Come on again. If you're great, blessing enjoyed us to return your Bibles to Joel chapter 3, the prophet Joel chapter 3. We'll read the whole chapter, verses 1 to 21, Joel chapter 3 verses 1 through 21. The prophet Joel says, writes carried along by the Holy Spirit, for behold in those days and at that time when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem, I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat and I will enter into judgment with them there on behalf of my people in my heritage Israel, because they have scattered them on the nations and have divided up my land.
You know, cast lots for my people and have traded a boy for a prostitute and have sold a girl for wine and have drunk it. What are you to me, O Tyren Seiden, and all the regions of Philistia? Are you paying me back for something? If you were paying me back, I will return your payment on your own head swiftly and speedily.
If you have taken my silver and my gold and have carried my rich treasures into your temples, you have sold the people of Judah and Jerusalem to the Greeks in order to remove them far from their own border. Behold, I will stir them up from the place to which you have sold them and I will return your payments on your own head. I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the people of Judah and they will sell them to the civilians to a nation far away, but the Lord has spoken. Claim this among the nations.
Contocrate for war. Stir up the mighty men. Let all the men of war draw near. Let them come up.
Beat your plowshares into sorts and your pruning hooks into spheres. Let the weak say, I am a warrior. Hayson and come all you surrounding nations and gather yourselves there. Come down your warriors, O Lord.
Let the nations stir themselves up and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat for their eye will sit to judge all the surrounding nations. Put in the sickle for the harvest's right. Go in, tread, for the winepress is full. The vats overflow for their evil is great.
Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of the incision, for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of the incision. The sun and the moon are darkens and the stars withdraw their shining. The Lord roars from Zion and he utters his voice from Jerusalem and the heavens and the earth quake. The Lord is a refuge to his people, a stronghold to the people of Israel.
So you shall know that I am the Lord your God who dwells in Zion, my holy mountain, in Jerusalem shall be holy and stranger shall never again pass through it. And in that day the mountains shall drip sweet wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the stream beds of Judah shall flow with water, and of fountains shall come forth from the house of the Lord and water the valley of Chateen. Egypt shall become a desolation and eat them a desolate wilderness for the violence done to the people of Judah because they have shed instant blood in their land. But Judah shall be inhabited forever in Jerusalem to all generations.
I will avenge their blood, blood that I have not avenged for the Lord dwells in Zion. This is God's word. Let's pray together. Father, show us Christ.
Show us Christ. Reveal your glory for the preaching of your word so that and until every heart confesses that Christ is indeed Lord and be saved. We pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen.
Last time we asked the question, start in Joel. What do we have to be happy about? What on earth in the central world the simple people, brokenness, and death, and sickness, and suffering, what do we have to be happy about? And we saw the answer to that question in Joel 2 1832, where the main idea was rejoice and be glad.
For God's day of salvation and judgment, we have something to rejoice and be glad about. And we saw that we were to rejoice and be glad in satisfaction without shame in God's spirit and in God's salvation in chapter 2 1832. And last time we learned about the wonderful news that God is a God who satisfies richly in everything and he restores everything that has been lost to sin. He has begun that restoration now by his spirit and he guarantees that we will completely see this restoration on a future day in his new creation.
He places his presence among his people by his spirit so he might never be put to shame. Especially when we were not put to shame in his coming, we judged the world in righteousness. Indeed, the new coming people got are indiscriminately characterized by the possession of this indwelling spirit of God. Those young and old, those who do in Greek, slave and free, male and female are all one in the fact that they have the spirit.
We saw in Joel and in Acts how Joel 2 28 and 32, the poor and out of the spirit, the exes like signs and wonders that warn people to repent and call upon the name of the Lord, is fulfilled in Pentecost and in Jesus' person and work. While Jesus, his ministry on earth was like those exes' plagues that they serve as signs and wonders to people in heaven above and on earth below. That God is indeed with his people and that he is the Lord and the Lord alone and that salvation can only be won and received by faith in him by calling upon the name of the Lord Jesus. Satisfaction, no shame, the spirit of God, salvation itself, what a reason to be happy today, yes?
What a reason to be happy? What a reason to rejoice and be glad as Joel tells us to in Joel 2. But you may say, hey, wait a minute, God, we have all those things now in part, right? I have the spirit, we have the spirit of God in you, you've been saved, you have satisfaction in God, you can by faith in him, I can have no shame, John says, you can not be ashamed right now because you believe and just Christ.
But even if I have all these things to rejoice and be glad in, sometimes that joy is clouded by things like persecution. People maligning me at work for what I believe, suffering, the fear that we might have people in common, violently harm us for simply confessing that Christ is Lord. What will you do about that, God? How am I supposed to rejoice and be glad even in that?
Will we ever have final victory over those enemies? Will we ever be vindicated for what we believe in the eyes of the world? Will we ever be proven right? Will we ever have the joy unclouded by that persecution and suffering?
Well, Joel continues to blow our minds with affirmative answers in the next two sessions of his book, the last two sections of his book in chapter three. We see that we are to rejoice and be glad in God's slaughter and in God's summary. Rejoice and be glad for God's day of salvation even in this, in God's slaughter and in God's summary. And just like last time, how each section was marked off by that sandwich, in this inclusio, the thing at the beginning and the thing at the end, we're going to have the same thing here as well in these last two points.
And before we move on, I just want to always remember you as we're going through the book of the Twelve. Once again, that this is one single book composed of twelve little books and that they all work together in our order in the way they are for a purpose. And we therefore must bring with us and read wisely everything that we've already learned in the book of Hosea and namely three things. Just want to remind you of those three things again.
Number one, the last day's context of the book of the Twelve, that is Hosea three, four, and five says this salvation and judgment is going to come about in the last days. And as those who, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10, or those on whom the end of the ages has come, as Paul says in 1 Timothy, that we're in the last days now, as 1 John says, that we are in the last days, we have particular interest for what these decks talk about because it talks to us. Second, this salvation and judgment is through God's Messiah, through God's King, through God's ruler, His coming Messiah. And finally, it is a salvation for not my people.
The logic of salvation in the book of the Twelve is that as it goes for the faithful remnants of ethnic Israelites who believe in the Christ, so it goes for the remnants of ethnic Gentiles who believe in the Christ. So that together, the ethnically mixed, not my people, becomes an ethnically mixed, my people that gather children of Abraham. And with these things in mind, with those three main points in mind, let's move on now into Joel chapter three, where he tells us to first rejoice and be glad in God's slaughter. It might be stark, might be sort of slaughter.
But yes, in God's slaughter. This is sandwiched by the term Jerusalem in verse one, and he restores the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem, and verse 16. The Lord, Udders, from Zion, and Udders his voice from Jerusalem. And in this section, it's all about God's vindication or his proving right or his justification of Jerusalem, his people, in his judgment of their enemies.
And see that we see that the section is all about judgment in verse two, where God summarizes for us, I will gather all the nations and bring them down the valley of Jehoshaphat, and I will enter into judgment with them there on behalf of my people. Israel, the word play in this verse, there is no such place called the valley of Jehoshaphat, biblical scholars have looked them up for years, there's no such place known as the valley of Jehoshaphat, which has made some readers puzzled. But the name Jehoshaphat, I don't think should be listed as Jehoshaphat, I think it should be translated into what it means, which is, he will judge, or the Lord will judge. And so if you read like this, the valley of the Lord will judge, which he says, then, that place I will enter into judgment, which is the same root in the verb I will judge.
And so he says here, I will enter into judgment with them in the valley of the Lord will judge. So God is emphasizing, in other words, in describing in this section the judgment that he is going to bring on the enemy nations, the people that do not believe in him. The connecting word for at the start of verse one shows us that this section gives us further explanation of what we just saw, and the time stamp, notice the time stamp, before we hold in those days and at that time, well in what days? Well, it's the same days as verse 29 and 28, where he says, even on the mainland of the day, I will pour out my spirit.
So sometime after the pouring out of the spirit of God, in the last days, God is going to execute this full and final judgment. And of course, we know that in Joel, he's all about the day of the Lord, the day, the final day of salvation and judgment. And so in other words, the last day of the last days is when this will happen. It's after the pouring out of the spirit at Pentecost, but it's at the end of that period of time in the last days.
And this is all about the judgment, the sections, all about the judgment on the last day of the last days when God sets all things right, and he brings about simultaneous salvation and judgment in the world. And so this chapter would correspond to what we see in chapter 2, verse 1 through 11, right? And so if you remember in chapter 2, verse 1 through 11, he talks about the day of the Lord that is coming, he describes it as the day of darkness and gloom of clouds and thick darkness. He says in verse 10 of chapter 2 that the earth quakes before them, the heavens tremble, the sun and moon are dark and the sun's withdraw their shining.
The Lord utters his voice before his army for his camp is exceedingly great. And you see the same kind of description that we're going to see later in chapter 3. Let's look down with me in verse 15 or verse 14. He says, for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision.
And what's the day of the Lord like? The sun and moon are dark and the stars will draw their shining. The Lord wars from Zion. He utters his voice from Jerusalem.
So just context says this is about the day, the full and final day of the Lord, and his judgment and salvation there. And Joel describes this day of the Lord's judgment in two ways. He describes it in economic terms and he describes it in military terms. He described it first in economic terms.
In last section we talked about how there's these reversals, right? In Joel 2, 18, and 27, we see these beautiful reversals of how God restores everything that was lost. The grain and wine and oil were lost, but now they're found. The dry and withering land.
But now it has abundant rain. Similarly, in this section we're going to see the opposite. We're going to see God take things and describe judgment in reversals of terms or places of irony as well in these sections. So the Lord first depicts this judgment in these series of reversals in economic terms.
And the first one, the first reversal we see is on the word returning or paying back in the first few verses. So the opening verse of the chapter of the Lord says that he restores or returns, the word is returns, the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem. So for the people of God, what they have returned to them is their fortunes, is blessing, is salvation. That's what they have returned to them.
Now the enemies of God on the other hand have a little bit something different. They are said to pay God back in verse 4. You see that verse 4 when God addresses them and says, what are you to me? You're tired inside and all the regions of listia?
Are you paying me back for something? And this is not a positive as if they're trying to owe a debt back to him. This is like what we call payback. They're trying to get it God.
They're trying to do something to him. They're trying to get at him because they don't like him and they hate him. And what are they doing? What are they doing in verse 2 and 3?
Why does God enter into judgment with them? Because they have scattered my people among the nations and have divided up my land. They've cast lots for my people. They trade a boy for a prostitute and sold a girl for wine and have drunk it.
They have completely devalued human life. They're selling children, boys and girls, for prostitutes and for wine, pleasures of his life. They don't care about the people of God. And they're trying to get at God by getting at his people who bear his name.
That's how the world tries to get at God. They act out in hatred against God by getting at his people and trying to get at God. The Lord says, you're trying to pay me back. That's what I'm going to do to you.
Look, what he says in verse 4. I will return, what did they get in return? Your own payment on your own head, swiftly and speedily. The people of God have their fortune to return to them.
The enemies of God who pay him back have their own payment returned on their heads. The same kind of desolation and destruction that they dealt out on God's people. In other words, in the words of Jesus, with the same measure that they judge God's people, he judges them. He also has reversal on the term selling in verses 6 through 8.
He says in verse 6, you have sold the sons of Judah and Jerusalem to the sons of the Greeks in order to remove them far from their own border. Behold, I will stir them up in place in which you have sold them, and I will return your payment on your own head. I will, how did he do that? I will sell your sons and daughters into the hands of the people of Judah.
And they will sell them to the subeyans to an ancient far away for the Lord has spoken. So once again, he's like, you sold my people, I sell you to them. And they will sell you to another person. And they'll sell you to another person.
And this is not something that actually happens. It's not like in the end of days we're going to have this economic slave trade or something to make all things right. That's not what he's saying. Just as the exile of God's people was an instance of God's judgment, the removal of them from his presence to a nation far, far away, so will God do that same kind of judgment to them, to the nations, to the enemy nations of God.
He will sell them to a nation far, far away in judgment. If being close to the Lord and being right with the Lord is to be returned and restored to Jerusalem, and surely to be judged by the Lord is to be sold away to a far, far away nation, and far from God's presence. So this is what God does. He is returning things on his own head.
He is judging, thremmies. He enters into judgment as he says on behalf of his people, as he says in verse 2. And what God we serve, who cares so much about his people that he acts to bring such fitting judgments on his and their enemies. I mean, notice that the reasons he gives for judging these enemy nations is not because, well, you defame my name, because you sinned against me, which they did, because you're against you.
We worship false God. That's why I'm doing it. Well, surely he's doing it for those reasons because we read that in other places. But the reasons he gives is because you touched my people who I love.
I think of when I was in elementary school, I was at a basketball camp with my brothers, my two-order brothers. And after one of the three V3s images that they do at this, in my age group, I got into a verbal altercation with one of the other kids. Who happened to be twice my size in those directions? And so way stronger than I am, way taller than I am, I was a pretty small kid, especially back then.
And it turns physical, not me to the grounds. And my oldest brother comes in and pushes the kid back and tells him to, he gave him the business. He tells me to get away, basically. And I just think about that.
And I think my brother had absolutely nothing to do with my mouth getting me in trouble. He could have just said, well, this will teach him, you know, this will teach him not to talk. This will teach my brother to not do things he shouldn't be doing. This will let it happen.
But he didn't. He gained absolutely nothing from helping me out. Nothing. No reputation.
No good things. Nothing. So why did he step in? Why did he step in on my behalf?
Simple. Even though he probably doesn't want to admit this, he stepped in because he loves his brother. And no one is going to touch his baby brother and knock him to the ground, except for him. That's the only person who's going to be able to do it.
But it's because he loves his brother. Why would God step in and already have? We certainly don't deserve anything, do we? We didn't deserve it.
But why did he do it? Why did he step in in and join me? As he says in verse 2, I will gather all the nations. I will enter into heaven with them there on behalf of my people.
Why? Because he loves them. He loves them so much. He loves you so much.
He does not overlook the suffering and the persecution of his people. He indeed will repay it on your enemy's heads tenfold, a thousandfold, a millionfold. And he turned it. Because he loves you.
Because he loves you. What did God, we serve? God first describes his judgment in economic terms. And he turns to describe his judgment in military terms, in verses 9 to 16.
He really first hints at the military terms in verse 7. Look at verse 7 with me. He says, behold, I will stir them up, that is his people, from the place to which you have sold them. And I will return your payment on your own head.
So this stirring up is not just like getting them riled up. We see in verse 9 and verse 12 what this stirring up means. He says in verse 9, consecrate for war, stir up the mighty men and let all the men of war draw near and let them come up. Verse 12, let the nations stir themselves up and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat for war, for battle.
So to stir them up in Joel 3 here is to stir them up for battle, to get them to take up arms and to get them ready for war. That's what stirring up means. And we see God summoned this enemy army from all the earth in verse 9. He says in verse 9, proclaim this among nations, consecrate for war, stir up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near.
Let them come up. Let all the men, all the nations, let them all come up and square up with me. Let them prepare for battle. So just as in chapter 2 we have this imagery of God's army who is the means of his last day's judgment.
So we have God stirring up his own people to be ready for battle. And he has the nations stirring up a people ready for battle. He's getting ready for a face off, in other words, of God in his army and the army of the world. And he goes on, he describes what these nations are supposed to do.
He says, beat your plowshares into swords and your pruning hooks into spheres. If you have ears to hear there, that is the opposite of what the new creation is described like, guys, I have two. So I say I have two four. It says, when under the Messianic Kingdom, they will do what?
We will beat our swords into plowshares and our spheres into pruning hooks. We will not lift up sword against nation and near shall they learn war anymore. The new creation, when Christ comes and everything is under his righteous reign, instruments of war becomes instruments of peace and cultivation in the new creation. But God says that's not here yet.
I want to take every single last instrument of peace you have and turn it into an instrument of warfare because I'm coming and you better buck up and get ready. The army of the Lord is beckoned to come down in verse 11. He says, hasten and come, all you surround nations, gather yourselves there. And then it says, bring down your warriors, O Lord.
Presumably they're coming down from Jerusalem or Zion, the mountain where God is. They're coming down from God against the nations. And the nations stir themselves up. And they come up.
You see that in verse 12. And the nations stir themselves up and come up to the valley of people judge for their God will sit to judge all the surrounding nations. So I just want to keep on painting this picture for you. You have these two armies, one coming down, one coming up, the army of the Lord, the army of the nations.
And the Lord, notice where he is. Look at verse 12b. There I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations. Again, in verse 14 through 16 and verse 16 in particular, where the Lord simply roars from Zion.
He utters his voice from Jerusalem and the heavens and the earth quakes. So the Lord, once again, we're filling out the picture here. Army coming down, army coming up. The Lord is just sitting on his throne.
And his role in the battle is just to speak the word. Lord sits in judgment and the earth quakes when he speaks. So that's the picture. This wrathful judgment of God comes.
As it says in verse 14 and 15, the day of the Lord is near. The day of the Lord looks like the sun and the moon once again, just like it was back when Christ took the judgment on our behalf on the cross. Here again, when it's being poured out in the nations, the sun and the moon are darkened, the stars don't shine anymore. It's all coming to the head.
Everything is like a Narnia scene where the two armies are coming together. But who wins? Who wins? What army wins?
Well, I think he describes the victory in two ways. First, look at verse 13. The Lord switches from military imagery to wine press imagery in order to show the kind of slaughter that God is bringing against the army. He tells his army, hey, you guys, put in the sickle, harvest the earth, tread them under your feet.
For the wine press is full of that overflow, and their evil is great. In other words, God's people bring in this army, this enemy army, into this proverbial wine press, and they crush them under their feet like grapes. And that overflows with their blood because of how great their evil is. That's why they deserve this kind of judgment.
Absolute desolation, complete destruction, a wrathful wine press is the image of victory and success for God and his people. It is when God does the earth, an actual blood bath, actual blood bath. God's army evidently wins. And another sign of victory here is that the Lord, all he has to do is simply utter his voice and what happens?
The earth, heaven and earth, quake, it says in 16. Everything is shaken down to nothing like the walls of Jericho at the sound of God's voice. Absolute dominating power from God on the final day. That is the day of the Lord.
So let's look at Joel as a whole. We've gone through Joel, we've looked at the day of the Lord, which is Joel's unique contribution to the Bible. I mean, no one else talks about the day of the Lord as much as Joel does, the full and final judgment and salvation of God. And so here is just a summary of what the day of the Lord is characterized by.
I will read them out so you cannot see them. Number one, darkness and the sun and moon being darkened and the stars being darkened. Darkness and the sun and moon being darkened. We see that in 210 and 315.
An earthquake, we see that both times in 210a and in 316. Gathering of the army of the world from all nations. You see that in 39 and in 312. A final battle between God's army and the world's army, 2, 1, 3, 9, 3, 16.
You see that in both sections. God's army comes down as we saw in 3 verse 11. World's army comes up from somewhere, 39 and 12a. The final battle is in a valley of judgment.
You see that in 312 and in 312. The judgment comes according to God swiftly and speedily. Perhaps like a thief in the night. God's army is led by he who executes the Lord's word and he is powerful.
Look at chapter 2 verse 11 with me. The Lord utters his voice before his army, for his camp or his army is exceedingly great. And powerful is the one or he who executes his word is powerful. Literally he who does his word is powerful.
I'm not willing to stick a diamond hill for it. But Lord utters his voice, another person does it. This one who executes God's word is very powerful. So on the day of the Lord, there is this army of God led by he who executes the word word.
And then finally two things. The victory in judgment of God is depicted by the uttering of the Lord's voice as we see in 211 and 316. And the victory in judgment depicted as a sickle that reaps a full wine press that is then stomped out and overflows with blood. All of that happens on the day of the Lord according to all of it.
That's what the day of the Lord looks like. Can we agree by not of head that the day of the Lord is the father. The final day when God source everything out. It's one day when God source everything out.
That's what day means, right? Yeah. It means one day, and Genesis one, it means one day in Joel two, in three. The day of the Lord.
And that we would agree then that all of this happens on that one day according to Joel. Yes. Okay. I'm glad we're at an understanding.
So we saw last week how the words of Joel two, twenty eight, thirty two are fulfilled in acts to Pentecost and the person in the word of Christ, right? And I said in the first sermon on Joel that I read the back of the book, you got wins. And what we see here in chapter three of Joel concerning the final day of the Lord, where God judges his enemies in the last battle, is depicted again in the Bible, in the back of the book, no less, in the book of Revelation. In Revelation, as you know, it's very difficult to read.
It is not easy. But like it is with the rest of the Bible and the rest of the New Testament in particular, you become a better reader of the New Testament when you read the Old Testament, actually. Many problems of New Testament interpretation are because people don't know their Old Testament. And now that we have read the book of Joel and understood what he says about the day of the Lord and the final judgment of God, I want to turn to Revelation now and see how John is reading the book of Joel and how he is using his material to depict that same final judgment in the same ways.
So I have a fourth of all purpose in doing this. First, is to show you how New Testament offers are master interpreters of the Bible. New Testament offers are master interpreters of the Bible, the Old Testament, and they show it in how they use the Old Testament. Second, I want to show you that John in Revelation is heavily dependent on Joel throughout the book, heavily dependent on Joel.
Third, I want to make a point about how we should read the book of Revelation in light of what we see from John and how he depicts the day of the Lord in Revelation. And finally, I want to instill in you through all of this a confident hope and expectation that God indeed will do what he says, that the new creation will come, that everything will be set right, and that God will judge his enemies on your behalf. So I'm going to keep this up here. Let's go to Revelation 6.
Revelation 6 briefly with us. Trying to keep this relatively short. Revelation 6 with everything in mind. So we're going to identify where the day of the Lord appears in Revelation.
That one full final day of judgment, one day of judgment, and where it all appears in Revelation. We went over Revelation 6 verse 12 through 17 whenever we went through Joel 1 and 2. It says, when you open the sixth deal, I looked in verse 12, chapter 6, I looked and behold, there was a great earthquake, ding. And the sun became black, the sapphock, the full moon became like blood, the stars of the sky fell to the earth, ding, ding, ding.
The sky vanished like a scroll that was being rolled up in every mountain, an island was removed from its place. And then who else is there? The kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and every one, slave and free, ding, hid themselves in the caves and the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, following us and hiding us from the face of him who seced on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb for what? The great day of their wrath has come.
And who can stand? Ding and ding. Because Joel, if you remember, in 2.11 asked that same question after he described to David Lord, who can stand? Who can stand in this judgment?
And then many actually observe that the 144,000 of Israel who are sealed, or the people of God who can stand, who sound like the 144,000 but look like a great multitude from every nation, that census is like a military census that's only everly seen in the military census of numbers one. And so it's almost like John is depicting the people of God as this military army as well. So that's Revelation 6, at the end of the sixth seal, the end of the seals that we seem to have by explicit confession and by all of the markers that we had in Joel, the day of the Lord, the full and final day of the Lord. Okay, let's turn to Revelation 9, 1 through 21.
We're not going to read Revelation 9, 1 through 21. But I would just say this, that we have here a description of in the fifth and sixth trumpets, we have here a description of armies depicted as locust of all things, which we're also going to see armies depicted as locust and bible, only one other place in Joel chapter 2 and Joel chapter 1. So that's all I'm going to say about that chapter. Okay, Revelation 14.
Revelation 14, let's look at verses 14 through 20. But as you blow by, there's that 144,000 in verse 1 again. Look at verse 14. Then I look and behold a white cloud and seated on the cloud, one like a son of man with a golden crown in his head and a sharp sickle in his hand.
And who is that? Jesus. And another angel came out of the temple calling with a loud voice and he was out of the cloud, put in your sickle and reap for the hour to reap is calm, but the harvest of the earth is fully ripe. So he sat on the cloud and swung his sickle across the earth and the earth was reaped.
That is the people of God. And another angel came out of the temple and heaven and he too had a sharp sickle. And another angel came out from the altar, the angel had authority on the fire and he called with a loud voice to the one who had a sharp sickle, put in your sickle and gather the clusters from the vine of the earth for the rich grapes are ripe. So the angel swung his sickle across the earth and gathered keyword again, the great harvest of the earth and through it where?
Into the great wine press of the wrath of God, in the wine press was trodden outside the city and blood flowed from the wine press as high as the horses bridle for 1600 stadium. Where is the only other place in the Bible that the judgment of God described as wine press? Joel chapter 3. And it is on what day?
The final day of the Lord. Here is a question. We already have the day of the Lord in Revelation. How can we have it again?
Interesting question. And here is some math for you. I was a math minor. Here is a math for you on the highest horses bridle in 1600, 1680 is around 184 miles.
Driving, that is like from here to just north of Louisville, Kentucky. That is how long that is. If I look at the horses bridle, I can talk to some people who are horse people in here after this. If I look it up, and apparently if they are resting, if they are just trying to trodden along, they are about 5.5 to 6.5 feet off the ground.
They are bridles. And if they are alert and looking around, then it is about 8 feet, 7.5 to 8 feet. So we will just be anywhere from 8 foot to 6.5 feet of blood flowing 184 miles from here to Louisville. And if that river of blood is just as wide as the mad river, it can hold enough blood if a human being was stripped of every single drop of blood.
It can hold enough blood for 27 billion people. Does that sound full and final to you? It sure does to me. Who is left after that?
Who is left after 27 billion on the low side? Billion people's worth of blood is put into the wine press of God's wrath. Revelation 16 next, Revelation 16. This is the end of the bulls.
At the end of the seals, at the end of the trumpets, with the locus blood. And now we have the end of the bulls, the sixth angel. Put out his bull and the great river you frayed in his water was dried up to prepare the way for the kings from the east. And I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs.
He might experience a growing sign to go abroad to the kings of the whole world to assemble them for battle on what day? The great day of the God the Almighty. Behold, I am coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake, keeping his garments on, so he may not go about naked and be seen exposed.
Look at verse 17, the angel poured out his bull into the air and a loud voice came out of the temple from the throne saying it is done. And there were flashes of light and his rumblings peeled with under and a great earthquake, such as there had never been seen since the Son of Man was on the earth. So great was that earthquake. The great city was split into three parts and the cities of the nations fell.
And I remember Babylon and great to make her drain the cup of the wine of the fury of his wrath. And then what does that say? Every island fled away. No mountains were to be found.
Well, every island and mountain were thrown away in chapter 6. I thought, interesting. So all of these once again, army of gods of the enemies of the world gathered check. It's coming swiftly and speedily like a thief.
Check on earthquake. Check. Great day. Explicitly mentioned.
Check. So we have the day of the word again in Revelation 16. Let's go. Revelation 19.
Revelation 19, verse 11 through 21. We read this morning. Thank you, Mike, for reading that with such thoughtful pauses fitting. We see the revelation of the Lord Jesus on the white horse.
We turn him ready for battle. The one sitting on the horse is called faithful and true. And where does he come from? Where comes from above?
He comes from heaven. So he comes down and behind him are who? In verse 14, the armies of heaven arrayed in fine women, white and pure. We're following him on white horses.
So we have the army of the Lord come down led by the one who executes his word as he says in verse 13. He's closed in a robe dipped in blood and a name by which he is called is the word of God. And it says in verse 15. Look at what else he does in verse 15.
He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God, the Almighty. But John, it's already treaded. 27 billion people's worth of blood has been treaded. What are you talking about?
Verse 17, I saw angel standing in the sun with a loud voice. He called the birds and fly to the overhead. Come gather for the great supper of God. To eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of captains, the flesh of mighty men, the flesh of horses and the riders, the flesh of all men.
But free and slay, the small and great. All men. This whole army of all nations is once again coming up and gathering against the people of the Lord. The beast is captured.
They're thrown into the lake of fire. And in verse 21, the rest were slain by the sword that came from the mouth of him who was sitting on the horse. The Lord just utters his voice. And everyone's taken out.
This is once again, according to these Joel inspired designations, it is the great day of the Lord. And we can also make the same argument for chapter 20 verse 7 through 10. But my purpose in doing this was forful. So first, I hope we can see that John is a master in the Church of the Bible.
He has picked up everything that we've seen and more in Joel and used it in his presentation of the last day in Revelation. Second, it's a show that Revelation is heavily dependent on Joel. I mean, John uses it in all these places in Revelation. That's amazing.
One tiny little book used so many times. And then thirdly, I want to point out how we should read Revelation then. Because it's imperative that we understand exactly what's going on here. We see the day of the Lord.
I hope you see that. We see that day of the Lord happened in 6, in 14, in 16, in 19, in 9, over and over again. But Colby said it was one day. We all agreed to that.
I have it. One recording. We all agreed to that. It was one final day of the Lord.
It's what day means. We have two options. We either say that John is re-interpreting Joel, or he misunderstands you over. And actually the day is actually drawn out over a period of time.
We don't like that move. Day is being drawn out over a long period of time. It's not a great move for us. We don't like that, do we?
So that this Revelation's presentation of the day of the Lord is this long drawn out linear chronological movement. Or the other option is that John is a literary genius who is writing to a church that is under the thumb of Rome. And is under the thumb of Satan, he says in chapter 2 and 3. And is suffering dearly for the cause of Christ.
And who are even thinking about choosing the way of the dragon instead of the way of the lamb. And he wants them to ponder for 22 chapters, the diamond that is the day of the Lord. And he wants to turn it and let them behold every single facet of its beauty, presenting it and re-presenting it from different angles, that they can come to the end of the book of Revelation and think, I believe that that God is coming to judge, that that God is coming in salvation, that that God is coming for me. And I can endure the suffering in this earth because there's another one coming.
I prefer the latter of how to read the book. I don't care about systems of thought if you haven't noticed. I don't care about systematic theological categories. I care about the text of the Bible and what it presents and the beauty of everything it wants for us, in the pastoral charge of the apostles as they're begging for us to lift our eyes, all of our current circumstances and lift them up to the God and the land who saves.
So let's rejoice and be glad for John to show us over and over again that God wins. Christ wins. And if we believe in him, we're on those white horses with him when he comes. Revelation depicts for us, just as Joel does, after this final battle and judgment, there is new creation.
And that's exactly what Joel tells us about in verses 17 to 21. To rejoice and be glad in God's summary, which he summarizes, the good news of Joel in a few verses. It's sandwiched, as you can see in 17, by you shall know that I am the Lord your God who dwells in Zion, my holy mountain. Or in verse 21 it says again, for the Lord dwells in Zion.
So his summary is all about how this new creation life is characterized by his presence in Zion. We see multiple things in this text that once again John picks up again in Revelation. First, Joel says in verse 17, that Jerusalem shall be holy, holy to the Lord, no more sin. Revelation 21, 1 through 2 says, I need a flip back there, Revelation 21, 1 through 2 confesses this very same truth.
Jerusalem, this new Jerusalem that God has built is holy. There I saw a new heaven and new earth, the first heaven first with the pass away and see was no more. And I saw the holy city, the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. Similarly it says in verse 17, that stranger shall never again pass through it.
And this John picks up in Revelation 21, 8, where he says, but as for the cowardly, the faithless, the testable, as for murder, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, the doctors, liars, their portion will be not in the new Jerusalem, but with a lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death. He says again in 25 and 26, the gates shall never be shut by day and there will be no night there. They will, they as the nations will bring into it the glory and honor of all the nations. Verse 27, but nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who dies with his testable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb's book of life.
Once again, Joel says, a fountain shall come forth from the house of the Lord. In water, the valley of Shatim, we see this in Revelation 22, 1 through 3, or the river of life, the river of the water of life, bride is crystal flowing from the throne of God, and of the Lamb. And finally, from the whole point of this section, the Lord dwells in Zion. And we see this in Revelation 21, verse 22 and 23, I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God, the Almighty, and the Lamb.
And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives its light, and its lamp is the Lamb. God will dwell with his people when he shall be their God, and they shall be his people. In that day, as he says in verse 17, you shall know that I am the Lord your God, because I will dwell among you. And so in that day, we will know in fullness, we will no longer only know in part that this is the God who dwells with us.
And friends, even now, as the Lord dwells in your heart through faith, you can know with absolute assurance that God is the Lord who dwells in Zion, who does do in all of these things, and who will do all these things for you. Know that today. Be assured of that today. Finally, a few points of application for us as we close.
First of all, is that if it's not been obvious, vengeance belongs to the Lord. Vengeance belongs to God and God alone. Friends, we are probably in some situation or have been or will be in some situation in which we are wronged. And anger will stir up in our hearts.
That anger, as Robert Jones says, is us putting ourselves on the throne of God as judges. Don't do that. Let vengeance belong to God. He's way better at it than you are, as we have seen here.
He's going to sort it all out in the last day. Similarly, if you are being persecuted, ever in the line, if you are physically beaten, Lord forbid, take refuge in the Lord who is a refuge to his people in a stronghold to the people of Israel. Take refuge in him. Let the fact that his vengeance is surely coming, that he will venge your blood, that he has not avenged.
Be your solace. And your fortress. And finally, you're almost home. The day is coming soon.
As we've seen over and over in Joel, the day of the Lord is indeed near. It's near to us, so close to me in touch. Hope in that day where mountains will drip with sweet wine and flow with milk. And all the pleasures of the Lord, spiritual pleasures, physical pleasures of the Lord, will be ours forever.
Rejoice and be glad in God's day of salvation and judgment. This is the Word of God from the book of Joel, which I now commit to your faithful, steady and fervent obedience until the Lord who is the Lamb comes. As a man come forward for communion, let's go to the Lord in prayer. Let's pray.
Father, we thank you. We praise you. We love you. Father, we celebrate at 250 years of supposed victory of a nation over enemies near and far.
But Father, that victory pales in comparison to the awesome and fearsome day when you will have ultimate victory over sin, death, the devil in the world. Father, let us not be scared of the slaughter that is surely to come, but let us delight in the demonstration of your love for us, not only in Jesus Christ, who is the preeminent example of love, who has taken on the judgment that we so desperately deserve in our place. Lord, in the demonstration of your love that will happen, that you will step in for people who do not deserve it, and you will enter into judgment with their enemies on our behalf. Father, we pray that you would stir up in our hearts a love and a delight in you because of these things, because of who you are as the Lord who dwells in Zion.
We pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.