All Heaven Rejoicing

Church Life

Announcements

There’s a caroling group going to a care home at 2 pm today. You don’t need to be a great singer, just have the love of Jesus in your heart. 

Choir practice for the Christmas program will be at 4 pm today. 

If you haven’t already been to it, Journey to Bethlehem is happening over at the Kennewick Adventist Church starting at 5:30 tonight. If you haven’t reserved a ticket online, that’s fine, just show up early and they’ll get you in as a walk-in within 30 to 45 minutes. 

Next Friday night we’re going to have an intimate Christmas experience filled with Christmas memories and stories and songs. There’s a dinner at 5 pm and the program starts shortly after dinner. 

And next Sabbath is our Christmas worship experience. The theme is Do Not Be Afraid. Please invite your neighbors and friends to join us for this encouraging Christmas worship. 

Church life feature:

Call up Beginner and kindergarten class teachers and helpers and musicians

Ilene, Emma

Shelanne, Harvey and Esther Lighthouse

Shauna Hallam

And anyone else that assists.

Do you know how valuable you are to the family of God?

You play a crucial role in laying a foundation of faith in the lives of our children. You help grow the faith of some of the most precious members of our church family. Through your service and your teaching you provide an example of godliness that they will not soon forget. I still remember lessons that I learned in my kindergarten class. And the songs from beginner class still run through my head.

From what I understand, most SS teachers don’t care to be in front of the whole church, so I haven’t called you up to praise you or make a big scene. I’ve asked you to come up to thank you for your service, and to invite the Holy Spirit to fill you with power to do the ministry he has you to.

I’ve also asked you to come forward because I want the church to know that both of your classes need help. Our ministry placement team has asked several individuals, but so far we havne’t found enough helpers fr your classes. If you are willing to help in one of these classes once or twice a month, please talk to me, or to Ilene or Shelanne. It would be helpful to have two more teachers in each class.

Now I’d like to invite the elders to come forward and lay their hands on you and pray for you.

Prayer

Offering

Our offering emphasis this Sabbath is for Adventist Community Services, also known as ACS. ACS provides vital help to individuals and families who are unemployed, working-poor, uninsured and disadvantaged in poverty stricken and urban areas. It offers relief services, promotes individual and community development that includes equipping community members with skills to become self-sufficient and engages in public advocacy. To give a special offering to ACS you can put cash or a check in the white offering boxes in the foyer or in the long hallway, or you can mark ACS on a tithe envelope or choose ACS from the menu of option on Adventistgiving.org.

All that we have comes from the Lord, and from his resources we give back to Him. 

David Jaimeson, president of the conference of churches we belong to, has a message for us on video.

Prepare hearts for worship

Introduction

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We started this year with a bang — the big bang. We talked about creation and our fall into sin and rebellion. Since Adam and Eve distrusted God and turned to their own way, we’ve all been subject to the impact of evil. We’re born into sin, surrounded by wickedness, and pounded by our broken world until the day we die.

But right as soon as there was sin, God stepped in and made a promise —a covenant— that he would one-day crush the rebellion.

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Later, Jesus said it this way:

John 16:33 ESV

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

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Generation after generation passed by and the people felt like their redemption was no closer. Everything went on as it had for hundreds of years before. And then one day shepherds saw angels and wise men saw a star because God had become a human and Jesus had been born. It was the beginning of the end of sin.

The boy turned into a man, and the man taught the world about the God of love, and then His love was poured out as he bore our sin and gave His life in our place.

But death couldn’t hold the giver of life—he conquered the grave and rose on the third day!

After spending some time commissioning his team, Jesus rose into the clouds while his followers wept. But haven wasn’t weeping because the angels knew something that we didn’t know yet.

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Turn with me to the last book in the Bible, Revelation, as we explore our last In The Word message, All Heaven Rejoicing.

Jesus in Heaven

The book of Revelation is thought of as a fearful book. It’s got dragons and blood and scorching heat and scorpion horses and the cup of God’s indignation and forever fire, and so many other things that seem scary to the casual reader. But to the person who has been following this story all through the Bible, the book of Revelation is filled with hope.

The title song of the album “The Lamb Wins” by the Lesser Light Collective is a powerful statement about the meaning of the book of revelation. It’s not a book of anger and violence, its a book of victory and ultimately peace.

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Notice the words of this song:

Children, do not fear All the kings and beasts of history Prideful, strong and cruel Climbing toward the great I AM Ultimately fail And the power of love, the mystery Wins the war at last Through the weakness of the Lamb

See how the story ends before the end begins The Lamb wins, the Lamb wins The war of good and evil Praise to the One Who triumphed over all our sins The Lamb wins, the Lamb wins!

Now read aloud with me the first words of the book of Revelation:

Revelation 1:1 (ESV)

The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place.

This a revelation BY Jesus Christ to John, but more importantly, it is a revelation OF Jesus to the world. Which means that whatever we read here is grounded in the love of the lamb and calculated to crush the rebellion of Satan so that there will no longer be evil anywhere in the universe.

Let’s go back to that scene where Jesus has lifted up from the ground and his disciples look on with sadness in their eyes. In that moment two angels appeared to them to encourage them. Here’s the story in Acts 1

Acts 1:10–11 (ESV)

And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes,

and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

This Jesus. This very one. He’s coming back in the same way you saw him go into heaven. He rose up into the clouds, and he’s coming back down one day. That’s the promise they were left with, and with that hope they launched a worldwide movement that started out as The Way of Jesus, and turned into the Christian church we see today.

But what happened to Jesus? Revelation tells us. Turn to Revelation 4 and 5 where we’ll see the first moment of rejoicing in the book of Revelation:

Revelation 4 describes a scene where there’s a throne for God in heaven — just one. That’s important because the Bible tells us that Jesus is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Father, but this scene doesn’t have Jesus sitting on a throne yet. And around the father are the twenty four elders on twenty-four thrones. And there was a sea of glass in front of the Father’s throne with four living creatures surrounding Him. These living creatures are called Cherubim by Ezekiel, and the bible says that they have different faces, but notice what they do:

Revelation 4:8 (ESV)

day and night they never cease to say, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!”

And when these creatures call out, “holy, holy, holy” the twenty-four elders come off their thrones and fall down before God the Father and say,

Revelation 4:11 (ESV)

“Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”

Heaven is praising God.

But there’s a problem in heaven. Heaven is not at peace. It’s still wartime because there’s a rebellion on earth and the solution to the rebellion — Jesus Christ — has not come home to heaven, yet.

Revelation 5:1–2 (ESV)

Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals.

And I saw a mighty angel proclaiming with a loud voice, “Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals?”

When he saw that no one was worthy, John began to weep loudly.

The next couple of chapters reveal the contents of that scroll, but at this point, all John knows is that its essential for God’s plan to end evil in the universe. And no one can open it.

And then John saw a lamb as though it had been slain standing among the elders and the four living creatures, coming to the throne of God. And when the twenty four elders saw the lamb they fell down before the lamb and sand a NEW SONG:

Revelation 5:9 (ESV)

And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation,

And then John heard the angels that surrounded the living creatures and elders — so many that he couldn’t count them; he estimated that there were ten thousand times ten thousand and thousands of thousands more. And all those angels joined the song,

Revelation 5:12 (ESV)

saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!”

And then, if that weren’t enough, all the creatures in heaven and earth and in the sea and the creepy crawly things inside the dirt, all joined them:

Revelation 5:13 (ESV)

“To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!”

This is the first time in Revelation where we find all heaven rejoicing and it’s the most important moment in history.

Now, we’re not quite sure of the timing of this heavenly event. It may be that this was right after Jesus’ resurrection—after he talked with Mary and said, “don’t touch me, I haven’t ascended to my Father yet.” That’s the most likely scenario. The other possibility is that this is happening right after Jesus ascended from the earth when the disciples watched him go into heaven. Either way, Jesus had just given his life on the cross. He had just born the sins of the whole world as the lamb of God. And because He was the slain lamb that had come back to life, he alone was worthy to begin the next steps of God’s plan of salvation. If Jesus had not died on the cross, he could never crush the rebellion of Satan. The cross was the key to unlock whatever else was necessary to save the universe from sin.

And so, all heaven rejoiced. It was finally happening. After many long years of waiting, the devil’s agenda was beginning to unravel and God was beginning to set up His forever kingdom.

The Progress of Prophecy

Back in Revelation 2 and 3 John began to set up something that I’m going to call the progress of prophecy. The angel told him that he was going to show him things that would “shortly take place.” (Rev 1:1 and Rev 22:6). And then God began to unfold the history of the churches which began with Ephesus, a church that represented the time of John.

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The church of smyrna was the church of the martyrs from the 100’s to the 300’s AD.

The church of Pergamum represented the compromised church that began to let paganism influence it in the mid 300’s to the late 500’s.

The church of Thyatira that allowed the “that woman Jezabel” as Rev 2:20 describes church during the reign of the Roman Catholic church from the 600’s to the protestant reformation of the early 1500’s.

The church of Sardis represents the reformation period from the 1500’s to the 1600s.

The church of Philadelphia represents the revival period in the first and second great awakenings of the 1600s and 1700’s.

And the church of Laodicea represents the modern church from the 1800’s until Jesus’ return.

(https://bath.adventistchurch.org.uk/bibleinfo_questions/seven-churches-revelation)

This progression of prophecy moving through time from John’s day until today is repeated in the prophecies of the seals and the trumpets. Each of these progressive prophecies moved through time from the day of John to the second coming of Jesus.

The seals in Revelation 6 and 7 depict the political movements that affect God’s people throughout the time between the early church and the second coming.

The trumpets in Revelation 8 through 11 depict God’s intervention in that same period of history. Satan seems to get the upper hand time and time again and then a divine intervention preserves God’s faithful people.

At the end of the 7 trumpets, we see the 24 elders again and guess what they’re doing as the seals and the trumpets wrap up? Praising God!

Revelation 11:16–18 (ESV)

And the twenty-four elders who sit on their thrones before God fell on their faces and worshiped God,

saying, “We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, who is and who was, for you have taken your great power and begun to reign.

The nations raged, but your wrath came, and the time for the dead to be judged, and for rewarding your servants, the prophets and saints, and those who fear your name, both small and great, and for destroying the destroyers of the earth.”

Do you hear it? They’re praising God for intervening and protecting his people and His word through some of the darkest times in earthy’s history. And they’re praising God that Jesus is about to wrap it all up and bring justice on evil. Pretty soon God’s children will be rewarded and the wicked will see justice.

After the trumpets are finished Revelation jumps back to Satan’s rebellion in heaven. Revelation 12 describes the transition from the people of Israel to the Christian church with a pure woman who is clothed with the righteousness of Christ. A few chapters later, in chapter 17, you see a woman, representing the apostate Christian church who has prostituted herself to receive power from Satan and to pursue the wealth and pleasure of the world. This contrast between the true people of God and those who follow Satan but call themselves Christians is magnified until the whole world is either wandering after the false church who gets its power from Satan, or is following the lamb, Jesus Christ, wherever He leads them.

In chapter 18 there is a final declaration that calls this false religious and political system, Babylon:

Revelation 18:2 (ESV)

And he called out with a mighty voice, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a dwelling place for demons, a haunt for every unclean spirit, a haunt for every unclean bird, a haunt for every unclean and detestable beast.

Revelation 18:4 (ESV)

Then I heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, my people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues;

That prostitute church, that false prophet, that beast—Babylon—is fallen. Come out of her my people. This is God’s final cry, the final polarization of humanity. At this point its all done. Progressive prophecy has reached its end. The next thing to happen in the time of the 7th church and 7th seal and 7th trumpet is the return of Jesus. That’s when that beast, that false prophet, that harlot called Babylon will finally see justice. And in this moment a great multitude of angels in heaven rejoices:

Revelation 19:1–3 (ESV)

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 has 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 then the four living creatures join them saying, “Amen, hallelujah!”

This moment of justice is celebrated. Not because there will be destruction. Not because the bad people are getting what’s coming to them. But because God is finally fulfilling what He promised Adam and Eve in the garden — he is going to crush the rebellion and bring an end to all evil.

But this moment isn’t just about justice, it’s also about a reward. And so, after the elders say, Amen, the great multitude in heaven strike up the second verse of this anthem and sing,

Revelation 19:6–8 (ESV)

“Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready;

it was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure”— for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints.

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At the end of this song Jesus takes off the robes and responsibilities of he high priest that he’s been wearing for some 2,000 years, and he puts on robes and responsibilities of a just and conquering king. He takes his scepter in his hand and He straddles a great white horse, and with the entire retinue of angels behind Him He heads straight for the earth. When he gets there He will bring an end to every earthly kingdom just like Daniel described in Daniel 2.

The next verses of Revelation 19 describe a scene that is both glorious and gruesome. Jesus comes, people gather to battle Him, and they are all killed by the brightness of his coming (2 Thes 2:8). The Bible says that the birds gather for a feast because there is no one left to burry them. And that’s because there is another group of people that see Jesus coming and instead of rising up to do battle, they raise their arms in welcome and say, “behold, this is our God. We have waited for Him and he will save us!” (Isaiah 25:9). Those people will be changed in the blink of an eye to have eternal bodies. As Jesus returns he will stop mid-air, according to 1 Thessalonians 4, and God will call for all those who have died having faith in Him to come back to life. The dead will come out of the earth with eternal bodies and will rise up into the air to meet Jesus. And then those who were alive to see Jesus coming will rise up in the air too and they will go back to heaven with Jesus and the angels.

Back in Revelation 8 when the 7th seal described Jesus’ second coming it says that there will be silence in heaven for the space of half an hour. If a prophetic day is a literal year, then maybe this 30 minute time frame is a small portion of a year— 0.02 or a little more than one fiftieth of a year. Some people wonder how long it will take Jesus to get to the earth when he puts on those kingly robes. Will it take only an instant, or maybe it will take weeks or months.

If a half hour is a little more than one 50th of a day, and a prophetic day is a literal year, then a half hour in prophecy is 7 and a 1/4 days.

Here’s my opinion on this timing idea: it won’t take Jesus long to bring all the angels from heaven to earth — maybe a few hours, the 1/4 day seems about right. And then I think he’s going to take his time going back to heaven with us—that’s where the 7 days comes in. We’re going to be traveling through the universe with Jesus, the Father and the Spirit and all the angels and the elders and the living creatures and anyone else that would have been in heaven.

It will be better than the most amazing scenic cruise. I bet he’s going to show us the wonders of the universe in a way that no telescope could have seen and no scientist could have imagined.

The Final Rejoicing

This is an amazing thought, but Revelation doesn’t stop in chapter 19. It goes on to chapter 20 where it introduces another period of time. For various reasons I don’t believe this time period is prophetic. When it says there will be 1,000 years, I think it’s being literal.

As Jesus is leaving earth, Revelation says that a powerful angel from heaven binds Satan to the earth — what Revelation calls the “abusson,” or the abyss in English. With all the destructive forces that happen at the very end, the earth is a desolate place. And with no one left alive, Satan left alone with his thoughts for 1,000 years—unable to leave.

Those who were raised to life and went to heaven with God have a job to do. As they get to heaven and the celebrations die down, the Bible says that thrones are set up again.

Revelation 20:4 ESV

Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed. Also I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.

This verse points to the martyrs and the people who stood firm for the testimony of Jesus as the one who “reign” with Christ. They were raised to life at Jesus’ 2nd coming and now they sit on thrones with Jesus. Their reign has a specific time frame — 1,000 years — and a specific purpose: judging.

Paul pointed to this time when he told the church in 1 Corinthians 6:

1 Corinthians 6:3 (ESV)

Do you not know that we are to judge angels?

At the end of the 1,000 years—this period of judging—there is another resurrection.

This one doesn’t sound good because its all the people who died at the second coming of Jesus, combined with all the wicked who refused to leave the rebellion throughout all of human history.

And its at this resurrection of the wicked that John describes one final judgment scene. We call this the great white throne judgment. This is when the final verdict gets handed down for the wicked. Let’s read about it in Revelation 20:12:

Revelation 20:12 ESV

And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done.

The Bible tells us that God’s love casts out fear of the judgment because the children of God know that they are judged according to the righteousness of Jesus, and not their own works. But after the 1,000 years, the wicked will be judged by the record of their own lives that are written in God books of record. The righteous will have been looking at those records for the last 1,000 years — the most extensive discovery period any death-row inmate has ever recieved.

When God brings the final punishment for sin there will be no doubt in anyone’s mind that those people and angels being judged are guilty and the punishment is the most fair that love and justice could deal out.

And when its all said and done the wicked people and angels are consumed by the fire of God. And then God turns to death and hell itself and judges them:

Revelation 20:14 ESV

Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.

And that is when the final rejoicing will take place. Maybe not rejoicing. That might be the wrong word. Revelation has no more alleluias or blessings and honors to sing. This rejoicing is more like the calm after the storm, the peaceful, lazy river after the rapids, the crackling fire and easy chair after a long-hard day of working in the rain. This is the rejoicing of peace.

revelation 21 says,

Revelation 21:1–5 (ESV)

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.

And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

What’s left to say after that? The end. It’s done. There is more in Revelation, but it’s descriptions of the New Jerusalem and a whole chapter of Jesus saying, “trust me, I’m going to come quickly. Hold on until I come.” And I love how John ends the book:

Revelation 22:20 ESV

He who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!

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You and I haven’t experienced the final end of sin yet. We are still in the waiting time, looking forward to those moments of God’s righteous and glorious judgment. The judgment of the righteous where we get the reward of eternity with God. The judgment of the wicked where they are laid to rest and then the righteous get to look into their cases for 1,000 years, and the final judgment where all evil is extinguished and even death itself dies. Those will be the final and wonderful fulfillment of God’s promises. It will happen. These things are trustworthy and true, the angel told John. He even told him to write it down that they are trustworthy and true because God doesn’t want us to be afraid. He doesn’t want us to be afraid of judgment — Jesus is capable of saving us to the uttermost! And he doesn’t want us to be afraid that evil will persist—no, it will come to a final and total end.

One day, not very much longer now, all heaven will rejoice at the wonderful salvation of our God.

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Will you stand with me and glorify God for all the things he has done, and all that he promises to do?

To God Be the Glory