The Coming Hope: The Coming Reunion

His comings into this world, on his work into this world because God's time determines our lives. And Advent is looking forward to the future that we have, the future of Christ coming into this world. And so that determines our hopes, it determines our life. God's future time determines our present lives.

So today and over the next few weeks, we look to the future that we know is coming by going to the book of Revelation and reflecting upon the beautiful visions that John has for us. And today we'll be doing that by looking at Revelation chapter seven verses nine through 17.

It's our custom in this church to read together God's word. And so I'll invite you to read along with me, either using the screen or the handout that you have. This is the word of God for the people of God.

After this, I looked and there was a vast multitude from every nation, tribe, people, and language which no one could number. Standing before the throne and before the lamb, they were clothed in white robes with palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice, salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne and to the lamb. All the angels stood around the throne and along with the elders and the four living creatures, they fell face down before the throne and worshiped God saying, amen. Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and strength be to our God forever and ever, amen. Then one of the elders asked me, who are these people in white robes and where did they come from? I said to him, sir, you know. Then he told me, these are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb. For this reason, they are before the throne of God, and they will serve him day and night in his temple. The one seated on the throne will shelter them. They will no longer hunger. They will no longer thirst. The sun will no longer strike them, nor will any scorching heat. For the lamb who is at the center of the throne will shepherd them. He will guide them to springs of the waters of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. — Revelation 7:9-17

The grass withers, the flowers fade, but the word of the Lord stands forever. — Isaiah 40:8

I'm going to pause and pray that God would bless us. You're welcome to pray along with me quietly in your hearts.

Our Lord and our God, we thank you that you are not silent, but that you speak, that you have spoken to us in these words, and that you give us your spirit that these truths may become alive in us. We pray that they will leave us with great hope in you. We pray this for Jesus' sake. Amen.

The Worshipers of the Lamb

This passage is a passage of worship. And our outline for today is around that. It's simply this: the worshipers of the lamb. But first, we see the worshipers.

The book of Revelation, if you've read it, is really a book of pictures. It's a picture book. That's why our passage starts out simply by saying, "After this I looked." This book is a series of revelations, of visions that the Apostle John received while he was exiled by a Roman emperor to the island of Patmos, somewhere around the last third of the first century.

And this was a time when Christians were undergoing persecution for their faith. John himself had been exiled as a part of that persecution, and many other Christians like him were experiencing persecution. Many of the other apostles, the disciples of Jesus, had either been killed already or would soon die for their faith.

And so John, when he starts the book of Revelation, describes himself this way saying,

I am your brother and partner in the tribulation and kingdom and perseverance which are in Jesus.

This book is a book of pictures, a book written for people who were experiencing affliction, who were experiencing hardship, who were experiencing persecution by a man who himself was dealing with hardship and affliction. And so John is given bright and vivid images so that he can have in the midst of all the hardship and darkness that he's amongst in his life, hope. And he writes down these visions to give to God's people who are undergoing persecution so that they too can see these vivid pictures, and they too can have hope.

And if you read through the book of Revelation, you will see a rhythm develop in this book. You'll see that it starts with tribulation, it starts with persecution, but then it moves to judgment and then it ultimately ends in worship. Tribulation, judgment, worship. But John always ends with worship. He always ends with praise because he himself is a man who needs that. And he knows he's writing to a people who are undergoing trials and tribulations and afflictions and hardships. And so he knows that worship is vital.

Because worship is meditating, dwelling, reflecting, holding into your heart what gives you hope. John's visions meet people where they are in tribulation, affliction, and brings them to where they need to be to worship.

John leads us again and again to worship a hope throughout this book so that we can live with that hope in our life. God's future determining how we view our present life. And so this is what we see in this passage before us. We see one of those scenes of worship. And we see here a picture of what the worshiping people are like.

In verse nine, John says, "After this I looked and there was a vast multitude from every nation, tribe, people, and language, which no one could number, standing before the throne and before the lamb. They were clothed in white robes with palm branches in their hands."

I want you to notice that one of the things that John sees is a vast multitude as he says, which no one could number. And here he's using language that would be reminiscent to people of the book of Genesis. And the way that God spoke to Abraham, his promise that through Abraham, he would be bringing many descendants into this world. And he says in particular, "Look at the sky and count the stars. If you're able to count them, your offspring will be that numerous."

This is what we see fulfilled in this passage. A numerous number, a number that you can't count, a number that is beyond even our imagination. And here we see the fulfillment of the promise to Abraham. More people than there are grains of sand on the seashore. More people than there are stars in the sky.

And think about how this image could give hope to the people that are reading these visions when they were first given. A small group that feels like they're a little tiny sect that's being stamped into the dust by the powerful Roman Empire. As they see persecution coming into their community, as they see some of their own faithful members lose their faithfulness and begin to return back into the world, they could wonder, will Christianity survive?

But John gives them this picture of hope saying that, "Don't you know that at the end of the age, don't you know that in the end, there will be this vast multitude of people worshiping at the throne of God?" A number that you can't even count. This picture would give them as it does to us, the ability to like John endure in a faithful witness. Because God uses our witness to bring in these people. God uses this church and churches like us, uses our presence in the lives of those who don't know Christ as ways that he brings into his worship an innumerable mount.

And we need this hope to help us to live our present life in a faithful way. It's this hope that helps you to continue to pray for your neighbor. It's this hope that gives you courage to ask your coworker to come to church. It's this hope that you hold on to, to enable you to still pray and love and point your children to Jesus. God's future determines our present life.

And as we set our hearts on these kinds of hopes, it disciples us, it shapes us, it leads us to be faithful believers. Even consider the way that this group of worshipers that John describes is a multitude of people of every tribe, every tongue, every nation. In our country and even in our city, see lines of division drawn by color and by culture. And the church knows that these divisions are not ultimate. This church knows that this is the picture of our future. This picture gives us hope that we will one day be a united and yet diverse community.

And so this picture gives us the ability as a church to be realistic and yet hopeful in the way that we shape our own community, and that this very community can be a demonstration of the in breaking of God's future into our present world. Do you understand that the reason that this church prays for and works for cross cultural discipleship is because we are allowing God's future to determine our present life? That the reason that we are praying for and working for cross cultural discipleship is not because we are woke, but because we have hope. That it's not the culture driving us, but it's this picture that is driving us. Because this is our future and we want our future to be experienced more and more now. God's future time determines our present lives.

The Explanation of the Vision

But John knows that these are hopes that are needed because it doesn't seem like things are going our way. And in Revelation, what often happens is John describes a vision that he sees, but then someone explains to John what that vision really is. And this happens in our passage. John describes the worshiping community in verse nine as clothed in white robes and holding palm branches. But then in verse 13, a person that John calls the elder explains a little bit more about this worshiping community.

In verses fourteen and fifteen it says, "Then he told me these are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb. For this reason, they are before the throne of God and they serve him day and night in his temple. The one seated on the throne will shelter them."

John here is describing, again, all the saints who ever lived, all the saints who are the child of Abraham by faith. But what characterizes these saints? What is it the elder highlights identifies them? He says that these are the ones who are coming out of the great tribulation. Sometimes we can think of that great tribulation as this short period of time that will come before the return of Christ, but John describes it differently here, doesn't he? He describes the great tribulation as not an event for the few but for all. As something that happens in the day to day life of everyone who is a child of Abraham by faith, from everyone who seeks to in their day to day life endure in their faithfulness, in their testimony to Christ in their life.

Think of it this way, when Paul uses this same word tribulation throughout his letters and the 23 times that he uses it, 21 of those times is talking about the normal everyday life of a Christian. The normal everyday life of a Christian is one of the great tribulation. We see this in Second Timothy when Paul says:

All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. — 2 Timothy

Or think about Jesus who says:

In this world you will have trouble. — John

Or also think about how he says:

If they persecuted me, they will persecute you. — John

The great tribulation is not just a time to come that we fear, but it is the time that we live in now. The great tribulation began with the sufferings of Jesus, as he said, they persecuted me, and is now shared in by all believers. As he says, so they will persecute you. This is why we are all with John, fellow partakers in the tribulation and the kingdom and the perseverance which are in Jesus.

This is why Peter says:

Dear friends, don't be surprised when the fiery trials come on you to test you as if something unusual were happening to you. — 1 Peter

Peter wants us to understand that we should not be surprised by trials, by persecution, by tribulation, by evil because that is what marks us in this life. But so often we do feel surprised by it. We do think that suffering is something unusual, that it's happening to us in a way that we wouldn't expect and so we fail to prepare for it.

Living in the Darkness of Advent

But we do not live in a season of light. We live in a season of darkness. Advent begins in the darkness. Think about it. When is it that the angels came to speak to the shepherds about the birth of Jesus? It was at night. When was Jesus born? It was at night. When is it that the light of dawn that is Jesus broke into this world? It was in darkness. Advent begins in the darkness.

And I may not know you, but I know that you feel this darkness in some way in your life, that you feel this tribulation in some way in your life, whether it's in your own attempt to be faithful and following Jesus in your sexuality or in your finances or in your witness to him at work, or whether it's in the tribulation that you experience in your own life and the frustration that you have in trying to faithfully love Jesus in the midst of Thanksgiving and family. You may be experiencing the tribulation in your life in your attempt to minister, to care for someone, to love someone, and it seems like they're moving further and further away from Jesus. You may be experiencing the tribulation, the evil, the death that lives still in this world in your own bodies, or in the bodies of those that you love. We all are experiencing the lingering presence of evil that exists in this world.

And so John wants us to see that those who are gathered to worship are those who have gone through the great tribulation. Because when we understand that we are in the midst of the great tribulation, this picture of worship becomes so much more important. When we understand that in this world we will have trouble, it's then that we take heart because we look to Jesus who has overcome this world. But as we fail to remember this, we set ourselves up for disappointment, discouraged, to be surprised by the evil that still marks the time that we live in. We're surprised by suffering because we forget that we're in the great tribulation, the collision of two ages that are like two tectonic plates pressing against each other. But it's on those two plates that we rise up to heaven.

Author Fleming Rutledge puts it this way. She says:

The disappointment, brokenness, suffering and pain that characterize life in this present world is held in dynamic tension with the promise of future glory that is yet to come.

In that advent tension, the church lives its life. The life of the believer, the life of that church is feeling that tension between the great tribulation and the great reunion. Between the evil age that is this present world and the age to come that is the triumph of Christ. And to fail to remember that tension leads to a misinformed and a misshapen discipleship. The church needs to be discipled to live in the great tribulation.

We must be a community that comes again and again to worship, that we might remind ourselves of the hope that we need to endure with faithfulness. But if you think about it, one of the interesting aspects of this passage is the way that worship should cause us to not be surprised by suffering. This passage helps us to understand how worship can form us so that when suffering comes, when tribulation is in our life, it doesn't surprise us, but it actually gives us hope.

We see this in the way that these worshipers are worshiping the lamb because the lamb is the object of worship. And if you read through the book of Revelation, you would see that again and again this lamb shows up. The main title for Jesus that John uses throughout the book is the lamb. He refers to the lamb 29 times in the book of Revelation. You only have him refer to Jesus Christ seven times or Christ four times. But again and again and again, he holds forth to the people the vision of the lamb.

He tells us who this lamb is in Revelation 5, that this is the lamb who was slain, but the lamb who is also the lion of the tribe of Judah. This is the lamb who was slain, who is Jesus, who came into this world as a lamb, that he might give his life to save his people through his sacrifice. The main times that John holds forth this picture of the slain Lamb are in moments of worship. After the tribulation, after the judgment, he brings everyone's eyes back to the lamb who was slain so that they can stare and worship at his glory.

But if you think about it, that's such an ironic picture—that a lamb, a weak creature, a lamb who is slain is the object of worship. But yet he is worshiped. We see it in our passage in verse 10:

And they cried out in a loud voice, "Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne and to the lamb." And all the angels stood around the throne and along with the elders and the four living creatures, they fell face down before the throne and worshiped God saying, "Amen, blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and strength be to our God forever and ever." — Revelation 7:10-12

The lamb is worshiped with all the glory that belongs to God because the lamb is God as well. The lamb is worshiped by the saints and by the angels proclaiming that the lamb has all glory and wisdom and honor and power and strength that belong to him. The lamb is not weak, but the lamb is strong. The lamb is powerful. The lamb is glorious. The lamb who is slain is triumphant. And this lamb throughout the book of Revelation reveals his power, his glory and his strength, triumphing again and again in divisions over evil.

But think about the irony of this picture. The conquering force throughout the book of Revelation is the Lamb who was slain. And this method of triumph, of conquest, is foolish to the world, but the foolishness of God is always wiser than human wisdom. And the weakness of God is always stronger than human strength. We worship the lamb who is slain, the lamb who triumphs by sacrifice, because we know that is the wisdom of God. That is the strength of God.

John uses this image of Jesus again and again in this book to bring encouragement to believers that are wondering, "Is God really wise when my life seems like it's filled with tribulation? Is God really strong when I feel so weak? My life doesn't feel like it's triumph, my life feels like it's tribulation. Is God really on the throne?"

But who is on the throne in this passage? The lamb who is slain. The lamb who is slain, John says, is at the center of the throne. That means that all power and authority is his. The lamb is all the glory in Emmanuel's land, as we sang earlier. We worship the lamb who was slain and this gives encouragement to believers to keep God's wisdom as their hope as they endure the sufferings of this present world.

John shows Christians that they will spend eternity worshiping the one who triumphs over sin, over death, over the devil. How? Through being slain, through his own sacrifice, through his own suffering. And it's that which leads us into worship. We have our robes washed in the blood of the lamb. His sacrifice marks believers. The weakness of God is stronger than man. And so we set our hopes according to that strength. We set our hopes according to the lamb who was slain. We keep time according to the conquering power of the lamb, because it's him we worship, it's him we follow.

This is another ironic image that we see in this passage. If you look at verse 17:

For the lamb who is at the center of the throne will shepherd them. — Revelation 7:17

A lamb shepherding the sheep, the sheep following the slain lamb. But it speaks to us of the incarnation of Jesus and the one who became like us so that we could become like him. And this is what John's vision communicates to us. We must become like him.

We must first conform to his humiliation before we conform to his exaltation. We become like what we worship, and Christians are the people who worship the lamb who was slain. And the central picture of the book of Revelation is that this lamb who is slain triumphs over evil. And John gives you that central picture because it explains your life. It explains how in the midst of great tribulation, you do not lose hope because you know that the lamb triumphs that way. The lamb who is slain triumphs, and he will triumph in the midst of your tribulation.

This is what Paul refers to in Romans chapter eight, that magnificent chapter of hope when he says:

Who can separate us from the love of God in Christ? Can affliction or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? — Romans 8

And this is a verse we often skip over. He then says:

As it is written, because of you, because of you, Jesus, we are being put to death all the day long. We are counted as sheep to be slaughtered. — Romans 8

Because of you, the lamb who was slain. Because of you, the crucified King of Kings. Because of you, the sheep that was silent before his shearers. Because of you, the one who is crushed for our iniquities, we too are being put to death every day. We too are counted as sheep to be slaughtered. Why? Because the sheep follow the shepherd. And this lamb that is slain is the good shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep.

And it's only as we see and remember this that we can embrace the tribulation in the times that we live in with hope, with confidence, with courage. Because as Paul goes on to say:

In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us, through the lamb that was slain. — Romans 8

God establishes his kingdom, his rule in this world, not through worldly ways of power, but through this picture, through this person, through the lamb that is slain. And so our lives are going to look like that. Our lives are going to look like people that are barely making it, who are weary. But yet that very tribulation is the path that the shepherd leads his people because it's the way that he too went.

Do you think that triumph in your life looks like this? Are you surprised at suffering when the one that you worship tells you that your salvation came through his suffering? That your robes are washed in his blood. Salvation belongs to the lamb who is slain. And so how would we expect him to work that salvation out into our own lives? The sheep must look like the shepherd. But God's future determines our present lives and so because we know that he will lead us to triumph, we have hope.

Frenetic Busyness and Despair

But this is often how we don't live. We often live as though this is an age of triumph for us to work hard. Author and philosopher James K. Smith puts it this way: our frenetic busyness is often a practical outworking of unconscious despair. Our frenetic busyness is refusal of hope. It's a refusal of hope because it is functionally a refusal of trust and dependence. For when I am frantically busy, I am assuming that everything depends on me as if I am the one who is upholding the cosmos. As if the arrival of the kingdom depends on me.

What does your life reveal about your hope? Is your life marked by frenetic busyness that reveals an unconscious despair that the lamb will not triumph? That God's future will not materialize? That your tribulations are proof that hope disappoints?

Christian discipleship is not marked by frenetic busyness, but by hopeful waiting for God to work. He goes on to say, we sing Maranatha, come Lord Jesus, but we are not a panicked people. This is not to condone apathy, but to rather encourage hope, a way of laboring toward a future that arrives as a gift. A future that arrives as a gift.

God's future determines our present life. The lamb who is slain will triumph over death and sin and evil. Does your life reflect that hope that is marked by you waiting or frenetic busyness, as though you have to make that hope materialize?

Yes, we are in the great tribulation, but we are destined for a great reunion. And this great reunion is not a future that you have to make, but it is where the lamb himself will lead you. We are people who cry, come Lord Jesus, not because we are weak, but because our hope is strong. And we cry that because it removes the sense that we have to bring his kingdom into the world and reminds us that he brings his kingdom into us and into our world.

God's future determines our present lives. And so think of the promises of this great reunion that are held out to the worshipers and to us. We see that in verse 16 where it says:

They will no longer hunger, they will no longer thirst. The sun will no longer strike them nor will any scorching heat. — Revelation 7:16

And that promise is given to us because that's what our present life feels like. To live in a time of tribulation pictured by hunger and thirst and scorching heat.

In this season of waiting, you will have trouble because Advent is not for the weak. Advent is not for the faint of heart. Are you weary? You should be. But what would you expect? Your shepherd is the lamb who is slain. But that's a part of the beautiful picture that John paints to us. Because here he shows us the lamb who is the shepherd. And he draws into everyone's mind the twenty-third Psalm.

The Lord is the shepherd who leads us by still waters so that we who are thirsty can drink. That he is the good shepherd that leads us through the valley of the shadow of death so that we can come to dwell with the Lord forever. — Psalm 23

This is what John holds out for us in the passage when he says:

The one seated on the throne will shelter them. — Revelation 7:15

And that word for shelter is the same word in Greek for tabernacle. The lamb brings the people to dwell in his midst, to be with him. He brings the people through the valley of the shadow of death so that they no longer know the power of death, but they know the power of healing that comes from being in his presence.

He will guide them to the springs of the water of life and God will wipe every tear away from their eyes. — Revelation 7:17

The lamb will be the same shepherd who laid down his life for his sheep. And just as he was slain for our healing, so also he is enthroned for our healing. He is at the center of the throne so that you can know that all the resources of heaven, all the power of the lamb is used to heal his wounded saints.

We do not have to be afraid of our trials. We do not have to be afraid of the tribulation. We do not have to be afraid of our sorrows because there is no sorrow that can come to us that does not come without the permission of the one who is seated at the center of the throne. There is no sorrow that can come to us that does not go through his nail-pierced hand. There is no sorrow that we experience as thirst in this world that we do not know he understands more deeply because he was the one on the cross who cried out, "I thirst."

There is no sorrow that marks our life as we walk through the valley of the shadow of death that can cause us to be afraid because we know that he himself didn't just go into that valley but went into death. So that he could lead us through that into his presence, that we could dwell with him in his healing.

Death, pain, sin are here and it feels like they're breathing down our necks. Evil seems to surround us. It seems to be at the center of our lives and the center of our world, but don't believe it. This passage tells us what is at the center of this world. What is at the center of the throne? It is the lamb who was slain. It is the lamb who is conquering. It is the lamb who will bring all his people through the great tribulation to the great reunion, where they can dwell with him in his healing.

This is what the hymn that we rarely sing says:

Joy the desolate light of the straying, hope of the penitent, faithless and pure. Here speaks the comforter in mercy saying, earth has no sorrows, heaven cannot cure.

Why are there no sorrows that heaven cannot heal? Because the King of Kings and Lord of Lords is the lamb who is slain and all power and glory and honor and wisdom belong to him. And through his death, he brings healing.

This is the good shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep so that we fear no evil. But we know that we will all be brought through him to dwell in his presence forever. That future, your future if you are in Christ, determines how you view your present time.

Hold this worshipful hope in your hearts as we await the coming of the lamb.

Let's pray. Our Lord and our God, we thank you for this vivid picture that can help us to know how to hope. Help us to draw close to you in worship, that this hope might permeate our life. We pray this for Jesus' sake. Amen.