Sermon Tone Analysis

Shabbat Shalom and Good morning, my name is Michael Vowell, and I’m the Rabbi here at Beth El Shalom, I’d like to welcome all of our guests here today!

And I’d like to say hello to everyone watching this online.

…we know most people will check us out online before they ever visit

…so, we really look forward to seeing you soon…

Jab 1:It is an Honest Book (225 Words, 2 Minutes)

I want to start today by saying that in full disclosure here is much about the book of Revelation that rubs me the wrong way.

I do not like its violence, its menacing tone, its opaqueness, its horrific visions, enemy thinking, and what feels like a vacancy of love.

And, if I am brutally honest, people who like the book of Revelation frighten me sometimes, since so many of them use it to justify their crazier ideas about God and scare other people with what they think they know.

Right this minute, someone is turning the situation in Syria into a predictor of apocalypse and using the book of Revelation to do so.

I don’t wish this book had been left out of the Bible, I just wish it would have come with a “how-to” read it and “how to not” read it guide.

If you want an idealistic vision of humanity, you will not find it in these pages.

People are sensual, vulgar, fallen, adulterers, greedy, and stuck-up, and I am just talking about the saints.

I have not even gotten to the sinners.

Revelation does not have perfect saints nor perfect sinners; they are real people acting, feeling, and behaving like real people.

There are no cookie-cutter clerics nor cuddly communes here.

There is just none that are righteous, not a single one on planet earth.

Jab 2: It Confronts Toxic Forgiveness Theories (321 Words, 2:35 minutes)

This is really what bothers lots of people about this book.

But this book also really bothers professional theologian.

One prominent North American Pastor and Author who I do highly regard said this about it, “I wish it had been left out of the Bible” (Barbara Brown Taylor, Nov 4 Sermon “This Way Home.”

Why does this acclaimed spokesperson of the Gospel feel this way?

Because the Book of Revelations takes nicely packaged theology and rips it to shreds like a three year old during Chanukah.

This passage requires us to come face-to-face with a dangerous and dark questions.

None could be more dangerous than the question that emerges from our text today, “Is vengeance consistent with forgiveness?”

We must be careful because we are not just on holy ground.

This is dangerous ground.

When you land on a question like this it i a bit like Jack Ryan holding a liver grenade with the pin out while a terrorist five feet away holds a gun at him and is ready to cut him down.

The problem, you shoot jack you will get blow to bits.

This is one of those questions, it is just that volatile.

It is volatile because it surfaces toxic theories about forgiveness that have become the boss of you.”

All of us have some toxic bible theories in our hearts.

If I speak in some vague general way like, “All of us have some toxic bible theories in our heart,” you will say, yes and indeed, because I am speaking so opaquely and generally that it hardly means anything.

But, if I look you in the eye and lean in and say, “You hold some toxic ideas about forgiving your husband, your wife, your child, your abuser, about forgiving yourself.”

Well, those might be fighting words.

What if I told you what makes your forgiveness toxic is that it lacks any cry for vengeance.

Well, you would publicly tell me I am out of my mind, but privately, secretly, you would know that there is something right about that.

Jab 3: Is your forgiveness theory toxic?

(429 words, 4:00 Minutes)

Think about this for a second:

Nov 4, 2019, 9 members of a Mormon family killed.

Six of the nine were children.

Gunned down by rival gangs.

Jan 1-Dec 31 of 2017 1,366 rapes were reported in Houston.

That is four women being raped per day in the city we call home.

Since 2013 there has been a 121% increase in rapes.

And HPD reports only being able to solve 39% of these cases.

Nov 8, 2019, Ashley Bianco was fired from her job at CBS unjustly.

Bianco was accused of being the person who leaked the now-famous ABC Epstein cover-up clip.

She fervently denied she was the leaker, bursting into tears at the “humiliation” of being run out of the network where she had worked for just four days, without even the “professional courtesy” of allowing her to mount a defense.

Claiming ignorance of who might have shared the clip, she insisted “everyone” at ABC had seen and been scandalized by it.

It is rumored the person who leaked the clip is still on staff at ABC.

Murder…Rape…Corruption

Does your forgiveness theory demand that no vengeance be prayed for?

No hope of God’s vindication to be sought?

This last week I heard a very well-known preacher would argue “yes” that is what you must do.

He was giving a talk about “toxic emotions” that are competing for control of our hearts.

I have no doubt that if he were asked, “Is vengeance consistent with forgiveness?”

He would say, “No, it is not consistent, and then, he would probably quote Ephesians 4:2, “And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Messiah forgave you (Ephesians 4:32)”

And my response would be, but isn’t it okay to ask for vengeance alongside forgiveness?

What about Psalm 99:8?

O Lord our God, You answered them; You were a forgiving God to them, And yet an avenger of their evil deeds.

I imagine he would say to me, “that is the old testament, and we are now under the new.

And God may lead those very criminals to the cross or deal with them one day.”

I imagine I would say in response, “Let me clarify my question to you.

Do you believe a believer can ask God to avenge a moral evil done against them and at the same time still be forgiving?”

Right Hook: If I have done my job well today, then by the end of this message, you will Stop allowing a toxic forgiveness theory to be the boss of your prayer life.

Let’s look at Revelation 6:9-11

Ha-Foke-Bah, Ha-Foke-Bah, De-Colah-bah

Ha-Foke-Bah, Ha-Foke-Bah, Mashiach-bah

Turn-it, and turn-it, everything you need is in it.

Turn-it, and turn-it, the Messiah is in it!

Revelation 6:9–11 (TLV) — 9 When the Lamb opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those slaughtered for the sake of the word of God and for the witness they had.

Evil Has Its Day ( Rev 6:9)

Remember, the first four seals let loose the four riders who bring about the systematic breakdown of all national, social, economic, and personal safety.

And, when the Lamb opens the fifth seal, John sees the souls (or bodies) under the altar that had been slaughtered.

The imagery is violent.

Later in the book of revelation, we find out what it means for them to be slaughtered.

It says in Revelation 20:4 (TLV) — 4 Then I saw thrones, and people sat upon them—those to whom authority to judge was given.

And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony for Yeshua and because of the word of God.”

(Go Back to Rev 6:9).

They were part of the systematic breakdown of the world, but God got a hold of their hearts, and they gave testimony to His redemptive purposes in judgment.

For this, they joined the great rollcall of Jewish suffers, victims and martyrs, and the Messiah Himself.

The imagery is also strange to our modern ears.

It seems odd that victims are placed “under something.”

That feels oppressive, like adding insult to injury.

If they are sacrifices, why are they not on the altar?

Why have they placed anything?

Yet, John’s audience would have understood it right away.

First, this is not the bronze altar of sacrifices that we find in the courtyard.

This is the altar of incense that is located in the Most Holy Place.

This altar symbolically mediated the prayer of God’s people into God’s presence.

In Jewish thinking, to be placed “under” something is to be set “under” it’s care.

Like when you are “under the shadow of the wings of the Most High.

Though evil has had its day, they are under the protection of the altar of prayer.

If this seal had never been opened, we might be led to believe that there is no hope, no gospel, no mercy, no hearing the voice of the Spirit at this time, but He is speaking.

It is just that evil has turned up the volume.

Though sin is having a field day, these believers have come under the protection of the altar of prayer.

Don’t get me to preaching here, but when you come under the protection of the altar of prayer, that means your voice, your prayer matters, God does not smell the incense he hears your voice.

That means your prayers are protected, guarded, and will be heard.

And evil’s victims do pray.