Let's hear God's word from the book of Revelation chapter five beginning with verse one. And I saw in the right hand of him who sat on the throne a scroll written inside and on the back sealed with seven seals. Then I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, who is worthy to open the scroll and to loose its seals? And no one in heaven or on the earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look at it. So I wept much because no one was found worthy to open and read the scroll or to look at it. But one of the elders said to me, do not weep. Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose its seven seals. And I looked, and behold, in the midst of the throne and of the four living creatures and in the midst of the elders stood a lamb, as though it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out. into all the earth. Then he came and took the scroll out of the right hand of him who sat on the throne. Amen. We'll end our reading there in Revelation 5, verse 7. Let's once again ask for God's help in prayer. Our gracious God and heavenly Father, as we come to this portion of your word, we know that we need to hear of the Lord Jesus Christ. We acknowledge that we are changed into his image by degrees as we behold him as though it were in a mirror, as we see his glory by glimpses. And Lord, we know that it is in your word that we are taught of Christ. We know that our hearts faint and fail, that we are prone to wander and to drift away, and it is really only the love of Christ that can constrain us to do what we ought to be faithful as we should. And so Lord, we pray today that any veil, any obstacle, any difficulty with perceiving the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ would be overcome by the word of God in the hand of your spirit. And so, Lord, in this way we pray that we would all leave this place rejoicing because of the glory of Christ our Savior. In his name we pray, amen. Whenever you jump into the book of Revelation, it's helpful to take a moment or two just to remember where are we and what is going on. Well, of course, Revelation 1 through 3 deals with the church here on earth. John has a vision on the island of Patmos. He has a heavenly interlocutor. Somebody from heaven is speaking to him, the Lord Jesus. dictates to him letters to seven different churches. And those wrap up at the end of chapter three. Then at the beginning of chapter four, John sees a door standing open in heaven, and he hears a voice which summons him to go up to heaven and see things which are soon to take place. Now, immediately on hearing the summons, John is in the Spirit, and now he's seeing what is happening in heaven. And the first thing he sees in heaven is a sort of worship service where God is praised, holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come in chapter four, verse eight. And then those who represent creation, the living creatures, the 24 elders say, you are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things and by your will they exist and were created. At the conclusion of that worship service, John begins to get a little bit more detail. in the hand of the one sitting on a throne is a scroll. The scroll is written on both sides. In other words, there's nothing that can be added to it. It is complete, but John can't read it and neither can anybody else because there are seven seals on that scroll. So you can't unroll it. You can't see what's written on it. And John is distressed in his vision because nobody is worthy to open that scroll. Now, once the scroll is opened, once the seals begin to be released, you begin to understand what this scroll is because as each seal is opened, things happen. Things happen in heaven and things happen on earth. And then, of course, out of the last seal, come seven trumpets and then as the trumpets are blown, more things happen and you get on to the rest of the book. But where we are now in chapter five is there's this dilemma. God is holding a scroll. That scroll governs what happens in heaven and on earth. But nobody can open it until One of the elders encourages John saying, don't weep or stop crying. There is somebody who can open it. Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose its seven seals. Now this morning, our interest is especially in the titles that are given to this one who has prevailed. But before we get into the titles, just let me make this general observation. There is one person who is worthy to administer God's decree. There is one person who is worthy to govern history. There is one person to oversee the whole process whereby we go from where we are now from the conditions described in the first three chapters of Revelation to the glorious conditions described in the closing chapters when the new Jerusalem comes down from heaven. and is established on the earth and the tabernacle of God is with men and he wipes away all tears from our eyes and there's no more sorrow or pain or anything similar. There is only one person who can oversee that process and that person is the Lord Jesus Christ. So he's already held up as glorious by the fact that he is worthy to take the scroll. But what is it about him that makes him worthy? How is that set out? Well, it's set out partially in these titles that are given to him. The first title is the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. Now, at first blush, that is a little bit of an unusual title for more than one reason. In the Bible, lions are generally not held up in a very positive light. You're probably familiar with the passage. that we need to be sober and vigilant because our adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour. David knew the Lord could equip him to face down Goliath because the Lord had already equipped him to overthrow a lion and a bear. A lion came roaring against Samson and was torn in half by Samson's supernatural strength. Or in the Psalms, in Psalm 91, where we're told that will tread upon the serpent, we're also told that will trample the lion. So a lot of times in the Bible, the lion is actually a symbol for our enemy, is a symbol of the veracity, the fierceness of our adversary, the devil. So we're a little surprised to find the Lord Jesus called a lion, the lion from the tribe of Judah. Well, one of the key points for the book of Revelation is that it heavily, heavily, heavily draws on what has already been said in the Old Testament. It is saturated with the imagery, the concepts, the language of the Old Testament. And the lion of the tribe of Judah goes way back to the book of Genesis chapter 49. Genesis chapter 49 is the patriarch Jacob's farewell to his sons. He's on his deathbed and so he is giving them a prediction. It's a prophecy of what will happen in the last days. And with regard to Judah, this is what Jacob says. Judah is a lion's whelp. From the prey, my son, you have gone up. He bows down, he lies down as a lion, and as a lion, who shall rouse him? The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet. until Shiloh comes and to him shall be the obedience of the people. Why is Jesus described as the lion of the tribe of Judah in the book of Revelation? Because he is the fulfillment of what Jacob had said about Judah a long time ago. And what is being emphasized is the preeminent strength as well as the ruling position of this tribe. None of the other tribes will compare, ultimately. And none of the other tribes will be given the same dominion. Now that had its initial fulfillment, of course, when, well, it had its initial fulfillment in a variety of ways in the leadership that the tribe of Judah showed even before the monarchy came about. But of course, it was made very clear when David from Judah became the king. And then his successors continued to reign in Jerusalem, and even after the exile, there was leadership from the tribe of Judah. But that whole idea would fall a little flat if it didn't find its fulfillment in the Lord Jesus Christ, preeminent in strength and supreme in authority. He is our brother. He shares our nature, but he is so far beyond us at the same time, glorious in power and excelling in might. Now that Jesus was from the tribe of Judah, we would know that in a general way based on his genealogies, but the book of Hebrews specifically says that it's evident that our Lord sprang from the tribe of Judah, which he needed to do in order to fulfill this prophecy. So what does it mean that he's the lion of the tribe of Judah? Well, it does mean that he's the fulfillment of God's promises, but he's specifically the fulfillment of those promises of preeminent strength and supreme authority. Well, who is going to be able to govern the processes of history? Who is going to be able to oversee the execution of God's decree? Don't you need somebody who is strong and authoritative? You certainly do. You wouldn't want to commit that responsibility to somebody who didn't know what they were doing or somebody who wasn't strong enough to bear that burden, somebody who wasn't strong enough to carry that out. So the Lord Jesus is the Lion of the tribe of Judah. Of course, in order to be that, he did have to take on Judean flesh. He had to be truly human, descended from Abraham, from Isaac, from Jacob, from Judah, Connect the dots in between from David, connect the dots in between until you get to the Lord Jesus himself. And of course, that's brought out again in the following title, where he's called the root of David. Now, when we hear root, I think our first instinct is to think, well, he's the source of David. Like the root is the stability and the source of life for the tree, this must mean that David came from him. And so a number of people have taken it that way and have said, well, according to his humanity, he's descended from David, but according to his divinity, he is David. the root, the ground of being for David. Well, that's certainly true on general terms, but if we compare a couple of other scripture references, I think we see that that's not necessarily what's had in mind with the root of David. First of all, there's another reference within Revelation itself. Revelation 22, verse 16, I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright and morning star. the root and the offspring. In other words, I would take it that he's clarifying here that the idea of root is not the idea of source, but the idea of root is the idea of descendant, that he is David's true heir. And if we look at the source for these words from the book of Isaiah, I think you'll see something similar. Isaiah chapter 11 verse one says, there shall come forth a rod from the stem of Jesse and a branch shall grow out of his roots. The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. Now, Again, that sounds like, well, there's a root, Jesse is the root, and a branch, a shoot comes up out of that. A rod comes from the stem. But now look at verse 10. And in that day, there shall be a root of Jesse, who shall stand as a banner to the people. For the Gentiles shall seek him, and his resting place shall be glorious. In other words, The goal is not to say that root never means stability or source, but the goal is just to say that root in biblical language has enough flexibility that it doesn't always mean that. Sometimes the root can mean new growth, whether you want to think of it as a runner or a fresh shoot or pick your favorite plant and however it propagates itself. Think of it in those terms. Well, what's being gotten at then with that, with root and offspring of David, with this root of Jesse or this rod from Jesse's stem? What is the idea of all of that? Well, the idea is that the family of Jesse, Jesse you remember was David's father, so this is a reference to the Davidic monarchy and the Davidic dynasty. You remember that that fell on hard times. Of course, they fell on hard times morally. They went astray. They didn't do what they should do. But then they also fell on hard times politically. There were conspiracies against them. Some of the Davidic kings were assassinated. Some of them were deposed and replaced with other Davidic kings at the whim of more powerful emperors in the region. And then the kingship was taken away. They were eliminated. You might have had a governor or two, but they were under somebody else's thumb. They were accountable to somebody other than to the Lord. And of course, the ideal of the Davidic monarch is, well, he's accountable to the Lord and the prophets will tell him if he makes a mistake. But he is the human face of the kingdom of God. He is the representative of God's rule on earth. But that kingdom falls on hard times. That kingdom is destroyed for all political purposes at any rate. And yet there is this truth. It will revive. It will come again. It will flourish. It will be like a root out of dry ground. That is fulfilled in Christ. You think about the circumstances of his birth. We saw this just a little bit ago. Why is he in Bethlehem to be born when that's not where they live? Well, because a foreign power imposed upon them this census or taxation or registration. They had to travel at an inconvenient time in order to be where the person in charge wanted them to be, and yet they were of the household, the lineage of David. Joseph is addressed as son of David by the angel when he comes to tell him about what's gonna happen. And yet, though they belong to the house of David, though they should be ruling and reigning in Jerusalem, they're not. but God is going to revive, not that political kingdom, but what that political kingdom stood for, what it was always meant to represent. And that's why when the Lord Jesus comes preaching, He says, repent, because the kingdom of God is at hand. God has done this great thing. God has fulfilled this promise. Jesus is the root of David, the flourishing again of the promises made to David. In fact, flourishing again is maybe a little bit too weak because it's being taken to a new level. And of course, that continues to happen. You might remember that in the book of Acts, the apostle James, the brother of Jesus, interprets some words from Amos with reference to the preaching of the gospel and the growth of the church. Amos had predicted that God would build again the tabernacle of David that had fallen. And James saw that fulfilled when the borders, the boundaries of the kingdom of God were expanded to include Gentile believers as well. You see, in the exaltation of Christ, in the proclamation of Christ as a savior, not just to one limited people, but throughout the world, when we're able to say about the Lord Jesus, as it says in the book of Isaiah, look unto me and be saved all the ends of the earth. Oh, that is building up the fallen tabernacle of David because he is the root of David as well as the lion of the tribe of Judah. Because he is the fulfillment of God's purposes, because he excels in strength, because he is like David and yet better than David, he prevails to open the scroll and to loose its seals. Now John is told. the lion of the tribe of Judah has prevailed. But what John sees is a lamb and a slaughtered lamb standing in the midst of the throne. There's a few places in Revelation where there is kind of a contrast like that. John is summoned to behold the bride, the lamb's wife, but then he's shown a city. Well, the bride and the city are two different ways of talking about the church. John is told that there's a lion and what he sees is a lamb. Not as a contradiction. John is not so dense that he's not gonna notice this difference. It's there on purpose. It's meant to be there. This one who is the lion of the tribe of Judah is also the slaughtered lamb. And that rounds out our portrait of Christ from this passage. Did we only know him as a lion? Did we only know him as the root of David? We would recognize his authority. We would recognize his power. We might even recognize his integrity, his character. But if we only knew him in that capacity, we would not be sure. that his unfolding of this scroll would be to our advantage. But he's not just a lion. He is a lion in the ultimate sense you can give to that word. I'm not trying to diminish the lion quality, but along with, at the same time, he is a lamb, a slaughtered lamb, a lamb who was killed And they are going to say that to him if we jump down to verse nine. They sang a new song saying, you are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals for you were slain. And what's the significance of that? And have redeemed us to God by your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation and have made us kings and priests to God and we shall reign on the earth. What is the significance of him having been slain, of a slaughtered lamb standing in the midst of the throne? Well, it is that he has died for us. It is that he has died to redeem us. And though he has died, that doesn't take away from his quality as a lion. It doesn't diminish his kingship. He was dead, but he's alive again. Just a quick comment on those seven horns and seven eyes, which just by itself is not a very attractive picture. The seven horns speak of a fullness of strength, seven being the perfect number, right? And horns speaking of the strength of an animal. And eyes, of course, speak of understanding, of discernment. I think you can see a reference to Isaiah 11, verse two, which we read a little bit ago, where there's a sevenfold spirit of God. So when it says that the seven eyes are the seven spirits of God, it's not saying that there's more than one Holy Spirit. It's saying that this one Holy Spirit has a sevenfold capacity, as you find in Isaiah 11, two, and that this spirit is the possession of the Lamb. Now it's speaking particularly then of knowledge. So what do we find in this lion who is also a lamb? Well, we find authority, we find power, we find strength, we also find wisdom. He knows what needs to be done. But then, in the fact that he's a slaughtered lamb, you find such love. and such compassion, how will God's decree unfold? Well, I don't know all the details, but I know that it will be unfolded by somebody who died in my place. What does God's decree contain? Well, in broad strokes and visionary format, John tells us some of it, but you know there are seven thunders that utter their voice and John is going to write those down and then he's told, don't write that part down. So we don't know everything. There's a lot we don't know about tomorrow, about the future. But it's very vividly expressed here. He came, verse seven, and took the scroll out of the right hand of him who sat on the throne. So now who is holding the scroll of your life, of your destiny, of the fate of the world? It's the Lord Jesus. It's the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, the slain lamb. You don't know what's gonna happen tomorrow, but can you trust? that in the unrolling of this scroll, the lamb will not forget that he died for you? Can you trust that he will unfold this scroll for the best interests of his people? Can you trust that one who died in your place is worthy to open the scroll, to release its sealing? That's what we're called to do today. Knowing who the Lord Jesus is, we are called to trust and to rest, to be at peace and to rejoice. Amen.