Worship in the Throne-room of God

Transcription

1 Worship in the Throne-room of God Revelation 4-5 Sunday 7 June, am, 10am & 5.30pm services Johnny Sharpe Introduction: After this I looked Good morning. This morning we move into the first part of Revelation. This is where the book really gets going. We ve had the introductory vision of chapter 1, where the risen Jesus appears in glory before our narrator, John. We ve had two chapters of letters, dictated by Jesus and written and delivered by John. And now, after this, John sees a doorway. This is the moment where John steps out of this world and into the heavenly realm, the place where God dwells, the spiritual dimension. I don t want you to have the wrong idea about this doorway into heaven. It s not some doorway up in the sky, far away from the earth, like this (show rapture picture) It s more like this (show wardrobe picture). C. S. Lewis Narnia is not heaven, but the idea that you could step through a wardrobe door and find yourself in a strange other world is a really helpful idea. Heaven in the bible is not always distant when God wants to, he can bring heaven very close to earth so close in John s case that he can simply step through a doorway and find himself transported into the throne-room of God. Worship of God is universal The throne-room of God is an incredible place. Many people have tried (and failed) to recreate the picture that John

2 describes. Here s one of the better ones (believe it or not). But I think it s better in your imagination, so I ll take that down now and leave you to your own devises! The throne-room of God is described in an interesting way. The first thing John sees is the one seated on the throne. He is like jasper and ruby. Around him is an emerald rainbow. In verse 5, we are told there are flashes of lightning emanating from the throne, as well as the sound of thunder. In front of the throne is a sea of glass. What each of these things signify is difficult to say, but the overall impression is one of incredible beauty and splendour. Whoever this King is, seated on this magnificent throne, He is glorious and powerful. This is a picture of our God, the God of the bible. God sits enthroned in heaven, the ultimate authority, the God over everything and everyone. And this is a picture of a God who is praiseworthy. I think we sometimes struggle with the idea that we ought to praise God. I know many people who think it is absurd that anyone would go to a church and sing songs about (and to) this god of ours. Why should we praise God? Well, there are two reasons to praise God. We praise him for who he is, and we praise him for what he has done. Here in Revelation, we see four strange-looking creatures worshiping God. They are covered in eyes, and they resemble four types of animal: a lion, an ox, a man and an eagle. These four creatures are strange, but stranger still, they re not unique! They resemble the four creatures of Ezekiel s vision, written almost 700 years earlier. What is it about these four types of creature? What do they represent? There is an ancient rabbinic Jewish saying that says, The mightiest among the birds is the eagle, the mightiest among the domestic animals is the bull, the mightiest among the wild beasts is the lion, and the mightiest among all is man. In Jewish thought, these four creatures are representatives of the entire created world, the natural world. What John is seeing here symbolizes the entirety of creation worshiping God. Psalm 96 reflects a similar idea, saying: Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad; let the sea resound, and all that is in it. Let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them; let all the trees of the forest sing for joy. Let all creation rejoice before the Lord. Anyone can see this happening, if their eyes are opened to see it: this is the glory of God the creator reflected in the beauty of his creation. They declare the truth of God without words, simply by their very existence. What is the truth about God that they declare? It s right here in Revelation 4:8: Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, Who was, and is, and is to come. There are three things here declared by the creation. God is the ultimate holy, the holy of holy of holies, completely and utterly holy. That s what the three holies mean. Secondly, God is

3 Lord and Almighty, meaning that he has the ultimate authority over all others. And thirdly, he is eternal, existing forever into the past and the future. This is a God who is worthy of praise. If everything he has made praises him, then we too should praise him. And in a way, many of us do, even without realising it. If the creation can worship God by being what it was made to be, then so can a human being. When people are creative, they reflect a creative God. When people are beautiful, they reflect a beautiful God. When people love, they reflect a loving God. When people are kind, or generous, or forgiving, or selfless, they reflect a good God. Worship of God is deserved Yet it is not enough to simply praise God in our being. We are conscious beings, and that changes everything. Firstly, our consciousness affects our ability to live as God wants us to live. We are able to be destructive instead of creative, full of hate instead of love, unkind, greedy, angry and selfish. In a word, human beings can be evil, even though we were created by a good God. So we are unable to properly reflect the God who made us in the way that the creation can. Yet our consciousness also provides us with a unique form of worship. N.T. Wright calls this the ability to say because. We can reason, and with that reason we can control our own behaviour. In John s vision, he sees 24 elders, representatives of humanity. Probably these elders represent the 12 tribes of Israel and the 12 apostles. That is to say, they represent all the people of God, both those in the past, before Christ, and those in the present and future, after Christ. These people worship differently to the four creatures. They leave their own thrones and bow down before God as he is seated upon his throne. They remove their crowns and lay them at His feet. They give up any status they have, even that which God has given them rightly; they submit themselves entirely before him. They declare that God is worthy. He deserves to be worshiped because of what he has done. They have seen the creation of God, as represented in the four creatures, and in seeing what God has done and how amazing He is, they praise and worship Him. This is conscious worship. This is a cognitive step, a response to God s actions in the world. Most of the worship seen in the bible is this kind of worship. We should love to praise God in this way it is the fullest form of praise a person can give to Him. We should contemplate God who he is and what he has done and in reflecting on Him we should glorify and praise him.

4 As we see God reflected in his creation, and as we enjoy Him and His world, we should overflow with praise for him. C. S. Lewis points out that praise for God should be like praise for anything or anyone else. We praise the people and thing we admire (to their faces, or to our friends, or to anyone who will listen: have you heard this band? have you seen this film? It s great!). Well then, we ought to praise what Lewis calls the supremely valuable more than we praise anything else we consider to have lesser value. That kind of praise is exciting, and fun, and fills us with joy. He goes on to say, I think we delight to praise what we enjoy because the praise not merely expresses but completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation. It is not out of compliment that lovers keep on telling one another how beautiful they are; the delight is incomplete till it is expressed. We praise God in our being when we reflect his nature to the world; and we praise God in our words when we understand and rejoice in his glory. Worship of Jesus is deserved Now we reach chapter 5. And here, we see something different, something new. We see a scroll with writing on both sides, sealed with seven seals. This can only be a message from God we are not told what it says. There is some discussion about which message it is that is kept in this scroll it could be the gospel message, the message of God s love for the world expressed in Jesus death and resurrection or it could be the message of revelation, the continuing unveiling of God s intentions for the world and His Kingdom. I d lean towards the latter. I think this is God s plan, his sovereign plan for the world. And who will open the scroll? Not just anyone, clearly. No one in heaven or earth or under the earth can be found to open the scroll and look inside. The plans of God cannot be heard (and perhaps, since God s word and his actions are so intertwined, this might mean that the plans of God cannot be fulfilled either!) John weeps and weeps, because there is nobody worthy to open this scroll. And then he hears there is. The Lion of Judah, the root of David, the promised Messiah of God, the victorious King of God s Kingdom; he is able to open the scroll! This is great news! Yet when John turns, he does not see this great, conquering lion. He sees a lamb, looking as if it had been slain. This is Jesus, the one who was sacrificed at the cross for the sins of the world, the one who conquered even in his defeat at the hands of evil men. The lamb is worthy. And for his worthiness to reveal God s intentions to the world (and perhaps to enact those intentions as well), the lamb is

5 worshiped. The four living creatures and the 24 elders fall down before the lamb in humble worship. They sing a new song to Him. They praise Him, just as they praised God in chapter 1. This is Jesus, the Son of God, God in human flesh, just as worthy of praise as the God enthroned beside him; equal with God the Father and the Holy Spirit (who is represented here as the seven horns on the lamb). Look at their song in verse 9: Jesus is worthy because he was slain: With your blood c you purchased d for God persons from every tribe and language and people and nation. Jesus death on the cross is worthy of worship. We worship Jesus because he died for us. But the song is not over. Verse 10: You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth. We praise Jesus because he called us to be his; to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God that is, to be his people and his worshipers and his servants. We get to be part of what God is doing in the world, and that is worth praising Jesus for, because he has made it possible for us to be in this kind of relationship with God, despite our failings and our sins. He has dealt with that for us in his death and resurrection, and for that, we praise him. As we worship this Jesus, we find ourselves caught up with this vision of heaven. Even if our lives on earth are full of pain, hardship, struggle, sorrow, disappointments, grief or even persecutions, just as the lives of those in the seven churches John was writing Revelation for; even then, as we come before God in worship, we join with the four living creatures and the 24 elders in heaven and sing worthy is the lamb. On earth, we may be poor, weak, pitiful and ostracised. But from heaven, we are a kingdom and priests; those who will one day reign on earth with the victorious lamb. Worship of Jesus is universal And yet the praise and worship of the lamb is not done yet. It continues and swells into an amazing crescendo, with thousands upon thousands of angels joining in the worship of the lamb who was slain. He is worthy to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise! And these angels in heaven are joined by every creature on earth, under the earth, and in the seas. The whole of creation, everything and everyone, joined together in universal praise of God the creator, seated on the throne, and the lamb, his Son: Praise and honour and glory and power. This is full and complete worship for God. This is the end result, the fullness of God s intentions.

6 When we worship God, we are worshiping this kind of God. The God who has created all things, who is all-powerful, who reigns from his heavenly throne, who is majestic and glorious and awe-inspiring; and the God who loves us and gave himself up for us at the cross, who calls us his children and his people and his kingdom and priests, who asks us to join with him in his saving, loving works in the world. This is the God of the bible. And as we know Him more and more, we love him more and more, and we praise him more and more. And that is what it is to belong to Jesus we worship. So let s worship God, with all that we are, and because we know that He is worthy of all praise. Amen.