Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Don't Give Up on Jesus | New Testament | Revelation 11

Episode Date: November 6, 2023

Are you running low on hopes? Maybe your life isn't turning out how you thought. Maybe it looks like evil is winning. In today's episode, Keith looks at Revelation 11 to find hope for the hopeless and encouragement for the discouraged. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Prepare your heart to celebrate Jesus. Sign up to have the 'I Am Your God' Advent Devotional delivered directly to your inbox starting Sunday, Dec. 3, 2023. Join the TMBT community in reading the entire New Testament in one year. Get your FREE reading plan here. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it with others, so others can find it too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter@TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Revelation 11

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Keith Simon. My grandmother grew up with a hope chest. Unless you're older or come from a very traditional family, there's a good chance that you don't know what a hope chest is. But they were very popular at one time in her history, especially in the South. Originally, these chests were given to young girls with the idea that they would collect items in them that they would need once they were married. So instead of having a bridal shower in which you're...

your friends give you gifts for a new house, the family would collect and save stuff for the day that the girl got married and moved out. But as the years passed, the purpose of these chests changed. If they exist at all now, it's mainly to collect family heirlooms, a kind of inheritance that is passed from one generation to another. The reason that it was called a hope chest is because it held things in hope that life would work out in the future. They became the place that people would put their dreams in. The Bible says that we all have a hope chest. We all have a place where we store our deepest longings and our greatest desires, but it isn't a box. The Bible says that our heart is a hope chest, and that's why all human

beings are what John Orpberg calls unstoppable hopers. Hope is what drives our life. Hope is why people get married and why they get divorced. Hope is why people have children. Hope is why people pay to send those children to college. Hope is why people go to the gym. It's why people pay for makeovers and read self-help books and go to counselors and play the stock market. It's why we go on blind dates. Hope is the reason kids go nuts on Christmas morning. It's why we read the Bible. It's probably even why you're listening to TMBT. You can't live without hope. Well, that brings us to Revelation chapter 11. The book of Revelation is about the lamb triumphing over the dragon and the beast. It's a book that shows how through many tribulations, Jesus defeats all of his enemies and reigns over a renewed world.

As John describes God's judgments against the world, he doesn't want Christians to give up hope. So he interrupts his story about what is happening on earth in order to help his readers have God's divine perspective on life. These interruptions or interludes remind us that it may look like God's enemies are winning, but just as Easter follows God's Good Friday, so will one day God reign over the entire world. The interlude pulls back the curtain and allows people to see that while on earth it may seem that the dragon is winning, heaven is still in control. While God's judgment is being experienced on earth, what Christians are called to do is continue to share the good news of the gospel. That's what we see in Revelation chapter 11. There are two witnesses who are also called two olive trees

based on the Old Testament book of Zechariah. They are also called two lampstands, which means they stand in the presence of God and worship and witness to the truth that is found in him. In Revelation 11, God protects and empowers these two witnesses to reenact the plagues found back in the Book of Exodus. Here's verse 6. They have power to shut the heavens so that it will not reign during the time they are prophesying, and they have power to turn the waters into bluish. and to strike the earth with every kind of plague as often as they want. Then we're told that the beast will come and destroy these witnesses. Here's verse 7.

Now when they have finished their testimony, the beast that comes up from the abyss will attack them and overpower and kill them. We find that the people gloat over the dead bodies of these two witnesses for three and a half days. Verse 8. Their bodies will lie in the public square of the great city, which is figuratively called Sodom and Egypt, or also their Lord was crucified. For three and a half days, some from every people, tribe, language, and nation will gaze on their bodies and refuse them burial. The inhabitants

of the earth will gloat over them and will celebrate by sending each other gifts, because these two prophets had tormented those who lived on earth. So the people of the earth, they reject God's witnesses, and when they are killed, they gloat over them and refuse to give them a proper burial. Verse 11. But after the three and a half days, the breath of life from God entered them, and they stood on their feet and terror struck those who saw them. So you see what's happening is that God interrupts the world's celebration at the death of his witnesses, and he resurrects them. Verse 12. Then they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, come up here, and they went up to heaven in a cloud while their enemies looked on. God resurrects these two witnesses.

and calls them into his presence. Verse 13. At that very hour, there was a severe earthquake, and a tenth of the city collapsed. 7,000 people were killed in the earthquake, and the survivors were terrified and gave glory to the God of heaven. At the very same time that God is resurrecting his witnesses, he is dealing a blow to his enemies, and that comes in the form of an earthquake. But did you notice that those who survived the earthquake become followers of Jesus?

In other words, they are awakened by the earthquake, by the judgment, and they turn from their sin and turn to faith in Jesus. So the message to the first readers and the message to us today is that today is good Friday, but Sunday is coming. Today things look bleak because sin triumphs, but just as God raised Jesus from the dead, so you too can be sure that he will triumph over all of his enemies. therefore do not lose hope we must not give up on following jesus don't get discouraged because in the end jesus wins don't give up on your fight against sin remain faithful don't give up on other people

like don't give up on the addict or the person that you know who seems furthest from god because jesus rose from the dead we cannot give up on anyone and most importantly no because jesus grows from the dead because Revelation tells us that in the end God wins, we do not have the right to give up on anyone. God has not given up on his world. He has not given up on his people, and therefore we will not give up either.