The Throne Room Rev 4

All right, good morning, good morning. Sorry about the delay, some technical difficulties both with the printer as well as with connecting to Facebook, but we are here this morning. Hello to you, Connie. All right, I forgot I had to take these headphones off because of the delay. And Eric, it's good to see you as well. Good morning, Rod and Gail. Okay, let's go ahead and get underway because we are running behind and we need to begin. Good morning to Carol and Gail. We're going to talk this morning from Revelation chapter 4 and we're going to be dealing with the throne room of the holy of holies. And this will just be a little bit of an introductory message into chapter 4. And then we'll, so I'm going to have to break this one down into several parts because it's a little bit too much to try to do at one time. And so we'll cover some of that later. But let's go ahead and get started. As I said, there was some technical problems with the printer and my notes as well as with the getting on this morning, but we'll go ahead and start. So in the first three chapters of the book of Revelation, we have those things taking place in the first part of the temple. At least that's what's being portrayed because you have those lampstands and in those lampstands that indicated the place that was outside the second veil. You have examples of that in Hebrews chapter 9. So if you turn to Hebrews chapter 9, we can see where it says, then the first covenant, this is verse 1 of chapter 9, then verily the first covenant had also ordinances of divine service and a worldly sanctuary. That was the division of the tabernacle where it was showing where these particular items of furnishings were placed because it says, well, there was a tabernacle made in the first, wherein was the candlestick and the table and the showbread, which is called the sanctuary. And that's verse 2. So when we see the opening scene of the book of Revelation, this is what we see in terms of these seven lampstands. And verse 12 and 13 of the chapter says, then I turned to see the voice that spoke at me and having turned, I saw seven golden lampstands. And in the midst of the seven lampstands, one like the son of man clothed with a garment down to his feet and girded about the chest with a golden band. Now, this is also seen in the book of Exodus, Exodus 25 and verse 31. When he, when Moses is being instructed to construct the tabernacle and it says that thou shall make a candlestick of pure gold, of beaten work shall the candlestick be made. His shaft and his branches, his bowls, his knops and flowers shall be of the same. And thou shall make the seven lamps thereof, and they shall light the lamps thereof. And they may, that they may give light over against it. So that's Exodus 25 and verse 37. And you can also see it in Exodus 26 and verse 33, Exodus 26 and verse 34, where you have the mercy seat upon the ark of the testimony and the most holy. And then you have the table outside the veil and the lampstand across from the table on the side of the tabernacle toward the south. And they would put the table on the north side. So that's verse 35. Now in the right hand, according to verse 16, it says he has in his right hand, this is revelation 116, by the way, in his right hand, the seven stars out of his mouth when a sharp two edged sword and his countenance was as the sun shines in his strength. Let me see. I'm trying to make sure I started the recorder. I don't remember if I did or not, but I need to stop and at least check that. So I want to go back. So please give me for a second to just make this pause because I may not have done it trying to get all those technical issues taken care of and we did not. So I apologize for that. Okay. So we got a part of it recorded and we'll get the whole thing recorded today. And so back to where we were. And I'll just, just briefly say that this scene that we have opening up in chapter four is one where we have the transition from one part of the tabernacle to the other, or one part of the temple to the other. The first three chapters that dealt with the seven churches have to do with the Lord among the seven candlesticks. And that pointed to the first part of the temple that was Hebrew chapter nine, verses one and two, and then Exodus 25, where we could see it in verse 31, verse 37, and also chapter 26, verses 33 through 35. So that's just kind of a brief recap of what we had covered before. Now, that being the case, we talked about the seven stars that were in his right hand and out of his mouth goes the two-edged sword, and his countenance was as the sun shining in its strength. And that's Revelation 1.16. And then he interprets all of that to say that the mystery of the seven stars, verse 20, which you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels or the messengers of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands which you saw are the seven churches. Now, from there, we see that from that point that Christ worked in the holy place, the first part of the temple as symbolized there, and that this message is a message to the seven churches, and that's what he was doing in that first part. However, from that inspection of the churches, as we saw in the first three chapters, then he moved to chapter four. And believe it or not, there's still some issues going on with my screen and my notes, et cetera. They're just not falling into place right. But anyway, we'll go on. So, after these things, I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven. And the first voice which I heard was like a trumpet speaking with me, saying, come up here, and I will show you things which must take place after this. So, the chapter four opens with an invitation to John to enter the holy of holies. And in this, he sees this door open in heaven that represents an ascent to the most holy place, which is the location of the throne of God. And the holy place of God was an ascent to his throne. If you're familiar with the temple and where the priests would go to make the atoning sacrifice, et cetera, they would ascend up the steps in the temple or the tabernacle, but particularly in the temple. And so, from that point, he was summoned to meet with God, just as Moses was in the mountain in Exodus 19. Isaiah also talks about in Isaiah two, the mountain of the Lord's house. So, you see this high and lifted up place. And then when we go to Isaiah chapter six and verse one, it says, in the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon the throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. So, it's a temple scene. It's a scene of the throne of God. And it's one that is at a higher elevation than what we see in the area where the regular priests went. This is the place where the high priests would go. And so, John is called up into this place. And then in so doing, he hears a voice like a trumpet saying, you know, come up here. And again, this loud voice is typical of the appearances of God in the Holy of Holies. Exodus 19 verses 16 through 19, but also Hebrews chapter 12 and verse 19, which recounts the Exodus event is important here. So, in verse 18 of chapter 12, he says, for you have not come to the mountain that may be touched and that burned with fire into blackness and darkness and tempest, and to the sound of a trumpet and the voice of words, so that those who heard it begged that the word should not be spoken to them anymore. And so, that is the message that follows what had been given to the seven churches. So, John is about to see some of the mysteries of God revealed in the book of Revelation, just as the first verse says, the revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him to show to his servant things which must shortly come to pass. And he sent and signified it by his angel to his servant, John. So, as Ezekiel in the vision of the throne vision that he saw a message of impending judgment on Israel was about to be revealed, but also in that message, there was also the blessing of the salvation of the remnant. And this is what we see unfolding in the book of Revelation as we move forward. It is a message of the impending judgment that was about to take place, but also of the salvation of the remnant and their deliverance through those events and through the trials that the churches were about to go through, as we had mentioned in the message to the seven churches. And so, this vision is similar to that, which is recorded in the Testament of Levi. Just to give you some idea of what's said there, it says the Testament of Levi describes a vision. And of course, I don't take this as an inspired book, obviously, but what these books will do is sometimes give some insight on the literature of that time and how people view things. And sometimes they can be helpful in helping us to understand a little bit about the writings in the scriptures, because these were the resources and tools that they had or that they used at that time. And so, there's much in some of that apocalyptic literature that will help us to understand these things. So, at any rate, the Testament of Levi describes a vision in which Levi was taken through the heavens and the angel who went with them said, you shall stand near the Lord, you shall be his priest, and you shall tell forth his mysteries to men. So, that sounds a lot like what was about to happen with John. He was invited into the Holy of Holies. We'll see when we start next week and we talk about the 24 elders around the throne, we will see that that gets more into a priesthood concept as we will develop that. And so, Levi ascended. At this moment, the angel opened for me the gates of heaven, and I saw the holy Motei sitting on the throne. And he said to me, Levi, to you, I have given the blessing of the priesthood until I shall come and dwell in the midst of Israel. And then the angel led me back to earth. And that's the Testament of Levi chapter 5 verses 1 through 3. So, notice how similar that message is to what we have in chapter 4 of Revelation, but also not only chapter 4 in the scriptures themselves, because it kind of tells the whole message in one sense, where the gates of heaven are open, he sees the Motei sitting on the throne, and then he says he had been given the blessing of the priesthood until he comes. Now, he's saying that that's to Levi until he comes, and that sort of takes us back to the text in Hebrews chapter 7, 11, and 12, where he says, therefore, if perfection were through the Levitical priesthood, for under it the people received the law, what further need was there that another priest should rise according to the order of Melchizedek and not be called according to the order of Aaron? For the priesthood being changed, there is of necessity a change also of the law. So, from that perspective, we're seeing this transition and change from the Levitical priesthood to the priesthood of Melchizedek, of which Christ being of the tribe of Judah would be the high priest. And it's these messages that are being revealed in the book of Revelation. They've been taught, of course, in the epistles, but the actuality of them are beginning to unfold, and so this is why we have the visions mentioned here. And it again shows you the priestly concepts and the temple typology, etc., in the book of Revelation. And so, the mysteries of the priesthood are described in the Qumran text. The teacher of righteousness was to be a priest to whom God would reveal all the mysteries of the words of the prophets. Again, that's the message that you see John is receiving from Christ, so it's being revealed to him. These wisdom writings exhort the reader to consider the rods, and I'm going to try to pronounce this word, milie, the mystery of existence, or perhaps it means the mystery to come, and I would think more of the latter. So, there are frequent references to this term. For those who ponder it, they will learn the birth of salvation and who was to inherit glory or trouble. So again, in very general terms, that's the same message that we see in the book of Revelation, because it's talking about the salvation that would be brought. You can see evidence of that in Revelation chapter 12, but you also see it in Revelation chapter 19, and of course, the chapters where they enter into the realm of glory in chapter 21 and chapter 22. The two fragments together from the Qumran text show that this was the knowledge of the God of the awesome ones, the knowledge of the past, the present, and the future, of the truth, of iniquity, of wisdom, and foolishness. Now that sort of indicates or at least alludes to Revelation 119, or it's probably taken from that, but nevertheless, Revelation 119, where he says that he would show him things that were past, things that were present, and things that were about to come. So, these were things that were near and were about to be unveiled. And so, they thank God for his knowledge, his mysteries, and marvelous mysteries and knowledge, and then Melchizedek was to reveal the ends of the ages. So, they have this idea of what's taking place in Revelation chapter 4, in opening up the throne room to the holy of holies. And then, the last one that I will talk about in terms of these visions would be the vision that was similar to the record in the book of Enoch, where he was told to come, and or at least this was Enoch saying to this Rabbi Ishmael, I will show you, he says, come and I will show you the curtain of the divine majesty which is spread before the Holy One, blessed be He. On it are written all the generations of the world and all their deeds, actions, doings, both of what they have done and what they will do until the end of all generations. Well, when you look in the book of Revelation, again, and you see where the text says Christ is going to judge each one according to his works, you look at the seven churches and he makes that statement, you know, to them, I know your works, etc. So, you can see what's being revealed concerning them. And of course, they deal with all of those who were influencers among them. So, the open door took them into a time beyond time, if you please. It was the piercing into eternity. And that's what the scriptures reveal about the Holy of Holies. This is where they move from the temporal age that was coming to an end into the age that has no end. And so, it represents that which is beyond time from that perspective. Now, it's still taking place in time as far as those who are earth dwellers are concerned, but it moves into what we would consider to be eternity. And that was an imminent future that was coming about at the time. So, John says he was in the spirit, and these were the things that he saw. The concepts here would be the part of the tabernacle that are stated in Hebrews 9, 3 through 6. And so, we can compare that. And then he says, the one who sat on the throne in Revelation chapter 4, when he describes him, and I found this rather interesting because I looked in several commentaries and some give different concepts of this throne, but it says, immediately I was in the spirit and behold, a throne set in heaven and one sat on the throne. And of course, when we talk about the throne, we're talking about Christ's throne in the temple, in the tabernacle. And this is where all of the communication, God's judgment, his blessings, his laws, etc. This is where all of that took place. You have that again in Exodus chapter 25. And in Exodus 25, and the verse is 21 and 22, he says, you shall put the mercy seat on the top of the ark. And in the ark, you should put the testimony that I will give you. And there, I will meet with you and I will speak with you from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim, which are on the ark of the testimony about everything, which I will give you in commandment to the children of Israel. You also have the same thing indicated in Ezekiel chapter nine, when God was about to judge Israel for all the abominations that were committed among them. Again, that judgment takes place from the throne. If you please, the text will actually say, when he's meeting out there, judgment began at my sanctuary. So that again, of course, is a reference to God speaking from his throne in the holy of holies. And then in first Peter chapter four and verse 17, when the Bible says, for the time of the judgment has come and must begin at the house of God. So all of those represent the place where God issues his judgments from his throne. And of course, that would be in the holy of holies. Then in verse three, as it describes the throne, he who sat there was like a Jasper and a Sardius stone in appearance. And there was a rainbow around the throne in appearance like an emerald. So when I looked up these terms, Jasper and this Sardius stone, now some commentaries say that this was crystal clear, that it was transparent and crystal clear. But another one, and with some of the images that I was able to find for the Jasper stone, indicated that it was sort of reddish or reddish brown in color. And that seemed to be more in line because the Sardius stone was also kind of brownish red. It was a bit more brownish in hue than was the Jasper stone. And so it makes me wonder why some say it was crystal or clear as crystal and the others in a different hue. That seems to harmonize with also what has been stated in the previous times when the Bible talks about the throne of God, because in Exodus chapter 24, it is a Sardius stone, not Sardius, Sapphire. It's Sapphire. And again, in Ezekiel, it was a Sapphire. So these were stones that had a deep color to them in some way. They may have been sort of translucent in a way, but the hue of them was definitely evident as opposed to those that did not have any color to them whatsoever. And so he who sat on it was like a Jasper and a Sardius stone in appearance. There was a rainbow around the throne in appearance like an emerald. And an emerald, of course, that would be more of a greenish hue. So all of these seem to have a color to them that were expressive of God sitting on this throne rather than something that was unseen. Now, there are some images in the book of Revelation that do indicate transparency and that which is very clear, but in this one, it was a bit different from that perspective. And so he says in verse four, around the throne were the 24 thrones and on the thrones, I saw 24 elders sitting clothed in white robes and they had crowns of gold on their heads. These 24 elders represent priests. They're said to be the elders among the priests and they are clothed in white robes which indicate the garments of the priests and then they had crowns on their heads and that would indicate the royal priesthood that we see spoken of in the New Testament. I want to stop here because I want to develop this a little bit further. You can see as we were talking about the colors and the hues, when you look in verse five or rather verse six, it says before the throne, there was a sea of glass and white crystals. So you do have a crystal indicated in this imagery, but in the previous imagery, it was more that which had some colors to it. So that's just an introductory, a brief one into the throne room of God. It is a reference to the Holy of Holies that John is called to where God is going to reveal to him those things that we see unfolding in the book of Revelation and those things that pertain primarily to the future because as he goes in and is called up, he says, come and I will show you the things which must take place after this. We've already seen where those things were imminent, where they were shortly to come to pass. And of course, once those things are done, then what follows them would be those things that have to do with the new heavens and the new earth, those things that are eternal. So next week we'll be back. We'll talk about the elders on the throne and we'll look more into these living creatures that we have as we examine the throne room and the Holy of Holies in the chapter. With that, I want to thank you for being here. Let's check and see who do we have. Dale says, I currently hold that the stones in Revelation 2130 symbolize the rainbow, the Genesis covenant to mankind regarding baptism. Okay. He certainly does mention the rainbow in connection with these and these would be some of the colors in the rainbow as far as we can see. Let's see. I think I've spoken to most of you, Carlos, Dale, Stephen, Robin, Jermaine. I talked to Theo yesterday and he's gave me some very good reports about you and the work that you're doing. So I appreciate all of that that's going on in your area. So keep up the great work. All right. Most certainly Dale, there's definitely more to it and we'll get a chance to delve into it a little bit more, but right now we're pretty much out of time. So we got kind of a late start and due to some technical difficulties, but we will see you on next week and we'll continue our study on the throne room in Revelation chapter four.