is special and significant and
every little thing that happens in this creation matters enormously.
He said to the disciples, And he says, I am, to Martha,
I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth in me,
though he were dead, yet shall he live. Whosoever liveth and
believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this? He says
in the previous chapter, My sheep, My sheep, all of them, hear My
voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. I give unto them eternal
life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them
out of My hand. My Father which gave them me
is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of
my Father's hand. My Father and I are one. He said, if you would believe,
you would see the glory of God. Our dear sister June believed
and she sees the glory of God. She saw him here. Let's give some thought to what
she's seeing at the moment. In Revelation chapter 7, And they cried with a loud voice
saying, salvation, Revelation 7, 10, salvation to our God,
which sits upon the throne and unto the lamb. And all the angels
stood round about the throne and about the elders and the
four beasts and fell down before the throne on their faces and
worshipped God saying, amen, blessing and glory and wisdom
and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be unto our God. forever and ever, amen. And one of the elders answered,
saying unto me, what are these which are arrayed in white robes? And whence came they? And I said
unto him, sir, thou knowest. And he said unto me, these are
they which came out of the great tribulation and have washed their
robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb. Therefore
they are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night
in his temple. And he that sitteth on the throne
shall dwell among them, and they shall hunger no more, neither
thirst any more, neither shall the sun light on them, nor any
heat for the lamb which is in the midst of the throne, shall
feed them, and shall lead them into living fountains of water.
waters and God shall wipe away all tears from our eyes. Such is the intimacy of the union
of the saints of God with their glorious saviour. That's what
it is to be in heaven, to be in his presence. to be rejoicing
in Him. June's given us the hymns and
she's given us the verses and the verses she wants us to meditate
on and they're verses for all of us and I trust that we just
hold on to these words of June to us as we journey on a pilgrimage. He said unto me, My grace is
sufficient for thee. My grace is, right now, sufficient
for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most
gladly, therefore, will I rather glory in mine infirmities that
the power of Christ may rest upon me. may rest upon thee. It means to pitch a tent and
dwell over and have someone under your care and your protection.
Rest upon me, the power of Christ may rest upon me. Let's pray. our dear and gracious and good
and all-sovereign God, and we thank you, Heavenly Father, that
we can always come into your presence, because ever before
and seated on the throne is our Lord Jesus Christ, and all of
your people come to you in him, our Father. And we thank you
that at times like this we are encouraged to come with boldness
to the throne of grace that we might find help in our time of
need. And Father God, we are needy. We are needy of your mercy. We
are needy of your grace. We are needy of your love. We
are needy of the blessed comfort that you alone can bring. Heavenly
Father, and we pray that the words that we have read, the
promises that your dear Son has made would be so very real to
us, Heavenly Father, that we would be comforted in them. our
missing of June. We praise you, our Father, that
in John Chapter 11 the Lord Jesus Christ wept at the tomb of Lazarus. We thank you, our Father, that
our great King and Saviour and God is a friend of sinners and
He's touched with the feelings of our infirmities. Heavenly
Father, He understands what it is for we who are dust to live
in this world and to be so bowed down by the circumstances of
life. But we praise you, Heavenly Father,
that beyond all of these things there is a great and glorious
God, and there is a great and glorious future for all of your
people, and we praise you, Heavenly Father. The dune's body rested
here, but she, the real dune, went away to be with you in glory
at that very moment, Heavenly Father, and we just Thank and
praise you for eternal life, that none of your children can
ever perish, no, and that nothing can pluck them out of your hand.
Nothing in this world, nothing, death or Satan or all the other
things that seem opposed to us, can separate us from the love
of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. So bless our time,
bless our memories, Heavenly Father. Comfort Graham and Bethany
and their family. And draw near as you promised
to us, Heavenly Father, at these times. And once again, we pray
that you might reveal your majesty and your glory, your sovereignty,
your love, and your power in all things that we might be those
that have a peace that passes the understanding of this world
as we look and rest upon our Lord Jesus Christ. Bless our
time together, Heavenly Father. Bless the events over the next
few days and bless Graham and Bethany and their family into
the future, Heavenly Father. Please cause us to be reminded
again and again of whose June was and is and where she is now. What a gift you've given us,
Heavenly Father, sending your sister, your daughter, our sister,
the sister of the Lord Jesus Christ, his wife, into our presence
to remind us of who you are and how you save sinners like us.
We pray these things for the glory of your dear and precious
son and for the comfort of your saints, our Father. We pray in
Jesus' name, amen. June wanted us to sing, and we're
gonna sing one of them right now. Rejoice, the Lord is King. Turn
in your hymn books to number 46. Rejoice, the Lord is King. Your Lord and King adore. Rejoice, give thanks and sing
and triumph evermore. Lift up your heart, lift up your
voice. Rejoice again, I say, rejoice. Thank you. ? To the people sing ? His kingdom cannot fail, He rules
over land and air. Through days of death and ill,
Unto our Jesus live. Rejoice! Rejoice! My prayer for some time is that
we've been enabled by the grace of God to actually rejoice and
appreciate and and learn the lessons that our God has brought
to us by sending June into our lives and we want to treasure
every moment, we want to treasure the glorious gift, the gifts
of God to us. I just wanted you to turn to
Hebrews chapter 6 and There's some just lovely words that I've
found very, very comforting in this last little while. And he speaks, and obviously
in verse 6 he's talking about those who fall away from the
faith, but he's talking about the better things. Verse 9, the
better things. Beloved, we are persuaded of
better things of you, and the things that accompany salvation. Isn't that a lovely word? The
things that accompany salvation. For God is not unrighteous to
forget your work and labour of love which you have showed toward
his name, in that you have ministered to the saints and do minister."
What a great word about June. She ministered to the saints. And she's still ministering.
She still speaks. And we desire that every one
of you do show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope
unto the end. the full assurance of hope unto
the end. That ye not be slothful, but
followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the
promises. And we know that all the promises
are yea and amen in the Lord Jesus Christ. The promise is
the promise of the Spirit. The promise is Christ dwelling
in you, the hope of glory. For when God made a promise to
Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, he swore by himself,
saying, surely blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying
I will multiply thee. And so after he had patiently
endured, he obtained the promise. The promise is in Isaac. The
promise is the seed. The promise is the Lord Jesus
Christ is to come into the world. All of God's promises are wrapped
up in this one, one glorious Redeemer. For men verily swear
by the greater and an oath for confirmation is to them an end
of all strife. willingly, more abundantly, to
show unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel,
the unchangeableness of his purpose, which is what that word counsel
means. Purpose, it's the unchangeableness of his will. He does all things
according to the counsel of his own will. The immutability of
his counsel confirmed it by an oath, that by two immutable things
in which it was impossible for God to lie. The immutable things
are his counsel, the immutable things are the oath that is small
in his counsel, that counsel of peace which was between them
and their counsel from before the foundation of the world.
It's impossible for God to lie, verse 18, that we might have
strong consolation. We might have strong comfort. The word is paraklesis, to come
alongside, to come alongside and to hold you and to uphold
you and to comfort you. Simeon was in that temple and
he was waiting. He was waiting patiently for
the consolation of Israel and a baby was put in his arms. rest in peace. Now here's the
consolation of Israel. All the promises of God are fulfilled
in the Lord Jesus Christ. We might have strong consolation,
everlasting consolation. Who have, listen to what we've
done, we've fled We fled to those cities of refuge.
We fled to the Lord Jesus Christ. We fled from this world. We fled
from this world's religion. We fled from this world's righteousness.
We fled from all of this wealth. We fled from all of those things.
We fled for refuge. We need a refuge. We fled there.
To lay hold of the hope set before us. Which hope we have as an
anchor of the soul, an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast. It's firm, isn't it? The anchor
of the soul which entereth in within the veil. Whether the forerunner is for
us entered, even Jesus made a high priest forever after the order
of Melchizedek. We have an anchor, brothers and
sisters, and he's entered in through that veil, and the veil
is his flesh. He's entered in, he's entered
into that Holy of Holies, and when he entered into the Holy
of Holies, he took all of his people with him into the Holy
of Holies. He carried them on his shoulders, the government's
on his shoulders, and he carried them on his heart, and he carried
them from all eternity, he carried them before the foundation of
this world, and he carries them in there. That's an anchor, isn't
it? An anchor to ride out the storms. An anchor to ensure that all
of his people will never be, have shipwreck of their faith.
And he enters in within that veil, he enters in with his own
blood, having accomplished redemption for all of his people. Our anchors
on the rock of ages. The rock of ages. When men throw
anchors over boats, they can't see where the anchor is. But
the other problem is that they don't have any idea where it's
going. You throw it over and you hope, don't you, that it
finds something stable. We're not throwing an anchor
over in any whim whatsoever. We're throwing an anchor over
the rock of ages. And it's the rock of ages that
holds us and holds the boat. The anchor is unseen, but it's
not unfilled. The anchor is not thrown out
with uncertainty. We have an anchor. We have an
anchor who is the rock. And we can't see him now, brothers
and sisters, but our friend, June, does. Our faith is being tried in so
many ways, isn't it? Let's read 1 Peter 1, verse 7. That the trial of your faith
being much more precious than gold. It's remarkable, isn't
it? The trial of your faith is more precious than gold that perishes. They who are betrothed
with fire might be found under praise and honour and glory at
the appearing of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen, we can't
see that anchor and we can't see the chain that holds the
anchor, in whom, though now you see him
not yet believing, you rejoice with joy unspeakable and full
of glory, receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation
of your souls. We have an anchor. We have an
anchor. He's unseen but not unknown. June's asked us to sing again.
Isn't it lovely that I have here on the back of our bulletin,
I have the last words that June wrote in this world, and they're
words about singing.