All Saints Day 2022

In the book of Revelation we have many sevens. It speaks about seven lamps, seven thunders, seven trumpets and many sevens like that. One of those seven's which is not mentioned as seven, but which is hidden throughout the whole book are the seven glimpses of heaven. If you have the patience to meditate on these seven glimpses of heaven, you will see that, in every one of these places, they are praising God. For time sake I will only reference them.

Revelation 4:8-11, the last four verses of Revelation 4, you find that they are praising God and singing, 'Thou art Worthy'. Secondly, again in Chapter 5:8-14, you find the elders and the living creatures and the angels - millions and millions of angels singing with a loud voice praising God and praising the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God. Thirdly, we see another example in chapter 7: 9-12. This is the great multitude of people who have been born again, cleansed in the blood of Jesus Christ, who again, it says in verse 10, they cry out with a loud voice to Him who sits on the throne, saying, our salvation is due to God and all the angels also join in that, and they fall down before the throne and worship God, saying, Amen, Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power be to God. And then the fourth sight of heaven, we find in chapter 11:15-18. There we find loud voices in heaven again saying, the kingdom of this world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ and we give thanks Oh Lord because You have taken Your great power and have begun to reign. Then we see a fifth picture in chapter 14: 1-4 where we see 144,000 standing with the Lamb on mount Zion and also singing this new song. The sixth glimpse of heaven is chapter 15:1-4 where we see a sea of glass, and those who overcome standing there and with the harps of God. They were singing the Song of Moses and of the Lamb, saying, great and marvelous are Your works, Oh Lord. Then the last glimpse of heaven is in chapter 19:1-6 where there is a loud voice again of a great multitude singing, Hallelujah, Salvation and Glory and Power belong to our God, and Babylon has been judged. In verse 6 we read, 'This voice of the great multitude was like the sound of many waters and as the sound of mighty peels of thunder.' Have you got a little picture of heaven now?

What does this heaven and the praise sound like - like thunder?

There is not a single angel there, sitting depressed and gloomy or complaining about something, or scared, wondering, what is going to happen to the world next. Nobody is scared; they are praising God with all of their heart, because they know that God is on the throne. They praise God for His sovereignty, His holiness, His judgment. There is not a single long-faced, gloomy angel anywhere in heaven. You will only find them in hell, not heaven. And the more you are long-faced and gloomy, the more you bring the spirit of hell into your lives. And the more you are cheerful and happy, acknowledging that God is on the throne, in your heart, in your home, in your Church, and in heaven, the more you bring the spirit of Heaven into your life.

So we see here again and again, in these glimpses of heaven, that people shout Hallelujah and Amen. It is meaningful praise, because they say Hallelujah, because God has done this, or because God is sovereign. They worship the God in the beauty of holiness. Now the Holy Spirit has come from heaven into our hearts, to produce within our hearts, the atmosphere of heaven. He has come into our homes to produce the atmosphere of heaven in our homes. He comes to our Churches to produce the atmosphere of Heaven in our Churches. What should it be? It should be an atmosphere of praise.

Now you may say, well, when I get to heaven, I will start praising the Lord. Well, why has the Holy Spirit come then? He has come to prepare us for heaven. He has come to teach us the language of heaven before we reach there. Now, for example, if you have decided that you are going to migrate to, say, France and live in France for the rest of your life, what would you do before you go to France? One thing you would certainly do is learn French, the language of France. You won't wait till you go there. You will like to learn it before you go there. And you know what the language of heaven is? It is the language of praise. It is good for us to learn it now, before we go to heaven.

It is a language in which there is no grumbling, no complaining, no murmuring concerning anything.

It is a language of continuous praise. Let's learn that language now, before we go. We are told in Revelation 14, one of the passages that we looked at, that there were 144,000 people who sang a new song before the throne. Revelation 14:3 tells us "no one else could learn that song except these people, and they learned it while they were on Earth". Now what is this new song that these 144,000 people were singing? We already saw in Revelation 4 and 5 that the new song is the song of praise and it is a song to God and to the Lord Jesus Christ. What is the old song then, if this is the new song?

Well, the old song is the song that everybody sings on earth. The song of grumbling, complaining against people and circumstances; 1st verse, 2nd verse, 3rd verse; all verses of the old song is the same. Every day they are singing that same song, verse after verse after verse. This has only got one thing; everything is going the bad way and this person is bad and the other person is bad and this person is evil and somebody else has treated me badly and somebody else has cheated me and the circumstances are so bad and it is a time of financial difficulty; it is the same old thing in every single verse.

It is the old song, but in the midst of such a world, where everybody is singing that old song, do you know that God wants from you, if you are a child of God? God wants you to learn this new song and that is the song of praising Him. Don't wait till you get to heaven.

We complain because we don't have our own ways. Everything doesn't work out according to our plans, but they are working out according to God' plan. God is on the throne and you are not, that is good. If we were on the throne, we would mess up everything in our lives. Since God is on the throne, He makes everything for good. So when people praise God, in Heaven, they are praising God because they believe in His sovereignty. And if we believe in the sovereignty of God, that, God Almighty is ruling this universe, we would also give thanks in everything.

When you learn to do that, you have learned the new song and you can learn it only on earth. Why? Because in heaven you don't have difficult situations, you don't have difficult people, you don't face problems, you don't face trials. So, it is only here on earth that we can learn this wonderful new song - to learn to praise God in every type of situation, with every type of person. Say, 'Lord you are on the throne. Things may be difficult for me, maybe hard even, but you are on the throne.' Let me encourage you to learn this song of praise, today.