The last few of studies on Revelation 4 and 5 were on "Worship and Praise' in heaven. Yesterday, out thoughts were focused on planet earth. We turned our attention to the 'opening of the seals and judgement.' I gave an overview of John's vision of God's wrath and judgement against sin, chapters 6-16. From next week onwards we shall go into more detail study of the opening of the seals. I am pleased our studies have generated a deal of interest among our people.
Whether we see the calamities as events of the past or future depending on the view one takes - the historicist, preterist, futurist or spiritual, much of it is certainly contemporary in application.
Frightening indeed, the judgements as recorded in Revelation, but none is inconsistent with the suffering love as seen at the cross on Calvary. Albert Schweitzer described Jesus as 'laying hold of the wheel of he world to set moving on that last revolution which is to bring all history to a close." Jesus did it at tremendous cost of personal agony, pain and suffering.
It appears that Revelation falls far below the standards set in the gospels or the teachings of Jesus or even much of the Old Testament. The God of the Apocalypse seems to contradict the picture expressed by Jesus. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil because God was with Him.
Really, in my own study of Revelation I find nothing in Revelation inconsistent with the teachings of Jesus. Jesus spoke about hell with great intensity of feeling. In the gospels as well as in Revelation we see God does not approve of war and famines and plagues. These are but the consequences of men's persistence to go against God. We live in a moral world - the inevitable outcome of selfishness is disaster and doom. The wages of sin is death. Herbert Butterfield said this, "The character of divine judgment in history is that men are made to execute it upon themselves."
In his book, THE GREAT DIVORCE C S Lewis said, "There are only two kinds of people in the end; those who say to God 'Thy will be done' and those to whom God says in the end 'Thy will be done.'" Revelation certainly supports this thought.
The last Sunday of the month is always Family Sunday when the children and youth all join in worship at the main hall. The message was "From generation to generation' based on Psalm 78. We were reminded of our responsibility to the next generation. We are to pass on our faith and the lessons we have learned in life to the next generation.
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