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Revelation
4
Have you ever said
these words: “I’d like to speak to the manager.” “Can I talk to your supervisor?” “Who’s in charge here?”
If you’ve ever said
words like these it’s probably because things are not going well. Perhaps you’re about to register a
complaint. Things are a mess and
you want to know who’s responsible.
But imagine you’re in
a chaotic restaurant and you go back into the kitchen and half the food’s
on fire, the cooks are screaming at each other and the head waitress has
just quit. Or you’re visiting a
school where the children are running riot, you knock on the
headteacher’s door and she’s drunk.
Or you’re on a plane flight that’s really bumpy – you go into the
cockpit and the pilot’s shrieking hysterically ‘What the heck are all
these dials for?”
None of those
situations would fill you with confidence.
But I wonder also if
life just makes us ask ‘Who’s in charge here? Who’s responsible for this? Does life ever make you say: “I’d like to register a
complaint.” Think now, what do
you most want to speak to the Manager about? What is it this evening that most makes you question how
things are being run?
Well whatever it is,
Revelation is a good book for us.
Because it was written by John, a man who knew all about suffering. You might think that John would have
every right to lodge a complaint with the Manager. Have a look at chapter 1 verse 9.
9 I, John, your brother and companion in the suffering and kingdom and
patient endurance that are ours in Jesus, was on the island of Patmos
because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.
John is effectively
imprisoned on the island of Patmos because he’s a Christian. He’s an old man and he’s been left
there to die because he refused to shut up about Jesus. And John says that his situation is
the normal Christian experience.
Do you see in v9, he is a companion with us his
readers ‘in the suffering and kingdom and patient endurance that
are ours in Jesus.’
Suffering is ours in Jesus, it belongs to us. It is inescapable. Jesus suffered in this world. And if we belong to Jesus then
suffering belongs to us.
And this suffering
will make us want to know – who’s in charge? Life for the Christian will be a bit like being in the
chaotic restaurant or the shambolic school or the lurching airplane and
we’ll want to know what’s going on in the kitchen, what’s going on in the
headmaster’s office, what’s going on in the cockpit? Who’s in charge of this mess? Do they know what they’re doing? Are they on top of things?
Well the book of
Revelation is basically a sneak peak into the ultimate control
centre. And when John sees who’s
in control he is hugely encouraged.
Look at v10:
10 On the Lord's Day I was in the Spirit, and I heard behind me a loud
voice like a trumpet, 11 which said: "Write on a scroll
what you see and send it to the seven churches: to Ephesus, Smyrna,
Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia and Laodicea." 12
I turned round to see the voice that was speaking to me. And when I
turned I saw seven golden lampstands, 13 and among the
lampstands was someone "like a son of man"
John sees Jesus. He sees the risen Lord Jesus who is
ruling over the churches, ruling over history. And John is commissioned to write to the churches and
encourage them with this vision of Christ. We studied these early chapters of Revelation before
Christmas. And we were encouraged
that Jesus really does rule even in the midst of terrible suffering, awful
heresies, disgusting sins and deadly persecutions. Jesus still rules. It’s His future that will come to pass
even when our present seems so difficult.
And now we come to
chapter 4 and we see the same voice calling to John. Look at chapter 4:1
After
this I looked, and there before me was a door standing open in heaven.
And the voice I had first heard speaking to me like a trumpet said,
"Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after
this."
John is again spoken to by Jesus. But this time John is shown a
different perspective. Chapters
1-3 were about Jesus ruling amidst the churches on earth. Here, Jesus calls John up to heaven to
see things from on high.
John sees a door that has been opened into
heaven. And the voice of Jesus,
like a trumpet, calls him through it.
Here in verse 1 is a little picture of the gospel. The voice of Jesus comes like a
trumpet. The first time the bible
mentions trumpets is on mount Sinai at the giving of the ten
commandments. There the trumpet
blast was the sign that the people were to come up the mountain to meet
God. On that day the
trumpet sounded and the people stayed at a distance. Here the voice of Jesus is
itself the trumpet blast and it calls John up into the presence of
God. The word of Jesus calls us
up.
And so Jesus takes John through a door
which He has opened into heaven.
When v1 says the door was ‘standing open’ it’s better translated
‘the door had been decisively opened.’
The sense is that this door to heaven stands open now
because of something that has happened in the past. The door to heaven has been decisively
opened. And that’s right – Christ
is described in Micah chapter 2 as One who “breaks open the way.” He
“breaks through the gate”… “at the head” of His people. (Micah 2:13)
Christ decisively opened the door to
heaven. It’s a truth that’s
reflected in the architecture here.
Over this arch are the words about Christ “I know that my Redeemer
lives”. The person who knows
this, passes through the door and can then enter the place where they cry
(Revelation 4:8) : ‘Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty.’ Jesus is the
Door, He is the Way, the Truth and the Life and when we follow His voice
He calls us up to meet the Father.
So because of Jesus, John is here about to
see the Manager. Here he is in
the control centre of all control centres – heaven itself. And what he is about to see will be
hugely encouraging for us, just so long as we don’t get put off by the
weird and wonderful imagery.
At this point I just want to make a plea with
you. Persevere with the weird
imagery. Of course it’s weird, it
couldn’t be anything other than weird.
This is other-worldly stuff here.
But if you want an out of this world perspective then you’re going
to have to deal with out of this world imagery.
Let me flag up three very quick points about
what we see here that will help us as we work through Revelation. First of all, this is a vision not
a video. The images of
Revelation will not be things that we simply map onto our experience of
the world. It’s not a video, it’s
a vision. In this book Jesus is
described as a son of man, a Lion, a Lamb, a Shepherd, an Angel, a Child,
a Warrior and a Bridegroom. Now
if you gave that description in evidence to a court, there is not a
courtroom artist in the world who could make an image of Jesus that would
look like all these things at once.
Can you imagine a child bridegroom who is a lion? Can you imagine a sheep who’s also a
shepherd who rides a white horse?
This is vision not video.
Don’t get caught up trying to map everything onto our earthly
experience.
Second, John is writing in symbols. He’s not just writing in Greek or
Hebrew he’s writing in biblical symbols.
He’s taking a snippet from a bible passage here and putting it
together with 100 other snippets from other places and weaving a biblical
portrait. Which means we don’t
need a calculator and a newspaper and a special bible-code to decypher
Revelation. We just need our
bibles. Look down at verse 3 we
read about jasper and carnelian, well we’ve met them earlier in the
bible, we know what they’re associated with. We read about a rainbow, well the bible tells us about
rainbows, we know what they mean.
In verse 4 we read about the number 24, the bible tells us about
the significance of numbers, it also tells us what being dressed in white
means and what crowns symbolize and so on and so on. John’s not writing in a secret code
that requires secret knowledge.
John is simply speaking bible language. It’s simply biblical imagert woven together and if we pay
attention to the detail and go back to our bibles we will get what
he’s trying to say.
The third thing to say here is that
Revelation 4 is incomplete.
Sometimes people read Revelation 4 and think that this is the
bible’s happily ever after. Far
from it. This is the Once upon a
time. This is not the end, it’s
only the beginning. Revelation 4
sets the scene for chapter 5 where Jesus appears as the Lamb. And that sets the scene for the rest
of the book where Jesus opens the seals and the history of the world
unfolds. Revelation 4 is not the
end-point it’s the beginning, it’s the scene setter. It’s a sneak peak inside the control
centre before the history of the world unfolds.
What do we see?
Verse 2: there is a throne in heaven.
It doesn’t always feel like it. But the word of God tells you there is
a throne in heaven. A place of
authority, power and control. And
this throne is not empty. Someone
is sitting on it. He sat
on this throne last week and He will continue to sit on the throne this
week. Someone rules the
universe. Someone rules the events
of your life. Someone rules
you. And that Someone is not
you. That is a truly
revolutionary thought. There is a throne more powerful than we could ever
imagine. It’s not empty. And you’re not the one sitting on it.
Who is?
Well verse 3, the One sitting on the throne has the appearance of
jasper and carnelian. These are
precious stones that appear at the beginning and at the end of
history. The garden of Eden was a
place of full of these precious stones (Ezekiel 28) and the new Jerusalem
will be a place full of these precious stones. (Revelation 21). And here we learn why these places are
so beautiful – because they are a reflection of the Father’s own
beauty. He is the One whose
appearance is like dazzling, gorgeous jewelry. He is breath-takingly beautiful, precious, valuable,
attractive. This is the first
thing John tells us about the One who sits on the throne. Not His awesome power but His awesome
beauty.
And then immediately he speaks of the
covenant love of God. The rainbow
is God’s own symbol that He first gave after the flood. It is His pledge that He will not
destroy the earth with a flood again.
It is the sign of His everlasting covenant with all the
earth. (Genesis 9:12-17).
So this throne-room does not display the pure
power of an arch tyrant. This is
the place where the beautiful God is surrounded by His covenant promise
to all creation. The One who
rules is committed to His creation and everything we see happen in
Revelation flows out of His covenant commitment. That includes even, v5, ‘flashes of
lightning, rumblings and peals of thunder.’ These are associated in Revelation with the judgements that
shake the earth to its foundations.
Always the thunder, lightning and earthquakes come at the end of
the process of God’s judgement (Rev 8:5; 11:19; 16:18). And it’s almost the sense of God
shaking creation right again. It
is judgement, but judgement that heals and restores.
When the life of heaven meets earth in its sin it disrupts and tears
apart – but always to the end of putting it back together again. And so around the throne
is the covenant sign. And from
the throne comes judgement. But
the judgement is always surrounded by the covenant love – even God’s
anger is part of His good purposes for the world – it’s all part of
shaking this world right again.
Well what
else surrounds this throne? Verse
4: 24 elders on 24 thrones, dressed in white, wearing crowns. Here are some very priestly figures
which suits the very temple feel of this vision. There are 24 of them which almost
certainly refers to the 12 tribes of Israel PLUS the 12 apostles of
Jesus. The whole people of God in
other words are represented. And
they have been brought into heaven as rulers themselves – they sit on
thrones and have crowns. Time and
again the bible promises that those who follow Jesus the King of Kings
will rule with Him and here is that picture fulfilled.
Who else is
in this vision? Verse 5, the
seven spirits of God or as the footnote says ‘the Sevenfold Spirit of
God.’ Why would John describe the
Spirit like this? Well this whole
vision looks very much like the earthly temple – which is not surprising
because the temple was meant to be a copy of heaven. (e.g. Exod 25:40; Acts 7:44; Heb
8:5). And so we see pieces of
furniture from the temple – like v6 – the Sea, which in the temple was a
big vat of water. Or v5 – the
seven blazing lamps. The
sevenfold lampstand was like a single candlestick but with seven lights
on it. And the bible says that
this represented the Holy Spirit (Zech 4:2-6), so here this is weaved
into John’s image. That’s why
it’s the seven-fold Spirit because we’re preserving this temple imagery.
So the
Father is here in heaven, the church is here, the Holy Spirit is here,
but there are also angelic figures.
Read with me from half-way through verse 6:
[There] were four living
creatures, and they were covered with eyes, in front and behind. 7
The first living creature was like a lion, the second was like an ox, the
third had a face like a man, the fourth was like a flying eagle. 8
Each of the four living creatures had six wings and was covered with eyes
all around, even under his wings.
Now this is
where we have to remember – this is vision not video. And this is not written in secret
code, it’s just written in biblical symbols. All these things we’ve seen before in the bible it’s just
that in this vision they’re all squished together.
Now in
particular these creatures are a mish-mash of different angelic
visions. The first is from
Genesis chapter 3 – the cherubim who guard the way back into
paradise. These cherubim are
represented in the temple by cherubs that watch over the ark of the
covenant. Then in Isaiah 6, the
cherubim are said to have six wings and they cry out ‘Holy, Holy, Holy,
is the Lord Almighty.’ (Isaiah 6:3).
And finally in Ezekiel 1 and Ezekiel 10 we see these guardians of
the LORD and they are described as four living creatures – one like a
lion, one like and ox, one like a man, one like an eagle. These are heavenly creatures who stand
in the presence of the Almighty.
They are glorious and fearful creatures. If we encountered them tonight on the way home we would
almost certainly die of shock.
And yet they fall on down in worship of the One who sits on the
throne. How much more worthy, how
much more fearful and glorious is He?
Here’s what
they say: Verse 8
Day and night they never
stop saying: "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was,
and is, and is to come."
Things that
are holy are set apart, devoted, consecrated for special use. So you have holy days and holy spaces
and holy people – they are set apart, devoted, consecrated for special
use. Here the Father is not
simply Holy, not simply Holy Holy but He is Holy Holy Holy. He is set apart, devoted, consecrated,
special beyond measure. He is
Lord, He is God, He is Almighty.
And He elicits, verse 9, continual “glory, honour and thanks.”
You know I
find it difficult to think of ceaseless praise – are you the same? It seems almost impossible for me to
imagine continual worship. But
look again at that word ‘thanks’ in v9.
What would it be like to be endlessly thankful and overflowingly
in gratitude. Have you ever found
yourself saying “Thank you, thank you, thank you. I can’t thank you enough. I am eternally grateful. Thank
you.” Because that is heaven.
And that
gives us a clue about worship.
Heaven won’t be never-ending worship because there’s a worship
rule in heaven. Worship comes
when you see how worthy God really is.
Look at
v11:
"You are worthy, our Lord and God, to
receive glory and honour and power, for you created all things."
God is worthy of worship. He’s not the God who makes you worship
Him so much as He’s the God who makes you want to worship
Him. There’s all the difference
in the world!
Why am I not in awe-struck wonder at the
glories of the grand canyon right now?
Because I’m not there. But
if you take me to the rim of the grand canyon at sunset my jaw will be on
the floor. You won’t have to tell
me to be awe-struck. I just will
be.
It’s the same with God. Put me in front of God and I will
endlessly give glory, honour and thanks.
I will do what the 24 elders do in v10: I will lay down before God the crown He’s given me. That’s a wonderful picture. God saves us raises us in His Son to
sit on thrones in heaven and all we’ll want to do when we’re there is
take our crowns off and say ‘We are not worthy – but you are.’ We struggle for crowns in this
life. We work hard to be
honoured. But when God honours us
beyond our wildest dreams all we will want to do is prostrate ourselves
before Him and give Him all the honour.
Why don’t we live like
that now? Well we’re not there is
one answer. I’m not gob-smacked
about the grand canyon now and I’m not flat on my face in worship now because
I’m not there. But in another
sense the voice of Christ is calling me up to heaven even now. He’s wanting us to see what John sees,
and to hear what John hears.
Listen to this song that’s going on in heaven right now:
11
"You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honour and
power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and
have their being."
Can you join in on
this song? Do you also see that
you are a creature, held in being, sustained this moment by the One who
sits on that throne? He gives you
your being. Without Him,
nothingness would break in from every side. He gives you your life and breath and each heart-beat. Every time we say thank you we are
joining the song of heaven. Next
week we’ll see His Son Jesus who is also worthy of the most heart-felt
praise. And one day the Father
and the Son will move house and bring heaven to earth – we will live
together with them on a renewed earth and we won’t be able to stop
ourselves joyfully and heartily singing the praises of Him who sits on
the throne and the Lamb.
But for now, we live,
as John did in a suffering and uncertain world. But Christ has raised us up to heaven and we’ve seen the
control centre. And it is a
picture of authority (the throne of v2), beauty and covenant faithfulness
(v3), purity (v4), power (v5), calm (v6 – the waters are clear as
crystal), and verses 7 to the end – never-ending praise. The Manager is not running around in a
flap, He is not drunk, incompetent or out of control. He is the beautiful, loving, powerful,
praiseworthy, Almighty Creator.
He is sitting on the throne which means we can trust Him with
whatever we’re facing this week.
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