Sunday, May 26, 2019 - 9 AM

Shall We Gather – Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5 Bascomb UMC / May 26, 2019 / 9AM & 11AM Focus: The things that are absent in the full presence of God at the end of time. Function: To encourage believers to prepare now to enter God’s full kingdom by releasing anything that hinders us reaching God’s full kingdom. 5 Purpose Outcomes of the Church: Worship, Fellowship, Discipleship, Evangelism, Service Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5 - New Jerusalem 10 He took me in a Spirit-inspired trance to a great, high mountain, and he showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. 22 I didn’t see a temple in the city, because its temple is the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb. 23 The city doesn’t need the sun or the moon to shine on it, because God’s glory is its light, and its lamp is the Lamb. 24 The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it. 25 Its gates will never be shut by day, and there will be no night there. 26 They will bring the glory and honor of the nations into it. 27 Nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is vile and deceitful, but only those who are registered in the Lamb’s scroll of life. Chapter 22 1 Then the angel showed me the river of life-giving water, shining like crystal, flowing from the throne of God and the Lamb 2 through the middle of the city’s main street. On each side of the river is the tree of life, which produces twelve crops of fruit, bearing its fruit each month. The tree’s leaves are for the healing of the nations. 3 There will no longer be any curse. The throne of God and the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. 5 Night will be no more. They won’t need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will shine on them, and they will rule forever and always. A Time for Children: The Tree that made it! I have here a special candle holder kept in the Jewish temple called “The Tree of Life.” It has seven candles for each day of the week, and it represents one of the two special trees in the Garden of Eden – can anybody tell me what those two trees were called? (take answers). Eden was full of good trees, but the two special trees were: The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and The Tree of Life. Adam & Eve tasted the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil – we call THAT the day we disobeyed God and bad things came into God’s good creation. Then God sent us OUT - East of Eden – out of the garden so we could NOT eat from the Tree of Life. So, the Jewish temple had this imitation of the Tree of Life in hopes that God would one day give it back to us! In the Bible reading today we see the New Jerusalem come down out of heaven and SURPRISE, SURPRISE, there is that Tree of Life – Yayyyyy. But what is not there? The other tree – if we go into the New Jerusalem, we have to leave knowledge of good and evil behind and just trust God that Jesus makes all things good again. Can you do that - just trust Jesus to make all things good? SURE, we can! Let’s pray…… OK, parents – can you identify persons or places IF I describe them by what is absent? By what is NOT there. Try it! #1 – (easy) a place that has not a drop of water in it – (desert) – #2 – (easy) a person that does not eat meat (vegetarian) actually look, it’s more complicated: Vegetarians may eat eggs & dairy…….still a Meatatarian is just called Sonny. OK, next #3 – (harder) a place with NO sky overhead and NO natural light (cave) and #4 – (hard) a person with the lowest possible amount of melanin (albino). One more - #5 - a place with “no temple, no night, no sun, no moon, nothing unclean, no curses and no vile people” – now you may say HEAVEN, but John is describing the New Jerusalem that actually comes down from heaven to earth! This is not a new concept to Jewish faith. John grew up with this idea already present in his religious tradition. Most religious Jews believe the rebuilding of the temple will occur by divine hands and in a miraculous fashion. John’s details of the “descent” of the Holy City to earth is the understanding that it is established by God rather than by human effort. Then we see (for the first time) the face of God (Moses actually only got to see God’s backside), and there is the tree of life! There are a lot of other details: golden streets and pearly gates (that never close – by the way) all part of John’s Old Testament understanding. My point with the game as we began today, is that John describes the Holy City by telling us what is not in it. After the first heaven and the first earth have passed away, he says, “the sea [is] no more.” The sea (they had no idea of something as massive as an ocean) is a powerful symbol for chaos (the thing God’s Spirit must speak over at the beginning of all creation – a kind-of “anti-creation”). And the sea also represents what separates humans from one another. So, part of the beauty of this new Jerusalem is that there are no stormy seas to separate people from one another, just a river of life. Running water (like rivers) were considered living water. And the main point is: here God and human beings live in harmonious relationship with each another. John’s revelation to us is the inclusion of all types of people described as nations other than Israel. In John’s vision, the new Jerusalem is the fulfillment of all human dreams for the community and security of life in an ideal city and it includes the best of the garden of Eden, just inside this city – four rivers become the ONE river of life giving water and ONE great tree – the tree of life. These last Sunday’s of the Easter season give us this passage to provide strength and hope to anyone in desperate times. And this is NOT window dressing as we pass by and move on down the street. John invites us to sit down and take it in. We have a promise that God will bring us to a place where there is no more pain and suffering, where we can lay down the burdens like bags full of rocks, where we are released from the cares that bind us like graveclothes. Your ability to stand tomorrow may depended on your trust in this vision. That way, when we must stand up again and face life on this side of the river, we can move forward in the hope that something new and wonderful lies ahead - the new Jerusalem—the place where the God we love and worship is at the very center, so keep walking until you and I arrive at that city. God has made a home among us. I said in the sermon teaser that after a service one Sunday, a student spoke honest words when I talked about the worship that is always going on in heaven. She asked me, “Is that what we think the end is like?” “That’s all we can understand about it at this point,” I said. The imagined that for a minute and said, “I don’t know if I want that.” That hits the nail right on the head! Do we want that? Shall we gather? Really? I believe that we are transformed into God’s people by the work of the Holy Spirit (again, God’s doing and our cooperation). That work happens here, it must happen now. That student (and the rest of us) must be willing to choose transformation. Let me remind you again what is NOT there: “Nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is vile and deceitful” Revelation 21:27 (CEB). I’m reminded of a movie where our heroes have to escape a tomb – the challenge is, it’s full of treasure and they struggle to leave the treasure behind. Video Clip: “Goodbye Beni” from The Mummy Goodbye Beni! You ran out of time. And they were all tempted to take something with them. What do you hold onto? My student ended up with a powerful love for meth and it almost killed her. I said last week if you have hatred, prejudice, or any love greater than your love of God and God’s kingdom, you may choose NOT to “Gather by the River” – it just cost you too much of what you love on this shore to cross over! I pray that we allow God to replace our hearts of stone with hearts that love God only. The New Jerusalem is not really a place God is at the center of new creation – our future is simply where God is – I just want to be where God is, I just want to follow Jesus – come – Shall We Gather? I say yes….let us pray. (Shall We Gather At the River/11AM) (9AM) O let all who thirst, let them come to the water. And let all who have nothing, let them come to the Lord. And let all who seek, let them come to the water. Why should you spend your life except for the Lord? And let all who toil, let them come to the water. And let all who are weary, let them come to the Lord. All who labor without rest, how can your soul be its best - except for the Lord? Let the ones who are laden, let them come to the Lord. Bring the children without might - ease the load, make it light. Let them come to the water and come to the Lord I will run to you, I will run to you, I will run to my Lord. I will run to you, I will run to you, I will run to my Lord.