Seven Blessings of Revelation

We do know that in the Bible, the number seven has great importance. I mean, there's seven days in the week, the seventh day is the Sabbath. From the very beginning, seven is an important number. There's seven days to the days of love and bread. There's seven days to the Feast of Tabernacles. In the book of Revelation, there's a whole lot of sevens. Now, I know there's a few saying, oh, a sermon on Revelation.

Others are saying, oh, good, a prophecy sermon, right? Well, yes, this is going to be about Revelation. But I want to take a little different approach to one of the messages in this book. There's a whole lot of messages, and I want to take a little different approach to one of those messages to keep us focused on something. So if you're one of those people that says, oh, no, a Revelation sermon, don't tune out yet.

Because there's something important here that we all need to know. The book of Revelation contains numerous patterns of seven. We find seven spirits, seven lampstands, seven churches, seven stars, seven torches, seven seals, a lamb with seven horns and seven eyes, seven angels with seven trumpets, seven thunders, a dragon with seven crowns on his seventh head, seven hills, seven kings, and seven last planks.

Now, for that number seven, to appear that many times, cannot be by accident. There's a design to it. Well, what I want to do today is talk about seven things that are stated in Revelation that I didn't mention. Now, I have a handout. Before we hand it out, I'll let you know. It's one for family, and there's not enough, and there's a reason why.

We handed these out this morning in Murfreesboro, and there was one big stack that one of the ushers handed out and was going to give me after services, and he set it down on the floor beside him, and his baby came over and sat on it with a wet diaper. I decided not to hand those out. So, we'll go ahead and hand these out. We're going to be a little short. That's okay. I'll either send out one electronically or just bring some more handouts.

Now, some people, handouts are a big thing. Some, they like to hold on to handouts. If you're one of the people that likes to hold on to handouts, this is something you can fold up and put in your Bible case, because it's something about revelation that we need to think about. Because what I'm going to cover today is that the book of Revelation contains seven blessings. Seven blessings? I mean, you think of revelation as what?

Tribulation and pain and suffering. And there's a lot of terrible things in this book that are predicted to happen. But there's seven blessings, and those blessings are on people who understand why the book of Revelation is here. It's interesting that all through history since the first century, there have been movements in Christianity to remove the book of Revelation. In the early days when they started to look at what is the canon, what is the original books of the Bible, it was a very simple criteria. They had to appear in the first century. And so they gathered everything that they knew that had appeared in the first century and said, this must be the Bible. And then they tried to throw out revelation, because it's nothing like the rest of the book.

It can't be part of the book. Martin Luther, when he helped led the Protestant Revolution over the Catholic Church, decided that the book of Revelation had to be removed. A couple others too, James, Hebrews, but Revelation, it would just, you know, had to be removed from the Bible.

The Enlightenment philosophers who created a whole new way of thinking in the 1700s, 1600s, 1700s in Europe, they looked at the Bible. So you've got to really pick and choose. Thomas Jefferson was an Enlightenment philosopher. And in one of his letters he wrote towards the end of his life, he basically said, revelation has to be from a crazy man. It has to be removed from the Bible. Of course, he wanted to remove a lot of things from the Bible, as most Enlightenment philosophers wanted to do.

Jefferson actually created his own gospels. So he edited the teachings of Jesus and took out everything he didn't like. And as a deist, he took out all the miracles, because deists believed that God created everything, but he's the great watchmaker. He stepped back and he's watching his machine work. And we learned about God by studying nature because we're studying the machine he made.

And since Jefferson was a deist, he had to take out all the things that Jesus did that were miracles because God doesn't work in miracles. So revelation has been under attack from the very beginning when they started to put together, this has to be the Bible.

The book of Revelation talks about why it should be studied. And in this handout, and I'm not gonna read all of it, in this handout, what I want you to think about, and this is why it's something you might keep and put in your Bible case, is that there is a positive message in Revelation. And we're gonna look at the blessings. But the positive message centers around these mega themes. So I won't go through all of them, but just to mention them, God's sovereignty. Satan and humanity will reach the point where humanity will cease to exist if God doesn't intervene. God intervenes. God does not allow Satan and corrupt humanity to destroy itself. He's not gonna let that happen. Christ's return, the whole point of Revelation, and we're gonna get into this as we go on. Yes, I love getting sermons on the four horsemen, right? I love getting sermons on the tribulation. I love getting sermons on different aspects of the book of Revelation. But you know, that's not the central point. The central point is the return of Jesus Christ, His reign for a thousand years, the great white throne judgment, and New Jerusalem coming to earth where God comes to live on earth with His family. That's the point. Everything else is driving towards that point. So Christ's return. There's also blessings for God's faithful people. Now some of those blessings we're gonna look at, you might say, that's a blessing according to the Scripture it is. So we'll have to look at what's being said. Also, judgment. This is important because what it proves is God will not endure evil forever. There is a point where God says, I will not allow evil. That's it. He just steps in. He stops it. And then there's actually a message of hope. Now when you read the Revelation, your sermons on Revelation, you usually don't think of hope. Actually, that's the purpose for the book. The purpose God had this written and given to His people was to tell them, no matter how bad this gets, and before the end, it's going to get horrendous. It's going to get terrifying. God's sovereignty, Christ's return, a message that God will have faithful people and all that, God's judgment to stop it and hope are actually the reason for the book. It's the reason all these prophecies are here. We don't know or understand everything in the book of Revelation. I go clear back to the radio church of God, the worldwide church of God, and even in United, we've had to look at places in Revelation every once in a while and say, well, we've taught it said this, and then we've taught it said this, and we've taught it said this, and we say, well, you know what? It's a little vague. There's maybe two different things it could mean. In other words, we don't know all the exact answers to Revelation. And every once in a while, I'll meet somebody who thinks they do. And usually, they're really lonely because nobody else sees it, right? Now, that doesn't mean we're not supposed to read it. Doesn't mean we're not supposed to understand it. We are supposed to clearly understand its vision, its hope, its plan of God, the details. We are to know when they happen.

You know, how many times have we had discussions? You know, every time I give a, I don't give a sermon too often on the Mark of the Beast, but I have occasionally, and it's like, I can't tell you exactly what it is. I can give you probably four or five things it is, and probably it may be more than one thing. The thing is, if you know this book, you will know what it is, what happens. You'll know how to reject it, right? There was a big thing a few years ago that the Mark of the Beast was the COVID vaccine. Well, COVID came and went, and so far, everyone that got one, enough supporting or not supporting the COVID vaccine, I'm just saying that was a theory that came along that was taught, and people were really into it. And the truth is, it has nothing to do with the Mark of the Beast. Now, whether it was good for you or not, you'll have to decide that for yourselves. But that's not the point. The point is, it wasn't the Mark of the Beast. So, when it happens, we'll know it. So let's look at some blessings for you from God in the book of Revelation. Let's go to Revelation 1. 1. The Revelation of Jesus Christ. The revealing of Jesus Christ. In other words, this is a message that uncovers something. You can't see it, it's uncovered, and now you see it. So this is a revelation that comes directly from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants things which must shortly take place, and he sent and signified it by his angel to his servant John. So John says, I received this from Christ through an angel, and this is what God wants us to know. Now, for those of us who believe that Revelation is part of the canon, it was written in the first century, it was passed around in the first century, it is part of what was inspired by God, then we believe this. And then he says, who bore witness to the word of God, and to the testimony of Jesus Christ to all things that he saw. In other words, John says, I know Jesus. I understand. I receive this. I'm giving it to you. And then verse 3, Blessed is he who reads those who hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written in it, for the time is near. There is a blessing to read and hold on to the things in the book of Revelation. So when Catholicism tried to remove it, when Martin Luther tried to remove it, when Thomas Jefferson tried to remove it, they were taking away a blessing or attempting to take away a blessing. This is a blessing from God. He didn't say who understands every word.

He didn't say who understands every little symbolism in it. He just said, blessed are those who read it and keep it. Let's see, this is important.

He says that those things are written for it, for the time is near. Now, the time is near. Then, it's a whole lot more near now.

But this was written for Christians throughout time. From the first century to now, this is what we're to learn from the book of Revelation. And this is actually the starting point. It's right at the beginning. It comes from Christ. It's a blessing to have this book. It's a blessing to have this book. You know, we'll come right back here to Revelation. But let's go to Ephesians 1. Here Paul, to the church in Ephesus, writes about this concept of revelation. The revelation comes from God. So he's talking about this revelation from God. Not something we make up or put together because we're smart. But this is something that comes from God. So verse 15, he writes to the church in Ephesus, Therefore I also, after a herd of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention to you in my prayers, or of you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him. There's a sermon right there. There's a sermon right there. The spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Jesus Christ. But what he's saying is God gives us wisdom to understand the truth, to understand living, but it is also revelation. He uncovers things that we would not see. Now, the great danger is we don't want to become Gnostics. We're finding secret truth in everything. A bird came in and landed on my porch today. That's a message from God. It had dropped a certain kind of leaf, which I looked up that means this. Therefore, it's a message from God, and I'm supposed to wear fig leaves the rest of my life as clothing. I mean, I'm being facetious, but sometimes it's almost that bad.

So, he reveals things to us. Now, remember, the revelation of Jesus Christ in the book of Revealing is a blessing for those who read it. He goes on and talks about what God's revelation does for us. The eyes of your understanding, verse 18, being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of His calling. This revelation brings us to God so that we can now have hope. In a difficult life, we can have hope. And what we have in the book of Revelation is that the difficulty of the four horsemen and the difficulty of the tribulation and the difficulty of the day of the Lord, those three great epics of that time, in that difficulty, we can have hope. That's why they're called blessings. Here, he ties in... Now, once again, he's not talking about the book of Revelation. It hadn't been written yet, but he's talking about a principle. Revelation from God gives us hope, hope of His calling, the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, that God's going to give you something in the future you do not have. And what is the exceedingly exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe according to the work of His mighty power, which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead, and seated Him at His right hand in heavenly places, far above all principalities and power, and might and dominion, and every name which is named not only in His age, but also in that is to come. He put all things under His feet and gave Him to be heard, head over all things, to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fits all in all. So this is the wisdom. This is the revelation that Paul says, this begins to give us our basis for understanding the wisdom and revelation of God. And everything he talks about here we're going to find as an element in the book of Revelation. Everything that Paul says here, once again, not that he's doing it on purpose, it's because this is the way God's Spirit works. It creates continuity within what He's telling and giving to people. So we have the very first one, this uncovering that if you read and keep this book, you will receive blessings. You'll receive a blessing.

Okay. Well, every time I read it, I read of diseases and earthquakes and pestilence and death and destruction. How's that a blessing? Okay. Well, we have to find out what it means inside the book of Revelation. So let's go to Revelation 14 and look at our second blessing here. Revelation 14 verse 12. This part of Revelation is about the terrible time that is known as the day of the Lord. When we have a time when God intervenes in human history, humanity is destroying itself. He begins to punish humanity. Humanity, the results of human beings knowing what they're doing is actually leading to the destruction of the very planet they're on. So this is the worst of this time. Okay. And he says this, here's the patience of the saints. There are those... The saints. Here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. So here's where the saints find their patience in this terrible time.

Because they keep God's commandments. They keep His instructions. They try to live life in the coordinates the way He wants them to. And yet they have faith in Jesus. Verse 13. Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, right, blessed. Oh good. Blessed are those who have this faith and nothing happens to them. Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Yes, says the spirit that they may rest from their labors and from their works and their works will follow them. What? What? Blessed are those who die?

I understand this only because I've lived long enough to see this many times. If you would have told me this at 20, I would have said, don't get it. At 30, I don't get it. 40, maybe a little bit. At 70, I have held the hand of many a person that was dying. And they have said, would you pray for me and ask God that if it's time just to let me go to sleep so I can wake up when Christ returns? It's so real to them. They're not afraid. They just want to go to sleep. They know what's going to happen next. They believe it. They're comfortable with it. And I've prayed it before. I remember one man, I prayed with him. Two days later, I called the hospital to go visit him. And his wife said, it's really weird. I went and said, you were coming. And he just smiled and said, it's okay. Tell him, he doesn't have to. He died just a little bit later. We prayed together. He was ready. When I went back to see him, he said, don't worry about it. It's okay. It's okay. That's what this means. There's gonna come a time that the world is so terrible that God says, blessed are those who go to sleep. Because in a very short time, they're gonna wake up different. And the world's gonna be different. And they're gonna be spirit beings. And they're gonna be in God's family. I want you to notice the whole point of what we're going through here is an understanding of the end goal. The book of Revelation, we think is just the revelation of all the terrible things are gonna happen in the end. Well, that's part of it. But that's not the purpose. The purpose of the book of Revelation is the end goal. It's God's goal. This is what God is working for. This is what God anticipates. This is what God wants for you and me. This is what God is designing. This is why Christ came. This is why he was resurrected. It's all for a certain point in time. And he says, when it gets bad enough where Satan's trying to destroy this, blessed are you, if you know the book, and blessed are you if you go to sleep in the midst of all this terrible things. If we're gonna understand these blessings, it's a little difficult because we literally find ourselves having to rethink. But you know, this is the new thought. We'll come right back to Revelation. Go to Isaiah 57. Isaiah 57. I have on rare occasion read this at a funeral because I knew how the person felt about dying. And they were ready for it. Verse 1, the righteous perishes and no man takes it to heart. Merciful men are taken away while no one considers that the righteous is taken away from evil. And he shall enter into peace. They shall rest in their beds, each when walking in his uprightness. In other words, they simply go to sleep and they wake up. And he says here that this is a good thing because the evil can no longer touch them. In the resurrection, as we're going to look at here, the blessing is really aimed at for us, the first resurrection. In the resurrection, evil can no longer hurt us. And justice can't hurt us. Pain can't hurt us. Physical pain means nothing. The mental anguish we suffer won't be there.

It's not there anymore. Sin isn't part of us anymore. We're changed. The blessings that we're going to look at keep pointing us towards think what God's thinking about. Think where God is going and think that you're part of this. So we have our second blessing, which is blessed are those who die in Christ in the tribulation. Number three, Revelation 16.

Verse 15.

Behold, and this is Jesus Christ, behold, I am a coming as a thief. In other words, he's going to be coming and the world isn't going to be ready for it. Blessed is he who watches and keeps his garments, lest he walk naked and see his shame. Blessed is he who watches and keeps his garments. You're going to see this idea of wearing white garments all through the book of Revelation. White garments meant that you were living a righteous life, that you were seen as holy and sanctified before God, that you weren't wearing soiled and ripped and garments, filthy garments, because that represented your lifestyle. So when he says watch here, he just doesn't mean watch the news all the time. I mean, there's a time to watch the news, but if you watch the news all the time, you just need to be depressed. We have to know what's going on in the world, but what's happening right now isn't our hope. I mean, there's no form of government, none. There's no leader on the face of the earth that can set up God's kingdom. Only Jesus Christ can set up God's kingdom. And any attempt to create some kind of righteous government will fail. It has, since Adam and Eve, got kicked out of the garden, and it will fail until Christ comes back. It doesn't mean there are some governments that are better than others, right?

There's lots of people that live under governments that kill them. And I mean, there's terrible governments in this world, but the US government isn't Christ-led either. It has some biblical principles in our society. That helps us. But the bottom line is that we're watching for Christ. And yes, we're looking around at the terrible things that are happening. I mean, the bottom line is, I don't know when Christ is going to come back, but our world right now is a precarious situation where it can spiral out of control very quickly. This whole thing can fall apart real quick. Oh, you have to do with study history. It's happened before, but there's never been 8 billion people. There's never been nuclear weapons. There's never been all these things. You know, it's just, it's so different and there's no human way to fix it. But what if Christ doesn't come back for 20 years? Some of you won't be alive. Some of you say, well, if it's going to be 20 years, I'm just going to do what I want. You know, I'll get ready before then. Watch here means that we have to be constantly prepared. Constantly prepared because you say, well, okay, I got to be prepared to meet Jesus Christ. On the way home, if you get hit by a car and you die, that's it. You better be prepared.

You better be prepared. You don't have to worry about the tribulation and, you know, the day of the Lord. You're either coming up with a resurrection or you're not when He returns. So this has to be a mindset and keeps His garments, which means that you live your Christian life.

You know, Luke talks about four different kinds of judgments. Let's just look at these briefly in Luke 12. That's actually Jesus that says it's not Luke, but Luke records it in Luke 12.

I find this interesting because, one, it's written to the church.

I mean, He gives this to a Jewish audience, but it is about those who follow Him. Okay, so it's a parable about Him and His followers, and He breaks this down in a way that probably didn't make a lot of sense to anybody at the time.

Verse 42 says, And the Lord said, Who then is that faithful and wise servant, or steward, whom his master will make rule over his household, to give them portion of food and deuces, and blesses that servant whom his master will find doing when he comes. For truly I say to you that he will make him ruler over all that he has. And that is part of the message of Revelation. As you see the world around you spiral more and more into evil, you stay where you're supposed to be. You stay focused. You let God work in your life.

Don't let it let you become just distracted so much with the world. We can either become so distracted with the world that we just start acting like the world, or we live in some kind of newsphobia. You know, people that maybe you do this, I mean, you just get on YouTube and go from news cast to newscast until you're, you know, you just got the shakes because everything's so bad.

That's not what we're supposed to be as Christians either.

Because we have this hope. We see the end of all this. We see the focal point of everything that's happening in human history. Now he says there's another type of servant. Verse 45, but if that servant says in his heart, my master's delaying his coming, begins to beat the male and female servants and to eat and drink and be drunk. Okay, think about this. This is the person who said, you know what? I don't think Christ is coming back soon. So suddenly they're involved in all kinds of business practices that are not Christian. They're becoming dishonest. They're living, you know, lascivious lifestyles. They're out drinking. They're having a good time. And they begin fighting with everybody around them so that the church is a place to come. Church services and worship with other people and harmony before God is a place to come and pound your own ideas and do this and do that and cause arguments and just, you know, be nothing but a person that causes fighting and arguing. He says, the master of that servant will come on a day when he is not looking for him, and an hour when he's not aware and will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the unbelievers. That's a scary statement. That's all. That's like this person will be rejected.

So we have to make sure that we understand. Once again, I remember as a child, the belief that Christ was coming back in the early 70s.

It didn't happen. It never was going to happen. Somebody just looked at some prophecies, figured out that's what it meant, and lots of people believed it. You see that all the time. Every time there's a blood moon. There was a blood moon the other night, and I have to admit, I didn't see anybody saying it was the sign that Jesus was coming back. Usually a blood moon is Jesus coming back, there's the sign. And they'll go to a place in Revelation, which can't mean that, and that becomes their selling point.

It was a beautiful moon. How many saw that? That was a beautiful moon.

But this kind of person, it says, is just cut off. Because they decide all this emphasis on the return of Jesus Christ is keeping me from doing what I want now. The emphasis on the return of Jesus Christ doesn't make us go out and live like monks, right? Oh, I'm just going to live in a monastery and eat bread and water and sleep on a bed of nails. I'm just going to do that because Christ is coming back. That's not what this is about. What it's about is living life fully as a Christian in a world that isn't God's and understanding that there's always going to be hurts and problems and sins. This has got to be a rocky road at times. That's part of the journey here. And you're looking at the focal point of how it works out.

He then says, that the servant who knew his master's will and did not prepare himself or according to his will shall be beaten with many stripes. Now, here's a person that didn't necessarily go out and live simple lifestyles, but they really didn't live like a Christian either. And the answer is, their life's going to get real hard. He doesn't say they'll be thrown with the unbelievers. It's almost like they're going to learn the hard way. They're going to learn the hard way. And then 48, but he who did not know, yet committed things deserving of stripes shall be beaten with few for everyone to whom much is given. To him much will be required, and to him who much has been committed, of him they will ask the more. In other words, there's people who just didn't totally understand what God wanted to do and failed at times. And God says, well, their lack of knowledge I won't treat as harshly. They only did what they knew. But there's a warning here. To those who are given much. And if we're honest, we have to know we haven't given much. We have been given much. And God requires much of us, because if He gives it to us, we're expected to work with what He does. His power is to be used. His knowledge is to be internalized. That's an interesting little parable there, that He gave to a group of people that would have meant much to them.

It means a lot to those who live between the first and second comings of Jesus Christ. Number four, Revelation 19.

Get through the book of Revelation here and get all of our blessings. Revelation 19, verse 6. The last four that we're going to look at are the focal point itself. This is now where Christ hears where the real blessings lie. You and I get physical blessings all the time from God. We get spiritual blessings from God. We get little things He gives to us just because that's who He is. But His focal point, my wife and I have a joke. Some of you might remember, what was it? The publishers...

What was it? Yeah, it was where once a year, there was this big thing they sent out in the mail, and you could win like a million dollars in cash and prizes. So ever since we've been married, I'll go get the mail and say, today's my day. I'm getting a million dollars in cash and prize. Publishers Clearing House, that's what it was. Well, I don't even think it exists anymore. It's a joke, right? Oh, good. I'm going to go get my physical blessing from God, a million dollars in cash and prizes. But that's how we can approach life sometimes. We think only in terms of God's physical blessings. And physical blessings come from God, but that's not His focal point. He has a much greater purpose for your life than a sweepstakes winner. Of course, I never entered a sweepstakes, so I never had a chance to win, but it was just a joke. I say, as before, I even met Kim. It was a joke my whole life as a kid. Oh, this is the day I get the million dollars. Yeah, I know. I'm a nerd, but that's okay. You reach an age, you just, you have to accept that you're eccentric, and I fully accept it. So it's okay. Revelation 19 verse 6.

He says, As I heard it as it were, a voice of a great multitude, as the sound of many waters and the sound of mighty thunders, saying, Alleluia for the Lord God, and nippet it reigns, let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife have made herself ready. We keep going back to wearing these white garments, and that the church is the wife of Christ. And to her was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, and bright for the saints, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. So see, the lifestyle, the mindset, everything about them was being changed and molded by God and prepared for this moment. You don't become part of the bride of Christ in a moment. It's a lifetime of being prepared to marry Jesus Christ. We have to look at what that means. Then He said to me, He says to John, verse 9, write, Blessed are those who are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb. And He said to me, these are the true sayings of God. Blessed are those who are called to come together, because this is what God is doing. At this stage of His salvation plan, He is preparing a bride for Christ. He's not trying to save the world. The world is called after the tribulation when Christ is reigning on the earth and calls everybody to Him. Right now He's preparing a bride. Now that message is supposed to go out so that more can be called to be part of the bride. It's also to go out so the people can remember that God, you know, people say, well, if you'd just warned me, why did? You just would listen. So the message has to go out. We have to preach. We have to share the gospel. But the focal point is Christ's return and the preparation of this bride. Blessed are you if you're called to be part of the bride of Christ. If you're here today, then is that not why you're here? You're here to be prepared. Now, you're here to be a child of God first, but then you have a very specific job, if you will. And that is to serve Jesus Christ when He returns on this earth. We're to serve Him as He takes and recreates the earth or heals the earth and then begins to rule over the entire earth. He's going to have a group of children of God prepared to serve Him, the bride of Christ.

That's why we're here. God, the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, is a whole lot more interested in preparing you for that ceremony than He is about the things that I know I'm interested in every day. My worries are very minute compared to this concept. And it's like, you don't get this. Okay? So you're worried about—Mr. Rades will get a chocolatas—the crabgrass in your yard. I'm a grumpy old man. Look at the crabgrass in my yard. And sometimes I just do it because I don't care. I just like to sound crabby. But look at the crabgrass in my yard. Just crabgrass. You know, one of these days I'm going to go stand out in my yard because some kid walks by and goes, go off my lawn just so I can do it. Not because I care. But, you know, in reality there's a lot of things we're upset over or worry about every day. And God says, no, no, no, no, no. I'm not preparing you for a new advancement at work. Now, if you get that advancement, that's great. God's not against it. But God says, actually, that's not what I'm working for in your life. I'm working in your life to prepare you to be a group of people who assist and help and worship Jesus Christ as He changes the world. Blessed are you if you're called to that.

You're already receiving that blessing. You're already participating. Now, the blessing isn't complete yet, is it? But you're participating in the blessing you've been called. And in the tribulation, in the pain and terror and wonder of what's going on, whether you're protected or not, some are protected, some are not protected. You know, that isn't the focal point. God says, wait till you see what I'm going to have you do. What your purpose in this life is to prepare for. You want a job advancement?

Yeah, I work for Steve Myers. He's my boss, by the way, my best friend, but my boss. About the reality is I work for Jesus Christ. I've thought about that before. Wait a minute. I was ordained into the ministry of Jesus. I work for Jesus Christ. What about some day when you, everybody can say, oh, no, no, I work for Jesus Christ. That's my boss. That's a purpose. That's a reason.

And it's something that's a blessing from God.

So that leads us to the next blessing that's tied in with this, but I just want to emphasize something here. Verse 4 of chapter 20.

Verse 5. So blessed are those who are called to the marriage supper.

And blessed are those who die before Christ returns, because that's what they'll experience next. Now, there will be people who are alive at Christ's return. It just says they're changed. But the blessings of revelation always focus on no matter how bad it gets. It always focused on remember what's going to happen. Remember what God is doing for you and in you and will do with you. Remember that. It's at the heart of it.

And that's why there's supposed to be this message of hope in here.

The first resurrection is a blessing. Now, the two last blessings, quickly. Revelation 22.7.

Okay. Revelation 22, because Revelation 20 is about the first resurrection. It's about the thousand-year reign of Christ, the Satanic rebellion at the end, the great white throne judgment, and then the time when God… There's only two kinds of what used to be human beings that are left. Well, one kind. And that's the ones who have been changed because the other kind have been destroyed in the Lake of Fire. All that's left are those who are now the children of God. And so Revelation 21 talks about God coming to earth, the Father coming to earth with New Jerusalem, and starts to summarize, this is it. This is it. This is why. This is why from Genesis 1 to Revelation 19 is all about this. It's about these things. It's about this is God's purpose from the very beginning. And that's why in verse 7 of Revelation 22, Behold, I am coming quickly, Jesus says. Blessed is he who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book.

You know, it's interesting. It's not the words of the prophecy about how God's going to burn all those evil people. God's going to, yes, there's judgment as in the handout. That's one of the messages here. But that has to do with God not enduring. He just won't live with evil forever. What he wants to do in creating this family. In fact, that's what Revelation 21 talks about being the children of God. That's the purpose. All these blessings in Revelation are aimed at Revelation 20, 21 and 22. It's to take us there to be a reminder of what we're part of, that life is more than this right now. It's a great life. But you know, if this is all the was, eat, drink, and be married because, you know, tomorrow we die, right? It's so much more than this and the blessing we've received to know more about it. And then the last, Revelation 22, 12. Behold, I'm coming quickly. He keeps saying this. In other words, no matter when He comes, it's going to be a surprise to a certain amount of people, and it's going to seem to happen real fast.

And my reward is with me to give to everyone according to His work. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, may enter through the gates into the city. The city is their Jerusalem. That's what He's talking about here. Enter into the throne of God.

Now, I always read from the New King, or usually from the New King James. Some of you might have another translation, and it doesn't say, keep the commandments. Anybody have a translation that says, has their garments washed? No. Okay. The reason some translations will say, have their garments washed? The two oldest manuscripts they found, probably somewhere in the second century, manuscripts fall apart. And they have some problems with them, but they say, have their garments washed. Thousands of other manuscripts from the second and third century say, keep the commandments. They actually mean the same thing. If you look through washing your garments, it's always the righteousness of the saints. It has to do with the Ten Commandments, or the commandments of God. It says that in Revelation. The commandments of God in washing of garments, or there's a connection, but probably keeping the commandments is the most accurate translation of it. But like I said, it really doesn't matter. I mean, the same thing in the context of Revelation. The commandments of God in the Old Testament. Blessed are those who have obeyed God, kept His words, had faith in Jesus Christ. Remember, we already read, they keep the commandments, they have faith in Jesus. That's in Revelation. That's one of the blessings. And they are blessed because they now have become the children of God. We won't go there, but you'll see in Matthew 22, there's a parable given by Jesus where He talks about the wedding supper. And those who will be there, and they won't understand why they're asked to leave. And He'll say, because you don't have on wedding garments. You have garments that are filthy and torn and soiled. And their answer is, so what? No, you have to have the wedding garments. You have to be called by God, and you have to be changed. And that message is all through here. Blessing, blessing, blessing, blessing, blessing. But each blessing requires a commitment to the blessing, a commitment to what God is doing. So this is why, yes, the book of Revelation is about the four horsemen. I like giving sermons about the four school. Four horsemen. I like giving sermons about the tribulation, the day of the Lord, putting all that together. All those are parts of it. I don't know the answer to, but we know a lot. We have an understanding outline of the book.

But also, this is a book of hope, because it's a book of blessings. You've already started to receive these blessings. You already are having your clothes, your wedding gowns, cleat. You already are learning faith in Christ and obedience to God's commands. You're already looking forward at knowing that your calling is to be serving Jesus Christ and His government when He returns. You already know these blessings. They're just waiting there for you. But they're also supposed to be blessings in our lives now. Blessings that help us understand that even in the most terrible times, I mean, if the tribulation can't start tomorrow, but if all the things that lead up to the tribulation start tomorrow, or if it's 10 years from now, no, I think it's going to happen soon. But you know what? So did my parents. So did the generation before them. Of course, it was never as bad as it is now. It wasn't. They never had 8 billion people, you know, the capacities we have now. But what if I'm wrong? What if Christ doesn't return sometime in my lifetime or the next 15 years or whatever? Does it change anything? Nope. It just means I live my life in the context of these blessings. If he doesn't come back for 100 years, you know what will matter? Does each generation live in the context of these blessings? Does each generation watch and look and see the world, watch themselves, watch God? And does that transformation take place? Because if we do, we will be there. We will be there.

And we will be prepared to marry Jesus Christ at His second coming and receive childhood into the God's family, which is the greatest blessing we could ever receive.