Three Angels and a Voice from Heaven

have your Bible and I hope you do turn to Revelation chapter 14 and I'm wondering
if this has ever happened to you. Have you ever had a friend or your spouse say
these five words to you? Did you get my text? Have you ever had somebody who has
said that to you? This has happened on more than one occasion in our marriage where
we have said this to one another and the other person has had that deer in the
headlights look, that look of shock, having overlooked a text message that we sent
to one another. Or maybe we saw the text message but then we got distracted and we
never responded and so communication broke down. It's not good when that happens,
whether you missed it or whether you saw it and ignored it. We're going to look at
a passage of scripture this morning that is not a text message. In fact, it's much
more serious than a text message. It's much more sobering than a text message but
it is God sending messages to the earth, preparing them,
messages of warning, messages telling them of what is to come and encouraging people
to respond to this message. We're in the middle of a section in Revelation where
John is seeing visions of all of redemptive history. This started back in chapter
12, and what John saw first in chapter 12 was a vision of a woman who was giving
birth to a child and a dragon. And you remember the dragon wanted to destroy the
child when the child was born. The Bible says he wanted to devour it, but the
child was not destroyed or devoured. By the way, the woman is God's people
throughout redemptive history. The child is the Messiah coming into the world. The
dragon is Satan. So that's the picture that John is seeing here.
And when the child is born, it is announced to John that this is a male child who
will rule the nations with a rod of iron. But not yet. This child is caught up to
be with God at his throne. And the woman, God's people, go into the wilderness
where she is then pursued by the dragon. And the dragon, meanwhile,
in chapter 13 enlists the help of two co -conspirators, two allies,
two beasts, who represent earthly power and authority, or human government,
and false religion. One beast representing one, the other beast representing the
other, and Satan, through Berkeley power and authority and false religion is trying
to destroy the work of the child, the work in the woman,
in the church, and as we saw last week, as the beasts are trying to destroy God's
people, there is a scene that John sees in heaven in the heavenly Mount Zion where
the lamb is preparing those saints who have died and gone before. He's preparing
them for a day of judgment, a day when he will return and they will
inhabitants of the earth, the devastating news that judgment and destruction are
coming to the earth, along with the destruction of those who refuse to follow the
Lamb and instead are following the beast. And it concludes, this section does,
with a voice coming from heaven to God's people, reminding them that they are to
stand firm and endure and God will bless them. And these messages, the message from
the three angels and the message from heaven, are messages that are to be looked at
soberly. They're not to be overlooked or ignored like you sometimes do with the text
message. When you get these messages, you need to pause, you need to stop, you need
to consider what's being said. These are urgent messages. These are sobering messages.
They are warnings that are to be heeded. And I want to make sure as we look at
the passage this morning that we are appropriately sobered by it. I was talking to
a friend in Chicago yesterday and he said what are you preaching on tomorrow? I
said well we're in the middle of Revelation 14 and he said are you preaching
through Revelation 14 or did you just pick this message about coming destruction as
a joyful thanksgiving message for your congregation?
And I said you know Nobody in his right mind is going to pick this passage to
preach on Thanksgiving week, but in a way, as we look at this, there's a message
of Thanksgiving in this for God's people that He is rescuing us from what is coming
on the whole earth. So with that as our context, let's dig into this text.
You follow along as I read Revelation 14 beginning at verse 6. This is the word of
God for the people of God. The Bible says, "Then I saw another angel flying
directly overhead with an eternal gospel to proclaim to those who dwell on the earth
and every nation and tribe and language and people." And he said with a loud voice,
"Fear God and give him glory because the hour of his judgment his come and worship
him who made heaven and earth and the sea and the springs of water another angel a
second followed saying fallen fallen is babble on the grave she who made all nations
drink the wine of her passion of the passion of her sexual immorality and another
angel a third followed them saying with a loud voice, if anyone worships the beast
and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will
drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger,
and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels,
in the presence of the Lamb, and the smoke of their torment goes up forever and
ever, and they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its
image, whoever receives the mark of his name.
Here is a call for the endurance of the saints, those who keep the commandments of
God and their faith in Jesus. And I heard a voice from heaven saying,
"Write this, "Blessed are the dead who died in the Lord from now on.
Blessed indeed," says the Spirit, "that they may rest from their labors for their
deeds follow them." Amen. May God bless this reading of his word.
The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of God will last forever. I
will confess to you this morning as I read through this passage, my mind kept going
back to Hurricane Helene.
Meteorologists first identified that Helene was a storm, a low pressure system forming
in the western Caribbean on September 22nd. That was when,
if you were watching the weather channel, you would hear the meteorologists on the
weather channel saying, "We're keeping our eye on this depression that's happening out
in the Western Caribbean. This could grow into a major storm, so we're watching
that. Two days later, on September 24th, this tropical storm was officially declared
a – not just a system, but a tropical storm, and they gave it a name. That's when
Helene got her name. The National Hurricane Center moved it from tropical storm to
hurricane the next day on the 25th. And this was the time when the authorities
started to issue the storm warnings. When they started to say you need to evacuate.
The storm is coming. It is powerful. It's very powerful. It's destructive. You need
to get out of the way soon. And most people heeded the warning. Most people headed
inland. They went to stay with friends. They left the coast land, which would be
hit the hardest. But some people, as they always do, some people decided to stay
and ride out the storm. It's always the case that there are a few who say, "It's
not going to be that bad." Or, "I just want to stay here with my stuff." Chip
Scanlon and Mimi Andelman were a couple in St. Petersburg who decided that they
would ride it out. They said, "Our neighborhood had never flooded before." but on 10
30 at night on September 26th when the storm hit Tampa Bay they were kneeling on
their bed as the water rose in their bedroom and then they heard a loud pop and
they smelled an electrical fire and they said we should probably get out of here
and at that point they tried to escape and they got to safety Frank Pirelli who
lives in Treasure Island Florida in Pinellas County right where Helene hit also
stayed home during the hurricane because he has an elevated house and he thought
well it won't be a problem the storm surge won't get this high and when Helene
flooded the bottom floor of his elevated house he decided well he was shocked he
wrote it out but he was stunned that the water got that high and a few days later
when there was a report of a second hurricane coming, Milton, you remember? They
went to Frank and said, "Are you going to ride this one out as well, or what
advice would you give to others?" And he said, "Get out of there." He used another
word in the middle of that, "Get out of there. It's going to be a horror," he
said.
The warnings about Helene and all the hurricanes come kind of in three stages. We're
watching because trouble looks like it's brewing, and then as it gets closer, you
see the reporters who are standing on the beach, and you see the gray skies out on
the horizon, and then you see the winds start to pick up and the waves start to
come in, and they're reporting that through. That's kind of the second stage, and
then the third stage is the aftermath, where they go in afterwards, and you see the
destruction, the trees that are down, the power lines that are down, the homes that
have been destroyed. And when you ask the people who ride out the storms, why they
ride out the storms, it's typically not because nobody told them a storm was coming.
They knew it was coming. They either didn't think it was going to be that bad, or
they were just distracted by other things. They said, "I'll take my chances." Well,
these angelic warnings that we just read from Revelation chapter 14 are like the
stages of a storm warning. The first angel comes and he says the hour of judgment
has come. He says it in past tense even though it's a future tense activity because
in the Bible oftentimes with prophetic pronouncements it will be said in the past
tense. It's called the prophetic past. It's said in past tense because there's a
certainty that it's going to happen. So you say it in the past tense like that he
happened, even though it hasn't yet. So he says the hour of judgment has come. And
then the second angel comes and he says Babylon the great has fallen. Again, it's a
future event, but he's looking back at this. And finally, the third angel says God
is going to pour out his wrath full strength. Three warnings with increasing
intensity as the storm gets nearer. Judgment is coming, Babylon has fallen,
the wrath of God is going to be poured out full strength. And like the guys on
the Weather Channel, these angels are telling you what's coming so that you can get
out of the path of the storm, so that you can make sure you're in a place of
safety when the storm comes. Now let me say something about these angels.
We have to remember what we're reading here is a vision. This is not John looking
at an actual event. He's seeing something that's a vision. It's not like the actual
time -space world. In other words, what John is seeing is intended to be a picture
that points to a larger reality. I don't think John is seeing specific angels
floating in the sky with a loudspeaker, whatever an angel would use for a
loudspeaker to say, attention, Attention please, judgment is coming, Babylon has
fallen. I think what John is seeing here is a vision that symbolizes God's design
and intent for these three messages to go out throughout the earth in the days
leading up to the final judgment, that God will send his messengers to declare these
messages throughout the earth. In fact, Jesus in the Olivet
In the Olivet Discourse is where Jesus is on the Mount of Olives. It's before his
death and he's talking about the coming of the end times. This is in Matthew 24.
And one of the things Jesus says is, "This gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed
throughout the whole earth as a testimony to all nations and then the end will
come." So the angel in this vision, all three of these angels are depicting for
John the truth about these warning messages being proclaimed throughout the ends of
the earth until the final day of judgment comes. And I want us to look at all
three of these messages in order. First, the first angel who says the hour of
judgment has come in verses six and seven. John sees this angel flying overhead just
like the eagle we saw back in chapter eight verse 13. There was an eagle flying
overhead saying, "Whoa, whoa, whoa." Again, I think we're looking at types and
symbols here. I think it's a bigger message. John says this first angel is
proclaiming what he calls an everlasting gospel, an eternal gospel. That's an
interesting phrase because the message that judgment is coming doesn't sound like good
news, does it? When you hear that message, that judgment is coming to the earth,
Your first instinct is not to throw a party or say, "Oh, that's great." But of
course the idea that God is going to come and execute justice and put an end to
wickedness and establish righteousness is indeed good news for those who know Him and
those who follow Him. It is the best news that what is broken is going to be made
right. It's the news that the children in Narnia got when they started to hear the
water running and the winter was about to be over. When the snow starts to thaw
and you see spring coming again, that's good news. In our world,
every time a criminal is rightly convicted of a crime and is fairly sentenced as a
result, as a society we see that as a good thing.
It is good for justice to be carried out if you're people who want to live in
peace and safety. In fact, we've seen in our own country what happens when we fail
in that regard, when we don't execute justice on the wicked and we let them carry
out their wickedness, we see the destructive nature of that for a society. And those
who were living in the Roman Empire, who got this letter when it was first written,
the idea that God would come and bring judgment and would destroy the wicked and
would bring righteousness to the earth, that was a hope. That was a great hope,
the idea that they would be liberated from the injustice they were living under. And
I think we got to keep this in mind. If we're going to fully appreciate what is
good news, we have to first understand how bad the bad news is. You don't really
appreciate the announcement of good news until you understand how desperate or how
bad the situation is. What makes this angelic announcement good news is that God is
in His mercy and grace giving a warning of what's coming before it's too late. I
have good news there's a way of escape from what's coming. When the meteorologist
comes on TV and says we're projecting the storm will hit landfall three days from
now That's good news. You still have time. You can still escape the storm that's
coming. It's a good news warning. And this eternal gospel that the angel is
proclaiming is the news that justice is coming and there's still time to get right
with God. That's good news. And he says, "You are to fear him.
You are to give him glory. You are to worship the one who made the heavens and
the earth, the sea, and the springs of water, he made these things, they belong to
him, he has the right to bring justice to destroy what he created and to recreate
it and make it better, and that's exactly what he's going to do. And it's called
the eternal gospel because this has always been God's plan to redeem his people
through this destruction of the sinful world and the recreation of the heavens and
the earth. It's been the plan, it's not gonna change. God's not gonna wake up
tomorrow, well, God's not gonna sleep, so he's not gonna wake up tomorrow and say,
I should do this differently. Or I have a new idea. Or, I plan B, we'll put
plant, no. This is God's eternal gospel. This has been the plan from the beginning.
He has not deviated from it and he will not deviate from it. This what's going to
happen. And our response should be to fear Him, to give Him glory and worship Him,
and if we do that, we are spared from the wrath that is coming. When we talk
about fearing God, I want to go through all three of those. Fear God, glorify God,
worship Him. When we talk about fearing God, it's not a slavish fear, it's not an
anxious fear, it's a reverent
Al Martin who Curtis you know Al Martin right there the pastor yeah Curtis knows
him he pastored for many years in New Jersey He says the the essential ingredients
of fearing God are first of all a correct concept of the character of God do we
have this can this can you can you does this go up here? You got the Alma Martin
slides that we can put up here There we go So The essential elements of fearing
God are the correct concepts of the character of God, a pervasive sense of the
presence of God, and a constant awareness of our obligation to God. Just let that
sink in for a second. Fearing God means that you have a correct understanding of
his character, a pervasive sense of his presence, and a constant awareness of your
obligation to him. The good news for the people who fear God is that
and your accomplishments, or your goodness, or your power.
I don't have an NFL team that I root for. I grew up in St. Louis, and in those
days, the St. Louis football cardinals played in St. Louis, and so I cheered for
them growing up, but then they moved to Arizona. We didn't have a team for a
while, and then we got the Rams for a while. They won the Super Bowl in St.
Louis. I cheered for them, and then they moved out. St. Louis is without a team,
that's where I grew up so I don't have a football team that I cheer for. So now
I cheer for players, individual players, and the players I cheer for are the ones
who have a bold testimony of their faith in Christ. The bolder their testimony, the
more I'm cheering for them. It's always hard when you've got two guys who are going
against each other and they're both outspoken Christians, but I cheer for both of
them on a given game like that. So I don't know if you saw this on Thursday
night. There was a game on Thursday night where the Cleveland Browns played the
Pittsburgh Steelers in a game that has now been dubbed the Snow Bowl game. This is
what it looked like on Thursday night in Cleveland. And both of the starting
quarterbacks Russell Wilson who plays for the Steelers and James Wilson who plays for
the Browns, both of them profess their faith in Christ. But I want us to watch,
there was a sideline interview that a reporter did with James Winston before the
game. Now this is gonna be a little tricky because we got to move over the
internet to pull this up. So can we do that? So there to watch this interview with
James Wilson. We've said you don't become a brown until you beat the Steelers. What
will it take tonight?
The horse is prepared for battle but victory comes from the Lord. So I'm depending
on the Lord. Is that the message to the team? Day by day,
one play at a time. That's the message. Weather conditions tonight. We're expecting
winds up to 15 miles per hour in a wintery mix. How will that impact your ability
to throw the ball?
I am so happy and grateful that the Lord has blessed me to play in some snow, to
be in true football weather in Cleveland, Ohio at Huntington Bank Field today to
give him the glory. It's a beautiful day. Sure it feels like you're playing in the
AMC North. It is. It's magical. Thank you. Okay.
I don't know. So that's on that. There was no question she could have asked him
that he wouldn't have turned to Jesus and said the Lord's telling him, right? That's
giving glory to God. They did win with two minutes ago.
It was a come from behind with but we won't go into that it was
It now it's one thing let me just say this is one thing to glorify God with your
words But you also have to back it up with how you live With the choices you make
Your words and your life need to keep Putting the spotlight back on God and that's
how you glorify Him. So you fear Him, you glorify Him, and you worship Him. And we
talked this fall about worshiping God. It's the first banner over there, what it
means to worship Him. It means, again, that you ascribe to God the greatest worth,
that He is worth more than anything, that His worth is above any other worth in
your life. And so the first angel comes and says, Here's the eternal gospel judgment
is coming those who fear God glorify him and those who worship him can escape That
coming judgment That's the first message then the second angel comes and the second
angels message is fallen fallen is Babylon the great Now we will learn more about
Babylon when we get to chapters 17 through 19 It's an extended session or section
section about Babylon. And this is not a reference to the Middle Eastern kingdom
that was eventually destroyed by the Medes and the Persians back in the 500 BC,
back in the 6th century BC. And I don't think it's a reference to a resurrected
Babylonian empire in a future day. I think resurrected Babylon is a metaphor for an
earthly kingdom, any earthly kingdom that ignores or rejects God. Any earthly kingdom
that has power and authority but ignores or rejects God. That's what Babylon is.
The ancient Babylonians, after they had destroyed and defeated Jerusalem and had taken
the Jews into captivity, they boasted in their power. In fact, they looked and they
said, "We are more powerful than your God. You depended on your God to save you.
We destroyed you." They exalted themselves above God. They dismissed the God of
Israel as being inconsequential. And they said, "We are Babylon. We are the
mightiest. No one can destroy us." That was true for about 70 years until Babylon
fell. In Psalm 137, the psalmist talks about the Jews in exile being by the shores
of Babylon, and they had to lay down their harps because they could not sing the
songs of Zion. The Babylonian captors would come to the people of Israel and they'd
say, "So play us one of your songs. One of those songs you like to sing about how
great your God is. Play us one of those songs of Zion. Yeah. We want to hear you
singing about how great your God is while you're in chains here." It was mockery.
And the Jews said, "We had to put down our liars for our captors required that we
would sing these songs." But how can we sing the Lord's song in a foreign land?
In the mind of the Babylonians, Babylon was greater. Here's the formula.
Babylon's greater than God. You know the greater than symbol, right kids? You know
that? Greater than. And in the days when Revelation was written, Rome was the new
Babylon, so in this day it was the idea that Rome is now greater than God. The
God of the Christians, he's nothing. Rome is the all -powerful. These guys can
believe in their God if they want, but there's nothing there. Worldly power is
stronger than anything, and that was the message. So this angel comes to announce
that this mighty, Godless human rulers, the human rulers,
whatever is the Babylon of our day, the mighty godless empires will one day fall.
The ones that are led by the two beasts in the dragon, they're gonna be wiped out.
Babylon is every city, every nation, every system, every empire that opposes itself
to God in his ways. In fact, Robert Mount says this. He says, "Babylon is the
spirit of godlessness, which in every age lures men away from the worship of the
Creator.
And the fall of Babylon is stated here, as I said, in past tense, because it's
certain that it's going to happen. And if you were reading Revelation in Sardis or
Pergamum or Ephesus or any of the cities that first got this letter, and the letter
said, "Rome has fallen," You would say, "It sure doesn't look like Rome has fallen.
It sure looks like it's powerful." And the angel is saying here, "It hasn't fallen
yet, but it will. Trust me, it's a done deal." All human kingdoms,
well the writer of Hebrews says, "All human kingdoms are shakable kingdoms, and all
that will shake will be shaken." But the kingdom of God is an unshakable kingdom.
And so this news that Babylon is fallen is that warning, but it's a representation
that the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and of his
Christ and he will reign forever and ever. And we see that now in part we will
see it fully when Jesus returns. Babylon is described in verse 8 as "she who made
all nations drink the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality. Now remember
back in verse 4 when we had the scene in Zion, the 144 ,000 were listed as those
who were pure. They were pure virgins. And we saw that that's really a reference
not to their physical or sexual virginity, but their spiritual purity, that they are
wholly committed to the Lord and nothing is seducing them from Him. So,
it could be that the reference here to the whine of the passion of the sexual
immorality could be about the spiritual adultery that is taking place with those who
are aligned with Babylon. But here's what we know throughout human history, anytime
there is spiritual rejection of God or spiritual ignorance of God, what often
accompanies that is sexual immorality.
Legitimate, Not metaphorical sexual immorality, but actual sexual immorality. Those who
refuse to follow God are most often prone to following. If you're not gonna follow
God, you're gonna follow your own appetites, your desires, your passions. You're gonna
say, "What feels right to me? "What sounds good to me? "What do I think I wanna
do?" And you're gonna do that. And that will lead you to a path of sexual
immorality. Now let me say a couple of things about that. First of all, it's clear
that we're living in a Babylonian -like situation here in this country. Increasingly,
we as a nation, as people, are moving away from God as the God of our lives,
God as the God over us, to a country that is dominated by rejection of God,
rejection of his ways, and along with that, a nation that is consumed with the
unashamed promotion of and participation in sexual sin. It's not just something that
people are doing, it's something that people are bragging about and promoting, sexual
immorality and sin. And as I said, these two are connected. Rejection of God and
sexual immorality go together. But we need to recognize that the root issue in all
of this is not the sexual immorality, it's the rejection of God in his ways that
leads to the sexual immorality.
So if you're trying to get things fixed, you don't focus on the sexual immorality.
You focus on the rejection of God and the spiritual immorality, the spiritual
adultery that's taking place, because when someone is right with God, God will
reshape their sexuality at that point. The other thing I want to say about all the
sexual immorality is that there is a difference between people who are tripped up by
sexual sin and those who unashamedly and wholeheartedly imbibe in sexual sin.
I use the word imbibe because the passage talks about drinking from the cup. One
commentator I read said the imagery of drinking the cup refers to a participation in
a lifestyle. It is a wholehearted embracing of sexual sin as normal,
natural, and right. And King David, I think, gives us a picture of the opposite.
Somebody who was tripped up by sexual sin and who had to experience consequences for
the sexual sin that were deep and painful and long lasting, but who eventually
turned and repented from his sexual sin and who got right before the Lord.
That's different from somebody who embraces sexual sin and rejoices in it.
With any sin, whether it's sexual sin, any sin, God's grace and mercy and
forgiveness is there for all who stumble. That's true for sexual sin.
Those who stumble in sexual sin, when we turn to God, He is full of grace and
mercy and compassion. His judgment comes on those who repeatedly,
willingly, unashamedly reject his word and embrace sexual sin as a pattern in their
life. So if you find yourself tripped up by sexual sin, you should know that the
consequences of your sin will be real and devastating. The Bible says your sins will
find you out, but you also need to know that when you surrender your life to
Jesus, you confess your sin. You turn from that sin and you say, "I did it.
I'm sorry." When you confess your sin, the Bible says, "He is faithful and just to
forgive the sin and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness." So while sexual sin is
real and we can trip and stumble, it's not the unpardonable sin. It has
consequences, but there's forgiveness and mercy and grace for those who turn to the
Lord. And if you are snared in a sexual sin pattern in your life,
I just need to say here, you need to get help. You need to get accountability. You
need to bring it out into light. Half of the power of your sexual sin will be
broken if you'll just bring it out into the light.
If you'll tell others what's going on in your life and get some help in some
accountability. I know there's shame and I know there's embarrassment, but the
question is, are you willing to endure some shame and embarrassment that you're going
to feel in order to get free from the bondage that you're in?
Get on a path to sexual purity and get help with that.
Here's the warning the second angel is announcing here. If you're all in with
Babylon, if you're, if You've joined with the beast. If you're living for the
success of this life, if you're living for the approval of your peers or the
validation of society or esteem, if you have bought into Babylonian priorities and
Babylonian values, you need to know you picked the wrong team. Babylon has fallen.
It may look like in the fourth quarter, they're ahead. They will not survive.
People talk today about embracing cultural values and saying you need to be on the
right side of history. Well, the angel is telling you, I'll tell you what the right
side of history is. The right side of history is to align yourself with God, not
with the beast.
We'll see more about what's coming for Babylon when we get to chapter 17. But let's
move to the third angel and what he says.
Look at verse 9, he says, "This is another angel." Third angel follows them saying
with loud voice, "If anyone worships the beast and its image, receive some mark on
his forehead or his hand." In other words, if there's anyone who has embraced the
Babylonian values, if you've said, "I'm all in with Babylon," you're following the
lead of this world, verse 10 says, "He will also drink the wine of God's wrath
poured out full strength into the cup of his anger. First two angels have announced
judgment is coming. The third angel is announcing the consequences of refusing to
follow the warnings.
You've been warned twice and you say, "I'm going to write it out." "Well, here's
what's coming for you," the angel says. The consequences of refusing to fear God,
glorify God, worship God, instead going along with the Babylonian values and
priorities will lead you to a life of eternal torment.
We find this in Psalms 75, Psalm 75 verses 7 and 8. It is God who executes
judgment, the psalmist says, putting down one and lifting up another. For in the
hand of the Lord there is a cup with foaming wine, well mixed, and he pours out
from it, and all of it.
think, "Well, I know who the wicked are. They're the people who do the bad things."
Now, the wicked here are those who reject God. That's how the Bible defines
wickedness. You may do bad things or you may do nice things, but when you reject
God, you are in the category of the wicked. I'm not talking about the movie,
I'm talking about wickedness according to the Bible. It is wicked according to the
Bible to ignore and reject God.
You can put a veneer of kindness around a wicked heart but when you peel it back
what you find is a wicked stubborn rebels heart underneath and one day by the way
your nice friends who reject God the veneer will be pulled back and you will see
the reality of their wicked heart and their hatred and loathing for the God of the
universe. But when that happens, it will be too late for them.
This cup that God is gonna pour out, the cup of his wrath, will come on all who
reject him on the wicked.
But we gotta stop here for just a minute. There's someone else other than the
wicked who has drunk this cup.
What did Jesus say on the night before he was to be crucified? Father, if it's
possible for this cup to pass me, let it pass me, but not my will,
your will be done. Jesus drank the cup of wrath on the cross for us.
He took on himself the wrath, we sing that, for on the cross as Jesus died,
the wrath of God was satisfied.
That's the eternal gospel. The Bible says all of us are like sheep who have gone
astray each one of us to his own way We've all rejected or ignored the shepherd.
We've all said I'm gonna follow my own way my own path and As a result what's
ahead for all of us is The cup of wrath The righteous wrath of God being poured
out and Jesus comes and says, I will drink that cup for you.
I have drunk that cup for you. Turn to me, follow me.
I will take on myself the penalty you deserve. And it's a free offer. It costs you
nothing. And it costs you everything.
It's your whole life surrendered to him.
What's in the cup, according to verse 10, "The one who rejects God in his ways
will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and the
presence of the Lamb."
Notice two things about that description. First of all, we don't know if this is
talking about literal fire and sulfur, or if it's a metaphor for pain and for
destruction, but in either case, I read one commentator who said, "If it's not
literal, what's literal is going to be worse than the fire and the sulfur.
And think about what God did to Sodom and Gomorrah when he destroyed them, fire and
brimstone, coming down to destroy a city. That's the eternal state for those who
reject God.
We're talking about an unimaginable kind of torment that goes on forever. And I have
to tell you, my first reaction when I read words like this is I don't want to
think about this too much.
My second reaction is I'd like to soften this somehow.
And then I have to struggle with this question. What does this tell me about God?
Does God delight in pouring out His wrath on the wicked?
And I don't have all the answers here, but I found something from Sam norms that I
thought was very helpful. He says this. He says, "The degree to which you and I
struggle with the concept of hell and eternal punishment is the degree to which we
don't understand God's holiness and honor on the one hand, or the horror and
depravity of mankind's sin on the other." We don't understand the wrath of God
because we don't believe God is as holy as he is, and we don't believe we're as
sinful as we really are. He says, "In other words, if hell strikes you "as
unreasonable or unfair or disproportionate, "it can only be due to the fact "that
you either don't believe this book, "the Bible, is inspired and true, "or you don't
believe that God is infinitely holy and just, "or you don't believe that mankind is
morally depraved "and has committed cosmic treason "and is thus deserving of eternal
condemnation."
Listen, the announcement this third angel is making is chilling.
And not to put too fine a point on it, but you and I know people, this is what
is ahead for them. This is where they're headed.
They hear the storm warnings and they think, "Well, I'll ride it out. It's to
leave. I don't believe it. It probably won't be as bad as they say anyway. It
looks sunny out today. It's crazy to think a storm is coming. But here's how bad
it will be. Verse 11, "The smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever. They
have no rest day or night. These who worship the beast in his image and receives
the mark." You've heard some preachers refer to as fire and brimstone, hail fire and
brimstone preachers, and We roll our eyes and we shake our head about preachers like
that, but listen to me carefully this morning. This passage is just one of many in
the Bible that describes eternal conscious torment for those who reject God.
And you may be here this morning thinking, "Well, that's not me. I don't reject
God. I haven't rejected God." Well, let me go back to the beginning. Do you fear
God?
Do you worship God, do you glorify God?
You can say you don't reject him, but what does your life say? What do your
priorities say?
None of us follows him perfectly, of course, but the path you got to be on is the
path that follows Jesus, and when you stumble you get back on that path.
One other thing I want you to see in verse 10 those who are tormented forever are
tormented in the presence of the Lamb Now I don't think this means that When we
are in heaven we will be able to look and see the torment that is going on I
don't think it means that that God is standing guard over the gates of hell But
Remember what it says in Psalm 139 where the psalmist says, where can I go from
your spirit, Lord? If I go to Sheol, you are there.
People who end up in hell, you just need to get this right theologically. Somebody
ends up in hell, they're not punished by the devil for eternity. The devil is being
punished for eternity by God. And if you end up in hell, you and the devil are
being punished together for eternity. It is God who is pouring out the cup of
wrath. It is God who is doing the punishment. Hell is not separation from God, it's
separation from God's grace and His love. God is there, but there's no grace left.
There's no love for the wicked.
Verse 12 says, "This message from the third angel, this message of eternal punishment
for those who reject and ignore God is a call for the endurance of the saints, for
us to keep His commandments and faith in Jesus. So this message that's going out
that is telling the wicked what's coming to them is a call for the saints to
endure, to keep God's commandments, and to trust Him. So let's review here.
Judgment is coming. Babylon is calling you to get drunk on the wine of immorality
to live your life without God in the picture. Babylon will fall. You will fall with
it. It has fallen already. You can take it to the bank. And those who love Babylon
and follow Babylon and marked out as Babylonians will face God's wrath forever. The
call to you and me who know Jesus is to surrender our lives and to endure. In the
face of opposition and persecution we endure. We stay on the path. We don't quit.
We don't give up. We keep our faith in Jesus We keep obeying his commandments and
the good news of the eternal gospel is that in Christ you can escape the wrath
That is coming for you if you follow God and don't reject him Here's the last
thing I think we need to see this morning. It's a voice from heaven That calls out
to God's people in verse 13 Three angels have been warning about the coming
judgment. God says to his people, "Endure, keep your faith, keep the commandments,
follow me." And then he says, "And if you die in the process of doing that, if
you're wind up martyred for your faith, you're blessed if you die in the Lord."
This is the second of seven blessings in the book of Revelation. That number seven
just keeps showing up. There are seven statements of blessing in the book of
Revelation. This is number two. The first one was back in Revelation 1, where it
said, "Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy. Blessed are
those who hear and who keep what is written in it for the time is near." Now,
we'll see the other five blessings as we move through the book, but here the
encouragement is that God will bless those who endure. If you're following Jesus,
you endure and you remain faithful. It may cost you your life. If it does, you're
experiencing the blessing of God when you die as a martyr. Because you're immediately
with Him, you will not face His wrath. You will come face to face with Him.
You will face His love, His mercy, and His kindness. And there are two parts to
this blessing. You'll be blessed because you're with Him. And the Spirit says you'll
be blessed indeed because you'll be able to rest from your labors. What is it that
you're resting from here? You're resting from having to do battle with sin. That's
the labor it's talking about. You're resting because you will no longer have to do
battle against the world, the flesh, and the devil when you die in the Lord and
you're with him. Now that's good news.
You understand that when you come to faith in Christ, you are free in that moment
from the penalty of sin. The penalty is gone. As you grow in Christ the power of
sin is being weakened in your life. One day you will be removed from the presence
of sin. So the past, the penalty is broken, the present, the power is being
weakened. In the future the presence of sin will be gone. There's a day ahead when
there will be no sin in you or around you. Imagine that day, right? That's what
the angel is saying, or what the voice from heaven is saying. If you die in the
Lord, you're free from having to wrestle with sin. That labor is gone.
And it says your deeds will follow you. Now that's significant. It does not say
your deeds will go before you. Because it's not your deeds that get you into
heaven. It's you getting into heaven by the grace of God and your deeds come with
you. What are these deeds that come with you? Whatever you've done for service for
Christ in this life follows you into the next life. These are the treasures you're
laying up for yourself in heaven according to the Bible. I don't know what all that
means. I just know that somehow eternity is impacted by how we serve the Lord in
this life and our deeds go with us into eternity.
We're about to enter a season of the year when we will be singing a lot about
angels and we'll be singing about them bending near the earth to touch with harps
of gold and peace on the earth and goodwill to men. And that's a glorious message
that the angels proclaimed when Jesus was born. These angels in Revelation are
telling us the other side of that story.
They are telling us a storm is coming and you still have time to evacuate yourself.
And it's not just save yourself from the wrath that is coming, it's the promise
that there is great blessing if you turn and worship the Lamb.
So the bottom line of all of this for all of us is have we heeded the warnings
that these messengers have been announcing in our own lives? Have you heeded this?
Do you recognize judgment is coming? Do you recognize that this world will pass
away, that Babylon has fallen. Do you recognize that God's wrath is coming and will
be poured out on the wicked? And have you escaped?
Have you gotten to safety? Have you run to Jesus?
And are you telling others what's ahead for them?
Now it doesn't, just like talking about eternal punishment on the Sunday before
Thanksgiving, It doesn't feel like it's pleasant Thanksgiving sermon topic, and I'm
sure that sitting around the Thanksgiving table, none of you are going to want to
say, "But have you thought about hell recently?" Right? That might break the mood,
but would there be a time when you're with family and friends over the next week,
where you would have an opportunity to say, "You know, I don't know why you did
it, but my pastor preached on hell last Sunday." And it just got me thinking, "What
do you believe about hell? Do you believe there is a hell? Who do you think is
going there? And why do you think that? Where did that idea come from?
Do you think it's for real? And maybe there could be a spiritual conversation that
could get opened up. And you could say, what my pastor was telling us is there's a
storm coming and it's going to be devastating. And we need to make sure we've
gotten to safety.
I'm following Jesus to safety. Have you followed Jesus to safety?
Let's pray. Father,
I confess to you that a passage like this is hard for me to want to dwell on too
much in my own heart and life because of the horror of what's coming for so many.
People I know
Lord, I pray that there would be no one in this room who
would face this kind of a
moment, this kind of an eternity, that they would flee from the wrath to come,
that they would come and fear you and glorify you and worship you. Keep your
commandments,
stay firm in their faith.
And Lord, I pray you would give us boldness and wisdom to know how we can warn
others well
about the judgment that is coming and call them to find a rescue in you.
We ask all of this in Jesus' name. Amen.