We have come into this place
to call upon his name and worship him. We have come into this place
to call upon his name and worship Christ the Lord. Worship him, Jesus Christ the
Lord. Good evening, everyone. Let's
open tonight's service with hymn number 99 from your softback
timbrel. Hymn number 99. Let's all stand
together. Behold the house of God's abode,
The church of God's elect, A blessed fellowship of love, In Jesus'
name we've met. The Lamb of God is in our midst
He promised he would be Among his saints wherever they meet
If only two or three The triune God who rules the
world, here makes His glory known. Through the sacred word here
proclaimed, the way of life is shown. It is here that God in
grace descends to speak to fallen men and shows the wisdom of His
grace to put away man's sins. We raise our songs of praise
to God, And wait to hear His word. Perhaps today a wondrous thought,
We'll hear and see our Lord. Please be seated. That is a wondrous thought. One day does not yet appear what
we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear, we shall
see him as he is and be made like him. We're going to continue
looking at Revelation 21 tonight, but for our scripture reading
first, I just mention that because that's what we just sang about.
For our scripture reading, would you turn with me to Psalm 42? Mary, it's good to have you with
us. One more time, I'm not going to recognize you anymore. All
right? We're glad you're here. You're
part of the family. All right? Psalm 42, verse 1,
as the heart As the deer panteth after the
water brook, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. My soul thirsteth
for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear
before God? My tears have been my meat day
and night, while they continually say unto me, where is thy God? Oh, they've been talking about
his coming for long time. When I remember these things,
I pour out my soul in me. For I had gone with the multitude,
I went with them to the house of God with the voice of joy
and praise and with the multitude that kept holy day. Why art thou cast down on my
soul? Why art thou disquieted in me?
Why do you let so many things disrupt you so much? Hope thou
in God, for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance. Oh my God, my soul is cast down
within me. Therefore, because I've got no
place else to go, I've got no place else to go. Therefore,
I will remember thee from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites,
and of the hill Meser. Deep calleth unto deep at the
noise of thy water spouts. All thy waves and thy billows
are gone over me. Yet the Lord will command." In
other words, all this disquietedness that I'm experiencing in my soul,
God's brought it to me. He's brought it to me. The old
man serves the young man. He's the one driving me to Christ.
Yet the Lord will command his loving kindness in the daytime,
and in the night his song shall be with me, and my prayer unto
the God of my life. I will say unto God, my rock." Oh. You see the contrast between
the shifting sands of our circumstances and the rock of ages. Lord, would
you enable us to find a sure footing on that rock tonight? I will say unto God my rock,
why hast thou forgotten me? Why go I mourning because of
the oppression of the enemy? As with the sword in my bones,
mine enemies reproach me while they say daily unto me, where
is thy God? Why art thou cast down, O my
soul? And why art thou disquieted within me? Hope thou in God,
for I shall yet praise him who is the health of my countenance
and my God. Let's pray together. Our merciful heavenly Father,
we come in the name of thy dear son, thanking you that we have
acceptance before thee in him. We ask, Lord, that you would
reveal to our souls the glorious person and the accomplished work
of the Lord Jesus Christ. who is our life and our salvation,
our hope. We pray that you would make him
our desire. Lord, we come to this place having
been disquieted in this world. Truly, we are strangers and pilgrims
in the world. We ask now, Lord, that you would
set our feet upon a rock. We pray that you would hide our
souls in the cleft of the rock. that you would cause your backside
to pass by. And Lord, that we would be comforted
and assured of thy power, of thy presence, and that we would
experience thy peace. For we ask it in Christ's name.
Amen. Number 290 in the hardback temple. 290. Let's all stand again. 290, hard back tempo. Be still, my soul, the Lord is
on thy side. Bear patiently the cross of grief
or pain. Leave to thy God to order and
provide. In every change, ye faithful
will remain. Be still, my soul, thy best,
thy heavenly friend. Through thorny ways leads to
a joyful end. Be still, my soul, thy God doth
undertake To guide the future as He has the past. Thy hope, thy confidence, let
nothing shake. All now mysterious shall be bright
at last. Be still, my soul, The waves
and winds still know His voice who ruled them while He dwelt
below. Be still, my soul, the hour is
hastening on when we shall be forever with the Lord. When disappointment, grief, and
fear are gone, sorrow forgot, love's purest joys restored,
Be still, my soul, when change and tears are past. All safe and blessed we shall
meet at last. Please be seated. That's a good hymn. Amazes me how the Lord puts his
word together with the hymns that Tom picks out and enables
us to worship Christ in a theme every time we come together. You have your Bibles open to
Revelation 21. I want to encourage you to be still. and wait, waiting upon the Lord
to fulfill all of his promises. Abraham believed God. He saw a city which hath foundations,
whose builder and maker was God. Abraham's called in the Bible
the father of the faithful. And what was true for Abraham
is true for every one of God's people. They truly are strangers
and pilgrims in this world. And they truly do have their
affections in their new man. Oh, their old man's still tethered
to this world, but their new man, that's who we're speaking
to when we preach the gospel. We're speaking to the live man,
not the dead man. And I hope the Spirit of God
will speak to your heart and your soul and encourage you to
believe these words, as we saw Sunday, that are faithful and
true. This is no wild-eyed visionary. This is the Word of God. This
is the believer's hope. A vision, a vision for the hopeful. Now I want to introduce this
message by reminding you that God has given the penman of Scripture
certain revelations. Paul said, I was caught up into
the third heaven, whether I was in the body or not, I don't know.
It was such a real experience to him. Isaiah, when he went
to the temple, the scripture says he saw the Lord. He saw
him high and lifted up. He saw him sitting upon a throne. And he saw the seraphim hovering
over that throne and crying, holy, holy, holy is the Lord
God of hosts. The scripture says that Moses
spoke with God face-to-face as a man does with a friend. And those were real encounters. John has a real vision where
he's caught up into heaven and he sees things, much of which
he could not record. The Lord at one point told him,
John, put down your pen. There's no words to describe
this. But he does give us, in symbolic language at least, some
things to long for, some things to look for, some revelations
to have in hope. Now, my concern is that we might
expect the kind of experience that the penman of Scripture
had. And that's not going to happen. The Lord's not going
to give you a physical experience, a physical vision. You're not
going to go into a trance and you're not going to see these
things like they saw them. Nevertheless, Remember when Peter,
James, and John were on the Mount of Transfiguration? They had
that experience. I mean, it was a mountaintop
experience. They saw the veil of our Lord's
humanity taken away. They saw, at least in part, I
don't think they were able to see the fullness of his glory,
but they saw in part a radiance of his deity that was more than
they could bear. And when Peter recounts that
experience, he says, we did not bring to you cunningly devised
fables. We handled the word of God. And
when we were on the mountain, we saw him in his splendor. And
the next verse says, yet, here's your hope, child of God, here's
your hope. Yet, we have a more sure word
of prophecy. We have the revelation of God's
Word. And my hope for you and for me is that the Lord will
give us these same experiences, not in feelings, not in dreams
and in visions, but through the eye of faith, that He will give
us the faith to believe the testimony that's been recorded by these
men. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing comes by the Word
of God. What I'm trying to say to you is don't expect a feeling,
don't expect an experience. If God gives you those, that's
wonderful. But feelings come and feelings go. Feelings are
deceiving. My only warrant is the Word of
God. None else is worth believing. So if God's given you and I faith,
then we will hang the hope of our souls on the testimony of
these men who did have visions, they did have experiences, and
our experience in our soul, in our new man, will be just as
real as was theirs. Matter of fact, according to
what God says, it'll be more real. You'll be more sure if
the Holy Spirit is pleased to take the testimony of the penman
of scripture and convince us of them, cause us to believe
them, cause us to embrace them, cause us to be thoroughly convinced
of them. Then that revelation to the heart
will be more real than even those experiences that these men had. We left off Sunday with verse
11, verse 7, I'm sorry, verse 7. But in order to make sure
that we understand this testimony, let's just go back to verse 6
for a moment, where the Lord Jesus Christ speaks to John,
and he speaks to you, and he speaks to me. And he says, I
am the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end. Salvation
is of the Lord. I'm going to do it all. From
election to glorification and everything in between, in sanctification,
in redemption, in justification, everything that God does to secure
our souls in hope for this vision, this experience that we will
have one day. Right now we have faith, hope,
and love, and the greatest of these is love. Why? Because in
this day, when we see him as he is, and we are able to experience
the fullness of this revelation, we'll no longer need faith. Our
faith will be our experience. It'll be our sight. We'll actually
be seeing it. We'll be looking right at it.
Our hope? You don't hope for something
that you've already got. So right now we're hoping and we're believing. And if it's a sure hope, If it's
a hope and a faith given to us by the Spirit of God, it'll be
enough. It will sustain us. It'll sustain
us through thick and thin, through all the trials and all the troubles.
The glory that I've prepared for you cannot be compared. It
cannot be compared, the scripture says, to the troubles that you're
going to experience in this life. Lord, give us that faith. Enable
us to look to the Lord Jesus Christ as our Alpha and our Omega,
the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is
a thirst of the water of life freely. Now they say you can't,
you can take, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make
him drink, right? But you know what you can do? You can put
a salt block down there. And after he licks that salt
block for a little while, he's going to want a drink. And that's
what the Lord does. The scripture, this is the salt
of the earth. This is the thing that God uses
his word in order to create in us a thirst. As we read these
revelations and these visions, the spirit of God begins to work
in our hearts and cause us to be thirsty. And then that's his
work. That's his work. You didn't just
decide one day, I'm gonna be thirsty for God. No man seeketh
after God at any time. If we're thirsty for him, if
we like the heart that's panting after the water broke, it's because
he made us thirsty. He caused us to see the vanity
of this world. He caused us to see our need for Christ. And he brings
us to that river. He that overcometh, and don't
get hung up on that. That just means that if you can
fall away, you will fall away eventually. If you can, you will. And plenty of folks have done
it. But he's saying those who who continue to the end, they
will inherit all things, all things. And I will be his God
and he shall be my people. Notice the order. I can't remember
if I've mentioned that Sunday or not, but notice the order.
He has to become our God. I will be his God and he shall
be my son. The Lord gives us, in verse 8,
a contrast between the faithful and the unbeliever. If God has made you to be a sinner,
you read this verse and you think, I'm guilty of
all these things. I'm guilty of all these things.
These things, they pop up in my heart all the time. And the
Lord makes it clear. He says, but the fearful and
the unbelieving and the abominable and the murderer and the whoremonger
and the sorcerer and the idolaters and all liars shall have their
part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone which
is the second death. If we're not careful, a verse
like that can grip our souls with great fear. These things have to be understood
in light of the gospel. They have to be understood in
light of faith, in light of the new man. They can't be understood
any other way. He begins with this word, the
fearful. Truth is that we all experience
different types of fear and different degrees of fear, and there are
times when we are brought, even in our souls, to say with the
disciples, Lord, is it I? But this is a description of
those who are fearful that they've not done enough They've not done
enough. And men who don't know Christ
fear in the hour of their death, if they fear no other time, they
fear in the hour of their death, maybe I haven't done enough.
Maybe I need to do more. Maybe I need to make more of
a commitment. Maybe I need to give more of
my possessions to some charity and secure myself a place in
heaven. The child of God knows better.
He doesn't think like that. You see, this is a description
of the unbeliever, the unbelieving. See, we all are able to say,
Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief. And it is the sin that
thus so easily beset us, the sin of unbelief in the old man.
But the truth is that the new man does believe the gospel. He does. He believes that Jesus
is the Christ, the Son of the living God. He knows he's got
no place else to go. He knows that he alone has the
words of eternal life. He knows that he's faithful and
true. He knows that God chose him or chose a people. If he
doesn't know he chose him, he knows that salvation is determined
by God electing a people in Christ before the world ever began.
He knows that the only hope that he has is to rest the hope of
his salvation on the accomplished work of the Lord Jesus Christ
on Calvary's cross. He's not unbelieving when it
comes to the gospel. He believes the gospel. He does. He believes the gospel. He believes
that the Lord Jesus Christ satisfied all the demands of God's holy
law, and he satisfied God's divine justice when he shed his precious
blood. He believes that the only way
he can come into the presence of God, the only way that he
can escape the death angel, is that if God sees the blood of
the Lord Jesus Christ, He knows that nothing He does is going
to earn Him favor or merit Him salvation in any way with God. He knows that. So the Lord's
describing, He's describing the unbeliever here. These things
don't relate, even though we look in our hearts and the Lord
makes us to be sinners and we see that we've got issues with
every one of these things. But in the gospel, in light of
the gospel, the unbeliever does not believe the gospel. He doesn't
believe it. I can't remember if I'd said
it here or Sarasota Sunday night, but I had somebody tell me recently,
he said, if I believed what you just told me, I would lose all
my faith. I'd lose all my faith. I said,
yep, you would. And you need to lose it. Because it's not a good faith.
It's not a faith that's gonna save you. So the fearful, the
one who fears that he hasn't done enough, the unbelieving,
the abominable, the defiled. Oh, how many things we put our
hands to and we defile them. Everything we do, everything
we do is mixed with sin. Our motives are never pure. Everything
we do has got wood, hay, and stubble in it. I'm ashamed to
tell you I cannot stand up here and preach God's word and tell
you about Christ without me being involved in it. I just can't
do it. One time I thought maybe I could,
but I've come to realize that there's just no escaping it.
So, you know, we are defiled. We put our hands to things that... But here's the thing. We're not
defiling the gospel. We're not putting our hands to
the work of Christ. We're not trying to improve on
what the Lord Jesus Christ did in order to earn us favor with
God. We know better. We know better. And those who are doing that,
those who are abominable before God, you know why the very first
time that word is used in the scripture is when Joseph went
to Pharaoh and told Pharaoh, I'm sorry, not Joseph, Moses.
When Moses went to Pharaoh and told Pharaoh, our people have
to go worship God. We've got to make sacrifice.
And Pharaoh said, okay, finally he said, okay, we'll just go
ahead and worship your God here. And Moses said, no. He said, the sacrifices that
we have to make in order to worship our God are an abomination to
the Egyptians. And if they see us doing it,
they'll stone us. We have to leave this place in
order to make sacrifice. Our gospel is an abomination.
And what's an abomination to men is holy to God. And what's right to man is an
abomination to God. And so these sins have to be
understood in light of the gospel. That which is highly esteemed
among men is what? An abomination with God. The fearful, child of God, I
don't want you to fear going to hell. This is describing those
who will go to hell. Those who will suffer the second
death, this scripture says. Everybody's worried about the
first death. Don't worry about the first death. First death's
gonna be quick and painless. It is. You may suffer with debilitating
disease for years, but compared to the second death, that's going
to be quick and painless. It's the second death you need
to be worried about. Those who are born once, die
twice. Those who are born twice, die
once. This is a description This is
a description of those who are going to suffer the second death. The murderer. The Lord said, if you've been angry
with your brother without a cause, you're guilty of murder. See,
all these things, we have them in our hearts, don't we? Our
heart is wicked and deceitful, and we can't know it, and we
look at ourselves as sinners. We say, well, could this be describing
me? Could this be describing me?
No. This is describing the one who
tramples underfoot the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and
counts the covenant of grace a common thing. This is the one
who doesn't see the death of the Lord Jesus Christ as the
only hope of their salvation. They believe in a general atonement. They believe that God loves everybody
and Christ died for everybody. And in that regard, they are
trampling underfoot the blood of Christ. They're murdering
Him. Whoremongers. This is talking about spiritual
prostitution. The great whore of Babylon. is the one who is trying to win
her salvation by what she does. And you try to purchase God's
favor and you are guilty of spiritual whoremongering, spiritual prostitution,
paying for God's favor. That's it. It's the only way
we're going to be able to understand these things. Sorcerers, superstitious religion, doing what Saul did, King Saul
consulted with the witch of Endor, trying to find a word from God
from someone other than God, going outside of the word of
God in order to try to find the hope of salvation. God's people
don't do that. They don't do that. They know. that all that they need to know
about the gospel are here. There was a time when they did.
There was a time when I sacrificed my children on an altar of fire to false
gods. I didn't know any better. That's
exactly what I was doing. We don't go to the sorcerer anymore. Idolaters? Oh, the old man is quick to look
away from Christ. And as soon as we do, we make
an idol. We're so quick to fashion idols, aren't we? But that's
not what this is talking about here. It's talking about perverting
the gospel. It's talking about perverting
who Christ is and what he's accomplished. And those who are walking in
faith don't do that. And all those who are outside
of Christ, they do that. They come into this world with
the idol factory of their imagination already working. And man just
naturally fashions a God that is altogether as himself. But
when the Lord's pleased to make himself known to you and secure
you for glory, that idolatry, as far as denying who Christ
is, all the false gods and false gospels. I mentioned Sunday night,
I'm always encouraged when I hear someone renounce their false
religious background for what it was, idolatry. Paul said, I was an idolater.
I was an injurious man. I was a blasphemer. But the Lord
had mercy upon me. I did it in ignorance. I didn't
know. You can't go back to that now, can you? Once the Lord shows
you the truth, you cannot go back to your idolatrous ways. Liars! Oh, we... We're guilty of that in so many
ways. We hide the truth. We want to present ourselves
in ways that that are acceptable to other men. And believers can
flat out lie about things. God says all liars are going
to go to hell. All liars are going to hell.
What's he talking about? He's talking about the scripture
says every man is a liar. God alone tells the truth. If
he's just talking about the natural means of lying that we all get
caught up in from time to time, then what hope do we have? It's talking about telling lies
on God. Listen to what Isaiah said in Isaiah chapter 63, surely
they are my people, children that will not lie. You know what
the child of God doesn't do? He doesn't lie about himself
being a sinner. He doesn't lie, not before God. Now he's hearing
the gospel. He doesn't lie to pretend that
he's got some righteousness or some merit with God based on
something that he's done. He knows better. He doesn't lie
about Christ. He doesn't say God loves everybody,
Christ died for everybody, and God wants everybody to be saved.
Those are lies from hell. He doesn't do that. But all of
the men do. All the unbelievers do. All liars. All liars who deny the finished
work of Christ on Calvary's cross are going to be in the lake of
fire, and they are going to suffer the second death. Somebody told me recently, he
said, well, you can't know for sure what the Bible really means. It means what it says, and no
lie is of the truth, and God's people know the truth. For this
cause came I into the world, and for this purpose was I born,
to bear witness unto the truth. They that are of the truth hear
my voice. If you know the truth, the truth
will set you free. Christ is that truth, and believers
know. Those who are going to heaven
know. that all their salvation is bound up solely and completely
in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. These sins
have to be understood in light of faith and in light of the
gospel. Otherwise, if you're a sinner
and you know your heart, you know a little bit about it, God's
shown you the wickedness of it, these things will overwhelm you.
They shall all have their part in the lake which burneth with
fire and brimstone, which is the second death." The gospel of God's free grace
revealed to the soul by the Spirit of God is the only hope of escaping
this lake that burns with fire, this second death. And there came unto me one of
the seven angels, which had the seven vials full of seven last
plagues, and talked with me, saying, Come hither, come hither. Oh, how I want the Lord to say
that. I want to believe this. I want
him to say to me. You know, John begins this revelation
by saying that the Lord opened the windows of heaven and revealed
to him this revelation of hope. for the sinner. And here he says
again, come hither and I'll show you the bride. I'm gonna show
you the bride, the lamb's wife. You say, well, I thought this
was a revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is, it is. And you can't separate the bride
from the bridegroom anymore than you can separate your head from
your body. So when the Lord is revealing his bride, he's revealing
himself. He said, come up hither. I'm
gonna show you what the bride looks like. This beautiful bride,
the bride of the Lord Jesus Christ, the one who was presented to
the Lord Jesus Christ before time ever began. And nothing
she's ever done, nothing she's ever done has caused one bit
of lesser affection on the part of her husband. He's as in love
with her now as he was before she ever fell. Before she ever... Hosea never quit loving Gomer,
did he? And so it is with the Lord. Here's the question that we have
to ask. The disciples asked the Lord
this question. Lord, how is it that thou hast
manifested thyself unto us and not unto the world? The Lord show in a contrast here
between the bride and those who end up in the lake of fire. And
what's the child of God say? Lord, why me? Why me? Why would you manifest yourself
unto me and not unto the world? Who maketh thee to differ? Why is it that you have hope
in believing that you're part of the bride of Christ, the one
that he has made holy and without blame before him in love? The king's daughter, in all of
her sin, has lost nothing in terms of her relationship with
her Lord. Nothing. Jeremiah chapter 3 says,
Thou hast played the harlot with many lovers, yet, yet return
unto me. And he does. He just keeps bringing
us back to himself, doesn't he? Why? Because The church is his
bride. He's committed to her. He's going
to keep her. He's going to present her without
spot and without blemish before him in love. He's going to accomplish
that. And he carried me away in the
spirit to a great and high mountain. It's the only place you're going
to see this. The only place you're going to see it is if the Lord
carries you away by the Spirit of God. The natural man cannot
receive the things of the Spirit. They are spiritually discerned. The flesh profiteth nothing. The life of God can only come
by the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God will lead us
into all truth and will take us to a high mountain. where
we'll be able to get a heavenly point of view, if you will, of
these things. And he showed me that great city,
the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God. It's the only place it can come
from. Has to come from God. Starts with God, it finishes
with God. It can't earn its way up to God. The Lord, isn't that
what the Tower of Babel was all about? Man trying to achieve
access into heaven. Climbing up on a pyramid, if
you will, to make a sacrifice and hear the angel of God. What's the angel? He's the messenger.
He's the messenger. He's just declaring the truth
of the gospel. And he's the one that God uses to take his people
up to the top of the mountain, to see the new city, the great
city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, having
the glory of God. Having the glory of God. The glory of God is the Lord
Jesus Christ. He is God's glory. When Moses asked the Lord to
show me thy glory, he showed him Christ. He said, I'll cause
my goodness to pass before you. You're going to see my glory
and that you're going to know that all the hope of your salvation
is bound up in what I've done for you. having the glory of
God, and her light was like unto a stone, most precious, even
like a jasper stone, clear as crystal." The Lord said, lay
up for yourself treasures in heaven. What? Of gold and precious
stones. See, these things are the things
that Christ does. All these things are the work
of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the glory of heaven, and
he's the work of heaven. Everything we contribute to it
is wood, hay, and stubble, and it's going to be burned up. And
it's not going to enter into glory. The only thing that's
going to enter into glory is righteousness. And so here he
says, I saw the glory of God and the light of heaven was like
a most precious stone, even like a jasper stone, clear as crystal,
and had a great wall high. Oh, Lord, hedge me about. That
wall is nothing but the Lord Jesus Christ as well. He's the
bulwark that David speaks about so much in the Psalms. He's the
protector and the defender of his people. So now we see in
this symbolic language, this heavenly city coming down, which
has a great wall, a great wall. And it had 12 gates. had 12 gates and the gates had
12 angels. And the name, what were the angels
doing? Enter in here. The angels were doing exactly
what John did. John the Baptist pointed to the
Lord Jesus Christ. He's the gate. He's the pearly gate. And what
did John say? Behold the Lamb of God. So at
each one of the gates, there's three gates on the north, three
gates on the south, three gates on the east and three gates on
the west. 12 gates in all, giving God's people all of one pearl,
the scripture says. What's the Lord saying here?
Whatever your experience, wherever you're coming from, whatever's
ever happened to you, whatever you've ever done, there's access into the heavenly
city through one of these gates. For every tongue, every nation,
every tribe, every people, every experience, Every sinner, no
sinner can say, well, you know, I couldn't find the way in. No. From whatever direction you're
coming from, the names written therein are the names of the
12 tribes of the children of Israel. Here's the spiritual
Israel. Here's the true children of Abraham.
All 144,000 of them. And that number is symbolic,
just representing the fact that all Israel, the scripture says
in Romans chapter 8, shall be saved. All Israel. Romans chapter
11, actually. All Israel shall be saved. And
on the east three gates, and on the north three gates, and
on the south three gates, and on the west three gates. And
the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and the name of
them were the twelve apostles of the Lamb. This is a city which
has foundations. What is the foundational hope
of our salvation? It's the revelation that God
has given us of the Lamb through the penman of Scripture. That's
the hope. That's the foundation of this
city. Christ is the wall. He's the gate. He's the foundation. This book is a revelation of
the Lord Jesus Christ. You know that. It's not a history
book. It's not a book of theology.
It's not a book to be read in order to try to learn something,
some knowledge that other people don't know. It's a revelation
of Christ. He's the foundation of the city. He's the whole city.
The glory of the city is Christ. And he that talketh with me hath
a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof,
and the wall thereof. The city is exactly the size
the Lord would have it to be. And notice the dimensions of
the city. The city lieeth foursquare, and the length of it is as large
as the breadth. And he measured the city with
the reed, and twelve thousand furlongs. The length, and the
breadth, and the height of it are all equal. Tell me times
the Lord uses 144,000 or 12,000. 12 times 12,000. What God is saying here is that
every one of my children are gonna end up in this city. Every
single one. I'm not gonna lose one. Not gonna
lose a single one. Not one of my sheep's gonna be
lost. And he measured the wall thereof,
and a hundred and forty, and four cubits, according to the
measure of a man, that is, of the angel. And the building of
the wall, of it, was of jasper, and the city was pure gold, like
unto clear glass." What is it that men value most
in this world? What is it? What is it that God
says is the root of all evil? And what is it that represents
the love of money? It's gold, isn't it? How do we
see gold described in heaven? The thing that's most valued
in this world, we're walking on it in heaven and you don't
even notice it. It's clear as crystal. You're
not taking any notice of that which captivated all of your
attention while you were here in this world, and it's just
the streets are paid with it and you don't even see it. You
don't even see it. Why? Because that's the glory
of this world. It's not the glory of heaven.
Christ is the glory of heaven. And the foundations of the wall,
verse 19, of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones.
All these stones, picturing Christ, we're not going to look at each
one of them and try to... They're all representing the Lord Jesus.
He's the precious stone. He's the gold and the silver
and the precious stone. He's the foundation of the city. Go down to verse 21. And the
12 gates were 12 pearls, every several gate was of one pearl,
and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent
glass. You're not looking at gold as
gold. People think they're going to get to heaven and they're
going to be enamored by the golden streets. Scripture says right
here, it's transparent glass. You're not going to be taking
notice of that. any more than you drive the streets around
here and take notice of them. And I saw no temple therein,
for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it." Everything in this world, everything,
loses its luster in time, doesn't it? I mean, if you could sit down
and eat the most amazing meal that you could imagine, try eating
it three times a day. In about three days, you'll be
asking somebody where can you find a hot dog. It just does. The most amazing experience.
That's why we have to go on vacation. That's why we're always having
to have some change in our lives, aren't we? We always happen to
have change, because it just loses its luster. Just the opposite is true in
glory. We're going to be focused on
Him, and every moment, for the rest of eternity, His glory is
going to increase. Now, I don't know what all that
means. But I know it's so. I know it's so. The Lord God Almighty and the
Lamb are the temple of it. And the city had no need of the
sun, neither of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of the Lord
did lighten it. And the Lamb, the Lamb himself
is the light thereof. No shadows in heaven. No dark
spots. The Lord Jesus Christ lightens
the entire place, 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. Who are those kings? Well, Revelation
chapter 1 says that God has made us to be kings and priests unto
our God. And so here we come bringing
our glory, which is his glory, into that place. acknowledging
the fact that we're there only because of him. The gates of it shall not be
shut at all by day, and there shall be no night there. It won't be like what we're having
here. We have moments of time where God enables us to experience
his presence in a very special way, and then the Lord closes
the gates. and comes and goes. Not there.
Not there. The gates will always be open,
and there'll be no night there. And they shall bring the glory
and the honor of the nations unto it, and there shall in no
wise enter into it anything that defileth. See, all those sins
that were described in verse 8, are things that defile Christ. They rob from Christ his glory
in salvation and that won't be in heaven. Won't be in heaven. Neither whatsoever worketh abomination
or maketh a lie, but they which are written in the Lamb's book
of life. Let's pray. Our merciful Heavenly Father,
we ask that you would bless your word by your spirit. Cause us
to believe these words as they are faithful and true. And cause
us to Hang all the hope of our salvation on that nail that is
fashioned in a sure place, the Lord Jesus Christ. Cause us, Lord, to escape by
thy grace the horrors of the second death. For it's in Christ's
name we ask it, amen. number 114 in the Salfack Temple. Let's stand. so a hope, both strong and sure,
a hope within the veil. Tis Christ the Lord, my advocate,
he pleads and must prevail. My name is written on His breast,
Inscribed by love and grace. In Him my heart finds peace and
rest, He does my soul embrace. amidst tribulation, pain, and
toil, He is my hope and stay. I trust His gracious providence
to guide me in His way. I have no hope within myself,
Christ is my all in all. My care I cast upon my Lord,
and for His praise I call. And when my time on earth is
done, And all my care shall cease, I'll see my Savior as He is,
My hope I shall embrace. Thank you.