Thank you, Bill. Let's go to
Revelation chapter 20 this evening. Revelation chapter 20. Let me read one verse and then
go back to the beginning of the chapter and kind of lay a foundation
for what I want to say about this one verse, and that is verse, well, actually I'll read two
verses, 5 and 6. Revelation chapter 20, 5 and
6. The rest of the dead lived not
again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first
resurrection. That's my subject, the first
resurrection. Let me read this next verse. Blessed and holy is he that hath
part in the first resurrection. I'll tell you why he's blessed,
why she's blessed, because on such the second death hath no
power but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and they
shall reign with him a thousand years. Now here's the way the
chapter begins. John sees an angel coming down
from heaven. This is the Lord Jesus. Now we
begin the last vision. that our Savior gave to John. The last vision consists of chapters
20, 21, and 22. It begins with our Lord's first
advent. We've already said to you several
times that in each of these visions that the Lord Jesus gave to John,
we see a kind of a picture of things that will happen during
the gospel age, during the age of the church. And always we
will find in these visions something that takes us back to, reminds
us of our Lord's first advent and his work of salvation for
us. by which He forgave us of our
sins, by His bloody death, and then in that vision we're always
taken to the last advent of our Lord Jesus or the second advent
when He comes again. That is also true in this vision. There's no need, no reason for
what we would call the pattern to change. This is the method
John has used throughout the book of Revelation. I would be
shocked if he did anything else in this last vision. So we're
going to be escorted, as it were, by the Spirit of God. He takes
us by the hand. And he says, now this is the
first advent of our Lord Jesus. And then he shows us things that's
going to happen during this age. And we're in that age now. We're
in this thousand years. We're in this kingdom. age now,
the gospel age, the church age. He shows us things that are going
to happen during these years between our Lord's first coming
and then he shows us the incoming of our Lord Jesus. And indeed,
in this vision, John takes us even beyond that. He takes us
to see the wonders and the beauties and the glories of the New Jerusalem. He shows us the people of God
with Christ Jesus as we enjoy Him and we feed on Him and we
learn from Him and we enjoy His presence forever and ever. And so as he begins this seventh
vision, he sees this messenger come from heaven. This is the
Lord Jesus. We know it's the Lord Jesus because
he has the key of the bottomless pit. We've already learned from
Revelation chapter one. Christ, he identifies himself
to John as being the one who was dead, but he's alive forevermore. He has the keys of death and
hell. And here it says that He comes down from Heaven. Thank
God He did. Thank God He came into this world. There wouldn't be any salvation
for us unless God Himself came down and joined Himself to our
nature, to our flesh. There wouldn't be any salvation
for any poor soul unless God Himself intervened, unless He
came and honored His own justice and then died under the wrath
of himself, of his own law and justice, and so he sees him come
down. Angel means messenger. Our Lord
Jesus is the messenger. He's the messenger of the covenant
of grace. He's the messenger of God. Thank
God He sent to us a messenger. He sent one to speak to us, to
reveal Himself to us. That's why our Lord Jesus is
identified, especially by John, as being the Word of God. He is that one who reveals God
to us. He makes God's mind known to
us, the purpose of God to us, what God is doing, the person
of God, everything God's like, He makes God known to us. He's
the Word of God. And John says, I saw Him come
down. Now John is in a vision again.
The Spirit of God, He shows him this. He has in His one hand,
He has a key to the bottomless pit. In His other hand, He has
a great chain. He had the key to the bottomless
pit. We take this figuratively, of
course, he didn't literally have a key as we would have keys to
our cars and houses and so forth. This indicates he's the owner
and he has all authority. And he also has a great, he has
something else in his other hand, he has great change. That is,
he has ultimate power to bind, to hold captive. There's a creature he's come
after. He's going to take hold of this
creature because this creature is the devil himself. It is the
old serpent. He's the one who deceived Eve
in the very beginning. He's the one who introduced wickedness
into this world. The sinfulness of this world
is due to Satan's own deception to Eve. And of course, Adam wasn't
deceived, but here's the evil one. Our Lord Jesus has come
down here. When Christ, when He entered
into this world, There were several missions he was on. I think we
could express it that way. Certainly he came to save the
people of God's choice. He came to bring in for us everlasting
righteousness. He came to shed his blood that
he might remove all of the sins of his people. But he also came
to deal with the evil one. Satan is no match for us. And
I'll tell you, he's active today. He's very active today. You know,
even in the heart and life of Peter, when our Lord Jesus said
to His disciples that He must suffer many things of the chief
priests and He must be killed and raised again, Simon Peter
pulled our Lord aside And he said, not so, Lord. This mustn't happen. Spare yourself. Be merciful to yourself. And
our Lord said, get thee behind me, Satan. That's what he said. Satan. In other words, our Lord
is saying, Satan has put this in your mind to be an obstacle
to me who arrive at that which is my predestinated goal, my
death. After all, the Lord Jesus is
the Lamb of God slain before the foundation of the world.
And so the Lord Jesus, He rebuked Peter. He says, get thee behind
me, Satan. You don't savor the things that
be of God. You don't understand, Peter.
You don't understand how sweet this is, the preciousness of
this, that I must lay down my life to save people like you. You won't be reconciled to God
unless I die. You don't savor the things of
God. The gospel of God's grace right now in your mind is not
sweet to you. And I'll tell you, Satan still
works. He's still active. And he is the great tempter,
even of the Lord's people. And we must, the scripture, the
word of God in the book of Ephesians, it tells us about the wiles of
Satan. He's very deceptive. And He's a lot smarter than we
are. And we're no match for Him. The
only defense against Him is the sword of the Spirit. The Word
of God. We must go to the Word of God
when Satan tempts us. And he tempts us in many ways.
I think a lot of times that we would blame Satan for just the
desires of the flesh. covetousness and lust, and things
of that nature, that's just within us. What we need to remember
is Satan, he works in the religious realm, especially in the spiritual
realm. not being patient with God, murmuring
against the providence of God, Satan puts a question mark in
your mind about, you know, I don't know how this is going to work
out for my good, and you begin to doubt the purpose of God. in working things out for our
good. Satan has many tactics that he
uses. And thank God that our Lord Jesus
has already dealt him a fatal blow. But he's still very active. And we dare not toy around with
him. You see these preachers on television
sometimes, and they'll say foolish things like, I just told the
devil. Get away from me, devil. Go away
from me. Like that? Let me tell you something.
You don't want to deal with him. He's the evil one. He's vile. He's wretched. He is absolute,
pure evil. and he is the enemy of God, he's
the enemy of the Lord Jesus, and make no mistake about it,
he's your enemy. He's your enemy. He would like
nothing more than to make you fall. He would like nothing more than
to put in your mind and in your heart a question mark about the
gospel. You see, He's a creature who
works most especially, I know He works in the world and in
outward evil and things like that, but He works in the mind,
in the thoughts. He's very cunning. Don't be ignorant of His devices. Thank God our Lord Jesus has
come into this world And in the second verse it says, he laid
hold on him. Something we dare not do. He
laid hold on the dragon. He laid hold on the old serpent. Satan is the dragon in that he's
a ferocious beast. He breathes out the fires of
persecution. He stirs up the enemies of the
gospel to make life difficult for the people of God. And I'm
sure he does that today. He stirs up those who follow
him, those who are still held captive at his will. He stirs
them up to make life difficult for the people of God in the
workplace. Sure. He'll stir up your neighbor
against you. He wants to make life miserable
for you and for me. He's the dragon, a beast of ferocious power. Furthermore,
he is that old serpent. He's subtle. He has deadly, deadly
poison. He's deceiving men today using
a false gospel. This is his work of deception. He has men preach a false gospel,
a false Jesus by another spirit. He's the old serpent. He's the
devil. He's a liar. He slanders the
people of God. And he is Satan. He's the accuser. He's the opposer. of the people
of God. Well, our Lord Jesus came and
laid hold of him. Now, here's the question. When
did He do that? Well, I would say the very first
time the God-man laid hold of Him. And you see, the God-man
had to do this. If Christ is going to do us any
good, He, as a man, had to lay hold on this one who is pure
evil. Because it was a man who got
us in this mess. It was a man who first fell. And then in his fall, all of
us fell. It was a man who stood in rebellion
against God. It was a man who, as it were,
took sides with the evil one. Oh yeah, he took sides with the
evil one. Adam's on the wrong side. And
we're born on the wrong side. We're born in opposition to God. And our Lord Jesus, He came down
here to lay hold of him. This one who is pure evil. And He bound him. Now He first
of all bound him, I think, when He dealt with him in the wilderness. Look with me in Matthew chapter
4. And I don't want to read too
many verses here because it's a lengthy passage of Scripture.
You know this portion of Scripture. where our Lord was triumphant
over the enemy, and then he began his public ministry. Forty days
and forty nights he was tempted of the devil, but it was the
Spirit of God who led him into the wilderness. Now don't forget
that. Because our Lord Jesus, this
man, This man, he's got to indicate, he's got to manifest the fact
that he can stand up to this evil one. We can't. We can't
even do it now. There was a perfect man and woman
in the Garden of Eden. They couldn't stand. And there the man fell. So another
man, he's got to manifest, he's got to show that he's up to the
task. He cannot save his people unless
he is more powerful than the dragon. He's got to slay the
dragon. He's got to lay hold of him.
The very first time he did it was in the wilderness and he
defeated him. Satan, here's what he offered
him, authority, a kingdom, which wasn't Satan's to give, but that's
the temptation. And we know, and I won't go through
this, but we know that our Lord Jesus came out victorious. Now,
here's what I want to show you. Immediately after that, our Lord
began his public ministry. He has begun to bind the dragon. And he immediately goes out and
he begins preaching the gospel. And look at verse 24. Well, verse
23 first. And Jesus went about all Galilee
teaching in their synagogues. preaching the gospel of the kingdom,
healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among
the people. And His fame went throughout
all Syria. And they brought unto Him all
sick people that were taken with diverse diseases and torments,
and those that were possessed with devils." That's very important. Those that were possessed with
devils, and those which were lunatic, and those which had
the policy, and he healed them. You see, having bound this one
who is strong, he now goes out and he spoils his goods. That's
what the Lord Jesus does. He's bound Satan. He has showed
that he's up to the task. This God-man, a man like you
and me, but without sin. But a real man in every sense
of the word. He dealt with Satan one-on-one
and he beat him back. And now he goes out into the
devil's territory, where people are possessed of demons. And
our Lord Jesus drives them out. That's our Savior. Almighty,
all-powerful. He's the conqueror. And this
is one of the things that he came into the world to do, was
to bind the evil one. Now, the binding really took
place at the cross. And that's in fulfillment of
Genesis. chapter three and verse 15. That's where he crushed the
head of the serpent. He took hold of him and he bound
him. Go back to our text now in Revelation
chapter 20. It says here, he laid a hold
of the dragon and he bound him. Now what does that mean? I didn't
bind him in every sense of the word. He bound him in that he put him under obligation
to himself. Our Lord Jesus put Satan under
obligation to himself. You say, but hasn't Satan always
been bound by God? Well, indeed he has been. Our
Lord has always limited him. Satan has never had free reign. Illustration, Job. Job. The Lord said to Job, said to
Satan, you see my servant Job? And he said, yeah, I see him.
But you let me touch him. And he'll turn his back on you. The Lord said, you can take everything
he's got, but you can't touch him. Satan did that. See how the Lord had boundaries?
Satan has boundaries. Boundary, the root word for boundary
is that which binds or bound, a boundary. Satan has boundaries
that he can't cross over. He doesn't have unlimited power,
he never has and he never will. And he doesn't have unlimited
dominion. Our Lord has given him a dominion
according to God's sovereign will and purpose. And Satan,
like all of God's creatures, will fulfill that which God has
ordained for him and ultimately will work out for the good of
God's people. Our Lord bound him. He bound
him. He put him under obligation to
him. Tied him up. Well then, as you
know, Job lost everything he had. But Job said, the Lord gave and
the Lord had taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
I'm gonna worship God. In all this, he worshiped God.
And another day, the Lord said to Satan, you see my servant? And Satan said, yeah, but let
me touch his body. All that a man hath will he give
for his life. The Lord said, well, you can
touch him, but you can't kill him. He was bound. Satan can only
do that which God has purposed for him to do. Don't ever forget
that. And we know that Satan did touch
his body, but he couldn't take his life. So God has always had
boundaries for Satan. But as I've already said, it
was a man who was defeated to begin with, and another man's
got to stand up to the evil one. And here comes this angel from
heaven, the Son of God, the messenger of the covenant. And he binds
him, he ties him, he prohibits him from doing many of the things
that he was doing already. And one of those things, and
I'm persuaded that this is perhaps in the forefront of what is meant
by this. Throughout the Old Testament,
Gentile nations were blinded by Satan, deceived by Satan,
worshiping rocks and trees and all kinds of foolish things,
beasts and creatures. But our Lord Jesus has bound
him. Because you see, the gospel had
to go forth to all the world. Because God's got a people of
every nation, kindred, tribe, and tongue. And thus far, up
to this point, according to the purpose of God, Satan had blinded
the minds of people lest they believe the gospel. And so the
Gentiles, almost by and large, for the most part, all Gentiles
were in heathen darkness. That's just the way it was. And
you read through the Old Testament, the Gospel was given to the Jews. They had the Scriptures, they
had the tabernacle, they had the offerings, they had all of
these things that pointed to Christ Jesus. But they didn't
believe the Gospel, and in the purpose of God, their unbelief
resulted in the Gospel coming to folks like us, pagans. That's us. And the Lord Jesus
has bound Satan so that His Word will go forth, the Gospel will
go forth, and it does go forth, and our Lord, He takes care of
every obstacle that stands in the way. Whatever obstacle there
is to the gospel going forth to those appointed unto salvation,
our sovereign Lord Jesus Christ breaks down those obstacles. Because He can't be defeated.
He's always going to be successful. This man in Christ Jesus. So He binds Him. And He binds
Him a thousand years. I wouldn't take the thousand
years literally any more than I would take the key literally
or the great chain literally. This is figurative language.
It means a long time. I believe the thousand years
indicates the number of years, whatever they are, between our
Lord's first advent and his second advent. The Jews used thousand to Not
in a definite way, but to express things that were bountiful or
a lot. Much like, I was up preaching
in Almont a couple of Sundays ago and enjoyed standing back
behind the pulpit where I preach for a lot of years up there. And I was telling the man there's
some new folks that have been attending. And this man, he said
to me before the first message, he said, I've listened to a message
that you preached on the resurrection. He said, I've listened to it
a million times. You think he counted all those
times? One, two, three, four, five. No, it's a figure of speech.
Right? That's all that is, a figure
of speech. And that's the way it was with a thousand to the
Jews. A figure of speech. Long time. And I believe this thousand years,
this is the time during this gospel age. So he Look at verse
three. He cast him into the bottomless
pit. That is, our Lord Jesus bound
him and he limits his sphere of service or his sphere of activity,
I should say. He shut him up. He set a seal
upon him that he should deceive the nations no more. That is,
the people of God in the nations throughout the world. That is,
until the thousand years should be fulfilled. And then, toward
the end of this age, he must be loosed, he must be released
a little season. How long is a little season?
I don't know. You don't know either. Nobody
knows. But the Lord is going to say
to the dragon, I release you to go back to full deception
or to deceiving multitudes of people. Now this is evident from
the passage of scripture. But he binds him until that time
arrives. And the reason he binds him is
so that the word of God will go forth. Listen, men and women
have got to hear the true gospel. They've got to hear of who God
is. They've got to hear of who Christ Jesus is. Men and women
have got to hear about our condition. And Satan, his activity is now
limited by the sovereign power of Christ who defeated him at
the cross Our Lord Jesus holds him in check. He has, as it were,
a great chain around this lion who goes about seeking whom he
may devour. And He has locked him away, as
it were, in a pit to severely limit the area where he can be
active. But toward the end of this age,
whenever that is, The Lord is going to give him more chain
to be more active. And remember this, Satan's area
where he works primarily is in religion. That's where he does
his work. And I know free willism and Arminianism
certainly in that, but in religion all around the world. Religions
that we don't have much knowledge of. Satan's in those too. Listen,
he's a liar. He's a liar and he's the one
who began lies. He's a liar. Our Lord Jesus said
he's a liar from the beginning. And the lies that he tells are
lies about God. Lies about Christ Jesus. Lies
about salvation. And men and women, unless God
sovereignly intervenes, men believe his lies. They always do because
our Lord Jesus said, if I come in my own name, you won't receive
me. If another comes in his own name, him you will receive every
single time. All you've got to do is look
at religion today. Look at the thousands and thousands of people. I mentioned this morning, I was
watching a religious program the other morning. Yesterday
morning I got up and I was watching a guy and he had thousands and
thousands of people in there. And he's saying absolutely nothing. Absolutely nothing. His is psychology
with a little bit of religion to kind of make it tasty to people
who think they need to hear something from the Bible. And that's all
it is. Satan, he sends forth lies. He has his false prophets. The scripture says apostles,
they transform themselves. They masquerade as angels of
light. And people say, my, what a good
preacher. My, what a good pastor. But if
you could take off the mask, you'd see a wolf. You'd see a
wolf. I know a lady years ago told
us about her pastor. She said, he's not much of a
preacher, but he's a good pastor. And by that she meant he's good
to visit people. But he wasn't much of a preacher.
Well, I tell you what, if a man's not much of a preacher, he's
not much of a pastor, is he? If he doesn't preach the gospel
to you, if he doesn't declare the truth to you, Well, Satan's
going to be released. And just to tie this together,
and then I'll try to get to the heart of this message, drop down
to verse seven, and when the thousand years are expired, Satan
shall be loosed out of his prison, released. And here's what he's
gonna do, he's gonna go out to deceive the nations, which are
in the four corners of the earth, four quarters of the earth, Gog
and Magog. And all this means is all of
the false religions of the world, all of the enemies of God, they
will be gathered together to battle against God. Here is yet
another reference to Armageddon. Armageddon. Gonna get all the
enemies together. The number of them, it says at
the end of verse 8, as the sand of the sea. And they went up on the breadth
of the earth, they compassed the camp of the saints about,
and the beloved city. Who are they in opposition to?
The church of our Lord Jesus Christ, the holy city, Jerusalem. Not that city over there in the
Middle East. but God's chosen people. Wherever men and women
meet and set forth the glories of Christ Jesus and his successful
death, these are gonna set out in opposition against them. But
very quickly, fire will come down from God out of heaven and
devour them. And the devil that deceived them
was cast in the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast
and the false prophet are, that's already been set forth at the
latter part of chapter 18, and shall be tormented day and night
forever and ever. Satan is going to be released.
Maybe we're in that age now. I don't know, maybe we're in
that little season now where people are being deceived. But
not everybody's gonna be deceived. Because our Lord always has a
remnant according to the election of grace. And we see the people of God
who are in heaven in verse 4. John says, I saw thrones and
they that sat on them and judgment was given unto them. How are
the saints of God in heaven? How in what way are they judging?
They're one with Christ Jesus and he judges a righteous judgment.
And I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness
of Jesus and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped
the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark
upon their foreheads or in their hands. And they lived and reigned
with Christ a thousand years." Where are the people of God who
died in faith? Bill read that chapter. These
people who died in faith, where are they? They're with the Lord. That's where they are. It says
here in verse four, watch how specific it is. I saw the souls
of them. He didn't say I saw the saints.
He said I saw the souls of them. The souls, they've gone back
to glory. What happens when a believer,
when they die, they go to be with the Lord? Blessed are the
dead which die in the Lord, it says back in chapter 14. But look at verse five, but the
rest of the dead, live not again until the thousand years were
finished. What do you mean the rest of the dead? Who's that?
Everybody who died in unbelief. They remain spiritually dead. Now their existence doesn't cease. Believers, when we die, when
our souls vacate this body, our souls go back to the Lord. When an unbeliever dies, his
soul goes to God and God casts it into hell. And you can't very
well call that a life. That's why it says the rest of
the dead live not again until the thousand years were finished.
Now, he begins to speak here about the first resurrection.
And he says, Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first
resurrection, on such the second death hath no power, but they
shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with
him a thousand years. That is, the people who've gone
to glory, they have experienced the first resurrection. The Bible
only talks about two resurrections. The first resurrection and the
last resurrection. The last resurrection is when
our Lord Jesus shall come back and he'll resurrect our bodies,
the bodies of all the people of God, the righteous people,
and he'll raise the bodies of the wicked as well. But what
about this first resurrection? I think the first resurrection,
I'll give it to you, I think it has, I think three things
are involved in the first resurrection. The first resurrection, remember,
everybody who's gone to glory, they're blessed and they're holy.
That's a fulfillment of Ephesians 1, 3, and 4, isn't it? Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who's blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ
Jesus, according as he hath made us holy in Christ. What is this first resurrection? The first resurrection, and I'll
give it to you in three parts, because to me it is in three
parts. The first resurrection is, and
these people have experienced it, is the resurrection of our Lord
Jesus. because we were raised in Him. The first resurrection
is the resurrection of our Savior. We can go to the scriptures.
We can go to 1 Peter 1 and verse 3. We can go to other references
that speak. We can go to Matthew, Mark, Luke,
and John and read about our Lord's resurrection. When He arose,
as we read in Ephesians chapter one, we arose with him. That's the first resurrection.
You know how we were raised first? Representatively. That's how
we were raised. That's part of the first resurrection. Our Lord Jesus, you see, when
he lived in this world, we lived in him. And when He went to the
cross of Calvary and died, we died in Him. And when He was
buried, we were buried in Him. And when He arose, we arose in
Him. When the head rises, the body
rises as well. And you read in Ephesians chapter
2, He ascended and we ascended with Him. We're seated with Him
in heavenly places. How can that be when we're still
down here, representatively? So the first resurrection is
vitally united to the resurrection of our Lord Jesus. And I'll tell
you, if you're a believer, you've already had a part in the first
resurrection. Because when he arose, you arose
too. But secondly, this resurrection
is regeneration. And that is also tied to our
Lord Jesus' resurrection. Blessed and holy is he that hath
part in the first resurrection. On such the second death hath
no power. Those of us who've been born
of the Spirit, we have partaken of the first resurrection. And the second death, it doesn't
have any power over us. Judgment has no power over us. There's no penalty of sin for
us. There's no threat of hell toward
us. Because our Lord Jesus has already
borne all of the wrath of God. We were raised in Him representatively,
but we have been raised spiritually in reality. Let me ask you this. When God said to Adam, in the
day ye eat thereof, thou shalt surely die. How did man die first? What was the first death? It
was a spiritual death. Right? You with me? It was a
spiritual death. That's how man died. Well then,
what is going to be the first resurrection? Spiritual life. And that's what we have in Christ
Jesus. He raises us from a spiritual
death. And then I think there's another
aspect to this, and I won't be dogmatic on it, but I think there's
a third aspect to this first resurrection. that all of the
people in heaven have experienced already. They've not only experienced
being raised representatively in Christ and His resurrection,
they've not only experienced a regeneration by the power of
the Spirit who gives life so that we'll believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ, they've been raised up to be with Christ Jesus in
heaven through their own death. through their own death. I know
we mourn the people of God when they die, we miss them, and they
leave a vacancy in the congregation, in the family, but they have
experienced being raised up to be with the Lord. Oh, how blessed is that? No wonder
the scripture says, blessed and holy is he that hath part in
the first resurrection. They've been privileged to leave
an old body, or a young body, it doesn't make any difference,
but a corrupt body, a sinful body. And the Lord has said,
it's time for you to be raised up from the earth. and to come
up to be with me. I think about Enoch. Bill read
to us there from Hebrews chapter 11. Enoch was translated that
he should not see death. You know what translated means?
It means he passed over. He just passed over. And I'll
tell you, If I could use that for those who die in Christ Jesus,
one of these days we're just gonna pass over. Pass over to
be with the Lord. We have been raised in Christ
representatively in his resurrection. And as a result of his resurrection,
we have been raised spiritually in that we've been born again.
The Savior said you must be born again. but we're going to experience
another sort of resurrection or being raised. These bodies
are going to be raised up by the Lord and we're going to go,
we'll go past everything that's visible and we'll go, everything
is visible to these eyes and we'll go to be with Christ Jesus
forever and ever. And I'll tell you, blessed is
that person. Blessed is that people who is
seated upon the thrones of glory in the presence of Christ Jesus
to behold Him and to worship Him and to adore Him without
any sin. Can you imagine that? Without
any hindrance of the flesh. Because they've left all that
behind. And as it were, the soul has
been released. That's what death is to a believer. It's the body releasing the soul
and the soul goes back to God who gave it. Goes back to God
who washed it in the blood of Christ Jesus and robes us in
His righteousness. And we go to live with Him and
dwell with Him forever and ever. That's a story with a happy ending. I like stories with happy endings,
don't y'all? And I'll tell you, that's the
best one of all. It is indeed. Well, let's sing
the closing song, 393. Look at number 393. Take my life
and let it