"And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse, and He that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He does judge and make war."

Up until now in the book of Revelation, we've been introduced to the Lamb of God, a Lamb that was slain, a Lamb that takes away the sin of the world, the Passover Lamb, if you will.

Now we're introduced to a very different Christ, and the world is going to have to come up against and face a Christ who is not merely a Lamb, not a meek and mild Lamb, but a warrior, a warrior mounted upon a white horse with a sword with crowns on his head. {12} "His eyes, we're told, is like a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns, and He had a name written that no man knew, but He himself, {13} and He was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood."

That's the only reference we have to His sacrifice in this different environment, "and His name is called the Word of God."

This is the return of Christ. We're in Revelation 19, and we began in verse 11.

You know, one of the things that puzzles me, and it will always puzzle me, I think, that if you go around to Christian people who say they believe in Jesus, they believe in what He said, they believe what He said was true, they believe the Bible is true, they're Christian people.

Many of them, might even be graduates of seminaries or religious schools, Bible schools. If you were to ask these people, "Do you believe in a literal return of Jesus Christ," a surprising number of them will tell you, "No, I don't." Now, what's odd about this is that back in John 14 verse 1, when Jesus is preparing his disciples for his departure, He said this, "Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe in Me."

Why would their heart be troubled? Well, because He was about to go away from them, and they had in their mind that Jesus would, as the Messiah, that He would establish the kingdom of God now, that He would go straight on into the kingdom of God with them. But He was going to die, and He says, "Don't let your heart be troubled. You believe in God, now believe in me." In my Father's house are many mansions or rooms or places. If it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you."

Now, we all understand ‘I go’, don't we?

Then He said, {3} "If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself that where I am, there you may be also."

Now, what's odd about this is that, in the face of so many of the assumptions that we make about Christianity, one wonders, why is He coming back? Why is there any need for Jesus to come again?

"Lord, Will You at this Time Restore the Kingdom to Israel?"

Take Acts, the first chapter, when Jesus had finally finished his charge to His disciples, when He's finally told them where He's going and what He's going to do, and they seem to be at least beginning to accept it.

They came together, and they asked Him in Acts 1 verse 6 , "Lord, will you at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?" He said to them, {7} "It's not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father has put in his own power."

Now, they still were expecting, you know, when are you going to restore the kingdom? The kingdom is what we're looking for. We're looking for liberation from these dominant Romans around here. "When are you going to restore the kingdom? "

He said, {7} "That's not for you to know," {8} "but you're going to receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you'll be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem and Judea, Samaria, and even to the uttermost part of the earth."

And {9} "when He had spoken these things," now, mind you, they're standing on the Mount of Olives, just opposite the Temple Mount. "When He had spoken these things, while they watched, He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight."

One minute, they're looking at Him, eyeball to eyeball. Then He begins to rise up, his feet separate from the ground. He goes up, their heads crane back, their jaws drop open, and He disappears in a cloud, and they are standing there gaping.

And {10} "While they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, {11} and they said, "You men of Galilee, why are you standing here gazing up into the sky? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as you have seen him go into heaven."

He's going away to heaven, He's coming back from heaven. Coming back to where? Back to here, back to the clouds, back to the earth where He left from.

Now, I said it's odd, in the face of these scriptures, that so many Christians doubt the literal return of Jesus Christ. It's odd except for the fact that many of their assumptions about Him are consistent with that.

Take the idea that we all go immediately to heaven or to hell at death. Isn't that what most people believe? This fellow has died, we're at his funeral, and the preacher up there tells us that He's already in heaven beholding the master's face. Now, I don't recall ever going to a funeral where the preacher stood up there and said, "Now, even as we speak here, old Bob is down in hell, and the devil is putting a pitchfork into him to see that he's done."

I've never heard that. I guess that would be in bad taste. But the question is that if we go immediately to heaven or hell at death, what purpose is there in Jesus coming again?

So you can see a logic that if they believe that when I die, I go to heaven or hell, whichever it happens to be, that being the logic, then why should I believe in a literal return of Jesus Christ? Why should any of us who are in heaven, sitting around the master's throne, dining on milk and honey, looking up into the master's face, singing songs of praise to God, why should we leave all that and come back down here? I don't understand why anyone would suggest that. And yet, that's a part of it.

Judgment, that's not necessary. The decision is already made. And yet, it's inescapable.

Jesus Is Coming Again

Jesus is coming again, and He seems to have some really important unfinished business, right here on earth. Now, a clue to that unfinished business begins in verse 14 of Revelation 19, "The armies which were in heaven, followed Him on white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean."

So the returning Christ, according to Revelation 19, is accompanied with an army. He's on a white horse, and there are armies, plural, on white horses coming back with Him. (15) "And out of his mouth goes a sharp sword, that with it He should smite the nations. And He shall rule them with a rod of iron. And He treads the winepress of the fierceness and the wrath of Almighty God. {16) He has on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, KING OF KINGS and LORD OF LORDS."

Now, this is an interesting development. He does not merely destroy the nations that are upon the earth. He rules over them.

He does not depose the kings of the earth. He dominates them. That's what King of Kings means. Lord of Lords means, He is the one who is above the priests, and He himself, is a Priest King.

Now, as I said, this tends to run a little counter to some of our assumptions, because we tend to think of maybe coming back and rescuing the saints, and then destroying the earth and going off into the vastness of the universe, never to give a second thought to this miserable little cinder of a planet sitting here, that He's just burnt up.

But that's not what's pictured here. He comes back. He conquers. He rules, which implies some time in which people are ruled. And instead of deposing the kings, He dominates them.

In verse 17 of Revelation 19, "I saw an angel standing in the sun, and He cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that flock in the midst of heaven, Come, gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God, {18} that you may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses and them that sit upon them, and the flesh of all men, free and bond, small and great."

Now, what in the world is that all about? Well, what happens, when you have a great battle in the field, is that the landscape is strewn with the bodies of men and war horses, the wreckage of chariots, or in modern warfare, tanks.

But the flesh, the bodies of men, is everywhere. One vivid scene in my mind from the movie Patton, when a tank battle had been fought, and there were bodies strewn about the landscape, and an officer and his driver, drive up to the scene. The vultures are sitting on the dead bodies of the soldiers.

They fire a machine gun burst, and the vultures fly away, but it sort of impresses upon your mind that after a great battle, there is food for the vultures and for the birds.

That's what this is about. There is going to be an enormous battle. Great numbers of people are going to die, and the vultures will come in and eat them.

In verse 19, He says, "I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against Him that sat upon the horse, and against His army."

At the very end, a great battle is fought. But then, everybody knows that. The word Armageddon has passed into common usage to mean a great last battle that involves total destruction. But the battle is between the returning Christ with His armies and the armies and kings who are in alliance with this creature, the Beast.

But Christ wins.

Verse 20 of Revelation 19, "And the Beast was taken, and with him, the False Prophet that worked miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had the mark of the beast, and them that worshiped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone. {21} And the remnant were slain with the sword of Him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of His mouth, and all the fowls were filled with their flesh."

You know, the description here of this person called the false prophet is important, because it confirms what we've been saying all along, that you've got a civil system, say the Roman Empire, in type, that exists out here, that is really kind of an instrumentality of the dragon (Satan), the physical instrumentality in destroying the people of God, be they Israel, physical Israel, or be they the church, spiritual Israel, or believers far and wide.

This great beast is destructive and trying to tear apart God's work. But with this beast is one called the false prophet. The false prophet himself is pictured actually as a second beast earlier on in Revelation, but here He is clearly identified as a false prophet.

Now, Jesus warned early on about false prophets. Fairly early in His ministry He said this, the reference is Matthew 7 and verse 13, "Enter you in at the straight gate, for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leads to destruction, and there are many that go in thereat."

Jesus is saying that the way of life that He's offering and the way into His kingdom is a narrow gate, not wide, because narrow is the gate and narrow is the way which leads unto life and there are few that find it.

Why? Well, Christ goes on to say something very important. He said, "Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves."

Now, recognizing a false prophet would be a simple thing, if wolves looked like wolves, wouldn't it? A man comes along and says, "Well, I'm a prophet of Baal."

Uh-ha. "Well, I'm not going to follow you anywhere." But let me ask you this.

If a man comes along and identifies himself as a prophet of Baal or a prophet of Moloch or a prophet of this or that god and says, "I'm a prophet of Baal, follow me." Is he a false prophet or is he a truth-telling prophet of Baal? He's honest. He comes right up and says, "I serve Baal" "I think that's simple enough.

Now, you need to remember that sheep in biblical metaphor are a symbol of God's people, the faithful of God's people, because Jesus in one of His parables says, when He comes back, He's going to gather all these people before Him and He's going to separate the sheep from the goats. Sheep on his right hand, goats on his left hand, and the sheep are the faithful servants of Christ. The goats are the ones who are not faithful.

So here we've got one, a wolf in sheep's clothing, which means this person that comes as a false prophet is going to look like a faithful servant of God. He's going to look like, are you ready for this, a Christian. Now, how can you spot them? How can you tell the difference? How can you know what you've got here?

Well, Jesus went on to say in Matthew 7 and verse 16, "You shall know them by their fruits."

Do men gather grapes of thorns? Well, no, you don't go out to a thorn bush and look on it for clusters of grapes. You go to a grapevine, of course.

Do they gather figs of thistles? Well, no, you gather figs off of a fig tree.

So what He is saying is that, what you're actually getting from these people somehow, tells you what they are. Well, that's not hard, is it? If you can see corrupt fruit coming forward, you can assume that the tree that's producing it is corrupt itself. "A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit."

"Every tree," {18} "that brings not forth good fruit is cut down and cast into the fire. Wherefore, by their fruits you shall know them. {19} Now, He didn't just stop there."

He went on to explain further because there were some more things you need to know.

For example, verse 21, He says, "Not everyone that says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven. But He that does the will of my Father which is in heaven."

Now, I have oftentimes seen this little plaque, put up on the wall of a home or a business that says, "Jesus is Lord." Now, does that mean that the person who is conducting business in this establishment is a Christian? Well, he certainly claims to be! But on the other hand, if he does not behave like one, what does the plaque on the wall mean? For example, if he puts up a plaque on the wall of his business and says, "Jesus is Lord," and then shortchanges his customers, cheats his customers, cuts the quality of his goods and raises the price, if he profiteers in his business, does the sign on the wall that says, "Jesus is Lord," really mean anything? Is Jesus his Lord? No.

But can you know him by his fruits? Yes. You don't know people by the signs. You don't know them by the fish on the back of their car.

You don't know them by a "Honk if you love Jesus" on a bumper sticker. You don't know them by these things. You know them by the way they live their life.

How do they treat people? Are they honest? You can, a lot of times, tell a person is a Christian by the way he lives his life, even when he has never so much as said to you, "I am a Christian."

"Now, not everyone," said Jesus, "that says to me, {21" "Lord, Lord, will enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that does the will of my Father which is in heaven.""

Now, how are you going to know that? Well, there's a chance that you're sitting there listening to this broadcast (or reading this article) with a Bible in front of you.

That's the word of God, and it tells you how to live your life. Are we supposed to actually live by the Bible? Well, He then says, {22} "Many will say to me in that day, "Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name? Have we not in your name cast out demons? Have we not in your name done many wonderful works?" And Jesus says, {23} "then I will profess unto them, "I never knew you.""

Now, that's a little bit spooky.

Here are people who are prophesying in the name of Jesus. "In the name of Jesus," they say they have actually cast out demons. They've actually done wonderful works in his name.

The implication is that you can have miracles performed in the name of Jesus by people who when they come in the presence of Jesus himself says, "Who are you? I don't know you. I have never known you." He said, "I never knew you. Depart from me, you that work iniquity" (Matthew 7:23).

Now, that word ‘iniquity’ is really interesting. What does the word mean? Well, it comes from a Greek word ‘anomia,’ and it means: violation of law, wickedness, unrighteousness.

We use prefixes to change things from positive into negative, don't we? We put the word ‘un’ in front of it, and it means you undo instead of do. So we understand putting the negative in front. Well, in Greek the negative is ‘a’ (ah). So you have two words here.

You have nomos, law, and ‘a,’ negative. And what He is saying is, you depart from me, you people who are lawless and refuse to accept my law. The law of God is a standard that tells man how to live his life. It tells him the difference between right and wrong.

And there is a peculiar thing among many theologians who seem to want to do away with the law of God.

I certainly believe in grace. "By grace are you saved through faith and not of yourselves" (Ephesians 2:8), and I'm the last person to ever tell anybody they would be saved by law. You're not. But at the same time, the law of God is that which defines right from wrong. Is a Christian supposed to live his life right or wrong? Are we supposed to follow lawlessness, or should we as Christians be law-abiding, relative to God's law?

What Jesus says to us here about these false prophets essentially is, that they're lawless. They're anti-law. They turn their back on God's law.

They refuse to be obedient to God, while they at the same time profess that they are Christians and make great noises about grace and salvation by grace, which all of us believe in that.

He will profess to them, "I never knew you. Get away from me, you lawless workers."

Verse 24 of Matthew 7, "Therefore whosoever hears these sayings of mine," Jesus said, "and does them, I will liken him to a wise man which built his house upon a rock. {25} And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it didn't fall, because it was founded upon a rock. {26} And everyone that hears these sayings of mine, and does not do them, shall be likened unto a foolish man, who built his house upon the sand. {27} And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it."

Well, you know, it's pretty simple, isn't it? The New Testament contains much in the way of instruction from Jesus about how to live your life, what to do, what not to do. And there are people who will go around, calling themselves by the name of Jesus, who pay no more attention to what He said, than they do to what the laws of the land say about how they drive their cars, do they? Laws were made to be broken, and they don't pay much attention.

And so false prophets that are spoken of in Revelation, are going to be preachers or teachers or prophets by name, I should say, that themselves appear to be Christian, but their message, their conduct, the way they live their lives, the way they treat people are simply not.

Jesus didn't let this false prophet thing drop with this.

Later in the Olivet Prophecy, He's once again telling his disciples of the things that have to take place toward the very end.

And He says in Matthew 24 and verse 14, "This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations, and then shall the end come."

That word ‘end’ makes me very uncomfortable, but here it is. There is an end to all this. It doesn't just go on like this forever. Maybe we should be grateful.

But in Matthew 24 and verse 15, He says, "When you, therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place. {16} Then let those who are in Judea flee into the mountains. {17} Let him that's on the housetop not come down to take anything out of his house. {18} Don't let him who is in the field turn back to take his clothes. {19} Woe to them that are with child, to those who will give suck in those days. {20} And pray that your flight may not be in winter or on the Sabbath."

"And He goes on to say, "Except those days should be shortened," in verse 22, ‘there should be no flesh saved, but for the elect's sake, those days shall be shortened."

Then if any man shall say to you, "Lo, here is Christ, or there," don't believe it, for there shall arise false christs."

Well, how close does it have to get? How far down the line do we have to come before we believe, that something will appear to be Christian, and yet will be false, misleading, and deceitful?"

Well, here's a false christs, much less a false prophet.

But Jesus says, "There will arise false christs and false prophets, and they'll show great signs and wonders.

They'll actually do miracles, folks. Now, how about it? Here comes a person who claims he is Christ, and he reaches out and touches somebody that's sick, and heals them, or he calls down fire from heaven, or he does something else. Are you going to believe him? Well, one would hope not.

But how can you know? How can you understand that when you see what this man is doing, and he does some great wonder or some great work, how would you know?

Well, Jesus said, "Be careful.{24} There are going to arise false christs and false prophets, and they'll show great signs and wonders, insomuch that if it's possible, they will deceive the very elect. {25} I've told you ahead of time," He said.{26} "If they shall say to you, "Behold, He is in the desert," don't go forth. "Behold, He is in the secret chambers," don't believe it."

You know, what you're supposed to believe, is what Jesus told us before.

Because inevitably when these false prophets and false christs come along, they don't agree with Christ's words. They don't believe what He said. They'll find some excuse for not obeying what He told them to do.

He said, "Don't believe this," {27} "because as the lightning comes out of the east, and flashes to the west, so shall the coming of the Son of Man be."

What He means by that is, no one is going to miss it. Nobody's going to have to come up and tug you on the coat and say, "Oh, excuse me, Christ has returned."

Believe me, you will know. At this point in the book of Revelation comes one of the greatest events in the history of the world. It is more important, I think, than many realize. Not as great as the return of Christ, for without the return of Christ, this would not happen.

In Revelation 20, in verse 1, John is still seeing visions. "And He says," in this particular place, "I saw an angel come down from heaven having the key of the bottomless pit, that is, of the abyss, and a great chain in his hand. {2} And He laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, {3}and cast him into the abyss, and shut him up, and set a seal on him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled. And after that, he must be loosed for a little season."

Well, realizing the havoc that this great dragon has worked upon the earth, realizing that he is the author of the destruction of millions of human lives, that he has been the enemy of God's people, physical and spiritual, down through all time, knowing that this great arch demon is finally shackled and bound and put away where he can no longer practice his deception, has got to be, cause for great rejoicing upon the face of this earth.

So maybe you can see why people think that the millennium will be a marvelous utopian time. Indeed, the prophecies do suggest that it will be.

The word millennium basically means 1,000 years, and it's a reference, it's a shorthand reference in theology to the thousand-year reign of Christ, the time when He will be ruling on the earth instead of the Devil, the time when every man can sit under his own vine, under his own fig tree, when they'll beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks, when no one will learn war, we can close all the war colleges down, no longer will we need police patrols through the neighborhood, because the great deceiver, the great source, the great fountain head of all the evil upon this planet has been bound and taken away.

Verse 4 of Revelation 20, "And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given to them. And I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and who had not worshiped the beast, or his image, and had not received his mark upon their foreheads or in their hands, and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years."

That's really a reference to the saints, to the holy people of God, to the obedient people of God.

And what it's saying is, that for a thousand years, this world will be governed by Jesus Christ and by people who have His spirit, people who are motivated by the love and the gentleness of Jesus Christ, and a time when men can put war away finally for all time.

Jesus has on His robe a name written: KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS and He will rule for one thousand years.

Verse 5, "But the rest of the dead lived not again until a thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. {6} Blessed and holy is he that has part in the first resurrection. On such the second death has no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years."

Do you realize that Jesus has just told us there is a second resurrection? But that will have to wait till next time.

Until then, this is Ronald Dart reminding you, you were Born to Win!

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