Morning and turn to the book
of Revelation chapter 22. Revelation 22. Revelation 22, 89, And I, John,
saw these things and heard them. And when I had heard and seen,
I fell down to worship Before the feet of the angel which showed
me these things, then saith he unto me, see thou do it not. For I am thy fellow servant. And of thy brethren, the prophets
and of them which keep the sayings of this book. Worship God. John. had just heard this angel say something
in verse 7 that we looked at last week. He said, quoting the
Lord, Behold, I come quickly. Blessed is he that keepeth the
sayings of the prophecy of this book. Let's pray together. Our Father, we are a blessed people. Blessed, Lord, that You would
give us a time to come and a heart to come and a desire to come. and a heart that's thankful to
be here. We ask you this morning, speak. Oh, our God and our Savior, speak
to us by your Spirit, through your Word. Help us that we might
see, know, and be comforted for Christ's sake. Amen. After John had seen and heard the angel speak, after he heard him say, These things are faithful and
true. These things are dependable. Truthful. You know, a lot of people hear
these things. A lot of people hear those words.
These things are faithful and true. But verse 8 says, I saw Him and I heard Him. I saw, I looked, I perceived,
I regarded, and I took heed. It's one thing to hear something
with an ear that every man and every woman is born with. Everybody
sitting here hears what I am saying, but it takes a new heart to hear
it and to believe it and to rejoice in it. Now that right there,
That's a miracle of God's grace. The hearing ear and the seeing
eye, the Lord gives those. Job said in Job 13, 1, Lo, mine
eye hath seen all this, mine ear hath heard. Then he said, and I understood
it. If we're here this morning and
we hear it, and we see it, and we understand it, and rejoice
in it, what? Hear and see what? The sayings of the prophecy of
this book. The Lord Jesus Christ is to the average man, carnal man, He's exactly what Nicodemus thought Him to be. We know that you're a good man. We know that you're
a wise man. You must be a preacher. You must be a prophet sent from
God. You've got to be in the higher
echelon. And the Lord told Nicodemus,
a Pharisee, a teacher, one of the instructed
ones there in Israel, Nicodemus, you must be born again." How, Nicodemus said, can a man
be born again? He didn't know. He didn't perceive.
He didn't understand. Blessed are those that keep. in their heart." That is wisdom
by a new heart. One that hears, knows, and loves
Almighty God. It loves Him. It follows Him. It hungers for Him. John had heard that messenger
say concerning the Lord Jesus Christ, Behold, I come quickly. I wonder how many times I've
heard that. Behold, I come quickly. But to be able to get up on a
certain day today, to be able to get up and to think with a heart that loves this,
today could be the day. And to get up every day Mitch,
with this attitude, what does it matter? What does
it matter? What comes my way? What trial? What tribulation? What does it
matter? He's coming quickly. It could be today. Today could be
the last day. This could be the last time you
ever hear the gospel. This may be it. Behold, I come quickly. This
is coming from the mouth of Him who is faithful and true. And the Scripture says, after that angel told John in
verse 7, Behold, I come quickly. Blessed
is he that keepeth the sayings of the prophecy of this book."
And John said, I heard that. I saw it. As if the Spirit of
God took that and just bore his heart with it. And when I heard and had seen,
John said, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel,
showed me these things. You know, no matter how taught
we are. And there are some folks here
that I believe are taught of God. It doesn't matter how taught
we are. We're so ignorant. And when we hear these things
afresh, when the Spirit of God brings them to our heart afresh, It's like we just never heard
it before just like that. I just don't think I've ever
heard it like that before. I think that, that may have been
the first time I ever heard it. My flesh would say, oh, now don't
say that. Don't say that, because if you
say that, then you might be insinuating that you'd never truly heard
before. What if I hadn't? I just heard it now. And everything
else is water under the bridge. What, admit that I had never
truly heard and seen by faith the wonder of the glory of the
Lord Jesus Christ? My friend, be thankful that you
just heard. John fell down to worship a good man, one taught of God,
obviously. Proverbs 24, 16 says, For a just
man falleth seven times and riseth up again, but the wicked shall
fall into mischief. A justified man, when he hears
afresh the wonder of the glory of Almighty God in the person
of the Lord Jesus Christ, when he hears it by faith, the like I've heard before, Faith cometh by hearing. It cometh. It's a continual coming,
a continual coming, a continual coming. Faith cometh. I believed yesterday. That doesn't
matter. For that, I'm thankful. But if
it doesn't come to me afresh today, Brother Scott, I don't
have anything. And faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the
Word of God. I need for Almighty God to teach
me now, and the realization of the wonder of the glory of His
majesty, of His being, of His nature, of His attributes, overwhelmed. This just man, John, a man taught
of God, frail in himself. How frail! We just witnessed it. We say to ourselves, I cannot
believe John would have done that. I would have never done
that. Oh yes, you would have. Peter would have never done that.
Everybody else will forsake you, but I will never bow to anything
other than. I will never let my heart, I'll
never let my emotions, I'll never let anything come between me
and the worship of Almighty God. You want to bet? But for the grace of God, Almighty
God will give you exactly what you want. And all the while, you'll believe,
I'm worshiping God. fell down to worship. But even in our frailty and mistakes
and shortcomings, even in that we see a blessing
because He lifts us up. Let me read something out of
Colossians. 3 verses 1 to 4. If you then be risen with Christ,
seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right
hand of God. Right now, sitting on the right
hand of the Majesty on high. seated, ruling and reigning,
ordering all these things, every act, everything ordered
by Him until, the Scripture says, until He had made all of His enemies
His footstool. Set your affection on things
above, not on things on the earth. Oh, how quickly does my mind
start setting my affection on the things of this earth. I get
so concerned. I get so distracted. I got stuff I got to do, Gary. Set your affections, set your
mind on things above. Why, Paul? Verse 3 says, for
you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ
in God. When Christ, who is our life,
shall appear, then shall ye also appear with Him in glory. If my mind, by the grace of God,
is set on things above, what difference does it make? He who
is ordering all these things, He who causes me to behold the
wonder of His marvelous grace to me, even now while I'm standing
here preaching, I'm thinking to myself, Lord, help me to understand
what I'm talking about. Lord, would You cause me to hear
and see? I want to hear this. David said, Thy Word have I hid
in mine heart. I looked that word hid up because I just didn't know what
it meant. Somebody said, oh yeah, Oh, I've
hidden the Word of God in my heart. Really? What does that
mean to hide? Hide, it means to treasure. I've
treasured it. That I might not sin against
Thee. If Almighty God has given me
a treasure and given me a desire and put His Word in my heart,
and it's a treasure to me, That's mine. It's mine. I've hid thy word in my heart
and treasured it. John. John heard these things
and he heard that angel talk to him. These things are faithful
and true. Just think, if Almighty God would
give us a heart right now to truly remove the veil of our hindrances
and cause us to believe it. And we believe it. Neal, we believe
this. This is it. What does it matter? I'm going
through a trial. Well, this body is failing. I just don't know if I'm going
to be able to pay my bills this next week." He said, I'll never
leave you. I'll never forsake you. Consider the lilies. What about the birds? I read that last few Wednesday
nights ago about the Lord caring for creation. Do you think He's going to forsake
you? If I believe that, and God Almighty gave me a heart to believe
that, I just... Well, I'll tell you what John
did. He wanted to bow down and worship the messenger. Thank
you. Oh, thank you. That angel said
in verse 9, See thou do it not. Don't do this. I am thy fellow
servant of thy brethren, the prophets of them that keep the
sayings of this book. Worship God. I'm a fellow servant. I'm one created by God Himself. Here was an angel, a messenger, one that was sent by God to teach
John something. You know, I got to thinking about
the angels. We're going through, you know,
the book of Hebrews. how much greater the Lord Jesus Christ
in His humiliation, in His being made flesh, how much greater
He was in the angels. You know, we would think there were instances in Scriptures
where angels actually appeared. I mean, they could make themselves
visible. They saw. You remember the three
that came to Abraham and Sarah? One was the Lord Himself. Two
others went into Sodom and they saw Him. They looked at Him.
Those evil men that were there in Sodom, they saw Him. They
were men. They looked like men. They took
on that appearance. How much respect even right now
in our minds we would think concerning angels. Scripture says the angels in
heaven look with amazement at what is unfolding right here. They look, they delve into it. They know what they've been taught
or heard or seen out of the unfolding of the indescribable mercy and
compassion of Almighty God in Christ toward His elect. Here
is an angel speaking to one of Christ's bride. We think how much respect we
would have toward a created being like that. Think of how much
the Lord Jesus Christ has looked upon us in mercy and grace, having
been chosen in Him before the foundation of the world. I am
a fellow servant of thy brethren, the prophets, as much a servant
in position as the position you hold. This is where God put me. Worship God. Worship me, worship God. I got
to thinking about that a moment ago before I got up. I thought,
worship God. Boy, what a command. And you
know what's so sad? Of all the things that we've
ever heard concerning the worship of Almighty God, I ask myself
this. You ask yourself this. If someone were to come up to
you and say, what does it mean to worship
God? What do you mean? There are some
folks here that sat under a faithful pastor for over 50 years, and
I know he faithfully set forth the worship of God. And if somebody
were to ask us right now, what do you mean, worship God? You'd try as hard as you could
trying to come out with the right words. You're thinking, I've
got an opportunity right now to explain to somebody something. Oh, how ignorant I am. What would
you say? Worship God. I know this, the
Lord told the woman at the well. The hour cometh and now is when
the true worshipers worship in spirit and truth. There's an external form of worship. I know that. We're all going
through that right here. I can view an external form of
worship. Prayer is worship. sitting, listening to the gospel
of God's grace as an external form of worship. But true worship is internal. They that worship, worship in
spirit because they are born of the Spirit. They worship in
truth because the Spirit of God has taught the truth of The truth
Himself. Worship must be true worship is internal. It's a new heart. And here's the bottom line. No man can teach another man how to worship God. God Himself
teaches worship. Believers worship and they mind
the things of the Spirit of God. They love the Spirit of the truth
because they love the truth Himself. They love the way in which the
Spirit of God teaches them the truth. bears witness to the truth. And those that worship long to
grow in grace and in the knowledge of their Lord and Savior, Jesus
Christ the Lord." Whenever they called Him Lord,
He said, You call Me Lord, and rightly so. The word Lord in
the New Testament is the same word concerning the Lord Jesus,
the same word Jehovah. In the Old Testament. They worship. They savor those
that worship God. They savor the things of God. Because they've got a heart to
do so. They're taught to worship. John
heard the things that that angel was saying. These things are
faithful and true. If Almighty God bears to my heart
these things concerning this book, and I'm telling you, and
I hear them with a new heart, and I believe them, and I long
after them by the grace of God, and He allows me the privilege
to truly enter into them, and He burns them with my heart.
Hides them in my heart. Sets up a treasure in my heart. I'll worship Him. May Almighty
God cause our hearts to truly rejoice in Him who alone is worthy
of our worship. And may He cause us to worship. May we worship Him today. For Christ's sake, Let's take about a 10 minute
break.