God’s Final Words

Revelation  •  Sermon  •  Submitted   •  Presented
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Introduction
Tonight we will finish the book of Revelation. This is number 34 in this series! And it has gone by much quicker than I expected.
The focus of the last half of the last chapter will be on God’s final words to us. This last section is an address to the bond servants which includes a promise of blessing, a promise of coming, and an exhortation to stay faithful.
Rev 22:6
1) The Final Witness
Revelation 22:6–9 NASB95
And he said to me, “These words are faithful and true”; and the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, sent His angel to show to His bond-servants the things which must soon take place. “And behold, I am coming quickly. Blessed is he who heeds the words of the prophecy of this book.” I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I heard and saw, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who showed me these things. But he said to me, “Do not do that. I am a fellow servant of yours and of your brethren the prophets and of those who heed the words of this book. Worship God.”
“these words are faithful and true”
That means they are reliable. What this book says and teaches is worthy of our trust and is worthy of our faith. It is the only tangible thing we have on earth that is 100% trustworthy
One major objection to putting our trust in God’s Word: It was written by men
I’ve heard this argument, and I’m sure you have heard this before. People say I can’t believe the Bible Becuse it has been written by men.
But what about all the other things that we trust that are written by men? Ever took a biology class and read about human anatomy? The cellular structure? The function of the different organs who all work together to keep us alive so perfectly? And how there are over 30 trillion cells in the human body. When people read that do you think they say, “I don’t believe that! That’s a lie that people made up”. No they say wow that’s amazing! How in the world is that even possible. But every biology book was written by a man.
“The God of the spirits of the prophets, sent His angel to show to His bond servants the things which must soon take place”
See God’s Word is different from every other thing written because it was God that dictated what was written.
All the prophets who wrote Scripture were only mouthpieces of God. They wrote and recorded everything exactly the way God wanted them to, left nothing out, and included everything He wanted. The Bible is trustworthy because it is God’s Word.
“Blessed is he who needs the words of this prophecy”
“I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things”
Who is the final witness of what the angel has said? The apostle John Himself. He has signed his name to everything that has been written in this book, to place his name behind the message he has heard and seen.
The signing of a letter makes it authentic. Letters written anonymously do not carry the weight of one that has a name behind it, because that name says for a person, and the character of that person can either be trusted or not trusted.
John was imprisoned for his testimony, dipped in hot oil in an attempt to kill him because of his witness to Christ, gave his entire life to testify of what he has seen, and his final testimony we have here in our hands, what God has showed him
2) The Final Reward
Revelation 22:10–13 NASB95
And he said to me, “Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is near. “Let the one who does wrong, still do wrong; and the one who is filthy, still be filthy; and let the one who is righteous, still practice righteousness; and the one who is holy, still keep himself holy.” “Behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to render to every man according to what he has done. “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”
“Do not seal up the words of this prophecy, For the time is near”
In the opening chapters of this book, we read this exact statement. If we are not careful, we will stumble over this because it has been nearly 2,000 years since this book was written and still no second coming.
QUESTION: Can someone explain to me what that means, “the time is near”
One of the things the Bible never says to us is we’ve got plenty of time, though we tell that to ourselves quite often. We put things off that need to be done because we are always banking on tomorrow.
This reminds us that Jesus could return at any moment, at any time everything we know could very well come to end. That is the conclusion of this book: time is limited. Time is running out. Opportunities are becoming fewer and fewer.
“Let the one who does wrong, still do wrong; and the one who is filthy, still be filthy; and let the one who is righteous, still practice righteousness; and the one who is holy, still keep himself holy”
It’s an odd thing to read in the Bible that the sinner should just keep on sinning.
BUT, The point of these verses is to say that the coming of Jesus will be do swift that there will be no time to change. So to the one who decides to continue doing wrong will be found by Jesus doing wrong, and the who decides to still do what is right will be found by Jesus doing right.
There will be no last minute repentance.
“Behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with me, to render every man according to what he has done”
The word reward means “wage”
It is something that is due us for what we have done.
The righteous will be rewarded with good things
The wrong will be rewarded with judgement.
But everyone receives their wages according to their deeds
John 5:29 “and will come forth; those who did the good deeds to a resurrection of life, those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment.”
Does that mean that if I sin that I will go to hell? No, it means one who sins habitually or has a pattern of sin is evident that they never had salvation to begin with
3) The Final Beatitude
Revelation 22:14–16 NASB95
Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter by the gates into the city. Outside are the dogs and the sorcerers and the immoral persons and the murderers and the idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices lying. “I, Jesus, have sent My angel to testify to you these things for the churches. I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.”
“Blessed are those who wash their robes”
How does someone wash their robes? It’s a symbolic way of saying to clean oneself up. To get the sin and filth out of our lives and begin living clean and righteous.
Why would we do that? So that we may eat from the tree of life. The tree of life is a symbol of eternal life, and one that exists in the garden of Eden and will also be in the new Eden.
The good news here is that those who take the prior warning seriously will turn from their sin and follow Jesus and have eternal life.
What are beatitudes? They describe the state in which one lives. They always begin with “blessed are” and then describe a characteristic of believers. They are not statements that tell us how to earn blessings.
These people live in a state of “blessedness” because they “washed their robes”. Think about how simple this verse says it is for someon to live in a constant state of blessedness! Simply by getting the filth out of their life.
The contrast between inside and outside the city
This should be understood as the heavenly city in a symbolic sense. The unrighteousness will spend eternity in hell. The righteous will spend eternity in heaven. The city gates represent the separation between the two.
“practices lying”
One group who will not inherit eternal life are those who practice lying. We rarely think that lying is a sin that will condemn someone becuase everyone has lied and probably does at least occasionally. But this is the practice of lying. Something one does on a regular basis for whatever reason. And this is true for every sin. Every one of us will sin. It’s inevitable. But no one who is part of the kingdom of God will practice sin. This is why sin must be dealt with seriously and swiftly!
People are not sinners because they sin, people sin because they are sinners. The only way to change who a person is, is by receiving a new heart from God.
4) The Final Invitation
Revelation 22:17–21 NASB95
The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who wishes take the water of life without cost. I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues which are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city, which are written in this book. He who testifies to these things says, “Yes, I am coming quickly.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.
The invitation to the reader: “Come, come, come”
The Spirit says come ~ Holy Spirit
The bride says come ~ the church
“Let The one who hears say, ‘come’”~ this is those who hear (with their hearts) accept the invitation and then repeat that invitation to others
What a great example of the greatness of following Christ. Unbelievers are not inviting people to come and follow Jesus. They are not telling others their testimony. But as soon as an unbeliever begins to follow Jesus, he immediately becomes a compelled to tell others.
The one who is thirsty: this is the one who wants to know God, to follow God, to have an intimate relationship with the living God is invited to come and drink.
God is diligent in inviting people to come to Jesus. The church to be like God must alwasy be invitational. Inviting, calling, compelling others that Jesus is the answer, Jesus is the hope, only in Jesus do we have salvation
5) The Final Warning
Revelation 22:18–21 NASB95
I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues which are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city, which are written in this book. He who testifies to these things says, “Yes, I am coming quickly.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.
I knew a guy one time that quotes these verses like they were the very gospel themselves. This is a very stern warning to not add to these words or take any words away from this book. In other words, the whole message is the true message, no less or no more.
Now who is this referring to? “Those who HEAR the words of the prophecy of this book”
He is not talking to the copyist though they are included
He is talking to the hearers in the churches who will hear this letter read aloud in the service and possibly be tempted to distort its message to others
It’s a stern reminder to us that the entire Word of God is the Word of God. And to the preachers they must preach all the Bible regardless of how much it offends or goes against peoples desires. To us as individuals, we are to heed the entire message of the Bible and not cherry pick what we want.
What will happen if we willfully distort it?
If we add to it: God will add to us the plagues mentioned in this book
If we take away from it: God will take away our part from the tree of life
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