Revelation 4 & 5 Explained: The Throne Room & the Scroll

Hello, and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. And again, it's good to have everybody back with us for the next half hour, and we just ask now that you would turn to Revelation chapter 4. Again, for those of you joining us on television, we appreciate your letters, we appreciate your financial help, because without it we cannot stay on the air. And we always like to let people know that every dime that is given to this program goes to produce the program and to buy television time. No salaries, no remuneration goes to people. We want everyone to know that. And as I've stressed so often, I'm just a layman. My wife is a full-time registered nurse, so we don't depend on any money from the ministry for our family expenses, and we just hope that everyone appreciates that. All right, now as we do like we promised, we're going to start a rather in -depth study of the book of Revelation. A book that I think after you've been through it with me once, you're going to find out is a thrilling book. It's not that hard to understand, and I know a lot of people have been instructed to shy away from it, leave it alone, you can't understand it anyway. In fact, as we were driving up this morning, I couldn't help but remember that when we were still farming in Iowa, I had a home class and we were teaching in the book of Revelation one winter. And as that part of the country is prone to do, it came under a tremendous blizzard, snowstorm. And up there, of course, farmers are aware of the possibility that travelers get stranded and have to come in and spend the night. Well, it just so happened that one of these blizzards struck, and a couple got stranded on the highway, and the nearest home was a fellow and his wife who had been in my class where we were teaching the book of Revelation. So during the process of that storm, and being locked up, of course, in four walls, they had a lot of time to talk, and so he was sharing with him what they had been learning from the book of Revelation. Well, it turned out that this fellow was a pastor, he and his wife, of one of our large denominations, and when he expressed that they were studying the book of Revelation, he just said nonchalantly, he says, well, we never pay any attention to that book. He said, we just don't feel there's anything in it that's appropriate, and consequently, we just have no interest in it. And at the time it may have shocked me a little bit, and yet not really, because I know that this is a trend in a lot of people's thinking, that the book of Revelation has nothing for us to understand. It's totally just a bunch of gobbledygook, and it's a lot of myths and legends, and who can believe it? But you know, the book of Revelation starts out with, blessed is he that readeth. And that means for you and I. And to study the book of Revelation is exciting, I think, it's revealing, and just have to remember that it is all in symbolism, but every symbolic teaching in the book of Revelation comes back to a literal meaning and literal truth. All we have to do is search the Scriptures, and it just comes out so clearly. Now since we're dealing primarily with the future aspect of the nation of Israel, and the Tribulation period as we see it coming on the scene, I'm going to skip the seven letters to the seven churches. I don't like to do that, but for sake of time, I'm going to for now, and we'll hit them later. And I'm going to come all the way into chapter 4, Revelation chapter 4, and as we look at the last verse in chapter 3, it says, "...he that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, saith unto the churches." And then what I want you to understand, this is the last time that word church appears in the book of Revelation until you get to the very closing verses. So from chapter 4, verse 1, all the way to the end, there is nothing in here with regard to the church as we know the church age. And I think it's evident then that the church will be gone when the Tribulation begins, and again it's symbolically pictured in John's own experience in chapter 4, verse 1. Now what's the after? After the church age has been completed, and it's over, then he says, "...I looked, and behold, a door was opened in heaven, and the first voice which I heard was as it were." Now here's where you have to be careful as you read Revelation. It doesn't say the voice was a trumpet. It says it was like a trumpet. Now I've had somebody try to refute the whole aspect of the Rapture because it's associated with a trumpet call. And they say only Israel was called with a trumpet. Well now you see that limit's gone. Yes, Israel was brought to convocations and congregational call by the trumpets, no doubt. But you see God has His own trumpets as well, and you have the angelic trumpet. But here you see John hears a trumpet from heaven, and as a trumpet it says, "...come up hither." Now I like to picture that as a symbolic view of what's going to happen to the church. It too will hear a trumpet call, and the archangel is going to give a shout, and suddenly we who know the Lord are going to be gone. Now I'm aware that there are many who refute the, what we call, the doctrine of the Rapture, and the first thing they like to point out is that the word Rapture isn't in our New Testament. And that's true. It's not in the English. But if I can believe everything I read, why the German translation does use the word Rapture, a calling out. And as we stressed a few weeks ago, it's so clear in the earlier translations in 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, that before the man of sin can be revealed, before the Antichrist comes on the scene, there has to be the departure. Well the departure of who or what? The departure of the body of Christ. And so we too will hear that trumpet call to come up, and in an instant we're going to be gone. That's our blessed hope that Paul talks about in Titus chapter 2. So now then, reading on, and he says that the voice of the trumpet said, "...come up hither, and I will show thee things which must be..." Now what's the next clear word? Hereafter. In other words, after what? After the church age has ended. The church is over, and now all these things are still going to be left on the scene. Now verse 2, "...and immediately," John says, "...I was in the Spirit." In other words, he didn't go to glory bodily. And remember, he's on the island of Patmos, and he's been exiled, remember. "...and so he evidently just went up in the area of the Spirit, and behold, a throne was set in heaven. And one sat upon the throne, and he that sat was to look upon like a jasper and a sardinstone, and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald." Beautiful beyond description. I don't think John could even begin to put it into words, the beauty of the throne room of heaven. All right, I'm going to let that go for that for now, and come right on into verse 4. "...and round about the throne were four and twenty seats," or thrones, if you want to use that word, "...and upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment, and they had on their heads crowns of gold." Now there's a lot of controversy. Who are the twenty-four elders? No, there's a lot of guesswork. They may be twelve of this, and twelve of that. But you know what? The Bible doesn't tell us. And so if the Bible doesn't tell us, why speculate? Because we just don't know. And like I told the lady who called yesterday morning, she had several questions, and I said, well, you always have to remember, the Bible doesn't tell us everything we'd like to know. It just tells us everything that we need to know. Everything we need to know is here. A lot of the things we'd like to know, God hasn't seen fit to reveal it. And here's one of them. We just do not know who these twenty -four elders are. Now granted, it could be twelve from the Jewish economy. It could be the twelve apostles of Christ's time. But the Bible doesn't say it, and so we'll just leave it as twenty-four elders from whatever dispensation they may have come from. But they're sitting there in twenty-four seats, or twenty-four seats five, and out of the throne, that is the throne room of heaven, the very presence of God, proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices, and there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the seven Spirits of God. Now the best way I think I can define the seven Spirits of God are attributes of the Holy Spirit. And I'd like to have you come all the way back. Keep your hand in Revelation. We'll be back shortly. Come all the way back to Isaiah chapter 11, Isaiah chapter 11. Now remember, Isaiah is sort of in the middle of your Old Testament. It's the first of the major prophets. Isaiah chapter 11, and I'd like to have you drop down to verse 2. In Isaiah chapter 11, verse 2, we have what I like to think are the sevenfold attributes of the person of the Holy Spirit. Now we'll see that mentioned again later in Revelation, that Christ had the seven Spirits. Well here's what I think it's referring to. Verse 2, "...and the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him," in this case it's the branch up in verse 1, who of course is the Son, it's the Christ, "...the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him." Now count them. That's 1. The Spirit of Wisdom is 2. The Spirit of Understanding is 3. The Spirit of Counsel is 4. The Spirit of Might is 5. The Spirit of Knowledge is 6. And the Spirit of the Fear of the Lord, and remember Proverbs says, "...the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." So those are your seven attributes of the Holy Spirit, as they function within His role as a member of the Godhead. Now then if you'll come back to Revelation chapter 4, and so these sevenfold aspects of the Spirit are round about the throne as John is being introduced to it. And now he says in verse 6, "...and before the throne there was a sea of glass, like unto crystal, and in the midst of the throne, and round about the throne there were four beasts." Now we've got to be careful. Don't envision some horrible wild animal or something like that. But a better translation, and I'll show you where I get it, a better translation is living creatures. These are angelic beings of a sort, and so round about the throne we have these living creatures full of eyes before and behind. Now I'll show you in a minute where I get the living creatures, but before we go back let's go on into verse 7 and 8, because here are some beautiful illustrations again of how all of Scripture fits together. Even though this is written by John in about 90 A.D., yet we're going to see that it fits the pictures of Christ in the four Gospels, and it's going to picture the exact description of Ezekiel way back in the Old Testament. But let's finish these two verses and then we'll go back and look at them. The first living creature was like a lion. The second living creature like a calf or an ox. The third living creature had a face as a man, and the fourth creature was like a flying eagle. All right, let's put them on the board. I'm going to use the timeline after a while, so we'll leave that up there. But here we have first in these living creatures, the first one was like a lion. The second one is like a calf, or I'm going to use the term ox. And the third one had the face of a man, and the fourth one was as an eagle. Now that's back here in Revelation. All right, now turn back with me to Ezekiel chapter, I think it's chapter 1, I'll have to look a second. Ezekiel, it's either chapter 1 or 2, but we'll find it in a second. In Ezekiel chapter 1, Ezekiel chapter 1, now remember I told you several weeks ago that there are three books in our Bible written by Jews from out of the land, remember that? The book of Ezekiel is one of them, the book of Daniel is the second one, and the book of Revelation is the third. All written by Jews outside the land of Palestine. Daniel writes from Babylon and Mede-Persia, Ezekiel writes from of course the capital of Shushan and the Medes and Persians, and John writes from the island of Patmos there off the western coast of Turkey. And they all write more or less in symbolic language. So now then we can tell that Ezekiel and Revelation have a perfect correlation. Chapter 1, and let's drop down to verse 5, Ezekiel 1, verse 5. Also out of the midst thereof came the likeness of four, what does your Bible say? Living creatures. See that? Four living creatures, and this was their appearance. Now in order to get them four locked up together in one verse, go over to verse 10. As for the likeness of their faces, the four had the face of a man, now it's in a little different order of course, so we're still going to put them down here opposite. The one had the face of a man, the other one had the face of a lion, the other one had the face of the ox, and the other one had the face of a what? A lion. All right, you got the same four, don't we? Now I'm going to ask you something. You've all been in Sunday school all your life, you've all heard sermons all your life, I'm pretty sure you all know this. How is Christ pictured in the book of Matthew? He's pictured as the what? The king, is He not? Matthew depicts Him as the king. Mark depicts Him as the servant. Luke depicts Him as the Son of Man. John's Gospel depicts Him as the Son of God, His deity. Now what am I trying to show? That all of the Scripture is depicting Christ from these same viewpoints. He is first and foremost the lion of the tribe of Judah, He's the King of kings and Lord of lords. He is the servant as Mark depicts Him, and He is constantly depicted in the Gospel of Mark as just that, the servant. And so you have the foot-washing aspect of washing the disciples' feet, that was indicative of His servitude, He lowered Himself to that. And then of course Luke pictures Him as the Son of Man, His humanity. And then John's Gospel comes along and shows us that indeed He is the Son of God. And so these angelic creatures spoken of by Ezekiel as well as what John sees in Revelation are all living creatures that are depicting one of the four attributes again of Christ as we see Him in the Gospels. Now to me all that just shows is how the book just all fits together. It's so beautifully tuned. That reminds me of a letter we got from a gentleman from Pennsylvania. He said, he said, last he said, the Bible is finally beginning to run like a fine-tuned machine. Well, you know, I like that. He was a farmer of course, and we're aware that when a machine is running right you don't hear anything but just that steady hum, see, and when something goes wrong then all of a sudden there's a clickety-clack and so forth, you know you've got a problem. But a fine-tuned machine, and that's what this book is. It is just so fine-tuned. And that's why, you know, it just disturbs me when people say, well, it's full of contradictions, it's full of errors. No, it isn't. It's not full of contradictions. Whenever there is a seeming contradiction it's just a difference in program, naturally. Naturally what the Bible says to the nation of Israel under the law is going to be different than what He says to us under grace, but that's not contradiction. It's simply a change of operandi, see. All right, now as we come back to Revelation then, if you will again, to chapter 4, and so now as He sees these living creatures, verse 8, "...and the four living creatures had each of them six wings about him, and they were full of eyes within. And they rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come." Well what does that speak of? From His eternity past to the present to the future, He's the same eternal sovereign God of the universe. Now then, verse 9, "...and when those living creatures give glory, and honor, and thanks to Him who sat on the throne, who liveth forever and ever, now the four and twenty elders get involved, and they too fall down, and worship Him who sat on the throne, worship Him who liveth forever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honor, and power. Why? Because Thou hast created all things." See, He has created everything. It didn't just happen, it just didn't evolve, but everything was created by the Creator, and for His pleasure they are and were created. And you know, someone called me a while back, and he said, you know, until I started coming to your class, he said, I didn't really read every word, and that's what I'm trying to get people to do. And he said, all of a sudden I realized, he said, we've always been taught, and I've always been of the mindset that when we get to glory, we're going to take our rewards and our crowns and cast them at His feet. But he said, this is the verse we got it from, and it isn't we who are doing that, but who is it? Well, it's the twenty-four elders. Now we may, but the Scripture doesn't say that we will. These twenty-four elders will do it. Now you see, that makes all the difference in the world. But it's so easy to take a verse of Scripture and just lift it out of its context and make a statement from it. And I just don't agree with that. Now, like I said, we may indeed, we certainly should be worthy of not keeping those things for ourselves, but the Scripture doesn't say that we're going to do that, but the twenty-four elders do. Well, anyway, come in now to chapter five, and all I'm trying to get you to do is be careful what you read and how you read it. Makes all the difference in the world. Now he says, "...I saw in the right hand of Him who sat on the throne a scroll." Now we used this a little bit way back when we were in the earlier lessons in Daniel, remember? So this is kind of a review. And John now sees the one on the throne holding a scroll. I think book is again an unfortunate translation. They didn't know what books were in those days, but they had scrolls rolled up and sealed. And so he sees this scroll written with in and on the backside, and then sealed with seven seals. Now just picture a scroll rolled up, and then on the outside were written details, and then sealed with seven seals. Now of course this is an allusion to the Old Testament economy again, going back to Israel, back in the Old Testament days. And they had every right and privilege to mortgage their property. Mortgages aren't something new. I guess we think that's strictly 20th century, but mortgages are nothing new. And so way back, especially at the time of Ruth and Boaz, they could mortgage their property. But if they got in a bind and the mortgage was due and they couldn't pay it, they would either lose their property, or they could go to a next of kin. And that was paramount. That was one of the first requirements. They could go to a next of kin, and if he had the wherewithal, if he had the funds and the wealth, and if he wanted to, so there you have the three requirements for paying off a mortgage. There had to be a next of kin, he had to have the wherewithal, and he had to be willing, then he could pay off the mortgage, and the next of kin could keep it in the family. And of course this was the whole idea in Israel, that the families would keep their inheritances. Now we have the same picture here then of a mortgage. And it says that it was written inside as well as on the outside. Now again, here's why we know it's talking about a mortgage, because that's exactly how they did in ancient Israel. The private details that were not for public scrutiny were written on the inside where the public couldn't see it. But the public need, in other words, to know who that property was mortgaged to, and who it belonged to, that would be written on the outside, just like we do when we record something in the courthouse. It was not that much different. And so we have the lesson here, now that there's a mortgage involved, sealed with seven seals, and then as you move on, I suppose I'm going to run out of time as usual, that there was no man in heaven, in earth, nor under the earth, who was able to open the scroll. In other words, there was no one seemingly who had the next of kinship, who had the wherewithal in wealth, or was willing. And John says, I've wept much, because there was no one found worthy to open and to read the scroll, and to look thereon. But we get into verse 5, and one of the elders, that is one of these 24, said unto me, Weep not, don't get too shook up John, behold the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, he has prevailed, and is able to open the scroll. And who's the Lion of the tribe of Judah? Christ, God the Son. And then verse 6, And I beheld, and low in the midst of the throne, and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb. I mentioned in one of my classes a few weeks ago, that if I'm not mistaken, and I'm always willing to have people check me out, and someone came back last night and said, No, bless you were right. But if I'm not mistaken, John is the only one who uses the expression, the Lamb of God. You think about that, and check it out. He's the only one that uses that expression. Paul doesn't use it, the Gospels don't use it, except John. Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world, and then of course it comes up here again in Revelation. That in the midst of all this, there stood the Lamb, slain, having seven horns, and seven eyes, and these again are those seven spirits that we saw back in Isaiah chapter 11. Now verse 7, And He, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, Israel's King, the King of kings, the Son of God, the One who was crucified, and rose, and ascended, He takes the scroll out of the right hand of Him who sat on the throne. Now we have to, again, bring the Trinity into view here, don't we? We have to place God the Father in this case, and in order to get a glimpse of it, we place God the Father on the throne, because Christ is not on the throne tonight. You're all aware of that. It never says that He ascended to sit on the throne. Where is He? He's at the right hand, He's at the Father's right hand, He is not on the throne. And so it's God the Father that we have to, and I don't like to use visualization as such, but in order to get the language, we picture now then God the Father as on the throne, God the Son is at the Father's right hand, and when John's all shook up that no one is able to open the scroll, it's God the Son comes before God the Father, and what does He say? I'll do it. I'll pay off that mortgage. And John assumes that he can do it because of already accomplishing the work of the cross. He is also depicted throughout the Old Testament as the Son of David, the Son of God, and so in kinship, he can fulfill all those demands. Thank you for watching Through the Bible with Les Feldick, a weekly Bible study. If you would like more information about the Les Feldick Ministries, a Bible study in your area, or about this program, write to Les Feldick Ministries, Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. That's Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. Through the Bible with Les Feldick is viewer supported, and your gift is appreciated. Thank you, and be sure to tune in next time for Through the Bible with Les Feldick.