Revelation 7:9-17  

… ¹⁶ "They shall neither hunger anymore nor thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any heat; ¹⁷ "for the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to living fountains of waters. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."

“The Great Tribulation!”  Sounds wonderful, doesn’t it?  But what exactly is the “great tribulation” as it’s spoken of here in Revelation?  That’s a question a lot of people have, isn’t it?  Maybe it’s a question a lot of you have.  What is the “great tribulation”?  Some Christians have the notion that the “great tribulation” is some special time period in the future that hasn’t come yet.  Yet if you actually read what God’s Word says about this “great tribulation,” you get a little bit of a different idea.   

In Matthew 24 Jesus spoke about wars and rumors of wars, pestilence and disease, famine and death, and the persecution of those who refused to let go of their Savior.  And in the midst of it all—the Good News is preached to all the world!  This is what happens during the great tribulation.  Yet when you think about it, though, all these things—war, famine, death, persecution—this is our experience.  Now is the “great tribulation.”  We’ve watched loved ones depart to fight in war.  We’ve experienced famine too—from the dust bowl of the Great Depression to the modern famine that results at the grocery store from an inflated dollar that won’t buy as much as it did six months ago.  Just this week the Centers for Disease Control told us that the Zika virus—the virus that causes horrible birth defects in children—has been identified in mosquitos as far north as Missouri.   But even if you never catch the Zika virus, even if you get your flu shot every year, even if you’ve never smoked or drank or done drugs—you’re still going to die.  And then persecution:  how would you like to be a Christian living in North Carolina right now, where people are boycotting the state because they passed a law protecting the civil rights of Christians?  Even worse, how’d you like to be a Christian living in ISIS-controlled parts of Iraq or Syria, where you run the risk of losing your head? 

War, famine, death and persecution touch all our lives; we experience all of them in one way or another.  And have you ever noticed that it’s these things that make following Jesus hard?  War, famine, death, disease, persecution—these are all challenges to faith in Christ.  This life is a walk through the valley of the shadow of death! 

Yet we’re here today to be reminded that we’re not alone on this walk.  We have a Shepherd!  He’s not the Shepherd we expect or even deserve—but He is a Good Shepherd who cares for each one of us, who in that loving care guides us through this life of tribulation.  We are Shepherded by the Lamb!  And in the truth we find our greatest hopes. 

I.          He has cleansed you by His blood.

In John’s Revelation he lays out this scene of a great multitude that no one could number, from all over the world, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white and holding palm branches, crying out, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (v. 9-10).  And one of the twenty-four elders came to John and asked basically asked him, “Who are these people?” (v. 13).

John answers by saying, “Sir, you know” (v. 14).  It was a polite way of saying, “I don’t know.” 

So the elder answered his own question:  “These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (v. 14).  You know what?  These people are you!  You are part of that great multitude from every nation, tribe, language, and people!  You are the ones who are clothed in those white robes, holding your palm branches in victory!  You are the ones who “come out of the great tribulation”!

If you think about it, the elements of the great tribulation share one thing in common, don’t they?  They’re all the consequences of sin!  The sin and selfishness that leads to wars big and small, the sin that causes the death and disease we experience as sinners, the sin that hates God and His Word.  It’s all part of the same sin that stains the garments of our lives, the sin that turns the garments of our own righteousness into filthy rags (Isaiah 61).  This week at pastor’s conference, we got to sit in on Pastor Hartwig’s devotion for the school-age kids at Holy Trinity.  He pointed to all us pastors in the back and told the kids, “You see all those pastors back there?  Those pastors are a bunch of sinners!”  But it’s true—we are a bunch of sinners!  And so are you!

Thankfully you and I are shepherded by the Lamb, who has cleansed you by His blood.  Our Shepherd is not the stereotypical shepherd-type, though—a burly, tough guy who manhandles the sheep.  Our Shepherd appeared in weakness and lowliness as one of the sheep—the Lamb of God.  And He was led a lamb to the slaughter when they led Him to that cross.  And yet we still sing, “The King of love my Shepherd is, whose mercy faileth never!”  Because by dying on that cross, Jesus showed the greatest love of all—dying for the sinful, erring sheep, paying for all our sins by offering up His innocent life in our place.  And the Good Shepherd not only died as the Lamb of God—He rose again!  And He came to each and every one of you in the waters of your baptisms, taking the guilty, sin-stained rag that you call a life, washing it clean in His own blood, totally removing the guilt of all of your sin!  That’s how He brought each of us into His flock!      

We are Shepherded by the Lamb—and that’s why there’s so much rejoicing in heaven!  Why the angels surrounding the throne fall down in worship—because “there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents” (Luke 15:10).  And their joy is our joy too, as we leave this vale of tears and join the great multitude in giving glory to God, crying out, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (v. 10).  

II.         He leads you to the joys of eternal life. 

Because the robes of our lives have been washed clean from all the stains of sin, we now know where we’re headed.  We know what our ultimate destiny is going to be.  Because we’re shepherded by the lamb, you can know that He leads you to the joys of eternal life. 

You will have the joy of being in the visible presence of the our heavenly Father!  The joy of being able to worship the Lord at all times, to be before His throne and serve Him day and night in His temple (v. 15).  Heaven isn’t going to be lounge chairs and umbrella drinks—it’s going to be work!  We’re going to serve the Lord with our worship, singing His praises all day, every day!  Sound boring?  But in heaven you’re not going to have a sinful human nature anymore to get you to think that worship is boring or that you’re too tired to pray.  Beyond that, you’re going to have the joy of the Lord dwelling with you personally.  He “will dwell among them,” literally “stretch out His tent with them” (v. 15).  Though now you only know God with the eyes of faith, then you will see Him with your own eyes and you will enjoy all the fruits of that face to face relationship! 

Not only will you have the joy of seeing God visibly, but you’ll have the benefits that come from being in His presence!  No more suffering of any kind!  No hunger or thirst—not even a sunburn or heatstroke will get to you when you’re with the Lord in heaven!  You get to enjoy the complete and utter absence of sorrow from your life because God Himself is right there with you to wipe every last tear away.  And in life eternal you will find perfect fulfillment and nourishment from your Shepherd, the Lamb of God, who leads you beside not only still waters—but living waters, waters of His love that will well up in you to eternal life (John 4).

And that’s the real comfort of knowing who our Shepherd is, isn’t it?  That we are shepherded by the Lamb.  We rely on guides to get us places, like the GPS on our smartphones.   But sometimes you want to question that guide—you start wondering why your GPS is taking you on all these back country roads.  And sometimes we want to question our Shepherd—when it seems like life isn’t going the way we think it should.  You can trust your Shepherd, though!  You are shepherded by the Lamb—the Lamb who was slain, who laid down His life for you in order to wash all your sins away!  He saved you from the great tribulation the day He died on that cross!  And He is the same Lamb who ultimately is leading you to everlasting life with Him.  Not only does He know the way, but He will watch over you every step of the way, keeping you from harm until you reach the living waters of heaven.    

Yes, we are living through the great tribulation.  We are walking through the valley of the shadow of death.  Yet we are not alone.  Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb!  “Blessing and glory and wisdom, Thanksgiving and honor and power and might, Be to our God forever and ever.”  Amen.