Revelation: Part 4

Yesterday’s prophesies for today’s world. When anyone anywhere responds to this knowledge by having a desire to know this God, God will move heaven and earth to get the message so them. And now the continuation of Hal Lindsey’s Bible study, the book of Revelation. John called him in beginning, there always was the word.

And the word always was face‑to‑face with God, and the word always was God. He calls him ‑‑ he calls Jesus by the title of “the word.” Why? Because just think of what a difficult time I would have up here tonight if I was trying to teach this class, but I couldn’t use words.

I’d have to use sign language, and so it would be very difficult. Because you see, my words reveal my invisible self to you. My invisible self has certain things to say to you, and those words clothe my invisible self and bring them out to you. That’s why Jesus is called by the title “the word.”

He brings into visible recognition the invisible God. He is the one who always ‑‑ the second person that God had, he is always that one who unveils and reveals the invisible God. And that way he is definitely the faithful witness. He is the exact moving picture in every word, deed and thing he did of God, the father.

Before Jesus, no human had ever been resurrected from these corruptible human ‑‑ this corruptible human being into an incorruptible eternal being. He has done that since. The first‑born from the dead. He’s the first fruit of the great harvest of which we’re going to be a part.

Isn’t that wonderful? I mean, the ‑‑ and for us, we may get the ‑‑ the eticket ride. Because, you know, it says there’s going to be a generation ‑‑ Paul talked about this mystery in first corinthians. He says behold, I show you a mystery.

We shall not all die, but we shall all be changed. See, everyone knew about resurrection in the Old Testament, but no one knew there would be a generation that wouldn’t die, but would be shot into heaven and turned from mortal to immortal without seeing death. Man, I hope we make that. That ‑‑ it’s okay if we don’t, I’ll ‑‑ you know, but, Lord, I’d sure like to make that one.

That would just be so exciting. And the wonderful thing about it is I believe some of them ‑‑ some of you I’m looking at right now will not die, but will go straight to heaven. When Jesus ‑‑ remember I said Jesus come to see you, what’s the word? Come up here.

“Come up here.” That’s what he said to John, and we’ll see ‑‑ boy, we’ll really see that when we got to John 4:1. Come up here and instantly he was standing before the throne of God and said, oh, boy. As it says in Colossians 1:15, in that context, versus 15 through 17, it says, and he, Jesus, is the image of the invisible God, the first‑born of all creation.

Now see, the first‑born of all creation, that’s referring to being the first human to be resurrected. For by him all things were created, both in heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things have been created through him and for him. And here’s ‑‑ this is what always blows my mind, verse 17: he is before all things, and in him, all things hold together. You know, I’ll never forget meditating on this back in the ’50s, and we had just set off the first thermonuclear weapon, we called it the hydrogen bomb then.

Just set off the first hydrogen bomb in the south pacific at eniwetok. You know, I got ‑‑ I must have watched the movie of that thing going off many, many times. And I was studying colossians and I came across it, I was just a brand‑new believer. I was looking at that verse and all of a sudden it just hit me.

I said, oh, my Lord, I said, you know, I was wondering how a few atoms of hydrogen would have such power to do the inconceivable damage that the hydrogen bomb did. And all of that awesome power was simply let loose by causing the neutrons and protons in a hydrogen nuclei to split. In other words, it was taking the force that held those teeny little atoms together and releasing them. That’s how much power is released.

It’s the power that takes it to hold it together. And so when you split an atom, you cause the ‑‑ and please don’t hold me, I’m not a scientist, so don’t hold me too close to this, but I know approximately, that if you can make the neutrons and protons of an atom split, and what you do is release the power that held them together, that is what is an explosion. And I thought, how many atoms are in the universe? Jesus Christ is the power that holds every atom in all the universe together.

You see, every ‑‑ every created thing was created from raw divine power. Everything in your being is just simply awesome omnipotent power held together by his power. Every element in the world is just simply atoms that are held together by his power. That is who stepped out of heaven into time and loved us so much that he became a man.

And looking down through history, he knew you by name and he died for every sin you’d ever commit. It’s almost beyond conception, isn’t it? Let’s go on. The ruler of the kings of the earth.

You know, Jesus has not asserted his authority yet, but at the cross he won back the title deed to the earth. Adam was the benedict arnold of eternity. Because God gave Adam the title deed to the earth, and when Satan got Adam to follow him, he won the title deed to the earth and all mankind in it, it became his. And, you know, God honors all commitments.

So since Satan won it by Adam following him, God had to honor the fact. As a matter of fact, you read the first two chapters of the book of job, you’ll notice that Satan comes into heaven and God asks him, where have you been? And he says, I’ve been on earth and I’ve been walking about, and he just let God know in no uncertain terms he was just going about inspecting all the things that were his. And mocking God about it.

You know, that’s why before Jesus was resurrected no human being could be taken off this planet. They were kept in a place called Hades or Abraham’s bosom, or paradise. You know, paradise and Abraham’s bosom are empty right now because when Jesus was raised from the dead, it says he took all with him to heaven. So when we die today, we go instantly to be face‑to‑face with Jesus Christ, 2 Corinthians 5 versus 1 through 10.

In the Old Testament, they went to Abraham’s bosom. Why is that so? Because when Jesus paid for the sin of mankind at the cost of his own blood dying for every sin mankind would commit, he purchased back the title deed that had been forfeited. And, therefore, he is the king of kings and Lord of lords and he is going to assert that authority soon.

Then this place is going to be under new management. But here’s something really exciting. It says from him ‑‑ not literally ‑‑ in the Greek, it’s not “to him,” but “from him.” From him who loves us and released us from our sins by his blood.

Now, here’s where Greek verbs come in real handy, really important. When it says from him who loves us, present tense, it means he constantly loves you and loves me. And then it says that he released us from our sins by his blood. The word “released,” actually means being freed from slavery, and it’s in the aorist tense, which means the moment you believe in Jesus Christ, once and for all, at that point of time, you are freed, released, from your sins.

Now, you can still sin as a believer, but he will discipline you as a child, not disown you, because from the moment you believe, you are loosed and forgiven of past, present and future sins. Now, let me show you an illustration. How many of your sins were future when Jesus died for you? All of them.

All right. If all of your sins were future, how many of your sins were bothering God? All of them. So for how many would Jesus have to die to accept you at all?

All of them. So when you believe in Jesus, how many are forgiven? All of them. You got it.

That’s why the aorist tense is used. The moment you believe in Jesus Christ, you become God’s possession. You are bought with the blood of Jesus Christ. You can’t earn it, you can’t deserve it, you can’t buy it and you can’t lose it.

Amen. Because if you could, you would. I’ll guarantee you. Salvation is spelled out very carefully in Ephesians 2:8‑9: for by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves, as a gift of God, not of works lest any man should boast.

You know, there are going to be all kinds of sinners in heaven? Because we’re all sinners. But you know, there’s one kind of sinner that’s not going to be there? There’s not going to be one boaster that says, “I helped God.”

I’m here, but, you know, I gave him a little help. Oh, there won’t be any of that. He loves you and he died, he released you, aorist tense. Now, let me quickly go through the rest of this.

He has ‑‑ it says in some translations that he ‑‑ he has made us to be a kingdom priest to his God. It literally says he’s made us to be kings and priests to his God. Okay? I’m going to pose a question for you to meditate on for this week, too.

Another question. What does it mean? What does it mean that he’s made us kings and priests? Kings by very nature of the word means you rule over some intelligent beings.

And priests are even more important because a priest represents and appeals before God on behalf of another intelligent being. A priest is someone who intercedes for another intelligent being that needs help. What do you think that means? You know, the Bible says there are a lot of things God hasn’t told us.

He’s got a lot of surprises for us. So if you’re going to be a king and you’re going to be a priest, that means there’s some ‑‑ there’s some intelligent beings out there we don’t know about. We know about angels. We do know that we will rule angels, but they don’t need priests.

Yeah, that’s really exciting to me, because, you know, at ‑‑ at first when I first became a believer, I kind of thought, well, you know, play a harp all the time, I think I’d get bored. Okay. Verse 7: behold, he is coming with clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and all the tribes of the earth will mourn over him. Even so.

Amen. You know, several times ‑‑ in fact, seven times the Bible says that Christ is coming with clouds. That’s interesting. But let me tell you something: the Bible says in the Rapture you’re going to be caught up into the clouds.

When it says in chapter 19 we come back with Christ, we are the clouds. In other words, there will be so many of us coming back with him that it looks like clouds. And I think that’s what it’s talking about in Hebrews 12:1 where it says since we have so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every hinderance and keep pressing on to win the prize. Now, it says that every eye will see him.

Well, this has to be talking about the Second Coming, because in the Rapture, it happens so instantaneously, no one will see it, no one will know it. Now, also it says ‑‑ it’s interesting that in the Greek, it says that every eye will see him, but it says especially those who pierced him. Zechariah 12:10 says, and this was 2550 years ago, I will pour out on the house of David, on the inhabitants of Jerusalem in the spirit of grace and of supplication so that they will look on me whom they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only son. And they will weep bitterly over him like the bitter weeping for the first‑born.

Man, I’m telling you, there are going to be some conversions like you never dreamed. The God that we pierced, especially the Israelites. And then he says, I am the alpha and the omega, verse 8. I am the alpha and the omega says the Lord God.

You know what? He’s not only the Word of God, he’s the alphabet of God, which means that anything God wants to let us know, he’s the one that will do it. He’s the alpha and the omega, the first letter and the last letter of the Greek alphabet. And he is the one that’s going to let us know everything, and he’s letting us know a lot right now.

All right. And then we complete it by ‑‑ this will be the last development here. It says at the end of verse 8, it says the Lord God who is, who was and who is to come, the almighty. Now, who is this talking about?

Jesus. See, the same thing that was said about the father is now said about Jesus. He who always is, who always was and always will be to come. Jesus Christ.

And it says he is the pata cretar, the almighty God. You know, there’s a verse that you’ve just got to put in your notes here, it’s from Isaiah 9, versus 6 and 7, it’s a prophecy. We sing it in the hymns during Christmas. It says for a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us, and a government will rest on his shoulders and his name will be called ‑‑ now listen.

This is a child that’s predicted will be born to Israel and a son will be given. What’s the name of this child that will be born? Wonderful counselor, God almighty. That’s what el gibhor means, the mighty God means God almighty.

El gibhor in Hebrew. The child that will be born will be called God almighty. Now, either Isaiah should have been stoned as a false prophet or these ‑‑ you know, he so proved he was a true prophet of God by giving the credentials of fulfilled prophesy, they didn’t dare. So he was telling the truth.

The child that would be born would be God almighty, it was predicted 2750 years ago, fulfilled in Jesus. Now, reading on, literally in the Hebrew, the father of eternity and the prince of peace, there will be no end to ‑‑ literally, to the extent of his government or of peace. He will reign on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forever more, and the zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this. Who was that predicting?

It can only be one, the son of David, the greater son of David, Jesus Christ. And it predicted that he would be born as a child but would also be God almighty. Do you grasp ‑‑ you know, can you grasp in your heart what all this means? The one who holds the universe together, the one who created everything, visible or invisible.

The one who has always been the object of heaven’s worship and glory, loved each of you enough to lay aside all of that, come into this world, become what we are, and willingly go to the most horrible death that any human being will ever ‑‑ I’m not talking about the physical sufferings, I’m talking about when he was made sin. Just think about a lovely girl that’s been raised with love and tenderness all of her life, and then is gang raped by a whole army. That would give you one trillionth of an idea of what it was like for Jesus to have sin laid on him. It was beyond anything we could imagine.

You know, there’s a lot of hymns ‑‑ unfortunately a lot of hymn writers write beautiful hymns that express doctrinal error. But you know what? There’s one that I love and I wished I could sing, but I can’t. I’ll read you the words because this hymn sums up everything I’m trying to say.

It says I’m not worthy, the least of his favor, yet Jesus left heaven for me. The word became flesh and died as my Savior, forsaken on dark Calvary. I am not worthy, this heart gladly beats it, I’m not worthy, this dull tongue repeats it. Jesus loved heaven to die in my place, what mercy, what love, what grace.

Father, we thank you, we can never praise you enough for what you’ve done for us. Thank you for the gift of forgiveness and eternal life. Thank you for the assurance of being in your presence forever. Thank you for knowing that no matter what happens on this earth, we’re in your hands.

And thank you for the hope that we’ll see you soon. If there’s one here that has never received the gift of pardon that has his or her name on it right now, have that one right now simply say thank you Jesus for dying for me. I receive the gift of pardon. Come into my life, I can’t change it, but I give you the right and I ask you to do it.

In Jesus’ name, amen. Join us next week for the continuation of Hal Lindsey’s Bible study of the book of Revelation. You can find more of Hal Lindsey at his website, www.hallindsey.com. There, you can access our video and article archives.

Visit our online store for Hal Lindsey’s cds, books and other specialty items. To support this program, send your tax‑deductible gift to Hal Lindsey media ministries, p.o. Box 470470, Tulsa, Oklahoma 74147. You can also support this ministry online, visit hallindsey.com or call 1‑888‑Rapture.