First Peter 1, if the Lord is
willing, I believe I'm gonna bring Brother Charles's funeral
message from this passage of scripture. And as I was looking at it Monday
morning, I was reminded of what the scripture has to say about
that moment of death as we say it from this side of things,
you know, that moment of death for a believer and it's precious. What the scripture has to say
about this is precious. I thought we could all just look
at it and be reminded of it and enjoy it together tonight. I
don't feel like I have an outline. We're just going to enjoy what
the scripture has to say about this moment for a believer. Let's read the first five verses
here in 1 Peter 1. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ,
to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia,
Asia, and Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the
Father. Through sanctification of the
Spirit unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ,
Grace unto you and peace be multiplied. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy
hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus
Christ from the dead. To an inheritance incorruptible,
and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven
for you who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation,
ready to be revealed in the last time." Now, this is what Peter
just said. He said, all of God's people
have been given a living hope. All of God's people have been
given a living and alive hope by the resurrection of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Because he rose from the dead,
we have a living hope. He said in verse 2, all of God's
elect have been set apart by the Spirit
of God. That's what sanctified means. That's what sanctification, elect
according to the foreknowledge of God the Father through sanctification
of the Spirit. That's what sanctified means. It means set apart by the Spirit
of God. And where did God's Spirit set? the elect of God when he set
them apart? This is wonderful. He set them
in the obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. That truly is wonderful. When God's Spirit set apart the
elect that God the Father chose to save, He set them in the righteousness
and blood of Jesus Christ. That's where he put them. What
a place to be, a place to be set. That blood and righteousness
of Christ was the gift. It was the grace, as it says
at the end of verse two. It was the grace that brought
a multitude of peace to God's people. Multiplied peace. Peace with God. What God did
for His elect in Christ. It brought peace with God. It
brought peace with the law. Do you know God's people are
at peace with the law? The law that we can't keep. The
law that only condemns us in the flesh. In Christ, we're at
peace with the law. We're at peace with judgment. And because of that, all the
blessing is owed to God, the father, God, the son, and God,
the spirit. As verse three says, blessed
be God. And it's because their great
mercy and grace saved us. They saved us. God, Father, Son,
and Spirit. They purposed to save their people. They saved their people. They
brought life to us again. They gave us a promise of hope. that we can now cling to forever. We can cling to it now, we can
cling to it for the rest of eternity. And that hope will never go away
in the sense that it will give way to sight. We don't need hope
anymore once we physically have the sight of Christ and these
things. But that hope that we have, it'll
never be diminished. That hope is unto the reserved,
it's all the way up to the reserved inheritance that will be kept. God's people will be kept. God's people will be kept. Are any of God's people who Christ
redeemed on the cross of Calvary, will any of them be lost? No. They're all going to be kept. That ought to make everybody
here happy because we're all a bunch of sinners. but we're
going to be kept. Kept by the power of God. Their
reserved inheritance in Christ is kept by the power of God.
It's all going to be kept until it's revealed on the day that
God's people step foot into glory itself. And when that day comes,
this is what the scripture has to say about it. I turned to
each one of these references and I enjoyed them so much and
that's all we're going to do. I'm just going to turn to some of these references.
We're going to enjoy them and we're going to hope in them.
With our living hope, our lively hope that has been given to us
in Christ. And let me just point out before
we turn that the word hope means expected anticipation. That's what this lively hope
is. It is an, it is an expected anticipation. It doesn't mean, well, this is
a long shot. You know, it may or may not happen,
but I'm hoping it's not what it means. It's going to happen. What God has to say concerning
his people, it's going to happen. The hope that God gives to his
people is a living hope. It's an expectation that God's
people are just waiting for. We're just waiting for it. Waiting for salvation to be revealed
to us when that moment comes. Our leaving of this world, entering
into the world to come. And when that moment happens,
this is what the scripture has to say about it. Okay. Turn with
me to some of these places. Let's go to Psalm 116. Psalm 116 verse 15 says, precious in the sight of the
Lord is the death of his saints. When that moment comes for each
one of God's people, it is a precious moment to the Lord. That's a
precious moment to our Lord. The word precious means valuable.
It means prized. It means highly valued for its
cost because of what it cost. Because of what it cost, you
know, lemons limitations three talks about our Lord remembering
the wormwood in the gall. Remembering the cross, remembering
how great the payment was. to purchase that sinner to himself. Oh, how great the payment was
to purchase me and to purchase you. And that's what makes that moment
precious to our Lord, him remembering the great cost that it took to redeem that sinner to himself.
He redeemed his own because he wanted his own. I had this little
illustration. This is not a good illustration. Because it just, it doesn't do
this justice. But you know what it's like to
want something. You desire something. You think
about something. You think about purchasing that
thing. And when you do, it's precious to you. It's a
precious moment to you. You understand what you have
something you desire it, you want it, you buy it, you take
it. Well, our Lord purchased his own. He redeemed his own
because he wanted his own. His own that were lost, his own
that died in sin, his own that were outcasts, strangers, enemies. He said, father, I want them
to be with me where I am. Aren't you so glad that's what
he wanted? He wanted his own, he thought
about his own. David, it's either David or Moses,
he said, if I could count the number of thoughts that you've
had toward me, it would be more than there are grains of sand. He wanted his own, he thought
about his own, he purchased his own. And that's what makes that moment
of him physically receiving his purchased Possession, precious
to him. It's precious to us. Thank God
it's precious to him. That's a precious moment. All
right, turn over to Isaiah 65. I love this chapter right here
so much. Isaiah 65 verse 8 says, Thus saith the Lord, As the new
wine is found in the cluster, and one saith, Destroy it not,
for a blessing is in it, so will I do for my servants' sakes,
that I may not destroy them all. and I will bring forth a seed
out of Jacob and out of Judah, an inheritor of my mountains,
and mine elect shall inherit it, and my servants shall dwell
there. Now look at verse 17. He said,
for behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, And the former
shall not be remembered nor come into mind. The moment that we
step foot there, it's going to be so glorious. Our mind and
our thoughts will never come back to this place. They'll never
come back to this place. We're going to be so taken with
Christ. Not heaven, not just heaven. We're talking about this place.
This place is a person. We're going to a person. And
we're going to be so taken with Christ when we see him as he
is. You know, we see him by faith
as he was when he walked this earth. We see him by faith as
he is right now. we see through a glass darkly,
everything that we see and we believe we know about this man,
the God man, our God, it's so dim, it's so, we don't see him
yet, not like we're gonna see him. And once we see him as he is,
we're gonna be so taken with him, it's gonna be so glorious,
our mind and our thoughts will never come back to this place. Verse 18, it says, but be ye
glad and rejoice forever in that which I create, for behold, I
create Jerusalem a rejoicing and her people a joy. It's immediate rejoicing and
joy. Verse 19, and I will rejoice
in Jerusalem and joy in my people. They're rejoicing and joying
in him. He's rejoicing and joying in
them. And the voice of weeping shall
be no more heard in her, nor the voice of crying. There shall
be no more thence in infinite days, nor an old man that hath
not filled his days, for the child shall die and hundred years
old, but the sinner being in a hundred years old shall be
accursed. Everyone there will be the same. Everyone there is going to bear
the image of Christ. Everybody there will bear the
image of Christ. And based on the scripture, I
believe, you know, this is just my thought. We'll find out when
we get there. But as a man, I believe his image
is about 33 and a half years. The angel said to the disciples,
why are you standing there gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus
that you've seen go up, he's going to come back down the exact
same way. Verse 21, they shall build houses
and inhabit them. They shall plant vineyards and
eat the fruit of them. They shall not build in another
inhabit. They shall not plant in another
eat. That means nobody's gonna take
it away from them. Nobody's gonna come in and besiege
them and run them out and take it from them. Whereas the days
of a tree are the days of my people and my elect shall long
enjoy the work of their hands. We're gonna work with our hands. We're going to plant gardens
and vineyards. After our Lord arose, he told
the disciples, touch me, handle me. I'm flesh and bone. He said,
give me something to eat. He ate fish and honey. He said, once all the elect are
gathered, there's going to be a marriage supper of the lamb. There's going to be a feast.
He said, I'm going to serve wine. Verse 24, verse 23, they shall
not labor in vain nor bring forth for trouble for they are the
seed of the blessed of the Lord and their offspring with them.
And it shall come to pass that before they call, I will answer. That means his focus and attention
is constantly on his people. While they are yet speaking,
I will hear. Verse 25 says, the wolf and the
lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like
the bullock, and dust shall be the serpent's meat. They shall
not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the Lord. There's gonna be peace. There
is going to be peace. It's a real heaven and a real
earth with a real God and real people in real peace. Peace on all sides. Peace everywhere. Turn over to
John 14. John 14, verse 27. Our Lord said, peace I leave
with you, my peace I give unto you. Not as the world giveth,
give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled,
neither let it be afraid. Now verse 28, he said, you have
heard how I said unto you, I go away and come again unto you.
If you loved me, you would rejoice because I said, I go unto the
father. For my father is greater than
I. He said, if you only knew where I was going, you would
be happy for me. You know, he kept telling them,
son of man is going to be taken. He's going to be killed. They
kept saying, no, no. Sorrow filled their hearts. He
said, if you knew where I was going, you would be happy for
me. Because that's what it is, it's
happiness. He said, I'm going to the Father. Happy is he that
hath the God of Jacob for his help. The moment we leave this
world and realize the help that we have received from the God
of Jacob, man, we're gonna be so happy. We're gonna be so happy. That's what that moment is, it's
precious, it's peace, it's happiness in a way that we're never gonna
understand down here. Indescribable joy. A brother
in my study a moment ago just read from Isaiah 55 and the end
of Isaiah 55 says you're gonna go out in that moment when you
leave here and you enter into the world to come. He said, you're going to go out
with joy. You're going to be led forth
with peace. This is how it's going to be. The mountains and the hills are
going to break forth into singing and all the trees of the field
are going to clap their hands. That's going to be the precursor
of joy that's coming forever. That's just precious. Turn over
to Romans 8. Verse 29, it says. Romans 8 29 it says for whom
he did for know that means elect. He also did predestinate to be
conformed to the image of his son. that he might be the firstborn
among many brethren. As we already pointed out in
Isaiah 65, we're gonna bear his image, conformed to his image. Every soul that the father foreknew,
every soul that he elected, he predestinated that soul. That's how sovereign God is. That's how in control our God
is. He predetermined, He ordered
all things concerning His people. And everything that He predestinated
them to is leading them to the perfect image of Jesus Christ,
conformed to the image of Christ. What is His image? It's holiness. It's sinlessness. That's something
we don't know anything about right now. But Ephesians one says we're
going to be holy and without blame. And I can't wait. I am sinful and with blame. That's what I am right now. And
I can't wait. Ephesians five says we're going
to be without spot or wrinkle. Perfection is perfection, holy
perfection, just like him. As he is, so are we. Look at
verse 35, Romans 8, verse 35. It says, who shall separate us
from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress?
or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword,
as it is written, for thy sake we're killed all the day long.
We're accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these
things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded that neither
death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers,
nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth,
nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the
love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. All the love
of God is in Christ Jesus our Lord. It's not in the world,
it's not anywhere, but in Christ. And that's what glory with Him
is going to be. It's going to be love. Love. In that moment, we will know
the love of God. We're going to know the height
of it, the depth of it, the length of it, the width of it. Unending, overwhelming love. Turn over to 2 Corinthians 5. Second Corinthians five verse
one, it says, for we know that if our earthly
house of this tabernacle were dissolved, if, if this body was
laid down and, and we died as, as we say it here, we have a
building of God and house not made with hands eternal in the
heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly
desiring to be clothed upon with our house, which is from heaven. If so be that being clothed,
we shall not be found naked. For we that are in this tabernacle
do groan, being burdened. Not for that we would be unclothed,
but clothed upon. that mortality might be swallowed
up of life. I love the sound of that. God's
people are not morbid. They're not just, oh, I'm just
ready to die. They're not ready to die. They're
ready to live. They're ready to be done with the body of this
death. This body right here is death,
and they're tired of death, and they're ready for life. They're
ready for mortality, death, to be swallowed up of life. Verse
five, now he that hath wrought us for the self same thing is
God who also hath given unto us the earnest of the spirit.
Therefore, we are always confident knowing that whilst we are at
home in the body, we're absent from the Lord, for we walk by
faith, not by sight. We are confident, I say, and
willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with
the Lord. To be absent from this body is
to be present with the Lord. There's so much about a believer's
death that I don't understand. There's so much that I don't
understand. Our earthly bodies stay here.
But according to this and so many other places, we're given
a heavenly body. That's first Corinthians 15 talks
about that. But when the Lord comes back,
he's going to bring his people who are already there with him. They're coming back with him. So they were there with him in
a body. And then they're going to come
back and get their earthly bodies. You know, the graves are going
to open up the graves or the dust or the sea, or I don't know. I don't understand all that.
I don't need to know. All I need to know is immediately. I'll be with him. That's all
I need to know. When that moment comes immediate to be absent from this
body is to be present with the Lord. The moment a believer leaves
this body, that believer is with Christ. It is immediate. But
with him now, we just don't have the eyes we're going to have.
But it's immediate. Turn over to Philippians 1. Philippians 1 verse 20. According to my earnest expectation
and my hope, my expectation, Paul said, and my hope, that
in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness, as
always, so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether
it be by life or by death. For to me, to live is Christ,
and to die is gain. But if I live in the flesh, this
is the fruit of my labor. Yet what I shall choose, I know
not. For I'm in a straight betwixt
two, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which
is far better. Nevertheless, to abide in the
flesh is more needful to you. I'm not going to expound on that
because I can't, but according to the man who went there and
had to come back. Can you imagine the apostle Paul
is carried up into the third heaven and then he had to come
back. According to the man who went
there and had to come back, he said, it's gain. It's great gain,
it's far better. Isaiah wrote, I hath not seen,
ear hath not heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man.
It cannot be described. Only expected. Only hoped for. With a living hope. Go with me
to Revelation 21. Revelation 21, verse one, it
says, And I saw a new heaven and a
new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth were passed
away and there was no more sea. And I, John, saw the holy city,
New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as
a bride adorned for her husband. It's going to be love, it's going
to be unity. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold,
the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them,
and they shall be his people. And God himself shall be with
them and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears
from their eyes, and there shall be no more death. Neither sorrow
nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former
things are passed away. And he that sat upon the throne
said, behold, I make all things new. It's all going to be new.
And he said unto me, write, for these words are true and faithful. And he said unto me, it is done.
I am alpha and omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto
him that is a thirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. He that overcometh shall inherit
all things and I will be his God and he shall be my son. And look at verse 22, it says, I saw no temple therein, for
the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. We're
not going to need to go to worship. We will always be in worship. Verse 23, And the city had no
need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it, for the
glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. And the nations of them which
are saved shall walk in the light of it, and the kings of the earth
do bring their glory and honor into it. And the gates of it
shall not be shut at all by day, for there shall be no night there. And they shall bring the glory
and honor of the nations into it, and there shall in no wise
enter into it anything that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination,
or maketh a lie, but they which are written in the Lamb's book
of life. He said there's no night there.
It's just today. It's just today. Every believer
that goes there goes today. Everybody that goes goes today.
A day is as a thousand years. It never ends. It never ends. Adam and Eve's son, Abel, he
went there today. Every believer after him has
gone there today. Everybody goes today. There's
no tomorrow. There's no tomorrow. You ever fear tomorrow? Well, there, there's no tomorrow. It's just, I am. It's just we
are. He is. Forever. Perfectly forever. God, His people, His kingdom,
His glory, His honor, His praise, His worship, His joy, His love. Forever. That's something to
hope in. That's something to hope in.
And I pray God will give every one of us that living hope. For
Christ our life's sake. Amen.