Salvation and Glory

Revelation 19 will be looking at verses 135 after this I heard what seemed to be the loud voice of a great multitude in heaven crying out, hallelujah, salvation and glory and power belong to our God for his judgments are true and just for he has judged the great prostitute who corrupted the earth with her immorality and is avenged on her the blood of his servants once more.

They cried out hallelujah the smoke from her goes up forever and ever. And the 24 elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshiped God who was seated on the throne saying, amen hallelujah and from the throne came a voice saying praise our God all you his servants, you who fear him, small and great spray heavenly father, we thank you for such a glorious passage of Scripture to deal with today, we thank you Lord for the rejoicing that is going to take place in heaven. We thank you Lord that because of the shed blood of Jesus Christ.

We are going to be a part of that. And Lord, how that thrills our souls. Heavenly father got us and directors to this passion today. May Jesus be uplifted and exalted through it made this congregation beatified by, and it's in Jesus holy and precious name we pray. Amen. You have a seated on the night before Jesus was crucified. He gathered his disciples together in the upper room and they celebrated together. The Passover meal after the Passover meal Jesus instituted the Lord's supper he took the bread in his hand. He broke and he said this is my body that is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me. He took the cup, he held it up to his disciples and said this is the blood of the new covenant in my blood of the new covenant that was shed for many did this in remembrance of me. After that, the Scripture says that they sang a hymn and when I helped now there's Jewish tradition that deals with what they did during the celebration of the Passover and they always sign for my section of the Psalms call the how Leon solves some hundred 13 through some hundred 18.

If you read through those Psalms you will see the word hallelujah used other number and over and over again. What is the word hallelujah many will constitute Hebrew words.

The word holiday.

Help me to praise the word Ya is the shortened form of Yahweh. And so it literally means praise the Lord now. I don't think I know anyone who is not at least familiar with the word hallelujah and if you were to ask most people where the Bible do you find the word hallelujah I think they would say find it all over the Bible less not so there's only two books in the Bible that you find the word hallelujah one of them is as love songs, and the other is in the book of Revelation in the Psalms turn hallelujah is used 24 times the book of Revelation is used for times now the last verse in the book of Psalms is Psalm hundred 50 verse six and it's one word in the Hebrew is hallelujah in the English is translated as praise the Lord not believe there is a connection between that last verse in the Psalms and the though passage that we are dealing with today which is the last song in the New Testament. So the last verse in the Psalms is a command to his God's people say in saying this, hallelujah, and then the last song that we have in the New Testament is the people in heaven rejoicing and crying out, hallelujah if you remember how we been studying the book of Revelation we been viewing it through a tool that we've called progressive parallelism and what that does is it breaks the book Revelation down in the seven Chapter divisions seven big sections in each section is a picture of the church age.

From the first coming of Christ to the second coming of Christ in the 19th chapter, we are in the sixth section and this is the very last statement the last week we saw how God brought great judgment on babbling, who is babbling well, babbling is a picture or a simple and of the political, economic, and cultural system that is totally secular, anti-God, and very hostile to God's people and we saw how, in a quick moment, God brought stinging judgment upon babbling and have a anti-God system.

At that point in time is amazing to me how just absolutely fell apart and when that anti-God system fell apart. Then things begin to happen. The politicians began to mourn because there they lost their power. The merchants begin to mourn because they lost their stuff. The seafarers begin to mourn because they lost their money. But in heaven heaven was rejoicing. Revelation 19 teaches us about this rejoicing in heaven, and then the next thing that we will get to is the glorious second coming of Jesus Christ.

Three points I want to share with you today .1 God glorified in salvation.

Look at verse one after this I heard what seemed to be the loud voice of a great multitude in heaven crying out, hallelujah, salvation and glory and power belong to our God now is to picture here. What's going on in heaven because I don't think it's enough just to hear it. I think we have to feel it, I think we have to see it in our minds. I the Angels whose that Michael the Archangel Gabriel Harold Angel, the sera from others. The Angels that encircled the throne of God, crying out, holy, holy, holy, the cherubim, the, the guardian angels are they here and there there with the believers who have died and gone on to be with the Lord in the Angels and the saints together are an absolute all of the judgment that is just taken place on earth. The kingdom that his father gets God all the way through history has been finally gloriously and totally destroyed the salt in the minds of this great multitude of angels and saints is not so much on just the demise of the of Satan's kingdom is more focused upon God and I love what what is said here at the Scripture says they cried out with a loud voice.

I because it was five minutes of voices going to shake all of heaven and what are they say hallelujah, salvation and glory and power belong to the Lord we share with your passage of Scripture that is always fascinated me that has to do with what the Angels think about our salvation, how they deal with it is in first Peter 110 through 12 concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories it was revealed to them that they were serving not them sales but you and the things that have now been announced to you through those who preach the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. Things into which angels long to look the angels long to look into it. Now you know why the Angels are thinking why in the world would I creator the Lord Jesus Christ, the one who made us. Why would he go to the earth and die a horrible death on the cross for people like them. They are sinners. They didn't love God. They didn't come to God. They didn't obey God. God had to come to them and guided to reach down in them and change them and he took out of them a heart of stone and gave them a heart of flesh here in Revelation 19 that which the Angels did not understand. 2000 years ago. Now they get it. Now they get it. Jesus is glorified by changing sinners into saints so they praise the Lord for three things they say hallelujah, salvation and glory and power belong to our God. When the angel say salvation belongs to our God. They are saying that God is sovereign over our salvation. They are saying that God alone accomplishes our salvation that we don't work up our salvation by good works in human efforts. We are awakened by God's spirit we are convicted by God's spirit we are are given the ability to repent and to express faith by God spirit we are saved by the blood of his son Jesus Christ. We are like Jehoshaphat, who had three enemy armies coming against him and it looked like certain absolute defeat and destruction for Judah, and he didn't know what to do. So he cried out to the Lord, he said, Lord, we don't have any power and we don't have any mind. We don't know what to do but eyes are on you and the Lord said, do not fear Jehoshaphat for this battle is not mine.

That is not yours. It's mine is that this is what you do should put your weapons down. Get your choirs out here and begin to praise me and Jehoshaphat abated and they begin to praise him, and when that happened. Armies came and they heard the praise of God and all the sudden God confused their minds and they didn't turn against Judah, they turned to get some sales and they started started firing arrows of their sales and all of a sudden they killed each other off. Judah never had to lift a finger as Jonah the prophet said salvation belongs to the Lord Richard Phillips added this since the expression salvation belongs to our God emphasizes God's sovereignty in our salvation. It reminds us of the aim of God's will for believers Christian sometimes wonder what God's will for them is especially when they're going through hard times. To what purpose is God working in my life.

They ask and how I make sense of these trials, the answers that God is sovereignly wielding is presently working out our salvation to the praise of his glory. He is arrange marvelous ways in which each of our lives. Display is sovereign grace so that forever in heaven the angels will marvel at how we will each bear our own unique testimony that salvation belongs to God. Second attribute that I want to mention here is God's power member with angels. The saints had just been hailed the satanic world system that seem to be so entrenched, so impenetrable, so permanent has come crashing down and it fail in a matter of minutes people when we doubt God's power.

Why when we do that all the way through the Bible, God is moving to save his people. I think about Sampson God enable Sampson to kill a thousand Philistines with the jawbone of a donkey and when the Israelites needed a way of escape, God parted the Red Sea. When Jericho became an obstacle, God will knock down the walls of Jericho flat. If you want to see the power of God. Take a look at the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And in Ephesians chapter 1 verses 19 through 20. Paul said and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, but the third thing they praise God for is his glory.

The word glory in Hebrew is kebab and it means weighty the secular worldviews God kind of his inconsequential they don't have much fear of God because they don't believe what the word of God says about God. I will be honest with you folks. I'm very concerned about the type of worship that is popping up in churches all over America today it is light and it is fleeting.

It leaves people with the wrong impression of who God is. We are being told that God is our buddy. We don't need to really fear or reverence him. We can go to church sing a few deities hear a message on positive thinking give God a high five and walk out once again it is not by accident that we worship the way that we do here. Grace we don't sing little deities we sing psalms and spiritual songs and theologically correct hymns. We believe that God wants you to feel the weight of glory folks, it is not light. It is heavy and we need to give God honor by worshiping him in the way he deserves to be worshiped. Revelation 117. After John saw the great vision of Jesus and in his glorified body. He saw the that the his countenance just shining like the sun. The Scripture says that he fell at his feet as if you were dead in Isaiah 6. Isaiah walks into the temple of the Lord. He sees the Lord high and lifted up on his throne.

He goes into body tremors and he says woe is me, for I am undone from an unclean man, and in the midst of an unclean people, brothers and sisters. That's not light in inconsequential. That is weighty, the first question the Westminster shorter catechism is what is the chief end of man and the answer that the chief end of man is to glorify God into enjoying forever. John Piper said it could be written this way that the chief end of man is to glorify God by enjoying him forever.

CS Lewis said the Scotch catechism says that man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever, but we shall then know that these are the same thing fully to enjoy is to glorify and commanded us to glorify him.

God is inviting us to enjoy him. The Greek word for glory is the carryover docs and it means something that that is to be esteemed or something that is to be counted as precious counted as precious present sisters.

We have a calling from God on our life to count our God is precious .2 God glorified in judgment. Look at verse two free judgments are true and just three is judge the great prostitute who is corrupted the earth with her immorality and is avenged on her the blood of his servants. Here we are told the two primary causes that that for God's judgment upon this wicked world system in the first one was a horrible immorality.

The world champs people by making ungodly actions appear to be attractive and pleasing when in reality they are immoral and destructive.

This is heinously offensive to our God. Think of the entertainment industry in America today.

Have they done anything to infect our culture. My word, our children watch television the day even just on regular TV and they say near nudity, horrible sexual immorality and just the worst types of sexual perversion stone regular TV and I don't care if you have your child in Sunday school Sunday after Sunday after Sunday that television is after their heart. I can remember my grandmother's dad was a Southern Baptist pastor, not just a little kid. She told me about one of her convictions. She said I've never been to a movie, I'm never going to a movie at that time the only movies I've ever seen were old yeller Davy Crockett Daffy Doug and so I thought my grandmother was just an old fuddy-duddy and so I got saved was 21 I went back and sat down.

My grandma Sue was just a little kid. You told me you would never seen a movie you never gone to a movie asset to know why and she reached up. She got her Bible. She brought it down and she opened it up to Jeremiah chapter 23 in verse 14 and she said Jeremiah is dealing with the false prophets in Judah and she said I believe that Hollywood is doing to America with the false prophets did to Judah and she read me the verse I seen a horrible thing they commit adultery, and they walk in lies they strengthen the hands of the evildoers, so that no one turns from evil. She said Hollywood is known for its sexual immorality, and she said I'm afraid that if I buy a movie ticket that will strengthen the hands of the evildoers, it will support Hollywood and its profligate lifestyle. It will, it will help them to influence our young people and she said, and then what will be the consequences of that and she pointed right down to the last part of that verse that says and no one turns from their evil that was 1971. I thought my grandmother was little radical at that time and she died in 1976. I wonder what she would say to me if she was living today if she would not say to him it was all right has Hollywood influence people for evil. Do they glory in their immorality. They walk in lies, who is the day the first runs to the camera when there's a crisis that takes place, and they state their opinion and it's always a un-biblical stance and it's always a un-encouragement for people to accept evil is it not Hollywood me ask you something Martha preachers interviewed. Why is it that the man of God in this nation will stand up and say, thus saith the Lord God.

If your kids are listening to Robert De Niro and Sean Penn in Charlie's theremin. Debra Messing are they hearing the truth. I'm not as radical as my grandmom. I probably should be. I'm not as radicals were going to movies and still go thought think it's going to be a good movie. If I hear it's a good movie that I can trust, but I wonder sometimes if I will have to give an account to my God for strengthening the hands of the evildoers this much I know when Babel and collapses in this judgment of God fall swiftly and powerfully.

My grandmother on the agony is going to be with the saints and with the Angels and she is going to say hallelujah for the judgments of God are just and true art. Secondly, Babel is judge because her hands are red with the blood of God's servants. Richard Phillips hit the nail on the head with these comments in many places in the world. The day the most dangerous thing one can do to speak the word of God or worship openly in Jesus's name.

Christians are killed and imprisoned for telling others the good news of salvation. Milder forms of persecution have now arrived in the West, businesses are closed because their Christian owners refused to violate their consciences by glorifying the sin of homosexuality, others are threatened by the government for refusing to fund the slaughter of in infants in the womb worldly Babel and lashes out against faithful witnesses to the grace and truth of Christ.

But God's promise to avenge their sorrow and blood in the end, the world's persecution of believers together with its crucifixion of Jesus will be achieved because of God's wrath for judging those who shared his servants. Blood God's faithfulness will be praised.

We need to remember here that the fall of Babylon is not their final judgment. For we find out the just a little later they are going to stand before the Lord Jesus Christ and give an account for what they have done and then they are going to be cast into eternal judgment. Revelation 20 verse 15 says this and if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. Some Christians find it very difficult to accept such a brutal doctrine as eternal punishment, and I had people say to me. We know print print preachers ought not to took to preach on hail because hail makes people feel uncomfortable.

I agree it doesn't like people feeling comfortable and praise the Lord in all of make people feel uncomfortable in the Lord uses that to be a fear of God into our hearts so that we might be driven to Christ brothers and sisters when we soften the idea of hail suffering we minimize the sacrifice that Jesus made for our sins takes us to .3 a summons to praise verse 335 once more.

They cried out hallelujah the smoke from her goes up forever and ever. And the 24 elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshiped God. He was seated on the throne saying, amen hallelujah and from the throne came a voice saying praise our God all you his servants, all you who fear him, small and great, if the Lord is saved you and you are not bound to the culture and you are grateful grateful that God is reached, stand in the muck in the mire of this world and pulled you up out of it and you work excited about heaven and you are praising God because hail is not even a possibility for you nail the limitation God has a calling on your life and that calling is Thanksgiving and praise. Three statements are made here about those who worship the true and living God number one God is worshiped by servants and what is speaks of the servants of God is he talking about tongue that preachers missionaries in and worship leaders and youth directors and Christian counselors. He is talking about those we talk about a much larger group than that he's talking about every person who claims the name of Jesus is a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ puts the word serving in the Greek is due last me tell you what it means. It literally means slave. I've heard a lot of John MacArthur sermons. But the one that had the greatest impact on the was a sermon that he preached at the Cove in Nashville at a pastors conference that Cindy and I went to several years ago entitled that message slave, he was writing a book called slave soon as it came out I got the book for the most important books in my library. He said that slaves have no rights that slaves have the responsibility of absolutely obeying their slave masters. Now if you belong to Christ. That's not a negative thing. That's a good thing because we have a wonderful master and every command.

He gives us is a command that will do good to us and bring glory to him. Paul said it this way. First Corinthians 624 you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body, her story years ago that I think illustrates this Wales little boy who went to a store and he bought a model boat kit and it was pretty expensive. Took it home, started working on it and and just put great effort into it. He sanded off the rough edges he painted it beautifully. Finally got it ready and he attached the sale to it. He was so proud he took it out to his huge lake that was close to their home, like one of the Great Lakes. Just one.

You could even see the other side and he put a dent in the water and before he realized that a gust of wind hit it in that boat started just sailing and sailing and it just went outside. He couldn't swim so he couldn't do anything about it and he was just devastated.

Not long after that just a few weeks. He was at a toy store and he looked up on the shelf of the toy store and there was his boat. He sacked Kate believe it and he ran over to the to the store underneath telling the stories of how my butt back in the Manson one. Sorry but he said a man came by and resold me this boat and and I paid a lot of money for the king is give you this boat is about to sell it to you telling the price will voice about have that much money said we you give me a month. I'm a work hard to get that money in a bottle about back and the man said yes I'll save for you took it off the shelf, put it back in the store room and little boy went home, worked hard for that. That much money and finally got it went back to the store handed the man his hard-earned money he said I want my boat in the man cave in the little boat he held up his hands. He went outside, looked at it in the sun and then he looked at the boat said this now you were twice mine.

I made you, and I bought you. That's why it's a privilege to be a slave of Christ he created you and then when you were dead in trespasses and sins, he saved you for all of eternity by shedding his precious blood for you. Secondly, worshipers are those who fear him. The fear here is not like a man that would have a mean and nasty type of master that would hurt him in doing damage. This type of theater that were talking about here is a fear the little boy would have for his daddy. It's a reverence it's all is a desire to please his dad because he loves him so much and we are told here that we are to worship God in reference and in fear. Thirdly, the God-fearing servants who are worshiping God with reverence and all our people from every tribe, kindred tongue and nation that includes view believers and all believers that includes all nationalities, all missing piece all economic classes.

It matters not how the world tries to divide us up the blood of Jesus Christ makes us one the grace of Jesus Christ brings us into that union with Jesus that makes us one Americans right near very frustrated with the Iranians, the Iranian government is feel with the lot of radical Moslems that want to destroy America off the face of the earth.

But did you realize that in ran right now they are more people irradiance form Moslems that are coming to Christ than ever before in ran's history, Solomonic killed 600 Americans but just a few months ago in a ran he killed 1500 arrangements people in his own country people that were citizens of a ran and he killed them for protesting against radical Islam. Many of those people that were killed were Christians. Believers, the day will come when we will celebrate the judgment of this world system and we will worship God together with the rainy Christians with Iranian Christians who like us were slaves to Christ and not slaves to culture. Hallelujah.

Let's pray heavenly father we thank you and we praise you today for being our great God, we thank you Lord for giving us a picture of what's coming that we can know deep down in the.

The crevices of our heart that we belong to you and it's all good in whale because Jesus wins heavenly father, help us, that we might live with that truth resonating in our hearts. Heavenly father now as we partake of the Lord's supper may we do like the apostles did 2000 years ago, do it with a hallelujah on her lips appraise for what Jesus Christ has done for us by dying for us having his body broken. Heaven's bloodshed that we might be able to spend all eternity with.

We love you Lord, thank you for 11 us in this in Jesus name we pray