A New Song
Notes
Transcript
Introduction:
If you have your bibles let me invite you to open with me to the book of Revelation chapter 14.
Yesterday we woke up to news of a military operation in the middle east.
And for most of us,
the impact of this event is primarily something to be watched from a far.
Some of us have more immediate and personal fears because of our loved ones serving in the military.
None of us likely felt the same immediate sense of dread that the group of 27 pastors and their wives from South Carolina felt,
when their tour of Jerusalem was interrupted by sirens,
and they were told to make way to the bomb shelter under their hotel.
The baptist press reported a statement from one of the pastors on what the scene looks like in that basement bunker…
South Carolina pastor Josh Powell sent this text…,
“We sang together and prayed together in a bunker below Jerusalem, knowing that our hope is in the Lord.”
Know doubt that response is the response today in churches throughout the middle east, where faithful believers gather to worship…,
They will sing together and they will pray together knowing that their hope is in the Lord..
What is it about the Christian person that frees them to sing while the bombs are falling?
I think the book of Revelation was written,
not so that we might hypothesize the significance of every world event as a clue to the timing of the return of Christ…,
but rather…,
I think the book of Revelation was written to help Christians sing a new song..., especially when the bombs fall….. especially when the enemies of God wage war on the people of God.
The visions depicted in chapters 12 and 13 reveal the working of God’s enemies throughout the ages.
In chapter 12, we were introduced to the ravaging of the dragon…, Satan himself.
Next, we were introduced to Satan’s accomplish,
a beast rising from the sea symbolizing the beastly empires of the world, Ancient empires like Babylon and Rome,
modern empires like Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, like modern day Iran…
Revelation 13:7 says these beastly empires are allowed to make war on the saints to conquer them…, They are like henchmen of the dragon.
Revelation 13 concludes by the introduction of yet a third beast..,
a lamb like beast who speaks like a dragon…,
symbolizing the ministry of false prophets in the world,
false teachings,
world views that look religious but are demonic.
False teachings that take all kinds of forms in order to deceive the people into worshipping a false God.
Chapters 12 and 13 are a call for Christian endurance and a call for Christian wisdom during this age of enemy attack.
but chapter 14 calls for something different.
chapter 14 is new a vision standing in contrast to the previous three visions….
and this vision calls for Christian singing….
So Lets read.
1 Then I looked, and behold, on Mount Zion stood the Lamb, and with him 144,000 who had his name and his Father’s name written on their foreheads.
2 And I heard a voice from heaven like the roar of many waters and like the sound of loud thunder. The voice I heard was like the sound of harpists playing on their harps,
3 and they were singing a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and before the elders. No one could learn that song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth.
4 It is these who have not defiled themselves with women, for they are virgins. It is these who follow the Lamb wherever he goes. These have been redeemed from mankind as firstfruits for God and the Lamb,
5 and in their mouth no lie was found, for they are blameless.
Lets Pray
We need to read chapter 14 as it arrives in this series of seven signs..
sign #1 a dragon is devouring.
sign #2 a beast is waging war
sign #3 a beast is deceiving...,
but chapter 14:1 initiates a shift.
John lifts his eyes up and away from all the havoc wreaking work of God’s enemies
and he sets his eyes on Mount Zion….
This is the Old testament title for the city of God
from which God’s appointed King rules over the Kingdom.
The Psalmist over and over again sings of God’s rule and power and sovereignty coming from Zion.
6 “As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill.”
John looks and behold the place from which God rules
and he sees THE Lamb of God…,
not the deceiver,
not the imposter lamb who spoke like a dragon from chapter 13,
but this time he sees the true lamb of God…,
Jesus of Nazareth who died and rose again…,
And in this vision…, John sees not just the Lamb…,
but he sees that the Lamb is not alone.
He sees with the Lamb 144,000 who had taken on the name of the Lamb…,
Those who had the name of the Heavenly Father written on their foreheads.
These are God’s people reigning in power with Jesus by his side.
These are not some kind of special elite group of believers…,
We have seen time and time again in our study that the numbers of Revelation are symbolic.
the number 12 symbolizes God’s people
because of its tie to the 12 tribes of Israel and the 12 apostles.
The number we saw earlier in chapter 7 and now we see again is
the redeemed being symbolized as 12 times 12 times 1,000…,
Whats the point?
John is seeing a vision of the full number of the people of God both Old Testament and New…,
standing with Jesus far above all the hell wreaking havoc of the beasts…, standing in the place where Jesus rules with all authority….
What a sweet relief this vision must have been in the context of the visions which unfolded just before….,
John looks and he sees God’s people with God’s name on their foreheads…,
They are no longer in the wilderness of waiting..,
They are no longer enduring this long tribulation under then attack of God’s enemies.
They did not bow the knee to the beasts of this world…,
God has claimed his people,
saved his people,
exalted his people to stand with him on Mount Zion.
Later in verse 3, these people are identified more specifically as those who had been redeemed from the earth.
In verse 4, they are called those who have been redeemed
from mankind as firstfruits for God and for the Lamb.
I want us to focus in on these people as they are described in this vision.
I want us to see five attributes of the people of God.
Five attributes of every Christian person in this room that come to life in this vision….
#1 We are Redeemed by Jesus and for Jesus
#1 We are Redeemed by Jesus and for Jesus
Don’t miss this in the vision….
John sees a vision of a people whom God has claimed for himself.
The word “redeemed” means to purchase….
We are seeing a vision of the people whom God has purchased at a price.
How did God purchase this people?
What was the price?
Revelation 1 tells us.
5 …To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood
Peter says it this way.
18 knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold,
19 but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.
This is the gospel message.
We all have sinned.
Which means all of us had a debt to pay.
The penalty for sin according to the Holy God of the Universe is death…,
Our sin cannot go unpunished….
22….without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.
So how did God purchase us?
How did he redeem us?
He paid the price for our debt with the blood of Jesus.
Jesus paid the price of our penalty
so that we might be present with him.
God therefore claimed us to be his forevermore despite our sinfulness.
He wrote his name on our foreheads so to speak…,
he redeemed us from the earth,
he redeemed us from mankind,
and you have to love the emphasis of verse 4.
these people in John’s vision were redeemed for God and for the Lamb.
Peter describes Christians in this way:
9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession…
If you are here and you believe that Jesus paid the price of his own blood for your sins…,
you my friend have been redeemed by Jesus and you have been redeemed for Jesus….
He wants you to stand by his side on Mount Zion in victory over all of his enemies…,
he loves you, he has claimed you, and saved you, and purchased you, to be his forevermore.
and that friends is why John doesn’t just see this 144,000 standing with Jesus...,
he hears them….
2 And I heard a voice from heaven like the roar of many waters and like the sound of loud thunder. The voice I heard was like the sound of harpists playing on their harps,
3 and they were singing a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and before the elders. No one could learn that song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth.
#2 We are Redeemed to Sing
#2 We are Redeemed to Sing
The most powerful sound known to man at the time of John’s writing verse 2 would have been the sound of great rushing waterfalls
or the sound of heart pounding thunder from the sky…,
John is grasping at words to describe the sound of the combined voices of all those throughout human history combining their voice to sing to the Lord Jesus…,
it is a powerful sound, and it is a joyful sound….,
its this crazy combination of both thunder and the sound of many harps…,
a joyful, and celebratory sound…,
and they are singing a new song…,
Its not like the song of praise for God’s creating work that we saw earlier in Revelation…,
this time it is a song like the singing after a military victory…,
there is a new thing to sing about…,
a new experience of God’s glory to sing about…,
We see a call for this kind of singing throughout the Psalms
1 I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry.
2 He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure.
3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the Lord.
There is a sense that on the other side of every trial in our life and the sustaining grace of our God carrying us through we can say with the Psalmist…,
he put a new song in my mouth…, a song of praise to our God…
and in the end when we all see him face to face we will be given a new song…,
to sing in a new way,
like we never have before…,
But don’t miss the significance of this reality on or present moment. …,
This vision shows that we were redeemed to sing…,
Meaning the act of God’s saving grace in our lives is meant to fill us with so much joy that we burst with it…,
Our salvation in Jesus is meant to fill us with a kind of joy that overwhelms us
and overflows from us in ways that only a song will do…,
Yesterday I saw videos of Iranian woman singing and dancing in the streets because their beastly so called “supreme leader” was dead…,
How much more brothers and sisters will we sing when we see that ancient serpent, the dragon, and enemy of our souls thrown into the lake of fire on the last day…,
We will sing with the the whole host of God’s redeemed people from all of human history
and it will be like a roar of many waters
and like a great symphony of joyful harps ringing out together…,
That is our future…, but it is also our present…,
Its why a group of 27 christians in a bunker in the basement of a hotel two nights ago decided that the best course of action was to sing…,
Its why this morning in the aftermath of so many in our church hurting,
from the loss of loved ones,
from the disappointment of miscarriages,
from the ache of divorce,
from the uncertainty of medical diagnosis…,
we sing…
Sometimes when we don’t even feel the joy in this age…, but we sing because we know that their is something to rejoice over…
Do not miss this fact when you think about the importance of your church attendance…,
One of the most significant things you do each and every week is SING with this group of believers TODAY
as we look forward to SINGING with THAT group of believers
on the LAST DAY.
#2 We Are Redeemed to Sing
#2 We Are Redeemed to Sing
But the description of the redeemed does not stop there.
John sees a singing people…,
but he also sees a purified people.
look at how they are described in verse 4.
4 It is these who have not defiled themselves with women, for they are virgins….
Now what in the world is this all about?
We should not assume that the only people who make it to heaven are people who never marry and are never physically intimate with anyone…,
That would be very false for a variety of reasons.
The point is this.
#3 We Are Redeemed Into Purity
#3 We Are Redeemed Into Purity
What John beholds, symbolically, is a pure and undefiled people…,
The language is drawn from the very common analogy in the Old Testament that speaks of Israel’s idolatry as a kind of spiritual adultery.
The prophets of the Old Testament used this analogy often…,
In fact when they spoke about the idolatry and the false worship of Israel…,
some of the prophets might make you blush with how graphically they spoke against what idolatry really was in the eyes of God.
When spoken of in a positive light the whole nation of Israel in the Old Testament is referred to as the virgin daughter.., pure and undefiled…,
3 the Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.
4 Again I will build you, and you shall be built, O virgin Israel! Again you shall adorn yourself with tambourines and shall go forth in the dance of the merrymakers.
When spoken in a negative light for their idolatry, a different word is used….
39 Thus they became unclean by their acts, and played the whore in their deeds.
This language is intensified with later visions in Revelation 17
where the evil empire of the world is described as a great prostitute and a harlot….,
There are two kinds of spiritual people in the world then…,
Those who give themselves in spiritual adultery to the false gods of our world….,
or those who have been purified for the true God and the great wedding feast of the last day...,
When John sees the redeemed in the presence of Jesus…,
They look to him like those who have not defiled themselves.
They are clean, and pure in the presence of God….,
Now this imagery has two implications for our lives...,
This means that God did not just pay the price for us….,
He also purifies us for his presence…,
The promise is not just that all of your gross sin and rebellion against him is paid for…,
The promise is that its all wiped clean…,
There will be no more stain of your sin on your life when you are welcomed into the presence of your savior…,
What is it that Paul says…
4 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared,
5 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit,
Christian, you may be guilty of some truly grotesque and atrocious sexual sin in your life…,
But the Good news is that Jesus aims to not just forgive you…,
but to wash you of all of that….
True purity is our eternal future…,
and just like we sing today, in faith that we will sing forever…,
Christian, we fight for purity today in very practical ways, in faith that we will be pure forever…,
The Holy Spirit has been given to you Christian to fight the schemes of the devil who would seek to enslave you to your impurities in this life…,
But that is not the way of Christ…
Jesus saves not just from the penalty of sin, but also from the power of sin…,
The Holy Spirit was given to us so that we might fight
and have small victory after small victory
until we see Jesus face to face
and we sing a new song that the war is won.
The promise of our eternal purity is meant to fuel our fight for purity today and tomorrow and every day after.
We were redeemed for this and into this purity.
4 It is these who have not defiled themselves with women, for they are virgins. It is these who follow the Lamb wherever he goes…
First John comments on their purity…,
and then he comments on their devotion to Jesus himself….
#4 We are Redeemed to Follow Jesus as Lord
#4 We are Redeemed to Follow Jesus as Lord
John describes these redeemed people as those who follow the Lamb wherever he goes…,
This is short hand for those who were disciples…,
The invitation of Jesus has always been an invitation not just to believe facts about him….,
but it is an invitation to follow him as a disciple….
the first command that Jesus gives to his disciples in the gospel of Mark is simple…,
14 ....he said to him, “Follow me.”
The call that Jesus gives to big crowds who just wanted a free meal was to follow him as a disciple…,
34 And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
to the rich young ruler who wanted eternal life…, Jesus broke it down for him.
21 And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”
The thing that John notes about these redeemed people in this heavenly reality… is that they now follow Jesus wherever he leads…,
In this vision they do perfectly…,what they began to do imperfectly in their life on earth…,
There is no getting around this in the Bible…,
We are saved by God’s grace…, it has nothing to do with our works…
We do not earn salvation...,
BUT salvation leads to following Jesus with our lives…,
To believe that Jesus is our savior who gives us eternal life…,
is to also believe that Jesus is our Lord who is worthy of actually following for the rest of our lives…,
You cannot put your faith in Jesus as savior without having faith that he is the rightful Lord as well….,
9 because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
The title Lord means something..
HE is the true supreme leader…,
His way is better than my way…,
He is the shepherd of my soul and he leads me into abundant life..,
Faith in Jesus as Lord, if its true faith,
It does inevitably lead to some kind of action,
some kind of repentance,
some kind of desire to follow the leadership of this Jesus.
That is why we do teach at this church…,
that if there is no evidence of repentance in someone’s life,
no evidence of following Jesus
we should be slow to affirm that they are a Christian…,
WE can’t know the heart, but we can assess the fruit.
God redeems people from their sin AND he redeems them unto their Lord.
Ephesians summarizes this for us perfectly…
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,
9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
Today we Christians do this imperfectly…,
we do not follow Jesus in all the ways that we should,
we fail,
we fall short,
but the grace poured out on us drives us to follow after our Lord
in the good works he has prepared for us…,
and can I just say…,
There is nothing more exhilarating than following the Lord Jesus wherever he leads…,
There is no kind of life worth living like the kind of life that follows the Lord Jesus…,
Imagine the apostle John’s life on the day when Jesus said “follow me.”
What if he would have said no thank you, I’ll just believe you from over here.
What if he would have prioritized the safety and security of his career as a fishermen…,
never to walk with Jesus day by day
never to eat the miracle bread from heaven
never to witness Jesus’ power over demons and disease.
never to be filled by the Spirit with flaming tongues of fire above his head while thousands of people repent and believe upon the Lord Jesus
never to see the Christian movement spread through the empire
never to see the visions of Revelation from the island of patmos and write them down for untold generations of Christians to read….
I don’t know about you…,
but I want to practice for eternity today…,
I want to follow the Lamb wherever he goes…,
He hasn’t led me astray thus far…,
I wouldn’t have drafted up the last 10 years of my own life in the way that they have unfolded,
but I have never regretted following the leadership of my Lord.
#4 We are Redeemed to Follow Jesus as Lord
#4 We are Redeemed to Follow Jesus as Lord
and lastly…,
John notices a stark difference between the redeemed and those who give themselves to worship the beast…,
The redeemed are those who embraced the truth..,
5 and in their mouth no lie was found, for they are blameless.
#5 We are Redeemed to Reflect the Truth
#5 We are Redeemed to Reflect the Truth
The redeemed in John’s vision are those who speak truth and who cannot be blamed for the lies of the false prophet…,
Brothers and sisters we aren’t speaking about fairy tales this morning…,
When I preach,
I am not simply participating in a traditional religious ritual…,
When we understand the Bible…
We are understanding true reality…,
the way in which the world works...,
we are immersing ourselves in what is true about the world
and what is true about us
and what is true about the future.
One day we will never believe a lie again,
one day we will never speak a lie again,
one day we will be totally and entirely full of the knowledge of the truth of God…
but today we seek the truth with all that we are…,
and we speak the truth as best as we can to our own hearts,
to our dear friends and church members,
to our lost neighbors and family,
we are truth believing,
truth singing,
truth praying,
truth proclaiming people…..
Now imperfectly, but one day fully and finally…,
This is the people that God is redeeming for himself.
This is what he is turning us into step by step and day by day until we are glorified in his presence.
Five attributes of the redeemed people of God.
#1 We Are Redeemed by Jesus and for Jesus
#2 We are Redeemed to Sing
#3 We are Redeemed Into Purity
#4 We are Redeemed to Follow Jesus as Lord
#5 We are Redeemed to Know the Truth and Speak the Truth
let me close with with what I believe to be the right response to a text like this….
1 Praise the Lord! Sing to the Lord a new song, his praise in the assembly of the godly!
2 Let Israel be glad in his Maker; let the children of Zion rejoice in their King!
3 Let them praise his name with dancing, making melody to him with tambourine and lyre!
4 For the Lord takes pleasure in his people; he adorns the humble with salvation.
5 Let the godly exult in glory; let them sing for joy on their beds.
1 Praise the Lord! Praise God in his sanctuary; praise him in his mighty heavens!
2 Praise him for his mighty deeds; praise him according to his excellent greatness!
3 Praise him with trumpet sound; praise him with lute and harp!
4 Praise him with tambourine and dance; praise him with strings and pipe!
5 Praise him with sounding cymbals; praise him with loud clashing cymbals!
6 Let everything that has breath praise the Lord! Praise the Lord!
Lets do that together.
