HE WHO STILLS THE STORMS

Overview

Revelation 20:1–6 is the only passage that mentions a time period of 1,000 years. Rev 20:1-6

It presents an era when Satan is heavily restricted and unable to mislead the nations (Rev 20:1-3).

At this time, God will also resurrect the saints to reign with Christ (Rev 20:4–6).

The Millennium seems to occur before the creation of a new heavens and new earth (Rev 21:1–2).

This time period displays God’s victorious reign over evil and the fulfillment of His promises to His people. Various views on the nature of the Millennium exist.

HE WHO STILLS THE STORMS

PSALMS 93:1-5

**I. THE TIMES ARE HELD BY HIM **(Ps 93:1-2)

A. An Expression of the Full Sovereignty of God (Ps 93:1)a

“The LORD reigneth, He is clothed with majesty; the LORD is clothed with strength, wherewith He hath girded Himself.”

The Revised Version puts it like this: “Jehovah hath proclaimed Himself king; He hath robed Himself with majesty.”

God has visibly stepped down into the arena of human affairs in the person of the Lord Jesus and deliberately taken the administration of earth’s affairs into His own hands.

Self-coronation is rare. It is an expression of self-created and self-manifested power.

There is one arrogant example of it in European history.

**In 1799 Napoleon abolished what was left of the government of France derived from the French Revolution. **

He set up a new government of three members, called the Consulate, and had himself proclaimed First Consul.

Not satisfied with that, he began to undermine all governmental powers which did not lie in his own hand.

In 1804 the French Senate voted him the title of emperor.

“When I see an empty throne,” he said, “I feel the urge to sit on it.”

B. An Examination of the Fresh Stability of Earth (Ps 93:1)b

The LORD reigneth … the world also is established, that it cannot be moved.”

Moral order, in such chaos on earth, is now restored, for Jesus will reign with a rod of iron and a firm, unfaltering hand.

The tiny remnant of Jews and Gentiles who will enter into the millennial kingdom will heave a sigh of relief.

At last—there is a strong, stable government on earth!

Jesus will bring fresh stability to earth.

He will found an empire which will stretch from pole to pole and from sea to sea; it will last unchallenged for a thousand years—a thousand years of peace and prosperity and progress.

C. An Exposure of the False Suppositions of Men (Ps 93:2)

What about the Assyrian empire, the Babylonian, the Persian, the Greek and Roman empires? They are all gone.

Where is the British empire I knew as a boy? Gone! The ghost of it still haunts the world in the British Commonwealth of Nations, but the empire is no more.God’s empire, however, is older than the stars.

The universe is thought to be about twenty billion years old.

When we go back to that cataclysmic moment in time, when the universe was born and the galaxies began their awesome rush through space, we find that God was there then.

Time is on His side; His throne is forever.

1. REIGN

2. ROBE

3. ROYALTY

**II. THE TEMPEST IS HUSHED BY HIM **(Ps 93:3-4)

“The floods have lifted up, O LORD, the floods have lifted up their voice; the floods lift up their waves.”

A. The Awesome Power of the Nations (Ps 93:3)

The nations will rise like the storm-tossed sea.

There is a reason why Israel is seen as the land in the symbolism of Scripture and the nations as the troubled sea.

There is a reason why Isaiah said:

“Woe to the multitude of many people, which make a noise like the noise of the seas; and to the rushing of the nations, that make a rushing like the rushing of mighty waters” (Isaiah 17:12).

But it is all in vain! The nations, in single waves or in one vast heaving tide, can no more swamp Israel than the ocean waves can triumph over the rocky cliffs of the shore.

B. The Actual Paralysis of the Nations (Ps 93:4)

“The LORD on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea.”

It does not always look that way.

It often seems that God has lost control. In actual fact, He is working to a plan—a plan revealed to us in the Bible.

It is there that we find the blueprints of the great Architect for the final wellbeing of mankind.

Man, in his blindness, refuses to look at the plans and accuses God of being a blunderer.

I said to him: “Suppose you bought a complex piece of machinery.

When it was installed you were given an operator’s manual and warned to read it and follow instructions carefully because the manufacturer’s liability and warranty would be voided if you did not do as instructed.

Instead of heeding the manual, however, you threw it away, saying you were not going to be told how to run this equipment.

So, you went ahead, you did it your way, and you ruined the machine.

Then you blamed the manufacturer for making such a poor job of that piece of expensive, intricate equipment.

1. POWER

2. PROTECTION

3. PRAISE

**III. THE TEMPLE HOME TO HIM** (Ps 93:5)

There it stood in Jerusalem, a shadow of the once magnificent building erected by Solomon.

But, just the same, there it stood. The psalmist has two words to say to his own heart, to the Hebrew people, to the heathen nations round about, to all peoples on earth.

A. Trust! The Law Is There (Ps 93:5)a

“Thy testimonies are very sure.”

The Bible often speaks of God’s law as “His testimonies,” because it was the function of the law to bear witness to God’s demands and to man’s duties.

In Solomon’s temple, those testimonies were kept in the sacred ark in the holy of holies.

Copies of those testimonies were in circulation so that the people might know just what it was that God expected of them.

Nehemiah tells us that when he was temporary governor of Jerusalem Ezra the scribe read that law to the assembled people in Jerusalem.

The reading of that law produced a revival.

The people wept because of their national sins which had left them a mere dependency, a tiny and insignificant province in the mighty empire of Persia.

They “separated themselves … unto the law of God,” was the way Nehemiah put it (Nehemiah 10:28).

That was the first thing then; it should be the first thing now.

It will be the first thing in a coming millennial day when Ezekiel’s temple is built and the nations of the earth are constituted “one nation under God with liberty and justice for all.”

The American dream will become a reality for all the nations of mankind.

All will be ruled by the testimonies of the Lord.

People learn to trust those testimonies because they point to paths of happiness for the children of men.

B. Tremble! The Lord Is There (Ps 93:5)b

“Holiness becometh Thine house, O LORD, for ever.”

The temple was His house! Let it never be forgotten that while God is love, He is also holy.

The Lord has returned! He has taken up residence in His house! Neither the temple nor the land will be defiled again.

His holiness will ensure that. Thus ends this anonymous little hymn.

It begins with His royal highness; it ends with His impeccable holiness.

1. HOPEFULNESS

2. HARMONY

3. HOLY

The God who intends to set up His millennial Sabbath of rest on this planet wants to set up a miniature millennium in our hearts.

He would like us to acknowledge Him as His royal majesty and let Him still the storms of rebellion and sin.

Let Him come into His house, these bodies in which we live, so that He might make them His temple.

He would like us then to acknowledge His impeccable holiness as the continuing law of our lives.