Allen Jackson - No More Tears
The first few chapters the book of Revelation dealt with the present, the seven churches in Asia Minor that John was familiar with. The middle section dealt with that season that was ahead of him. The last couple of chapters deal with the distant future, the ultimate judgment, the establishment of Christ reigning on earth. That distant future has gotten a lot shorter. John saw that vision 2,000 years ago. But I think so often we’re afraid of the book of Revelation. I just want you to see the angels, their strength, their power, the prominent role they play. The book of Revelation is not the story of the destruction of the antichrist, or Satan, or the false prophet. It’s the story of God, through his angels and Jesus the Lamb, bringing his judgment and his kingdom into this world.
It’s a description of a birth. It’s a wonderful story. In fact, if I had to give you a summary for those last three chapters, I would do it with this: something good’s gonna happen to you. Something good is gonna happen to you. Some of you won’t read Revelation 'cause it’s scary. Somethin' good is gonna happen to you. It is. Revelation chapter 18, and verse 1, «I saw another angel coming down from heaven». He’s seen a lot of angels by this point. «This angel had great authority, and the earth was illuminated by his splendor». Wow! I mean, by this point, John has seen millions of angels, but this particular one, he said, «I understood that he had great authority and his presence illuminated the whole earth».
Do you have an imagination of angels like that? Revelation 20, verse 1, «I saw an angel coming down out of heaven. He had the key to the abyss and he held in his hand a great chain. He seized the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is the devil or Satan, and he bound him for 1,000 years». An angel with God’s authority to bind Satan. Whoo hoo! «He threw him into the abyss, and locked it, and sealed it over him to keep him from deceiving the nations anymore until the thousand years were ended». Next chapter, Revelation 21, «I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away and there was no longer any sea».
You know, in general, as a race, we don’t like change. Oh, come on. You know, we like home cooking. We like our favorite pair of blue jeans. We like the way we’ve always done it. I know you do 'cause you sit in the same space every week, right? I mean, if I really want to mess with ya, and occasionally I’ll do it, I’ll have somebody to sit in your favorite seat and then I just watch you. For real. I mean, I’ll take my space, you’ll walk in, and you’ll go… I can watch. You’re trying to decide if in Jesus’s name you can evict them. You know, change is just not our favorite thing. Even when they’re good changes, when the church has grown and, we’ve reached new people, and there’s more children in our classes, and there is evidence that God is changing lives, the people that were here before you got here are goin'… «Praise the Lord».
You know, it’s almost as if, «Well, I’ve found my space. Let them go find their own». Because we understand intuitively that change means that we can’t maintain our routines and there could even be some things asked of us. So when we read this first sentence in Revelation 21, «I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away,» I think there’s something even below our conscious level that goes, «I’m not sure this is good. I might be against this. Is there gonna be fried chicken in the new heaven and the new earth»? It says, «I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, 'Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They’ll be his people and God himself will be with them and be their God.'»
I’m thinkin' this sounds like an upgrade. Look at verse 4, «He’ll wipe every tear from their eyes. There’ll be no more death, or mourning, or crying, or pain, for the old order of things has passed away». Something good is gonna happen to you. «And he who was seated on the throne said, 'I’m making everything new. Write this down, these words are trustworthy and they’re true.' And he said to me, 'It’s done. I’m the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.'» It’s the beginning and the end of the alphabet. «To him who is thirsty, I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life». If you’ve got a pen, you oughta circle that little phrase, «The spring of the water of life».
You can read past it right there and think it’s metaphorical. It’s kinda poetic. But I believe it’s grounded in reality more than that. Verse 7 is an important key in this passage. It says, «He who overcomes will inherit all of this». The person who inherits this is the overcomer. Revelation is a disruptive book. Judgments, announcements, insights, all sorts of things. The seven churches each get a message at the beginning in the book that says they’ll have to overcome. The book is written to the broader church, church with a capital C, and when we get to the triumphant chapters of the establishment of the kingdom of God on earth, it says the one who will inherit this is the one who overcomes. Overcoming presupposes obstacles, difficulties, hurdles, inconveniences, unwanted things.
«I’ll be his God and he’ll be my son. But the cowardly», what’s the opposite of being an overcomer? Cowardice. Cowardice is the choice is to not confront, to not stand, to yield. There’s always a reason for it. We’ll push it through the logical formulas that we can find that give us the outcome that we are preferring. The challenge is to be led by the Spirit of God to understand when we’re supposed to stand and when we’re not. We don’t always stand in defiance. When the angels released Peter from prison in the book of Acts, he was slated for execution very soon and he’d been in prison for several days, and God sent an angelic contingent to unlock his chains, to silence the soldiers around him, to open the prison doors before him. They opened. He didn’t open them. They were open before him. He saw one angel.
I’m quite certain there were many present. He went and found the believers who were praying for him, an all-night prayer meeting, and when he got there, he knocks on the door. And it took a little while, there were some communication challenges. They were praying for him to get out of prison, but when he got out of prison, they didn’t believe it was him. Isn’t it good to know we’re with that crew? Are you ever surprised when God moves? I am. I’m like, «Well, I’ve prayed, but…» But what Peter said to them is what always captures my emotion. He said, «Tell the brothers I’m leaving town».
And there’s been multiple occasions prior to that in the book of Acts when they’d be released from prison or delivered from a threat and the angels would say to them, «Go back to the Temple Mount. Finish the sermon that they interrupted». But not this day. Peter says, «Tell the brothers I’m leaving. I’m not abandoning the message». He stays in the story. So when I say that we’re called to stand, we need God’s wisdom. It’s not that we’re just permanently belligerent. We need God’s wisdom. «To him who overcomes will inherit all of this, but the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, who practice magic arts, the idolaters, the liars».
You see, I think it takes courage to follow the Lord. It takes courage to take the truth of God and say, «I will own that for myself». Forget somebody else. It begins with a personal decision. And if we’re not willing to demonstrate the courage it takes to choose the truth for ourselves, the rest of that list finds its way into our behaviors. Well, we may still sit in churches. We may sing the songs and carry our Bibles. We may even read Bibles, and lead groups, and do all sorts of things, but the rest of those behaviors creep into our lives. And there’s still a warning. I’m amazed at the grace and the mercy of God. We’re coming to the most triumphant chapters in all of the Bible and God is saying there’s gonna be a point of judgment.
If you’ve gotten this far into the story and you still haven’t righted the ship, there’s going to be a point of judgment. Please don’t live casually. Don’t live presumptively. I don’t want you to live in fear or under the threat. God is a God of mercy and grace, but he’s not sloppy. Revelation 22, «Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life». Remember I asked you to circle a minute ago, «The spring of the water of life»? Now the angel, the messenger, the ministering spirit that helps us, is gonna show John the river of the water of life. «As clear as crystal, it flows from the throne of God and the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city».
You know, you’ll see that one day. «On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing 12 crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and the Lamb will be in the city and the servants will serve him». I think that’s a change we could stand. Revelation 22, same chapter, «John, the one who heard and saw these things, when I’d heard and seen them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who had been showing them to me». Makes sense. What an amazing journey. What an amazing insight he’s been given. He’s seen the throne of heaven. He’s seen a hundred million angels. He’s seen what was to come in the future.
So he falls down at the feet of the one who has been guiding him through this revelation. «But he said to me, 'Don’t do it. I’m a fellow servant with you.'» I want you to hear that for just a minute. Do you know there are angels serving with you? Never feel alone. Maybe you hear the news or you hear people in powerful positions mocking God. You see expressions of evil that seem to be supported by enormous resources or all sorts of stuff. Whatever it is that makes you feel isolated and alone, I tell ya, I find tremendous comfort and real courage in that one little insight. The angel said, «I’m a fellow servant with you». You know, there’s angels serving with me. I’m not just some hillbilly preacher. Well, I mean, there’s some serving with you too, but hey. «I’m a fellow servant with you, and with your brothers, and the prophets, and all who keep the words of this book worship God».
But as I was doing my research on angels and and their role, Zechariah was a wonderful reminder that this isn’t just a story about the book of Revelation. It’s not just an end of the age thing. The angels don’t just find their way into the New Testament because the 1st century world embraced mythological ideas and spiritual language. Don’t yield the truth of Scripture for those kind of pathetic explanations. Zechariah precedes all of that and the angels play a role in the book of Zechariah that is very similar. It’s a forerunner to what we find. You see, what John described in the book of Revelation was easy for him to describe because he’s familiar with the book of Zechariah. I’ll give you just a couple of brief examples.
Zechariah chapter 1, verse 8, «During the night, I had a vision». Sounds familiar. «And before me was a man riding a red horse. And he was standing among the myrtle trees in a ravine. And behind him were red, brown, and white horses. And I said, What are these, my lord? And the angel who was talking with me answered, 'I’ll show you what they are.'» And he goes on to get the explanation. Sounds a lot like, if you’ve been doing this study with us, the four horsemen in Revelation chapter 6, doesn’t it? Remember the white horse of the gospel, the red horse, the black horse, the pale horse? Again, it was a familiar pattern to Zechariah. It was a familiar pattern to John when he had his vision. He understood he stood in a heritage of people whose faith was described, defined, and made possible by the interaction of angels on their journey.
I suspect we have more confidence in our affiliation with a denomination or a congregation or a translation of the Bible that we do angels. I spent my life in the church, I’m not opposed to denominations, congregations, or translations. But angels occupy an important part of our journey. They’re fellow servants. You don’t wanna worship them. Doesn’t make you more spiritual to know their names. Zechariah 3, «Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right side to accuse him. And the Lord said to Satan, 'The Lord rebuke you, Satan. The Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you.'» It’s an interesting passage. The angel gives to Zechariah this vision. He lets him see Joshua, a man, the current high priest, standing before the Lord, and on the other side of this person is Satan himself. And it’s a helpful phrase, says, «The angel (Satan), standing at his right side to accuse him».
The Hebrew word for Satan means accuser. If you were reading in its original language, it would say the angel of the Lord and the accuser standing at his right side. But God in his mercy to us gives us a little extra language. He said the accuser was standing at his right side. What would the accuser do? Accuse him. So, if you don’t know Hebrew, you still got the meaning. Isn’t God good to us? The Hebrew word for Satan means accuser. And this is in verse 3, «Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes as he stood before the angel. And the angel said to those who were standing before him, 'Take off his filthy clothes. I’ve taken away your sin and put rich garments on you.'»
It’s a very graphic portrayal of what God has done for us. He’s taken away our sin. We’ve been given a robe of righteousness that we didn’t earn, we didn’t deserve. We certainly couldn’t purchase it. There’s no work program where you can work it out. But the response of our life is the value we attach to the gift of righteousness. We’re not delivered from the responsibility to live righteously because we receive the gift of righteousness. A righteous life is your expression of appreciation, gratitude, and the value you attach to that gift. If you live a shabby, sloppy life, dishonoring God, you don’t attach much value to the gift. On the other hand, you can’t earn it. You can’t be good enough. I don’t choose to honor the Lord with my life, or my emotions, or my words, or my behaviors so that God will love me more. He loved me when I was a flat out pagan, thank God.
But this graphic portrayal here of Joshua’s clothing being filthy and clean clothing being provided for him leads me back to the pictures of Revelation. Revelation 3, and verse 18, I put it in your notes. It’s the message to the church in Laodicea. This is to a church now. That’s where we started our discussion today. If our hearts will change, God’ll change our nation. He’ll change our schools and our universities. He’ll change our economy. He’ll change a lot of things. «I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire so you can become rich, and white clothes to wear so you can cover your shameful nakedness». It’s a church. They already have robes of righteousness. They’ve been given the gift of righteousness, but the outcome of their life has left them, in the description in Revelation, of blind, pitiful, naked, and in need of all things.
How messed up do you have to be to be that messed up and not know it? I mean, you gotta be pretty strung out. He says, «You say, 'I don’t need anything, that I’m rich and I have everything, '» and he said, «In reality, you’re poor, blind, and naked, and you don’t know it». I mean, have you ever been so messed up you were poor, blind, and naked, and didn’t know it? Look at everybody lookin' at the carpet, «Not me, Pastor. I have no idea what you’re talking about». Good. Revelation 7, «I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation, and all tribes, and peoples, and tongues standing before the throne, and the Lamb clothed in white robes. And palm branches were in their hands. And they cried with a loud voice, 'Salvation to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb.'»
Look at verse 13. One of the elders said, He asked who these people are, and he said, «These are who are clothed in white robes, who are they, and where have they come from»? And he said, «My lord, you know. They’re the ones who’ve come out of the great tribulation». They are overcomers. I’ll go back to Zechariah for one more passage. I think it’s helpful. Zechariah 4, in verse 1 says, «The angel who talked with me returned and wakened me, as a man is wakened from his sleep». We’re gonna need spiritual help to wake out of the slumber we’ve been in. We all have some friends who are still a bit asleep spiritually. Good people, people of faith, people with a heritage of faith, but they’re still a bit asleep. They’re not awake to what God is doing.
We need God’s help. Don’t be angry with them. Begin to quietly say, «Lord, wake up the people around me. Wake up your people, Lord. Send an angel if necessary. Stir their hearts by your Spirit, Lord». «He awakened me. He said, 'What do you see? ' And I answered, 'I see seven gold lampstands with a bowl at the top.'» Sound a lot like Revelation to me. How about you? Verse 5, «He said, 'Do you know what these are? ' 'No, ' I reply. Then he said, 'This is the Word of the Lord to Zerubbabel. „Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,“ says the Lord Almighty.'»
Do you know who Zerubbabel is? Do you happen to know what his contribution to the Jewish history or Israelite history was? I’ll give you a hint. Who built the first temple in Jerusalem? Do you know? Solomon. It’s not really a trick question. That temple was destroyed by the Babylonians, 587 B.C. The second temple was built in Jerusalem under the authority of a Persian King. The Jews, the exiles and not all returned yet, but they’ve been given permission to rebuild their temple in Jerusalem, and Zerubbabel is the one who builds the temple. Until this day, the Jewish people understand their history in terms of the first temple period and the second temple period.
That was a very modest building because they didn’t have the wealth and the resources that Solomon had when he rebuilt it. Herod the Great will do to call it a remodel is an understatement. The Jews of Herod’s day, it’s the New Testament, didn’t trust Herod enough to allow him to dismantle Zerubbabel’s temple, so he had to simply expand around it, and expand around that he did. It became one of the wonders of the ancient world. But when Zerubbabel built his temple, resources were few. They were still slaves in a foreign land. And the the exiles had begun to return, but not in great numbers. They hadn’t restored temple worship yet. And the message that the angel brought to Zerubbabel was, «'Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit, ' says the Lord Almighty».
I believe if there was a message for the church in the world today, it would be, «Not by might nor by power, but by the Spirit of the living God». The tasks are difficult, the adversaries seem to have more power. There are many deficits. We can look at other seasons and other times historically. The temple and its grandeur when Solomon built it was one of the most beautiful buildings ever constructed by human beings. And Zerubbabel is not going to rival that, but he’s been given an assignment. And God says, «Zerubbabel, you could accomplish this, but it won’t be by your physical might or the power of the numbers that you marshal. It’ll be by the Spirit of the living God».
We need a church empowered by the Spirit of the living God. It’s the truth. Look in verse 7, «What are you, O mighty mountain? Before Zerubbabel, you will become level ground». It’s a wonderful little prayer. Next time there’s some huge hill in front of you that seems ungodly, or immoral, or wicked, or extraordinarily dark, you can say, «Before the Spirit of God, you’ll become level ground».
You don’t have to tell anybody, just quietly start to walk around with that prayer, «You’re gonna become level ground». That disease will become level ground. That threat is gonna become level ground. That broken heart is gonna become level ground. Look at the next sentence, «The hands of Zerubbabel». «Then the word of the Lord came to me, 'The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this temple. His hands will also complete it. And you’ll know that the Lord Almighty has sent me to you who despises the thing of small, the day of small things.'»
Don’t despise, he said, small beginnings. The same hands that began it will complete it because the Spirit of God is in you. In Hebrews, it says that Jesus our Lord is the Author and the Completer of our story; that what he’s begun in us, he will bring to completion; that he called us out of darkness and he will see us into his kingdom. But we’ve got a journey through time. We’re strangers here, pilgrims in the world on a temporary assignment.
Hey, we’re talking about the things of God. We want to offer prayers of invitation so that God is welcome in our lives. Let’s do that right now:
Heavenly Father, thank you for your Word, for the truth it brings to us, for the way that you fill our imagination with what’s possible. We want to welcome you into our lives today more fully than we ever have before. Holy Spirit, you are welcome. Lord, let us see the angels that are at work on our behalf. Give us a discernment, and an understanding, and awareness. Fill our lives with your purposes. In Jesus’s name, amen.