John's Revelation - Sunday Nov 3, 2024

In this episode, we delve into the intriguing world of Revelation, exploring the mysteries of the future and the timeless struggle between good and evil. Drawing inspiration from the iconic movie "Back to the Future," we embark on a journey to understand the significance of key concepts such as "Nike" and "ecclesia," and their relevance to the mission of the church today.

We examine different theological perspectives on Revelation, including the idealist, preterist, historicist, and futurist views, and discuss how these interpretations offer various insights into the end times. Throughout the discussion, we emphasize the importance of remaining vigilant, embracing faith over fear, and understanding the overarching message of hope and victory in the face of uncertainty.

Join us as we navigate through the complex tapestry of Revelation, reflecting on how the teachings of the past continue to guide us in our present and future endeavors. Discover the profound truth that amidst all the chaos and confusion, one message remains clear: God wins.

 

TRANSCRIPT:

 

I always prayed for an opportunity to use that clip. Today was that opportunity,

one of my favorite movies.

You created a time machine out of a DeLorean? So tell me, future boy,

who's president of the United States?

Ronald Reagan, the actor?

And so it goes back and forth. Everybody wants to know something about the future.

You might want to know something relationally about the future.

You might want to know something financially about the future.

You want to know something about your future.

And oftentimes people ask me about the future. Where do you think we are? Are we in those times?

So today I'm going to try to take you, I'm going to hit 88 miles per hour,

I'm going to try to fly you over the future in John's revelation of the future.

So we were talking about the important words when we talk about revelation,

when we talk about the future.

And there are two key words, and I'm going to tell you this over and over again,

because if you get these words, you really understand what's going on.

There's the word Nike, to overcome, to overpower, to conquer,

to triumph, to be victorious like all the teams in the NFL want to be today.

The second word is always church, ekklesia.

Jesus said, I will build my ekklesia.

He said, it's a powerful organism. It's a powerful group of people that go out

and they're light in the world and they change the world and they accomplish

my purposes in the world.

It's not a static entity. It's not people just sitting in a room. It's action.

In this series, I gave you the first Nike lesson. It's easy to get distracted

from the main mission of Christ because we get caught up in our own mission.

It's so easy to do. The second Nike lesson, don't let missing the mark become

a theme of your life. You will always be tempted to compromise your values.

The third Nike lesson, God searches hearts and minds.

God searches hearts and minds. What is God seeing in your heart and mind today.

The Bible is one story with one message about one God who loves you.

And one of my favorite parts about last week was telling you about comfortable.

Comfortable isn't comfortable.

Comfortable never got up before dawn. You got an extra hour of sleep today.

Comfortable won't get its hands dirty. Comfortable has nothing to prove.

Comfortable can't get the job done. Comfortable doesn't have new ideas.

Comfortable won't dive in head first. Comfortable never dares to be great.

Comfortable falls apart at the seams. Don't get comfortable.

And then Craig Groeschel put it this way. Get comfortable being uncomfortable.

Growth and comfort never co-exist.

Growth and comfort never co-exist.

Last week's Nike points, Nike church points were hot or cold is a real thing.

Hot or cold is a real thing.

Lukewarm drives God crazy. He'd rather you be hot on fire or just walk away.

But don't try to get in the middle there.

Don't try to be lukewarm. It's not what he's looking for.

Pride is a problem. It was then and it is now. Blindness is a problem.

That's why John Newton wrote Amazing Grace. I once was blind, but now I see.

The equation of discipline is important.

Those whom I love, I discipline, which is kind of like an echo of John 15,

where Jesus is the vine, where the branch is, and he cuts us back,

he prunes us back so we can bear more fruit.

The equation of discipline is important.

And then the knock on the door, we talked about the knock on the door.

Behold, I stand at the door, knock. What is the door a picture of?

It's a picture of the church.

So there at the end of the first century, they locked Jesus outside of the church.

He said, I'll build my church.

And now they're going on inside of the church. And he's locked out because they've

lost track of what the church is supposed to be.

We can never lose track of what the church is supposed to be.

Like Nike has always said, just do it.

In Matthew chapter 4, there are some important words. Jesus said.

Heaven and earth will pass away.

There'll be an end, but my words will never pass away.

Everything that he said is always true, always has been true, always will be true.

We need to study it, listen to it, embrace it.

But about that day or hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven,

nor the Son, but only the Father.

Stay alert. The devil is poised to pounce and would like nothing better than to catch you napping.

Keep your guard up. You're not the only ones plunged into these hard times.

It's the same with Christians all over the world. So keep a firm grip on faith.

The suffering won't last forever. It won't be long before this generous God

who has great plans for us in Christ, eternal and glorious plans they are,

will have you put together and on your feet for good.

He gets the last word.

Yes, he does. If you go to the Museum of the Bible in Washington,

D.C., as Gail and I were able to do a couple of years ago, we stayed overnight

so we could spend two days in that museum because you can't do it all in one day.

It's just an amazing display of biblical artifacts.

And there's the Dead Sea Scrolls. They're not the originals,

but facsimiles, but it's still amazing to see that.

And the Gutenberg printing press. And everything is just amazing. It's overwhelming.

If you go there, you can go to a room. This is my favorite room that puts you on a moving platform.

So you're moving, the platform is tilting and you feel like you're flying.

And it flies you over many monuments and buildings in DC where God's word is

inscribed or referenced to God is etched into marble, like the top of the Washington Monument,

like the Library of Congress.

It's an amazing place.

Put that on your list for 2025.

While the floor of this room will not tilt or bounce this morning,

I'm going to try to fly you over John's Revelation to give you the big picture.

And if you feel like leaning and making believe the floors, you can do that

if you want to, because that'll give you more engagement with what we're talking about.

So today we're talking about everything you wanted to know about Revelation, but were afraid to ask.

The timeline, what we know, what we don't know.

We'll begin with the maps of how theologians and others have tried to figure out the end of days.

And there are a lot of maps. Okay, so there's the first map.

I'm not going to really say anything about the maps because a lot of them I

can't even figure out myself.

There's the first map, And you can go this way and go that way and look at it

sideways and upside down.

And then there's another map that looks like it's got lightning streaks coming

down. And it's got the seals, the trumpets, and the bowls.

Then there's one that's a little more linear and straightforward.

And then there's another one that's very linear and straightforward.

But let me read from my friend's book, Max Lucado, about what he says about the end times.

And this is a great book. If you have lots of questions and you always want

to know about the rapture and the end times and all that, what happens next?

Max Lucado has put a lot of time and effort and energy into this book.

So he says, we have a choice.

We can view the future through the eyes of fear. We're faith.

The eyes of fear see little reason for hope and ample reason for anxiety.

The eyes of faith see history inching closer and closer to a new era, a heavenly destiny.

God tells us what to expect, not to scare us, but to prepare us.

He is the pilot on the intercom telling the passengers about impending turbulence.

Please buckle your seatbelts for the next few minutes because we'll be going

through some turbulence, comes over the intercom.

A good pilot keeps his travelers informed.

Our good father does the same. Between now and the end of this age,

we can expect some severe instability or call it turbulence,

but we will arrive safely.

And then I read this a few weeks ago.

Lucado starts out saying, we will celebrate. Someday we will celebrate what

we understood correctly.

Chuckle at what we missed entirely.

Mostly we will honor the one teacher who stands above us all.

We will celebrate what we understood correctly. Chuckle at what we missed entirely.

Mostly we will honor the one teacher who stands above us all, Jesus Christ.

So let's fly. Let's start to fly. Let's hit 88 miles per hour.

So I'm going to give you the big theological views that I first learned going to seminary.

I didn't know there were all these different views, but here are the big ones.

The first view is called the idealist view, and these have been proposed over

hundreds of years by lots of different theological positions, corners.

You know, they're not meant to try to help us, you know, get confused,

but they're an attempt to say, let's look at it this way. I think this is a good way to look at it.

So the idealist view says the book of Revelation is not about future events.

It's about the overarching battle of good and evil that always exists.

You see that in the world today.

It's just there's always this battle going on between good and evil.

Henry Cloud once did this great message at the Leadership Summit.

He said there are three kinds of people, the wise, the foolish, and the destructive.

You know how you know the wise person? The wise person, you go to the wise person

and you say, I think you missed this.

Or I think you could have done that better.

Or I think when you use this word, you could have used that word.

And you know what the wise person says?

Thank you. Thank you. for coming to me and being honest, you know,

helping me to grow and get better.

A wise person says that. You know what the fullest person says?

The fullest person says, why don't you just take care of your own business?

You know, what business do you have of telling me, you know,

how I did that, you know, and I could have done that better.

Just go pay attention to yourself. You got, there's a lot of things.

You want me to start talking about you?

I can tell you a lot of things about you that you need to fix and figure out.

So the foolish person just pushes it away.

The destructive person, they just.

Hurt you, and they want to do anything they can to hurt you.

So the idealist view is this overarching struggle of good versus evil in the

world that has always been, will always be.

You can see it today when you turn on the news, when you read the papers,

and when you listen to podcasts.

Okay, this is one of the most interesting, and it came to me,

and I didn't even get this going to seminary theological school.

I got this going to a little Baptist church in Chesapeake where there was a

professor of the Bible from Southern Seminary, which is in Louisville, Kentucky.

And he has studied and studied and studied and studied the book of Revelation.

And he came up with this concept, this theory that John wrote the book of Revelation

to be performed on the stage at Ephesus.

If you go to Ephesus, there it is.

If you go to Ephesus, that's the largest amphitheater in the ancient world. You can go there today.

And look how amazing it is. When I went to college at Montclair State College

in New Jersey, we had a little amphitheater.

I used to like to go there and sit there, you know, being outside and sitting

on the rocks. And it's always kind of a peaceful experience.

But this was the largest amphitheater in the ancient world. So people go here

to see plays. People go here to see shows.

So just as we go today to Chrysler Hall or we go to Broadway or we go anywhere

to see a play, you drive up to Richmond to go see somebody perform.

They did the same thing and said they would go there. But the interesting thing

about this amphitheater is they had seven porticos behind this where the amphitheater

is, you can't see it here, but they would put up pictures.

And in these pictures, they would show what was happening on the stage.

They would show, this is what's happening. And if you take the structure of

Revelation, it's all done in sevens.

And that was this professor's theory, that because John put everything in sevens,

as I mentioned, the seven bowls, the seven woes, the seven seals,

because everything's in sevens.

It's all designed to be on the stage.

So it's kind of like that passion play that they have in Germany where people

go every so many years. I don't know if it's eight years or 10 years.

And it just tells the story of creation. It tells the story of redemption.

And so John wrote it to show the people of the first century that this was a

story that was never going to end, the play.

Ephesus. Then there was the preterist view, the idealist view,

the play at Ephesus, the preterist view.

And don't ask me what preterist means because I do not know.

The struggle of Christianity in the time of the Roman Empire,

they were hopeful of the near return of Jesus Christ.

And you read about that as you read the New Testament, you'll read about they

were thinking that Jesus was coming back soon, and there was still the struggle

with the Roman empire, and so that's the struggle.

First century, Christianity is getting stronger, stronger, stronger.

The Romans are trying to beat him, beat him, beat him back, and hopefully Jesus

was going to come back soon and take care of all that, the preterist view.

The next view is called the historicist view.

Sounds like it is. The telling of church history from the apostles to the second

coming and final judgment.

Now, this is where we kind of get on board with modern times and the modern

view, but there's going to be one more view we're going to look at after this.

So they say, in the historicist view, the breaking of the seals represents the fall of Rome.

In the historicist view, the locusts from the bottomless pit represents invaders

that are coming into Jerusalem and into Israel.

In the historicist view, the beast represents, according to the reformers,

the reformers, 15th, 16th century, the beast represents, according to the reformers,

the religious political system.

I get 666 come up, I buy something else.

You know, I go and I buy another can of soup, I buy a cookie,

and there's gum right there.

So, I have to add this gum, you know, so I don't go near the 666 thing.

But then there's the Antichrist, okay? So, this is really interesting.

I found this description of what the Antichrist is going to be by a very smart

theologian named Mark Hiscock.

He says, Scripture reveals eight attributes or characteristics of the Antichrist's personality.

He'll be an intellectual genius. He'll be an oratorical genius.

He'll be a political genius. He'll be a commercial genius.

He'll be a military genius. He'll be a religious genius.

He'll be a Gentile, so non-Jewish person. He'll be a Gentile.

He will emerge from a reunited Roman Empire. So we're talking basically Europe.

So I know as I was reading those first few things, you had somebody in mind,

please take that person out of your mind and just think about somebody in Europe.

So we'll take that out of the tape, I think. Okay. So nobody really knows.

And you got 666 and nobody really knows, you know, but when you get to the next.

Theory, it starts to all fall into place, sort of, kind of, because there's

so much that you—there's a little you can know.

There's a lot that you can't know, and there's a lot that people still don't know.

But the next theory is the futurist.

The futurist, this view holds to what modern Christianity often refers to as

the rapture, the tribulation, and the millennium.

A popular book series. You may remember, and a lot of people were reading all these books.

They kept coming out with these books called Left Behind.

Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins wrote out of the book of Revelation and out of

the book of Daniel and other passages in the Bible, the Left Behind series.

There was also a movie about the rapture starring Nicolas Cage.

But it's actually more fun watching him in National Treasure,

but that's just my opinion.

And I really liked when he kidnapped the president, and that was really a good

part of that movie with Nicolas Cage. But he was in this movie about the rapture.

In Matthew chapter 24, we read about the rapture.

It says, you will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed.

Such things must happen, but the end is still to come.

And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his

elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.

So the rapture, the tribulation, the millennium, let me explain the rapture by 1 Corinthians 15, 51.

But let me tell you something wonderful, a mystery I'll probably never fully

understand. So Paul's writing this.

He's going, I'm not going to understand it. There's a mystery.

We are not all going to die, but we are all going to be changed.

Later on in that chapter, it says, you hear a blast and all blasts from a trumpet.

And the time that it took you to look up and blink your eyes, it's over.

In the NIV, and this is kind of also, you know, going back to the King James,

in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet.

If Paul couldn't really understand it, I certainly can't understand it.

And it's just this idea of at some point we are all going up and we don't understand it.

But right now there's a commercial, I think it might be a T-Mobile commercial,

where all the phones are going, it might be Verizon, all the phones are going

up and disappearing into the sky. It's kind of like that.

So we see that commercial, it's going to be me. I'm like one of those phones.

about those who sleep in death.

So that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind who have no hope.

And then it says this in verses 16a and 17a, For the Lord himself will come down from heaven.

After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with

them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, just like those phones that are going up.

And we certainly cannot figure it out.

So that's the rapture. Let me explain to you the tribulation.

The rapture says at some point, everybody's going up.

The tribulation is a seven-year period, a seven-year period,

three and a half years of peace, three and a half years of turmoil and chaos.

It just describes a very, very bad time.

And I always tell people this when they ask me about, you know,

are we in the end times? There has to be a one world government.

I'll ask you a question. Are we close to a one world government? I don't think so.

There's got to be a one world government, and the person that's in charge of

that one world government is the one the Bible refers to as the Antichrist or the beast.

And actually, there's two beasts, so we're not going to talk about that.

I explained one world government, So you've got not just that idea of the tribulation,

three and a half years peace, three and a half years of chaos.

You also have what's called the pre-trib, mid-trib, post-trib.

I always love to say that. Pre-trib, mid-trib, post-trib.

And those are the theories of Christ is going to come pre-trib for the rapture.

Christ is going to come mid-trib for the rapture.

Christ is going to come post-trib for the rapture, which means we're going to

be here through the whole thing, even the bad stuff.

So there's also, when you talk about the millennium, there's the.

The amillennium, which means we're already in the millennium,

and we've been in the millennium for a long time.

There's the post-millennium, which is after the thousand years that Jesus is going to come back.

And then there's just like the millennium-millennium, where it's just a thousand years.

When Christ comes back, you know, he's going to reign and rule out of Jerusalem for a thousand years.

Again, but about that day or hour, no one knows,

not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, which that has got to be mind-boggling, but only the Father.

Lots of theological disagreements, lots of charts, lots of maps,

lots of pre-, mid-, post-, lots of chaos, lots of millennial perspectives.

But I'm going to stick with Matthew 24, 36.

But about that day or hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven nor

the Son, but only the Father.

No one knows. When this happens, you're probably going to be at Starbucks.

When this happens, you're going to be trying to pick up a deal for Christmas

at Walmart on the big TV or something.

You may be lined up. When this happens, you're just going to hear a loud boom, and there you go.

You're going to be planning vacation, and then no need to be on vacation.

It's all going to happen.

So let me land the plane, let me slow down the DeLorean and hit you with Revelation

He who was seated on the throne said, I'm making everything new.

In some translations, it goes, behold, I'm making everything new.

Then he said, write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.

He said to me, it is done. I'm the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.

Of course, this is Jesus speaking. To the thirsty, I will give water without

cost from the spring of the water of life.

And when you hear that, you should immediately, in your mind, go to John chapter 4,

where Jesus met a woman at a well, and he told her that he could create within

her a spring of water that welled up to eternal life.

So Jesus is not changing the story at all.

There's something very mysterious. There's something very amazing about eternal life.

And he wants to give us this eternal life because you want to know really what

the most important thing on the chart is on any one of those charts,

what the most important thing is.

This is the most important thing on the chart.

They put him in a tomb. And we're all here today because he didn't stay in the tomb.

On the third day, he rose again, and he proved that he had the power over life

and death, that God has that power, that God gave him his life back.

He becomes, at that point, the hinge of history.

He becomes the change that we all need to understand.

Even though it's still a mystery, when we embrace Him as our Lord and Savior,

when we realize that He gave Himself for us, that we can give ourselves back

to Him with full confidence.

For it is by grace that you're saved through faith. It's the gift of God,

not by works that anyone should boast.

For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works,

which he prepared beforehand for us to do.

It's all there. Ephesians 2, 8, 9, and 10.

And so today, if you go, I want to trust him with my whole life,

not just my spiritual life, my going to church life, but everything,

my job life, my family life, my past,

my hopeful future, my goals.

You want to give everything to Him. He gave 100% to us, to you.

Can we do any less than give 100% back to Him?

So if you want to do that today, at the end of this message,

I'll pray, and you can just do that. You can just do that in your hearts.

And then he writes this, those who are victorious. Ah, love that.

Guess what that is? Nike.

Those who are victorious, guess what those is? The church.

There it is. Those who are victorious, those who have Nike'd,

you've stayed the course.

You've run the race. You hit the finish line. You know, Paul says, I've run the race.

You will inherit all this, and I will be their God, and they will be my children.

Yes, that's right. Uh-oh, uh-oh, if we don't do this.

Those who are victorious will inherit all this, and I will be their God,

and they will be my children.

So, you might not understand, you know, the maps, and I certainly,

you know, don't spend a lot of my time on the maps because,

you know, I always tell people I have a hard enough time, like,

every day asking God to just let me do his will on earth as it is in heaven.

And God is very invested in that.

But God also wanted to give us sort of a peek, but not give us all the answers,

but kind of give us a peek.

And so I thought about, you know, what does be victorious mean?

And I read this to you a couple weeks ago, but this is so dear to my heart.

I want to read this to you one more time.

I asked God to take away my pride, and God said no.

He said it was not for him to take away, but for me to give up.

I asked God to make my child whole, and God said no.

He said her spirit is whole, her body is only temporary.

I asked God to grant me patience, and God said no.

He said that patience is a byproduct of tribulation. It isn't granted, it's earned.

Ask God to give me happiness, and God said no. He said he gives blessings, happiness is up to me.

Ask God to spare my pain, and God said no.

He said suffering draws you apart from worldly cares and brings you closer to me.

Ask God to make my spirit grow, and God said no.

He said I must grow on my own, but he will prune me to make me fruitful. Ask God if he loves me.

And God said, yes. He gave me his only son who died for me. And I'll be in heaven

someday because I believe.

He asked God to help me love others as much as he loves me.

And God said, ah, finally, you have the idea.

So the words of Revelation 4, 8 will always echo in our ears.

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come.

You want to know the book of Revelation? Here it is. Two words. God wins.

Music.

Dear Heavenly Father, I pray for anyone this morning who needs to make that

final decision of their eternal destiny by giving their entire life to you,

by trusting their heart to you,

by accepting you as Lord and Savior.

Father, draw that person to your heart right now.

Father, help us to always ask, God, what do you need from me today?

Help us to live the Nike life. Help us to live that Nike life in the church

and make a difference in the world.

Allow us to be a light in the world.

Father, bless us in this moment because we know that despite a swirling,

twirling, crazy world that we must come back to you.

In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.