Revelation 6:12-17

Reviewing our lessons from chapter six and the opening of the seals:

SLIDE 1  The Four Horsemen usher in the tribulation with

1.     White horse representing the antichrist

2.     The red horse represents war

3.     The black horse represents famine

4.     Chloros or Pale horse represents death

If you have read the Left Behind Series all these events are fictionalized in the book Tribulation.

The fifth seal was the cry from heaven from the saints under the altar.

SLIDE 2 READ Revelation 6:12-13 Does this sound like anything that has happened in recent times? Remember the church is gone, we were raptured before the tribulation.

Revelation 6:12-13 When he opened the sixth seal, I looked, and behold, there was a great earthquake,

Here are some of photos of earthquakes in our lifetime. Slides-3-5

Matthew 24:6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet.

SLIDE 6 and the sun became black as sackcloth, Eclipse of Sun

Prophecies from the OT:  Zephaniah, Jeremiah, Isaiah, Joel

Zephaniah 1:14-16  The great day of the LORD is near; it is near and hastens quickly. The noise of the day of the LORD is bitter; there the mighty men shall cry out. That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of devastation and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness, a day of trumpet and alarm against the fortified cities and against the high towers.

SLIDE 7 the full moon became like blood,

Revelation 6:13 and the stars of the sky fell to the earth as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale.

Isaiah 34:8 and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree. For it is the day of the LORD'S vengeance, and the year of recompences for the controversy of Zion."

Prophets from the Old Testament use nature to add illustrations such as the unripe fig falling.

You should read Chapter 24 in the Gospel of Matthew: ; it parallels these events in Revelation.

SLIDE 8 Book of Revelation unveiled Matthew 24:29 "Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

SLIDE 9  Revelation 6:14The sky vanished like a scroll that is being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place.

Isaiah 34:4 And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll:

Imagine the mountains being leveled and filling in the oceans so there are no islands.

SLIDE 10  Revelation 6:15-16 Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains,¹⁶calling to the mountains and rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb,

There is no class distinction here rich and poor, slave and free ALL unbelievers will cry out to be hidden from “the wrath of the Lamb.”

They are right to fear the mighty power of the LORD. God is all powerful, creator or the mountains and the heavenly bodies. But instead of praying to the only ONE who is able to save them they call to the mountains and rocks to fall on them and hide them.

SLIDE 11  Nowhere to hide

Job 34:22 There is no darkness, nor shadow of death, where the workers of iniquity may hide themselves.

Jeremiah 16:17 For mine eyes are upon all their ways: they are not hid from my face, neither is their iniquity hid from mine eyes.

Hebrews 4:13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

SLIDE12 Isaiah 2:19-21"And they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the LORD, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth. In that day a man shall cast his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which they made each one for himself to worship, to the moles and to the bats; To go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, for fear of the LORD, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth."  

Joel 2:10-11: The sun and moon grow dark, and stars diminish their brightness . . . for the day of the LORD is great and terrible; who can endure it?

SLIDE 13 ¹⁷for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?"

The sixth seal concludes with a valid question: Who is able to stand? Only the believer can stand before this great judgment, the one who is justified by grace through faith in Jesus Christ.

Romans 5:1-2Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand. 

1 Corinthians 15:1 I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which you also received and in which you stand. 

SLIDE 14 1 Peter 5:12 Testifying that this is the true grace of God in which you stand. 

The believer can stand in the face of this great wrath of God because Jesus already bore the wrath the believer deserved. It is not for works that we have done, they are as filthy rags before a Holy God. We can stand justified only by faith in Christ Jesus through GRACE.

Our God of Love is also a God of Judgment