(Revelation) Heaven's Alleluias

1 John 2 please, 103, man of sorrows, what a name for the son of God who came, ruined sinners to reclaim, hallelujah, what a saviour, 102 please. Chapter 19 this evening, book of the revelation, chapter 19, and you can see from your notes this evening that I've called these first six verses, heavens, hallelujahs, because you get this great word hallelujah. Four times in these six verses, we'll read them through and you mark them as we go through.

Verse 1, after these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven saying, hallelujah, salvation and glory and honour and power unto the Lord our God. For true and righteous are his judgments, for he hath judged the great hall which did corrupt the earth with her fornication, and hath avenged the blood of his servants at her hands. And again they said, hallelujah, and her smoke rose up for ever and ever, and the four and twenty elders and four beasts fell down and worshipped God that sat on the throne saying, amen, hallelujah.

And a voice came out of the throne saying, praise our God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both small and great, 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 thundering saying, hallelujah. For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth. And so you can see if you're watching closely that you've got this great word of praise four times this evening in six short verses.

There's no doubt at all that this is the hallelujah chorus that we're up this evening. Sometimes the Greek word is spelt with H, and sometimes it's spelt without it, and sometimes I say it with the H, and sometimes I say it without it. It can be hallelujah, or it can be hallelujah, and just how it comes to your tongue you can do it.

But it's the great hallelujah chorus this evening, and that's what we're at, four times in these six verses. And we don't want to take so much time as to see where it was sounded forth, or when it was sounded forth, but we do want to take a bit of time about for why did all heaven go into the hallelujah chorus. Let's begin again at verse one.

Let me show you how to read this book. And after these things, I think you should stop there, although the stop is not there. I think you should stop and ask the question, after what things? After these things.

You see, if we were going back a couple of chapters to chapter seventeen, you'll remember this. Verse one begins like this, And there came one of the seven angels, which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come, Heather, I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great hall that sittheth upon many waters. And the whole seventeenth chapter was taken up with the revelation of the judgment.

The judgment of God upon this great hall. And we took great time one evening to find out exactly who this great hall is. She's clothed in scarlet, and I called her the Scarlet Woman.

And when we went through the scriptures to her place, we found out that this is the pagan system of the Roman church. And you know, God is fed up with this horrible system. This system of disease and enslaves, and then eventually damns the souls of men and women.

And the whole seventeenth chapter was taken up with the judgment of this great hall, and we saw how it came about. The kings of Europe, there were ten kings. And I said that Mr. Heath is doing his best to form it just now.

And these ten kings turned on this system, and the Roman church was burned with fire. And when we went into chapter eighteen, we found that a great number of commercial businesses were connected with this system. For there is not only a mystical Babylon in seventeen, but there's a commercial Babylon in eighteen.

And this mystical system and this commercial system was totally destroyed. Do you remember how chapter eighteen came to an end? Verse twenty-one said, And a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and cast it into the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall not great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be found no more at all. And I pointed out to you that time after time at the end of the chapter, you'll find the phrase, No more at all.

She's completely and eternally destroyed. And after three things is where our chapter begins. After three things.

After the judgment. After the burning. After the desolation and the destruction.

After these things. I heard, we're back at nineteen, verse one, and it's John that's reading. You see, John was a prisoner on the Isle of Thutmose, and God was taking him by the Spirit at times up into see the glories of heaven, and taking him on forward to see the coming history of earth.

And they had taken him on forward past where we are even this much, down into the tribulation period. And he had seen this scarlet woman completely and eternally destroyed. And he said, After these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven.

It's getting quite clear now where this crowd is. They're in heaven. Oh, I know the beast, and the ten kings, and the ten foes, and the scarlet woman, and the commerce with all on earth.

That's quite simple. But you know, heaven was being told exactly what was happening on earth. There was news going up, you know.

And John said, After these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven. All the saints were there. Much people in heaven.

Say, Hallelujah. This great word came roaring out of heaven. What a wonderful sound it must have been as John was listening.

And you know, the day that this pagan, pitiful, diabolical, damnable victim is destroyed on this earth, I'll be in heaven. And I assure you, I'll mingle my hallelujahs with the rest. I think old Tesley will be there, and he'll hallelujah a bit too.

I'll tell you this, all heaven will shout. Make no mistakes about it. But no mealy-mouthing it then.

Because the heavens will know exactly what has happened. And you'll find that John hears this great voice of much people in heaven saying, Hallelujah. And the next word is salvation.

You know, God's salvation is a wonderful thing. You know that God saves you when he saves you from the penalty of sin. If you get saved you'll never be in hell.

But salvation is more than that. You know, he's gone to save his people from the power of sin. Saves you every day from the power of sin.

I need his grace every day. And then he'll come back one of these nights and he'll save me from the very presence of sin. He'll put me out altogether.

Oh, and when he takes the church out, you know, the tribulation will start down here. But he'll have a few witnesses left. And Rome will give them a rough time.

Oh, but he'll save them from the deception of Rome. And this is what the Hallelujah is all about. All heaven will shout, Hallelujah.

My, this earth will be nearer total salvation when we get rid of this pagan system. And that's the day that great glory and honor and power will come to God. You see what they're saying, Hallelujah, salvation and glory and honor and power unto the Lord our God.

But they're saying Hallelujah for other reasons. You see this one, for true and righteous are his judgments. And I've reserved that specially for this evening and will not touch it just now.

Not only saying Hallelujah for salvation and for the true and righteous judgments. But they're saying it for this. For he hath judged the great war which did corrupt the earth with her fornication.

They're saying it for that too, you know. You know, all heaven will know exactly what's been happening on earth. They'll know that God hath judged this system.

And they'll shout Hallelujah. But there's something else here that this Hallelujah comes up for that we need to take a moment or two with. Oh, they're saying Hallelujah because salvation and glory and honor and power has come.

Because God's judgments are true and righteous. Because he has judged the war which did corrupt the earth with her fornication. But they're saying it because God hath avenged the blood of his servants.

You know, this vengeance is a tremendous thing. I think we need to take a moment with that. You know, we need to always remind ourselves that we, in the church age, in this day and hour, we live in the dispensation of grace.

We must never forget that. And here's what God says to us. Let's go back to Romans chapter 12 for a moment.

Romans chapter 12. And this is God talking to us believers in this day and hour in which we're living. And in verse 19 he says this.

You can see he's talking to Christians. He says, dearly beloved. That's the term for all us believers.

And he's saying this to us, avenge not yourselves. I wish I could get that over to all the believers. Mind you, that's God's teaching for you.

Man came to see me today and I sat alone with him in the car. His son was shot the other night. Caught in darkness for horror.

I said, you know what God says to you, don't you? And he never let me finish the lesson. He says, God says I'm not to avenge myself. I said, that's right.

You know, you would be tempted if you lost your big fella to do anything. You would be tempted to avenge, you're not to avenge yourselves. You know, the Christians start to suffer wrongfully.

My dear friends, that's where we're placed. We're in the dispensation of grace. We have no notion of taking vengeance.

We're just asked to suffer wrongfully. But here's what God says to you. Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves.

But rather give place unto us. It takes a lot of grace to do that. It would take a lot of grace for me.

Yes, rather give place unto us, for it is written. I want you to get this bit. Vengeance is mine.

You're not to do it, but there'll come a time when God will do it. And that's why the horror really went up, you know. Because God had avenged the blood of his servants.

And I'll tell you he'll do it. There's nobody getting off with shedding this blood, you know. If they think they are, they have made the biggest mistake they've ever made on telling you God is going to deal with them.

And in a way they never dreamed of that. You know, there's a day of vengeance marked out on the calendar for this whole world of ours. The day of vengeance of our God.

And it'll come, you know. You know, here's something that I want you Christians to get the hold of. Let's go over to Luke's Gospel, chapter 4. Luke's Gospel, chapter 4. Now, verse 16, it's talking about the Lord Jesus.

Luke 4, 16, And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, back into his own town. And as his custom was, isn't that a nice thing, you know, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day. Is it your custom to go to the Lord's house on the Lord's day? Or is it your custom to run away in the shower when it's a good day? Or is it your custom to stay in when it's raining? Because I'll tell you that the Lord that you're supposed to be following, his custom was, he was there every Sabbath day.

And we ought to be here every Lord's day. He came to Nazareth where he had been brought up, and as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to read. And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Isaiah.

It's the Greek way of writing Isaiah. And it was a big scroll, you know, it's not a book like this, it's a long scroll. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written.

He just rolled out the scroll and took his time, you know, until he found the place. He found the place where this was written. Verse 18.

Now, if you want to find the same place as he found, I'll get it for you in a moment. But hold on, it was Isaiah chapter 61. It wasn't in chapters then, he just found the place without the chapters.

Now, let me say this to you, that when we find it, he only read one verse. Somebody said to me the other Sunday morning, they always say things to me, that he only read one verse this morning. Oh, maybe when we come on Sunday morning, I'll just read the one verse, if any man be in Christ.

I said, dear, once upon a time the Lord stood up and he only read one verse. But don't be too critical, because it might be your ignorance that's producing certain things. You should know all these things before you open your mouth.

The Lord only read one verse, and a phrase into the next one. But here's the verse he read. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor, he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set up liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord, and that the word Lord he stopped and closed the book.

Just like that. Now, let's go over to Isaiah 61, so you see what he did. The prophecy of Isaiah 61.

And he rolled out the scrolls when he came to this chapter. And he began reading this verse, verse 1. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek, he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. That's where he stopped and closed the book.

Now, that's in the middle of a sentence. There's not a full stop there. You see what the next bit says.

To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God. No, he didn't come the first time to do that at all. You know, there are boys in this class who try to argue with me that there are no dispensations.

Well, I can tell you the Lord was proving that there are dispensations, because he says, you know, I came to do all these things. Then he stopped. Then he comes again! It will be the day of vengeance! Oh, but he couldn't preach that the first time, because he wasn't coming for that.

How very wonderful he was. How very stupid you are at times. You don't even know the time.

My Lord stopped in the middle of a verse, dear, because he was dividing the dispensations. Between the word Lord and the next start of the next phrase, there are thousands of years. And he knew it.

It's very wonderful, you know. He just closed the book at the right place. Oh, but there is the day of vengeance! Oh, yes, the day of vengeance will come, you know.

You see, when the Church of Jesus Christ goes home, and the Antichrist appears, and the ten toes of Daniel's image are in full swing, then the day of vengeance will just begin to appear. It hasn't fully appeared, you know. The day takes a long time of coming.

The dawning is slow. But even in the dawning of that day, he's going to avenge the blood of his challenge! This Roman Church burned millions of true believers in the Inquisition. God hasn't forgotten.

God is going to avenge the blood of all his servants. Make no mistakes about it. Whether you like it or whether you don't, the day of vengeance is going to come.

That's only the dawning of the day of vengeance, but the day of vengeance will fully come, you know. Let's look at 2 Thessalonians, and we're at the first chapter. 2 Thessalonians, and we're at chapter 1. It's a very interesting letter, this 2 Thessalonians.

Paul's writing to these saints at Thessalonica. He says in verse 3, We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is meek, because your faith groweth exceedingly. It's great to see a fellow's faith growing.

And the charity of every one of you, all toward each other aboundeth. My, when faith begins to grow and love begins to abound, it's a fellowship worth looking at. So that we ourselves glory in you in the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure.

Which is the manner, says Spoken, of the righteous judgment of God, that ye may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God for which ye ought to suffer. Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you, and to you who are troubled rest with us. Oh, there'll come a time of rest, all right.

Here's when it will come. When the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels. You know, he's going to come right down to this earth one day.

He'll come to the air first and he'll take the church home. And then after that he'll come to the earth. He'll be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels.

One day, he'll come to the air first and he'll take the church home. And then after that he'll come to the earth. He'll be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, seeking vengeance for men that know not God.

Ah, that's the day of vengeance. Will he come? Make you no mistakes about it, you know. God says vengeance is right.

And the Lord Jesus was very conscious that there was a day of vengeance after the day of grace. And he differentiated between the two. And there's coming a time when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God and that obey not the gospel.

Make no mistakes about it. And you know when he does? Oh, heaven will cry, Hallelujah! Because that's what we're seeing back there, you know. Let's go back to that again.

We're at Revelation 19. And I think you can see the force here quite clearly for salvation, for true and righteous judgments, for the judgment upon the Great Hall, for the avenging of the blood of the servants. Verse 3, And again they said, Hallelujah! And her smoke rose up forever and ever.

She's not only totally, but she's eternally judged. And the four and twenty elders, and you remember we have them at the beginning of the book. And I said that there were twelve tribes in the old economy and there were twelve apostles in the new economy.

And I believe that the twenty four elders was a symbolic figure of the Old Testament saints and the New Testament saints being together in heaven, praising the Lord. And at this psychological moment, the four and twenty elders and the four beasts fell down and worshipped God that sat on the throne saying, Amen, Hallelujah. It's the same word, you know.

It'll be a great moment, you know, when we fall down and really praise the Lord and shout Hallelujah just because He's on the throne. That's one of the reasons for the Hallelujah, that He's on the throne. You know, we want to practice it a bit down here.

You know, I think, you know, that we should get into the way of saying this Hallelujah, because, you know, when the enemy comes in like a flood and make no mistakes about it, as we go through this wistful wilderness in this dead place, the enemy comes in like a flood at times. Ah, well, you should learn to say Hallelujah. God is still on the throne.

And when you little boat, the boat of your life, dear, gets filled with water, and the night is dark, and the lion roars, you should learn to say Hallelujah, for God is still on the throne. And when the mountains round about you are filled with the prophets of Baal, these old novelists that would tear these pages up because they don't understand them, they'd tear them up, they can't manage it. Even when the mountains are filled with the prophets of Baal, shout out to them, for God is still on the throne.

One of the reasons for saying Hallelujah. Big Beasley has in the study a little glass case with a wording in it. It says Hallelujah anyway.

I think it's a great thing. Just say Hallelujah anyway, no matter what happens. Whether the night is dark or not dark, whether the enemies come in like a flood, no matter what happens.

Learn to say it, dear, go down to Satan's heaven, man. Hallelujah. God is still on the throne.

It's a great thing. This is what they're praising the Lord for. Now I want you to get the hold of this, verse 5, and avoid him out of the throne saying, Praise our God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both small and great.

Because God wants all his servants to be always praising him, at all times for things. Oh, there's always something to praise the Lord about. You know those Persian Greeks one Sunday morning, praise the Lord at all times.

And that Sunday afternoon going through Hyde Park in London, some vagabond came round a hedge and knocked him down and blackened his eye and took his purse and ran off. And the fellow who was at the meeting came bounding across and lifted him up and said, Can you praise the Lord now? He said, Of course I can praise the Lord. Praise God that he hit me and I didn't hit him.

Praise God that he took my purse and I didn't take his. Praise God that I had only a few shillings in it, the rest of the money's in the house. There's always something to praise the Lord for, you know.

If you just work it out, it'll work out all right. You can praise the Lord at all times. I was hearing this evening, there's a man in the meeting, I'll get into trouble for this, I've opened the mouth again, I'll not go back on it, sir.

A man in the meeting, it's Paddy, he's sitting down there. Sorry for you Paddy, but you're in for it, sir. He was at Jim Irvin's on Sunday, and Irvin was saying, Come on, praise the Lord, getting them all singing.

And then at the end of the meeting he says, Paddy, you never opened your mouth once. Paddy, if I get you in here not singing, I'll tell you, you'll get more than Irvin ever gave you. Oh, praise the Lord.

That's when to praise the Lord. Praise him that God wants his people to praise him at all times, for all things, under all circumstances. Now watch this, verse 6. And I heard of it where the voice of a great multitude.

My, when a multitude roars together. I don't know how many go to Glenelg in the times, but when they score up there, we can hear them down in our place. There's a great shout goes up, you know.

I can nearly tell you how many goals they've got. But what must the voice of a great multitude be like? He puts it more than that. He says, and of the voice of many waters.

A lot of folks here this evening have been to Niagara Falls. I can remember the day that I stood in on the falls Sometimes folk go, they go up into the big place to have their dinner and look down. I went away in behind the falls and the water comes over you.

You can't hear a fellow talking next to you. What a time. Now this is what John was at.

He says, the voice of a great multitude, of the voice of many waters, of the voice of mighty thunderings. He's trying to gather up things to say about the noise. All saying, Alleluia! Mine is stronger than ever, and for this reason, for Lord God omnipotent reigneth.

Oh, that we could get that into it. It's great that he's on the phone. But let's get this word in this evening, that the one that is on the phone, don't look up so much where he is, but look up who he is.

He's the Lord God omnipotent. And he's ringing. You know, as you look up to my church, there are no impossibilities with him.

There's nothing too hard for him. There's nothing bigger than him. There is no power, and no problem, and no potentate that I must overcome.

Let's get the hold of this tonight. This is what I want you to get. God is on the phone.

Oh, that it's the Lord God omnipotent that reigneth. You know, I think, you know, if we just grasped that he's on the phone, you could say hallelujah. And if you grasped that the one that is on the phone is the Lord God omnipotent, you could say hallelujah anyway, no matter what happens.

Well, that's just an introduction to where we're going next week, and I thought we should take that bit out of it. I'm going to sing in my pen this evening 168. 158.

Christ the Lord is written today, hallelujah. Sons of men and angels say hallelujah. Raise your joy and triumph high.

Sing ye heavens and earth reply hallelujah. Now, I preached the way up in the Faroe Isles and went on up there into Iceland, and they sing this hymn very, very often there, of course, in their own language. It was there I learned this tune for this hymn.

When they sang, I knew the tunes, and I could sort of fit in the words then in their own language. I had their hymn book. And this is how they sang it.

They sang Christ the Lord is written today, sons of men and angels say, raise your joy and triumph high, sing ye heavens and earth reply, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah. They sang it like this, the four lines first. Then all the men would sing hallelujah.

Then all the women would say hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah. But we're going to sing it together. We'll all sing the hallelujah, hallelujah, and you'll find it goes well with this old tune this evening, 1-5-8, if you've got the idea.

Now we mean to sing this, you know. It's probably a singing song. Why they sing hallelujah in heaven, they do it down here this evening.

Now everybody, opening them up, Paddy, where are you? God help you, I assure you, you'll come up here, you know. Everybody singing on the second verse, putting your best into it, thank you. In thy fear and with thy blessing, for thy holy name's sake, amen.