Revelation: Who Can Stand?

 Revelation: Justification by Faith

Who Can Stand?

The great question for that day of wrath is:

Revelation 6:17

For the great day of His wrath has come, and who can stand?

God Himself, Jesus Christ, will come as the Judge of heaven, and that which can be shaken will not stand.
Hebrews 12 makes this clear:

Hebrews 12:27-29

27 This “yet once more” indicates the removal of things that can be shaken — that is, things that have been made — so that the things that cannot be shaken may remain.
29 For our God is a consuming fire.

The question is: what is unshakable?
How can we stand firm?
The psalmist tells us:

Psalm 24:3-6

3 Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord?
Who shall stand in His holy place?
4 He who has clean hands and a pure heart,
who does not lift up his soul to what is false,
and does not swear deceitfully.
5 He will receive blessing from the Lord
and righteousness from the God of his salvation.
6 Such is the generation of those who seek him,
who seek the face of the God of Jacob. Selah.

There is no doubt that this will be the character of the saints when Jesus returns. But the natural question comes to us: do I fall short? Has my life every day been in harmony with this?
On top of that, we must remember that by nature we are sold under sin:

Romans 7:14

For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin.

Then we ask:

Psalm 130:3

If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
O Lord, who could stand?

And:

Malachi 3:2

But who can endure the day of His coming?
And who can stand when He appears?
For He is like a refiner’s fire
and like fullers’ soap.

By nature, we are part of the kingdom of Satan. But this kingdom is doomed to fail and be destroyed. Therefore, we need an unshakable kingdom:

Hebrews 12:28

Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe.

Here, and here alone, is our certainty. It is in this Kingdom where we are safe. This will stand firm.
Or, better put: only Jesus will stand at His return. He alone will continue to live. If we are found in Him, we will stand.
We need forgiveness of sin. The wrath of God threatens to come upon us because of sin, but in Christ the price for our sins has already been paid. In other words, Christ has paid the price in our place and lived a perfect life as a man.
Here we find the only certainty for that day of wrath. Then we will be able to stand before God with a clean conscience.
For it is written:

Psalm 130:3-4

If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
O Lord, who could stand?
4 But with you there is forgiveness,
that you may be feared.

Romans 5:2, 9-11

2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.
10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.
11 More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

Stand firm in this, and you will be saved.

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