This is Living Waters of Grace, the teaching ministry of Clark
Wofford, senior pastor of Calvary Chapel of Westmoreland,
County of Greensburg, PA. Now here's Pastor Clark as he
continues teaching through God's Word.
That he's pictured in tight and the Old Testament is a Passover
lamb. That he is the true Lamb of God
that has the ability to take away the sins of the world.
Well, John is giving us a picture as though it had been
slain, and he's describing what he's seeing in this this vision.
And the lion is referring to the one who judges as sins of the
ungodly, the lion of the tribe of Judah.
Stop and think about a lamb. They are furry, fairly docile
and approachable. Have you ever heard of a lamb
attack? No, lambs are harmless
creatures. As we just heard from Pastor
Clark, Jesus is described as the Lamb, the Lamb of God.
Why would God describe His Son this way?
You'll learn today that Jesus is described as the Lamb of God
because he is directly correlated to the Passover lamb
that was sacrificed for the Jewish people just before the
exodus from the land of Egypt. Now here's Pastor Clark in the
Book of Revelation Chapter 5 with today's edition of Living
Waters of Grace. They represent his government
over the four corners of the Earth.
The first one is referred to one who looks like a lion,
representing one who has majesty and authority and power.
We think of Jesus being the lion from the tribe of Judah.
We see the second creature is described as a young bull or
like an ox, meaning someone who is a servant and we know Jesus
Christ is a servant to all. The third one is has a face of a
man that represents intelligence and moral choice and
responsibility. We know that God Himself became
man and dwelt among us, and so the picture of the humanity of
our Savior being fully God and fully man, and the fourth
creature is symbolized as looking as a flying eagle,
representing the majesty and the swiftness and the transcendence
of our God. I love that verse in Isaiah that
says that those who wait upon the Lord shall renew their
strength. They shall mount up with wings
like eagles. They shall run and not be weary,
and they shall walk and not faint.
And boy, don't we need that at times, huh?
We get weighed down in life, the struggles, the difficulty, and
to be able to wait upon the Lord.
And He promises us if we wait upon Him, He will renew our
strength. And I know I need that all the
time. And this vision that John is
receiving is pretty much the same kind of vision that Isaiah
saw in chapter 6 of the book of Isaiah when he was standing
before the throne of God. And he had the vision and heard
the voices of the cherifim and the seraphim.
Holy, holy, holy art thou, O God, who was and is and is to
come. This is a picture of worship
again of the throne of God. As we speak.
There is continual worship. The worship is never over and
the creatures are always ascribing to the Lord his honor.
Do holy, holy, holy art thou, O God.
Whenever I look at this and I'm at a different stage in my life,
when I would read this when I was a fairly new believer, I
would sort of say, well, that sort of sounds nice, but is that
all they do up there? I mean, when they get boring
after a while, I mean, just like, what else do you do?
Well, I'm sure there's a lot of things we do the scriptures, you
know, there's, there's so many things that are not yet in this
book. The Bible says all the things
that Jesus both spoke about and did, all the books in the world
could not fill everything that He had actually accomplished.
But in regard to worship for me at this stage of my life, I want
Christ more than ever in my life.
And I found in my own heart that He's enough to satisfy me.
There's nothing else I long for in earth or in heaven but the
Lord. And so in my own mind, at the
stage I'm at my life, to me this is bliss.
This being in the presence of God and worshipping Him, it
just, it satisfies the deepest longings in my heart.
No distraction or no temptation or no other thought would come
near. No other experience would come
close to experiencing this kind of presence right with God.
And I trust that as we study this book, that Christ will
become your All in all that as you are being taught of him and
as you're being drawn closer to him, that he fulfills your heart
in a way that nothing or nobody else can.
And because it's that's what it's going to be all about.
And those of us I think that come to understand that in a
deeper way on this side of heaven, we'll be able to be
prepared to receive the richness of this experience when we see
it face to face, as opposed to going and saying, what are they
doing? Can you explain why are they
doing that? Well, go back in the Book of
Revelation. This is what's going on.
I mean, we're going to continually learn in the in the
in the heavens. You know, it isn't like we're
going to get there and we don't need to learn anymore.
It tells us in Ephesians that in the ages that come, He will
reveal his riches and his glory and His kindness to us in Christ
Jesus. And so as we see these
creatures, keep in mind that heaven is full of all kind of
experiences and a different type of manifestations of things that
God has created. Specifically in the heavenly
realm of that first sphere where they, Sarah from a cherub, from
standing, give watch to the throne of God, angels,
archangels, Sarah from cherubim. And what's happening here?
This is the prelude to the tribulation, judgment, the
celebration, the worship, the glory of God, the excitement,
the anticipation that's happening right now is that
they're on the edge of God, finally bringing justice upon
the earth, upon the evilness of this earth.
David says, why do the wicked rage and the people imagine vain
things? Why is it that the wicked
prosper? I'm sure you think in your own
life, people that have done bad things to you in in your life,
why do they get away with it? Why is there seeming no justice?
But one day there will be justice.
And one day God's anger in his wrath is going to come down upon
the ungodly people upon the face of the earth.
And even then, his love will still be manifest because that
judgement, even though it's a judgment that's due, it's a
judgment that will cause many to realize Jesus is who He said He
was. I remember all those people that
would tell me about him, and they're no longer here that have
been raptured or taken out. I know now that what they told
me was true. And I need this Savior as well.
And so His holy judgment is about to be unleashed.
And we'll get into that next week in chapter 6.
As we look in the verse nine now, it says these living
creatures, they give glory and honor.
And we see in this picture the attributes of God being
magnified. In verse 9, it tells us that the
one who sits on the throne, he lives forever and ever.
God is an eternal being. There is no beginning or ending
with God. He's the Alpha and Omega, the
1st and the last, the beginning and the end.
And verse 11 it says He is worthy, the worthy one.
His worthiness to receive glory, honor and power.
That's something we need to learn, isn't it?
More about that. Our prayers before God and our
offerings to Him. He deserves our worship and so
often our prayers are, Lord, I need this, help me with this.
This isn't going right. I'm not happy with this.
And we our prayers many times are complaints and
unthankfulness to God, wanting him to to do all kinds of
things. But can we learn to just give
him glory and worship him and give him honor and give him
praise. Think about your prayer life
this week when you sit before the Lord.
How much of your time is this praising Him and thanking Him
and honoring Him and glorifying Him?
And then verse 11 it says that He has created all things.
This is a good proof text for those who are trying to cram
evolution down your throat. Just smile and say, well, it
says here that God creates all things.
They just didn't happen. God has made these things and He
has brought all this to pass and He does this, it says for His
pleasure. These are created.
And it isn't like this ego selfish type concept.
It means for his desire they were created.
You know, God has created everything on the earth to bless
us. Everything He's made, everything
He's designed was with the intention of blowing our minds
and blessing us and this being good to us.
Think about that when you see a beautiful sunset or you see the
blossoms of the spring come this don't say, well, this is just a
cycle. Again, it happens every year,
spring, summer, winter and fall. No, God rejoices in the
daffodils and the lilies and all the flowers in the bloom.
It magnifies Him and gives him glory, but it also regenerates
us, doesn't it? It makes us alive and it
strengthens us. And so again, God does these
things for various purposes. And I think of that song, Open
the eyes of my heart, Lord. We need the Lord to open our
eyes that we may know how to worship Him.
I know I need to learn a lot about what that means to worship
Him. Worship is a selfless act, isn't
it? Worship is all about being
totally empty of our own interests and our own desires
and our our thoughts and our intentions are only upon the
Lord. It's important that our hearts
are empty of our self will when we come to worship God so that
our focus and our attention can be on Him.
And boy, what a day that's going to be when we are in the heavens
and I can worship and I don't have to think about Monday
morning anymore. You know what's going to happen
Monday morning with my job or my boss or the trials and the
struggles of life? It won't be like that anymore.
What a freedom it'll be. It'll be like a eternal
vacation, won't it? It's going to be awesome.
And in verse 10, it says that the four and 20 elders, they
cast their crowns before the throne.
And there's different types of crowns we see in the Scriptures.
James 112 talks about the crown of life.
It's for those who endure temptation.
And Jesus says that those who love him will receive this
crown. You know, when temptation comes
our way, we have one or two choices and and God doesn't let
us get tempted. He he permits the temptation,
but he doesn't cause the temptation.
The Bible says when we're tempted, we're drawn away by our
own lusts. And while lust is birth, it
brings forth evil. So no one can say they've been
tempted by God. But the interesting thing about
temptation is that there's never a temptation that's set up, so
to speak, by the evil one that you're going to look and say, oh
man, that's horrible. Who would want that?
The temptation is always going to be the most alluring, most
exciting, most dynamic type of possibility that you could ever
fathom. It's a temptation.
It's called temptation because it wants to draw you to itself
and draw you away from the Lord. Well, the beauty of you
resisting temptation by the grace of God, every time you
guys resist temptation, you're saying and proving that you love
God. The crown is given to those who
endure temptation because they love him.
So how can we prove that we love God?
Resist temptation. Every time you give in to
temptation, you're basically saying I don't love you God.
I want this more than you was taught to me many years ago.
And every time I'm tempted, I think of that.
If I give into the temptation, I'm not loving God.
But if I resist the temptation, God knows that I love him.
The crown of righteousness And Second Timothy 48, this is for
all those who love his appearing.
So that's a crown that you're all going to have because if
you're really a Christian, you're, you're looking forward
to his appearing. You're you're you're excited
about it. The next crown is a clown of
crown of glory. First Peter 54 it fadeth not
away. It's again given to those who
are excited about his appearing. And then first Thessalonians 219
talks about the crown of rejoicing and that's for those
who have lived their life for the purpose of reaching others,
winning people to Christ, telling people the gospel,
seeing people come into the Kingdom.
Those we reached for Jesus Christ who now stand in the
presence of God with us. And then the last crown is the
crown of life again, similar to the first one I described.
And this is given to the martyrs and we'll read about this.
We already read about it in the second chapter of Revelation.
These people have been faithful to death.
And you think about all those who have given our lives for the
gospel and history of the church that died horrendous deaths,
burned at the stake and horrible things happening to them
physically. And they didn't renounce their
faith in Jesus Christ. They were faithful to death.
The Bible says precious in the sight of the Lord is the death
of his Saints. And we'll get to cast these
crowns at the feet of Jesus Christ, just like the elders.
And when we go through the judgment seat, which is a
judgment for believers, our works are going to be tried as,
oh, by fire. Gold, silver, precious stone or
wood, hay and stubble. If you died today and your life
would go through that fire, what would be left of your work on
earth, would it? This burn up like man?
There's nothing there. It says there will be some saved
as oh, by fire, meaning by the skin of their teeth, and then
there'll be others that out of their life will flow gold,
silver, and precious stone, and have a big pile of stuff that
you can take and lay at the feet of Christ and cast at his feet.
I'll tell you, the Bible says that there will be some who will
suffer loss in Jesus. It says in Revelation, we'll
wipe away all the tears that people will have.
There'll be a lot of heartache and heartbreak at that judgment
because we'll say, oh, if I would have known how glorious
this was and how real it truly is, I would have lived my life
so differently. But May God give us grace this
morning to sit here not thinking just about words, but may these
words penetrate our heart to wake us up to the reality of
what lay lies ahead for those who belong to the Lord.
And in chapter 5 we see it says, I saw on the right hand of him
who sat on the throne a scroll written inside and on the back
sealed with 7 seals. This scroll was written on both
sides. There's seven seals.
The Romans whenever they had a document in regard to a deed of
title, it was sealed 7 times and this is seen as the title deed
to to the earth and Christ is the only one that can receive
this. The judgments are already
written on this scroll. It isn't like, well let's figure
this out as we go along. All this has been preordained by
God. Everything has been established.
It's just waiting to be a manifest.
And the seal is, these seals are made with wax and it forbids any
unauthorized opening. This particular scroll, this
document has never ever been opened in the past.
And it will be open at that time prior to the the wrath of God
being poured out onto the face of the earth at the start of the
tribulation period. And these 7 seals represent the
tribulation judgments that will be manifest by these seals.
Verse 2 says, I saw a strong Angel proclaiming with a loud
voice, who is worthy to open the scroll and to lucid seals.
And no one in heaven are on earth or under the earth was
able to open the scroll or to look at it.
And the reason that is, is that we're all sinful people.
There's only one that has the power and the ability and the
right to cast judgment. Right now, you and I aren't to
judge. The Bible says judge not lest ye
be judged. One of my prayers every day is
Lord, help me to judge my own sins and not the sins of my
brothers and sisters. It's easy for us to judge, but
our judgments have no power. They have no authority, and I'm
not talking about the judgments of sin or church discipline.
Those have been given to us that authority by the word of God.
But in regard to judging sinful people, well, this person
deserves to go to hell because of this and this and that.
Well, if that's the case, we all deserve to go to hell, right?
There's none of us that are worthy.
Praise God that when you look at someone who's messed up, that
your heart would pray for the Lord to save them and work in
their lives as He's worked in yours, and that you wouldn't be
casting judgment. But John's weeping, this was so
broken understanding that we are so unholy compared to the
greatness of our God, our Savior Jesus Christ.
And John 87, it says he that is without sin among you, let him
cast the first stone. Who of us here today can pick up
a stone and throw it at each other?
None of us. God's our Judge.
The Scripture reminds us about this picture of the scepter of
God's righteousness that only is given to the one from the tribe
of Judah, Jesus Christ himself. In Genesis 44910, it says A
scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from
between his feet until Shiloh come, and unto him shall the
gathering of the people be. And we see that verse 4 says he
wept so much that no one was found worthy to open and read
the scroll or to look at it. But one of the elders said to
me, do not weep. Behold, the lion of the tribe of
Judah, the root of David has prevailed to open the scroll and
to lucid 7 seals. And so the the beauty of this is
Jesus isn't only the descendant of the throne of David, but he's
the one who established the throne before the earth was
made. So David truly is a descendant
of our Savior, the Messiah, Jesus Christ.
But in Jesus humanity, he is a descendant of this lineage
through David's father Jesse. And the Messiah is this word
Shiloh is taken from the word meaning Messiah, and he takes
the scepter, the symbol of the right to govern.
There's only one that has the authority to govern the universe
and the whole world, and that's our Savior Jesus Christ and all
those in the line of Judah. David and Solomon and Rehoboam
were actually kings from the line of Judah, but Jesus himself
is truly the King of kings and the Lord of Lords that was
preordained and prophesized by the Old Testament Saints and the
prophets. And Acts 13 is an interesting
verse that ties into this. If you got your Bible to flip
over there to Acts 13, it's amazing how all these things
connect together. Acts 13 verse 22 and 23 it says
and when he had removed him, he raised up for them David as
king, to whom also he gave testimony and said, I have found
David the son of Jesse, a man after my own heart, who will do
my will from this man's seed. Referring to David, according to
the promise God raised up for Israel a Savior Jesus.
And so Jesus is this one that's being spoken about in the Book
of Revelation. The lion of the tribe of Judah,
the root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose
its seven seals. Jesus is seen as he looks in
verse 6. And behold, in the midst of the
throne, and of the four living creatures, into the midst of the
elder, stood a lamb as though it had been slain, having 7 horns
and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out
into all the earth. Then he came and took the scroll
out of the right hand of him who sat on the throne.
Again, when we study the Book of Revelation, some of these things
are quite graphic and strange. You know, that we would think,
OK, here's here's the Lord here referred to as a lamb, the Lamb
of God who taketh away the sin of the world.
That's what John the Baptist said whenever he saw Jesus
walking at him. He said, behold, the Lamb of
God. Now, Jesus was not coming down
the road as a lamb, but he's pictured in type and the Old
Testament is a Passover lamb, that he is the true Lamb of God
that has the ability to take away the sins of the world.
Well, John is giving us a picture as though it had been
slain, and he's describing what he's seeing in this this vision.
And the lion is referring to the one who judges the sins of the
ungodly, the lion of the tribe of Judah.
And the seven horns represent the complete omnipotent power of
God. 7 is always a number of completeness and perfection.
The seven eyes show the omniscience of God, that God is
all seeing. He's everywhere, present and
knows all things. I mean, today he looks into your
heart and mine. He sees it all.
We can't see each other's hearts, but God sees it all.
He's receiving now, taking into His own hands the title D to the
universe. The beautiful picture is that
only the Father has the authority to give this scroll,
and only the Son has the power and the authority to receive it.
No one else. And what happens in verse 8 when
he takes this scroll? The the living creatures, the
four creatures and the 24 elders, they fall down before
the Lamb. They fall down and adore Him and
worship him. Thanks for being with us today
here on Living Waters of Grace. We're in the Book of Revelation,
and we find it fascinating how influential and involved the
angels are in this book. They bring about whatever it is
that God has instructed them to do, but it's through their
actions that much of the judgements come on the earth.
The angels are in submission to God as their authority, but He
utilizes them in unique ways throughout this book.
Like angels have a specific purpose from God, you have a
unique purpose and plan too. God wants to use you in your
life as a testimony to others and to bring others who are
currently lost into the fold of God.
God would love more than anything for all who are willing
to come to Him for salvation, but he wants it to be their
choice, not a forced situation. This is the way God works, not
forcing himself on anyone, but giving each person free will.
If you're interested in learning about this choice that's free
and that it's a gift, go to calvarychapelonline.com and
click on the About Us tab and then find the link for what we
believe. We'd love to be a help and a
resource for you as you walk through what it means to be a
follower of Jesus. If you find the contact tab on
our website, you can get in touch with us or submit a prayer
request. We'd love to hear from you.
That's all for today's edition and Revelation, but there's much
more that Pastor Clark plans to share with us from this
culminating book of the Bible. Stay tuned for that.
And make sure to mention this radio program to others.
Invite them to tune in to Grace FM 91.7 FM and they can stream
worldwide at Grace Radio dot FM. This has been living waters of
grace.