Passage Read: Revelation 15-16
Meditation Verses: 15:2-4
Thought
The only way to be victorious over the beast and his image and his mark is by submitting to death at their hands or by enduring until the rapture. Either way, it doesn't go easy for the faithful. But in the end, they're not bitter or complaining or emotionally scarred. Rather they celebrate the victory and glory of God! This had to be their theme during the days of the Antichrist. They had to be fully convinced of the truth of God, His ultimate victory and the justice of His ways, even as they suffered for their faithfulness to Him! "Just and true are Your ways, King of the ages," sing those who have endured the worst persecution in the history of mankind. They have such a clear vision of God in His glory and holiness, that they cannot help but fear Him and glorify Him, even as the world hunts them down.
Application
This is the vision and view of God I need even today. My life is unimportant. God alone and Jesus His Son and the Holy Spirit, they alone are worthy of honor and glory and fear and praise and life-upending devotion. Jesus is worthy of all honor even when my life is completely destroyed in obedience and faithfulness to Him. God's ways are true and just even when I undergo discipline for wrong behavior or belief. He is to be feared at all times, above all else, especially when things go smoothly for me. The value of God is not in how my life goes, whether good or bad, but in His sovereignty and surpassing majesty, in His holiness and the righteousness of His deeds. The thing that saves me is the recognition of the greatness of God, to the exclusion of all else, to the point of forgetting even myself.