We pick up where we left off. We are in the Throne Room of God in Revelation 4. We are looking at the various occupants of that Throne Room. The Father is there. We have seen Him. We have seen the twenty-four elders. We have now seen the four living creatures as well as the seven Spirits. So, we are looking at the four living creatures. We find the description of these beings as probably an angelic type being. They are very similar to cherubim in Ezekiel 1, and very similar to the seraphim in Isaiah 6. Perhaps it is one of those angelic groups or another group. They are never totally identified except for living creatures. We saw what they look like yesterday, which was very interesting.
Now we want to look at what they are doing, and that’s even more interesting. It says at the end of Revelation 4:8, “HOLY, HOLY, HOLY IS THE LORD GOD, THE ALMIGHTY, WHO WAS AND WHO IS AND WHO IS TO COME.” This is a very similar worship rhetoric that was given in Isaiah 6. The only other place in all the Bible where we have what is called, the Thrice-holy worship of God is found in Isaiah 6 by the seraphim as Isaiah was in the Throne Room of God there in a vision. Right here - as John is either in a vision or in the spirit - we have the “HOLY, HOLY, HOLY.” In the writing of Scripture and in the oral languages and so forth, in order to emphasize something, you said it twice. Jesus often said, “truly, truly” or “verily, verily” to make a point. It was a way of saying, “Listen up, this is important!” It’s not normal to have three times of repetition. Only twice in all the Bible is the Lord called holy three times, and this is one of them. So, the emphasis is on His holiness. This is the very essence of God as being holy. He is also, it says, “almighty and who was and who is and who is to come.” He is eternal. He has always been here, and He always will be here, and He is here now. Therefore, He is being praised and glorified and worshiped for that reason. In Revelation 4:9, it says, “And when the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne, to Him who lives forever and ever.” So, the worship is of the Father, who is eternal, who lives forever and ever and that is their job. The job of these four living creatures, their task, is to worship God and to lead the universe in the worship of the Almighty God. The twenty-four elders join in at verse 10, “the twenty-four elders will fall down before Him who sits on the throne, and will worship Him who lives forever and ever, and will cast their crowns before the throne, saying.” These twenty-four elders, who may very well be the church or at least representatives of the church, could be angels. They could be a combination of both angels and people. I don’t know for sure. They could maybe be something totally different, like some kind of heavenly being that is a different grouping all together. We do know they are worshiping God here and they are joining the four living creatures in doing so. The next thing they do is they cast their crowns before the throne. The traditional views are that the twenty-four elders are representative of the church and the twenty-four elders are casting their crowns at the feet of the Lord. In the epistles we are told that there are five different crowns that we as believers are given for our service and faithfulness to the Lord and rewards of different kinds. It is believed that we will cast our crowns at the feet of Christ in worship. That comes out of this verse here. The idea being your crown is not for you to show off with or for people to look at you and say, “look at all your crowns,” but rather that whatever crowns are given to you are given back to Him in worship. That’s a beautiful picture and may very well be what is happening here . . .
