The Throne (Ultimate Authority - Unshakable - Week 3 - Matt Nussbaum)

In his sermon, Matt Nussbaum emphasizes the significance of worship and the concept of the throne in the Christian faith, referencing passages from Isaiah and Revelation. He describes the invisible world of worship, explaining that our physical expressions, such as raising hands or kneeling, play a crucial role in connecting with God. Nussbaum encourages the congregation to actively engage in worship, as it invites God's presence into our lives and provides healing and purpose. Ultimately, he underscores that true worship brings us into a deeper relationship with Jesus, who alone is worthy of our adoration and praise.

Transcript

Good morning. For those of you who don't know, which is possible, because I grew up in church that didn't know that when we sang the word maranatha, it's an Aramaic word, and it means Come, Lord Jesus. So I grew up and I didn't. Had no idea what I was singing. So I just thought when we sing that, we're saying, Come, Lord Jesus.

So just a quick aside. Hey, I. When I was like 22 or so, I heard a sermon one time that clicked something in me. And it was from the pastor was speaking from Isaiah, James, chapter six. And let me just read how this starts out.

This is not our passage today, but this is how this one starts out. This is the prophet Isaiah. 2700 years ago. It was the year that King Uzziah died that I saw the Lord. He was seated on a lofty throne, and the train of his robe filled the temple.

Attending him were mighty seraphim, each having six wings. With two wings they covered their faces. With two they covered their eyes, and with two they flew. They were crying out to each other, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of heaven's armies. The whole earth is full of his glory.

And what clicked in me was an introduction to what I'll call the invisible world of what it means to follow Jesus. Because it's really easy as a Christian to kind of. I got all this stuff in my head. I got all the doctrines right, I got all the ideas right. But this sermon, I remember when I heard it, it was like, okay, there's a whole nother reality that we simultaneously live in.

Cause Isaiah was having a vision. He saw something that God showed him. And it's like, what does that mean? And I was telling somebody, I told my wife this this morning. And I just felt.

Even as I'm looking at the passage we're looking at this week, I fel some confusion. Because anytime you enter into the invisible world, we're not being weird here, or we are being weird in a good kind of way. Something starts to click and it's like, what do we do with that? How do we. So we're talking about.

We've been doing a series on Revelation. And I'll explain this chair here in a second. And the series is called Unshakeable. Two weeks ago, Greg Robbins introduced us to Revelation. Last week, Sean talked about the seven lampstands.

If you haven't watched or listened to Sean's sermon last week, make sure you do. I was gone last week. My daughter got married. So I was gone last weekend. And I had the chance to listen to it yesterday.

I'll acknowledge I listened to it at one and a half speed. But Sean sounds really good at one and a half speed. I tried two. Too fast. Too fast.

All right. If you put me at one and a half speed, I'll be way, way, way, way, way too fast. Cause I speak too fast anyway. So don't do that with my sermons. But Sean has good diction, good pace.

But I'm just saying listen to the. If you haven't listened to it, listen to it. If you were here again, you may want to listen to it again. So. But today we're talking about the.

The. In Revelation, we're talking about the throne. I just read a passage from Isaiah. Isaiah was 2,700 years ago. So today we're talking about the throne.

That's why this chair is here. We couldn't find a real throne. It'd be impossible to mimic what we're gonna read here in a second. But the passage from Isaiah that I just read, Isaiah 6, where Isaiah saw the throne, the Lord seated on a lofty throne, and the train of his robe filled the temple, and they were crying out, holy, holy, holy. There's other times in the Old Testament where the throne room scene shows up, but in Revelation, it shows up a bunch.

All right, so the passage for today is Revelation, chapter six. And before we read the passage, put this on the screen. I think I have this on Satan. I always like to make is. The invisible world is just as real as the visible.

Read that with me. The invisible world is just as real as the visible. All right, That's a true statement. We have to learn to live that way, though. It's easy to say, how do we live that way?

So Revelation, chapter four. We're going to read the first few verses of that. And if you. If you haven't been here before or don't remember, Revelation was written by John, one of the apostles of Jesus. And it's.

All of. It's a vision that he saw. The whole thing is a vision that God gave him about what's happening in the world and how do we deal with was true for them then, it's true for us now. Whether you're struggling with your own personal issues, realities, financial stuff, whatever, or world politics or whatever. John's writing to us in chapter four.

It's part of the ongoing vision he's having. And here. And I'll start off this way, so read this with me. Revelation, chapter four. We're gonna read just the first two verses all right.

Out loud with me. Then I looked, and I saw a door standing open in heaven. And the same voice I had heard before spoke to me like a trumpet blast. The voice said, come up here and. And I will show you what must happen after this.

And instantly, I was in the Spirit. And I saw a throne in heaven and someone sitting on it. I saw a throne in heaven and someone sitting on it. The word throne occurs 40 times in the Book of Revelation, most of it about the throne of God, some about the lesser thrones of evil, but most about the throne of God. If you did a play, if you did a musical, the Book of Revelation, it was the IU auditorium.

The whole set would have a throne right here. It'd be center stage. It would never move. The throne never moves. It's in.

It's a fixed thing. And there's somebody sitting on the throne. And so the whole book of Revelation, with all the different images and smoke and trumpets and bowls and blood, this stays central to the throne, to the. To the whole book. And the rest of the chapter of chapter four, it describes a scene.

And I. We have a really good production team here. We cannot mimic what Revelation 4 describes. Cause it says, I saw the Lord seated on the throne. And then it says, there was, like, a rainbow behind him.

We've tried a little bit, a few colors here. All right. But this is where your imagination has to take over. It says there was a sea of glass in front of him. There were precious stones around the throne that were shining.

There were 24 other thrones around this throne that had the elders who were worshiping the one on the throne. And then there were these beasts. When you read about it, it's kind of like. It is confusing sometimes. Confusion is the doorway to understanding, though, because the beast had a face like a lion and an ox and an eagle and a man, and they had wings and they had multiple eyes all over their body.

And it's like, I don't understand it, but I know something grand is happening here. Hollywood could never mimic that. There was thunder and. And lightning and smoke. I mean, Isaiah or Isaiah in chapter six saw that.

But now John seeing this 2500 years later or not. I mean, 500 years later, he's seeing a similar thing. And it's like this throne. And so what's it. What's going on?

Why is this so central to John when he's writing to people like us who are going through stuff? What does the fixed point of the throne mean? So basically, we're going to ask Three questions today about this whole throne thing. Three questions of this. Why, how and what?

Why, how and what? So what's going on here? So first is why? And the question is a simple question. Why do we worship Jesus?

Why? You might have that question. I mean, is Jesus a narcissist? Does he need, like us to pat him on the back? Of course not.

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit existed before people did. They don't need that from us. But why Jesus? My response would be, do you have someone else in mind to sit on the throne? Mohammed, maybe?

Buddha? Joseph Smith? Donald Trump? No, please. Joe Biden?

No, please. Kamala Harris? No, please. Right. Who else would you suggest we put on the throne that deserves every part of our honor and worship?

Worship means worth ship. You're giving worth to something. And there's no one like Jesus. There's no one like Jesus. There's no one that raised from the dead.

There's no one that did the miraculous healings he did. There's no one with the incredible love and justice that Jesus had. There's no one like Jesus. There's no one that came to compete for the throne like Jesus. So the question of why, it's an obvious question, but it's always good to answer.

Because Jesus, scripture says what they say in the passage. He's worthy cause he shed his blood for us. He loved us. He rose from the dead. So the question of why we worship at the throne and why the throne is so central, even though it seems like an obvious question.

We're just gonna say we worship because it's Jesus. We're Christians. We follow Jesus. We're not religious people. We're not just good people.

Hopefully we are. But we follow Jesus. We worship Jesus because He's given us meaning. He's given us purpose. He's given us life.

He's changed our lives. That's the why question. Here's the how question, though. This is what I find is interesting. When I look at the book of Revelation and see the throne, what happens over and over around the throne is this massive worship.

And you might think, well, that's kind of weird. Is that all we're gonna do in eternity? Cause what's happening in Revelation is not just true of then, then it's now. Now it's. It's happening, like right now.

There's something going on in the invisible world that we don't see or feel, but it's there. It's not like the angels are taking a rest until, you know, we all get there someday. They're worshiping all the time. All the time. And so the how question is.

So when you read Revelation, around the throne seams, here's some of the things that happen. All right? There's a lot of songs this is going to. From chapter one all the way to chapter 22. There's a lot of singing around the throne, singing to the one on the throne, to the Lamb, to God and to the Lamb.

There's a lot of loud shouting.

There's a great war in one. The passage is a great roar where they're shouting, salvation belongs to our God. Another passage says loud voices are shouting, he reigns. He reigns Almighty. Another loud voice shouts, at last the kingdom of God has come.

There's another passage where it says a vast crowd was shouting, praise the Lord. I mean, it's loud. Like, really loud. Almost everybody that talks or says something is shouting. They're crying out, how long?

Oh, Lord. All kinds of conversation to the throne. And then from the throne, we're told a lot of shouting happens. One of the things that shouted from the throne is, it is finished. All right?

Jesus on the cross, it's finished. Evil is done with. Redemption is right here. Another thing shouted from the throne. Again, a loud shout.

Scripture tells us God is now at home with his people. So they're shouting in a vast crowd to the throne. There's loud voices, loud shouting from the throne. It's loud now, if you know me, you know that I'm loud. My son tells me I sing too loud, but I will be totally at home in heaven.

He may not be all right, but not only is it, there's a loudness, there's a lot of physical expression. Because I told you, there's these 24 thrones around this throne, these are the elders, the godly people who followed Jesus. We don't know. Sometimes people think it represents the disciples. We don't know exactly, but it says when, after they praise the throne, they fall down on their faces and they continue to worship.

They fall down on their knees, put their foreheads on the ground. That happens twice, happens two more times. They fall down before the Lamb. So there's this real. It's physical.

Their bodies are involved. It's loud. Everything around the throne, when you see the Book of Revelation, it's bold, it's lively, it's joyful, and it's awesome.

And again, you might think, I don't get it. I don't see it. And I'll say what I said earlier, I don't always see it, but I know I believe it's true. Because I believe Jesus is trustworthy. So the point of that with worship is your body is involved in worship.

I mean, these elders are falling down, they're loud. Your body is involved in worship.

Book of Psalms, numerous times the psalmist says, lift up your hands. Lift up your hands. Numerous times it says, I bow down before the Lord. Let us worship and bow down. There's times in Psalms where it says, clap your hands.

And should even mention the passage where David, King David, dances for the Lord. And you might say, as I would say, oh, that's just not for me. King David was a warrior. He was a dude, all right. He wasn't like a ballet major.

No offense. I'm just saying. So there's a lot of expression in worship when we worship Jesus. And you might say, like me. So I grew up in a church where when we sang songs, this was the proper posture.

Or this. If you were holding a hymnbook, if you ever did this, something was wrong with you. If you ever did this, you have a mental problem, right? We only clapped in youth group to songs. Cause that's what kids do.

But any other physical expression, it's a little bit emotional. We'll frown on that. We don't need that here. Nobody said that. But it was clearly the unspoken message.

And I remember when I was in college, seeing for the first time people that were singing and raising their hands and had their eyes closed. And I remember thinking to myself, come on, open your eyes. What are you doing? I mean, I was really condemning them. This is unnecessary.

You think you're better than us or whatever, but let's just be honest. The worship around the throne in Revelation, the worship described in the Bible, your body is involved. It's involved your body. It's true. Our postures, the posture of our body does change something in our hearts.

When I kneel down in my own home, in my own private time with God, this changes something in me. When I raise my hands, when I worship, it changes something in my heart. Your heart often follows your posture. Now, I'm not saying this is not gonna be, you know, body language police time. We're not gonna say who's doing this, who's doing.

It's not about that. But I'm asking you, why don't you. And maybe, maybe in the privacy of your own home, own room where nobody sees you, maybe kneel down and pray, maybe raise your hands and sing. Nobody else has seen you. God is.

I mean, even the first time I started doing that, I felt almost really self conscious. And I was like, hope nobody comes in and sees me. All right, but try if you want. You might not feel at home when we have this kind of worship. If you think everybody else around you is a little bit weird because they're raising their hands or they're kneeling or let alone.

Let's not fall down on our faces.

So just try. Because our bodies are part of our worship. When we worship Jesus, it's not just like that. All right, I guarantee you, if any of you watched. I know this is aging me.

If any of you watched Christian Watford make the shot that IU beat Kentucky years ago, I'm sure when it went in, most of you weren't. If you were there, most of you, or watching on tv, most of you weren't like, oh, that was nice. That was a nice shot. You were like, yeah, right. Your body got into it.

Yeah. Or, you know, my daughter got married last week. The dancing was. Yeah. All right.

You go to a Taylor Swift concert, there's a lot of. There's a lot of energy and body movement because we're made for that. So when we do that at an athletic event or at a, you know, a wedding or at a concert, it's not bad that we have that excitement. Let that excitement be a shadow of the way you're meant to be toward God. When we sing the National Anthem, I get emotional.

Why? Cause I realize I'm part of something bigger than myself. It's not so much I'm proud of my country, yes, but as I'm part of something bigger. But let that be a pointer to your part of something bigger. Bigger.

Because God's stirring something in you. So your body is meant. We put our hands over our hearts. We do things because we know our bodies are part of our worship. So when you see the worship in heaven, it's pretty raucous.

It's pretty loud. It's exciting. It's not boring. It is not boring. I guarantee you the excitement you felt at the best athletic event you've ever seen, multiply that times about 1,000, and that's what you will feel before the throne of Jesus.

It's not gonna be boring. It's gonna be you fully alive and free. You fully alive and expressive. And something inside of you is gonna be alive like it's never been before. So that's the how question, then, the what question.

What is actually is going on when we sing? Like, we just sang a few songs, we'll sing some at the end. When we sing, is it simply sound waves hitting the Ceiling and then coming back down. I mean, for those of us like me who sing loudly, is it simply because I want people to hear what I'm singing and that I'm hitting the notes most of the time? Or is there something else going on when we sing?

Because we're not singing to each other. The band's not singing to you, you're not singing to them. Who are we singing to? Why are we even here? Right.

Well, we come to church because we believe it's a place we can experience God. Yeah, you might come for. You might come because your parents made you come. You might come because your wife or husband wants you to come. You might come because simply you want people to think you're a churchgoer.

But ultimately, underneath all that, we come because inside of us, there's a hunger to experience the presence of God. That's what we want. So when we have sermons, when you worship, it's because we want to experience the presence of God in our lives. So when we sing in church, something happens more than just sound waves. In the book of Psalms, it says God is enthroned on the praises of his people.

So when we praise, when we sing, when we worship, it gives. It's an invitation to God to sit on the throne. And in the context of the culture that time and even when the. When John wrote and what we read earlier, I saw one seated on the throne. The king has his power when he sits on the throne.

Only until he sits on the throne does he have his power. Our worship enthrones God on his throne. So when you worship, you are put. You are basically, we're inviting God sit down and now be the king of me, of my life, because he's seen. So worship.

I'll use this phrase, worship welcomes God. When we worship, we're welcoming again. This is invisible world. We're welcoming the spirit of God into this place, into my life, into your home. It's a welcome, welcome, sit on the throne.

Worship welcomes God. The Bible even says when we worship, we. This is in the book of Psalms that when even infants sing, it quiets the voice of the enemy. So our worship quiets the accusing voice that Satan shouts at us many times. So when we worship, it says script, God is enthroned on the praises of his people and the praises of even children.

Quiet the voice of the enemy. So there might be times like there was a situation I was going in. This is years ago. I was going into a meeting, and it was potentially a very tense meeting. And I just thought, okay, God, I don't want Satan to have his way in the meeting.

I want you to have your way. So I started singing in my car worship songs. And in my mind, I was singing over the meeting, like, God, I want you to be there. I want you to be seated on the throne in the middle of that meeting. So all my responses, all my reactions are aware that you're with me.

I don't need to be afraid. I don't need to be defensive. I don't need to get angry. I'm gonna do what you want me to do. So when we sing, things start to happen.

Jesus starts to move. Revelation 4 and 5. The elders worship what happens. The lamb takes the scroll and starts the process of redeeming the world. Revelation, chapter 19.

There's songs of victory that are sung around the throne. I mean, it's like a raucous sound around the throne, singing, they worship. What happens. The next thing, the announcement of the defeat of Satan. Revelation 20:2.

They worship. What happens. Talks about a throne. A river of clear water flows from the throne and goes to the right and the left of the riverbank, giving life to the trees. And then it says.

And it gives healing to the nations. So worship puts Jesus into motion to bring healing into your life. So you might have stuff going on in your life. Maybe it's money stuff, relational stuff. Maybe it's just internal anxiety stuff.

Lately. I don't know why, but the last couple years of my life, I wake up a number of times over a course of a month and at night. And I'm anxious. Maybe some of you can relate. I'm just anxious about stuff.

So I. Sometimes I go downstairs to My wife. Doesn't want me to do it in the bedroom. Cause it's too loud. I put my phone on worship music and fall asleep.

Cause I want to fix my mind on Jesus. It's not magic, but sometimes fixing my mind on the invisible world is pretty powerful. Fixing my mind on Jesus on the throne. Cause John's writing to these people, you know, 2,000 years ago, who were going through stuff, persecution difficulty, or last week, like Sean said, sometimes they were just drifting away from God because of all kinds of issues. There's something about worship that puts you back into focus.

And I'll say this, too. When you worship, pay attention to what comes to your mind that you might think are random thoughts. All right? Because when you worship, if I can say it this way, you kind of. You're opening up a portal to the invisible world.

You're Singing to God, he might talk to you. I told you this about a month ago when I was preaching. I told you about. I was sitting over there one Sunday and we started singing. And immediately God brought somebody to mind.

That God basically said to me, you don't like this person, do you? Nobody here, right? And I was like, no, I don't. And I can't remember what we were singing, but I was singing praises. And the whole time in my mind, I'm having this conversation with God because maybe God wants to expose that to you.

Maybe he just wants to give you affirmation or blessing, but pay attention to random thoughts or ideas that come to her. It may not be God, but at least ask God, is this you? In that case, I knew it was God. Cause when you worship, when we worship, puts Jesus on the move. Whole book of Revelation, there's worship.

Jesus is on the move. Eliminating evil from the world, establishing the new heaven and the new Earth. When we worship, Jesus is on the move, welcomes God to work, and things start to happen.

So here's what we're going to do. We're going to practice, and we're going to practice. So here's my tension on this. When I say we're going to practice, it sounds like we're practicing for something that is yet to come. We are.

Right? But we're practicing. But we're also joining something that's happening right now. This worship scene in Revelation. It's happening now.

I mean, what do we think? The angels are all sitting around waiting for the end of time? No, they're worshiping millions of them. The Bible tells us they're worshiping, so we're going to practice. In the book of Revelation, there are a number of songs they sing or just words they shout.

So we're going to do that. Give yourself permission to be loud. All right, so here's what we're gonna do. Stand up with me. Nobody's gonna be embarrassed.

At least not any more than we should be. Right? We should. All our pride is always something that God needs to destroy. Our pride, Right?

So put it on the screen. We're gonna do two. So this is Revelation 4. This is the end of the passage that I didn't finish reading. But it talks about the creatures who are falling down in worship before the throne.

And then they keep on saying, it's like a chant, right? But it's not like weird chant. It's like they're energized by it. All right, so we're going to do this. This side's going to go first.

Holy, holy, holy Lord Almighty was and is to come. This side's going to respond the same thing before I do it twice. All right, Give yourself permission to be loud. If. If your son.

If my son was here, he'd probably help me and say, not that loud, dad, but I don't care. Right. As loud as you want to be. All right, this side first. Here we go.

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come this side. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and is to come this side face the throne. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come this side face the throne. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come. And if you think when we're in heaven, that's gonna be mundane and boring and monotone, you are wrong.

It will be more than any kind of exuberance you felt at any high school game, basketball game, football game, anything. There'll be energy and joy that you've never experienced. All right, next thing. So the next one. This is where there's people of every tribe and language and nation.

And the Bible says it's a great throng and it's a great roar of people, and they're shouting to the throne because they're worshiping the one who gave them meaning in life and healing and wholeness. So we're going to do this all together, starting with salvation. Here we go. 1, 2, 3. Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb.

One more time. Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the lamb.

There's probably 10 other passages we could use. I'm not going to. But there's a lot of. And again, it's energetic, it's enthused. It is from the heart.

The last thing we're going to do while we're standing is we're going to sing. All right. More than once. The song around the throne is Worthy is the lamb that was slain. He's worthy, worthy.

He's worthy because he was slain for us. All right? So I want you to. And you'll know this song, the words. I'm gonna be on the screen.

You know the song if you need to. I encourage you even to close your eyes and just picture the throne. If you wanna look up this chair, that's fine, too. But I want you to. And I also want you to do this.

I want you to think of something right now that's causing you anxiety in life, maybe money, people, whatever. And I want you to. We're singing worship to Jesus, but I want that issue on your heart to be in mind as well. Hold both those there. And you're inviting Jesus into that situation.

You're inviting Jesus into your marriage and your relationship with your kids, into your work situation. You're inviting Jesus to move in your financial world, in your job world, in your health, in your addictions. You're inviting Jesus to move. When you sing in the throne. All right.

You can close your eyes. You can leave them open because you know the song. Oh, come let us adore Him O come let us adore him O come let us adore him Christ the Lord raise your voices. For he alone is worthy for he alone is worthy for he alone is worth the.

Do it one more time. And I want you to imagine Jesus coming down the aisle. Let's take a seat. All right. For he.

No, let's sing. For you alone. For you alone are worth. He's coming down the aisle. For you alone are worthy Christ the Lord Jesus.

You alone are worthy. No human being is worthy to sit in that throne. No other being throughout history ever has been or will be worthy. Because scripture says, you ransomed us for God. You were slain for us.

You bring us life. You don't bring us religion, you bring us life. We love you. Go ahead and have a seat. If you don't, you probably have your communion.

Maybe ask you to bring it on the way in. So we're going to. I don't know. Scripture doesn't say anything about taking communion in heaven. I'm assuming we won't need to.

But just for a moment, would you imagine if we were doing this in front of the throne with Jesus sitting there and all the ways you may have. Think about what he's done in your life, what he's done for you, the ways that there is no one like him who can change your life and change the world. There's no one like Him. Not even close, right? So he said, when he.

When you serve the meal to the disciples tonight, he was betrayed. He said, every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim me and forgiveness of sins through me. So go ahead and rip the bottom part off. Get the bread out. We're gonna take it all together.

I'll give you time to get it open.

And this is Jesus saying, every time you eat this bread, you remember me. Remember what I did for you. Remember all the promises I have for you. So now let's eat the bread together and then go ahead and tear the top off the cup and just imagine with me Jesus sitting on his throne, maybe leaning forward and just with lavish love in his eyes saying, this is for you. This blood is for you, to set you free.

It forgives your sins and heals all your diseases. Every time you drink this, you proclaim not just forgiveness for yourself but for others through you that I can Jesus says that I can do things in the lives of others through you. Every time you drink this, remember me. So go ahead and drink the cup, Jesus, we're grateful for you. I mean that's that maybe isn't even an understatement to make Would you teach us how to worship you on the throne during our daily lives?

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, at home, in the office, in the car, wherever we are, with our money, with our time, with our relationships, in the midst of struggles, in the midst of joy. Be on the throne. Be on the throne. Amen.