Sermon Tone Analysis
Overall tone of the sermon
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Introduction
Good morning.
You know an all time favorite game was hide-and-seek.
It’s interesting to see how kids still play that same game today.
My favorite part of the game was the count down.
When you got to “10” then said ready or not … here I come.
Thinking back it was, once you said ready or not … here I come, you could always tell the ones in the group who know what they were doing early in the count down.
Then there were the ones who always took it right up the edge.
And even when the words were said “ready or not … here I come” there were always ones who were still trying to hide and scramble.
When you came out to the shoot, the ones who were still trying to hide were low hanging fruit and the easiest to get out.
Kids love the excitement of these games.
Another fun one is star gazing, especially when you are far enough away from city lights.
It’s awesome how the night sky light up in the early morning hours.
All this talk about looking into the sky gets me thinking what Jesus’ second coming will be like.
Whether its during the day or at night, could you imagine what it would be like to see heaven open and the king of kings making is way back for those who are on this rock.
This will be a world event unlike no other.
Every news stream could be blowing up from news to social media trying to cover every detail of the event.
Let me ask you this morning, if Jesus were to make His return right now - are you ready to meet the King?
Perhaps yes.
Perhaps no.
Do you think you would be one of the ones in scramble when you learn Jesus is right on your door step.
Some will realize, that crazy pastor or that young pup or that small group teacher, who kept telling me to turn to Jesus while he can still be found, will know what we meant.
This morning we’re going to turn our attention to some of Jesus’ words John records in Revelation.
Turn with me into your Bibles to Revelation chapter 22.
We will be reading from verses 12 through 17.
Pastoral Prayer
I can’t highlight this here, perhaps your Bibles might.
These first two verses are the words of Jesus Christ.
These are what we would consider the red-letters of Christ.
You have to love how Jesus starts here with “behold.”
In this context, the word behold is a verb.
It’s a call for action.
It’s trying to get out attention to see or observe.
This is an alert to us.
It’s like that sound of the emergency broadcast system, when an important message is about to hit the air waves.
This is alerting us about he coming of the Lord.
It’s like saying, “look at that blinking light on your phone trying to get your attention because some has sent you a message.”
Jesus is sending us a blinking to get our attention.
But for what?
He is trying to get our attention to announce he is coming soon.
Some might question what is the time frame of soon?
If you’re talking soon as meaning sometime within the next hundred years - like everyone else is talking.
Or is soon within the thousand years or so.
Soon means eminent, now!
Some may say now?
Ok - I’ve waited, so where’s Jesus.
Jesus is infinite.
What we know as time does not apply to Jesus.
What we have come to know as days and years is proof of God grace allowing sinners to become justified through the centuries.
Jesus taught this in:
Although Jesus’ return in eminent, Jesus mentions he is bringing his recompense to repay each one for what he has done.
Recompense is a strong word and should not be easily dismissed.
Jesus will deal with each person for what he/she has done.
Paul teaches this in:
This is where recompense takes on two flavors.
For the believer, the reward will be spiritual blessedness based on their faithfulness in serving Christ in this life.
The non-believer will receive punishing judgement, eternally separated from God.
This should be sobering and a major wake up call.
I’ve had people tell me, pastor - people have been talking about Jesus’ return as long as the scriptures are old.
Here’s the thing.
We, people, have invented the calendar.
The calendar helps us keep track of many important types of anniversaries.
The problem of our calendar lies at it’s root.
That root is what we call time.
Mankind developed and defined the unit measure of time.
We are comparing apples and oranges.
Mankind uses the calendar to chart and predict future events.
Jesus, on the other hand, does not use the what we have come to know as time.
Jesus is infinite.
But! Jesus gives something we can comprehend in verse 13.
Jesus applies 3 titles where he says, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”
Jesus is once again using a context which the readers of the time would be able to grasp.
The words Alpha and Omega point to letters of the Greek alphabet.
Alpha is the first letter, and Omega is the last letter.
Jesus is using this illustration to show He is both the beginning and source of all things.
John recognizes this in the next verse:
This verse is considered the seventh and last beatitude of the book of Revelation.
Technically it means “blessedness.”
In this context “blessed” means to have divine favor.
We can experience the blessedness of God by living a life in close proximity to God, where we can experience forgiveness, the love and favor of God.
To be in the favor of God, our sins must first be washed by the blood of Jesus Christ, shed at Calvary.
In a few moments we are going to have the Lord’s supper as a family.
When Jesus chose to go to the cross for you and for me, He went there out of love for all of humanity, for every human being.
I want you to understand, intimidate death would have been to easy.
Jesus had to suffer and shed blood.
The sin payment was heavy and required more than just a quick easy death.
There is nothing we could every do enough of to satisfy the payment required for sin.
Jesus was the only one who could make the payment.
When we turn from sin and place our faith in Jesus Christ for salvation from the hell fire, we are washed by the blood of Christ.
We are then justified before God.
We now have the favor of God.
And, by having this favor - John tells us in the last half of verse 14 what the benefit will be.
By the grace of God, believers will be able to enter city, have access to the tree of life, and be in the presence of God himself.
This is going to be awesome!
But!
It will not be a joyous time for everyone.
Verse 15 tell us, not everyone will be invited.
Verse 15 brings contrast to the surface.
This verse describes those who will not have access to enter.
Here’s the beauty of the good news of the gospel.
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