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.
Because they were prevented by death from continuing.
But he, because he continues forever, has an unchangeable
priesthood. Therefore he is able to save to
the uttermost those who come to God through him.
Since He always lives to make intercession for them, He's able
to save to the uttermost those who come to Him, mediating on
our behalf, praying to the Father on behalf of us, and
we're taught to do what He does. Did you know that Jesus is
praying for you right now? The Bible is clear.
Jesus is making intercession, which is just a fancy word for
praying right now. As you hear the sound of my
voice, as you listen to Pastor Clark teach through the 8th
chapter of the Book of Revelation, Jesus is praying for
you. This is a wonderful and life
giving truth that should impact your day-to-day life.
Now this should also stir you to pray for others, to lift others
into the presence of Jesus so that they may experience the
deep peace of Christ. Now here's Pastor Clark in
Revelation Chapter 8 with today's edition of Living Waters
of Grace. Heavens worship is it's
completely unlike anything that any of us have ever touched or
experienced, believe me. And so it says that there's
silence in the midst of this period that John is about to
encounter. The sound is deafening.
The silence is deafening because what's about to transpire on the
face of the earth is horrendous, but also majestic in the sense
that as Christ has opened those seals for the first time in the
history of the universe, he has conveyed his full plan to all
the angelic hosts. And they're speechless.
They're astounded at what he has in store, not only in the sense
of his anger and his wrath toward an unbelieving and
ungodly world, but his plan for the future of his Church, the
bride of Jesus Christ. So we see in verse one the
mention of silence. We see in verse 2 the mention of
musical instruments, trumpets. We see in verse 3 and 4 the
offering of incense. And what's interesting is I
don't know about you, but I've been in a lot of different kind
of worship situations. I've been in like really crazy
stuff where people are jumping around and running around and
dislike doing all kind of wild stuff.
And I've been in real conservative type of worship
experiences. I've experienced liturgical
worship experiences, experience, obviously Calvary Chapel kind of
worship experiences. But as good as we might think
our worship is, and it is good, we have a godly worship leader
and team. These guys love the Lord and
give their hearts to serve Christ fully and worship every
week. But we fall short, don't we?
We all fall short of understanding what true worship
is. It's not an emotion or a high,
although we can get kind of like joy, obviously, when we think
about the greatness of God and worship him.
But it's much deeper than that. And so we're getting a glimpse
into heaven. Now as Protestants and as a New
Testament Christians, we have an interesting perspective on how
we look at the development of historical worship from the age
of the Tabernacle, right, in the temple in the Old Testament,
right? And we don't see any visible
temple or Tabernacle right now in our day and age, right?
But it's going to be rebuilt. The sacrifices will begin to
continue during that time of the Tribulation.
The Antichrist will set himself up in the temple as God, the
abomination, the desolation, and a lot of very, very interesting
things are going to occur. Even now in Israel.
There is plans for the structure to build the the robes are being
developed. The Sacramento aspect of how the
Jewish nation connected and worshiped with God will be
reinstituted. And but what I find fascinating
is, is that from God's perspective, that never ended,
right? It's still going on, even though
there is no physical temple or Tabernacle on the earth right
now in the sense of the way it was in Israel with the ark of
the covenant and that kind of stuff.
In heaven right now, there is this element of worship that
most of us have never, ever encountered, But one day we
will. And some people might say, I
don't like the smell of incense. Some people get sick, get
headaches when there's incense. But in heaven, the good news is
when we're there, we won't have the the same kind of physical
maladies. And incense will be awesome
because it's like the most fragrant of perfumes and it it
pleases God. He has it in his throne room
24/7 throughout all eternity. And the incense represents the
prayers of the Saints. We'll get into that in a minute.
But in the Tabernacle or in the temple, there was a golden
altar, different types of altars in the midst of the temple, the
Tabernacle. But this specific altar was
right before the veil entering into the Holy of Holies.
And the responsibility of the temple priest was to burn
incense because it represented the prayers of the nation of
Israel and in heaven. Now, as we read, as John is
teaching us, that this incense is representative of the prayers
of Saints, believers throughout the course of human history.
And so we see in verse one this silence.
Again, just going back to this half hour of silence, it's
dramatically indicating the profound awe at the opening of
the 7th seal. It's no wonder that the Sarah
from and Sheriff from can't help but to continually proclaim,
holy, holy art thou, O God, if we were there, that's going to
be our description. What else can we say?
Holy, holy, holy, aren't you, O God.
And Habakkuk chapter 2, verse 20, it says, but the Lord is in
his holy temple. Let all the earth keep silence
before him. God enjoys silence.
We don't. We have to have noise all the
time. We always have to have some kind
of media on iPod, TV, headphones, music.
I mean, the more noise, the more happy we seem to be at times.
But you take a time of silence and that makes a lot of people
uncomfortable. That's why prayer is so
difficult at times, because it is a time of silence and we're
before God and it's just our thoughts and our heart laid bare
before Him. And sometimes that makes us a
little awkward because we're not used to having silence.
But God says that he's in His holy temple and it's pleasing to
him that the earth would be silent before him.
In Zephaniah chapter one, verse 7, it says be silent in presence
of the Lord God for the day of the Lord is at hand.
For the Lord has prepared a sacrifice and he's invited his
guests. Be silent in the presence of the
Lord. And again, it's something that
sometimes we're not accustomed to.
Or you get with some people and you're going to pray and this
person prays and that person's that person prays.
And then all of a sudden there's a period of silence and, and
sometimes people like restless, well, like who's going to pray
next? Or how long will this silence
last? Does that mean we're done or is
it over? But I think from God's heart,
the silence represents just the beginning of our being open to
what it is that He wants to say to us, more so than what we
think we need to say to God. In Zechariah chapter 2, verse
13, it says be silent all flesh before the Lord, for he is
aroused from his holy habitation.
Be silent, all flesh before the Lord, the one that you're all
familiar with. Psalm 4610 Be still and know
that I am God. I will be exalted among the
nations. I will be exalted in the earth.
And I think it's, it's healthy at times when we come together
as as Christians and, and pray even on Thursdays, it isn't so
much what we're saying, it's what we're hearing, right?
Because so often our prayers are circular.
Lord bless me, mine, you know, me, myself and I or bless my
people or my family or my job or my finance.
I mean, sometimes our prayers are like really, really boring.
God hears him and he loves us. He's merciful.
But like you realize you're saying the same thing all the
time. You realize, like I've answered
like the majority of those things, but you're still asking
me and I've already done it. I mean, do you have any capacity
to pray outside your comfort zone, to pray for people that
you don't know or situations that you're normally not
interested in? You have the heart to let me put
my heart in there to expand your awareness of what it is I
specifically want you to pray about right now at this time and
this day and this age. And verse 2 of Revelation 8, we
see these 7 angels. I saw 7 angels who stand before
God, and to them are given the seven trumpets.
These bodily powers that Victoria so beautifully sung
about represent the Old Testament priests who also
sounded the trumpets during the temple worship.
You know, sometimes when we read the New Testament and the Book
of Revelation and disconnect it from the roots of what worship
has been about since the beginning of time, we, we
unfortunately distort really what the meaning is or we, we
pull things unfortunately sometimes out of context.
But in Joshua chapter 6, verse 13, it refers to these guys.
It says the seven priests bearing 7 trumpets of Ram's
horns before the ark of the Lord went on and continually and blew
the trumpets. And you remember what happened
eventually as a result of blowing those trumpets, right?
The walls fell down, God moved miraculously.
First Chronicles chapter 16, verse 6.
Benanaya and Jehaziel, the priest regularly blew the
trumpets before the Ark of the Covenant of God.
Psalm 96, Six, honor and majesty are before him.
Strength and beauty are in his sanctuary.
So we see this view of heaven of of music, right?
Where's the guitars? Now there is stringed
instruments you'll read about in Revelation, but in this
instance, there's trumpets and verse 3.
This is when it gets interesting.
Then another Angel having a golden censor came and stood at
the altar. He was given much incense that
he should offer it with the prayers of all the Saints upon
the golden altar which was before the throne.
Much incense is present in heaven, much incense, and it's
offered along with the prayers of the Saints.
If you go back to chapter 5 of Revelation verse 8, it says now
when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and
the 24 elders fell down before the Lamb, each having a harp and
golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the
Saints. Psalm 141 two says, let my
prayer be set before you as incense, the lifting up of my
hands as the evening sacrifice. I mean the beauty of how God
designed worship for Himself. It's not about us.
We're given the privilege to worship Him.
But whenever we can worship Him the way He has orchestrated and
desired, what does that do to His heart?
Let my prayer be set before you. Psalm 141.
Two as incense, the lifting up of my hands as the evening
sacrifice. So we see in Revelation that
incense is the visible sign of the prayers of all the people.
Symbolism is important. The dove represents the Holy
Spirit. The cross represents the
crucifixion, the death of burial and resurrection of Christ.
Baptism. Immersion is a sign of dying to
our sin and coming out as new people, new life, the Lord's
Supper that we take every week. The bread represents Christ's
body. The cup represents His blood.
God is not making this stuff up as He goes along.
These are specific things He has put in place that we might truly
know how to worship Him. You remember in the Old
Testament when those priests took strange license to attempt
to worship God with strange fire and strange incense?
It wasn't pleasing to Him. We have to think about our own
worship before him. Lord, does this really please
you today so much worship today. And I'll tell you guys and and
these guys work real hard to pick the songs that are about
God to God for God, not songs that are you could sing to your
girlfriend or your wife, you know that are just like you were
these words. What do they mean but songs that
are doctrinally correct and pure and magnify the glory of of God
in Malachi chapter one, verse 11, it's interesting.
It says for from the rising of the sun even to its going down.
That's that's a picture of eternity.
My name shall be great among the Gentiles and every place incense
shall be offered to my name for my name shall be great among the
nations, says the Lord of hosts. He says in every place, in every
place. Incense is a beautiful gift that
was given to our Lord at His birthright.
Incense, frankincense and myrrh were given to Him at His birth
and we see as we reflect on the Jewish temple, the worship its
continuation in heaven. I love this section in Luke
chapter one, verse 9 through 11. According to the custom of the
priesthood, his lot fell to burn incense.
This is Zacharias as he's doing his responsibility before the
altar of God and the Angel of God is speaking to the family
that Elizabeth is going to have a child and it's an
impossibility because she's been barren.
How in the world can this happen and he's burning the incense and
he he went into the temple of the Lord and the whole multitude
of the people were praying outside at the hour of incense
again the the the community when the prayers of the the incense
was the representation that we now are lifting up the
fragrance. Our prayers are like fragrance
unto God. And an Angel of the Lord
appeared to him to Zacharias standing on the right side of
the altar of incense, A literal physical altar that is not any
on earth at the time, but will also be in heaven.
We're seeing John talk about it. So the worship and revelation is
very different from ours, isn't it?
Completely different from ours? And verse 4, it talks about the
smoke of the incense with the prayers that are ascending
before the Lord, and the smoke of the incense with the prayers
that ascends. Saints ascended before God from
the angel's hand. So the Angel has a sensor that's
coals fire to burn the incense, and he's sensing that altar
before God's throne. And God immediately sees that as
the prayers of his people growing up into heaven from all
the earth throughout all time, and that he has our prayers in
bowls. I, I can't imagine the size of
those bowls, that all the prayers of every person and
every broken heart throughout all time has never been dumped
out. And that one day all our prayers
are going to be answered. And some prayers we're waiting
for and waiting for, we think, well, God, did you miss that one
or wasn't it important to God? Every prayer of his children is
priceless, so priceless that he stores them all in these bowls.
And verse 5, we see the Angel. He takes the sensor, fills it
with fire from the altar, and he throws it to the earth.
And there were noises, thunderings, lightnings and
earthquake. The casting of this sensor to
earth shows the prayers of the Saints in the sense of how long,
Lord will it be till you bring righteousness, not vengeance on
our part? Lord, I hope you get that person
that really messed me up in my life years ago.
I hope you get even with that dirtbag and that, you know,
whatever. And we're just like, you know,
no, it's not about that. It's God's righteousness that
we're waiting to be completely satisfied.
If you look at Revelation chapter 6, we were there a few
weeks ago, 9:00 and 11:00. This is the heart of what is
happening. When He opens the 5th seal.
I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for
the word of God and for the testimony which they held.
And they crowd with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord,
holy and true, until you judge and avenge our blood on those
who dwell on the earth. Then a white robe was given to
each of them, and it was said to them that they should rest a
little while longer, until both the number of the fellow
servants and their brethren, who would be killed as they were,
was completed. And so the the the prayer for us
is OK. Lord, how long will these things
occur on earth where mankind refuses to acknowledge your
existence? Where we feel as countries that
we don't need God, that we want to take down the crosses in
public places. We want to eliminate the prayers
from our Senate and our House and our government.
We want to change the name of our country to something that is
completely independent of God, who He is.
You know, I don't make this stuff up.
I have no political agenda. I hope you sense that when I
preach, I'm not lifting up the Republican or Democratic Party,
but the theocratic government of God.
And God's justice is clearly revealed in the Scripture for
what he says is right and what he says is wrong.
And I don't care what ideology we have politically, if our
ideology does not line up with God's intention, then we're to
be judged. And we're the ones that are
responsible for communicating what is true in our nation.
The freedom of religion that we have the precious right to have
in our country that is slowly being dismantled and we're not
even clearly aware of it. The casting of the center to
earth. Finally, the one who has the
right to bring judgement. Casts that down and it
represents the fire of God coming from heaven and the
beginning of the second period of the tribulation, the
devastation upon the earth begins to be poured out.
The thunderings, the earthquakes signify the judgment of God and
it is eminent at this point prior to, and we'll get into the
rest of the chapter next week. Next week we'll get into the
more radical aspects of the development of this difficult
time on the earth. But then I think about this
silence in heaven for half an hour.
And if you pick up nothing from the sermon up until this point,
think about this. This is a prophetic revelation
that he's been given a long time ago.
He's seen this. So really, the half hour is like
a really long time for all of us right now.
Christ is not willing that any should perish, but that all
should should come to repentance, right?
So from this vision of God's impending justice and wrath
coming out upon the earth, we've had all these years to scope
this landscape out and have an opportunity to let people know
that today is a day of salvation.
It isn't too late to repent. You can still come to Christ.
You can still be saved. All the people we love and care
about, it's not too late yet, but you don't want them to be on
this earth at the end of that half hour time period which we
still have time. In verse 3, as we begin to
conclude, there is this other Angel, this other Angel, another
Angel. It's very interesting how this,
this angelic being is depicted. He came and he stood at the
altar of incense and offered prayers up to the throne of God,
the ministry of intercession, the one whoever lives to make
intercession before the throne of God.
Night and day for who? For you and me.
Your prayers for me are valued, and I trust my prayers for you
like we pray for you guys. But there is one who is ever
living to make intercession before the throne of the Father,
night and day. He does not sleep, He does not
become weary. He's constantly praying for the
things that are on your hearts, guys and gals, the ministry of
intercession. And we intercede, as Ron talked
about on Thursday nights. What we're doing is we're
lifting our own prayers up before the Father on behalf of
one another and the person we believe that this Angel
represents as Jesus Christ himself.
For it says in Hebrews 924 For Christ has not entered the holy
place made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into
heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.
And Hebrews Chapter 7, verse 23 and 24 also there were many
priests, because they were prevented by death from
continuing. But He, because he continues
forever, has an unchangeable priesthood.
Therefore, He is able to save to the uttermost those who come to
God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for
them. He's able to save to the
uttermost those who come to Him. He's mediating on our behalf,
praying to the Father on behalf of us, and we're taught to do
what He does, to pray to the Father on behalf of one another.
It's a privilege to be given the opportunity to stand in a place
of intercession. It's the greatest ministry of
all because that's what our Savior does 24/7, right?
He's interceding before the throne for you and me.
This has been Living Waters of Grace with Pastor Clark.
We're going through the challenging and also intriguing
Book of Revelation. Whether you're a fan of reading
ahead in books of fiction, there's such a benefit to
reading ahead in the Bible to read about how it all ends.
But in an interesting turn of events, the Book of Revelation
is not really the end, but rather the beginning.
It's the end of life as we know it here on earth.
But there's so much to look forward to for what comes after
all the judgment of the earth and those who reject God.
There's a lot to work through, and it can be heartbreaking to
read through the intense judgments and wrath that will
come on those who hate God with all their might.
The thing is, God has given chance upon chance to these
people. They don't want it.
So the outcome is that there are judgments and consequences for
those who've rejected the good news and the gift of salvation
that's offered through Jesus's death and resurrection.
Are you one who has heard about these things but doesn't really
want it because you want to live life on your terms?
Trust me, living for Jesus is so much better.
That doesn't mean it will be easy, but as you listen and read
through Revelation with us, you'll come to a stark
realization that you don't want to be on earth when the
apocalypse happens. So check out Calvary Chapel
online.com to learn how to come to a saving grace through faith
that will allow you to be with Jesus for eternity.
We'd also love to meet you in person at Calvary Chapel
Westmoreland. Come join us at 400 E Pittsburgh
St. Ste. 6B in Greensburg, PA 15601.
This has been living waters of Grace.