Transcript
Will you turn with me in your Bibles to the book of Revelation and the 11th chapter of that book. Revelation chapter 11. Revelation chapter 11. And beginning to read from verse 3.
And I will give power to My two witnesses, and they shall prophesy one thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth. These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands standing before the God of the earth. And if any man will hurt them, fire proceeds out of their mouth and devours their enemy. And if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed.
These have power to shut heaven that it rain not in the days of their prophecy, and have power over the waters to turn them to blood, and to smite the earth with all plagues as often as they will. And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascends out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them and shall overcome them and kill them. And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. And the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and a half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves.
And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another because these two prophets tormented them that dwell on the earth. And after three days and a half the spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet. And great fear fell upon them which saw them. And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, ‘Come up hither.’ And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud, and their enemies beheld them.
And the same hour was there a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell. And in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand. And the remnant were affrighted and gave glory to the God of heaven. The second woe is past. And behold, the third woe comes quickly.
Students are often curious about the private lives of their professors. And therefore I feel sure that you will be interested to discover that the most passionate romance in my entire life took place in the second grade. I had not been a second-grade student for very long before I fell madly and head-over-heels in love with a cute little second-grade girl named Anne Nuttall.
I want you to know that I was raised to be a well-behaved little boy. But Anne Nuttall empowered me in the second grade. And I began to pass little love notes to my girlfriend during class. To my everlasting shame and embarrassment one of these mushy little communications was intercepted and read by my second-grade teacher. Fortunately she did not read it aloud or I would probably have died on the spot.
But despite such setbacks as that I soon discovered that Anne Nuttall also had a crush on me. And I continued the rest of my second-grade career floating along on cloud nine. Then tragedy struck our young romance. We both graduated to the third grade. And in third grade we were put in different classrooms. And we didn’t see each other quite as much as before.
But we did have one very thrilling and dramatic reunion during that year. The third grade was responsible for putting on a school play called The Nutcracker. I don’t remember too much about the storyline. But the plot has been used a thousand times. You know the beautiful princess who falls into the clutches of an evil power and is held against her will. And the bold and courageous hero dares to confront the evil power. And at the final moment is revealed as the handsome Prince Charming.
You’re not going to believe this. But when the teachers chose the cast of characters they chose Anne Nuttall as the princess in distress. And who did they choose as the handsome Prince Charming? I modestly confess it. They chose me. What a bonanza. Here was an opportunity to act out my childhood fantasies and to rescue the girl of my dreams and to live happily ever after someday.
I’m going to have to stop living on that experience. But I will never forget the night of the performance. Standing up before those footlights with an audience filled with adults and everybody dressed up in striking costumes. And me in particular. I had on one of those white satiny outfits with frills and all the trappings the prince wears. But it was all covered over with a heavy dark cloak that was clasped at the neck.
And at the high point of the drama I was supposed to unfasten the cloak and cast it from me and reveal myself as the handsome prince. And I can still remember fumbling at that clasp and wondering if it was ever going to come loose. But somehow or other I made it. And I cast the cloak aside. And the climax arrived. And I don’t really remember very much about the rest of the evening. But I presume that the curtain fell to great rounds of applause.
I’ve often wondered if my teachers spotted it that way. And I suppose that I never will know. But I want to assure you of one thing. When confronted with an opportunity to play a role like that believe me I played it for all it was worth.
Perhaps you’ve never stopped to consider that every single person in this audience is an actor. And you are playing out a role on the stage of life. Whether you want to be or whether you don’t want to be you are caught up in the action of the most important drama of all time. The age-long struggle between good and evil. And you are playing out your role not only in the presence of men but also in the sight of angels and principalities and powers.
There are many kinds of characters in this play. And there are heroes and there are heroines. And there are villains and there are villainesses. And in between there are a great multitude of mediocrities who hardly know that there’s a battle going on. And if they know they haven’t decided which side they are on.
And the question that I really want to ask you this morning in chapel is one that I think really deserves some thought. In the great struggle between good and evil who are you? Who are you? And what kind of a role are you playing?
I think it would be a great mistake to treat the passage that is before us as if it were simply a dry recitation of some far-off future events. This is more than an advance news report. This is more than an incident to be properly placed somewhere on our prophetic charts. What we are looking at this morning is drama. And it is some of the very highest order.
It is a reenactment upon the stage of future history of a struggle that has been repeated time without number down through the centuries of human experience. The struggle between good and evil. You don’t even need to buy a program to tell the players. They are obvious on the face of the story.
The heroes are clearly two great prophets of God raised up after the rapture of the church. And they witness for one thousand two hundred and threescore days. And in order to make it perfectly obvious that they represent the Creator of the heaven and the earth and the seas they are given almost unlimited power. So that they are able to shut up heaven that it might not rain on the earth for a period of three and a half years. They have power over the waters to turn them to blood. They have power on the earth to smite with every plague as often as they will.
They are dynamic vital sources of spiritual life and energy. They are called two olive trees. They hold aloft the Word of God in a darkened world. They are called two lampstands. They stand for everything that is right and good. They are the heroes.
But there’s a villain. And he appears for the very first time in this book in the passage that we have read. We know from later chapters that he’s a man. And that he’s a man who comes back from the dead. He ascends up as it were out of the very abyss of hell. But though he is a man he is usually described not as a man but as a wild animal. A savage and ferocious beast.
There’s a story about an army officer, a British army officer, who had a tiger cub for a pet. And he nurtured the tiger cub until it was grown to full strength and size. And it spent a lot of time with its master. And one day the officer was in his library reading. And he fell asleep as he was reading. The tiger was lying beside his chair. And the officer’s hand was dangling down beside the chair.
And the tiger began to lick his master’s hand. But there was an abrasion on the hand. And for the very first time the tiger tasted blood. And as he did so his animal nature was aroused. And when the officer awoke he found that he was no longer looking into the eyes of a tame and docile pet. He was looking into the eyes of a savage beast that had tasted his blood and was hungry for his life. Just in time he grabbed his pistol and shot the tiger to death.
The reason that story seems to me a parable about the nature of sin and its beginning. Sin often looks like a very tame and submissive pet. Something attractive and cuddly and appealing. But when it is fully grown and fully developed it is a wild animal. A savage and cruel and vicious beast.
And the man that we’re looking at on the pages of the Word of God is the very incarnation of evil and sin itself. A wild animal. He is called in the Bible the man of sin. He is called the lawless one. He sets aside every divine restraint. He breaks every divine law. He puts himself in the place of God. And after all that’s what sin is all about in the end.
Therefore the confrontation that we are looking at this morning is a classic confrontation. The confrontation between good and evil. Between the servants of God and the servant of the devil.
Right here we come to a rude surprise. A shocking event. When the battle is joined between good and evil good is defeated and evil is triumphant. And packed galleries burst into wild and enthusiastic applause.
Such a few months ago Roy Rogers was down in Fairfax, Virginia, officiating at the opening of another in his chain of family restaurants. And there was a young fellow seventeen years of age who was in the audience. And he had a concoction that was sort of like a pie made out of whipped cream and cottage cheese and oatmeal. Would you believe it? He threw that thing right in Roy Rogers’ face. The police caught him. And Roy Rogers after he recovered some of his composure said, “Let me take a poke at him.” And then he added, “I hope they serve Roy Rogers hamburgers right down his throat.”
You know when I read that story I had to ask myself the question who in the world could possibly have anything against Roy Rogers? I can’t think of a single movie star whose image is cleaner than Roy Rogers. And if we are thinking of the good guys and the white hats we almost have to think of Roy Rogers first of all.
And sometimes we are tempted to ask ourselves the question who in the world can have anything against God? But the answer to that question is the world hates God. I don’t mean by that the world knows it hates God or that it thinks that it hates God. Oftentimes in the world people think about God. They think of Him as a sort of a kindly fatherly figure who lives upstairs in heaven. And He wags His finger disapprovingly at His disobedient children. But in the end He’s ready to forgive anything and forgive everything. And it’s hard to hate a God like that.
But that’s not the God of the Bible. It’s true that the God of the Bible is a kind and merciful Heavenly Father. But He’s also a sovereign King. He’s also a righteous Judge. And He makes demands on the lives of men. And that’s the kind of God that the world hates.
It would be fine with the world if God would stay upstairs and mind His own business. Except of course when we need Him. But when God begins to interfere in man’s plans and their happiness and their tranquility and their security that’s the kind of God the world hates.
Make no mistake about it. Through these two witnesses God is interfering in the tranquility of the world. The age of grace is over. The Christian Church which has never been an instrument for judgment in the world has been taken out of the world. And a new kind of testimony has been raised up. And God is insisting on His right. And the judgments ministered through these men are God’s way of saying, “Give Me what is My due as your Maker.” And the world doesn’t like that.
And they build up a tremendous reservoir of hatred against these two men. But for a while they seem almost invincible. And whenever their enemies try to do anything like fire comes out of their mouths and destroys their enemy. And then there’s a great turn of events. A new figure appears on the stage. And he is able to do what nobody else was able to do. He draws his power unashamedly from the devil. And he kills these two men.
And their bodies lie as lifeless corpses on the streets of Jerusalem. You know it wouldn’t surprise me that the moment they fall dead it begins to rain on earth for the first time in three and a half years. The world is deliriously happy. I can just see the television cameras trained away at their corpses. And the picture being passed by satellite to television screens all over the world. And people from many nations and kindreds and tongues are watching these two men. And they’re delighted. And they celebrate an unholy Christmas time. And people actually send presents to each other to celebrate the defeat of God’s two witnesses.
Sinister scene, isn’t it? Good has fallen. Evil is triumphant. And a world rejoices.
So I’m thinking of Oren McConnell this morning. One of the very finest young men that it’s ever been my privilege to help train in the classroom. A young man gifted and dedicated and going out to minister to people with a pastor’s heart. Would God permit a dedicated man like that to experience in the very earliest years of his ministry an incurable cancer? Would God allow him to suffer the amputation of his leg and all of the additional suffering that followed that? And has a way of leaving behind in this world a wife and a family of small children? Would God allow that?
Would God allow Satan to strike His faithful servant Job so that Job’s body is covered with boils from head to foot? And to ease his misery he has to take a potsherd and scrape his painful sores? Would God permit that? Would God allow two great faithful prophets who have witnessed for Him for one thousand two hundred and threescore days to be ruthlessly slaughtered by the most vicious person that has ever walked on the stage of history? Would He allow their bodies to lie unburied and unattended on the streets of the city for three and a half days? Would God permit that?
You know I’m really surprised over the years at the large number of people that I have talked to. And it is evident that they have somewhere deep down inside of them the conviction that if you really love God, if you’re really serving faithfully, nothing really bad will ever happen to you. Surely God smooths the pathway of His faithful servants into His coming kingdom, doesn’t He? Doesn’t He?
And yet if you think of life and Christian experience like that you have hardly even begun to understand the Bible. And you have hardly even begun to understand the meaning of the struggle between good and evil. For it is one of the great principles of the Word of God that good wins no final victory except out of the depth of apparent defeat. May I repeat that? It’s important. Good wins no final victory except out of the depth of apparent defeat.
Did you notice the stage on which this scene was enacted? It’s the most appropriate stage in all of the world. The stage is the city of Jerusalem. A city that ought to have been called the holy city. But a city whose history was fully steeped in sin. But spiritually could be described as Sodom and Egypt. And here is the bottom line. This is the city where also our Lord was crucified.
Did you ever stop to consider that from one point of view the cross of Christ is the greatest victory that evil has ever won? Sinful wicked and sinful men taking the holy the sinless Son of God and nailing Him to a cross. The preacher crucifying the Creator and standing around to watch Him die. Evil’s greatest moment seemingly. But out of that apparent defeat has come every victory that good has ever won or will ever win.
For good wins no final victory except out of the depth of defeat. Did you know that that’s also true of your life and mine? It’s true that salvation is completely free. The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Salvation is free. But spiritual victory is very very expensive and costly.
And if you could really go through life without any heartbreak without any tragedy without any suffering without any sacrifice you could never become you could never become a victorious Christian. The Bible says, “Yes and all who will to live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.” Jesus said, “Except the corn of wheat fall into the ground and die it abides alone. But if it die it brings forth much fruit.” Jesus said also, “Any man will come after Me let him deny himself and let him take up his cross and follow Me. He that loveth his life shall lose it. He that loses his life for My sake and the gospel shall find it.”
I make a confession to you. Sometimes not always. Sometimes I am very discouraged by some of the students that I teach in class. You are surprised at the number of students who are intensely grade-conscious and intensely degree-conscious. As if the supreme badge of spiritual success was a grade-point average sufficient to get you into graduate school. And it’s not hard to find students who are all prepared for some significant and influential position in Christian ministry. Students who are ready to be recognized as scholars and exegetes and Christian leaders.
And just sometimes it seems awful hard to find a student who is content to be a corn of wheat that falls into the ground and dies for Jesus Christ. We turn out lots of students who are prepared for the victories and successes of Christian life. But how many of us are prepared for its defeats? For its frustrations? For its disappointments?
Don’t misunderstand me this morning. I’m not trying to load you down with a great burden of guilt. I’m not trying to send you all out looking for martyrdom. You don’t need to look for suffering. You keep your eyes on Jesus Christ. And if you follow Him faithfully whatever suffering God graciously and wisely designed for you will find you.
But I’m warning you about something. If you mean business with the Son of God you are following Someone who won His victory through a cross. And that is the only way. That is the only way you are going to win your victory as well. That’s not what I think about it. That’s what the Bible teaches.
For three and a half days these men lay in defeat and disgrace on the streets of Jerusalem. But then something happened. The spirit of life from God entered into them. And they stood up on their feet. And they were caught up into the presence of the Lord. And the city of Jerusalem was shaken to its core. The people who survived that earthquake gave glory to the God of heaven.
And in this final scene there is also a final prophecy. The three-and-a-half days remind us that there are now three and a half years and three and a half years only for evil to be triumphant. Well the next forty-two months the beast will rule the world. And he will crush the people of God under his feet and shed the blood of martyrs on the earth. But when it’s finished the whole world will be shaken to its foundations. And God’s people will rise from their defeat triumphant. Today and the remnant of men will give glory to the God of heaven.
And as for the two witnesses so also for God’s people in those days. And so also for God’s people today. A brief period of apparent defeat must precede ultimate and eternal victory.
Brian Cunningham of Jackson, Michigan, was only eighteen years of age when in March of 1975 his car ran off the highway and plunged through the ice of a frozen pond into the water. When rescuers pulled his body out of the water thirty-eight minutes later his body had turned blue. He had stopped breathing. His eyes were fixed in a glassy dilated stare. In fact he was pronounced dead from drowning.
And then he felt. And when he felt the rescuers decided that all evidence to the contrary they should do their best to revive him. After a high-speed ambulance ride after two hours of cardiopulmonary resuscitation after thirteen hours on a breathing system Brian Cunningham regained consciousness. And more. He had suffered none of the brain damage which is so extremely common in accidents of this kind. He was able to finish his course at the Jackson Community College and do excellent work.
Lots of people can relate a comeback from physical disaster like that. But in the spiritual realm such comebacks are common. And they belong to all of the truly triumphant and victorious and faithful servants of God. In fact they belong to everyone who shares the dedication of the Apostle Paul with whose words I would like to close.
Paul said, “What things were gain to me these I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord. That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings being made conformable unto His death.”
Is that your ambition this morning? If it’s not, it ought to be. And if it is you know exactly who you are. And you know exactly what role you are playing in the drama of the ages.
Shall we pray? Father, it is not easy truth that we’ve talked about this morning nor entirely pleasant. But it is Thy Word. We pray that we may be able by Thy grace to lay aside the false motivations and the false objectives and to fix our eyes upon the Lord Jesus Christ who loved us and gave Himself for us. And following His pathway wherever that pathway may lead because we know at least ultimately to victory and to fellowship with Him. Grant us this grace and privilege we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.