Let's open the scriptures to
the gospel of John, the second chapter, the book of John, the
second chapter. And we'll continue our study
in this great book tonight. But we're not going to get very
far. As I looked at this great story
about the marriage in Cana, of Galilee, where our Lord first
performed the miracle, or at least it's the first one recorded
in the Scriptures. I thought at first I could get
through the entire 12 verses of this, or the first 11 verses,
but I got stuck on verse 1. You'll see what I mean as we
go through this. John chapter 2 verse 1. The third
day there was a marriage and the marriage was in Cana of Galilee. My subject is a marriage in Cana. It is, I think, noteworthy that
Our Lord Jesus could have selected anywhere to perform His first
miracle. And He could have selected any
miracle which to perform. We know that the steps of a good
man are ordered by the Lord. And He is the good man. Make
no mistake about it. He's the good man. We're not
good. Some of we were talking about
this just before the service began. That when it comes to
us, there's none good. No, not one. There's nothing
good in us. There's nothing dependable in
us. There's nothing worth one in
us. We're full of sin. No matter
what we do, no matter what we say, no matter what we think,
there is no purity to us. And we know that, don't we? We
know that everything that we do is contaminated By sin, that's our biggest problem. There's
no question about it. You know, we talk about the devil
and I hear a lot of times, and this used to be more popular
than it is today, but people would say things like, the devil
made me do it. Well, I think sometimes the devil
gets a bad rap on that. I don't think it's the devil
at all. I think that we do it. It's just our own foulness. It's our own wretchedness. And
there's no question but what he's at work in the world. But
he works mainly in the religious realm with his false gospels
and in false religion. But as far as you and I are concerned,
we're vile people. And there is no goodness in us.
And yet, and yet, even our steps are ordered by the Lord. In fact,
in the Scriptures, everything that ever happens is of God. For of Him, and through Him,
and to Him are all things. To God be glory forever. Amen. That's Romans chapter 11,
right at the end of the chapter. So everything is of God. And
everything is for God. And everything works out by God
according to His purpose to fulfill that which He has ordained. Now in the life of our Lord Jesus,
as He begins His public ministry, We know very little about what
he did for the first 30 years, aside from what little we read
in Luke, the second chapter, when he was 12 years old. But
other than that, we know nothing of the first 30 years of our
Lord's life. And then he began his public
ministry. And we know that David is certainly
a picture of our Savior because he entered into the kingship,
he entered upon the throne of Israel when he was 30 years of
age. Even John the Baptist, when he was 30 years of age, he began
his ministry. And our Lord Jesus begins His
public ministry according to His own sovereign will and purpose
when He's 30. Now he could have selected anywhere
to perform his first miracle. And he could have chosen whatever
miracle he wanted to perform, wherever he would perform it. But he selected this little community
called Cana, and he ordained that he would go to a marriage.
He would go to a wedding and at this wedding he would perform
his very first miracle. He would change water into wine. His very presence and the performance
of this miracle, our Lord by this, by his performance of the
miracle and by his presence, he puts his stamp of approval
on marriage. It's how he begins his public
ministry. And this is no accident. There are no accidents. You know,
you and I, we talk about things happening. We say, well, it was
an accident. And as far as we perceive things, they are accidents. But in God's eternal purpose,
there are no accidents. Nothing happens by chance. As
we've already said, all things are of God. So God had ordained,
He had marked out the steps of our Savior, that He would go
to Cana of Galilee, and this is where He would perform His
first miracle. It's at a marriage. Marriage. It's the most basic of all social
relationships in this world, and in this world, it is the
oldest. God made Adam out of the dust
of the ground. And then God, using one of Adam's
ribs, God made him a wife. And so we read in Genesis chapter
1 verse 27, so God created man in his own image, in the image
of God created he him, male and female created he them. Genesis chapter 5 and the second
verse, male and female created he them and blessed them and
he called their name, he called their name Adam in the day when
they were created. And it is written in Genesis
chapter 1 and verse 28, and God blessed them. And God said unto
them, Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth, and
subdue it. And have dominion over the fish
of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living
thing that moveth upon the earth. God blessed Adam and Eve. He blessed them with all the
blessings of nature. God blessed them with all the
blessings of His providence. He blessed them with all the
good things of life. He blessed them with His own
presence. And that's the greatest blessing
of all. For God to be with you. He blessed them with communion
with Himself. And this communion that they
had with God, It was a communion that came natural to them. Now I know usually when we use
the word natural it has a negative connotation. But in the sense
with Adam and Eve before the fall, that which they did was
natural to them. And it was natural for them to
thank God. It was natural for them to worship
God. It was natural for them to honor
God all day long. That's just what came natural
to them. Now, after the fall, all of those
things are foreign to men. And nobody will desire, nobody
wants to worship God or honor God or bless God unless God does
a work of grace in the heart. But with Adam and Eve before
the fall and how wonderful it was for them, it just came natural
to honor God. and bless the name of our Savior
who gave Himself for us. There is coming a glorious day
in heaven above when we dwell with our Savior forever and ever. And again, it's going to just
be natural for us to honor God with every breath that we take,
every word that we speak, and every thought that we think,
and every act that we perform. Won't that be a great day? It
will just come natural. You won't have to think about
it. You know, now we have to focus. We have to push out of
our minds so much of the world and so much that's going on down
here. And you got so many irons in
the fire. And I know you do. And so do
I. And we feel all so pressed for
time. There's so many things that would
indulge on what time we've got or what time we think is available
to us. And God has to move in upon us
and bless His name He does that. He says, you're going to make
time for me. I'll make sure you make time for me. And He gets
your attention. By His Spirit, by His Word, He
arrests your heart. And He brings you to see the
glories and the honor and the majesty of King Jesus. And then
you'll honor God. But with Adam and Eve, it was
natural. It was natural for them to honor the Lord. They were
blessed. They were blessed. God blessed them with the ability
of, He said, procreation. God ordained that this world
be filled with people. Isaiah 45 and 18 says, For thus
saith the Lord that created the heavens, God Himself that formed
the earth and made it, He has established it, He created it
not in vain, He formed it to be inhabited. He said, I am the Lord, there
is none else. I made this earth to be inhabited. The Lord made the world to be
inhabited by people, and among all the peoples of the earth,
there's a special people. There's a people reserved in
grace. They're His people from old eternity. He said, you only have I've known. I've loved you with an everlasting
love. That's what He said to Jeremiah.
That's what He says to all of His people. We're a people among
a people. So God has ordained that this
world be inhabited. So God gave this directive to
Adam and Eve, be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth.
Marriage then is ordained of God and it was the Lord who brought
the first couple together. There was a man and there was
a woman. And they were absolutely committed to each other. And if you were to have a happy
marriage, you must be committed to one another. These two loved
each other. They dwelt in love together for
a lot of years. And we don't know how long they
dwelt together before the fall. There's no way to know that.
But we know after the fall, they had many, many years together. And of course this first marriage
is between a man and a woman. And any other kind of union,
as far as marriage is concerned, is condemned by God Almighty
as being perverse and vile and wicked. In the Word of God. And I know the prevalence of
the day. We read it in the newspaper,
it's set before us all the time. But in the Bible, this issue
of homosexuality is condemned. It's denounced. In the Bible
as being ungodly and unnatural. I know it's widely received in
the world. And of course, those out in Hollywood,
they keep it in front of us with the intention of kind of softening
us. That's what they're doing. They're
softening us. So that people will have the
attitude toward those who are these sodomites that, well, you
know, live and let live. It doesn't matter. It does matter.
It does matter. God Almighty condemned it. He
wiped out Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities of the plains.
People who were given over to do those things that are unnatural. I heard a news reporter say,
he said, the Bible never says anything against homosexuality. Well, he needs to read the Bible. Leviticus 18.22 says, Thou shalt
not lie with mankind as with womankind it is abomination. And to show how perverse that
is, when the Lord gave the law concerning mankind's not supposed
to lie with mankind and womankind's not supposed to lie with womankind,
He followed it up with a law against bestiality. Neither shalt
thou lie with any beast to defile thyself therewith, neither shall
any woman stand before a beast to lie down thereto, it is confusion."
In other words, it's a violation of that which is natural. He
says, Defile not yourselves in any of these things, for in all
of these the nations are defiled which I cast out before you,
and the land is defiled. Therefore I do visit the iniquity
upon it, and the land itself vomited out her inhabitants. What God is saying is, He is
going to evict all the people in the land of Canaan, for their
vileness, for their perversion. Like our bellies, when they get
full of rotten food, you eat some rotten food and your stomach
can't contain it. It just won't bear it any longer,
it rejects it and it rids itself and the stomach says, listen,
I'm getting rid of this stuff and it's coming up so you better
watch out. God says, so I'm going to vomit
you. I'm going to vomit these people
out of the land of Canaan. I'll reject them for their violence. A New Testament
passage that certainly sets forth this wickedness of sodomy is
in Romans chapter 1. If you read in that passage of
scripture, you'll find that it all began because with this,
when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God. They began a
downward spiral. And it ends up with people doing
those things that are not natural. Because God turned them over
to reprobate mind. I don't call people gay. That's a good word. It means
happy. They're solemnites, that's what
they are. You call it for what it is and
take a stand. Real marriage is the marriage
of the Bible and it is a God-ordained institution. Hebrews chapter
13 verse 1 says, And certainly this passage before us this evening,
and we'll go back to it again next Wednesday as well, this
passage shows us that marriage is indeed honorable. Because of all the events, of
all the different places that the Lord Jesus could have gone
to perform His first miracle, He goes to a wedding. He goes
to a marriage. When God brings together a man
and a woman who make a unique covenant commitment to each other,
that's called a marriage. And they make that covenant before
God Almighty. They take these vows, and I've
officiated at weddings, and I know some preachers don't like to
do weddings, and I only do weddings of people in the church or family
members within the church, but it's such a joyous occasion,
such a delightful time together, especially when it's people of
God. It's an honorable institution.
And two people stand before me and they exchange their vows,
they make a covenant before God, before God. It's a covenant that
leaves everybody out from intimacy, just those two. Therefore shall
a man leave his father and mother, shall cleave to his wife and
they shall be one flesh. Now, of course, this marriage
is a picture of another union, actually a union and an institution
that is older than marriage. It's a picture of the Lord Jesus
Christ and His church. When the Father gave a people
to the Son before the world began, God joined those people, the
church, the elect, Those whom He would redeem. Those who are
God's gift to Jesus Christ. We were joined to Him in old
eternity. We were brought to Him. We were
given to Him. We were joined together in union
from old eternity. And what God has joined together,
nobody is going to put asunder. We're one with Jesus Christ.
We've always been one with Jesus Christ. And nothing and nobody,
no power in heaven, earth or hell can dissolve that union. God's elect are safe in Jesus
Christ even since before the world was made. We're united
to Him. That's the first marriage. And
our marriages are just pictures of that. That everlasting union
of Jesus Christ and His church. That's what the Apostle Paul
said. You read it there in Ephesians chapter 5. He said, this is a
great mystery. And the word great is mega. This
is a mega mystery. What are you talking about, Paul?
He said, I speak concerning Christ and the church. Oh yes, there's
instructions to wives. There's instructions to husbands.
Wives, you love your husband, you submit to your husband. Husband,
love your wife, as Christ also loved the church. Love your wife,
take care of your wife, protect your wife. There's a union there. There's a union there. God has
brought you together. But the real teaching of the
passage is about another union. It's about another marriage.
The marriage of God's own Son to a people God calls His bride. His bride. In our text we have our Lord
blessing marriage with His presence. Oh, that our Savior would bless
our weddings and bless our marriages with His presence. Oh, how glorious
and how honored that marriage is when the Lord is with us by
His Spirit. Lord be with us. When I perform weddings, I always
tell the couple, You build your home on the rock, Christ Jesus. You make certain God is worshipped. You're going to have some rocky
journeys along the way. You're going to have some storms.
But that house that's built upon the rock will stand. It'll stand. God will give you grace. to do
that. And I'll give this advice to
all who are prayerful for in seeking a companion in life. Make sure you seek somebody who
loves the gospel. Somebody who seeks the glory
of God like you do. Somebody who loves Christ Jesus
like you do. Somebody who loves to hear the
gospel of grace Somebody wants to hear the gospel of substitution
as much as you do. I know several people whose spouses
have no interest in the gospel and we pray for them. We seek
God's face on their behalf. But I'll tell you, they have
their struggles. That's tough. I can't imagine how tough it
would be. Nancy and I have been married
46 years. We've always pulled in the same direction. We both
love Christ Jesus by His grace. We both seek His glory. But now,
what if one of us didn't believe the gospel? Well, then you're
pulling in opposite directions. That'd be tough. That'd be hard.
And I give this advice. I give this advice to young people,
to all who are You know, if you're searching for a companion, I
wouldn't even date somebody who doesn't know the Lord. I wouldn't
do that. That's unwise. It's unwise. How can light have any fellowship
with darkness? You say, well, I don't think
it hurt anything to date somebody who doesn't love the gospel.
What if you fall in love with them? I'll tell you what the Apostle
Paul said in 1 Corinthians chapter 7 verse 39. He said, Marry in
the Lord. You've got God's Word on this
now. Marry in the Lord. Marry somebody
who loves Christ Jesus and who seeks His glory like you do. In our text, our Lord attends
this wedding in Cana of Galilee. I'll tell you this, according
to Jewish tradition, And I read some Jewish history on this.
A woman who had never been married, she always got married on a Wednesday.
And the reason was because they had several days after the Sabbath,
they had Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday to make preparation.
So the wedding of a woman who had never been married before,
it always took place on a Wednesday. Now if you look at the scripture,
keep that in mind, you'll notice chapter 2 begins with the word,
and the third day was a marriage. The third day. So this is actually
a continuation of chapter 1. Okay? Well now what has happened
in chapter 1? based on the fact that marriages
took place on Wednesday. We can go all the way back. We
can go back to Thursday before this. Thursday before this. This is the day that John the
Baptist met the delegation sent out by the Sanhedrin. It was
on Thursday when they said, who are you? And he said, I'm a boss.
That's all. I'm just a boss. I'm saying,
prepare ye the way of the Lord. The Lord has come. I'm a voice. That's Thursday. On Friday, John
was preaching and saw the Lord Jesus coming to him and he says
in John 1.29, Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin
of the world. That's on Friday. On Saturday,
the Sabbath, we find John still preaching. He's still preaching. And he still got the same message.
Behold the Lamb of God. The same message as the day before. The Spirit of God, it was according
to His purpose to open the eyes of Andrew and John the Apostle. John who later became an Apostle. And they heard the same message
that John had preached the day before. They heard John and then
they followed the Lord Jesus. That's on Saturday. The next
day was Sunday. And according to John 1.43, on
that day is when the Lord found Philip. And on that day is the
day that the Lord found Nathanael. After all, the Son of Man has
come to seek and to save that which was lost. Now we get to
chapter 2 and verse 1, and it says, and the third day. And
the third day would be Wednesday. Wednesday. So this is Wednesday.
Our Lord has spent Monday and Tuesday traveling. You look at
your map, you'll find He was in Bethsaida. which is up above,
north of the Sea of Galilee, right on the Sea of Galilee where
the Jordan River flows into the Sea of Galilee. Our Lord would
have crossed over the Jordan River and gone 22 miles southwest
until He got to Canaan. So He spent Monday and Tuesday
traveling, now it's Wednesday, it's wedding day. It's wedding
day. There are several things to know
about Jewish weddings. Number one, there was always
the betrothal. That's similar to our engagement,
but much more binding. In the betrothal, all the terms
of the wedding were publicly accepted. They had a priest,
a Jewish priest, not a Roman Catholic priest, but a Jewish
priest, a Jewish priest who would pronounce the blessings of the
Lord upon the couple. And this engagement, when they
became engaged, when they became betrothed, this engagement was
so binding that it took a divorce to break it off. In other words,
in the eyes of the law, they were married, though they had
never come together as a couple. You'll remember from Matthew
chapter 1, when Joseph found out that Mary was indeed pregnant,
he was mindful to put her away. That is, to seek a divorce. They
had been espoused to one another. He was going to divorce her,
but he wanted to do it ever so quietly because he loved her
and he didn't want to make a public example out of it. And I know
you remember reading that passage of Scripture. And the angel of
the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. And the angel said,
Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy
wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost,
and she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name
Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins." So they
were betrothed. So that's the first thing about
a Jewish wedding, an engagement that was legally binding. The
next thing, and I got these in case, a fine, fine book on the book of the Bible, the book
of the revelation of Jesus Christ. A really good book is a book
by a man by the name of William Hendrickson. And he lays out
these four things about a Jewish wedding. He said, first of all,
there was a betrothal. And secondly, he says there was
an interval. There was an interval between
the betrothal time and the wedding and the wedding feast that follows.
Now this interval could be a very long time or a very short time.
But it was during that time that the groom paid a dowry. He paid
a dowry to the bride's father for the honor of marrying his
daughter. The dowry could be money. The
dowry could be clothing. It could even be something very
unusual. When David was going to marry
King Saul's daughter, David said to him, what do you want as a
dowry? King Saul said, I don't want any money. I want 104 skins
of the Philistine soldiers. That's the dowry I'll accept.
So it could be that. Or it could be a service. When
Jacob wanted to marry Rachel, he said to Laban, what do you
want as a dowry? He said, seven years of service. Remember that? Seven years of
service. And Jacob served him and it said
it seemed to him but a day. Out of the love he had for us,
and see a picture of our Lord Jesus. who loved us with such
a love, such a deep abiding love, that the service He did for God,
His life and His death, His sufferings, His agonies on the cross, it
was but a light thing to Him for the love that He had for
His people. So this dowry could be a service. And then thirdly, William Hendrickson
said there's the wedding procession. At the close of the interval,
the bride would prepare herself for the wedding. And the groom,
dressed in his finest, he would be joined by the friends of the
groom. And they would go out in a great
procession to meet the bride at her house. And then to bring
the bride back to the groom's house, and his father's house. In the weddings back then, much
different than today. Back then it was the groom who
was the center of attention. And not today. The groom today
is just a necessary evil. That's all the groom is. He's just filling a spot. But
it's the bride. It's the bride's dress. It's
the bride's veil. It's the bride's shower. It's the bride's this. It's the
bride's that. And whenever I talk to a couple,
I just say to the bride, I say, ever how you want this wedding
to go, it's the way it's going to go. Because if you're not
happy, nobody's going to be happy. So we keep the bride happy. It's
all about the bride. But not back in those days. It
was all about the groom. all about the groom. I'll deal
more with that in a minute. Well then, after the wedding
procession, there was the wedding feast, a magnificent meal, a
great banquet, a celebration provided by the groom and his
father, and it was a great celebration that lasted seven days, seven
days. And at the wedding feast, the
bride and the groom were publicly married amidst the atmosphere
of joy and happiness. Let me see if I can give you
a picture now of the marriage of our Lord Jesus Christ to his
bride. First of all, the church was
betrothed to him in old eternity. All of God's people. They've
not all been gathered to the Savior yet, of course. And the
marriage supper of the Lamb, it hasn't taken place yet, as
is recorded in Revelation chapter 19. But back in eternity, our
union with the Lord Jesus Christ was a matter of legal record
in heaven. It was a matter of legal record
in heaven. Christ Jesus is the lawful groom
of His bride and all of His chosen people were His lawful bride. God ordained it to be so. God
who has caused those things as having already come to pass those
things that He has promised. He purposed in the covenant of
grace, Christ Jesus did, to love his bride and take care of her
forever. As we think about the marriage
of a Jewish man and a Jewish woman, when they became betrothed,
the newly engaged or betrothed bride, here's what she had to
do. And brides, think about this. When you got betrothed, whatever
money you had, It goes to the guy you're going to marry. He
gets it all. What? Oh yeah. Gets all the money. And guess
what? Whatever debt she had, they went
to the husband. Now listen, in our union with
Jesus Christ in this marriage, we had no assets. All we had
was debt. But when God Almighty ordained
our union to Jesus Christ and gave us to Him and we were betrothed
to Him, all of the debts to the bride shifted over to the groom. He's always been accountable.
He's always been responsible. God Almighty has never looked
to His church for the payment of any debt. He's always looked
to the surety of the church, the Son of God. God bless His
name, He is capable to pay. We didn't have anything. Into
this marriage union, we didn't bring anything but sin. That's
all we brought. We had no assets, nothing positive,
everything negative. But Christ Jesus, when we were
betrothed to Him, He said, I'll take all of her indebtedness. It's mine. Look to me for full
payment of all of her sin. Isn't that gracious? Oh my goodness. Is that good news or not? That's
the betrothal. That's the betrothal. Secondly,
the interval. That's that period of time between
the betrothal and the actual wedding feast. And during this
betrothal of our Lord and His bride, Christ came to pay the
dowry to the Father of the bride. See, it's the Father who gave
us to Christ. Our Father. Our Father. Christ
said, I go to my Father and your Father. To my God and your God. He's our Father. And if Christ
Jesus is to be wed to us, the Father says there must be a dowry
paid. Well, what is it going to be?
His blood. That's the payment price. That's the dowry. And our Lord
Jesus came to this world, He willingly, He willingly went
to the cross. Without hesitation. He went and
laid down His life and poured out His blood. This is the dowry,
O Father. I love these people. They're
my bride. I want them to be with me forever.
And the price was paid in full. He paid our dowry. We were not redeemed with silver
and gold. We were redeemed by the blood
of the Savior. And during this interval, The
bride is brought to pledge her troth to the groom. How does she find out about the
groom? From a friend of the bridegroom. Turn to John chapter 3. This
is how she finds out about him. Look at John chapter 3. This is John the Apostle and
he writes of what John the Baptist is saying. John chapter 3 verse
29, He that hath the bride is the bridegroom. But the friend
of the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth greatly
because of the bridegroom's voice. This my joy therefore is fulfilled. He's the friend of the groom.
And what's his job? To bring the bride to the groom.
And that's every preacher's responsibility, is to preach up the groom. That's
who I'm preaching. Jesus Christ the Lord. And you
being the bride, if you're one of His sheep, if you're one of
His elect, if you're part of the bride, you're going to fall
in love with my Master. Remember Eleazar? Sent out by
Abraham. He said, go find a wife for Isaac.
Eliezer, he's the friend of the bridegroom. And he goes out and
he gets there and he met Rachel and all that sort of thing. And then Laban says, well, let's
have a meal here. He said, I'm not going to eat
until I tell you my business. I'm here because of my master's
son. And he directed the attention of everybody to his master's
son Isaac. He talked about the glories of
Isaac, the riches of Isaac, the wealth of Isaac, how great Isaac
was, how good looking Isaac was. He just bragged on Isaac. Looking
for a bride. Looking for a bride for Isaac.
I'm looking for the Lord's bride. And I'm telling you about the
groom, the bridegroom. Of his glories, of his wonders,
of his sufferings, of his death, of his blood, of his righteousness. I'm a friend of the bridegroom.
A friend of the bridegroom. Telling you about Christ Jesus. By the call of the Spirit, we're
brought to believe Christ. That's when we pledge our troth
to Him. In conversion, We're enabled
by the Spirit of Christ Jesus to make a covenant of our own
with Christ. I love you and follow you and
believe you. I believe you from my heart.
I'm yours and I believe you're mine. Then there's the wedding
procession. During the wedding procession,
at the end of the interval, of course the bride makes herself
ready for the groom. I know salvation is of the Lord.
Here's what the Lord does. He makes us willing to be saved
His way. That's when we wash in the blood
of the Lamb. And we say, Oh Lord, strip off
these old self-righteous rags from me and put on the garment
of salvation. Put on the garment of righteousness.
Put that on me, Lord. The bride makes herself ready.
And at the close of this age, Christ is going to come and receive
us unto Himself. And it's interesting, I was reading
on this today, in all the other countries, whenever the groom and the bride
got married, they went back and lived with her folks. Went back
and lived with her folks. But in Israel, here's what would
happen. The bridegroom made herself ready.
The bridegroom and his friends would go and get the bride and
say, you're coming home with me. You're going to my father's
house. You're going to my father's house.
And in salvation, the groom comes after us and he says, now you
come with me. You're going to my father's house.
That's where we're going to dwell forever. And then, when we get
to the father's When He comes and gets us, He's going to come
in the clouds. He's going to receive us unto Himself. He's
going to take us home forever. He's got to come back where we
are. He's got to come where the bride is. And then He's going
to take the bride home to the Father. And when we get home
to the Father, it's going to be the marriage supper of the
Lamb. Oh, what a celebration time that's going to be. And
it's not going to last for a week. It's not going to last for two
weeks. It's going to last forever. And we are going to spend time
with the Lord. And you know what? We will all
be wearing the same wedding garment. We are all going to be wearing
the same wedding garment. Remember that over in Matthew chapter 22? A
king threw a feast for his son, a marriage supper. And everybody
come in and everybody was dressed alike because everything was
provided by the king. You didn't bring anything. I
can just imagine that when you come in the outer section there,
they had all these white robes. There's extra small and small
and medium and large and extra. What size are you? What size
are you? Uh-huh, okay, you're small. Alright. So we put a small
on you. Everybody wore the same garment.
Everybody looked just alike except for one man. And he dared to
come in there against against what the king had provided. And the king said, the father
of the bridegroom said, how dare you come in here without a wedding
garment on? And the man was speechless. And
the king said, bind him hand and foot, take him out of here.
Let me tell you something, we go to glory, we're all dressed
alike. That fine white linen garment
is called the righteousness of the saints. Did you know that?
That's what it's called in Revelation chapter 19. It's the righteousness
of the saints. Oh, but we didn't work it out.
It's the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ that He gives
to us. Because He's the Lord our righteousness. And that's our name. That's our
name. Oh, you know anything about this
wedding? know anything about this marriage. Oh boy, what a
thrill. What a thrill. Well, that's