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When the Stars Begin to Fall

Series: Revelation

by Liam Goligher May 9, 2021 Scripture: Revelation 6

When I was a boy, there was a book released called “The Late, Great Planet Earth.” It was written by Hal Lindsey. If you even know the name or have heard the title of the book, you must be ancient like me. One of the things that Hal Lindsey said in his book was that if you want to understand the book of Revelation and the prophetic books of the Bible, you had to have your Bible in one hand and your newspaper in the other. Now I was influenced by this book. So in my first church, at the evening service, I started preaching with titles that were intended to attract audiences, which they did by the way. Russia in prophecy was very popular. The European Union and the Bible was even more popular. And when I promised that I might name Antichrist, we had a pack out.

Now the problem was, of course, that as I preached those sermons, and by the way I also started studying the book of Daniel in one of the midweek meetings that I had to do at the church, what I discovered was that if I didn’t have “The Late Great Planet Earth” to read, actually I would never have got it out of the Bible. And if I didn’t have all these other guys’ books on the prophet with me, I would never have come to the conclusions that they came to just by reading the Bible on its own.

You see, one of the things that John teaches us in the book of Revelation is that you need all of the Bible to understand the Bible. Richard Bauckham, who was a professor in Cambridge University, said that the book of Revelation is the only work of Christian prophecy that forms part of the New Testament canon. It stands — Revelation stands — alongside Daniel and Ezekiel and Isaiah and Jeremiah and the twelve, what we call the minor of prophets. I don’t think they thought they were minor, but the twelve, group of twelve at the end of the Old Testament. The book of Revelation self-consciously understands itself to be the culmination of the whole prophetic tradition of Israel. At the end of the book of Revelation it tells you, it tells you that nothing will be added to this book of prophecy. This is God’s last word about what God is doing in the world, and what God is going to do with the world. That’s why it’s so important.

And so as you read the book of Revelation, you find that it is steeped in Old Testament language and prophecy because the Old Testament is the word of God. And the New Testament gathers together all the strands of God’s truth and focuses them on the fulfillment of all of that totality of revelation that’s been given to us, the fulfillment that is found in Christ. And what this book of Revelation does is shows us how God’s will will be done on earth, and how God’s kingdom will come. That’s why we have this book in the Bible. And he demonstrates in this book that Jesus’ life and death and resurrection is the key that unlocks God’s purposes to bless every family on the earth through his church — his church that lives by, dies for, and conquers through its allegiance to Jesus, and to the truth of Jesus.

We live in a society that has become relativized when it comes to truth. As far as truth is concerned, you have your truth, I have my truth, we have our truth, whatever it may be. This book presents us with absolute truth. It reminds us that the church, as the church is to witness in the world and can only be authentic to the degree to which it witnesses to the truth, the absolute truth that is found in Jesus.

Now we’re going to be looking at the very end of this chapter this morning. And what prompts this ending to the chapter is the cry of the martyrs that we looked at last Sunday.

“How long, O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?”

Revelation 6:10

It’s a cry for justice. Justice that has been held back. These are men and women who have died, been martyred; they’re now in heaven, they’re perfect, they’re sinless, and they’re crying for God to act in justice in the world, and justice on earth dwellers. Now that’s not just a reference to the location of the people, that is a reference to the mindset of the people. It’s a reminder that many men and women, perhaps vast numbers of men and women, suppress the natural knowledge of God that we inherit simply by being human. And seeing it displayed for us in natural beauty in the universe that God has made as a sign of his presence and to teach us something about his eternal power and Godhead.

There have been many men in history, I say men in history — some women — but I’m thinking of ancient times when very patriarchal societies, it was the men who were the philosophers. And those philosophers saw what God had left for them to see, like Plato and Aristotle. They had a conception of the God who is as being invisible and infinite, and being the author of everything that there is, making it out of nothing. They could describe this God to you — the God of the Bible actually — but they didn’t believe in him. They could give you such an accurate portrait of the deity of God, but they did not put their faith and their trust in him. They suppressed the natural knowledge that they had. And instead of that their eyes, and the eyes of so many today, don’t rise any higher than earthly things.

Now John is addressing this, and he gives us in doing so a series of sevens – seven seals, seven trumpets, seven bowls of wrath. And one of the things we see is a pattern as these sevens are unfolded for us. We see the beginning, something we can identify, for example, here in this set of seven that we’re looking at, as the seals are unfolded for us. At the beginning, we saw the risen, resurrected Christ, fresh from Calvary, coming to the throne of God and receiving the kingdom and taking the book of destiny into his hands. We know that that happened — the resurrection, the ascension — there it is. At the end of every series, we are brought to the last things, to the end of history, to the final day, and that’s where we are brought today.

And as John is given this final aspect of these seven seals, in the, in the opening of the sixth seal, we are introduced, first of all, to the presence of the Judge. Look at it with me:

“And I looked, and behold, there was a great earthquake.”

Revelation 6:12

Now this is no random detail. This is not one of the earthquakes Jesus talks about when he says that throughout this age there will be earthquakes in diverse places. This is a particular earthquake. It’s drawn from the Old Testament, and it carries with it a considerable weight of meaning. Because in the Old Testament, the earthquake usually went along with a theophany, that is, with an appearance of God the Judge. So in Judges chapter 5, when God is leading Israel out to battle, we read these words:

“The mountains quaked before the LORD, even Sinai quaked before the LORD, the God of Israel.”

Before the coming of God to reign over the nations, we read in Psalm 97:

“The mountains melt like wax before the LORD, before the Lord of all the earth.”

Psalm 97:5

And before God comes to judge the nations at the end of history, we read in Isaiah 13:

“Therefore I will make the heavens tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place, at the wrath of the LORD of hosts on the day of his fierce anger.”

Isaiah 13:9

This earthquake marks the presence of the Judge. You go back to Mount Sinai, when God gave the law, and he came to Israel as the Judge of Israel. They said about him:

“When you did awesome things that we did not look for,
you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence.”

Isaiah 64:3

Or in Psalm 68:

“The earth quaked before God, the One of Sinai, before God, the God of Israel.”

Psalm 68:8

Or Psalm 114:

“Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Israel.”

Psalm 114:7

Well, there’s this growing belief as we go through Revelation, that at the end of history there will be a manifestation of God in cosmic terms, and on a cosmic scale. This earthquake is of cosmic proportions. It signals the active presence of God in the affairs of humanity, with a view to final judgment. But this earthquake is not only a sign of the presence of God, it is also part of the final judgment as the plates of the entire world go into convulsions.

“You will be visited by the LORD of hosts with thunder and earthquake and great noise, with whirlwind and tempest, and the flame of devouring fire.”

Isaiah 29:6

And there is a foretaste of that day. When Jesus is on the cross, you remember, and the earth shook, and the rocks were split in two. The writer to the Hebrews tells us that there’s coming a day when God says,

“I will shake not only the earth but also the heaven.”

Hebrews 12:26

And the writer goes on to say when God says this, he indicates the removal, the removal of what is shaken, that is the removal of all that has been made, in order that what cannot be shaken, that is, the new creation, may remain. We see the presence of the Judge. We see the dissolution of the cosmos. The Holy Spirit goes on to describe the dissolution of the cosmos:

“The sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood, the stars of the sky fall to the earth, the sky vanished like a scroll.”

Revelation 6:12

Even though the heavens — the sun, moon, and the stars — were given as heavenly lights to earth, they are, they serve us as astral and lunar and solar clocks, but that’s not all they were given for. They were given as a reminder that we are not alone in the universe. They are given to make us think of something that is above us, bigger than us, outside of us, that is ever engaging with what is going on where we are. That we are not just earthly, but that there is a heavenly, not only a host of stars materially out there in the sky, but they signal that there is a host of other beings there. We live in a universe that is bristling with life. The disruption of the cosmos then is precisely what we’re to expect on the last day. In Joel chapter 2:

“And I will give portents in this the heaven and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, the moon to blood, before the great and terrible day of the LORD.”

Joel 2:30-31

This is the unified message of Scripture. Jesus says,

“In those days the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light, the stars will be falling down from heaven, the powers in the heavens will be shaken, and then they will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds with great power and glory.”

Mark 13:24-26

These movements in the physical heavens are the token of movements in the spiritual heavenly area, in dimensions that we cannot physically see with our eyes. Isaiah puts it like this:

“All the hosts of heaven shall rot away, and the skies roll up like a scroll, all the hosts shall fall as leaves fall from the vine, and as leaves falling from the fig tree.”

Isaiah 34:4

Jesus used that fig tree metaphor. He got it from the Song of Solomon where it talks about the fig tree putting forth or dropping its figs. Jesus uses that as an illustration of his coming at the end of history. When it says, “the sky vanished”, what it’s saying is the physical universe that we look at, as it were, with our physical eyes on the last day will be removed and enable us to see what lies behind the physical universe. What has always been there but has been unseen by us because it belongs in a different dimension to us. The universe will crack and part, as it were, and be partitioned and be rolled away in order we might see that.

That’s precisely what we find talked about throughout Scripture. We are waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God. Now the writer Peter, for example, tells us that we’re to understand this last day, we’re to understand it in terms of what is happening physically, first of all. Physically, he says,

“The heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the elements.” 

2 Peter 3:12

That was the smallest thing he could think about. We can go much smaller than that. We can go to the atom; we can go even smaller than the atom. That’s what he has in mind.

“The elements will melt with fervent heat.”

2 Peter 3:12

At the end of the book, the first heavens and the first earth will pass away. We see the dissolution of the cosmos. Thirdly, we see the wrath of the Lamb.

With the dissolution of the cosmos comes the final judgment. I want you to look at the text. It says there’ll be no distinction in that day. All the people who thought they were something will be nothing on that day. All the power will have been sucked away from those who have the power. Look what it says:

“The kings of the earth, the great ones, the generals, the rich, the powerful, everyone, slave and free.”

Revelation 6:15

Do you see how inclusive that list is? All favoritism has gone, all the tiers of society have disappeared. Here is a level playing field at last. Isaiah says,

“For the LORD of hosts has a day against all that is proud and lofty, against all that is lifted up – and it shall be brought low. And the haughtiness of man shall be humbled, and the lofty pride of men shall be brought low. And the LORD alone shall be exalted on that day.”

Isaiah 2:12, 17

Here we have a picture of the whole fabric of human society, from the emperor to the slave, including everybody else in between. Now they must all meet their Maker.

And there’s more, because as I said earthly things participate in some way in heavenly things. That there is this other higher reality behind earthly reality. There is a spiritual reality behind material reality. That’s why Paul can say to believers, to you and me, we’re sitting in this room this morning, that you’re not only located in this room, you are also located in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus. It does not yet appear what we shall be, but that’s what we are, right now, but it doesn’t appear to people, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, that you aren’t sitting in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus.

Similarly, the leaders, the influencers, the institutions of the world, of this godless age are backed by, in fact they are, simply the agents of other powers. And I’m not talking here about deep state, I’m talking about something far more sinister, and far more solid than deep state, which may exist only in people’s imaginations. I’m talking about “the principalities and the powers, the world rulers of this present darkness, the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.”

You see, this universe is bristling with life, physical and spiritual, visible and invisible, godly and ungodly, human, animal, angelic, demonic. And on the last day, when the sky is ripped apart, the world will see that unseen reality, be terrified by it. Be terrified by it. Isaiah writes of that day:

“Terror, terror of the pit and the snare are upon you, O earth dweller, inhabitant of the earth. He who flees at the sound of terror will fall into the pit, he who climbs out of the pit will be caught by the snare. For the windows of heaven are opened, the foundations of the earth tremble. The earth is utterly broken, the earth is split apart, the earth is violently shaken.”

Isaiah 24:17-19

Why? Because of its transgression.

“Its transgression lies heavy upon it, and it falls — and it will rise no more.”

Isaiah 24:20

It’s the end. The end. The sun, moon, and stars are signs in our material universe of the existence of those invisible powers. And Isaiah explains it to us:

“On that day the LORD will punish the host of heaven and the kings of the earth and they will be punished then. The moon shall be confounded, the sun ashamed, and the LORD of hosts will reign on Zion.”

Isaiah 24:21-23

And so it will be, when the end comes to natural, political, social order of this age. You see, this corrupt world you and I live in has an expiry date appointed by God. And all the previous actions of God — we’ve looked at some of them in the early part of this chapter, when he talks about conquest, and he talks about strife and war, and he talks about famine and disease and pestilence and epidemics — and these things these are all signs of God’s judgment of the world. The world is a world under judgment.

Men and women watching this pandemic — the pandemic that didn’t become as bad as they said it was going to be, but one day it will be as bad as they said it was going to be — but people watching this pandemic, even if it’s a little pandemic, they should have the fear of God in them. Not fear of death, but the fear of God because God is alerting the world to the day that is coming when “he will judge the world by that man he has appointed, Jesus Christ the righteous.”

All the previous actions of God will have been seen to be interim, provisional foretastes of this final act. This world system makes earthly things ultimate things, which is the essence of idolatry. But we’re taken on to the heart of the matter: everyone — the big people, the little people, the powerful people, the weak people — everyone “hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains calling for the rocks and the mountains…’Fall on us…hide us — hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, hide us from the wrath of the Lamb.'”

“The face of him.” We saw in chapter 4 the One who sits on the throne is invisible, that’s God in his Trinitarian life; God is invisible. But God who is invisible makes himself visible. How does he make himself visible? In the Son — in the Lamb. To hide from the face of him who sits on the throne is to hide from the One who is now visible. The wrath of the Lamb — they will see the Lamb — he will return in great power and glory and “every eye will see him”, we’re told.

“Every eye will see him.”

Revelation 1:7

And it’s him they’re hiding from, just as Adam and Eve hid from God when he came looking for them after they’d sinned. On that final day, everybody in the world will want to hide from the face of Jesus. They will want to hide from his face because they know now that he is coming in wrath to judge the world. And God is no respecter of persons. Every human being who has put their faith in this worldly reality alone is now exposed and terrified. In chapter 1 we read, when we were studying it, the words concerning this last day,

“that they shall look upon him whom they pierced.” 

Revelation 1:7

There will be this realization that will come across everybody that Jesus Christ was God. And that we killed God in killing Jesus. The realization will come upon them that their sins — however small their sins may be, however huge their sins may be — their sins nailed Jesus to the cross. They will see that we were serious when we said,

“It is appointed unto men once to die and after death the judgment.”

Hebrews 9:27

They will see why death; because “the wages of sin is death.” Isaiah introduces the day of the Lord like this:

“The Lord has a day . . . and people shall enter the caves of the rocks and the holes of the ground from before the terror of the Lord and from the splendor of his majesty.”

Isaiah 2:12,19

Hosea adds,

“And they shall say to the mountains, ‘Cover us,’ and to the hills, ‘Fall on us.”

Hosea 10:8

And what is the ultimate terror of that day? It is the sight of God Almighty in Christ. Now I want to just, I have to do a little bit of a clarified point of translation here: the word “wrath” here is singular. There are not two wraths. There’s only one wrath. When Jesus bore the wrath of God on the cross it was his own wrath as God that he bore on the cross.

And the other thing is to say that that last phrase “the great day of their wrath” is really the great day of “his” wrath. His wrath has come. Professor Beale reckons a copyist must have thought the plural would make more sense and that’s why in some copies the plural is inserted, but he also points out that later on at the end of the book in chapter 22 a similar formation has the use of he as well, and therefore in being consistent with the usages right throughout the book of Revelation. We probably should read it “for the great day of his wrath has come who can stand?”

The invisible God is made visible in Jesus. When Joel was describing this day, the day of the Lord, he writes:

“the great, the day of the Lord is great and terrible who shall endure it?”

Joel 2:11

The end, when it comes, will be a revelation of God — the face of the one seated on the throne that brings with it the wrath of the Lamb. Earlier on in this in chapter 5, we were told the Lion has conquered. When John turns to look at the Lion, he sees the Lamb as if it had just been slain. The Lion standing before the throne is the Lamb, the Lamb in the great day of his appearing as once more the Lion in the terribleness of his wrath. Somebody has written: “The gospel gives glimpses of this when Jesus is angry with the Pharisees, and he denounces them. When Jesus predicts the doom of those who would not repent. His sinless humanity is capable of righteous anger.”

Can I say this: the worst punishment of the ungodly on that final day will be the wrath of the Lamb. The wrath of the Lamb. Well, the passage ends with a question.

“Who will stand? Who can stand on that day?”

Revelation 6:17

C.S Lewis in his essay “The Weight of Glory” talks about “the only thing that matters in every human life is looking at the face of God in Christ, that is, the face of the Lamb.” The same face that will strike terror into the hearts of the godless, the same face that spells the wrath of God for those who have rejected Christ, and eternal ruin is the face of the Lamb who was slain. It’s the face to which the believer looks. It is the faith which, the face which to the believer, as Lewis says, “is a face of beauty and of supernal light.” The face that brings joy and healing and forgiveness and hope to those who, when we see him as he is, will be like him. The same face.

The face is the face of the one they have rejected, they have despised, they have hated, they have crucified, and before which they will stand on that last day filled with eternal terror.

“The great day of his wrath has come, and who can stand?”

Revelation 6:17

Let Jesus have the last word. He says,

“But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a thief or a trap. For it will come upon all who dwell on the face of the whole earth. But stay awake at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are going to take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.”

Luke 21:34-36

How can I be sure I’m going to stand on that day? How can you be sure you will stand on that day? You become sure by simply trusting him now, putting your life into his hands now, embracing him, receiving him as your Savior now, resting in him and in him alone for your salvation now, knowing yourself right now to be in Christ. That’s the only way to be found standing, rather than scurrying around trying to hide from the face of him who sits on the throne and the wrath of the Lamb.

I want to plead with you today, whether you’re watching my livestream or whether you’re here in this building. This day is going to come. The day of his wrath is going to come. We like to talk about pleasantries; sometimes we get preoccupied by things we can do to make life better here, but I want to tell you this: that day will come. This is a matter of supreme importance. This is not something we can play around with or just have our theological conversations about. That day will come. Jesus was insistent on it. He spoke about it more than anybody else in the whole Bible spoke about it, but he said it will come. And I want to tell you this, you need today, to be sure today, that you are not overtaken by that day.

Some of us here in this room remember how as leaders in the church here, the moment to lockdown came upon us and it came with such speed, we had to make decisions at such speed. Suddenly there was the threat, and at that time it seemed a massive threat, and it came so quickly. Let me tell you, the last day will come upon you instantly. That’s what the Bible says – suddenly. There will be no warning, it will just suddenly come, and Jesus will appear, and it will all be over. It will all be over. Will you be running scurrying around trying to hide from him? Or will you rise up to meet him with joy?

That’s the most important decision you will ever make in your life. May God help you to be sure where you stand today. Don’t wait till tomorrow.

Today.

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Please include the following statement on any distributed copy: By Liam Goligher. © 2024 Tenth Presbyterian Church. Website: tenth.org