The Book of Revelation - Part 16

05 Jul 2026 · this lesson on the church site

Taught by Dr. Keith Palmer, Grace Bible Church, Granbury, Texas — from the church’s Sunday School series on Revelation. These are lightly edited transcripts of the audio, posted for personal study; the teaching and its content belong to Dr. Palmer and Grace Bible Church. Listen to the originals and find his notes on the church website. Transcribed from the audio by AI. Edited only where the audio was unclear (all edits marked with *). Errors are possible — the recording is the authority.

Review of Where We Are (00:00)

Let's turn our Bibles to Revelation chapter six. We're in chapter six. When we last left John in the book of Revelation, he was seeing a vision of the throne room:

the lamb that was slain
the one sitting on the throne
the four living creatures
the 24 elders

Then this book is found with seven seals on it, and there is no one worthy, found in heaven or on earth or under the earth, to open the book. Then the Lion from the tribe of Judah appears, the Lamb that is slain, and he is found worthy to open the book and break its seals. There is great rejoicing in heaven and great praise that comes due to him, rightly due to him because of that.

We left off at the end of chapter five with every created thing, the angels and the elders and everybody, falling down and worshiping:

"To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever." The four living creatures kept saying, "Amen," and the elders fell down and worshiped.

So we have found the one who was worthy to open the book. What we're going to do now is turn the page to chapter six and begin to see this book opened one seal at a time. As we look ahead, we see that with each seal broken and the scroll slowly unfolded, a measure of God's judgment comes. We'll see that here.

Just to remind you where we've been, I know it's been a long time. This is our outline of the book. We're in the largest section, chapters 4 through 22, the things that take place after. That's not my title or John MacArthur's title. That is actually what the book says is happening in chapters 4 to 22.

Yes, you knew it was coming: the Revelation diagram. So we are right here. We've seen the letters to the seven churches. We've seen the throne room. Now the Lamb is taking the scroll, and we're opening the scroll with the seven seals over these next several chapters. If we zoom in, oh, wait a minute. We've got to get this. Almost forgot.

Do you guys remember the contest for the four living creatures? You were supposed to come by. I know it was a few weeks ago. The winner was Mr. Weston Wallace, and I promised him a reward. So I have a Braum's gift card here for Mr. Weston. Come get this, buddy. Give him applause. Did not want to forget that, for a job well done, my friend. All right, go have an ice cream cone.

Now, if we zoom in, here's the section we're looking at, and you see these scrolls. The seals on the scrolls are opened here, and then there's a really long section for the seventh seal, and you'll see why that is. In chapter six we learn about what are called the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Look at that. Wow.

Revelation 6:1-11*:

Then I saw when the Lamb broke one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures saying with a voice of thunder, "Come!" And I looked, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it had a bow, and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer. And when He broke the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, "Come!" And another, a red horse, went out, and to him who sat on it, it was granted to take peace from the earth, and that men would slay one another; and a great sword was given to him. And when He broke the third seal, I heard the third living creature saying, "Come!" And I looked, and behold, a black horse, and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand. And I heard something like a voice in the center of the four living creatures saying, "A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not damage the oil and the wine." And when the Lamb broke the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature saying, "Come!" And I looked, and behold, an ashen horse, and he who sat on it had the name Death, and Hades was following with him. Authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword and with famine and with pestilence and by the wild beasts of the earth. And when He broke the fifth seal, I saw underneath the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the Word of God and because of the testimony which they had maintained. And they cried out with a loud voice, saying, "How long, O Lord, holy and true, will You refrain from judging and avenging our blood on those who dwell on the earth?" And there was given to each of them a white robe, and they were told that they should rest for a little while longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brethren who were to be killed even as they had been would be completed also.

We'll just stop right there. So the four horsemen are called out by the four living creatures. And just to pull over for a second on this, I know we've talked about the symbolism of this book and how we interpret things like numbers and imagery. Can I just say something that's really obvious? You're going to say, "You didn't need to tell us that, Keith," but so far, the numbers we've seen have represented what numbers normally represent. Ta-da. All right, awesome. Thank you. That's so profound, Pastor Keith.

I'm saying that because sometimes we get into the numbers of Revelation, and there can be some diversity of opinion about whether we need to make more out of those numbers than we normally would. Does the number seven mean more than the number seven? Does the 144,000 mean more? We'll get to that, because we need to look at those numbers in their context. That's what determines meaning.

But so far, we had seven letters to seven churches, and how many of those letters do we actually see? Seven. We had four living creatures, and what do we have here? Four living creatures that call out, and there are four horsemen. So I'm showing you that just because it's apocalyptic literature doesn't mean we need to have an impulse to say the numbers don't mean what they normally mean. Sometimes they might mean more than that, and the context will help us determine that. But my task here is not to tell you what I think. It's to try to show you what the book itself is doing in terms of presenting this information to us.

In this case, those four living creatures actually call out four different horsemen. Anybody want to meet these guys, or do we want to move on? Okay, this one's a little more accurate, I think, because one has a crown and one has the sword, and you kind of see some of that there. So do we need to do another contest for the four horsemen? Someone's going, "I was thinking about that bronze ice cream cone." I need to. Okay. So there they are.

Let's talk about these seals and look at them one by one to make some observations. ## Seal One: The White Horse (08:16)

First of all, let's go to seal number one. We see this in the first text. Notice the Lamb, representing the Lord Jesus, is the one who is worthy to take the book and break its seals. That was the chorus of the elders and the living creatures as they sang the new song in the previous section. So here we see the Lamb breaking those seals.

Again, we have to ask, what does the book represent? What do the seals represent? My standard answer is to keep reading, and the book will show us what the scroll itself represents and what the seals represent.

So he breaks the first seal, and notice John tells us he heard one of the four living creatures saying, "as with a voice of thunder." What must that have sounded like? This living creature calls out with a voice of thunder the first horseman. John says, "I looked, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it had a bow, and a crown was given to him." What do crowns represent? Leadership, authority, maybe kingship, right? So he's given this crown, probably representative of some authority he has, and that's exactly what John says: the crown was given to him, and he went out and did what?

He conquered. He went out conquering and to conquer. We don't know more about that. He has a bow through which he presumably does the conquering, so we say, okay, this is representative of, I don't know, armies conquering armies, or some sort of conquest going on in the nations. John doesn't elaborate, and apparently the vision doesn't give him much more here, but the point is there's conquering going on. Why is that significant? We're going to see as these unfold why this is significant in relation to the others.

So the rider comes out with a bow and a crown, he goes out conquering and to conquer, and that leads very quickly to seal number two, the red horse.

Seal Two: The Red Horse (10:18)

When he broke the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, presumably with the same thunderous voice, "Come," and now emerges a red horse. To him who sat on it, it was granted, watch this, to take peace from the earth.

We have to stop right there and ask a question: where did that peace come from? If you were to say today, "Is there peace on earth today?" what would you say? Is it the worst of times? Probably not, historically. Is there peace around the world? No. In fact, there are multiple wars going on right now. And frankly, if you know church history, there are always multiple wars going on.

So when this living creature says, "Come," and the red horse emerges with the rider, and it's granted to him to take peace from the earth, the first thing we want to ask is, where did that peace come from? How was this peace established? Of course, John doesn't elaborate, but it begins to shape what's going on in our minds. What are these activities representing? One rider goes out to conquer and is conquering, and now another is granted to go out and take peace from the earth. That leads us back to the first rider. Does the conquering and the conquest establish some sort of peace that is then compromised with the second seal? That's one possibility. We don't know. But we're trying to put together the sequence of what's happening. The rider on the red horse comes out, and he is granted to take peace from the earth. Now, how is he going to take peace from the earth? What does it say?

The Second Seal: Conquest and War (12:22)

Look at that verse. He is going to do it through granting, well, the authority given so that men would slay one another with a great sword. They would slay one another, and a great sword was given to him. Presumably that sword represents the authority given to men to slay one another. So now there is some sort of peace, and we have to ask where that peace came from. We don't know. But that peace is then taken, and men begin to slay one another, and a great sword was given to the rider on the red horse. So we say, okay, we have conquering and we have war. Let's look at the next one*. So we ask, what's going on? We're seeing the unfolding of these violent acts on the earth.

The Third Seal: The Black Horse (13:23)

It's interesting, too. John is seeing this vision in heaven, but the vision he sees is representative of events on the earth, so let's keep that in mind. With seal number three, the black horse, the third living creature says, thunderously, "Come," and this rider comes. John says he saw that the one who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand. You're thinking scales, that's the device that sits on the floor of your bathroom and shows you numbers you don't want to see, right? But when we talk about a pair of scales, what does he have in mind here?

Weights and measures, that's right. A scale you would hold for weights and measures. In the ancient day, what did they use those for? They would use them for commerce and conversions. If you're exchanging currency, or weighing out an amount of some sort of currency or food, you use scales to verify the amount of what you're selling or of the currency with which you're purchasing it. So this pair of scales makes us think about commerce. That's what's going on here.

Then in verse 6, John writes: "I heard something like a voice in the center of the four living creatures saying, 'A quart of wheat for a denarius and three quarts of barley for a denarius, and do not damage the oil and the wine.'" We say, what on earth is going on there? I think I even put that in your notes. I heard a voice, that's what he says, and we say, what is going on there?

So what do you think that's all about? Don't read your notes. Look up here. What is that?

Inflation of food prices. Famine.

Okay, so what do you know about a denarius from biblical times? It's about a day's wage. And then it says a quart of wheat. How much is that? Not a whole lot. A quart of wheat was barely enough to cover one person for one day in terms of basic nutrition. That's what you could get for a whole day's wage, so the picture here is that this is not a good economic scenario. Perhaps a famine, as Grant said, some sort of economic hard times, inflation. That's what is represented here.

Now look at the barley. What's the difference between wheat and barley?

Lesser grain. Yes, exactly. Barley is considered a lesser grain, and typically it was reserved for animal feed. Human consumption is not going to make you sick, but it's like eating dog food, I guess. You wouldn't necessarily want to do that. So three quarts of barley, an animal food, for a day's wage again emphasizes the economic difficulties of the day, perhaps through famine or inflation or some sort of hard time.

Then the end of the verse: "do not damage the oil and the wine." What do you think he means there?

Oil and wine would have been much more expensive relative to things like barley and wheat, so the voice says, don't damage it. If you've got some, hang on to it. Don't lose it. Don't be careless with it, because it's very, very valuable.

So all three of those pictures point to the fact that there is some sort of economic collapse, some high inflation, perhaps a famine. People are barely making ends meet. They are turning to food they would normally give to animals, and they're paying a highly inflated price for it. Most commentators agree it's some sort of famine condition. The point is that this is not a good time we see here. There is conquering, there is war, people are slaying one another. The peace that was on the earth at some point is removed, people begin to kill each other, and now a famine breaks out. And things keep going.

The Fourth Seal: The Pale Horse (18:31)

The Lamb breaks the fourth seal. The pale horse, your translation might say "ashen." The Greek word means something like a gray-green color. That's where we get the idea of a pale horse.

The fourth living creature says, "Come," in that thunderous voice. This is interesting. The previous three seals just said there was a rider on each horse. Here the rider is named. Revelation 6:7-8: "I looked, and behold, an ashen horse, and he who sat on it had the name Death, and Hades was following with him." The rider's name is Death, and Hades follows him. We understand what death is. What is Hades in this context?

The grave*? Yes, yes. Hades is interesting. You see this with both the Hebrew word Sheol and the New Testament word Hades, and you're going to see them throughout your Bible. Don't lock in and say, "Oh, it means this," because both words have slightly different meanings depending on the context. Sheol can be a synonym for death, or it can mean the afterlife, depending on the context. Hades is very similar. It can be just another synonym for death, or it can speak to the underworld. If we get really technical in our eschatological thinking, we think of Abraham's bosom and Hades, and then we await the new heavens and new earth. We'll get into all that. But in this context, because it's used in parallel with death, it's probably just emphasizing another way of describing death or the grave.

So the point is that this ashen horse arrives, its rider's name is Death, Hades follows, the grave follows. And what happens? Back to the text: "An authority was given to them," and this is shocking. "Over a fourth of the earth." Over a fourth of the earth. How many people are on the earth? Let's just say today, about 8 billion people, a little over 8 billion. What is a fourth of that? Who wants to do some basic math? Over 2 billion. That's a lot of people.

When we read about wars and famines and conquering, that has always happened in a fallen world. But I want you to see that this is something different than normal fallen activity. These riders are given authority to bring death over a quarter of the earth. The text says they were given authority to kill:

with the sword
with famine
with pestilence
by the wild beasts of the earth

So you see the flow of all this. The Lamb breaks one of the seals, and the result is cataclysmic activity on the earth, represented by these horsemen and what they are doing or are given authority to do. The scroll is unfolding different levels of judgment, war, battle, and death. Okay? Let's stop right there. Questions on that? It's very straightforward. I know you have a hundred questions. What about this? What about that? We're just trying to figure out what this is talking about: the unfolding of judgments, disasters, and death on the earth, consecutively unfolding here.

Questions and Discussion (22:41)

Yes? Yeah, it's interesting, a little bit different language there. What do you guys think? Bible scholars, what do you think?

So let's talk about that. One option is that the rider on the first horse is Christ. It fits in the sense

Lesson Transcript

Are the four horsemen angelic beings or demonic beings? We don't know. They could be representative or symbolic, in that what they're doing is unleashing a certain measure of judgment on the earth. But to the point, it's ultimately Christ's judgment, brought on the earth through these means. So the answer is we don't know in that way. Sheila?

Ultimately God is sovereign over all things. So whether an angel or a demon or someone else, God's in charge. Good point, very good point. One other hand? Bob?

No, it's the same Greek word, and depending on the context, it can mean either. I think that's another one we have to ask: is this local or more global? As the seals unfold, you start to see the extent of all of this. Earth would be the normal way to take it, unless there were context-limiting factors that would lead us to a narrower scope.

I love watching you guys think through this. This is awesome. So what do we know? By the time we get to the second rider, there is some measure of peace that is then taken from the earth, and that leads us back to the first rider. Did the first rider establish some sense of peace on the earth? That's possible. It fits the context, but then you have all these questions raised. If it's Christ, you'd think it would be a true peace. If it's not Christ, is it some sort of false peace? We'll talk about that at some point.

Homework (25:46)

Your homework assignment this week is to read what we're reading here, the seven seals, in light of Matthew 24. Remember, Matthew 24 is where Jesus talks about the end times.

Comparing Matthew 24 and Revelation (26:46)

It's his most lengthy treatise on eschatology. What I want you to see in reading those side by side is that there is a significant amount of congruity between the two. What Jesus says and what's unfolding here... well, Jesus is actually the one speaking in both*. In Matthew 24 and Revelation there's a parallelism that goes on, and you'll see that. It helps us a little bit with the chronology. Jesus in Matthew 24 is going to link what's happening here back to something that happens in the book of Daniel, with what he calls the Abomination of Desolation. So we need to pull Daniel into all this. We're going to get there, and I love that you guys are already trying to put the puzzle pieces together. At this point, what I'm trying to do is wrestle with what this is saying first, and then we'll start bringing in other text to give it some color and help here.

Yes, John?

Sure, yeah. So if the seals were restraining something, the horsemen are in the wings kind of waiting to come out. Yeah, that makes sense. And I love that Grant's reading ahead. He talks about this having to do with the next seal, which is the martyrs.

So yes, Brenda. I'd have to look up the word to remember what it is, but it means authority or permission or power. It's the idea, like someone said, that if God is sovereign overall, he's granting permission, authority, and power to bring all these things about.

Observations on the Seals (27:48)

Okay, so now that we're on the side of the road, the car's pulled over, let's just make some observations. Then we'll get into seal number five. I don't know if that's in your notes, but I'm prepared to get in there if we have time. Again, call me Commander Obvious, but we're just trying to fit all this together.

First of all, the text indicates a clear chronology of events that corresponds to the seals, with each one coming about in order. There's creature number one, horse number one, seal number one, et cetera. There's an unfolding of the chronology here. That's important for bigger-picture questions like how we are to understand when these events happen, and whether we take them in chronological order, thematic order, or circular order. Those are good questions we need to answer as the book unfolds. But if we stop and look at what we've seen so far, we have multiple contextual evidences that this is unfolding chronologically. We've talked about the repetition of the phrase "and after this", and we've talked about how the seals lead one to the next.
The overall development we see here indicates an escalation of death and judgment on the earth. Would you agree with that? Things are getting worse. They're not getting better. That helps us in terms of where this is going and what it all means.
Some of these events could have already taken place, or are currently taking place. Can we say that's possible? Is there death in the world? Are there economic issues in the world? Have there been severe famines in the world? Conquering of peoples? So we can say, yes, maybe some of this has already happened, or maybe it is happening right now. We'll keep reading to figure out the best time in history for these things to fit.

Events That Seem Still Future (29:52)

We do have to say this as well. Other events we've seen here seem yet future, such as:

Established peace on the earth that is suddenly taken. I don't think we've seen that yet.
Death of one-fourth of the world's population. We definitely haven't seen that yet.

So, taking it at face value, some of these events we have to conclude haven't happened yet. That helps us with how we are to understand the timing of these things. I'm not banging a pulpit on a particular eschatological position. What I'm trying to help you see is what the book is actually giving us in terms of evidence. What is the text itself arguing and teaching? That allows us to think intelligently as the book unfolds about the questions of when and how that you want answered.

Yes?

Right. Yeah, no, I appreciate that. So Jason's just saying that some of these things we've seen on a smaller scale, and that's true. That's one of the views: are these things representative of events in church history that slowly get worse? That's plausible for sure. And that's possible. It depends, I guess, on going back to the phrase "peace on the earth". Is that a relative peace or an ultimate peace? We'll talk more about that when you study that phraseology. We'll get a little more insight, so we'll probably come back to it. I'm giving you a little bit at a time every week, and we'll see if we can put all the Lego pieces together as we go.

Yes?

Yeah. So the comment is that even with COVID, where we might have 30 million people die, that's a fraction of what a true quarter of the earth would be, at least using today's numbers. Yeah, that's right. So we try to imagine over 2 billion people. That's a big number, and I think it points to something that is unprecedented in history, for sure.

Closing Exhortation and Prayer (32:57)

All right, keep reading. Are you reading Revelation? You thought, because I took vacation, that I would not ask that, didn't you? Keep reading Revelation and stay in it. The best way to understand the book is to know it, and the way you're going to know it is by continuing to read it. We'll come back next week and talk about seal number five.

Let me pray for us, and if you don't mind, I'm going to pray especially for the kids that are missing, and just ask for God's kindness.

Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for the joy of studying it together and wrestling with the details. Thank you for the clarity of your word. We know you're not playing games with us, revealing things that are unknowable, and we trust that you'll guide us and direct us to understand what we need to. Father, we want to lift up especially these kids who escaped from the orphanage. Thank you for those who came back. We pray that you will minister to their hearts, and that the things that led them to leave can be addressed. Father, we grieve over the two who have not been found and have likely ended up back in a different country in human trafficking scenarios. It is hard to even imagine what it looks like for a six-year-old or an eight-year-old to be trafficked. So we pray for your mercy: that these kids, whom we had the privilege of meeting, would be protected, that you would bring them back, and even more than that, that you would open their eyes to the love of Jesus, and to an identity, a purpose, a belonging, and a family that they can be a part of by grace through faith in Jesus. So we lift them up. Thank you for those like Emily and the Restorer 17 folks who are doing good work there for Hota and his church, La Fuente. We lift up these friends and thank you for the work they're doing and that we can partner with them. Father, we pray that whether we're in Quito, Ecuador, or Granbury, Texas, we would remember our mission. These things in Revelation remind us of things to come, and that focuses our energy, clarifies our duty, and motivates why we're here. So might we be about gospel work this week, wherever you put us and whoever we're around, and all for your glory. In Jesus' name, amen.

* = the audio was unclear here and the words were reconstructed from context. Scripture read aloud is in red.

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