Here Comes The King!

For seven long years the Tribulation had been raging across the earth. Scores of people had been destroyed by the outpouring of God’s wrath. News outlets scrambled as unexplainable catastrophes happened one by one. Those unwilling to take the mark of the beast had to hide for their lives; others had been found and beheaded. Entire cities were decimated. Whole communities were gone.

This is the picture that the Bible gives us in the book of Revelation. We’ve only seen it in movies, but the Apocalypse will happen one day, and no movie can accurately display the horrors of what will unfold. It’s so despairing! Where is the hope?

The hope finally becomes reality in chapter 19, verse 11: “And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse…” This Rider was the conquering King, and He had finally returned to conquer the world once and for all.

Notice five distinctive truths concerning the Conqueror:

1. THE NAMES OF THE CONQUEROR (v. 11-13, 16)

The Conqueror is given no less than four names here:

—Faithful and True (v. 11)—describes the character of Christ

—The Word of God (v. 13)—speaks of His deity

John 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

—KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS (v. 16)—speaks of His ultimate authority. No king is higher than Jesus.

—A name that no man knew (v. 12)—speaks of the magnitude and mystery of Christ.

Henry Morris: “The names assigned to the Lord Jesus Christ in Scripture are many and beautiful…but all of them together cannot exhaust the infinite meaning of His ineffable name. We know Him in many wonderful attributes, but we can never know Him in His incomprehensible fullness. He is all and in all and we, even in the glorious resurrection, can never learn everything concerning Him, though no doubt our knowledge of Him will continue to grow throughout eternity. The fullness of His mighty name, only He can know!”

2. THE DESCRIPTION OF THE CONQUEROR (v. 12-13)

When Jesus came the first time, it was a lowly entrance. We’re very familiar with it. He was born to peasants and laid in a manger in a smelly stable! Jesus will also look different than He did the first time. Isaiah 53:2 says that Jesus had “no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.” Unlike the paintings, Jesus was not the model of perfection. He looked ordinary.

But when He returns as the King of kings, He will look anything but ordinary!

—His eyes are a flame of fire (judgment)

—His head is adorned with many crowns (King of all the nations)

—His vesture is dipped in blood (vengeance, the blood of His enemies)

But that’s not all. We have a further description of Christ in Revelation 1 (read v. 14-16)

—His hair is white as wool (wisdom)

—His feet were like fine brass (purity)

—His voice was like the sound of many waters (authority)

This is not a portrait of a handsome Jesus; it is a portrait of a fearsome King, the likes of which we have never seen! He is not coming this time as a meek Lamb, but as an avenging Conqueror.

3. THE HOSE WITH THE CONQUEROR (v. 14)

The armies in heaven—that’s us! During the Tribulation, we are with the Lord in heaven. When Jesus returns as the King, we get to ride with Him upon white horses wearing white linen robes.

Did you know that this was prophesied about in the Old Testament?

Zechariah 14:5, “And ye shall flee to the valley of the mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach unto Azal: yea, ye shall flee, like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah: and the LORD my God shall come, and all the saints with thee.”

Jude 14-15, “And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.”

David Jeremiah: “In one short verse, Jude used the word ungodly four times. This repetition is not accidental. Jude was emphasizing the fact that when Christ comes the second time, His long-suffering patience will have run its course…At this point the people on the earth will have rejected the ministry of the 144,000 preachers and the two witnesses that God sent to them for their salvation, just as the prophet Jonah was sent to the Ninevites…But unlike the Ninevites, the people in the last days will have hardened their hearts beyond repentance.”