God's Restoration of All Things

God’s Restoration of All Things

Revelation 15-19

 

Restoration is at the heart of our Christian faith.  In the beginning of human history, the Bible says that God created Adam and Eve and put them in the beautiful Garden of Eden.   Everything that Adam and Eve could ever want or need was in that garden.  And God, their loving Father, walked and talked with Adam and Eve each day.

 

God told Adam and Eve that everything in the garden was theirs to enjoy, except one thing. Adam and Eve were not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that stood in the middle of the Garden of Eden. If they did, God said that they would die. They didn’t believe God and decided not to obey Him and to do things their own way.  So, Adam and Eve disobeyed God and ate some of the forbidden fruit on the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

 

 And when they did, they knew something had changed! Things weren’t quite right!   Adam and Eve knew that they were naked, and they didn’t like it and wanted to cover themselves.  And when God came to walk with them that afternoon, they ran away and hid from God. Their sin had broken their precious intimacy with their loving Father. Adam and Eve’s sin changed God’s wonderful and perfect world into a broken and sinful world (Genesis 3) And with sin came sorrow and death. So much was lost on that terrible day.

 

But God’s restoration work began immediately.  With a broken heart, God, their loving heavenly Father, didn’t leave them there in their sin.  Right off, when Adam and Eve needed coverings for their nakedness, God provided clothing made from a lamb’s skin.  That first sacrifice providing clothing and pointed toward the ultimate sacrificial Lamb of God – Jesus Christ. 

 

God didn’t leave Adam and Eve and their children, but He promised to be there for them if they would try to obey. And God promised through the prophets that someday He would restore the world to it’s former sinless state.  And through Christ He will restore all those who would desire to follow Him to righteousness. In the book of Revelation, it says that Jesus’ followers will wear white robes, which is symbolic of Jesus’ righteousness given to them.  This restoration will take place during the end times. Acts 3:21 speaks of “the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken through all of His holy prophets since the world began.”

 

The book of Revelation is all about the end times and about restoration.  It may not seem like that to us when we read chapter after chapter in the book of Revelation about God’s burning judgments against a sinful world.  Fire and judgments may not sound like restoration.  But there would be no restoration if sin was not judged and dealt with. Just like a person with cancer cannot be healthy and well again until all the malignant cancer cells are killed and gone from his body, so our world cannot be restored until all malignant sin is gone.

 

 Our neighbor had throat cancer and was about to die. The cancer had metastasized to other parts of his body. One night his throat started bleeding badly and he couldn’t breathe. He was rushed to the hospital and had surgery where much of the cancer growths were cut out.  Then he had long months of radiation treatments and more painful months of chemotherapy, where the rest of those deadly cancer cells were burned and radiated. Months where he was nauseated and sick.  Finally, now he is slowly gaining his strength back and learning to talk without a voice. 

 

Like our neighbor, it seems the book of Revelation is about a sick and dying world going through surgery, radiation and chemotherapy to be free of the cancerous sin before it can be restored.  The whole message of Revelation can be summarized in Revelation 17:14a where it says: “These (evil powers) will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them.  For He is Lord of lords and King of kings,…”   Revelation is all about the war between Good and evil, Life and death.   

 

We read in Revelation chapter 15 and 16 about the seven angels having seven last plagues and pouring out their seven bowls upon the rebellious sinful world. We read in chapter 17 about the scarlet harlot and the scarlet beast.  The harlot’s name was on her forehead and her name was “Mystery Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and of the Abominations of the Earth”.  Bible scholars suggest that the harlot symbolizes a world system of idolatry and depravity that is opposed to God. 

 

Chapter 18 covers the fall of this great evil principality in our world, the mystery Babylon.  All these visions in Revelation I believe are symbols and pictures of evil spiritual powers in our world fighting against our righteous God.  The world mourns Babylon’s fall in chapter 18.  Babylon, the great harlot who corrupted the world.  And Satan, the dragon, is bound and thrown into the bottomless pit for 1,000 years. But then in chapter 19, Heaven exults over the fall of this evil Babylon.  The voice of a great multitude exults over the triumph of righteousness and truth over evil.  Alleluias can be heard all over heaven.  Finally, this terrible cancer of sin has been completely removed from the world.  And now finally, healing can take place!

At last the sin and curse of the whole world has been burned away and now everything can be restored. The last three chapters of Revelation nearly jump off of the page with glories too marvelous for us to even begin to understand.  The new heaven and new earth, the marriage of the Lamb, the pure river of the waters of life and the perpetual fruit-bearing trees whose leaves give “healing for the nations.”  The glorious vision of the final consummation of human history is all there for us to read in Revelation 21 and 22.

 

 In the end God has restored all that was lost and even more. When our loving God and Father restores what is lost, it is always increased, multiplied and improved so that its latter state is even better than before. Next week we will finish the book of Revelation. We are through with all of God’s judgments. Through with sin, wars, troubles and sorrow. Through with fears, anger, sickness and death. There will be great rejoicing! These last chapters in Revelation will be describing things too wonderful and marvelous for our little minds to begin to understand.  But let’s give it a try!