Dennis Tuuri

Uh hopefully each of you has the handout verses 1-8 for oral reading. It is the first eight verses of Revelation chapter 1. So I think what we’ll do today for the sermon scripture, I’ll really be speaking simply to a very small portion essentially of verse 7, looking at various Psalms and Old Testament readings for an understanding of clouds. It’s our subject today, clouds. But it’d be good if we stood and read this together.

Let’s do that this time for the scripture reading. Let us read these eight verses in unison. The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his slaves the things that must shortly take place. And he signified it, sending by his angel to his slave John, who testified the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ, whatever he saw. Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy and guard the things that are written in it, for the time is near.

John to the seven churches that are in Asia. Grace to you in peace from him who is and who was and who is to come. And from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the land. To him who loves us and released us from our sins by his blood, and he has made us a kingdom, priests to his God and father.

To him be the glory and the dominion age after age. Amen. Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him. And all the tribes of the earth will mourn over him. Even so, amen. I am the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.

Let us pray. Father, we pray that your Holy Spirit would be amongst us and each of us individually and corporately now as we seek to understand your scriptures and what they teach to us, particularly in verse 7 of this concluding book of your revelation. We thank you, Lord God, that this book is entitled Revelation, that your scriptures are a revelation, and that they reveal things to us. Help us, Father, to understand what you seek to reveal to us through these texts by the aid of your Holy Spirit to the end that we would obey you and rejoice in you forever. In Christ’s name we ask it. Amen.

And more appreciative of the world about me that God has created. But the last five or six years, I have just delighted in the clouds to be found in the state of Oregon. Rarely a week goes by when at least one time during that week I haven’t observed the clouds and the beautiful colors, manifestations of God’s glory in them. And, I don’t know, maybe there are more clouds, maybe the clouds are more brilliant now than they used to. I don’t know what’s going on, but I know that I’m appreciating them greatly, and I thank God for that.

I want to talk about clouds today, and there’s been a song going through my head as I considered this talk, back from my teenage years, a song written by a gal named Joni Mitchell. Judy Collins had the probably largest hit off it, as they say, called “Both Sides Now.” And the first verse of that song was about clouds. And on the way here today, I’ll give you something to look forward to, a reason to stay awake through the sermon.

At the conclusion of the sermon, I’m going to read what I penned very quickly in the van on the way over here this morning. My own rendition of this particular first verse. I wrote a little song. Well, in any event, this song that Judy Collins sang, first verse goes, “Bows and flows of angel hair and ice cream castles in the air and feather canyons everywhere.” I’ve looked at clouds that way, but now they only block the sun. They rain and snow on everyone. So many things I could have done, but clouds got in my way. I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now, from up and down, and still somehow it’s clouds illusions. I recall I really don’t know clouds at all.

We want to talk about clouds. We want to get to know a little bit more about them based upon the scriptures. I wanted to read also though the concluding verse of this song.

Tears and fears and feeling proud to say I love you right out loud. Dreams and schemes and circus crowds. I’ve looked at life that way. But now old friends are acting strange. They shake their head. They say I’ve changed. But something’s lost and something’s gained in living every day. I’ve looked at life from both sides now, from win and lose and still somehow it’s life’s illusions. I recall I really don’t know life at all.

Well, we have been called into the revelation of what life is, understanding who the creator of life is, and we rejoice that we do know what life is. We may not know a lot about clouds, but hopefully by the end of this next 30 or 45 minutes, you’ll know a little bit more what the scriptures have to say about clouds. That’s my goal.

How do you see clouds? And what I want to do is change the way that you look at them as you go out the door today. Perhaps nothing wrong with seeing them as vapors and the scientific explanation of what clouds are, but God’s scripture says a lot about clouds. Several hundred verses about clouds and most of them don’t have to do with vapor. So I want us to see clouds from both sides, from this perspective, from the heavenly perspective, and then change our lives hopefully a little bit on the basis of that.

Now I am then again returning to verse 7 where it says, “Behold, he comes in the clouds.” That’s the purpose, if we’re going to understand what Revelation says. We’ve got to know the Old Testament background, particularly of this book of the New Testament. This is particularly important in terms of verse 7 because, as I said last time I spoke two weeks ago, this is what many of us have been taught is the key verse of Revelation. And it’s talking about Christ coming back in the clouds at the end of all time, his second coming. And we really don’t think much more about clouds than that.

It’s just that he went up in the clouds. It’s kind of a neat picture. Those puffy things, he rides up on them and he rides back down for the second judgment. And that’s the key verse of Revelation. So all of Revelation is about something else other than what we are living through. It’s about something off way in the future. But we know that’s not the case. We know that this scripture that we read clearly tells us, as it does over and over, that these are about things that were going to shortly take place.

For you younger children, you’re the ones I primarily prepared—not an outline, but that sheet that shows the square box, God, throne, and then at the bottom, the chariot. That’s your outline. That’s what I want you to think of and listen for as I speak today as we go through some Old Testament references.

For you older children, your high school or junior high children, one thing I want you to think about is that what we’re going to be talking about today in terms of clouds and then what the book of Revelation describes is a cool view of history. It is a tremendous view of historical events. You’ve read history books that might have been fairly dry and mundane and not much exciting recitation of facts and events, etc. Well, the book of Revelation to us is a history book. It describes the history that happened between Pentecost and the destruction of the temple, between roughly 33 AD, when Jesus was born about 33 years prior to that, but the history is marked and delineated by the birth, the coming, the advent of Christ.

So from 30 AD, you know, nearly 2,000 years ago to 70 AD, there’s a 40-year piece of history there. And this Revelation is a history book. And we see the events of history. And it’s not wrong to record events in a linear fashion. That’s okay to see that in terms of what we see. Battles happen, presidents go up and down, and things happen, and various things happen historically, events. But what Revelation shows us is what’s going on all the time in terms of those events.

You see, it is realer, if you want to look at it that way, than the events we simply see that are the result of God’s action in history. Revelation pictures that 40-year history, this little textbook of Revelation about that particular time in history, from God’s heavenly perspective of what’s going on. And it’s not as if it just went on then. It always goes on and it goes on in heightened senses when God comes in judgment and reformation.

And that’s what clouds are about. And so we’re going to talk about that today.

So what I want the little children to do—or adults can do it, whoever wants to do it can do it. If you’ve got one of those little outline things, what you might want to start working on is wings all on the sides of the box and wheels at the bottom of the box. Because the idea is, this is a summation of what the scriptures teach in one aspect of clouds: when God comes in the clouds, it’s a portable throne room. It’s his chariot, hence the wheels on the bottom. He is surrounded by angels. These angels emanate fire and judgment from God. And that’s the reason—if you want to start putting a bunch of wings along the side there—is to remind us that the clouds we see, God correlates clouds to his sweeping down from heaven, wings of angels beating and making this tremendous noise and rushing sound, as it were.

If we could really see and hear what was going on with historical events, this is what happens. God comes and he comes in this portable throne room. It’s a chariot. It’s moving. It’s angels and it’s a throne room. It’s a little picture of his heavenly throne room because he’s going to come and execute judgment. The scales are in his hand, as it were. And he’s going to do it just like what we read about in Habakkuk. He’s going to kill people and he’s going to destroy some people and he’s going to establish other people because the throne is what that cloud represents. It’s God’s judging presence with his people.

So if you want to start working on wings and wheels on the bottom and wings on the side, that’s fine with me. God is up there because he sits on that throne and that throne has the manifestations of fire, angels, and we call them clouds. And the throne moves. It’s a portable throne that comes into human history. And that’s what clouds are about.

“Oh, okay. He said, ‘Well, that’s nice imagery, Dennis. I don’t know if I believe that, though.’” Well, I don’t want you to believe it for me. I want you to go to the scriptures with me now and let’s look at what the scriptures say about clouds.

First of all, just some general truths about clouds. There are two basic Hebrew words for clouds, and one of those is almost never used, or very rarely used. It’s sometimes used for particular small clouds, but usually it’s used for God’s judgment, as we’ve talked about. We’ll look at some of those places, but it also is used in several other senses that I’ll briefly articulate for you. This is from the Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament—a nice summation of word studies such as this that you can do.

The clouds: one Hebrew word used for a cloud speaks of the swiftness of the remnant coming back from captivity. So when God’s people come back from being out of influence or control of the land, there’s a swiftness, as clouds are swift. It talks about the swiftness of the removal of sin by God—he blows it away like a cloud is blown away. So our sins are removed that quickly. Clouds are given as a picture of the transitory nature of posterity or of what we do. Things vanish away. Our lives vanish away like a cloud. Clouds are seen also as indicating the pride of evil men. They think they’re on the clouds. They think they’re the ones who are riding the clouds. They’re the cloud rider instead of God.

By the way, one of the titles for Baal in the ancient idolatrous cultures was cloud walker or cloud rider, which, as we’ll see, is really the term that belongs to God. God rides in the clouds and so there’s a sense of mobility and transition, etc.

The other Hebrew word used for clouds is more of a thick cloud, as opposed to an individual cloud. It’s used 80 times and 60 out of those 80 times it’s talking about the pillar of cloud, in terms of the wilderness wanderings of God’s people. God leading his people by a pillar of cloud by day and then by a tower of fire at night. Really, I don’t think those are two separate things. We’ll see here that the cloud contains fire, but in the daytime, it’s sort of seen more as a cloud and at night, it’s seen as fire because it’s dark. You can see that fire that comes out from the angelic presence of the cloud.

So, fully three-fourths of the time, this other word used for clouds is talking about the manifestation of God’s cloud. There’s 20 times where it might respect to a particular, you know, water vapor clouds, but even there it’s frequently an allusion to the blotting out of sin. The clouds can be a picture of God’s protection of his people. You know, you can have the bitter, really too hot sun. Clouds protect you from sun that would shrivel you up. So God is pictured as a cloud to protect us from the wrath of our enemies.

So there’s lots of ways clouds are used, but what I want you to think about primarily is that for the most part, either one of those two Hebrew words, by far the majority of the references is to pictures or allusions to some other thing other than water vapors.

Okay. So God trains us to think about clouds in a particular way by his use of the term in the Old Testament. The New Testament is the same way. There the primary Greek word used for clouds is used, I don’t know, about 25, 30 times, and all but a couple of those times it’s talking about things other than cloud vapors. And even when it’s talking about actual cloud vapors that we think of as clouds, it’s still there using it as an allusion.

For instance, evil men are men who are clouds without water. So you see a cloud coming. Jesus says you can discern that a storm’s on its way. But even there, you can see that really what he’s probably really talking about is there are clouds in the lands now, guys. God’s judgment coming upon this land because you’re going to reject me. So even there when it is specifically used in terms of water vapors, the cloud reference is primarily one that gives us a reference to other truth that we’re going to talk about now and primarily the presence of God in this portable chariot.

Okay. Now, I want to turn to several specific Psalms and a few other verses as well. And what we’re going to do is begin with Psalm 18. So turn in your scriptures to Psalm 18 and we’ll look a little bit about what it teaches us about clouds.

Psalm 18. We’ll start in verse 6. “In my distress, I called upon the Lord and cried unto my God. He heard my voice out of his temple and my cry came before him, even into his ears.”

So we’ll see what’s going to happen here as a response to the prayers of God’s people. That’s really significant because the book of Revelation says the same thing. Prayers ascend and God moves then in terms of changing things in the context of the world.

Verse 7, “Then the earth shook and trembled. The foundations of the hills moved and were shaken because he was wroth.” He’s wroth in response to the prayers of his people. If nothing else, one other point of very easy application for you is the long prayer in the context of the worship service—the focal point of the prayers of God’s people. That is these prayers ascending here that produce judgments from God in the context of the earth.

Children, we don’t just pray hoping that God might do something. God hears prayers and he specifically hears the prayers of his corporate people and he actually does things then. And the implication is if we don’t pray, he’s not going to do anything. You know, widows were told by God, look, if you’re being oppressed by somebody, you got to cry out to me. If you don’t cry out to me, I’m not going to do anything. Now, it doesn’t say it that directly, but by implication, that’s what it says. When the widow’s cry is heard by God, then he acts. And so, if we don’t pray about events in our world, God—you know—wants us to think, at least wants us to be motivated by the fact that he’s usually not going to act. But he does act when we pray.

And so, verse 8, “There went up a smoke out of his nostrils, fire out of his mouth to devour. Coals were kindled by it.” Verse 9, “He bowed the heavens also, and came down, and darkness was under his feet.” Verse 10, “He rode upon a cherub.”

Now, the cherub here is an angelic created being that is a single being, but it’s by way of the literary device used here. It’s to picture that God works in the affairs of men, not directly with men, but through mediatorial created beings that we call angels. So, when he swoops down in response to our prayers and brings judgments and lightnings, he does so through the mechanism of a cherub or through myriads of angels, as we’ll see in other verses.

So he swoops down out of heaven is the picture here. He rides upon a cherub and did fly. Yeah, he did fly upon the wings of the wind. Okay, the wind comes. The angels are in the wind.

Verse 11, “He made darkness a secret place. His pavilion round about him were dark waters and thick clouds of the skies.” Verse 12, “At thy brightness that was before him, his thick clouds passed. Hailstones and coals of fire. The Lord also thundered in the heavens and the highest gave his voice till stones or hailstones and coals of fire. And he sent out his arrows and scattered them.” That’s lightning arrows. “And he shot out lightnings and discomforted them. Then the chambers of waters were seen and the foundations of the world were discovered at thy rebuke, O Lord, at the blast of the breath of thy nostrils.”

He said from above, he took me, he drew me out of many waters. So the picture in Psalm 18 of clouds is that these thick clouds are a manifestation of God having heard the prayers of his people, swooping down riding upon a cherub angel, in the context of your box, children. It’s a chariot. It’s moving quick and he’s coming down in the context of thick clouds and those angels in that cloud are filled with fire and lightnings and hailstones, etc. He brings judgment to the people.

But notice it’s not just judgment. The picture is a tremendous picture of the cloud rider, who is God, bringing judgment in response to the prayers of his people from his temple, right? It’s like a little portion of that temple comes down with him. But notice verse 16.

Tremendous shift. Horrific picture of judgment. Can you imagine if you’re outside and all of a sudden this huge cloud comes, lightning shooting out of it, clouds, fire, and you realize this is God coming in an advent to bring judgment to the land. Well, you’d quench your boots. You’d be like Habakkuk, you’d become like dead. But recognize that the purpose of this is verse 16. “He sent from above. That’s what we’re just describing. He took me and he drew me out of many waters.”

He doesn’t say “us” or “his people.” Us individually are the subject of his judgments. He’s rescuing us. When these horrific judgments come to the earth, when God moves in the affairs of men, the purpose is not simply the destruction of the ungodly. The purpose is grace and mercy toward you individually. You see, that’s what God says in Psalm 18 is a picture of what clouds are all about.

Now, Psalm 18 refers—can be seen a little clearer in light of Ezekiel 1. So, turning your scriptures to Ezekiel 1 for this same sort of picture.

Ezekiel is about the ordination of Ezekiel, to be a minister of God, as it were, a prophet. And this begins with Ezekiel being given a vision of what happens in ordination services from a heavenly perspective. And Ezekiel says in verse 4 of chapter 1, “I looked, and behold, a whirlwind came out of the north, a great cloud, and a fire enfolding itself, and brightness was about it. And out of the midst thereof, as the color of amber, out of the midst of the fire, also out of the midst thereof, came the likeness of four living creatures.” And this was their appearance. “They had the likeness of man.” And he goes on to describe these particular creatures.

And drop down to verse 13. “As for the likeness of the living creatures, their appearance was like burning coals of fire and like the appearance of lamps. It went up and down among the living creatures. And the fire was bright and out of the fire went forth lightning. And the living creatures ran and returned as the appearance of flash of lightning.”

You see what he’s saying? What we think of as this fire separate from God or separate from his angels isn’t separate. They’re moving around as Ezekiel watches them. As they move around, he realizes the connection between them and the flashes of lightning. The lightning moves as the angels move in terms of God’s mediation in the affairs of men to bring judgment.

You see, just like Psalm 18 described, so it is here. Whirlwind, cloud coming out of the north and he sees from a heavenly perspective. He sees from this side now, from God’s side now, from God’s heavenly perspective. And he sees that this cloud is in fact the judgment throne of God with angels round about God and fire coming out to do his bidding. And that fire is the angels. So this is a very similar picture.

Now look in verse 24 of chapter 1. “And when they went, I heard the noise of their wings like the noise of great waters as the voice of the Almighty, the voice of speech, as the noise of a host. When they stood, they let down their wings. And there was a voice from the firmament that was over their heads. And when they stood, and they had let down their wings.”

So, what this tells us is that the noise that’s frequently describes the appearance of God. You know, the noise of God when he comes to earth is described as a noise that accompanies that. The noise is the flapping of angel wings. That’s one way to think of it. That’s the way he wants us to draw the correlation here. So, the fire here is as the appearance of the angels and the noise is connected to the angel’s wings that are either moving or let down. See?

And then verse 28, “And the appearance of as the appearance of the bow that bow that was in the cloud in the day of rain, so is the appearance of the brightness round about.”

Now, he’s talking about the throne room of God. This same connection between the bow and the cloud and the throne room of God is made in the book of Revelation. So, the picture of the rainbow being set in the clouds is a picture to us of the throne room of God where God is surrounded by this same appearance of a rainbow. And the cloud is a picture of the angel host that surrounds God in his throne of heaven. You see? So when you see a rainbow, you know, yeah, it’s God’s promise that he’s not going to judge the earth again. It’s a promise that emanates from his throne room in heaven by bringing, as it were, a picture of that throne to heaven so that what is on in heaven will occur on earth.

The connection is made in our minds: clouds and rainbows. So, Ezekiel 1 ties this appearance, this cloud, the fire, the angels together to God’s coming.

Now, turn, if you will, to Psalm 97. We’ll look at a couple more verses.

Psalm 97. “The Lord reigneth. Let the earth rejoice. Let the multitude of isles be glad thereof. Clouds in darkness are round about him. Righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne.”

See, so now we’re talking about clouds in heaven, and they’re round about God in terms of his throne. Clouds and darkness.

Verse three, “A fire goeth before him and burneth up his enemies round about.”

This manifestation of the throne room of God—this fire comes down at times to burn up God’s enemies.

Drop down. Verse eight. “Zion heard and was glad, and the daughters of Judah rejoiced because of thy judgments, oh Lord. For thou, Lord, art high above all the earth, thou art exalted, far above all gods. Ye that love the Lord hate evil. He preserveth the souls of his saints. He deliverth them out of the hand of the wicked. Light is sown for the righteous, and gladness for the upright in heart. Rejoice in the Lord, oh ye righteous, and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness.”

There’s a connection here that we’ve already made in terms of the throne room of God: clouds and fire. We saw in Ezekiel that’s angels. And when God comes to bring judgment, he sends down and he brings judgments. But as seen here in Psalm 97, a larger emphasis—Psalm 18 ended with the reference to salvation being the result of this. The last few verses here of Psalm 97 remind us that we should be glad about this because when God’s judgments come, it’s a purifying judgment. It’s the establishment of his people.

But there’s a warning implied in this, isn’t there? You see, the holiness of God is referred to in here. “Ye that love the Lord hate evil.” If you’re going to love the Lord’s appearing, you better hate evil in yourself, you better recognize that verse 12 says, “Give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness.”

When you look at those clouds and you go outside and think it’s a picture, it’s a reminder that God comes to destroy the wicked and establish me. Well, when you think that, you better have an understanding. Those clouds are a remembrance of his holiness. And that if you want to stand in that day, if you want to be brought out of the many waters, as the psalmist wrote in verse in chapter 18, you better hate evil in yourself, not just in the other guy. You see, clouds are a call to personal holiness. They’re an assurance of God’s judgment and his presence of fire that burns up the enemies and makes us shine bright and are established.

But it’s a reminder also of holiness. And it’s a strong exhortation to us to live lives of holiness in all that we are. So Psalm 97, the same picture.

Turn now to Psalm 104.

By the way, Psalm 104, if you want to do this little exercise for yourself personally or at home, is very easily divided into the seven days of creation. It’s structured along that model. Okay.

Verse one. “Bless the Lord, oh my soul, oh Lord, my God. Thou art very great. Thou art clothed with honor and majesty. Who covereth thyself with the garment, who stretchest out the heavens like a curtain.”

So here God is described as wearing the clouds and the heavens. He delights in these things. He delights in these manifestations of his glory. And these clouds, again, as I said earlier, Ezekiel points out, it’s really the manifestation of God’s glory through angelic beings, not through simply inanimate things, but rather things that are motivated and move. The clouds move in relationship to the angels.

Verse three. “Who layeth the beams of the chambers and the waters, who maketh the clouds his chariot.”

See, kids, that’s why that word “chariot” is there at the bottom. The clouds—he makes his chariot. He moves. He wants us to think of… Now, we know that God is omnipresent. He’s everywhere. But he in a particular manifestation, he moves in the clouds by way of it being his chariot. “Who walketh upon the wings of the wind. He’s the skywalker, the cloud walker.”

Verse four. “Who maketh his angels, spirits, his ministers of flaming fire.”

So, do you see how all that’s connected? God wears the heavens and then God uses the clouds as his chariot and in the context of that cloud is connected to his angels who are ministering spirits and these ministers are a flaming fire. Now Hebrews says the same thing about angels: “Are they not all ministering spirits?”

So you see here very concise, succinct picture that the cloud manifestation in Revelation or other places is a manifestation of angelic beings who are doing God’s command and executing judgment in the context of the earth and the fire burns up his enemies and purifies those who love holiness.

And then one final psalm, Psalm 68. Turn to that, please.

Psalm 68. And this is a very interesting psalm, wonderful in terms of what we’re talking about today and its pictures of what happens. Derek Kidner, speaking of Psalm 68, says that this is one of the most boisterous and exhilarating in the Psalter. And he says this: the occasion for this writing of this psalm may have been for David’s procession with the ark from the house of Obed-Edom to the city of David with rejoicing. It seems that in 2 Samuel it connects this psalm to that event. So this psalm is a picture of the movement of the ark.

Let me read this little summary of this psalm from Derek Kidner: “Flanked by the ancient prologue and epilogue, the two main parts of the psalm celebrate first God’s victorious march from Egypt with its culmination at Jerusalem, verses 7-18. Secondly, the power and majesty of his regime seen in the ascendancy of his people and the flow of worshippers and vassals to his footstool, verses 19-31.”

So, what this psalm is about, and by the way, this psalm is quoted in Ephesians about our savior’s work. We’ll talk about that in a moment. But what the psalm is about is God delivering his people out of Egypt, the movement of the ark as it went toward Jerusalem, and then the establishment of Jerusalem of his people so that all the nations go up to the holy mountain to worship him.

Okay, with that as a background, let’s look at some portions of it now.

Verse one. “To the chief musician, a Psalm or song of David. Let God arise.”

Now, in Numbers, it says when the ark is picked up to go someplace, the people are supposed to say, “Let God arise.” God is connected to the ark. The ark is the throne of God. Again, think of it as some people called it a mercy seat. God sitting on the ark. It’s the wrong translation, but it’s a good thought that what you have in the ark of the covenant is God’s throne room. And so, the throne of God is moving from its construction and into then the promised land. And when it was picked up to be moved, you’re supposed to say, “Let God arise.” God accompanies the movement of the ark. You see?

Okay. So, that’s what’s going on in this psalm. It tells us right away, let God arise. And what’s going to be the effect of God’s movement? His enemy is going to be scattered. “Let them also that hate him flee before him. As smoke is driven away, so drive them away as the wax melted before the fire, the fire of his throne. So that the wicked perish at the presence of God.”

God’s presence is fire. That throne room chariot portable throne. Think of it that way, kids. And those clouds with the angels in there, fire, judgments, the throne room of God, it produces the presence of God that is fire mediated through the angels and the wicked perish as a result.

Verse three. “But let the righteous be glad. Let them rejoice before God. Yay, let them exceedingly rejoice.”

See, we look at a cloud, we think it’s the presence of God, angels, fire, portable throne, chariot, and it’s going to burn up the bad guys, and it’s going to establish the good guys. Every time it’s talked about, it has that dual implication. You see, we always think of judgment one way, but no, it’s an establishing judgment as well.

Then drop down to verse 7. “Oh God, when thou wentest forth before thy people, when thou did march through the wilderness.”

He marched through the wilderness. Jim Jordan once talked about the pillar of cloud by day and the fire at night being like the two legs of God as he marches toward Jerusalem. Kind of a funny image, but you know, in a way, it’s the image they give us here. God marches through the wilderness to lead his people to Jerusalem.

Now, it’s really—it’s just, as I said, it’s the same manifestation, the cloud and the fire, day or night. But God is leading his people is the point. And as God moves in the context of his throne room, he leads his people forth through the wilderness.

In verse 8, “The earth shakes, the heavens also dropped at the presence of God. Even Sinai itself was moved at the presence of God, the God of Israel.”

See, so we have obvious reference to Sinai in the wilderness here and the cloud that ascended on descended on Sinai when God came down to give the law of rule from his throne room to the men that they might govern with representations of his law everywhere they went.

Then drop down to verse 17. “The chariots of God are 20,000, even thousands of angels. The Lord is among them as in Sinai in the holy place. Not just at Sinai, but everywhere God’s manifestation goes.”

His chariots are all these angels. See, there they are again. This cloud is visible. It’s really angels as the representation. They’re fire. They’re God’s chariot. And he is moving out and he’s leading his people into victory even as he destroys their enemies.

Okay. Verse 18, this is really interesting. “Thou hast ascended on high. Thou hast led captivity captive. Thou hast received gifts for men. Yay for the rebellious also that the Lord God might dwell among them.”

Verse 19. “Blessed be the Lord who daily loads us with benefits, even the God of our salvation.”

Verse 21. “God shall wound the heads of his enemies.”

You see, it’s the same model being pictured in this section: he destroys the bad guys and he establishes the good guys. But recognize that verse—you know that verse, don’t you? Verse 18, ascended on high, given gifts to men. What’s that about? It’s about the ascension of Jesus. Yes, that’s what the scriptures say. He’s ascended on high. He’s given gifts to men. The book of Ephesians tells us that. Remember, the gifts are the various men to minister in the context of the church.

So, even as this gives us a history of the movement of the ark from Egypt into the promised land, it really is telling us as well what happened when Jesus ascended after his greater exodus. On the mount of transfiguration, Jesus spoke and remember the cloud came down there too and they were afraid but the cloud came—the manifestation of God’s throne room—and Jesus spoke to them about his coming departure. The Greek word is the same word basically as exodus. His coming exodus. What was he talking about? He was talking about his death and resurrection.

He was talking about verse 18. Jesus is who this is talking about. When Jesus rose up and ascended to the father is the same as this movement of this throne of God. He goes up in a cloud. He goes up in that portable chariot throne room of God, you see, with the angels. And he goes up for a purpose which we’ll look at in just a couple of minutes.

Okay. And he loads us with benefits and he wounds the head of the enemies. And then verse 23, “That thy foot, not his, your foot, Christian, may be dipped in the blood of thine enemies and the tongue of thy dogs in the same.”

The end result of the movement of the ark to Jerusalem was that we might be victorious, that we might be like those angels who, taking the law of God that we got out of that cloud room and from the angels, we might rule then in the context of our land and we might then see our foot dipped in the blood of our enemies. We might be victorious. You see, that we’d rule like those angels rule. See, that’s the culmination of Christ’s ascension is his giving rule and authority to his people. That’s what clouds are about, too.

Clouds are about God coming and giving us the rule of authority as he gave the law in the context of that cloud. He comes to us. We meet with him every day, every Lord’s day. And he comes and he gives us a little more of that book of rule and he writes it upon our hearts and we’re supposed to go out there and see our foot dipped in the blood of our enemies. You see, we win. That’s what it says.

Now, we’re not winning by means of the sword but with preaching of the gospel. But God will accompany that prayer and preaching of his truth with temporal judgments.

Then verse 24. “They have seen thy goings of God, even the goings of my God, my king in the sanctuary. See, there it comes again.”

Same model. This whole thing we’ve been talking about is found in the context of the sanctuary worship. That’s the picture of how it all works.

Verse 26. “Blessed be God in the congregation. There’s little Benjamin, the princes of Judah, and it talks about the tribes of God assembled in the congregation where all this is pictured before them.”

Then verse 33. “To him that rideth upon the heavens of heavens which were of old. He does send out his voice and that a mighty voice ascribe strength unto God. His excellency is over Israel. And his strength is in the clouds. Oh God, thou art terrible out of thy holy places. The God of Israel is he that giveth strength and power unto his people. Blessed be God.”

Yes, that’s what clouds are about. God comes. God gives rule and authority to his people. He establishes his people and destroys others. The clouds are ministering spirits, angels. Fire comes forth from the angels and in fact is involved in their very being. And that portable chariot that God rides brings judgments in the context of the earth.

Isaiah 19. Oh, look at one more verse, but don’t turn there. Isaiah 19:1. “The burden of Egypt. Behold the Lord rideth upon a swift cloud and shall come into Egypt, and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence.”

Another contemporary example back then. Isaiah talking about how God comes to his people. So when we read in the New Testament about the manifestation of Christ in the clouds, this is the background. All the stuff that talks about the coming of clouds and the judgment of the throne of God is what we’ve got to bring into passages when we read in the Gospels about Christ’s coming.

Now, let me read a few there.

Matthew 16:27. “The son of man shall come in the glory of his father with his angels, and then he shall reward every man according to his works. Verily I say unto you, there be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the son of man coming in his kingdom.”

Went out of his way to say: not talking second coming. Talking about AD 70. Talking about the next few years, you’re going to see the son of man coming with his angels, rewarding men according to their works.

Matthew 24. “After the tribulation of those days, then shall appear the sign of the son of man in heaven. And then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. He shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, shall gather together his elect from the four winds from one end of heaven to the other. Now learn a parable of the fig tree: when his branch is yet tender and putteth forth leaves. You know the summer is nigh. So likewise, when you see all these things, know that it comes upon this generation. This generation shall not pass away.”

He says, again, we would want to look at that in terms of second coming, wouldn’t we? But he says specifically, it’s not second coming. It’s going to happen in the context of this generation, that this manifestation of angels coming and taking his elect. Now, in book of Revelation, it pictures that as the martyrdom of his saints through Nero and the Jews killing them off as we got close to AD 70. That’s the history that went on as much of the church was martyred.

But really, it was God reaping his saints and taking them into his throne room from which they rule with him.

Matthew 26. “High priest arose and was speaking to him and Jesus says I say unto you, this is Matthew 26:64. Hereafter shall you see the son of man sitting on the right hand of power and coming in the clouds of heaven.”

You shall see this, he tells the high priest. High priest knows what’s going on. Jesus is claiming to be inhabiting that cloud that brings the judgments of God and that within his lifetime he was going to see—he was going to be dead. He was going to be burnt up by this appearance of God unless he repented. You see, he knew. He knew that Jesus was claiming to be God riding the clouds as only God can ride the clouds. And so he rent his clothes.

See, contemporary though is the point here.

Luke 21. “When you see the son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up and lift up your heads for your redemption drawth nigh. Your redemption drawth nigh when you see the son of man coming in clouds.”

Not talking about the second coming. Talking about manifestations of God’s judgment in AD 70 that were to come to pass.

Okay, that’s what the scriptures say about clouds. It tells us the Old Testament background. It tells us what we expect when we read Jesus talking about that in the context of his greater exodus, leading forth his people into victory.

Now, briefly, very briefly, then let’s remind ourselves what we learned two weeks ago about Revelation 1 verse 7.

Verse 7 says, “Behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him, and all the tribes of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, amen.”

Here’s the way to remember this text. This text says, children, write this down if you would: Christ Jesus. That’s what it says. Now, sometimes we read Jesus Christ in the New Testament. That’s okay. But sometimes we read the phrase Christ Jesus. Christ Jesus will do this. And this verse 7 says two things. It says that this is Messiah—this is Christ. And that this is Jesus. He’ll save his people. Christ Jesus.

What verse 7 does is bring together Daniel 7 and Zechariah 12. Specifically, it quotes Daniel 7:13 and Zechariah 12:10. And if you look at Daniel 7, remember we talked about this.

What does it say? Well, before it gets to the verse that’s quoted here, it says that a throne is going to be set up. Daniel sees in verse 9, “I kept looking till thrones were set up and the ancient of days took seat and his throne was flames of fire. Its wheels of burning fire.”

Wheels down there at the bottom of your drawing, kids. Burning fire. Okay. And then the books were opened. Daniel saw the establishment of the throne room of God preparing for an event and then he described the event.

“And I kept looking because of the sound of the great words. I kept looking…” and that’s verse 11 and 12. And then verse 13 where we have quoted here. “I kept looking in the night vision. And behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like a son of man was coming. And he came up to the ancient of days was presented before him. To him was given dominion, glory, and a kingdom that all the peoples, nations, and tongues might serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion will not pass away. And his kingdom is one that will not be destroyed.”

So when we read in Daniel chapter 7 that Christ is Messiah, that behold, he comes with the clouds, what it’s talking about in its first application is the ascension of Christ. The going in the clouds. The word can mean coming or going in the Greek. His going up in the clouds to the right hand of the father, pictured in chapters four and five of Revelation.

And he receives the book with the seven seals. He receives the book from the father by which he shall reign over the kings of the earth. So what verse 7 tells us of Revelation 1 is not that Jesus is going to come back some long time away. It’s describing the historical event in time and space, as it were, of Christ’s ascension to the right hand of the father. And in that cloud of angels that represents God’s movable throne, he’s taken up to the greater throne room and he’s given the book so that he can reign now.

By way of application though, it also talks about then the results of that. Remember we said that Daniel 7 doesn’t stop there. It goes on to say something else pretty astonishing. It goes on to say in verses 25-27 that there’ll be this one who seeks to wear down the holy ones of the highest and they’ll he’ll prevail for a while but then the sovereignty, the dominion and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven will be given to the holy people of the highest one.