Lawrenceville Conference: 2012
Table of Contents
Revelation 21
Reading
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See what manner of behavior does with this hope Agree. And in the prayers this morning those things that would bring before us the coming of the Lord.
My own soul, I believe that that's at any moment, uh, just as a doctrine, but as a reality. And I would like to suggest that we take off in connection with the thought of the Lord's coming. There are many different places where it could be taken off, but I would suggest it be taken up in Revelation chapter 21, where we have the description of the bride, the Lamb's wife. If I could put it this way, I suggest that we have a little dress rehearsal.
That we look at that a bride who is about to be married often goes to the mirror and looks at herself as she hopes she's going to be to her bridegroom. And I believe we have something of that character in Revelation 21. Beginning verses start with the eternity coming, and perhaps to be consistent we should begin there, but the emphasis really begins from verse 9.
I think that's a very, very good Don and excellent portion for us.
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Revelation chapter 21.
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the 1St heaven and the first earth were passed away, and there was no more sea. And I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the Tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people.
And God himself shall be with them and be their God.
And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away. And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, right, for these words are true and faithful. And he said unto me, It is done, I am alpha and Omega.
The beginning and the end I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.
And he that over cometh shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. But the fearful and unbelieving, and the abominable, and the murderers, and ************ and sorcerers and idolaters.
And all liars shall have their part in the lake of fire, which burneth with fire and brimstone.
Which is the second death? And there came unto me one of the seven angels.
Which had the seven vials full of the seven last plagues. And talked with me, saying, Come, hit her, I will show thee the bride, the Lamb's wife. And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, having the glory of God. And her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a Jasper stone.
Clear as crystal, and had a wall great and high, and had 12 gates, and at the gates 12 angels and names written thereon, which are the names of the 12 tribes of the children of Israel.
On the east 3 gates, on the north 3 gates, on the South 3 gates, and on the West 3 gates. And the wall of the city had 12 foundations, and in them the names of the 12 apostles of the Lamb. And he that talked with me had a golden Reed to measure the city.
And the gates thereof, and the wall thereof.
And the city lieth 4 square, and the length is as large as the bridge. And he measured the city with the Reed 12,000 furlongs, and the length in the breadth, and the heights of it are equal. And he measured the wall thereof and 140 and four cubits.
According to the measure of a man, that is of the Angel.
And the building of the wall of it was Jasper. And the city was pure gold, like unto clear glass. And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was Jasper.
The second Sapphire, the third a Caledonian, the 4th in Emerald, the 5th of Sardonic, and the 6th Sardis, the 7th Chrysolite, the 8th Barrel, the 9th of Topaz, the 10th of Christopresses, the 11Th adjacent the 12Th and Amethyst, and the 12 gates were 12 Pearls, every several gate was of 1 Pearl, and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass.
And I saw in the temple therein, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof.
And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it, and the kings of the earth to bring their glory and honor into it. And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day, for there shall be no night there.
And they shall bring the glory and honor of the nations into it, and there shall in no wise enter into it anything that defile it, neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie, but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life.
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1St 8 verses of this chapter.
Are one of the few places in Scripture that give to us a view of what's coming and what we call the eternal state, the day of God.
And after that, in verse nine, at the end of the chapter and into the 22nd chapter, we have a description of the bride, the Lamb's wife, in her display of millennial glory as associated with the Lamb when he reigns over all the earth and.
It's we lose a tremendous amount if we simply say, oh, we're in the Revelation, we're in prophecy and so on, rather than this is the description of us.
This is we who are part of the body of Christ are being described here, and I believe as well for us to look at the description and then ask ourselves the question in connection with it. Is my present daily life in the anticipated enjoyment of what I'm being brought into as part of as well as is my present daily life consistent with this expectation and hope? And it's really a thrilling hope for the soul if we lie in on it, so I'm not.
Before me so much the prophetic side of things, but rather the that which is described to us here for our blessing and benefit that will affect our outlook and our attitude as we go through our daily lives and anticipation. But before we really get to the ninth verse, we can spend a little time, I think profitably in the 1St 8 verses which presents the coming eternity to us in God's view of it for us.
We might well ask ourselves then, why, before He takes up the Church in her millennial glory, reigning with Christ over the earth, does he take up the eternal state? That's not in chronological order. We know that the chronological order will be just the reverse, but I suggest that we have at least part of the answer by backing up to the end of the 19th, the 20th chapter, where at the end of the 20th chapter he has taken up the great White Throne judgment.
And if we could put it this way, the Great White Throne Judgment is the last great act of time and the first great act of eternity. It's what really bridges time and eternity. And so having taken up that, then he goes on to describe in a few words, because there really is no human description to describe something that is beyond our grasp for comprehension now. But he goes on in a few verses then to take up the eternal state. Then he goes back and as you say, he fills in some details.
Concerning the millennial range of the Church with Christ. But there really is no human language to give a description of that which is beyond us now. Because we are governed by physical limitations, we find ourselves mercifully in the sphere of time. God is very graciously placed us in time and with physical limitations to operate.
Here on this planet Earth now. But think of it, brethren. There's a day coming when the things that affect us now are going to be completely done away. The Millennium on Earth is not going to be a perfect state of things as we know from the Old Testament. But there is a day coming when both for the heavenly sphere and the earthly sphere, all that affects us now, affects the creation now, is going to be done away.
And that's why when he sees the city coming down out of heaven as a bride, he it speaks about there being a new heaven and A and a new earth. There's no more sea. In other words, there's no more death, no more distance. CC no distance. Now, I believe season Scripture also speak of restlessness and sorrow. Jeremiah speaks, I think it's in the 49th chapter of the book of Jeremiah about sorrow on the sea.
All these things are denoted in the thought of a sea. But there's going to be no more sorrow. There's going to be no more restlessness of humanity which the sea often brings before us. There's going to be our distance is not going to be measured in the same way in which it is now. But I think what is overall helpful to see is that eternity is not a melting pot. The heavenly and the earthly company do not meld together. They remain distinct.
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For all eternity and of the heavenly company, the bride remains distinct too, not beautiful. And to think, brother, that we are going to remain the bride of all of Christ for all eternity and not just his wife as we get later on in connection with her function in the Millennium and so on. But the bride, those brought that bridal affection and that bridal beauty is never going to fade. You know, we were going through some old pictures recently of my parents and.
Different ones that we've known in the past. And a lot of wedding pictures, you know, as we look at those pictures, we realize time brings in its changes and its differences. But there's a day coming when time isn't going to affect that scene. And no, nothing is going to change. And the Lord Jesus is the bridegroom going to shower his love on the bride for all eternity. And she's never going to lose that place of beauty and affection to his heart. And if that doesn't thrill our hearts and cause us to walk in a way.
That is in view of that now breathing and we need to get down on our knees and examine our stated goal.
Everything connected with time changes. Everything connection with eternity is fixed.
And I suggest another reason perhaps Jim, that we have the eternal state first is because.
God's eternal purpose was this.
What we see in the 1St 8 verses and this is what will be for all eternity.
That relationship is purposeless.
A companion for his son, and there she is not a bride.
Prepared for her husband for all eternity. The freshness because there is no passing time, there is no change.
Wonderful.
And someone has said and I've enjoyed the comment.
The Millennium is necessary for the public vindication of God's holy character.
His glory was dragged in the dust for 6000 years.
His beloved Son came into this world and was crucified and had no rights for himself. God says, I will vindicate myself. I will vindicate my beloved Son right in the very world where he was cast out and crucified. But that is a finite time, isn't it? That is a finite period of 1000 years.
But then the eternal state is, you might say, for the everlasting satisfaction of God's heart. And as we've remarked, that never changes. There is a scene which.
God can rest in for all eternity, and of course ultimately you and I will rest with Him too. But the primary thought is we've had brought before us is that God will rest in that wonderful scene for all eternity, and you and I will enjoy that rest.
It's beautiful in that connection to see that and I know it's anticipating a little, but.
When the bride is mentioned here.
It mentions the city as well and.
And in verse 9, which takes up as we've had brought before us the glory of the Church, as pictured as the heavenly city during the Millennium, we also.
Get the bride mentioned and in verse 10 referred to as the city but.
I've enjoyed it this way and I'm indebted to others for this thought, but it's beautiful to see.
When it's millennial glory.
The bride is viewed as a city because there there is government, there is administration, there is, if you like, a perfect government, the first one that this world will ever have seen.
But in the eternal state, it's reversed. The city is viewed as a bride. The city is viewed as a bride. Why? Because in the eternal state, the emphasis is not on government, not on administration.
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But rather on relationship. And that's what you were bringing out, Jim. And I love that the eternal state will be relationship for all eternity, because it will be the everlasting satisfaction of God's heart and the honor and glory of his beloved Son and in the blessing of those whom he has chosen to be with them, whether in heaven or on earth.
I say be with them. Maybe that is that could be more accurately displayed.
Or, accurately stated, those who have been chosen to be with him in heaven and those who have been brought into blessing on earth.
In order to be to the eternal satisfaction of God's heart, everything has to be made new.
So we have the history of Adam's rice brought before us in scripture, and the conclusion of the history of the first creation in Adam is in First Corinthians 15. It says in Adam all die, and the moment that Adam sinned, and also Satan's fall.
God couldn't rest, He couldn't have a satisfaction for his heart in the condition in which things were. And he looked at his creation and, uh, on the 7th day in preparation for man here, it says he rested after he created man and placed him here. But from the moment that Adam and Eve sinned, God hasn't rested. He says my father worketh hitherto and I work but.
In Adam, all die. There's no future for Adam's creation. There's no future for anything connected with it. The heavens, the earth, and everything connected that is spoiled by sin has no future. There's not a single thing you can lay your eyes on in this room in its present condition that will last nothing.
We will last, but we have to be changed to have bodies of glory, and in that way there is something visible here that will remain, but it has to be changed to remain.
So as part of God's work, he starts anew in Christ. In Adam, all die. In Christ all shall be made alive, and all of us who belong to the Lord Jesus have been brought into a new creation, as we have in 2nd Corinthians 5, and through Christ's death and resurrection.
And so it's by death that we leave the old creation.
In in Christ and in his resurrection, we participate in that life that is eternal and we enjoy it. Here we have the actual physical creation finally removed from the sight of God. I make a new heaven and a new earth. Behold, I make all things new, he says in verse five. And when this work is done, then all sin.
And all the first creation will have been removed from the sight of God. And then he can look upon that which is new, that which is founded on the work of the Lamb, his Son. And he can rest in the satisfaction of his own heart. He can just say, now it's done. In fact, the Lord in this the Lamb says it is finished in this book. And when it's all finished and it's all done, then God says.
Now we're gonna be, we're gonna remain together in this relationship forever and rather than that's our future, we can enjoy it today in anticipation. But that's what's ahead of us, to have God resting in his satisfaction of his own heart. Inconsistency too with his nature of light and love. It's explained a little further too, isn't it in Second Peter chapter 3.
Where he tells us that at the end of the millennial reign and of time, the elements are going to melt with fervent heat. That is as you say, everything that has been tainted with sin is going to be completely dissolved and done away. Because the Millennium from an earthly perspective will show that the whole creation is painted with sin. And while righteousness will reign in the Millennium, it will not dwell until the eternal state. And Peter brings that out, that then there will be a day where where in righteousness will dwell.
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Not just simply rain, but not only is this planet tainted with sin, but all creation. Satan was cast out of the presence of God. He's the Prince of the power of the air. Man has sent his junk and his probes up into outer space. Everything that the enemy Satan and man has touched has become tainted and polluted. And so God will do it completely away or do it completely away with it. And then it's just as if he says.
I'm inviting you to a scene now where sin will never come. Sin penetrated the first creation.
And man fell, and the whole creation, not just man, but the whole creation growneth and travaileth in pain and came under the effects of sin as a result. But I do want to, in connection with what Bill said a little earlier, just read another portion in First Corinthians 15, because there's something else very beautiful in connection with the ushering in of the eternal state. As was said, we have very, very little said about it.
But I have enjoyed in this connection some verses here in the resurrection chapter, verse 26 of First Corinthians 15. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. 3 hath put all things under his feet. But when he Seth, all things are put under him. It is manifest that he is expected which did put all things under him. And I want you to notice this. And when all things shall be subdued unto him.
Then shall the Son also Himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be All in all in a beautiful brethren. To think that the Lord Jesus, after he has taken up the work of judgment that is committed to Him, and all things are set straight, straight, all things are set right, and the last enemy to be destroyed is death. What does he do? He delivers up the Kingdom to the Father.
So that as a man he can devote eternity to his bride. Does that throw your heart and mind as he's going to be God for all eternity, but he is going to remain a man so that he can spend eternity with you and with me as his bride. And as was pointed out in Revelation, the bride remains distinct. She doesn't just melt into the heavenly company as as a as a big part of it, A hodgepodge, so to speak, No.
Distinct in her bridal affection, her nearness and relationship to the man Christ Jesus for all eternity. And He delivers up the Kingdom to the Father. Because there's nothing else to be ruled over. There's nothing else to be suppressed or held in check. A Kingdom or rule gives the thought of something that needs to be held in check or suppress ruled over. That is not going to be necessary any longer, however.
It does say they shall reign forever and ever. What is established in the Millennium is going to go into the eternal state, but without anything needing to be put down or kept in check. But he's going to deliver up the Kingdom brethren, to the Father that he might spend eternity with us. And that's why when it's the eternal state, it's God. God shall be All in all. It's the day of God in second Peter and here in our chapter, it's God that tabernacles are dwells with man.
And just along that same line, I know you'd agree with this, Jim, that it's really beyond our understanding because the Lord Jesus remains a man for all eternity to enjoy his bride. But when it's God, that's All in all, it's God and Trinity, isn't it? It's not merely God the Father, if we could say it reverently. It's God in Trinity. He never leaves his place in the Godhead.
So he is All in all in that sense too. And yet in in another sense, he says I will remain a man for all eternity. I will be a servant forever, as we get in Exodus 21.
It's Emmanuel, isn't it, Bill? God with us, and this will be the ultimate fulfillment of that.
When we see something in verse 2, that's.
Precious, it says I John, saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God, coming down from God.
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The Holy City, the Lamb's Wife, is heavenly in origin and character.
That's very important for us to recognize that.
The Church's calling is from heaven. The formation of it is association with the one who is in heaven.
He went on high, He took a place in in proper for him as a man in the glory. And then the Church is formed on the day of Pentecost, so that the moment of its formation is connected from the very moment of its creation with heaven.
It comes down here from God. It's not something that has an earthly origin. There are things that do have an earthly origin and proper with God. Israel is one of them.
Israel has an earthly origin and they're well in the Millennium, Christ as King is associated with her as a wife in that kind of a relationship, and that's earthly. But this New Jerusalem, we brethren, as part of it, the origin of it is from God and it's from heaven. And in that way, it's important for us to.
She comes from that, her source, from God himself, and if we lose sight of that, we lose a lot in connection with her glory and God's glory in the formation of her.
She's also holy and new. There are really four things that describe her in this burst, aren't there? She's wholly new from God and from heaven.
You know, it's, it's remarkable when you look at the history of the church from its formation on the day of Pentecost until the time when we're reading up here, when you look at her in her beginnings, what a beautiful thing it is. We see great power and great grace and there was outward practical unity and testimony and so on. But you know, things came in very quickly. You know, we look around and what we see outwardly today isn't such a great picture.
It's not so beautiful outwardly, but brother, he's going to present it to himself, a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing. You say, how can he do it? Well, God can do it. The Lord Jesus can do it. And so to look around today at the testimony and as to the Church of God, not a very pretty picture. We have to hang our head and admit we're part of the failure, part of the outward ruin that has come in the brethren. Isn't it beautiful to go on then and look at her in her ending?
At the end of the story, so to speak, hold your finger in the book you're reading and turn over and see how the story ends. That gives us confidence to go on now in spite of failure, not to be indifferent to it, but in spite of what has come in and what we have to admit in our own souls as being part of it. But I say to read the last chapter. The story gives us confidence to press on, knowing that this is the scene that you and I are going to be part of in a coming day.
Like was mentioned before, this is.
Perhaps we can say the full development of what we have in 2nd Corinthians 5. If any man be in Christ, there is a new creation. This is the full development of new creation. And I enjoy that we're new in that it is characteristically new. It will never be anything but new. We're just so used to and the creation we live in now things.
Being new at one time and wearing out.
But it will never be anything else but new. We're all eternity.
Another thing I've enjoyed here, brethren, is there, as has been mentioned already, it's a new heaven and a new earth.
The promise of blessing to Abraham was.
The heavenly and the earthly spheres, the stars of heaven.
The sand by the seashore and multitude there would be blessings, and here we have it. But.
There is no distance here, it says.
00:35:03
Coming down from God out of heaven and in verse three, the Tabernacle of God is with men.
And it's interesting to think that God is a God of relationship.
Even God, in the very first chapter of Genesis, speaks in the plural. Let us make man in our image and likeness who is speaking God in the fullness of his being, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God is a communicating God. God is a God of relationships. And so there's gonna be relationships in that eternal day, and even between the heavenly and the earthly. It's interesting to go back in.
Time to the time of Abraham and Abraham got a heavenly visitor. Actually 3. Two were angels and one was the Lord himself. It doesn't seem to be a rare occasion for Abraham.
And I wonder how many times it may have happened, but there was that in the Old Testament that God came down and communicated.
I've seen this progress in the world that we are part of. Those kind of things are rarer and rarer. We don't see them very rare. Do you hear of something that might relate to reality? But in the future day there will be again that communication between the heavenly and the earthly.
And we see in Jacob's dream that he saw.
Heaven and the ladder between heaven and earth, and the angels of God ascending and descending.
And the same you see in John chapter one where the Lord Jesus speaks of what is millennial and he says thou shalt see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man. So there will be communication between heaven and earth in a fresh way.
It's interesting when you go to the last part of the chapter.
Uh, in connection with the Millennial Day.
It says in. I'm gonna read it in Mr. Darby's translation.
That in verse 24 And the nations shall walk by its light, that is the heavenly city, and the kings of the earth shall bring their glory to it.
It's not into it. It's true it because there's still sin in the earth during the millennial day. It will be perhaps a very rare thing, but still there is. And so sin brings in distance and nothing can ever enter that holy city that will defile. But there will be somewhat of a distance in the millennial day. Somebody has said that.
The heavenly city will be visible.
From the earth during the Millennium. But here in the first part of the chapter, there is no distance comes down of heaven from God. It always maintains that heavenly character like Dan Don brought out, and I think that's important. But there will be no distance in connection with the relationships between heaven and earth. Beautiful to think about.
I'd like to make a, to me important general comment too about the character of what's described to us here, to go back to John's Gospel chapter 17 for a verse.
That, I believe, has to do with what's described in our chapter.
Uh, in John chapter 17.
And verse.
20 The Lord, speaking to his Father, says, Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also, which shall believe on me through their word, that they all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee.
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And that they also may be one in US. This is the words to remember, that the world may believe that Thou hast sent me, and the glory which Thou gavest me, I have given them, that they may be one even as we are one, and I, and them, and Thou and me, that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know.
That thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as thou hast loved me.
That the world may know that thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me now before comment toward Ephesians chapter 5.
Ephesians chapter 5.
And verse 25 Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word.
That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.
Annotations Chapter 5 We have the love of the Sun.
For his bride to church.
And there will be in a coming day in heaven, the enjoyment of himself in his love for his bride. A little bit in contrast to that in Revelation chapter 21. The emphasis is not on that.
The emphasis is on God presenting to the world.
The bride which he has prepared for his Son. And in that public display he is displaying that he has loved her as he has loved his Son. You can't get beyond that in the sense of God's love. So in Ephesians 5 is the Son's love. It's more heavenly in his character. It's more intimate.
It goes beyond the public display. The world isn't going to see all of that. That's between himself and his bride in the home, if you will. We all who are husbands or wives know what it is to have a relationship with our bride that is very personal to us, and we don't share it completely with the world. We keep it between ourselves. It's wholly and precious to us in that personal inner circle of what we.
We have with our bride, but God has purposed that the whole world in the millennial day and in the eternal day as well. It's introduced when he's talking about eternity. He wants the whole world to know that I have loved her as I have loved my Son. I have chosen her for my son and I want to display her in a glory that.
Demonstrates that love that I have for her, and it's a wonderful thing, brethren, to realize that.
Not only do we have this relationship with the Lord Jesus, but with our God, and the relationship with our God is such that he says you can have this love between yourself and the Son. But I also want to demonstrate my love for you and Distremas demonstrate it as that the world may know that thou has loved them as thou hast loved me. And in the Revelation you don't have the Ephesians five side of it very much.
It's rather the Lamb doing the work that the Father's heart might be satisfied. And that includes what we have in the 21St chapter. And the Lamb is seen as the line. That's the Lamb of God in John, one who bears away the sin of the world. The Lamb in Revelation is first seen as slain because everyone who is going to be brought into blessing is brought into blessing through His death, which included his rejection. We know.
But then the Lamb is seen in the revelation, in his power hide us from the wrath of the Lamb. It says He is called the King of kings and Lord of Lords. He is called the one who comes out of heaven in power. He has the seven horns as a Lamb, and so on. So he's seen in both sides of his character both as the one who suffered and was slain. But in the revelation he's also seen as the one who in power delivers the creation from sin.
00:45:09
And presents it then to the Father. And so even in this chapter, he's seen as the one who is doing a work to his Father's glory.
Revelation 32. Church of Philadelphia. Revelation 3.
Where can.
That start diverse.
Yes, it is, and that's millennial when he will demonstrate that.
In the public display, they kept it during the word of his patients and so when he reigns then he will demonstrate what they were to him in that period of time and to show that they were so loved.
So would you take it down that there will be?
No special distinction between Israel and other people's in the eternal state, but simply.
One people on earth, is that what one thing we would gather from verse three? Again, not to get in, as you said, into intricacies of prophecy, but rather into the enjoyment of it, but is that what will happen in that day? I don't know of any scripture that tells us that there will be a distinction with Israel. And in fact the no more sea and God dwelling with man, I believe is to show us that there will be no more nations.
Hmm, but it's God dwelling with man. He has an earthly people. But there is in the third verse, I think what Jim has already said. There will be an eternal identity of the church that will never be lost. That's an eternity and there may be, maybe someone else has a thought as to it, but it from my own heart, it's God is All in all. And uh, the fact that God shall dwell with man means that on earth he won't keep those distinctions.
Well, I agree 100% with that. And of course, on the heavenly side, as Jim brought out, there's no question but that the Church will have her unique place for all eternity. But it seems on earth there will be just one people on earth. There will be no longer a distinct nation of Israel that will occupy a place that will be in that sense.
Prominent and distinct from others, but rather there will be one people on earth, the nations, for that from that point on.
Lose their distinction after all nations themselves who are a result of God's curse pronounced at the Tower of Babel, and thus the resultant dispersion of peoples around this world. And it seems that anything that has any reference to that will be forever removed. Just a couple of comments in that regard too, from the heavenly perspective and connection with the church remaining distinct. It is instructive when you go through the Book of Revelation.
Define that up until the marriage supper of the Lamb, the heavenly company is viewed as a whole, figuratively spoken of as the four and 20 elders when the marriage supper of the Lamb takes place, and it does not take place until the false church on earth is completely judged. But when it takes place, then the four and 20 elders are never mentioned again. The church, the bride, the wife, the city, it always remains distinct.
Time to I think it's helpful to understand from an earthly perspective that in the Old Testament you never really have the eternal statement. I know that sometimes it seems like it might be, but you have to notice the context. We spoke of why it's God in the eternal state. And I'm going to suggest another reason, and that is there's no need for an intermediary in the eternal state. But in the Millennium, there still will be. They'll still be the priest, they'll still be the sacrifices.
They'll be the man of God's counsels that sits on the throne, the Prince that sits on the throne of Israel, while the Lord Jesus reigns over the earth from the heaven and heavens and so on. And I just say that because I know sometimes young people have asked me concerning the 65th and the 66th chapters of the book of Isaiah, the last two chapters of Isaiah, because they're similar language used there to describe what we have. What's here. He speaks there of a new heaven and a new earth.
00:50:20
But it can't be the eternal state because when you read the context, there's still the priesthood, there's still Israel as a distinct nation, which I don't believe has been said that you will have that in the eternal state. There's still sin and the need for a sacrifice, and there's still death, and the carcasses of those that are judged are left in the street for an abhorrent all flesh and so on. So I just say that I think it's helpful to keep that in mind when you go through the Old Testament. So the language may seem to indicate it at times.
It is the Millennium that is referred to because of the context. But here where we have the new heaven and the new earth, we find that these things are done away. And then we find as we go on here he says in verse four, And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away. Now often we take this verse and we apply it.
In connection with ourselves in the coming day. And that's certainly true. This verse will certainly be true of us, but not only of us. It will be true on the new earth as well. There will be no more of these things. The eyes, someone has said, is the fountain of sorrow. It's going to be dried up for eternity. They'll never be. Sorrow penetrate the that wonderful sphere on the new earth again.
And so, yes, we can read this at a funeral, we can think of it in a future day in connection with us as the heavenly company. But let's remember this first supplies universally and in the context perhaps even more particularly to that state of things that will be so that will dwell on the new earth.
I'd like to make a comment too on, uh, verse three and six of the Tabernacle of God.
Umm, remember a number of years ago we had this chapter at a conference in Denver and the comment was made that I really enjoyed it was that the root word for Tabernacle is the same as you have in John chapter one and verse 14?
Just to read that verse, it's a well known verse, but it says the Word was made flesh and dwelt among them, and we beheld his glory, glory his only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
When it says dwell among us, it could be translated Tabernacle of the commandments, of course, that is.
In connection with the Lord Jesus and his incarnation. But the thought has been expressed in verse three of our chapter. The Tabernacle of God is the Lord Jesus and his people united together forever is the Tabernacle of God that is with men, and He will dwell with them. I must say I enjoyed that time.
Also want to say that the Tabernacle is originally set up really was that which maintained the separation.
God was going to take the children of Israel from Egypt to the land of Canaan. And the issue that was a question was, was God going to go with them? And Moses, when they failed, he says, well, if you don't go, we don't go, you have to go with us, we can't go. And he said yes. And and the the Tabernacle was sent up in such a way as we see in Hebrews and throughout the Old Testament.
The people didn't dare enter into it the way into the holiest. The high priest went in with fear and trembling once a year, but that was to maintain a holy separation between a sinful people and God. And yet he loved them and he wanted to go with them. And then at one point the Tabernacle had to be set outside the very camp itself because of sin, but still he goes with them. This is a statement of God is, if you will. That's all done.
I didn't want it that way. That's not my heart. That was necessary because of my holiness. My desire is there be no separation of that character. I want to dwell with man, my creature, and now I can, because everything that separated was connected with sin, and all sin has been removed and all the effects of sin have been removed. Where does crying come from? Where does pain come from? They're all consequences of sin.
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But when the new creation and sin is forever removed from before God, then there's absolutely nothing that would separate him. And in fact, the basis of it is seen on the day of his, the Lord's crucifixion. Because we have recorded in the Gospel that immediately upon the death of the Lord Jesus, or while he's on the cross, the veil of the temper, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom. What was that? God was making an announcement that the death of my son.
Is the foundation on which this separation is going to be forever removed. And I will Tabernacle with men. There will no longer be something that a curtain that has to separate us, a holy place that has to separate us. No, my heart is going to find its satisfaction in that. I may dwell with men.
I'd like to ask a question or two if I got a chance.
Uh, in the third of revelation in the reward.
Who where this year? The one that speaks says in the the 14th verse of the third of Revelation.
Middle of earth, when it speaks, says these things, saith the Amen, the faithful, and the true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. Now I have fought with it, that John.
Five and other verses 2 but John 5.
27 John 5.
27.
There's a because there.
John, 527.
Says 4/3/26 and 27 for the father.
Half life in himself, so has he given to have to the Son of life to have life in himself, and has given him authority to execute judges because he is the Son of man. That just seems to me that God gave me the victory where he looked like he could 50 feet by Satan when sin came in.
To the world, but the Son of Man, God gave us a victory over Satan as the Son of Man. What about these two verses?
Ultimately, if anything is left up to man, it's going to end up in failure. So God always has to retreat into His own power and sovereignty to act, and the only man through which He can act to fulfill His purposes is His Son.
Both to give life and to judge righteously, to fulfill as you have in John 5, his purposes. And so I think what you say is true, Clem. That. And it's seen in the sense that the only way that God can bring about what he wants in his own heart that we have is he can't do it through the faithfulness of man, but he can do it through His Son. Yeah. And so he does do it through this time.
There's a reason for saying that because he is the Son of man. That's Jesus. He, God, has gained the victory in the Son of Man. He lost it in the first Adam. He gained it in the last, and there'd never be another one.
In Revelation 3, the verse I think particularly connects itself with the fact that in the history of the church as a witness for God on earth.
It ultimately reaches the condition in which the Lord Himself is seen on the outside, and the only way that a continued testimony for God can be given in the earth, as if He retreats, if you will, to that position of testimony that He gives in creation. Because Laodicea, the Lord, is seen not inside with a bunch of corruption as some of the previous states of it, but the Lord has seen on the outside of it, completely knocking on the door. Will you let me in?
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So how can a testimony to the earth be given in such a condition? Well, God has never left Himself without testimony to man. From the beginning of creation, He has always been able to speak to man. As the 19th Psalm tells us, the glory declares His. His speaks to man even though there's not a physical voice. Every man who has ever lived has had the testimony of God in creation and will have to answer to it.
If he had no other, or if man and responsibility failed in his testimony, still God has a right and will act because He since He created man, He's never been without testimony to man. In the darkest of man's history, there's always been a testimony from God.
Can I ask a question regarding your school and verse 9? Just wondering why the difference is there.
The great city, the holy City, Jerusalem. I believe that the Holy City Jerusalem is coming down 1000 years later in the second year at the holding city New Jersey.
New Jerusalem and college translator.
I'm going to give a general remark. It's not a full answer to your question, but it came up recently at home.
The easiest way to get confused about the Book of Revelation is to try to force the sequence.
There are many things in the Book of Revelation in which God describes something and then he tells us how he arrives at it.
So you can't properly understand, you can't understand the songs either. Very often in the songs, in the first verse or two of the songs, God describes something and then he tells us how through the rest of the song, how we arrive at that. I'm going to call it conclusion or result. And the revelation is not properly seen by starting in chapter one and going to chapter 2 and try to make it all look right on a sequential timeline.
There are multiple. In fact it goes to Chapter 11 and starts over in a sense.
In the end of Chapter 11, to give us a certain view of things with specific things that God has to deal with, and sometimes, for example, He will tell us like in Chapter 7, how He is going to preserve His elect.
As things pass through the verses which follow or the chapters which follow. And so I just as a general remark, to enjoy the revelation, I think you have to be very careful not to force the timeline on it, even though there are definite things that are stated to us in a sequential order.
And for myself, verse two of this chapter is telling us something that will still be seen in eternity even as it's seen in the Millennium. It's to show us that that which is to be described later in the chapter will also be there when eternity comes.
We don't understand.
Where there is no time. And I think part of our problem sometimes stems from the fact that we try to understand eternity from our vantage point in time.
And I have had to say that I've been challenged on that. And I realize I don't really understand eternity that much, but it is where there is no time. What is eternity?
As Isaiah 57.
High and.
Lofty one who inhabits eternity, God inhabits eternity. Habitation of God.
01:05:09
I suggest too, she's described as new in the eternal state. Well, for one reason he makes all things new if he sums it up. But not only that, but not new in the sense of it being something different or something new introduced.
But new in the sense of there being no deterioration. And so we look at something, it might be 20 years old, but we say, boy, that's been well preserved. It looks like brand new. Well, the, the bride and the eternal state should just be brand new and shall they'll never be any deterioration there. And so I suggest that's one reason why that she's referred to as being new, not made over, not, not something new introduced, but new in her.
Her bridal beauty and affection to the heart of Christ. That's why I like to say sometimes it's characteristic. Yeah, yeah. That's what's characteristic of that creation. Before we close, I know our time is gone unless we miss it by going on next reading meeting. I just want to make a comment about the seventh verse. I know it's jumping ahead a little bit, but I know Don's exercise was to take up the later verses. Particularly. It says he that overcometh shall inherit. If you notice Mr. Darby's translation, it's these things.
When you go back to the second and third chapters of Revelation, you find that there's an overcomer in each of the seven assemblies that John writes to. And when John writes to the overcomer there, it's overcoming in connection with some specific situation in each assembly, and a specific promise given to each overcomer in relationship to the difficulty in the situation that had come in to each assembly. But here is, I believe, something a little more general.
What are these things? Well, the things we've been Speaking of, brethren, we're going to be part of this scene. We're going to inherit these things. And what is the overcoming here? I just want to make this little suggestion that it's not so much something specific, it's more just the daily grind of life. I know there are brethren here, and you just get weary with life, don't you? You see things deteriorating down here. We see the condition in the world.
We see the condition amongst the people of God and you just say how can we go on with the daily grind of life personally in the family, often in the assembly. He says if you keep this in peace and you will overcome. This is what is ahead and rather that's why we need to keep these things ahead. We're going on to a day where there'll be no daily grind of life anymore. There's not going to be the problems and the difficulty.
It's not going to be the things that send us home from the meeting in tears because of some situation amongst the people of God. There's going to be no more separation through death and so on. And if we can keep the glory in view and what is ahead and what it's going to mean to His heart to have us there and to share that glory and display us in that coming day, rather than that's what's going to give us the courage to overcome so that we might inherit these things.
Could we sing #48?
#48 high in the Father's house above. And then verse 3. All taint of sin shall be removed, all evil done away #48.
In the Father's house forward nights and day.
Umm.
Flexible pride and.
01:10:04
Our new life.
Let's give thanks.
Gracious God our Father, we thank Thee for this. Start reading meetings in this meeting. The new heaven and the new earth.
Oh, what a subject it is.
Called Us Unto His Eternal Glory
God's Grace to Judah
Thank God for Your Afflictions and Your Tears - They Are for Your Blessing
Revelation 21
Reading
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I'm groomed by my bloodshed laying in the early.
Thou hast.
All night you can't come together like the earth.
Now sleep.
I'm ready, in power and Lord.
And we shall make him live.
Lord, hear the last good Lord.
To die upon us. To reach.
Where else to come play?
I come again and we need calm furniture.
Sun sprayed out on.
It is done. I have an Alpha in Omega. The beginning and the end I will give unto him. That is the thirst of the fountain of the water of blood.
He that overcome us shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. But the fearful and unbelieving, and the abominable, and the murderers, and ************ and sorcerers and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake of fire, which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death. And there came unto me one of the seven angels, which had seven vials full of the seven last play, and talked with me, saying.
Come hit her, I will show thee the bride, the Lamb's wife.
And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God.
Having the glory of God in her life was like unto a stone most precious, even like the Jasper stone, clear as crystal, and had a wall great and high, and had 12 gates, and at the gates 12 angels and names written there on.
00:05:13
Which are the names of the 12 tribes of the children of Israel. On the east 3 gates and on the north 3 gates, on the South 3 gates, and on the West 3 gates. And the wall of the city had 12 foundations, and in them the names of the 12 apartments of the land.
He was also made at a golden Reed to measure the city from the gates thereof and the wall thereof.
And the city lies 4 square, and the length is as large as the bridge. And he measured the city with a reach 12,000 furlongs. The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal.
And he measured the wall thereof in 140 and four cubits, according to the measure of a man, that is, of the Angel.
In the building of the wall of it was of Jasper, and the city was pure gold, like unto clear glass.
And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was Jasper, the second sapphire, the third accalcedone the 4th, and emerald the 5th, sardonics the 6th, Sardis the 7th, chrysalis the 8th, barrel the 9th, to Topaz, the 10th a chrysoprassis, the 11Th adjacent.
The 12Th and Amethyst, and the 12 gates were 12 Pearls, every several gate was of 1 Pearl. And the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass, and I saw no temple therein, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it.
And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon to shine in it. For the glory of God is light in it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. And the Ignatians of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it, and the kings of the earth to to bring their glory and honor unto it.
And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day, for there shall be no night there. And they shall bring the glory and honor of the nations unto it. And there shall in no wise enter into it anything that defile it. Neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie, but they which are written in the Lamb spoke of life.
Well, we begin with the expression. He says unto me, It is done.
In John's Gospel it begins, John the Baptist sees the Lord Jesus walking down the road, and he looks at him and he says, Behold the Lamb of God, which beareth away the sin of the world.
And then we see in John's Gospel toward the end of it that the Lord Jesus is on the cross.
And it says you see makes the statement it is finished.
And here he makes the statement. It is done.
The Lamb of God and John's Gospel presents to us the redeeming Lamb.
And he does a great work for God.
And the results of that work are seen in Revelation chapter five. Part of the results are seen in Revelation chapter 5.
Thou art worthy, for thou was slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood.
And so that redeeming work was finished. It was done on the cross, and as a consequence of it, many, many, many souls have been brought into blessing. We see in the earlier chapters of the Revelation, they're still souls. They're going to come and come into blessing by the redemptive work that was done on the cross. But the Lamb of God has the 2nd work as well connected with the 1St.
And that is to bear away the sin of the world. It's necessary for him to act in power.
To restore or return to God the order of the earth that's now in a great state of disorder. And so we see that work throughout the revelation of that work to bring back into harmony with God the order of God's creation and when it is all complete.
00:10:03
And when we see the millennial work?
Of the Lamb, as we had this morning in First Corinthians 15.
We see Him in the final phase of it, presenting to God the end result.
It's finished, it's done. Here is the result, and it's a result that's according to God's character, God's nature, and God's heart. And then we can enter into the state that we call eternity for God. And so he reminds us of that work that is being done. And then he brings before us two classes. There are those that overcome by the blood of the Lamb.
By the work of salvation for their souls, I trust. I hope that's the case for each one of us in this room this afternoon, that we are going to be looked at and as overcomers, as redeemed by the precious blood of Christ. But then there's another class in verse 8, the those that overcome inherit all things and are part of what follows in the chapter as well. But in the eighth verse, we have another class.
And they are those who refuse.
To accept the work of the blood of the Lamb. Those who refuse to accept God's work for them through his Son, and they are going to enter into an eternal and a fixed state of things that in Matthew 25 is called eternal judgment. And here they have their part in the lake of fire, the second death. And so everyone in this room has to fall into one of these two categories when the incomes.
Either those who have entered into eternal life or those who are going to enter into eternal judgment. And we see the two sets of them brought before us in these verses. And then he goes on in the ninth verse to present us the.
Lamb's wife and her millennial glory.
I'd like to call attention to the end of verse 6.
I will give unto him that is a thirst of the fountains of.
The water of life freely.
I used to puzzle over why in connection with the eternal state, it speaks of thirst.
And I just give what the?
Believe. Maybe the meaning is that even in that eternal day, brethren.
We are not going to be sufficient in ourselves.
We will always.
Be drinking of that fountain of the water of life freely forever.
He's going to satisfy her.
So often in this world.
There's desires we have that are not satisfied, but there every desire we could ever have fully, completely satisfied.
But man in himself is never sufficient in himself. We will always need our God to be fully satisfied.
And if they could satisfy us, we'd be satisfied without God, and that would be horrible.
We thank God that the natural desires of a sinful creation do not satisfy.
And that only that which satisfies is the pure water of life.
Precious Savior, even in eternity. You know, those of us who've been married, we certainly didn't know everything about her wife when we married her wife.
That relationship grows, we learned more and more of each other, and the same will be true of our precious favorite in this life and.
It shows too, doesn't it, that the life that we're going to have there is no different than the life we have now.
We have the very life of Christ now, eternal life. It's the perfect life. But as another has said, well, that is true, It is a dependent life. And so we encourage one another to drink in the water of the Word now, to feed on Christ through the Word. Is the life we're going to have an eternity any different than it is now? No. And so even later on we find that in the midst of the city there's the tree of life that bear 12 manner of fruit, every fruit in its season.
00:15:32
And again, as another has said, the fruit there is for the sustaining of divine life. The leaves are for the healing of the nations, but the fruit is for the sustaining of divine life. So we're going to eat and drink in that day, just as that life, if it's going to be healthy and fruitful and for God's glory now, it must be sustained by that which is in Himself.
Hmm.
Well, as we take up then the subject or the section of this chapter in connection with the church described as the lambs wife and the city, it's very instructive to see how it is introduced. If we were to back up to the 18th chapter, we would find that when John was called to view the final judgment of the false church, he views it from the wilderness.
He views it from an earthly perspective. Just a little parenthesis in our comments. You know, we don't always consider it, but there is going to be a church on earth after we're gone. It's going to be a false church, but there will be a church on earth and it will finally be completely judged. But John was to view that from an earthly perspective, from the wilderness. But now he's going to view the church in her millennial glory with Christ coming down to reign over the earth.
And that cannot be viewed from an earthly perspective. And so the Angel comes and talks with him and says, come up, I will show thee the bride, the lambs wife. And where does he take them? To a great and high mountain. He's going to view this.
Heavenly. This is going to view the church now from a heavenly perspective. And it's interesting that before she's described in figurative language as the city she brought before us as the lambs wife. We've had her as the bride, but now she's brought before us as the lamb's wife. We find again, if we were to go back a few a couple of pages to the 19th chapter at the marriage supper of the Lamb, it says.
And his wife hath made herself ready. I want to just suggest this little difference between the bride and the wife and why she's introduced to us as the wife in connection with the millennial reign of Christ. The bride, as we've mentioned this morning, speaks of the freshness and loveliness of what she is to his heart, those those bridal beauties and affections. But the wife would speak of relationships.
There's some of us here who've been married for a number of years and the one who was our bride on the wedding day has become our wife. And there's been a deepening and a going on in the relationship that was established back on the wedding day. And if I can illustrate it this way, when the President of the United States or the Prime Minister of Canada or any elected official moves into the official residence that they occupy during their term of office.
There's somebody moves in with them, not because they are elected, but because of relationship. There's somebody in the White House this afternoon that's there because of relationship. She's there because she is the wife of the president of the United States. And not only does she move into the White House with her husband, but she shares in some of the things that take place in connection with the administration of the country. And she sits perhaps on some.
Several committees and she's in the public eye to some degree at least. And wouldn't we be surprised when the president or the Prime Minister of a country moved into their official residence if their wife didn't move in with them when they took office? And wouldn't we be surprised if their wife wasn't at their side at least some of the time when they're they're performing their official duties and functions? We see their pictures splashed across the national press.
00:20:00
And quite often there's their wife. She may be standing slightly in the background or to one side, but there she is sharing in all that is taking place. And brethren, is a day coming when not only as the bride of Christ, but as the Lamb's wife, we're going to share in that administrative function of reigning over the earth. And brethren, what a day it's going to be. Why do we want to do it now? There was so much to encourage us in Christian circles today to do it now.
Get into places, high places. Try to straighten things out. Be a moral force to change the world.
Run for political office? Sit on committees, Lobby against the abuses of humanity? Are we going to do it before we stand at the side of the Lord Jesus, our bridegroom, as his wife?
The Lord, the apostle Paul said to the Corinthians, I would that you were reigning because if you were, we'd reign with you and the Lord would be reigning. But grabbing the reigning time isn't yet. We're reading of it here in anticipation. But brethren, as sure as we're sitting in the seat this afternoon, the reigning time is coming. And not simply us is bride, but as his wife, we're going to be with him in that day.
I'd like to go back to Isaiah chapter 61 for a moment.
In Isaiah chapter 6061 and 62.
We have a description similar in one sense to what we have in Revelation 21, but it is a description in these three chapters of Israel as the earthly bride.
What we have in Revelation 21 is the Church as the bride of the Lamb.
In Isaiah 6160 sixty 162 we have the picture of.
The life of the king. And so there are similarities and differences between the two, but I wanna pick up one verse out of chapter 61 and verse 10.
I will greatly rejoice in the Lord. My soul shall be joyful, and my God, for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, He hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decaf himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels.
God has chosen.
The wife, the bride for the lamb. It's God's choice.
He chose it.
And God is going to see that she properly expresses the honor of the Lamb.
When you have a state function in which the president of a country or the king or the queen or something is presented to the people and the life is present.
She is that which also reflects upon the one who is king or in charge.
And God, having chosen her to be the bride for the Lamb, is going to see that she is properly seen.
And the fact that it's a high mountain suggests that it's visible. It's not a hidden glory, it's not the heavenly side of things, but it is that which is going to be seen among men on earth.
And when people on earth look upon the Lamb's wife, it will properly express the honor and the glory that belongs to the Lamb.
Could she properly arrive herself?
No, shouldn't have the resources.
What God does, God has the resources he is going to.
Place upon her those what are described here as jewels that will make her properly express the greatness of the Lamb, the husband.
00:25:13
And so God is going to confer upon her the display of glories that come from Himself.
That may occur what she will be.
We have in the 19th chapter, and I don't wanna take away, maybe we'll talk about that a little later or something. But in the 19th chapter she has, and we have presently something we can and should be doing in preparation for the wedding.
That when we come to the wedding itself, we will be there prepared in a garment clean and white. But beyond the garment clean and white, there is going to be the conferring upon her of those jewels, those displays of glory that properly express the greatness of the One to whom she is married. And she is that compliment of Him.
That is suited to the greatness of His person, and only God can do that, and only God will do that. And He wants to confer that honor upon the Lamb that has done the work for him. If I could put it this way, nothing that would make her a suited wife for the Lamb will God withhold from her, and it will be to His glory and the glory of the sun.
And that's what's being introduced to us here.
To behold the bride, the Lamb's wife.
Hmm, 7th verse here.
At the end of the summer, verse and his wife had made herself wedding.
Not the full thought.
Because the wife isn't the one that puts the jewels. She doesn't provide her own jewels. In that sense, that's really a work of God. But every one of us.
To go back to the 19th chapter, since it's brought up and it's an important point, connection with our life today, Chapter 19, where we have the marriage of the Lamb.
It says in verse nine, or verse 8, verse six or seven. Let's start seven. Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honor to him. For the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his wife hath made herself ready, and to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white, for the fine linen is the righteousness.
Of the Saints, That's the Derby translation.
A bride who is preparing to get married.
Thanks a lot about how she's going to appear to her bridegroom as he sees her for the first time, or at least commonly so when she walks down the aisle to meet him to be married to him.
And many of us, just a little side point, but many of us in such occasions as the bride comes into the room, we all stand up as which is often appropriate. And we turn around and we watch the bride walk down the aisle and we see her in her finery for the first time.
My father-in-law most often didn't do that. He looked at the bridegroom.
And his face.
And he looked at the what was on his face.
And brethren, we need that perspective as well.
It isn't that we want to see this.
These chapters and have a sense of them, simply wow, we're going to look great and God's going to put all this honor on us.
Our hearts will go better if we anticipate the bridegroom space.
What will it mean to his heart?
To have a bride that is clean and white.
Fear is not the work of righteousness at the cross. It's not cleansing of the blood that has redeemed us. That's in view here. It's a practical thing. It's the righteousnesses of the Saints.
00:30:15
Try to illustrate it this way.
Many of us are aware sometimes when somebody is getting married or in some special occasion, sometimes people say, let's make a quilt and each person is going to produce one square and they're going to put on it something that will be appropriate to the person or the memory of that person's growing up or whatever it is. And so each person works on their square and those squares are sewed together to form the final.
Quilt.
Every one of us in this room.
Yes. The garment is not a quill. I don't know any garments that were made this way, but it is that each one of us is sewing, or not sewing, but preparing the little square that is going to be part of the wedding garment and what will last in it. Some squares, I think will be bigger than others. I'm sure they will, but it will be those things.
Of our present life, the righteousnesses of our lives, those things that we're presently occupied with and doing that are appropriate to the wedding dress. And when we've talked about it, it was before us in the last meeting. A life that's lived in view of these things and each one of us is that we're is living a daily life.
In which we are preparing our little piece to be part of the wedding dress and that which will survive it, that which will be part of it is. She has said she's prepared herself to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and light, clean and white. That purity, that which is suited to himself. There will be the wedding. But when it comes to the chapter 21 and the display of it, God is going to.
Display her in a glory that exceeds even the wedding day in the sense of or else for the wedding day, give her those glories that He alone can present to her, that He alone is rich enough. And so it says. We see the glory of God coming down. She is the display of the glory of God for the honor of the Lamb.
So she's described then as the city.
In her millennial glory, and I think it was alluded to this morning, but might be helpful just to repeat as we begin this section that she's described here as the city because cities denote administration. If we say Washington DC or Ottawa, Canada or London or any of the other celebrated capitals of the world, we admit we immediately think of the administration of the country from that city from that point.
And so she's described here as a city because as we've been saying, she's going to have an administrative part in the Kingdom reigning with the Lord Jesus Christ. And all that we have here, figuratively speaking in connection with her description of the city really is a reflection in one way or another of the glories of Christ. That's what it really is. And so she comes down and she has the glory of God, and her light is like unto a.
Stone most precious, even a Jasper stone, clear as crystal.
I, I could quote it, but let's just turn back to the Second Thessalonians one for a moment where I think it's summed up so very beautifully. Yes, Second Thessalonians chapter one.
He's Speaking of a future day here. And then in verse ten of two Thessalonians one he says.
When he shall come to be glorified in His Saints, and to be admired in all them that believed because of our testimony, because our testimony among you was believed in that day. Let me read this and leave the parentheses out. When he shall come to be glorified in His Saints.
And to be admired in all them that believe in that day. What day, brethren? The day we're reading up here. No, it's tremendous to think that when heaven opens up to reveal not only Christ, but his Church, the heavenly company and the world looks up, not only are they going to see Christ, but they are going to see perfectly reflected in every believer.
00:35:27
Christ, that's what this verse in Thessalonians is telling us. He's coming to be glorified in his Saints. When they look at you, when they look at me, he's going to be glorified in his Saints. You know we ought to.
Reflect something of Christ now, and we will, as Corinthians tells us, that in the measure in which we are occupied with Christ in glory now, we will be changed into the same image from glory to glory.
We will reflect something in our lives of Christ now in the measure in which we are occupied with Him. But I can only speak for myself, brethren. I have to hang my head and say I don't always reflect something of the glories of the glories of Christ like I ought to. But it thrills my heart to think that there's a day coming when everything that causes a shadow and a shade now is going to be totally removed. The world looks at me now. They don't always see Christ perfectly reflected.
But the day is coming when they're going to look at me, they're going to look at you, and they're going to see Christ glorified in every St. of God. Now that ought to motivate us now to be occupied with Himself, that there might be something of that reflection in testimony now and then to think that we are going to reflect Him perfectly in that day.
Could we suggest the thought, and I don't say it dogmatically, but it seems that the Jasper stone is particularly connected with the glory of Christ that he shares with and displays in his Saints. That's why it's mentioned first year and we don't need to turn back to it. You can look it up. I think it's in the 28th of Exodus, but you can see there that the Jasper stone is mentioned in the.
Stones that the high priest bore in the breastplate on his breast.
But there you find the Jasper stone is the last one mentioned. I just suggest the thought that there in the Old Testament there was a partial glory displayed, but it was only very very partial because they were under a dispensation of law. They were, if you like, worn by a high priest that could not display the glory that that true high priest wouldn't display.
And in fact, it seems that those garments of glory and beauty were worn very little.
And then they had to be set aside, as it were, until there was a priest that could wear them and display the glory properly. But if those stones are a picture of the glory displayed in believers, the particular glory that is displayed in believers, I suggest they're the Jasper is the very last one mentioned. But here in connection with the glory of the church, it's the very first one mentioned.
And so all, as you say, Jim, of that wonderful glory of Christ is going to be displayed in you and me in that day.
And as you say, how nice and how important to recognize the fact that he looks to see more and more of it displayed now.
It's actually mentioned three times in this description. I'll just point them out and leave them for your meditation. We have it in the 10th verse in connection with light. Then we have it in the 18th verse in connection with the wall, which perhaps would speak to us of security, and in the 19th verse in connection with the foundation, which would perhaps speak to us of stability. So it's beautiful to see how it's brought out three times in a little different context.
MMM.
Like to turn back for a moment to Matthew's Gospel.
Chapter 17.
Matthew chapter 17 and verse 2.
00:40:01
And he was transfigured when I read the first verse because it connects with our chapter in the high mountain. And after six days, Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John as brother and bringeth them up into a high mountain.
Park and was transfigured before them, and his face to shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light.
And, umm.
Verse six. And his disciples heard it, and they fell on their face, and were sore afraid. And Jesus came and touched them, and said, Arise and be not afraid.
Brethren, if we've already had multiple times that said to us that we don't lay hold of these things very much yet.
I believe that the truth be told that if we could fully enter into and see now.
The display of the glory of God in the Lamb's wife. We'd be afraid.
We'd be afraid. We'd be afraid in the same way that it's described here in chapter 17, which is the millennial glory.
We read it here in connection with the person of the Lord Jesus Christ and the disciples. They weren't in a condition yet to be able to enjoy it. And when they saw Him transfigured before them, and his face could shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light, its effect on them was, was not what?
We might expect and except that we haven't seen it.
But they coming down out of heaven, having the glory of God, will be a church that shines.
Reflecting, we say, the glory of Christ. What is it? It's to be like him and it will shine in this character. This is our future. This is what is going to be seen by this world from the high mountain standpoint, if you will.
We will be suited to it. We shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is when we arrive in glory. And then when we come back with him in his glory, we'll be like him and there won't be any fear in US. But it's, it's a tremendous thing because God's glory is so often in Scripture connected with light, and the absoluteness of the greatness of God is such that his personal.
Absolute glory is beyond even the creature ever entering into. It says he dwells in light. In First Timothy, the last chapter, he says it dwells in light, which no man can approach unto, and he never will.
But the light is that which of all created things, it's a It's a symbol to us to give us to see something. What is the one thing in all the creation we can't look at?
The sun, it's too bright in its brightness for us. The Apostle Paul saw something that was beyond the brightness of the noonday sun.
He was introduced by his conversion being a heavenly man in a pattern St. of God immediately connected with His glory.
And that from that glory we are going to come and be seen on in this world in a display, a dazzling display of brightness, of the glory of God that, as Paul said, was above the brightness of the noonday sun. And now we can't enter into it, but in the measure in which our hearts are touched by it, it's going to affect how we Live Today and tomorrow.
This is our destiny.
You know, I was thinking about it and I'll stop with this comment at the end of the last reading meeting.
I well remember many times in my actually before I came to Bible Truth publishers, but in my work, the daily grind of the work and the pressure of the work it it would build up and build up and build up and I would find myself looking forward to that thing we call vacation.
And would enjoy being away from it all for a short period of time and then coming back to it.
00:45:04
When I came back to it, the circumstances were the same as I loved them, but I was changed. I was changed. The way I looked at those circumstances, the way they affected me for a few weeks or a few months or something was different, even though the circumstances stayed the same. I say that because if this weekend, I will say properly lays hold of our hearts, we're going to go Monday or whenever back to a daily grind of life.
And it will be the same. But brethren, we don't have to be the same. We don't have to be the same. If our hearts are laid hold of that which is before us for the honor of God and His Son, then we can be different. And if we are, the way we look at those daily things will change. Our attitude toward them will change, and the way they affect our hearts will change. And we will go through them with God in a different way. And that's.
Prayerful hope for us when we finish our weekend.
Think we can easily say, brethren, that?
The millennial day, especially the introduction of the day of the Lord, when the Lord Jesus comes back with power and glory with his Saints, as we read in Second Thessalonians one and there it also mentions with the angels of his power. It will easily be probably I think we can easily say that it will be the.
Most dramatic display of power and glory this world will ever, ever see. Ever in the past, ever in the future when God introduces His Son.
They last saw him hanging dead on a cross. He's coming back and power and glory. And it's in the measure that that day lays hold of our souls, that it will affect this in our lives down here. It's nothing that will compare with it. The knowledge of the Lord. After that day, through the millennial day, the knowledge of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. No one shall save his neighbor.
Know the Lord, for they shall all know me. It will be something that will be displayed through the whole earth. And that's why it will be so serious in the millennial day to sin, because they'll be immediately cut off. It'll be so different than it is today. Oh brethren, this is what is ahead for us who are believers in the Lord Jesus. Tremendous.
To let us sink into our souls the importance of what we're talking about, having the glory of God. Naturally speaking, we've come short of the glory of God, but here we are having the glory of God.
Isn't it true to Bob that our faithfulness to the Lord down here is going to determine our office?
That's what you learn in the Parable of the talent, yeah.
Isn't it true that our faithfulness to the Lord here could determine our office when we reign with Him in the coming?
And our brother between personally counted the terrible town.
I'd like to just interject a little practical parenthesis and application into what we have in this 11Th verse. And I want to preface my remarks by saying I realize this is not the typical teaching of this expression, but there's an expression here that we sometimes use even in talking about things in everyday life. It's used twice in the description of the church here, once in the 10th verse, and we didn't read it, but really the description doesn't end until the end of the fifth verse of the next chapter.
And in verse one of the next chapter, it's used again in connection with the river of the water of life. And that is the little expression, clear as crystal. We use that expression so often. Now, brethren, I realize that it's used here to show that it's going to be a fixed state of things and nothing is ever going to touch the church in that day that will defile. She's going to reign over the earth and while there's sin and defilement still on the earth.
00:50:14
Although suppressed to a great degree by the righteous reign of Christ, yet the Church is above that, and nothing enters in that defiled.
But you know, I've often thought of this little expression clear as crystal. You know, I have no doubt, brethren, sitting here in these chairs this afternoon who are struggling with difficulties and enigmas in their life. Questions, you know, even in the assembly sometimes questions and difficulties arise and there doesn't seem to be clarity to deal with the situation. You know, and again, I know I'm applying, but it says we now we see through a glass darkly and isn't that the way we feel? Sometimes we say we just can't seem to.
Get to the bottom of this and circumstances in our life you say. I just don't see clearly how the Lord is showing his love or how he why the Lord has allowed this circumstance in my life.
But, brethren, I believe we can submit.
Even though we don't have all the answers now, we can submit in the circumstances of our lives, individually and collectively.
When we realize that there's a day coming when everything's going to be clear as crystal, there's not going to be any dark spots there, no shadows or shades there, we're not going to wonder why this and why that. You know, when the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they said, why did God bring us this way and that way, and why did Moses do this and that and so on. You know, when they rehearsed it in retrospect, it says in the songs, he led them by the right way.
And that's the way we're going to rehearse it too. Everything is going to be finally clear. Judge nothing before the time until the Lord comes, who will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, make manifest the counsels of the heart, and then shall every man have praise of God. We're going to see it all clearly there. And I believe that's why at the end of Revelation 5, it is the four beasts say Amen, those four beasts that represent God's governmental ways in the earth. They say we see it all now.
It's all clear as crystal. It was all working out for a purpose. It was all working out for the glory of God and of his Christ. And they simply say Amen. Well, I know that's, as I say, a little parenthesis in what we're taking up here. But rather than be encouraged, you don't understand things now, you don't see things clearly.
Someday, everything's going to be clear as crystal.
Could we say that the question we won't be having in the 21St chapter with the the rising or the church being shown as the bride and the and the city being a contrast what we have in the 17th chapter in the 17th chapter we have the woman and who is the false church about the course of the Harley of the false church.
And at the beginning of this chapter and at the end of the chapter, we have the woman who is also the last verse.
False pride as it were. False system is now going to be shown on the display of the Crew, True Bride and True True City. Is there a thought there?
I don't know if this is complementary to UMM.
That thought but.
OK, the salt sprayed.
Honors herself.
And all her glory is her own glory.
If I could put it this way, it's like she wants outshine her husband.
Now she doesn't have a true husband, but she says I'm a queen and no widow.
And but yeah, she takes all earthly glory.
That exalts herself, and in fact you have some of the same raiment mentioned for her as you have in the 21St chapter with that which is true.
00:55:06
But it's all for sale. It it, it characterizes the ultimate state of something that is nauseous to God. And that's the nature of man. I exalt myself and I give myself all the honor and the glory. And in in a certain sense, what is her relationship? Well, she, she doesn't want anybody. She reigns over the kings of the earth, the bride, the Lamb's wife. You don't hear her saying I reign over the kings of the earth.
It's the Lamb that rains, and as Jim had earlier it it's she is in the fullness of him that filleth. All in all, she's a reflection of the greatness of his person, not her own in the separation from him. And if we are to enjoy the contrast between the false and the truth, we see that everything that she is, is to the glory of the one she's associated with and everything the false is.
Is to her own glory and in fact, her own desire to reign herself over the kings of the earth. And her only relationship with the kings of the earth is the harlot, the ultimate perversion of the relationship. And and yet it it, there's a lot of detail in it, but I think for this afternoon, the the important thing for us is to recognize our place.
Is to His glory.
And the expression of that glory I I.
I'd like to make this comment about light.
If you I've noticed a few times in my life I've happened to be.
Where a jeweler shop is shutting down for the day.
And I've noticed this characteristic of one of the last things that the jeweler does in his shop is he has brightly lit all his jewels.
Because that's what sells them to his customers. It puts them in their best life. It makes them the most brilliant to see. But when he wants to protect them, if you will, for the night, he turns all the cabinet lights out. He shudders the door and the wind, the shades come down if you can. And so on. The point of it is what makes a jewel a jewel.
Depends on the light. You don't have a dual that's that you can enjoy or that reflects anything without light. And it tells us that all glory originates and comes from God. God is light, and without God there would be no glory seen in anything. But everything that reflects the glory of God reflects just that, the glory of God, not its own glory, not the false glory of the harlot.
But it is, and in fact, in the harlot's description, it speaks about light, but it's not heavenly light. It's a candle. She needs, she needs light, but she can't produce the good light. But with us the glory of God is, is a reflection of what he is as light seeing through his work.
And the second thing about a Joule is that what makes a Joule brilliant, given there's light, is how it's cut.
And individually, God is working in your life and mine, like a jeweler works with His jewels to properly cut them, to form them, to result that when the light shines on them, they reflect it in a beautiful way. And when we are seeing individually and here in the collective sense, in this expression of glory, well, thank God for every aspect in which He worked on the stone.
To cut it and if there's if there's an imperfection in a stone.
It's not worth as much. They can't sell it as much when you shine the light on it. Oh, that one's not perfect and it's not worth as much. Well, every one of us will be perfect. There'll be no imperfections in the cutting of the final results of of either the collective charge or any of us individually. And all of us will reflect the glory of God. The true source of it all is light. We are called His workmanship.
We're basically a word in progress.
01:00:00
Eager to understand by reading Second Peter, the first part of the first capture Second Peter.
And Sam here Trevor of Jesus Christ, his hands that have obtained.
Lunch breaks with us to the righteousness of God and our Savior Jesus Christ. Praise and keep devoted unto you to the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, according to.
His divine power.
God's divine power can give unto us all things that percay unto the life, and God in his.
Through the knowledge of Him that had called us by glory and virtue.
Minnesota verify are given unto the rush exceeded great and precious promises, and this expression is in a puddle for me, but I like it that by these he might be part takers.
Of the deadline nature.
And his shape and respect that is of the world and earth. Well, the knowledge of God is what putting the light on their word is what makes it sound.
Ma'am, would you read Second Corinthians connection with what you just read? Read Second Corinthians chapter 4.
Umm, verse 6.
And seven Second Corinthians 4/6 and seven.
Compliments what you just read.
You're ready. OK, Second Corinthians 4/6 For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the Excellency of the power might be of God and not of us.
That answers a lot of my questions.
One of the aspects, brethren, of the glory that will be displayed is, if I can put it this way, the world will see it.
And I don't know how to express it right, but they'll look at you and I and they'll say wow.
Is that what God did with that?
In other words, you you take a a mining operation and you get some gold and when you first see it, it doesn't mount anything really visually. But after it's worked on by the jeweler and it's mined and it's cut, then it shines in its brilliance. It's to the glory of God that he could take creatures like us and produce.
What we see in this chapter, individually us and collectively us, that He could display us to the world as a student.
Bride and wife of the last, that's to God's glory, that He can take what we were and make us what we will be.
#18 in the back of the book. 18 in the back of the book.
Oh, I shall be like my God.
Thing that's the greatest.
Good morning.
When I read it now.
Nor I am.
Who wanted to fall down and make?
Strange glory.
Rhythm.
With joy shall be.
Oh my God.
Thy glory in thy Kingdom.
All right, all.
Umm.
Behold the Man
Gospel—Jim Hyland
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Let's start the Gospel Meeting this evening with Hymn #20 on the Gospel Hymn sheet.
Behold the Savior at the door. He gently knocked, has knocked before, has waited long, is waiting. Still, you use no other friend, so I'll open the door. He'll enter in and stuff with you and you with him. Let's stand to sing this hymn #20 and if someone will please start it.
Umm, for my last.
Night.
00:05:16
How thankful we are tonight for the Lord Jesus Christ, and how thankful we are that He is indeed the Savior of sinners. We're thankful for that mighty work of Calvary, for that blood that was shed, of which blood we read it cleanses from all sins. We're thankful, too, to know that that Blessed One is risen, ascended, seated at Thy right hand. We know that His arms are outstretched in love to the Sinner. And we rejoice to realize that the gospel is going forth around this planet tonight.
And now it's still working by Thy Spirit, compelling sinners to come in that Thy house may be filled. And now, as this Gospel meeting has been announced for this room, our God, we pray that we might be solemnized as the reality of eternal issues. That if there's someone here who's lost tonight, our God and Father, we pray that they might have their consciences reached, their hearts touched, that Thy living Word might have its effect, that the good seed might fall on good ground.
And that there might be much fruit for thy glory and honor. We pray that souls might be saved tonight, and the hearts of thine own refreshed. As we tell again the sweet story of thy love and grace, we ask thy help and blessing we ask it in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and for his glory. Amen.
Turn with me first of all, please, to John's gospel.
John's Gospel chapter one and verse 14.
And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory.
The glory as of the only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth and justice. A little further over in the chapter verse 29. The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and Seth behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. Verse 36 And looking upon Jesus as he walked, he says.
Behold.
The Lamb of God and then a verse in the 19 chapter.
Chapter 19.
And justice, the last three words of verse 5. Behold the man.
We began this gospel meeting by singing Behold the Savior, and that really is what is on my heart this evening in the presentation of the gospel.
Is to point you to the Lord Jesus Christ, I suppose, if we could put a title on this gospel meeting this evening.
It would be these three words that we have just read together. Behold the man. Because it is a man that we present to you tonight. It's the man Christ Jesus. We're not going to present to you tonight religion. We're not going to present to you tonight sociology or reform or anything like that. No, we want to bring before you from the pages of this living word the Lord Jesus Christ. And you know God would have you take a moment this evening.
To turn your eyes to the Lord Jesus, to look to him. You remember it illustrated in the Old Testament, when the children of Israel were in the wilderness, and sin had come into the camp of Israel, and there were fiery serpents sent amongst the children of Israel, And those serpents bit the children of Israel, and they died. Many of them died on that occasion. But there was a remedy. Moses was told to take a brazen serpent.
And to put it on a pole and to put it for all to see And the instructions were.
That whosoever looked at that serpent of brass, a simple look to that serpent on the pole was what healed the person of the serpent's bite. It is what gave them life and kept them from death. And it's a beautiful illustration of the Lord Jesus, the one who went to Calvary's cross and gave himself there. And so we read, look unto me and be saved all the ends of the earth.
00:10:10
Men are looking to various things today. They're looking to reform. They're looking to democracy as the great band aids that's going to solve the walls of the world. They talk about the Arab Spring, all these revolutions that are taking place. And if we just get rid of this government and implement this policy, everything's going to be better. But you know, in the end, men's hearts are failing them for fear today.
I watched them in the airport, in the train stations, in the store, to look into men's faces and women too, and to see the fear that is written in their faces, the fear in their eyes, because they recognize even people in high places recognize that things can't go on the way they are forever. I've sometimes illustrated it like an elastic being pulled to such a point that it's got to snap some time.
And the social and economic and political forces with which this world is trying to deal are like that. Elastic. And men know it has to, has to give at some point. And yet are they looking to the only source, to the only one who can give life, to the only one who can bring about stability? No, they're not. They're looking to themselves. They're looking to their own inventions. They're counting on their own intelligence. But oh, tonight in connection with your soul.
And eternity and salvation. How wonderful that we can turn to the word of God.
And we don't have to speculate tonight on what it is that gives security. We don't have to speculate on the future as far as life after death. We don't have to speculate on eternity. We can rest on security tonight. Uncertainties tonight, because the word of God is the truth. Men have all kinds of theories, and sometimes it's even truth, but it's mixed with error and theory and supposition.
But this book is true from cover to cover. It's God's Word, and above all, it presents the man Christ Jesus.
You know, wherever we read in the Word of God, it wouldn't matter tonight whether we turned to the Old Testament from Genesis to Malachi, or in the New Testament from Matthew to Revelation. We wouldn't have to read very far to realize that the subject is Christ, that God's desire is to direct our focus to the man, the man Christ Jesus. Yes, it's many things about his person and work by type and shadow in the Old Testament.
But it's Christ and his life. In the Gospels we see the exaltation of Christ in the Epistles and the development of Christianity and what blessings the Christian has been brought into, and their relationship with God the Father and the Lord Jesus. In Revelation, as we've been enjoying in these readings, we look on to the fruition of things, the full exaltation of God's Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
And many of us are hearts thrilled as we think of that, because God's heart will never be satisfied.
Until his son is fully vindicated on this planet that spit in his blessed face.
God's heart will never be satisfied until his Son has his rightful place here in this world. That said, away with Him, crucify Him. And it's going to happen. Yes, it is. It's going to happen, but it's going to mean different things for different people. And that's why we've scheduled a gospel meeting tonight to direct our focus to the Lord Jesus Christ, and we find that the that John in writing.
He says We beheld his glory as of the only begotten of the Father.
Full of grace and truth, John could open his epistle by saying.
We have looked upon in our hands of handles of the word of life. John had the privilege.
Of walking in this world in company with the Lord Jesus, one of the special apostles, disciples that was called to be closest to the Lord Jesus during his public ministry. John with the others accompanied with the Lord Jesus. They saw those glories, those moral glories that shone out. But more than that, there were times when there were little flashes beyond that.
00:15:12
Peter said we were eyewitnesses of His Majesty that time on the Mount of Transfiguration, when there was a little preview of the coming Kingdom, the coming glory, when they came to take him in the garden, and there was a little flash of his glory that knocked them to the ground. It must have been wonderful to company with the Lord Jesus as he walked here in this world.
But you know, the Apostle Paul said. Henceforth know we know man after the flesh.
Though we knew Christ after the flesh, henceforth know we Him no more.
And tonight we're not presenting the Lord Jesus walking in this world.
The way John and John the Baptist and so many others saw him. John the Baptist, as we read, proclaimed twice. Behold the Lamb of God.
On one occasion, he added, which taketh away the sin of the world. You know that hasn't happened yet.
And it won't happen fully until the eternal state I love that hymn we sang.
This morning I believe it was all taint of sin shall be removed, all evil done away.
And we shall dwell with God's beloved thru God's eternal day. What a day that's going to be when sin is completely done away and we're invited to a scene where sin will never penetrate again. But tonight, the question is, what about your sins? Are your sins taken care of? Are they gone? Are they washed in the blood of the Lord Jesus? Have you looked to the one who is indeed the Lamb of God? Who can take away your sins tonight if you come?
In repentance and faith, because it is repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. It's to realize, first of all, that you are a Sinner. But it's to realize more than that, too. I say that because if we were to go out on some busy street corner in a nearby town or city tonight, I think if we were to interview passers by, most people today, even today, if they're really honest with themselves, will admit they've done wrong things.
We'll admit that they are sinners, but to admit that they're helpless sinners with no ability to get rid of their sins or better, their position before God is quite another matter. You know, you've often heard me say this, but I'll repeat it. I have nothing against home remedies. We use them in our house too. I'm not a person that runs to the doctor every time I have a sniffle or some little ache.
But you know, as long as you feel that you can administer some home remedy to cure your sickness, whatever it might be.
You will never seek the advice of a physician. But when you come to the point you're sick and you come to the point where you realize your home remedy is not helping, it's not doing any good to cure you, Then and only then are you going to seek the advice of a doctor. And we've heard stories about people who've left it too late. They've administered their home remedy and thought they could cure themselves, but they finally realized that they needed to go to a doctor and they found it was too late.
And the doctor has said if you'd only come a month earlier, if you'd only come a few weeks ago, if you'd only come last year, I could have done something for you.
That's why the Lord Jesus said they that are whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.
He said. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance and so often as we read through the Gospels.
It was the sinners, those who realized, or though I should say those who realized that they were sinners, that came to hear the Lord Jesus, the Pharisees, and the other self-righteous elite of the day. They didn't have time for the Lord Jesus. They thought they were good in themselves, that they didn't need what the Lord Jesus was presenting to them. And then you'll read something to the effect, Then drew near all the publicans and sinners for to hear him. How thankful we are for statements like that.
And if there's someone here tonight and you have never looked to the Lord Jesus for salvation?
Well, tonight I want to tell you the way is open. It's like the children of Israel in the wilderness. A simple look of faith to the Lord Jesus is what saves the soul. Realizing we're sinners, yes, but realizing that there's a cure, there's a remedy. And that remedy has been provided through the work of the Lord Jesus on Calvary's cross. But all I want to stress before we pass on to There is no other cure.
00:20:12
No other remedy apart from what God has provided through His Son and that sacrificial work that was taken up so long ago. There are not many roads to heaven tonight. There are not many ways to be saved. The Lord Jesus in John's gospel, before he left his disciples, he said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me.
Oh, behold the man tonight, the man Christ Jesus. Behold the Savior at the door. He gently knocks, has knocked before he's there. He's here, so to speak, and he's knocking. He wants entrance, but you must open the door. If I can put it that way, you must let him in through faith in himself and what he has done.
Behold the man.
I want to turn to a verse now in Luke's Gospel chapter 23.
Luke's Gospel, chapter 23.
And verse 35.
And the people stood beholding.
And the rulers also with them derided him, saying he saved others, let him save himself, if he be Christ, the chosen of God. And the people stood beholding. You know, this is a very interesting statement. Here was the Lord Jesus. His trial was over. They had led him out to Calvary. They had nailed him to a Roman cross.
And there he hung between heaven and earth as a spectacle for men and angels.
And there were many who beheld the Lord Jesus as he hung on that cross.
There were many who beheld that loved him. There were the women. There was John himself, to whom his mother he committed his mother. Later on there were many who beheld the Lord Jesus. There were some who passed by, and they wagged their head and reviled him. There were others who sat down and watched him suffer in his agony, those who had no love for the Lord Jesus, But oh, tonight I want to pass us by the cross.
I want us to take a look by faith at the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, to behold Him hanging there, as it were, to see that mighty sacrifice, and to realize.
That he died there for sin and for sinners. And I am thankful to be able to stand here tonight and to say with the apostle Peter, who wrote later on he bore our sins in his own body on the tree.
If Peter were to come here tonight, we could stand here together and say that verse in plural our sins, because he bore my sins in his own body on the tree.
But can you say that tonight? Could you honestly say that tonight? I don't know what goes on within your heart. You know, from a vantage point like this, I can see right into the back rows. I think sometimes young people think you can't see into the back rows, but I can see right into the back rows. I can often tell whether someone is texting or passing notes or whatever else you might be doing.
But you know, there's one who looks down tonight and he sees right into your heart.
His eye is upon you, and he loves you so very much.
Oh, as he looks at you, what does he see? What does he see? Does he see those stains of sin? Or can you say He bore your sins in his own body on the tree? Can you say that your sins are gone, completely gone, washed in the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ?
I'm thankful too that I can stand with Peter and say redeemed, not with corruptible things as silver and gold.
But with the precious blood of Christ.
Perhaps I've mentioned this before, but just a few weeks ago I was back in Guyana, South America.
00:25:06
It's one of those countries that has a dollar that is absolutely worthless.
It's a dollar where they knock a few zeros off the end of it once in a while so that it brings it back into some sort of line or reason.
We would go every morning and exchange money. I would take 150 or $200 US, depending on what we were going to be doing that day and what I felt we'd need it we'd need.
I take that money to the money changer and.
The brother who had the contact, he would go into the money changer and he would take my 150 or $200 US and he would literally come out with a box of money.
And the the value of the money today wasn't necessarily the value of the money tomorrow. You know, money changes in value. Even gold and silver change in value. And if we were to go to the newspaper on Monday morning and check the value of gold and silver as well as money, the your the euro against the US dollar and the Canadian dollar and the Japanese yen, we might find that they'll be very different than they were when the markets opened last Monday.
Or even when they closed on Friday. Money changes. Gold and silver changes in value. And perhaps you're more aware of it in a country where it changes sometimes every hour. But I'm thankful that I'm redeemed, not with something that changes in value, but I'm redeemed with the precious blood of Christ. And that blood is as valuable to the heart of God today as it was when it was shared at Calvary's Cross.
I know we've often, but I want to stress the value of the blood of Christ tonight. And I know we've often gone in our minds eye to that scene at Calvary where the Lord Jesus after those hours of darkness. And maybe I'll just say this as we pass by, there was part of the work that no one beheld. The Lord Jesus was shrouded in darkness by God for three hours when he bore my sins in his own body on the tree, when God took up the question of sin, when he punished His Son for my sins.
It's to me it's just as if he said that's enough and he shut man out. Man had abused the Lord Jesus for hours and hours and hours. They had reviled him. They beheld him suffering in his agony. And God said that's enough. And God shrouded the scene in darkness while he laid my sins on his sacred head.
But then later on, after the darkness was over and it was suggested that those bodies, the body of the Lord Jesus and the two malefactors that were crucified with him.
Be taken down from the cross.
We find that when the soldier came to the Lord Jesus, he had already laid down his life, because the Lord Jesus had said of his life, I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father. He had bowed his head and said, Father into thy hands. I commend my spirit.
And a soldier with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came throughout blood and water. And John records that he saw it. John beheld that event, He that sought their record, And his record is true. And he knoweth that he saith true, that she might believe. Do you believe that? Do you believe that the blood of Jesus was shed? And it says, the blood of Jesus Christ his Son, cleanses us from all.
Sin I have never been to Evergreen Cemetery near New York City, but I am told that there is a large monument in that cemetery.
That has one word on it, the word forgiven. You know, that's enough.
Because it's through that blood that we have the forgiveness of sins.
And there are so many buried in graveyards around this world who are absent from the body and present with the Lord because the blood of Jesus.
Has cleansed them from every stain of sin.
I had the privilege recently of taking a funeral of a brother who was very dear to my heart.
A brother who is absent from the body and present with the Lord.
00:30:03
And you know, as his mind became more and more confused in the years leading up to his.
Passing on out of this scene, there was one expression that always came up in conversation.
I wanna go home.
And his mind became so confused that you weren't always sure which home he was living in the past.
You weren't always sure whether it was the home he grew up in, whether it was in Coleman, TX, or whether it was the father's house or what it was.
But you know, it didn't really matter.
And I was told just two days ago.
That when the graveyard called to see what his widow wanted put on his tombstone, she asked that these words be put on his tombstone. I thought it was so appropriate. Praise God, I'm home. Isn't that great? Praise God, I'm home. No uncertainty there. No. Well, maybe he's with the Lord. Well, I hope he was ready. No. Praise God, I'm home.
You know, we talk about those who have gone ahead as departed, and from our perspective, they have. They are. And it's certainly a scriptural expression, but, you know, they're the ones that have arrived. They're the ones that are our home, and they're there because of the work of the Lord Jesus on Calvary's cross. But what if you were to pass out of this world tonight? What if you were to draw your last breath tonight? What if the Lord Jesus were to come tonight? You know, we've been talking about.
A wonderful day, that yet future in these meetings, the day of Glory. But you know before that day dawns, there's an event going to take place that is going to impact every man and woman that has ever lived in this world. And that is what we refer to as the rapture or the second coming of Christ. The Lord Jesus is going to descend from heaven with a shout. He's going to give that shout and every believer.
Whether they're dead or alive is going to hear that shout. Everyone from righteous Abel right up to those of us who are alive and remain. And it might be before this gospel meeting is concluded. Yes, it well might be, but everyone who knows Christ as their Savior is going to hear that shout.
You know, it is a solemn thing to look into the faces of an audience like this.
So often in the course of a year I have opportunity to look into the faces.
Of those that I feel perhaps have never heard, a clear gospel message.
Many who are perhaps hearing it for the first time, and that is a very, very solemn thing. It is a very, very serious responsibility to seek, by the grace of God, to present the gospel simply and clearly to those who've never heard it, or at least never heard it clearly.
But I sometimes wonder if it isn't even more of a challenge to look into the faces of an audience like this tonight, where you have, for the most part, heard it over and over and over and over again.
Sometimes there is more indifference and more hardness in an audience like this.
Than an audience in the middle of the jungle in Guyana, South America or Trinidad or wherever it might be.
Because you've heard it so many, many times.
And in reading the story of Elijah, I've often been solemnized to realize that when Elijah was caught away to heaven in a whirlwind, a chariot of fire, it wasn't initially the general populace in Israel that missed Elijah. That was the sons of the prophets.
And I often wonder if the Lord Jesus were to come before a gospel meeting like this is over.
And so many, most, no doubt would go from this room. Would there be the sons and daughters of praying parents left behind to look around and see the empty chairs and to know exactly what had happened initially? I say initially because I believe it is just those who will be very quickly sent a strong delusion from Satan that they believe a lie. You know, that delusion isn't necessarily sent to the heathen.
It's sent to those who have known the truth, but because they receive not the love of the truth, they're sent.
00:35:02
A strong delusion that they might believe a lie, you say? How could that be?
Well, God will make sure it happens. In that solemn to think about, you'll look around initially. You'll know what has happened, like the sons of the prophets missing Elijah. And then it won't be very long until this lie is propagated. And you will actually swallow that lie. You will believe that lie. That's why we're serious tonight in the presentation of the gospel.
Let's go on to another portion in Mark's Gospel chapter 16.
Mark's Gospel, chapter 16 and verse 6. And he says unto them.
Be not affrighted, ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified.
He is risen. He is not here. Behold the place where they laid him.
We have stressed the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus Christ and that blood that was shed on Calvary's cross. But there is another very important vital element of the gospel that we want to focus on for a few moments now, and that is the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. You know, when these ones that were early to the Sepulchre came, I believe they fully expected to look into the tomb and behold the dead body.
Of the Lord Jesus Christ. But they were told to come and look in the tomb, not to behold the dead body of the Lord Jesus Christ, but to behold the place where they had laid him. To see that the tomb was empty, that the Lord Jesus had bodily risen from the dead. Because if Christ be not raised, your faith is in vain, and ye are still in your sins.
I suppose one of the reasons that people over the centuries have tried to discredit the bodily resurrection of the Lord Jesus.
Is because they don't want to deal with the fact that they are responsible.
As to him, Because as soon as they recognize that he rose from the dead.
They have to recognize that they're responsible to him as a risen man.
And they don't want to do that. But he is risen. And oh, how thankful we are that we present to you tonight.
A savior who died, yes, but a savior who is risen?
There was a man giving out some gospel tracts in a village one time, and he was going from door to door and handing out these gospel tracts and saying a little word for his savior.
And he came to the door of an elderly lady.
And ** *** answered the door, and he asked her if she wouldn't like to have.
A gospel paper concerning the Lord Jesus Christ, she said. Oh, I often look at him.
Well, he wasn't sure what she meant by that response, and so he asked her, what do you mean? I often you often look at him, She said, Come into my kitchen and I'll show you. And she took him into her kitchen, and there on the wall was a figure of the cross, with a figure hanging on that cross to represent the Lord Jesus.
And she said, You see, Sir, I often look at him, But he told her, Oh, ma'am, it's wonderful to consider the fact that the Lord Jesus died on the cross, but he's not on the cross now. And we direct people's gaze in the gospel to our risen Christ. And as he talked to her, he realized she was a believer, that she understood that the Lord Jesus had died for her on the cross.
And that she even understood that he was a risen savior. But the import of it just hadn't hit her in that way to realize that he was no longer on the cross. He had risen from the dead, and so the Lord Jesus remained on earth.
After his resurrection, and appeared to various of his own, even to about 500 of his own at one time.
To give ample and complete testimony that he had bodily risen from the dead. He didn't just leave them with an empty tomb, he left them with himself. He ate in front of them on one occasion and said, handle me and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bone as you see me have. You'll forgive the repetition of a story that's often been told, but I think it illustrates this very well. There were some missionaries, a couple of missionaries, some years ago.
00:40:15
Working in one of the busy cities in India and one day they.
Were on a street in that busy city and they were startled by a large procession coming down the road.
And they asked what the all the commotion and celebration was about.
And they were told that supposedly a bone of Buddha had been found.
And they were carrying it in a box down the road. And the followers of Buddha were rejoicing that this bone of Buddha had been found.
Well, the missionaries watched this for a time and when they retired to their quarters and talked over the matter.
They were impressed with that and, as they said, what the contrast would have been in Christianity.
Because they concluded if supposedly a bone of the Lord Jesus had been found in Christianity.
It would not have caused great rejoicing amongst the Christians. It would have caused great sorrow.
Because it would have been the proof that the Lord Jesus hadn't bodily risen from the dead. But thank God, a bone of the Lord Jesus will never be found in this world. He rose bodily from the dead and I'd like to follow this out by reading a verse now in the book of Acts.
To take this just a little step further, Acts Chapter One.
And verse 9.
And when he had spoken these things while they beheld, he was taken up in a cloud, received him.
Out of their sight, I want to stress for a few moments, not merely the bodily resurrection of the Lord Jesus.
But his bodily ascension back to the Father, You know, the resurrection, the ascension, and the glorification of Christ are God's. Amen to the work of Calvary. God has raised him from the dead and seated him at his own right hand. That's why so often we sing that old gospel hymn. There is a savior on high in the glory, a savior who suffered on Calvary's tree, a Savior as willing to save now as ever.
His arm is almighty, His love great and free. Yes, the Savior we present to you is the man Christ Jesus. Not in this world, not hanging on a cross, not in the tomb, not walking this world in resurrection, but one who is at the right hand of God. If you ever want ever doubt whether God is satisfied with the work of the Lord Jesus, just look up and see where He is now.
Seated there as the glorified man. Do you know this man?
Have you beheld the man, the man in glory? And isn't it wonderful to realize too?
That having returned to heaven with the marks of atonement on his body.
Those marks in his hands, in his feet, and in his side, which He showed on more than one occasion to His disciples in resurrection.
With the marks of atonement in his body, He's entered heaven, and the place is prepared for all those who will come in faith and receive that that offer of salvation, the gift of God, which is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Oh, I thrill as I think of the time when I'm going to enter the Father's house with the Lord Jesus, to be with the Lord Jesus to be in that scene of glory.
When I was in Saint Vincent a few weeks ago, the first three days I was there, I attended 3 different funerals.
The first funeral I attended was of a lady, a sister in the Lord by the name of Irma Collins.
For me it was a very touching experience. I had known Irma for many, many years.
Irma was born into this world, a cripple. Severely crippled at 8 years of age. Her parents dropped her off at what we call the poor house.
I won't even try to describe it to you tonight.
The stench, the vermin, the heat, the humidity, the filth, the grime.
If you think I'm exaggerating, just talk to brother Hans Buchanan or Caleb James. They've been there with me on more than one occasion. It was almost more than I could do to visit Irma every time I was in Saint Vincent. I don't have a weak stomach, but it was very difficult for me to go into that place. But there she was, in her corner.
00:45:19
Dropped off there. She'd lived there since she was 8 years old and she passed out of this world at 75. So you do the math.
But she was a bright testimony. Her face would light up when you walked in. She'd always want you to pray. She enjoyed the scriptures and anything you could take her to read concerning the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
My own souls rebuked as I even think about it.
But I attended her funeral.
And all I could think about was that expression far better.
And I know this isn't good English, but it's the only way I can describe it.
Per Airman was more far better than most.
To go from the filth of that corner in that ward in the poor home, to the glory of the face of the Lord Jesus Christ must have been something. I know it's something for everyone. Don't misunderstand me, but all just to think of a contrast. Why is Irma in the presence of the Lord tonight? Because she had to spend most of her life in the poor house. Because she was a good person. No.
Because as a young girl, Irma in that poor house came to know the Lord Jesus Christ as her savior. She was resting on the finished work of Christ. And as I looked into that coffin and saw the peace on that body and yet knew that her spirit was with the Lord, oh, it did something to my soul that I'll never be able to explain.
The very next day, I stood up to take the funeral of an elderly sister in Dickson Village, Saint Vincent.
350 people crowded that room. In that courtyard, she had a tremendous testimony. She too had known the Lord Jesus as her savior. She was, I believe, 94 years of age.
Saved as a young woman in that village gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Faithful in her quiet testimony and witness for all those years.
She lived with her daughter the last few years of her life, but I remember visiting her in her home, a home that might have been twice the size of this platform.
A home very unlike the home that most of us came to these meetings from or will ever live in. But oh, she was a joyful soul. She was a soul that loved the Lord Jesus, and I knew she was safe home. I could stand up and take her funeral with confidence.
The next day I attended the funeral of a man I don't think.
He's in. He's in heaven. I don't think he's with the Lord. Only God knows a young man brought up in a Christian home. His mother is gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ in Camden Park. Saint Vincent. He left home and went his own way. He went off to Trinidad and he lived a wildlife, such a wildlife that it brought upon him a dreaded disease.
And a few weeks before he died.
At 29 years of age, he came home to die in his mother's house.
But his mother's not sure that he ever came to repentance.
Or put his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. What a contrast.
How solemn?
Some of the hardest things I've ever done is take the funerals of unbelievers. It is a very serious thing. There is no comfort. And if you pass out of this world tonight in your sins and someone stands up to take your funeral, there will be no comfort for those that are left behind. There will be warning, yes for those that are left, but no comfort.
But oh, I trust, and there are so many here who are praying at this very moment for your soul.
That before you leave this room, you will come to know the Lord Jesus as your savior.
And that you too will be looking forward to being with the Lord Jesus in the glory where He is now and where He is waiting for that moment when he's going to give that assembling shout that's going to call everyone home who has been washed in His precious blood. Let's go to Revelation Chapter One.
00:50:30
Revelation, Chapter One.
And verse 7 Behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see him.
And they also which pierced him, and all the all kindreds of the earth, shall wail because of him Even so. Amen.
This verse has a very solemn aspect to it. This is the day when the Lord Jesus comes back in judgment.
And the heavens are going to open up someday to reveal the Lord Jesus not coming as the Savior of sinners.
Not coming in loneliness and grace, but coming in power and glory to execute judgment. And if we were to read on in this book, we would find that there are those who are going to cry for the mountains and the rocks to fall on them and to hide them from the wrath of the Lamb and the face of him that sitteth upon the throne.
There's a day coming when they're going to look up and they're going to see the Lord Jesus coming.
And oh, what an awful sight it's going to be, what note of bread it's going to strike in their hearts.
But there will be no escaping. They will seek death even, but they will not be able to find it, And in the final analysis they will stand at the Great White Throne judgment.
And there they will behold the Lord Jesus not as the lamb, but as the judge, one whose sight to look upon will be awesome. It will be terrifying. And they will stand there, and they will be judged for their works, and they will be judged because they rejected or neglected. So great salvation. I trust there's nobody here.
Who's going to be left behind for this awful event? Again, the way of blessing.
Is open. Let's in contrast, notice a verse in the 17th chapter of John.
John's Gospel chapter 17 and verse 24. Father, I will.
That they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory, which thou gavest me.
For thou lovest me, before the foundation of the world, there are those, as we have said, who are going to look into the faith of the Lord Jesus as their judge.
But there are those who are going to see his glory and the desire of the Lord Jesus is to have his own.
Around himself, that they may behold his glory. His heart is going to be satisfied to have us there.
And those of us who know him and are going to be there, we're going to be satisfied. When we awaken His likeness, what a wonderful, mutual feeling of satisfaction and joy. He'll joy over us with singing. He'll be satisfied. We'll join in raising in joining in the eternal song. We'll be satisfied in His presence and will behold for all eternity his glory. Oh, what a day that's going to be, I thrill to think.
Of that day. But maybe it strikes terror in your heart. Oh, it doesn't have to tonight.
I want, in closing, to turn to one more scripture now it's in the book of the Acts.
Acts Chapter 7.
Acts Chapter 7 and verse 56.
This is Steven talking and said behold, I see heavens opened and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God. I'm going to take this verse a little bit out of its context at the end of the gospel meeting.
Because I want to apply it in this way.
The Lord Jesus is the Savior of sinners.
Is standing tonight, as it were, on the very threshold of heaven.
I see heaven open, and the Son of man standing, or shall I say for our purposes tonight, the Son of man standing.
00:55:04
And why is he standing tonight on the threshold of heaven? He's standing to receive anyone who will come to him as a repentance center.
He's bending low over this room tonight to hear the faintest whisper of faith and repentance. He desires to receive you to himself. His arms are outstretched in love, waiting to embrace you tonight. Are you going to come as he stands on the threshold of heaven, waiting to receive you if you go out of this gospel meeting tonight, rejecting or neglecting Christ?
You're going to cause great sorrow to his heart.
His desire is to bless you. He desires your blessing far, far more.
Than any other human being, and thank God he does.
Oh, don't disappoint him.
Don't grieve his heart tonight, but if you come, there's joy in the presence of the angels of God over 1 Sinner that repenteth.
You wanna bring joy in heaven tonight, come as a Sinner.
Repent, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. Oh tonight. Behold the man. He's there in the glory. Look up by faith and behold him and take hold of what he's offering.
Eternal life. The forgiveness of sins. A happy life down here.
Not necessarily problem free, but a happy life down here.
And a blessed, a blessed and a wonderful eternity in that coming day of glory.
Something that defies and is beyond description in human language. But all tonight, all tonight, it's available. Come tonight, behold the man, let's pray our God and Father how thankful we are tonight again for the Lord Jesus, that blessed Savior.
Water to Drink
Children—Tim Roach
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Good morning. Morning. Why don't we start this morning by singing #40? We'll sing the first verse and the chorus.
#40
Jesus loved me this time so that it was 1-2 and three one play. Hardly.
From beginning times 128.
Lounge loudly.
Yeah, I'm getting time to live through my mindfulness of.
OK, now let's sing #41, the 1St and the first verse in the chorus.
Around the.
Person are all forgiven, will be of them handsome drinking quality.
Glory faces on all the time.
Now let's see #47, the first verse in the chorus.
When he cometh, when he come, I still hang out with you, was articulated.
By land his own.
Flight as far as the morning in a bright brown and ***** they shall shine until it's good. It's bright down for him and brown.
OK, let's pray before we continue. Our God and Father, we give thanks for your son, the Lord Jesus. We give thanks that we can learn about him this morning, about his love for us, about his death for us, and about salvation. Father, we just ask for help this morning as we talk about the Lord Jesus. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. Amen.
OK, if anybody with any children would like to come sit up in the front, it might be easier for you to see. So you're welcome to come sit in one of these first two rows.
OK, let's see.
Let's see #16.
Now the daughter is so bad and her while he was back in. Did you hear something untrue today? And also playground the big wedding Do somebody else work? Well, I'm trying to get a call.
When the lighter will do, the last breath will know.
Across 190, she had no longer failed myself.
There is a father called the laundry called.
Do so rather well. Merry Christmas.
OK, I want to read a verse from Exodus chapter 17. I'm going to read the first verse and it says all. The congregation of the children of Israel journeyed from the wilderness of seeing after their journey according to the commandments of the Lord and pitched in reference. And there is no water for the people to drink. There was no water for the people to drink. Have you ever been thirsty?
00:05:19
I tell you, search is the worst. I remember one time there is a festival in Glenwood, MN where we used to live and we were walking along looking at all the the sights and here we walked past the lake and they were having a a canoe race and they had two people in the canoe race but they needed another team and they convinced my wife and I to join this race. There was US against these two big guys.
And so we got into that canoe and we agreed to do it and we started out and we are supposed to go up and go around 1 buoy and then go off to the second buoy, go around that one, go to the third buoy, go around that one saying come back to the finish line. And so we got in our boat and then others were in their canoe too and we started paddling and we were going as fast as we could. We got to the first buoys at the same time we started to we we got on the inside and we kind of pushed them out and they kind of gave us a big push back. So we went backwards and they went around the booing viewers behind.
And so they got we. We caught up to them by the 2nd the second week, but they were around that faster than we could and.
On to the third degree. Well, we went to the third buoy. We went around but we forgot to go in a circle around it and we kept right on going to the finish line and all we had to do is stop and come back. And we first we had to take care of them, so we had to run into them and push them and they went toasty off into the shallow water and they got stuck in the mud. So then we were able to get around the the buoy and by that time they got unstuck and then we're we're just nose to nose going back and forth to the finish line.
And it but when we were working so hard, That's the worst time I've ever been so thirsty. I could hardly breathe and you couldn't swallow. But there was water everywhere. If I stopped to take a drink of water, we wouldn't have been contending in the race. And so we had to continue racing hard. But the thirst, the thirst is the worst. And because your tongue gets thick, your mouth gets dry, you can't swallow. And if you don't drink water for a long time.
Your body starts to work badly because I think it's about 70% of your body is made-up of water and so your body needs water.
Well, these people of children of Israel, Moses was their leader. He was leading them through the the wilderness. And they came.
There was about one million of these people, the children of Israel. There are more than one million of them had just left the land of Egypt, where they were slaves.
And they started walking out of Egypt and walking through the wilderness, and they got to a place.
Where they were going to worship the Lord. They said, we're going to leave this land. We want to leave this slavery. We want to go out and we want to worship the Lord. And Moses, he was leading these people as he led them out of Israel. They were out of Egypt. He was going to take them to the promised land. They were going to have their own country, their own land. And one day, as they walked, they came to a deserted place in the wilderness of Arabia. And there they came up and they found a large rock.
Just like this, A large rock they had found and it was called the Rock. The name of the rock was called Horeb. Now Horeb means desolate. It means there's nothing around. It's like a desert. There's nothing. There's no food, there's no water.
There's no water there. At Horeb. There's 1,000,000 people and there was no water to drink.
They wanted to cool their tongues, They wanted to quench their thirst. They wanted to be able to live. But they had no water. That reminds me, boys and girls. That reminds me of the rich man and Lazarus. Lazarus was a poor man. He had no food.
And the rich man, he had lots of food. He fared sumptuously every day, and he ate lots of food. And he was sitting there at his table, and the Lazarus had nothing to eat.
But when drops of food, scraps of food fell from the table or somebody threw away something they didn't want, he could go and get that and he could eat something there. But then one day.
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They both died. Lazarus knew the Lord as his savior and he went to heaven. But the rich man he did not know. The Lord is his savior, and he went to hell. And as he was there in hell in the torments of the flames, he was thirsty.
He was thirsty. He had no water to drink. He wanted somebody to come and justice. Give him one drop of water to quench his thirst to cool his tongue. Boys and girls, you don't want to go to a place called hell. It's not a nice place.
God didn't prepare hell for you. He prepared hell for the devil and his angels. He God prepared a way of escape for you. I want to read Diverse Exodus chapter 17, verse 2.
And now remember that these people were in Horeb. And there was number water there, 1,000,000 people, And there was number water. And these people were angry. And let's read this verse. The people said, Wherefore the people did chide with Moses. And they said, give us water that we may drink. And Moses said unto them, Why do you chide with me? Wherefore do you tempt the Lord? Oh, these people, they were angry at Moses.
And they chided him and they complained. You took us out of Egypt. We had all the food, all the water we could drink. And you bring us out here in the desert. We have no water. Why did you bring us out here? To die in the in the desert. We are dying. Our children are dying. Our animals are dying. We hate you, Moses. We hate you. We're thirsty. We want water to drink. Give us water to drink or we will kill you.
That's what chiding is.
That's what it means to chive. They were angry and they they were angry with Moses and they chided Moses. They all bent down and they picked up stones. They were going to throw those stones at Moses. If you have 1,000,000 people throwing stones at one person, that person is going to die pretty quickly. They were going to kill Moses. But Moses, he was afraid. He was afraid and he cries to the Lord. He says, Lord, what should I do?
These people, they're ready to throw stones at me. They're ready to kill me. But God? God is a God of mercy. He doesn't want anyone to perish. And he.
And so the Lord said to Moses, he said in verse five, he said, Moses, go on before the people, go in front of all the people, and take with you the elders of Israel, and take your rod.
We're with us, modest, the river. Take the rod in thy hand and go. Behold, I will stand before thee upon the rock in Horeb. So Moses was supposed to go in front of all the people, go up to the rock. God was going to be on top of the rock. It says here I will be upon the rock and horeb, and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it that the people may drink.
God told Moses to strike that rock and water was going to come out of it.
If you think we can get water out of this rock.
Let's go to Psalm 105 for a verse before we get water out of this rock.
We want to go to Psalm 105.
Because Moses, he did exactly what the Lord God told him to do. He hit that rock with his stick and the rock split and water came up out of that rock. And the water that came out of the rock, it wasn't like a little fountain. It wasn't like a tap of water where you could turn the tap on, put your cup underneath there and get a cup of water to drink. That's not what kind of water came. Look what it says here in verse 41. It says God opened the rock.
And the waters gushed out. They ran in the dry places like a river, so the rock opened and the waters gushed out.
And they ran like a river. A river for one million people to drink of water for their animals to drink. Now I need some some help. How many people? Why don't you? All you kids sitting in the front. You come stand here and we're going to show you how to get water out of a rock. Come on, guys, stand all up here. Why don't you stand right over here and we'll see. And I want you to get your hands ready to catch the water. OK. I'm going to hit this rock and the water is going to come out of it.
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OK.
Stop.
Rivers of water came out of the rock water of life for everyone. They were able to drink the water and without water they would die. So the people drank the water, they drank and drank the water and they gave the water to their children. They gave the water to their animals. Water is life. Water keeps your body alive.
You can drink the water if you want, you can open it up and you can take a drink of the water.
But rivers of water came out of that rock.
Now boys and girls.
Listen to me now.
Water is what helps to keep you alive.
But inside your body, inside your body, you have a soul and you have a spirit.
And your spirit is thirsty. It's thirsty for God.
Your spirit is like it connects you to God. You know, like when you have a plug, you want to plug it into the wall.
That's how that's like your spirit. Your spirit plugs in and connects you to God. But before you can be connected to God, you need spiritual water for your spiritual thirst.
The book of Ephesians in the Bible it tells us that the word of God.
Is spiritual water, and so we need to read our word of God. We need to know that the Word of God is the water of life.
In Revelation 22, verse 17, it says whosoever will let him take the water of life freely. I want to go to John's Gospel chapter 4.
John's Gospel chapter 4 And this is a story about a lady and a story about the Lord Jesus. One day, the Lord Jesus he was, he was walking through the wilderness and he was tired and he was thirsty and he needed a drink of water. This is the Lord Jesus. He needed a drink of water, but he had no bucket. He found a well, but he had no bucket. He had no rope to get the water, so he just sat down.
And he rested on the well.
Soon a lady came along and she had a bucket with her, and she came, and the Lord Jesus said to her, oh give me water, please give me water. And then Jesus, he offered her some water. He said, Jesus offered this lady a drink of spiritual water. And Jesus said, if you drink this spiritual water, you will have everlasting life.
The lady said to the Lord Jesus.
How are you going to get water? You have nothing to draw water up with. Where are you going to get the water? But what did you? Let's read verse 14. John 414. Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him. A well of water spring up into everlasting life. Oh, So what did what did the Lord Jesus mean when he told her that drinking water would give her everlasting life?
I think the Lord Jesus meant that she needed to believe the word of God. She needed to believe, and if she believed, she would have everlasting life, John 316 says. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.
Believe. What are you going to believe, boys and girls? What are you going to believe? Believe that Jesus is God. He says if you don't believe that I am, you shall die in your sins. Believe that Jesus is God and believe that you are a Sinner and that you are on your way to hell because of your sins. And you can't help yourself. You can't save yourself.
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You can come to the Bible meetings. You can learn the verses, but that's not going to save you. Your mom and dad might be saved. Maybe your mom and dad knows the Lord is their savior, but your mom and dad can't save you just because they bring you to the meetings. You need to believe that you are a Sinner and that you are helpless and you need a savior. Jesus is your savior. Jesus suffered on the cross because of your sins. God punished Jesus there at the cross.
For your sins. And then Jesus died. After Jesus died, the soldier came with the spear and pierced him in the side.
And immediately came out the blood and the water. And it's the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, that cleanses us from all sin.
And after the Lord Jesus died and his blood was shed, they took him down off the cross, and they buried him in a tomb. And three days later the Lord Jesus rose from the dead. Do you believe this? Do you believe this?
If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
God wants you to come now, he says. Come now.
He says, behold, now is the accepted time. Behold, now is the day of salvation.
OK, we may need somebody to help here, but I'd like all the children to be able to open their bottles. Could could someone come and help them open their bottles?
Everybody, I want you to open your bottle and take a little drink.
Is that water good?
It's easy, isn't it? You just tip it up, take a little drink.
It's good water now. Now put the lid back on your water so it doesn't spill. But now I want you to open your spirit, open your soul, open your heart, and I want you to ask the Lord Jesus to save you. I want you to take a drink of spiritual water and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved. John 316 says for God to love the world that he gave his only begotten Son.
That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Believe, and you will have everlasting life. But if you do not believe.
You will perish. You will perish in hell. And you know what, boys and girls in hell, There is no water. There's no water in hell. And you're going to be thirsty there. So please drink the water of life today.
Believe on the Lord Jesus.
You know what? You guys all had something to drink, but I didn't have anything to drink. Does somebody want to share their water with me, Holly?
Can you open up your bottle and pour some water in here?
That's good. Thank you very much.
She's sharing her water with me. Wasn't that nice?
That was good. Thank you, Holly.
She shared her water with me.
You know what Jesus shared the water of everlasting life.
He shared that water with the lady. But then what did the lady do? She went to her village and she told them about Jesus. Come, she said. Come and see this man. Isn't this man the Christ? Isn't this God? She went and shared the word of God, the message of life. She shared it with those other people.
You too. You can take your.
Bibles. You can remember a verse from your memory. Verse from Sunday school. You can remember the verse. You can go and you can talk to your friends at school. You can share the words of life with other people.
Let's sing a little song that's not in the paper. Jesus gave her water that was not from the world, gave her living water.
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When she went or to come, she went away.
And came back to me and scored the water and everyone else was not in about.
Boys and girls, first you need to drink the water of life yourself. You need to be saved. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved secondly. Then you can take the water of life and you can share it with your friends just like holly. She shared with me her water. You can share the words of Jesus Christ with your friends. Let's pray our God and Father. We give thanks to the water of life. We give thanks for the Lord Jesus who died on the cross.
We give thanks for the privilege that we have of believing on the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved. We just ask for each one of these children and and and all to know the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior. We ask this in Jesus name. Amen. Amen.
Continue Ye in My Love
Address—Bill Prost
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Could we sing together the 1St 6 verses of #2 in the appendix?
#2 in the appendix, the first university.
Lord, thy loved unbounded, so sweet, so full, so free.
You'll notice that the language of this hymn written by JN Garvey is more personal, written in the first person. I suppose the lyrics could have been changed a little to reflect the more collective response, but.
He chose to leave it in the singular and that does bring it home, doesn't it? Individually More to our souls #2 in the appendix, the 1St 6 verses.
Oh Lord, thy love thyroid.
My soul is all friend of all the earth and glamour. I think I'm feeling good.
For all of us.
In my laundry.
Mind and yeah, I thought one generation.
Of all my quarters.
You know, Joy and all his crying.
And brighter Lord in the end.
And I did turn to the island.
Crying.
My glory.
Forever and merit thy name.
When I determined.
Towards me.
As ever, was bright.
Let's look at the Lord, our loving God and our Father. We have custody now this afternoon.
We give thanks for that love and love that was so four weeks explained to Calvary classes that love which existed towards, you know, past experience.
As long as our God, this goes on with us all the way to the end.
At love which we showed the joy for all eternity.
You know, we went to heat for the time over Thy word this afternoon, and we prayed that it's open together, that Thou guide You direct. Why rest?
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During examples for you twice the forest and all the flowing must be the devil will need to lead to our God for their enemy. You know here this afternoon.
We commend our time together for the event and your name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen. Christmas.
I can well remember, and I think it was the Lawrenceville conference here quite a few years ago now.
And.
It was long enough to go that the meetings, I think were in Bridgeport, not here.
And I will remember that I had been asked to have the responsibility of a meeting, and as I was walking up the aisle, a brother who's now with the Lord, not from this area, kind of waylaid me. And with somewhat of a plaintive note to his voice, he said.
Have you got something for the heart?
Have you got something for the heart?
I must confess, I don't even remember what we had before us at that meeting.
But what I have before me this afternoon, I trust, will be primarily for the heart.
As I travel around and get to know some of the Lord's people, I find that.
Among most of them, there are real hurts.
And when there is the opportunity to probe a little beneath the surface, and sometimes when people feel relaxed enough to, as it were, let their hair down and talk a little, you find that in the hearts of almost all of the Saints of God today, whether here in North America or whether in foreign lands.
There are hurts, there are problems, there are serious difficulties.
There are things that perhaps in some cases are not suitable to be talked about publicly and perhaps not revealed to everyone.
And in saying that, I freely confess that sometimes there is an attitude in my own soul that doesn't, shall we say, encourage people to open up the way that they should. But nevertheless, there are many things out there.
Which caused the people of God to be hurting.
And I'd like to speak a little this afternoon about the love of God.
Turn with me first then please, to a verse in Romans 5A, well known verse, Romans chapter 5.
And verse 8.
We're going to start here right at the beginning of our Christian pathway, although this is an address primarily to believers, but here we find in Romans five and eight that well known verse that probably most of the children here have committed to memory.
But God commandeth his love toward us.
In that while we were yet sinners, Christ.
Guide for us.
Oh what a beautiful verse that is. As an old brother long since with the Lord used to remind us, if God has not won your heart and mind, what more could he do to win it?
I well remember when I was going to College in the city of Toronto quite a few years ago now. We lived in an apartment in a high rise building.
And there was a young man, not a believer, but who occupied the apartment next to us.
He was single and he got lonely, so that it was not unusual for him to knock on our door and come into our apartment at times in the evening just to sit and talk. He characteristically, characteristically would knock on the door and then open it. We knew him well without even waiting for someone to answer it, and his characteristic greeting was break, break.
Meaning stop studying for a while, we're going to sit and chat.
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He had a good job.
He was doing well for himself, but he didn't know the Savior. And I remember there was the opportunity to speak to him about Christ, and at first he seemed indifferent.
But then the Lord allowed an event in his life that really sobered him up because he held, I'm sorry, he had an aunt who was not that old, perhaps in her 50s, who suddenly had a serious heart attack and within a few hours was taken away.
And he suddenly realized how vulnerable he could be, whether from something like that or some other cause, and he accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as his Savior.
I appreciated that I can remember him to this day, although I haven't seen him for many years.
But you know what I remember about him? His name was Howie Howard, or Howie as he was affectionately known.
Was that there failed to be what I would like to have seen as a real growth in his soul as a Christian. He came to the meetings in Toronto for a while. He even came to the conference which was held in Detroit, MI at that time and.
In a measure, he enjoyed the things of the Lord, but there was a problem there because he had come to Christ, if I could say it.
For the most part as a fire escape from hell. He had come to Christ because he realized he was headed.
For a lost eternity. And I don't mean to imply that there's anything wrong with coming to Christ for that reason.
But he never seemed to get hold of the enjoyment of Christ in his heart. He never seemed to get hold of the preciousness of the love of God that had been so fully displayed at Calvary's cross.
We often speak of the grace of God and the love of God, and sometimes, at least I have in the past, almost seem to equate the two.
But there is a difference. There is a difference even though they are very closely connected and certainly overlap. What is the difference? Well, I would suggest this. There is a similarity in the sense that.
As far as you and I were concerned, both the grace of God and the love of God originated in His heart.
Beautiful.
The grace of God, The grace of God is what we might say the unmerited or undeserved favor of God to you and to me.
And the love of God in that sense is too, as someone has said so perfectly, and I couldn't put it in any better words, he said. God is light.
And we make him a judge by our sins. But God is also love, and none have made him so. That is blessedly true. And the divine love that was extended to you and me and that originated in the heart of God had nothing to do with anything in US.
But when we get to that point, we find there is a difference because.
Let me say it reverently. Do you and I ever show grace to God?
Not really. Do we can't do it, It doesn't fit. Do we ever show God some special favor that he doesn't deserve? You say? Well, no, that thought is totally.
Out of character, with everything to do with God and his creature, and in view of the Word of God.
But when we come to love, there is the opportunity to reciprocate.
Oh, how precious that is. The grace of God, if we could say it, precious although it is, goes only one way.
The love of God originates in the heart of God, yes.
But as it says in first John chapter four, we love Him because He first loved us. Oh, how beautiful to recognize that it was God's love that reached out to you and me when we were nothing but lost, guilty sinners, and that was brought before us in the meeting this morning. I was thankful for the theme that the Lord by His Spirit laid on our hearts this morning because I had the thoughts that I want to try and give out this afternoon on my heart already.
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And what we had before us this morning, I trust only emphasized and corroborated that.
The love of God extended to you and to me. We'll come back to that theme about.
Our love to Christ, our love returned to the Lord in a moment, but let's turn now to John's Gospel, chapter 15.
As I said a moment ago, we're speaking mainly to believers this afternoon.
John's Gospel, chapter 15.
Verse 9.
As the Father hath loved me.
So have I loved you.
Continue ye in my love.
Those of you.
Who read the April issue of The Christian will recognize the source of what I'm going to say.
Because there was an old brother again, long since with the Lord.
Who used to emphasize this verse over and over again in his public ministry? And there was a little excerpt from his ministry in that issue of the Christian he used to say to us.
Memorize this verse and say it over to yourself.
Every day of your life.
Over and over again he used to bring that in. Sometimes some of us that used to listen to us to it used to think well.
That that particular thought really isn't the in the chapter we're taking up right now in the reading meeting. But he'd bring it in anyway. Why? Oh, because it was so precious to his soul. As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you.
Continue ye in my love.
God doesn't put any special premium on ignorance, and it's a wonderful thing to be intelligent in the things of God.
But it's not the one that knows the most that makes the best Christian.
It's the one that enjoys the love of God in the soul the most, that makes the best Christian. And that is why you and I sometimes see dear believers who know very little. And perhaps if you were to ask them questions about prophecy or about some of the deeper truths of the Church, they would not be able to answer you as intelligently as many here could do. And yet there is a rejoicing and a bubbling over in their hearts. Why?
Oh, because the love of God is being enjoyed in the soul. And sometimes, you know, you and I read this verse, and if you're anything like me, you gloss over it quickly. As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you. Can we ever measure divine love? Can we ever measure the depth of love that the Father has for his beloved Son? Go back all the way into a past eternity.
And you find the Lord Jesus, and we'll talk about one of those verses in a few minutes. Reaches back into a past eternity to talk about the love that the Father had for him.
The Lord Jesus says I have loved you with that same love, and now he says I don't want you to appreciate that love only in respect of what took place at Calvary's cross, although that was the full display of it. I don't want you to think about that love only in terms of your sins being forgiven and being on your way to heaven. I want you to continue in that love.
All I say to your heart and mind, what a wonderful thing that is to be able to do that. What a wonderful thing it is in your life and mine every day of our lives, to think of the fact that the Lord loves us.
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I don't remember the brother, and I don't think anyone here does, but there was a brother. He was.
Based in Canada, although his ministry took him into many parts of North America and ultimately in some cases to other parts of the world such as the West Indies and so on. James B Dunlop and I am told on good authority that on one occasion he was in a private home where they were holding the remembrance of the Lord because there weren't enough believers there to.
Have a meeting room and after the meeting was over while they waited for the noon meal to be prepared.
It was noticed that he was just leaning back in an armchair in the living room with his head back and.
His eyes closed, someone wondering if he was OK because he was an older man at the time, said Brother Dunlop, are you all right? And his response was, Oh yes, he said I'm very much all right. I was just sitting here and letting the Lord love me. Isn't that beautiful?
Maybe I can use a personal illustration in the absence of my wife.
We sometimes spend some longer hours in the car and it so happens in our car that there is a shift lever on the console so that I can reach it and so can she. And it's not unusual. Sometimes for some reason, I end up resting my hand on that shift lever. Not that I'm planning to shift anything, but it's just a convenient place to rest it. And it is not unusual for her to put her left hand over on top of mine. We don't say anything. We don't have to make conversation all the time.
It's just pleasant to ride along there. And I trust mutually have in our souls the sense of one another's love.
Oh, what a wonderful thing that is. And I say to your heart and mine, the Lord wants you and me to enjoy all of that in our lives. But there is something that is very important in this connection. And I just want we said this meeting would be mainly for the heart. I trust it will be, but we can't separate in one sense, ministry for the heart and ministry for the conscience because they go together.
And I would like, if you will, to turn over to 1St John just for one verse. That is very, very important. And there are others that we could refer to which are along the same line, but this one will do for our purposes.
First John, chapter 5.
Five and verse 3.
First John 5 and verse 3.
For this is the love of God.
That we keep His commandments and His commandments are not grievous. I would just make this point to each one of our hearts mind. Perhaps most of all, that if you and I want to enjoy the Lord's love. Excuse me. And what a wonderful experience it is. Let us never forget that love and obedience go together. And if you and I want to enjoy the Lord's love. If we want to have true happiness in our Christian lives.
All obedience is part of it.
Think about that for a moment.
Referring, for example, to the marriage relationship, referring to the relationship between parents and children. If there is, on the part of either spouse, a deliberate and willful doing of that which is known to be distasteful to the other spouse, can there be the enjoyment of one another's love? No, there can't. If there is, we'll say on the part of a child, deliberate and willful doing of that which they know.
Is against what their parents have commanded them to do.
Can there be real enjoyment of that love? No their cat?
Obedience is important and sometimes we fool ourselves because our hearts are so deceitful into thinking, well, the Lord loves me anyway. His love is unconditional. Ah, that is blessedly true. And if you will remember, and you'll pardon my referring to it, but if you will remember, those of you that have read it, that quotation in the Christian, it emphasized that fact by saying that although God.
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'S government may come into our lives and although his ways with us may change.
His love never does. That is blessedly true. But at the same time, my enjoyment of that love will not be the same if there is willful disobedience. And if I try to gloss over the whole situation by saying, well, the Lord loves me anyway and he accepts me the way I am, and he loved me when I was a lost, guilty Sinner. So that it's not so critical if I go out deliberately and disobey the Word of God because he loves me anyway.
Oh, I will find that, as another has so aptly put it.
Yes, God loves me the way I am.
But that's the half truth. He loves me too much to let me stay that way. He wants to see the full enjoyment of himself. And in that connection once again in first John, turn back to chapter 3 because I want to refer to a verse here.
First John three and verse 20.
I love the wording of this verse.
And I'm indebted to a brother who's sitting in the room today for pointing this out not only to me, but to others.
Versus 20 and 21?
For if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things.
Beloved, if our heart condemneth not, then have we confidence toward God.
Oh, there's a depth, I believe to those verses that I sometimes don't realize. There are times when my heart condemns me. And notice the wording here. This is John's ministry, and his ministry tends to speak more to the heart, and so he does not say.
Beloved, if our conscience condemn us, if I do that which is a deliberate act of disobedience to the Lord, my conscience will condemn me.
And I will not enjoy the Lord's love, but if I go a step further, can my heart condemn me even if I'm not disobeying and no one command? Yes, it can. Because as the depth of a relationship matures and those here, if I can say it, that have been married for any length of time will know what I'm talking about. Or even those that have enjoyed a close friendship with someone for many years, you know very well that after a while you get to know that individual so that you do not need.
A specific command in order to know that you're doing something that they would not like. And I suggest here that the thought perhaps is deeper than mere disobedience to something about which Scripture is very explicit. It's rather has my walk drifted? Has my walk gotten away from the Lord?
Oh, if my heart condemns me, what do I find out? God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things, and I would encourage your heart and mind that if that has happened.
As a dear brother, I think it was Mr. Bellitt made the remark. I enjoyed it so much, He said, if we have gotten away from the Lord, and even if we have seriously failed, let us always remember that in coming back to the Lord we have always to do with love. Love that may act in government, yes. Love that may sometimes act in discipline, yes. But it's always to do with love. But oh, how much better to be in a position where our heart doesn't condemn us. And then what's the result?
Oh, then there's confidence toward God. Confidence toward God.
But then.
We want to talk a little bit about.
Trials and difficulties in our lives.
We said at the beginning of the meeting.
And we'll turn to one more verse before we talk about it. But we said at the beginning of the meeting.
That there are many, and I'm sure there are many here in this room this afternoon.
Were really hurting.
Can be many different kinds of problems, problems in one's personal life. I've talked to a lot of young people and they have unburdened in some cases to the point where they have revealed some of the difficulties and nightmares, at least they seem like nightmares. I look back to some of the things that bothered me as a teenager and I look back from the vantage point of my point in life and I say my, Oh my, whatever did I get all worked up about that for?
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But it was sure was real at the time. It was very real at the time. It was not small stuff.
The world has a saying, don't sweat the small stuff. And it's all small stuff. But it wasn't small stuff at the time, was it? And the world has that saying.
There are hurts out there, assembly problems, and maybe there doesn't seem to be any solution. Difficulties in our work lives where there doesn't seem to be any way out, difficulties in our family life, in our assembly life, health problems, many different things where the Lord, as it were, seems to have allowed something that's almost overwhelming.
We think, and I don't think it hurts to mention a specific name of dear Suzanne Rogers out on the West Coast. There she is in her prime of life, humanly speaking, loving husband, 4 lovely children. And there, unless the Lord works an absolute miracle in the next little while, it looks very certain as if the Lord is going to take her home. And you and I look on and say, why Lord? Why? Why?
Looks like a nightmare of tragedy. And we could multiply that hundreds and perhaps thousands of times if we were to go around the Saints of God. And of course your acquaintance and mine with the Saints of God is very limited. Turn back to John chapter 13.
John's Gospel, chapter 13.
John 13 and verse one. Beautiful verse.
Now, before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come, that he should depart out of this world under the Father.
Having loved his own, which were in the world, He loved them unto the end.
Oh how lovely, He loved them unto the end.
Now you can take that expression under the end in more than one way. Some have taken it that it meant that the Lord Jesus was willing to go right to the very end of the pathway to the cross in order to exhibit His love for his own. And I enjoy that thought. But I believe there is also the thought here, and it is in keeping with what takes place as the chapter unfolds, that the Lord Jesus.
Not only was going to go to Calvary's cross in order forever to settle the question of sin, but.
He, as we have often heard the expression, was going to exhibit that love all the way home. He is going to take you and me all the way home.
When these difficulties occur in our lives, and sometimes they seem so overwhelming and sometimes they're things.
That seem very difficult. Let me touch on a sensitive issue. Maybe there are those sitting here, maybe young men, maybe young women even more so, who say I'd love to have my own home.
I'd love to have my own family.
And the time goes on and it doesn't happen.
I'd never been in that situation, but I've talked to those that are very difficult and I mentioned that only as one heartache that can be there on a continual basis, many, many things like that.
I say to your heart and mind, if you're not careful, if I'm not careful, the devil will whisper in our ear.
Does the Lord really love you? And he allows that. Could the Lord really be a loving God? You say that he's your Savior, and you say that he died for you on Calvary's cross, and you say that he has a home in heaven for you. But if he really loved you, would he put you through all this kind of trouble and difficulty when at the moment there seems just no way out with Is that really a loving God?
And I say to my own heart, if we are not careful, He can get a toehold in our hearts. And you see the result of that in the parable of the talents in Matthew 25 and the parable of the pounds in Luke 19. And you will remember that in each case the man with one talent or the man with 1 LB did not use what he was given for the Lord.
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In the one case he buried it in the earth, and the other case he wrapped it up in a napkin.
And when he was called to account as to why he had done that, the response was almost the same in each case, he said, as it were, to the Lord and Master. Excuse me?
He said, I knew that you were an austere man, reaping where thou hadst not stolen, and gathering where thou hadst not strode. And therefore I went and hid my talent in the earth and wrapped it up in a napkin.
Oh, he had wrong thoughts of the Master, And if we are not careful, even as believers, we can have wrong thoughts of God, and we can fall back into the natural man's view of God that says.
God is asking of Maine more than I can give. God is a demanding God who wants something from me and all I'm getting from him is trouble and difficulty. And then he's saying give me this, give me that, and how can I do it in all the pickle I'm in?
I can still remember.
Boy.
50 years ago now, being in a brother's home as a teenager, I was in.
My first year of college at the time.
And I don't take any credit for it, but I'm very thankful to the Lord that the Lord gave me the grace to go to the assembly meetings during the week rather than hit the books. And I remember being in this brother's home, a brother whom I knew very well and whom I esteemed and who was old enough to be my father.
And it came time to go to meeting and I said, well, I'm going to meeting. I said how about coming, Let's go.
And I'll never forget his response. He had a difficult time at his work. It wasn't easy. His boss was giving him a rough time, he had stomach ulcers and other problems, and things weren't going that well for him at work.
And his reaction was this Oh, Bill, he said. I'm having a hard enough time earning a living, let alone go to any reading meeting.
Ouch.
As if the Lord was giving him such a rough time at his work that he couldn't find time to go collectively and have the word of God open. Oh, may the Lord preserve us from that. And I say to my own heart, as I say to you, whatever there may be allowed in your life, whatever the Lord may have put into my life, and even if I have brought it on myself by my own unfaithfulness, willfulness, carelessness, let me justify God first and foremost.
Job had to learn that lesson, and it was a hard one for Job to learn because he was a Goodman.
But he was taking all the credit for it, and the Lord had to put him through the most difficult circumstances to bring him down, down, down.
It makes some of us hang our heads.
Because some of us know what that feels like, and maybe we still do. But justify God in everything. That's the pathway to blessing. And first of all, before we talk about you and about me, it honors God. Oh, it honors God when you and I accept everything from Him. And if the world were to look on and see you and me as believers, having everything nice and rosy and smooth, that's what Joe thought was going to happen.
He had it all figured out. Maybe you and I have too. He was a wealthy man. His life was going along smoothly. He had a nice family. Everything was prosperous. People looked up to him. Was he? Was he leading a good life? Indeed he was. Even Satan couldn't pick holes in his character, and Job confesses when he speaks to his three friends later on. He'd said in his heart, I shall die in my nest. Nest.
Yeah, there's a nest all figured out.
And he was all prepared to go through life and die in his nest.
And then the Lord, as it were, blew that nest all the pieces in. Poor Job finds himself under the very worst of circumstances.
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But you know, Job is going to thank the Lord in a coming day for that experience. Oh, how beautiful.
I enjoyed what our brother brought out about Job's daughters this morning because there he gave Job that which I do believe spoke of the finished work of Christ. And Job had more than he had before. But he only got one family again. Why? Well, because the animals, his possessions down here were made for time.
But his children were made for eternity. He's going to have not just.
Three daughters in eternity. He'll have six. He'll have a full family up there. All of the ones that were carried away in the original catastrophe. Wonderful. And I say to your heart and mind, and we won't belabor the point because Don Rule covered it pretty well yesterday afternoon. I just want to make it.
Remember that behind every circumstance is a love that you and I can measure only by what took place at Calvary's cross. And if you and I ever have any doubt about what the Lord's love is or the truth of all that He did for us. If there ever is a dart of Satan that gets into my heart, if there ever is a jab there that makes me think, oh, is the Lord really loving me as much as.
He says he does.
Could I make a suggestion? Go back and read Matthew 27 again. Go back and read Luke 22 and 23. Go back and read Mark 14 and 15, and so on. Go back and read what transpired there, and then you will have no doubt about the love of that Blessed One as we get in Romans 8. He that spared not His own son, but delivered Him up first all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us?
All six.
Couple more things we want to talk about respecting the love of God turn over to 2nd Corinthians chapter 5.
There are so many verses to which we could refer, and we can only mention a few of them this afternoon, But in 2nd Corinthians 5.
We have something very, very beautiful here.
These verses are familiar to all of us.
2nd Corinthians 5 and verse 14.
For the love of Christ constraineth us, because we thus judge that if one died for all, then we're all dead.
And that he died for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves.
But unto him which died for them, and rose again.
What does it mean to constrain someone?
It doesn't mean to force anything, does it?
The word doesn't go that far.
It's rather the urging that is based on love. When the two on the way to Emmaus reached Emmaus and the Lord Jesus, although they did not yet know who he was, made as though he would have gone further. What did they do? It says they constrained him, saying abide with us. Why did they say that? Oh, I believe there were two reasons on the.
Surface, I believe there was the reason that the hospitality in their heart said we will not allow a man simply to go on as darkness is approaching and he has nowhere to go for the night.
But I suggest that there was a more personal reason in their hearts. They wanted more of what they had appreciated all along, that 7 1/2 miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus. They wanted more.
And they said, oh, let's, let's, let's urge him, let's see if we can get him to come in and we'll hear more of what he has been bringing before.
Turn the tables on that.
The Lord Jesus constrains you and me. He doesn't force the issue because it's love that does it. And when love constrains, it doesn't grab hold of us and force us into anything. It rather takes hold of us and says as it were, I want you. I want you very much.
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The love of Christ constraineth us. It does do that. It doesn't say it should constrain us, or it ought to. It does do that.
Do I feel the tug, the pull of that constraining love?
We talked about our late brother Eric Smith yesterday. Allow me to refer to another incident and this again is going back, I suppose, a good 45 years or so.
When he held a spellbound in an open meeting in Toronto ON speaking on this very verse.
And talking about how.
That constraining love of God had gotten hold of him when he was young, given him the grace to go.
To that land of Bolivia and to spend his time there. Now we say again, it's not for everyone to go to foreign lands. That's not the thought. The thought is simply that if your heart and mind are constrained, there will be a response.
You will remember the account of the woman that anointed the Lord Jesus in Bethany just before He went to the cross.
It was probably Mary of Bethany, but we won't argue that point. It's not pertinent for what we're going to say, but she anointed the Lord Jesus there. And there were those that found fault with what she did, complaining that the ointment was being wasted and that here it was worth so much that it could have been sold and given and the money given to the poor. And you will remember that the Lord Jesus defended her and said let her alone.
The poor always ye have with you, and whensoever ye will ye may do them good, but me ye have not always. And then the Lord said something that I used to puzzle over. He said, For wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall also this that this woman has done be told for a memorial of her. Why would he say that it wasn't particularly that her act was going to be used as.
A special attraction to unbelievers, to Christ, although it could be, but I believe it was like this the Lord.
Values so much.
The response in your heart and mind.
It's true that the Word of God never occupies you and me with our love to Christ.
It rather brings before us His love to us.
I've told the story before, but it bears repeating. That's how the hymn came to be written. I am so glad that our Father in heaven tells of His love in the book. He hath given wonderful things in the Bible. I see this is the dearest that Jesus loves me. Philip Bliss, who wrote that hymn, was editing a hymn book and he wanted to put in that hymn.
How I love Jesus. Oh, how I love Jesus because he first loved me. Beautiful hymn. And we wouldn't take anything away from it. Well, in those days they had to set type in a very manual way. And he had a space reserved in the hymn book for that hymn. And when he having counted on the permission of the author who was still living at the time to put that him in when he approached the author just kind of as a courtesy to say I'm intending to put your him in my hymn book. Is that OK?
The author flatly refused and said no way, I'm putting out a hymn book two and I don't want to hurt the sales of my hymn book. So you can't use my hymn in your hymn book.
Oh, Philip Bliss was devastated, not only because he couldn't use the hymn, but because the hymns and the things of the Lord were being used in a mercenary way. Anyway, we leave that for the moment. But then Philip Bliss went home and said, what am I going to do now? I can't rearrange the whole hymn book and all the numbers. That's a huge problem. I've got to have a hymn to go in that place.
And as he was lying in bed that night, the Lord seemed to bring before him.
It's not your love to me that is so important. It's my love to you. And so the words of that hymn came to him. I am so glad that our Father in heaven and in the chorus, Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me and so on. And we don't want to take away from that. But at the same time, the Word of God does speak about our response to his love. And the Lord values that so much that, as Don said yesterday, it's going to last for all eternity.
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And what a wonderful thing it is when there are hearts that respond to the Lord's love.
Are we in danger of being sidetracked here in these favored lands in North America? I fear we are, and I speak to my own heart, we are in danger of being sidetracked not only from the enjoyment of that love, but of what follows it, the enjoyment that he has.
Of our love to Him, and how much the Lord appreciates it when there is a response in our hearts to His love.
Going back a little bit.
If there's any entertaining in your heart and mind of that bitterness and resentment that so easily wells up, that my circumstances are unfair. Have we ever thought like that? Why did this happen to me? What have I done to deserve this? I don't need this. Why is somebody else's life seemingly so smooth, so nice, so seemingly carefree?
While I am seeming to go through a nightmare of difficulties and problems.
The Lord doesn't tell me or anyone else necessarily why He allows something in your life.
But in going to the Lord, first of all, I can justify God. I can enjoy the sense of His love and what I have said before, and I say it more often to my own heart than to you. But I'll say it again. The Lord will give me enough of His love overflowing in my heart, a sense of His grace that I will not only be able to be an overcomer in the problems and difficulties that I may be experiencing.
But there'll be enough leftover to give something to someone else. And you know, that is something the world doesn't understand. Here is someone going through a nightmare of difficulties and yet he or she still has something to give. You know, when we're in trouble ourselves, naturally we want to receive. And I have seen and heard people who got very angry when nothing happened when they were in trouble. Why doesn't somebody notice? Why doesn't somebody come and help? What is the matter with people?
Why don't they send help?
But when you see somebody going through the most awful difficulties in their lives.
I never knew the dear brother, but I talked to those that did.
And I don't suppose anybody here would remember him either because he has been gone well over 60 years.
Brother Frank Gill.
He lived out on the West Coast, I believe, and he suffered, I understand, from very serious rheumatoid arthritis, which got to the point that he was largely bedridden.
But those that were able to go and visit him, and I remember I talked to my late father-in-law, Albert Hayhoe, who knew him well.
He told of a visit to Brother Frank Gill and there he was with his hands and Anyone that understands rheumatoid arthritis will know the.
Bad deviation and they didn't have a lot of the medication, the anti inflammatories and things that they have today. They didn't have that back 50-60 years ago. So he didn't have a lot of pain relievers. And there he was, they said, trying to turn over the pages of his Bible because he couldn't even grasp them with thumb and forefinger and so on.
And when they sat down there to have a visit, oh, he just overflowed for a full 15 minutes in the enjoyment of the things of Christ, with his face just radiant.
Finally, he said, Oh, brother, brethren, I apologize. I apologize. Here, here. You've come to visit me. You've come all this way to visit me, and here I am holding the floor and doing all the talking.
They said to him, brother, that's all right, you keep right on talking. Who got encouraged the most on that visit? All those that came away said we got encouraged. Now, that is not to say that visiting those in that situation encourages them.
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May we do more of it? But oh, what an example of one who was in the most serious of difficulties, and yet who accepted it all from the Lord.
I hope this isn't saying anything out of line. I think we can get away with it at this point in the game.
His son Walter Gill, whom I'm sure.
Sure, many here in the room remember.
Lived most of his life in Oakland, CA and I had the privilege of knowing Walter reasonably well. Stayed in his home many times.
And he told me once, he said, you know, that rheumatoid arthritis was very hard on my father in more than one way. Not only were there the physical sufferings, but he said my father had a deep seated desire to go out and to serve the Lord and to go in and out among the Lord's people and be a help to his brethren.
And he said the Lord allowed him to get rheumatoid arthritis so that that.
What shall we call it? Deep seated desire never came to fruition. And he said, my dear father, as far as I know, never showed one iota of bitterness or resentment over that. I've never forgotten that. I hope it's all right to tell that story. I I haven't got any family to ask if it's all right. I can't. I don't think Brother Walter would mind my repeating that. He told me that personally.
I say that to show that sometimes the Lord allows you and me to have the dreams. If I could say it even good, If I could say it dreams good thoughts to be unfulfilled.
But he says I have something eternal in mind.
Our time is gone. One more verse.
Well, two more.
Two more John's Gospel, chapter 14.
No, I'm sorry, that verse would do but.
There's a better one in chapter 17, and that's already been referred to in the readings, but we'll read it again. John 17 and verse 24.
Here's the Lord Jesus, praying to the Father, pleading on our behalf with the Father.
Beyond our understanding. And in verse 24 he says, Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am, that they may behold my.
Revelation 21-22
Reading
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Had a great, had a wall great and high, and had 12 gates, and at the gates 12 angels and names written thereon, which are the names of the 12 tribes of the children of Israel.
On the east 3 gig, on the north 3 gate, on the South 3 gates, and on the West 3 gates. And the wall of the city had 12 foundations, and in them the names of the 12 Apostles of the Lamb. And he that talked with me had a golden wreath to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof. And the city lieth Foursquare, and the length is as large as the breadth.
Any measure of the city with the reading 12,000 per loans. The length and breadth and the height of it are equal. Any measure of the wall thereof 140 and four cubits, according to the measure of a man, that is, of the Angel.
And the building of the wall of it was Jasper.
And the city was pure gold, like a tooth fair glass. And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was Jasper, the second sapphire, the third of Caledonia, the 4th in emerald, the 5th Sardani, the 6th Sardius, the 7th Chrysalite, the 8th Burles, the 9th Topaz, the 10th Crossoverus, the 11Th adjacent.
The 12Th and Amethyst.
And the 12 gates were 12 Pearls, every several gates has been one Pearl. And the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass. And I saw no temple therein. For the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of us. And this city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God and lightness. And the Lamb is the light thereof, and the nations.
Of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it, and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honor into it.
And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day. Therefore there shall be no knight there, and they shall bring the glory and honor of the nations into it. And there shall in no wise enter into it anything that defile it, neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie, but they which are written the Lamb's Book of life.
And he showed me a pure river of water, of life, as clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.
In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which spared 12 manner of fruit, and yielded her fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nation. And there shall be no more curse for the light, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, And His servants shall serve Him, and they shall see his face, and his name shall be in their foreheads.
And there shall be no night there.
And they need no candle, neither light of the sun, for the Lord God giveth them light, and they shall reign forever and ever.
I would also like to suggest this is the last reading meeting and last time we'll be together at this time to consider the chapter, umm, the description of something that we not feel constrained to do so in any sequential order.
But rather there be liberty for whomever might have something, to contribute it to the enjoyment of this description, even if it's 10 verses or 20 verses past where we start, that there be an opportunity to do so rather than try to keep going in any sequential manner, so that, as desired, some of the latter points in the conclusion of it might be taken up as well.
So.
There have been questions raised in some cases in private conversation about the next few verses here I'm going to ask the question, what is the thought when we have a wall?
Whose foundations are characterized by the 12 apostles of the Lamb, but the gates are connected with the 12 tribes of the Children of Israel.
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How do we reconcile that thought with the picture that we have here with the Church in millennial glory?
That's right, now.
Yes, that is definitely correct.
The Lord Jesus will be supreme in the coming Kingdom, of course, but with him will be the Church, his companion forever. And.
So that is the heavenly city, which will be over the earthly Jerusalem, and in the earth it will be Israel that will be the head of the nation. And so it seems to be that this is an account of the authority or the rule that there will be in the millennial day, a wall. And I'm sure you can tell us that too, Bill. There's something to keep something out, and it indicates that there will be something.
To be kept out, and in the end of the chapter it says in verse 27, there shall in no wise enter into it anything that defile us, neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie, but that they which are written in the Lambs book of life. So there will be sin in the millennial period.
In the.
City as we see it in the first part of the chapter, the eternal day, there's no wall mentioned at all. There's nothing to keep out because.
That little hymn you gave out the other day, no taint of sin will be left, absolutely. So there's no need for any walls there. But in the millennial day, there will be.
It's interesting. Another thing that is quite.
I found very interesting is the number 12, how often it is mentioned in this chapter and there's one mention of it in verse two of chapter 22. If you count the number of times 12 is used, there is one place where it says 144, which is 12 * 12. So if we.
Add 2 twelves for that. You'll find that there are 12 twelves. So it's a picture of perfect administration that there will be under the Kingdom in the millennial day.
You you fill in on that bill, I'm sure you can say more about it. No, I was raising the question. I just enjoyed it in a fairly simple way that here is the church and its foundations are.
Especially the foundations of the wall are laid in the 12 apostles of the Lamb, showing I believe that there is the security of the Church based on.
That which was taught by the apostles and the foundation that they laid in the beginning. And that wall, of course, will keep everything out that would in any way defile it. But the administration of the world in the millennial day will be through Israel. And so the 12 apostles of the Lamb are mentioned here.
And as our brother Martin was mentioning, certainly we know from the Lord's ministry that the 12 disciples, the 12 apostles, will sit on Thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel. So that ties in with this. But maybe there are deeper thoughts than that that could be brought out.
I believe in part it's to show us a change in administration and how the change in administration takes.
Place when Israel was established in the earth, they were established in the earth as God's center of government on the earth. Because they were unfaithful, God set them aside in the time of Daniel and well before Daniel actually. But he was living in that time, and He put into the hands of the Gentiles the responsibility of governing matters concerning the earth.
But the purposes of God never being frustrated, he is going to bring them back.
Into their city, into their land, into their possession. But interestingly enough.
00:10:01
When they were in their place, where did they rule from?
Jerusalem. That was the place. Now we have a description of New Jerusalem.
And the new Jerusalem seen when we began it as coming down out of God from heaven.
But it actually had its formation in the city of Jerusalem on earth on the day of Pentecost.
And I believe God is showing us that there is going to be this connection between the heavenly character of administration and the earthly, and he uses those things that identify it with Israel.
As well as having previously described it to us as coming down from heaven out of God, the same is true when it speaks about the angels.
Angels had for thousands of years.
Had the responsibility of carrying out administrative affairs for God.
But when the Lord Jesus ascended on high.
God said no, it's not going to be in the hand of angels anymore, it's going to be in the hand of my Son.
And the role of the angels as seen here, they're gatekeepers, They're not overseers, they're not the primary administrators, but they're seen as keeping the gate, if you will, because when the Lord Jesus as man takes over the full administration of all things having to do with God's creation in heaven and in earth, he has his bride, the Lamb's wife.
In association with himself. And not only does he pass angels by, but so do we in that sense of administration. We in this coming, what's described to us here, will have an administrative function that passes the Angel. And in fact, the angels will be, can I put it this way, serving him and serving us as gatekeepers.
And yet here it's seen as starting out on Earth.
And it's beginning as on the day of Pentecost in Jerusalem. But when Israel comes back, they will be there in Jerusalem. And yet over them will be ourselves as part of the heavenly new Jerusalem coming down from God out of heaven. And I believe in these little descriptions. Here is why it you, you see the Angel why? And as Bill said, the foundation of it.
Administratively, even in the Church in its very formation, the 12 foundation stones of the doctrine of the Church were established in the person of the Apostles.
And that will never change. Even in the Millennium, it was still what we have. We're reading one of them this afternoon, John and the ministry that was given to him and so on. As to especially earthly administration, Paul's not one of them, because Paul's ministry had to do with the heavenly side. But what's here has to do with the connection between heaven and earth.
And that was not Paul's particular ministry, so he's not one of the 12 That's given to us here.
We spoke yesterday and used the illustration of the leader of a country when he's elected to office and moved into his official residence and how his wife moved in with him and shares in that special relationship and some of the function and administration of what goes on during his term of office. But if we were to take that illustration and picture what goes on in the White House, there are many others who serve in the White House under the direction of the president.
Of the United States as well. Yes, his wife is at his side in a special place of relationship, and nobody can take away from that. But there are many others, as I say, who carry out different offices. And would you allow that in the administration of the Kingdom, while the Church is described here as the city, and she occupies that place of relationship and administration that none other can take? Yet I suppose it would be right to say that all the heavenly company will have.
00:15:01
Best thing to do with the administration of the Kingdom. We we think of Abraham, he had, he thought of the reward that was ahead. You think of Moses and Elijah on the Mount of Transfiguration. A little preview of the Kingdom, the coming glory and the Kingdom as they talked with the Lord and were associated with him there, while the three disciples that had the privilege of being on the mount looked on and so on. The angels will have a part as they've always had a part in carrying out God's bidding as his ministers and so on.
And so I wonder if there isn't perhaps just a hint too, that not only will the church who occupies that special place of relationship and administration because of that relationship, yet even the Old Testament Saints as well as the heavenly company, the the angels, will have a part in what takes place. Would it be right to say that?
Well, it's beautiful to see too, isn't it? That as he goes on to describe this city, and again I realized the language is figurative, but he gives the dimensions of the city. It's a cube and you couldn't prove it by me. I wasn't any good at math, but someone has said that if you figured out these dimensions, it's actually about 2.6 billion cubic miles.
Now I know that the language is figurative, but it's the Spirit of God giving us some idea of the vastness of what the what's going to take place and the fact that it is not going to be Him. When we come down with Christ to reign and he reigns over the earth, the earth is going to look up and they're going to see very clearly. Are they not? The church in her administrative glory, reigning with the Lord Jesus.
And you'll notice it's the cube, and he measures it with a golden rig. Gold speaks of righteousness, divine righteousness. And I suppose it shows us, brethren, that there is a day coming when there's going to be equity and justice administered over the earth. You know, if we were to go to the courtrooms of this land or any other land tomorrow, I don't suggest we do it unless we really had to. But if we were, we would come away at the end of the day and shake our heads and say there's no equity and justice.
And we have to realize that we can't expect righteousness in an unrighteous world. They've rejected the Prince of Peace and the King of righteousness. And not till the King of righteousness or the Son of Righteousness rises with healing in his wings will there be equity and justice and true righteousness carried out from day-to-day in this world. But there is a day when it's going to happen. The city is measured with a golden Reed. It's four square is equal on all sides.
And that ought to or will encourage us, if we can grasp the truth of this in our souls, to go on, brethren, seeking in our own lives to live soberly, righteously, and godly, but realizing that we can't expect righteousness in the in a world where they have rejected the Lord Jesus Christ. We can live righteously in this present age, as Titus tells us, but not to expect it in the world around us and its administration today.
In the world that we live in, we look around and everywhere is inequality.
But here they lengthen the breadth and the height of it are equal, so any direction you look there will be quality. Wonderful day. It's interesting too, to think that.
In the Tabernacle, in the Temple, the Holy of Holies was always the cube, wasn't it?
And here is the dwelling place of God.
And it is a cue as well.
God's government, that is. That's only in the hand of God. We speak about the grace of God and the government of God.
That government has always been and always will be perfect.
But no government since government began in principle after Noah came out of the ark. And God instituted the principle of government in saying to Noah, whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed. And that's the beginning of earthly government, that man was put in responsibility to maintain order so that the earth wouldn't return to the violence and corruption.
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That it had gone into before the flood and before government. But since government has begun, there's never been a perfect one.
The the earth has never had a perfect government in its history of thousands of years of government and whatever man has and responsibility, he doesn't manage well, we.
Umm, even if you look at the function of the assembly on Earth and its administrative responsibilities.
Any one of us that's an adult here would hang our heads in pain and shame in our own identification with failure and administration.
Connected with God's assembly as according to his word, but in the outer greater sense of government it's never been in man's hands but here we're viewing something that God is going to establish in people headed up by the lamb, a man that will be perfect and so the description here is to show us the perfection of.
The one who administers with the Lamb, the Lamb's wife and these different characters, this purity seen in the gold and the righteousness and the cube and all these are figures to us to help us to think about that which is to the glory of God in government and in the perfection of it in man. That's to me the amazing thing. It's in math it it's not angels we think you know the good angels they haven't they were administering things and now they're put aside for whom that.
Oh, you don't want to put something in man's hands that angels can do because, well, they, they do it right and we always fail in it. But here not so. It's to the glory of God that He has taken something that was so previously sad as far as man and responsibility, and put man and responsibility in something that well, for the first time give the earth a perfect order in government.
And it will be fully tested. It will last a whole 1000 years. And from the first day to the last day of the 1000 years, there won't be a single instance, there won't be a single case of failure in that responsibility.
Man for the most part has given up God's standard or God's measure, which is the word of God, of course. And he tends today to measure things by his own standard and by comparing himself with his fellow man. But it tells us in, I think it's the book of Corinthians, men measuring themselves by themselves, they're not wise. And why do we see things in such chaos and unrighteousness in the world in which we live?
Because the standard has been been removed and it's measured by another standard other than God's, which is no standard at all. And so we see the deterioration of in the days in which we live, at least when this country was founded and the country I come from, there were God fearing men and at least biblical or God fearing principles that the faces of government. But as Bob has said and and Don, everything that man does, he fails and he he breaks down.
But isn't it again wonderful to realize, brethren, there's a day coming when everything is going to be measured by golden Reed. Everything is going to be measured not by our sense of what is right and acceptable, what is good versus bad or evil, but it's going to be measured by his standard. And so he measures the city with a golden Reed. That's interesting, Jim, in verse 17, it says according to the measure of a man.
So that it will be men in authority. In that day there will be angels like you say. But really the world to come is not committed to angels, but to men.
That person just read Bob. What's the meaning there when it says according to the measure of a man that is of the Angel and freedom, Mr. Derby, a man says here that is the Angel who thought there.
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I could not get to stay. Maybe somebody else can help us better.
I was just wondering perhaps?
If no particular they didn't use the measure a particular man, you wouldn't be able to glory in it.
Set a 5.
I'd like to read in First and 2nd Thessalonians chapter one it seems I don't profess to know much about this chapter, but I'd like to link it with First the 2nd Thessalonians 1. What Paul writes to the the Thessalonians in their suffering and and when the he speaks of when the Lord is going to be revealed. That seems to me to connect with our chapter.
Umm, if I just read these verses in chapter one of Thessalonians, beginning with, uh, verse seven. And to you who are troubled, rest with us, when the Lord cases shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power, when he shall come to be glorified in his Saints, or through them, and to be admired in all them that believe, because our testimony among you was believed in that day? Wherefore shall we pray always for you, that our God would count you worthy of this calling?
And fulfill the good pleasure of His goodness and the work of faith with power.
That the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and ye in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ. This is what Paul wrote before them as as to their time of suffering now pointing the finger to the coming day.
Of glory when the Lord would associate them with him and isn't this city a prolongation of that that glory of the Lord and administration over the earth and and how he associates his people with him and the the stones there the glories that shine out of these precious stones are are are.
His the Lord's people that.
That are put on display there and that there will be seen on earth.
It just gives us courage too, doesn't it, to accept our present circumstances. And you know, that's easy to say as we sit here this afternoon, We've got the doors open. We can put a sign out advertising or telling folks about a gospel meeting.
We're not afraid of someone coming in here to the authorities coming in here this afternoon and opening fire or arresting some of us because we're having Bible meetings. But you know, brethren, some of our, some of our fellow believers live in in countries where there is absolute, unright, open unrighteousness and corruption and hatred to work Christianity. How can our brethren go on and not rise up and try to fight that?
Because with the realization.
That we are living in an unrighteous world where we can't expect things to see things get better down here. They also realize that there is a day of righteous rain coming. And you know, you read the faith chapter, the 11Th of Hebrews, you often see that Abraham didn't receive the promises. But how could he go on day after day, year after year, as a stranger in Pilgrim? He installed them afar off and embraced them with others and they confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims.
On the earth, when Moses turned his back on Egypt, and Egypt was not a base nation in those days, the treasures of Egypt which some of us have have seen in the pyramids, and the Kingdom at that time was a tremendous Kingdom at that time, and he turned his back on it twice.
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He endured of seeing Him who is invisible. He esteemed the reproaches of Christ greater than the treasures of Egypt.
And so if we're going to go on, brethren, in an unrighteous world, and not rise up and try to correct things here, not to be indifferent to it, but not to try to correct things here, what is it that's going to encourage us to do that? What was it that would encourage the Thessalonians to go on even amidst persecution?
Trials and difficulties to realize there was a day of glory ahead. And brethren, there is, as sure as we're sitting here this afternoon, these things that we're reading about are going to come to pass. And perhaps sooner than we even realized by the Lord, Jesus is going to come and take us out at any moment. Then things are going to begin to unfold on the earth. And then he's going to come back at the appropriate moment. Heaven's going to open up to reveal Him coming in power and glory and the heavenly companies Church and the heavenly company with him.
Brethren, if we could just get a sense in our souls as to the reality of this, it would adjust and correct. It would cause us to have the proper reaction and relationships to what goes on around us now. Not that we're indifferent to the abuses of humanity and all the unrighteousness that goes on in the world today, but to realize there's one who's going to set it straight and in that day we're going to be associated with him.
In verse 18, the city was.
Your goal likened to clear glass.
Verse 21.
The street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass. We know of gold to be in this life something that is opaque.
But it's figurative, and so God's divine righteousness, but fully transparent.
You will and I will be able to see the reason for everything there will be fully visible. Wonderful to think about it. I enjoy in verse 21. It's the street of the city.
The place of concourse.
And the Spanish translation It uses the word the Plaza of the city, the place where people come out to visit at night. In Latin America, you'll often find the Plaza full of people conversing during the day, too. But.
The point is, is that there will be concourse interaction. On what grounds? Divine righteousness fully visible?
Interesting, isn't it, That it's one, it's street or Plaza singular too. We sometimes sing at the streets of gold and that's, that's OK. But it is singular here. Speaks of unity, doesn't it? Because whatever fellowship we have, whatever.
We speak up together, it'll all be in unity, centered on Christ. We think of streets. We go into a town or a village or a city.
And there's many streets, maybe even many plazas. And so someone goes one way, someone goes the other way. There may not be real unity, although everybody lives in the same city or town, but in, in that day there will be in figurative language, one St. showing unity. I'd just like to say a word about that because we mentioned the other day that in connection with this, this, this description, we've learned that.
Eternity, either the Millennium or eternity, the eternal state is not a melting pot where everything just melts into one big lump or company of either humanity or heavenly company, earthly company. We've noticed how the Bride remains distinct as part of the heavenly company and so on. But I believe there's also another aspect, and that is that while the church is looked at as one, every several gate was one Pearl. That's the unity, the Pearl of great price.
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That the merchant man went to seek and he sold all that he had that he might have it and so on. And we see the illustration very quickly. It's the church and it's one, it speaks of unity. But there are also these jewels that make up the wall of the, of the foundation of the city here. And the jewels I believe, would perhaps indicate to us that not only does the church remain distinct.
As the bride, the lamb's wife, but each individual will retain their individuality as well. We're not going to even just meld into one big group as the church, we are going to remain individual. I say that because this list is very similar to the list in the Old Testament where we find that there was a separate stone for everyone of the 12 tribes of Israel.
Carried on the breastplate close to the heart of the high priest, showing the individual value and preciousness of believers to the heart of the Lord Jesus. And we will, I believe, retain that individual preciousness to his heart. I like the way a brother put it. I don't remember this brother, but I heard it quoted a number of times. He said in glory we will all be like Christ.
We will be the bride of Christ collectively, but we will retain our individuality. Perhaps again, there's a little hint of it where you have on the Mount of Transfiguration, where the coming Kingdom is previewed, we find men from three different eras of time that had never been introduced to one another on earth. There was, first of all, Moses and Elijah. They had never known one another on earth.
And yet they are there, distinct as to who they are. Not only that, but not only did they not need introduction, but the three disciples, Peter, James and John, they immediately recognized who those men were that were talking with the Lord, seemingly without having to be told. Perhaps again, just a little hint that we will retain our individuality. Isn't it beautiful, brethren, to think you're going to be individually precious and valuable?
To the heart of the Lord Jesus for all eternity. He's never going to lose us. He chose you. We were chosen in Him as individuals. We were saved as individuals. He deals with us in our lives as individuals. Bill was bringing before us that individual love and care that He has for us all along the path of faith and service. And that individual preciousness, I suggest will be retained for all eternity.
I've enjoyed that, brother Jim, in connection with what we have in John 14, when the Lord Jesus speaks about the Father's house. The Lord Jesus does not stay in my house.
No, it's the father's house, and when you have a father, you have children.
And a father may have many children.
I often like when they come to a family that's a large family to ask the father. Which of your children is your favorite child?
Sometimes they do have favorites, but I think when there is a normal family, why the.
Father will say they're all my favorites.
But their favorite in different ways. And I think that's where you come into the individual. And I think that's what it means in the Father's house, where he says there are many abodes, it's really not mansions, but abodes. So there's only really one house in heaven, the Father's house.
And in that house are many of those.
There's a place prepared for Jim Highland. Jim, I won't be able to fill that place. That's for you. And I think that's the thought of individuality. We're going to be individuals. God is a God of variety. It's incredible when you think of creation that we're part of the variety that there is. Just look at any particular person. You ever see anybody like Derek Mullen? Never have.
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Never expect to. We're all different and God's made us that way.
Even in a spiritual way. And I think that's so beautiful to see the way God works. And I see, I think you see that perhaps in these very colors of these different stones. I don't say that represents us so much. It's the foundation.
Well, it does say they shall be mine in that day when I make up my jewels. So a person may have a jewel box on their dresser and they have a lot of jewels. And again, you might say, well, which is your favorite? Well, it depends what I'm doing today, what outfit I'm wearing.
And so the person goes to the jewel box and they have all these jewels. They may pick one today, they may wear another tomorrow. It's not that they favor one above the other, but everyone of those jewels is unique. And I believe, as you say, Bob, that's really the thought. We are all unique to God and we will retain that uniqueness in the coming day.
Just thinking to go into London. Over in London, England there's a place called the Tower of London where they have the royal jewels on display.
They're, they're fantastic and each of them not only is distinctive, each one has a history, and that's part of the glory of the jewels.
Can somebody say something about Jasper? It's mentioned a number of times here in verse.
11.
Inverse.
18 and verse 19.
That seems to stand out that.
Stone, I'm not sure that I understand. Maybe somebody has a thought.
Go back to chapter 4 and.
Verse 3 where we have the first mention of that particular stone in the Revelation.
Revelation chapter 4 and verse three. And he that sat was to look upon like a Jasper.
And a Sergeant stone, And there was a rainbow round about the throne, and insight like unto an emerald.
I'll just say it in the words of another.
The the the Jasper is visible glory.
And there are various aspects of the glory of God which can be seen in a very visible way and.
As you have in the amount of transfiguration, what made the disciples afraid was the transfigured face and Raymond of the Lord Jesus. And so there are moral glories.
Umm, righteousness and love and so on, they manifest themselves in in some action. And that action is the way that we, I observe, you might say, the glory of what's there, but there will also be official glories that are visible to us. And I believe the Jasper or others have said anyways, that the Jasper represents that which is a visible physical.
Official glory that can be seen and so it's introduced in the revelation when they look upon the one that's on the throne who is about to unfold the work of the revelation that ends in our chapter really with then the the not the originator of the Jasper bought those which get to display it themselves in this state of things which is the plant's life.
In that connection, I believe that Jasper has the thought in Scripture of, as you say, on the visible glory of God, but it's a glory that he can share and display in his Saints. So you get it here in connection, as we noticed in verse 11, the whole of the city has.
A light like a Jasper stone, and then you get it in connection with the wall itself.
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But then, and it seems in one sense almost superfluous, that not only is the wall of Jasper, but then it's garnished with precious stones, of which Jasper is the 1St. And it seems to me that there is the beauty and glory of Christ displayed in His people. Yes, this city, and it's portrayed here as a city, has perhaps the thought of administration and government.
And that's brought in in the connection with the gates and with Israel and so on. But at the same time there is also the beauty of the church as associated with Christ in reflecting his glory. And so that is brought out perhaps in the Jasper stone.
Make a further comment with respect to life, both in this chapter and in our present lives as well. Go back to the first John chapter one.
First John, chapter one.
First five. This then is a message we have heard of him, and declare unto you that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we stay, we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness. We lie and do not the truth.
But if we walk in the truth as He is walking, the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sins.
God is life.
That is his nature of his being. He is like.
And for anything to remain before his eye, it must be consistent with what he is.
The only possible way any one of us today, during this day, have had been able to have fellowship with God is in the purity of light.
We could have fellowship with each other on something that's less than light.
But fellowship with God cannot be on any other basis than that which is consistent with what our God is.
That's why sin breaks the fellowship, because it's inconsistent with God.
He can't tolerate it in the sense and having yes, he's patient. The mystery of iniquity goes on for a while and eventually he will bring all out and resolve it in righteousness. But the moment I sin, I break my fellowship with God because it's inconsistent with God.
Here we have a description of a city, if I could put it this way, that can stand the light.
Does my life perfectly withstand the light? Sorry to say, it doesn't.
But.
Thank God the blood of Jesus Christ cleanse us from all sin.
But on the other side of it, what gives these jewels their brilliance? Their display is totally dependent on light.
A journalism do anything in the dark, you must shine the light through it in order for it to have its brilliance.
That's true. Something that's transparent as well. It it allows the light to fully shine through it.
And the joy of what's coming and the glories that are displayed, and they were displayed in the life of the Lord Jesus perfectly because he walked in the light.
And everything that was reflected from his person and his life.
Was a perfect reflection of light. There was number flaw in it. There was nothing that came short. And here by God's work and God's grace and through the redemption work of the Lamb.
There is this perfect unity that can reflect to the glory of God, that is, the jewels reflecting to the glory of God, a visible display of that which God is.
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And that was the Lord Jesus is it's a wonderful thing, brother, and when we reach this state that is suited to the glory of God and.
And remain in it forever.
I was just wondering question where we can do these tools, They're all different colors and the reason you have colors is because they don't reflect all of the rays of light equally. And I'm just wondering when you have these different colors.
Because we've been saying we have individual.
Personalities that we've accepted the Lord Jesus Christ their Savior. Those different colors represent the aspects the Lord Jesus Christ in our lives.
Might put it this way, God loves varieties.
He loves variety. He could have created us so that there was only one food. He could have made us with eyes that were totally black and white.
But God has so chosen for His pleasure and ours in the natural realm, to give us eyes that see color, to give us taste, that enjoys the variety of the different tastes of food. In other words, He gave us our senses.
To his pleasure.
And He wants us to eternally feed on and enjoy the multifaceted beauty of His Son.
And so he has presented the Son to us with a brilliance and variety that we first see in the Old Testament in the at least one of the first places in the multi colored garment of Joseph as a type of Christ and the Father's delight. And God having that delight, he creates us to be like him.
I enjoy this.
This now I'm going to make you so you enjoy the same.
And there's a sense there too, I believe, which is beyond our comprehension.
Because we want to be careful how we say this, but I don't believe that as a man, the Lord Jesus had what we would conventionally call a personality. That is, everything in him was perfectly equal. And if I could say this reverently, I don't think that when the Lord Jesus went to Bethany, they would say, well, I know, I know his favorite is fish. So that's what we're going to cook tonight or something like that. The Lord Jesus, I believe, was perfectly in balance in everything.
But yet we are made that way. Nor do I believe God intended it to be that way. And yet God in his wonders of grace is going to make all of us perfectly like Christ, but without destroying our individuality. Now you and I can say, how can that be? I don't know. But I believe Scripture is clear that that's the way it will happen. Because as John says, God does appreciate variety, and that variety will be there for all eternity. But it doesn't mean that any one of us will be any less like Christ than the other.
But rather than the individuality will be maintained.
And we're going to have to leave it, I think, until that day to see how God works it all out maintained in its balance. I think the word balance is a very good one because a lot of what characterizes human personalities, the exaggerated traits that not are not maintained in a balanced way.
It's interesting that this isn't the first time we see this display.
In in the in the different gyms.
God has displayed this in the Old Testament on the breastplate of the High Priest and.
He he played the the different stones there umm.
To figure, I suppose, the the glory of Christ that he desired to see in Israel.
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And, uh, it's interesting that we, we see that again, don't we, that God is looking for a display in his people, no matter whether it was the children of Israel or whether it's the heavenly Jerusalem.
That he, he has had the desire that the display of the Christ be seen.
And those that he has has chosen to realize that.
Be with him, in relationship with him. So this isn't the first display. This isn't, we know that Israel couldn't really.
Fulfill what God was desiring in the first man.
But here we don't have the 1St man on display. We don't have the 1St man under under responsibility.
Uh, we have this in relationship to the Newman.
Even almost more beautiful than in the old 70s.
This is new creation, isn't it? We're, we're going to have our new bodies. We'll be at.
This light here, there's no sun or, nor moon. Uh, it, it's gonna be, uh, the light that shown that Jesus is on the mount of Transfiguration didn't come from the sun. It came from himself, didn't it? And, uh, so, so that's the way it's gonna be in the Millennium is he's gonna be the source of light that, uh, that we're going to have, we're gonna be a part of that kind of a creation that.
Reflects that, that like a brother was speaking about the different colors and we look at light from the sun and it looks white to us, at least that's what I call it white. But you put it through a prism and it splits out into seven colors and depending on what the light strikes, that's the what the color that's in the in the sunlight shines that color.
In according to what it reflects off of, doesn't it?
Uh, whichever one of the seven colors are combination of a mixture.
So there's going to be.
No under moon. And there's also neither, uh, there's going to be uh, no temple or it says, uh, uh.
There's no temple there in.
That is, these were all fugitive. The Tabernacle and the temple were all instruments that were, uh, gigantic of approach to God, of a dwelling place of God, but like the temp temple and the Tabernacle in the Old Testament.
All of those figures are going to be done away and it's going to be the real thing then, isn't it?
Hmm. There are three sources of light that we understand and appreciate now, aren't there? There's the sun that's created light. There's the moon that's boiled light or reflected light, and there's artificial light. And so he says there's no need of the candle either. There's no need of artificial light. We're glad for these lights here in this room. If we turn them out, yes, we get some creative light in from the sun. But perhaps we'd have a difficulty without windows, just the doors of reading our Bibles.
Usually when jewels are displayed today, they're displayed under artificial light. And for a number of years, John Mark Council, the jewelry business and myself, we would share an apartment in Nassau when we were there. He was there on business and I was there on to give the gospel in the schools. And he had the apartment rigged up with lights, different kinds of lights. And when he would have a customer come up to the room to look at the the jewelry, he would turn those lights on, not all at once.
But he would turn certain lights on according to what kind of gems and jewelry he was showing at the time. And that artificial light was to bring out the luster as best it could of the gems and the jewelry that he was displaying. But in that day, as Doug said, there's going to be no need of created light, no need of borrowed or reflected light, and there's going to be no need of artificial light because God and the Lamb are going to be the light in that day and in that day.
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If everything is going to be perfectly reflected.
And everything is going to show pure glory in that day.
I've enjoyed a lot to somebody mentioned this one time and he said if you have a green light bulb that makes everything look green, you have a red light bulb that makes everything look red. But here the lamb is the light thereof and everywhere you look you're.
Connection with these things I'd like to turn over to John's Gospel chapter one.
Johns Gospel chapter one.
First one in the beginning was the Word, and the Word drew swift God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made in Him with life. And the life was the light of men, and the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not.
Or say he was not that light. That's John the Baptist. He was sent to bear witness of that light. That was the true light which lighted every man that cometh into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.
Verse 29 The next day John see if Jesus coming unto him and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. Now before commenting go to 2nd Corinthians chapter 4.
Been there before in the reading but it's revisited.
Verse four. Chapter 4. Verse four. In whom the God of this world has blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
Where we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your servants for Jesus sake. For God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
We won't turn to it.
But if we were to go to the 18th Psalm or the 19th Psalm.
It says the heavens declare the glory of God.
God had revealed himself to man in creation. We know from Romans chapter one that man understood because he was so made that when he saw the glory of the creation he recognized two things. One, that he had a creator and two, that he was responsible to him.
And so God had manifested to mankind the glory of Himself.
In his creation.
But then the Center was in rebellion. He was lost.
God, from his perspective, could look down on that creation and see it as darkness covering the face of the deep.
God chose to come down into his creation.
Then the fullness of all that is.
He came down into the darkness.
We had this morning at the breaking of bread, the treatment of the body of the Lord Jesus.
And yet from God's side of it, in that body, dwell all the fullness.
Of the Godhead, the fullness of the Godhead that came down.
From the purity of light.
Into that state of darkness.
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The darkness that covered the face of the deep.
That light was the light of every man.
But man, being darkness itself comprehended it not.
You would think that the shining of light would have illuminated. Yes, it was the light for every man, John says. But the darkness comprehended not.
What does God do in that condition of things?
The sun goes down further.
Into the water.
That which was the light of the world.
That was descended as we have in Ephesians chapter 4. That descends all the way down to the depths.
Brethren.
We see in it.
When we shine, when we look upon the face of the Lord Jesus now, who has ascended far above all things, and we look on him, what do we see?
We see the glory of redemption. We see the glory of redemption, not the glory of creation.
That didn't do it. That did not transform us.
Being darkness itself, but the Lamb takes it all the way down.
As far as it had to go.
And the sun in that body could say, I have finished the work that thou gave us me to do. I have glorified thee on the earth. What had he done? He glorified God in redemption. He had provided to God a way to deal with the darkness.
And bring man out of it. And in fact, John's epistle says to us, The true light now shineth in the darkness is passing. Why?
Because in this room the darkness has passed for every soul that now has the light of life.
In themselves.
And when the millennial day, the whole earth will be in that life. It's not yet.
But when we look upon the face of the Lord Jesus Christ.
We see the glory of redemption and consequently in Revelation chapter 5, the first view you have of a Lamb is.
The Lamb slave.
The Lamb slang.
What did the Lamb bearing the glory of redemption do for us in this room?
What are we going to sing? What are we going to say? Thou art worthy, for thou was slain.
And hast redeemed us to God by thy blood.
And the whole foundation on which the 21St chapter rests.
Is the glory of God and redemption in the Lamb?
And those who, by the blood of the lamb, are associated with themselves.
Those who the light has brought us to that place where we can have fellowship with all that God is according to his heart, according to his being, and it will be to our eternal sense of the worthiness.
Of the Redeemer.
And consequently, just one last thought, but he descends to the bottom.
He accomplishes that work to the glory of God in the midst of the darkness. And God's response to it is he ascends far above all principalities and powers and everything that is named, and they're above everything in matter of glory.
He says. The Father says to him, I'm going to give you a church right there.
Far above all principalities and powers. And so he takes that which was darkness itself, and by the power of redemption he raises it to the highest possible place that a creature could have.
And he says to you and I, that's your place. We are now far above all. And having purified itself to himself, then he says in Ephesians chapter 3, Now here's a habitation for God by the Spirit. Here is where God can dwell.
01:10:05
And he does, and He will, and then he manifests that place to the rest of the creation, as we have in this chapter, and all the brilliancy of the jewels that reflect the person of Christ and reflect the Person of Christ and his people.
We've spoken at great lengths about the uniqueness and individuality of believers and how we will retain that in the coming day. It might be just helpful to add to that in that coming day, though Heaven will be filled with myriads of the redeemed, yet we will all retain or have a special place of nearness and relationship to the Lord Jesus. Not beautiful to think about. You know on it on an occasion like this where there's several hundred of us together.
We can't all sit up front. Some perhaps would like to sit up further, and they come a little late and there's only some back rows left. And so you take those rows, those seats, and you're glad to get them. Isn't it wonderful, brethren, that in that day when we have bodies of glory like unto His body of glory, we're going to be able with those bodies of glory to be first of all, perfectly comfortable in heaven, perfectly comfortable in His presence, and able to enjoy a special place of nearness and relations and relationships.
Now we wanna be careful in saying that, because we will never, even with glorified bodies, will never be omniscient. We'll never be all knowing or all seeing. We'll never be omnipotent, we'll never be all powerful, we'll never be omnipresent. Those things are reserved only for Deity. But we will have bodies in that day that have far greater capabilities than they are now. And you say, how could with all those myriads?
In the in the heavens 10,000 * 10,000 and thousands of thousands and so on. How could that be? Well, God can do it, and we're going to be in a sphere and a scene that won't be governed in the same way by distance and physical limitations as it is now.
Brother Lundin used to make the comment and that it was helpful to me that new creation is not a question of time nor distance. So how can you all be close to the Lord? Like you say in physical things, the way we know Him today is impossible. That new creation there is no sense of time nor distance.
Maybe we can just touch on the 1St 5 verses of the 22nd chapter brother because.
I tend to get in close.
That we have in verse one of chapter 22.
A pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God into the Lamb.
Rivers in this world are still contaminated, and here is a river that comes from the throne of God and of the land. Refreshment for all eternity proceeding from the throne of God in the land.
And then in verse two you have in the midst of the street.
I think expression in the midst is so prevalent through the whole book, the whole Bible.
But who is it that occupies that place, that central position there? It is the tree of life.
The second chapter of Genesis, you have it in the midst of the garden. Here it's translated or transplanted into the heavenly paradise.
We have it in the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river was the tree of life.
Beautiful there is person of our Lord Jesus.
Tree of Life.
I have a question on verse 3.
It says verse three, and there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God, and the Lamb shall be in it, and his servants shall serve him.
Luke, chapter 12.
And verse 37.
Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching. Verily I say unto you, He shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meet, and and will come forward and serve them. I'm wondering.
01:15:13
How we put those two verses together? Go ahead, John. No, I'm asking the question. I've been just waiting for the.
I would just suggest as a brief comment on that, that first of all we do know that the Lord Jesus remains a servant forever. According to Exodus 21, which exemplifies that truth, we find that the Hebrew servant became a servant forever, and in the 17th of John we find in the first verse the Lord Jesus.
Bringing before the Father that he had glorified Him, and now asked him to be glorified.
To what end? That thy Son also may glorify thee. That is, He had served in full capacity, if we could say it reverently in this world. And now in coming glory, now raised as it were from the dead and in glory there He was going to continue to glorify God in serving. And so the Lord Jesus will remain a servant for all eternity. And that verse in Luke 12 is so precious because.
It's an indication of the value He places on those who are content to share His rejection in this world and to be faithful to Him during the time of His absence. But it's not going to end there for you and for me, because both are true. The Lord will remain a servant for all eternity, but are we going to have the privilege of serving in that? Him and our little flock hymn book. It's beautifully put. Rest, Lord.
In serving thee.
As none have served below, our service down here is tainted with failure. It's connected, sad to say, with the things that are of the flesh and.
Yet when it comes down to that eternity, the service there will be absolutely perfect. Want to be wonderful to be able to serve in that millennial day and absolute perfection with no thought of self getting into the picture. Nothing that comes in except perfect devotedness to Christ and perfect, shall we say, service in connection.
With Him. So I don't see any, shall I say, contradiction in the two statements. They rather compliment each other. He will be a servant for all eternity, but He'll give us that privilege too. Can I just add to that bill? Because you quoted part of the verse about Him. But it's interesting, the rest of the verse. It says all through that blessed eternity what tides of praise shall flow. And it's interesting, isn't it, that while we will have a part, as you say, in the service of the king, millennial Kingdom and so on.
Yet there is another service that we will continue for all eternity and that is the service of praise and worship. There were there were two types of service under the Levitical order. There was the service of burden and the service of song. The service of burden in that way is something that's only given to us for this life. When we get home, the service of burden will be over and He's going to make us to sit down to meet and come forth and serve Him forever.
But the service of song is going to continue for all eternity. We're going to worship him. We're going to praise Him for all eternity. And in that way we too will see His face and will serve Him. And when we get one look at his blessed face, brethren, what is it going to do? Why? It's just going to bring forth for eternity fresh bursts of praise and worship to the one, the Lamb who is so worthy. So I just add that a little bit to what you say. Very good, because.
The service of the millennial day has an end, but the service of praise there for all eternity. Are you going to say something, Bobby?
No, just to mention perhaps in verse two that it speaks of the.
I think Jim mentioned it earlier in the readings that the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nation, so that it shows that from that center, from the Lord Jesus and that heavenly city will go forth heal.
Heaven or Hell
Gospel—Don Mackewich
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Good evening. I'd like to welcome everyone to the Gospel meeting. We're glad that you can be here on this Lord's Day and for the last meeting of the conference.
I'd like to begin with #15.
Oh, blessed gospel sound, yet there is room.
It tells the all around yes there is room the guilty, the guilty may draw near the vile. You need not fear ladies and gentlemen, the joy you now may hear Yes, there is room like to sing #15 when someone started, please.
Who, blessed God, will thou get?
Razor Gray 'cause I mean, he had one thyroid in the groove.
And all he made love to me together to hear you put it on the ring alphabet display.
All the way I can gently leave. Yes, there is room.
Nsnoise, Godfather. Nsnoise.
Yeah.
So how do you get out of this way? OK, I'm alive. Yeah. Yeah. So there's an intervention through.
Yes, there's a lot of patience and wrong. It will find so many.
The great No more wealthy. Yes, there's a bruise.
What a wonderful song it is. What a great way to start the message that tonight there is room. Maybe you're here tonight. You have questions about Jesus. You have questions about how do I get to heaven?
Maybe you've heard about it from your parents.
Maybe you've heard it about it from somebody at work.
You're in the right place because tonight you can leave a changed person. We're going to pray and ask the Lord's health, and then we'll sing another song.
We thank you, Lord Jesus, that we can be here tonight.
To go over the wonderful news.
If you're here tonight, sign an invitation of a friend or someone from work. We wanna welcome you. We're thankful that you're here. We've been holding meetings here the last two days and the meetings have been really good. We've had a chance to learn more about the Lord Jesus. We've had a chance to open up the Holy Bible. And yet we're so fortunate before we end this conference that once again.
But we can go over the wonderful news that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.
00:05:07
And that those doors that you have come through.
Good news, you can leave tonight knowing Jesus as your Savior. And if you've been here the entire time.
Guys, it's time to make a decision.
It's time to say yes to Jesus.
To walk out these doors.
To walk out the doors in the back.
Is putting off.
Something that you should not.
To be putting off Today is the day of salvation.
In the back of the gymnasium, there's a scoreboard.
There's one up here, too. We're in a gym during the basketball game. They keep score.
The baskets and points that have been made, but in the basketball game, eventually the scoreboard, the clock ticks down.
And eventually there comes a point where it's game over.
Tonight is your night. Tonight is your chance to say yes to Jesus Christ. Tonight you have that opportunity.
Tomorrow, maybe too late, let's get in the game. Tonight we're going to sing also #40 Jesus loves me. This I know. Yes, it's in this book, the Bible.
For the Bible tells me so.
Whether you're small, little one, to him belong. They are weak, but he is strong. The message that we present to you tonight, you could be three years old, you could be in middle school, you could be in high school. You may be away at Vincennes University or visiting at another university. You could be an adult, a grandparent.
Good news guys, this message is for you and every single person who hears this message tonight.
You can receive Jesus as your savior. If you haven't, no one is going to be able to walk out of this room thing. Nobody loves me.
Jesus loves you. We're excited to share that message with you tonight, and I'm looking forward to singing this song. I hope you are too. If Jesus is your Savior, I hope you sing it with some enthusiasm. And if you're not, I want you to listen. And as we sing the song, I hope your heart is open and you will realize how much He loves you. Let's stand and sing #40.
Jesus, God's love.
Yes, she does love me.
Yeah, she's got the long day from my home and album to his soul.
33128743 and 9009 from the man's breathing arm. Yeah. I don't see it. That's a lot of great. Yeah. And to make things out of bounds, to make anything, you know, Do you talk to us? Great. You are crying.
00:10:06
About me strong.
Yes, she's from one place. Yeah, she's not close to me.
Yeah, I think that's a flounder you love. I don't know.
She's a lot of God made me well today. Well, great developer can be all the long ways.
And I have enough and I thought it will take me.
Along my mind, yelled yeast unplugged. Please, you're not. She's like, lost me.
Your eyes and you need to pass the light to break my heart and also 1000 lbs in the snow.
Isn't it exciting that we can sing about the Lord Jesus? Just hear those words. Yes, Jesus loves me. And that message, that good news applies to every single person in this room. It's marvelous, it's exciting. And tonight, how wonderful. Tonight you can accept Jesus.
As your Savior tonight, what we present before you comes from this book. It's called the Bible. We're going to use it tonight. If you have a Bible, we ask that you follow along in your Bible. For those of you that are following electronically, you can do that as well. We want you to remember it's not, it's not what I say. I'm not perfect myself, but tonight we're presenting to you what God says and yes.
He is perfect 100% of the time.
I want to begin by asking a question, so if you would open your Bibles please to John chapter 14.
And as you're opening your Bible to John chapter 14, I want you just to raise your hand if you've heard of a place called Heaven.
OK, I want you to raise your other hand if you've heard of a place called Hell.
The question that we have before is that we need to find out how do we get to heaven?
Because, you know, there's a lot of different people out there with a lot of different ideas on how to get to heaven, OK?
And when it comes to something so important.
We want to make sure that we are 100% sure.
Not hoping.
Not wishing.
Not Navy, but we want you to leave tonight knowing and being able to say I know exactly.
How to get there? Sound good, doesn't it John? Chapter 14.
And verse 5.
John chapter 14 and verse five. We're going to read the last part of the verse.
It says and how can we know?
The way guys, have you ever wondered that? Can we know how to get to that place called heaven?
Is it possible that we can know?
How to get there? Good news, the answer is yes.
This is how we get there. Verse 6. Go ahead and follow along with me, please. Jesus said unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
I'm going to read it again. I want you to follow along with your eyes. Put your finger on it. Jesus said unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
00:15:05
Tonight your way to heaven is through the Lord.
Tonight we present to you a savior, a person.
If you've come here tonight.
Wondering what you have to do as far as joining a church or doing some type of emeritus or good deed? The news for you tonight is it's not about joining a church, It's not about doing some good things tonight. It's about a person, the Lord Jesus Christ last night, Jim Highland brought before us, Behold.
The man, behold the Savior, and it's the Lord Jesus Christ.
Who is waiting to save you? He is the way, He is the truth, and He is the light.
He's not a way, he is the only way, and the wonderful news is tonight you can come through him.
I said I'm not a perfect person, and you know that's true of every single one of us in this room. Raise your hand if you've done something wrong.
Raise your hand if he's thin.
If your hand is not raised, you've got to make sure we get the hand up right. The Bible says that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And if you're saying, well, yes, that's true of me, I've sinned, and that's true of every single person, here's some good news. Listen carefully that tonight those sins and every single one of them can be forgiven. That's wonderful, isn't it? That's marvelous that those sins can be forgiven.
But furthermore, I want you to realize, as Jim brought out last night, that not only have we all been, but we are helpless.
We can't get to God on our own strength. We can't get to God.
By doing it our way, we need Jesus. We need a Savior.
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.
Maybe there's someone here tonight who's kind of trying to cover up those things and kind of pretending that day you haven't sinned.
Is that you tonight?
I want to tell you a story about John and Sally. They had the chance to go and visit their grandparents who lived on a farm. How many of you have been to a farmer visited a farm?
Good. As you can tell, I like to try and involve people when I'm talking. So John and Sally were younger, I think they were younger than 10 years old, but they were excited. They got to go visit their grandparents on a farm. And some of you might have heard the story before, but John was given a slingshot to.
Playlist Any of the young boys or girls know what a slingshot is used or what you do with a slingshot?
What's that?
Yeah, you shoot things and he had the slingshots and give some of those stones and put it in it and pull it back and have some fun with it.
But on the farm, grandpa and grandma had a pet duck.
And Johnny was playing around with his slingshots and saw the pet duck and I don't know what got into him, but he decided to take a aim at the duck. Grandma pet duck, put the stone in the slingshot, pulled it back. Anybody guess what happened? He hit the duck, hit the duck so hard the duck was killed.
Johnny had a problem. Grandma's pet duck is dead. What do we do with the dead duck?
Well, on the farm there was.
Some pile of wood. And Johnny got an idea. He thought, Maybe I'll hide that duck underneath the pile of wood. Kind of cover it up real nice so nobody sees it. And.
If the duct comes up missing, which it would, I don't know where the duct is. Well, so Johnny decided to act on that thought. He took the duck, covered it up with wood.
Nobody's gonna know.
Until he turned around and there was his sister watching.
Oh no, what's going to happen now? Sally just saw Johnny cover up the duck with the wood. You think Sally would go and tell Grandpa and Grandma what happened?
00:20:11
Let's stop for a second. Let me ask you a question. Is it a good idea? And we've established the fact that we all have been. It isn't a good idea to try and cover up those things and pretend like we haven't done anything wrong.
How do you sleep at night?
Knowing that.
Before the eyes of a holy God.
Your heart's not right. Not very comfortable, is it? Not very comfortable. So Sally didn't say anything that night, and I don't know if Johnny was relieved, but, uh.
Here's how she did it. The next night, or the next day, Grandpa invited John to go fishing.
With him.
Sally would have to stay behind and help Grandma with the dishes. Johnny would get to go fishing. The Sally was smart and so Sally when she heard that Johnny was invited, she just piped in and said actually grandpa Johnny said that he wants to stay home and help grandma with addition. Didn't you Johnny remember the duck?
For Johnny.
He did remember the duck.
Johnny had to stay home and help Grandma with the dishes. Sally got to go fishing.
The next day, Grandpa needed to go into town.
And Johnny was invited.
And Sally was invited, but then grandma said actually I need Sally to stay behind and help me with some laundry.
Well, Sally was really smart and actually she piped in and said, actually, Grandma Johnny wants to stay home and help you with the laundry today, Don't you, Johnny? Remember the ducks?
He did. Johnny had to stay home. Sally got to go with Trampa into town.
For Johnny, two days in a row, he had to stay home because his sister was using that against him. It happened one or two more days and.
For debt for John, each time he had to stay home. Finally Johnny got to the point where he could stand it no longer. He could stand it no longer that his sister was using this to his advantage and he went and told his grandma the true story. Explain to her Grandma, I am sorry I killed your duck and I covered it up with the wood.
I'm sorry, that's a good thing to do, isn't it?
When we stand to admit it.
Grandma, she called Johnny. Johnny, I forgive you.
You see, I was standing at the window the day that you killed my duck, and I saw the whole thing. I wanted to see how long you let Sally make a slave of you.
Boys and girls, ladies and gentlemen, God is watching from heaven. And as to where he's seen the whole thing?
And tonight, there's ones in this room.
And you know who you are.
Who are just like Johnny and trying to cover it up.
And here's what this book says he that covereth his sins.
Will not prosper. He that covereth his sins will not prosper. Let's say it all together. He that covereth his sin will not prosper. But whoso confesseth and forsake of them shall have mercy tonight, if you are sitting in this room.
And you are like Johnny. You have committed those sins and have not yet.
Told the Lord Jesus that you are sorry for your sins tonight if you have not invited Him to be your Savior.
You're not going to be happy.
In fact, you're going to go to bed tonight and you're going to have this on your conscience knowing that you are not ready to meet Jesus.
And that's a serious thing, isn't it? But the good news is tonight that we can tell you that there is forgiveness.
And tonight, if you will admit and be honest instead of trying to cover it up.
And say, yes, I am what this book says I am. I've done what this book says I've done. I'm going where this book says I'm going. You'll be honest tonight and confess your sins to Jesus. All your sins, all your sins can be forgiven. That's marvelous.
00:25:13
I want you to remember that story. Remember the duck. And tonight, if you have not accepted Jesus as your Savior, if you are still in your sins, I want you to remember that Johnny had no peace until he admitted that he had done wrong and accepted him.
You know where boys and girls, You know where adults go who die in their sins.
Do they go to the good Place or do they go to the Bad Place? Everybody, where do they go?
They go to the bad place. That place is called Hell.
That's serious.
Is there anyone who wants to go there tonight?
Do you know who's going there? The devil will end up going there.
You want to go to the same place that he's going.
No, if you die in your sins, you will go to that bad place. And we don't want a single person in this room and anyone who's listening to this recording, we don't want you going there either. The good news is that you don't have to go.
The good news is tonight you can have your sins forgiven. The Bible says if you believe not that I am, you shall die in your sins. And where I am you cannot go. And we don't want a single person, and that means you.
To go there, we want you to leave these gym doors in 20 minutes or so. Knowing Jesus as your Savior, we want you to avoid the judgment that is coming on this world.
If you are listening carefully during the meetings, you heard that Jesus is coming. For those that have joined us tonight in the meetings, we've been talking about a time that's coming soon, where we will be with the Lord Jesus Christ, and our desire is that you too will be able to join us in that place. We don't want a single one in this room or a single one who's listening to this recording to end up in the lake of Fire.
We want you to escape that judgment, and the way that you can do that is through the Lord Jesus Christ.
I like the story, and I don't always tell the stories as well as others do, but it was in the Echoes of Grace, and some of you might have thought it was a story about an engineer named Jim Root who was driving a train. That's what engineers do, driving a train through the state of Minnesota. And this happened back in the late 1800s, back before there was electricity, back before there was indoor running water, back before there was cell phones, back before there was the Internet.
And he was guiding that train down the train track heading toward the city of St. Paul, MN.
And as he was driving?
What's the right word? Engineering to train? That'll do for right now. As he was engineering the train off in the distance, he saw that there was a force that was on fire.
The smoke was going up and he could see the flames now. Back then, cars hadn't been invented.
And as far as I know, there wasn't any strings or bodies of water close by where people could get into a boat and escape.
And the only way of escape was to go to the railroad tracks and hopefully try and get on board this train and get out before the whole forest caught on fire and people started to die. It's a good idea if there's a fire to get out of the way, isn't it? You know what's an even better way an idea is if you're on your way to hell to accept Jesus as your savior. That's a wise thing to do. Well, the engineer got closer and closer to the city.
The flames were getting more intense, the smoke was going up, and as I remember from the story, the engineer realized that up ahead there was a trestle, a bridge that went over the water, and that he wasn't going to be able to cross that river.
He also realized that there was a lot of people who would not be able to escape the, uh, forest fire if they didn't get on board this train. And so Jim Root put on the brakes and brought the train to a stop and people were running and coming to the train. This was going to be the only way to safety. And what the engineer would have to do is put the train in reverse and back up. Let me ask you a question tonight. If you knew and you were living back then, that your house is going to be burned up.
00:30:10
Would you stick around to find your items or would you try and get out as fast as you could?
You probably wanna get out as fast as you could, wouldn't you? Let me ask you another question. If you had a father, a mother, a brother or a sister, would you try and make some effort to make sure that they got out too? I think you would I would you ever wonder why we have gospel meetings?
Just like these people were trying to get away from the fire, we want you to escape the coming judgment. If you had a pet dog or cat or turtle or rat or lizard, or would you want to try and bring that pet with you too? You'd probably go so far as to make sure that none of your loved ones or animals were caught in the fire. And people were running to the train. And the engineer waited as long as he could, but there came a point in time where it lasts. Even though the fire was coming and burning and the smoke was going up. Finally he had to say, I've got to get the train going in reverse and we've got to get out of here.
It was time sensitive and this message tonight is time sensitive. We cannot wait yet. There is room, but eventually it'll be too late. While Jim Root, the engineer, he put the train in reverse and the people on board that train clinging, crying, screaming, praying, praying, He went backwards trying to get away as fast as he could. As I understand if the fire was so intense that some of the windows on the train, the engine had broken and they even poured some water on Jim Root to help him stay conscious.
The good news is that he was able to drive the train backwards about 6 miles to where there was a body of water, and many of the passengers on board that train were able to jump off and get some cool water.
They were able to find Jim Root, the engineer. His hand was on the throttle.
Very badly burned. He himself was burned as well.
Thankfully, he lived.
But at a tremendous cost to him, and he was regarded by many as a hero for risking his life so that the passengers of this town could escape.
The fire.
I'm reminded of one who didn't risk his life.
He gave his life. Let's turn to that verse that's in Galatians chapter 2.
Stop.
If we follow along as we read in Galatians chapter 2.
And verse 20.
Says I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh. Here it is. I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Jim Root was a hero. He risked his life so that many.
People could get to safety. Tonight we bring before you the Lord Jesus Christ who came into this world, lived a real life and eventually went to Calvary's cross and there died a real death.
So that you and I could escape the coming judgment. You see what happened as well. He was on the cross. He was punished for the things that I have committed, and he was punished for the sins that you committed.
If you will repent and put your faith and trust in Him.
The ones who were saved in the story were the ones who got on the train.
And tonight you will be saved. You put your faith and trust in Jesus.
If anyone back then was foolish enough to say, you know what, I'm not going to get on board the train, I'm going to try and escape some other way, They weren't going to make it.
Can we be real clear tonight?
I mean real clear. Let's listen carefully if you try.
To get to heaven.
On your own or through some other way?
You will not make it and you will end up in hell. Ladies and gentlemen, we don't want a single person to go there when we preach the gospel. This message is about one who can save you and who can change your life. Regardless of what you have said, regardless of what you have done, it is His joy, the Lord's joy, to come in and save you, to give you a new life.
00:35:21
And to help you, that's wonderful, isn't it? Regardless of what you've done. And friends, I don't know your past, but I do know this, that tonight the Lord Jesus would. He wants to forgive you. He wants to set you free. Would you be free from your burden of sin? There's power in the blood. The Bible says the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son cleanseth us from all seven of all sins. Oh, tonight it would be his joy.
And it would be our joy, too, to know that you have finally said yes, that you have finally made a decision that I am not going to cover my sins. I am not going to try to do it on my own, But I am going to realize, I'm going to admit that I have sinned. It's his home.
He can't allow any sin in. But the good news is he wants you to come and tonight He wants you to come just as you are. Don't try to start tomorrow, April 2nd by living a new life. Don't try to do it on your own tonight just as you are. Admit I have sinned. I have sinned. And if you admit that, repentance and put your faith and trust in Jesus.
You're gonna be able to leave this room.
A saved person. We've only got about 5 minutes left. Time goes by very very quickly and as we start to wrap things up.
First, I want to thank the brethren here for, uh, inviting us here. We've had a very wonderful time. The ministry has been phenomenal.
But I need you to listen very carefully. It's not gonna do you good tonight if you don't know Jesus as your Savior to walk out these doors.
In your sins.
Guys, we've got to make that decision tonight.
We can't be putting it off.
Tonight is your night. Now is the accepted time. Now is the day of salvation.
In this gym, when a basketball player shoots the basket.
The ball either goes in the net.
Are off the backboard and in some way or another it goes in and the team gets points or it doesn't go in. It's that simple. It's either in or it's not in and tonight it's real simple. You either are saved.
Well, you're not safe and tonight you can leave knowing the Lord Jesus is your Savior. We want you to accept Jesus as your Savior. We don't want you to put it off. We're in the gymnasium of the Yellow Jackets and on the wall it says sting them jackets. In First Corinthians 15, it says the sting of death is sin. But the good news is.
Let's turn to it First Corinthians 15 as we start to wrap it up.
The good news is.
First Corinthians, chapter 15.
Verse 55 tonight you can know Jesus as your Savior and you can say as verse 55 says.
Odesk, where is nighting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. Oh, but it gets good. Listen to this. But thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, do you want victory in your life?
Victory through the Lord Jesus Christ. These athletes, they want the victory. They want the win. They've got to get the ball in the hoop tonight. It's not about athletics, it's about the victory, and it's through the Lord Jesus Christ. It's not through yourself, it's not through trying harder. It's not by going to church, it's not by trying to change it. The victory is through our Lord Jesus Christ.
I challenge you tonight to come just as you are. And for those of us who know the Lord Jesus Christ, for those of us who can say, I claim the victory, let's say it together, I claim the victory altogether, I claim the victory for 58 it says. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. For you know that your, that your, that your labor.
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Is not in vain in the Lord?
Your labor is not in vain. Continue to give out those gospel tracts. Continue to tell your friends, continue to tell your neighbors, the people that you work with, let them know that there is victory in Jesus. Let's sing a song in closing #4 Christ is the Savior of sinners. Christ is the Savior for me long I was changing same darkness. Praise the Lord now by His grace.
I am free.
You say, oh, you get excited about this, Yes we do. It's a message of deliverance and there is power in the blood. And tonight Jesus can be your Savior, Savior of sinners, save your sinners like me, shedding his blood for my ransom. This is the Savior for me. Would you like to be happy tonight? Can you leave with these words? Now I can say I am pardoned, happy. Marvelous, isn't it? And justified free.
Stay.
Can you say I'm saved by my blessed Redeemer? This is the Savior for me, ladies and gentlemen. He saved me when I was a young boy. He has saved many in this room. And tonight He'll be your Savior if you'll accept him #4 but stand.
Rice is the savior of men.
Christ is like later for me.
Long I was shamelessness, darkness.
Now, by the grace I am praying.
Save the rustling.
Nevertheless.
Generate life or life.
Umm, and then the savior for me.
Just as I was hearing.
Me speak in front of us with swiftly to have learned the presentation.
It took us a year to go away.
If there's anything that you heard tonight, then didn't quite make sense.
Or something was unclear.
After I've done training in the center, have a seat over here.
Is there someone who'd like to accept you, Sister savior tonight?
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Please see myself.
Or please ask someone.
You can find a room away from the ground and we can talk with you.
Let's do it tonight. Let's not put it off. Thanks be unto God, which giveth us the victory to our Lord Jesus Christ. We want you to see this gem a victor.
Tonight, salvation can be yours. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, we just pray that.
Our Heavenly Calling, Gen. 49, Eternal Weight of Glory
Open—R. Thonney, B. Prost, D. Rule
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
To read Brethren a verse in First Peter chapter 5.
Verse 10.
But the God of all grace.
Who have called us unto His eternal glory.
By Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, Make you perfect, establish, strengthen, settle you to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.
Just like to speak about that little expression for a few minutes, brother and.
He has called us unto His eternal glory.
We have a calling like nobody else in this world.
Call to eternal glory. There's glory in this world, and it's interesting to see it sometimes.
But we're not called to any glory in this world. We're called to eternal glory. Tremendous to get it. Let it get a grip on your soul.
I must say, brother, and that's why I felt led to stand up.
Just been down in Bolivia.
And each time I go to see what the Lord has done down there.
Through the work of our brother Eric Smith.
And others, of course, many native brethren have been used of the Lord.
One of the things that we did on the way back from the South of the country.
And a brother's pick up to Porto Sea. Brother Eric Smith arrived in Potosi in 1921.
To start his work in Bolivia, we stopped in a little town called Vitichi.
To the South of and in that town there's a cemetery, and we went into the cemetery.
Because brother Eric Smith's first wife was buried there, I didn't really have too much hope.
And she was buried there in the 1930s, so I didn't have too much hope that her grave would be visible any longer. But to our surprise, we found it, and still in fairly decent shape.
I don't think anybody here in the States knew his first wife. Her name was Rose, she was from England and he was only married to her for about 5 years before she got cancer. The brain.
And he took her to England to see if he could get treatment.
And when she realized what it was and how extensive it was, she says, please take me back to the Indians in Eulog. They're called Pukachumpis in the Quechua Indian language. It means red belt because they have a sash around their middle. That's their that's their typical dress. So they call the Pukachumpi Indian tribe and take me back there. She said to him, I want to die amongst.
My Indian brother. So he brought her back and that's where she lived her final days. And then she was buried there in this town called Vitichi. Well, there is a lot of suffering in brother Eric Smith's life. He lost two wives in Bolivia and one up here during his life. And, uh, there was suffering in connection with it. But what impressed me about our dear brother.
Was the call that was on his heart.
He was from New Zealand, I think many of you know, but I'll say this for the younger people.
And, uh, when he got saved, his father wasn't a believer at that time.
But he after some time.
In this Christian life, he decided he was going to go to Bolivia to preach the gospel, and he came and told his father. And his father was a very prosperous businessman, had a lot of connections, a lot of opportunities for his children to take up to do well for themselves in this light.
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And so when brother Eric Smith told him about his decision to go to Bolivia, he says.
Son, if that's your decision, out of my house.
And so he had to go and make his own way. He took two years of medical school. And because of that, he's known as El doctor in, in Bolivia, the doctor. But, uh, he really didn't practice medicine very much, but he's known as that because he did treat some people.
But what impressed me was.
The call.
That he had from the Lord to go. And I just want to present it to especially other young people here, but it's something we all need to be exercised about. Are you living for the brief moments of time or are you living for God's eternal day? Remember, you were not called to anything down here.
You are called to eternal glory, that is if you are a believer in the Lord Jesus.
And to me, it is a tragedy to see how many so-called believers get sidetracked into simply making good for themselves down here in this world.
In fact, one of the tragedies to me.
When we go into a nursing home to see somebody.
Perhaps prosperous in this world.
Maybe has a lot of material goods, a big bank account, homes and money.
And there they sit. What are they doing? They've lost it mentally. They're they're sitting in a wheelchair.
With absolutely nothing in front of them. They're unbelievers, of course, I think you understand. I mean that.
And.
They have lived full to the hilt down here in this world. And what do they have in front of them?
Nothing. Blackness of darkness forever. That seems to me one of the.
Most terrible tragedies that there can ever be.
Deceived by this present world to living for present advantage.
And young people. Scripture says the time is short.
Doctor Buchanan and I and Clem Buchanan went down the first time to Bolivia in 1968.
44 years ago, I can't hardly believe.
That it's been that long ago.
The time is short.
Time is very relative. We've been talking a little bit about time and eternity. It's hard to explain eternity. We think of eternity in the realms of time, thousands and millions and billions and billions of years.
That's really not what eternity is. Eternity is where there's no more time.
But the challenge that comes to my own soul is to live our lives for that which will last for all eternity.
And not just for a few brief moments of time down here, because.
The time is short.
Don't waste your time on just mere material advantage. Don't do it. You'll lament it in the end. That's the way this world lives. That's the way they're encouraged to live.
Don't let this world rob you of what is real and lasting.
When I went the first time, that first time with Clem and Doug to Bolivia, I remember we flew into the city of Potosi, which is a city of about 13,000 feet altitude.
And from there our brother came in his truck and picked us up and took us to the place where Brother Eric Smith started his work amongst the Indians, a town called Eulog, to the South of Porto Sea.
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And remember, Brother Smith was up in the cab of the truck with Brother Alarcon, and I think the rest of us were all on the back of the truck there.
Jostling over those rough roads, at the end of the day we came to where those brethren were waiting for and they knew he was coming and there was a group of them waiting on the road there.
Singing hymns and the brother was driving the truck, turned off the engine and posted to a stop.
I looked through a little porthole there to see Brother Smith and dear brothers Hedges down.
Tears were streaming down his face.
And let's say it was a tremendous challenge to me at that time, Brother Smith turned his back on all earthly advantage in New Zealand that he could have had. What does he have now? Does he have a mass wealth down here? No.
That all the results, the eternal results.
That will last for all eternity, I said in my own soul to the Lord. Please, Lord, help me not be deceived by the material things of this world. Help me to live for that eternal day.
And those things that will last for that eternal day. And I just want to go briefly to Luke chapter 16, where we get the question of stewardship.
God has put into our hands certain things, and I'm not talking merely about money.
You young people may not have too much money, but you certainly got a lot of good facilities, good mind.
Strength. How are you using it? Are you using it in view of this life?
Or of that life to come. Here we have a story that the Lord tells.
Of an unfaithful steward.
Let's read it a bit, verse one. And he said unto his disciples, There was a certain rich man.
Which had a steward, and the same was accused unto him, that he had wasted his goods.
And he called him and said unto him, How is it that I hear this of thee? You have an account of thy stewardship, for thou mayst not be no longer steward. And the steward said within himself, What shall I do? For my Lord taketh away from me the stewardship. I cannot dig to beg. I am ashamed. I'm resolved what to do, that when I am put out of the stewardship, they may receive me into their houses.
So he called everyone his Lord's debtors unto him, and said unto the first, How much OST thou unto my Lord?
And he said in 100 measures of oil, and he said unto him, take thy bill and sit down quickly and write 50. Pretty good discount, 50% discount, well worthwhile taking the advantage of. Then said he to another, And how much owest down? He said in 100 measures of wheat, he said unto him, Take thy bill and write 4 score. There's a 20% discount.
Well worthwhile at taking advantage of a 20% discount.
And the Lord commended the unjust steward, because he had done wisely. For the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light. And I say unto you, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness.
That when ye really it should read, it fails.
You may be received into everlasting habitations. He that is faithful in that which is leashed is faithful also in much, and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much. If, therefore, ye have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the true riches? And if you have not been faithful in that which is another man's?
Who shall give you that which is your own?
Just wanted to call attention especially to this verse 8. The Lord commended the unjust steward. Now why did he commend him? He didn't commend him for being unjust.
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What did he commend him for? Because he had done wisely. In what way had he done wisely?
Before his Lord took away his stewardship.
Why he used that which was still in his possession in view of that time in the future.
When he would no longer be steward to his own advantage. And then the Lord says the end of verse 8, Because for the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light. And this is a hard place to understand, but I think it is an important principle.
How are the children of this generation wiser than the children of Light?
This is the way I understand it.
The children of this world look forward to retirement up ahead and they plan for it. They look forward to that and they're making plans according to what they have in their vision.
The children of Light, what is their vision? Their vision goes into all eternity.
And are we planning in view of eternity? Are we planning to view just of a few brief moments down here in this world?
In general, the Lord says here, the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light. They are acting.
In relation to their vision properly and the children of Light who have all eternity before them.
Are not acting according to the vision that's before them. Everything you have, your intelligence, your time. Time is a tremendously important commodity. Scripture tells us to redeem the time. What does it mean to redeem the time?
Can you buy back some of those moments you've lost in life? No, I don't think that's what it means.
But reading means paying a price to buy something.
And those moments you have in your life, how do you use them?
Do you use them in view of eternity?
Or do you use them for the way any worldly might use them? You know, we have 24 hours a day basically. We sleep about 8 hours. That leaves you about 16 and you go to school. I don't know how much that might might be up to 8 hours that you go to school. You have another eight hours in there. How are you using those?
Moments. Are you buying them back for God and for that eternal day? Are you using them just for something that you enjoy down here?
That's what I saw as a young person, the life of our dear brother Eric Smith, and it was a tremendous challenge to me. And I don't lament having reflected that way. And I just want to pass the challenge on to you, dear young sisters and dear young brothers.
Time is short.
Your young sisters that are pretty.
Physically, right now. How are you gonna look in 50 years? The Lord Lise is here.
Are you gonna be thinking about how pretty you look? I don't think so.
You young guys that think you're strong and able for things.
Let me tell you, strength runs out after a while and you start getting aches and pains in your bones.
I proved it.
But let me tell you, while you have those things in your power, use them.
For God and for God's eternal day.
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First of all, let me say how much I agree with and how much I appreciate what our brother Bob has just brought before us.
I too remember our late brother Eric Smith very well and can attest to what an effect he had on my life.
Quite some years ago now, along the same lines as what Bob has talked about, I'd like to add to that remark by turning back, please, to the 49th chapter of Genesis.
Something here that I have enjoyed for many years, but it was brought home to me a fresh just recently in reading through the book of Genesis.
And we'll readjust the first part of the blessings of Jacob here in chapter 49.
You'll see what we are going to bring out in a moment.
Genesis 49 and verse one. And Jacob called unto his sons, and said, Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which shall befall you in the last days.
Gather yourselves together and hear, ye sons of Jacob, and hearken unto Israel your father.
Now, we're not going to go into the.
Prophetic meaning of what we have here, but more look at the moral aspect of it and notice what Jacob says.
Verse 3 Reuben, thou art my first born, my might, and the beginning of my strength, the Excellency of dignity, and the Excellency of power.
Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel because thou wentest up to thy father's bed. Then defile us, thou it. He went up to my couch.
Oh, here Jacob talks about his first born son.
And he looked at Reuben as being the beginning of his strength.
The first foreign was supposed to have the 1St place and as it were to get the double portion.
But something had happened here. There had been failure in Reuben's life. There had been immorality. And as far as we can tell from the history and Scripture, there was never any straightening out of that matter. We don't read that Reuben ever repented of it, or that he ever made it right with his father, or, more important, that he ever made it right with the Lord.
And so we find here that at the end of his life, Jacob as an old man.
Lays that sin at the door of Reuben. Very sad.
Let's go on verse four, or I should say verse five. Simeon and Levi are brethren. Instruments of cruelty are in their habitations. O my soul, come not thou into their secret unto their assembly might honor be not thou united. For in their anger they slew a man, and in their self will they dig down a wall. Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce and their raw, for it was cruel.
I will divide them in Jacob and scatter them in Israel.
Here were the second and third sons of Jacob, and once again we find that Jacob has to say something rather serious about.
Oh, what had happened all way back in their history.
You can read about it how that, sad to say Jacob when he was not really walking with the Lord as he should.
Wenon bought a piece of property and built himself a house, neither of which Abraham ever did, nor Isaac as far as we know. And as a result his daughter Dinah or Dina went out and got involved with the daughters of the land. And that resulted in immorality on her part. And the result of all that was that her two brothers, particularly Simeon and Levi, although the others were doubtless involved to some extent.
Use the seat against the whole city of Shechem.
And went and killed them all in an underhanded way.
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And so far as was recorded in God's Word, once again we find that.
Those two brothers never repented of that act of cruelty, that act of treachery that they had committed, and as a result here that sin is laid upon them when Jacob pronounces the blessings on his son.
But now look at verse 8.
Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise. Thy hand shall be in the neck of thine enemies. Thy father's children shall bow down before thee.
Judah is alliance. Well from the prey, my son, thou art gone up. He stooped down He couched as a lion and as an old lion. Who shall rouse him up?
The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come, and unto him shall the gathering of the people be. We'll leave the rest of it for the moment.
You and I might look at this and say, how can that be? How can that be?
Reuben was an immoral man, but as far as we can tell he was not a violent man, in fact, rather the opposite. And you will remember that when Joseph's brethren had settled on the fact that they were going to kill Joseph and had put him into a pit, kind of just to keep him until they carried out that awful act.
It was Ruben who had suggested putting him there with the idea that he would come and rescue him later on, probably on the fly, and let him go home to his father. So Ruben was not a violent man.
Simeon Levi were violent men. Treacherous, underhanded, cruel, all of that. But so far as we can gather from the history, there is no record that they were immoral men.
But if you read the history of Judah.
Oh, you say Judah. You're the worst one of the bunch.
He was the violent one of the bunch. He was the one that suggested selling Joseph into Egypt. And in those days, of course, to sell a man as a slave was tantamount to a death sentence. And his idea was we don't need to kill him. Let's not let our hand be upon him. Let's just sell him. We'll accomplish what we want to do. We'll get some money in the bargain, and it won't be we that is responsible directly for his death.
But then if you read the 38th chapter of Genesis, which we won't turn to.
We find that Judah was also an immoral man.
And in the worst way, and as was fairly common in those days, he lived by a double standard. It was OK for him to go out and commit adultery and get involved with someone whom he thought was a harlot. But if his daughter-in-law, as he thought she was, did that, then he was going to impose very severe punishment on her.
So Judah was the worst of the bunch.
How then is it that here we find Jacob not breathing one word about any of his failure?
But rather in every way telling him that he was the one whom his brethren would praise.
And more than that, he would have strength. Bob has been talking, and it's true, about how that as we get older, we get aches and pains and we don't have.
The strength that we used to have. But he says, Judy, you're going to be like a lion. And if you read the Darby translation, it's not as if it's an old lion who's so weak and played out that who can rouse him up. No, that's not the thought.
The thought is and it used to be this way.
Among the natives of Africa, that if a lion lay down under a tree after he'd had a good meal.
Oh boy, nobody disturbed them. Neither man nor beast disturbed that lion. Why? Because neither one was capable of resisting his strength and fury. And that's the thought here. Who shall rouse him up? In other words, who would dare to meddle with him? To use the vernacular that is current today, Who would dare to mess with them? Nobody.
How did all that come about?
Well, what happened? Oh, it was the grace of God. The grace of God.
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I believe there was a time in Judah's life after Joseph had been sold into Egypt.
And when they went down to Egypt to buy food from Joseph and you will remember the way that Joseph.
I believe with the mind of God used roughness to his brethren, and sought by that means to bring before them.
They are for sin that they had committed first of all in.
Hating him and secondly and selling him down into Egypt, I.
I suppose at that time Joseph knew nothing of the deceit involved in killing a kid of the goats and dipping his coat of many colors into it and taking it back to their father. He wouldn't have known about that. But he seeks to reach their hearts and consciences with what they had done. And I believe that above all of his brethren, Judah profited by that. And although it is not recorded in the word of God, what do we find? Oh, go back and we won't take the time because I want to leave time for some other brother, but.
Go back and read the history, you will find that when Jacob wants his sons to go down to Egypt the second time.
What happens? It's Judah that comes forward and says, Father, we can't go unless Benjamin comes with us. That's what was said.
And somehow Judah.
Reaches into Jacob's heart. Reuben tried, couldn't get anywhere.
And I don't say it dogmatically, but I suggest that it was because.
Somehow, someway, Ruben had not settled things with his father the way he should. The sin was still there. There was a wall a distance between him and Jacob. And as a result, when Judas says let let him go with me, slay my two sons if I don't bring them back again, Jacob says no way.
But then Judica he pleads with Jacob. This time Jacob listens.
Somehow there's a bond between them. Why? Oh, I believe Grace was working.
I believe on the one hand, Judah was realizing it was I that.
Laid those plans to sell Joseph. It was I that was the most guilty of the bunch.
And no doubt in Jacob's heart there was the feeling. And where did they learn it? Where did they get all that idea of underhanded dealing and subtlety and treachery and lying and cheating and all that?
You had no nowhere to look but his own life and his own character, didn't he?
What happens later on? The truth comes out.
Suddenly Joseph is revealed to his brethren and they have to go home.
And they tell their father Joseph is yet alive and he is governor over all the land of Egypt.
We don't wanna say anything where scripture is silent.
But again, if I could fall back into the vernacular, I would love to have been a family on the wall.
When those brethren went back to Jacob with that story.
Oh, you think what had to come out?
Oh boys, is it true, after the wonder of it and the joy of it had settled down.
All things had to come out. What about that coat of many colors, fellas? How did that? How did that happen? How did he get down to Egypt there? How is Joseph in Egypt? You led me to believe he was eaten by wild beasts. How did he end up in Egypt? Surely he didn't walk there all by himself. How did all that happen? It had to come out.
But then what do we find? Oh, we find that as Jacob goes down into Egypt, we find.
Prior to that, when Joseph is dealing with his brethren.
It's Judah that comes forward and pleads for Benjamin. It's Judah that comes forward and pleads for Benjamin. Oh, he pleads and says, let me remain a bondman instead of Benjamin. How easy it would have been for them to say, well, Benjamin, we don't know how that silver cup got in your sack, but.
I guess we're off the hook. So you stay as a slave and we're off home.
Oh no, Judah comes forward, the worst one of the bunch in fleet for him. What a picture of Grace working. And then when Jacob is going down into Egypt, he sends Judah ahead of him to prepare his way. Before, oh, there was a bond there between them, A stronger bond, perhaps than it ever existed before.
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Why? Oh, because there was real repentance in a getting hold of the grace of God.
And Jacob realized that in spite of all his bad character, his scheming, his planning, his lies, his trickery, everything that he had practiced most of his life, there was a God above who wanted to deal with him in love and grace. And he kept trying to get the blessing in his own strength. And as a result, here was one of his sons in the person of Judah, who had been the worst of his family. But he too gets before the Lord.
How do we connect that with what our Bob said, with what our brother Bob said?
I suggest in this way, these are days of wonderful opportunity. These are days, I believe, when there are more opportunities to serve the Lord and to live for His glory than there ever were before. And I can only re echo what was said that may you and I, and especially those that are younger be exercised to use the energy and whatever the Lord gives you for him. What do you say? But I there's nothing that I can do.
What do we do?
We do what's right in front of us, do the next thing, do what's right before you, and if you do what's right before you, before the Lord.
The Lord will enlarge your scope soon enough. He'll give you plenty to fill your life and fill your time.
But sometimes you know there is failure.
And sometimes we may look at our lives and say, but what I have done and the way I have lived my life has not been according to the way the Lord would have it. And I am not suggesting for a moment that there is not a government in the House of God. There is. And Joseph, or rather Jacob, felt the effect of that government in his own life. There were things in his life that were very, very hard to bear and even at the end of his life.
In spite of all that the grace of God had done.
He has to say to Pharaoh, few and evil have been the days of the years of my pilgrimage.
And I have not attained under the years of my fathers. Oh, he recognized that the walk that he had been characterized by.
Had not been the same as that, for example of Abraham, but at the same time there was a profiting by the way God had worked with him.
And I suggest to you and to me that if there's any blessing in our lives, it's not because of anything that we are, but it's all going to be because of the grace of God. And Judah came in the blessing not because of anything that he was, but because there was real repentance in his life and the getting before the Lord. And even though no doubt he was a very mature man when he came to that point, as it were, he said, as Peter gives us in his epistle, there was the rest of his time. That's in first Peter chapter 4.
There was the rest of his time and as a result.
He becomes the prominent one, he becomes the tribe from which the kings came, he becomes the one from which King David sprung. And of course, eventually, and it's wonderful because there's an illusion to it here, until Shiloh comes, and unto him shall the gathering of the people be. Oh, that blessed prophecy looked forward to Christ.
The one who would fulfill all of God's heart, and who in perfection would be everything that man is not.
But in the meanwhile, there is God's grace that is there for each one of us.
And so let me say to my own heart as to each one here, perhaps our lives have gotten to such a point where we feel that we can't go back.
And we can't go back. And sometimes we feel I've gone so far that I can't change now.
That is not true. That is not true.
Brother Bob, how old was Eric Smith's father when he got saved?
In his 50s at least, wasn't he? I believe so. Eric Smith's father kicked him out of the house, as Bob has been telling us. But there came a time when the grace of God reached down to that man and grabbed hold of him.
Can I tell you the story? Can I take a minute? Some of you know it, but it's worth telling.
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His father couldn't handle the gospel, even though his wife and his children were all saved.
One day a preacher came.
And he was like our late brother Bob Baum, and he had Bible verses plastered all over his horse and buggy.
And he came to the house and his father said, get that man out of here, what nonsense Bible verses all over his horse and buggy, get him out of here. So he left.
Big ranch in New Zealand.
But Eric Smith's older brother, Hugh, went out after the man to the gate as he left, and he said, come on back, come on back. After a while, don't quit. After some months, he came back. And Eric Smith's father at least agreed to be polite. He said, well, give him a room, but just keep him out of my hair.
Well, of course, when somebody is a guest in your home, you can't ignore him completely. And one evening they were sitting there and Eric Smith's family, for those that remember him, was extremely musical. Eric Smith himself played the violin very beautifully, and most of his family were capable in that respect, but whether with the piano or other instruments.
So in the living room, 1 evening, Eric Smith's father, just to make conversations, said.
The visiting preacher, he said. Do you play anything?
No, he said. I don't. But he said if you don't mind, I'll sing you or him.
Hmm, alright, so one of Eric Smith's sisters sat down at the piano.
And the brother, who evidently had a good voice, started to sing.
The glory shines before me. I cannot linger here.
And so on he went down all the way to the end.
By the time the last verse was being sung.
Eric Smith's father was sitting there with the tears running down his face.
I can't give you the details, but that night he accepted Christ as his Savior.
And Eric Smith's only comment, and this was if I can say it to me personally in conversation, he said.
Brother Bill, my mother had 30 happy years.
He lived to be up into his 80s. He says. My mother had 30 happy years. I say that to everyone of us here. Not that I suppose that there are those out there who are resisting the gospel, although there may be some. And not that I'm supposing that there are those out there who perhaps have wasted their lives, or that there are necessarily those out in the audience here who have led a life that is not pleasing to the Lord. I'm not suggesting that.
But I am saying that the grace of God is able to reach out to us whether we are saved or whether we are lost, and to enable us, like Judah, to use the rest of our time not to live under ourselves, but unto him that died for us and rose again.
Turn with me to 2nd Corinthians chapter 4.
15 where all things are, for your sakes.
That the abundant grace might through the Thanksgiving of many.
Redound to the glory of God.
For which 'cause we think not, but though our outward man perish, at the inward man is renewed day by day for our light affliction, which is but for a moment.
Worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. For we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.
I'll turn it over to Revelation Chapter 7.
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Notice as we read these verses the similarity in them to what we have been reading in Revelation chapter 21 That we had in the morning reading.
Revelation Chapter 7.
And verse 13 And one of the elders answered, saying unto me, What are these which are arrayed in white robes? And whence came they?
And he I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said unto me, These are they which came out of the great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the throne of God, and serve him night and day in his temple, and he that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them.
Now these are like Revelation 21. And they shall hunger no more, neither shall they thirst anymore, neither shall the sun light on them, nor any beast. And the Lamb, which is in the midst of the throne, shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of water, and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.
Brother and I, I wanna say, in view of what we had this morning and what we've had this afternoon, I wanna encourage you to thank God for your afflictions. I want to encourage you to thank God for your tears.
God is using them for your eternal good and mine.
They are for your sake.
They are brought into your life.
With the purpose of good for you.
I wanna go back just to make a footnote on what Bill just said to illustrate the point.
He said it, but I'm gonna amplify it on it for a moment.
Judah.
Took the lead.
In selling Joseph.
A type of Christ.
Later on, Joseph tested the brothers.
On the point.
They had brought Benjamin back with them as he required of them.
And Jonathan Joseph tested them.
Would they sell Benjamin like they had sold Joseph?
And Judah wouldn't do it.
When we fail in life, God in His grace, because He has an eternal good for us in view.
Will often bring us, No, we can't backtrack. No, we can't go back to the same failure in itself, but in the ways of God. All things are for our sakes, and God will often bring us into a circumstance in our life that He tests us on the point.
In which we had previously failed.
And if necessary, he's a very patient teacher.
It may be a third time, and a fourth and a fifth if necessary, but and each time, the intent of God is for our sakes.
He has an end result that is to himself and for his pleasure that he's going to work out in our lives so that he can rest in it and the results of what he's doing in our individual lives. We had in this morning in the prayer meeting or not in the prayer meeting, but in the beginning Matthew 18 and 20 was read.
Come unto me, all ye that labor.
And are heavy laden and I will give you rest.
You'll never hear the words. The Lord Jesus will never say that to you in heaven.
You'll never have the opportunity to know him in that way if you don't learn him that way now.
We thank God for those circumstances of life that would draw us to Him in that way, so that He might come and speak to our hearts and say, Come unto me.
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And I will give you rest.
That's only now.
But what is the end result of it? It will be for your blessing forever. The end result of it will never be lost. It's part of the eternal weight of glory that will be yours.
God shall wipe away all tears.
From their eyes.
The Lord Jesus the Lamb In Revelation Chapter 7 there were those that identified themselves with the Lord Jesus.
In the Tribulation.
Did he value it? Yes, he did.
Did he express it to them? Did he identify with them later? Yes, he did.
You'll never go to Bolivia in heaven.
You'll never go to your next door neighbor in heaven.
To tell them about the Lord Jesus.
You'll never speak to the person that you work with or you go to school with in heaven.
But if you do now.
The Lord will remember with you forever, forever it.
Will never cease to be precious to his heart.
We aren't all going to pass through the same circumstances of life.
But what we do pass through, we want to remember it's for our sakes. It's for our sakes.
It is God. We may not always live life as we should, as Bob encourages us to do so.
But on God's part, he never forgets.
We may live for the moment, we may live for the now, and in some cases God may stop us and say, no, I'm going to bring something into your life that will force you to stop.
May be pain, it may be sorrow, it may be something you bring upon yourself.
But the heart of God in it.
Is for your good, because he never forgets the eternal view.
He never forgets the eternal weight of glory. That is His purpose for your blessing and mine.
And so he encourages us.
To accept it.
If I could add the word embrace it.
And give thanks for it. It's his purpose of good.
And he will bring out of it that which honors himself and fulfills his purpose.
Just wanna add 1.
Final remark I've added. I've said it before to perhaps many here, but it's very precious to me in this connection.
Turned back to Genesis or Genesis chapter 45.
Genesis 45, verse one. Then Joseph could not restrain himself before all them that stood by him. And he cried, 'cause every man to go out from me, And there stood no man with him, while Joseph made himself known to his brethren, and he wept aloud.
This is the Lord Jesus prophetically in the Tribulation.
In the process whereby he is, his brethren of Israel are restored to him.
And here it says he wept aloud.
Your tears, I don't believe are going to stop when the rapture takes place.
Because you are having formed in you now.
An identity of relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. And if I may put it this way, your tears won't stop until His due.
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That's why it's those words take place in eternity, not in time.
Do you weep over something now?
The day will come when you will see the Lord Jesus weep.
In this process of being restored to his brethren and.
You'll weep with them.
That we've been sympathy with his own heart.
You can't learn that in heaven. You're learning it now.
You are learning now.
To enter into that which he enters in.
And be able to can I put it in this figurative way to put your arm around the Lord Jesus?
And feel with him, you know what we do at a funeral or a difficult time sometimes with someone we're close to and in the measure in which your heart is being drawn close to the Lord Jesus. So when he goes through seven times actually in these latter part of Genesis.
It says he wakes because it will be a process for them to be brought back to him and he'll feel that as a man and you'll feel it with him, but when there's no longer anything to produce tears.
God wipes away all tears from their eyes, and in Revelation 7 is the Lamb that does it in the character of when they pass through it themselves, and then they wait for what they did to him.
And are restored to him.
Then not only does he weep for them.
But then he removes their tears as well. And so the Lord Jesus, in some ways our God, in some ways he may produce the tears, He may bring us into that which produces our tears, but it would be also the one that gives the answer to it that will remove them. And what will be left? A worship, a praise, an adoration to our God.
Forever.