The God who flung galaxies across the field of space will touch, personally and directly, each eye that cries. He will take tears as his own. The God who hears the thunderous cataract of the multitude in praise, attunes to each sigh of his beloved. He attends to us like a father, like a spouse, like a friend. This is our God. We feel him do this from time to time in these dark days. Sometimes by the presence of his comforting Spirit. Sometimes through those he sends us.

Revelation assures us that more is coming. None of these tears are lost. They will all be cared for.

Every worship service between now and Jesus' return is like an engagement party. All the guests come. Everyone anticipates the wedding that will be. So confident are we that the groom will keep his pledge, that we dance with abandon. We lift up our voices in joy. We let our hearts swell for the wedding day that will be here soon, oh, so very soon.

No matter how much theology I read, I cannot scrub out the clear warning in passages like this one from Revelation. There is a judgment. There will be a lake of fire. No can survive it on his own merits. Jesus, however, has made a way. Will we answer his call and rely on him alone?

God’s wrath is warranted and just in its execution. The first angel takes up his bowl, walks over to the earth, and pours it out.  The second angel follows, goes over the waters, pours out God’s wrath and the sequence is repeated through the third, fourth…

There is a cadence to the unleashing. God’s wrath is poured out over time, it is not a tyrannical unleashing and explosion of rage. God will not be mocked, he will execute judgment in an appropriate proportion, and he will pour out his wrath as a function of his holiness and love. God alone is fit to determine what sentencing is just and how punishment should be delivered.  His wrath is just, and the battle is warranted.

God’s wrath is warranted and just in its execution. The first angel takes up his bowl, walks over to the earth, and pours it out.  The second angel follows, goes over the waters, pours out God’s wrath and the sequence is repeated through the third, fourth…

There is a cadence to the unleashing. God’s wrath is poured out over time, it is not a tyrannical unleashing and explosion of rage. God will not be mocked, he will execute judgment in an appropriate proportion, and he will pour out his wrath as a function of his holiness and love. God alone is fit to determine what sentencing is just and how punishment should be delivered.  His wrath is just, and the battle is warranted.

Jesus comes down fully into the deathliness of our lives so that he can raise us fully into his everlasting life. That life can begin now. He asks that we let him join the song of our life to the mighty song of his life. He wants to take our out of tune, discordant, even grating song and tune it to his satisfying symphony.

So pervasive will be the beast’s power, so seductive its promises, that the whole world will be deceived. Everyone except one group. Those whose names have been written in the book of life of the Lamb who was slain. That is, those who come to faith in Jesus, a faith that carries on even when the whole world has gone astray. 

The revolution that became the Protestant Church was the discovery that Scripture teaches us to rely on Christ alone. We depend solely on the merits of Christ. I merit nothing. I am joined to Christ by faith, so that his merits become my own, and I am free from having to work for spiritual rewards. Jesus is good enough on my behalf. Now I can joyfully respond in thanks by living for Jesus’ whose merits alone save me.

 The Church appears as a guttering and flickering flame in the West. But, this is the hour to which you have been called. For such an hour, the Church needs strength, courage, boldness, an unwavering confidence and a steady gaze to conquer. We must not fear to look into the eyes of the beast, clearly proclaiming the truth, genuinely imitating the pattern placed before us. And, come what may, our hope is the very hope that we commemorate every Lord’s Day. The hope of the resurrection, that out of death comes life.