Transcript

John Barnett here, my wonderful wife, Bonnie's on the back row. Bonnie is... yeah, I'd clap for her. She is a blessing. I will talk about her now and then. But I won't do that now because I want to introduce you to Revelation. In fact, the way we're going to be introduced to Revelation is something... I want to follow the example of Ezra. You all know Ezra, like the book of the Bible, Ezra. He came back from Babylon with the children of Israel from the exile and the people didn't know the Bible. They were illiterate. And so, he told them that he was going to read them the law of God, the Pentateuch, the Old Testament, which takes several hours. And he told them to stand for the reading of the Word of God. And they stood. And while he was reading, it started raining. And they continued to stand for hours, and he read Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus. Can you believe they stood while he read all that out loud? I'm not going to do that. I would just like to invite you to stand together for the reading of the Word of God with me. So, stand up. I know you're all connected to your computers, and I know it's hard to stand. You have to move your chairs. But this will make Revelation chapter 1 be different to you. Because the first time this book was presented the people heard it read from a scroll, which looks like a roll of paper towel, to them by the pastor of their church. And they didn't have a copy, and they just stood there, and it takes an hour and 20 minutes to read this out loud, maybe an hour and 10 minutes. Can you imagine? So, you're going to experience a little bit of that, but here we go.

Revelation chapter 1, verse 1, the revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants things which must shortly take place. And He sent and signified it by His angel to His servant, John, who bore witness to the Word of God, to the testimony of Jesus Christ and to all things that he saw. Now, verse 3. Blessed is he who reads. It's the only book of the Bible that says, whoever reads it gets blessed. So, I just got a blessing from the Lord. And blessed are those who hear. It's the only book of the Bible that says if you just do what you're doing right now, you're standing up and listening, God is pouring out His blessing on you just for hearing this. That's why I'm glad they let me come. It's my favorite book in the whole Bible. And, here's the key. Those who hear the words of this prophecy, but here's the key, and keep those things which are written in it. For the time is near.

I'm going to add one word of prayer to this. Father, open our hearts to understand and not just be hearers of Your truth, but I pray that each one of these young people will find some truth in these next few moments of this hour, that they want to keep, and treasure, and guard, and make a part of their lives. For Jesus sake we pray, and all God's people said, Amen. You may be seated.

And I won't do that to you again for quite a while. I want you to think about the context of Revelation. Tomorrow we'll get into what the Bible says about, what you're seeing unfolding with Iran. How many of you noticed what happened over the weekend? Any of you notice? The very first direct attack by Iran..., who's mentioned in the Bible, that country..., on Israel, which also is mentioned in the Bible. And what's fascinating is, the moment we've come to. Because that was just a little event, and Iran is promising the big event if Israel does anything. So, what does that mean? Because the Bible already tells us that Iran does not get destroyed. Iran is around. Iran is around to launch the huge battle with all the nations of the world against Israel. So, Israel is still around at the end and Iran is still around at the end. So, what's happening? And it's very exciting. So, we'll cover that tomorrow.

The book of revelation, primarily, there are many ways that we could talk about it, but what you just read, or what I read and you heard while we were standing up, the very first words of this book are the theme of this book. The book is the revelation. Which, you've all heard the word. In fact, it was in Mike's prayer, apokalypsis, apocalypse. He said Apocalyptic, but the apokalypsis, what does that mean? The unveiling. It's the revealing, it's kind of like, you ever watch an Apple event? I still remember when Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone, I remember the iPad getting unveiled, it was behind a pencil. It was so small, the iPad was, it was laying like this, that Apple showed a pencil, and you couldn't see anything on the screen but a pencil, and then the camera moved and there was an iPad behind it. But it was the perspective of the camera. But I remember unveilings. This is the greatest unveiling of all. And it's Jesus Christ being unveiled for us.

And the reason for that, look at this is, that the first recipients, the ones who stood the first time and heard the Bible, this book of the Bible being read. Think about who they were. As far as they were concerned, things weren't turning out. They were, the generation that saw this book unveiled, was seeing the Roman Empire winning everywhere. Rome stood for everything that God didn't. Rome stood for oppression, for the enslavement of the world, for all the materialism. In fact, the Roman emperor of this time was notorious because his family had killed one million Jews. That's notoriety. Domitian's brother Titus had encircled the city of Jerusalem and killed all the people, and anybody they didn't kill they brought 100,000 that were left, and they built the Colosseum. You know the Colosseum? Right? It's the most famous, one of the most famous buildings in the world that was built by 100,000 Jewish slaves from war that were captured in Israel. They were boated over to Rome and they were forced to build that building. And most of them died building that building because they were just work to death.

Now think about it. The second generation Church. Now you see on the left side there, there's a cross and then you see Jesus ascended back to Heaven. Then we have the first generation Church and all the Gospels are being written in the epistles. And then after that middle line, Paul and the other apostles are getting martyred, and the second generation Church is around. Now the second generation Church, none of them ever saw Jesus Christ. These were the children that were born of the first generation Church. And so, they had never met Jesus Christ, most of them never saw an apostle, most of them only knew about God, the Bible, the future, the death of Christ through a book. Do you understand how significant that is? They're just like us. They didn't see Jesus multiply food. They didn't see Him walk on water. They didn't see Him with the holes in His side and the holes in His hands and feet. They didn't see anything. They had to believe what they read. It's so close to us.

The second generation Church needed help. It was very confusing to them. It appeared God wasn't winning. Do you understand? Rome was winning. Rome was conquering. At this moment, Rome was on its way to its zenith. The zenith hit about 117. We're in about 96. So, it's 21 years from the top of the Roman Empire. And it was just everywhere they went, they won. They were undefeated, just boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And they were, it was very confusing to the Church. Rome was expanding, it was enslaving everyone in their path. They were proud, they were cruel. Witchcraft? The occult? Satan? He was prominent. He had prominence in their culture. They were very occultic and they were very flourishing, and Christians needed hope. And so, for most Christians, it was kind of like, wow, what's going to happen? Isn't that where people are today? It's like, what's going to happen to our world? You all, your generation, you wonder what's going to run out first, water or air or food? Certainly, you don't want the oil to run out. You just want it to go away because it's polluting everything. Do you understand what I mean? You are in a very similar time of confusion. Not you, because you're in Bible college. I'm talking about your generation. You're facing a confusing time.

Revelation, and this is my premise to you. And this is what we're going to spend the next, I get to spend 20 hours with you guys.

Can you believe it? And that Bonnie and I, our goal, we just came from New York, and we, I met a hundred and ten of them, and Bonnie met another probably 40 or 50. So we almost got through all 200 and however many of them there are, and it was finally, at the end, they just started lining up, so I could go like this and meet them. It was really sweet but, our goal, there's less of you, is to meet all of you over the next 20 hours.

Revelation is the most powerful dose of hope God could ever send. What's the hope? That Jesus is revealed as everything we need. What do you need to know what you should do after Word of Life? Jesus. What do you need when you get into your new job and it's really horrible and it wasn't what they promised? What do you need when you get home and something's happened in your family? Or what do you need if that person you have your heart set on says their heart is not set on you? You know what I mean? That's one of the most convulsive things at your age when that happens. What do you need? This book presents Jesus more clearly than any other book of the Bible. See, this isn't a book about prophecy, although this idea, the history of the future is what Revelation is, but in the center of the future is Jesus Christ.

Now, I had a great talk with our sound director here, Eric, and I said, what are you going to do after Word of Life? Or maybe he's the video director, I don't know, but he said I'm not considering full time ministry. And I'm so glad he said that because I needed, I talked to everybody till someone tells me that. That's common, isn't it? People say to you, what are you going to do? And you say I'm not going to be one of those missionaries. I'm not going full time. I'm going to be a beautician, or an electrician, or I'm going to be a lawyer, or a congressman. I'm going to be something, but not one of those... I wanted him to say that. So that's why I talked to people. Because I want to hear. Do you know why? My whole purpose of this class is to tell you that Jesus actually wants all of you to be in full time ministry, not paid for it, not being a supported missionary or a staff member or a wife, He just wants you to be a Christian full time for Him wherever you are. At school, at work, because there's something you can do no one else can do. And there's some group of people you're a part of where you live, the family you were born into in, what you like to do, there's something you can do for Him no one else can do. And He wants you being full time paid by IBM, or General Electric, or the state of Florida, or the state of Maine, Bangor Airport, or something, but He wants you to be full time for Him. To do that, you need what they needed. They needed hope God is winning, Christ is returning, and we're forever with Him.

Let's go through the book of Revelation. I already read this verse to you. The Revelation of Jesus Christ, apokalypsis. On your test, now let me start talking, you have a 20 point test, and so this morning I'm going to give you things that are on the test. In fact, this morning I'm giving you everything that's on the test so you can get that 20 points, off the chart. You don't have to worry about it. The first one is, this is the only book in the Bible that the very first word of the book, apokalypsis, is the theme of the book, okay? What's the theme of the book? It's the revelation of Jesus Christ. Okay, so what's the theme of the book? [Students respond] Now you have a point. Very good.

Which God gave Him to show His servants the things which must shortly take place. Now, that's the where everybody gets mixed up about Revelation. What does shortly mean? All of you car buffs, right? There's one in every group. The guys that like cars, and girls like cars, but guys like to get greasy and fix them and supe them up. This word is the Greek word tachos, not taco like food, like tachometer. Okay, do you know the speed of the engine? That's the Greek word. So, it doesn't mean that it's going to take place in a few moments. It means it's going to speedily take place. See, tachometer checks the speed. So, it's the things which are speedily, tachometer, tachos, going to take place. He's sent and signified by His angel John.

So basically, and I'm going to say this 20 to 40 times, at least once or twice in every hour. Jesus is all we need, is what Revelation is about. He's unveiled. That's the theme of the book, that Jesus is unveiled. For what? For whatever we need. To help us through a time of fear. To help us through anxiety. To help us to get unenslaved to some sin that so easily besets us. He's the only one. He's the only one that will never leave us. He'll never forsake us. He designed us.

Now think about you. You didn't pick your family. God picked what family you're in. You didn't pick if you're a man or a woman. God picked who you are. Your identity, your DNA, your family, what time in history, what part of the country you dropped into at your birth. God picked all that. Have you ever thought about that? Especially anything you can't change about yourself, like what you look like, what kind of a family setting you had to grow up in. All the things you can't pick, God picked. It's very exciting to think about that. So, Jesus is all we need to live for God in an ever darkening world. Our world is darkening. I don't know if you know that. The way things are going, and we'll cover that.

But let me just survey the whole book with you, okay? This is where we are. By the way, the book of Revelation is the simplest book, because it's the only book that follows a pattern and outline that it gives right at the beginning, and then it does it. So, here's the outline it gives. Chapters 1 through 3 are about the Church on Earth. And there are a lot of verses about that, but that is ended with the taking of the Church on Earth out, and they show up in Heaven.

And so, what we're going to see is, in chapter 1, we have hope through Christ, because chapter 1 is all about serving God as we struggle through life. Where is John? He's a prisoner of war on an island in prison of the emperor. He's an imperial prisoner on an island and he sees Jesus in all of His power and glory coming and standing next to him. Now that's very hopeful.

And what Jesus does is Jesus reveals that He has visited the Church. That's what chapter 2 and 3 are about. Jesus actually goes to visit all the churches of the seven churches. Now, think about that. Did they see Him? No. Was He there? Yes. Was He watching? Yes. What did He see? He wrote it down. That's why this is the most fascinating part of the Bible, chapter 2 and 3. It's what Jesus sees when He comes to see us at church. And think about that. This is what, Tuesday? Sunday you were somewhere. And, what did Jesus see? Now, here in Florida, they have mega churches. All over the place, they have huge churches. And yet, when Jesus walks through those churches, what does He see? This morning, we'll talk about it. He sees seven types of people. Every church has the same seven types of people, and He describes them, and we'll go through that.

The church culminates with standing before Christ at the judgment seat of Christ. That's called the Bema seat of Christ, where we actually get to answer to Him for what we did with our lives. Remember I told you're designed by God, you're unique, and no one else is like you in the whole world, and there's something He wants you to do. And He's going to actually ask you, when you stand all alone, with all the angels and all the other saints watching, and you don't even need one of these microphone things, everyone is going to hear. And He's going to say, what did you do with your precious one and only life I gave you to live. And you say I learned all of, what's her name, that's dating the football guy. I've learned all the lyrics of Taylor Swift..., isn't she? Or did she stop dating him? She's still dating him. Nobody knows. It's in the news. I don't even know how to pronounce it. Kelsey? [Student answers: Travis Kelce] Kelsey. So, K E L C E. It's the New York Times, Bloomberg, CNN, everybody, they have a headline about those two. So, at the judgment seat of Christ, you can say, I know every lyric of every song Taylor Swift ever sang. Did you know there's nothing wrong with that except for the lyrics that might be ungodly, but just the lyrics, there's nothing wrong with it. But what will happen to those?

What will happen to everything in our life that we did that was not for the glory of God and fulfilling His purpose? We'll see in a minute at the judgment seat of Christ 1 Corinthians 3:10-15 says, everything we did that wasn't sin... because all sin is removed from our life through the justifying death of Christ. But everything else we did, like watching TV, and playing sports, and playing video games, and hiking, and kayaking, and being good at whatever we're good at, everything we did that wasn't sin, but wasn't connected to God to accomplish His purposes, burns up. It goes away. Do you know what 1 Corinthians 3 says? Many Christians are going to stand in front of Christ and everything, the whole pile of their life, it just burns up. And it says, they're saved, they go to Heaven, but they suffer loss. Isn't that interesting? They lose everything because they didn't connect their life to doing God's will. And that's what the Judgment Seat of Christ is about.

The next thing we see is Jesus brings each of us safely to Heaven. That's chapters 4 and 5. By the way, the whole book of Revelation is sequential like this. It's, if you read it, and 30 percent of your grade is just reading. All you have to do is read it. Spend the 1 hour and 20 minutes to read it. That's an assignment that you'll see in your syllabus. But as you're reading, if you want to do something that will affect the rest of your life, take a highlighter or use your pen or highlight on your computer or something. The timestamps. What do I mean by that? It'll say, and then..., and when he saw..., and for a half hour..., and after that..., and for five months. The whole book reads like a shooting script for a movie. And it's just like this. John looks here and the angel says, and now look over there. And John says, and then I saw. So, there's all this sequential time. What we see after the Church on Earth is right here. Jesus brings us to stand around His throne after we finish the plan He made for our lives here on Earth. That's chapter 4 and 5.

What follows that? Probably the most interesting part of Revelation. It's, boom, the Tribulation. The part everyone out there in the world has heard about Revelation is the Tribulation. In fact, you'll hear it on CNN, you'll hear it in the New York Times. What they call it is, these are apocalyptic moments. Or, do you know what they call snowstorms on the East Coast? Snowmageddon. What does that sound like? Armageddon. It comes through. They call hurricanes apocalyptic. They call financial meltdowns apocalyptic. What are they talking about? What the Bible talks about, the end of the world, the Tribulation.

What is the Tribulation? Basically, chapter 6 through 8 is, humanity believes in evolution and denies biblical creationism, so the Creator shows them His power. Earth dwellers worship Mother Earth. So, God allows, in chapter 6-8, is a series of natural disasters multiplying. Like right now, we're seeing a little bit of it. Last year, water ran out in the west. Did you see the pictures of Lake Mead and the reservoirs, the water, the white lines, and the waters going down. They actually had to stop the Hoover Dam because there wasn't enough water coming through it. All the people's boats were beached because Lake Mead and Lake Powell didn't have enough water in them. It was just... they wouldn't let people take long showers in Phoenix, in Los Angeles. It was unbelievable to us. If you don't live there, nothing wrong with me. See, we're thinking about our little world. America went through a drought that was unparalleled.

Now we have, crop... Right now, there's bird flu hitting dairy cows and chickens. Last weekend, the largest egg producer in America killed two million hens, laying hens that lay eggs. In one day, they had to kill two million of them. Why? They got the flu, and it's communicable. Because the people working with the chickens, one of them for the first time in history, caught the flu from a bird. It was, you ought to read New York Times. It's frightening. It's worse than anything we've seen before that a person can get bird flu from a bird. It just hadn't happened before, and now the dairy cows are catching it. And now they're asking... you know what the headlines of Bloomberg was? Are our eggs and is our milk safe? Now, isn't that a little unnerving to wonder when you're about ready to get your scrambled eggs or you know, get your latte, which latte is milk, is it safe? See the questions our world is having? God allows natural disasters to amplify at every level. There's always been bird flu. There's always been droughts. There have always been animals giving diseases to people but it's just going to amplify and amplify.

Secondly, in chapters 10 to 12, starting in chapter 9, lost humanity is fascinated with demons. Bonnie and I went to see, we heard about that civil war movie. So I thought, we landed and we had an hour. So, we went to see it because we're never in one place long enough. But what was before it? What comes before every movie? If you ever go to one about 20 minutes of what? [students respond: previews] The problem is, the previews were almost all about demons and the occult. Because, I made the mistake, I didn't know the Civil War movie was a R rated movie, because of all the killing, and so all the previews were R rated, and they were about slash, and Halloween murderers, and screaming, and graves, and demonic witchcraft stuff. So basically, we stayed like this... But the problem is, you couldn't, you had to have one hand to cover your eyes and plug your ears. But humanity is fascinated with demons. Occultic power.

What is occultic power? It's the power that comes not from God. Now where do you think Thor, you know that handsome Australian guy, where do you think he gets his power in the Avengers? Do you think God empowers Thor on Avenger movies? Yes, or no? It's okay to answer. Yes, or no? No. He's from the Norse gods. He's portrayed that way. What are the Norse gods? Demons? Who are demons empowered by? Satan. Have you thought about the fact that most of the fascinating movies are about occultic power? Now, they're not real. I know, it's science fiction. But it's portraying occultic powers. So, God lets humanity taste the searing torments of Satan's demons. That's what chapter 9 is about. Probably of all the times I've taught, that's the one class no one falls asleep in. Everyone sits up because most people always have wondered how all that connects with the angels, the demons. There are, five different orders of angelic creatures and more orders of demonic creatures. And what they can do where they can go. Did you know the word daimon the Greek word means intelligence? If you right click that in your Logos program, demon comes from the Greek word daimon which means intelligence.

So, what's a demon? It's a living intelligence. They know every language in the world. They've lived for thousands of years. Nothing stops them. They go through walls, they go through ceilings, they go through doors. They're inside of every bunker and every safe room. They're everywhere, listening. They're an intelligence. They know all of history. They know all languages. They've been around since God created the angels and they fell with Satan. And that's why the occult is so powerful. You get witchcraft, you get a witch, you get someone in a seance, the demons know stuff no human could possibly know. Because they've been everywhere. They saw where Oak Island's treasure is. They know where the pharaohs dumped all their stuff. They know where all the Nazi gold is, because they saw that happen and they witnessed it. Everybody's so fascinated. God lets them all get Satan's demons.

Lost humanity seeks to rule themselves and reject God's Messiah, so God sends a fake Jesus. That's who the Anti-christ is. He's not opposed to Jesus, he just takes His place. He says, I'm the Jesus all of you want. And he is. The whole world follows him. That's who the Anti-christ is. And God allows him to lead humanity to destruction. And that's chapter 10 to 13.

And then it gets worse in 14 to 16. God the Son, the Creator, systematically destroys the atmosphere. We already are having trouble with air pollution. You look at Beijing and New Delhi and, all the different places where Bangkok... Bonnie and I were serving in Bangkok. You couldn't see across a five lane road, two lanes, a turn lane and two lanes. You couldn't see, you couldn't see the other side of the road. There was so much smoke and smog and stuff in Bangkok. We're not talking about China or India, Thailand. You couldn't see that far, it was just like brown fog. And everybody was wearing masks, and our eyes were watering. Can you imagine in the Tribulation? That's how the whole world is, here. It'll be in nice, breezy, fresh air, Florida it's going to be horrible. The earthquakes, smoke, fire, red tides, global warming, volcanoes, tsunamis, asteroids, comets, meteors, all of them. In this section from 14 to 16 are the environmental disasters. They're already here, but they ramp up and they get closer and bigger. And then of course, you've all heard the ending of chapter 16 is Armageddon.

Following that is chapter 17. God destroys all religions. Following that is chapter 18. God's destroys the idolatry of materialism. You know what the curious thing during the Tribulation is? There's still a group of wealthy people that are enjoying all the luxuries of life. They are insulated. We see that. Did you hear about Mr. Facebook? He built a 200 million dollar bunker, or was it 300 million? On Kauai. He lives in Kauai, has a square mile of the island of Kauai. Under it, he built this bunker. They said it's amazing. It has swimming pools, it has everything. It has an entertainment center. And he's ready for the end of the world. And he's not the only one. All the billionaires are building these bunkers to kind of make it through the bad times coming. And it appears they do in Revelation. But now in chapter 18, it all stops. The electricity goes off, the music stops, the food distribution system ends, it's over. And that's chapter 18.

That culminates with this... ends, boom, the Bible says in flaming fire, Jesus appears, taking vengeance on a world that's opposed to Him, and it's the Second Coming of Christ. Followed by His thousand year rule. Followed by the Great White Throne judgment. So that event we read about.

Lost humanity has rejected their creator and redeemer. So Christ, the King, that's the Second Coming, returns as judge. And for 1,000 years He fulfills what one fourth of the Old Testament is about. Did you know a fourth of the Old Testament is about Jesus literally being King of the Earth? Literally bringing peace, harmony, clean air, pure water to the whole world. It's like the weeds go away, poisonous spiders, poisonous snakes, carnivorous animals, they all are gone. You can swim anywhere and no great white shark will get you, in Australia or wherever you are. You understand what I mean? During the Millennium, it goes back to like it was in the Garden of Eden, the whole world. It's the most amazing time, but God shows what He can do renewing the Earth, but nearly all of humanity rebels.

When I was..., I was younger than you are right now. In the 60s, when I was a little boy, the President of the United States, he was from Texas. His name was LBJ, Lyndon Baines Johnson. He started an American program, it was called the Great Society. That was his platform when he ran for president. Do you know what it was? It was a great idea. He said, I'm going into the center of all the cities. I'm going to go into the center of Los Angeles, in the center of Detroit, St. Louis, Philadelphia. We're going to knock down all the tenements and rundown houses. We're going to build all brand new buildings and apartments. And we're going to rehouse all the poor people downtown in these new places. And crime is going to stop. And all the murders are going to stop. And all the drug addiction is going to stop. And he proposed that. And he won the presidency with his great society platform. And they did it. They spent billions of dollars. Plowed down the old stuff, built federally, subsidized, beautiful, brand new housing. And guess what? Crime rate didn't change. Murder rate didn't change. Poverty rate didn't change. Why? A perfect environment doesn't produce perfect people. How do you get perfect people? By getting a new heart. See, that's the Gospel. A new heart I'll give you, a new spirit I'll put within you. You can put a struggling person in a brand new house and they'll still be struggling. You understand what I mean? And that's what God does. He puts the whole world into a new house, a perfect Earth. And guess what they do? They all, except for the saints who are gathered around Jerusalem, all the rest of the world rebels. And it says they come up like the sand of the sea to destroy Jerusalem, where Jesus is King and the temple is, and where the saints live. And they come up and surround it, and God just says enough's enough and it's over. That's chapter 20, we're going to cover that.

Then, after that, the Christ's rule and the Great White Throne Judgment, Heaven starts. And that's the greatest presentation of what Heaven is.

And basically, Revelation 21 and 22, we see ourselves as saints enjoying God's invitation. We get to dwell with Him. You talk about captivating. You go to movies to see things. How would you like to actually go to the place? How would you like to actually go see a galaxy? How would you like to go see a comet? How would you like to go see the Marianas Trench and see all those creatures that are down there, glowing and are so beautiful? Or go to the Antarctic? You understand what I mean? Heaven is going to be going through the universe with the Creator. But living with Him. And we'll spend a whole hour looking at that. God is with us, we're at home in Heaven forever.

So basically, here's your second note. This is the test. The biggest part of our test is you matching. On one side it's going to be chapter 1 through 3. And what would you pick on this side? Christ's Church on Earth. Or on this side, it'll be Revelation 20:1-6. What would you match it with? Christ's earthly Millennial rule. Do you see that? You have to know the seven clear events in Revelation. The number of chapters. That's important. However you do it, put a box around it or something. Very important to you to know what's going on in these chapters. And that's going to be on the test.

Now, everything in Revelation tracks with the rest of the Bible. What you see here is when Paul, did you guys have Chris Gnanakan do an Acts yet? Or does he do Acts? Have you had Acts? Did Chris do it or someone else? [Student responds: We had a new guy do it, and it was so good. But not Chris from India? I'm glad the new guy was so good. Do you remember Paul on Mars Hill? You remember that? When Paul talked to all the philosophers in Athens? Do any of you remember that? That's the highlight of chapter 17. Did you think about how Paul shared the Gospel in Acts 17? He has a three part Gospel presentation. He says, you've ignored your Creator, you rejected your Redeemer, and the Judge is coming. That's exactly how Paul shares the Gospel with the Athenians. But you know what Paul adds? What Revelation adds. Look at that verse at the bottom. The Gospel is always attached to impending doom. Some people say it's negative to share, you know, the judgment of God on sin. Jesus didn't think it was. Jesus spoke two for one, twice about Hell for every time He talked about Heaven two for one. Twice as many times. Jesus warns people about Hell, for every time, once, He tells them Heaven's great. See, Jesus believed in warning people of impending doom. So does Peter, so does John, but especially Paul's big on it.

And this is what Paul says, this is the Second Coming, 2 Thessalonians 1:8-9, In flaming fire, taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. When I share the Gospel, I'm as loving and positive and friendly as I can be. And I say to them, do you know what makes me go out of my comfort zone to talk to you? Did you know it's hard to tell someone they're going to Hell? It's hard to tell someone they're a sinner. I start by telling them I'm the worst sinner that I know in the whole world. Because I am. Because I don't know you. I don't know why you do what you do. I don't know how much... but I sure know me. I know I've been in church all my life. I've read the Bible. I know the truth of God. So, I'm the worst sinner I know, up close, personally. That usually disarms them.

Now, you have to be careful. I remember I was witnessing to a waitress at Red Robin or whatever it's called. I had the whole staff of our church there. And the waitress came up and said, who's paying the bill? And I said, I'll pay the bill. I said, but you have to watch out for this group. They're all convicts. She backed up. She looked at all the staff guys. They're convicts, eh? Later on in the meal, she came over and she said to me, what did they do? She wanted to know how scared of them she should be. Were they murderers, or rapists, or what? I said, they're all convicted, guilty sinners. She stood there. She had to think about that for a minute. What did that mean? That opened the door to sharing the Gospel with her, because we're all, that's what all of us are, and we're coming toward doom.

We're to be God's servants. Verse 1 says, to show His servants. That's what we're supposed to be. That's the whole thing I started with. We're called to be full time ministers of the Gospel. What that means is we live it and we share it. To minister the Gospel is not to do what I'm doing, and that's one form of it. But you know what the big one is? To believe it, to live it, and share it. Not all the time, not to everyone. We're all called in a different way. Do you, how you know what God's will is for you? What do you like to do? Remember God designed you. He designed what you're good at. He designed what you love. He designed what you..., people around you say, wow, you're really good at art. You're really good at music. You're really good at sports. You're really good at, building stuff. You're really, wow, you understand the computer. Boy, your pictures are out of this world. Do any of you notice? That you see that in other people, you see what they're really good at. Who designed what your underlying really good at is? God. That's called your giftedness, not your spiritual gifts, that's a whole different dimension. But God uses how he built you with the spiritual Greek word pneumatikoi.

By the way, what is a servant? Remember, anything that's important, God defines. How does God define a servant? He says in Acts 13:36, do you see at the bottom, Acts 13:36? Do you see 1 Corinthians 4:1? Those two verses describe David in the Old Testament. That's Acts 13 and Paul in the New Testament. Both of them are called God's servants. But you won't see it in the verse. What you see is, the Greek word, if you right click it in Logos, is a listing of the eight different terms for servants in the New Testament. Did you know there are eight different words, Greek words, for servants? There are doulos, and hyperetes, and leitourgos, and therapons, and diakonos, all those are Greek words. This one here you've all heard of. You ever heard of Ben Hur and galley slaves? That's the word that God uses to describe the greatest Old Testament saint, David... 141 chapters about him in the Old Testament, and the greatest New Testament saint, Paul. They're both called a galley slave. What was a galley slave? They rowed to the captain's beat. They were submissive. They rowed together with all the other slaves. They were sensitive. They could only trust the captain because they were under the deck, chained. They were chained for life, so they were dedicated to their job, and when they were doing their job they were never seen. They were humble. That's how God describes what a servant is. Someone that is submissive to God, sensitive to the fellow members around them of His body of Christ, trusting their life to Him, dedicated to Him, and not wanting to be seen.

So, Revelation says this to the servants, and I emphasized it when we were reading it, blessed, verse 3, are those who read, those who hear, but what brings the blessing? Those who keep, the things written. The reading is my exposure. The hearing is when I focus on what God's way is. And the keeping is when I say I want to do your will, God.

By the way, you notice the seven churches? What's seven? It's heptadic. The Jews like sevens. A seven is a set, a set of things. Were there more than seven churches in Asia? You bet there were. It doesn't even mention the church in Colossae. It doesn't, you understand what I mean? It doesn't mention all the churches that we saw Paul building on his first and second missionary journey. But seven is the representation of the whole. When it says, John to the seven churches in Asia, From He who is the seven spirits before His throne. He's talking about sets of things. But, you notice every letter, we'll see in chapter 2 and 3, it's to a specific singular church but it's always this plural churches. Because the message was for all of them then and by the power of the Spirit to us now.

I love verse 5. Jesus Christ the faithful witness to Him who loved us and washed us from our sins. Jesus introduced Himself. He says, I know what you're struggling with. I know that you sometimes don't obey Me and fail. I love you so much. I'm constantly washing you from your sins.

Look what He says in verse 7, behold, He's coming in the clouds, and every eye will see Him. Now here's something, now it's time we're getting near, we have five more minutes and then you'll get a great break. So, shake it off and catch this. There are 404 verses in Revelation, total number, 404. Those 404 verses quote 800 different spots in the Old Testament. Do you understand Revelation is connected to more parts of the Bible than any other book in the Bible? That's why it's the last one. The book of Revelation stands at the end, and it connects together everything else in the Bible in a way, none of the rest of the Bible does. Revelation explains here, all those prophecies about the Second Coming of Christ. It says, every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him. Wait a minute, who pierced Christ? None of those people were still alive. Do you understand? When Revelation was written, none of those people were still alive. It was like 70 years ago and people didn't live that long back then. All those people what we would call dead, but you know what it says at the Second Coming of Christ, every human eye on Earth will see Him and all those people that have died and didn't believe in Him will see Him. What does that mean? Where are all those dead people?

Where is everyone that has died on Earth? Do you ever wonder about that? Where are they? When they stick their body on the ground, where is that person? See the scriptures explain that and it tells us that they're alive and conscious and know what's going on and still have their memories and can see things and they can communicate even after they're dead. And the Bible tells us and that's coming, at about our seven where we look at the Grave and Sheol, and all that stuff. But look at verse 8. I'm the Alpha and Omega. That's the first and last letter of the Greek alphabet. The beginning and the end says the Lord, who was and is to come, the Almighty.

Okay, now let's talk. We have three minutes left. Wow, you know what Russia is doing? Russia just sent to the Middle East one of their destroyers that has their hypersonic missiles on them. And the whole world knows that Russia is good at making missiles. And this missile, and it's very important, the Sarmat missile, one missile can destroy 250,000 square miles of everything alive, and Russia is good at reminding the world they have the most precise and the largest missiles in the world.

So, you know what that does? That scares people. Now it doesn't scare us, because we already know God's plan. We know what He's going to do. We know our purpose. We know where we're going. We know He's going to right all wrongs, but guess what?

And I have two minutes left for this. People are a little shaken up by the news.

Bonnie and I landed at Tampa airport. It was 11 something. I said, honey, I've got to get some milk. When you get old, just wait, about 60 years from now all of you are going to love milk. It just does something for you when you're old. So, I went to 7 Eleven and they still had all that Plexiglas up. Do you remember the COVID Plexiglas where there's just a little hole there and there were three credit card machines. So I leaned over to the hole and I says, which credit card machine do I use? As I said those words, the man standing, at midnight, behind me in the line at 7 Eleven said, Uh! Dr. Barnett, I've never seen you. I recognize your voice. And I turned around. It was the most burly looking truck driver guy I've ever seen in my life. He was rough. And he looked at me and he said, I'm a trucker. He said, I was scared to death during COVID, I was going to die. He said, so I typed into Google, knowing God. And he says, one of your classes came up. But he says, I'm driving the truck. I've never watched the video on YouTube. He said, I just listened to your voice. He said, I got saved in my truck. And he said, I've listened to you five hours a day for the last two years. He said, I could find you in the dark, anywhere in the world. He says, it's you, isn't it? And I looked at him. I said, praise the Lord. Isn't it amazing that Google posts things for people to use about Christ? And there was this class that I posted back during COVID because you guys didn't come and they did all this remote stuff, and that truck driver heard it and in his truck got saved. You realize this is a great time to know the Lord because people are shaken up and you know Christ.