BY E. LONNIE MELASHENKO

O YOU ENJOY reading a good revenge story? Something like Alexandre Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo, where the hero at first suffers injustice at the hands of an evil antagonist, but in the end he or she comes out on top and gets even?

There must be a lot of people who enjoy a good story like that. It's certainly one of the most popular genres in Hollywood. You know, the type of movie in which they bring up the violins at the end as the hero strides off into the sunset, having finally brought justice to an unjust world.

It's just human nature to want to see the tables turned on people who take advantage of others, isn't it?

Well, if that's the type of story you like, you ought to love the Apocalypse! It's the book at the end of the Bible--the book where the violins play with gusto, along with a lot of trumpets and harps and the Hallelujah Chorus!

But it's not always a pretty picture. The history of our world has not always been a pretty picture. Not by any stretch of the imagination.

Ever since Eve stopped to have lunch at the devil's fruit stand and first bought into the devil's big lie that she could become like God by declaring her independence from God, things have gone from bad to worse to worse yet.

When Adam and Eve chose to accept Satan's lie in place of God's truth, rulership of this planet changed hands. A placard was hung out on the world's front door stating "Under New Management," and everything went downhill from there. Now the villain was in power management--usurped, of course. But instead of people yielding control to a loving God who had the best interests of His creation at heart, our human race yielded to the rebel warlord, the evil rogue bent on destruction of everything good that God had ever made. That's the subplot of Revelation.

Just days ago I returned from holding live-by-satellite evangelistic meetings across the great continent of Africa. Days before departure, as our team prepared for our work over there, we read extensively, trying to familiarize ourselves with the situation of those we would be meeting and with whom we would be sharing the gospel. The political situation escalated into more serious terrorist threats of unrest and heightened levels of concern.

But I have to tell you, it broke my heart to hear so often of the suffering that had come upon people in Liberia, Angola, Congo, and other countries as a result of civil war and bloodshed. All as a direct result of rebel armies trying to steal away the wealth of the nation for their own nefarious agendas. Whole villages were wiped out as opposing armies, often made up of little boys--orphan soldiers--fought for control of diamond mines or gold mines or oil reserves.

The suffering and bloodshed have been terrible, and it just makes you long for a day when everything will be made right; when true, honest, caring, and just rulers will overthrow any who have a self-centered agenda.

But come closer to home. Corporate America (or Japan or England or Europe) in recent years has been racked again and again by scandals in penthouse offices--in which top-level managers have found ways to become wealthy beyond imagination. Raiding the pension funds of the people at the bottom of the ladder, these managers then cast them out on the street, penniless and jobless.

When you see that kind of thing, it makes you cry out for justice, doesn't it?

And that, my friend, is what the book of Revelation--the Book of the End--is all about. Turning the tables and evening the score!

I'm not sure what kind of rating Revelation would get if it were made into a movie. There's a lot of violence in it. There's a lot of illicit sex. Prostitutes and other fornicators have some pretty major roles.

That's just because the Bible is not in the habit of mincing words when it describes the slough of sin that our world has sunk into. And so, when Revelation pictures the final scenes of earth's history, there's some rather graphic details we might prefer to ignore or skip over.

But God doesn't gloss them over. He wants us to know that He knows just how bad it has been down here since the villain Satan took the reins. He also wants us to know that He's not going to let things go on like that forever. There is an end in sight.

The Altar Speaks
Two key texts rivet our attention as we look at the message of this Book of the End.

"And I heard the altar respond, 'Yes, O Lord God, the Almighty, your judgments are true and just!'" (Rev. 16:7, NRSV).

Have you ever heard of a talking altar? Why is the altar before the throne of God making this proclamation about God's justice--proclaiming that His judgments are true and just?

There's a clue in Revelation 8:3. Listen to this description of the altar and what is on it: "Then another angel, having a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. And He was given much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne" (NKJV).

Here's another clue, found in Revelation 6:9, 10: "When He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held. And they cried with a loud voice, saying, 'How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?'" (NKJV).

The altar is the depository of the prayers of all the saints who have been treated unjustly, killed, and tortured for their faith. It's the place in heaven where all the cries for justice that have ever ascended from this tired old earth have been collecting for millennia. It's a place filled with coals of fire--the anger of God at all the injustices that have ever been done on earth. Revelation pictures a time when their fiery feeling finally erupts like a Niagara of lava and is released against all the unrepentant perpetrators of injustice.

But the altar represents something else as well.

Because an altar is always a place of sacrifice.

It's the place where the lamb-sacrificed to bring forgiveness--was laid every day, just outside the temple that represented the dwelling place of God.

The altar is also a place for forgiveness.

The altar is Mount Calvary, the place where the Lamb of God died to bear the burden of all the hatred, injustice, and sin that has ever blighted the face of this planet.

The altar is where every sinner can go to have the weight of sin removed, to have the stain of sin bleached from their clothing by the blood of the Lamb! When John the revelator sees the redeemed of the earth, they are described as those who have "washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb" (Rev. 7:14, NKJV).

Meeting Place
So the altar before the throne of God is the meeting place of the two greatest forces that have played out their battle here on planet earth: the force of selfishness versus the force of selflessness.

Here at the altar, the meeting place, all rebels are invited to lay down their arms, to cease their rebellion, to repent and lay all their sins on the altar. For all those who accept the invitation, their sins are placed there. They have been taken up by the Lamb of God. He has died for those sins. He has allowed them to be burned up on the altar. They will never again trouble this universe.

But for those who have said No to God, who have refused to repent, who have said "Thanks, God, but I don't need a Savior; I'm good enough on my own," their sins have not been placed upon the altar. Those sins still have to be burned up, and they will be. Unfortunately, those sins will be burned up while they are still attached to the unrepentant sinners who clung to them.

That's precisely why there are so many plagues and so much fire and bloodshed in the book of Revelation. It's just picturing the natural outcome of the titanic struggle that has gone on down here on earth. Revelation pictures God's last great call to all who dwell on earth to repent of their rebellion and bow down and worship their Creator. That last great call is found in Revelation 14:7 in the voice of a great angel flying in heaven, crying out to the whole world: "'Fear God and give him glory, for the hour of his judgment has come; and worship him who made heaven and earth, the sea and the springs of water'" (NRSV).

Revelation gives the call to come back to God. And in order to demonstrate the importance of our decision in relation to God, it also pictures the result of not surrendering to God.

The Final Test
I'm glad that it's on the altar that the final decision about justice is made, aren't you? It's there--where you and I have the chance to be rid of our sins day by day, moment by moment--that the final examination of the rightness and wrongness of what God has done and what people have done will have to pass muster.

Revelation says the altar proclaims the justice of God because Calvary proclaims the justice of God. That's where sin and Satan met their match, where hatred was conquered by love. That's where rebellion showed its true fruits and love gave itself to redeem all who would accept redemption.

I'll admit Revelation spends a lot of words describing the final working out of justice against those who refuse God's forgiveness, but it doesn't end that way. No, Revelation, the Book of the End, closes with a glorious, wonderful picture of justice from its positive side: the rewards of righteousness. Good things are in store for those who turn to God and make Him their king on a daily basis.

After witnessing judgment and justice meted out against those who wanted no part with God, the apostle John saw another vision--one that I'd rather spend my time thinking about. Yes, it's nice to have justice done. But the violins and trumpets and harps can't play their triumphant music unless the justice also includes a reward for the good guys--a happy ending. That's what Revelation ends with--John's vision of the good side of justice. These verses from the last two chapters of the Bible make that clear:

"I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. . . . And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, 'Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.' . . .

"And He said to me, 'It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts. He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son.'"

"And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall serve Him. They shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads. There shall be no night there: They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light. And they shall reign forever and ever" (Rev. 21:1-7; 22:1-5, NKJV).

There's been a lot of darkness, and a lot of death on our planet. Revelation doesn't mince words about that. But neither does it fail to remind us that in the end God will rule, and there will be light and life for all who choose to live with Him--for eternity!

I want to do that, and I trust you do too. Resolve anew today to bring yourself to God, to surrender yourself to Him on a daily basis. Lay your sins on the altar. Accept the sacrifice of Jesus. Live today, every day, and all of eternity with Him!

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E. Lonnie Melashenko is speaker/director of the Voice of Prophecy radio ministry.