Chapter 7 Verse 9

• I love this scene because we speak of peace in the middle-east, peace between the Jew and the Arab, peace between the Democrats and the Republicans, peace in our own homes…and how interesting, we fund peace with weaponry.
• What’s that?  Listen to this, the Stockholm International Peace Institute measured the aggregate spend of the peace sought by the United States’ and guess how they measured it, they counted Nuclear Weapons!  15 years ago the amount of money spent by the United States on Nuclear Weapons, and mind you this was 15 years ago, was $5.8 Trillion dollars per year.  That’s $96 million dollars a day!
• You see we as a world, as a nation, even as an employee, a home-owner’s association member…a spouse, we preach peace yet we pursue advantage.  We scratch for the upper hand man, even leaders of religious organizations…making moves for control, why?  Because of fear, and in most cases, well founded fear.  The Jews can’t trust the Arabs!  The democrats can’t trust the republicans!  The United States can’t trust Iran…and so the uranium enrichment plants pump, man!
• And so we peach peace and press the production button on weaponry in its name!  Even the Nobel Peace Prize, do you know where that comes from?  Alfred Nobel was a brilliant chemical engineer in the 1800s.  His inventions included dynamite and ballistite, both of which were used in his lifetime to kill thousands!  He himself became an armaments manufacturer! 
• Isn’t that amazing?  Doesn’t it seem that the foundation by which this world defines peace is offense, advantage and war?  Do you know who won this peace prize in 2009?  Barack Obama…for “his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”  He accepted the peace award with one hand and signed a $680B Department of Defense budget with the other so that support of the numerous conflicts, wars, intelligence and weaponry projects would continue so that we might have more what?  Peace!  HA
• I’m not saying that this is backwards, this investing in defense and military might in order to ensure peace…I know we must do that…I’m saying that this world is backwards!  This world is fallen, man.  A great multitude here on earth, which no one can number, but we can estimate…of all nations, of all tribes, of all people, and of all tongues…with guns pointed towards one another…talking about “we are the world!”  But that’s not the scene in eternity.  Great hope and real peace await you believer…
• John sees a vast number, more than he’s willing to estimate, all standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes…comfortable, clean, united and in their hands, not plans, not defense budgets, not glocks and trigger switches…the elements of worldly peace…but palm branches!
• Palm branches man!  Just like the palm branches that the people laid before Jesus as He rode into Jerusalem!  As Jesus arrived, the lowly King, the Savior, the people waved palm branches and cried out “Save now!”  “Hosanna!”  “Save now!”  And man we are in the habit, in our busted and fallen sinful state as a world, as a nation, as a family, a spouse, a mom, a dad, a sister, a brother…even a church…we have a tendency, a fleshly urge (and unchecked an absolute habit), to desire peace yet produce projectiles!
• We scheme and scratch for power all the while thinking that it will ensure peace of some sort when all it does is produce dynamite and eventually causes all sorts of blow-ups…explosions.  Our deepest need if we truly desire peace is to welcome the Savior into the city, man.  Singing Hosanna in the highest and trading our sorrows, fears and aggressions for palm branches.  Offering your wife the place of priority…continually.  Refusing this man over man lordship authority that is set up today in so many churches…Jesus said if you want to lead then become the servant of all…Humbling yourself and serving your neighbor…all in the name and pursuit of Jesus…and then, white robes…unity.  Just like what John sees here…in heaven.
• Man, test me in this and watch your war-ships in your marriages, in your neighborhoods, in your churches and lives…watch your war-ships turn into worship…just like what John sees here.

Chapter 7 Verses 8 – 12

• Look at their song.  Blessing, glory, wisdom, thanksgiving, honor, power and might…be to me for now and forever!  What a horrid song!  No!  Look all of those things are to God man!  But we think we should be blessed, we fight for our own glory, we believe that we know what’s best…that we’re the ones that are wise…and man we’re so off. 
• Well not me Matt…oh really?  Survey your life man!  Who’s blessings permeate your prayer life?  Probably your own!  “God will you please bless this or that or me…” when our prayer should be “God may you be blessed by my life.  By my trust in You….”  We so often worry more of our own reputation don’t we than we do honoring God…don’t we!?  And then wisdom…just look at how we make our decisions.  What is the composition of your day?  How is your time spent?  Do your children know more about Squidward and Sandy the Squirrel than they know about Jesus and the Bible…are their table manners superior to their love of Jesus?  Are your decisions predicated in prayer and does your life align with the Word of God?  Yet we confess with our mouths that God alone is wise?  We’re fooled man…our lives so often and so constantly reflect our dependence upon our own understanding…
• You see all of these things sung by this crowd in heaven, man, belong to God alone…and please if you hear this and accept this and embrace this then you too will worship.  You too will stand before His throne even in the presence of the Lamb and look, you’ll make the right decisions…maybe not the easy ones, maybe not even the logical ones, but the right ones which will lead you to still waters of a life.  Your children will rise up in the morning and call you blessed mom (as it says in Proverbs 31) and when they grow they will too make the right decisions, because they will follow you!  And peace will proliferate…

Chapter 7 Verses 13 – 15

• Most commentators agree that this great multitude that John sees here are indeed the Tribulation Saints.  The ones that have come to faith after the rapture of the church and therefore this crowd is not the church but an entirely different group of people.  And I find that to be acceptable because there are certain subtle differences in the description of this group and the descriptions we find elsewhere of the church.
• For example, these stand before the throne of God while Jesus says of the church in Revelation 3:21 that we will sit with Him upon His throne.  These serve the Lord day and night in His temple while we see the church, the bride of Christ, being served by the Lord.  Luke writes in Luke Chapter 12 verse 37, “blessed are those servants whom the Master, when He comes, will find watching.  Assuredly, I say to you that He will gird Himself and have them sit down to eat, and will come and serve them.”
• And so I find the teaching that these are exclusively Tribulation Saints entirely acceptable however I can also accept that this may indeed be the church.  Why?  Because of what is to come next in the description of their comfort…and I’ll get to that in a moment but also because of the Greek phrase “erchomai ek.”  Or in the English there in verse 14, “come out of.”
• You see that Greek phrase doesn’t necessarily mean that this group has come out from within…but it could also be translated, “arise and appear away from.”  Therefore it could be read there in verse 14 that these are the ones who arose away from the Great Tribulation…and while I do see differences as I’ve noted already between this group and the church, I also see great similarities. 
• One thing before we move on to verse 16.  Notice there in verse 14…the angel doesn’t say these are the many, this is the crowd, here is the multitude…he says, these are the ones.  That’s striking to me…why?  Because that singles them out, one by one.  That shows their particular importance to God…one by one.  And then it occurs to me…why are we so wrapped up as a church, universally, not this church specifically, in numbers…?  The individual, you specifically, are preciously important to God.
• He has numbered the very hairs on your heads, He has counted your tears and stored them, Psalm 56 says.  Psalm 56 also says that He knows your troubles and your wanderings…He is so personally and intensely involved in my life just as He is yours and then the light bulb.  If that’s the case, and He’s good, and He loves me incessantly…enough to give His own life, His own Son, enough to rescue me individually, then I can trust Him.  Even if I don’t understand.  Even if tonight is sleepless.  Even if the bank account goes negative.  Even if I am pressed on all sides, even if I don’t understand…I can trust Him…because He calls me the one.
• And in wholly trusting Him, the following awaits…

Chapter 7 Verses 16 – 17

• When He appears, in the clouds, in His Word, in my prayer time, in my mornings, in my nights, in my marriage, in my family, in my church…when Jesus appears, life appears with Him.  Living fountains of waters…tears wiped dry…pangs of need, filled, pains of trouble, soothed.  What are you waiting for?  The road ahead in this life will be dark…but He’ll shepherd you.  And ultimately you will stand before His throne, clothed and comforted for eternity, complete and whole for ever…so what are you waiting for?  You’re the one.