A MOMENT OF ANTICIPATION

Pastor
Calvin Christian Reformed Church
Nepean, Ontario

It was the grim silence of shock and horror at what had happened.
And there is the silence of suspense. The jury files into the court room, prepared to give their verdict. The media and other onlookers stop everything. A hush descends. People hold their breath - what will it be?

Or when a classroom has been rowdy, picking on the poor substitute teacher, a novice. Throwing spitballs, paper aeroplanes, shuffling feet, snickers.... until the principal walked through the door. Suddenly things become deathly still.

What's going to happen now?
And everyone waits in suspense.
Silence.

In this marvellous book of Revelation the bible peals back the covers from that dimension of reality which normally lays beyond the scope of human senses. We are granted, through apocalyptic symbols and images, a picture of what things are like in the great and holy Cosmic Throne Room, the centrepointe of Heaven, the Holy of Holies. In a specialized poetic and picturesque form we are allowed to see the other side of history's timeline -- the perspective on time from God's side.

Our reading is one slice of that picture. It is a slice of action and noise. There is the gathering of believers - what we in theological circles call The Church Triumphant. It's the part of Christ's community of believers that have won the battle; they have crossed the last great hurdle, death, and they have triumphed. Sin, pain, evil can no longer get to them. Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst... no scorching heat... God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

They are safe and secure, forever, living in the visible presence of God.They see Him in all His glorious radiance. Just as He is. A radiance that is so overwhelmingly great and powerful and grand that no mortal can see it and live.

They have gone from the mortal to immortality.
And they see it.
They see the love that He has for His children.
They experience it first-hand.
Bathed in it. Protected by it.

The Church Triumphant. And they celebrate. Oh, how they celebrate. Which John sees pictured in ways that 1st century folk would understand -- white robes and palm branches. That was ballroom apparel -- the stuff of grand celebrations.

The Church Triumphant celebrates salvation that has been won for them. They glory in the love and power and grandeur and wonder of the Lord. On and on and on and on they celebrate. The angels join in that celebration. And the great leaders of the heavenly community - the elders - they join in the celebration. Singing. Rejoicing. Dropping to their knees in total adoration before the One who has made this all possible.

It's an amazing picture, and one that can give tremendous comfort to you and I who have had to lay loved ones to rest in the grave. Comfort because we can know that the grave doesn't mean defeat. It's the doorway to triumph.
Triumph. Victory. Celebration.

So there they celebrate. Loudly. Singing. Proclaiming.
If you go to Rev.14.2 you are given another sneak peak at this celebration. And its obviously a loud celebration. The Church Triumphant is playing the harp. But they must be electronic harps, amplified and connected to huge heavenly speakers. None of this wee tiny stuff that you see in pictures. These are big suckers -- ch.14 says they sounded like the roar of rushing waters and like a loud peal of thunder.

But then it happens. The scroll of history, which step by step is being opened has the last seal removed from the cover. The next phase of history is about to unfold. And at that moment the singing stops. The declarations stop. The amplifiers to the harps are turned off. Everyone stands still.
Silence..... in heaven for about half an hour.

As the silence builds seven angels quietly come forward and are given seven trumpets.
There's one more angel. This one is the angel of prayer. He's in charge of handling the prayers of believers on earth.
Christians who are still fighting the wars of life, still facing the attacks of Satan and the challenges of existing in a broken, sin-scarred world -- the ones we call The Church Militant -they pray. That's you and I, right now and tomorrow as we go back to work.

Prayers go up to heaven.
Pray without ceasing.

Every moment from around the globe prayers go into the Holy of Holies. God hears them. Every word, every sigh, every tear.
Christ also hears. Sitting at God's right hand - right beside Him - He hears. Romans 8.34 says that "Christ Jesus.... is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us." That is pictured here in Revelation 8. The angel of prayer is given incense. Incense is an ancient substance used to symbolize prayers. In other words, the angel of prayer is given prayers to add to the prayers of the saints -- extra prayers that will go up to heaven.

Those extra prayers are the holy prayers of the Saviour.
His intercession mingled with our prayers and going to the Father.

Can you picture the scene?
Great heavenly glory.
Prayers coming from earth. Never-ending.
Prayers coming from the Saviour.
Seven angels given trumpets.
Everything is ready and waits; waits in silence.
Everything is set for...
.... well, for what? Why the silence?

Well, consider words from another prophet, words to a world that is bustling with activity, so busy that they don't have time for their Heavenly Master; so busy that they ignore Him: (Hab 2.20)"....The Lord is in His holy temple; let all the earth be silent before Him."And this one -"Be silent before the Sovereign Lord, for the day of the Lord is near." (Zeph 1.7) And this -"Be still before the Lord, all humanity, because He has roused Himself from His holy dwelling." (Zech 2.13) Stop all your fussin' and fumin'. Listen up. Pay attention to God. He's going to act and He means business. Remember our talk about different kinds of silence?

The silence in heaven is the silence of suspense. Something big is going to happen. God is going to act. Listen up! It's going to be serious. Judgement is involved. That's why the angels have to be ready to sound the trumpets of warning. It won't be the final judgement. You will see that through the subsequent verses of ch.8 where different segments of creation are affected - the land, the sea, the sky. Not entirely - just a third. Enough to make a devastating impact; enough of a painful whack to get all these distracted, self-preoccupied people to stop, be quiet, pay attention.

The silence of Revelation 8.1 is the silence before the storm.The prayers of pained and struggling saints have gone to the Lord. Christ has added His holy prayers to theirs. God prepares to respond. And heaven stands, breathless, silent in anticipation. Eventually the time arrives and the angel of prayer hurles the coals from the altar to the earth to signal the beginning of judgement time. Peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning and an earthquake.

Complacency will disappear.
A humanity that has been so distracted with paying off the mortgage, or heading to the cottage or the bar for a good time, or getting all preoccupied about whether woman should be allowed to go topless or not, and building the industrial base of the economy -this distracted humanity will have to pay attention.
I don't want to talk about that judgement tonight. Some day we'll go through that stuff, maybe do a series on Revelation or something. Can figure that out in the future.
Right now what matters and what I want us to see, carefully, is the silence. The anticipation in heaven of God's actions.

No busyness.
No noise.
No distraction.
No nothin'.

Just silence.
Waiting.
Expectant.Not planning. Not doing.Just silence.
And as we go off to bake our brains on the beach, and fish, and visit, and cut the grass and do whatever it is we're going to do during these next couple of months, I want us to stop and be silent for a moment.
I want us to listen up. To think.

What's our attitude towards the things of God?
Is it one of expectancy? Do we have any sort of breathless anticipation for God to act, for our prayers to be heard and responses given? If we think of God acting, do we expect it to be significant? One thing that Revelation is very hazy about is timelines. Commentators and scholars have written endless pages trying to figure stuff out. Various views of the end times have been developed, some in great detail. You've got Premillenial, dispensational premillenial, postmillenial, amillenial. And then this one - that I like - called panmillenial. Meaning - "In the end, it'll all pan out."

Seriously though, I don't want to nail things down too tightly, but when you see so much smog clouding the skies, holes in the ozone causing UV trouble and burning here on earth; huge areas of famine and drought; water being polluted and killing millions of people because of disease and infection --How much of this is God's handing humanity over to judgement, allowing them to feel the effects of their own foolish rebellion?

As we pray, as we move forward in faith and act, as we strive to live with integrity as obedient servants of the Lord in His Kingdom, do we believe that God is stirred, that He acts, and that the day is coming or perhaps is already here where He will act in decisive sorts of ways?

For that is the teaching of scripture.
And though it is a teaching that is serious, and has an element of dread to it, I'd hope that we could take it from here also as a teaching of comfort.
For it means that we on earth, on this side of reality, are not abandoned. We're not left to fend for ourselves. What we say and pray and do matters. It is noticed. And it is responded to. Acted upon in the greatest of arenas -- in the Holy of Holies.

Let's stop to consider that from time to time.
To take 30 minutes and anticipate - "Lord, what will you be doing?"

Source: http://www.calvincrc.ca/Sermons/jun29pm.htm