Volume 4 Issue 1
THE EARTH BELONGS TO THE LORD
“I saw in the right hand of Him who sat on the throne a book written inside and on the back, sealed up with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, ‘Who is worthy to open the book and to break its seals?’ And no one in heaven or on the earth or under the earth was able to open the book or to look into it. Then I began to weep greatly because no one was found worthy to open the book or to look into it; and one of the elders said to me, ‘Stop weeping; behold, the Lion that is from the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has overcome so as to open the book and its seven seals.’
“And I saw between the throne (with the four living creatures) and the elders a Lamb standing, as if slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God, sent out into all the earth. And He came and took the book out of the right hand of Him who sat on the throne. When He had taken the book, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each one holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song, saying, ‘Worthy are You to take the book and to break its seals; for You were slain, and purchased for God with Your blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth’” (Revelation 5:1-10 NASU).[1] What have these verses got to do with the fact that the earth belongs to the Lord? Perhaps other verses that come more naturally to mind are, “The earth is the Lord’s, and all it contains, the world, and those who dwell in it” (Psalm 24:1); “If I were hungry I would not tell you, for the world is Mine, and all it contains” (Psalm 50:12); or “The heavens are Yours, the earth also is Yours; the world and all it contains, You have founded them” (Psalm 89:11). The Bible makes abundantly clear that not only the earth, but also all of creation, belongs to the Lord. However, no other words in the entire Bible more clearly underscore the fact that the earth now belongs to, and has always belonged to the Lord than those quoted above from Revelation.
To understand the significance of this scroll (scroll is the better term since books as known today did not exist during the 1st century A.D.) one must understand something of the Old Testament year of Jubilee and the right of redemption.
Chapter 25 of Leviticus details this special year called Jubilee. In essence God commanded the Israelites that after they entered the Promised Land they were to work the fields for six years, but on the seventh year the land was to have a Sabbath rest. At the end of seven Sabbaths of years for the land, the 50th year, all property (with a few exceptions) was to be returned to the original owner. “You shall thus consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim a release through the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you, and each of you shall return to his own property, and each of you shall return to his family” (Leviticus 25:10).
This law was necessary to protect the poor or unfortunate from being permanently displaced from their land. If, for any reason an individual became obligated to sell his land, and thus, his inheritance, the year of Jubilee was God’s solution of restoration. A Jew, no matter how poor or destitute, lived with the hope Jubilee brought. He understood that he would not forever be a slave or servant to another, but he or his heir would once again possess his God-given inheritance.
The one shortcoming of Jubilee was the length of time between them. If a man had to sell his property near the beginning of one Jubilee, he may not live until the next one, thus being deprived of his inheritance for the rest of his life. In such a case, his heir, rather than he, would obtain the benefit of restoration. Therefore, the Lord made a way of restoration before the next Jubilee.
“The land, moreover, shall not be sold permanently, for the land is Mine; for you are but aliens and sojourners with Me. Thus for every piece of your property, you are to provide for the redemption of the land. If a fellow countryman of yours becomes so poor he has to sell part of his property, then his nearest kinsman is to come and buy back what his relative has sold. Or in case a man has no kinsman, but so recovers his means as to find sufficient for its redemption, then he shall calculate the years since its sale and refund the balance to the man to whom he sold it, and so return to his property” (Leviticus 25:23-27). If a man regained enough means to buy the land back that he had sold, the buyer was obligated to restore it. If, however, he was unable to gain the means of redemption, his nearest kinsman, sometimes referred to as a kinsman redeemer, was to buy the land and restore it. In the book of Ruth this law is implemented when Boaz exercised his right of redemption. (This is a wonderful book well worth reading and careful study).
The point being made is that if an inheritance was forfeited, for whatever reason, God provided a way of restoration. Man needed such a way of restoration long before the Jews settled in Israel. After God had created Adam and Eve He said to them, “‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’ Then God said, ‘Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree which has fruit yielding seed; it shall be food for you; and to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the sky and to every thing that moves on the earth which has life, I have given every green plant for food’; and it was so” (Genesis 1:28-30). The earth was man’s inheritance. It was to be his home, a gift from God to enjoy. He was meant to tend it and to cultivate it. Yet, man forfeited his inheritance. “Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, ‘Indeed, has God said, “You shall not eat from any tree of the garden”?’ The woman said to the serpent, ‘From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat; but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, “You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.”’ The serpent said to the woman, ‘You surely will not die! For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil’” (Genesis 3:1-5). Eve, and then Adam, did disobey God; thus, forfeiting his inheritance. Though God still owned the world, Satan had usurped man’s birthright to freely possess it. Joy turned to drudgery; the ground grudgingly brought forth food; the first command God gave to man to be fruitful and multiply was now to be accompanied by extreme pain. Man’s loss was great; worse, he had absolutely no way to restore his inheritance. He did not have, nor would he ever have, the means to restore it. The situation was hopeless and would have remained that way if God had not made an amazing promise while cursing the serpent. “And I will put enmity between you (the serpent) and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel” (Genesis 3:15). The seed of the woman was to become the Kinsman Redeemer, Jesus Christ. Jesus was to be “bruised on His heel”, by undergoing death upon a cross, but the serpent, Satan, was to be “bruised on his head”. Jesus rose from the dead, paying the price for man’s rebellion and sentenced Satan to death. The earth, man’s inheritance, has been redeemed and the Kingdom of God is being established throughout the earth one heart at a time. Yet, the fullness of the redemption has not been realized. One causal look around the world testifies to this truth. Evil is rampant; violence, injustice, and immorality abound. With the author of Hebrews one would have to agree: “He (God) left nothing that is not subject to him (Jesus). But now we do not yet see all things subjected to him” (Hebrews 2:8).
Why? Why, if Jesus redeemed the earth by paying the price upon the cross and rising again three days later, is not the earth, and all that is in it, subjected to Him? Because the title deed that contains the terms of redemption has not yet been unsealed.
Consider for a moment another law of the Jews. When they bought land two deeds were drawn up; one open, one sealed. An example of this is found in the book of Jeremiah. Jeremiah lived during the last years of the kingdom of Judah. He had prophesized for years that Judah would fall into the hands of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon as a punishment from God for their numerous sins. Judah was to become the property, the possession, of Babylon. Ownership of land at that time was meaningless because Judah was to cease being a sovereign nation. Nebuchadnezzar would apportion the land to any he chose. Yet, it was at this very moment in history that the Lord told Jeremiah to redeem his cousin, Hanamel’s, land in his hometown of Anathoth. It seemed foolish to do such a thing. Nevertheless, Jeremiah obeyed. Read carefully the legal transaction that took place. “I (Jeremiah) signed and sealed the deed, and called in witnesses, and weighed out the silver on the scales. Then I took the deeds of purchase, both the sealed copy containing the terms and conditions and the open copy; and I gave the deed of purchase to Baruch the son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah, in the sight of Hanamel my uncle's son and in the sight of the witnesses who signed the deed of purchase, before all the Jews who were sitting in the court of the guard. And I commanded Baruch in their presence, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, “Take these deeds, this sealed deed of purchase and this open deed, and put them in an earthenware jar, that they may last a long time.”’ For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, ‘Houses and fields and vineyards will again be bought in this land’” (Jeremiah 32:10-15). Jeremiah bought the land knowing it would soon fall into enemy hands, but with the promise that it would once more to restored to his heirs. God assured him of this because he obeyed His voice and acquired the land legally. Though Babylon would possess it for a time, in actuality it belonged to Jeremiah.
So it is with the earth; the earth belongs to the Lord; He never lost legal possession of it, but it took a Redeemer, Jesus, to redeem it legally. “But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons” (Galatians 4:3-5). As Jeremiah purchased the land in Anathoth, closing the deal with two deeds, one open, one sealed, so did Jesus. His life upon the earth is the open deed. This deed is “Immanuel”, which means “God with Us”. Jesus lived His life in the open for all to see. He lived a very public life and died a very public death. The very words He spoke were the terms His Father required for the earth’s redemption. One must give in order to receive; one must loose his life to gain it; one must love his enemies, bless those who curse him, and pray for those who mistreat him. The open deed is the Bible. So, what is the sealed deed?
Mounce calles it “the scroll of destiny.”[2] Fausset explains, “The roll, ‘the title deed of man’s inheritance’ (De Burgh), redeemed by Christ, contains the successive steps by which He shall recover from its usurper possession of the kingdom already ‘purchased’ for Himself and His elect (emphasis in the original).”[3] These statements agree completely with what has already been said. The sealed deed is the scroll of destiny in that man’s destiny is unfolded as the seals are broken and history plays out its final chapter. This scroll contains the terms of redemption necessary to be fulfilled before man can once again claim his God-given inheritance forfeited centuries earlier by Adam. The breaking of the seals opens the way back to the Garden of Eden and access to the Tree of Life, but the way back must of necessity lead past the flaming sword held in the hand of the Cherubim (Genesis 3:24). Is it any wonder that the breaking of the seals releases upon the earth tribulation of an extent that is almost beyond imagination? With each seal broken, creation is brought closer to the Lord’s flaming sword so that all that is evil and corrupt will be destroyed.
As terrifying as the events in Revelation may appear as the seals are broken, for the scroll to remain closed would result in a much greater calamity. “That book, unlifted and unopened, is the Church’s grief and distress. It bespeaks the inheritance unredeemed – the children still estranged from their purchased possession.”[4] John’s bitter weeping becomes more understandable knowing what this scroll truly is. “Then I began to weep greatly because no one was found worthy to open the book or to look into it” (Revelation 5:4). “John knew by that Spirit in which he was, what that sealed book meant. He knew that if no one was found worthy and able to take it from the hand of God, and to break its seals, that all the promises of the prophets, and all the hopes of the saints, and all the preintimations of a redeemed world, must fail…Until, therefore, that book is opened, and its seals broken, the people of God must remain in privation, sorrow, and tears.”[5] Revelation must come to pass if man’s inheritance is to be restored.
Ladd makes the observation that the scroll is more than a title deed – it is a will. “The little book is in the form of an ancient will, which was usually sealed with the seals of seven witnesses. The book contains God’s inheritance for his people, which is founded upon the death of his Son”[6] (emphasis added). Jesus died so that all of creation could be restored back to God, and man’s lost inheritance could be regained. “For this reason He (Jesus) is the mediator of a new covenant, so that, since a death has taken place for the redemption of the transgressions that were committed under the first covenant, those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance. For where a covenant is, there must of necessity be the death of the one who made it. For a covenant is valid only when men are dead, for it is never in force while the one who made it lives” (Hebrews 9:15-17). Thus, John “saw between the throne (with the four living creatures) and the elders a Lamb standing, as if slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God, sent out into all the earth. And He came and took the book out of the right hand of Him who sat on the throne” (Revelation 5:6-7). God’s last will and testament, the scroll He held in His right hand, could now be legally opened and the final stage of history entered. Agony and travail were set to begin as Jesus prepared to break the first seal; it was the agony and travail of birth pangs.
Revelation is a book of new life. Yet, new life comes into being only through pain. Is it worth it? “Whenever a woman is in labor she has pain, because her hour has come; but when she gives birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy that a child has been born into the world” (John 16:21). Does the mother of a newborn resent the child because of the intense pain she had to endure to give him life? No. Instead, a smile rooted in love for him lights up her face and a joy impossible to describe wells up from deep within her being. Was it worth the pain? “For I (Paul) consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body” (Romans 8:18-23). Pain that ends in new life is always worth it.
Paul spoke of the redemption of the body. What is the body but an earthen vessel (2 Corinthians 4:7)? Just as the earth will be redeemed as Jesus begins the process of breaking the seals on the “scroll of destiny”, man will experience his redemption in the same way, resulting in a glorified body such as Jesus has. The image of man was marred by sin in the Garden of Eden, but God holds the “title deed” to each individual person just as He holds the title deed to the earth; and just as Jesus’ death and resurrection gave Him the authority to take the earth’s title deed from the hand of God to open it, so He does for every person. “After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you” (1 Peter 5:10). Revelation is your story. The earth, and you, belong to the Lord.
