D. L. Moody, the man of God, made the resolution, shortly after he himself was saved, that he would never let 24 hours pass over his head without speaking to at least one person about his soul. One night he got home late and went to bed. Then, he realized that he had not spoken to a soul that day about accepting Jesus. He said to himself, “Well, it is no good getting up now; there will be nobody on the street at this hour of night.” But anyway, he got up, dressed and went to the front door. It was pouring rain. He said, “Oh, there will be no one out in this pouring rain.” Just then he heard a man’s footsteps as he came down the street, holding an umbrella over his head. Then, Mr. Moody darted out and rushed up to the man and said: “May I share the shelter of your umbrella?” “Certainly,” the man replied. Then, Mr. Moody said, “Do you have any shelter in the time of storm?” and preached Jesus to him.[1]
When the World Collapses
Let me ask you the same question, “Do you have any shelter in the time of storm?” The main point of today’s passage is this: There is no security, no firm ground to stand on, nothing in the universe to depend on except God himself. The rest of creation will pass away. As we explore the Book of Revelation, we need to remember that the visions in Revelation are symbolic, not literal. In verses 12-14 John sees six parts of the cosmos destroyed: earth, sun, moon, stars, heaven, and “every mountain and island.” Who can even imagine that the sun would become black as ink, moon all bloody, stars falling out of the sky? This vision tells us that even the sun, moon, stars, mountains, and basically every creation on earth are temporary, passing away, wearing out. There is no security. There is nothing in this world to depend on. If we put this vision in our everyday language, it’s something like: “Do not put your security in anything that is temporary. You can lose your money, your job, your health, your reputation, your spouse, your family, and even your mind. But you cannot lose your relationship to God eternal. Put your security in God, God alone.”
In Psalm 62 David sings, “For God alone my soul waits in silence, for my hope is from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall not be shaken!” (6) David lived a difficult life. Because of his affair with Bathsheba, David had to accept the consequences of sin: the sword never left his house. There was a rape and murder between his children. Absalom, one of his sons, even claimed the throne for himself. But as he was going through all these trials, he learned to trust God. He learned to find security in God alone. So David exhorts the people of Israel and us today, “Trust in him at all times, O People; pour out your heart before him; God is a refuge for us” (8) Yes, God alone is our security.
The Wicked and The Righteous
Now we move on to next vision. From the next vision we learn what it means to put our security in God. Now in verses 15-17 John sees six classes of humanity who are hiding themselves from God’s presence and about to be judged: kings, great ones, rulers of thousands, the rich, the powerful, and “every slave and free man.” Though these six groups of people are diverse, they have one thing in common: they are those who live as they see fit. They are those who do whatever seems right in their own eyes (cf. Jg 17:6).
In Psalms they are called, “the wicked.” In particular, Psalm 1 tells us there are two ways of life – the way of the righteous and the way of the wicked. The righteous are those who love God, treasure His word and order their lives according to His word. In contrast, the wicked are those who don’t love God, don’t take God seriously and thus disregard His word. The psalmist says the wicked are like chaff. What is chaff? Chaff has no substance. It has no root. It constantly moves around wherever the wind blows. So do the wicked! They easily move with the times. They easily jump on the bandwagon. They live a wind-driven life like chaff. They go wherever they want. They do whatever they want. They love to consider themselves “free spirit.” But in reality, they are constantly swayed by the wind. They may be successful and great before people, but before God they will be blown away life chaff. And in the final judgment they will not stand.
The righteous are not so. They delight in the word of God. I love the word “delight.” In the Old Testament the word delight is used of a man delighting in a woman. I still remember the times when I had a date with Joyce. I was so excited. At that time I was busy with preparing to study abroad. So I had a heavy schedule. But because I delighted in Joyce, I rearranged all my schedules, all my priorities, so that suddenly I had plenty of time to spend with her. I did that not because I had to, but because I got to. Now let me ask you: Do you delight in God’s word in that sense? Do you set aside time and rearrange your priorities to spend in the word because you delight in it? Do you have your devotional time because you have to or because you get to?
Not only do the righteous delight in the word of God, but also they mediate on it day and night. The word “meditation” in Hebrew means to speak or to mutter. So meditating on the word of God day and night means to speak to yourself the word of God day and night and to speak to yourself about it. Meditating on the word of God day and night is like digesting food: chewing on the word, letting the word become part of you. As we mediate on the word day and night, our minds and hearts are being shaped by God. As we mediate on the word day and night, we become like sturdy trees, planted by streams of living water, yielding the fruit in its season.
Wonderful Words of Life
So how do we put our security in God? By delighting in and mediating on the word of God! Let me give you one example to encourage you and spur you more meditation and more delight. Here is the testimony of George Muller:[2]
Before this time my practice had been, at least for ten years previously, as a habitual thing, to give myself to prayer, after having dressed in the morning. Now I saw, that the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the Word of God and to meditation on it, that thus my heart might be comforted, encouraged, warned, reproved, instructed.
The first thing I did, after having asked in a few words the Lord's blessing upon His precious Word, was to begin to meditate on the Word of God, searching, as it were, into every verse, to get blessing out of it; not for the sake of the public ministry of the Word; not for the sake of preaching on what I had meditated upon, but for the sake of obtaining food for my own soul. The result I have found to be almost invariably this, that after a very few minutes my soul has been led to confession, or to thanksgiving, or to intercession, or to supplication; so that though I did not, as it were, give myself to prayer, but to meditation, yet it turned almost immediately more or less into prayer.
And yet now, since God has taught me this point, it is as plain to me as anything that the first thing the child of God has to do morning by morning is to obtain food for his inner man… and after having now above forty years tried this way, I can most fully in the fear of God, commend it. How different when the soul is refreshed and made happy early in the morning, from what it is when, without spiritual preparation, the service, the trials, and the temptations of the day come upon one!Psalm 1:6 summarizes today’s passage, Revelation 6:12-17, in essence: “For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.” Jesus said, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away” (Matt 24:35). Friends in Christ, let us put our security in God and His word alone. May the Lord increase your desire for His word and enable you to delight in it and meditate on it day and night!
Sing them over again to me,Wonderful words of life,Let me more of their beauty see,Wonderful words of life;Words of life and beautyTeach me faith and duty.
--------------------------------Beautiful words, wonderful words,Wonderful words of life;Beautiful words, wonderful words,Wonderful words of life.
[1] R. A. Torrey, Why God Used D. L. Moody (Billy Graham Center, 2005), 38-40.
[2] John Piper, “Delighting in the Law of God,” https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/delighting-in-the-law-of-god
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