Today’s Scripture
Psalm 148 Acts 11:1-18 Revelation 21:1-7 John
16:12-22
Illustration – 2 houses on Algonquin.
- 1st restored and made new that way – same
shape, style, just all new
- 2nd – ripped apart and is being
rebuilt. Single story becoming two
story. It will not look the same.
With both – the old is gone, the
new is there. There will not be any memory
of what the old looked like, only the new will remain. All that was no longer needed was judged and
taken away. Only the new and renewed
remain. While the process is going on,
we cannot see what the new will be like.
We do see what the tearing down is going through.
John’s Gospel and the Revelation
today are directly connected. Jesus is
telling the disciples to be ready for some tearing down of the old things. At first it will not be a pretty sight. He tells up front that the world will have
its way and believers will wonder what is coming of this world? Death is what is coming of this world! Sin results in death, pure and simple. Death is a real thing. Is there anyone here today who is not going
to die? No matter how, when and where it
happens, earthly death is not pretty.
Jesus
tells us that today is like the pains of childbirth. I have yet to hear a mother say that those
pains are pretty in any way, shape or form.
I do know that every mother delights in the results of those pains. No matter how exhausted, how weak or still
strong, the mother delights in seeing, hearing, and holding that baby as soon
as she can. There is a new life
here. There is a new beginning
here. There is nothing but the future
with this child here.
In
Revelation, John has just described final judgment in the end of chapter
20. “Then
death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. If anyone’s name was not found written in the
book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire,” [20:14-15]. The second death, not earthly death as we
know it, but eternal death is not a pretty picture at all.
The
promise of the Gospel begins right away in this passage. The Gospel is nothing but “Good News.” This Gospel promise is what keeps you, me,
and all believers going day in and day out in all of the good and lousy things
of this world and of this life. Think
first of the Garden of Eden. All in that
place and everything that Adam and Eve had to do was good, until sin. This old earth, that had at first been the
most beautiful, pure and holy creation, was now a broken down old dump. The window sashes rot out, the plumbing
breaks down, and isn’t that death? “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for
the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer
any sea.” God’s plan is to make
everything new and that lake of fire, Hell, will be eternally separated. That includes the Hells we live through while
in this life as well as the eternal Hell that Satan and all of his followers
and all unbelievers will be relegated to for eternity. Both today’s Hells and eternal Hell will be
separated from the new heaven and new earth
That is the joy that awaits each believer and all believers together
when eternity happens.
The
Holy City, God’s City, the new Jerusalem, is the
prepared as a bride. You see, this new
city, this new Jerusalem is not a city as you and I know Des Plaines, but is
us, all believers. We cannot make
ourselves beautiful in God’s sight, but he does that for us, beautiful as a
bride for the husband who is Christ. You
see, the church is the bride of Christ.
The church is the body of all believers in eternity. As a bride looks forward to how splendid all
will be on her wedding day, that is what we have to look forward to, the
perfect day when Jesus comes to take make us new in his new eternity to be with
him. We do not have to worry about the
flowers, the clothing, the decorations, the meal, the limousines, the
photographers, the arrangements for guests.
God takes care of it all. Read
Isaiah 24 about the great feast he prepares for that day. When someone wishes that a joyous day will
never end, that is the day that will never end.
God
will now live with us, and we with him.
Sin and evil separate us from him here on earth. There will be nothing to separate us from him
in heaven. God comforts you today with
this promise. He comforts you in that
day as he wipes every tear
from your eye. Death, mourning, grief
and pain will be gone for that order is taken away.
The
two houses on Algonquin are like the earth at the time of the flood. Eventually they will break down again just as
Noah’s family and descendants could not stop sin by themselves. What Jesus is now preparing for us and what we
look forward to is our hope, our joy, our eternal comfort when this life and
world are gone. Just as Lot and his
family were instructed to not look back at the sinful past, we too are told
that here today. Just as the Psalmist
prays that God not remember the sins of youth but to remember according to his
unfailing love, he shows that unfailing love in the eternity for you today.
You
are washed in the waters of baptism, in the blood of the lamb, and made pure
again in that miracle. You receive in
bread and wine the very body and blood that won this victory over sin death and
Hell for you. You hear the Word of God
that tells you the reality of life today, and the great hope and joy of life
eternal with him.
That
is why today and always we can confidently proclaim,
“Alleluia! Christ is risen.!”
“He
is risen indeed! Alleluia!”
Because we will be risen too. Amen.