Hebrews chapter 9. Let's read maybe the first 12
verses. Chapter 9 and verse 1. Then verily the first covenant
hath also ordinances of divine service, and a worldly sanctuary. Well, there was a tabernacle
made. The first wherein was the candlestick and the table and
the showbread, which is called the sanctuary, the holy place.
Then after that, the second veil, the tabernacle, which is called
the holiest of all, which had the golden censer and the Ark
of the Covenant overlaid round about with gold, wherein was
the golden pot that had manna, Aaron's rod that budded, and
the tables of the covenant. And over it the chair of them
of glory, shadowing the mercy seat, of which we cannot now
speak particularly. Now when these things were thus
ordained, the priest went always into the first tabernacle, accomplishing
the services of God. But into the second went the
high priest alone, once every year, not without blood, which
he offered for himself and for the heirs of the people. The
Holy Ghost thus signifying that the way unto the holiest of all
was not yet made manifest while as the first tabernacle was yet
standing, which was a figure for the time then present in
which were offered both gifts and sacrifices that could not
make him that did the service perfect as pertaining to the
conscience. which stood only in meats and
drinks and various worships and carnal ordinances imposed on
them until the time of reformation. But Christ being come, then I
preached of good things to come by greater and more perfect tabernacle,
not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building,
neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood,
He entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal
redemption for us. Paul had been offering all sorts
of examples in this book of how Christ is better. He is superior
to everything, to everybody. He begins in chapter one, if
you remember where we started there. He began with Christ being
superior to the prophets. Paul said that God spoke in time
past to the fathers by the prophets, but He has in these last days
spoken to us by His Son. He saved the best to last, didn't
He? Christ is superior to the prophets. And then he goes ahead in chapter
1 to prove that the Lord Jesus Christ is superior than the angels. He's better than the angels.
Which of the angels, he said, did God say at any time, said
on my right hand, till I make your enemy? your footstool. And
again he said that he has obtained a more excellent name than they. They're just created angels.
Jesus is the Son of God. And then of course he goes on
in the third chapter, and I think that's one of the most important
chapters as far as proving the superiority of Christ over somebody. And he proves there that Christ
is superior over Moses. And this was a sticking point
for these self-righteous Jews because they said we'd be Moses'
disciples. But Paul made the statement that
this man, Jesus of Nazareth, was counted worthy of more glory
than Moses. And he said it like this, inasmuch
as he that has built the house has more honor than the house.
He said Moses was a servant in his house, but Christ was a son
over his house. And he proved there that the
Lord Jesus was as superior to Moses as the master is to his
servant. So he is superior to Moses. Then
in the fourth chapter he proved that he was superior to Joshua.
Joshua led the children of Israel into the land of Canaan, but
he could not give them that gospel rest. He could not give them
rest for their souls. They still had to fight. They
were so upset even when they entered that land. But Jesus
gives us rest, doesn't He? He finished His work just as
God did the work of creation. Christ said it's finished and
He entered unto His rest and now we enter into the rest of
Christ, His accomplished work, the gospel rest. Come unto Me
and I'll give you rest for your souls. And then in chapters 5
and 7, he proved the superiority of Jesus' priesthood over the
Levitical priesthood. And I think probably that one
of the key verses into that proof is this, the law made men high
priests which have infirmities. And boy, we saw some of the infirmities,
didn't we? Not only natural infirmities, but sinful firmities. But the
word of the oath which was since the law maketh the son who is
perfected. forevermore. He was perfected. And then He proved Christ was
the mediator of a better covenant. That was also in chapter 7 and
the first portion here of chapter 8. He was the mediator of a better
covenant. That was established upon better
promises. The first covenant depended upon
men. This do and you shall live. This do, and you'll obtain favor.
And they didn't do, so what happened? He forsook them, didn't He? They
continue not in My covenant, and I regarded them not, saith
the Lord. But the second covenant, Jesus
Christ, is the surety of that covenant, and it has much better
promises. Because the promises of that
covenant are dependent upon the Lord Himself, what He will do.
I will do this, and I will do that. And because I do this,
then you're going to do that. So that's a much better covenant
than the covenant of works. And then here in the ninth chapter,
he begins to prove that Jesus Christ is superior to the tabernacle
and all the furniture and the fixture and the paraphernalia
of this tabernacle. And why does he even do this? Why does he feel like he needs
to do this? This tabernacle, even from the
very beginning, and then of course it developed into the temple,
replaced it. But this was the most important
place in the Jews' life. When they made that tabernacle,
they camped around it. The 12 tribes camped around this
tabernacle. When they worshipped publicly,
this is where they went to. When they offered, when they
had discussions, when they had controversy, they went to the
tabernacle. Everything surrounded this tabernacle. It was the most
important place in the Jewish life. And you know they weren't
going to let it go for nothing. They had to be convinced that
something was better to let this go. And not only that, but this
tabernacle and all the paraphernalia in this tabernacle, we're told
here in chapter 8 and verse 5. Look at this. This was so important.
Look at what he said about this, "...who serve unto the example
and shadow of heavenly things." When the Lord told Moses to make
all of these things after the pattern that I show you, it was
so important that He did that because these were examples.
The tabernacle and all the paraphernalia in it were examples of heavenly
things. He mentions that three times.
In chapter 9 and verse 23, He says it again. It was therefore
necessary that the pattern of things in the heavens should
be purified by these. And then He tells us in verse
1 of chapter 10, the law having a shadow of good things to come. So these things were very important.
They were figures. That's why we should be somewhat
excited when we study these things, if we can see what figure they
represented, what heavenly figure they represented. If we can see
that, we'll be blessed in it. Here in chapter 9 and verses
1 through 10, Paul describes the inward tabernacle, these
fixtures within it and the worship and what took place there. And
then here in verse 11 he says this, ìBut Christ being come,
then I preached of good things to come by a greater and more
perfect tabernacle.î That tabernacle and everything that went on in
that tabernacle was a figure of Jesus Christ and redemption
by Him. It all connects vitally to Him. This tabernacle, it is such a
beautiful picture of the Lord Jesus. If you saw this tabernacle,
there was no beauty to desire. Not only was there no beauty,
it was probably unattractive. That's why they said that sometimes
the heathen made fun of it. What did they see in that? It
was just goat skin, badger skins, ram skins. But you know, inside
was the beauty. Inside was the gold. And that's
where the glory of God filled that tabernacle. It filled the
tabernacle. And that was where the beautiful
tapestry, the beautiful curtains and the colors were inside. And when you saw the Lord Jesus
Christ, there was no beauty. He looked just like us. There
was no halo. He didn't glow. But boy, I tell
you inside, The Bible says this about Him. In Him dwelt all the
fullness of the Godhead bodily. God was in Christ. The fullness
of God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself. And John
makes a wonderful statement about the tabernacle. He said the Word
was made flesh and tabernacled among us, and we beheld His glory. The glory of who? the only begotten
of the Father. The glory of God was in Him,
upon Him, and He was the very glory of God. And He wasn't begotten
by natural means. He said here He wasn't a tabernacle
made with hands. He was begotten by supernatural
means, wasn't He? The Virgin was found with child
of the Holy Ghost. So when they saw the Lord Jesus
Christ, there was no more beauty in Him. than the heathen saw
in this tabernacle. But boy, if you had eyes to see,
if you had eyes to see, you would see the beauty and the glory.
Now let's look quickly, just quickly, at the paraphernalia
in this tabernacle. He says here in verse 2, you're
in the holy place. If you went into this holy place,
you pushed aside a veil, you walked into this holy place,
And there on your left-hand side you will see a candlestick. It
was one lampstand with seven arms that had lights on top that
they kept oil and burned light in it. And we know what this
means from the Scripture. Revelation chapter 1 tells us
that this is the church. John saw a lampstand with these
seven arms on it and these lamps on it, and the Lord Jesus standing
in the midst of those lamps. And the Lord Jesus Himself said,
this is the mystery of the churches. The churches are the lampstands. They are the lamp. The seven
candlesticks are the seven churches of God, of Christ. Isn't it amazing
then? We're here tonight and we're
in the church. We're in this mystical body of Christ. Thousands
of years before we even knew anything about it, He represented
to us what we are in the church of Christ in this lampstand.
And then on your right as you went into that holy place, He
had this showbread, the table of showbread. A table that had
12 cakes, they kept 12 fresh cakes of bread on this table. And we know what that represents,
don't we? 1 Corinthians chapter 10 Paul talks about the communion
of the blood of Christ and the communion of the body of Christ. It's the table of the Lord. You
cannot eat, he said, of the table of the Lord and the table of
the devil. He called it the communion table. That's what we call it,
isn't it? We come to the table of the Lord and that's the body
of Jesus Christ. That's the blood of the Lord
Jesus Christ which we eat of. My flesh is meat indeed and my
blood is drink indeed. He that eats my flesh and drinks
my blood dwells in me and I in him. That's this table of showbread. Communion. sharing in the death
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And then in verse 3 he says this,
and after the second veil, he went through the first veil,
the holy place, and then there was this second veil that the
priest, high priest alone, went into every year. And we know
what this means because the Bible tells us what this means. This
is the torn body, the crucified body of Jesus Christ. Remember
when the Lord, turn your chapter 10, just over one chapter to
your left or to your right, and look in chapter 10, and look
in verse 19. You remember when the Lord Jesus
on the cross said, ìItís finished,î and gave up the ghost? Remember
what happened to the veil of that temple, that big four-inch
thick veil? It tore apart, wasnít it? It
was rent from the top to the bottom. Not from the bottom to
the top. That would indicate somebody got a hold of it and
ripped it. From the top to the bottom. God ripped it. And what
was that indicative of? The torn flesh, the torn body
of our Lord Jesus. Look what he says in verse 19.
Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter the holiest by the blood
of Jesus, by a new and living way which he hath made for us
through the veil, that is to say, his flesh, his crucified
flesh, is that veil. The sixth thing he says here
in our text, in verse 4, which had the golden censer, or the showbread, which is the
sanctuary, then the veil, and then verse 4, which had the golden
censer, the golden censer. If you want to mark this down,
I won't take time to turn over and read it, but in Leviticus
chapter 16, the high priest, he had a censer, a golden censer,
he took that censer with hot coals from off the altar, and
he took a whole handful of sweet incense, he would go into the
most holy place and dump that sweet incense on that censer,
and there before the mercy seat, he would send up this sweet incense.
And the Lord would smell that sweet incense. Now, I think we
know what this is. It's not only the death of the
Lord Jesus Christ that gave Himself as a sweet-smelling savor to
God, but I think it has to do more with His intercessions on
our behalf. I want you to see that over in
Revelations chapter 8, whole Hebrews chapter 7. There's one
thing in my life that has to do with my prayer that's been
a great encouragement to me. And Revelation Chapter 8 and
verse beginning here in verse 2 is one of them. Revelation Chapter 8 and look
at this. And I saw seven angels which stood before God, and to
them were given seven trumpets. And another angel came and stood
at the altar. This is the Lord Jesus. He had
a golden censer, and there was given unto him much incense. that he should offer it with
the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before
the throne. And the smoke of the incense
which came with the prayers of the saints ascended up before
God out of the angels' hands." Now if you can just imagine this
happening in a spiritual sense, when the saint goes to God in
prayer, You have the mediator, the Lord Jesus, between us and
our Father, and He takes the sweet incense of His own merits,
His own worth, His blood, His death, His obedience, and He
mixes that with the prayers of His children, and all of that
sweet odor comes up before the Father out of His hands. Isn't
that a wonderful thought? Doesn't that encourage you to
pray? That's why the Scripture says we have access unto God
by Him, and our access is such a sweet access to the Father.
This is why He encourages us to pray. This is why we should
always pray, because the Lord Jesus is there at the right end
of our Father, mixing His sweet merits, His incense, with our
prayers, and how they must smell before the Father. They go out
of our lips, and I tell you, they're not very attractive,
are they? Boy, they are when they get to the Father because
they go through the Son. Now back to our text again. The
golden censer and then he says, the Ark of the Covenant in verse
4, the Ark of the Covenant overlaid around about with gold. And I
noticed the last thing he said in verse 4 that was in that Ark
was the Table of the Covenant or the Ten Commandment Law. I
don't know this for sure. I've never found this in any
of the other commentaries. But this is what this box, it
was just a box overlaid with pure gold, and they had the tables
of the Law in it. And this represents to me not
only Jesus Christ, but the heart of Christ. Because what does
the Bible say was in the heart of Christ? The Law of God, doesn't
it? in chapter 10 of this book, and
he quotes from Psalms 40, where the Lord Jesus said, Then said
I, lo, I come to do thy will, O my God. I delight, he said,
not just to do, but I delight to do thy will, yea, thy law
is in my heart. Just like this box was holding
the law, the law was in the heart of Jesus Christ. Why was it there? Because He loved it. He obeyed
it. He honored it. He magnified it. So that's what that represents
to me. And then, sixthly, He says the golden pot of manna. And you'll find this in Exodus
chapter 16 and verse 32. The Lord told Moses to take some
manna, gather it one morning, gather a little pot, and He filled
it full of manna, put a lid on it, and put it in this box. And he said, I want you to put
it there so in the generations to come they can see how I fed
the people in the desert. Now here's the amazing thing
about that. They weren't allowed to keep it. They couldn't preserve
it. Remember when they tried to get
it for two days and it bred worms and rotted? But they kept this
in the ark for who knows how long they kept it in there. But
we know exactly what this represents. The Lord Jesus was preaching
to the Jews and He said, they were saying, Moses gave us that
manna from heaven. And He said, Moses gave you not
that bread from heaven. How did Moses give you that?
But he said, Nevertheless, my Father giveth you the true bread
from heaven. For the bread of God is he which
cometh down from heaven and giveth life unto the world. I am the
bread of life. Your fathers ate manna in the
wilderness and are dead. This is the bread which came
down from heaven that a man may eat thereof and not die. And you know something? He is
preserved forever, isn't he? He's in heaven to die no more. He ever lived. And this is interesting. There's something else here that
was in this box. Lastly, the poll mentions. And
that was Aaron's rod that budded. You'll find this in number 17.
This is somewhat amazing when I read this. Some higher-ups in the nation
children of Israel. They were very envious that Aaron's
office as a high priest. Some of them tried to overthrow
him in his office. And God killed him, opened up
the earth and swallowed him, Korah and his group. But the
Lord told Moses one time, He said, I'm going to prove whom
I've chosen to be a high priest. And He told Moses to tell all
the princes, the prince from every tribe, all the princes
to bring the rods. I don't know how long the rods
they had. But he had 12 rods. He had Aaron's old dry rod. And
he told Moses to lay them up in the sanctuary. And he laid
them up overnight. The next morning Moses went in
and got the rods and brought them out. And all of those rods
were still old dried up rods except one rod. One rod had budded,
it had blossomed, and brought forth almonds. a whole rod of
almonds. And they turned it over to look
at it and it was the house of Levi, Aaron's tribe. And God showed by that that He
had put His hand upon Aaron and nobody was going to take the
office of high priest from him. What a beautiful, beautiful picture
of our Savior. You know when He was here they
envied Him too, didn't they? Oh, the high priest was so mad
at him, the Pharisees envied him. Pilate knew that for envy
they delivered him. And they thought when he died,
boy, we've got him now. But God said in effect, I'm going
to show them whom I've chosen. And he took that root out of
a dry ground, laying there in the grave dead, and he brought
him forth, he buddied, he blossomed, and look at the fruit he's brought
forth today. And He said of Himself, Except a corn of wheat fall into
the ground and die, it abides alone. But if it die, it brings
forth much fruit. And I tell you, the Lord Jesus
has brought forth fruit, hasn't He? And nobody is going to take
His office. Until they lay in the ground and dead, and they
are raised, then they may challenge Him. But we never know anybody
who has done that. Have you? God showed us who He
chose, didn't He? The Lord Jesus, His Son. And
then here in verse 5, Brother Baker called me the other day
and we were looking at this verse. This was the mercy seat. They
had a lid over this ark of the covenant that was pure gold.
It was the mercy seat. And then over this mercy seat
they had these what's called here cherubims. And they had
wings spread out. The wings touched in the middle
and they looked facing each other down at the mercy seat. They
were made of gold. Now in the temple, Solomon made
them huge. They were small in the most holy
place overlooking this golden mercy seat. But boy, in the temple,
he made them huge. He made them out of olive trees,
15 foot high. The wings were 15 foot span.
And He overlaid them with pure gold. Those were beautiful statues
there in the temple. But we don't know very much about
these things, about these cherubim. We know they were majestic creatures. And cherub, cherubim is the plural,
Hebrew plural, they tell us for cherub, so they were these two
cherubims. All we know about them for sure
is they were creatures. They were majestic. We don't
know anything else hardly about them. We know that Ezekiel saw
them in his vision. You can find them there in the
book of Ezekiel. Remember when God ran our parents out of the
garden? He put these cherubims there,
you know, to guard the garden, the tree of life. Last week we
studied on the seraphims in Isaiah chapter 6. Remember the seraphim?
These seem to be different degrees of angels. The glory seems to
vary. You've got your angels that can
take on our likeness. They communicate with us. Paul
said, you know, some of us have entertained angels unaware. They're
messengers. They come and speak like they
announced the Savior's birth. Then you have these higher classes
seemingly. You have those seraphims that
were there that took the coals off the altar and touched the
lips of Isaiah and said, ìYour sins be purged.î Then youíve
got these, these cherubims that seem to be the highest ones of
all. And remember when Satan was called?
The Lord called Satan the cherub that covered, didnít He? He was
a beautiful creature. That's one of the reasons He
was lifted up in pride. He saw His beauty and He got
lifted up in pride. And His wisdom was corrupted
because of His brightness. So these must be bright and glorious
creatures. But you know what is so amazing
about them? Everywhere you see them mentioned,
Angels, the holy angels or the seraphims or the cherubims, everywhere
you see in the Scriptures mentioned, they are always in the work of
the Lord. They are always doing His commandments.
And the most interesting thing about them is their main interest
seems to be that redeeming love and grace that is in the Lord
Jesus Christ. that salvation that is in the
Son of God. That seems to be always their
chief interest. Now let me show you two places
concerning that. Over to your right in 1 Peter. Look in 1 Peter chapter 1 and
verse 9 and through verse 12. These are angelic beings, creatures,
but there are some who seem to be of greater majesty than others. But look here how Peter says
it in I Peter chapter 1 and look in verse 9. Receiving the end of your faith,
even the salvation of your souls, of which salvation the prophets
have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that
should come unto you. Search in what or what manner
of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify
when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and
the glory that should follow, unto whom it was revealed that
not unto themselves, But unto us they did minister the things
which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the
gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven,
which things the angels desire to look into." Isn't that amazing? These majestic beings with all
they would have to occupy them, their minds, their thoughts,
their beings, and what's their desire? to look into the Gospel
and the preaching of the Gospel. What in the world does that say
about the depravity of man? How ruined must man be? Why ain't
this place full of people tonight hearing the Gospel? Men have
no desire for it. Beg them to come. Tell them of
the Savior. They don't care. They have no
desire for Him. Isn't it very telling? that these
majestic beings think of nothing else or nothing greater than
this salvation that's in the Son of God? We need to learn
something from them, don't we? And there's another passage.
Look over in Ephesians chapter 3. In Ephesians chapter 3 it
tells us something here that these angels learn from the church. Look what he says in Ephesians
chapter 3 and look in verse 9. Paul here was telling us about
the mystery that had been revealed to him about that salvation that's
in Christ for Jews and the Gentiles being made one and so on. And
he said that's why the Lord gave him this grace to go preaching
it. In verse 9, To make all men see what is the fellowship of
the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in
God, who created all things by Jesus Christ, to the intent that
now unto the principalities and powers, that's these angels of
different degrees, in heavenly places, might be known, that
they might know, who's going to teach them? By the church!
The manifold, the various, many-sided wisdom of God according to the
eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus the Lord. He's
telling us here that these angels are learning from the church. Can you imagine that? Why would
they have to learn about redemption? I tell you, these angels, the
angels and especially these seraphims, they must have been extremely
wise. God ain't going to make no dumb creatures. But you know
there's some things they can't know. There's some wisdom of
God they can't see. Even that we see. They see the
wisdom of God in creation and probably in God's providence.
But boy, they can't grasp hardly the wisdom in redemption. This eternal purpose of God in
redeeming His people is continually unfolding before their eyes.
And they're listening and watching and learning from the church.
And they're absolutely amazed by it. Everything from God choosing
who was going to make up the members of the church to the
Lord Jesus, the Son of God, coming here in our humanity and atoning
for our sins. When they see the wisdom of God,
how He preserves the elect before He calls them, and then how He
gives them faith and puts these graces in their hearts and keeps
them in this wicked world full of devils and then takes them
up to heaven. They're amazed, they're astounded
and they listen and they learn. You know the best way to learn
things is by experience and they can't experience this like we
can. So they just have to keep listening and hearing over and
over and over. These mighty creatures, isn't
that amazing? They learn from us. None of them
has ever prayed for mercy. They don't need it. Not in the
sense that we do. Don't you think they bow their
heads and listen when they hear a poor sinner be merciful to
me? And oh, they see the mercy come
out from the heart of God and they're amazed by it. They learn from the church. Look back over at our text again.
Mr. Baker called me the other day
and we were talking a little bit about this and why the Apostle
made this statement in the last portion of verse 5. talking about
the cherubims overshadowing the mercy seat, of which we cannot
now speak particularly. And I don't know if he was speaking
there about, you know, he didn't stop to tell us what any of these
things represented. And he didn't tell us what these
cherubims represented. He didn't comment on any of that.
And maybe there were some reasons why he didn't. Maybe he didn't
have time. He wrote 13th chapters and the
last chapter just was closed and he said, bear with this word
of exhortation. I know it went on a long time.
And he could have went on a lot longer, so maybe that's why he
did it. Another reason, probably, that they couldn't hear it anyway. He'd already told them they were
dull of hearing, didn't he? But I tell you, sometimes the
best of men, the most spiritual men, can't hear something. The
Lord Jesus told His disciples, I've got many things to say unto
you, but you can't bear them now. You're babies. I can't feed meat to babies.
And it could be that He said, which I cannot now speak particular,
because He didn't know Himself. We think sometimes these prophets
and apostles, they knew everything, but they didn't. They absolutely
didn't. Daniel saw all those great visions,
and he saw one. He said, Lord, what does this
mean? And the Lord said, I'm not going to show you. You seal
your book up to the time of the end. John said, we're sons of
God. It don't yet appear to me what
we're going to be. It's just that when He shall appear, we
shall be like Him. That's all we know. There's things that
they didn't know, and really none of us know anything, whether
we're apostles or not, until He shows us. So we may very well
not have known. Let's go now to verse 9, so I
won't keep you too long. Let's finish this study by looking
at verse 9. We're speaking of all these figures,
and here's what He said about them. Which was a figure, all
this we've been looking at, the tabernacle and all the services
and the priest going into the Most Holy Place. The figure for
the time, then present. So this tabernacle and its figures
and its furniture, and all that took place there was just figures
for time, for the time then present. And this is what confused these
Jews. They couldn't understand this.
These things were divinely ordered of God. And now they're coming
to an end and replaced by something else, replaced by something new,
and they couldn't understand that. But you know, it's always
been that way. We've never lived long in one
time, have we? It's always been said for the
present time. There was a time back in eternity
when the triune God dwelt alone. But you know it didn't stay that
way. There'll come a time when God spake everything into existence. And He made man and He made woman
upon this earth. He made them upright. They had
sweet communion with their Creator in the garden, but listen, that
was just for a time. And things changed, didn't they? Man fell. And then from
the fall of Adam up into the flood, the old world that you
and I know so little about. And some people are so curious,
they study and they give their life's labor and finances to
find out What went on in the whole world? We know this much about it. It
was just for a time. Men got corrupt. They corrupted
the earth. The imagination of men's heart
was only evil continually, and it changed. The flood came and
took them all away. And then from the time of Abraham
to Moses, we're told that those people, the children of God,
had no certain dwelling place. Abraham came out of error of
the Chaldees, came into Canaan, went down to Egypt, back to Canaan.
And then Jacob had to go back to Assyria, came back to Canaan,
then went down to Egypt and back. They had no certain dwelling
place. But that was only for a time. Moses came on the scene
and everything changed again. God made this covenant with Israel,
gave them the law and this tabernacle in holy days, but you know, that
was just for the time present. It all changed, didn't it? And
then the Lord Jesus came, He obtained eternal redemption for
His Church, the gospel of the grace of Christ began to be preached,
the elect of God are being brought to the unity of the faith and
the knowledge of the Son of God, and this will continue. but not
forever. It's for only a time, the present
time. There's coming a day when everything
will be made new. The saints will have new bodies.
The heavens and the earth will be made new. Every man will be
assigned his long home, the righteous until life eternal. and the unbelievers
into everlasting torment. And not until then can it be
said. It will never be said the present
time again. It will never be said for the
present time again because eternity will forbid any change. The saints
will forever be eternally happy and holy in heaven And the wicked
will forever be miserable and tormented. And it will never
be said to either party, this is just for the present time.
And brothers and sisters, that's what I'm looking for. That's
what I'm longing for. Isn't it you? Where time will
be no more, but eternal bliss, a world to come. May God give
us that grace to be interested Even as those great cherubs are
interested and desire to look into these things, may God give
us grace. And may He give us an interest
in that world that's to come for His sake. Oh, Father, gracious
and holy Father, we thank You for letting us come here tonight,
putting it in our hearts to be here, making a way in Your kind
providence to gather here with Your children to worship You
publicly. We feel such a need of it. That's
why we're here this night. We're here at Your Word. You've
commanded us to assemble ourselves. And we thank You, Lord, for meeting
with us, giving us Your Word and preserving it, that we can
know You better. We thank You for these blessed Scriptures.
And I pray You'll give us eyes to see You and hearts to receive
You in all Your fullness. We pray, Our Father, for this
little congregation, those that are here and those that aren't.
Lord, would You give us grace to awaken us. Would You fill
our minds and our hearts with Yourself. Would You give us a
desire and our affections and a will to follow You, no matter
what may come upon us. We pray, Lord, for Your people.
Not only those that you've called and given life to, but we pray
for those you haven't called. And we pray there's some around
here in this area, some of your elect that you haven't brought
in yet. And you'll use this congregation to that end, to bring them to
the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God.
We bless your name. We bless you for your tender
mercies. Thank you for your goodness to us. Thank you for your faithfulness.
and grant, Lord, that we can be with you when this life is
over. Receive us as you received the
poor thief into the Father's house, your kingdom above, and
we'll spend eternity in your praises for it. Amen.