In the sermon titled 'The Living and the Dead Will Stand Before God,' Scott Brown explores the themes of judgment, authority, and eschatology as depicted in Revelation 11:14-19. The sermon begins with the sounding of the seventh trumpet, which marks the final woe and the declaration that the kingdoms of the world have become the kingdoms of Christ. This prompts the 24 elders to worship God, acknowledging His eternal reign. The sermon emphasizes the importance of being ready to meet the Lord, as all will be judged, both the living and the dead. Brown outlines five key scenes: the coming of the final woe, the announcement of Christ's rule, the delight of the church's representatives, the judgment of the living and the dead, and the opening of the heavenly temple revealing the Ark of the Covenant. The sermon stresses that true belief involves delighting in God's authority and turning away from sin, contrasting it with the devil's belief that lacks salvation. Brown also highlights the importance of understanding God's timing and the inevitability of judgment, where the righteous will be rewarded, and the wicked will face destruction. The Ark of the Covenant symbolizes God's presence and the atonement for sin, offering hope for those covered by Christ's blood. The sermon concludes by urging listeners to examine their readiness to meet God and the sincerity of their faith.

Please open your Bibles to the inerrant, all-sufficient, holy, perfect, sweeter than honey, word of God. Revelation 11 verse 14, I'm going to read from 14 to 19 here. The second woe is past, behold the third woe is coming quickly. Then the seventh angel sounded, and there were loud voices in heaven saying, the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ and he shall reign forever and ever and the 24 elders who sat before God on their thrones fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying, We give you thanks, O Lord God Almighty, the one who is and who was and who is to come, because you have taken your great power and reigned. The nations were angry and your wrath has come and the time of the dead that they should be judged and that you should reward your servants the prophets and the saints and those who fear your name, small and great, and should destroy those who destroy the earth.

Then the temple of God was opened in heaven and the ark of his covenant was seen in his temple. And there were lightnings, noises, thunderings, and earthquake and great hail. Would you pray with me? Lord, in these words you've shown us many pictures of your authority, of your power, your reigning, and we're so thankful that it's you that reigns. And now we have an opportunity to just consider them by meditation and by preaching, that you might help us to understand your will and what these words mean for us.

In Jesus name, amen. Please be seated. The seventh trumpet here is finally sounded after an interlude and really the question of these verses is a very simple one. Are you ready to meet the Lord? When you die will you be ready?

Now are you ready at the moment? These verses tell us what is going to happen to this world. These verses tell us what will happen to every single person who has been born into the world and Christ will return and he will gather up the living and the dead he will rule and they will be judged and this is a is a critical doctrine of the Bible. One of the marvelous things that we've experienced in the book of Revelation is lots of doctrinal preaching because various doctrines of the Bible are stated in graphic, visual, pictorial, theological form. And so today we're being exposed to what I'm going to declare as the most important and the clearest element of biblical ecclesiastical eschatology.

Now, you have in your hand, we passed it out to your seat, a statement of this church on eschatology and the statement comes from the 1689 Baptist confession from chapter 32 on the last judgment and you may be wondering or maybe you haven't been wondering at all over these weeks what my official unalterable position on eschatology is and of this church as well. And you'll notice that this position on eschatology leaves room for discussion about various eschatological positions in the book of Revelation. But the confession addresses the clearest matter of eschatology in the Bible. So we've landed right here and what we've seen in Revelation so far is that his return will not happen until there's tremendous tumult in the world. The war against Jesus Christ, the hatred, the loathing of the church of Jesus Christ has been profiled over and over again and we're not done with it it actually only escalates as we move into chapter 12 and the second half of the book of Revelation, where the false prophet and the beast and the harlot are all escalating this war.

Now, this war does continue to escalate in the world. I think we all understand that. And, you know, one of the reasons the world is continuing to disintegrate into deeper and deeper levels of deception, deeper and deeper depths of depths of sin is because the world has lost a sense of the time and the timing of God that God is going to judge the world in righteousness. And this passage of scripture is about time and timing. I woke up this morning to Psalm 75, verse two, these words.

When I choose the proper time, I will judge uprightly the earth and all its inhabitants are dissolved. Welcome to a new day. Very consistent with the passage that I was getting ready to preach on here this morning. And there is a day coming. That day is announced here in these verses.

And what you find on this day is all the efforts of the devil in people's lives, in your life, in my life, will receive a final blow. The relativistic world, the pornographic world, the world of Hollywood amusing people to death in a world where there's no God, the world of evil people in the world, the world where people hate God and his law, the world dominated by the secular states and their tyranny, the indifferent world toward God, people who shrug their shoulders at God, they will receive their final blow. And that's what's announced here. It's what's such a remarkable picture. Well do you believe this?

Good. Even the devil believes it. Don't think that you're believing this has anything to do with your salvation. The devil believes this already. There's a kind of belief that's not true saving belief.

The devil has great emotions about this day too. He's moved to think about it. Maybe you are too. Don't think that that's that you can secure your salvation. But this is a very riveting section.

You know again we've we've observed over and over this pictorial theology that is described in the in the book of Revelation. And here you've got angels and trumpet blasts and kingdoms in submission and elders on their faces and giving thanks and you got angry nations. You have dead, you have the living, you have a temple, you have the great, the small, those who are destroying the earth, you have an ark, you have lightning and thunder and an earthquake and noises, loud noises in heaven. That's what you get in this passage. You might think God is trying to get your attention.

There are five scenes that I want to speak about here in these verses. You have an outline in front of you that show you these five scenes, and I've not hidden behind the curtain what I want us to think about each one of these scenes. And in the outline you have a question that is assigned to each scene. The first scene is the woe is coming. Do you see it?

Secondly, the rule of Christ is announced. Do you love his authority? The third scene, the representatives of the church are delighted. Do you delight in him? Fourth, the living and the dead are judged.

Will you receive reward or destruction? And then finally, the temple is opened and the ark of his covenant is seen. Are you ready to stand before the ark of the covenant? So there you have it. Let's take these one by one.

Are you ready to meet the Lord? I think is the most important question that can be asked about these verses here. And you find this woe that is coming. The final judgment is announced. The second woe is passed, behold the third woe is coming quickly.

This is a marker in the context of Revelation and we have found ourselves here with this verse at the end of the very first major section in Revelation. Revelation 1 through 11. In Chapter 1 we had the introduction and how to interpret the book. In Chapters 2 and 3 the letters to the seven churches and then the visions of heaven in chapters four and five, and then the seven seal judgments ending in the second coming, and then the seven trumpet judgments now ending again in the second coming of Jesus Christ. And we've been in this interlude for a couple of weeks, and now the interlude is over, and the seventh trumpet sounds.

And the plagues of the last three Trumpets are characterized by three woes. This is the third woe. And note that the, if you go back and look at the seventh seal, there was really no content. It was really the introduction to the trumpets. And now it's the very same here with the final trumpet.

It really has no content. It introduces the coming woes that are ahead. And I believe those are the woes of the pouring out of the bold judgments that come in the second half of the book of Revelation. So these words here are directed to things that are happening in heaven. People caught up before God and other things happening while people are being caught up before God you The scene in Matthew 25 is just expanded here You see more of what Jesus spoke of one of the commentators says the seventh trumpet announces what will be happening in heaven.

I think that's a great summary. Well, that's the third woe. And then the second scene is found in verse 15. If you look at Verse 15, the rule of Jesus Christ is announced. You know, children always want to say, you're not the boss of me.

But the question is, do you want to be ruled by Jesus Christ? And so the seventh trumpet sounds and the rule of Jesus Christ is announced notice the loud voices Then the seventh trumpet sounded and there were loud voices in heaven Just hang on that for a minute loud voices in heaven and saying the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ and he shall reign forever and ever. So you have this scene in the final judgment where there will be loud voices in heaven and What what are these voices saying well, they're they're actually are voices of delight They are delighted They're delighted that the kingdoms of this world had become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever. They're so delighted that he will reign. They're so delighted that the kingdoms of this world are being thrown down.

And the reason is because there's no kingdom so sweet and so true and so good as the kingdom of Jesus Christ. All the other kingdoms thankfully will be shattered. But it's the kingdom of Jesus that deserves the loud voices and I think these are... Who are the voices? Well, I'll tell you who I think they are.

I think that they are the beings before the throne that we've been reading about all along. Some are remarkable created beings. They're angels and they're believers and they're before the throne. And they are before the throne of the only true ruler of the universe. The New Testament calls him a potentate.

And this is an announcement that the devil's domain has been plundered forever. God has neutralized completely the demonic powers and principalities that we see in the world. The secular state is nullified. The secular states have been given rope, But they've always been limited. They've always been on a chain of God's sovereignly appointed length.

And they can only go so far. And this has been spoken of over and over again in the Bible. Isaiah and Isaiah 40 spoke of it this way, he brings the princes to nothing. He makes the judges of the earth useless. Scarcely shall they be planted, scarcely shall they be sown, scarcely shall their stock take root in the earth, when he will also blow on them and they will wither and the furrow wind will take them away like stubble.

All it takes for God to unravel the secular state is to blow on it. And scarcely will they be seen again. Psalm two speaks of this, of the the raging's of the nations. He who sits in heaven laughs. Don't you love that?

Well that's what we should be doing too. When the secular state raises, you know, flexes its muscles. You know, just do what God is doing in heaven. Laugh. Well God has highly exalted him And as Paul said to the Philippian church in chapter two, verse nine, and God has given him the name, which is above every name that at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess and he speaks that these all those who are on the earth those who are under the earth every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ his Lord to the glory of God that's the scene here And this is just a picture of his kingdom.

Now, in this verse, you have two kingdoms. You have the kingdoms of this world, and you have the kingdoms of our Lord Jesus Christ. And in this verse, we find that the kingdoms of the world are consumed and belittled and thrown down by the king of kings. And they have not wanted God's rule, but they will get God's rule. If a person thinks that they can rebel against God's rule, they just need to understand that it won't last forever.

There will be a time where they will bow to his rule. And if you're saying, today, I still want to rule myself, I still want to experience my pleasures my way. If you're still saying that, if you still think that you'll be happier if you do your own thing, if you still think that your ways are pleasant ways, just be put on notice. That won't last because he's coming. You remember the parable of the vineyard where the tenants of the vineyard said, we don't want him to reign over us.

That's the question. Do you want him to reign over you? That will tell you quite a bit about who you really are and your status before God. Who do you want to rule over you? And what happens to a Christian is that he comes to a place where he says, my self rule was really stupid and it did me a lot of harm and I want Jesus Christ to rule my life.

And so that's the question here. Do you love his authority? Do you want his authority in your life? Because there will be a day when you will relinquish all of your authority to him. So then in the next scene, the third scene, the 24 elders, and my understanding of this is that the 24 elders are the representatives of the church.

And what do you find in these 24 elders? They're delighted. That's what you find in them, verse 16 and 17. And so we're being told again of what is happening with these beings in heaven. They are abundantly satisfied.

They are happier than happy. And in verses 16 and 17, they're giving thanks. And they're thankful that Babylon has fallen and they're thankful that King Jesus kingdom has been established forever and but here but here you know God is ending the rebellion he's he is overthrowing the opposition. That's what they're happy about. Man's antagonism toward God's authority has ended and those who are in heaven are delighted with that.

God is interrupting the sorrows of humanity. God is putting an end to licentiousness. God is putting an end to abuse. God is putting to end of every manner of injustice in the world. And they are so happy.

What a blessing it is. And they're on their faces. And they're worshiping God. And they're giving thanks. They say, we give you thanks, oh Lord God Almighty.

There's a whole sermon in that phrase, oh Lord God Almighty. And they're stating a truth about God's nature. He is the one who is, who was, and who is to come. And we've we've already heard this before. This is what they're saying.

They are the beings in heaven are so delighted. And you know what they're saying? That Jesus Christ has been taking care of you before you were born, after you were born, and after you die, who was, who is, and is to come. They're so thankful for this one who has everything in his hands. He's carrying his people all through this wilderness wasteland into the promised land.

And they're so thankful. He was, he is, and he is to come. And he's made his name, his reign known. So are you ready to meet the Lord? Is this the condition of your heart?

Delighted. Are you delighted with God? Jonathan Edwards preached a sermon in the 1700s, and he was talking about, how do you know if you're really saved? And he pointed out that mere belief in Jesus is not saving necessarily. But he ended up saying, you know if you're saved, if you delight in him, if you love his ways, if you want to follow him with all of your heart, if more and more you hate your sin, more and more you're falling out of love with the world and its things.

That's how you know if you're saved. It isn't your technical belief, it's not your doctrinal statement. Even the devil has a perfect doctrinal statement. He just hates it. So are you ready to meet the Lord?

And the fourth scene, we find judgment falling on humanity. Verse 18, the living and the dead are judged. And the big question here is, when you meet that moment, and you will meet that moment, in the same way that you were born into this world, you will also die, and you will meet this moment. No one can escape this moment. And will you receive a reward or will you be destroyed?

That's the question. Are you ready to meet the Lord? So the elders, again, these 24 elders are reporting here and they're reporting on what has been happening in the earth. And they say, the nations were angry and your wrath has come. Oh, well, they were angry.

They had wrath, but now God's wrath has come. For the time, now this is a matter of time, the time of the dead that they should be judged. There's a time appointed for every man wants to die and then comes the judgment that's what the Apostle Paul told the Corinthian Church and at that time you God should give reward to your servants the prophets and the Saints and those who fear your name small and great and should destroy those who destroy the earth. So the nations are angry here, and God has a plan for the angry nations. God has a plan for the secular state.

You know we've seen the secular states all over the world do unimaginable things. Don't worry about it. Don't worry about it. They're angry, but their anger can't hold a candle to God's. So just rest in that.

Don't worry about it. God is ruling all these nations. Hey, God is not waiting for man to do anything. God is acting. He's taking up the times and the seasons by his own authority.

It's not for you to know times and seasons in which the Father is fixed by his own authority, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and the uttermost parts of the earth. That's our job. We know what to do. We're not confused.

Jonathan Edwards spoke of God's wrath like this. The wrath of God is like great waters that are dammed for the present. In other words, they're like dammed up. The waters are pent up, they're holding back, and that dam is going to break at his own time. The Bible says that the wicked are storing up wrath.

It's like a dam that is getting ready to burst. They increase more and more and rise higher and higher till an outlet is given. And the longer the stream is stopped, the more rapid and mighty is its course when it once sets loose. But then Edwards says something very interesting Because he's talking about the wrath of God and being cast into everlasting darkness. And this dam that's going to break upon every person in the world.

It's like a tsunami that no one can get away from. You've seen pictures of tsunamis. I mean, when they come ashore, no one can get away. They are so vanquishing, so terrifying. Go look at the tsunami from the ocean in Indonesia and in Japan.

This is what the judgment is. It happens without warning. But Edward says, almost every natural man that hears of hell flatters himself that he shall escape it. Well you who've been on the street with us and saying you know that everyone flatters themselves. Everyone is a good person.

Everyone is good enough. Everyone believes that Jesus is the Son of God, just like the devil. So this is a warning. It's a warning about where you place your trust in your salvation. But look at the kinds of people that are judged.

Well, it's all kinds of people. Prophets, saints, servants, those who fear your name, the small, the great, everybody. This is God's justice. There's no partiality in God's justice. There's nothing that you've ever done.

There's nothing that you've ever been that will save you from the wrath to come. God's justice is perfect justice. We need justice in the world today, but not this fake justice that the social justice movement is feeding us. That's not justice at all. It's bondage.

But this is God's justice. You know, why? Because the nations were angry. And the nations rage. You know, in Psalm two, the nations are conspiring together.

How about that? There's your conspiracy theory right there. Psalm 2 says the nations are conspiring together. You know how is it, how do you think it is really that the whole world is doing the same thing about COVID-19, vaccinations, Business? Why?

Why do you think that's happening? How in the world did that happen? The nations are raging. And they're conspiring. The nations conspire.

Now I don't know how this conspiracy works. You know, is it a formal conspiracy or are they just following each other because they want to be cool? I think it's probably that. I think everybody just wants to be so cool and so accepted. So they just do what the others do.

That's their salvation, by the way. Salvation by coolness. Thank you. But I mean you have whole organizations, you know, the World Health Organization, the United Nations, the World Economic Forum. You know I was talking to one of the brothers the other day, we're gonna set up the Hope Economic Forum.

That's what we're gonna do. There's actual hope there. But with all the disturbing news from the governments of the world, what are we supposed to say? God's rage is greater than the rage of the nations. You know, I read a Psalm this week, Psalm 67, 3 through 7.

It's about the nations. It's about God and his relationship with the nations and what the people of God should do. Well, I'll just read the section that really grabbed me. Let the peoples praise you, oh God. Let all the peoples praise you.

Oh, let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you shall judge the people righteously and govern the nations on earth. Let the peoples praise you, O God. So, Praise God for what he's doing in the nations. It's a lot easier to complain about it than to praise God for it. You know, I've spent a lot of time complaining about what the nations are doing.

I want to spend a little bit more time praising God for what he's doing and do the things that we're just supposed to do. You know, I'm getting ready to do a conference next week, actually, we're calling it Build Dwell Plant. That comes from Jeremiah 29, 5, where the children of Israel are held captive in Babylon for 70 years. The false prophets are saying, oh, this is going to end. It's not going to be a big deal.

Jeremiah says, it is not going to end for 70 years. You're going to be here for three generations. What are you supposed to do? Build houses, dwell in the land, plant gardens, go find husbands for your daughters, go find wives for your sons, and pray and seek the peace of the city. In other words, go into construction, you know, buy power tools, you know, build houses, you know, do have babies, have a family, you know, Crank it up.

Don't get scared. Don't, you don't need to head for the hills. Just do the stuff. Just do the normal things. You know, you men who have jobs out there, just keep, just do a good job.

Just serve God in your job. That's what you should do while you're in captivity. So that's what this whole conference is about. I can't wait to go. Deborah and I are going at the end of this week.

But then the dead are judged and the time of the dead that they should be judged. There's God's timing again. The dead will be judged. You know there have been many of the judgments of God in Revelation that are on the earth. God is judging the earth through various natural calamities and political calamities and things like that, but now the dead are judged.

And this is the final judgment. Now you have in your hand our church's position on eschatology, and there are three paragraphs in chapter 32 of the Baptist Confession of 1689, And it's about the last judgment. I'm just gonna read some of these things that are written here. God has appointed a day, that's the time. God has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by Jesus Christ to whom all power and judgment is given by the Father.

In that day apostate angels will be judged so all people who have lived on the earth will appear before the judgment seat of Christ to give an account of their thoughts words and deeds and to receive a reckoning according to what they have done in the body whether good or evil. Now what's this all about? I mean, it's about lots of things. One of the things that is really important to recognize is what happens to your body when you die. You know, I want all, I want all, particularly the children in our church, to understand why God gave them a body.

Well, the body that you have is going to be resurrected. God is gonna reassemble your dead body if you die. He's gonna reassemble it whether you were drowned in the ocean and the fish ate you, or whether you were burned in a fire, or whether you were laid in a grave, your body is gonna be reassembled. And your body, not somebody else's body, the body that God gave you, somehow is gonna appear before God. That's what's gonna happen to your body a God when you die You're not done with your body You might think oh, I don't really like my body well, God liked it enough to give it to you, and he's gonna keep it going for all eternity.

And you're gonna like it probably a lot better then. But the Lord Jesus gives lots of details about what's happening here. In Matthew chapter 25, verse 31, when the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the holy angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. All the nations will be gathered before him and he will separate them one from another as a shepherd divides his sheep from goats and he will set the sheep on his right hand but the goats on his left then the king will say to those on his right hand, come you blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food.

I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and you took me in. I was naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you visited me. I was in prison and you came to me." That's code four.

You loved God's people and you took care of them. Then the righteous will answer him saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you or thirsty and give you drink and when did we see you a stranger and take you in or naked and clothe you Or when did we see you sick or in prison and come to you?' And the king will answer and say to them, Assuredly I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.' Then he will also say to those on the left hand, depart from me, you cursed into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food. I was thirsty and you gave me no drink. I was a stranger and you did not invite me in.

Naked and you did not clothe me. Sick and in prison and you did not visit me. Then they also will answer him saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not minister to you? Then he will answer them saying, assuredly I say to you, in as much as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me. And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life." In Acts chapter 17, 31, we're told again that God has appointed this day.

This day is coming. Are you ready? In Acts 17, we're told, "'Truly these times of ignorance God overlooked, "'but now he commands all men everywhere to repent, "'because he has appointed a day "'on which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he has ordained. That man is Jesus Christ, we just read about him. He has given assurance of this to all by raising him from the dead.

The resurrection of the Son of God from the grave is given as a sign that you would believe that he is coming to judge the world in righteousness. In Ecclesiastes 12 verse 14 we learn more about what is going to be judged. Jesus spoke of it. But in Ecclesiastes 12 Solomon tells us, for God will bring every work into judgment, including every secret thing, whether good or evil. Everything done in secret will be judged.

Everything good will be judged. Everything evil will be judged. And, And what will happen to the devil? But not just the devil, maybe you can't relate to the devil, but The Bible relates unbelievers to the devil and treats them the same way. You might flatter yourself if you're an unbeliever that you're not so bad, but the Bible actually makes you like the devil in judgment.

He treats you like he treats the devil in judgment in many ways. And there's this term called everlasting chains in Jude five and six. He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them in similar manner to these having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh and are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. The second paragraph in our confession reads like this. God's purpose for appointing this day is to manifest the glory of his mercy in the eternal salvation of the elect.

Got that? There are two purposes. To glorify his mercy in saving sinners and his justice in the eternal damnation of the reprobate who are wicked and disobedient For at that time the righteous will go into everlasting life and will receive fullness of glory and glory with everlasting rewards in the presence of the Lord. But the wicked who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of Jesus Christ will be thrown into everlasting torments and punished with everlasting destruction away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power. Our confession says that God glorifies himself in two ways.

First of all, he has mercy on sinners. He'll forgive all your sins if you turn to him and follow him with all of your heart. But he will also glorify himself in the damnation of the wicked. God glorifies himself in both ways. God will put to death everything that is harmful And that glorifies God to put away everything that hinders.

In Romans 9 22, we learned that God actually displays his mercy in judgment. Judgment is actually mercy in the Bible. Romans 922, what if God, wanting to show his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much long suffering the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction and that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy Which he has prepared beforehand for glory even us whom he called not of the Jews only but also the Gentiles as He says in Hosea. I will call them my people who were not a people, and her beloved who was not beloved. And it shall come to pass in the place where it is said of them, you are not my people, yet there they shall be called the sons of God.

So God glorifies himself by saving sinners. You say, you might say, When the Lord saved me, I was the most despicable sinner. God has glorified himself by taking you in and bringing you into his family. That's what he does with your past sins. He glorifies himself in your past sins.

You know, I think we all regret past sins. We should regret our past sins, but let's don't forget. Here's what the Bible teaches. God permitted you to sin that way so that he would glorify his mercy. So you shouldn't just think one way about your sin.

You should also think about how God glorified his mercy in your sin that he permitted in time past. Think of the mercy that's fallen upon you. The Bible says he let the nations go for a time. He let us go for a time and then he stopped us in our tracks. And we looked at our sin completely different.

And he was glorifying himself in his mercy. Isn't that wonderful? In Mark chapter 9 verse 47, Jesus tells us that even so we ought to take extreme measures to turn from our sins. Mark 9 47, and if your eye causes you to sin pluck it out for it's better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye rather than having two eyes and be cast into hellfire where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched That speaks of the seriousness of sin, to turn away from every form of sin. The third paragraph in the confession reads like this, Christ desires that we be firmly convinced that a day of judgment will come both to deter everyone from sin and to comfort the godly more fully of their adversity in their adversity for this reason he has determined to keep the day secret.

No one knows the time. To encourage people to shake off any fleshly security and always to be watchful because they do not know the hour when the Lord will come. And so that they may always be prepared to say come Lord Jesus come quickly amen so this is the purpose of the judgment in one way is to is to help us to say every day come Lord Jesus to be always aware of his holiness, his purity, his goodness, his laws, everything about him, that his coming would remind us of the day that we're experiencing in the moment. So the confession just says that Christ desires us to be firmly convinced of the day of judgment to deter us from sin. It's a very important doctrine as you can see, But Christ does desire that we be firmly convinced that the day of judgment will come.

In 2nd Corinthians 5-10, we are told, For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body according to what he has done whether good or bad knowing therefore the terror of the Lord we persuade men in second Thessalonians 7 verses there in second Thessalonians 1 verses 7 through 10 we're told how this will take place. When the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ these shall go punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power. When he comes in that day to be glorified in his saints and to be admired among all those who believe because our testimony among you was believed. In this context, the Thessalonian church is told that he will come as a thief in the night. He'll come by surprise.

Everyone will be surprised. He will come in a moment. And then he puts all of his enemies under his feet. So it speaks in first Corinthians 15. And the entire human family, the dead, all who have died, all who have died from Adam to the present, and all who are alive will be caught up before God.

They'll be caught up in the clouds and they'll be judged and this time is coming and it's coming soon like a thief in the night. Romans chapter one tells us why God is coming to judge the world. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness Because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and godhead, so that they are without excuse because even though they knew God, they did not glorify him as God, nor were they thankful, but their futile, but became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were darkened." You know, they weren't thankful for God. They weren't thankful for his laws.

And Romans 1 goes on to tell that professing to be foolish they became wise and they became homosexuals and they became idolaters and they were a picture of everything the secular state is demanding from you and your company and your institution. So that's what's happening in the world. But God's people will be rewarded. Look at verse 18. And that you should reward your servants, the prophets and the saints, and those who fear your name.

God will reward those who love him and who follow him. Those who've left houses and lands will be rewarded, says the Lord Jesus Christ. We read earlier, he who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the house of my God. The Apostle Paul told Timothy, finally there's laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give to me on that day, and not to me only, but also to all, all who have loved his appearing. Really only those who have loved his appearing.

How do you know if you're saved? Do you love him? Are you ordering your entire life after him? Do you want him and him alone? Or do you still think you can find some pleasure in this world?

If you do, you're probably not a Christian. Because it's only to those who've loved His appearing, who are saved. Not those who say Jesus Christ is Lord with their mouth, not those who accepted Jesus Christ in their heart when they were 12. That's not the basis of salvation. And then the destroyers of the earth will be destroyed, that's also in verse 18, and those who destroy the earth, and those who destroy the end should destroy those who destroy the earth.

So the wicked destroy the earth. We read earlier about how The wrath of God is used, God uses in his wrath the wicked to destroy the wicked. He uses the wicked to do his destruction in the world. And that's why you have all the drug abuse and the murder and all the stuff, all the horrible abuses that happen in the world. The devil is destroying, is harming his own people.

The devil uses his own to harm his own. That's what he does. And I think what happened with the four horsemen that we encountered earlier in Revelation who were wreaking havoc on the earth. They were destroying, and now they will be destroyed. The death in Hades, the wormwood of chapter eight, they will be destroyed.

But what's interesting here is finally the doubters are convinced. Finally the mockers are silenced. Finally the dispassionate who just shrugging their shoulders and they say, I don't know. Finally, they're snapped to attention and they are before the throne of God. And the stiff neck are broken and they're before the throne of God.

And then the fifth scene, the temple is opened and the arc of his covenant is seen. Are you ready? Are you ready for that? Well, it says that the temple is open. Now, that represents, you know what the temple represents.

We've talked about it before. The temple, the tabernacle, represents the presence of God before his people. And this represents the unbroken presence of God in your life, completely cared for, covered up, and sweetly dominated by the presence of God. This is a picture of access to God. You have access to God in heaven.

In the crucifixion, the veil of the temple was torn. This is another sort of tearing of the temple where You see the Lord and his glory and there are no more barriers. You have access like never before. And then the ark is seen. And the Ark of his covenant was seen in the temple.

So what's the what's the Ark all about? Well the Ark represents God's presence and what was in the Ark? Remember what was in the ark? The Ten Commandments, the tablets of stone. There was a gold jar of manna.

There was Aaron's rod budding representing God's authority. And you can read about this in Hebrews nine, for the Ark of the covenant was covered on all sides with gold and which was a golden jar beholding the manna and Aaron's rod which butted and the tablets of the covenant. Now the ark was about four and a half feet long and about two feet eight inches wide. It was covered with gold. It had a golden lid that was called the mercy seat and there were two angels with their wings stretched out on that ark and how is it used after it was built after the tabernacle well it was respected it was it was in front during travel and battle.

It was exalted. It was carried on the shoulders, high above the ground. It brought pestilence on the wicked when the men of Beth-Shemesh looked at it. Thousands died. It blessed a family when it was in the house of Obadi-Dim.

God's blessing was poured out in that family. It destroyed idols when it was captured by the Philistines and went into the temple of Dagon. The statue of Dagon fell to the ground and shattered, and the people were struck with hemorrhoids. It controlled nature when the ark touched the Jordan River, the water parted and they walked over in dry land. And The ark represented God's merciful presence among his people.

Power in your family, power among the idols, power in your journeys, power. But it was because of the sacrificial blood that was sprinkled on the ark, on the mercy seat as a covering for sin. The Ark was a picture of covering for sin. Has Christ covered your sin? Thomas Wilcox writing in his book, Honey from the Rock of Christ, he captures the power of the mercy seed.

Whatever Satan or your conscience will say to you, Christ shall have the last word. He is the judge of the living and the dead, and he must pronounce the final sentence. His blood speaks reconciliation. His blood speaks cleansing. His blood speaks purchase.

His blood speaks redemption and purging and remission of sins and liberty and justification and the nearness of God. So in this picture is a picture of the power of the shed blood of Jesus Christ for all those who stand before God. And that really is the sinner's only hope. Our hope rests only upon his covenant and the blood of the everlasting covenant with which we'll celebrate in a few moments in the Lord's Supper. But the ark means that God is present, that sin is atoned for.

It's covered, it's blotted out, it's nailed to the cross, it's forgiven, it's put in the bottom of the sea. It's separated from you as far as the east is from the west. That's what the ark means. It means you're free. It means you're free to stand before God and be just like those 24 elders, those representatives of the church.

The happiest who've ever lived. Those who spend eternity in heaven. Now, I don't wanna miss the lightnings and the thunderings and the earthquakes and the hail. Now, these are things that always scare us on the earth. They won't scare you in heaven.

They will be just manifestations of God's power. They will, the thunder will be delightful. My dog runs whenever there's thunder. But we won't be running when there's thunder and lightning and hail, hail stones like in Revelation of a hundred pounds. I mean you won't be scared by the thunder anymore.

You'll be so amazed. You'll be so thankful for thunder. You'll be so thankful for lightning. You'll see that's the power of God. When the hail comes down and shreds everything you'll say that's my God.

He does whatever he wants in heaven and on the earth. That's my God. I love lightning. I love that thunder. I love earthquakes because they show me the power of God.

When you have an earthquake on the earth, it's terrifying. But don't be too terrified. Because earthquakes and thunderings and lightnings are all manifestations of God's power. And when you see them and hear them, God is just telling you, I am the ruler of all things. And there's a day that's coming and there will be thunder and lightning, but if you love me, you'll like it.

So there you have it. What a marvelous text of scripture. Are you ready to meet him? The Lord Jesus said that the Son of Man came to seek and save those who were lost. The writer of Hebrews says, "'See to it that you do not refuse him who speaks.

Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, that we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear, for our God is a consuming fire." So there you have it. Have you become like a little child before God? Do you love his commands? Have you been born again? Have you lost your appetite for sin?

Because you'll stand before a holy God and your only hope before a holy God is the shed blood of Jesus Christ. This is a faithful saying worthy of all acceptance. 1st Timothy 1 15 that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of this prophecy and keep those things which are written in it. I'm going to pray in a moment, but let's just have a moment of meditation about all these matters.

Father, thank you for showing us the world the way it really is, the status of all humanity, your timing in the world, the end of all things, and how good you are to glorify yourself through having mercy on sinners and judging the world in righteousness. Amen.