Presented to TSA Corps 614 Regent Park, 01 May 2016 by Captain Michael Ramsay
We believe that there is only one God, who is infinitely perfect, the Creator, Preserver, and Governor of all things, and who is the only proper object of religious worship.
We believe that it is the privilege of all believers to be wholly sanctified, and that their whole spirit and should and body may be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Today we are invited to worship God visually and creatively. We often worship God in church by singing. Today we are invited to worship God by drawing, sketching. There are sheets of paper on the wall and there are pieces of paper up front. You can create your worship picture song on whichever scale you want. Today the worship picture we will be drawing will be a picture or two pictures of the City of God. You may draw your picture as the Spirit leads. There are pens, felts, crayons, pencil crayons. I invite you to move to a spot you want and take the materials you need. As I read from our Scriptures, I will put my pictures on the screen. These are not for you to copy unless you really want to; these are the images that moved in my heart as I was reading through. Yours will probably look different. Let us pray and then I will read through the Scripture again and we will create our worship pictures together.
10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.
This passage comes into the end of the NT, the end of Revelation, and the end of time. What happens at the end? The Holy City comes to earth[1]. This is important. We don’t get sucked up into outer space like Star Trek and ‘Beam me up Scotty’ at this point; the Holy City comes from Heaven to earth[2]. It is a holy city: What does it mean to be holy? To be set apart AND to belong to God[3]; in the NT, Christians by definition are holy[4]. What is the name of the Holy City? Jerusalem. We remember that Jerusalem was the name of the capital city when Israel and Judah were one country. What was the most important building in Jerusalem? The Temple. This brings us to our next addition to our pictures and our next verse.
22 I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.
The Temple was the centre of worship for a unified Judah and Israel and, at times, it was the whole focus of life and worship for the ancient city of Jerusalem and the Southern Kingdom of Judah[5]. Some people even believed that God lived [only or primarily] there (cf. 2 Samuel 7; 1 Kings 5:3-5, 8:10-17; 1 Chronicles 22, 28:1-29:9; 2 Chronicles 5:13-14, Joel 3:5). Now there had been a number of temples in the old Jerusalem throughout history. The first one was built by King Solomon and the last by King Herod. Today there is no Temple there but rather a mosque (The Dome on the Rock).
In our text, when we have a New Jerusalem descending to earth from heaven to replace the old one, you will notice that there is no temple at all. This place that was the centre of worship of the LORD does not even exist when God sends down His new city to His new earth. How can that be? Quite simply the key is that one no longer needs to go to a building to worship God because God himself is there.
Who is this Lamb? The Lamb is Jesus. Jesus and God are the Temple in the new city. We can all be in the presence of God. This brings us to our next addition to our pictures and our next verse:
23 The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.
Jesus as God is with us forever in the New Jerusalem; we don’t need a temple. According to our verse, what else don’t we need because God is with us? (The sun and the moon.) What is the point of the sun and the moon? They give us light and more than that, they give us life. Nothing can survive in our world and our cities today without the sun and the moon but at the eschaton, at the end of this age, in the new age, there will be no need for the sun and moon to sustain us because we will be sustained simply by being in the very presence of Jesus as God. And more than that, there isn’t a need for streetlights or anything like that because Jesus, the Lamb, is the light of God. This brings us to our next addition to our pictures and our next verse.
24 The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendour into it. 25 On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. 26 The glory and honour of the nations will be brought into it.
Its gates will never be shut. Why did ancient walled cities close their gates? For protection. Now the city doesn’t need protection from enemies or the dark because just like God is their temple and God is their light and life, He is also their protection. At the end of the book, at the end of the age, at the end, we don’t need to worry about any of those things, at the end there is God to protect us and sustain us. This City of God will be so attractive that everyone will want to pour into it. And everyone can. The nations of the earth will walk by its light (remember there is no more sun) and even the world leaders will be subject to it[6]. All the earth will serve God in the New Jerusalem. The Glory and honour of all the nations will pour into it. This brings us to our next addition to our pictures and our next verse.
27 Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
God and being in the presence of God provides light, life, and protection for the whole world and each and every one of us are invited to be a part of it but some people will not serve God in His City for eternity. No one needs to but some will choose to perish. In Revelation these people are referred to in a number of different ways, here John underlines that those who are shameful and deceitful choose not to serve the Lord. This is important, Heaven, where the New Jerusalem comes from and the new earth upon which it lands, do not have evil in them[7]. They do not have deceit. They do not have lies, white lies or otherwise[8]. When we walk by the light of the Lamb, we are honest and pure. Do you want to be honest and pure? You can be. Jesus died and rose again so that we can all be a part of this kingdom to come.
In a moment we will start our second picture of the Capital City but first if you want to be a part of this world where there is no fear because there is no darkness, no night; there is nothing impure but instead the light and the love of God, then I invite you to stand with me and sing, Create in me a Pure Heart. Because as our heart is pure, we can be with God. If you would like a pure heart, stand and pray in song with me, now.
This brings us to our second picture of the city of God. I will only speak for a couple of more minutes here. You can take a new piece of paper if you like or you can continue to add to your first piece. Reading from Revelation 22:1
22:1 Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb
2 down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.
This verse speaks about the Tree of Life. Does anyone know where the Tree of Life shows up in scripture? In Genesis (Gen 2:9, 3:17-24), remember there were two trees in the Garden of Eden, the tree that brought death, the Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life. In Genesis, we ate of the tree whose fruit brought death. In Revelation, we have access to the Tree of Life.
And in the eternal presence of God, it is an everlasting harvest. Every season is harvest season. Every month the tree bears fruit. No one starves anymore, no one goes hungry anymore. God’s provision continues forever and more than that; you will notice that the leaves of this tree provide healing of the nations. Our nation is sick. Almost every nation is sick, not just in people being ill and dying but also in all of the sin that flows around us in our world today. In the world to come what flows around us, by contrast, is the river of life, flowing from the very throne of God: there is no more pain, no more tears, no more suffering. The curse we suffered when humanity ate of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is lifted. (Next slide.)
3 No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads.
5 There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.
Do you want to reign with God forever? Do you want to be in this city with no sin, no hate, no death, no deceit; where everyone is honest and loving and serving our Lord? Do you want to? You can. Salvation starts today and last forever.
Look around you. Today, as you have accepted Jesus as your Lord and leader, you are surrounded by the City of God. You are in a representation of the City of God. On every wall before you, behind you, and around you is the City of God and that person sitting next to you, they too are in this city of God. If you would like to live forever in the eternal City of God, where there is no more pain, no more suffering, no more sin, no more hate, no more death, no more deceit; where everyone is honest and loving and serving our Lord then why don’t you join me of singing of this triumph where the Lamb rules forever from the throne of God. Let us sing together, Are You Washed?
Let us sing and let us pray.
www.sheepspeak.com
---
We believe that there is only one God, who is infinitely perfect, the Creator, Preserver, and Governor of all things, and who is the only proper object of religious worship.
We believe that it is the privilege of all believers to be wholly sanctified, and that their whole spirit and should and body may be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Today we are invited to worship God visually and creatively. We often worship God in church by singing. Today we are invited to worship God by drawing, sketching. There are sheets of paper on the wall and there are pieces of paper up front. You can create your worship picture song on whichever scale you want. Today the worship picture we will be drawing will be a picture or two pictures of the City of God. You may draw your picture as the Spirit leads. There are pens, felts, crayons, pencil crayons. I invite you to move to a spot you want and take the materials you need. As I read from our Scriptures, I will put my pictures on the screen. These are not for you to copy unless you really want to; these are the images that moved in my heart as I was reading through. Yours will probably look different. Let us pray and then I will read through the Scripture again and we will create our worship pictures together.
10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.
This passage comes into the end of the NT, the end of Revelation, and the end of time. What happens at the end? The Holy City comes to earth[1]. This is important. We don’t get sucked up into outer space like Star Trek and ‘Beam me up Scotty’ at this point; the Holy City comes from Heaven to earth[2]. It is a holy city: What does it mean to be holy? To be set apart AND to belong to God[3]; in the NT, Christians by definition are holy[4]. What is the name of the Holy City? Jerusalem. We remember that Jerusalem was the name of the capital city when Israel and Judah were one country. What was the most important building in Jerusalem? The Temple. This brings us to our next addition to our pictures and our next verse.
22 I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.
The Temple was the centre of worship for a unified Judah and Israel and, at times, it was the whole focus of life and worship for the ancient city of Jerusalem and the Southern Kingdom of Judah[5]. Some people even believed that God lived [only or primarily] there (cf. 2 Samuel 7; 1 Kings 5:3-5, 8:10-17; 1 Chronicles 22, 28:1-29:9; 2 Chronicles 5:13-14, Joel 3:5). Now there had been a number of temples in the old Jerusalem throughout history. The first one was built by King Solomon and the last by King Herod. Today there is no Temple there but rather a mosque (The Dome on the Rock).
In our text, when we have a New Jerusalem descending to earth from heaven to replace the old one, you will notice that there is no temple at all. This place that was the centre of worship of the LORD does not even exist when God sends down His new city to His new earth. How can that be? Quite simply the key is that one no longer needs to go to a building to worship God because God himself is there.
Who is this Lamb? The Lamb is Jesus. Jesus and God are the Temple in the new city. We can all be in the presence of God. This brings us to our next addition to our pictures and our next verse:
23 The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.
Jesus as God is with us forever in the New Jerusalem; we don’t need a temple. According to our verse, what else don’t we need because God is with us? (The sun and the moon.) What is the point of the sun and the moon? They give us light and more than that, they give us life. Nothing can survive in our world and our cities today without the sun and the moon but at the eschaton, at the end of this age, in the new age, there will be no need for the sun and moon to sustain us because we will be sustained simply by being in the very presence of Jesus as God. And more than that, there isn’t a need for streetlights or anything like that because Jesus, the Lamb, is the light of God. This brings us to our next addition to our pictures and our next verse.
24 The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendour into it. 25 On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. 26 The glory and honour of the nations will be brought into it.
Its gates will never be shut. Why did ancient walled cities close their gates? For protection. Now the city doesn’t need protection from enemies or the dark because just like God is their temple and God is their light and life, He is also their protection. At the end of the book, at the end of the age, at the end, we don’t need to worry about any of those things, at the end there is God to protect us and sustain us. This City of God will be so attractive that everyone will want to pour into it. And everyone can. The nations of the earth will walk by its light (remember there is no more sun) and even the world leaders will be subject to it[6]. All the earth will serve God in the New Jerusalem. The Glory and honour of all the nations will pour into it. This brings us to our next addition to our pictures and our next verse.
27 Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
God and being in the presence of God provides light, life, and protection for the whole world and each and every one of us are invited to be a part of it but some people will not serve God in His City for eternity. No one needs to but some will choose to perish. In Revelation these people are referred to in a number of different ways, here John underlines that those who are shameful and deceitful choose not to serve the Lord. This is important, Heaven, where the New Jerusalem comes from and the new earth upon which it lands, do not have evil in them[7]. They do not have deceit. They do not have lies, white lies or otherwise[8]. When we walk by the light of the Lamb, we are honest and pure. Do you want to be honest and pure? You can be. Jesus died and rose again so that we can all be a part of this kingdom to come.
In a moment we will start our second picture of the Capital City but first if you want to be a part of this world where there is no fear because there is no darkness, no night; there is nothing impure but instead the light and the love of God, then I invite you to stand with me and sing, Create in me a Pure Heart. Because as our heart is pure, we can be with God. If you would like a pure heart, stand and pray in song with me, now.
This brings us to our second picture of the city of God. I will only speak for a couple of more minutes here. You can take a new piece of paper if you like or you can continue to add to your first piece. Reading from Revelation 22:1
22:1 Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb
2 down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.
This verse speaks about the Tree of Life. Does anyone know where the Tree of Life shows up in scripture? In Genesis (Gen 2:9, 3:17-24), remember there were two trees in the Garden of Eden, the tree that brought death, the Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life. In Genesis, we ate of the tree whose fruit brought death. In Revelation, we have access to the Tree of Life.
And in the eternal presence of God, it is an everlasting harvest. Every season is harvest season. Every month the tree bears fruit. No one starves anymore, no one goes hungry anymore. God’s provision continues forever and more than that; you will notice that the leaves of this tree provide healing of the nations. Our nation is sick. Almost every nation is sick, not just in people being ill and dying but also in all of the sin that flows around us in our world today. In the world to come what flows around us, by contrast, is the river of life, flowing from the very throne of God: there is no more pain, no more tears, no more suffering. The curse we suffered when humanity ate of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is lifted. (Next slide.)
3 No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads.
5 There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.
Do you want to reign with God forever? Do you want to be in this city with no sin, no hate, no death, no deceit; where everyone is honest and loving and serving our Lord? Do you want to? You can. Salvation starts today and last forever.
Look around you. Today, as you have accepted Jesus as your Lord and leader, you are surrounded by the City of God. You are in a representation of the City of God. On every wall before you, behind you, and around you is the City of God and that person sitting next to you, they too are in this city of God. If you would like to live forever in the eternal City of God, where there is no more pain, no more suffering, no more sin, no more hate, no more death, no more deceit; where everyone is honest and loving and serving our Lord then why don’t you join me of singing of this triumph where the Lamb rules forever from the throne of God. Let us sing together, Are You Washed?
Let us sing and let us pray.
www.sheepspeak.com
---
[1]
J.B. Moffatt, EGT, 5:477: “From the smoke and pain and heat [of the preceding
scenes] it is a relief to pass into the clear, clean atmosphere of the eternal
morning where the breath of heaven is sweet and the vast city of God sparkles
like a diamond in the radiance of his presence" Quoted from Alan F.
Johnson, The Expositor's Bible Commentary,
Pradis CD-ROM:Revelation/Exposition of Revelation/V. Vision of the New Heaven
and the New Earth and the New Jerusalem (21:1-22:5)/A. The New Jerusalem
(21:1-27), Book Version: 4.0.2
[2]
Cf. N.T. Wright, ‘Farewell to the Rapture!’ Bible
Review, August 2001. Available on-line at:
http://www.ntwrightpage.com/Wright_BR_Farewell_Rapture.htm
[3]
W.E. Vine. . 'Holiness, Holy, Holily.' In Vine's
Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words. (Nashville, Tennessee: Royal
Publishers Inc., 1939), 555.
[4]
John D.W. Watts. 'Holy.' In Holman Bible
Dictionary, general editor Trent C. Butler. Nashville, Tennesee: Holman
Bible Publishers, 1991), 660. W.E. Vine. 'Holiness, Holy, Holily.' In Vine's
Expository Dictionary of New Testament Word. (Nashville, Tennessee: Royal
Publishers Inc., 1939), 555.
[5] Cf. P. Alexander, ‘Temple’ in Lions Encyclopaedia of the Bible (Herts, UK: Lion Publishing,
1986).
[6]
M. Eugene Boring, ‘Revelation’ (Interpretation: a Bible Commentary for Teaching
and Preaching: Louisville, Kentucky: John Knox Press, 1989), 221.
[7]
Cf. Simon J. Kistemaker, Exposition of
the Book of Revelation (New Testament Commentary: Grand Rapids, Michigan:
Baker Academic, 2007), 564.
[8] Cf. NT Write, Revelation
for Everyone (For Everyone Series, London: SKPC Publishing, 2011),194-195.
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