Glory for me, glory for me, when
by His grace I shall look on His face, there will be glory,
be glory for me. Colossians chapter 1. Go over
there. Colossians chapter 1. You pray for me. If you don't feel like coming here,
you just stay home, don't you? Or if you do come, you just sit. I can't do that. And this was
one of those nights I thought, I'm tired and I don't want to
do this. I've wanted to deal with this,
though, for a long time. We looked at a few verses here. You may remember a couple of
weeks ago on a prayer for the saints, verses 9 through 12. Somebody read this at the meeting. It caught my attention again. One line, verse 12. It said, giving thanks unto the
Father. which hath made us meet or fit
to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light, giving
thanks that God has made us meet or fit to be a partaker of this
inheritance. God, this work of salvation is
God's work. It's not ours. It's He that hath
made us, and not we ourselves. God made Christ to be sin for
us. God made Him to be wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, redemption for us. Verse 13 says, God delivered
us from the power of darkness I don't know about you, but I
was in darkness, and I loved it. But God came in the gospel
one day and delivered me from that darkness, translated us,
verse 13, that is, took us out of the kingdom of this world,
of the God of this world, of kingdom of darkness, and put
us by election, by power, by blood, put us in the kingdom
of His dear Son. It's His work, according to His
good pleasure. And verse 14 says, in Him, in
Christ, His dear Son, we have redemption. Have you ever built
up a debt so high that you thought, I'll never pay this off? Redeemed
means to pay off something. In our past sins, you know, have
you ever thought, I'd like to redeem myself for what I've done?
Have you ever thought that? I sure would like to undo and
redeem myself for all that I've done. You thought, I just can't
do it. Well, it says He has. He has. And He did it through His blood. Verse 14 says, even the forgiveness
of sin. Not only did Christ pay for our
sins, But He forgave us our sin. We built up a debt so large to
our God, and sins so abounding, and yet Christ redeemed us. And God has forgiven us. And
buddy, there's only peace for a guilty sinner when you believe
that God really forgives you. That's the only peace. that you
can have, really. You'll go on in guilt, you'll
hang your head, you'll never... Feel like a child of God until
you really believe that God forgives you. And He delights to. He delights to show me. He gives
me great pleasure. So that's for our peace. Now
this meateness in verse 12 is what I want us to look at. It
says He's made us meat to be takers of this inheritance. Meat, the word means enabled.
He's enabled us to partake. of this inheritance. He's qualified
us. That's what that means. Made
us fit. That is, we'll be able to be in heaven with a holy God. He's done that. We'll be able
to enjoy heaven for all eternity. Because He's made us fit. He's
made us to fit right in. Can I use that word? We'll fit
right in with the angels, it says, with the saints in light. Those saints that are there.
We're going to fit right in. In light. Not in darkness, but
light. Alright? Let's look at this inheritance. He says He's made us heirs to be partakers of this inheritance. That means we're an heir of the
kingdom. An heir. How do you inherit something? How does someone inherit something?
Made an heir of this kingdom. Well, someone's got to live,
don't they? They've got to live and they've got to die. All right,
we have this inheritance by virtue of our Lord Jesus Christ living
on this earth as a man, our covenant head. And he, as the only begotten
Son of God, earned heaven. That's why he came. The wages
that we have earned are death. God ought to send us all to hell. But God, in love, chose a people
and gave them to His Son, and He became their covenant head,
the second Adam. And He came to this world as
a man to live a holy life. We've heard this all before,
but this is it. This is why we're going to be in heaven. This is
why we're qualified. It's because of what Jesus Christ
did. He's the one that makes us fit. for heaven that the Father
was going to let us in. It's all by Him. Alright? He
earned the right to everything. He was so pleasing to His Father
that the Father gave Him everything. Gave Him the people, gave Him
a new heaven, a new earth, everybody in it. Gave Him. He's Lord over
all. All power, all authority, all souls are mine, Christ said.
He gave it all because He pleased the Father. You and I, if we
have an inheritance coming from our parents, Don't mess up before
they die. Okay? Don't make them mad at
you, because they could take it away, couldn't they? Well,
this, you see, God's pleased with His Son. You know why we're
going to get into heaven? Jesus Christ. And God said, everyone
that comes by Him, because I'm so pleased with Him, All right? By life and by His death. There's
got to be a death. Hebrews 9, and I hope to make
this short but sweet. Hebrews 9, I'll go over there
quickly because this speaks of death and inheritance. Hebrews
9, verse 15, it says, For this cause Christ is the mediator
of the New Testament, or that's the will, the will, the will
of God in His Testament. that by means of death, for the
redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament,
the law, they which are called might receive the promise of
the internal inheritance. You see, he did it all. And where
a testament is, there must also be, of necessity, be the death
of the testator. The one whose will it is has
to die, doesn't it? And the scripture goes on to
say, that Christ ever lives to make sure that all He died for
enter into His inheritance. So Christ is our reason. He's
the heir, isn't He? He's the Son that pleased the
Father, and we're joint heirs. with Him. We get what He earned. You're an heir of a kingdom of
God by adoption. There's a difference between
adoption and birth. Have you ever thought about this,
why God makes this difference between adoption? Romans 8 speaks
about receiving the spirit of adoption, and our Lord said you
must be born again. Have you ever thought about that?
It has to be both. Adoption is always by choice. Adoption is election is what
it is. No adopted child chooses his
parent. They didn't used to. And they're
not chosen for you. Years ago, they used to choose
whom they would. And that's God's choice. Elect
according to the foreknowledge and love of God. Adopted parent love a child like
their own born children. Ed, can they? Ed was adopted. Can an adopted child love the
parents like their natural born parents? Ed says so. Well, I say so. Because, and
the Father loves His people that He adopted and chose just like
Christ. Just like Christ. As the Father has loved me, He
said, I love you and the Father loves you also. We love Him. made heirs by birth, by birth,
were born again into the King. This is necessary. You've got
to be a new creature. You can't get into God's heaven without
this holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord. We've
got to be a new creature. We've got to be born again. Our
Lord said flesh and blood can't inherit the Kingdom. But you
must be born of God, born of the Spirit, a new creature to
be fit. To be able to enjoy heaven that
we're going to talk about in a few minutes. Go to John chapter
1. You've got to be made fit to
be in this kingdom of light. Of light. Look at John chapter
1. To dwell with the saints in light. Right now, they dwell
in... There's no darkness at all there. All light. John chapter
1 verse 5. The light shineth in darkness.
Speaking of Christ. He came into this world. Dark
light. Darkness. The world comprehended it not.
They still don't know Him. We do. He's given us an understanding,
hasn't He? Look at verse 9. That was the
true light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
That is, everyone has any light. He was in the world, the world
was made by Him, the world knew Him not. He came unto His own,
that is, His creatures, and His own received Him not. But as
many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons
of God, the right, privilege, sons of God by adoption, by birth,
even to them that believed on His name, which were born, you
see. They're born of God, not of blood, not of the will of
the flesh or the will of man, but of God. Look at John 3, John
chapter 3, verse 21. Light came into this world. Men
loved darkness rather than light. God's kingdom is a kingdom of
light. In Him there's no darkness at
all. John chapter 3, verse... Well, verse 16, God so loved
the world, He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth
in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. And down
in verse 21, verse 20, everyone that doeth evil hateth the light.
Hates Christ, hates God who is light. Doesn't come to the light.
They won't come to God, won't come to Christ, lest their deeds
or sins should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh
to the light. Have you come to Christ? I believe
I have, and I keep coming, don't you? That his deeds may be made
manifest that they're wrought in God. So we've got to be made
fit to dwell in this kingdom, all right? This inheritance,
what is it? And by describing it, you may know if you have
it. Alright? By describing it. I'm going to try to describe
to you what this inheritance is. And in describing it, you
may know if you have it. Alright? Our inheritance is God Himself. Look at Psalm 16. Psalm 16. This is a great psalm. A great
psalm. You'll love this. Psalm 16. You
love God. Psalm 16, verse... You have it? Verse 4, their sorrows shall
be multiplied that hasten after another God. Their drink offerings
of blood will I not offer, or take up their names into My lips.
The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup, and
He's the one that maintains that lot, that portion. He's going
to make sure, John, it's reserved, you see, in heaven for us. And we didn't make that reservation.
He did. And it's going to be kept. We'll
be there. It's ready to be revealed. That's
why I read Peter. And here's what David says. Can
you say this? The Lord is a portion of your
inheritance. Can you say in verse 6, Well, the lions have fallen
unto me in pleasant places. Oh, I have a good lyric. You
remember the story of Abraham and Lot, don't you? Lot looked
in the hell to well-watered plains of Sodom. That's His Word. And he said, oh, that's what
I want. Well, God had mercy on him then.
So God gave him that. And Abraham was forced to dwell
in a mountain with God. And Abraham said, what did I
get? God said, Abraham, I'm your portion. He said, I'm going to
destroy Sodom and everyone and everything in it. If you're with me. He is heaven. God is heaven. David said this, whom have I,
can you say that? Whom have I in heaven with thee? And he said there's none on earth
I desire beside thee. We sang that song, thou O Christ,
did you mean it? Thou, O Christ, art all I want,
all in Thee, more than all in Thee I find. Thou mine inheritance
now and always. That's why we sang the song. Can you say that? There was once
a time I saw no beauty in Him that I should desire, but I do
now. Once a time when I was dead in
darkness No thoughts of God, but a day came. The day of God's
power, the gospel. It's like falling in love. Bride
for the bridegroom, sinner with his savior. This meekness, or
this meekness Meatness starts here. He makes us meat to be
partakers now. Right now. And how you know you'll
be with Him then is if you love to be with Him now. How you know
you will be with Him there and see His glory is you've seen
His glory here. And you love to see His glory. Our Lord said, this is the Father's
will that everyone seeeth the Son, seeeth His glory, seeeth
their need of Him, seeeth His beauty and desires to dwell with
Him and behold His beauty forever. He said, I'm going to raise Him
up the last day. He's going to be in heaven with
me to behold my glory. Everyone who loves to hear His
story, who loves to hear His voice, who loves to sing His
praises. Brother John read Psalm 92. He said it's a good thing to
give thanks unto the Lord. Do you think it's good? Do you
enjoy it? Singing His praises? Well, God
Himself is our portion. God Himself is our inheritance. And there's a kingdom. Turn to
1 Kings with me. 1 Kings chapter 10. There's a
kingdom, the kingdom of God, it's unseen, it's eternal, in
the heavens, someday it will be on a new earth. But it's a
kingdom wherein dwelleth righteousness. A righteous kingdom, full of
righteousness, peace, and joy of the Holy Ghost. And everybody
there is around the King of Peace. Everyone there is enjoying The
Lord Jesus Christ, our King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Everyone is beholding His face. I would have loved to have known
David. I really would have. I've asked
you this question many times. what period of time would you
have liked to live in? I would have loved to have known
David. I would have loved to have lived then. I would have
loved to have been one of his, hopefully, I'd have been one
of his men. And I would have loved to have
heard Solomon, wouldn't you? You'd have loved to have been
at the time of Solomon's peace for 40 years and every man dwelled
under his own vine and fig tree. And could commune with and dwell
with sup with the greatest man on earth, Solomon, but there's
a greater than that. 1 Kings 10, you know this story.
The Queen of Sheba, verse 1, heard the fame of Solomon. Concerning
the name of the Lord, she came to prove Him with hard questions.
She came to Jerusalem with a very great train. She thought she
was a great person. Camels bore spices and much gold
and precious stone. She came to Solomon. She communed
with him, poured out her heart, to Solomon. And it says Solomon
told her all her questions. It means he not only gave her
answers to her questions, but he told her what questions to
ask. He told her things she wasn't
even thinking about. He's so wise. Not anything hid from the
King. And this is a picture of us when
we come to Christ, when He finally reveals Himself to her. Nothing
He didn't tell her about her heart, about himself. And when the Queen of Sheba had
seen all Solomon's wisdom, well, some of it, and the house that
he had built, oh my, the meat of his table, the provisions,
oh my, have you seen the meat? Oh, we have, haven't we? We've
been served fat things. And the sitting of his servants,
What a pleasure, how good it is for brethren to dwell together,
to sit at the feet of His Lord, the attendance of His ministers,
their apparel, the robe of righteousness, His cupbearers, His butlers,
His servants, men of God, the message from God, His ascent,
the King's ascent by which He went up unto the house of the
Lord, there's no more spirit in Him. You know, Scripture says
there's going to be silence in heaven in the space of 30 minutes.
We're all going to be so spellbound seeing the Lord Jesus Christ.
Spellbound. No more spirit left. She said
to the king, verse 6, it was true, a true report that I heard
in my own land. I heard about you, of your acts,
of your wisdom. But I believed not until I came. And mine eye had seen it. Old
Job said this to me, I heard of you, but now I see. And we won't behold His glory
until we actually see Him. And behold, the half was not
told me, thy wisdom and prosperity exceeded the fame which I heard.
Happy, oh, how happy, how blessed are thy men. Those are the ones
He chose. Happy are these thy servants,
He chose, which stand continually before thee, and that hear thy
wisdom. Oh, we're so blessed to be sitting here tonight. The
only way we're going to be more blessed is when we sit there.
with Him. Blessed be the Lord, this sounds
like Ephesians 1, doesn't it? Sounds like Colossians 1, doesn't
it? Sounds like 1 Peter 1, doesn't it? Blessed be the Lord, thy
God, which delighteth in thee, in Christ, to set Him on the
throne of Israel, because the Lord loved Israel forever, His
people. He made Him King to do judgment
and justice. We've got a kingdom. There is
a kingdom and we're heirs of it. We're in it already, but
we're not there. We're not there. That's a mystery. You know, I hate darkness. I
do. I hate it. I want to dwell in
a world of light. I used to love darkness. Not
now. I can't wait for the sun to come
up. I don't sleep too well at night. You get to a certain age,
I guess that happens, but I've got some infirmities, and I don't
sleep too well. And I can't wait for that Son
to rise. There's always healing in His wings. This world is an
ungodly, dark place, and I'll be glad to be out of it. Now,
I haven't said a word about any things yet. Have we talked about
God? Have we talked about His Kingdom? Because the older we
grow in the faith, to grow in grace and the knowledge of our
Lord Jesus Christ. Like David said, to behold His
beauty is the thing we want to behold. And the older we get
in the faith, the less things appeal to us. Things. The less
things impress us. In fact, what's happening is
to all of God's people, their eye is becoming single. And your
whole body is full of life. When the eye becomes single,
you only have eyes for Christ, you see. But I tell you, there
are some things I do enjoy in this life right now. I like peace.
I've gotten to where I want peace so bad. I get so tired of fights. Don't you? I want peace. You know, there's some problems
and things I've always wanted to bring to my father, but I
thought, no, I'm not going to disturb him anymore. He's at
the age now where God has given him rest around the back from
all his enemies. And I look forward to that day.
Peace without, peace within. No enemies. And it's not going
to be. It's not going to happen. And I so look forward to that.
And I like it now, but I just can't seem to find much of it.
Rest. The older I get, boy, I just
want to rest. Don't you? Boy, when I was young,
there weren't enough hours in the day. Younger. I'm still pretty
young. Younger. Younger than Margaret. Always will be. I just want to rest now. I don't
want any more projects. I don't want any more things
to do. I want to rest. I just want to enjoy things. Love, peace, rest, joy, love. I want to love and be loved. Don't you? When I find somebody
that loves me, you know what I've concluded? Some people don't
like me. There ain't nothing I can do
about it. So I'm going to find somebody that does. And I'm going
to do everything in my power to provoke them to love me. And
I'm going to cherish that from now on. I went down to Crossville
and those people acted like it made their life to see me. And
I thought, I don't deserve it, but I sure do love it. And I
love them. And I love you too. Love is such a thing to be treasured. That's why Peter said, see that
you love one another with a pure heart. Don't just say it. Love
them with a pure heart, fervently, actively. And His Word, the older
I get, the more His Word means to me. Nothing else means anything. His Gospel, His worship, The
peace and unity of the church, I value that more than anything
on this planet. Because there's no peace as soon
as we walk out this door. Nothing better. How does this
all appeal to you? Listen to me. Go to Isaiah 65
and I'm going to quit. It's been 26 minutes. Isaiah
65 and I'm going to quit with this. I promise you. Isaiah 65. How does this sound to you? We're
all going to go. Those who have been made meat,
those whom Christ lived for, died for, those whom God has
adopted, those whom have been born again by His incorruptible
seed, His Word, the Gospel, and those who see His beauty, see
His glory, love the Lord Jesus Christ, see their need of Him,
come to Him by faith, confess Him, How does this sound to you? We're going to be in an everlasting
Bible conference. An eternal Bible conference. We're going to listen to preaching
forever and never grow tired. How does that sound to you? But
it's not going to be bad preaching. Like Virgie said. She said, I
don't want to hear any bad preaching. Don't you love that? The last
thing she ever said to me was, I don't want to go to no nursing
home because I don't want to hear no bad preaching." And the
Lord took her the next day. And the next person she heard
preach was Jesus Christ, the Prince of Preachery. Listen
to Him for heaven. You'll never grow tired. Never
grow weary. You'll retain every word. Hang
on every word. Chew it. Get everything from
it? How does that sound to you? I listen to a fellow not long
ago that just wore me out. He preached for an hour and fifteen
minutes. Mindy heard it too and we were
both thinking, would he please stop? Scott Richardson said that one
time. I remember him saying that when I was a young man at a Bible
conference after there had been about 111 preachers. It did me
good to hear that old man say, I heard all the preaching, I
can stand. But buddy, we won't hear all the
preaching, we can stand. Never tire. How about singing?
You love beautiful singing? Paul said, I heard things. He
said, I heard things. I can't even tell you. I can't
tell you that. I can't describe it. The Boring
sisters sang for us down there, didn't they, Jeanette? The Boring,
Eleanor Boring and her husband's three daughters, Floyd Boring. Roy died not long ago. Real close
family. The three girls are believers.
You know them. Most of you do. Married to believers. Fine. These are the salt of the
earth, these three sisters. And they sang, What a Day That
Will Be. It tore us up. It tore me up. In fact, they couldn't hardly
get through it. But oh, everybody in that place
was thinking about what a day that would be. Food and drink, yeah, that'll
be there. But we won't live on it. It just ought to be all taste. Land flowing with milk and honey.
Honestly, Christ said, I won't eat this with you again until... Christ did say that. I'll eat
with you in the kingdom. I'll sup with you in the kingdom.
Remember when He rose in His glorified body, He said, do you
have any meat? Anything to eat? And He ate meat, drank fish and
a honeycomb. There's a diet. Food and drink,
yes. Oh, my. But seeing Him. Look at Isaiah 65, and let's
close with this. At His right hand are pleasures
forevermore. Verse 13. He says, My servant
shall eat, talking about his chosen, his elect in Christ,
but everyone else, you shall be hungry. My servant shall drink,
and you shall be thirsty. My servant, behold, they shall
rejoice, but you'll be ashamed. And I serve it, so sing for joy
of heart, but you'll cry for sorrow of heart and howl for
vexation of spirit." And see verse 16, those that bless themselves
in the earth bless themselves in the God of truth. And the
former troubles, he said, are forgotten. They're going to be
hid from mine eyes. Verse 17, Behold, I create new
heavens and a new earth. The former shall not be remembered,
but come into mine. Oh, be ye glad. Rejoice forever
in that which I create. Behold, I create Jerusalem a
rejoicing, and her people a joy, and I will rejoice in Jerusalem.
There's a Zechariah that said, I'll rejoice over them with singing.
He's going to sing with us. Wait till you hear his voice
singing. And the voice of weeping shall no more be heard in her,
nor the voice of crying. No more infant of David or old
man. For the child will not die a
hundred years a sinner and a hundred years old shall be a curse on
his servant." They'll build houses and inhabit them. They'll plant
vineyards and eat the fruit of them. This is all figurative.
But they shall not build another and inhabit. They shall not plant
another and eat. Like Israel of old, the days of the tree
are the days of my people. Mine elect shall long enjoy the
work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain
or bring forth for trouble. They are the seed of the blessed
of the Lord. They are offspring with them.
It shall come to pass that before they call, I'll answer. We won't
be praying to God then, we'll be talking to Him. Right in His
presence, talking to Him. Christ, we'll be seeing Him and
actually hearing His actual voice. And while they're near, see,
they're speaking, I'll hear. The wolf and the lamb will feed
together. The lion shall eat straw like a bullet. The dust
shall be the serpent's meat. They'll not hurt and destroy
My holy mountain. Said the Lord. Is that where you want to be?
With whom you want to be? Thanks be unto God that made
us meet and be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in
life. Stand with me. Our Lord, we thank You again
for Your Word. Joy and rejoicing when you speak
to us through Your Word and give us assurance that Thou art God,
Christ, who came and lived and died for His people and now ever
lives to make intercession for them and to prepare a place for
His people and is coming again to receive them unto Himself
that where He is we may be also. Lord, this is our desire, our
great desire, dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of our
life, behold the beauty of the Lord, and inquire into His temple
to hear His blessed voice. Make it so, Lord, that every
person in this room, young and old alike, bring our children
up and let them hear Your voice and rejoice in being a member
of their Creator in the days of their youth, in this evil
day. In Christ's name we pray and
ask Thee to sing. Amen.