Thank you so much. Let's open our Bibles to the
last book of the Bible and the last chapter of the last book
of the Bible, Revelation chapter 22. In every message, of course, we
have goals. that which we endeavor to do
as preachers of the gospel. Our first goal is to give God
the glory. It's always, that's the first
reason for doing everything, isn't it? Whether we eat or drink
or whatever, the scripture says do all for the glory of God. And whenever we get up to and
open the scriptures to set forth the things of our Lord. Our first goal is to seek the
glory of our God, to magnify the name of the Lord Jesus. I do want to worship, don't you? That's what I want. I want to
worship. I want to exalt Him. This service, certainly we want
to be blessed. There's no question about that.
I want God to speak to us. I want him to speak to me and
teach me and help you and teach you. This service is for God. We're here to honor the Lord. We're here to magnify His name. That's always the goal. Many years ago, I wrote some
things and pasted in the very front of my Bible. Quite often I read those. It
starts off this way, always seek the glory of Christ Jesus. I
know this, folks, that God honors those that honor His Son. If
He would honor us, if we would be honored by His presence and
leadership and guidance, then it's absolutely vital that we
seek to honor Christ Jesus and magnify Him and who He is and
all that He's done for sinners. And then, I also have a goal. I always want to point folks
to Christ and Him crucified for salvation. I'm very confident that God has
his people in this world. God gave his son the gift of
a multitude which no man can number. They belong to the Lord. And he's going to see to it that
they hear the truth. They hear his word. And therefore,
Whenever we get together, I always admonish people to close with
Christ, to come to Christ. I pray that God would show us
our neediness, show us our poverty, show us our desperate situation. Folks, we gotta have righteousness
and we can't produce it. And I'll tell you, it's always
my joy to tell people of Him who is our righteousness, Christ
Jesus. And if you would be received
by God, that reception is only to be found in Christ Jesus.
So that's always my goal, to point people to Christ, the only
Savior of sinners, point sinners to His bloody death, His sacrifice,
His substitutionary atonement. And then I have another goal. I want to help the people of
God. I want to help the saints of God. Life can be tough. The world beats up on us. In this religious society that
we live in, we stand alone as far as upholding the truth of
the gospel. And I say we, every body of believers,
but we're surrounded by the enemy. at one who's the prince of the
power of the air. And there's also our flesh we
have to contend with. There are the trials of life. The Lord's people need to be
encouraged. We need to be reminded of our
standing in Christ. We need to be reminded of the
sweet providence of God, that the one who chose us out into
salvation, he's the same one who has mapped out our lives,
and he governs all things for the good of his people. He's
always got his people's welfare at heart. I know this, everything
God does, and that is everything, God does everything, and all
that He does fulfills His eternal purpose. And He makes everything
work out for the good of His children. And I want to say a few words
tonight to the Lord's dear children. We were predestinated to the
adoption of children by Jesus Christ unto himself in the eternity
past. We've always been the children
of God. We've never been the children of Satan. We've never
been the children of the wicked one. Our Lord Jesus said to the
self-righteous religionists of his day, year of your father
the devil, the lusts of your father you will do. But we're
not of the devil. The people of God were never
the children of the wicked one. We were never goats. We've always
been his sheep. We've always been the Lord's
children. We were his lost children. We were his wayward children. We were his disobedient children. His children who were dead in
trespasses and in sins, but we've always been the children of God. In Revelation chapter 21, the
apostle John, directed by the Spirit of God, has showed us
the bride that a group which is called the Lamb's Wife. Scripture says the Lord Jesus
loved the church and he gave himself for it. Our Bible class
this morning, we're talking about the subject of divorce and marriage. It's the oldest institution in
this world though there's an institution older, and that was
in eternity past, and that's a relationship of Christ to those
whom the Father gave Him. But this earthly relationship
of marriage, it's a beautiful picture, wonderful picture of
the relationship of Christ to His Church. Here's husband and
wife who are one. Who are one. Even so, the Lord's
people and the Lord Jesus, we're one. We're united in Him from
old eternity. And in Revelation chapter 21,
John sees the church as God sees her. As God sees her. As we see ourselves That's not
a very pretty picture. We see ourselves as fallen, sinful,
defiled, still wayward, unbelieving. Oh, we do believe, but we say,
Lord, help our unbelief. We do love Him, but our love
is not nearly what it ought to be. But in chapter 21, the church
isn't viewed as we view her, she's viewed as God views her.
And keep this in mind, as God sees things, that's how they
are. That's how they are. And he sees,
this messenger from God, he takes John and he says, let me show
you the bride. Let me show you this blood washed
group of people. Let me present to you, let me
show you this group of people made righteous in the Lord Jesus
Christ. She is gorgeously arrayed. She's the people of God, the
people of God. Christ loved the church, the
scripture says, and gave himself for it. Well, these people that
John sees, the bride, the lamb's wife, where'd they come from? Where did they originate? What's
their origin? Well, we find the origin of these
people in the last verse of chapter 21 and the last statement. They which are written in the
Lamb's book of life. You see, he says at the beginning
of verse 27 of chapter 21, there shall no wise enter into it anything
that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh
a lie. That's one group of people. They're
not going to enter in, but here's this other group. This other
group, but they which are written Lamb's Book of Life. And in the
Spirit of God, He takes John back to the very origin of our
salvation. Let's go back to the beginning.
Let's go back before God ever created what we call time. Let's go back to the infinite
mind and purpose of God. And John says, There was a book, a book called the Lamb's Book,
and in that book were written the names of the people of God,
written in indelible ink, as it were, written with the very
finger of God. This is the origin. We talk about
our salvation and salvation is experienced. We don't deny that. And God does a work of grace
within our hearts to bring us, to make us alive. He gives us
life. He gives us faith. He gives us
repentance. And he makes us to know this,
this is not of you. This is not of your doing. The Lord makes us to see this
salvation is of Him. And He then takes us back and
He says, this is where it all started. This is the reason you
believe. This is the reason you embrace
the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the reason you have laid
hold on eternal life. It's because God In His infinite,
sovereign grace, He chose you unto salvation. That's the start
of it. And He who originated salvation,
John is being, he's being, having this revealed to him, this God
who started salvation, He's gonna finish it. He who began a good
work in us, He's going to perform it. He's going to finish the
work that He began in us in everlasting glory. These are the people the Lord
loved and cared for forever. They're the elect of God. Elections behind the whole thing. Don't ever try to apologize for
God or try to weaken the adoption of God's electing grace. I say shout it from the mountaintops. This is absolutely glorious.
It's wonderful. Here we are tonight. We love
the word of God. We love the scriptures. We long
to worship. We long to adore the Lord more
than we do, and we love Christ Jesus. We believe Christ Jesus. We've laid hold of Him. We rested
our poor souls on Him. We lean on Him for all of our
acceptance with God, and we know salvation's got to be of the
Lord. And the reason we believe and the reason we have this desire
to honor Him and to worship Him, the reason is to be traced all
the way back to His covenant of grace. Because God purposed our salvation,
He therefore created the world and all things in the world And then into this world he brought
a people, and into this world he brought his son. Now the way
it began at first was in a paradise, a garden, a garden. Paradise, as I said, this more
means a walled city. The garden of God. God made it for Adam. He put
this man in this garden. But Adam wasn't, he wasn't complete
in himself. God says it's not good for the
man to be by himself. So God put Adam into a deep sleep. He wounded his side. And from that wound, from that
wound, he took a rib. And he made a help me for Adam. Eve came forth from the rib of
Adam. Didn't come forth from his foot
so that he put his foot on her. Eve was made from a rib underneath
Adam's arm so he would protect her. From a rib near his heart for
him to love her. Eve is called the mother of all
living. And truly Eve did complete Adam. Go back to Genesis 22, or Genesis
chapter two. Let me just show you this real
quick. Genesis two. Look at verses, starting verse
20. Genesis chapter two, verse 20.
And Adam gave names to all cattle. There was a man whose mind had
not been depraved or incapacitated in any way due to sin. He had the full capacity of his
brain. Imagine that. You know, they
say we only use a small portion of our brain anyway. Some of
us use less than others, but we don't use the full capacity
of the brain that God's given us. But imagine, imagine Adam
in his unfallen state, how intelligent he was. Imagine us in everlasting glory
without any sin. to be able to think and reason,
comprehend, as God gives us understanding of the things of God. Well, this
is Adam, he gave names to all the cattle and the fowl of the
air, to every beast of the field. How could you even think of enough
names? Well, he did, he named them all.
But for Adam, there was not found in help me for him. The Lord
God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam. He put him in a coma. And he slept. And he took one
of his ribs. He closed up the flesh thereof. And the rib which the Lord God
had taken from man made he a woman. And watch this. He brought her
unto the man. God made the woman. God made
the woman out of the man. And God brought the woman to
the man. And we know that this is a picture,
this is a picture of the relationship of Christ Jesus and his bride. Keep on reading. Adam said, this
is now bone of my bones, flesh of my flesh. She shall be called
woman because she was taken out of man. And you read in Ephesians
chapter five, these two became one. You see, Adam's the head. He's the head. And she's taken
from him. And here they are joined together
in union by God Himself. So that they're viewed as one.
Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and be
married to a woman. These two become one. Read again
Ephesians chapter five. Well, here's a beautiful picture
of the grace of God to us through Christ Jesus. The Lord gave to
Christ Jesus a bond. Let me remind you this. Eve would
have no existence apart from Adam. She would never have lived,
she would never have existed apart from Adam. Don't you see
something there? Here we are the bride of Christ
Jesus. We would have no existence, however,
apart from Christ Jesus. You say, but God chose us unto
salvation. Yes, He did, but He chose us
in Christ Jesus. That's what the scripture says.
We had no existence outside of the Savior. And God gave us to
Him, just as surely as God gave Eve to Adam, God gave the church,
God gave an elect people to Christ Jesus, the Son of God. We were
a gift. Eve was God's gift to Adam. Even so, all of the people of
God, all of the elect of God, we were God's gift to Christ
Jesus. All that the Father giveth me,
Christ said, shall come to me. And him that cometh to me, I'll
let no wise cast out. And listen. as God gave us to
Christ Jesus, we would have no life apart from Him. Where did
Eve get her life? She got her life from Adam. I
said she wouldn't have had any life, she wouldn't have had any
existence except through Adam. That's the way we have life.
We have life in Christ Jesus only. Outside of Him, there's
just death. We would have had no existence.
We would have had no life except in Christ Jesus. And here's what
God did. Just as he brought Eve to Adam,
he brought us to Christ. That's effectual grace, folks. Adam, here's the bride. I promised you. And I'm bringing
her to you as a gift of my mercy. And our God gave us to Christ
Jesus and brought us to Christ Jesus as a gift of his grace. But don't forget this. All of
this was in association with God putting Adam into a deep
sleep. And we must never forget, we
live because God put his only begotten son into a deep sleep,
the sleep of death. The sleep of death. We wouldn't
have any life. We couldn't have any life. It
was impossible for God himself to give us life except Christ
Jesus died to satisfy God's justice. That's where we get life from.
We get life from his death. God put him in that deep sleep
of death. And since he died, We live. This is the bride of our Lord
Jesus Christ. And back over here, back over
here in the book of Revelation, John sees, he sees the bride. He sees the bride. He sees her
in his beauty. You see, in the book of Revelation,
God's been pleased to show John several things. Go back to chapter 17, I'll give
you this too just briefly. Look at chapter 17. Several things
the Lord said, I'm going to show you. I'm going to show you. Here he says in chapter 17 verse
1, there came one of the seven angels, 17 and 1, there came
one of the seven angels which had the seven vows and talked
with me saying, come hither, I'm going to show you something.
Well, he said, I'm going to show you something. I'm going to show
you the judgment of the great Ahor that sitteth upon many waters. And in chapter 17, he shows him
the great whore. He shows him false religion who
has the wine, the wine of her false gospel that many people
drink. And they're in a stupor on this
wine. They're drunk on the wine of
her fornication. And John, he's shown this. And then in chapter 18, he sees
the downfall of Babylon. He sees the wrath of God poured
out upon her. And then go a little bit further,
then over to chapter 21, and here he says in verse 19, one
of the seven angels, which had the seven vows, full of the seven
last plagues, talked with me saying, come hither, I'm gonna
show you something else. The last thing he said to John,
back in chapter 17, I'm gonna show you the harlot. That's the
false church. I'm gonna show you the false
church and her demise, her judgment. Now he says, I'm gonna show you
the true bride. I'm gonna show you the true church.
He says, come hither, I'll show thee the bride, the lamb's wife.
He carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain.
He showed me that great city. He showed it to me. Now in chapter
22, verse one, He's gonna show him something
else. The Lord's gonna show him something else. Chapter 22, verse
one, and he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear
as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the
Lamb. Here's the first thing John is
shown on this occasion. He sees a pure river, not a stream. Not a pool that might dry up,
he sees a river of life. There's something about this
river, because wherever it flows, it always brings life. It is
a pure river of water of life. What is this river of water of
life? It must be the everlasting, ever-living,
ever-flowing love of God in Christ Jesus for His people. This river has been flowing forever. Forever. It had no beginning. And it'll have no end. This love
is manifested in different ways, but primarily it's manifested
in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. Here in his love, not
that we love God, but that he loved us and gave his son to
be the propitiation for our sins, to be the satisfaction of divine
justice, to be the mercy seat, to be the mercy seat. But understand
this about this, river of water of life that's clear as crystal. Understand this, it didn't begin
with the death of Christ. That just manifested it. In fact,
the reason for the death of the Son of God, the reason for His
crucifixion, the reason that He was wounded for our transgressions
and bruised for our iniquities, the reason the chastisement of
our peace was upon Him was because of this river, the everlasting
love of God for His people. For God so loved the world. How much did he love the world
of his elect? He so loved the world that he
gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth on him should
not perish, but have everlasting life. The Lord Jesus Christ did not
live a life of obedience and die a sacrificial death so that
the Father could love us or so that we would be made lovable. He died because God did love
us. He died so that God, in a just
way, in a just way, justice, you see, oh, that's the issue.
And people miss that. That's what the religious world
doesn't see. They don't see the justice of
God at work in the death of the Son of God. Justice had to be
satisfied, and it was satisfied. When the sword of God's justice
was buried in the heart of the Son of God, Justice put its sword
in its sheath and said, for those in whose stead Christ died, I
got nothing against them. I had nothing against them. Nothing,
no wrath remains for them. Why not? Because I poured out
all my wrath on their suitable substitute. And that, my friend,
is gospel truth. There is the good news. Christ
died in our stead, in our place, and in our room. We'll never
die. We'll never die. This is a pure
river, nothing to defile it. It's pure and eternal and unchanging. You see all the streams of earthly
love are muddied, muddied, by our own sinfulness and depravity. But this is a pure river. Pure
river. And it's not conditioned upon
us. It flows unconditionally. We say, well, what did I do to
deserve this? Nothing. Nothing. Well, where did it come from?
Well, keep on reading. Proceeds out of the throne of
God and of the Lamb. When you see these words, the
throne of God, think of the king, think of dominion, think of sovereignty,
think of authority. Where is this stream of God's
everlasting love? Where are the headwaters of it? Where does it flow from? The
throne of sovereign grace. Well, I don't know why God would
love me, because He willed it to. That's all you can say. That's all you can say. Why did
God love Jacob and hate Esau? Well, because Jacob was a better
man than Esau. You know better than that if
you have any knowledge of Old Testament history. Both of them
were bad. Both of them were rotten. And
yet the scripture says before those men did anything, either
good or bad, God chose Jacob and he rejected Esau. Why does God love the ones that
He loves? Because He would. That's all
you can attribute it to. It's unconditional. You know,
we talk about in the points of grace, we talk about unconditional
election. What does that mean? It's not
conditioned upon anything we do. See, this is salvation. And this is what the world doesn't
see. Every facet of salvation. Now let's just go all the way
back, all the way back to God writing our names down in the
Lamb's Book of Life, and then go all the way forward to being
glorified in Christ Jesus. The world doesn't understand
this. All of it is of God only. That's what they don't see. But
the only reason and the only way this salvation could be absolutely
certain is for God to have control of it. That's the only way. If any part of it was left up
to us, Why, the whole thing would come crashing down. All of God's
eternal purpose, it would all come to failure if any bit of
it was dependent or conditioned on us. The whole edifice would
come crashing down. But she'll never crash. Because
it's all of God. It's all of God. Here's the origin
of the river. It comes from the throne of God and of the Lamb. And two times in this text tonight,
we'll see that John says the throne of God and of the Lamb. How'd he get on that throne?
by way of a bloody tree. And God has exalted him. Well, then watch this, look the
next verse. In the midst of the street of
it. Oh, there's a street in this
paradise of God. There's a street. It's mentioned back in chapter
21 and verse, Number 21. The 12 gates were the 12 pearls,
and every several gate was one a pearl. The street of that city
was pure as gold, as it were transparent glass. How many times
have you heard this expression, oh the streets of gold, the streets
of gold. I beg your pardon, one street. It's just one street. It's just
one road. And I'll tell you what, it comes
from the throne of God and leads to the throne of God. Well, you
see, to me, this one street, this street that leads to the
throne of God, it's the one true gospel. It's the one true gospel,
which is The Lord Jesus in His work of redemption. He said,
I'm the way, the truth, and the life. As much as saying, I'm
the street. I'm the street and a pure gold. Had to be pure. He had to be
pure. He couldn't be contaminated in
any way. Oh, He's precious. Precious to
the Father, precious to his people. He's the street. He's the street. And then notice in verse two,
it talks about the tree of life. In Eden's garden, there was a
tree of life, but Adam lost the privilege of eating of that tree. And you know what we can say
about that paradise, as paradise lost. Here's paradise restored. That's what John is being shown
here, paradise restored. Here's the paradise of God. And
in the paradise of God, there's another tree of life. And I'll
tell you, that tree of life is the Lord Jesus Christ himself. And don't divorce that from the
fact he once hung on a tree. He once hung on a tree. This
is Christ and Him crucified. He's the tree of life. Notice what it says in the midst
of the street. I've been on either side of the
river. There was a tree of life. It bore 12 manner of fruits. Yielded her fruit every month.
He's perpetually blessing his people. He bears all kinds of fruit. Today I have eaten of the fruit
of his sweet forgiveness. That's what the tree bears. The
preciousness of forgiveness. My sins, which are many, are
all washed away. That's sweet fruit, isn't it,
Alan? There's the sweet fruit of imputed
righteousness. Let me take another bite of that.
Let me enjoy that. Let my soul be nourished again
with that, that the beauties and the comeliness of my Savior
given to me To me, I drink iniquity like water. I'm foul from the top of my head
to the bottom of my feet. There's no soundness in me. Just
wounds and bruises and putrefying sores. Oh, but God has made Christ
Jesus to be unto me wisdom. Righteousness, sanctification,
you know what sanctification is? That's holiness. You're looking
at a righteous man and you're looking at a holy man. Well, I've seen you, you don't
act too holy. Well, my actions betray what
I am by grace. I'm a holy man in Christ Jesus. and redemption. I'm not gonna
be more holy in glory than I am now. I'm not gonna be more justified
in heaven than I am now. I'm not gonna be more righteous
in heaven than I am now, because you see, Christ Jesus is all
of that, and redemption. And redemption, so that he that
glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. Here's the fruit of forgiveness,
the fruit of righteousness, the fruit of full redemption from
the curse of the law. You know what Paul says? He says
the law's got nothing to do with a righteous man. That's what
it says in it. He says it's got nothing to do
with a righteous man. You know what that means, Bill? It don't
have anything to do with us. The law says I got no issue with
you. The law has an issue with sinful men. But we're made the
righteousness of God in Christ Jesus due to his substitutionary
death. And the law says, that don't
mean anything to me. Because your debt's been paid,
but I'm satisfied. That's what the law says. All these fruits. And you know
what? This is an evergreen tree. It bears fruit perpetually. And this tree, notice the rest
of it. The leaves of the tree were for
the healing of the nations. This tree has leaves. What are
the leaves? It's the glorious doctrines of
the gospel of grace. Election. Boy, I tell you, that heals me.
That helps me. That soothes my poor soul. Redemption. And I'll tell you what it says
here. Look at the next verse, verse three, there should be
no more curse. I'll tell you, the curse of the broken law was
real, but that curse was dealt with by our substitute. He bore
the curse, and you know what's the opposite of curse? Blessing. That's all that comes our way.
In fact, listen, that's all that's ever come our way. Right? That's all that's ever come our
way. Because we were blessed with all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places, in Christ Jesus, before the world began. That's all God's got. Everything
is a blessing. Well, I don't feel like this
is a blessing. Well, it don't matter how you
feel. Everything's a blessing. Have you ever heard the expression,
anything this side of hell is mercy? I believe that. I believe
anything this side of hell is mercy. And I believe that everything
God has for his people is blessing. Because you see, he's the one
who guides us. He's the one who directs us.
And he takes all of these things of life and he makes that everything
to work out for our good. It's a blessing, it's a blessing. No more curse, just blessings,
just blessing. Boys, that song counts you many
blessings, name them one by one, and it will surprise you what
the Lord's done. You can't add up all of the blessings
he's given to you. And here's the thing of it. He
hadn't blessed you any more than he blessed me. You're not getting more blessings
than me. And I'm not getting more blessings
than you. We've all got them all. We have all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places in Christ. You see, we think of physical
things as blessings and some of them are, but really true
blessings last forever. That's right. True blessings
last forever. And then he says, there shall
be no more curse. Well, how can you be so sure? Well, Look, the next phrase again,
but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it. There's
the stability. Ah, there's our assurance. There's the throne of God and
of the Lamb again. And you know what we gonna do
in the paradise of God? We'll serve Him. We'll serve
Him. We'll worship Him forever and
ever. I fully believe, and I made this statement before, when we
come together as a group of believers, and the Lord is blessing, and
the Lord is speaking through His Word, this is as close to
heaven as we're going to get in this world. When the saints
of God are gathered together, exalting Christ Jesus, it's as
close as we're going to get. But in heaven, we're going to
serve Him always. Imagine, no wayward thoughts,
nothing to distract. Well, I can't even imagine how
that's going to be. And we're not going to get tired.
You know, the preacher preaches too long, which I have a tendency
to do sometimes. You say, boy, you know, it's
a good message, but my back's beginning to hurt a little bit.
Won't have that problem anymore. Won't have them aches and pains,
arthritis and rheumatism anymore. No. We'll serve Him. That's all we'll do. That's all
we'll do. And verse four, here's the joy
of the paradise of God. We'll see His face. We'll see
His face. I talked about that this morning.
But that's the glory of heaven. And his name shall be in their
foreheads. What does that mean? All we're
gonna think about is Christ. That's all we're gonna think
about. And verse five, there shall be
no night there. There can't be any night there
because the lamb is the light in the city of God. There's no
night there. There's no darkness there. You
know what that means? There's no error there. There's
no wickedness there. There's no evil one there. You
see, there's no mention now of the red dragon. No, he's gone. He's gone. The beast, the false
prophet, they're gone. Babylon, she's gone. There's no darkness there, there's
no night there. Nobody needs a candle, neither
the light of the sun, for the Lord God giveth them light. You know who gives you light
now? The Lord God. Light to understand
His Word. like to read this book and say,
you know, I see what he's talking about. He's the one who gives
you light. And he's the one who'll give
you light from now on. And they shall reign with him
forever and ever, will be a kingdom of priests. That's the paradise
of God. Wonderful, isn't it? And one
of these days the Lord's going to say, it's time to come home
to paradise. And we'll say, Lord, I'm ready. I'm ready. Take me. Take me. I'll enter into the
joy of my Lord.