"You Invited How Many People?"
Notes
Transcript
After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth, that no wind might blow on earth or sea or against any tree. Then I saw another angel ascending from the rising of the sun, with the seal of the living God, and he called with a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm earth and sea, saying, “Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees, until we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.” And I heard the number of the sealed, 144,000, sealed from every tribe of the sons of Israel:
12,000 from the tribe of Judah were sealed,
12,000 from the tribe of Reuben,
12,000 from the tribe of Gad,
12,000 from the tribe of Asher,
12,000 from the tribe of Naphtali,
12,000 from the tribe of Manasseh,
12,000 from the tribe of Simeon,
12,000 from the tribe of Levi,
12,000 from the tribe of Issachar,
12,000 from the tribe of Zebulun,
12,000 from the tribe of Joseph,
12,000 from the tribe of Benjamin were sealed.
After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”
Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, clothed in white robes, and from where have they come?” I said to him, “Sir, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
“Therefore they are before the throne of God,
and serve him day and night in his temple;
and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence.
They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore;
the sun shall not strike them,
nor any scorching heat.
For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd,
and he will guide them to springs of living water,
and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
Scripture: Revelation 7:1-17
Sermon Title: “You Invited How Many People?”
Since Thanksgiving, we’ve been working through the beginning of the book of Revelation. For the last couple weeks, John’s vision has taken us into the throne room of heaven, where the focus for believers is worship. As minds and hearts are drawn into the residence of God, we worship the Lamb who was slain, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Last time we also became aware of a scroll that was sealed. When the Lamb opens the seals, terrifying things happen as the judgment of God on sin is unleashed, that unfolds primarily in Revelation 6 and 8.
Something to notice as we read Revelation 7 is that while the setting around John or that which John saw changes, he was brought back to familiar things, things he had seen before. While he sees a lot more than just the throne room throughout these chapters, when we get to Revelation 7 verse 9, he’s back before the throne, the Lamb, the angels, elders, and the four living creatures.
Before we get into our reading today, let’s hear about the opening of the fifth seal. Starting at Revelation 6 verse 9, we read, “When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. They called out in a loud voice, ‘How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?’ Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and brothers who were to be killed as they had been was completed.”
I’m pointing this out because the way those who God has saved are identified is not just as one group as we go through Revelation. Those in chapter 6 appear to be those who were explicitly martyred, who died under persecution for their faith. When this was revealed to John, a number of Christians had been killed already, but God knew there were more who would be. However, not all Christians die that way. Martyrs aren’t the only saved people in heaven. We’ll hear in chapter 7 about 12 groups of 12,000, which equals 144,000, in the picture on the screen what looks like squares is each of those 12 groups. There are either angels or “the great multitude” above them.
We’ll hear those final words repeated when we gather on Christmas morning and turn to Revelation 21, God has promised and he “will wipe away every tear from our eyes.”
Brothers and sisters in Christ, we’ve all heard it said and probably have said it ourselves: this year looks very different, especially when it comes to the holidays. Most people are being a lot more careful, especially when it comes to larger gatherings—we know, we’ve seen it. I want you to think about or remember, though, what a “normal” year entails throughout this season. Christmas programs and concerts being put on by schools and churches, and we usually invite anyone and everyone who would like to come. Work colleagues get together for festive parties either at work or someone’s home or going out to eat. Orchestras perform Handel’s Messiah and there are plenty of other musical options in front of hundreds of people. Public skating rinks are usually filled with smiling families. Malls are filled with eager shoppers and Santa picture-takers. Groups of carolers sing familiar and treasured songs. Whatever else you can think of, where crowds gather together, people are often in good spirits.
It’s not fun, at least I don’t think so, to think about all that stuff that feels missing this year. Even when it’s not directly related to a Christian celebration of Christmas and the good news of Jesus being born to Mary and Joseph long ago, if you like this season and all that it has come to involve, there’s some sadness with what’s missing. It hurts when we’re not inviting or being invited to family parties or even small get-togethers. We look forward to the day, hopefully not too far in the future when people can be invited to things and they’ll come to things without all the fear of getting sick. Whereas before we wondered if we invited too many people, maybe once all this is done, we’ll say that we can always make room for more
As we spend some time with Revelation 7 this morning, the most important invitation of all is before us, the invitation to a gathering you don’t want to miss out on. What I mean is we just heard about a gathering of all the saved. I want to be careful: we’re not into the new heavens and new earth post-Judgment Day time, but what John saw was a gathering of the redeemed.
Our first point this morning is the question: who has been invited, and with that, who will the multitude include? Maybe you’re drawn, as many people are, to the numbers in this chapter: 12,000 and 144,000—who is that counting? Maybe we’re thinking a step further: have all those spots been claimed? If someone who fits into these 12 tribes or is a real believer of Israel but is number 12,001 or 144,001, does God say “Sorry, we’re full up here. No room available”? Maybe you know this, there are traditions which take a very literal approach and claim to be able to explain every number and every detail. They tell who fits in these numbers. Yet I don’t know exactly what these numbers mean, and I don’t feel that God is leading us to figure that out today. It’s enough to say and to know that only God knows exactly how many people have been saved through Jesus.
Just as there is no need for us to know the number; it wouldn’t do us any good to have the number. It’s not to our benefit to try and say, “I think all the redeemed spots are accounted for, so there’s no longer a need for obedience to biblical teachings of spreading the news. That part of God’s work is taken care of.” No, we’re simply being told there is “a great multitude…no one can count.” Along with that, this isn’t meant to contradict what Jesus said in Matthew 7:14-15, “…Many enter through [the wide gate and broad road that leads to destruction]. But…only a few find [the small gate and narrow road that leads to life].” While we must know that there are many people headed for destruction, that doesn’t mean that overall, across time, many can be saved.
All that said, the question before us is very intentional: Who is described, what do we know about those who God has invited? We see in verse 9, the earthly characteristics of the multitude—they are “from every nation, tribe, people and language,” that is what we’re told about them. The redeemed, the saved, Christians come from all over the world. There is not only one skin color, or one language, or one ethnicity or anything like that, which should be viewed or held as God’s required expectation for salvation. No, those who John saw as saved shows that the gospel of Jesus Christ really is meant to go everywhere. Just as we heard in our Acts series over and over again, Jesus commanded his disciples and his followers to go witness about him to the ends of the earth.
Rev. Kevin DeYoung puts this in real-life terms in what he wrote several years ago, “There are going to be millions of Africans in that great multitude and plenty of Brazilians and Chinese and Filipinos, and lots of Mexicans and Indians and Arabs, and there will be some white people too…Heaven will be diversity without the political correctness and multiculturalism unified in one single purpose. Every heart, every head, every voice giving glory to God and to the Lamb.” Maybe for a lot of us, most of us, honestly I hope all of us—this is obvious. It’s not something that should be all that controversial, and yet we know in different places and different times it has been. People have avoided taking the gospel to their neighbor or seen them as being beneath the saving work of God. Yet let us remember: it has been already been seen in heaven that anyone who believes from anywhere, no matter what they look like, no matter what language they use, can be saved by God.
We move to our second point now: what is the multitude doing? Looking back to verses 9 and 10, we read, “[They are] standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice: ‘Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.’” There’s something familiar here. We’ve heard before that the 24 elders were also dressed in white robes. We find in verse 14 here that the robes are white because they’ve been washed clean in the blood of the Lamb.
Rev. Doug Bratt, a CRC pastor, notes, “…While it’s a startlingly diverse crowd, several things unite it. Its members all wear white robes and clutch palm branches in their hands. The whiteness of this multitude’s ‘uniform’ appears to symbolize God’s gifts to God’s children of both victory and purity. Yet it also, as Walter Taylor points out, signifies its wearer’s status. When, after all, his father gave the prodigal son a new robe, it showed everyone his restored place in his family. The palm branches people hold and perhaps wave further emphasize the victory God has won in Christ on their behalf.”
There’s a lot in Bratt’s reflection on this part of the passage that’s worth considering. As he points out at the end, these robes we can safely assume have been given, they’ve been supplied to those wearing them. The redeemed, which hopefully we consider ourselves a part of, didn’t fashion them ourselves or pay for them with our earnings. No, God provides the “uniform” as Bratt calls it. Its whiteness represents having been washed in the blood, the palm branches—think back to Palm Sunday, the triumphant entry—those represent victory.
With that in mind and as we hear what the multitude says, “‘Salvation belongs to our God…and to the Lamb,” what the multitude is doing is exalting what God has done. We heard in Revelation 5 verse 5, “‘…See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed…” It is right. It is appropriate. It is good for us to recognize that part of the character of God, and the honor that he deserves, and that his kingdom and his reign involves, is victory.
As much as our faith involves a humble Savior who was born a baby and placed in a manger, a rejected Christ who suffered on the cross, a Lord who died for his servants who he has called his friends, all that does not negate that our God is and will be victorious in the ultimate pursuit of his will. He has won salvation for his redeemed. We don’t have to wonder if he’s deficient in some way; if he’s not enough in some way. We don’t have to doubt—can he really finish out the battle against sin and the evil one? People, today at least, have this internal struggle because we want everyone to have what we’ve received as repentant believers. We want God winning to mean everyone gets saved. Yet what happens in God’s Word is that God’s victory comes on his terms. We exalt him for what he has done.
That takes us to our final point now: what hope is given to those who are invited, to those in the multitude? There are many things we could touch on here, but we’ll focus this morning on part of the final two verses. The elder tells John in verses 16-17, “…Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst. The sun will not beat upon them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water…”
For us today, perhaps this doesn’t necessarily seem all that great of a hope. We’ve got plenty of food. We don’t have to grow it ourselves if we don’t want to. We can go to a grocery store and trust there will be food on the shelves, and if not exactly what we want now, it’ll probably be restocked soon. Hydration never seems too far away; if we’re near our homes, we can find a tap or a spigot or we can buy clean water. The sun can be hot and we may complain, but we’ve got hats and sunglasses and umbrellas and shelter and air conditioning or fans in most vehicles and homes. I pick up this image of someone wasting away in a barren desert, which isn’t all that common for us.
We can imagine, though, if someone really were in those kinds of dire straits, it’d be great—it’d be absolutely necessary—to have someone you trust lead you “to springs of living water.” If we think back throughout Scripture, this was common. The Afternoon Bible Study group has been working through Genesis and we find a couple times where Abraham experienced famine and traveled for food, as did his son Isaac, as did his son Jacob—it’s how the Israelites ended up enslaved in Egypt. Think of the Israelites after they had been freed from slavery, one of their grumblings was about water. God had freed them and promised a home and great blessing to all these people, but it always required dependance on his guidance. Getting to the blessing required dependance on God’s guidance. The same is true for our eternal hope—in this world, even if we don’t experience regular or great physical hunger or thirst or terrible heat and sun, every person needs God’s guidance to lead us to himself and to eternal life. No one can find their own way.
With all that in mind, could it be that we’re also to see here the rolling back of God’s curse on Adam in Genesis 3? In addition to painful toil, thorns and thistles in the ground, verse 19, God told Adam, and in effect his descendants, “‘…By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.’” As human beings, in these bodies, we need sustenance, but we can only eat if we work. Our work is not always easy or pleasant or without hardship—it takes sweat and energy as well as trust and the blessing of God. While we were created to work, the pains are because of the Fall.
Yet there is hope, brothers and sisters. The effects of the fall will not go on forever for the redeemed of the Lord. We will not always be cursed by God. Our toil will not be endless and painful and at times seem so meaningless. Not only will this be true some of the time, but the elder told John, “Never again [because the Lamb] will lead them.”
The invitation that I’ve been referring to this morning is God’s invitation to experience not just life with all that we’ve come to understand it in our mortal existence, whether in times of ease or times of trouble and separation. God gives the invitation to a life in which he fully provides, and provides what is wholly good, and we lack nothing. The salvation of our God isn’t just for one part of our lives; it is perfect and complete. Jesus came to bring and to accomplish all that was necessary to give us this hope. Let us rejoice in him not only in this season, but let us worship and rejoice without ceasing. Amen.