In Scott Brown's sermon, 'They Follow the Lamb Wherever He Goes,' based on Revelation 14:1-5, the focus is on the imagery and symbolism of the 144,000 standing with the Lamb on Mount Zion. This chapter marks a transition from the earthly struggles depicted in Revelation 13 to a heavenly scene. The 144,000 are marked with God's name on their foreheads, contrasting with the followers of the beast. The sermon emphasizes the doctrine of salvation through pictorial theology, focusing on the victory and majesty of Jesus Christ. Brown outlines eight marks of salvation: bearing the Father's name, singing a new song, being undefiled by spiritual adultery, following the Lamb, being redeemed, offering themselves as first fruits, being truthful, and being without fault. The sermon calls for self-examination and encourages believers to find comfort in their salvation and the assurance of being God's own. Through vivid imagery, Brown illustrates the spiritual reality of salvation, urging listeners to live as true followers of Christ.

Please open your Bibles of Revelation, chapter 14, and we'll be reading from verse 1 to verse 5. This is the inerrant, all-sufficient, holy Word of God. Then I looked, and behold, a lamb standing on Mount Zion, and with him 144,000, having his father's name written on their foreheads. And I heard a voice from heaven like the voice of many waters and like the voice of loud thunder And I heard the sound of harpists playing their harps They sang as it were a new song before the throne, before the four living creatures, and the elders. And no one could learn that song except the 144,000 who were redeemed from the earth.

These are the ones who were not defiled with women, for they are virgins. These are the ones who follow the Lamb wherever he goes. These were redeemed from among men, being first fruits to God and to the Lamb. And in their mouth was found no deceit, for they are without fault before the throne of God. Would you pray with me?

Oh Lord we we thank you for these words to instruct us to move our hearts to see the things that are true. We pray oh Lord that you would use these words to cause us to love and good deeds to cause us to examine our own hearts to cause us to rejoice in the greatness of your salvation amen be please be seated So as we come to chapter 14 in Revelation, the scene changes. It now shifts from earth in chapter 13 to heaven in chapter 14 with the Lamb of God standing on Mount Zion with the people of God surrounding him. Now in the previous chapter we saw the activity of the beast. We saw the beast, these two beasts, the sea beast and the land beast who are really doing the will the dragon and they've received, people in the earth have received the mark of the beast.

So in the previous chapter you see the followers of the beast and the mark of the beast. He was so persuasive that the whole world followed him wherever he went and they were marked by their worldly philosophies, worldly practices, embracing of worldly ungodly systems. I don't believe it was a physical mark. It's really on the mark of the world on your soul and the inclinations of your heart and the things that you believe and the things that you do. And, but in this chapter we find different worshipers with a different mark.

And this is a mark on their foreheads. And so now in chapter 14, we find what one commentator called the godly counterpart to the beast worshipers. So we've shifted to see something completely different. What's so important about what's here is that we're given pictures of the doctrine of salvation. You remember Revelation is a book of pictures.

In the first three verses, we learn how to interpret Revelation. It's a book of symbols, and those symbols are not there to hide things, those symbols are there to reveal things, they're to reveal first of all the glory and the majesty of Jesus Christ and to speak of the victory of Jesus Christ. Every verse in Revelation is a declaration. It's a revelation of Jesus Christ and so we find these pictures. It's doctrine in pictures.

It's pictorial theology And now we enter into another section where we find these pictures. Now if you have been following us in these studies, we are in the midst of an interlude in Revelation. There are other interludes. This is the interlude of pictures that is poised after the trumpet judgments and before the outpouring of the bowls of wrath. So this is an interlude section.

It began in chapter 12. We've been in this interlude for weeks and so we're now coming to the end of it. We will come to the end of it with verse 4 in the next chapter in chapter 15. So we're in this midst of interlude. I don't know if you've noticed the focus on angels in these chapters, it's really been remarkable.

In chapter 12, you had these angels in heaven, Michael and his angels are fighting with the dragon's angels and just showing us the rage of the devil against the church. The dragon wants to devour the child but he can't do it. And in chapter 13 the scene shifts back to earth and you have these demonic armies on the earth the beast comes out of the sea and then another beast comes out of the land and these are these are beasts who are the mouthpieces of the dragon and there are they are so persuasive that many follow them and they receive the mark of the beast, which is the number of a man. But in chapter 13 you still see Satan's efforts are frustrated. And then now when we come into chapter 14 verses 1 through 6 we have a picture of the redeemed in heaven and then right after this there are three angels again in this chapter.

You know at the very beginning of this study I said you're going to get an advanced degree in angel ology and That's what we're getting here, but chapter 14 is divided into three sections We're just going to cover the first section this morning in the first five verses And this this ends in a song the song of victory over the beast. Now there are two songs in this chapter and the next. The one in this chapter is a new song And it's explained in such remarkable language, we'll camp on it when we get there. But in chapter 15, they sing an old song. They sing the song of Moses and of the lamb.

So here we have the new song, but we're getting to an old song in the next chapter. And you know, so here the Lord gives his people a picture of the end to comfort them. We can more gracefully endure hardship when we know what's coming and this is what is coming and this is why we sing and these are pictures of the victory of Jesus Christ. So I think that this chapter really is a call for endurance to see what's coming, but what is coming has already been experienced here. This is one very interesting thing, how the Lord Jesus prayed on earth as it is in heaven.

In some ways it's in heaven as it is on earth. There are four tastes of heaven that we have here and this is the doctrine of salvation. The doctrine of salvation is proclaimed here. The way that men and women are saved on earth and then the result of that and how it's expressed in heaven is so beautifully described here. So I have here before you these various marks of salvation and I'm going to identify eight of them.

And I just want you to ask, do you bear these marks of salvation? Are they yours? And if they're yours, rejoice, be glad, have consolation in your soul, be comforted by them, and give glory to God. Rest in his love. That's what I'm hoping you'll do.

And if not though that you would be drawn to the beauty of Jesus Christ. He is so good. And you'll see it in each one of these. So the first mark of these in heaven is that they bear their father's name. They bear their father's name, verse one.

And the question is, you know, do you bear your father's name? Your father's name is a love for his character in your soul you love him and you are you bear his name all All of his attributes are the attributes that you desire. That's what it means to bear the mark of your father's name. It's to identify with him. And here you find the lamb is standing on Mount Zion with a hundred and forty four thousand I looked and behold a lamb standing on Mount Zion and with him one hundred and forty four thousand having his father's name having his father's name written on their foreheads.

So here the Lord Jesus is standing as a lamb with 144,000. Again, this is the mark of God as opposed to the mark of the beast. It's on their foreheads. And they're marked as God's property. In other words, they're branded.

They are who they are. They are followers of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Everything about them says, I am his and he is mine. You know, not only do you have your father's name, that the Bible also says that your name is written on his hand. Not only are you his, he recognizes that you belong to him.

So you have this two-way belonging that you find here. Now he's standing with 144,000. We covered this in chapter 7 fairly extensively You know my view is that the 144,000 is a symbolic number as the number 7 as a number 3 as a number 4 as The number 12 is in Revelation. It's symbolic of the whole number of the redeemed, all of them. All are present and are accounted for.

They've been kept by the power of God. And not one is missing. Those whom God saves, he preserves to the very end and this is the 144,000. And he's standing on Mount Zion. Now Mount Zion appears over a hundred times in the Bible and it's used both of a physical place, a real place that you can visit today, and it's also symbolic of God's blessing.

It's used both ways in the Bible. And sometimes it refers to the actual presence of the people of God on physical Mount Zion. But other times it's used figuratively of heaven and of the presence of God. And for example in Hebrews 12 22 we read these words but you have come to Mount Zion and the city of the living God the heavenly Jerusalem It's not just a rock on earth. And to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly of the church and of the firstborn who are registered in heaven, to God the judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks of better things than that of Abel.

In other words, That Mount Zion was really an earthly representation of a heavenly reality. And that's why in Psalm 125 we learn that Zion lasts forever. In Galatians 4, 24 and 25, we read that Mount Zion is that idyllic city where the blessings of God just overwhelm the curses of unbelief. Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all. So in that passage, Jerusalem is a mother, it's not just a rock, It's a place, it's a place of God's blessing and help.

In Hebrews nine, Mount Zion is a figure, a copy of the reality of Zion. For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself. And then the writer of Hebrews in Hebrews 13-14 says it like this, for here we have no continuing city but we seek the one to come. So the physical Mount Zion is really representative of the one to come. So now notice the lamb is standing with his feet upon Mount Zion.

Psalm two says verse six, but as for me, I've installed my king upon Zion, my holy mountain. So this is Zion, this is a picture of the people of God. In Isaiah 62, God says, my delight is in her. In Isaiah 62-12, it's a city that's not forsaken. In Ezekiel 48, verse 35, Yahweh is there.

So this is the place of God's presence. You're in the presence of God, and you have his mark on your forehead and the lamb is there. And again, this is figurative speech to help you understand not what Jesus looks like, but what he is like. He's like a lamb. He doesn't look like a lamb.

It's figurative language. When John the Baptist said, Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, he didn't mean that he saw a lamb walking down the road. He was speaking in figurative language. And that's the same kind of language that we find here in this just before we depart from this point. If you're if you recall in the book of Revelation the term for lamb that is used every time but I believe one time is the word for little lamb.

It's the diminutive form of lamb. And so here you have in the previous use of this term that we encountered, The little lamb was conquering the beast. He's the little lamb who conquers the beast. But this is the same form, this is the same word of little lamb. So what makes us who we are, what makes those in heaven who they are, they bear their father's name.

They bear their father's name. Do you love to bear your father's name? Is it your delight to bear his name and to represent him? So secondly, they're singing. They are singing.

This is verses 2 and 3. This is so remarkable. And I heard a voice from heaven like the voice of many waters. Remember that in chapter 1? Jesus Christ's voice is like the voice of many waters and and like the voice of loud thunder and I heard the sound of harpists playing with their harps and they sang as it were a new song before the throne, before the living creatures and the elders, and no one could learn that song except the 144,000.

So What a song. What a sound. Now, the redeemed love to sing. I remember reading an article one time about the songs that are in Revelation. There's several of them.

And I loved the name of the article. It was titled, The Soundtrack of Heaven. How about that? Get that on your computer. Get that on Spotify.

The soundtrack of heaven. And the author was making various observations of the songs in Revelation. Someday we should just go through the songs in Revelation. Wouldn't that be fun? But he noted that they are first of all, they're songs of exuberance.

Second, they are songs of explanation. They explain the holiness of God and of redemption. They are songs of encouragement, and they're songs of expectation. Well, Those are the four categories that he used. I think, you know, there might be more.

But just, I mean, hang on. Imagine a song like this, where you have the sound of many waters. It's some, how is it harmonized with thunder? And then, and how is thunder harmonized with harpists and then how is all that harmonized with voices what kind of a song is that It's like a song you've never heard. And William Hendrickson says, it's the most lovely, sweet and tender song you have ever heard.

It's really a remarkable song. I think that it's likely that the song is so new, so unusual, because it's sung when you have a new experience in heaven. We sing songs like this here on earth, but boy, when you sing them in heaven. You know, it's a little bit like when you become a Christian. You know, before you're a Christian, you've maybe you were in church, you know, all your life, and you sang songs, and then you become a Christian, and you walk into church, and you sing a song, you sang your whole life.

And for the first time in your life, it's thrilling. You love that song, you used to sing that song. A mighty fortress is our God. And then you sing that song. Because he's your mighty fortress, he is your God, he saved your soul, and that song is like you never sang it before.

That's what happens when you become a Christian. You don't sing the same way. Now it may be something like that. Now this is being sung in heaven. You know, songs turn out to be beautiful markers in our lives.

I can tell you of various trials and joys I've had over the years and they're just hooked to songs that I ended up... Maybe I walked into church during a really difficult moment in my life and we sang a song and that was the defining song for that entire season. You know I had a business many years ago and we were having terrible, terrible, cash flow problems And I didn't know what was going to happen in this company. Was it going to blow up? And I remember walking into church and we sang a song.

And every I I can't sing that song without remembering God's great kindness toward me during that season. But anyway, songs mark our lives, but they, songs carry you through, you know, various seasons of your life. Well, this song, it's gripping like thunder, it's melodic like voices, it's male and female voices, you know, it's exuberant, it's soprano and mezzo-soprano, it's tenor, it's bass, it's everything just thrown together, it's just remarkable. John is trying to describe it with these words. It's an exquisite genre of music, like no other genre.

I don't think you've ever heard a genre of music like this before. It's just so beautiful. You know, the genres of music that we sing on earth, they are pictures, they are helps for us, but they are probably a little bit like chopsticks compared to this song. This is a really amazing song. So there there are songs in Revelation, Revelation 5, 9, and they sang a new song saying, you are worthy to take the scroll and open its seals for you were slain and have redeemed us to God by your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation and have made us kings and priests to our God and we shall reign on the earth." So that's just one.

There's one in chapter 15. There's just many, many songs. Singing is meant to bind us together on earth. We admonish one another when we sing. The Bible tells us to admonish one another while we sing.

You're not just singing to God, not just singing to yourself, you're singing to one another. Singing is a way that we care for one another's souls. We should sing very thoughtfully and intently. Most people have a very low view of singing. That's not the Bible's view.

People have a low view of singing because they just think about it personally. They just think of it in one way. They just think that it's about them and before God. They have a very very pinched and truncated view of the whole doctrine of singing and they just think in terms of their own emotional response to the song rather than the contribution they're making to the church by actually singing off the same music, by being unified with the people of God. When you sing, you're not just singing for yourself, you're actually binding your doctrine together.

You're putting a fence around your doctrine, you're saying this is what we believe. This is what we believe about God, this is what we believe about the world, this is what we believe about evil. We believe this and so singing just unites us, It pulls us together around things that are true. Singing is so important. And people have such a low view of singing because they don't understand what the Bible says about it.

You know, singing is one of the battle lines for the defense of sound doctrine. It's a unifying factor in a local church, where the church gets together and they sing what's true. And we're not alone either. The book of Hebrews tells us that Jesus Christ is always singing with this congregation And there in Hebrews he says here am I and the people that you gave me Lord They are delight. They are a delight to me.

Yeah, Jesus Christ sings with his church. And we sing to teach one another. And we sing to admonish one another. And we sing to the Lord. But I hope you in this church don't have a low view of singing.

You want to have a rich view. Not just that it's about between you and God. And you're not just singing to an audience of one. That's not the biblical understanding of singing. So anyway, they're singing this song and what's so critical about this is what we sing in the church is what we end up humming in our hearts when we're driving down the road.

You've experienced that and it's very catchy isn't it? You know somebody's humming a song and all of a sudden you're doing the same thing all day long. If it's a good song that's a good thing. So what makes these people who they are? They are singing and they are singing a wonderful song with exuberance.

And then thirdly, they're not defiled. Verse four, these are the ones who were not defiled with women, for they are virgins. So what does this mean? Are these some spiritual elite virgins that are in the world or that are now in heaven? You know, does this give us a tip off of God's negative view of sex in general, like sex is defiling?

Is that what he's saying? No, we're not Roman Catholics who believe that it's defiling. Sexual intimacy is a holy and a good gift and he's not talking about this in terms of physical terms he's speaking figuratively. We know what the Bible tells us about sexual intimacy, not to deprive one another in 1 Corinthians 9. The apostles took their wives on missionary journeys.

Hebrews 13, 4 says, let the marriage bed be undefiled. In other words, he can't be talking about that. What does it mean? It's figurative language again, and It's language that speaks of remaining faithful to Jesus Christ. They did not commit spiritual adultery.

They did not go after other gods. They did not go after the harlot. This is going to be explained in Revelation 21 vividly, but it doesn't mean that they were never married, it doesn't mean that they never experienced sexual intimacy. It refers to separation from spiritual harlotry, not abstinence from sexual intimacy. The idea that the word brings is that they are not smeared with the Ideologies of the world there.

They're not dirty with a cultural Waywardness of the world they're not covered with the the superstitions of the Greek lexicon called it like a Pig that is dirty not like that Now remember remember the hermeneutical principle that we've been working with. The Bible interprets the Bible. Look to the internal testimony of the word of God if you want to understand something and this is a very important point the word virgin is a very good example of how important it is to understand this hermeneutical principle you hear the word virgin and you just think of it the way that you think of it but you're not thinking of it in the way that it is spoken of in the Bible and but the word virgin is often applied to Old Testament Israel and her faithfulness in second Kings 19 20 to 21 there's a picture of the virgin daughter of Zion and that daughter is Israel and what is she doing? She is scorning a pagan king, King Sennacherib. He's threatening to come and destroy the people of God and in second Kings 19 this virgin daughter is spoken of and It reads like this the virgin daughter of Zion has despised you, laughed you to scorn.

The daughter of Jerusalem has shaken her head behind your back. This is a picture of the virgin daughter of Israel, the people of Israel, the people of God who have turned their back on paganism and they're not going to follow Sennacherib's program. They do not want Sennacherib's rulership. They want God's rulership. So that's how it's used there.

In Jeremiah 31 the Lord promises to restore his disobedient and adulterous people after the Babylonian captivity and the same language is used. In Jeremiah 31 for again I will build you and you shall be rebuilt oh virgin of Israel You shall again be adorned with tambourines and shall go forth in the dances of those who rejoice. In other words, This virgin of Israel is a restored people, a holy people walking before God. And in the New Testament, a virgin is symbolic language for being loyal to Jesus Christ. One who did not follow the culture into its impurity but rather kept itself from spiritual idol- harlotry.

And we read about this in James 4, verse 4, where we understand that friendship with the world makes you an adulterer. He says adulterers and adulteresses do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity to God. Therefore, whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. So when you read that word virgin there you just need to look at how the Bible speaks of it I'll give you another in 2nd Corinthians 11 to Christians are actually called chased virgins The Apostle Paul speaks to that church. He says, oh that you would bear with me in a little folly and Indeed you do bear with me for I am jealous for you with godly jealousy and Get this for I have betrothed you to one husband that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.

But I fear lest somehow as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. So he is speaking figuratively It cannot mean literal virginity because it's not sinful to engage in sexual intimacy. We're actually commanded to get married. So this is about spiritual adultery and we'll find this language used later on in the harlot that is Jezebel who attempts to lure people into her web of death, but instead you have those who were betrothed to Jesus Christ. They were washed by the blood of the lamb.

They were made pure by the blood of Jesus Christ. That's what he's talking about. He's talking about the people who by their hatred of the world demonstrated that they were children of God. And so, of course, the question is, you know, are you a chaste servant of Jesus Christ? Do you follow him and him alone?

Are you married to one? Are you guarding your eyes? Are you guarding your heart? Are you flirting with anyone? Are you fleeing immorality of every kind?

Are you a chaste virgin in that sense? So, not only are these unspotted from the world, they follow the lamb wherever they go. This is the fourth quality. They follow the lamb wherever he goes. Now in this world there really are only two choices.

Light and darkness. And light and darkness. And you either follow your heart or you follow God. You either follow this culture and its philosophies or you follow God which separates you from the world but the true Christian follows the lamb of God the true Christian identifies with the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. And the true Christian has come to the place where they only want to have one authority.

They only want God as their authority. They are sick and tired of the devil's authority in their life and they don't want it anymore and they only want God. That's the mark of a Christian. That's the mark of a disciple. Jesus said, follow me.

Jesus said, my sheep hear my voice and they follow me in John 10. So we follow the Lamb wherever he goes. This is really a truth about salvation. The Christian the Christian has renounced self-ownership. The Christian has renounced autonomy.

The Christian sees the futility of autonomy and the myth of self-ownership. The Christian sees the Sinfulness of living by your own truth It's sinful to live by your own truth Because it's your truth is not God's truth You know first Peter 2 makes it clear what it means to follow the lamb. 1 Peter 2, 21. For to this you were called because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow in his steps who committed no sin nor was deceit found in his mouth, who when he was reviled, he did not revile in return. So this is the whole matter of following Jesus Christ and to say my food is to do the will of him who sent me.

Like Jesus Christ said, I always do the will of my father. I only say the things that I hear my father say. That's what it means to follow Jesus Christ. That's what it means to take up your cross and follow him. So these that are in heaven are marked because they followed the lamb when they were in the world.

And now they're just rejoicing in the condition that that brought to them. And then they not only followed the Lamb, they were redeemed. Verse 4, these were redeemed from among men. Now in verse 3, who were redeemed from the earth, the word, the term redeemed appears twice in this section. Now the word redeemed carries massive theological weight.

There is so much sitting under that word, but it's a word picture. It's the picture of being purchased. It's a picture of a slave on the slave block and someone comes and buys that slave Off the slave block and sets him free That's what that word picture means to be redeemed In other words, you didn't save yourself somebody saved you you contributed nothing to your salvation. You were purchased you were redeemed by the blood of the lamb and that's what it means to be redeemed and now you have a new owner and of course he puts his mark on your forehead, the mark of your father. And then they are also an offering.

Verse four, being first fruits to God and to the Lamb. So they are an offering. A Christian is a person who has offered himself to God. In the Old Testament the first fruit was an offering to God and like in Ezekiel 20 verse 40 the first fruits are actual actually people That's why the Bible talks of the Christian as a first fruit. That person is separated to the Lord and offered up as a sacrifice.

And so the person who's in heaven is the person who has offered his body, his whole life, his mind, his heart, everything as a sacrifice. He was harvested and then offered as an offering. That's the biblical language of a Christian. You get harvested and offered to God. A living sacrifice like Romans 12 speaks about.

The Christian says, Lord, make me an offering. Make me your dwelling place. Make me your instrument. Make me your mouthpiece. Is that you?

I mean I'm praying that somebody here wants to say that now with all their heart for the first time Lord I offer you my life my life is not my own that's what it means to become a Christian Only those who do that end up in heaven. Don't think for a second that making a profession of faith and accepting Jesus Christ into your heart is gonna save you. It does not save you. Getting baptized doesn't save you. But these are the marks of true conversion that you, and one of them is that you offer your life up as a sacrifice to God.

In James 1, 18, We see a description of this. Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth that we might be a kind of first fruits of his creatures. Romans 8 23 not only that but We also who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves grown within ourselves eagerly waiting for the adoption of the redemption of our body, for we were saved in this hope. This is the fact of being an offering generated, regenerated by the Spirit of God. Now, a false professor is a person who doesn't offer himself up to God.

He's still offering himself up to the other gods that he likes better and he might be a very nice person, a very moral person, you know, he could easily be a conservative, but that's, those are just things that spin his wheel. But a Christian offers himself up to God. Don't you love that song, Take my life and let it be consecrated, Lord, to Thee. And then it says, take my moments and my days. Lord, take my hands.

No, take my feet. No, take my voice. Take my silver and my gold. That's an offering. That's what it means to be a Christian.

So they are an offering and then they are also truthful. Verse five, And in their mouth was found no deceit. You know, false professions are very common. Often children who get baptized in their youth, they grow up, and then they end up lying about the state of their soul. They know they're not really converted.

They know they don't have affections for God. They know they haven't offered themselves up to God. They know they're not following the lamb, but they still keep playing the game. And they want to make sure that nobody knows. It's very common.

But here, in their mouth was found no deceit. In other words, they're no longer crafty. They're no longer spinning stories. They're no longer hiding the truth. They've said, I'm a sinner.

I need the grace of Jesus Christ. They recognize the truth. And you know, we're all born liars, but over time we learn how not to do bold face lies like when we were three, which our parents knew were lies. We can have a religious mask over our lying by pretending to be somebody that we really aren't. But the joy of recognizing who you are is what's spoken of here.

That you really are hopelessly lost. That the only way you can be saved is if someone would stand in your place who is not a liar and that's Jesus Christ. But this is just the joy of rec and the relief of recognizing the ear of sinner and throwing your life on the mercy of God to save your soul. You know Isaiah did that. He saw the Lord and he said I I'm a man of unclean lips but then a coal touched His mouth and cleansed His lips and He said, Lord, here am I, send me.

I think that's the picture here. The Lord Jesus Christ had no deceit in his mouth, Isaiah 53.9. And that's the only way that sinners can be saved. But there's no deceit. In other words, they want to walk in the truth and as time passes they learn more and more to walk in the truth and then when they get to the heaven That's all they do is walk in the truth.

And that's the experience of joy that's before this throne. And then they are without fault, verse five. And for they are without fault before the throne of God. They have no reproach. They don't feel the hammer over their head.

The false professor is always walking under his guilt. He feels like the sword of Damocles, you know, hanging over his head, the thread is gonna break any second. And he walks around with feelings of guilt. He's heavy with guilt because he doesn't know the grace of God. But there is no reproach.

No reproach. He's not reproachable because he was declared not guilty. This is justification by faith alone. Hebrews 9, 14 speaks of this cleansing power of the conscience. How much more shall the blood of Christ through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot to God cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

That's why David could say, "'Blessed is the man whom the Lord does not impute iniquity, "'in whose spirit there is no deceit,' he says." In Psalm 32, verse two. He says in verse five, "'I acknowledge my sin to you and my iniquity I have not hidden now there was no more deceit And I said I will confess my transgressions to the Lord and you forgave the iniquity of my sin So what does it mean what does it mean to be in heaven what does it mean to be a Christian on earth? It means that you bear the mark of your father. It means that you sing like never before. It means that you are not defiled with spiritual adultery.

It means that you follow the lamb wherever he goes. It means that you are redeemed by the blood of the lamb. It means that you are an offering to God. It means that you are now truthful about yourself, and it means that you are without fault. Do you see even more clearly how the book of Revelation is a revelation of Jesus Christ and the greatness of his victory in every way, not just over the nations of the earth, not just over the demonic powers, but over your sin and mine.

What 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. Would you pray with me? Father, we thank you for these beautiful pictures to show us how kind you are to Save Centers and to help us to know whether we will be in that number or not. Amen.