Revelation | May 1, 2026

Start your day with a short, Scripture-centered devotional from Paul Michael. In about seven minutes, you will hear the Word, reflect on its truth, and be encouraged to live it out in everyday life.

Revelation | The Beginning of the End

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Transcript

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Welcome to your daily devotional with me, PMV. The last few times we've been finishing up the book of James. And now that that's done, we're going to jump back into the book of Revelation. We're going to finish the last major section of the book of Revelation, chapters 19 through 22. So as we come to this final section, it will focus a lot on the return of Jesus and then the resulting eternal state. But why does the return of Jesus matter? I want to give you two big reasons. First, the return of Jesus is prophesied about in hundreds of scriptures. And in fact, Jesus taught about his return. Many of his parables were about his return. So if Jesus does not return, then God's word is not true, and that would mean Jesus would be a liar. But we know that God keeps his promises and every prophecy will be fulfilled. Jesus will return, and we will see him who not only created the world, but came to save the world, and he will return as the judge of all. Second, Jesus must return to put an end to Satan and the evil of this world. In many ways, the last four chapters of Revelation, the last four chapters of the Bible, are a bookend to the first four chapters of the Bible, Genesis 1 through 4. In Genesis 1 through 4, God created all that we see, all that we know was created. But also in Genesis 1 through 4, Satan deceived Eve. Mankind sinned against God. A curse came upon God's perfect creation. Then we see the effects of this sinful nature played out as Cain murdered his brother Abel. So in the first four chapters of the Bible, we move from a perfect creation, man in the presence of God, to sin and ultimately murder. In the last four chapters of the Bible, we move from the destruction of Babylon and the forces of hell and a creation, we move to the creation of a new heavens and a new earth, and the presence of God dwelling in the midst of his people forever. God makes all things new. And the pinnacle of all of this is the return of Jesus. He is what brings all of this about. Everything has been waiting for this moment. So just like in Revelation chapters 17 and 18, we saw different dimensions of the fall of Babylon. We saw it from different perspectives. I think that Revelation 19 gives us two different vantage points of the return of Jesus. First, in Revelation 19, 1 through 10, we'll see the return of Jesus from the heavenly perspective. Then in Revelation 19, 11 through 22, we'll see the return of Jesus from the earthly perspective. Same event, just from two perspectives. We see this a lot in Revelation and in Jewish apocalyptic literature. So let's begin Revelation 19. Let's read the first two verses. After these things I heard a loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, saying, Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and honor belong to the Lord our God. For true and righteous are his judgments, because he has judged the great harlot who corrupted the earth with her fornication, and he has avenged on her the blood of his servants shed by her. Okay, so Babylon has fallen. God has destroyed those who oppressed and murdered his servants. And we've talked about the concept of God's righteousness and his justice and judgments. We've talked about this multiple times in Revelation. So we're not going to go over that again, but I do want you to notice one thing about verse 2. It says that he has avenged who? His servants. The word that we translate here as servant is the same word used in Revelation chapter 1, verse 1. The first verse of the book of Revelation reads, The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants, things which must shortly take place. And he sent and signified it by his angel to his servant John. Okay, so what did that say? The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his who? His servants. The book of Revelation was written to the servants of Jesus Christ to show them that one day God would avenge them, but also to warn them to hold fast until the end. You know, we need to understand this concept of being God's servants. As a believer in Jesus Christ, he is Lord, you are his servant. If it is your master or your Lord's will for you to suffer, will you do it? If your master has a valley for you to walk through, will you go through it with him? If he tells you to wait, will you? If he tells you to be courageous and move forward, will you? This key to understanding that we have a Lord, we have a master, and we are his servants. This is, I think, in many ways key to living the Christian life. If you get this, I think many things will fall in place for you. If you fight this or reject this, I think you'll just struggle with a lot of things in the Christian life. So going back to verse 1, notice the voice of the great multitude in heaven. Verse 1 says they cry out, Alleluia, salvation and glory and honor and power belong to the Lord our God. So the New King James translates the word here as hallelujah, but most other translations have hallelujah, and a more literal translation is praise Yahweh. It's also translated as praise the Lord. Why am I saying this? Well, in Revelation 19, this is the only place in the New Testament where this word is translated as hallelujah, and it is used four times in six verses. So there's a point of emphasis here that's being made that should get our attention. This is all about declaring the praises of God as he triumphs over his enemies and avenges his people. It is his praises that are issuing forth as God acts. But let's look at again what he's worthy of, why he's worthy of this praise. The hosts of heaven cry out with a loud voice, Praise the Lord. Then they continue, salvation and glory and honor and power belong to the Lord our God. So I want to break this down first. God is worthy of praise because salvation belongs to him. He alone is our salvation. He is our deliverer, he is mighty to save. Second, God is worthy of praise because glory belongs to him. We've seen this already in our series through Revelation. God is worthy of praise because of his very nature, because of who he is. Glory belongs to him, and it demands his praise. Third, God is worthy of praise because honor belongs to him. There is no other being above him. He alone is God, and there is an honor that is due to him alone. Fourth, God is worthy of praise because power belongs to him. The word translated here as power, the Greek word here, we get our English word dynamite from. Can you imagine if God wanted to save you, but he didn't have the power to save you? No, power belongs to our God and he is worthy of praise. Next, the heavenly praise continues in verse 3 saying, Again they said, Alleluia, her smoke rises up forever and ever. So at this point, this is the finality of the fall of Babylon. We've been building up to this. This is the finality of it. God is bringing evil to an end. This is the time that all creation has been waiting for in great anticipation. God is making all things new, and in this new creation, evil will have no place. Then verses four and five are last two verses for today. And the 24 elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshipped God who sat on the throne, saying, Amen. Alleluia. There it is again. Then a voice came from the throne saying, Praise our God, all you his servants, and those who fear him, both small and great. All right, to bring this to a close, this reminds me of Revelation 4. Do you remember Revelation 4? In Revelation chapter 1, chapters 1 through 3, there were specific messages given to specific churches. As that came to an end, John was caught up into heaven before the very throne of God. And as he sees this throne in the throne room, what's going on before the throne in heaven? What's going on there? Worship. This is an important concept throughout the book of Revelation. From the beginning to the end, what we see is as people are found in the presence of God, the appropriate response is worship, to praise Him. And you don't see them complaining about worship. They're not like, oh man, we have to do this again. It's just their natural response to the presence of God. Now, I believe we'll have some sort of work assignments in heaven. We will have some sort of relationships, celebrations, there'll be things to do. Part of worshiping God is also obeying Him and just enjoying life in His presence. So I'm not saying that all of eternity is going to be necessarily just kneel down before the throne of God. But if this concept of giving him worship and bowing before him, if this is something that's kind of off-putting to you, if that's like, well, I don't know if I want that kind of heaven, well, I would say you just maybe don't know God as well as you think you do. Because when people really get in his presence, their response is to worship. To know him is to worship him. As we said before, he is worthy of praise for salvation, glory, honor, and power belong to him. Thank you for joining me today. For more information, go to pmvministries.org. As always, I hope you have a great day.