The Seven Blessings of Revelations

In the Bible, the number seven has a lot of importance. And we know that. We've talked about it. You hear about it. You think about it. You're reminded about it every Sabbath, every seventh day. How important that number is in the Scripture. There's the Feast of Tabernacles is seven days long. The Days of Love and Bread are seven days long.

The Bible's full of the number seven. What's very interesting is the book of Revelation is full of the number seven. It appears over and over and over again. There are, start to make a list here, seven spirits, seven lampstands, seven churches, seven stars, seven torches, seven seals, a lamb with seven horns and seven eyes, angels with seven trumpets, seven thunders, a dragon with seven crowns and seven heads, seven hills, seven kings, and seven last plagues. Now that number appears over and over and over again for a reason. I mean, that's not arbitrary that that number appears over and over again. Now I'm not going to go through all the numbers in all the places of Revelation where there's seven.

But there are seven things listed in Trump in Revelation that I want to do today, I want to cover today. And it's something we usually don't think about and don't connect to the book of Revelation. We think of all the doom and gloom that's in this book. Oh no, another sermon on Revelation. We're going to hear about plagues and terrible things.

Well, a little bit. But there are seven blessings from God that are mentioned in the book of Revelation. Seven blessings. And in the midst of all the terrible things that's predicted in that book, there are seven blessings. Today we're going to look at the seven blessings. We're going to go through the seven places in the book of Revelation where God says people receive a blessing if they do this or because of this. And it's all in the context of the prophecies of the book of Revelation.

So let's start. Let's go to Revelation 1 right at the very beginning. Revelation 1, the revelation of Jesus Christ, the revealing. The revelation is when you reveal something. It's covered and you pull back the covering and you get to see what's underneath. So here's the revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave him to show his servants. So what John's saying here is that what he's giving was revealed by God to Christ to him.

This is an uncovering of end-time events. Events which must shortly take place and he said and signified it by his angel to his servant John who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ to all things that he saw. So this is John saying this was revealed to me, this was given to me by God, the revelation of Jesus Christ, and he's writing it down. It has been interesting that in the early days of Catholicism and even in the early days of Protestantism there was a movement to remove revelation from the Bible because it just seems so strange that there was nothing quite like it in the Scripture and so there was a movement to do so even in the Enlightenment philosophers, one which was Thomas Jefferson.

Thomas Jefferson wanted revelation removed from the Bible because it made no sense at all. Why shouldn't it even be there? It's the mad ramblings of a crazy man. We see this as revealed word of God and so right here at the very beginning in verse 3 we have a blessing. Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of this prophecy and keep those things which are written in it so the time is near. Blessed are those who actually take this seriously. Blessed are those who read this and accept and believe that this is a revelation from God.

Now we don't know everything in the book of Revelation. We don't have all the answers. I've been around a long time in the Church of God and I've seen all kinds of speculations and ideas of what different passages of revelation means. But there is a story flow that we can understand and in Revelation there are things predicted that we will know when they happen. We may not know all the details before they happen, but we will know when they happen. It's being revealed to us. Let's go to Ephesians 1. Ephesians 1. Something very interesting here. We look through Revelation and say it can't be understood.

And there are parts we still don't understand. But overall we do have an understanding. And it is a revelation of Jesus Christ. This is important that we at least go through this book, that we study it, that we have an understanding of these end time things. And we are blessed if we do so. What's interesting here, now this isn't tied in with the book of Revelation, but there are some general statements made by the Apostle Paul here in Ephesians 1, verse 15.

Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith, he's talking about the people, mainly Gentiles there in Ephesus, who would turn to God, your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention 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. Now he's not talking about the book of Revelation, he's talking about the uncovering, that there's things that God reveals through His Spirit that has been given to the people of God.

So when we look at the book of Revelation, we have to look at it in the belief that we have been given a spirit of revelation, that there's things there that will be uncovered and revealed to us. And like I said, as you read it, you begin to realize there are certain things that won't be revealed until they happen. You will understand it when it happens. There's other things that we can look forward to because we can see the trends, we can see the prophecies that are predicted in general, sometimes not entirely in detail.

He goes on to talks about, or writes about, this spirit of revelation, of wisdom and revelation, both together. The eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power, which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at the right hand of the heavenly places.

Then he goes on to talks about what has been revealed. Much of this, the details of some of this, is given in Revelation. Far above, verse 21, all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, and only in this age, but also in the age which is to come. For He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.

So we, through this spirit of revelation, who Jesus Christ is. So when we go to the book of Revelation, what we see is what He is revealing to His church. And it is never going to make sense to those outside. Even in the church, we struggle sometimes because it seems like on a regular basis, someone will say, here, I've discovered a new part of revelation, and I have this new revealing of this part of revelation, and I see people so excited, and they say it, and they show it, and it makes no sense to anybody else.

Or it's easily disproven. Or you just now put it in a list of four or five possible explanations. I mean, the Mark of the Beast. I've heard at least a dozen different ideas of what the Mark of the Beast is over the years. And actually, it could be a series of things. There's a number of things that could be the Mark of the Beast, and they all come together. But I'm not going to get up here and talk about the Mark of the Beast.

But you see what I mean about we try to say, what is revealed here? What is revealed here? And sometimes we won't know until it happens. But if we are blessed by studying it and by reading it, because that's what it says at the very beginning, that's the first blessing in the book, you're blessed if you study this.

You're blessed if you struggle with this, and you will see it as it happens. So there's a blessing. I know people said, I hate reading the book of Revelation. I understand the difficulties of it. But it is a blessing. And there are times it's actually very comforting. That's why we need to know the blessings that are contained in the book. What we can receive in Revelation are these blessings. So that's the first one. Now, when we go through—I have a handout. If you go ahead and have a couple of minutes, I'll hand it out. Try to hand one per family—I don't think I printed enough—but one per family. I have a handout.

Because I didn't want to go through this in great detail, because I wanted to stick with the seven blessings. But what the handout is—and I know some people like handouts, some people don't, they throw them away. Others, I see the fold up, they'll put them in their Bible. This is a good thing to fold up and put in your Bible every time you think, oh, the book of Revelation is just nothing that glue would do. Oh, no, the book of Revelation again. It's just all about people dying and pestilences and tribulations. No, there's something very positive that is built into this Revelation. And this gives you a number of themes, sort of mega themes, that are in Revelation that are very positive.

One is the understanding of God's sovereignty. God is going to control what happens. It seems like it's going to be out of control because Satan's going to be trying to destroy humanity. And humanity is going to go insane. But God is going to control what happens. It's about Christ's return, which is the only hope that humanity has.

There's a lot in this book about God's faithful people. The third of the great mega themes. There is a lot in this book about judgment. God will not, and you've heard me say this many times, He will not exist forever with evil. He will not. He just, evil has a limited time where it's allowed. A limited time. And it is a book of hope. Hope? Yes. And we find this hope when we really understand the blessings that are in it.

So we have our first blessing. And our first blessing is you are blessed if you read and keep the book. In other words, you just don't set this one aside. You don't set aside any book in the Bible, but you don't set this one aside. You hold on to it for its purpose. Now, Revelation shouldn't be the center of all your study. It should be the center of all our understanding of the Scriptures. It's one book, but we are to keep it.

Okay, so let's go to Revelation 14.

And let's start in verse 12.

This is going to seem like a strange blessing, but it's actually one of the blessings here in the book. Here's the patience of the saints. Verse 12.

Here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.

So here we have a description of the people of God. They're keeping His commandments. They have faith in Jesus Christ, and He said, this is their patience. In other words, in the time of troubles, we know part of the churches is protected during this time period, but not the entire church. There's reasons for that. Part of it is God's going to be doing a work during this time period with the two witnesses. And there's going to be people who live God's way, stand up for God's way, and are persecuted during this time. Verse 13. Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me. Now this is very interesting because this is just before the tribulation turns into absolute chaos all over the world. Blessed are the dead who died in the Lord from now on. Yes, says the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them. Blessed are those who die through at this time period because they will rest and they will be given their reward. Now I put this blessing here because this one, you think, well what a, that's not a blessing. Blessed are those who die in the context. And this was sort of brought out in the sermonette. In the context of salvation, death can be a blessing because your next moment of consciousness is being, is that you are changed and you are spirit.

So we tend to think, oh any Christian that has to go through the tribulation, that's a curse.

And that's not what this says. Blessed are those who die for Christ, as did many people in the first century. Blessed because God's going to give them a blessing in their next moment. Boy, that doesn't seem like a blessing to me to die.

But we have to look at this the way God looks at it. And God looks at it, you have no idea what I have prepared for you. And that salvation is I save you from eternal death and I give you a life beyond anything you can imagine. And that's the faith, that's part of the faith of the saints, that we believe in that resurrection. We believe in what God's going to do.

So this seems like a strange blessing, but it's not. You know, this just is an echo of something that Isaiah said. We'll come right back here, but let's go to Isaiah chapter 57.

Isaiah 57.

Verse 1. He says, The righteous perish, and no man takes it to heart.

Merciful men are taken away, and no one considers that the righteous is taken away from evil.

And he shall enter into peace, and they shall rest in their beds, each one walking in his uprightness.

Isaiah was writing here what is being revealed as a blessing in Revelation. And that is, to die in your faith is a blessing because the evil can't touch you ever again.

Harm can't come to you ever again in the promise that God's giving to you.

I have met people over the years, people who were sick for a long period of time, or people who just knew age, had reached the point where Isaiah 57 verse 1 was one of their favorite verses in the Bible. I am ready to die. I've heard that. And of course, usually I'm thinking, I'm not.

I am ready to die because I know what happens next. So I'm not afraid of it anymore.

Not afraid of it anymore because I know what happens next. It's that deep inside of them that they know what happens next. And so what we have is a blessing for those who are dying during the tribulation because they can't be hurt ever again.

Their blessing is they're protected from the evil, and when they're resurrected, they can't be hurt by it. They can't touch them.

God looks at blessings sometimes a little different. We do.

But that's because God sees way beyond the little life that we have.

His viewpoint is so much more expansive than how we look at life.

And he sees the greatness and the goodness that we'll receive then.

And bless are you if you die for me.

Let's go back into something that was brought out in the sermon.

Okay, let's go to another blessing. Revelation 16.

Revelation 16. Verse 15. 16. Behold, I am coming as a thief. Okay, this is Jesus Christ.

He's in this whole book is about his second coming, right? And what happens afterwards?

Behold, I am coming as a thief. Blessed is he who watches and keeps his garments, lest he walk naked and see his shame. Garments are used a couple of times, white garments in the book of Revelation. In other words, blessed are those who continue to live in the sanctification, in the holiness that they've been called to. Blessed are those who keep doing what they're supposed to do. Stay close to God, obey God, stay in the faith. Blessed are those people in this.

Because they won't be put to shame when he returns and says to them, I never knew you.

Right? He talks about that in book of Matthew. Blessed are those who stay focused in this time period of the end time. Who stay focused on what's true and what's right and focused on God and on Christ. Blessed are them. Let's go to Luke 12. Luke 12.

Here we have a parable that's given for the church.

And ties in to the blessing there that's given. He wants us to focus on the blessing. The blessing is watch. Now, watching is more than just watching world events. That's part of it. It's watching yourself. It's watching society. It's watching that your relationship with God is proper.

That you're not being dragged into the world or into despair or fear.

Verse 42. And the Lord said, Who then is that faithful and wise servant, whom his master will make ruler over his household, could give them their portion of food in due season. So he's talking here about the church that is going to be resurrected to rule with Christ.

Blessed, oh, we have another blessing here, and it ties in the revelation. Blessed is the servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. And I will say to you that he will make him the ruler over all that he has. So he says, blessed is the one who stays faithful and is doing, continuing to live the way of life, continuing to live in that repentance, continuing to live with the power of God's Spirit in us.

But there's something else. There's a warning here that Jesus gives. And remember, this can't be to the Jewish world, and it can't be to the non-Christian world. This is to His followers.

But if that servant says in his heart, my master is delaying his coming, and he gets to beat the male and female servants and to drink and eat and drink with the drunk and be drunk. Okay. What we have here is a servant that says, I've been watching, and you know what?

Christ isn't coming back for a long time.

This reads the signs. Of course, you know, my parents thought Jesus Christ was coming back in their lives. They've since died, but they lived their whole lives focusing on being prepared for His return. See, it doesn't matter if He comes back in our lifetime. What matters is that we are so focused on what He's called us to. They were living as if He's coming back real soon.

We live that way. We live preparing for that return. Now, when I look at the world today, I fully believe He's coming soon. Right? But if I die tomorrow, the message stays the same.

Watch. Be prepared. In so doing. It doesn't matter if you die tomorrow or if you die or if you die tomorrow or if He comes 10 years from now or 20 years from now.

It is the mindset, the way of living life that matters.

Being His child, the child of God, being a disciple of Jesus Christ, that's what matters. The motivation that He's coming back is to be strong. That's what is always a point here. His return was a strong motivation for all the earliest Christians. Paul believed he was coming back in his lifetime, then realized he wasn't and still stayed just as motivated because he knew when he died, that's when Christ came back for him. Right? See, that's what they understood. The moment he dies, he wakes up there. He's there. So it doesn't matter in one way. Now that doesn't mean we still should be watching. If you watch the world, you watch the news, you watch what's happening all over the world, this world could come apart and we could be in the tribulation very quickly.

That's just the truth. You can see it. But that can't be the only motivation. You know why it can't be the only motivation? Because for those people who thought Jesus Christ was coming back in 1972, back in the radio church of God, that was a falsehood. It didn't happen.

And there were people who left the truth because of that. And there were people that said, that realized, well, we don't know exactly when he's coming back. We have to keep living this way. We have to keep preparing for that. That is the preparation of life is for Christ's return.

And we should, we ought to be driven by it. Here you have people who are called by the master who don't do that. So the master's delaying, so they start to beat the male and female service. They start treating each other terribly. And to eat and drink and be drunk. In other words, they just live life now. Physical things, abuse of physical things, sexual issues, getting drunk, what they led into their mind in entertainment. All that becomes less and less important. And they are always fighting with the fellow servants. The master of the servant will come in a day when he is not looking for him. He won't be prepared for that. He won't be prepared. How can you not be prepared in the tribulation that Christ is coming back? Well, not only will it be those who have lost the concept of Christ coming back at that time period, but there'll be those who died today who aren't prepared for the blessing that is waiting for them. The master of that servant will come in a day when he's not looking for him and an hour when he's not aware and will cut him into and appoint him with his portion with his unbelievers. And the servant who knew the master's will and did not prepare himself to do it, according to his will, though she be beaten with many stripes. But he who did not know yet committed these things of stripes, or deserving of stripes, shall be beaten with few. For everyone to whom much is given, to him much will be required, and to whom much has been committed, of him that they shall seek the more or ask the more. There's a lot of, we will go through here, there's a lot of actual condemnation here, different levels of condemnation, different levels of punishment from God.

For those who say the Lord delays his coming, therefore my life is going to be centered on just physical things, including conflict and sin. So, blessed are those who watch and are not caught unawares.

Okay, the fourth of our blessings in Revelation 19.

Revelation 19, verse 6. Breaking into the middle, once again, of a thought here. John writes, And I heard, as it were, the voice of a great multitude, as the sound of many waters, and as the sound of mighty thunder, and said, saying, Alleluia, for the Lord God, omnipotent reigns, let us be glad and rejoice, and give him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his wife has made herself ready. Now, you notice how many of these things are about people who are living a certain way. They're taking certain actions, they're thinking a certain way.

The wife, the church, has made itself ready. And to her was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. We're back to how your clothing, this white clothing, represents the lifestyle, the mental condition, the spiritual condition of these people. And he said to me, right, blessed are those who are called to the married supper of the Lamb. And he said to me, these are the true sayings of God. Blessed are those who are called to that married supper. We can't forget in the daily grind, in the stresses of life, that you have been called and you are being prepared to wear these white garments to be married to Jesus Christ. Blessed are you to have this calling. Blessed! Now we want other blessings. It's okay to have physical blessings, right? We want physical health. We want to have a nice roof over our heads. We want to have a good job. We want blessings. And God allows us to ask and desire and have physical blessings. But that isn't the center point of life. Blessed are those who have prepared, who have the white garments on because they are going to be there when this happens. When all these bad things happen in the book of Revelation, they will be part of the great good things that happen starting in chapter 20, 21, 22. The great things of God. The whole focal point of creation is when Christ returns and the events that happen, the millennium and then the great white throne judgment, and then God Himself, the Father, comes to earth with New Jerusalem. That is the focal point. That's what God is concerned with. That is what He is preparing for. And the next great step in that is the preparation and deliverance of a bride to Christ. That's been going on since God's been calling people way back to the Old Testament, to preparing of a bride.

You are blessed because you have been called to be part of that bride.

And that blessing is supposed to be paramount in our minds.

That we look at that as the greatest blessing that could ever be, to be the children of God and to be prepared to serve Jesus Christ when He returns.

So in this book filled with all this terror and terrible things, He says, blessed are those who know what their lives are all about and where God is taking us. You know, when I think of this, I automatically think of the parable of the ten virgins, right? You know the parable of the ten virgins.

All of them are virgins. In other words, all of them are called to marry Christ. That's the whole point of the parable. They're all called to marry Christ. They're all prepared in a life of preparing. And yet, because they lose the vision of the return of the Christ, they review the vision of the bridegroom coming, that their purpose is to be prepared to serve Him. You haven't been called just for salvation. That's not the only calling you had. You have been called to be prepared to serve Jesus Christ when He returns. You're being prepared for that. That's a purpose. That's a meaning in life. That's not just some, you know, well, that's sort of a nice concept. No, it is your calling. There are people that will be called in the Great White Throne Judgment where their calling isn't to be prepared to serve Christ for a thousand years on earth in His setting up of God's kingdom on the earth. They will be prepared for that. Being prepared for that, the kingdom will already be here, right? They won't be prepared for that. Jesus Christ will have already reigned for a thousand years. Blessed are those who understand and have been prepared as the bride of Christ to be His servants, to serve Him in setting up God's kingdom on earth.

And in all the things that happen in Revelation, that group of people are to be reminded how blessed they are. Because the world doesn't know this. They will be in a terror in a time that is so terrible that it's hard to even imagine it, which is where Revelation takes us. And what's happening in the world collapse, the death of billions of people, world war, all those terrible, disease epidemics, all that stuff, all the terrible things. And all through here, God says, but remember, remember the blessing. The blessing is you know what's happening, and the blessing is you know why you're alive. You know your calling. You know what you're being prepared for. You're being prepared to serve Jesus Christ and changing all that.

He comes to stop it, and He comes to change it. And in that parable of the virgins, five of the virgins out of the ten lose their understanding of their calling. It's interesting, all of them go to sleep. In other words, there is a certain lack of purpose living in the world, waiting for the bridegroom to come. But when they really wake up, five of them respond to God's spirit. Five of them are now being prepared. They're ready, and five of them aren't ready.

Now, I know there's always attempts to try to figure out who the five are, who the five aren't. That's not the purpose of the parable. I mean, we're saying, oh well, that's one of those bad virgins over there. You know, that probably means you're a bad virgin. Okay, I mean, the purpose isn't to go around condemning others. It is to look at ourselves and say, have I received the blessing? Do I understand the enormity of the blessing I received?

Do I understand it? Because that's the blessing that's going to help carry people through the tribulation. That blessing of who you are. So, the next here is related a little bit to that. The next blessing is in Revelation 20.

Revelation 20. Verse 4.

So, the one blessing is what we just read was, blessed are those who are called to the married supper. It's interesting. They're called to it. The blessing is the calling. The blessing is the preparation. The blessing is knowing this while going through the trials. These blessings, by the way, studying these blessings help us in any trial we're going through. Any trial we're going through.

God says, remember this. Remember that. This is, I've given you a blessing. I've given you that blessing.

Now they actually receive the blessing. Verse 4. This is after Christ returns and the great first resurrection takes place. He says, I saw a throne that they said on them, a judgment was committed them. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the witness to Jesus and to the word of God, who had not worshiped the beast or his image, had not received his mark on their foreheads or their hands. And they lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. Now, this means all the saints throughout history. But what's interesting in the context of this book, it specifically says the people who died during the tribulation serving him. He specifically mentions them as special because during the tribulation, they continued to be loyal to God. But the rest of the dead did not live again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is he who is part of the first resurrection.

Over such the second death has no power. But they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him for a thousand years. We just read about a blessing that is concerned with understanding we're called to be the right of Christ.

This blessing is when it actually happens. That blessing will be so great we can't even imagine it. We can't imagine what it is to either be resurrected or you're alive at that time.

But you know, if you're alive at that time as a Christian, whether you're protected or not, you've had a terrible experience. You've watched the world collapse.

You've watched people die by the billions.

So it's not like, oh good, we were somehow saved. We didn't see all this stuff. It was a good time for us. You know, we were just sitting around eating steak and drinking piñucaladas during the tribulation. No, that's not what happens. So at this point, we have the blessing of the reality, the reality of being changed, of where the second death cannot hurt us at all.

And that's the blessing we can't even understand. What is it like to have a spirit body?

What is it like to never suffer, to never have depression, to never feel some of the terrible things that we experience, think about and feel? It's gone from us. We won't have that anymore. The absence of sin in us. You and I carry the burned scars of sin every day.

That's all gone. And he says he wants us to look for that blessing.

Once again, it doesn't matter whether you die before the tribulation comes or not, or you have to live through it, or you die during the tribulation. This is the focal point.

And he specifically mentions those who had to die during the tribulation.

That's part of this blessing.

Okay, chapter 22. We've got two more blessings here. Chapter 22. They're at the end of the book.

Chapter 22, verse 7. Christ says, Behold, I am coming quickly.

Blessed is he who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book.

We're back to, blessed are those who understand what this book is about. Not all the details.

But it is about Satan's last attempt to control and destroy humanity. It's about the greatest time of evil in the history of the world. It's about God's people struggling through that time.

It's about the return of Jesus Christ, the setting up of God's kingdom, the great white throne judgment. And at this point in this book, he's even explained New Jerusalem coming to earth.

He wants us to keep focusing on the solution to this problem.

The solution to the problem of the tribulation isn't how much money you have in your seller. I mean in your pocket because that would be worthless. It isn't how much food you have in your seller. It isn't how many guns you have. That's just another way to die. That's all that is.

It's not about how much physical preparation you have.

You know, I have... we always have three months extra food sitting in the house. We just do that. But you can't prepare enough food for the tribulation. You can't build a big enough wall. You can't build a big enough boat and put a bunch of alligators in it. You can't save yourself in the tribulation. God has to take care of us. And a focal point always has to be, this is a short period of time and God fixes it. He changes it.

There are blessings here. And blessing, one of the blessings is, blessed is He who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book. Blessed is He who stays focused on the hope of this book.

You know, the handout I handed out, one of the megathemes of this is hope.

Because when you're in the middle of this, unless you understand what God is doing, there'll be no hope. There'll be no hope in the tribulation, unless you know what God's doing, unless you are close to God, unless you have on those garments.

And then the last blessing is verse 12 here of chapter 22. And behold, I am coming quickly, and my reward is with me to give to everyone according to his work. He says, I'm coming to save you. Eternal salvation. 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 and may enter through the gates into the city.

Blessed are those who have been faithful to God this whole time. Oh, they had their doubts, they had their worries, they had their times, they didn't think they could make it, but they stayed close to God, received the power of God, and they made it. And that's the blessing.

I use the New King James, so it says, do His commandments.

Some of you may have a translation where it says their garments are white.

There's two really, really old manuscripts that says their garments are white, but those manuscripts have some difficulties to them. The overwhelming majority, which is like 5,000, around 5,000, manuscripts from the second and third centuries, say, talks about commandments. Okay, so it's the majority. So they both mean the same thing, by the way. They both mean the same thing. Because we've already seen numerous times where it talks about white garments. And then even keeping the commandments. So those two things are already mentioned. They're already in the book. So this has to do with white garments or keeping the commandments. Obeying God, following God, having God's will in your life. We also have a parable in the...we have a Jesus about when he comes at the married supper, and there are people who don't have white garments on. And he throws them out. He says, you don't belong here. Why? We followed you. No, you didn't. You had the wrong garments on.

That's an interesting parable. They come to the wedding thinking that they can come dirty, filthy, and not realizing that they haven't been washed in the blood of Christ.

Revelation tells us, yes, about the terrible times of the four horsemen and the tribulation and the day of the Lord. The three great themes there. And throwing the Feast of Trumpets, we always cover some of this. Because the Feast of Trumpets has to do with the day of the Lord.

But for the people of God, strangely enough, it's a book of hope. In the midst of all this, it's the book of hope. It reminds us of these blessings. And we found seven blessings.

That number seven appears over and over again in Revelation. It's an important number. I mean, that's not by accident. And there's seven blessings that He wants us to recognize as blessings. And we've already received some of those blessings in our white garments, in our calling, in the understanding of what's going to happen. And keeping the words of this book, which has been repeatedly throughout history, there's been an attempt by various movements in Christianity to remove the book. Just remove the book. And yet this book tells us that we must keep it. We must understand it. Studying Revelation does cause some trepidation and fear, doesn't it? But its purpose is to give us hope.

Its purpose is for those who are blessed to see the blessing.

Oh, every time you see the word blessed, you realize, wait a minute, that's specifically, that's not to the world, that's specifically to those who have been called by God, who are anticipating the return of Jesus Christ, looking forward to the return of Jesus Christ. You're blessed because God is preparing you, which is the greatest blessing of all. He's called you out of this world. You've been given His Spirit, the Spirit of God, and you've been called to be prepared to be a blessing, be a blessing from God when Christ returns to be changed and serve Jesus Christ in setting up God's kingdom on this earth.