Pastor Tom Johnson, April 17, 2016
God gives John a peek into the Kingdom. That is what revelation means. God reveals spiritual reality. He peals back the veil of this earthy existence to show John the spiritual realm that is, was, and is to come. Our reading from Revelation chapter 7, along with the entire letter, will make little sense if it is approached as merely telling the future. It is descriptive of what is, what was, and what is to come just as the resurrected Christ is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and end, the One who is, who was, and is to come.
John sees a great multitude that no one can count—a company of people so numerous that no census could ever be taken. They are multi-ethnic, an international coalition, multilingual, every hue of color, and truly global. John sees the holy catholic and apostolic Church—what we will soon confess in the Creed. This is the universal body of believers. This is the baptized—dressed in pure and clean robes—washed in the blood of the Lamb. They have just come out of the great ordeal. This is the tribulation of those who are, who were, and will be. This is a snapshot of the church triumphant from dawn of creation until the dawn of the new creation—from Adam and Eve until the coming of Christ to judge the living and the dead. For those who are, this ordeal is the persecution of Christians under Rome—most likely the emperor Nero who did unspeakable things to the followers of Jesus 2000 years ago. This is why John gives Rome the code-name Babylon.
This points to back to those who were, the ordeal they suffered in captivity in historic Babylon. And before that, it was the 400 year tribulation the Israelites suffered in Egypt. Time and time again, God brought his people through pain, suffering, slavery, and bondage. For those who will be, the ordeal will be generations of Christians struggling to live out their faith in a hostile world. After, Constantine, the ordeal will be a Church battling false teaching and nominal Christianity. It will be a church fractured between east and west. It will be a struggle to preserve the doctrines of grace, which is God’s love clearly and beautifully revealed to us through his Son, Jesus Christ—salvation freely given and received by faith alone. The great ordeal is for all human history. And our struggle is not merely against flesh and blood but against the powers and principalities of this present darkness (Eph 6). As Jesus said, “In the world, you will face persecution.”
What is your great ordeal today? What is the tribulation that threatens to rob you of your joy? What is your struggle against? Is it battling your body, your spirit, or your soul? Often times, the great ordeal in our lives threatens us spiritually as much as it does physically. The sad truth is that all human history has been a great ordeal—from the eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil until the serpent of old is thrown into the lake of fire along with sin and the power of death. God gives John a vision and revelation of the way things are, have been, and will be. It is not looking at life through rose-colored glasses so that everything looks rosy. The great ordeal is what it is.
But God invites us to look at our great ordeal through the lens of the resurrected Christ! On this side of eternity, we will always wrestle with the power of sin, death, and palpable evil. “In the world you will face persecution. But take courage;” Jesus says, “I have conquered the world!” (John 16:33). Our Scripture invites us to look at the vast number of God’s people from all human history—from the beginning to the end of time—and all the time in between. We are the church triumphant! We stand in the triumph of the resurrection! Just as we say every week before we receive Communion—“therefore with angels, and archangels, and all the company of heaven, we laud and glorify your glorious name”—the strong name of Christ who died and rose again from the dead. Our robes have been laundered to perfection. We are clean, pure, and holy in God’s sight. Our sins have been washed away—not with detergent and launders soap—but with the precious blood of the Lamb.
The Lamb has met us in our great ordeal. He joined us in our ordeal. He took the great ordeal upon himself—the ordeal that threatened and plagued all humanity in every age. His ordeal culminated at the tribulation of the Cross of Calvary. There he struggled against and battled our sin, death, and the power of hell itself. The Lamb of God lay his life down for the world. And three days later, the Lamb rose triumphantly as the Shepherd who has conquered death and all that threatens us. This is the Lamb who has become our Shepherd. He became Victim to become our Victor. He shed his blood on the Cross so that he could wash away the sins of the world. He leads us safely through dark valleys and great ordeals. He causes us to stand in the company of the triumphant to celebrate his victory. “Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies. Thou anointest my head with oil. My cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life. And I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.”
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