Revelation Ramblings

"The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshipping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk, nor did they repent of their murders of their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts." -Revelation 9:20-21

In the previous two chapters of revelation, there are seven angels that are blowing trumpets which are causing plagues on eath such as fire from the sky and locusts that will torture people for five months without letting them die. Then before this passage an angel comes to kill. At the end of the plagues, one third of mankind is gone. Then I read the verses at the top. They still didn't repent! I couldn't believe it. If earth was being destroyed, I'd been stung repeatedly by huge locusts for five months, my friends were now dead, I think I'd be quick to repent and beg for mercy!

But this passage shows how lost we are. Apart from Christ revealing himself to us, we really don't see him. We still choose sin that leads to self destruction rather than give our life to Christ who will only give us good things. It's amazing to see just how lost, blind, and depraved we are.

In this depressing passage about lost souls, there is hope. The hope is that if you truly desire Christ, then that is clearly not of your own doing! God has started a work in you and he promises to complete it. By truly desiring Christ, I don't mean that you read your Bible everyday, love sharing the gospel, or go to church every Sunday. Those are great things, and we should do them as a result of our love for Christ and desire to know him better and share that with others. But truly desiring Christ means that you want Christ or even if you want to want Christ. That is something unique to a regenerate heart. The people described in these verses do not want to want Christ. They have no desire to know him. They might have a desire to go to church because it makes them feel better about themselves, but you must desire truth because it is truth, not because of personal gain. We will sin and there are days, even weeks, where my life doesn't represent Christ well. And because of the work God is doing in my heart, I desire to repent and change to be more like Christ. Assurance of salvation is in the genuine desire for Christ, not in how clean our lives are. If I were to take this idea as an excuse to continue in sin because I have assurance of salvation, then I wouldn't truly be desiring Christ.

This is something I learned from my mentor, Laura, when I was overwhelmed with the sin in my life and began questioning whether I was really saved. It took a while for me to accept what she was saying. But it was so comforting and freeing to hear her say that the fact I even care about the sin in my life is evidence of the Holy Spirit at work in me. I still struggle with this idea from time to time when my sin seems too big, but I always come back to this lesson I learned from Laura years ago. This passage stood out to me because it clearly displays the difference between regenerate and unregenerate hearts, which reinforced my beliefs on this subject.