Welcome to EBible Fellowship's Bible study in the Book of Revelation. This will be study #42 of Revelation, chapter 1, and we going to begin in Revelation 1:15:

And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters.

We have been going verse by verse, discussing each verse that God has given us. We are attempting to allow the Bible to direct us as we come across words and phrases. We simply follow them and in this way God is leading us through the Bible.

We were discussing the phrase, "his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace" in our last study, and now we are going to go the last part of Revelation 1:15:

...and his voice as the sound of many waters.

Now this is another figure that God is using to describe the voice of Christ. If you remember, He had already given us a previous figure concerning the voice back in Revelation 1:10:

I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet,

And that is when John turned, and it says in Revelation 1:12:

And I turned to see the voice that spake with me. And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks; And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man...

So that means that God had already described this voice "as of a trumpet," and now we are given a different description, a different picture: "his voice as the sound of many waters." Well, which is it? Is it a "voice as of a trumpet," or is it the "voice of the sound of many waters?" And the answer is that it is both, and that is because it is actually neither one. Remember, this is a vision of the Lord Jesus Christ, and He does not look like this, and His voice does not sound like this. God is just using these pictures and images (and even sound effects), and, of course, we have to use our "mind's eye" to hear the trumpet sound, or to hear the sound of many waters, but in these things God is describing various spiritual truths concerning the Lord Jesus Christ and concerning the Bible. So, now, we have this particular picture of the voice of the Son of man, Jesus Himself, "as the sound of many waters."

God is giving us this picture in order for us to now follow that directive, to search the Scriptures to see if we can find information about "many waters." We do not have to search all that hard because this is a fairly common picture the Bible uses. It says in Psalm 105:41:

He opened the rock, and the waters gushed out; they ran in the dry places like a river.

This is a Psalm that is detailing the events of Israel's wilderness sojourn when the Lord brought about the miracle of satisfying the thirst of a thirsty nation that was in the wilderness by bringing water out of a rock. Of course, that rock pictures Christ, and the water that flowed forth brought physical life and sustained the existence of the people of Israel, or else they would have died in the hot desert sun from thirst. That water is a representation of the Gospel that flows forth from the Lord Jesus Christ that is able to give life---spiritual life, salvation---and to save a sinner from death, and to satisfy the thirst of a thirsty soul. That is the picture in Isaiah 55:1:

Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.

Here, the Lord is speaking to the one that is "thirsting after righteousness." Now, naturally no man thirsts for the righteousness of God. We all naturally attempt to provide our own righteousness, to get right with God based on our own good works, and the things that we do ourselves. That is why religion is so successful, and false gospels are so successful, because they develop their religions and their gospels along those same lines. They do not attempt to change the natural state of things, the natural condition of a man: man wants to work in order to obtain salvation, well, then they just meet that need and go hand-in-hand with the nature of man. That is why you will find false religions with numerous adherents, and false gospels churches that are filled, and stadiums that can be filled with individuals that just want to do a little work of "coming down a stadium aisle and accepting Christ," and then they can claim salvation.

That is not the nature of the true Gospel, the Gospel of the Bible. God gives a *thirst* to those that He is dealing with---those that He is drawing to salvation---and He did this in the days when it was the day of salvation. He is still drawing (the elect) to a closer relationship with Him after the day of salvation has come to its close, and it is now the day of judgment. But God did this often with men. He would create a "thirst" within them, and He would cause individuals to see their own vileness and filthiness in the spiritual realm, and He would cause them to understand there was nothing they can do, and there was no work that could satisfy the Law's demand---they would have to keep the whole Law to enter into the kingdom of God.

So God would open up the understanding of people to realize that they could not get right with Him on their own. And, as a result of this, a "thirst for righteousness" would begin to develop within them, just like thirst develops in the natural realm when we get thirsty; at first we get a little bit thirsty and we would like a drink, but then as time goes on and conditions are such---maybe we are out under the hot sun and exerting ourselves---then our desire for thirst increases. Of course, someone who is in a situation where maybe there is not any water, and they are all alone and they have no way of obtaining it, then their thirst can get to drastic levels, and to a dangerous situation, to where they might even die of thirst.

And this is where the Lord leads the sinner, to "thirst after righteousness" which he can not develop or obtain on His own efforts, and based on nothing he has done, or ever could do. So the sinner begins to thirst after that which only God can provide, and God would beckon people: "Come, everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters." Come to the Lord Jesus Christ, that Rock from which the waters would gush out. Come to the waters of the Gospel! God, in His mercy and His wonderful graciousness, would quench that spiritual thirst of His elect according to His own timeline for that person. God did this, generation after generation.

Let us also go to Ezekiel, chapter 1, and we will find the waters also spoken of in relationship to the voice of God. It says in Ezekiel 1:24:

And when they went, I heard the noise of their wings, like the noise of great waters, as the voice of the Almighty, the voice of speech, as the noise of an host: when they stood, they let down their wings.

And, again we find that this is speaking of God, and "the voice of the Almighty" is likened to "the noise of great waters."

Also, in the Book of Revelation itself, this type of language is used, and I will just read the verses because, Lord willing, we will get to these eventually in our study, and it says in Revelation 14:2:

And I heard a voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder: and I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps:

And also in Revelation 19:6:

And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia: for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.

We can see how God likens His voice---and that would be His word and, of course, would identify with the Bible itself---to "the voice of many waters."

Well, let us move on to Revelation 1:16:

And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength.

This is another one of those verses that is just jam-packed with information, and all of these statements are full of important things for us to know. Let us begin with the first part of the verse: "And he had in his right hand seven stars..." This is "the one like onto the Son of man," the Lord Jesus, and what He had in His right hand, and then it is said to be "seven stars."

You know, God is big enough to hold the whole universe in His hand, if He wants to, in a figurative way. God is infinite, and this creation (which would include the universe, the sun, the moon and the stars, and the various galaxies), is so great that mankind, in our many efforts, have only learned about a little portion of this universe; it is so enormous, so vast, and so great. And, remember, God just created it all with a word, "Let there be...." and it came into being.

And, finally, at the end, God will also just destroy this whole universe, and He will burn it up with fire. Some find that hard to believe because it is so enormous, and we are just tiny little finite creatures, and we stand in awe when we look up into the heavens, and we see these stars sparkling at night, and we have some understanding of how far away they are, and how huge they are---some of them many times the size our own sun---and we sort of hesitate to think that God could destroy such an incredible creation. And, yet, we should not hesitate. He spoke it all into being, and as far as we know, it took just very little effort from the all-powerful God. His voice is majestic and full of glory, and full of mighty power, power that we cannot even begin to understand.

We understand that the sun gives the earth power, and we use that power for various things. And, yet, the power of the sun or the energy that God has placed within His creation is really nothing---it probably is only a speck that gives us a tiny glimpse into the awesome power that created it. The power of God is just incredibly beyond our ability to comprehend. "His ways are higher than our ways," and his thoughts far greater than ours, and so is His omnipotent nature. He is this great and enormous Being, the Creator who has created us in His image, and that is a wonder in itself. He can do with this creation as He wills, and then He can simply recreate a new earth even more glorious than this present earth, and a new heavens more glorious than the heavens that are presently in our night sky. All that is nothing to God. He could create a thousand creations like this present one we dwell in.

And, certainly, God has been creating from eternity past, and will continue to create into eternity future. But we are not to understand, as we see this image of "one like onto the Son of man" that has in His right hand "seven stars", this literally; God is not speaking of literal stars or a literal hand. We are to understand this spiritually.

Now we are helped right away because further along in this same chapter God defines the "seven stars" in Revelation 1:20:

The mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in my right hand, and the seven golden candlesticks. The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches: and the seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven churches.

So, once again, God has helped us. He has saved us effort, and it is always nice when He does this because we know we have a right and true interpretation, as God is the one interpreting the "seven stars" for us, and He says, "The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches." So, we have a definition. Again, that is what we always try to do: search the Bible to find the definition for what is in view.

Of course, that definition leaves us with more questions such as, "Who are the seven angels and what do they represent?" We are going to save that until we get to verse 20 and then into chapter 2, because chapters 2 and 3 of Revelation are addressed to each of those seven angels; for example, "unto the angel of the church of Ephesus;" or we could understand it as, "unto the star of the church at Ephesus," and "unto the star of the church of Thyatira," and "unto the star of the church of Philadelphia," and so on. The "seven stars" are the "seven angels," or the "seven angels" are the "seven stars." We will, again, get into that discussion later, and that gives us more time to study and think about that.

But right now, what does it mean that He had in His right hand "seven stars?" Let us think about the right hand of "the one like unto the Son of man," and who is that but God? Let us consider what the Bible has to say about the right hand of God, and the Bible has a lot to say about God's right hand. Many of the most helpful statements are found in the Psalms. It says in Psalm 16:8:

I have set JEHOVAH always before me: because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.

And also in Psalm 16:11:

Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.

Now that is interesting. That makes the "right hand" of God very attractive: "at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore." We are very interested in learning about that, in learning about these pleasures that are eternal.

The next Psalm, Psalm 17 says in Psalm 17:7:

Shew thy marvellous lovingkindness, O thou that savest by thy right hand them which put their trust in thee from those that rise up against them.

There, God is referring to His right hand and the reference is made, "thou that savest by thy right hand." The "right hand" of God is somehow instrumental in saving, and what could that be pointing to?

Well, let us go back to the Book of Job, and then we will return to the Psalms. Let us go back to Job, chapter 40, and this is when JEHOVAH reveals Himself to Job, and God asks this of Job in Job 40:9:

Hast thou an arm like God? or canst thou thunder with a voice like him?

That is, "Job, do you have an arm like me?" And then God goes on to make some follow-up statements (and keep in mind that this is the case if Job did have an arm like God), and it says in Job 40:14:

Then will I also confess unto thee that thine own right hand can save thee.

You see, the "right hand" of God is a "hand of salvation": Thine own right hand could save you, IF you had an arm like God.

Now let us go to Psalm 138, and it says in Psalm 138:7:

Though I walk in the midst of trouble, thou wilt revive me: thou shalt stretch forth thine hand against the wrath of mine enemies, and thy right hand shall save me.

Again, and again, and again, we would find that God's "right hand" is associated with salvation, and this is why we find that in Psalm 144 the "right hand" becomes identified with another kind of a gospel, because, basically, it is a synonym for salvation, or for Christ, or for the Gospel, and it says in Psalm 144:7:

Send thine hand from above; rid me, and deliver me out of great waters, from the hand of strange children; Whose mouth speaketh vanity, and their right hand is a right hand of falsehood.

Then it says in Psalm 144:11:

Rid me, and deliver me from the hand of strange children, whose mouth speaketh vanity, and their right hand is a right hand of falsehood:

That is, if you look at a church, well, they have the Bible and they speak of Christ, and, yet, they add works to grace and, therefore, the pure Gospel of grace has become polluted, and has become another gospel. Therefore, their "right hand" which, perhaps, in time past in that church during the church age was a true *right hand* of God that saves, now has become a "right hand" of falsehood, another kind of a gospel that has no power to save.

This idea or this image of the "right hand of God" is carried over into the New Testament in Matthew 25. There are actually several verses in the New Testament, but we will just look at a couple of them. It says in Matthew 25:32-34:

And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats: And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left. Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:

Now, of course, we know now why the sheep are on the "right hand." That is the place of salvation. That is the place where God's elect would be found, and the goats are on the left because God does not speak of His left hand in a saving way, but the figure is that the "right hand" is the place of salvation, and the left hand is where the goats are found; that is, there is no salvation on the left hand.

Let us just look at one last verse dealing with this in Romans 8:34:

Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.

There is the place of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Saviour, and, therefore, there is the place of salvation, at the "right hand of God." It is in that "right hand" that Revelation 1:16 says, that there are "seven stars." They are in the "right hand" of "the one like unto the Son of man," the Lord Jesus Christ.