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18 in the back of the book.
And is this all?
Shall be the life thy son.
To him, there's some greatest way before me. I swallowed for.
It.
No.
Complete.
Everywhere.
Is it the mind of the Lord to go on with the reading then?
I think he'd be nice to everybody I think is anticipating what's going to come about in the fifth verse and going on further.
Second Peter, chapter one.
Did you say the fifth word verse, Bill? I was just suggesting maybe if anyone has a thought on the fourth verse that we didn't cover, we could go back to it. But we kind of rounded off the last meeting with the end of the fourth verse. So I think it might be nice to go on with the 5th.
Peter, I'm sorry, Second Peter, chapter one, beginning of verse 5.
And beside this giving all diligence add to your faith virtue, and to virtual knowledge, and to knowledge temperance, and to temperance patience, and to patience godliness, and to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness charity.
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For if these things be in you and abound.
They make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and have forgotten that he was purged from his own sins. Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure.
For if ye do these things, ye shall never fail. For so an entrance shall be minister unto you abundantly into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things, though you know them and be established.
In the present truth, yay, I think it meet as long as I am in this Tabernacle to stir you up by putting you in remembrance, knowing that shortly I must put off this my Tabernacle, even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath shown me. Moreover, I will endeavor that you may be able after my disease, to have these things always.
In remembrance, For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we may know unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but what eyewitnesses of His Majesty. For He received from God the Father honor and glory, when there came such a voice to Him from the excellent glory. This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.
And this voice which came from heaven, we heard when we were with him in the Holy Mount. We have also a more sure word of prophecy. Where unto ye do well, that you take heed as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn and the day star arise in your hearts, knowing this first, that no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation.
For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but holy man of God speak as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.
I like to make a comment on in verse four of the.
Exceeding great and precious promises.
Wonderful adjectives to that word Promises.
And isn't it wonderful, brethren, in the Scriptures, to lay hold on the promises of God? Take God at his word. He said it, He means it, and he is glorified when we take God at his word.
It's wonderful to think of them. The book is full of promises, and this is what faith does. It lays hold of the promises. We're work walking through a world that is.
Troubled, and even we get troubled at times, brethren, and we need to be encouraged to lay hold on these promises.
Just mention a couple that to me are exceedingly precious. One is I will never leave the nor forsake thee. He's with us. And you know, sometimes Brother Bill mentioned it this morning, but we get into circumstances that it appears that things are going against us.
Remember a young sister saying to me one time the Lord's left me? I said, How do you know that?
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She says, well, I don't feel like he's with me anymore.
I say, do your feelings ever change? Yeah.
Does the Word of God ever change? No.
Which is the better thing, to trust the word of God or your feelings? Well, I guess we better trust the Word of God. I agree, I say, because it does not change. Feelings are very real thing, brother. And then we can't ignore it. Exactly. But our faith should not be in our feelings. Our faith should be in something steadier than that.
Exceeding great and precious promises.
One of the other promises that is so precious to our hearts as believers.
Simple words, I will come again, the Lord Jesus said.
As he comes since that time.
No, that is a promise. He's coming again, and we need to live in the light of that promise. He's coming again, brethren. And so these are promises, and there's so many more promises in Scripture that when we pass through the trials of life, they're there for us to lay hold of and to claim them with our God.
Lord, help us brethren, to be exercised in that now in verse five as we go into the question of our faith.
And the exhortations about it, it says, let add to your faith virtue.
But notice what it says at the beginning of verse 5 giving.
All diligence. What is that word?
Brother and I suggest that there's some energy involved in diligence.
Notice it's mentioned in verse 10 as well as well. Wherefore the rather brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you shall never fall. Diligence, Lord help us brother. And these are important things. They're not just things that OK, if you like OK.
If you don't like, OK, that's not it.
We need to be serious about it. These are important diligence giving all diligence. Add to your faith, virtue. And then there's several other more to be added.
I take it that virtue and maybe other brethren can add to this, but it's what James says in his epistle in chapter 2 That faith without works is dead. In other words, he's saying you say you have faith. Let me see it by works.
Have that moral courage put it into action.
That's what he's saying here.
Add to your faith virtue.
So it takes effort, doesn't it, to enjoy the Lord and to live the Christian life.
God didn't save us in order simply to let us float along in this world and expect everything to go well for us. And we would continually learn more. Why is that? Oh, because we value something more if there's effort involved in getting it.
I think most parents here understand that. And if a child wants something, it's not unusual for the parent to say, well, if you can save a certain amount, I'll help you out with it. But simply to hand it out to them without any effort on their part causes them not to value it in the way that they should. And so in spiritual things, God has placed them there. They are ours in Christ, no question but.
Effort is needed on our part. Diligence is needed because there are enemies in this world. There are those that would take away from us what we have. And diligence is needed in every step of the way. And so I couldn't emphasize more what Bob has been saying.
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Giving all diligence, let's live out what we have. Faith is before God, but the moral courage to live it out in this world.
Is something that we all need and it brings it home to our souls in a real way when it has its practical effect in our lives.
I wonder if we could just back up just a little bit and finish. I think, I think we have skipped a little bit of verse four, the end of verse four, and it has to do with the effect.
Of the.
Let me get back there. And the great says in Darby, through which he has given to us the greatest and precious.
Promises that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through loss. This seems to be a a progression.
Of the effect of the great and precious promises that the Lord has given to us, that the effect of those promises on the sole realized by faith will produce in the divine nature.
An ability to escape the corruption that is in the world through lust. It seems to me that that's a process.
That we enter into and is to our advantage.
That we don't have to experience the corruption that is in the world through through lust. I'd like to just liken that verse to 1St John chapter 3.
Here's Here's kind of one of the promises that the believer has to enjoy.
Verse two of first John three says, Beloved, now are we the sons of God? And it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when we when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. So that's a prospect, a promise that the believer has to look forward to, and the result of that promise on the soul. That prospect is in every man that hath this hope in him.
Purifies himself even has he is pure. So that prospect of appearing with him and being like him has a purifying effect in our practical life. And I think that I bear to be corrected that in our the end of our verse in first Peter chapter.
One. One verse.
Verse 3. Verse 4.
I'm just going to read the whole verse and then we can go on.
Whereby are you given, are are given unto a succeeding, great and precious promises, that by these you may be partakers of the divine nature. And I think that has to do with the effect of the divine nature.
Inactivity.
Will having escaped the corruption that is in the world through loss, so the effect of the divine nature and activity will actually cause us to be able to escape the corruption that is in the world through lust? Is there Is that is that thought correct?
I think it is.
That if you.
Were to have the right and capacity to go out on the street here in Addison and meet somebody who was not a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.
And you said to them.
Next week.
You're going to die and go to heaven.
You think they'd be happy?
I don't.
And if you took them to heaven and they were there as they are in their present state on the street, they would say, can I go back to earth?
They would find nothing there that satisfied their nature and the thought of leaving what they do know on earth to go somewhere they don't know and can I say, really have no attraction to their natural heart. That promise of next week you're going to heaven with. Of course, the idea you're going to die here would not be an attractive promise. That person would say no.
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Yes, if you said when you lot, when you when you leave this world.
Do you want to go to heaven or hell? You'll typically get an answer if person cares to say they believe in such things as well. Yes, of course I want to go to heaven, but as a present.
Thing that has any effect on how daily life is lived, it's that that's down the road somewhere. I'm not interested in that. I got a bill to pay. I've got to get to the dentist. I want to go to the Cubs game or whatever that is on their present agenda and interest and they value.
God has given us certain things and promised them to us in a way that if they're laid hold of, and only if in faith they're laid hold of, does the world become a wilderness to the soul.
We say we're pilgrims in the wilderness, but if we don't lay hold of what's been before us this morning.
In truth, in activity, we don't act that way. We say, I want to find as much enjoyment as I can out of life now, and when it's over, I want to go to heaven. Yes, Jesus saved me and I'm looking forward to heaven, but as something that presently effects everyday life?
What's the relevance? What's the importance of it? But what's presented here is.
If these things really are entered into in the heart, these great and precious promises are laid hold of, then it affects the everyday life. And there is a character to everyday life that is.
Takes on its character, its value, its importance in view of what's ahead. And so it says in in this list of things that brings before us the, you might say what it's looking on to is.
Found in verse, the calling is given, and then in verse 11 it says, for thus shall an entrance into the everlasting Kingdom. That's what's looked on toward, and these divine life, character features of everyday life are seen as a person. If I could put it this way, that's spoiled for the world.
Truly, a Pilgrim in character looks at the things of the world as a danger to it, as something to distract it or defile it from being.
Like its object, the Lord Jesus which is promised in first John chapter 3 and verse three that was read. He that hath this hope in him and Peter's giving us something of the hope, at least he refers to it, he doesn't explain it. And if I have this hope in me, then I want to be like him now.
And God says I've given you every provision.
By imparting to you the same life and nature of the Lord Jesus and the same Spirit of God that was active in his life, that you can go through this dangerous path that he went through and you need in practice to add these things in in a practical everyday.
Moral way that you have the nature for.
But you have to live it out in its character and its practice. And it's sometimes very difficult lessons that have to be learned to grow in that which is given to us. And Peter is saying you, you in view of these things, therefore add in view of what I've just said to you, then here's the things you want to do to live it out.
Two, he said here in 11Th verse that you just read for so a entrance shall be ministered under you abundantly into the everlasting Kingdom. That's not the Father's house. The Lord Jesus, when he went away and had lived with the disciples for those three years and they had learned to love him, to trust him, and then he said, I'm going to go away. So they were very lonely.
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But he said, I'm going to go to my father's house. But don't worry, there's not just room for me there, there's room for all of you there. And I'm going to come back and I'm going to get you and I'm going to take you to my father's house and I'm never going to leave you again. You will be with me when I come out and I reign in the Kingdom. You'll be with me when I the new earth and the new heaven are set up, never going to leave you again. But the Kingdom is different. And so there's reward.
In the Kingdom, and so one has and you probably heard this illustration it's it's like 2 ships out on the sea and one gets into the storm and that's the captain is kind of poorly trained and the sales get tore up and The thing is all the rigging is hanging around and he just cripples into pork. But the other one, this captain he's.
Paid attention.
To how to sail through a storm and he comes in full sail into the harbor. They both come in, but one comes in in glory and the other one comes in crippling, as we might say if that's.
A right term for ships, but you get the picture. So the Kingdom is different. We can have an abundant interest into the Kingdom. Everyone is going to be in the Father's house, right? Is that?
If that's not right, tell me.
And we'll all be in the Kingdom too. But like you say, there will be an abundant entrance to encourage us in these things. I'd like to just mention here, brother. And then the verses that follow, verses 5-6 and seven where we have 7 things to be added to faith.
It mentions in the following verses these things five times. Notice verse eight if these things be in you.
Verse nine. He that lacketh these things.
Verse 10 at the end, for if you do these things, you shall never fall, and verse 12.
Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things.
Then verse 15, moreover, I will endeavor that you may be able after my deceased to have these things always in remembrance. So when you come across that expression, these things, it refers back to those seven things that are to be added to faith. Very interesting and important to keep this before us. It's a progression perhaps, and I see.
That these things that are to be added to faith, each compliment the previous in a special way, beautiful. So faith is first of all.
To be added as virtue that moral courage. Do you really believe God what he, when he says something, put it into action?
Go ahead. That's the moral courage. And then that's not the only thing. Knowledge, knowledge is important. Knowledge isn't everything either, but it is important. And so there are people that have, they say moral courage, but it's not according to knowledge. We need knowledge too.
And then to knowledge to add temperance self-control.
And then to temperance, patience or endurance.
These are important things in our faith, brethren.
And then to patience, godliness.
Be so patient. Sometimes you're patient with stuff that isn't to be patient with brother, and we need to add godliness to that.
And then you can be so godly you don't show any brotherly kindness. Add some brotherly kindness.
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And then the last is love. Charity. That's divine love. That's the agape love.
And I think it's so beautiful to see these things and I hope my brethren will help out in explaining these things too, because it's such a beautiful progression and it each one complements the other.
Philippians chapter 3 the Lord Jesus, I'm Lord Jesus. The apostle Paul, expressing his desire to the Philippian Saints, said that I may know him.
He had that intense personal desire of his soul above anything else to know the Lord Jesus better than he did. And he said concerning that, he said if passing through death and experiencing death and resurrection.
Helps me to know Him better because he passed through death and resurrection. I'm for it. He counted it an opportunity as another way in which he could know the Lord Jesus better by having gone through a shared experience and what we have here in these things. It says so that she be neither barren in verse 8 nor unfruitful in the what?
The knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. And so was He temperate.
Was the Lord Jesus temperate?
Then the exhortation is you be diligent in that divine nature which has been given to you to learn to be temperate, and if so, you will share that with the Lord Jesus and you will know Him better.
Was he patient?
That divine nature, does it have the capacity to be patient? Yes, it does. It's perfectly patient nature. And so if that nature is in activity such that there is that temperance seen in life, then you will know Him better. And each one of these things that are brought out before us are things in which when they are carried out and learn to be lived out in life.
The result is to be fruitful in that which we want to be, which is to know him, to know him better, to know him as well as we can possibly know him.
And.
It's important as well to see that.
Some of these things have to be learned now.
And you're not going to learn them as you can now in heaven. If we are not diligent in the learning of these things now, we're missing out on a very important opportunity in our lives to know the Lord Jesus in heaven in a way that we will not experience. What do I mean by that?
Is there going to be a single thing in heaven to try your patience?
Anything. The answer is no. You'll not have a single situation in heaven that will have any reason to try your patience.
Was the Lord Jesus as a man on earth, was that character of his life such that he had to exercise patience? Yes, it was. We see it repeatedly in his life. And the circumstances of life on earth were that which tested patients. And so we wanted, we want to know it, we want to be fruitful. Then there are some of these things that it's it's important right here and now.
To add them in a way that we get to know our Lord Jesus better and experience Him in that way as a shared knowledge even when we get to glory.
So these things aren't just kind of practical, well, yes or no's, they're extremely important if our hearts value the knowledge, personal knowledge, of knowing the Lord Jesus Christ in a individual and intimate way.
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Does that take sacrifice then for ourselves?
All said, I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live.
But the life, but the life that he lived, I live.
By the flesh, by this, by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. And also in Romans 12. It tells us ibcg therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice.
We we don't, we don't get these virtues.
Unless we sacrifice ourselves our our carnality.
I I know what you experience my canard.
Stops me from knowing the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And it takes, it takes a sacrifice, giving myself to him, letting the Lord Jesus live inside me that that he might be able to display all these virtues that we're talking about. And even even even when it comes to the fruit of the spirit, it has to be sacrificed. That's the spiritual part of us. We can, we cannot allow our flesh to control us. If we do and it will, then we, we won't learn anything. I mean, a, a cardinal, a carnal man.
Will only know the milk of the word. He'll never know that the deep knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ not not like a spiritual man that that that a carnal man is just almost like a like like the natural man, except he's he's renewed spiritually. But it takes it takes us spiritually a spiritual man to really know that the the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.
That's why in verse nine I think it's the referring to what's just been said. It here it brings out as the word.
Blind and short sighted in other words, to live according to the lusts of Adam's nature that we have in US is to be blind and short sighted because in that we don't get to know the Lord Jesus. In fact we're hindered from it. It stops us from entering into a fellowship with himself and the knowledge of himself. And so Peter saying, if you don't add these things which are.
Expressions of the life of Christ, the new nature. Well then it's to be blind and short sighted. It's it's not to see and not to enter in or value the promises that would make us as Peter expresses it here, or as we've already had in John. He that hath this hope in himself purifies himself as he is pure, that is, goes through the exercise to learn to value and live out.
That which is of the Newman, and to reckon as dead, that which is of the old or otherwise, were blind and short sighted.
I would suggest that we are short sighted in just the very way Don that you explained a few minutes ago, and that is there is a dimension of the knowledge of Christ that we can learn only down here. Our patience, as you pointed out, will never be tried in heaven. We will never go through difficult circumstances and see what the Lord can do in bringing us through.
In heaven, we will never go through trials down there and see how the Lord can meet us in those trials.
And have the chance to go through them with him up there. We learn that down here. But what we learn down here in that way?
Is not merely for this life. We have it for all eternity now. I would just suggest a thought that's related to that if you turn to Revelation chapter 2.
Now there are other thoughts that are connected with this, but Revelation 2 and verse 17.
We find here, and we won't go into the details of this particular assembly which is addressed here pergamos, but the overcomer, it says in verse 17, the middle of the verse to him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manner.
What was the hidden manner? It was the manner that was laid up in the bowl and hidden, as it were in the Ark of the Covenant, as a reminder and memory of what they had experienced in the wilderness. Once they entered the land, there was no more manna, the eight of the old corn of the land, and the manna ceased. It says, And in that sense, when you and I get to the glory, the opportunity to learn more of Christ in manhood, of which the manna speaks.
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Is not going to be there, but we have it down here. But up there.
Having been faithful to him down here, here and learn more of Him, we will be able to eat of that hidden manner up there. That is the enjoyment with Christ of all that we have learned in walking through circumstances, in fellowship with him and through which he walked in his pathway and so.
It's a very blessed thing when we think of it, and an opportunity that, as we've been reminded, we shouldn't miss out on. We shouldn't necessarily try to evade the difficulties down here because it will be worth far more in the coming day than if we had the smoothest path there could be. But the one who wants to evade that, why is he blind and cannot see it far off? Because his sights are on time.
And on the life down here, rather than looking at eternity.
Connection with that in in verse 11 as it says.
An entrance ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Part of the aspect of that Kingdom, not all of it, but part of it is. It's a Kingdom.
In which absolutely everything is morally consistent with what God is.
As we have in Romans.
The Kingdom of God is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. The Kingdom that we are destined for, that we are called to, is a Kingdom that is morally like God in His own nature, and everything in the Kingdom will be consistent with Himself.
He's wanting us to enter into that Kingdom. Can I put it this way? Fully grown?
Fully grown, with a full measure of intelligence as to his moral character. And yet we recognize you take a little child and it has all the capacity of its parents, but they're undeveloped in it. They are. The little child doesn't feel the same way as his father and mother. It doesn't think the same way as its father and mother, even though it has the same nature.
And it has the same capacity to do that. But little by little the child grows. And as it grows and matures and develops it, the parents can have more and more fellowship with it in those things which are common to their nature. And if you will, the Lord Jesus every day would like to have a little more fellowship with us. But that fellowship has to be, as John says, in the light.
Consistent with the nature of God.
He can't have fellowship with us in the flesh and the activities of the flesh. There's no fellowship there and there's no knowledge there. There's no growth there. But in the living out of that which is given to us in the living of it out, there's growth.
And that growth brings us into the enjoyment more and more of our destiny. And you might say we want to get home fully grown and having entered into, but any other goal or motive or whatever in US, and sadly most of us can say too much of life has been governed by something else, is a hindrance to that growth.
And a loss to our souls. And if I can put it this way.
It's a loss to the Lord Jesus too.
And that ought to make us feel it, that the Lord more than we misses when these things are not present in us. He misses the fellowship, He misses the communion that his soul desires to have with us. And even that ought to motivate us to say, please Lord, let's get together and be on the same track.
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He not walked with God.
And he was not, but God took me.
Yeah, there's testimony that he please God.
Marvelous.
The pleasure of God is to have fellowship with us and he had fellowship with Enoch and, and he wants to have no, he doesn't want to wait till we get to heaven. He wants that fellowship with us today and tomorrow in Matthew Chapter 11.
Verse.
28 We often use it in the gospel.
Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you and learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly in part, and you should find rest under your souls, for My yoke is easy, My burden is light.
The Lord Jesus never had to add.
These things we get in Peter, they didn't have to grow in him.
He was a marvelous object for the heart.
Unmatchable, John says. Which our eyes.
Have looked upon our ears, Have heard our hands, Have handled looking on eternal life.
Marvelous, that blessed person.
But this man as he walked here.
What was his yoke?
He was under.
I should say within the Father's booze.
As he looked upon the needs of the lane, the flying.
The the dead.
Marvelous.
Is that bosom communicated with the sun?
Son, we're going to raise this widow's son.
Son, we're going to heal this blind man.
Son, tell that man to stretch forth his withered hand.
What a yoke was his.
When we look upon him, the pure object transforms us.
It's not.
Laws that transform us.
Not rules the Transformers.
But there's someone to observe now. We've had read to us in John 15.
There.
Verse 7 If you abide in me, yes, we didn't read that verse, and my words abide in you. You shall ask what you will, and it should be done unto you. Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit.
So shall you be my disciples.
As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you. Continue in my love.
If you keep my commandments, you shall abide in my love, even as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in His love. These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.
You know as as we.
Failing.
What it is to abide in His love.
To learn of his yoke.
And I think we see some of that paralleled here in this chat.
Just the abundant privilege we have. But he says that your joy might be full.
Well.
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We had remarks about someone worried about their joy. Wasn't very full this morning.
To to look upon him though, That's what transforms us.
The person of the Lord Jesus, that eternal life John looked upon.
Marvelous.
And the.
Simple words there in Matthew.
About my yoke and learn at me for a meek and lowly of heart, and then some.
Chapter 8.
Psalm, chapter 8. Out of the Mouths of Babes and Sucklings, verse 2.
Hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and The Avengers?
The new translation.
Breeds out of the mouths of babes and sufferings. Hast thou established praise?
Because of thine adversaries.
To still the enemy and the Avenger.
What do you tell us in Matthew 18?
Check your intent.
And become as little children.
What a blessed person we have.
To view and learn from.
And this verse says.
Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast thou established praise because of thine adversaries. The word adversaries there is. You'll notice in the.
New Translation.
Footnote I believe.
The oppressor.
Of the remnant from within.
Judas was one of those.
But it's out of the mouths of Bates and sucklings that you get that strength.
Against the enemy's power.
When we look at some of our brethren in the middle.
Those having the most difficulty probably are those from.
They call Muslim background believers.
According to their religion.
They're the Muslims have to kill them.
Unless they repay.
But to see their simple.
Faith, Christ has laid hold of their souls.
And they're ready to go.
Unto death.
Because they have that peace, that joy, that forgiveness.
Marvelous.
The light of the Gospel.
Shines in the face of those dear Saints.
Laying down their lives for Christ.
The Millennium, then this.
Is this millennial Kingdom or is there a different Kingdom?
I would suggest Vern, at least the way I've looked at it is it is the millennial Kingdom and Bob was referring to it earlier. But we know that as far as the actual outward display of the Kingdom, it has a finite time frame attached to it of 1000 years. But as Dawn was bringing out, the moral side of the Kingdom of God is an everlasting Kingdom. And in that sense that endures forever. That's everlasting.
And you and I for all eternity, if we could say it will display the full character of God, and that is.
To me anyway, the meaning of the expression the everlasting Kingdom. Eventually, as we find later on in this epistle, there's going to be an eternal state when everything, everything in heaven and on earth will be absolutely and totally and eternally.
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According to God's mind, and that's what God is working toward. But you and I can have that abundant entrance into it now. And this would have been a very special interest to those to whom Peter was writing, because the epistle does have a Jewish flavor to it. And they had in many cases been very disappointed because the earthly Kingdom which they were expecting did not materialize.
And suddenly, you might say their thinking was having to be totally changed and look forward to a heavenly Kingdom. But God assures them it's going to be an everlasting Kingdom. And in that sense, of course there is.
The heavenly side of the Kingdom, but it says here of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So I would suggest that it is the moral side that's perhaps.
In view connected with the word everlasting, is that how you would see it done? Yes, I agree with them.
But in the transfiguration that we have.
Is really what he saw on the Mount of Transfiguration at the end of the chapter, but.
That's good. Thank you. And they in that transfiguration scene you see?
Two figures that are heavenly, that is Moses and Elijah. And you see three figures that are earthly. So it includes the both, doesn't it? The Kingdom has the sense of rule, doesn't it? And it's necessary in the millennial day because sin will still be in the earth. But like you say, in the eternal state, righteousness does not rule.
Righteousness dwells, but in the millennial day, righteousness will reign.
But eternal state? It's the permanent character.
Too in the transfiguration on the mount, that brings out a little aspect of this as well. And that is what was Peter and James and John reaction when they saw that Kingdom. It was fear.
Was fear. Well, they didn't say whoa, this is wonderful. This is what we're going to this is our destiny. This is.
Can't wait. No, it was not that.
They had a reaction of fear.
They saw the moral.
Excellency of light on display, and they had a very conscious sense in themselves of not being totally consistent with that.
And the consequence was fear.
One of the things that we tend to lack, naturally speaking, because we live in a world that the very often the Old Testament people had a much better sense than we do.
Many of them at least, and that was to them to see God was a fearful thing, and they were afraid to see God, and they thought if they did they would die. And the reason is, is because they had a certain sense of.
The character of God in His Holiness. We live in such an ungodly world that we don't naturally enter in very well into the holy character of God. And yet Peter and James and John, where you might say from a godly Jewish background, and they had that Old Testament sense and when the majesty of the holiness of God was displayed before their eyes.
In a physical way, they had fear as a consequence of it.
But.
The intent for us is the revelation of that light has been now given to us in Christianity, so that instead of approaching it with fear, there would be that reverential desire to be more suited to it every day that we would enter in. That the Lord could, if I could put it in a practical way.
Could embrace us coming into the the Kingdom and its public character and say and and we not have to have a a lifestyle change.
01:00:10
That the moral character of our lives wouldn't need any change.
Our bodies will need changing when we get to glory. But does our moral character in? Is there so much flesh and activity in us? Then it hinders the knowledge. But the desire of the entrance would be that to the fullest measure possible. Go again to the same verse. He that hath this hope in Him purifies self, even as He is pure. For we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.
And so when we see the Lord Jesus in that perfect full character of light and love will be like him. But we want to be as much as possible like him at the moment we enter into that state and Peter, Peter and seeing the more earthly public display of yet was also as which was more Jewish still. It was the same desire that.
The people that you might say would see us would say, well, that's the way they live their life. Their life is just now consistent with the way things now are in contrast to the way they once were.
Could we sing together hymn #76 in the appendix?
Thine Jesus, thine no more this heart of mine, so she shall seek its joys apart from me. The world is crucified to me, and I am thine. 76 in the appendix.
They tried my soul.
For us.
So.
I shall come.
And give you my home.
Forever.
Free from us.
01:05:17
Converse in.
The 22nd chapter of Revelation.
The little hymn certainly brought this out.
Revelation 22.
And.
Verse 20 and 21.
He which is God, which testifieth these things, saith.
Surely I come quickly. Amen.
Even so, come Lord Jesus, that's our cry.
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.
Amen. But the focus was Even so.
Lord Jesus.