Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship's Bible study in the Book of Revelation. Tonight is study #3 of Revelation, chapter 5, and we are going to begin by reading from Revelation 5:1-5:
And I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne a book written within and on the backside, sealed with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof? And no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon. And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to open and to read the book, neither to look thereon. And one of the elders saith unto me, Weep not: behold, the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof.
We have been looking at this picture that God has given us, as He is giving the Apostle John information concerning His throne in heaven; and the LORD is seated upon His throne and he has in His right hand a book written within and without, that is sealed with seven seals.
Then it says in Revelation 5:2:
And I saw a strong angel proclaiming…
The word proclaiming is the same Greek word that is often translated as preaching, so he is proclaiming or preaching with a loud voice:
Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof? And no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon.
Let us take a look at this strong angel before we continue looking at the rest of this information. Who is the strong angel that the Apostle John saw that was proclaiming with a loud voice and asking the question, “Who is worthy to open the book?” (Then there is a response given a little later in the chapter.)
We find that the angel proclaiming this is God Himself. It says in Revelation 18:8:
Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her.
That word strong is the same word that is used to describe this angel or messenger in our verse in chapter 5. It is a strong angel, and, of course, God is all powerful and almighty; He is the Omnipotent One and He is strong. We also find this statement in Revelation 10:1:
And I saw another mighty angel…
The word mighty is also a translation of the same Greek word.
And I saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire:
Now there is no question as to who this strong angel is in Revelation 10:1. It is the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one that identifies with the rainbow in the Bible. He is the one that is identified with the sun. He is said to the “Son of righteousness,” and the Bible says in Psalm 84:11 that the Lord God is a “sun and a shield.” And, also, Christ, as it states there, has feet “as pillars of fire.” The pillars of fire identify with the Lord Jesus experiencing the judgment and wrath of God for the sake of His elect.
Notice also in Revelation 10:2:
And he had in his hand a little book open: and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth,
Now in our passage in Revelation 5, God is the one that is on the throne and in His hand is a book that is sealed and in Revelation 10 this strong angel has in his hand a “little book open.” There is a difference because this is said to be a “little book” and I do not want to get into that right now; but the fact that it says it is “open,” literally, it should read: “And he had in his hand a little book having been opened.” It is, therefore, referring to the Bible during the great tribulation and during the Day of Judgment because that is the only time the Bible has been open. Otherwise, it would be sealed.
But right now, we are just trying to identify the strong angel and it clearly is the Lord Jesus. In Revelation 18, it says in verse 20:
Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and prophets; for God hath avenged you on her. And a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall that great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be found no more at all.
The mighty angel is judging Babylon and Babylon here is a picture of the world. Now God has not assigned that task for an angel to perform. God is the Judge. Christ is the Judge. Jesus is the mighty angel that is condemning Babylon; that is, bringing the judgment upon the world at the time of the end.
Well, let us go back to Revelation 5:2:
And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof? And no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon.
God’s people have always realized that we need God in order to understand the Bible – that apart from God there would be no proper understanding of the Scriptures – and this verse is confirming that truth: “no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth.” You cannot find a man anywhere that will have the ability, the power or the authority to open up the Book. No man is able to even open the Book – to remove the seven seals that God has placed upon it.
And remember what God says in a few places in the Bible – that what He has shut, “no man can open,” and He shut up His word, the Scriptures, as He said in Daniel 12: “Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end.” And then “knowledge will increase,” because at the time of the end it would be unsealed; and that would imply that the people of God would understand it: first of all, that they would read it and then that they would be able to understand it and comprehend it. But all of the time that it was sealed up, no one had any ability to understand the things of the Bible. God tells us in 1st Corinthians 13:9:
For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.
This is a true declaration concerning the entire church age; the people of God in the churches (Christians, whether saved or unsaved, whether wheat or tares) all “slept,” as it says in the Matthew 13 parable; and Isaiah 29 indicates that it is as though men sleep when a book is sealed. This means that all during the church age those in the churches had partial understanding and they declared what they understood; therefore, they prophesied in part or partially. They had some things correct – they were given some truth concerning the Lord Jesus and the Gospel of the Bible – but there was much that was not given them or revealed to them because it was not the time. You have to wait until the time of the end.
Now why did God do that? We asked that question in our last study. God had His own purposes and reasons. Of course, it was extremely wise of Him. We know that because He does everything wisely; He does everything with infinite wisdom and so it was according to the wisdom of God that He would only reveal partial truth.
Now one reason we can quickly see as to why it would be necessary for the LORD to seal up or close up information about the time of the end – information that would deal with the end of the church age, the great tribulation, the date for judgment day and which would deal with the period of time we are now in during this Day of Judgment. Christ indicates in John 16 that he had many things further to communicate with His people, but he would not do so at that point because He did not want them to be burdened. Let me read that verse because it is very helpful, in John 16:12:
I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.
God is concerned about the burden He would place upon His people if He gave all the information at once – if He just wrote it in more plain language, or if He had opened His people’s eyes to these truths early on, or if Christ would have explained them early on to His disciples and the disciples then explained it to those that followed them, and so on – then they would be carrying a burden of knowledge that we would be here for centuries; it is only the first century and the time of the end will not come until the 20th century when the great tribulation begins; and then the actual end of the world will not occur until the 21st century.
Oh, my, what a burden! Not only do they have to carry the burden of living the Christian life, but that expectation which God did allow His people to hold to in their partial understanding: “Perhaps the LORD will come in my lifetime. Perhaps the LORD will come in my generation or my son’s generation.” God permitted that, even though it was incorrect, in order not to overburden His people.
But, here, in John 16:13, Christ says:
Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.
There God lays down His end time program. It is very similar to what the LORD said to Daniel hundreds of years before the coming of Christ: “Go your way, Daniel, the word is sealed til the time of the end.” Well, now, in the first century A.D., Jesus is basically saying the same thing to His disciples: “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.” He is saying, “I do not want to overburden you, but go your way, and the Holy Spirit will come and show you all truth.” And when would that be? Would it be in Acts 2 with the pouring out of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost to begin the church age? No, there was not all truth revealed at that time, but it would come at the time of the end, as we read in Mark 13:10-11:
And the gospel must first be published among all nations. But when they shall lead you, and deliver you up, take no thought beforehand what ye shall speak, neither do ye premeditate: but whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye: for it is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost.
Now, there again, Jesus is saying that the Holy Ghost will speak, but when is the Holy Ghost going to speak? He is going to speak “in that hour” and the hour identifies with the great tribulation which is typified by one hour.
It is really amazing (in Mark 13, in the verse we just read) how the God of the Bible encourages the reader to study the Bible diligently and to “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed;” the same God who says, “Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear to all;”
The same God that encourages us to give attendance to reading, to continue to seek the truth, to pray for wisdom and to study, study, study…and, yet, how could it be that this same God says, in Mark 13:11: “Take no thought beforehand what ye shall speak, neither do ye premeditate,” concerning the end of the world “in that hour;” and the Lord is giving admonishment to not think of it beforehand and to not premeditate.
Just about everyone did not hearken to God concerning this instruction. All of those in the churches and congregations continued to try to figure out the time of the end and they developed scenarios and end time commentaries; eschatology was developed by all sorts of individuals – this is what the Bible teaches about the end – and many of them differed from one another and they were all saying contradicting things. And all of them, without fail, were wrong. It is really incredible how wrong all of them are (and were) in the things that they developed concerning the teaching of the Bible and the end of the world.
They were wrong because they could not know. That is why the Lord says: “take no thought beforehand what ye shall speak, neither do ye premeditate” (concerning the great tribulation and concerning His coming) because the Bible was sealed, and no matter how studious or how intelligent or how learned anyone might be…remember what Isaiah 29 said about the learned man? Let me just refer to that because God puts it better than any man could. It says in Isaiah 29:11:
And the vision of all is become unto you as the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to one that is learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee: and he saith, I cannot; for it *is* sealed: And the book is delivered to him that is not learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee: and he saith, I am not learned.
No man could read the Book that was sealed. Who can read a book that is sealed? And if you cannot open it to read it, you certainly cannot comprehend it or know it. That is the Lord’s point, so wait until the time of the end, until “that hour,” as it says in Mark 13:11:
… but whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye: for it is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost.
How is that possible? God is telling us that what we receive in that hour, we are to speak, but what we say is not coming from us, but it is coming from the Holy Ghost. Now, first of all, since he is referring to “that hour” of great tribulation which comes at the end of the world, long after the Bible was completed, how can the Holy Ghost speak? The bible is clear that God will not break the barrier of the supernatural; He will not add to or subtract from His word; He will not give a dream or a vision or divine revelation in any form, so how can He speak? And what He speaks, He will give us and we are to speak; and then we are to realize that it is not us that really did the speaking, but the Holy Ghost. How can God do that?
The answer is, actually, not that difficult. In 1st Corinthians 2, we read a verse that explains God’s end time program and tells us exactly how He intends to give information to His people in the time of the hour of the great tribulation when the Bible is unsealed, and how they are then to speak it, and also how it is evidently from Him and He takes full responsibility for what is being said. It says in 1st Corinthians 2:13:
Which things also we speak…
Well, there it is again. It is the child of God that is opening his mouth and speaking and declaring things.
Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
That is the solution to Mark 13:11 – that God will move within His people to will and to do of His good pleasure and to approach the Bible in the way that He has instructed them with the methodology that He has laid out for them, “comparing spiritual things with spiritual,” and as we do so – as we are carefully going about that – we will come to truth and understanding, because at the proper time at the time of the end, God will take the seals off the Book, the Bible, (all seven seals all at once) and now, suddenly, the Bible will be an open Book; it will be as though you can read it and understand it and comprehend it; and we will know: “The wise will understand.” None of the wicked will understand, but the wise will understand, as God says in so many places, and as He says in that verse in Ecclesiastes 8:5:
Whoso keepeth the commandment shall feel no evil thing: and a wise man's heart discerneth both time and judgment.
Now, by God’s grace, we have discerned the time of the great tribulation and we can lay it out; we have discerned the time of judgment day beginning on May 21, 2011, and now we have discerned judgment – the nature of the judgment of the Day of Judgment. God is giving His people that understanding and the ability to comprehend what He has done.
So we are at the time of the end; the seals are off the Book, the Bible, and now we are able to read and understand what no previous generations has been able to understand. It has nothing to do with intelligence. It has nothing to do with diligence. (Those things factor in but it is not the cause of it.) It is only a result of living at the time of the end. That is where we are. We are living in the Day of Judgment and living in the time when the Bible is now open.
This is actually a wonderful time; and it was necessary for God to do this so that He could open the Scriptures to reveal, for instance, the end of the church age, to get His people out of the churches, and to send forth the Gospel from that position in order to save a great multitude of sinners in the world (apart from the churches and congregations). God, in His wisdom, has decided to work things out this way.
And now we find we are coming down to the last few details for Him to reveal – the last few bits of information that have been closed up and sealed. Even though all of the seals were removed at the beginning of the great tribulation, it has been God’s program and His pleasure to reveal the truths, here and there, as we have gone along in the great tribulation and now in the Day of Judgment.