Corona Chronicles - Crown of Gold

Welcome back to the Corona Chronicles. We are in chapter 16 today. I'm gonna start reading from verse 1. Then I heard a loud voice from the temple saying to the 7 angels, go, pour out the 7 bowls of God's wrath on the earth. The first angel went and poured out his bowl on the land and ugly festering sores broke out on the people who had the mark of the beast and worshiped its image.

The second angel poured out his bowl on the sea, and it turned into blood like that of a dead person. And every living thing in the sea died. The third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and springs of water and they became blood. Then I heard the angel in charge of the water say, you are just in these judgments, oh holy 1. You who are and who were.

For they have shed the blood of your holy people and your prophets. And you have given them blood to drink as they deserve. And I heard the altar respond, yes, Lord God almighty true and just are your judgments. Well, here we are again. We we've sort of been here before.

It's the, you know, we've said this, I think, before that that revelation is is a bit like groundhog day in sort of clicks back, doesn't it? And start and starts the whole sort of process again. And here's the next series of 7. So it's not that the 7 follow each, you know, 1 7 follows another 7 other chronologically, it's a sort of click back. But having said that, we have seen that they get more and more darker, don't they?

So, you know, like a quarter of the earth is judged, and then it's a third, and and now it's the whole lot, really. Yeah. So, this is really the end time, isn't it? This is leading up to the final judgement. And it's it's it's strong meat here, isn't it?

Very strong meat yet again. Yeah. I think that's because we've been rounded round, every sort of rotation, we sort of understand more what's going on. We see God's patience more clearly. We see him and his warnings more clearly.

And even the fact that now in verse 2, we see that this festering sort breaks out on people who with the mark of the beast. Well, we know what the mark of the beast is because of the last few few chapters. And every time we go around, we paint more picture of what's what's going on. And we see yeah. We see more clearly what's happening.

So yeah. Absolutely. So we've sort of started again and and we hear this loud voice again every it's always loud, isn't it? And it's coming from the temple that that's where God is. So this is the voice of God, saying to the 7 angels, messengers of God that are going out into the world.

And then there's this extraordinary sentence, go, pour out the 7 bolt of God's wrath, not the earth. So this is really it in a sense. Yeah. God's wrath is now coming. And I guess when people hear that, they think, we don't normally hear about that, do we?

We hear about the love of God rightly so. I mean, extraordinary love of God, and God is love. But we don't really like hearing about the wrath of God. We don't like the idea that God is is angry at sin. Mhmm.

But of course, if he's a God of love, which he is, foundationally, he he loves truth and love and goodness. Yeah. Then he has to have wrath. Yeah. You can't really have love without, no, without wrath.

So the opposite to love is not is is is indifference. Yeah. I can't be bothered. It doesn't matter. Okay.

That sin doesn't matter. That lie doesn't matter. But love and Roth do go together, so he is angry at this world, and he's going to judge this world, and rightly so. Yeah. And you see the angels that actually hear sort of rejoicing in this in this judgment.

So in verse 5, well, verse 4, the blood Sorry, with the rivers and the springs of water tend to blood. But then the angel who's in charge of them says, you are just in these judgments of holy 1. You who are, who were for they have shed the blood of your holy people and your prophets. And you have given them the the blood to drink as they deserve. So there's this there's this, like, release, like, thank you.

You praise be to the god who has who has acted in this way -- Mhmm. -- because He's he's just and righteous to do so. Yeah. And we want righteousness. We want evil to be punished.

And we have said this before, but and God will do that. And so there is a day coming. Now, a lot of this, obviously, and as we read on through the chapter in in subsequent corona chronicles. We'll see that a lot of the imagery is coming from the exodus. Yes.

Isn't it? So here are God's people in slavery, in under the world power, which was Egypt of the time. In slavery, wanting to worship god freely, and pharaoh say, no, you know, that whole thing, let my people go, no. And then there's plague of the plague as a warning to pharaoh that that God is about his people worshiping him. And and Farow's just not listing.

And so these plates come to this is what's going on, isn't it? Yeah. Absolutely. And and and then, it's it's quite helpful to think about that because the God's people were were under incredible suffering there, weren't they? And, it was When you look at that story, you think God is right, isn't it?

To judge Egypt for how they've treated his people. Yeah. And then here, God is right to judge the nations and the world for how they've treated his people, verse 6 for they have shed the blood of your holy people and your prophets. So this is sometimes really revelation, we can just read it like on a nice, you know, sunny day, And you think, what on earth is good to be angry about? Yeah.

And we need to put this judgment in the context -- Yes. -- of of this horror which is the world and the way it's treated god's people. Yeah. And ultimately, the the way it's treated the lord Jesus Christ shows the representative head of God's people. What what did the world do when Jesus came?

It liked his miracles because suddenly you had bread when you didn't, when you didn't have prayed -- You were hungry. Yeah. When you were hungry. But in the end, it would not stand for him, saying that he was lord and Christ, then people should follow him. Mhmm.

And and it's interesting that the world powers both religious power in in that area of the day, and the world power put into death. Yeah. On a cross. And you know, if Jesus was to come first time in this world, we tend to think, oh, we would be liberal and tolerant No. We're not, are we?

We would say, I don't like what you're saying. Yeah. We would kill him again. Yeah. That's our attitude to God and his people.

And that that's the mercy of God to us because Peter, when he stood up to preach and pentecost of this Christ whom you crucified. Yeah. And you and I are included in Yes. We, you know, we crucified Jesus with our sins and yet and yet God's mercy has has given us this opportunity to repent, you know, come back to him. Yeah.

Yeah. So so the thing that's going out to the world is that I think verse 7 is amazing. I heard the response from the altar which is presumably god's people -- Mhmm. -- is, yes, lord, God almighty, true and just are your judgments. God is going to be true and just.

There's no 1 going to be able to say, hey, God, you didn't understand my situation. Because actually Christ came into this world and knew what it was like to be rejected and a man and all of that of stuff. And his judgments are true and just. And so when God says, you need to repent. You need to turn to me.

He's not just This isn't just a sort of weird religious sort of despot, just making things up. This is just and correct that he judges the world. Yeah. And this world is going to become to an end. Mhmm.

And hey, look at look at the cross because these judgments were poured out on the lord Jesus himself in our place. We don't have to face these because he's faced them for us. So why wouldn't you come to him? Yeah. Okay.

We'll we'll carry on in chapter 16 next time.