Ever since the fall of Adam,
there have been many, many kings in this earth. Many men have
desired to be kings. Others have tried to make other
men kings. I don't know if y'all realize,
I don't know why this came to my mind, but I remember in a
history class at some point that after the Revolutionary War,
there was a significant number of people in this country who
wanted to make George Washington the king of the United States. So he wisely declined, but it
seems to be the desire of fallen men to make other men kings,
or to make themselves kings. Look here in this book of Nahum
chapter three, this is what it says about kings in the earth. It says, behold thy people, verse
17, I'm sorry, verse 17 of chapter three. It says, thy crowned. And notice this is not God's
crown, this is the men that other men crown. It says, thy crown,
sinners, lost men, rebels, thy crown are as the locusts. There's
so, so many of them. They just like swarm everywhere. Thy captains, you know what a
captain is? We'll see this later. A captain
is somebody who would be the king, but never quite gets there. But in the back of his mind,
when he starts this climb up from private to sergeant to lieutenant
to captain, he has in mind he'd be general one day, and then
he'll be the king. And it says captains are as grasshoppers. The only thing there's more of
than locusts is grasshoppers. which camp in the hedges in the
cold of the day, but when the sun arises, they flee away, and
their place is not known where they are. That's where all the
kings are now. The kings of the earth, they're
not known. Where are they? Where's the king of the Amorites
now? Where's the king of the Hittites? You know, I read through
the book of Joshua and started identifying kings, that when
Joshua came up to take the land, and you know how many kings there
were in a promised land? I quit counting at 28. Now that's
a little area, what is Israel, about the size of Connecticut
or something? So they had at least 28 kings
in Connecticut. How would that work out? Okay,
no wonder they were always at war and trouble everywhere. But there's so many, they're
like locusts swarming all over each other. They're like a plague. In Ezekiel, we're told this,
that of the kings of men, there is a multitude. And they're all
of the common sort. They're no different from the,
you know the Queen of England? She's no different than you.
The King of Saudi Arabia? He's no different than any of
us. We're all just men and women is what we are. We're of the
common sort. And how are they identical? It says in Ezekiel, they put
crowns upon their own head. And as we'll see, that's a pretty
worthless crown. Turn to Revelation chapter 17. And let's get right to it here.
Who is the King? Capital K. That's the Lord Jesus
Christ. He is the only true, wise, legitimate
King, the Lord Jesus Christ. You see here in Revelation 13,
I mean 17, verse 13, it says, all of these false kings, all
men, they have one mind and shall give their power and strength
unto the beast. Men who pretend to be kings and
men who rebel against the true king, eventually we all cede
our power to the beast, to satanic things. Look at verse 14. These
shall make war with the Lamb in the last day, and the Lamb
shall overcome them. For he is Lord, you see capital
L, of all lords, and he is King, capital K, of all kings. And
they that are with him, are called and chosen and faithful. There's
those who are against him and those who are for him. Now, Jesus
Christ, he's the real king. He's the Lord of lords and king
of kings. Hold this just a second and turn a page over to chapter
19 of Revelation. Revelation 19, verse 16, here
it is again, it says, And he hath on his vesture, this is
the Son of God, he has on his breastplate, his chest, he has,
this is what is written, and his name's written on his thigh.
He is King of kings and Lord of lords. That's the high name
of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's King, he's Lord. Now, turn,
hold chapter 17 and turn back to Revelation 1. Who is the King, capital K? The
Lord Jesus Christ. Now, who are the kings? Small
k. Who are they? I think this is
very interesting. Look at Revelation 1, verse 5. It says, and from Jesus Christ,
who is faithful, the faithful witness, and the first begotten
of the dead, and the prince of kings of the earth. Jesus Christ
is the overall king, but it says that there are other kings. And
it says, unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins
in his own blood. Jesus Christ is the king of salvation. He's the king of the earth. He's
the king of everything. And verse six says, and he hath
made us. I wonder who that us is. He has
made us kings and priests unto God and his father. To him be glory and dominion
forever and ever, amen. Turn a few pages over to Revelation
5. Who is the king, capital K, the
Lord Jesus Christ? Who are the kings, small k? And the simple answer to that
is it's God's people. Everyone that God redeems, that
he saves, that he's determined to have in glory is a king, is
a king. Look here at Revelation 5 verse
9. And they sung a new song. This
is the folks in heaven. Everybody sings a new song and
it's thou art worthy to take the book and to open The seals
thereof. This is talking about those who
are speaking to the Lord Jesus Christ. For thou was slain and
hath redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred and
tongue and people and nation. It won't matter there what the
color of your skin was. It won't matter there how strong
you were or what your nationality is. It doesn't matter about any
of that. It says that If the blood of Christ is why we're
there, then we're kings. We're kings. He's chosen out
of every kindred, tongue, and people, and nation, verse 10,
and has made us unto our God kings. Kings and priests. And we shall reign on the earth. Turn now to Revelation 21. And I'm going to read some verses
here and pay real close attention to this because there's something
we're going to come back to in Revelation 21, 21. This is
talking about the great city in heaven. It has 12 gates and
12 pearls. Every several gate was of one
pearl and the street of the city was pure gold as it were transparent
glass. And I saw no temple therein,
for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it."
Things have changed. We've had an earthly temple here
on the earth, and there'll be one in glory too. But it's not
a place, it's a person. We've got all these things. We've
got earthly kings. We'll have a king in glory. It's
the Lord Jesus Christ. It's the lamb. Look at verse
23. And the city had no need of the sun. We've got a sun right
now and a moon to shine in it for the glory of God did lighten
it. And the lamb is the light thereof. We don't need a physical
sun and moon up there because Christ lights the whole place.
Verse 24 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 unto it. Those of us who have been
made kings in glory, any honor and glory we have, you'll see
in just a minute, we lay at his feet, at the high king of heaven,
capital K. 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 unto it.
All glory and honors go into one place. in heaven. Verse 27, 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. The only people there are those
whose names are written. Won't it be nice? Anybody wake
up this morning going, Oh, I got this to do. You got to drive
so-and-so and do this. And you got to go to that place
down there and go to work again. And come Monday morning, you
got to go to work. Is there not always something, something going
on? Not up there. The only thing
there is up there is to worship the king. And you know who has
no worries is the king. And we be made kings. There'll
be no more sorrow, no more trouble, no more any of that, any of that. Now, turn over to Revelation 14. And this is really where I've
been aiming the whole time. There are only two kinds of crowns
that kings wear. Only two. The first of which, they're made
of radically different things, but the first type of crown is
made of gold. If men get to make a king, you
ever seen a picture of that crown the monarchs in England wear?
Man, it's beautiful. It's gold and shiny and it's
got rubies like this and emeralds and all these precious stones
in it. Men make crowns of gold, and one of the two types of crowns
in God's word is made of gold. Look here in Revelation 4. Let me read to you, I meant to
have you read in Revelation 14, 14 first, listen to it, stay
there. John who went there said, I looked
and behold a white cloud and upon the cloud one sat like the
son of man. This is Christ in heaven, what
he saw and it says, having on his head a golden crown. The
Lord Jesus Christ in glory wears a crown and it's gold, all right? But now look who else wears crowns. In chapter four of Revelations,
verse four, we see, and round about the throne where the Lord
Jesus Christ is sitting in his crown of gold were four and 20
seats, and upon the seats I saw four and 20 elders sitting. They
were clothed in white raiment, and look at this, and they had
on their heads crowns of gold. So there are those in heaven
who wear golden crowns. You know who they are? They're
the kings, small K. They're the children of God.
You say, we're gonna be kings? That's what it says here. Why would they wear crowns up
there? Why would they do this? There's three simple reasons.
Christ loves them, and he's made them like him. What's he wearing,
Glory? A crown of gold. He loves them,
and he's made them. If we're like him, what are we
wearing? A crown of gold. He's made them that way, and
we wear it. And then the third reason is
that he gave them the crowns. He gave them to us. If the Lord
Jesus Christ gave us something, what would we do with it? I think
we'd cherish it, wouldn't we? And if he's wearing a crown and
he gives us one like it, we're going to wear it. We're going
to wear it. Now, look at Revelation 4, verse 10. Here's what we do
with those crowns. In Revelation 4, verse 10, and
the four and 20 elders fall down before him that sat on the throne,
that's the Lord Jesus Christ, and worship him that liveth forever
and ever. and cast their crowns before
the throne, saying, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory
and honor and power, for Thou hast created all things, and
for Thy pleasure they are and were created." Here's the scene. The Lord Jesus Christ is on His
throne. He has His crown of gold. And
here's everybody around Him. And he's given them a crown of
gold. What do we do with them in glory? You know what we do?
It says we bow and we take them and we cast them at his feet.
Why would we do that? Number one, we know who gave
them to us. You know who made us kings. And
we know who the king of kings is. And as such, we'll bow at
his feet and the crown Being gold is not what makes it precious. It's what it represents. Turn
to John 19. John 19. The crown represents
the glory and the honor of the Lord Jesus Christ. Let me show
you this other type of crown. In John chapter 19. Look at verse one. Then Pilate therefore took Jesus
and scourged him. This man Pilate took the king
of glory and tried to beat him to death. And the soldiers platted a crown,
here it is, of thorns. and put it on his head, and they
put on him a purple robe to mock him, and said, hail, king of
the Jews, and they smote him with their hands. They took the
king of glory, and let's be careful here, let's not go, those wicked
soldiers, they are and they were, but thank God I wasn't there. I would have joined right in,
and let's not deceive ourselves. would have participated in this.
But this crown of thorns, this scene that we just read about,
sadly has very little effect on many, many people. But the
scene does bother some people because it's violent, and it's
vicious, and it's bloody, and appears unjust. And we cannot
possibly enter into the brutality of seeing this done. A cat of nine tails had bone
and metal in it, and when the flesh on the back of a person
was beaten with it, they say the ribs began to come out. So
much flesh was ripped off of it. We just can't enter into
this, and that bothers a lot of people. But you know what
this scene does to God's people? This scene breaks our heart. It crushes our heart because
Christ is not only getting what he deserves, and I'll explain
that in a minute, he's getting what we deserve.
If we could just enter into what they were doing to him and understand
that's what I, I earned that, I deserve that, that's the price
of sin, and He was taking, what was he doing with that crown
on his head? He's the king of all those for
whom he died. And that's what this represents.
He was taking our place. Because of our sin, we deserve
to be scourged. Because of our sin, we deserve
to be mocked and beaten and crucified. We deserve to wear the crown
of thorns. But he wore it for us. Look at
verse five. It says, Then came Jesus after
all this torment. Then came Jesus forth wearing
the crown of thorns. And here's what I want us to
understand about this. He was not made, made to wear
it. He chose to wear it. Do we realize
when he came out of that soldier's hall, does it say anywhere his
hands were tied? It doesn't, does it? Do you know what he
could have done? He could have taken that crown
reached up, taken it, and thrown it off his head, cast it off.
Could he not have? Why didn't he? He knows he deserved
to wear it. He knew those for whom he was
dying deserved to wear it. And therefore, it says right
here, he came out of that soldier's hall, he wore it. He wore it. From the foundation of the world,
he chose, I'll wear this for my people. He's not wearing it
because he deserves it now. Our sin was put on him and therefore
he now does deserve this crown. But he's doing it for his people.
Do we see that? He took his crown of gold and
set it down in glory, came down here and wore a crown of thorns. So that when we get there, The
crown of thorns has been set aside and he takes his crown
and then gives each of his people one. Now, look at Psalm 103. We're almost done. Turn to Psalm
103. The crown or crowns in glory
may be made of gold, But here's what they mean to Christ the
King and all his people, because they too have been made kings.
In Psalm 103, look at verse one. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and
all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord,
O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. Who forgiveth all
thine iniquities, who healeth all thy diseases. who redeemeth
thy life from destruction, who crowneth thee with loving kindness
and tender mercies. That's the goal of the gospel
right there. That's the goal of this crown, is that because
of his loving kindness, he lived the way we should have lived.
He lived in the way that God demands. If you're coming into
my presence, you're gonna live like this. Christ did that that's
loving kindness. And because of his tender mercies,
we can come into his presence and receive a crown because he's
given us his righteousness. He lived a perfect life. He never
did anything to deserve to wear that crown of thorns. So that's
what the crown means. It's loving kindness and tender
mercies. And then look at Hebrews two. Hebrews 2 verse 7, God hath made him, made Christ,
a little lower than the angels. Thou crown'st him with glory
and honor. That's the goal to the gospel.
It's the glory and the honor Christ gets from living for his
people and dying on behalf of his people. He made him a little
lower than that and crowned him with glory and honor and did
set him over the works of thy hands." God determined from the
beginning of whenever before the creation of the world, He
determined this is how it's going to happen. I'll make man, he'll
fall. He can't help himself, but my
son's going to go down there in loving kindness and tender
mercies. He's going to live like they should and he's going to
die on their behalf because they wouldn't live pure. Then look
at verse eight, thou has put all things in subjection under
his feet for in that he put all things in subjection under him.
He left nothing that's not under him. That's a good thing. But
now we see not yet all things put under him, but we see Jesus
who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering
of death. He's crowned with what? Glory and honor. That crown of
gold, when we see it, it's glory and honor unto the lamb who was
slain. that he by the grace of God should
taste death for every man. Now, who's every man? It's not
the whole world. Look at the next verse. For it
became him for whom are all things and by whom are all things. That's
Christ bringing many sons. That's the all men. It's God's
children, his sons and daughters. That's for whom he died. It's
not the whole world. If he died for the whole world,
the whole world would be saved. They'd all have crowns in glory
and in hell, I suppose that's ridiculous, isn't it? Look at
this. And by whom are all things in
bringing many sons unto glory to make the captain of their
salvation perfect through sufferings. The Lord Jesus Christ is not
only the king, he's the captain. The captain's in charge. He would
be king. Jesus Christ came down here for
a while, set his crown down. He was a captain of our salvation.
When he goes back, he's king again. And verse 11, for both
he that sanctifies, he that sets apart, he that makes holy, and
they who are sanctified, those of his people, his sons who are
made holy and set apart, chosen, are all of one, for which cause
he's not ashamed to call them brethren. He's so not ashamed
of us. Do you know what he does? He says, here, you wear this. You wear this. You wear the crown
of gold. That's good news, isn't it? It
simply is not possible now to even imagine the joy, the honor,
and the glory that awaits all of his people to receive that
crown of gold in heaven. Not because it's gold. You know
what gold is worth in heaven? Not much, apparently, because
they paved the street with it. Did you notice that, by the way?
It doesn't say streets, it's just a street. And that street
is paved with gold. What's gold worth? It may still
be beautiful and it may be worth a lot, I don't know. But it's
such that the crowns are made of it, all right? And the real
beauty of it is because it's given with tender mercy and in
loving kindness. And the gap between our imagination
and that reality is a million miles apart. We think, won't
that be great? And it will be. But I wanna give
you an illustration in closing. that I hope brings home how little
we know, not only about what we owe, but the reward of being
in Christ in glory. You ever seen pictures drawn? It's why the scripture says don't
do this, don't make images. But have you seen these statues
and pictures of Jesus on the cross and he's got this crown
of thorns and sort of looks like a rose bush or something, doesn't
it? Usually it's, you know, it's got these little stickers and
things on it. I recently came across a tree. Most of the scholars
think that that crown was, either tied together or intertwined
from what is called the white thorn tree or the white locust
tree. I recently found one growing
on some property behind my house. Maybe some of you have seen it,
but the crown he wore is not these little stickery bushes.
Let me show you what it is. That's the thorn tree from which
the crown was made. You say, oh my, oh my. And they took these and they
intertwined these. Did you in your mind, I was like,
no, I can't imagine. Can you imagine what this did
to him? Luke one time got a little cut in his forehead playing in
sports. It looked like blood just ran,
and the cut was like that wide. Can you imagine what these did
to him? What his appearance was, how,
and this is just, I mean, we're just talking about now that crown
of thorns. Can you imagine the beating and
the punishment and the abuse he took? He wore the crown of thorns so
we could wear the crown of gold. We cannot even imagine, just
like we can't, I don't want you to remember the thorn so much
as it to prompt you to wear, to think about the crown of gold.
That's the beauty of this, is that Christ took that so we won't
have to wear it. And he gave us a crown of thorns.
because he's king of kings and he's made us kings and priests.
Okay, we'll take our break now.