Sermon Tone Analysis

How important is hope to you?

Dr. Caroline Leaf, in her book, “Cleaning up Your Mental Mess” quotes Carol Graham, the senior fellow at the Brooking Institution, who made this eye-opening observation in 2019 about the effect of “deaths of despair” that were rampant in the US: “The metric that really stands out is not whether a person is happy or unhappy.

Happy today doesn’t matter a whole lot.

It’s hope for the future or lack thereof that’s really linked with premature mortality.”

Dr. Leaf states that more and more research is showing how the absence of hope and the lack of resources to deal with our most basic emotional and physical needs are coming at a great cost.

Fear, isolation, pain, purposelessness, despair . . .

these are the symptoms of a society that is broken and hurting, and they can lead to an early death not only from suicide but from very real damage to the heart, immune system, GI system, and brain—the entire body goes into states of low-grade inflammation that can increase our vulnerability to disease by up to 75–95 percent when we are in a constant state of turmoil.

Hope is a key component for our lives.

It gives us the strength to endure hardship, the resilience to overcome criticism and the perspective to put challenges and struggles in their proper place.

We need hope as much as we need air, water, and food.

Where do you get your hope from?

And what do you put your hope in?

Revelation chapters 6 and 7 are all about hope and they challenge us to get our hope from God and to put our hope in God.

Last week, as we went through chapters 4 and 5, we beheld with John this amazing vision of the throne, the one on the throne, and of the lamb who was slain.

In the hand of the one on the throne was a scroll and attached to the scroll were 7 seals.

An angel cried out “Who is worthy to open the scroll?” and the answer is nobody.

Because of our sin, no one is worthy.

No one, except for Jesus.

Because he gave his life for humanity, to reconcile every person who puts their faith in him to the Father - because he is the lamb who was slain - Jesus is worthy.

So, what is on the scroll?

Darrell Johnson, whose brilliant book “Discipleship on the Edge” has been foundational for us as we go through the book of Revelation, says, “The scroll is the scroll of history.

The scroll contains the meaning of history - of world history, of your history, of my history, of our children’s history.

The scroll contains God’s plan for bringing the purpose of creation to its intended fulfillment.”

It’s God’s plan for bringing the kingdom of heaven to earth.

And who then is worthy to open the seals and put the plan into motion?

Only Jesus because only Jesus can and did take on the sin of the universe and suffered its consequences.

And so Jesus, the lamb who was slain, opens each of the 7 seals.

And what is easy to miss, but is important for us to notice is that each opening of the seals is a response to prayer.

For the first 4 seals, the living beings, which are representative of all living creation offer a single-word prayer to the lamb: they pray “Come.”

Some people think that the living creatures are calling John to come, but he is already there.

Others think that the living creatures are calling the four horsemen.

But, as Darrell Johnson points out, why would creation (which is the representation of the four living creatures) call for that which brings about its destruction and turmoil?

No, when the creatures pray “Come” they are praying that part of the Lord’s prayer that says, “Your kingdom come on earth as it is in Heaven.”

They are praying the prayers of the Spirit and Bride at the end of revelation

For the first four seals, the living creatures are praying for the in-breaking of the kingdom of heaven into our world.

For the fifth seal, the martyrs pray for justice.

For the sixth seal the people pray, not to God whom they have rejected, but to the mountains to hide them from God.

And for the seventh seal, there is a half hour of silence while the prayers of God’s people ascended to the throne.

The reason this is so important is that it reminds us that prayer - that your prayers - impact history.

One of the most beautiful and empowering mysteries of our faith is that our God who is the sovereign King of all creation, who alone rules the cosmos, uses our prayers move history towards his appointed destination.

It can be so easy for us to give up on prayer.

Maybe you’ve been praying for something or someone for decades and you’ve seen no results.

But things are not as they seem.

God is using our prayers to unfold history and to change lives and if we truly trust in him, then we need to be patient for God’s response and we need to persevere in praying.

So keep on praying, church, because God is going to use those prayers to change the world.

So now, let’s look at the seven seals that lamb of God opens, moving history to God’s desired place.

For the first four seals, there is a horse and rider that appears and these represent the things that happen when the world resists and opposes the kingdom of Jesus.

God doesn’t cause these things to happen.

They happen as a result of people rejecting the rule and reign of Jesus in the world and in their hearts.

Let’s look at each one now:

Seal 1 - White horse and rider

Some people think that this is Jesus, because its language is similar to chapter 19 when Jesus defeats the beast and the false prophet while riding a white horse.

But, more likely, this is an imitation of Jesus that has come to deceive the nations.

Jesus warns us of this in the book of Matthew:

This first horse is the power of evil imitating Jesus.

It looks like him, but in opposition to the lamb that was slain for the sins of the world, this rider is about conquest and deception.

Seal 2 - Red horse and rider

Whenever evil is threatened by the coming of God’s kingdom, it reacts with violence; it generates strife and war.

And what is a good thing for us to remember is that all the war, violence and strife that is prevalent in our world is due to spiritual conflict.

That’s why Paul reminds us in Ephesians

War, whether its nation versus nation, tribe versus tribe, or person versus another person, occurs when one or both people give up the way of Jesus and embrace the way of the beast, of the enemy of God.

Are any of you in any conflicts with others right now?

How does the way of Jesus, the lamb who was slain, impact how you will choose to respond?

Seal 3 - Black horse and rider

This one is all about justice - about economic injustice where food costs so much, it will be a whole day’s work just to have enough for a single loaf of bread.

And the oil and wine aren’t to be wasted on the poor.

The rich thrive and enjoy luxury while the poor struggle.

And we don’t have to look far to see that even though the cost of living in Canada has risen sharply lately, most of us get to enjoy an abundance of luxury compared to the many places where people are hoping for, praying for and working for that single loaf of bread for them and their families.

Economic injustice is wildly prevalent in our world and it, like war, has its roots in spiritual warfare of those who set themselves against Jesus.

Seal 4 - Pale horse and rider

Death is personified here but it’s important to see that it’s not referring to natural death, which comes for all of us.

This death that covers the earth is the preventable kind: war and murder, famine, disease, insufficient shelter from wild animals.

This is the type of death that happens because of the sin in the hearts of humanity that allows violence, injustice, and indifference to run rampant around the globe.

Until we see that our human problems are a spiritual problem - the resistance and opposition to the kingdom of God, these four horsemen will continue to plague us.

The four horsemen are not something that will happen in the future.

They have been around since Jesus was installed on the throne of the universe, trying to take him and his people down.

As all creation cries out “Come” to Jesus, evil rises up in opposition causing chaos, strife, injustice and hardship in our world.

Seal 5 - The Martyrs

The sad reality is that being a follower of Jesus does not keep us from experiencing the chaos and evil that arises in response to the in-breaking of the kingdom of God.

It affects us deeply and the toll has been heavy on Christians throughout the centuries.

Dr. Todd Johnson, professor of Global Christianity and MIssion at Gordon Conwell Seminary estimates that 70 million Christians have been martyred over the last two millennia, more than half of which died in the 20th century under fascist and communist regimes.

He also estimates that 1 million Christians were killed between 2001 and 2010 and about 900,000 were killed from 2011 to 2020.

When John sees the martyrs under the altar, they are crying out for justice.

How long, Oh Lord?

And for many Christians, they are echoing that cry for justice even today.

And God’s response is, “Wait a little longer.”

More will suffer as they did, but there is a finite number - the martyrdom will stop and God will enact his justice.

That’s what Revelation 20:12 is all about:

When there is no justice, people lose hope.

But the fifth seal reminds us that justice is coming, but we just have to wait a little longer.

Seal 6 - The Comos in Chaos

Can we all acknowledge that this feels dark?

It’s things like the sixth seal that turns people away from reading the book of Revelation.

But things are not as they seem.

There is hope.

The sixth seal uses Old Testament apocalyptic language to describe what it’s like to experience the wrath of God.

It feels like the end of the cosmos.

It feels so terrifying that everyone, from Kings to slaves, will hide themselves away and call on the mountains to bury them.

But where is the hope?

The hope is found two ways: First, there is hope as this is the justice of God being poured out against all who have rebelled against him, no matter who they are - whether they be Kings or slaves.