|
BEHOLD, HE COMES! #10
LUCIFER’S CONFESSION
If you could simply push a convenient button and have
certain national leaders suddenly be . . . gone . . . would you want to
do that? You push the button and, no questions asked, no lengthy trials,
no extradition, no possibility of avoiding retribution through a technical
loophole, no miscarriage of justice because some liberal European judge
over at the Hague lets him off the hook – you can completely remove that
certain someone from the scene. Would that be a good thing?
Quick! you say. Where’s the button? I’ll push it 50 times! Maybe so, and
in recent blood-bathed weeks as we’ve watched on TV, I might join you.
But on the other hand, humanity also longs for an accounting. A day of
reckoning. We’d like to see that brutal dictator, that strongman, have
to sit in a military courtroom and answer for the massacres, the weapons
of mass destruction, the rapes, the abuse of prisoners, the starving children,
the years of totalitarianism. Before pushing the button, we’d like to
simply be able to look evil in the eye and have evil admit: “I was wrong.”
In a sense, a war can’t really be over until there’s that final denouement,
a resolving of all things.
Not to connect this story with what I just said, but maybe you remember,
back in late September of 1974, when incoming President Gerald Ford made
a courageous but controversial decision to pardon Richard Nixon. It was
a blanket pardon, perfectly constitutional, and – in my view – probably
necessary for the nation to “get on with life.” But those who wanted a
final resolving, a big day in court, a playing of all the Watergate tapes,
a look-him-in-the-eye moment, were probably disappointed.
Speaking of wrapping things up, we certainly didn’t do that yesterday,
as the clock gained the upper hand on our Bible study in the book of Revelation.
We were thinking together about how a promised Second Coming of Jesus
seems to provide an end to the war. Instead of God’s people just endlessly
being born, dying, and having their soul float to heaven, the return of
Jesus brings a kind of finality to this tragic experiment called sin.
Let me humbly make the same disclaimer that I did in our Thursday radio
visit, because denominations do have various interpretations of last-day
prophetic events. Most of you are aware that the Voice of Prophecy is
an Adventist ministry, so we certainly are proponents of the visible Second
Coming or “Advent” of Jesus. But as we understand the time line of the
millennium, God’s redeemed saints spent that 1000-year period in heaven,
while this earth, holding Lucifer and his fallen angels captive, is essentially
empty. Your church may teach a “chiliast” view, where Jesus rules instead
on earth during the millennium, and I certainly respect that opinion.
In any case, Revelation plainly teaches that those who have rejected Jesus
Christ as their Savior will be raised to life for a short time at the
END of that 1000-year period, and also that Satan will be “loosed” from
his prison of isolation.
And there’s a brief, Armageddon-type moment where Lucifer amasses all
of the rebels from the four corners of the earth – this is chapter 20,
verse 8 – and they march against the New Jerusalem, which, in my Adventist
prophecy scenario, has just descended from heaven after the 1000 years
of peace in heaven. Satan’s fallen forces surround the city; they appear
ready to take it. But then, just one verse later, they meet their end.
Fire comes down and consumes them all.
It’s a sad, sad day . . . and it raises a painful question. It appears
that those who have rejected Jesus are already dead. Back in chapter 19,
we find a metaphorical picture where they are “killed with the sword that
came out of the mouth of the rider on the horse.” In the book of II Thessalonians
we read about rebels who are destroyed simply “by the brightness of His
coming.” And now, here in the final moments of Revelation, we seem to
find a picture of Jesus raising up these lost and angry castaways, only
for the purpose of destroying them AGAIN. And we have to wonder why? If
you’ve already won, why go back out onto the battlefield once again?
And you know, I believe we find the answer right in how we began our study
today. Doesn’t the universe deserve a denouement, a final wrap-up? Shouldn’t
there be a conclusive court scene where a sober, watching universe can
hear Lucifer’s admission of guilt?
It doesn’t say so here in Revelation, but friend, I firmly believe that
you can take Philippians chapter two . . . and put it right here at the
close of time. Right before the last executing of justice. Let me share
this long, poignant, powerful passage of Scripture with you, beginning
with verse five:
“Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ
Jesus,” Paul writes – and who could argue? He continues: “Who, being in
very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made
in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled
Himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross!”
And now comes the climactic moment of all ages, all
civilizations, all global and galactic beings who have ever lived anywhere
in God’s universe. Friend, listen to this:
“Therefore God exalted Him [Jesus] to the highest place
and gave Him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and
every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the
Father.”
If I read my Bible correctly, there will be one galactic
moment, found here in Revelation 20, where every being who has ever lived
in the domain of God’s universe will be alive and present at one time.
That’s never been true before; it will never be true again. But Cain and
Abel, and Nebuchadnezzar, and Nero, and Napoleon, Hitler, Luther, Mother
Teresa, Saddam Hussein, and all the other great saints and sinners of
all ages, past and present, will be on the scene. Some inside the great
City, others on the outside but closing in fast.
And then somehow – the Bible doesn’t give these details
– it appears that there will be a great pause. Jesus is exalted to the
highest place. In a new and unique way, He will be enthroned on the highest
throne, given the highest place. As the Redeemer of the fallen human race,
He will claim His trophies.
And notice: now EVERY knee will bow. EVERY tongue will confess. EVERY
soul, saved and lost, righteous and wicked, loyal and rebellious, will
go to their knees. Some will go to their knees in worship, others in defeated
submission. But we’ll all be on our knees. And with one voice, the Mother
Teresas and the Husseins, the Billy Grahams and the Mussolinis of this
shattered old world will admit that Jesus is Lord. That God’s cause is
just. That the war is over. As we mentioned yesterday, the weapons of
the enemy will be stacked up in a field because we ain’t gonna study war
no more.
And now I want to very carefully and prayerfully say this. I believe that
the flames of verses 9 and 10 are then going to really finish the conflict.
I believe the flames will be real. I believe they will be unquenchable.
And I think they will be “sufficient firepower,” as coalition forces have
said in recent weeks, to destroy Satan.
Please understand what I’m saying here – and I humbly respect where you
may believe differently. I believe the war is really going to be over,
and that the destruction of hell WILL come to an end. I know that verse
9 says evil will be devoured, while verse 10 says that the torment goes
“day and night forever and ever.” That sounds like a contradiction. Some
passages talk about eternal fire, while others describe the fate of the
wicked as death, extinction, “being no more,” being “as the chaff.” But
clearly, as we then read the triumph of Revelation 21 and 22, the universe
is clean. There are no more tears. The scars of sin, of rebellion, of
armed conflict, of warfare and atrocities, are a dim, tenderly bathed
memory. And so I believe it is possible that the metaphors about “eternal”
and “everlasting” are to convey two things. First of all, that Lucifer
and his armies will be hit with all of heaven’s righteous power and indignation.
Hell will be a sufficient force to do its sober work. And secondly, that
the DEATH of hell certainly will be everlasting and eternal and unceasing
through the ages. The punishMENT is forever, but perhaps not the punishING.
Tell me. Don’t you long for this conflict to be totally
finished, and for Satan to be gone forever? I know you do, and I do too.
Having said that, I bow before the sure Word of Scripture and I say to
our loving God: “Father, the tragedies of this world are in Your hands.
Do what You will.” Listen, friend, however and for how long God chooses
to deal with these enemy armies is His business. However He does it will
be fair and right, and all of God’s grateful children who stand inside
the wall of His grace and strength will praise Him and look forward to
a new heaven and a new earth, where there will be no more tears, no suffering,
no pain, no death.
It may be a hard word to pronounce, but nobody can do a denouement like
our God. Nobody can finish it like He can.
|
