Revelation 6 - 14

[00:00:15] Speaker A: Welcome to the weekly Deep Dive podcast on the Add on Education Network. The podcast where we take a look at the weekly come follow me discussion and try to add a little sight and unique perspective. I am your host, Jason Lloyd, here in the studio with our boy. Wow. Yeah. With our boy. And this show's producer, Nate Piper. [00:00:34] Speaker B: Oh, with our boy. Dude, that's. Yeah, man. [00:00:38] Speaker A: Changing it up. I like it. [00:00:40] Speaker B: I like it. A of. I'm just processing it now, but yeah, our boy. I'm your boy. [00:00:47] Speaker A: That's right. [00:00:48] Speaker B: All right. Well, what's up, dude? [00:00:50] Speaker A: Dude, it's Revelation. I don't know how we could not be excited getting into another lesson coming into the Book of Revelation. [00:00:58] Speaker B: I'm excited. [00:01:01] Speaker A: The only rough thing about it is that it's Revelation six through 14. So it's eight chapters of Revelation. And when you look at the Book of Revelation, just trying to understand one chapter can take a long time. I'm not sure that we're going to be able to cover everything with here. And some of this stuff is going to be covered a little bit better in a couple of weeks when we close the Book of Revelation, because that's where in the revelation, they start explaining what the symbols are and what they mean. And I think that'll make more sense and make better sense to maybe take some of the content from this reading and push it into our wrap up at the end of the year. Yes. But there's enough here that I think we can have a lot of fun talking about what we have. These six, seven seals, trumpets flying around. [00:01:50] Speaker B: That's all I want. [00:01:52] Speaker A: People blowing trumpets. [00:01:53] Speaker B: All I want is trumpets flying around, people blowing trumpets. Dude, we're going to get the musical band going. [00:01:59] Speaker A: Dude, do we have a clip of Night Rider with you playing the trumpet? [00:02:05] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, we do. [00:02:07] Speaker A: That would be fantastic. [00:02:09] Speaker B: Yeah, we do. I know, but it's visual. It's the visual part of it makes it work. [00:02:13] Speaker A: I mean, we could still get a little bit of trumpet blast, but. [00:02:16] Speaker B: Yeah, maybe. [00:02:18] Speaker A: But it's the visual that makes it. [00:02:20] Speaker B: All right, so what else we got? [00:02:24] Speaker A: I think that's it. [00:02:25] Speaker B: Okay, well, let's get into it. [00:02:26] Speaker A: Let's dive in. So where we left you guys last week was chapter five. I think it's important to just give us that segue because it really bleeds into each other. Right. Chapter five, as you recall, you have the host of heaven gathered around, and the question is, who is worthy to unseal this book? And the book has the Seven Seals, which represents a thousand years of Earth history. Each and nobody was. And that's where John was looking about and in the point of tears, ready to cry. And then that's when the lamb steps. And I really just want to maybe just read one or two verses from here just to set the stage. This is verse five. And one of the elders said unto me, weep not. Behold the lion of the Tribe of Judah. I want us to focus on the imagery, right? Because he says the lion can do it, but then he's going to call him the root of David. So now we're referring to him, the root, a tree, a plant, right? The Tree of life. So we went from lion to Tree of Life. He hath prevailed to open the seals. And then verse six, the lamb, as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, walks up to take this book. And it's not that it's a literal lamb or lion or tree. It's that all of these images symbolically represent Jesus Christ. And so as we get into the Book of Revelation, I think it's important that we understand that a lot of what we're talking about has symbolic value in what it's doing. And why is it being referred to as a lion? Why is it being referred to as a lamb? Why Seven Eyes or Seven horns? And some of it is going to break down specifically to what these mean. I think that's part of the miracle of some of these symbols is how broad it can be. And you can scope out and you can see it in so many different ways, and then you can zoom in and see it very applicable to very specific situations. And it's part of the Amazement, the wonderment that is art, right? Art. Sometimes we talked a little bit about art last week, but can take on different interpretations. And sometimes even the imagery, the symbol, the power of art, takes on life beyond the creator that put it into there, right? When an artist creates their work, sometimes it's those that appreciate the art, that see something in there that even the artist hadn't imagined when they created it. Or even the artist looking back and reflecting on that and saying, yeah, I didn't even realize this was there. And it takes on. It's almost like the art surpasses the Creator to teach the creator or to even teach lessons on its own, that as we put something out there, sometimes we even learn more that we wouldn't have otherwise, if that makes any sense. [00:05:41] Speaker B: Not only does that make sense, but that's actually in the art world, something that is talked about in a very profound statement. And I don't know I guess, kind of realization that you just made, and I don't know how applicable it is to the point you're making, but as a songwriter, and it talked about quite a bit in the songwriting community and in the visual art community, all the time, is learning the processes of putting pen to paper and learning the processes of paintbrush to canvas, right. And letting your almost subconscious do the talking and being okay, not knowing exactly what it is, and then over time, realizing what some of those things meant. Right. I can't tell you how it just proves itself over and over as a songwriter, that, again, it's putting pen to paper. And there's times where I've written some songs that felt very honest and very sincere in the moment of writing them, and I definitely didn't fully understand even a lot of the lines that were kind of coming out, but that felt right, and that felt good. And years later, looked back and continue to look back and find new clues and even deeper meanings and connections with those things. And for me, I think that the correlation to the spiritual nature of those things has always kind of been, learn the word right, read the scriptures, even if you don't know. Right. We encourage our kids to read the scriptures right. I have to assume that my nine year old probably can't even probably read what a bunch of the words are right in a lot of these texts. But that's not the point of it. I don't think at the time, as you're reading this, you have to have the deepest of understanding for this, or it's worthless or it's not doing something. Instead, I believe that as we continue to go through the processes that we've been commanded, the point of that really is start putting those things in your brain, start putting those things inside of you, and over time, those things really do. A light does shine on and illuminate, and it's crazy. The things that we naturally start thinking back to. I feel like as we start making some of these connections, then you're like, oh, yeah. And then, hey, remember there's that scripture. Oh, yeah. Even we, as we were talking tonight about the idea of, like, the crystal ball, could that have its roots in Yurman thumb? But then it's like, oh, yeah, we're told that the world's going to be a sea of glass, and it's like, all these things. You start putting these pieces together that you can't put together if you haven't consumed it. And as an artist, I believe, or as somebody personally that strives to make art or to be an artist. I really believe that so much of good art, again, is communication and it's relations and it's making connections with other people. And so for me, it's like, go be a good person. Go experience, go read books, go learn life so that you have more ways to connect to more people. And that as you just try to, as the artist, be well read and be experienced in life and listen to perspectives and try to be compassionate and try to understand that naturally, what comes out of you will be a deeper, richer language in whatever I guess that medium is. But it is shocking how, like a patriarchal blessing, like, just throughout your life, it's just crazy how you were for sure that this is what it meant, and then life changes and you realize, oh, my goodness, this is even a deeper meaning for what that could have been. [00:10:22] Speaker A: Anyways, patriarchal blessing is a great reFerence, and I think we get used to learning in a linear pattern. Talk about math, right? You need to know how to add before you multiply, or spelling, and you need to learn your alphabet. You need to start learning this. And there's things that you have to learn before you can learn the other. But in a lot of these things, it's not a linear learning. It's a circular learning in the sense that there is no clear starting point. You don't know where to jump in. And sometimes you have to go right in the middle of the circle and you're going to be lost because you don't have the context before, and you're coming right in the middle. Right. And you just start reading and you don't understand. But as you read and you go through, you start to pick up the context and understand to where it helps the next time through. And it helps the next time through. And it's almost a very circular way of learning rather than a linear way of learning. And I think that's why we go back to the temple often. I think that's why we read our patriarchal blessings and return back to the Scriptures, because it's messy. It's not a clear I starting here, I'm finishing here, and now I'm going to know everything. It's a mess. We just got to start somewhere. And as we go through it, we'll see things. And it's almost one eternal round. We just take another pass and another pass and another pass, and even the. [00:11:49] Speaker B: Word remember, we'll remember. I feel like a lot of the things that we maybe have read and didn't think too much about because contextually, it wasn't where we were or needed or whatever that is. As life provides us opportunities to have new context around those things, we'll remember. And I love that word always. And that word continues to reveal itself as so much more of an incredible and profound idea. Remembering. [00:12:25] Speaker A: It's been a lot on my mind lately. I mean, you've really started a fire for me with remember and seeing that so much in the New Testament. So it was kind of a nice shout out in the Christmas message. And I don't remember her namE, ironically enough, but boy, she just drove that. And remember. It's important. I think we forget often the only way we remember is that familiarity, being in the content. And that's what it's going to do for us. And these symbols start to take on meaning as we become more familiar with it, as it becomes a bigger part of us, I think it comes to life and maybe something else that might be frustrating but hopeful at the same time. Joseph Smith, when commenting on the Book of Revelation, and I don't know, maybe he said it tongue in cheek just to frustrate people, or maybe he was sincere. He said that the Book of Revelation was the most plain book God ever caused to be written. I don't know if that's just his perspective as a prophet because he understood it very well, or if he's just trying to make people feel bad about where they were. [00:13:35] Speaker B: Maybe it's just he was being funny. Maybe it's like, trust me, the Book of Isaiah is the most straightforward book ever made. Maybe it was a joke. [00:13:46] Speaker A: Maybe it was a joke, but it does. I don't know. Let's see how plain we can make this tonight. And I think having that context taking us to that starting point, because chapter six is going to be cracking open each one of these seals. And when we understand that each seal represents 1000 years of history, I say that, right? And you're kind of either taking my word for it, or maybe it deserves a little bit of explaining of why. Is this what the Seven Seals represent? And if we go and work our way, perhaps backwards, it seems maybe more familiar with things in our time. It helps us to understand what these seals mean, maybe in times past that we're less familiar with. And so when we talk about what happens in the 7th seal, and we're talking about Christ coming and ruling all the nations, this becomes a very apparent. We're talking millennial themes, we're talking about the end of the world. And as we talk about the 6th Seal and going and gathering people and sealing them to the Lord and this restorative process and bringing the people back in salvation through the atonement of Jesus Christ, it seems to match with our understanding of during this thousand years. At some point you're going to have a restoration of the Gospel heading up into the millennium, and then you back up one more seal before that. And they talk about the martyrdom of saints and what time period is more appropriate to be highlighted by the martyrdom of saints than the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and of the eleven of the Twelve apostles that follow him, right? I say eleven. I mean, Judas kind of offed himself. I don't know if that really counts as a martyrdom, but most of the apostles, right, being martyred and then not even just that, I mean, the persecution from the Jews trying to stone and kill and slay. But then you even have the Romans and the Coliseum and the persecutions that these guys felt and all of these people that died simply for what they believe. It seems like a good characterization of that one thing to maybe put into context when they're opening the seals and reading this book. It's not like John is going there. And let me describe every event that's going to happen within that thousand year period of time. He's taking something that he can highlight from that time period and saying, this represents this time, this represent because this was prominent here. Because this was prominent here. And when we talk about the millennium and the millennium being a time of 1000 years of peace, it's 1000 year period of history. It's the 7th Seal. But when we look at that 7th seal being cracked and open, there's a lot of horrific things or a lot of scary things or a lot of intimidating things that you wouldn't necessarily associate with peace. But maybe it's not that there's a whole thousand years, and every one of those years represented this peaceful Kumbaya moment on Earth. But the great achievement is that during that thousand year period of time, world peace was achieved. And that's something so memorable that we're going to note that for the accomplishment of that time period. So if we start working our Way backwards, we can see that these Seals represent different periods of time. We can associate that which is familiar with us. So going to the very beginning, then when we start reading, he opens the first seal and he sees a horse, right? He sees, let's see, verse two of chapter six. And I saw him behold a white horse. And he that sat on him had a bow and a crown given him, and he went forth conquering to conquer. And then he opened the second seal and he said, come and see. And he sees another Person Riding a horse. These are the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. And I think a lot of people equate the Four Horsemen with the ApocalyPse as something that's going to come towards the end of time, the crisis, you got the Four Horsemen and the end of the world and all these crazy things. But if you understand this book is representing six different SEALs leading up to the 7th SEAL, and that the first SEAL represented the First Thousand years, well, then that first White horse isn't some horse coming at the end of time to rain death down on the world. In fact, as we read the Book of Moses and we read about Enoch, and we see about how great of a Conqueror he was, that people would stand afar off and with his word, all of a sudden you start to see, okay, I can see this. This Dispensation marked this time period where this was happening. And then you follow it, know, look at the Famines that were happening. You look at Abraham and his Family that were dying, starving, and they had to send his sons down to Egypt where Joseph was able to feed him. You have this time period. I mean, Famine is sprinkled all throughout the world, but it seems like there's this time and Period where this is Happening, where this is more associated with. So when you start understanding some of these events in the history of the world as summarizing different time periods, I think it becomes a little bit less intimidating. And we're not waiting for Four Horsemen to come down and do some crazy Things. It puts these events in context. And as you look at what the world has been through, then you realize that what we have left to go maybe doesn't seem as crazy or unimaginable. We've been here, we've done that. Maybe it's not going to be so hard getting to the end. So let's fast forward to some of these seals, and let's just get to the Six seals. This is verse twelve, chapter six. And I beheld, and when he had opened the 6th seal, and Lo, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon as blood, and the stars of heaven fell into the earth, even as the fig casteth their untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. And the heaven departed as a scroll which is rolled together, and every mountain and island were moved out of their place. And the kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men, and the chief captains of the mighty men and every bondsman and every Freeman hid themselves in the dens and the rocks and the mountains, and said unto the mountains and the rocks fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of his wrath has come. And they associate that with the opening of the 6th Seal. And so if we're looking at this time period wise, we say it's about 4000 years roughly before Christ came. The first thousand years, zero to about 1000, would be the fifth seal. The 6th Seal would be somewhere around 1000 AD to 2000 AD. And I'm not using this to try to nail down specific dates to just kind of roughly look at what we're talking about. If we're saying that this equates to the opening of the 6th Seal, then we're saying that this roughly includes events that transpired almost 1000 years ago. And we talk about these things. The heaven departed as a scroll. When it's rolled together, every mountain and island were moved out of their places. These are things that we associate with the end of the world. And yet the world has existed a thousand years after these events happened. And if they got through those times, maybe those times aren't what we imagined them to be. If the heavens are disappearing, maybe the heavens are disappearing because there's a thick cloud or smoke in the air that's causing us to not see it. Maybe there's a massive volcanic eruption that's really disrupted the world. Maybe the whole new heaven and new Earth is because now we've got people who've only known one small corner of the world have spread out into a whole different world in a new continent, in a new area, and seeing things differently. And you think about the maps they had of the Earth back then versus the maps that we have today. Things change. And you want to talk about a new heaven, go back and try to understand how they understood the relationship between Earth and the heaven and the idea that everything revolved around the Earth or how simple or how small the heavens were to where we've been able to look now into the sky with telescopes and the advent of modern physics and understand the relationship with the Earth and how it fits and moves and revolves around the heavenly bodies. To understand our understanding of heaven today is vastly different than how they understood it a thousand years ago. And a lot of that happened, I would say, during the 6th seal. If we try to look at it from about 1000 to about 2000 AD, think of how much our understanding of the Earth and the heavens have changed. You think about the astronomers that we've had in Tyco Brache, in Copernicus and Galileo, and you think about the advances in physics with Isaac Newton and even Albert Einstein. We've had some of the greatest minds really redefine how we view the heavens and the Earth. So maybe we open up our minds a little bit and look at some of the things that we've been through and realize, you know, what? We've been through this. It's not so scary. I'm not maybe as afraid as I was to face whatever's coming ahead of me, too. And maybe we've been through a lot of the garbage. Maybe our ancestors went through a lot of that. And maybe I don't need to be so terrified. I don't know. There's something comforting about knowing that other people have been through it or that we've survived that. Knowing that, you know what? I can do this too, if that makes sense. [00:23:41] Speaker B: Yeah. There's also been a lot of heinous things that have happened even before that though, too. When you think of how terrifying life would have been during various plagues throughout history, during just times of war and misery and lack of basic food, water, all of those things, it's like to your point, as much as we know that things are going to get gnarlier as we get closer to the Second Coming, we can also be hopefully very thankful that we live in a time of relative peace, at least in relation to the last 5000 years on this earth. Man, we can raise our kids knowing that we're not going to need to teach them how to use a sword just so that we can protect the little farm that we can hopefully grow some food on before it gets taken by a king and some other feuding tribe is just going to come through and wipe us out before the age of 30. As much as we know that things are going to get crazy and things are and can be, I also am just thankful so much that we do still just live in such a relative time of peace and comfort. And I sometimes worry that the things that are going to be the craziest are going to be so self inflicted out of potentially our own, not laziness, but sometimes our own, I don't know, passive nature. Like, it's almost too comfortable that a lot of the things I think are going to be made worse because of a lot of people's indifference and a lot of people's kind of unwillingness to actually do hard things and unwillingness to step up to the plate because they've had just such a relatively easy, comforting go of it to that point that their, I don't know, not placency, but just sometimes the general, I don't know, non assertiveness in life, I think, is going to be the catalyst to a lot of the gnarliest things that are going to happen. [00:26:21] Speaker A: You put that well, because we live in a society where the term cruel and unusual punishment exists. I know. That's amazing. Right? [00:26:31] Speaker B: And it's not even exactly definable. That's the funny thing, too. But keep going. [00:26:35] Speaker A: Yeah. And in a society where we become very critical in how parents are raising their children and what discipline looks like and what it can and what it can't include. When we put that in perspective, I'm not trying to make judgment on what's right or wrong as far as raising kids, but I am trying to say, look at what we are critical of today in relationship to times before when punishment, I mean, look at Braveheart, look at the London Tower. Look at the Spanish Inquisition. Look at how people treated people not just behind closed doors in your house, but government sponsored. The more cruel, the more creative, the more unusual, the more effective. Like, let's sign up for that. Here's a new technique that's even more gruesome than the last. We've come through some pretty dark times in history where we were being very creative on how to create bad environments, how to torture people. Like here. Let me see if I can't inflict pain in a cruel and unusual way. Yeah. To where we're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Let's draw some lines. I know this person did some horrific things, but they still have rights. [00:27:54] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. I wonder what, when we say we only know that it's going to get worse and we do accept, like, there's going to be wars and rumors of wars, and there is, and I feel like there always kind of has been. So when we do say, oh, I think it's only going to get worse, there's a lot of things that, it leaves it open to interpretation, I guess. What does that actually mean? How can it get worse than the Dark Ages? [00:28:35] Speaker A: Maybe the focus is, I know it's going to get better. I mean, isn't the millennium supposed to be known for 1000 years of peace? How do we get to 1000 years of peace if we're not improving on the lessons that we've learned in the past? Maybe things aren't going to be as bad as what we imagined them to be. Maybe a lot of that is behind us, hoPefully. [00:28:59] Speaker B: I also try not to be naive enough, though, to think that we couldn't find ways of having life be pretty insane. [00:29:08] Speaker A: Yeah. And I can't say that we've passed it all. When we get to the 7th seal opening, let's get there, right? Let's get there. So chapter seven after these things. And so this is talking about the 6th Seal opening and we're talking kind of wrapping things up before we even get to the 7th seal. So this is towards the end of the 6th seal, after these things, I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor the sea, nor any tree. And I think about the winds. The Lord talks about his winds for scattering, and I will send my winds and the east wind for destruction and the winds and the four corners of the earth, and I will drive them to and fro the winds of scattering. And so what's he doing at the end of the 6th seal? So we should expect somewhere towards the end of 1000 to roughly 2000, there's going to be a pause in the commotion and the scattering and the pushing people around to the four corners of the earth. You want to talk about driving people out to the four corners of the earth. You look at during this time period, this thousand year span, discovering the New World and people seeking religious freedom and going and populating the four corners of the earth. But towards the end there's going to be a pause and we're not going to be scattering and driving people to the edge of the earth anymore. If we're having a pause, it's so that we can start pulling it together, so that we can start gathering it. That's what I see in this. When he starts holding the wind, it's to start gathering. And you see that verse two. And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. And he cried with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, saying, hurt not the earth, neither the sea nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads. So we're going to put a pause to the destruction and we're going to start gathering people. And that sounds like what we've been talking about when we talk about the awful, horrific things we've come to, where we're enjoying relative peace and we're seeing a gospel restored towards the end of that thousand years, 1820 when Joseph Smith has his first vision, 1830, when the Church is restored. You're wrapping up that thousand year period with the Lord starting to seal his people, gather them together and calm the winds to start to organize things. And it's interesting, it says, and I heard the number of them, which were sealed. They were sealed, 144,000. All the tribes of Israel, the tribe of Judah, 12,000. And I'm not going to read all of this. I'm going to sum it up with twelve tribes. Out of each tribe, there was 12,000. And it comes to the sum then, twelve times 12,000, 144,000. And the question I think that a lot of us dwell on is, who are the 144,000? What is the meaning of the 144,000? What are we supposed to take away from this? And we look at our church. If we believe that this is the Church of Jesus Christ and this is the calming of the winds to gather and seal in these people, we're a lot higher than 144,000. And I would say we're stacked heavily in the Ephraim camp. So where are we supposed to take with this? What are we supposed to run with this? And I think that we unfairly focus too much on the 144 and miss the next verse. And this, to me, blew me away. So this is verse nine. After this, I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number of all nations and kindreds and people and tongues stood before the throne and before the lamb, clothed with white robes and palms in their hands. So who are the ones that the Lord is gathering and sealing and bringing to him? It's not just the 144,000 from Israel. It's a numberless host. And this was the promise made to Abraham. Look at the stars and tell me if you can count them. Look at the sands of the sea and tell me if you can count them. That's going to be your posterity. It's not 144,000, 12,000 from each of these twelve sons. That's just the beginning. And so when I look at this symbolically, it's almost that we owe a debt of gratitude to our Jewish heritage, our Jewish ancestors, that brought us these teachings, that gave us the acquaintance to who God is, that laid the foundation that represent a very orderly twelve from twelve tribes and 12,000. And putting this all together so that a great multitude that could not be numbered could be saved, almost. Go back to that first promise to Abraham, and he said, you will have a son. And then he's asking him to sacrifice his son, but what does he gain? Abraham 17, you will inherit all the nations, not just the one. You almost sacrificed the one to get everyone else, and then he doesn't even end up having to sacrifice the one. He gets the one, too. The Lord does still maintain and have his love for his original Israel, and he will save them, and he will number them, and he will count them and bring them into his fold, but because of them, many more will be saved. It's not a limited 144,000 seating, where you have to ask the question, am I 01:00 a.m.. I one of the 144? We don't have to be one of the 144. That verse, the very next verse, I think we all miss it because we focus so much on that, a numberless countitude so great that no man could count them from every nation. And that's why it was so important so early on when the church was restored. And you think you can't even take care of things at home. You're being chased out of your house, and your women are being treated poorly, your kids starving in the wintertime. And yet what are the men doing being called to missions all over the world? Because we need to start calling in from every corner, all over the place. It's fulfilling this scripture. It was that important. That's how I see it. And the beautiful thing about these people, let's go down to verse 14. And I said unto them, sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, you know what? I should read verse 13, because you missed the question with that. Verse 13. And one of the elders answered, saying unto me, what are these? Which are arrayed in white robes? And whence came they? So you can almost see the question. We had the 144,000. We had it all organized. Who in the world are all these other people? Where did they come from, the numberless hosts that are all clothed in white? Who are they? Where do they come from? Now, the answer to that question in verse 14. And I said unto them, sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, these are they which came out of great tribulation. And the Greek word here translated for tribulation is the press, the oil press, the wine press that we see that's associated with the atonement of Jesus Christ. And this is the wonderful thing about revelation is this imagery and this dual meaning that it takes on, because we're the ones in the wine press now rather than Christ. And from the wine press, the pressure, the tribulation, they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Again, this is some powerful imagery. And as we were reading this in the. Come follow me with my kids. I mean, this really stumped them. How in the world can you make your robes white? By washing it in blood. Wouldn't it make all your robes red? And I think there's something in that when we talk about our robes becoming white. Because his was red, yet isn't it the other way around? Because we were red, he had to be white in order to take our stains. And you go back to Isaiah, chapter one, verse 18. Though your sins be as Scarlet, yet they'll be as white as snow. Right. And though your sins be talking about them being red and being cleansed white and made white only through the sacrifice of Christ, we've talked about this. Is he the lion? Is he the Lamb? Is he the one that's treading the winepress or the one that's being tread upon? And it's all of the above, but so are we. And we're the ones treading the wine press, but we're the ones being tread upon. We're the ones with the Red garments, and yet we're the ones with the white ones. He's the one with the white, but he's the. It's just interesting to see this interplay. And there's going to be a lot of that. Sorry. That's kind of good stuff. Yeah. And maybe one last point with this verse. The fact that they had to wash their robes should tell us something. These people aren't perfect. They didn't come to Christ with white robes. They came to Christ with dirty robes, and yet they were still saved. And let's not wait for our robes to be white before we approach Christ, or I promise you, they will never be white. Christ is for us that have the stained robes, the embarrassing things that we don't want to see Christ because we feel like we need to hide. That's the reason we need to come to him, so that we can find a way that only through him can those stains be removed. Love it. All right, let's go. Chapter eight. And when he had opened the 7th Seal, there was silence in heaven for the space of half an hour. And it's important to note that they're saying, in heaven is the silence. And when you talk about silence, the word of God is quick, is powerful, is judgment. And if he's holding, abstaining from speaking, if there's silence, it's almost as if he's withholding judgment. There's a time of silence in a half hour in heaven, whatever that equates to here on earth where the heavens are holding back their judgment. And I think we see that when we read about people saying, well, he's delaying his coming, or he's not coming at all, or he's given up on us, or the heavens are closed, or whatever the case may be. He's giving us a chance to repent, to make it right, to withhold judgment until we can fix it, till we can wash our clothes clean. That's what he's doing. And he's not being quick to censor us, to condemn us, to blame us for every little thing we do. He's showing us love and giving us the opportunity to wash our clothes white for a space of time before the judgments start coming out so that we don't get caught up in it. That's how I see it. And then we get to verse two. And I saw seven angels which stood before God, and to them were given seven trumpets. And they're going to start doing some crazy things with these trumpets. The first one. And the smoke of the incense which came up with the prayers out of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand. And the angel took the censer and filled it up with fire at the altar and cast it to the earth. And there were voices and thunderings and lightnings and an earthquake. The reason I bring that up is location. Location. We've talked about this before. When John opens this vision, he hears a voice and he turns and he sees the menorah. And then he describes this passage through the temple, going through the veils, and it all starts for John in the Holy place and takes you up to the Holy of Holies. Well, in here, when they open the 7th seal, the incense altar is also another piece of furniture in the Holy place. So here we have. The Holy place is where the 7th seal begins. He's taking coals from this. So setting location, I think this is important because fast forward, he's going to go through all these plagues and we'll see what we get to. But chapter eleven, verse one. And there was given me a reed like a rod. And the angel stood saying, rise and measure the Temple of God and the altar, and them that worship therein. But the court which is without the temple, leave out and measure it not, for it is given unto the Gentiles. And the Holy City shall be tread under 40 in two months. And I will give power unto my two witnesses and they shall prophesy a 1203 score days clothed in sackcloth. For John. He's measuring the temple. He's measuring the incense altar inside the temple, those that worship in the temple. But everything outside the temple he's leaving out. So we keep going back to this. What's outside is going to be tread down and destroyed. And how do you get in? Because everything in this vision keeps going back to being inside of this temple, being inside the Holy place. And we're Going to start looking at what happened to the people that are outside, because this is the context, the setting when he talks about a dragon waging a war with Michael and with his tail drew away a third part of the heavens. These are the ones that never made it through the first veil. And I think about this, the first veil being birth, and they didn't make it out. They're going to be tread, it's outer darkness, it's out, whatever. And those who were willing made it here. This is where it starts. This is what's measured, this is what's saved, this is what's going to be resurrected. And so going back to John and his measuring stick, everything that he measures is going to be saved. Everything that's not measured is going to be. And to some extent, all of us that have come here on this earth have made it into this holy place. The earth is the holy place. We're going to be saved to some degree. [00:44:11] Speaker B: Okay, like it? [00:44:14] Speaker A: Let's take this and go back to that Michael Dragon in chapter twelve and see if I can't make some sense out of this too. Verse one. And there appeared a great wonder. And it's interesting, this word wonder in the Greek Semaron is sign, mark or token. In heaven, a woman clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars. And she being with child, cried, travailing in birth and painful to be delivered. It's important to note that this sign is in the heavens. So as John's talking about things that are happening, he looks up and he's looking at the stars. And when you try to look at the stars, we have a constellation, Virgo, which is a virgin, which is a woman. And at her feet is this serpent, this dragon constellation. And at the above her head is Leo, the lion constellation. And within Leo you have regum the. So when we start looking at these signs that he sees in the heaven, it's almost as if to help us always remember, these images are put in front of us every night to remind us, to remind us, to remind us. And what John's going to do is take these images and then explain what they're supposed to be reminding us of. And when he talks about it being clothed in the sun. This happens every September. This is why Virgo's associated with September. The sun, as the Earth moves, and how it works as the Earth revolves around the sun, the constellation. What's a good way to try to illustrate this verbally? The sun is inevitably always going to be between the Earth and a constellation. So in September, the constellation that the sun is going to be in or blocking or over is Virgo. And so Virgo is clothed in the sun, literally, from our point of view, looking up at this at Earth. And then the Moon also traverses all of the different constellations. But rather than doing it on an annual schedule, it's doing it through a monthly schedule. So the moon will be at the feet of Virgo a few days in the month of September. This happens every year. It's an annual process. And then you have the Leo above, Virgo, Virgo, representing this Virgin who's going to bear a child, and he's going to have the king. And then you have the serpent that will have power to bruise his heel, but he will have power to crush his head. And so John is going to do his best to give us the backdrop to these signs in the heavens. And when he does this, he says, and there appeared a wonder in heaven. And behold, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns. We'll get into those later. Upon his head and his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven and had cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman, which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born. And she brought forth a man child who was to rule all nations with the Rod of Iron. And her child was caught up unto God and to his throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she had place prepared for God, and that they should feed her for two score or for a 1203 score days. And there was a war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels and prevailed not. Neither was their place found anymore in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, the old serpent called the Devil and Satan, which deceived the whole world. He was cast out to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. And they talk about this, too. And now I heard a loud voice saying, in heaven, now has come the salvation and strength of the kingdom of God and the power of Christ. For the accuser of his brethren is cast down, and they overcame him by the power of the blood. Now, verse twelve. Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. However, woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the sea, for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time. All right, let's try to make sense of this. He was cast out of heaven down to earth. And where was all of this happening? It's important to understand that this is happening all in the heavens. And if we understand that this was happening in the heavens, not here on earth, but that he was cast down to the earth, then maybe another important question is to ask is when and if Satan was cast down to earth and waged war here on earth? We have to look at when was the first time we see Satan here on earth, trying to destroy God's creation, Adam and Eve. So he was cast out before the beginning. So this war that's being waged, what John is doing is he is looking at the signs in the heaven and not describing things that are going to be happening in the 7th Seal, not describing things that are happening in his current seal, but he's looking at these and saying, let me give you context to what's happening here on earth. These signs that you see every night in the stars are supposed to point us to remember that there was a war waged in heaven where Satan and a third of his hosts, a third of the hosts of heaven rebelled against God, and they could no longer stay in heaven. They were cast down to the earth because they left the heaven. The heavens could rejoice. But woe to those who Were on Earth, because you're sharing that place of habitation with Satan and a third of the hosts of heaven that were sent here as well. This is where it's taught in the Bible, and Semi plainly that Satan and his host rebelled and were cast out to Earth and sent here, where we also live. Boy, that just seems long. Great. [00:50:57] Speaker B: It's long, but we got to know it, dude. [00:51:00] Speaker A: All right, this is our circular learning as opposed to linear learning. That's right. And hopefully just diving in, it's what. [00:51:07] Speaker B: We got to do. [00:51:09] Speaker A: I'm going to take us to Psalms 82 on this. [00:51:11] Speaker B: Okay. [00:51:13] Speaker A: And hopefully this is going to go hand in hand with what we're reading. God stands in the Congregation of the gods. And I know if you're reading and following along with me, in the King James, it says that he stands in the Congregation of the mighty, but here in the Hebrew the mighty, literally is Elohim, God. The one God, stands in the congregation of gods, the many gods. And you can see that that's what the text says, because the very next line confirms it. He, God, judge among the gods. Lowercase G, the many gods. Now, who are these many gods that he's talking about? Who is this host of heaven that God is standing among and judging? Let's learn about these gods, because it says verse two. How long will you judge unjustly and accept the persons of the wicked? So what's the character? What's the nature of these gods? Imperfect. These gods are imperfect gods. And so this is, Psalms 82 is the locker room speech a coach gives his team before they take the field. I'm looking at you. How long are you guys going to be? Maybe even a halftime speech, because you know what? You're out there blowing it, and I need you to change some things up, right? And he says, defend the poor and the Fatherless. Do justice to the afflicted and the needy. Deliver the poor and the needy. Rid them out of the hand of the wicked. They know not, neither will they understand. They walk in darkness. All the foundations of the earth are out. Of course. I said, you are gods. And all of you children of THE MOST HiGH, AND THIS IS THE MOST HiGH, AddRESSING THEM. I'm telling you guys, you are gods, but you shall die like. And it says men here. But that word in Hebrew is Adam, and it can be translated as man or Adam. I like to translate it as Adam. You shall die like Adam and fall like one of the princes. We're talking about a physical death, Adam and a spiritual death. One of the princes, Satan, the dragon that was cast out, all of you are going to sin. All OF YOU ARE GOiNG To PHySICALLY DIE. I'm telling you, you're gods, but you're going to go through this mortal experience. And he says, arise, Elohim. IT SAyS, oh, GOD. BUT THIS IS THE ELOHIM AGAIN. The gods with the lowercase G judge the Earth. And this is the line that's most important to me here, for you shall inherit all nations. Go BacK TO THE SERMON ON THe MOUNT. When Christ said, the meek shall inherit the earth, what did it take for us to be able to inherit the earth? When God said, I have a plan, we had to be meek enough to accept his plan and say, here am I, send me. And those that said, I have a better plan were not meek. They didn't come here to inherit the earth. They were cast out to the earth. But they didn't enter the earth, if that makes any sense. I WANt TO TaKE THIS BacK. We made it through the first veil coming here. This Earth is our inheritance. God has given us an opportunity to be like God. He's given us the coach, the pep talk. And doing that, we have entered past the first veil into the holy place. The earth is our holy place. It was prepared for us. It's sacred for our experience, for our learning, for our becoming like Jesus Christ. And the Holy place is surrounded with images of Christ, with the menorah, with the showbread altar, with the table, with the incense altar. AND THOSE WHO WERE CAST OUT TO EARTH DIDN'T PASS THROUGH THE VEIL. They're the ones in the courtyard that John is saying when he says, measure, measure those that are therein, measure the temple, measure those that are going to be saved. THOSE ThAT ARE ThE OUTsIDE ARE not going to be saved. Sweet. [00:55:33] Speaker B: Let's keep going. Joe Smith was right, dude. Just plain as day. [00:55:39] Speaker A: I hope it's plain, and I hope I'm not just talking too long on mean. [00:55:44] Speaker B: We got to move on, though. [00:55:46] Speaker A: We do have to move on. But this is what John's trying to describe. This is the context. So when we start going through some of the signs of what's going to happen, let's see. Verse. So, chapter eight. I'm going backwards now. And the first angel sounded, and there followed hell and fire mingle with blood, and they were cast upon the earth. And the third part of the trees were burnt up, and all the green grass was burnt up. And the second angel sounded as if were a great mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea. And a third part of the heaven became blood. And the third part of the creation, which were in the sea, had died. And a third, and a third, and a third, and a third, and what is he doing here? John's giving us the context and the imagery and the symbol. Yes, there's life here on Earth. But a third part of the creation was destroyed. A third part of the creation was wasted. A third part is here waging war with the saints, with the people, with those who listened. And it was the meek that inherit the earth. And it'll only be the meek that can take the next step and move on. Got it? All right. Love it. [00:57:16] Speaker B: Got time for, like, one more. [00:57:17] Speaker A: Like, this is. This is the end. [00:57:20] Speaker B: All right. [00:57:22] Speaker A: This is the end. [00:57:25] Speaker B: Let me some of the doors right now. Is that what you're saying? [00:57:30] Speaker A: Let's go to chapter eleven. After John measured everything. We'll finish with this. Verse three. And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy 1203 score days. There's a couple of things that I hope you guys notice. As we keep reading this over and over and over again. He'll say time, times and half a time. And if you add single time with double time, that's three and then half a time, three and a half, that shows up a lot. When he says 42 months, it is twelve months, and another twelve months is 24 and another is 36. And then you take half a year and that's 42. So 42 months is another way of saying time, times and half a time, which is also another way of saying three and a half years. And he uses these numbers, which is also the same thing, by the way, as saying 1260 days. So he'll say it by days, he'll say it by months, he'll say it by years, and he'll say it by times. But he's saying the same thing every time. And he's going to refer to this here, 1203 score days, clothed in sackcloth. These are the two olive trees and the two candlesticks standing before God of the earth. And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth and devoureth their enemies. And if any man will hurt them, he must be in this manner killed. These shall have power to shut up heaven in the rain. And they're going to be invincible until the time when the beast raises up and kills them. And this is the prophecy of the two prophets. But I wanted to point out a few things here. I think we've always associated this prophecy with two prophets dying in Jerusalem. That's what I've always grown up knowing. But as I read this revelation, I don't see it per se, because here's what it's saying. It's saying, I will give power unto my two witnesses. And what are the two witnesses? Because I think witnesses becomes a lot more broad than just prophets. It says they'll prophesy, but it doesn't necessarily call them prophets. It's not until we read doctrine covenants, when Joseph Smith, they ask him the question about this, and he refers to them as prophets. But then where do we get the idea that they die in Jerusalem? Because it says in verse eight, and their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great City, which spiritually is called Sodom. You're like, wait, spiritually it's called Sodom. That's Jerusalem. That seems like a weird stretch to me. But then he says, and Egypt. Wait, is it Sodom or Egypt, because those two are kind of far away from each other on a map where also our Lord was crucified. Well, now we get Jerusalem, and it's like we took those three locaTions, Sodom, Egypt, and where the Lord was crucified. Well, I know where the Lord was crucified. I'm sticking with that one. They're going to die in Jerusalem, but where? It doesn't necessarily say. In fact, what they're doing is quoting three evil references. And I think of Jerusalem as being this holy city. And John's going to refer to Jerusalem as a holy city. I don't know that we can limit what happens to them to things that are going to have to happen in the city of Jerusalem. It's not in the Book of Revelation. I'm not sure where that comes from. [01:00:50] Speaker B: Okay. I mean, is it doctrine of covenants where it comes? [01:00:54] Speaker A: That I. Not that I read. [01:00:56] Speaker B: Okay. [01:00:57] Speaker A: I'm going to have to try to figure out where that came from. [01:00:59] Speaker B: Okay. Awesome. Maybe somebody listening can point us in that direction, too, if, you know, off the top of your head. [01:01:05] Speaker A: Well, we try to think of two witnesses. What are the two witnesses? And to me, this almost becomes interesting. In fact, boy, when we start reading this, what happens when they're dead? Verse ten. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another, because these two prophets tormented them, or that dwelt on earth. And after three days and half the spirit of life from God entered unto them, and they stood their feet, and great fear fell upon them that saw them. And then what happens is they're carried up into heaven, and that's kind of the end of them. When I was thinking about this, Christ was dead for three days, and after three days, his spirit came back into his body, and then he was caught up into heaven and went back to God. And you know what? We mark his death. Well, we mark his birth. We celebrate by giving gifts to each other. With Christmas every year, how is that different? [01:02:12] Speaker B: Even in Easter? I mean, a lot of people for Easter give presents and things like that, too. Traditionally. [01:02:20] Speaker A: Yeah. How is that different? And when we talk about the two witnesses, you bring up a good point. What if the two witnesses, then, in this case, are Easter and Christmas? What could two witnesses be? What if the two witnesses is Judaism and Christianity? [01:02:43] Speaker B: Interesting. [01:02:44] Speaker A: Both of which rejected their God, both of which ruled with an iron fist and issued out fire to destroy anyone that went against them, that didn't agree with their way of believing punishable by death. [01:03:01] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:03:04] Speaker A: And yet they had their end, but both witnessed and testified to the nature of God. What if it refers to the Jews and the Gentiles? What if it refers to the Old Testament and the New Testament? Are they not also witnesses of Christ? [01:03:18] Speaker B: Sure. Absolutely. [01:03:20] Speaker A: What if it refers to the Bible and the Book of Mormon? [01:03:24] Speaker B: There you go. [01:03:25] Speaker A: What if it refers to Joseph Smith and Hiram Smith? What if it refers to. I don't. Just the symbolism of this just starts to come to life. [01:03:40] Speaker B: It is interesting, too, that we celebrate Christmas and Hanukkah, even kind of at the same time when you brought up the Jews and the Christians. [01:03:51] Speaker A: And what if it's the Jews and the Gentiles? [01:03:53] Speaker B: Yeah, that's what I mean. The Jews and the Gentiles, right? [01:03:55] Speaker A: Yeah, right next to each other. [01:03:59] Speaker B: I love thought provoking questions like that. That's going to be fun to kind of think through. [01:04:07] Speaker A: And maybe there are still two prophets that are literally going to die somewhere that this is really going to happen. [01:04:13] Speaker B: But it's just hard to believe that everybody's going to be celebrating their deaths because these prophets were tormenting them. Because that's the question then that it would beg to ask is, okay, say you send over a couple of the Twelve Apostles. I just don't feel like they're going over to Jerusalem to torment people. [01:04:33] Speaker A: Well, see, this is the weird thing, too, because you look at the fact that there's two and they're tormenting everyone, and if anyone speaks out against them, it's death, right? Yet this represents witnesses of God, the good guys. Then in revelation, we're going to get to. And there was a beast that arose out of the sea with so many horns and this, whatever, this great beast, right? And then he's wounded with a sword and another beast rises up out and you have these two beasts that everyone has to worship. And it's almost like these two beasts are in contrast with these two prophets. And you're like, wait, what's the difference? And the beasts are wounded by the sword, and these prophets are going to die in the street, and yet they both torment people, and people are going to be celebrating their death, and they both look out to be the bad guy, but yet one's God and one's not. It's kind of interesting how in the revelation it's going to paint Babylon as this Woman, and then it's going to describe her as a whore, the whore that sits on the many waters, that does all these things, and then it's going to go and it's going to describe Zion as a Woman, but wasn't Zion also in a sense, a whore that left the Lord that went to go worship other gods that turned away? And yet he talks about her being the bride. And yet the way he describes both Babylon and Zion are almost in identical terms. And we look at it and say, well, Babylon was obviously the wrong one. And we're like, well, wait, wasn't Zion the one that turned away from God? And you almost have the same thing with the Jews and the Gentiles and this whole, I don't know, it's fascinating, the imagery and the ideas that he uses and maybe challenge our perception on what is it to be the good guy versus the bad guy. I mean, at the end of the day, the saints are washing their garments clean because they were stained with blood, but yet they're using blood to wash them clean. I don't. It's, I love it. [01:06:54] Speaker B: Like Joseph Smith said, just clear as mud. [01:06:57] Speaker A: It's the plainest book ever written. [01:07:02] Speaker B: Jason, thank you as always for all the prep that you put into this is I've just enjoyed sitting back and kind of just listening to this one and taking it in and gave me a lot of fun, thought provoking stuff to think about. The Book of Revelation is intense. I'm going to have to disagree with our beloved prophet on this one. This is not the most plain book for the majority of us. But yeah, I feel like I could probably point to some books that are a little bit more plain and straightforward. Thank you so much for listening. We have only a few episodes left of this year. Then we get to get into the Book of Mormon, complete the cycle, I guess. All four of the standard works, I guess we love any appreciate any questions or comments feedback you can get a hold of us. The email address of [email protected] we do what we can to respond to everything when we have time, but this is not our full time gig and we do have lives and families and responsibilities. So forgive us if we're not immediately responding to everything it check out our new podcast starting in January of 2024 called Inevitable Art. And if that's it, then I guess next week, right? [01:08:36] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay, see you.