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Studying Revelation

 Sunday Evening, April 22, 2007

 Bob Bradley

_________________________ 

Revelation 6:1-8

 

1 And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see.

2 And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.

3 And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, Come and see.

4 And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.

5 And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say, Come and see. And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that sat on him had a pair of balances in his hand.

6 And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine.

7 And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.

8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.

 

 

In this scripture, the church is in heaven.  Saved people are in heaven; we are gone.  If you read Revelation 4, we left, that is when we got there.  In Revelation 5, we see the throne, God the Father, and God the Son taking the scroll from Him that is sitting upon the throne. 

 

As we talked this morning, this scroll contains the deed or title deed for planet earth and those things that are necessary for the earth to be redeemed.  We have learned that it has a curse pronounced upon it.  We know that when Adam sinned, not only was Adam run out of the garden, but also God cursed the earth.  As we read the book of Romans and different places, the earth today is groaning and travailing in waiting upon the time that it is going to be redeemed. 

 

John is seeing these things and writing them down.  After the events in chapter 5, things shift here a little.  We saw in chapters 4 & 5, that we are in heaven and we are around the throne of God and praising God.  However, when we get to chapter 6, the scene is going to change.  It is going to change from the events in heaven to events that are going to start taking place on planet earth. 

 

There are so many things that I do not know.  There are so many things that we do not know.  God has not revealed them unto us about certain events that are going to take place.  However, there are certain things that we can know that are going to take place.  We know that God, back with the prophets, told about some things that were going to take place.  Even Jesus spoke about a time of great tribulation upon planet earth. 

 

Some writers call it the time of Jacob's trouble.  It is called different things.  John is getting ready to explain to us that there is going to come a time when this world is going to suffer the wrath of Almighty God.  There is going to come a time that this world is going to see and understand that God, He is God, and He is going to be dealing with a world that has rejected Him.  There are so many things that we could talk about there.

 

As you start here from Revelation 6 to Revelation 19, we are dealing with the time of Jacob's trouble.  We are dealing with the time of the great tribulation period.  We are dealing with the seventieth week of Daniel's prophesy. 

 

If you go back to Daniel chapter 9:24-26, you find out that God put a big time table, a big clock that God has and we know that He placed a time table upon the children of Israel. 

 

Daniel 9:24

24 Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.

25 Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.

 

God shows us these seventy weeks of years.  When you read this in the Hebrew, He is not talking about seventy weeks of seven days, but He is talking about seventy weeks of years.  Seven times seventy is 490.  Therefore, He is talking about 490 years from the time that the Persian King gave the authority for Israel, or for the Jews to go back and rebuild Jerusalem; he said threescore and two weeks, which is 69 weeks out of the seventy weeks. 

 

This is amazing.  This will bless your socks off when you study it.  When you go back and look at the decree that was given for the Jews to have the right or ability to go back into Jerusalem; they had that ability in April of 445 B. C.  The king gave them the authority to go back and to build the temple. 

 

Now it says that it is going to be 69 weeks times 7, which is 483 years, after that king gave the commandment for the Jews to go back to Jerusalem and build their city.  Four hundred eighty-three (483) years later, Jesus Christ walked into Jerusalem on what we call Palm Sunday and declared Himself, that He was the Messiah.  He came exactly as Messiah was going to come.  He came.  Messiah was cut off.  Messiah was killed.  It was 483 years from the time that the commandment was given, until the time that Jesus Christ died at Calvary.  When 483 years has expired, Jesus died and the clock is stopped again.  The reason that God stops the time clock, as far as prophesy is concerned, is because Israel rejected their King. 

 

God promised them a kingdom.  God promised them peace on earth and good will toward men.  God promised them a time that when Messiah would rule and reign from the throne David, but when they rejected that, then God stopped the prophesy timetable. 

 

We know today that God is calling Himself out a people as the bride for His Son.  We know that God is dealing with every nation all over the world.  He is calling out a people, people that are being born again today that are making up His church, His bride, and that are coming from every nation, every kindred, every tongue, and every people all over the known world.  Jews, Gentiles, and every nation; there are people being saved everywhere. 

 

There is going to come a time that God again is going to finish the work that He said that He was going to do with Israel.  There are seven years left on the time clock that has to be fulfilled, it has to happen then when these seven years are fulfilled, they can have peace on earth and good will toward men. 

 

The time is stopped and there is 483 years passed.  Now we have seven years that we have to deal with to get to where the Messiah is going to come and that heaven is going to be on earth.  We know that when we look at the scripture and we read what the Bible says, we know that this last week is going to be a horrible, horrible time upon planet earth. 

 

The reason is that men have rejected Jesus Christ.  Not only that, but also there has to be certain things that have to happen and this world has to know that He is God.  This world is going to know that He is God.  The unbelieving world that has rejected the God of heaven they are going to know, they are going to understand, that the one that is sitting upon the throne, that He is God.  God is going to deal with that. 

 

That does not make me happy because I can see the suffering that people are gong to be suffering here at this time.  That does not make me happy, but it does prove to me how much God hates sin.  It does prove to me that we are not going to go to heaven just by sliding in. 

 

God is going to deal with the world that He created, and a people that He created.  People that are on earth that have rejected Him, He is going to deal with them.  He has some things here that he has to deal with satan, because of when Adam sinned.  Adam turned his back.  If that had not happened then many other things would not have happened. 

 

We need to understand that the events that are taking place are not going to happen randomly.  These things are not going to happen by the spur of the moment.  These things are not going to happen just because God woke one morning, or thought one day that these things were going to happen.  These things have been ordained before the foundation of the world was ever created.  God knew the end before there ever was a beginning for planet earth. 

 

As we read, these things in these first four seals are going to correspond with what Jesus said in Matthew 24 about the horrors of what is going to take place in this final week.  We know that Jesus here is talking about that.  John sees:

 

1 And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, come and see.

 

When you read that, it makes us think that when Jesus takes the book from the Father, He takes the first wax seal off, and unrolls this portion of the scroll, then one of the four beasts says, “come and see.”  When we see what they say, we would think that beast is saying to John "come and see," as we read this Kings James.  However, when you read this in the original it is actually saying, "come".  He is actually giving this first rider the authority to start his journey, or start bringing those things about on planet earth that he is going to bring about.  He is giving him the right for these things to start. 

 

Why is that going to happen?  If that was not happening then all the other that is going to take place, they could not work.  Look what it says:

 

He gives him the right to start his responsibility, duty or whatever word you want to use here, on planet earth.  These events are going to start taking place.

 

2 And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.

 

The beast, the living creature says “come.”  He gives the rider on the white horse the authority to bring those events that he has power to do upon planet earth, he gives him the authority to start doing those things. 

 

First thing, he mentions here is a white horse.  If you remember a few weeks ago and studying, we read about Jesus Christ when He came into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday He was not riding a white horse, but He was riding a donkey.  Kings, at peacetime, would ride into a city on a donkey because it was a very peaceful animal.  When a king would ride in as a victorious king, he would ride on a white horse. 

 

The first thing that we want to see here is that this horse is white.  When we think about white, the first thing we think about, is when Jesus Christ is coming from heaven and we are going to be coming with Him, we see that He is riding a white horse and we are going to be riding white horses with Him.  We want to take this rider and say that this is Jesus Christ.  It cannot be Jesus Christ because He is the One who is opening the scroll.  Furthermore, when we see what the white horse rider is going to do then we would absolutely know beyond doubt that it could not be Jesus Christ.  The scriptures talk about this one.  An anti-christ, that is going to come and he is going to present himself as the great savior of the world.  People are going to accept this guy.

 

Think about something today.  Think about what is happening in our world today, and all of the chaos that is going on everywhere.  We have people starving to death in numbers today that has never been known before.  We have turmoil in nation after nation today; little countries that you never dreamed that could raise up armies of tens of thousands of men have all kinds of armies today.  We see countries today that are so perplexed.  No body knows what to do with situation in the Middle East between the Jews and the Arabs.  No body has a clue what to go on.  No body knows what to do with global warming.  It is melting the polar ice cap.  The sea is raised.  No body knows what to do with feeding the world. 

 

There is going to be a fellow who is going to come on the scene very soon, but I believe that this is going to take place very soon.  He is going to come on the scene and he is going to seem to have the answers to all the problems.  He is riding a white horse that is going to look very good to our world. 

 

He also has a bow, which means that he has control of a great military force.  Not only does it say that here, but also it says that a crown was given unto him and he goes forth conquering and to conquer.  When we read about anti-christ, when he first comes on the scene is going to happen shortly after the rapture of the church.  I don't know how long it is going to be it may be a week, it may be a month, it may be a year, it may be five years, but very shortly after you and I leave here this white horse rider is going to come on the scene.  When he does, he is going to seem to have the answers to all man's problems.  He is going to come and is going to be the knight in shinning armor.  He is going to declare, “If you let me do this, then I can do that.” 

 

The Bible tells us that the whole world is going to wander off after him.  We know that.  This fellow is going to have a great following.  When you read the first 3 1/2 years of the last week, the last seven years, the first forty-two months or twelve hundred sixty days as you read the scripture, you will find out that the first half of tribulation is going to be a time of peace and prosperity. 

 

The Bible says in the book of Daniel that he is going to make craft prosper.    It means that manufacturing and things are going to be going great.  There are going to be jobs and everyone is going to have a job.  Unemployment is going to go down.  It is going to look like things could not get any better.  However, that is just the calm before the storm because he has other things on his mind.  This guy is going to come riding a white horse and he is going to be completely controlled by satan himself.  he is going to have one thing on his mind, and that is to destroy men. 

 

Even though that things are going to be horrible on planet earth for all those folks that are going to be here; "Aren't you glad that we are not going to be here?  Aren't you glad that we are not going to see the white horse from here?"  We are going to see from up there looking down. 

 

He is going to come and he is going to be a conquering fellow and have a great military behind him.  There is going to be a crown that is given unto him.  The world is going to wander off after him and it looks like everything is going to be perfect.  It looks like that planet earth has finally got to where it needs to be.  Nevertheless, it just going to be the ‘calm before the storm.’

 

The Bible says that he opens the second seal.  Jesus removes the second seal.  He unrolls the scroll that has to do with the second seal and the Bible says, “…and I heard the second beast say come and see.”  The beast is giving authority for the rider here to come and to go.  The Bible says in verse four:

 

 

4 And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.

 

If I understand things, the first part of tribulation is going to be a time of peace.  It is going to be a time of prosperity where everything is going to be going great. 

 

Somewhere towards the middle of tribulation then you are going to have another horse and rider that are going to come forth and things are going to change drastically. 

 

The Bible says that power was given unto him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth.  Not to take peace from just from one little part of the earth, but to take peace from planet earth where there will be no peace at all on planet earth.  Things are going to escalate quickly. 

 

When you read and study prophecy, when you read Ezekiel 38 you can read about Russia and Russia's allies and there is no doubt in my mind what John is seeing here, the red horse rider he is seeing is Russia and all her allies invading the land of Israel.  They are coming to the land of Israel. 

 

I know people say that we do not have to worry about Russian anymore; the cold war is over we don't have to worry about their nuclear weapons anymore we don't have to worry about them having any power.  If God said 2500 or 3000 years ago that there is going to be a nation that is going to come from the north, and when you look at where Israel is at, when you look at where Jerusalem is at, and when you look at the word Meshech; it means Moscow.  When you look directly north from Jerusalem, you will find Moscow.  The Bible tells us that they are going to come with their Arab allies and they are going to invade the land of Israel.

 

What can we look at today to see that these things are going to happen very soon?  When you look at what is happening in Iran today, they are not getting to where they are today alone.  They are not enriching uranium alone.  Iran is not doing this alone.  If you read some reports by people in the military, you will find out that they are getting this information and technology from Russia.  The prudent guy who is supposed to be a friend of the world is a snake.  He is going to get some allies and come to the land of Israel.

 

When that takes place, when the armies of the north from Russia come, and some of the allies with them, it is not going to stop with four or five nations.  Russia, Ethiopia, and Libya and some of these others nations that are going to be involved  will not be stopped with them, because in a short time the whole world is going to be involved in what we call Armageddon.  What is so serious about that? 

 

I have heard people say that we should just let those people kill themselves and just let them do whatever they want to.  What is that to us?  It is everything to us.  This thing is all about oil.  These nations are coming, but when they get there, the war starts.  Not only is Russia involved, but also the United States gets involved.  All the other nations of the world get involved and in a very short amount of time, peace is taken from planet earth.  It is going to happen.  The Bible is teaching that when the red horse rider arrives, denoting blood, there will be bloodshed as we have never saw before.  When the red horse rider comes, he is going to take peace from the world.

 

"...that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword."

 

Not only is mankind going to kill each other, but also there was given to him a great sword.  Weapons of war to be able to kill and to slaughter, as we have never saw before.  This is reality.  I know very little.  Some of things are just a plain as the nose on your face if you do just a little bit of studying.  You can find out what I am telling is the truth.  The Bible says in verse five:

 

5 And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say, Come and see. And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that sat on him had a pair of balances in his hand.

6 And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine.

 

Famine follows war.  What the Bible calls Armageddon, this is the beginning of Armageddon, when we see this battle start, when peace is taken from the earth then there is going to be something happen.  John saw "he that sat upon the horse had a pair of balances in his hand."  That means that they are scales. 

 

When we go to the store now, we usually buy things but during this time, everything that you are going to be buying is going to be weighed.  That is telling us the shortage of food.  It is telling us the shortage of food to eat upon planet earth. 

 

The 'meth' epidemic that we have across the world and that people are killing people over little small things, but during this time when people start getting hungry, you have not seen killing like this.    They will steal gasoline that is one thing, but when people get hungry, they will kill you for what you have to eat. 

 

A pair of balances means famine.  It means that food is going to be scarce.  Do you think that situations in New York and Los Angels; do you think riots happen now?  You have not seen anything that is going to take place like the killing of people by one another that is going to happen when the black horse rider comes on the scene.  We have war and when you have war, you have famine. 

 

Not only does he have a pair of balances in his hand means scarcely of food. However, he says this:

 

"...A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine."

 

A measure here of wheat, a measure is a quart of wheat.  He is says a measure wheat or a quart of wheat is going to be sold for a penny.  You might say then I am going to have all kinds of stuff to eat.  However, a penny during John's day was a day's wage.  What John is telling us here that during the time when the black horse comes on the scene when there is going to be scarcely of food, the people that are going to be living upon planet earth, the majority of folks are going to have to work everyday just for what they eat today.  If you do not work today, you do not eat today.  

 

A measure of wheat for a penny and three measure of barely for a penny; what that means is barley is a type of wheat, but it has one third of the nutrients in it that wheat has.  In others words, you may get three times as much barley for a penny as you do wheat, but it will not have the nutrients that you need to be able to sustain. 

 

Famine and murder; you think that our morals are wrong today and that we have no respect for human life, and we do not have.  However, you have not seen anything that is going to take place as when the black horse comes on the scene and starvation comes to planet earth like never before. It is not just going to be in Ethiopia, Africa, and other countries today, but it is going to be worldwide.  It is going to hit Lawrence County, Ohio.  It is going to hit right here.  People are going to be starving to death.  There is not going to be any government programs.  Now you can forget about that it is not going to be there.  If you do not work then you are not going to eat.

 

We have many folks in the world today that is too lazy to work and they are going to steal and kill to get something to eat. 

 

"... and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine." 

 

Oil and wine have to do with folk that are rich.  The poor people are going to have to work everyday to be able to eat what they get.  If they do not work today, they will not be able to buy anything to eat today.  You have heard the saying, "that the rich gets richer and the poor gets poorer."  During the time of the black horse rider, that is what is going to be.  There is going to be oil and wine.  There is going to be luxuries here yet, but it is going to be things that the majority of planet earth is not going to be able to afford.  It is going to be another temptation for people to steal and to kill. 

 

7 And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.

 

In others words "go."

 

8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.

 

We have a white horse, red horse, black horse and a pale horse.  When the pale horse comes on the scene, he is going to have the authority to kill 25% of the population.  I did not say that.  I did not make that up.  I did not write that.  That is what God says is going to happen. 

 

Twenty-five percent of the world's population is going to die when the pale horse rider comes in.  The pale horse represents famine, pestilences, and epidemics.  When you have war, you have people starving to death, you have people dying, you have people laying here that are dead then you have epidemics.  You have disease.  You have all kinds of things running rampant that you never dreamed about before. 

 

During this time of the pale horse, the Bible says that death and hell follows along with him.  Death has to do with the body.  Hell has to do with the soul.  People are going to die some horrible deaths.  Starving to death like we never saw.  In addition, he is going to be able to kill with the sword or military might.  He is going to be able to kill with hunger.  He is going to have the authority to kill with death and with the beasts of the field.  Twenty-five percent of six billion would be a billion and a half people that will die when the pale horse rider comes on the scene. 

 

The earth is going to be redeemed.  This world is going to know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.  They are going to know that God is God and they are going to suffer like we never seen things and people suffer before. 

 

It is my prayer that you repent of your sins today. 

 

I have heard people says, "Preacher, I want to get this done or I want to get that done before I get saved.  I want to get the kids raised and I want to get all these accomplished.  When I get that done then I am going to give my heart to the Lord."  You may not have that opportunity.  You may die before that happens.  Not only that but also the rapture of the church may happen and Jesus Christ may start pouring out on this planet the things that He is going to do here to judge this world. 

 

You have today.  You have right now and it would be my prayer right now that you would make things right with the Lord while you have time.

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