No, no. Revelation 21. Revelation 21. Let's pray together. Our Father, how we thank you for giving us
this time to be able to be together. to meet together in the presence
of the Lord Jesus Christ, our Master and our Lord and our surety,
our God, our Friend, our Husband. How thankful we are, Lord, that
You would grant us another time of fellowship. Lord, would You
bless the service this morning. Lord, we know if You If you don't
bless it by your Spirit, Lord, there's no blessing to it. Cause
us to hear. Cause us to see. We pray for
these, our friends that we met with in Martinsburg. Pray for our brethren, friends
in Japan. I pray for the men that are standing
this morning, Lord, preaching. Would you bless where you've
raised up a hearing of your gospel. Call your people out, we pray.
Comfort us this morning. Refresh our hearts and minds
again for Christ's sake. Amen. John, by the grace of God, is seeing the security of the bride He
sees her. Well, I'm sure as she is in her
glorified state. But I'll tell you this, in her
glorified state in heaven is what I'm talking about. She is
no more secure than she is right now. She's no more settled than she
is right now. The Scripture speaks of her. In the 18th verse we looked at
last time, the building or the essence or the material of the
wall, Christ Himself was of Jasper holiness. And the city was pure
gold. She is the essence of her Savior. Pure gold. Buy of me gold. Tried in the fire. That's what
he said. And concerning her purity, like clear glass, no spot, no
blemish. Oh, can that be so? That she is before Almighty God,
pure and holy, found in her Savior. Verse 19, 20. That's what we
look at this morning. The foundations of the wall. Now we're talking about Christ
now. The foundations of the wall, of the city were
garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation, jasper. Sapphire, 3rd Chalcedony, 4th
Emerald, 5th Sodonyx, 6th Sardius, 7th Chrysolite, 8th Beryl, 9th
Topaz, 10th Chrysoprophus, 11th Adjacent, 12th Amethyst, What we just read is actually speaking of the attributes
of the foundation himself, the foundations of the wall. These stones, precious stones, they were all in order. That's what it means,
garnished. They were in perfect order. And these attributes, the thing that I noticed about
these stones, and I'll tell you this, there's some things that
we know and there's some things we don't know about these stones. But I do know this, in the little
bit that I know. And how little I know. We see through a glass darkly.
But thanks be unto God, we see. I tell you, just a glimpse this
morning of Him fills our heart with joy. When we realize just as we just get a peek I wonder what Peter,
James, and John thought what went through their renewed mind
on the Mount of Transfiguration. I wonder what they thought when
they just got a glimpse of His unveiled, just a glimpse. They said He did shine brighter
than the noonday sun. I just muse on that for a minute
and just think, Lord, how little I've thought of you. But the first thing that I noticed
and the attributes, the foundations, the setting downs is what it
is of the wall of the city were all set in order with all manner
of precious stone garnished I love this. We've looked at
Jasper just a little bit. Here is the first, the primary,
the foremost. That's what it means. The first,
the foremost attribute. Jasper. We looked at this last
Sunday. Holy. Holy. How do you set forth a description
of the holiness of God? You proclaim it. And the Spirit
of God blesses it to the heart of God's people and they realize,
I can but bow in the lack of my understanding I would not
even attempt to cheapen the Word by trying to describe holiness.
What am I going to say? The Spirit of God can bring to my
understanding a glimpse somewhat in what it causes me to do is
to bow my heart. In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The foundation
attribute is holy. Jasper. He that sat upon the
throne, John said in Revelation 4, was likened to Jasper. It means that he had the appearance
of holiness. The second sapphire. This is
a little bit of what I know concerning this. Ezekiel 126, and above
the firmament that was over their heads was the likeness of a throne
as the appearance of a sapphire. I know this concerning the attributes,
the foundations of the wall. He's the king. He's king. He's
the Lord. The Holy King, the Holy Lord. And then we find the rest of
those stones, Chalcedony and Emerald, right on through. As
far as I can tell, no other mention of description
or understanding ever set forth. concerning those stones, those attributes. But here's the thing I do know
concerning the hidden fullness or the complete
understanding of His attributes. Here's a little bit of what I
know. I know this concerning His attributes. foundations, that which is set
down. This is the way He is. I know
this. Whatever those stones set forth,
I know that He is God. In the beginning, God created
the heaven and the earth. I know that He is the Lord alone.
I know concerning His attributes that He is the God of purpose. Ephesians 1.11, Who worketh all
things after the counsel of His own will. I know that concerning
His foundations. This is what's being set down.
This is it. The wall who is our salvation. What do we know about Him? We
know that He is holy. We know that He is the King. We know that He is the Lord.
We know that there is none like Him. I know thirdly that He is
omniscient. He knows all things. Hebrews
4, verse 13, All things are naked and open unto the eyes of Him
With whom we have to do. I know that right now that he
knows everything. Knows everything that's going
on right now. He knows what we think and he knows what we are.
We are dust. You realize that? I stand here this morning. I was thinking about something
that I told one of the folks there in Martinsburg. This is what a pastor is. Just a voice. Just a voice. Paul the Apostle said concerning
himself, he said, I am a servant. I am your servant for Christ's
sake. This is what I am. I am your
servant. Called by the Master. to be the
servant of His sheep. That's what God's called me to
do. He's omniscient. Fourthly, I
know this concerning His attributes. He's sovereign. Isaiah 46, 9
and 10, remember the former things of old. For I am God and there's
none else. I am God and there's none like
Me. declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times
the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand
and I will do all my pleasure." Tell me about Him that you serve.
I'll tell you. He does as He will. in the army
of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth. And I know this,
no man stays his hand." What if a man chooses not to
come to Christ? He won't come. What if God chooses
to call him? He will. He will. Because I'm telling you, all men, in this world, they
are but grasshoppers before Him with whom we have to deal. What is man? I know this concerning his attributes,
concerning how I can look at these precious stones that were laid in order of the foundation,
Who is the salvation? I'm talking about this is who
our salvation is. These are His attributes. He's immutable. I am the Lord, Malachi 3, 6.
I change not, therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed. Aren't
you glad? Aren't you glad? His people are. They're so thankful that He doesn't
change. Lord, You everlastingly loved me. That means You'll forever
love me. Lord, You never looked upon me
in wrath. You'll never look on me in wrath. Lord, You've always
chosen to show mercy. You'll forever show mercy. You
don't change. Sixthly, He's just. That means He's fair. Fair. Isaiah 45, 21, there is no God
beside me, a just God and a Savior. There is none beside me. When
I speak of His justice, I know this, that when Christ was made
sin, Almighty God put away my guilt forever. He paid my debt and He will never
look to me to pay it. He was made sin. The Scripture
says that I might be made the righteousness of God. That I might be made the righteousness
of God. I can't even take that in. I
can't enter into the fullness. I can believe it. And I can rejoice
in it somewhat. I wish I could rejoice in it
as I ought. I wish I could. One day, by the
grace of God, I will. And lastly, He's merciful and
gracious and compassionate. Exodus 33, 19, I will make all
my goodness. I can tell you this, that's Christ.
I will make all My goodness pass before thee." All that He has everlastingly
loved, all that He has chosen in His Son, He will cause His
Son to pass before you. And you will see Him. He will
cross your path. He is going to cross your path
in the Gospel. You will hear Him. You will hear the Gospel
of free grace. God will send a preacher. The
Spirit of God will bless the message like the wind. He will sovereignly move. He will call you out. He will
call you out by name. He said, I know my sheep. I call
them by name. And they hear my voice and they
follow. I will make all my goodness pass
before thee and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee
And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will
show mercy on whom I will show mercy." All these precious stones right
here. All of them set there and named.
And I can tell you for a fact that the Spirit of God did not
have John be the penman, which is what he was. Just a penman.
There's somebody writing down. He just wrote down what he heard.
But the Spirit of God did not have John the Apostle write those
stones down. And those stones have no meaning. They have meaning. I may not be able to perceive.
You say, well, Marvin, give me the fullness of the barrel. I can't. Well, how about the
fullness of the cross of light? Can you tell me the fullness
of that? No. I can drop a diamond ring into
a dead rotting carcass filled with maggots. And the
maggots can crawl all over that diamond ring. I'm talking about
maybe a 3 or 4 carat diamond ring. I'm talking about a nice
one. And just maggots. I can just sit there and look
at that ring and there's maggots crawling all over that diamond
ring. And you know what? Those maggots
never perceive the worth of that diamond ring. But do you know
that ring didn't lose one ounce of its or one cent of its value? But if one of those maggots by
a miracle was made to be a new creature and could perceive something
of the preciousness of that ring, you'd have to then admit That took a miracle of God to
do that, to make a maggot, to be able to understand and perceive
what it was mulling over. This morning, we're mulling over
some things here that, by the grace of God, we just get a glimpse
of. And if God leaves us to ourselves,
we can sit here and hear that, and we're just a bunch of maggots.
We're crawling all over the preciousness of this foundation right here.
But if God Almighty calls out one maggot and makes one maggot
to see something of the glory of God, that maggot, and that's
still what he is in himself, he's still just a maggot, but
he'll say this, this is a maggot that God's given some light.
And one of these days, All of this putrefying refuge that I'm
made up of right now is going to be put away. And I'm going
to see Him as He is. And I'm going to know Him. And
I'm going to be like Him. Now, that's a miracle. Has God
made you to be that? I pray so, for Christ's sake.
Amen. Let's just take about a 5-10
minute break and we'll come right back.