to think about that.

00:57:59.040 --> 00:58:02.440
Only the bride of Christ will recognize the bridegroom.

00:58:02.530 --> 00:58:03.760
Okay, that's what we were talking about earlier.

00:58:03.860 --> 00:58:09.400
When the rapture takes place, it's going to sound like as the sound of a trumpet.

00:58:10.220 --> 00:58:14.580
I think that the rest of the world will probably hear something, maybe.

00:58:15.040 --> 00:58:19.020
I don't know, but we are going to hear the voice of Jesus.

00:58:19.340 --> 00:58:21.260
We are going to be here, come up hither.

00:58:21.480 --> 00:58:27.580
We're going to hear, you know, I've come back to get you, and let's go home.

00:58:28.040 --> 00:58:28.820
Time to leave, guys.

00:58:29.000 --> 00:58:29.680
Let's go.

00:58:29.900 --> 00:58:30.300
Let's go.

00:58:30.680 --> 00:58:31.940
And so that's what it is.

00:58:32.140 --> 00:58:34.540
It's the voice of many waters.

00:58:36.920 --> 00:58:46.840
It's this picture of this great high priest, all these descriptions, inspecting and judging his church.

00:58:48.190 --> 00:58:49.520
And that's what he's doing.

00:58:49.680 --> 00:58:50.560
That's what he's going to do.

00:58:52.300 --> 00:58:59.000
We probably need to stop it there at that verse at 701, but we'll pick up in verse 16 next week.

00:58:59.320 --> 00:58:59.460
Definitely.

00:58:59.780 --> 00:59:05.300
continue with just this description of this awesome God that we serve.

00:59:05.820 --> 00:59:06.900
Yes, absolutely.

00:59:07.270 --> 00:59:17.260
And man, that's, oh man, what a good spot to kind of end on here because goodness, we

00:59:17.370 --> 00:59:22.100
are going to be the ones that when Christ comes back and we hear that voice and we hear

00:59:22.240 --> 00:59:25.760
that great sound like a trumpet, not a trumpet.

00:59:26.420 --> 00:59:31.300
You got this weird idea in pop culture and in modern media that it's going to be a trumpet that you hear.

00:59:31.460 --> 00:59:33.680
Well, the voice of the sound and the trump of God.

00:59:34.160 --> 00:59:35.380
No, like a trumpet.

00:59:36.040 --> 00:59:37.420
It's going to be this loud noise.

00:59:37.880 --> 00:59:43.260
And all of us, all of us Christians who are alive are going to go, hey, dad's come back.

00:59:43.320 --> 00:59:43.460
Yeah.

00:59:45.720 --> 00:59:49.340
Our father, our shepherd, our master.

00:59:49.720 --> 00:59:49.860
Amen.

00:59:50.240 --> 00:59:56.260
There's here's the if you haven't, if we haven't, let me put it that way.

00:59:56.320 --> 01:00:05.640
If we haven't completely turned ourself over to Christ now, so you're saved, you've made that decision, but you haven't let go of everything.

01:00:06.320 --> 01:00:13.160
If we haven't done it yet, when you hear that, you're not holding anything back.

01:00:13.710 --> 01:00:15.380
Like you said earlier, he sees it all.

01:00:15.620 --> 01:00:17.840
His eyes like a fiery flame.

01:00:18.800 --> 01:00:24.420
That is a penetrating, piercing gaze that sees through all the things that you want to hide.

01:00:24.500 --> 01:00:25.260
It lights up.

01:00:25.260 --> 01:00:27.560
It shines that light everywhere he looks.

01:00:27.820 --> 01:00:32.440
And his eye is on you and it's on me every minute of every day.

01:00:32.720 --> 01:00:33.220
He is watching.

01:00:33.640 --> 01:00:34.460
He is there.

01:00:34.720 --> 01:00:35.760
And he's saying, let me.

01:00:35.940 --> 01:00:36.940
It's not just that he's watching.

01:00:37.160 --> 01:00:38.760
He's there saying, let me help you.

01:00:39.240 --> 01:00:40.580
Let me help you carry this.

01:00:40.580 --> 01:00:41.860
Let me help you get through this.

01:00:42.220 --> 01:00:43.520
That's what Christ is to us.

01:00:43.800 --> 01:00:46.760
He is our burden bearer.

01:00:46.820 --> 01:00:47.320
He is.

01:00:48.120 --> 01:00:49.300
I mean, he is.

01:00:49.520 --> 01:00:52.760
And he sees to the very depths of our souls.

01:00:52.860 --> 01:00:56.540
He sees to the bone and the marrow of our hearts.

01:00:56.760 --> 01:00:57.780
I mean, he sees it all.

01:00:57.790 --> 01:01:03.080
He sees everything that is within us, the filth and the muck and the mire.

01:01:03.240 --> 01:01:05.380
But he doesn't want us to stay that way.

01:01:06.040 --> 01:01:07.320
That's why he died for us.

01:01:07.350 --> 01:01:11.580
He loves us so much that he does not want you to stay right where you are.

01:01:11.760 --> 01:01:18.840
And my hope in this Revelation study is that it's revealed to you, sure, what's going to happen later.

01:01:19.040 --> 01:01:26.540
But listen, let's think about what God has done, what he has done for you, what he has done for us and what he wants to do in your life.

01:01:27.460 --> 01:01:28.940
And let's begin to live that out.

01:01:29.260 --> 01:01:33.640
Let's begin to live our Christian life in the promised land.

01:01:33.920 --> 01:01:35.280
We've talked about that on here before.

01:01:35.380 --> 01:01:40.000
The promised land is a picture of a victorious Christian life.

01:01:40.460 --> 01:01:42.240
It is a life that follows Jesus.

01:01:42.700 --> 01:01:45.240
It is a life that exalts Jesus.

01:01:45.460 --> 01:01:51.400
It is a life that gives itself to him wholly and fully.

01:01:51.790 --> 01:01:53.140
And that's what we want for everybody.

01:01:53.350 --> 01:01:54.380
We want them to do that.

01:01:54.410 --> 01:01:59.940
We want them to be so connected to the source that you can't tell the difference between them and him.

01:02:00.380 --> 01:02:00.820
Absolutely.

01:02:01.640 --> 01:02:06.160
So, man, as we go out this week, let's try to remember that.

01:02:06.260 --> 01:02:10.580
Let's try to remember that we are children of the living God.

01:02:10.690 --> 01:02:12.420
We are children of a God who's not dead.

01:02:12.720 --> 01:02:13.960
He's not still in the grave.

01:02:14.050 --> 01:02:14.680
He is alive.

01:02:14.900 --> 01:02:19.380
He is coming back and he is coming back in a way that it will be undeniable for those

01:02:19.430 --> 01:02:20.280
of us that are his.

01:02:20.590 --> 01:02:24.560
And even those that choose to deny it can only deny it for so long because at some point

01:02:24.860 --> 01:02:26.720
he's coming back and even they can't deny it.

01:02:27.090 --> 01:02:28.140
So that's what's coming.

01:02:28.620 --> 01:02:30.500
And at the end of the day, we've got home.

01:02:30.940 --> 01:02:31.860
We're going home.

01:02:32.440 --> 01:02:35.960
You're gonna, and there will be judgment and there will be pain.

01:02:36.720 --> 01:02:38.040
And then it's all going to be wiped away.

01:02:38.520 --> 01:02:38.660
No.

01:02:39.020 --> 01:02:42.900
And we're just going to be where we were supposed to be doing what we were meant to do and what

01:02:42.940 --> 01:02:43.800
we were designed to do.

01:02:43.940 --> 01:02:44.840
So never forget that.

01:02:46.900 --> 01:02:51.700
And next week, we'll pick back up, starting with Revelation 1, verse 16.

01:02:52.640 --> 01:02:56.200
Say that right here at the end, so hopefully I'll hear it tonight, and I'll make a note of it in the go notes.

01:02:59.219 --> 01:03:01.340
Revelation 1, verse 16.

01:03:01.670 --> 01:03:03.600
Join us there next week.

01:03:04.000 --> 01:03:04.580
Have your Bible.

01:03:04.800 --> 01:03:06.820
This is the first time we've done an in-depth study like this.

01:03:06.880 --> 01:03:07.360
Have your Bible.

01:03:07.930 --> 01:03:12.660
I am trying to figure out a way that I can have something that I can kind of show up on the screen or something as we read through it.

01:03:13.180 --> 01:03:15.560
I haven't quite figured something out yet, but I am working on it.

01:03:15.660 --> 01:03:19.980
So hopefully at some point during this process, you'll be able to read the verses along with us as we hit them.

01:03:20.720 --> 01:03:24.900
So, Brother Brian, if you will, I'll let you dismiss us in prayer tonight.

01:03:25.100 --> 01:03:25.980
Absolutely, Brother.

01:03:26.620 --> 01:03:29.140
Father, we love you and we love your word.

01:03:30.000 --> 01:03:32.140
And God is not something that we should fear.

01:03:32.360 --> 01:03:39.500
It's not something that we should run from or decide that it doesn't need to be studied, God.

01:03:39.680 --> 01:03:45.560
But, Lord, you gave it to us to reveal yourself to us, that we might know your majesty, that

01:03:45.660 --> 01:03:50.060
we might know your goodness and your mercy and your grace, that we might know your judgment,

01:03:50.240 --> 01:03:54.940
that we might know the depth of who you are, that we might have an understanding of this

01:03:55.140 --> 01:03:58.720
God who loved us so much that he gave all for us.

01:03:59.140 --> 01:04:04.540
Lord, I pray that as we go through this study, God, that you would reveal yourself to everyone

01:04:04.740 --> 01:04:05.340
who listens.

01:04:06.380 --> 01:04:08.520
And, God, you would keep revealing yourself to them.

01:04:08.960 --> 01:04:10.760
Keep revealing yourself to us, God.

01:04:11.080 --> 01:04:12.520
We are never arrived.

01:04:12.680 --> 01:04:16.740
We have never got to the place and the point where we know enough, where we understand enough.

01:04:17.200 --> 01:04:25.280
I just pray, God, the Holy Spirit would speak to us all and bring us into a closer relationship with you, closer than we have ever been before.

01:04:26.000 --> 01:04:26.620
Bless us.

01:04:26.900 --> 01:04:27.580
Bless your church.

01:04:28.780 --> 01:04:32.180
Bless churches, Lord God, as individual churches.

01:04:32.660 --> 01:04:40.180
I pray that you would bless them and that, God, that we would see a great day of revival and people being saved and changed.

01:04:40.700 --> 01:04:45.140
Lord, I thank you for the opportunity to just speak the word of Jesus.

01:04:45.710 --> 01:04:48.460
And we give all credit and all praise to you.

01:04:48.930 --> 01:04:50.460
In Jesus' name, amen.

01:04:53.000 --> 01:05:02.640
Special thank you to Carter Pridmore, Brian Harris, Waverly Henderson, Tatum Harris Spears, and Josie Partain for our theme song, Truth Set Me Free.

01:05:03.360 --> 01:05:05.400
I've been Tyler Goza on production and audio.

01:05:06.060 --> 01:05:09.440
We hope you can join us live next Monday at 6 p.m. Central.

01:05:10.200 --> 01:05:10.920
Thank you for listening.

01:05:11.180 --> 01:05:22.080
But truth found me there. It was in my darkest hour. I traded my black heart for joy, for something real, something with power.

01:05:24.100 --> 01:05:35.220
Truth set me free. Truth came to me. I once was blind, but now I see. Truth set me free.

01:05:35.860 --> 01:05:41.240
Oh, oh, truth set me free

01:05:42.080 --> 01:05:47.260
Oh, oh, truth set me free

01:05:53.700 --> 01:05:55.100
you