[0:00] Revelation 6, starting in verse 1 and reading down to verse 8. John writing here, he's still in the throne room of heaven, but we're going to shift from looking at what's going on in heaven to what's going on on earth.
[0:11] Then I saw the lamb broke one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures saying with a loud voice of thunder, Come! And I looked, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it had a bow, and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer.
[0:26] And when he broke the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, Come! And another, a red horse, went out, and to him who sat on it, it was granted to take peace from the earth, and that men would slay one another, and a great sword was given to him.
[0:40] And when he broke the third seal, I heard the third living creature saying, Come! And I looked, and behold, a black horse, and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand. And I heard something like a voice in the center of the four living creatures saying, A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius, and do not damage the oil and the wine.
[0:58] Verse 7. When the lamb broke the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature saying, Come! And I looked, and behold, an ashen horse, and he who sat on it had the name Death, and Hades was following with him.
[1:11] Authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth to kill with sword, with famine, with pestilence, and by the wild beast of the earth. Revelation 6, verses 1 through 8.
[1:22] You may be seated. To properly understand much of what's going on in the book of Revelation, you have to let it be dictated by the rest of Scripture, or as we like to say, the best commentator on Scripture is Scripture.
[1:38] You find these same four horses recorded for us in other places of Scripture. Zechariah literally speaks of these same four horses. Isaiah tends to picture the things that are going on here in Revelation 6, verses 1 through 8.
[1:52] Zechariah gives two recordings of these four horses, even with the white horse, the red horse, the black horse, and the pale horse, or the ashen horse. He gives the same picture, and in the same picture, he's giving the same thought, that these horses are going around throughout the earth, and they are there to rule and to create havoc and misery.
[2:11] But probably the one that most people like to, not most people, that is the greatest example is the words of Christ himself found in Matthew 24. In Matthew 24, if you remember, if you're reading through the book of Matthew, Jesus is leaving the temple for the last time.
[2:27] It's a very important time because in Matthew 23, Jesus gives this great testimony. Jesus says that the light has left the temple, and the word light he uses there is the Shekinah glory, and he is literally saying, from this moment on, the Shekinah has left the temple.
[2:41] And then in Matthew 24, verse 1, it says, Jesus walked away from the temple. Now, that's important because Jesus is the light of the world. He is the Shekinah glory, right? So he could literally say the Shekinah glory is leaving the temple because he was walking out of the temple for the last time.
[2:56] And he left the temple, and from that point on, the Shekinah glory departed, and it was no longer there. But as he's leaving the temple, his disciples come up to him and say, Lord, look what great pictures of walls here.
[3:07] Because you had to understand the temple in Jerusalem had these great ornate walls, and on these walls there were vines and branches and grape clusters and all these carvings. And they are pointing to him, and they're saying, Jesus, look how beautiful all this is, thinking that he would be captivated by the architecture of the world.
[3:22] And Jesus said, I tell you the truth, not one stone will be left upon another, right? He talks about the destruction. That destruction came in A.D. 70 with the destruction of the temple, which has never been rebuilt. And in my understanding of Scripture, and I know some of you disagree with this, and that's okay, and we can have a long time talking about it, that it will never be rebuilt.
[3:40] And I know many of you say, wait a minute, the book of Revelation says there's going to be a new temple being built on the new heavens and the new earth, and I agree with you 100%. But Peter also tells us that we are the temple, and we are stones, and I believe that that temple that is being built up is called the church, and that we will be there, that Jesus will not confine himself to a structure anymore because now he lives inside his people.
[3:59] If you don't completely agree with that, that's okay. That's one of those small stones of theology, right? But we can still get along with that. But what we see in Matthew 24 is after Jesus says this, he goes up to the Mount of Olives, and he is there.
[4:12] This is before he prays in the Garden of Gethsemane. This is the night of his betrayal. And his disciples ask him, Lord, when will these things come about? When are the last days? What is the proof of the end times?
[4:24] What is the day of the Lord? There's this theme, and I'm giving you a lot more than what I can give in the recording, so it's always good to come to the first service because I'm fresh, and this is stuff that I'm really overflow with you, right?
[4:35] It is good to see this because there are two things in Scripture. There's the day of the Lord and the end times. And the day of the Lord is always referred to as the day of judgment.
[4:46] It is the day of his judgment. There's so much here that I won't give it to you. I probably won't be able to give all of it to you, but you need to stay with this. And Jesus says in Matthew 24, verses 6 through 8, really, he begins to talk about these events that will take place.
[5:03] He says, do not be misled because you'll hear people say, here he is or here he is, but do not go astray because I'm not there yet. You know, be false Christ. And he says, and then you will hear rumors of wars and wars here and wars there, and there will be various earthquakes and famines.
[5:16] But he says, these are the birth pangs of the end times or the day of the Lord. What we see in Revelation 6, verses 1 through 8, is literally the fulfillment of Matthew 24, verses 1 through 8.
[5:33] We see the beginning of the birth pangs of the tribulation. The beginning of the birth pangs. Those things that are coming in, the contractions are getting closer together, right? The pain is starting to set in.
[5:45] It is about time to give delivery. Now, what is the tribulation? The tribulation is a seven-year period. I understand I'm of the belief that the church is already raptured. Matthew, I mean, not Matthew, Revelation 2 and 3 speak of the church.
[5:59] Revelation 4, the church is in heaven. That's the 24 elders gathered around the throne. So I want you to understand something. If you know Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior, you've got to understand this as we go through it.
[6:09] This is so important. If you have accepted, and this is not a fear or trying to scare you into heaven. This is just a truth that I understand in Scripture. If you know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you are no longer present upon the face of the earth after Revelation 3.
[6:26] So the events that are taking place, Revelation 6 to 19, what we refer to as the tribulation time, they're not for you and I because of this thing, the day of the Lord, a proper understanding of what the day of the Lord is.
[6:38] It is His judgment for the unbelievers, for their rejection and denial of Him as Lord and Savior, and the beginning of His conquest to reclaim that which is rightfully His, namely the earth.
[6:52] He is beginning this campaign to reclaim the earth and the world, that which is rightfully His. And we understand this, that some people will come to salvific knowledge of Jesus Christ during the tribulation.
[7:06] We'll actually get to that when the fifth seal is broken, which is right after where I stopped this morning because you'll see the saints. And those are those, I'm kind of giving you a forerunner, who come to faith after these things start, but not before these things start.
[7:20] And then you say, Well, that's fine. I'll just wait. This is my encouragement to you, and this is where we get so scary. This is what compels us to proclaim the gospel. People say, Well, that's fine because the moment I see the church raptured, and the moment I see everybody caught, then I'll know it's time for me to repent and for me to confess Jesus Christ, and I'll be saved.
[7:37] And that sounds good in theory, but the problem is that Paul says in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, you can't do that. You say, What do you mean? Because Paul says, Then you're playing games with God. You're having fun with Jesus, and you're trying to use Him as a crush instead of claiming Him as a Savior.
[7:52] And Paul says in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, or actually I believe it's 1 Thessalonians chapter 3, that if those who have heard the gospel and had the opportunity to respond to the gospel, that when the day of the Lord comes and they are left, they will be given over to a delusioned mind, and they will believe the lie so as to follow Satan.
[8:13] And literally the wording is there, they will not have the opportunity to repent. So here's the, I guess you would say, the biblical warning, that if you've heard the gospel and you've had the opportunity to respond to Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you know the truth, and you deny the truth, when the church is raptured, it's too late.
[8:32] Those who come to the salvific knowledge of Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior are those who had never heard, those who have never had the opportunity. And during those times, turn to look and see what's going on.
[8:43] And friend, listen, there are records throughout history that we still lean upon. There are the scripture accounts, there are all these scrolls. People will have the opportunity to find something, and they'll believe that, and they'll come to faith in Jesus Christ, and most of them will pay with their life at that moment.
[8:57] They're the martyrs of the tribulation. But what we're looking at is the birth pains of the tribulation period here. The birth pains, the starting of it. What we need to understand are three truths.
[9:10] These are the beginnings of this seven-year period. And I don't have time to lay it all out for you, but I want us to see in these eight verses, three truths. Number one, we see the omnipotent one in control of it all.
[9:22] This is so important. The omnipotent one in control of it all. Again, what is the tribulation? Is this a big mean God doing things simply because he can?
[9:32] No, it is God's judgment upon man for their rejection or denial of him. Because as Paul said, that which may be made known about God has been revealed by God through all of creation.
[9:45] So all men are without excuse. And God is justified in his judgment of man for their denial of him. But it is also, not only his judgment of those who have denied him, it is the beginning of his conquest, as I've already said, to reclaim that which is his.
[10:04] Understanding the tribulation is this. There is this thing called the fullness of Gentiles. And after the fullness of Gentiles, then there is the rapture of the church. Paul, again, you have to understand all of scripture.
[10:14] You have to at least have a reading of scripture to understand what's going on. Paul says in Romans, the fullness of the Gentiles, that after the fullness of Gentiles, then there will be the day of the Lord. My understanding in scripture is this, that when the last Gentile, whoever God has marked down, however many that number is, I don't know, you don't know, no man knows, don't believe anybody, nobody knows, that there is a fullness of number, that at that moment, boom, the last non-Jewish individual comes to know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, then the church is raptured.
[10:45] And therefore, that begins real quickly following the rapture of the church. These things happen rapidly, by the way. I don't believe there's the rapture, and then a hundred years later, this starts. I believe the rapture, and then boom, the seven-year tribulation starts.
[10:57] Then we have this conquest of Jesus Christ to judge those who do not know him and to reclaim that which belongs to him, namely the world and his chosen people, the Jewish people.
[11:08] Because what we see at the end of this is kind of a revival among the Jewish people. We understand this. These are a lot of things that go on here. But we see, first of all, the omnipotent one in control of it all.
[11:21] He says, Then I saw the lamb broke one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures saying, As with a voice of thunder, Come. Friend, I want you to understand here, these seven seals, or the scroll that was sealed with seven seals, we see three groupings here real quick.
[11:38] Okay? You see seven seals, and seven trumpets, and seven bowls in the next few chapters. You'll see a break in between each of them because, thankfully, God is gracious. We do not have to read too much heavy material without kind of a repose, and we get to go into heaven, and we see the scene of heaven, and then we go back to the judgment.
[11:55] I don't know if you've noticed that when you read scripture, but you do read scripture, right? That's why we ought to read scripture. When you're reading these Old Testament books, these books of prophecy, and these books of judgment, like Isaiah, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, even Lamentations, which is just really a book of weeping and mourning, God is always so good.
[12:12] It's always like judgment, judgment, judgment, judgment, grace. Judgment, judgment, judgment, judgment, grace. God always gives you chapter after chapter after chapter, and then he stops for a moment and kind of lightens your load, but gives you the hope or the light in the midst of all of that and shows you that he is still a God in control.
[12:28] But what I want you to understand with these seven seals or the scroll that is in his hand, the scroll contains everything in the book of Revelation. We said that last week. How do you know that?
[12:38] Because you have seal one, two, three, four, five, six, and when he breaks seal seven, stay with me, seal seven contains the seven trumpets, right? That seventh seal is the seven trumpets.
[12:52] The seventh trumpet is the seven bowls. So it's almost like this widening angle, right? He opens the seals, and when he opens the seventh one, then the seven trumpets are there.
[13:03] And when he opens the seventh trumpet, or the seventh trumpet is sounded, then the seven bowls are there. So what we see, these seven seals are everything that takes place in the seven year of the tribulation period.
[13:15] But what you see is who is opening those? The lamb. That's important because that shows us that everything that is going on in the worst time in all of history, in the worst span that mankind has ever known, who is in control of it all?
[13:33] It is the lamb opening those. No one else can do it other than the lamb. Who is the lamb? He is the lion from the tribe of Judah. Who is that lion? That is Jesus Christ, who was slain yet lives. Friend, listen to me.
[13:44] The beauty of this, and I know I said it last week, but we're reminded of it here this week, is that he opens it. He is the one in control of it. It doesn't happen until he opens it. Right?
[13:54] It doesn't take place until he peels it open. And even after he opens it, one of the messengers from heaven have to proclaim it. Come. He's opened it. He's given you permission.
[14:05] So everything that follows this flows not only from the hand, but also the invitation of he who is in control of it all. You say, so what? Because if he's in control of it all at the worst time, then he most definitely is in control of it all the time.
[14:22] If he can control it all in the end, then my friend, listen to me. He is definitely still in control of it right now. And what we see in these four horses, we'll get to them in just a minute. He's in control of peace.
[14:34] He's in control of warfare. He's in control of food supply. And he's even in control of death, which means none of those things come apart from coming out of his hands.
[14:46] We do not live our life with this false sense of security or this false hope or reckless abandonment. We are to live our life as if our life flowed out of the control of the palm of his hands.
[15:03] And if he can open it up in that day, then my friend, he is still opening it up today. And one thing that we need to realize from Bible believing, clearly understanding scripture, is that nothing comes upon mankind, nothing in the book of Revelation or prior to the book of Revelation, nothing comes upon mankind apart from passing before the throne of the Lamb.
[15:29] You say, well, I don't understand it. Well, why do these things happen? Why do we have all this hurt and this pain and all this turmoil and all these things? Why, why, why, why, why? That's not the question.
[15:40] The question is who? Who is allowing it? Where is it coming from? Everything flows from the omnipotent control of the Lamb who has it all in his hand.
[15:51] He is the one opening that scroll. He is the one opening the seals. Everything found in that seven-year tribulation period flows from his hand. And if it can flow from his hand then, it flows from his hand now.
[16:03] All the events, all the despair, all the turmoil, all the pain, everything we see. You see, you cannot say God is a big, mean God. You cannot say that. When we get to Revelation, and here before we get to the end of Revelation 6, you'll see that men are saying to the mountains, fall on us.
[16:19] We want to die, but he won't let them. And you can't say, well, God is so mean he won't even let man die. You can't say that because the one in control of it all is the one who came and died for man, who paid the price for man.
[16:30] He came and died the death of man, suffered the pain of the sins of man, bore the guilt of man, and now is in control of all the events of man.
[16:41] He is the omnipotent one in control of it all. Number two, not only do we see the one in control of it all, number two, we see degenerate man in the midst of it all. We see the degenerate man in the midst of it all. And I know we kind of look at this over and over again, and many of you are waiting until I get to that last point, which by the way will be the four horses.
[16:57] We'll get there, but we don't want to overlook the events and forget that this is full of people, right? Because we read the book of Revelation, and we read portions of scripture like that, and we see so many things happening, and we get caught up in the events.
[17:09] We get caught up in the scroll, and we get caught up in the earthquakes, and the river's being turned to blood, and the water's being turned to blood, and the third of the sea dying, and we get caught in all this.
[17:20] But what we forget is in the midst of it all, the center, the focus of it all really is mankind. It is all revolving around what's going on with man. And this is God's judgment upon man, and also his ultimate redemption of earth for man, and so that in the new heavens and the new earth, Peter says in 1 Peter that this earth will be renewed as if by fire.
[17:43] It will be consumed. There's no coincidence in that when we read the book of Revelation. It seems like all the world is on fire because God is renewing it and rebirthing it for man.
[17:54] In the middle of it all is man. I believe it was John Phillips who says that in the tribulation we can break the tribulation time, the seven year period time, up into three different traits.
[18:06] The first part of the tribulation shows the world being ruined by man. The second half of the tribulation is the world being ruled by Satan. And then at the end of the tribulation we have the world being rescued by the Savior.
[18:18] We see the ruin of man, the rule of Satan, and the rescue of the Savior, and that's exactly what is going on. Maybe this is not true in your life, but it was sure true in my life. That God was so gracious to me, he let me get to the end of me so that I could see that I needed someone outside of me to be the rescuer of me.
[18:34] God in his grace, there's this great picture we find, I can't remember exactly where it is, I believe it's in Ezekiel, in Scripture, where it says, no it's not, it's in Zechariah, it says that he is striking yet healing.
[18:47] That he strikes you, that he hurts you, there's a pain there so that he can heal that pain, right? There's a discomfort there that God in his grace often brings us to a place of despair so that we can see someone greater than our despair.
[19:04] And what we see in Revelation is this same picture, God allowing and even orchestrating points in history that bring the world to the end of itself. There are many people that think this world would be a great place if it was ruled by Satan.
[19:17] If you want to see what happens when Satan rules, all you have to do is read portions of the book of Revelation. By the way, it doesn't seem like it's that great of a place to me. It is during that time that the world is saying, fall on us, O mountains, cover us, O mountains, we don't want anything to do with this anymore, O mountains.
[19:30] This doesn't seem like a place of fun and enjoyment and a place of ease and prosperity. As a matter of fact, it turns into a place of torment and discomfort and just a terrible state of existence. So we see here degenerate man in the midst of it all.
[19:43] In all of these things, what we see happening is God rescuing his people that are there through the tribulation, those who come to him, but also rescuing his creation because Romans 8 says, all the creation groans until the day of redemption.
[19:57] We see in the midst of all that is mankind. Man being the pinnacle of creation, man being that which was formed in his image for a specific purpose of obeying him and worshiping him has failed in that and now we see man with his day of reckoning because of that.
[20:12] Man cannot live independently of God and God not do anything, which shows us even in our own lives that there is this time of reckoning, there is this season in which we must obey him and follow him because there is a day of judgment even for the believers, by the way.
[20:30] We will not face this tribulation day of judgment, but we will stand before the judgment seat of Christ and give him an account for everything we've done. There is this problem that man has and what we see is this tribulation period is all there.
[20:42] The lamb is in control. He's bringing it all upon mankind. He is the one who was identified with man and now he is the one that brings man to his final place of judgment. So we see the one in control of it all.
[20:54] We see man in the midst of it all but let's look at the third thing, the thing that we really want to see, the cataclysmic events that begin it all. Commonly referred to as the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Billy Graham wrote about the four horsemen and the approaching hoofbeats in the early 1980s.
[21:10] Throughout history, a number of people have written about these four horsemen. Billy Graham said, I think it was in 1983 he wrote his book, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and I believe it was then that he said that we can hear the impending or the coming hoofbeats of these horsemen proceeding throughout the history of mankind and that is absolutely true because the four horses that we are identified to here were first recognized by Zechariah and they have been running throughout history and it's something that we have seen glimpses and portions of them but we have not seen the fulfillment of them.
[21:40] It is something that we have seen pictured and portrayed and it gives us and God is so good in allowing us to see what things are impartial so that we can begin to see kind of what they will be in completion.
[21:51] A lot of times we see in the Old Testament this partial fulfillment of a prophetic word and we see something partially being fulfilled. Isaiah 7.14 is probably the greatest of those because if you talk to a Jewish individual not a Messianic Jew but a practicing Jewish individual of the Judaism faith he will tell you that Isaiah 7.14 which says that there will be a virgin who shall conceive and shall give birth to a son and they shall call him Emmanuel.
[22:17] You know that prophecy right? He will tell you that that prophecy is fulfilled in the next chapter and by the way he is absolutely right. That prophecy was partially fulfilled in the very next chapter because it was a prophecy given as a sign for the king of that day but it finds its ultimate fulfillment when Jesus Christ was born of the Virgin Mary because there is kind of a word play there.
[22:36] We see this all throughout scripture. We see throughout scripture there is a partial fulfillment of some things that points to the reality of a full fulfillment to come later and history resounds with those things that God has shown us things that will be and in his grace and his mercy rather than us sitting there going there is no way these things could ever be because when John wrote this in Revelation 6 and he wrote of these four horses I am sure that he is sitting there thinking how in the world could these things ever be?
[23:04] We have lived long enough that we have seen these things historically being partially fulfilled which gives us a kind of a partial image of what they will be in their completion. The first horse that we are introduced to is the white horse.
[23:17] It says here in Revelation 6 and then I saw the lamb broke one of the seven seals and I heard one of the four living creatures saying with a voice of thunder come and I looked and behold a white horse and he who sat on it had a bow and a crown was given to him and he went out conquering and to conquer.
[23:32] Many people have had discussion of who is on this white horse. Some think that this is Jesus Christ because Revelation 19 Jesus is on a white horse. I am not going to take a lot of time on each of these horses but I want you because for one we don't have a lot of time and two it doesn't take us that much we don't want to split too many atoms.
[23:49] We don't want to split hairs over this. We know that this is not Jesus Christ because number one when Jesus is on the white horse he has a sword and he has a diadem a crown of authority on his head.
[24:00] Here this man or this individual on this white horse has a bow like a bow and arrow has a bow and he has a stephanos which is a victor's wreath. Okay so not even the same kind of crown. And we also know that this can't be Jesus because of those which follow this horse.
[24:14] That which follows this horse is war, famine, and death. Those don't follow Jesus. Okay that's not that's not the company that Jesus keeps. So this can't be Jesus. Some see that this is the spread of the gospel throughout the earth.
[24:26] I don't know how they got that but some biblical scholars tell you that this white horse is the spread of the gospel throughout the earth. I don't see that. Okay it's just not there. I can't even tell you who that how they came up with that but I want to let you know that some people believe that.
[24:39] Some tell you that this is the Antichrist and while we see that it is a picture of the Antichrist we're still at the birth of the tribulation right? So I'll show you that in just a minute. And I don't necessarily think it's the embodiment of the individual of the Antichrist who is Satan but rather the spirit of the Antichrist.
[24:57] The reason being is that each of the other three horses are representative spirits or a nature of something not an individual. So we don't want to put an individual on the first horse and not put an individual on the next three horses.
[25:09] Understand? It is the embodiment of a spirit. It is an embodiment of an ideology. That while the Antichrist is behind all four of these horses and these are his ideologies we can definitely see that first of all in the first horse the white horse.
[25:24] It says that the white horse went out and by the way it is a spirit of peace but it is a spirit of false peace. We know this because white often symbolizes victory, peace and rulership.
[25:34] It is a symbol of peace. We also know it's a symbol of peace. By the way don't worry about it Brother Caleb I love it when the babies preach back to me. It's okay. You a dad doing your best and I had to do that one time before I was ever a preacher and it's okay.
[25:50] Totally sidetracked there right? But anyway we get there. This white horse definitely is a spirit of peace because he has a bow but he has not arrows. He's carrying a bow but he doesn't have any arrows so he's not shooting anything from that bow.
[26:04] Right? He has a bow as a symbol of authority but he does not have the arrows as a symbol of terror. And he also has this stephanos this crown that was on his head it is literally a laurel wreath that was given to the victor of the Olympic Games.
[26:17] And it says and he went out to conquer and conquering which literally means that this spirit of peace went out and made peace with the world. But it was a false hope of peace and he offered worldwide peace and everybody bought in.
[26:30] And he claimed to be a man of peace. This is exactly what will take place the first three and a half years of the tribulation period. There will be three and a half years of peace and then three and a half years of terror. And what will happen is that the Antichrist himself will come and offer himself as a person of peace and the whole time have a hidden agenda.
[26:48] And I told you we have historically seen that being played out in partial roles. The greatest historical role we have seen in that is can this ever happen? Can this really be can this really take place?
[26:59] Can man really be that tricked? Well, some decade plus prior to the beginning of World War II Adolf Hitler issued his manifesto describing his intent to rule the world by authoritative power and yet for over 10 years declared himself to be a man of peace.
[27:17] And France and Britain believed him and made many peace tax with him and made many peace agreements with him and let him take over land that was taken away from them in World War I and the whole time said, he's a man of peace, he's a man of peace, he's a man of peace.
[27:30] And history shows us that for over 10 years while he spoke of being a man of peace, he was definitely filling out or bringing about what he said he was going to do in Minkoff. The very thing he said he would do some 10 years prior, the world never really thought he would do.
[27:46] And we still reel in history from that. Friend, listen to me, this first horse is a man of peace who goes out to the world and offers it peace. Why? Because this world desperately wants peace.
[27:58] And there will come a day when someone on a white horse will ride around, have a bow in his hand, not need an arrow, be given a crown of victory from all the world and he will offer false peace. But let's look at what follows that because now we have the second horse.
[28:10] Immediately following this horse of peace comes the horse of war. He says, And then I saw him break the second seal. And when he broke the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, Come, and another, a red horse.
[28:21] Red's so different than white because red is the color of warfare and blood. It is the color of hatred. And he went out and to him who said on it, it was granted to take peace from the earth. So this peace that was extended to worldwide now all of a sudden is taken and that men would slay one another.
[28:36] Look, it's not the Antichrist doing the slaying yet. Men are slaying one another. Men are slaying one another and a great sword was given to him. He has a sword, not a bow with no arrows.
[28:47] Now he has a sword. Here we see the spirit of war. Man is lulled into this false sense of peace and immediately following that false sense of peace will be this great spirit of war.
[28:59] Albert Einstein was being interviewed by a very dear friend of his which was a German philosopher at the time. He actually went into Germany and brought him back over here and he was a photographer who was taking pictures of Albert Einstein and he stopped in the middle of this photography session and was kind of sitting there musing a little bit and his friend asked him what was going on and he was really lamenting the fact that he had handed over some of his scientific discoveries to the government officials and his friend asked him, he says, do you believe that there will ever be peace?
[29:30] And Einstein himself said, as long as there is man there will not be peace. As long as there is man there will not be peace. A general of the World War II Army, his name slips me, he was giving a speech on Armistice Day and in the midst of that speech he made this comment that says that man has went to great lengths to discover science but we cannot control our discoveries of science.
[29:52] We know much about the splitting of the atom but we know little about the Sermon on the Mounts. man has specialized in killing that he has forgot how to do living.
[30:04] Man left to himself will ultimately destroy himself and when the church is removed and when the presence of the Spirit is removed and a false sense of peace is offered and man looks at one another, friend listen to me, man cannot live in peace with man.
[30:20] Why? Because it is degenerate man in the midst of it all. Apart from Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior, apart from the renewing of the Spirit, apart from a heart of flesh replacing a heart of stone, let's just be honest, we would not be able to live at peace with one another because peace is a literal impossibility with fallen man and what we see here is this spirit of war that follows and then we see the third horse.
[30:49] These horses by the way make sense because false peace and man standing around looking at one another leads to warfare and warfare always leads to this third horse and when he broke the third seal I heard the third living creature saying come and then looked and behold a black horse and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hands.
[31:05] So a black horse riding around with a pair of scales in his hands same image as Zechariah saw and I heard something like a voice in the center of the four living creatures. Now who is the one in the center of the four living creatures? Anyone remember?
[31:16] The four living creatures are gathered around the throne of heaven. So who is in the center of the four living creatures? That's God on the throne, right? So he makes this declaration. He says this a quart of wheat for a denarius and three quarts of barley for a denarius and do not damage the oil and the wine.
[31:30] You say well what difference does that matter? A denarius was the equivalent of a one day's wage for a working man which means you worked all day for a denarius. A quart was the equivalent of a military ration of that time which means that you would work all day for enough food to barely sustain yourself.
[31:47] That's what a quart of wheat is. That's what a quart of wheat. It would be that which would sustain you but say you had a family. Well that's where the barley comes in. Barley is of little value here.
[31:58] Barley was usually fed to animals because it wasn't a lot of nutritional value at this time and it wasn't really good for you so you could buy three quarts of barley for that which means if you had a family you could work all day for enough food to keep yourself alive or you could work all day for some meager food that may sustain your family.
[32:13] Some say that this is a 16 times increase over the price of things given during the Roman time when John would have written this.
[32:26] 16 time inflation saying that food is going to get astronomical. Why? Because warfare is always followed by famine. When man wreaks havoc with one another especially on the worldwide cataclysmic scale that we see with a second horse then famine is soon to follow.
[32:42] By the way famine kills more people worldwide than anything else. If we don't think that we have seen a picture of that the reality is that many of us sat down for our lunch here in just a minute in the span of our lunch some 40,000 plus people will die from malnutrition around the world while we're eating lunch.
[33:07] And that is something that we see unfortunately going on in third world countries isn't countries less fortunate while we throw our stuff away but the reality is is we're seeing a kind of foretaste of what's going to be a worldwide event.
[33:23] And that leads to the fourth horse because you cannot have false peace which leads to war which brings about famine without getting the fourth horse. That is the pale horse or the ashen horse.
[33:35] Ashen is literally the word used for like chlorophyll. It is kind of a green colored horse. It is the color of sickness and death. And it says here and when the lamb broke the fourth seal I heard the voice of the fourth living creature saying come and I looked and behold an ashen horse and he who sat on it had the name death and Hades was following him.
[33:53] Hades being a picture of being buried. It is being in the underworld. It is not necessarily hell. It is not what we understand as hell. It is death and the burial was falling with him. And he says an authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth.
[34:06] A fourth of the earth. There are almost seven billion people in the world today. Almost seven billion. Okay so a fourth of seven billion. Let's just say this. It is a lot.
[34:18] A fourth of the earth will die instantly. Here later we will see that a third of what is left over from that will die instantly. These are definitely cataclysmic events.
[34:29] Why? Because of the famine. A fourth of the earth and he will kill with the sword that is war with famine with pestilence and with wild beasts of the earth. He will kill with swords. So many people will die.
[34:39] A fourth of the earth will die from the warfare with a famine from a lack of food with pestilence. Following World War II the influenza outbreak killed some 20 or World War I by the way the influenza outbreak killed some 20 million people worldwide.
[34:55] That is an outbreak. Typhus killed over 4 million people at one time. More people died as a result of the disease of World War I than died in the battle of World War I.
[35:08] We see a little bit of foretaste of what's happening. And it says and of beasts. You say, you mean there are going to be beasts ravaging around? Think how many diseases are carried forth.
[35:20] Friend, listen to me. You want to see if these things are at least possible. All of a sudden your mind should go to one particular beast that is this small little beast called the rat that has spread more diseases worldwide than anything else.
[35:38] We see here, we have seen a foretaste of these things that are going to be brought to fulfillment. And these are just the birth pangs of things to come.
[35:50] This is just the foretaste. Antichrist isn't even on the throne yet. We see these things coming about but in the midst of all this we see the one in control.
[36:08] May we stand on this side of history rejoicing in the one in control of it all who has authority over it all because if he can control that surely he can control whatever comes our way.
[36:22] Let's pray. Lord we thank you so much for this day. We rejoice in the day you've given us and we thank you for the opportunity to look at your word. We pray oh Lord that you would help us to have a greater view of you.
[36:35] That we would stand amazed at who you are and all of your authority and all of your power and all of your control and we give you the praise for it and we ask it all in Jesus name. Amen.
[36:49] Amen. Amen.
[37:49] Amen. Amen.
[38:49] Amen. Amen.
[39:49] Amen. Amen.
[40:49] Amen. Amen.
[41:49] Amen. Amen.
[42:49] Amen. Amen.
[43:20] Amen. Thank you.
[43:50] Thank you.
[44:20] Thank you.
[44:50] Thank you.
[45:20] Thank you.
[45:50] Thank you.
[46:20] Thank you.