Sermon Tone Analysis

After a somewhat extended break, we’re returning this evening to the book of Revelation to begin the last four chapters.

The section immediately preceding our text unveiled God’s judgment against the second great enemy of the church — Rome.

Imperial Rome had conquered the world and, therefore, had come to believe that it was the greatest kingdom in the universe.

And if Rome was the greatest kingdom, the Roman emperor was the greatest king.

As was common in the ancient world, these emperors believed themselves to be incarnate deity.

Augustus, for example, titled his memoirs “The Deeds of the Divine Augustus,” and had them inscribed on bronze tablets to be mounted on the outside of his mausoleum.

So, not only did Rome believe that it was a greater empire than the kingdom of Christ, but also that the emperor as a greater king than the Lord Jesus Christ.

But Rome was nothing but a harlot.

It pretended to have heaven’s favor, but it did not.

In the previous two chapters God judged and condemned this harlot.

And now, by way of the sharpest possible contrast, the Lamb of God takes his true bride, adorned in the purest white linen.

These two things go together.

The kingdom of Christ advances by destroying the kingdom of the devil.

The events in tonight’s text parallel similar events at the end of chapter 11.

Both are victory songs.

Yet, they celebrate different triumphs.

In chapter 11 the hosts of heaven rejoiced in the Lamb’s conquest of his first enemy, viz., pagan Jews.

Here they rejoice in his success over his second enemy, viz., pagan Rome.

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The Worship of Heaven

Our text begins with a great multitude in heaven praising God for punishing the pretentious whore.

Of course, the whore deserved every bit of the judgment that she received.

In previous sermons, we examined her many sins and saw that they were almost overwhelming.

Here in verse 2 John gives us just a brief reminder.

She was guilty of two things.

She had corrupted the earth with her fornication (πορνεία), i.e., her false religion, and she was guilty of the blood of God’s people.

Both of these crimes are described in greater detail earlier in Revelation.

However, the rejoicing of the saints, as we’ve seen before, was not so much over the death and destruction of God’s enemy as it was for the righteousness of God that was revealed in that judgment.

Notice that the emphasis of their praise in verse 1 was on the salvation, glory, honor and power of God that had been demonstrated in God’s dealings with the whore.

In fact, the church attributed its entire deliverance, the avenging of the saints’ blood and the protection of the church solely to God.

It took note of what God had done for his people and then praised him for it.

And in verse 2 the church recognized that God’s judgments in this matter were completely true and righteous.

They could also see the impact of this judgment far into the future.

The fact that the whore was judged meant that the church could move forward.

It meant that the gospel would penetrate every nation under the sun, and that the kingdom of Christ would conquer not only Rome, which considered itself practically invincible, but all the kingdoms of the earth.

And you can see that the saints understood this in verse 6.

There they praised God for his sovereign reign.

As the saints praised the perfect justice of God’s ways, they filled their praise with alleluias.

Their first alleluia is in verse 1, followed by a second one in verse 3. The twenty-four elders added their alleluia at the end of verse 4, and finally the great multitude praised God with one last alleluia in verse 6. Alleluia is, of course, a transliteration of the Hebrew word /hallelujah/, which means “Praise the Lord!”

In the Old Testament, /hallelujah/ is not as common as we might think.

It occurs mostly as either the very first line and~/or the very last line of several Psalms (cf.

Pss.

104–106, 111–113, 115–116, 135, 146–150).

In the New Testament it’s even rarer.

In fact, the four instances of it that we have in our text are the only times it appears in the entire New Testament.

It seems that the Holy Spirit purposely reserved this word just for the judgment of the great whore.

Why?

Because in this judgment all the nations of the world learn that God really is in charge.

His kingdom is greater than any kingdom man could ever build.

In fact, one commentator even says that the four alleluias in our text give it “appearance of OT battle prayers.”

God engaged his enemy.

He won.

And then the heavenly hosts praised him for his marvelous victory.

The twenty-four elders and the four beasts fell down and worshiped God in verse 4. It doesn’t seem that the elders initiated the choruses of praise in the first three verses.

Rather, the people of God responded spontaneously to God’s mighty deliverance.

This, too, was a reason for the elders to praise God.

When they saw that the brethren delighted themselves in the worship of God, they didn’t delay to include their praise as well.

Their /amen/ affirmed all that the heavenly hosts had said, and their /alleluia/ recognized that the one who sits on the throne has done great things for his people.

The amazing thing about all of this is that the praise that we find in our text continues even now.

We join our voices with the hosts of heaven — angels and redeemed men — every time we celebrate God’s triumph over sin, Satan and death through the mighty work of the Lord Jesus Christ.

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The Marriage of the Lamb

As the heavenly host praised God, a voice came from the throne commanding them to continue their praise (v.

5).

In fact, it instructed all of God’s servants, those who fear him, whether great or small, to join in.

Since the voice came from the throne, we might expect it to be God’s voice.

It is not.

Nor is it the voice of the Lamb of God.

If it had been either of these, the pronouns would have been different.

It would have said, “Praise /your/ God, all /my/ servants,” or something in that vein.

No, the most likely source for the voice is the angel mentioned in the first verse of chapter 17, who was probably one of the pastors of the seven churches of Asia Minor.

This angel is the one who had invited John to come and behold the judgment of the great whore.

If this is correct, it would also fit in with verse 10.

When John prostrated himself before the one who was speaking, he was told not to do so because they were fellowservants and brethren in the gospel ministry.

The response to the command to praise God was beyond imagination.

It was greater than the Hallelujah chorus of Handel’s /Messiah/, which is based on this very passage.

John wrote, /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/ (v. 6).

The multiplication of metaphors — water and thundering — seems to indicate that God’s praise was even louder here than it was in the first verse.

But what’s even more fascinating is that those who offer the praise are the very ones who have been rescued from what the harlot formerly considered her territory.

Do you remember how she was first described?

The first time we met her, we were told that she sat /upon many waters/ (Rev.

17:1), i.e., that she governed a vast area, including people from countless backgrounds.

Verse 15 of that chapter says, /The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues/ (v.

15).

But now the many waters sing songs of praise to God.

We knew this would be so.

In the first chapter, John described also Christ as having a voice that sounded like many waters (Rev.

1:15).

This shows that the people of the earth were his to begin with.

They never really belonged to the whore.

In fact, the whore never really had any power at all.

The KJV translates the saints’ praise in verse 6 as /the Lord God omnipotent reigneth/.

The word /reigneth/ is present tense in English and emphasizes the fact that God was reigning at the time the saints praised him.

If it’s understood in a narrow sense, it doesn’t indicate whether he reigned before then or not.

But the Greek verb that’s used here is actually past tense (ἐβασίλευσεν).

Literally, the saints were praising God for having reigned.

He reigned when the dragon persecuted the woman and her child.

He reigned when the great whore committed her crimes against heaven, including the murder of his saints.

He reigned when he condemned the whore to unending punishment.

The point is that his reign is eternal.

He reigns once and for all.

And this is probably closer to what the KJV translators had in mind.

How, then, do we explain the martyrs mentioned in the book of Revelation?

Does God’s sovereign kingship mean that there should be no more persecutions?

No, persecutions will arise from time to time.

This is not because God is not in control, but because he is.