Well, now we’re really getting into it. As
we continue our sermon series on the book of Revelation, we’re getting to the
parts now that can be hard to deal with. They make a lot of people
uncomfortable. They make a lot of pastors uncomfortable too, which is why
you probably have not heard a lot of sermons about it. But as we said at
the start of this series, if we say we believe in the Bible as the inspired
word of God, we need to deal with the entire Bible, not just the parts we like.
So, here we go.
The Apostle John is being given a vision. At the
right hand of God he sees a scroll. There’s writing on both sides.
It’s sealed with seven seals. There’s no one to found who’s worthy
to open the seals. And John begins to cry.
We’re given no indication that John has any idea what’s on
the scroll. I wonder, if he had known what would happen when the seals
were opened, whether he’d have been crying. He might’ve preferred the
scroll to stay sealed. But we’ll come to that in a minute.
Because someone is found who’s worthy to open the seals.
The Lion of Judah. The Root of David. The Lamb who had been
slain. Jesus Christ. Jesus is worthy to open the seals. And
he starts to do so.
I know some of you are familiar with the four horsemen of
the apocalypse. It’s something we don’t hear a lot about these days.
I think people more familiar with them years ago than they are now.
But if you’ve ever heard that phrase, this is where it comes from.
As the Christ opens the first four seals, a horse and a rider appear each
time. And what they represent is not good, at least not in our eyes.
Conquest. War. Famine. Death. These are the
plagues, the bad things that are going to happen as the end of the world
approaches. Which is why I wonder whether John knew what was going to
happen when the seals were opened.
When the fifth seal is opened, the martyrs make an
appearance. The people who have been killed because they stood up for the
word of God. And they ask when their murders are going to be avenged.
They want God to get going and wipe out evil now. But they are each
given a white robe and told to wait.
Then comes the opening of the sixth seal. And there’s
an earthquake larger than any earthquake anyone has ever seen. And
everyone goes to hide. They are desperate to get away, because they know
God’s judgment is coming. As it says, “The great day of their wrath has
come, and who can withstand it?
One of the things we always
wonder about is why God allows bad things to happen. Now, understand what
I said there. I said God allows bad things to happen. I did not say
God causes bad things to happen. Many of us--maybe most of us--have had
some really bad things happen, either to ourselves or people we care about.
I’m not saying God pointed a finger and said “This bad thing is going to
happen to you now.” But if God is all-powerful, as we believe, then God
could stop bad things from happening. And God chooses not to, at least
much of the time. And we wonder why.
But what our reading for today shows is that allowing bad
things to happen is part of God’s plan. As it says in the third chapter
of Ecclesiastes, there’s a time for everything. Including a time to weep
and to mourn. A time to die. A time to kill. A time to hate.
A time for war. Ecclesiastes tells us there is a time for all those
things. And it also tells us that God has made everything, which must
include all those things, beautiful, in its time. God has made things
like death, killing, hatred, war--God has made all those things beautiful in
their time.
To me, that means that God allowing all of those things
must, in some way, be part of God’s plan. And we’re also told, in Romans
Eight, Verse Twenty-eight, that in all things God
works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his
purpose.
And again, it is not God causing these
things to happen. It’s God allowing them to happen. The fact that
the Christ is the only one worthy to open the seals shows that God has power
over those bad things--conquest, war, famine, and death. And when the
seals are opened, God does not command that conquest, war, famine, and death
take place. Those things are simply set free. They are allowed to
happen. The forces that cause these things are given the ability to do
what they wish to do. God does not require them to do those things.
God simply has stopped restraining them.
And you may remember that Jesus told us
all this would happen. In Matthew Six, Jesus says, “you will hear of wars
and rumors of wars... Such things must happen...Nation will rise against
nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and
earthquakes in various places.” Jesus told the disciples all this.
But Jesus told them one other thing. Jesus told them, “Do not be
alarmed...Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow
cold, but whoever stands firm to the end will be saved.”
These things must happen. We run
into that phrase time and time again. In Revelation, in Ecclesiastes, in
Matthew, in other places. These things must happen. Again, in some
way, a way that does not always make sense to us, these things apparently are
all part of God’s plan. This is the way it needs to go.
Why? We don’t know. We could
speculate. In part, I suspect it has to do with some of the qualities of
God that we tend to ignore. You know, we
like to think about God as being a loving, caring, forgiving, compassionate
God. And that’s all true. God is all of those things. But
what we don’t like to think about is that those things are not all God is.
We don’t like to think about God’s wrath. We don’t like to think
about God’s judgment. Now don’t get me wrong--I’m not saying God is up in
heaven with a big red pen, just waiting to catch us making a mistake so God can
punish us. But Jesus spoke about a day of judgment, and so does the book
of Revelation. And we forget that at our eternal peril.
I suspect God’s righteousness, God’s justice, God’s
holiness, are all tied it up in why these bad things must happen. That’s
not a full explanation, and I don’t intend it to be. Only God knows that
full explanation. God just told us that these things must happen, and if
we believe in God then we don’t have much choice but to accept that.
It sounds kind of scary, when we think about all these bad
things happening. That’s one of the reasons we don’t like to think about
God’s judgment--it scares us. We know, deep down, that we’re not the
people we should be. We try to hide it, a lot of times. We try to
pretend that we’re pretty good. We try to convince ourselves that what
we’re doing is okay, that we’re doing the best we can. After all, we tell
ourselves, God does not expect us to be perfect. God knows we’re going to
mess up. It’s okay.
But deep down, we know it’s not true. I mean, we may
be pretty good, in human terms. But we know we could do better. God
does know that we cannot be perfect, but God also knows that very few of us are
truly doing the best we can. Most of us, if we’re honest with ourselves,
know we have plenty of room for improvement. Most of us have lots of
times when we don’t follow God as well as we should. We don’t trust God
the way we should. We don’t love our neighbors the way we should. We
know how unworthy of God’s love and forgiveness we are. No matter how
many excuses we try to make for ourselves, deep down, we know. And we
know that God knows, too.
And so, when we think about God’s judgment, we get scared.
But we don’t have to be. The disciples were probably scared, too,
when Jesus started talking about all this stuff in the gospel of Matthew.
But remember what Jesus told them. “Do not be alarmed...whoever
stands firm to the end will be saved.”
That’s what it comes down to. Standing firm in our
faith to the end. Not making excuses for ourselves, but repenting of our
sins and asking for forgiveness. Not being perfect people, but standing
firm in our faith. Continuing to believe in God, no matter how many bad
things happen. Continuing to believe in Jesus Christ as our Savior, no
matter how desperate the situation may be. Continuing to love our
neighbor, even when our neighbor does not seem to deserve our love.
Standing firm in our faith, no matter what.
Because the worse things get, the more tempting it is to
give up on God. And the worse things get, the more the world tries to get
us to give up on God. And the worse things get, the more Satan tempts us
to turn away from God.
But God is always there. No matter how bad things
get, God is always there. No matter how bad things get, Jesus Christ is
still the Savior. The same Christ who was worthy to open the seals and
allow these terrible things will, in the end, triumph over them. And because
of that, you and I do not need to be alarmed. We don’t need to be scared.
All we need to do is what Jesus said. Stand firm in our faith.
If we do that, we will be saved. We will have eternal life.
God has allowed some bad things to happen. And God is
going to allow still more. We don’t know why. But we do know that
we don’t have to be scared. If we stand firm in our faith, we will be
able to stand up to God’s judgment. And we will be saved.
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