1. "Friends, what does the Bible teach about God's wrath? Is this an aberration? Some ill-tempered theologian's dreams? Or does the Bible itself teach about God, about his character and nature and even about his wrath?"

2. "Friend, God is eternal. And if you are here, not in Christ, not trusting in him, not with, as it were, his protection, that is your relationship with God. You are standing before God in your own merits, on your own account, captain of your own soul, master of your own fate, all you have to own before God includes nothing that should lead God to forgive you for your sins."

3. "As long as he is alive, the crucial witness to every act of wickedness, every injustice ever committed in the history of the world, lives and calls for goodness, calls for rightness, calls for justice. He stands as an eternal, ever present, ever truthful witness and an ever wise, ever merciful, ever just judge."

4. "We think of mercy itself as good, but it really depends on when and how it is exercised and upon whom, and by whom. God will one day say, enough."

5. "Love without justice is as meaningless as a compliment from a salesman."

6. "Every Sunday morning till Jesus returns, we're going to be gathering. As long as we're physically able, we'll be right here. We look for other Christians on that first day of the week to rejoice and celebrate and remind ourselves and feed ourselves and prepare ourselves for the return of Christ."

7. "Nothing is blunter than iron, yet when sharpened it hath an edge that will cut mortally. Nothing is smoother than the sea, yet when stirred into a tempest, nothing rageth more. Nothing is so sweet as the patience and goodness of God, and nothing so terrible as his wrath when it takes fire."

8. "You'll never work enough. You'll never work well enough. You'll never be good enough to justify yourself to God. You'll never be good enough that Jesus will say, don't worry about it."

9. "The whole story of humankind can be summarized in these words: Holiness, sin, wrath, salvation. God's holiness, our sin, God's wrath, the salvation God brings in Christ. That's our story."

10. "If you understand the truth of who God is, if you understand the truth of your own sins and of his justice, you will understand the idea of a substitute when it is presented to you. Christ came and died for us. And if you don't know something of the wrath you deserve, then you don't know why Christ came and died."

Observation Questions

1. In Revelation 15:1, what specific description is given about these seven plagues, and why is this significant?

2. According to Revelation 15:3-4, what two songs are the victorious believers singing, and what specific attributes of God do they praise?

3. In Revelation 16:5-7, how do both the angel of the waters and the altar respond to God's judgments?

4. Looking at Revelation 16:9, 11, and 21, what is the consistent response of people to God's judgments, and how does this differ from the purpose of God's current mercies?

5. In Revelation 16:15, what specific warning does Jesus give, and what metaphor does He use to describe His coming?

6. Throughout Revelation 16, what different elements of nature (water, sun, earth, etc.) are involved in God's judgments, and what does this tell us about the scope of His judgment?

Interpretation Questions

1. Why does the passage compare God's final judgment to "bowls" being poured out? How does this imagery help us understand the nature of God's wrath?

2. How does the song of Moses and the Lamb (Revelation 15:3-4) connect God's acts of judgment with worship? What does this tell us about the relationship between God's justice and His glory?

3. What does the response of unrepentant people throughout the judgments reveal about the human heart and the nature of true repentance?

4. How does the image of being "clothed" and not being found "naked" (Revelation 16:15) relate to the broader biblical theme of righteousness?

5. Why is it significant that these judgments proceed from the temple (Revelation 15:5-8)? What does this tell us about the source and nature of divine judgment?

Application Questions

1. When was the last time you encountered skepticism about God's judgment, either from others or in your own thoughts? How did you respond?

2. Think of a time when you tried to make yourself righteous through your own efforts. How does understanding God's perfect justice change your view of self-righteousness?

3. Revelation 16:15 warns us to "stay awake." What specific habits or practices in your life help you maintain spiritual vigilance?

4. Consider a recent situation where you witnessed or experienced injustice. How does the certainty of God's coming judgment influence your response to present-day injustices?

5. What keeps you from sharing the gospel more urgently with others, knowing that God's judgment is coming? What specific step could you take this week to overcome that barrier?

Additional Bible Reading

1. Isaiah 24:1-23 - A prophetic picture of God's universal judgment that parallels the cosmic scope of judgment described in Revelation 16.

2. 2 Peter 3:3-14 - Peter's teaching about the certainty and suddenness of the Day of the Lord, emphasizing both judgment and the proper response of believers.

3. Matthew 25:31-46 - Jesus' teaching about the final judgment, showing how the reality of coming judgment should shape our present actions and attitudes.

4. Romans 2:1-11 - Paul's exposition of the principles of divine judgment, explaining how God's patience relates to His eventual judgment.

Sermon Main Topics

I. The Challenge of Unbelief and the Reality of God’s Wrath

II. God’s Judgment Will Be Complete (Revelation 15:1, 16:3, 16:18-20)

III. God’s Judgment Will Be Correct (Revelation 15:3-4, 16:5-7)

IV. God’s Judgment Will Be Without Mercy (Revelation 16:8-11, 21)

V. God’s Judgment Will Be Sudden (Revelation 16:15)

VI. God’s Judgment Will Be Intense and Terrible (Revelation 16:19, 21)

VII. God’s Judgment Will Be Averted Only Because of the Lamb (Revelation 15:3; Luke 22:42; Mark 14:36)

VIII. The Urgency of Trusting in Christ to Avert God’s Wrath

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Detailed Sermon Outline

I remember meeting a distant relative on my mother's side for the first time.

I had just come back from doing a PhD in England and my mom was anxious for us to meet. So as we sat there talking over coffee, she very naturally asked me what I had returned to the States to do and I replied, I'm going to be a Baptist preacher. Her eyes fell to her coffee. She said, I don't have much use for organized religion. I think my cousin was stating a fairly commonly held sentiment.

Many, of course do. I mean, thus we're all gathered here in a church on a holiday weekend, but so there are many not also meeting in a house of worship this morning. Organized self conscious disbelief has seemed to grow somewhat over the last few centuries. Here's how Lewis Lapham put it a few years ago in Harper's as an unbaptized child raised in a family that went to church only for weddings and funerals, I didn't encounter the problem of religious belief until I reached Yale College in the 1950s where I was informed by the liberal arts faculty that it wasn't pressing because God was dead. What remained to be discussed was the autopsy report.

Apparently there was still some confusion about the cause and time of death. And the undergraduate surveys of Western civilization offered a wide range of options. God disemboweled by Machiavelli in Florence, assassinated in 18th century Paris by agents of the French Enlightenment, lost at Sea in 1834 while on a voyage to the Galapagos Islands, blown to pieces by German artillery at Verdun, garroted by Frederick Nietzsche on a Swiss alp and the body laid to rest in the consulting rooms of Sigmund Freud. John Updike said that it was science that had freed us from fear of a wrathful God. From the skepticism of David Hume.

Many a thoughtful young person has considered the claims of the Bible. Perhaps they have been brought up with it. And then they look up into a universe filled with suffering and have thought I just can't believe this anymore.

That's what Ann Wilson did, a 38 year old man at the time writer a biography of CS Lewis he finally just gave up believing. For Etta Linnemann, a German scholar reared as a faithful Lutheran, she found that it was actually her academic study of the Bible under Rudolf Bultmann at Marburg that led her into unbelief.

For Lin Yutang, brought up the son of a Chinese Presbyterian minister, it was a sudden awakening of his senses when he moved to Beijing and saw aspects of Chinese culture that he thought his Father's strict Presbyterian upbringing had denied him and he became resentful of that and so abandoned his Christian faith. For Cem Jowd, it was the simple irrationality religion. Anthony Flew grew up in a devout Methodist home but came to reject Christianity because of the problem of evil. As a young man his father had taken him to Germany and he had seen anti Semitism among Christians and totalitarianism and he didn't know how that could square with there being a good and all powerful God.

I wonder what you think about Christianity this morning. Are you done with organized religion?

Do you find it irrational, artificial, uncompelling, hypocritical? For many people it's the idea of God's wrath. Particularly as long as you talk about God being loving, well, then you're a nice addition to the community. Ineffectual perhaps, but no harm done. It's attractive even if it's not compelling or convicting for others.

But talk about his wrath and judgment and people start dropping away. That was, I think, one of the philosopher and scholar Lin Yutang's problems. Stephen Crane, author of the Red Badge of Courage and a Methodist minister's son, wrote a brief poem posing the seeming contradiction between disapproving of wrath in man and yet praising God for his wrath. And so by the middle of the last century, many Protestants had simply abandoned the idea. If you were in John Hardin's score seminar this morning, you heard John quote H.

Richard Niebuhr summarizing what was sort of mainstream thought among liberal Protestants in this country in the 1930s. A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment, through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross.

That was the message that echoed out and has since then echoed out from many a pulpit in this very district.

Friends, what does the Bible teach about God's wrath? Is this an aberration? Some ill tempered theologian's dreams? Or does the Bible itself teach about God, about his character and nature and even about his wrath? Well, in fact it does.

And in our study of the book of Revelation, we come this morning to one of the clearest passages in the entire Bible on the wrath of God. Let's turn to it now. Revelation chapters 15 and 16. Revelation chapters 15 and 16. If you look in one of the Bibles provided you'll find it either on page 1225 or 1297.

Either way, it won't be far from the back cover. Just take your Bible, open the back cover and it'll be in just a few pages. When I say chapter I Mean the large numbers. Verses are the smaller numbers after it. So 15, 6 means chapter 15, larger number, smaller verse, 6 after it.

In this book so far, we've seen that the aged Christian apostle John has been exiled to the Greek isle of Patmos. And there God had given him visions of history, including God's plans for the end. And this morning in our passage, we come to the last of these series of sevens that we've seen in the book. The judgments of God have been revealed in the seven seals. They have been proclaimed in the seven trumpets.

And now this morning, we come to a vision of their being poured out in the seven bowls. Let's read this passage now. Revelation, chapter 15.

I saw in heaven another great and marvelous seven angels with the seven last plagues. Last, because with them God's wrath is completed. And I saw what looked like a sea of glass mixed with fire. And standing beside the sea, those who had been victorious over the beast and his image and over the number of his name. They held harps, gave, given them by God, and sang the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb.

Great and marvelous are your deeds, Lord God Almighty. Just and true are your ways. King of the ages, who will not fear you, O Lord, and bring glory to your name, for you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before you, for your righteous acts have been revealed. After this I looked, and in heaven the temple that is the tabernacle of the testimony was opened.

Out of the temple came the seven angels with their seven plagues. They were dressed in clean, shining linen and wore golden sashes around their chests. Then one of the four living creatures gave to the seven angels seven golden bowls filled with the wrath of God who lives forever and ever. And the temple was filled with smoke from the glory of God and from his power. And no one could enter the temple until the seven plagues of the seven angels were completed.

Then I heard a loud voice from the temple saying to the seven angels, go pour out the seven bowls of God's wrath on the earth. The first angel went and poured out his bowl on the land. And ugly and painful sores broke out on the people who had the mark of the beast and worshiped his image. The second angel poured out his bowl on the sea, and it turned into blood like that of a dead man. 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 waters say, you are just in these Judgments, you who are and who were the Holy One, because you have so judged. For they have shed the blood of your saints and 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. The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and the sun was given power to scorch people with fire.

They were seared by the intense heat and they cursed the name of God who had control over these plagues, but they refused to repent and glorify him. The fifth angel poured out his bulb on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom was plunged into darkness. Men gnawed their tongues in agony and cursed the God of Heaven because of their pains and their sores, but they refused to repent of what they had done.

The sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up to prepare the way of the kings from the east. Then I saw three evil spirits that looked like frogs. They came out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. They are spirits of demons performing miraculous signs, and they go out into the kings of the whole world to gather them for the battle on the great day of God Almighty. Behold, I come like a thief.

Blessed is he who stays awake and keeps his clothes with him so that he may not go naked and be shamefully exposed. Then they gathered the kings together in the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon. The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and out of the temple came a loud voice from the throne saying, it is done. Then there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, and a severe earthquake. No earthquake like it has ever occurred since man has been on earth.

So tremendous was the quake. The great city split into three parts and the cities of the nations collapsed. God remembered Babylon the Great and gave her the cup filled with the wine of the fury of his wrath. Every island fled away and the mountains could not be found from the sky. Huge hailstones of about a hundred pounds fell upon men, and they cursed God on account of the plague of hail because the plague was so terrible.

I pray that this morning as we meditate on the coming wrath, we will all come to understand the truth about God better and about ourselves.

And I pray that no one within the sound of my voice will ever fall subject to God's wrath.

There are six matters touching God's judgment as we see it revealed in these chapters that I want us to consider. And the first of these is this number one. God's judgment will be complete. God's judgment will be complete. We see this really throughout this passage most clearly.

The very first verse where John calls these the seven last plagues at last may be referring to the order in which John saw them. But I think he means God's final judgments. Because it's interesting, if you look at the cycles of seven that represent the judgments before that we've seen in this book, their results have all been of fractions of things being destroyed. But here in this, it's the totality. So in the Trumpets, a third of things seem to be judged or destroyed.

But in this series of judgments, all of creation is brought before God. If you look in verse chapter 16, verse 3, every living thing in the sea, verse 14, kings of the whole world, verses 18 to 20, the most powerful earthquake ever. And all the cities absolutely collapse. And every island and mountain is destroyed. No stone is left unturned, no sinner unjudged, including those who worship gods other than himself, God himself, including those who kill God's people, including those who curse God, including those who refuse to repent and glorify.

No one can escape God's punishment. According to the Bible, nothing that we have ever done or ever will do escapes God's notice or will escape his evaluation, judgment.

Nothing.

No one gets away with anything ultimately, according to the Bible.

Friend, if you're here and you're not a Christian, have you ever considered that that innate sense of justice we all have in us, that innate sense of justice, our conscience, our sense of right and wrong, maybe they're not as some accident of evolution, but may be there in fact as a reflection of a meaning and a purpose and an intention in this creation by the Creator, God. Maybe a statement of a way this world was meant to be. Maybe some statement of the way this world will be.

Can you imagine everything that you've ever done that is truly wrong, being alive and real and present to God today?

Friend, God is eternal. And if you are here, not in Christ, not trusting in him, not with, as it were, his protection, that is your relationship with God. You are standing before God in your own merits, on your own account, captain of your own soul, master of your own fate, all you have to own before God includes nothing that should lead God to forgive you for your sins. You can see why we Christians are interested in a Savior, can't you? We want to know is we can't undo our sins, even if we make restitution for them in some way, we can't undo them.

Is there any way we can be forgiven for them and God still be just and right still be right and good still be good.

My Christian brothers and sisters, we should work for justice and right in this world. But work as we may, this world will never be a place of satisfying, let alone perfect justice.

Some things are taken that can never be restored in this world. Earthly penalties are insufficient. Our sight is short, our knowledge is limited. Wrong is hidden. Most wrongs are beyond the scope of earthly laws anyway.

All are beyond the scope of receiving final justice. Here below, we should understand that certainly none of us here and now know every real wrong done in every place by everyone has ever lived. Nor, for that matter, do we even have the moral character now to know how wrong wrong is. For us, wrong is just less than optimal. Usually it's just not so good.

We don't feel the weight of it. We don't have the moral character to but the God of the Bible does. As long as he is alive, the crucial witness to every act of wickedness, every injustice ever committed in the history of the world, lives and calls for goodness, calls for rightness, calls for justice. He stands as an eternal, ever present, ever truthful witness and an ever wise, ever merciful, ever just judge.

Friends, this means that we should be patient in enduring wrongs ourselves. We should not slacken in our effort and work to see justice in our jobs and relationships in our communities. But we should also not finally be discouraged because we recognize that God, the judge of all the earth, will do right in our homes. We should recognize that the punishment of our children is for their education, not ultimately for justice. Justice is God's concern.

Ultimately, God will take care of that. We at best partially approximate it in our decisions through the week. So throughout our lives as Christians, as those who've been forgiven by God through Christ, as those who are confident of this coming day of judgment that we read of here, we should be those who are fired with a desire for God to be glorified and who are freed from a desire for revenge against those who wrong us. Because we know that God knows and God will act. Friend, pray that God will comfort you with the knowledge that perfect justice will be done.

Because a day is coming when God's judgment will be complete.

A second thing I want us to understand. Number two. God's judgment will be correct. God's judgment will be correct. Did you notice that far from being the kind of thing that is shameful or to be hidden or made excuses for God Here in this passage is praised for his justice.

His justice brings honor and glory to his name because it is and is seen to be correct. Look again there in chapter 15, verse 2.

And I saw what looked like a sea of glass mixed with fire and standing beside the sea, those who had been victorious over the beast and his image and over the number of his name. They held harps given them by God, and sang the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb. Great and marvelous are your deeds, Lord God Almighty. Just and true are your ways. King of the ages, who will not fear you, O Lord, and bring glory to your name.

For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before you, for your righteous acts have been revealed. And then if you look there in verses five and six, you see these seven angels coming out from God's temple. Brothers and sisters, as we see this angelic procession, note that God's judgment proceeds from his holiness. There's nothing inconsistent between what God does and what he is.

He is good and true and holy and right. He will judge all that is wrong, and so he is to be praised for his judgments. If you look down in chapter 16 at verse 5, we see this again. 16, verse 5. Then I heard the angel in charge of the water say, you are just in these judgments, you who are and who were the Holy One, because you have so judged.

For they have shed the blood of your saints and 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. God's judgment of wrongdoers is not shameful, but praiseworthy, even glorious, that God would be so right and would act so justly. God's judgment brings him glory. Just as the Israelites delivered through the Red Sea praised God in Exodus 15, so here in Revelation 15, the redeemed worship God for his justice.

They glorify God for the judgment that he enacts. You know, in our human courts, even those small percentages of human wrongs that are dealt with are sometimes mishandled. Legal is far too limited a concept ever to approach, being a full reflection of moral. Even the best of human judicial systems are incompetent to try matters on any basis other than the evidence that is discovered to them. And of course, judgments are sometimes wrong, tragically wrong.

The wrong person is punished or the wrong person is released. The right person is punished, but too harshly or too lightly. We could go on, but we understand from the trivial to the most monumental matters. The justice of this world seriously flawed. If you have any question about that, just turn to your neighbor here this morning.

He's probably here. She's probably a lawyer. And they can certainly confirm this statement. It's true. I hear about the flaws of our legal systems, most from those of you who are lawyers.

Friends, we do not live in a world with perfect justice. As Christians, we don't take our understanding of right and wrong from the shifting poles and laws of the land anyway. We don't take it from the public opinion makers of the culture. We understand that right and wrong is not fundamentally discovered by mathematics or philosophy or science. Rather, true right and wrong is not arbitrary.

It is a reflection of the character of God himself. So we take our understanding of it from God's revelation of Himself in His Word. And we see that God teaches us that we are all wrong, that we have all done and continue to do those things which, considered alone by their very nature, would separate us from God, would call God's judgment rightly upon us. Friend, if you're here and you're not a Christian, this is basic idea to Christianity. This is the idea of human sinfulness, that we are all turned in on ourselves and serving ourselves by nature rather than serving God.

And God is right to judge us and it is pointless to oppose him in his judgments. Preaching at the Surrey Gardens Music hall as a young man in London, CH Spurgeon commented about this passage. He said, the wrath of man shall praise God. I believe the last song of the redeemed, when they shall ultimately triumph, will celebrate in heavenly stanzas the wrath of man overcome by God. The day is coming when fury and wrath and hatred and strife shall all be woven into a song.

And the weapons of our enemies, when taken from them, shall serve to make monuments to the praise of God. Rail on. Rail on. Blasphemer. Smite on.

Smite on tyrant. Lift thy heavy hand, O despot. Crush the truth which yet thou canst not crush. Knock from his head the crown, the crown that is far above thy reach. Poor, puny, impotent mortal as thou art.

Go on, go on. But all thou doest shall but increase his glories. The more mighty your preparations for battle, the more rich the spoil which he shall divide with the strong. O Christian, fear not the foe. Remember, the harder his blows, the sweeter thy song, the greater his wrath, the more splendid thy triumph, the more he rages, the more shall Christ be honored.

In the day of his approaching they sung the song of Moses and the Lamb. God's judgments will be correct A third matter touching God's judgment. Number three. God's judgment will be without mercy. God's judgment will be without mercy.

You see that by the response of the people throughout this vision. Look there in chapter 16, at verse 8, the fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and the sun was given power to scorch people with fire. They were seared by the intense heat and they cursed the name of God who had control over these plagues, but they refused to repent and glorify him. The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom was plunged into darkness. Men gnawed their tongues in agony and cursed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, but they refused to repent of what they had done.

And then look down at the last verse in chapter 16, verse 21. From the sky, huge hailstones of about a hundred pounds each fell upon men. And they cursed God on account of the plague of hail, because the plague was so terrible. Now think carefully here. Understand this.

The threat of God's judgment. God has often used to bring about repentance, the threat of God's judgment. But God's judgment itself brings only condemnation. We see here that those under God's wrath finally will not repent and glorify God, but they curse him and they refuse to repent. This is a contrast with the response we find earlier in the book to some of the partial judgments of God.

For example, back in chapter 11, God's partial judgment brought different results, terror and glory to God. And yet many were already hardened to the judgments of God. Dear friends, what we learn from this is that even as worrying does not give us wisdom and pain does not by itself bring prudence, so suffering in and of itself is not meritorious. It is not to our credit. It does not cleanse us from sin.

Here we see that even as the delivered praise God, so the condemned curse him. And so we see the continuing cycle of sin and rebellion and judgment just repeating forever. People sometimes wonder why hell is eternal. Well, could it be, at least in part, because the human rejection of God is eternal?

We think of mercy itself as good, but it really depends on when and how it is exercised and upon whom, and by whom. God will one day say, enough.

Now, until that time we will experience trials and troubles and even calamities and tragedies. And they may be used by God to turn us from serving ourselves and relying on ourselves to trusting in Christ alone for our salvation. But there will come a day, and this is what you must Hear, there will come a day when that offer will be over, when that offer will be done, will be expired, will be completed, when mercy will come to an end and the day for displaying God's justice comes. This is why, my friend, if you're here and you're not a Christian, this is why it's a good day for you today to stop fleeing from God and to turn and flee to him, because he is your only hope. I don't need to know your life individually to know that you have no claims upon the mercy of God, none, none that will stand before his righteous gaze.

Your only hope is to find him in mercy, to find him in Christ, to find him in now.

Friends, that's what we Christians mean by being saved. We understand that we deserve God's wrath because of our sins. And therefore we need to be saved from God's wrath. And we're saved from God's wrath not by, as it were, working ourselves out of a kind of debt. Morally, we can never do that with God.

He's eternal. All time is real to Him. All of our deeds are alive. No, it's only by there being a substitute who Himself can take upon Himself the penalty we are due for our sins. And we have found such a substitute in Jesus Christ.

God Himself has provided a way for us. And when we trust in him alone for our salvation, then we hide ourselves in Him. So we Christians sometimes think of mercy and only as always good. But indulgence and tolerance that we equate with forgiveness and love are wrong. Mercy is right sometimes.

Mercy. God's mercy is good for a season, for a time now, and for a purpose, either to lead us to repentance or to be an occasion for us further spurning his goodness. And so we become, we make of ourselves a display for God's justice. But mercy is a part of an expression of his character, as is his commitment to holiness, justice and righteousness. Friends, love without justice is as meaningless as a compliment from a salesman.

Even as the time for justice arrives, the time for mercy will end. Brothers and sisters, if this is the case, then we should think very carefully about what we fill our days and hearts and minds and times up with so as to exclude evangelism.

Now is the time of God's mercy. Today is the day of salvation. How many will we see at that last day that we've seen before and that we will wish we had shared the gospel with the gospel of God's mercy while there was still time?

God's judgment will be without mercy. A fourth matter about God's judgment. Number four. God's judgment will be sudden. God's judgment will be sudden.

Look there at the words of Christ in chapter 16, verse 15. Behold, I come like a thief. Blessed is he who stays awake and keeps his clothes with him so that he may not go naked and be shamefully exposed. The image here is one of being clothed with righteousness, so being prepared to be called upon to appear in the presence of a holy God at any time. Now our own righteousness is inadequate.

We read in Isaiah that it is as filthy rags and and so being prepared means being clothed with the righteousness of another, and that's the righteousness of Christ. By faith, friends, we must be prepared because Christ's return will be sudden and unexpected. How can we speak feelingly and intelligently of the end of the world, of Christ returning suddenly? What analogies in our own experience do we have for that kind of serious suddenness? I mean, perhaps the unexpected death of a friend, a family member.

How many of us, when we got up on the morning of September 11, 2001, expected what would unfold that day? There was a suddenness to the events which remind us of the suddenness that there will be a Christ's return. Imagine something coming out of the clear blue sky. For the Christian, of course, Christ's return is good news. For us, that means this laboring journey that we are on, where we struggle even to receive the good things that God would give us even today.

We labor even in the receiving of them, the assiduous fight against sin that will end on that day. It will be over. It will be complete. One day the war will be over and wrongs will be righted and debts will be paid and prisoners will be freed and the dead will be raised.

Our confidence of this shouldn't lead us to disengage with our work and become lazy as it did some of the early believers in Thessalonica we see in the New Testament, but rather it should give us hope and heart to keep going. Even among the most discouraging things that we see hope in, the return of Christ can fuel the life and obedience the Christian every day. Brothers and sisters, what does it mean for you to be prepared for Christ's return? Are there any ways that you do not feel prepared? Oh, if there are, would you speak to one of the elders or pastors, speak to one of us at the doors on the way?

That's why we're here, to help you, make sure you are prepared, ready for that day. That's why we, as a congregation are meeting this morning. It's Memorial Day weekend. Why didn't we take this weekend off, have a break? You know, we could always use some more sleep.

That's good. The temp. The body's a temple of the Holy Spirit. Why not do that? We can always use more family time, right?

A little more relaxation. Blood pressure goes down, it's got to be a good thing. Friends, we're Christians. Every Sunday morning till Jesus returns, we're going to be gathering. As long as we're physically able, we'll be right here.

We're on vacation or holiday. We've got hundreds of members obviously elsewhere this Sunday. But you know what? Unless they're camping, like some of them are in the Adirondacks, if they're in other places with other Christians, I'll bet you they're in Christian churches someplace this morning celebrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Because that's what Christians do.

We look for other Christians on that first day of the week to rejoice and celebrate and remind ourselves and feed ourselves and prepare ourselves for the return of Christ. Because we know that this is just a joyful dress rehearsal for the assembly that we will be made a part of. Because that day is coming. That day when finally God will judge. God's judgment will be sudden.

Number five. God's judgment will be intense and terrible.

Five. God's judgment will be intense and terrible.

Perhaps it is for this point that you were brought here this morning to understand something of the seriousness and the weight of God's judgment. You see that last word in chapter 16.

Terrible.

Throughout the whole passage, we see something of the severity of the trial. This final day will be represented in so many different ways. Plagues and sores and blood and death and scorching and searing intense heat and darkness and agony and pain and war and shame and lightning and earthquakes and hail. Look at that reference to God's wrath in verse 19, verse 19. Consider that carefully.

The God of the universe, our creator and judge, being wrathful.

And if that were not enough, his wrath is pictured here as wine in a cup. That means it is to be drunk by the object of his wrath. It is to be taken in note how God's wrath here is described. The fury of his wrath and the cup we see is filled with the fury of his wrath. Cup filled with the wine of the fury of his wrath.

My non Christian friend, are you prepared to drink such a cup?

Why should God not so serve you?

What defense do you have to God? God is good. God is righteous. What are the best arguments you have that you can give to God to tell him why he should not make you give? Account for your life, for all of it.

As I read this passage, I can only think that the worst of the suffering that we see in this world seems diffuse and diluted and passing compared to the suffering that is depicted here. Do you realize, Christian, that you do no one any favor by trying to make God's wrath seem less terrible than it is? Sometimes Christians get the idea that somehow if we can make God seem a little, I don't know, kinder, gentler, more merciful, then people will have an easier time accepting Him. Really? A couple of questions about that.

Number one, who is it that they're accepting? The real God or someone you've made up? And number two, but what if the Bible's right? What if God really is like this? I understand you might not want to hear something bad from the doctor, but you need the truth more than you just need to think pretty thoughts for a little while.

And, friends, if this is the truth about our spiritual health, if we are sinners and God is holy, it's a good and kind thing of God to let us know that before we have to give an account. We need to know the truth about God and his nature and ours. You know, it was looking at the horrendous nature of the wrath of God actually in this book of revelation that made C.H. dodd, a famous New Testament scholar at Cambridge, very nervous. Clearly he didn't like the idea.

He said, the God of the Apocalypse, the book of Revelation can hardly be recognized as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Really, what was it Paul wrote to the Thessalonians? God's judgment is right. God is just. He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you. This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels.

He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power. Friends, the closest parallels you find in the New Testament to this language in our chapter and in the Book of Revelation about the wrath of God. It's not in Paul. It's not in what Peter wrote or James someplace else by John.

No, it's in. It's in the words of Jesus.

People are forever saying, oh, I like Jesus. It's just Christianity I don't like. Well, you know what you're going to find out if you Ever close your mouth and open your ears and listen to Jesus. He teaches Christianity. It's where it came from.

Oh, I like the love stuff. I just don't like the wrath stuff. Then you don't like the Jesus stuff. Jesus is the clearest teacher on the wrath of God in the whole Scriptures. And what Jesus taught confirms what was revealed in the Old Testament.

What we read throughout the pages of the old Testament, Psalm 90, the Psalmist asks, who knows the power of your anger, for your wrath is as great as the fear that is due you. In Jeremiah 10 we read, but the Lord is the true God. He is the living God, the eternal King. When he is angry, the earth trembles. The nations cannot endure his wrath.

In the prophet Nahum, verse 1, we read, the mountains quake before him and the hills melt away. The earth trembles at his presence. The world and all who live in it, who can withstand his indignation, who can endure his fierce anger? His wrath is poured out like fire. The rocks are shattered before him.

Friends, from the fall to the flood, from the flood to Egypt, from Egypt in the exodus to Israel, in the exile, God has revealed himself as a God of righteous wrath. When Jonathan Edwards preached his now famous sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God in Enfield, Connecticut, those listening began to cry out for God's mercy. Feeling themselves slipping down into hell, some of them began clinging to their pews. Others simply prayed and wept. So powerful is the contemplation of the wrath of God.

And friends, it would be so much easier if this wrath were because God were hard, or he were too mean, or not kind at all. But we know that's not true of God. This is the God who hangs on the cross. No, this is made all the harder because we know he is right and everything he condemns, he is right.

Doesn't this book, even in our age of overstimulated imagination, still bring about awe in those of us who are gathered here who believe Christ himself is the judge, and Christ himself will pronounce those awful words of final malediction. Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. Surely our response when we see God's holiness displayed would be like the response of Moses to hide, or Isaiah, or the elders in this book of Revelation to fall on our faces. Or like Job who said at the end of it all, my ears had heard of you, but now my eyes have seen you. Therefore I despise myself and repent.

Dust and ashes.

The Puritan minister William Gurnall in his sermons publishes the Christian in complete armor meditated on the terror of God and his coming wrath.

When I consider how the goodness of God is abused and perverted by the greatest part of mankind, I cannot but be of his mind. Who said the greatest miracle in the world is God's patience and bounty to an ungrateful world. Oh, what would God not do for his creatures if thankful? Who thus heaps the coals of his mercies upon the heads of his enemies? But think not, sinners, that you will escape.

Thus God's mill goes slow, but it grinds small. The more admirable his patience and bounty now are, the more dreadful and insupportable will be that fury which ariseth out of his abused goodness. Nothing is blunter than iron, yet when sharpened it hath an edge that will cut mortally. Nothing is smoother than the sea, yet when stirred into a tempest, nothing rageth more. Nothing is so sweet as the patience and goodness of God, and nothing so terrible as his wrath when it takes fire.

God's judgment will be intense and terrible.

Finally, an all important truth to note number six. God's judgment will be averted only because of the Lamb. Did you see that reference to Christ there in chapter 15, verse 3? The harp holding redeemed, standing there beside the sea are singing the song of Moses, the servant of God. And the song of the Lamb.

Friend, could you imagine receiving from God exactly what you deserve?

That's where we would be if it weren't for this Lamb.

This Lamb slain from the creation of the world who purchased men for God. A great multitude that no one could count from every nation, tribe, people and language. The Lamb did this by shedding his own blood for us. Through his blood we have been clothed in the clean, righteous garments of Christ. Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, took upon himself our sins on the cross of Calvary.

He bore the punishment for everyone who would believe in him and confess him as Savior and Lord.

How else would you avoid the punishment that you deserve?

You'll never work enough. You'll never work well enough. You'll never be good enough to justify yourself to God. You'll never be good enough. That Jesus will say, don't worry about it.

All those things about my rightness about good. It's not a problem. You tried really hard right there. That's not going to happen. We depend upon Christ alone and totally.

We depend upon his sacrifice because God is unwaveringly holy and good and righteous. This is the basis for our praises, our songs, our hopes, our prayers. This is why we preach the gospel again and again. Because the Lamb is the only hope we have of averting God's righteous judgment of us. We are gathered here only because of the Lamb.

We. We have hope only because of the Lamb. We have no other hope. It is God's own wrath from which you and I need to be saved. This morning.

What did Paul say in Romans 5? Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through Jesus Christ? This is what Paul had written to the Thessalonians about in 1 Thessalonians 1, when Paul recounted what these Christians had correctly done. They had turned to God to serve him and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead. Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.

You know, Jonathan Edwards writes that he saw more conversions from preaching on Romans 3:19, 20 than any other text. Romans chapter 3, verses 19 and 20. Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law. Rather, through the law we become conscious of sin.

What was it Paul said? Since then we know what it is to fear the Lord. We try to persuade men. Jesus own words you may remember from Luke 12. I will show you whom you should fear.

Fear him, who after killing of the body, has power to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him. Friend, you realize the whole story of humankind can be summarized in these words. Holiness, sin, wrath, salvation. Holiness, sin, wrath, salvation.

God's holiness, our sin, God's wrath, the salvation God brings in Christ. That's our story. And you see how all this hangs together. You see how this helps us know how not only to have hope eternally, but how to live in this world, how to understand the world that we live in. You know, I am not surprised that some modern Christians today who spend very little time considering their own sins and therefore very little time considering the wrath of God, are all embarrassed by the cross.

They don't like talk of Jesus substitute because it seems very messy to speak of a death and somebody dying in the place of somebody else. We don't use the language of sacrifice. Scholars tell us, so we can't understand that language anymore. Oh, friend. But if you understand the truth of who God is, if you understand the truth of your own sins and of his justice, you will understand the idea of a substitute when it is presented to you.

Christ came and died for us. And if you don't know something of the wrath you deserve, then you don't know why Christ came and died. In the Old Testament, the Lord said to his people through Jeremiah that they were to take the cup filled with his wrath and they were to make the nations drink it. And in the New Testament, those who worship the beast we saw last week in chapter 14 were also to drink the wine of God's fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. He will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb.

Now look down in verse 19 here in our chapter this morning, chapter 16. When the final installment of God's wrath is described and we read the great city split into three parts and the cities of the nations collapsed. God remembered Babylon the great and gave her the cup filled with the wine of the fury of his wrath.

Now do you understand why Jesus came to die?

Do you understand why Jesus came to die?

He came to drink the cup of God's wrath for us.

That's what he said in Luke 22, Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me. Yet not my will, but yours be done. In Mark's Gospel, a little bit more is recorded. We read in Mark 14:36, Abba, Father, he said, everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me.

Yet not what I will, but what you will. Matthew makes it clear that Jesus even prayed about this twice.

Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, my Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will. He went away a second time and prayed, my Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done. May your will be done. His will became the same as that of his Father's.

May your will be done. John's Gospel 2 shows us how important this was. In John 18:11, after Peter attempted to defend Jesus with force, Jesus commanded, peter, put your sword away. Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?

Friends, as the hymn writer says, dearly, dearly has he loved.

God's judgment will be averted only because of the Lamb.

We should conclude, how are you doing with this idea of the wrath of God this morning?

It's one of the harder ideas in the Bible to grasp. I understand that. I used to be an agnostic, but it's also certainly one of the most basic ideas in the Bible's presentation of God and of our Understanding of this world unbelief can be difficult to maintain, actually, in the light of all the evidence there is for the truth of God in creation and in Christ. I mentioned to you last week, I think, that Ann Wilson, one of the atheists that I mentioned at the beginning of this message, is now once again a confessing Christian. I read an article just the other week where he said that Christianity simply fits better the realities of life that he experienced than atheism did.

He said Christopher Hitchens tried to catechize him in atheism, but he just finally couldn't accept it anymore.

And Wilson's not alone. Others who've rejected the Christian faith have come back. I mentioned Lin Yutang, the philosopher. He spent decades, decades writing about materialism. I actually first encountered him just a few weeks ago when I was reading an old essay from the 1930s that he wrote, a very eloquent essay against Christianity.

That's how I first found out about him. But as I dug a little more, I found that 20 years later, in 1959, he published another book called From Pagan to Christian, where he explained how he had come to find materialism not acceptable to him anymore. It was too thin, and the Christian faith was rich and full. Anthony Flew, just a couple of years ago, after spending his life teaching philosophy and debating against Christians, published a surprising book, There Is a God how the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind. And Cem Joad, a notorious atheist himself of the previous generation, found that his rationalist philosophy had far too shallow an understanding of human evil for what he had lived through in the first half of the 20th century.

And so he wrote his book in 1952, the Recovery of Belief. And Professor Linnemann, though she had led many people to basically not believe the Bible, as a professor of biblical literature in a German university, she read John 3:16 one day with different eyes as she met some Christians who seemed to know the God they were speaking of. After a month pretty much spent by herself, she came out and renounced her publications and became a missionary to Indonesia. She came to understand and believe that God hated sin, that she had sinned, that on the cross Christ had died for her. She saw the significance of it, and she believed.

Friends, to understand the cross of Christ, you must understand something of the wrath of God. You must understand, as Ephesians 2, 3 says, that all of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of Wrath. But it was this wrath that Christ bore for us. If we are his, Christ became, as Paul said in Romans 3, a propitiation for our sins.

He became, that is, a sacrifice bearing God's wrath for us. And to understand the world that we live in and to make sense of it, you must understand something of the wrath of God. What of all the injustices done in God's world? What of the wrongs represented on the front page of the Post this morning, let alone larger crimes? What of the millions of Ukrainians in the Plan famists or Jews in the Holocaust or Cambodians or Chinese or Christians who lay dead from the sinful, murderous actions of just the last few decades of human history?

What of all these of millions enslaved and racial prejudice and hatred and violence and killings? Friends, I could go on and on and on. Bring to me your atheism and show me what will be done about this. Nothing. Nothing except perhaps reform for those who live in the future.

About all of this is nothing to be done. Is that justice? Is that right? Is that a good response, friend? A cool response of composure and acceptance?

Is that anything other than immorality and nihilism?

Finally, though, it's not these crimes against humanity alone, as great as they are, but it is the offense against God himself that calls out for justice, calls out to be answered, and it will be. God's wrath will fall. The only question for you is will God's wrath, his complete, correct, merciless, sudden, terrible wrath for your sins, will it fall on you or on Christ?

If you trust in Christ alone, if you follow him, it has fallen on him and you are saved from the wrath of God.

If you have not, and if you will not, so trust in Christ, it will fall on you.

Let's pray together.

O God, you are the truth. Your ways are just and true. You know the truth of each one of our hearts. We pray, Lord, in your kindness and mercy, you would teach that to us? And teach us what it means for us to stop trying to save and justify ourselves.

Teach us, Lord, to rely on Christ alone, on your loving provision in him for all who will repent and believe. We pray in his name. Amen.