Sermon Tone Analysis

INTRODUCTION:

With summer time coming up it won’t be long before they start selling fireworks for the 4th of July.

I don’t like summer because I don’t like to be hot but I love fireworks.

(and it’s related family of gun powder!)

Anybody who has ever been to a fireworks show knows that the best part of the show is saved for the very end.

And when the end comes you won’t say “oh look at that one or ooo I like the blue sparklers...”

You won’t be able to see a single firework because they all get launched up together at the same time.

Do you know what they call that time in the fireworks show?

It’s called the “Grand Finale.”

You might think of today’s passage and this series we’re in right now as “The Grand Finale” of God’s judgment.

In some ways - the entire book of Revelation is a “Grand Finale” but in particular the grand finale of God’s judgment is reserved in what John describes as the seven bowls of God’s wrath.

Reviewing Revelation

Because today’s text serves as a climax to so much of what came before it I need to spend a little bit of time reviewing where we’ve been for the past several months.

So how should we understand the events described in the book of Revelation.

How does it all hold together?

Views of the Millennium

The approach that I’ve been preaching from falls under the broad umbrella of what’s called the “futurist” interpretive grid.

That means I believe the vast majority of the visions that John sees in this book of reserved for some point and time in the future.

Within that futurist approach there are many sub-views.

The theological camp that I subscribe to is what’s called “Premillennialism.”

The “millennium” is a word that describes the 1,000 year reign of Jesus Christ on the earth.

The Bible uses utopian language to describe this time.

Jesus is in charge, he rules the nations, there is peace and prosperity and the world is recreated into God’s original design for creation.

So a “PREmillennial” believes that Jesus is going to come back to the earth BEFORE that so called “1,000 year reign” on the earth happens.

There are other views.

Post millennial believes it’s happening now and we usher in the coming of Christ.

Amillennial means there is no actual earthly reign but that’s it’s a spiritual one.

The problem I have with the amil view and post-mil view is it requires a lot spiritualizing of certain passages in the Revelation and elsewhere that I don’t know the original author meant to be spiritualized.

The second problem is if post or amill is true then either one means we are living in the millennium right now and if this is the utopia that the Bible describes it to be then it’s pretty disappointing!

Over promise and under deliver is an under statement!

Four Main Events

Now when you hold to the view that I hold there are people within that umbrella who disagree on the way the events are going to transpire leading UP TO the second coming of Jesus.

There are four events that are universally agreed upon regardless of ones view.

They come from Daniels prophecy in Daniel 9:27, Jesus’ teaching in the Gospels, and the Apostle Paul’s teaching in his epistles.

The four fact are

the Abomination of Desolation

the Great Tribulation

the Day of the Lord

and the Rapture of the Church

CHART: Daniel 9:27 describes a seven year period that will precede the second coming of Messiah.

That seven year period will be started by the signing of a covenant between Israel and the Antichrist.

The antichrist will break that covenant at the midway point with what the Bible calls the abomination of desolation.

In Matthew 24:15-22 Jesus says after the AOD those living in Judea will undergo a Great Tribulation.

So bad that if the days hadn’t been cut short nobody would’ve survived.

But he does cut them short through the rapture of the Church and Day of the Lord.

I believe the day of the Lord started with the trumpet judgments but it culminates with the bowls of wrath.

Views of the Rapture

The day of the Lord, the AOD and the Great Tribulation are generally agreed upon by premillenials.

What isn’t agreed upon is the timing of what’s called the “rapture of the church.”

The purpose of today’s sermon is not to address this question but I do need to mention it to help orient us to the timeline of events in today’s passage.

CHART: Pre-trib rapture puts the rapture of the church before the seven years begins.

(Church will be with Jesus in heaven for those 7 years then come back with Jesus in judgment on the earth) Most popular view.

CHART: Mid-trib puts the rapture at the mid-point of the final seven years.

(simultaneous with the abomination of desolation)

CHART: Post-trib puts the rapture at the end of the seven years (simultaneous with the second coming of Jesus)

CHART: Pre-wrath puts the rapture after the Great Tribulation and before the day of the Lord (second coming of Jesus).

I hold to the prewrath position because I believe that the final generation of the church WILL go through part of the Great Tribulation but that we will be protected from the WRATH of God.

CHART: That means I place the rapture of the church sometime between the sixth seal and the 7 trumpet judgments.

The trumpet judgments begin what we’ve entitled this series: “The Day of the Lord.”

The Day of the Lord

The Day of the Lord is a concept that the Bible addresses frequently.

In many different times and in many different ways.

Day of the Lord’s sacrifice (Zeph 1:8)

Day of the Lord’s wrath (Zeph 1:18)

Those days, the day, that day, the GREAT day (Joel 3:1, 1 Thess 5:4; Jude 6; Isa 2:11)

Judgment day (Isa 10:3)

The last day (John 12:48)

The Great Day of God (Rev 16:14)

On and on we could go.

There are countless more examples.

(Isa 13:13; Isa 34:8; Zech 14:1; Zech 14:7; Matt 13:39; Matt 24:37; Luke 17:26; Rom 2:5; Phil 1:10; John 12:48; 2 Pet 2:9)

Just because a passage doesn’t say “the Day of the Lord” doesn’t mean it’s not referencing this day of the Lord.

The day of the Lord is a day of God’s judgment for his enemies and a day of God’s deliverance for his people.

Those who do not believe experience his wrath those who have trusted in the Lord experience his mercy.

In the OT the Day of the Lord was always “near.”

Prophet after prophet conveyed a sense of imminence, nearness and expectation.

(Isaiah 13:6; Ezekiel 30:3; Joel 2:1; Zephaniah 1:7)

Sometimes the prophets would refer to historical judgments from God as a day of his wrath but they always maintained a “future day” of wrath that was yet to come.

(Joel 2:30-32; Zechariah 14:1; Malachi 4:1, 5)

In the NT the Day of the Lord was a day wherein God’s wrath will be poured out on the unbelieving world: whether Israel or the world in general (Israel: Isaiah 22; Jeremiah 30:1-17; Joel 1-2; Amos 5; Zephaniah 1; World: Ezekiel 38-39; Zechariah 14 Malachi 4:1, 5)

On the day of the Lord the proud will be humbled.

God and God alone will be praised.

(Isa 2:17)

The day of the Lord will be a day of vengeance.

Whatever a person has sowed, that’s what they will reap.

(Obad 1:15)

The Trumpet Judgments

Where is the Day of the Lord in the book of Revelation?

I believe it begins with the blowing of the seven trumpets and completes after the pouring out of the seven bowls of wrath.

But the seven trumpets and seven bowls are proceeded by what?

The seven SEALS.

It’s like those little wooden dolls that have the doll within the doll within the doll.

CHART: Prewrath Timeline

The seals describe the birth pains before the second coming, the rise of the antichrist, his persecution of the saints and the cosmic signs that portend the day of the Lord.

After that time, there's a period of silence in heaven for a half an hour, followed by the trumpet judgments.

What comes after the trumpet judgments?

The 7 bowls of wrath.

That’s our text this morning.

With that in mind let’s look at today’s passage.

We’re going to look at the first four of the seven bowls of wrath.