Revelation Day 30 - Worship and Witness

DAY 30
Worship and Witness
Revelation 11:15-19

Why is there so much worship in Revelation?

John moves to a third and final scene in Rev 11. We're back to another worship service! Heaven celebrates God's victory over evil. It's both another preview of the invisible reality already happening every day and a preview of coming events. Think about it: two chapters ago, the world was going through the birth pains of judgment. A moment ago, the Church was witnessing and being attacked. Now we’re celebrating that God and his Christ “have begun to reign.”

Why is there so much worship in Revelation? Simple: worship is how we feed our witness. Look at it this way: witnessing is just telling the truth about what we’ve seen. We can’t talk about something we haven’t seen. The more we look at Jesus, the more familiar we are with him, the more we can talk about him with ease. You can tell the truth about God by being with God.

This is huge! Revelation takes a worship break in almost every other chapter. That’s telling us something huge! Worship isn’t optional. Worship has to be the main ingredient in a Christian’s diet. We have to take frequent worship breaks because worship amplifies reality. Worship stops to admire the bigness of God’s creation. Worship stops to look at what Jesus Christ did to save us from sin and death through his death and resurrection. Worship stops to see God governing the chaos of history to something better. Worship cements for us what is really real so our witness can be our weapon.

When we talk about witnessing, we spend most of our time talking about how to talk: how do I explain my story? How do I explain the gospel to my non-believer friend? How do I become a better listener? But Rev 10-11 remind us that our witnessing needs worship to be effective. What if…what if on top of gathering with God’s people like this once a week, we also paused throughout each day to say, “We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, the One who is and who was, because you have taken your great power and have begun to reign?” Keep looking at Jesus Christ, the faithful and true witness.

REFLECT
Based on your habits, how important is worship to you?

PRAY
We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, the One who is and who was, because you have taken your great power and have begun to reign. Amen.