So, hopefully, the study of the book of Revelations has made an impact, at least on the way that you think about your life, and again, so that we would not be caught off guard. Revelation 6.15, "Behold, I am coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake, keeping his garments on, that he may not go about naked and be seen exposed." So, the second part of it where it says to stay awake, right?

What does it mean to be awake as a Christian, to be sober in the way that we live? Again, the challenge that we have is that there's so much distraction, especially where we live, in a generation that we live. How do we stay sober where we are at, right?

Not to get the standard of our Christian living by the people that we're next to, but what we see in Scripture. So, again, generally, remember we talked about the three separate judgments? You could take that as the seven, and then another seven, and another seven, 21 years consecutively, or seven consecutively, or it could be one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and then it's basically all three judgments are talking about the same period, except that it's just talking about different aspects.

But the way we approached it, the way I approached it, is that on the seventh one, it opens up the trumpet judgments, and on the seventh trumpet judgment, it opens up the bowl judgment. So, that's the approach that we took in our interpretation. So, I'm not going to go through all of it for the sake of time, but remember there are different approaches to this, right?

Depending on your perspective on how you interpret this, everything that we studied, the application is going to look very different. So, one of the applications or the interpretation was that you would interpret it in a way that everything was fulfilled in the first century, right? Anybody remember what that view was called?

The preterist view, right? The historical view is the application of historical, certain historical events all throughout from the very first century until now. That's the historical view. So, what we are calling, it's called the futurist view, meaning that most of this stuff is meant to be applied at the end times when Christ comes, during the tribulation, during the millennium, and at the very end.

So, that was our approach, if you guys remember, okay? So, I'm going to go over 22 chapters, so it's going to be pretty quick, alright? And then I'm going to give you guys the rest of the time to start. So, if you remember, chapter one begins with the introduction, and verse three, it says, "Blessed are those who read," again, this is not the exact quote, "or hears and keeps the prophecy of this book of Revelation." And so, the emphasis was not just to read it, not just to hear it, but to obey.

And we talked about that last week, how he begins with this verse, and Revelation 22 ends with it, right? "Blessed are those who obey," or keep this word. So, when we think about the various prophecies that we studied, it wasn't just so that we can look at it and say, "Oh, now I understand the end times," but how does that cause us to obey, right?

And so, that's what it started with. And then, the very first vision that he has is the vision of Christ. And Christ is the one who calls John to give him the vision so that he can take it to the church. So, chapter one begins with a detailed description of who Christ is.

Chapter two and three gives us the seven different churches, right? Anybody remember which was the Lukewarm Church? Which was the church that, two churches that weren't rebuked? Samaritan and Philadelphia. Samaritan and Philadelphia. Good, you did your homework. Okay. Which is the church that lost their first love? Okay, Church of Ephesus.

All right, let's see if you remember this one. Which is the church that has a reputation of being alive, but was dead? Sardis. Okay. So, we have the seven different churches. If there is any unifying thing about all of them, it was that God promises that those who overcome, that He was going to give eternal life, right?

Meaning He perseveres to the end. So, the letters are written and everything in the content of the book of Revelation was meant to be distributed in the seven churches. Okay? So, this was not meant for any one particular church. This was universal in scope. So, He wasn't dealing with any one particular problem, one particular church.

Because the whole letter was supposed to be read. Okay? Now, of course, all of the New Testament was written for everybody to read. But it was addressing a particular problem in Galatia or Philippi or to a particular person. But this book, it makes it very clear that it was meant for everybody.

Okay? That's why the seven different churches are written. So, before we get into the seal judgments, remember there's, remember we said scattered throughout these judgments. What is the vision that John gets? Before and after. What does he see? The throne of God. God gives him a picture of heaven.

So, before he begins to reveal the horrific judgment that's coming upon mankind, He always gives him a vision of worship up in heaven. About the throne of God, the different creatures out there rotating and declaring His holiness. And then, so chapter four is a vision of the throne of God, the 24 elders and how He is being worshipped.

And then chapter five, if you remember, the lion and the lamb, it begins with the heavens crying because there's no one who is worthy to open up the seal. Right? And then they come and they say, "Don't worry, the lion of Judah has come. He is worthy." And they turn around and what do they see?

The lamb. Right? The lamb of God. The lion of Judah expressed as the lamb of God and He is worthy. Right? So, basically that's the gospel message that Christ, the Son of God comes, takes on human form, gives Himself as a ransom for many. So, we see that gospel picture in chapter five.

And how does chapter five end? With worship of the lamb. Right? So, chapter four is the worship of God and chapter five is the worship of the lamb. And then, so what happens after this? The seal judgments open up. Right? And I'm not going to ask you to remember all of the different seals, but because we went through this the first time, remember what the first seal?

We had the four horses. Right? The white horse. Do you remember what was next? The red horse, black horse, and then a pale horse. Right? And each of them representing different things. Famine, death, right? War. So, it represented different things. And then the fifth seal, what does it open up?

You get a vision of those who've been martyred. Right? At the temple. And then, and then, yes, and then the sixth, and then the seventh seal opens up in chapter seven and then we see the 144,000. Again, remember the six seals? After the judgment is done, the seventh seal opens the door and the first vision before they go into the trumpet judgments is again, worship.

Right? 144,000, 12,000 in each tribe making up 144,000 Jews, the Israelites, and then behind them, who are they? The Gentiles. Representing the world. So he sees, after the seal judgment, he sees again, he sees the throne of God, he sees God being worshipped, then after that vision starts the trumpet judgment.

Right? So the seventh seal judgment opens up the seventh trumpet judgments. In chapter eight, it goes, right, and what was, what was the key quality of the trumpet judgments? Anybody? There's two things. One is it's geared toward the earth, not directly toward man. Man suffers as a result of it.

So there's earthquakes, there's all these other things that judgment is coming upon the earth, but it's not directly toward them. Right? And the second, remember the number, a third? A third of this, a third of that. Right? So it's not a complete judgment. So remember, when we were going through the seven trumpet judgments, what was the intent of God?

He's still waiting for repentance. He's giving them an opportunity. So the whole earth is not wiped out yet. That doesn't happen until the woes. Remember three woes that come later on? Right? So this is the first of the woes. Right? You have the first one, two, three, four, four trumpet judgments, and then the fifth trumpet judgment opens up where the one who has the key to the abyss, he comes out and he forms an army.

And it's a demonic army. And remember when we talked about how the locust judgment in the book of Joel, that the locust judgment oftentimes refers to utter and complete destruction? So again, if you look at each of the judgments, there's an escalation of each one of the judgments. Now we've gotten to the point where he says that three woes are coming, and then the first woe is a demonic army that comes in the form of, again, whether there's going to be a literal locust or not, but the devastation is going to become more and more devastating.

Chapter 10, you have an angel. Remember, what does it signify when it says he had one foot in the sea, one foot on land? Remember when we talked about that? The power. He had power, and then he has a scroll, meaning that God had a specific message for him to give.

Message of judgment. Message of judgment. And then chapter 11, again, this starts out with the measuring of the temple, and then you have the two witnesses in chapter 11. So what did the measuring of the temple signify? Remember we talked about that? Why do you take measurements? To rebuild, to restore.

So this is prophetic of how God's temple or his home is going to be restored. It's a prophetic about what's coming, right? And then the two witnesses come, and they're very powerful, and at the end of it, what happens? They get overpowered by the beast, right? And then at the very end, they're left out in the open, and everybody is mocking, and everybody's horrified, and then after three days, they get back up and they ascend, right?

So that's how chapter 11 ends. And then the chapter 12, again, which was the session that we started, remember the woman and the dragon? Who did we say that the woman was? Israel. Most likely Israel. This is not in reference to... What do we say? Yeah, we'll get to the second vision with the other woman, but this is not the same.

In Israel, and the red dragon goes after the seed of the woman because of the... Remember the prophecy in the book of Genesis? The seed of the woman is going to come and crush the head of the serpent? And so this is that vision of how they're in conflict, and then God miraculously protects them, right?

And so that's that vision in Revelation chapter 12. So remember, chapter 12, the final bowl judgment doesn't come until chapter 16. So chapter 12, 13, 14, and 15, they're all kind of a prelude to the severest judgment that's coming at the end, okay? So all of this is just kind of giving us a picture of what's happening in human history, how Satan is working, how he's battling to defy what God is doing, and he's trying to hinder the gospel work.

And so all of that is pictured in chapter 12 and chapter 13. So remember chapter 13, it talks about after the red dragon, right? We have the first beast and the second beast. Who did we say the first beast was? Who's the first beast in chapter 13? Antichrist. What does Antichrist do to get popularity from people?

He mutates Christ. How does he mutate Christ? Right, he said it seemed like he had a mortal wound, but he doesn't die from it. He comes back to life. And he said everybody marvels because of that, and as a result of it, they go after him. And then when they go after him, what does he do?

He points to the dragon, right? So he gives glory to the dragon. And then the second beast represents what? False prophets, right? And then who did we say that these three mimic? Right, the Holy Trinity. So if you remember, we looked at each of the works that they were doing and how each one of them, and then the third one is mimicking the Holy Spirit, how it gives life and it gives spirit.

And so you look at the work of Satan, how it's trying to match the work of the Trinity, how the Antichrist is doing the work like to deceive. And when he deceives and gets the glory, he points it back to the Father. And then the whole work of the false prophet is to deceive people and then lead them to the Antichrist, right?

And then Antichrist ultimately gives glory to the dragon, right? So that's what we saw in chapter 13. In chapter 14, the beast, again, begins to have relation. Again, the reason why I put the beauty and the beast is because it refers to Babylon. And what was the lure of the Babylon?

Remember, there's one particular sin that kept on coming up over and over. I had no idea what you just said. Sexual immorality. So remember, we saw that. They kept on repeating over and over again how the Babylonian kingdom, the primary thing that gets mentioned over and over again, it doesn't necessarily just mean sexual sin, but sexual immorality is referring to any kind of lust rebellion.

So the Bible talks about how the nation of Israel, when it goes after idols, he calls them what? Harlots, right? Committing adultery. So sexual immorality isn't just talking about sex. It's obviously sexual immorality is part of it, but it's anything that is in rebellion against God, in idolatry, right?

And so Babylon, remember, the Assyrians, they conquered in fear. They would come, totally dominate, and they would put fear in people and make them tremble. So they would be, they were known for their cruelty. But the Babylonians, once they conquered, they treated them so well that they didn't want to be.

They wanted to be Babylonians. Remember that? Right? And remember how we were studying the book of Israel? Israel kind of, not Israel, Isaiah? Isaiah kind of highlights. And if you look at Israel's history, the problem with Israel's history was once they went into captivity and God allows them to come back, majority of them don't come back.

They assimilate and they just disappear. So in the book of Revelation, when the attraction of the Babylonians, it wasn't by force, it wasn't by fear, it was through temptation. Right? So the beast and the beauty is working together. So chapter 15, we see, again, they see a vision of heaven.

And in the vision of heaven, it says that the bulls, the seven angels with seven bulls are coming out from there. Remember we talked about that? This signifies the intensity of this judgment that this is directly coming from God's throne, that God has direct hand on it. Not that the other ones was not, but again, this vision reveals that God is directly targeting.

And this is the third woe. The seven bull judgments is the third woe that was mentioned. Right? Meaning that the intensity is increasing. And in each of these bulls, it was unlike the other judgments so far. Right? Do you remember why it was different? Chapter 16 is just kind of rapid fire.

What was different between the bull judgments and then the other two judgments? Obviously, it was more intense, but what made it more intense? All the other judgments up to this point, it was God's judging the earth and mankind is affected as a result of it. But even in the midst of that, God is hoping and he's giving opportunity for people to repent.

When this, when the bull judgment comes, the angel makes it clear, right, that he will not delay. Remember, he keeps saying he will not delay, he will not delay. Meaning that the final judgment is coming and he's referring to the bull judgments. And the bull judgment is severe because it is final.

There's nothing after that. After that is the end. There is no waiting for people to repent and come back. And this judgment is directly targeted to people. Right? And remember, up to now, we're talking about a third, where here it's utter devastation. Right? Whatever it is. The seven judgments that we see is, remember, the people who have the mark of the 666, they all had boils.

And then remember that this is the sea, the open waters, and this is the springs. And this is the sun's going to scorch the people. And then the demonic kingdom is going to be directly targeted. And darkness is going to come over them. And then there's going to be a famine where the Euphrates River dries up.

Right? Remember the significance of this? We talked about that. This is just our interpretation. But that when that thing dries up, that there's going to be no boundary between Israel and their enemies. And possibly that that is in preparation for the Armageddon, the final battle that's going to take place.

And then the final part of it is going to be an intense earthquake that's going to divide the Holy Land in three parts. And then whatever was not affected by the earthquake, there's going to be hail to come and bring judgment upon mankind. Okay? So, again, it's going to be intense, it's going to be thorough, and it's going to be final.

And which makes it different than the other judgments that we saw. Chapter 17 is the dragon and the woman. So this is not the same woman as I think we saw in Chapter 12. So again, this is representing Babylon. Again, I mentioned to you there are some people who think that maybe that's the Catholic Church.

We don't know that for sure. But again, there is a union between the dragon, the Antichrist, and the secular kingdom. But at the end of Chapter 17, they turn against her. Right? Because they see judgment coming, and then they actually turn against her. And then they kind of separate.

And then Chapter 18 is the fall of Babylon. So I don't know if you can see it in the picture, but just utter destruction. So you know what Chapter 19 is, right? After Chapter 18, what happens? We're at the end, so. Second coming of Christ, right? So basically the vision is, each of these visions, each step, it gets worse, and it gets more devastating, it gets more thorough, and then right before his second coming, before the millennial kingdom, it is utter destruction.

So Babylon is going to completely fall. Right? Whether that's going to be World War III, whether it's going to be natural disaster, but Babylon is judged. So all the people who are chasing after that, right, and who was marked by the number of the beasts will also be judged along with it.

It's utter devastation. So after this, there is no second chance. Right? The judgment is going to take place, and after that, the coming of Christ, the marriage lamb is coming. And we talked about how this will inaugurate the coming of the millennial kingdom, where Christ is going to come, resurrection is going to take place, and then people are going to enter into this thousand-year reign of Christ.

And during that period, right, Satan is bound for a thousand years. So Satanic work of deception is going to be gone for a thousand years, and at the end of the thousand years, he will be released, and he will deceive for a period, but very short period. Right? And he's going to try to come and challenge God, and God's going to squash him immediately, and then at the end of that comes what?

The white throne judgment. Right? Okay, so we enter the millennium, and then at the end of the millennium, there's a white throne judgment, where the final judgment takes place, and after the final judgment, we enter into the new heaven and new earth. Right? And, again, this should be fresh in your mind, because it wasn't too long.

So chapter 21 and 22, part of chapter 22 is a description of the new heaven and new earth that's coming. And we said that it was a physical kingdom, that the kingdom is going to be, the millennial kingdom is going to be restored back to what God intended, right?

And we're going to have resurrected bodies, we're going to have physical bodies, but it's going to be like Christ's resurrected body. So what we see in Christ after the resurrection is the same body we're going to have, and so most likely the heaven is going to reflect that. Okay?

New heaven and new earth. And then the second coming of Jesus, again, this is not the description of the chapter, but the book ends with the description of Christ's coming. And he says, "He who adds to this or subtracts from that, God will add plagues to him." In other words, it ends with anticipation of his second coming, right?

So it begins, and then it calls us to obedience. It calls us to obedience in the beginning, it calls us to obedience in the end. His intent was that through this prophecy, that it would cause the church to be awake, to live soberly, that we would not chase after the world that's going to be under judgment.

So the picture that we saw in chapter 18 is basically where all that we know, all that the word value is headed toward, right? Now when we read Book of Revelation, it's like, "Well, it sounds like a fairy tale," but when you actually see the application, like look at the world, do most people believe that this world is deteriorating and it's going to end, whether it's going to be a, you know, like nuclear bomb or maybe the ozone layer, maybe it's going to be whatever it may be.

I think scientifically, most people know that the earth is going to somehow die. We just don't know when, right? Either we're going to destroy it or naturally it's just going to be destroyed. So the fact that the world is headed toward that, right, is not debated. The only thing that's debated is if you don't believe God, you don't believe that God has any hand in that, right?

But we know that just as we, just like we said, we didn't come from amoebas that just decided one day to have a brain and then started walking. We know that God had specific hands in His creation, and so we also know through the Book of Revelation that the end is also going to be determined by God the Creator, that He is sovereign in the creation, He is sovereign in what we're doing, and He is sovereign at the end.

And so that's how the Bible pictures it, okay? So that's, again, in a nutshell, maybe a year from now you're not going to remember all the details, but at least you kind of have some idea when you think of the Book of Revelation that you don't just get confused.

It's like, "Oh, I don't know what's going on in Revelation," right? I really want to encourage you to, not just today, but at some point, go through it through your devotions. And I know Revelation is not like, "Oh, I'm doing quiet time, you know, verse by verse through the Book of Revelation," but hopefully this gave you enough so that you wouldn't be completely lost when you did through it.

And I guarantee you, this is my third time teaching through Revelation, and I gained much more through this third time than I did the first two times. And the reason why is because sometimes you go through a rabbit trail and you ask a lot of questions that kind of doesn't have clear answers, and then you just get confused.

So I realize that the Book of Revelation really is meant to be studied like if you're looking at a drawing or some kind of a painting. I don't know if you've, and I'm not artsy in any way, but there's some kind of paintings where you could see the painting and you can see the emotion behind the painter.

You can see if they're sad. You can see if they're excited. You can see if they're lonely or angry, right? You know what I'm talking about? You know what I'm talking about, right? So there are certain type of emotions that are better expressed through painting. You don't need words.

You don't need poetry. Just when you look at the painting, you can see what was in that person's mind and heart because it leaves an impression. And I think the Book of Revelation was meant to be understood that way, that the vision that John has is not like every single thing we try to dissect and we don't understand.

They're like, "Why is it green here? Why is it blue here? Why did he use upstroke and not downstroke here?" I think it was meant as a whole picture to make an impression. And this impression is pretty obvious. When anybody studies the Book of Revelation, the impression is God is on His throne.

He's absolutely sovereign. No matter how chaotic things may be, God is completely in control and He is being worshipped. There is an end to man's history, that all that seems attractive and beautiful at one point, there's going to be an end and it's going to be utter destruction. And judgment is going to come.

And heaven is going to be beautiful. That all that we've been looking for and all that we temporarily chase, the real fulfillment is in Christ when He comes in His second kingdom. These are big pictures that every single one of these visions, in one of those main themes, it leaves an impression.

So when we think about judgment, we don't just think about what He says. We think about the picture. Remember all the pictures that we saw? You just Google it. Somebody at some point in history has painted every single scene of the Book of Revelation. So that when you think about the seven seals, you're not just thinking about verbally.

Like we think about Ephesians, we think of chapter 3, chapter 4, chapter 5. But Revelation, you see a painting that made an impression. So you have some idea of what judgment may look like. And so all the things that we're talking about would have, again, not just mentally, but emotionally and willfully have an impact on the way that we live our Christian life.

The rest of the time, I'm going to ask you guys to, in your small group, take some time for discussion. One is, what is the general outline of the Book of Revelation? Make it as broad as possible, no more than five or six titles. So maybe chapter 1 through 3 would be the introduction and the three churches or six, seven churches.

And then you have chapter 4 and chapter 5. You have the seals and chapter 6. You know what I mean? Some broad outlines. So that if I said chapter 14, you don't say third seal. You kind of have an idea of what's in there. So when I say, what chapter are all the bold judgments?

Chapter 16. So bold judgments is all concentrated in one chapter. The trumpet judgments are scattered in like three or four chapters. And then the seal judgments are, again, in one chapter, and only one of it is the next chapter. So just kind of get a broad idea. So you don't need to spend too much time on that, just so that you have some idea.

If I said chapter 18, chapter 14, chapter 12, you have some idea what is in there. Number two, what are some similarities and distinctions between the seal, trumpet, and bold judgments? So these are study questions. Thirdly, what is the general impression, how is the demonic work generally described in Revelation?

List three or four observations. So I'm not talking about just one chapter. You don't have to go skim through it. Just in your memory, what is an impression that was made based upon Scripture, of what the Scripture says demonic work is going to look like? Four, what is the general impression of God's judgment at the end times?

Give two or three observations. So what are some things that you remember from that? What was one theme that kept coming up throughout the visions that John saw throughout the letter? List three or four. For me, the biggest thing that, at least for this time around, was God sitting on his throne.

That's the theme that I kept saying over and over, at least in my mind. So what are some things that kind of made an impression on you? And then six, describe heaven in one sentence. If maybe every person in your table, at least just one sentence, how would you describe heaven based upon what you've read and what you've studied?

So I'm going to ask you guys to take some time to discuss that. Richard, are you able to put the next, like put, can you put the third one, or this one on these screens and then the last one on the middle screen? Is that possible? Okay. All right.

So the next question, discussion question, is basically was your homework. So if you are done discussing, take some time to, this is more of an application, like what did you personally learn about God, about yourself, about sin? And so take some time to discuss that as well as you wrap up.

Okay. So I'm going to pray and we're going to finish and I'm going to let you guys go to your groups. But after we're done, we don't need to put away the chairs. We don't need to put away the tables. We just need to clean up. So we just need to put the trash away and then throw it away.

The college students also have their meeting here this Friday, so we're just going to leave it the way it is. Okay. All right. Let me pray for us. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you, Lord God, for the Holy Spirit that continues to teach and guide.

We pray that you would open our eyes and help us to glean from the things that you've already implanted in our hearts and mind. I pray that you would bless our small group time, help us to be honest and open with one another and that as iron sharpening iron, that we may be sharpened as a result of the time that we have together.

In Jesus name we pray. Amen.