Come, Lord Jesus – Revelation 22:6–21 (June 7, 2026)

It's promotion Sunday, so incoming kindergarten through third grade students can go ahead and head out to their class now.

The rest of us, if you would, go ahead and open up your Bibles to the very last page.

Not the weights and measurements, not the maps, not the indices, dictionary, the last page of the actual scripture.

We are finishing up this morning the last book of the Bible, the book of Revelation.

It's an incredible thing to think about having walked through this over the last four or five months, actually five now into six months.

I hope that it has been helpful for you.

I know the Lord has used it in my own heart and soul, and I pray that's true for us as a church as well.

We're going to be looking at Revelation 22, verses 6 through the end of the chapter, the last 16 verses of the Bible.

Revelation 22:6

If you don't have a Bible with you, there should be one under a chair around you.

We'd invite you to grab that and use that this morning.

But you can also find the passage in your bulletin as well.

You can follow around there, take some notes if that would be helpful.

But as we come to the end of Revelation, there's a clear message here for God's people, in fact, for all people.

And it's actually repeated three times in just these 16 verses, and all by Jesus himself.

Jesus says repeatedly in this passage, I am coming soon.

This is a promise, church.

And this is a promise that the whole of Revelation hinges on.

You know, one of my favorite honeydew list items, things that my wife will give me to do every once in a while, usually on my day off, is hanging pictures on the wall.

Now, the reason for that is not because I enjoy the precision of it.

I am a little bit of a perfectionist, and so is my wife, so they do need to be straight and in the right places and things like that, which can be hard.

I like the simplicity of it.

Uh if you don't know me, you may not know this about me, but if you do, you do, um, is be that I am not particularly handy.

Like I don't have a ton of expertise in the area of doing things around the house.

I tell people often, I've really done two things in life.

I read books and I've played sports.

Problem is I don't play sports very often, at least real sports.

So really now I just read books.

Um and so the reason I like hanging things on the wall is because it's one nail, or maybe if you get fancy, a hook.

And I can do that.

Like I can nail a nail in the wall or put a hook in the wall.

But you know what you do have to make sure about that nail or hook is it has to be sturdy.

Like it has to be solid, it has to hold.

In fact, if it doesn't hold, everything else is coming down.

That's what the return of Jesus is.

Friends, we need to understand this: that the promise of Christ is the nail or the hook that the entirety of Revelation hangs on.

I just want you to think about that for a moment.

All that we've looked at, the judgment of sin and Satan, the end of death, the defeat of death, the hope of heaven, the resurrection of this world, eternity with God, all hangs on this promise of Jesus.

I am coming soon.

Now, if that's the case, then I would think that it's pretty important that we believe this promise.

That's the point of this last section here.

That our hope and our faithfulness in Christ hangs on the reality of his return.

But I do think we have to ask this question then.

Do we believe Jesus is coming soon?

And I don't just simply mean like nod our heads at it, just sort of like, yeah, of course.

I mean actually believe it.

I mean, are our hearts captivated by the reality that Jesus is coming soon?

Think about how you might act if you knew family was coming in town.

Or maybe you had a really good friend or family friends or an old friend who's coming to visit, or maybe even more so, especially someone famous.

Someone you admired so much.

You knew they had announced that they were coming soon to your home.

Imagine that would change some things for you.

If you were in the Strickland house, that would mean that there were certain places that the Strickland boys could no longer sit.

There'd be certain rooms that the Strickland boys were not allowed to enter in into anymore, and probably it means that the Strickland boys might not eat indoors anymore.

There'd be certain preparations in our home that would have to happen in order for these people to come.

So why doesn't Jesus' announcement of his return really change that much for us?

Why don't we live differently?

Why aren't we preparing for Jesus to come soon?

Well, I think deep down, it's because we don't really believe it.

I think most of us have ignored Peter's warning.

Here's what Peter, the apostle Peter, tells us in 2 Peter chapter 3.

2 Peter 3 · chapter mention

He says, Above all, be aware of this.

Above all, be aware of this.

Scoffers will come in the last days scoffing and following their own evil desires.

What will they say?

Where is his coming?

Where is Jesus' coming that he promised?

And they'll say, Ever since our ancestors fell asleep, all our ancestors and fellow people before us, they've died.

All things continue as they have been since the beginning of creation.

You know, we might not want to admit it, but I think in some ways we live like these scoffers.

We doubt that Jesus is coming soon.

We live like all things continue since they have, since the beginning of creation.

Life goes on.

Things are normal.

We live like this world is more real than Christ.

That's why Revelation was written.

That's what we've been looking at for the past four or five months, is that Revelation wants to pull back the curtain for us and show us what is really true, what is most real in this life.

It wants to loosen our grip on the world.

And it wants to loosen the world's grip on us.

And it wants to help us hold fast to Jesus.

Revelation wants us to fix our eyes on heaven.

It wants us to live as citizens of the true, eternal, lasting city that is to come.

It wants us to serve King Jesus.

It wants us to make the most of this world by living for the next.

And all of those things.

And this is why this last passage is so essential.

That all of those things mean that we need to take hold of this promise from Jesus.

That He is coming soon.

Here's our main idea this morning.

The promise of Christ's return fuels our present faithfulness.

If we are going to be faithful, we need to remember and know that our uh Savior, King, is returning.

That's what we're going to look at this morning.

Let's look at the passage though, verses 6 through 21.

Here's what it says.

Then he said to me, this is an angel to uh John, these words are faithful and true.

The Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent his angel to show his servants what must soon take place.

And then Jesus, look, I am coming soon.

Blessed is the one who keeps 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 them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who had shown them to me.

But he said to me, Don't do that.

I'm a fellow servant with you, your brothers, the prophets, and those who keep the words of this book.

No, worship God.

Then he said to me, Don't seal up the words of this prophecy of this book, because the time is near.

Let the unrighteous go on in unrighteousness, let the filthy still be filthy, but let the righteous go on in righteousness and the holy still be holy.

Look, I am coming soon, and my reward is with me to repay each person according to his work.

I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.

Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they may have the right to the tree of life and may enter the city by the gates.

Outside are the dogs, the sorcerers, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

I, Jesus, have sent my angel to attest these things to you for the churches.

I am the root and descendant of David, the bright morning star.

Both the spirit and the bride say, Come, let anyone who hears say, Come, let the one who is thirsty come, let the one who desires to take the water of life free, or let the one who desires take the water of life freely.

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 that are written in this book.

And if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share of the tree of life and the holy city, which are written about in this book.

He who testifies about these things says, Yes, I am coming soon.

Amen.

Come, Lord Jesus.

And the grace of the Lord Jesus be with everyone.

Amen.

Church, we're gonna look at five ways that Christ's return fuels our present faithfulness.

We're gonna end this passage five different ways in which Christ's returns fuels our present faithfulness.

The first one is it fuels our keeping of God's word.

His return actually fuels our keeping of God's word.

Look at verse 7.

It's the first announcement that he is coming soon.

And notice what immediately follows this announcement.

Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book.

Now, you may not remember this because it's been a while ago, but this is exactly how Revelation started.

Way back in Revelation chapter 1, verse 3, here's what it said.

Revelation 1:3

Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy.

That's what we've done as a church these past five months.

Blessed are those who hear the words of this prophecy.

We've done that as well.

And keep what is written in it.

One since church, that's all that's left for us.

We have read it, we have heard it.

Now we need to keep it.

And why?

Because the time is near.

Keeping this word, keeping God's word, it's not an ancillary or sort of a side idea.

It is one of the premier themes of Revelation.

It's said at the very beginning and it is said at the very end.

It bookends the entire book.

We must keep God's word.

Now, why?

Because the time is near.

Because Christ is returning.

You might think of an office just prior to a boss arriving.

Or you might think of kids who know that their parents are coming home soon.

Jesus' sure and soon arrival should motivate us all the more to keep his word.

You know, this same idea is behind verse 10.

Look at it.

Then he said to me, the angel, don't seal up the words of the prophecy of this book, because the time is near.

Now you might think, well, that's a weird command.

Like, why would John ever think of sealing up the words of this prophecy of this book?

Well, because that's exactly what Daniel was told to do.

You know, if you were ever to wonder what's a book that's similar to Revelation in the Bible, it is Daniel.

Daniel has so much apocalyptic literature and prophecies.

And in Daniel chapter 12, at the end of Daniel, he's actually told to seal this up because the end is not here.

Daniel 12 · chapter mention

What is being prophesied, what uh Daniel saw was yet to come, I think it's what Revelation now shows us.

But it's different for John.

John is not to seal up his word.

Why?

Because the end is near.

The end has come.

Christ is returning.

This is the point that we've seen and revelation again and again and again.

We are living in the last days.

And what I mean by that is not sort of the predictions that tell us that Jesus is going to come back this month and this year, or that any of the sort of craziness that we see in this area.

The point is that we have always been living in these end days.

That since Christ has come, till he returns, we are in the last era of God's people.

We are awaiting his return in the new heavens and the new earth.

That means revelation is not about some distant future way out there.

What revelation, what we've seen, is about now.

It's for us.

And I think this gets to one of the root issues in our Christian life.

I think this is honestly for many of us, this is one of the problems that we most struggle with.

We think that we can obey God later.

Maybe, especially if you're young in here, you think, oh, I can get serious about Jesus tomorrow.

Next year, down the road, when I get older.

JC Ryle, I think, is right when he says this tomorrow is the devil's day.

Now, before you take too much of that, here's what he means Satan cares not how spiritual your intentions may be or how holy your resolutions, if only they are fixed for tomorrow.

Satan is very happy for you to have all sorts of inclinations as long as you are content to move them down the road.

To think that they are later, tomorrow, delayed.

That's why it's so important that we understand these promise of Jesus.

I am coming soon.

The time is near.

It's one sense almost seems saying, now is the time.

I think sometimes we are lackadaisical in keeping God's word because we are lackadaisical about the return of Christ.

We're not eager to keep his word because we don't really think he's coming.

At least not soon.

You know, his soon return is also behind verses 18 and 19.

You can look at those verses.

I'm not gonna read them again, but they talk about adding or subtracting from these words.

And the point is, if Jesus is coming soon, we don't have time for false prophets who are claiming new revelations.

We don't have time for people who are trying to add to the scripture.

You need something more than what you have in scripture.

We don't have time for that.

Jesus is coming.

And we also don't have people for false time for false teachers who are trying to undermine or take away from what God's word teaches.

Now, I do think that this uh saying and this command is primarily for the book of Revelation, but like the rest of the history of the church, I also think it's interesting that this command is given in a book that talks about last things.

In a book that was written by the last apostle at the very end of his life.

This is, in one sense, the end of the Bible.

And we need nothing more than scripture because the next thing that is going to happen is Jesus is going to return.

That's all we're waiting for.

And we have everything that we need in Scripture to be faithful until he returns.

And the point is that we need to keep it.

We need to keep the word.

But maybe you wonder, what does it mean to keep the word?

And I think pretty simply we could say, well, it means to obey it or it means to guard it.

But let me give you a little bit of a picture.

Let's make this a little bit more practical.

Think about the things that you keep over time.

What are things that you have that you've had for a really, really long time?

Maybe it's a letter, maybe it's a picture, maybe it's certain uh mementos or really special gifts that you've given.

You keep the things that are most important, most meaningful.

Well, think about the things that you keep on you throughout the day.

If I was to ask you, what are you even carrying right now?

Most of us have our wallet, we maybe have some keys, we have a phone, some of us have a really, really big water bottle.

Uh, there's all sorts of things that we keep with us throughout the day.

We keep those things which are most useful to us.

See, we keep the things that are most meaningful and are most needed.

The things we don't want to lose and those that we can't afford to lose.

So think about that.

To keep God's word, then, is to cherish it and to carry it.

It's to know it and to live by it.

In some ways, it is like the Psalm says, it is to store it in our hearts, that it is with us and guides us.

Love what the Puritan pastor John Flavil said.

He said, it is to study the word more and the concerns and interests of this world less.

What does it look like practically in this world?

It looks like to study the word more and the concerns and the interests of this world less.

And let me encourage you with this.

Don't forget the promise of verse 7.

Look at it again.

Blessed, happy, joyful, flourishing is the one who keeps the word.

Flavil continues by saying, keep the word and the word will keep you.

Church, if we want to be faithful, keep the word, and the word will keep us.

Christ is coming soon.

So it is necessit, it is essential that we keep the word.

See, the promise of Christ's return fuels our present faithfulness.

Second way that we see that is it fuels our worship of God.

It fuels our worship of God.

Look at verses eight and nine.

It says, I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things.

When I heard and saw them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who had shown them to me.

But he said to me, Don't do that.

I'm a fellow servant with you, your brothers, the prophets, and those who keep the words of this book.

That's an incredible thing to consider.

We are fellow servants with the angels, those who are in Christ.

And what does he say?

Worship God.

Do you know this is not the first time that this has happened to John?

Do you remember in Revelation 19, 10?

You can flip back and see there, but you can also, trust me, look back later.

John does the exact same thing.

He falls down and worships at the feet of an angel after seeing incredible things.

Now, why are these things recorded?

Well, certainly because they happened, but also I think they're recorded because they warn us of one of our great dangers.

We as people, humanity, we are easily tempted to worship lesser things.

To bow down to that which is lesser.

Isn't that what Revelation has been warning us against again and again?

Don't worship this world.

Don't live and put our lives in its pleasures, its power, its beauty, its leaders, its empire, its promises.

Don't worship these things.

This is idolatry.

And what Revelation is so helpful for us is to see that this can be so subtle.

It really can be as simple as wanting something more than God.

That's all idolatry is.

That's what it looks like to worship the world and not God.

See, we don't normally run from God, we drift from Him.

And here's what I think this looks like so often.

What does it look like to worship the world and not to worship God?

Well, I think it happens when the world, its concerns, and its treasures dominate our minds and hearts.

I want you to just be honest with yourself for a minute.

Think about these questions.

What really do you most want?

More of God or more of this world?

What do you most often pray for God to do?

Change your circumstances or your character?

What really aims?

What are the aims?

What are the goals?

What are your hopes most often the Occupy your heart.

Are they about your kingdom or about God's kingdom?

See, I think many of us are almost spiritually sleepwalking.

We are drifting through our hours, our days, our week, and we are asleep to the concerns and promises and wonders of God.

I almost think to revert back to a classic 80s movie, it's almost like honey, I shrunk the kids.

If you're familiar with that movie, they get shrunk and the world is massive.

It's all encompassing.

I think that's how many of us live.

We've been deceived into thinking that this world is all there is.

You know, we've done the same thing with people too.

It's pretty rare that the title of a book is worth the price of a book.

Now let me tell you, this book is fantastic, but its title may even be better.

Ed Welch wrote a book called When People Are Big and God is Small.

Friends, that's so often what worldly worship looks like in our lives.

We care so much about what other people think about or think about us.

And we, in contrast, often care very little about what God thinks.

I mean, I think we are desperate to please people and so often half-hearted and pleasing God.

We would be humiliated for someone to see us in sin or bring up our sin or confront our sin or see us do something wrong, and yet we seem pretty comfortable with the fact that God sees everything we do in private.

See, church, I think, we think that what matters most is how we appear, that we look good, appear good, appear godly, and not as much on whether we actually are.

I think the danger that we see in revelation again and again is that we would give up worshiping God if we could get the worship of the world.

And I think that is deep in our hearts.

That's why there have been so many scenes of heavenly worship and revelation.

If you wondered why it keeps on showing us what heaven is and what the worship of heaven looks like, because it gives us these glorious descriptions again and again of the indescribable worth and glory of God.

Because the greatest danger to our faithfulness is a worship problem.

It's that we'd worship creation and not the creator.

That's fundamentally what all sin is: worshiping something other than God.

This is why Jesus' sure and soon return is so important.

Because it reminds us that this world and everything in this world, all its glory, is passing away.

It's going to be judged.

It is not eternal, it is not lasting, it is not everything.

Jesus is.

Blessed are those who wash their robes.

That feels like something a mom might say to her like son as he leaves for college.

Like some of you might be a little bit tempted to make this a proof text for laundry.

Like, I don't think it's that.

That's not what's being talked about here.

No, this is an abbreviation from an earlier verse.

Revelation 7, 14 says this.

Then he told me, these are the ones coming out of the great tribulation.

Who is making it?

Who is conquering it?

Who is faithful through the hardship and suffering of this world?

They washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

It's those who washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

You know, see, through throughout Revelation, we get these pictures of God's people, and so often they are in these spotless, white garments.

And those white, spotless garments are pictures of righteousness.

The people of God are described as being righteous and pure.

But how are they made clean?

How are they made righteous?

By the blood of the Lamb.

Washing in the blood of the Lamb.

Now, if you're not a Christian and not familiar with the Bible, you're like, that doesn't seem any less confusing than what it was before.

Washing in the blood of the Lamb, what is that language?

Well, it helps to know that the Lamb is Jesus.

And that John the Baptist, even in the Gospel of John, tells us that Jesus is the Lamb who has come to take away the sin of the world.

A lamb is a picture of sacrifice.

And Jesus has come to take away that sin of the world.

How?

By his blood.

What does that mean?

It means by his death.

Very simply, it means that Jesus has come to die and raise again.

That what Christ has actually done is that he took our sin and its punishment upon himself and he raised to new life so that we might have new life, that we might be pure and righteous and clean before him.

Few passages picture it as beautifully as Isaiah 1, 18.

It's on the screen for you.

Though your sins are scarlet, they will be as white as snow.

We know something about snow in Indiana.

Though they are crimson red, they will be like wool.

You know, we've seen those laundry detergent commercials.

They always throw like white t-shirts out and then just throw all sorts of awfulness on those t-shirts, usually like deep, dark red stains.

Here's what scripture is telling us: it's telling us that our sin, our selfishness, our self-centeredness, our idolatry actually stains our heart.

It stains our mind, it stains our lives.

Verse 10, you can look at it.

It speaks of the unrighteous and the filthy.

Verse 15 speaks of the dogs, which are hypocrites, the sexually immoral, the idolatry, everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

It says more than that, too.

This is the reality of our sin.

Our sin, and we are all sinners, stains to a depth that we can never remove.

But Jesus can.

Friends, this is the wondrous good news of the gospel is no matter how great our sin, no matter how deep that stain, the grace and power of Christ is deeper still.

And not only can our sin be forgiven, but we can be made righteous.

In Christ, we receive his righteousness.

Know what that means.

Look at the end of uh the rest of verse 14.

What's the point?

What's the result?

So that they may have the right to the tree of life and may enter the city by the gates.

What is this tree of life and city and gates?

Well, if you were here with us last Sunday, those are all pictures of heaven.

So that we might know eternal life.

See, those who are in Christ have the right to and will enjoy all the wonders and blessings of heaven.

Why?

Because they've been washed in the gospel.

But friends, here's our problem.

See, our problem is that we so often want to clean up ourselves in worldly ways.

We go to other things to wash us.

We are so tempted to a worldly righteousness or a self-righteousness.

Because the truth of the matter, Christian or not, every single one of us feels the guilt of our sin.

There's not one of us who does not feel sort of caked or even the grass itchy on you.

We feel this sort of something is not right with us.

And we hate it.

And so what we want to do is we want to figure out a way to get rid of it or at least to dull it.

And so we try to wash ourselves in things that actually can't clean us.

Most often I think we turn to the praise of people.

One of the ways in which we make ourselves feel good or righteous is we uh want others to like us, approve of us, even applaud us.

If other people think we are great, maybe we are great and good and righteous.

Sometimes we turn to success and accomplishments.

If you're a student, you find your identity and doing well in school, getting all A's.

If you're an athlete, you find your identity on a field or a court.

If you're an adult, so often we think, oh man, I gotta get more promotions at work, I gotta crush it at work, or maybe it's just I've gotta get these things done today.

I gotta feel like I've done something, I've accomplished something.

Or sometimes we seek to wash ourselves in things like health.

Well, if I'm healthy, if I'm uh if I have energy and those sorts of things, then I'm I'm right, or we or beauty or money or possessions or even accomplished and respectable kids or families or marriages.

There's all sorts of things that we think well, if I have these things, then I'm right, I'm good, I'm respectable, I'm worthy.

They don't actually make us clean.

And I think most of us know it.

I think this is why so many of us spend our lives sort of swinging between two poles.

When we're crushing it, when we're having success, when things are going well, we're ecstatic.

Sometimes we're probably prideful.

We look down on other people who aren't crushing it as much as we do.

We feel great about ourselves when everything's going well.

But then when things go wrong, when we fail, when we don't live up to other people's standards, our own expectations, we're despaired.

We're devastated.

And we just swing between these two poles back and back.

See, friends, we can camouflage our sin.

We can cover it, but we cannot cleanse it.

Only Christ can wash away our sin and make us clean.

See, Christ's sure and soon return reminds us that there is a final judgment coming.

One day we will stand before a judge and it will not be us and it will not be this world.

It will be Jesus.

And he will judge justly in righteousness.

And all of our self-righteous endeavors, they will not stand on that day.

There is only one righteousness that has any that will at all stand through the judgment, and it's Christ's righteousness.

We must be washed in the gospel.

Friend, if you're not a Christian this morning, I need you to know this.

There is a judgment coming.

You will stand before God in your sin.

And I promise you will not be good enough.

But friends, your sin can be forgiven.

Everything you have ever done can be wiped clean.

You can actually stand pure and spotless and righteous on that day before God in Christ's righteousness.

Christians, that's what we need to do every day in one sense.

We need to keep on remembering, rehearsing, returning to the good news of Jesus.

We need to remember that we have our only hope is in what Jesus has done and who he is, not in who we are and what we've done.

That's our only hope for faithfulness.

Our present faithfulness is a gospel faithfulness.

We are reliant and dependent on Christ and His work as we await his return.

Fourth thing that we see that fuels, that the return of Christ fuels is our witness to Christ.

Look at what Jesus says in verse at the end of verse 16.

He says, I am the root and descendant of David, the bright morning star.

These are Old Testament promises that Jesus is claiming.

He's saying again, I am the promised one.

I am the one that the entire Old Testament says is going to come and make all things new.

And note the response in verse 17 of the Spirit and of the bride.

Remember, the bride is the church.

It's us.

Look at verse 17.

Both the spirit and the bride say, Come.

Let anyone who hears say, Come.

Let the one who is thirsty come.

Let the one who desires take the water of life freely.

Three, maybe even four invitations here.

And there is some disagreement as to what these invitations are.

Are they invitations for Christ to come, or are they invitations for to come to Christ?

Maybe a combination of both.

I think it is most helpful because the last one seems so clear to understand all three of these invitations as invitations to come to Christ.

To drink deeply of Christ.

And the call then for us is that we are actually calling one another.

This passage pictures God's people calling one another and the world to come to Christ.

Church, when sin tempts each other, one another, when suffering clouds our world, here's what we do: we encourage one another.

We say to one another, Christ is coming soon.

Brother, sister, turn to Jesus.

Drink of Jesus' presence, peace, comfort, strength, forgiveness, righteousness, joy.

We are to be encouraging one another.

We're actually gonna finish our entire time in Revelation by singing a song we introduced last week.

And I love this song because it's a song that we sing to one another.

And its chorus is this shout on, pray on.

We're gaining ground.

Glory, hallelujah.

The dead's alive and the lost is found.

Glory, hallelujah.

This is a song that we sing to one another, reminding one another.

Shout on, pray on.

We're gaining ground.

Keep going, be faithful, turn to Christ.

Because he's coming soon.

Friends, we say this often in our church that we want to be a church that values meaningful membership.

If you've been here any part of time, you know this.

Here's what we say in our value this.

Church membership isn't just having your name on a roll, it's a living and breathing community of relationships.

It's an eagerness to say, I am my brother's and sisters' keeper, and they are mine.

It's a commitment to intentionally serve and help others, to take responsibility for their well-being.

Church, this is why we gather in part.

I want us to get a vision for this.

When we come together on Sunday mornings, we are coming to drink deeply of Jesus, of the gospel, the wonders of the good news.

But you know why else we're coming?

We're coming to minister to one another.

We're coming to point each other to this wonderful fount and well of life.

I wonder if all of us thought when we woke up on Sunday morning and we came to gather with the church and we were thinking, who's a brother or sister in Christ that I know had a really tough week?

Who's a brother or sister in Christ that I know is being tempted and struggling?

How can I encourage them this morning?

What if our goal was just one person, one other brother and sister in Christ?

Every time we gather, we just want to point them to Jesus.

And I think that is happening, and I'm so encouraged by that.

And I want to see all the more of that, of what God might do through his people as we minister one another, and not just on Sundays.

Maybe we text, we call, take a walk, we uh show up and uh maybe grab some coffee or a meal.

We're encouraging one another as we walk this life together.

Keep on saying to each other, come drink, you who are thirsty.

And we don't just say it to one another, we say it to the world.

Church, there's going to be a day in which we cannot invite people, the world, to Jesus anymore.

This is a privilege that we have right now.

Until Jesus returns, we actually can invite the world to him.

We can drink deeply of Christ.

And in our neighborhoods and our workplaces and our families and our schools, we can say, hey, here is Jesus, the living bread, the bread of life and the living water, come eat, drink, know Jesus who has given me life.

I just want to ask you, I think it's helpful for us to consider.

Are we regularly inviting people to Jesus?

I think if we knew and believed that Jesus is coming soon, and that actually captivated our hearts and lives, I think we'd be more eager, more urgent to say, come to Jesus.

You who are weary.

This world is a desert filled with mirages.

And we know the one who is a well and a fountain of life.

Friends, I pray that we are inviting people to Christ again and again.

One of my favorite Lewis books is The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

Many of you have probably read it.

If you don't know that, Narnia is a world that is described as being always winter and never Christmas.

But in the first book, something happens.

There are these rumors that Aslan is returning.

Aslan is the great lion, he's the king.

They begin to hear his roars.

The landscape begins to melt.

The sun begins to come out, the warmth is coming, the people of Aslan are emboldened.

That's what Revelation is.

That's what Revelation intends to do: to tell us Jesus is coming soon.

Hear his roar.

He is coming.

This is happening.

Be bold.

Be faithful.

Shout on.

Pray on.

We're gaining ground.

Friends, the last thing that we see is that the return of Christ fuels our longing for Christ.

I'm not sure if there's a sweeter verse in Revelation.

Look at verse 20.

He who testifies about these things says, Yes, I am coming soon.

Amen.

Come, Lord Jesus.

Notice who it is that testifies about these things.

Everything that we've seen in Revelation is the testimony of Jesus.

It's his word, it comes with his authority.

And what are his very last words to us in all of Scripture?

Yes, I am coming soon.

And I know that we're tempted to doubt that.

And I think one of the reasons, maybe this is the question that you've had in your mind, one of the reasons we're tempted to doubt that is because that statement was made 2,000 years ago.

And we think, wait a second, there's a lot that has happened since that statement.

Jesus hasn't returned.

Maybe we lose confidence that Jesus is coming.

Well, friends, I think that would be to miss something.

Because

Jesus is and has been coming throughout the last 2,000 years.

Like Aslahan, his roars are being heard.

The gospel is spreading.

His church is growing.

His spirit is indwelling us and saving us and strengthening us.

His mission, his work has in no way been silent over the last 2,000 years.

Our presence here this morning proves that our King is indeed coming soon and is at work.

Christ has come and he promises he will return.

So what should our response be?

Well, I hope it's what John's is.

Amen.

Think about both of those statements.

First, amen.

See, many of us we use that word, but we really don't know what it means.

We say at the end of a prayer, maybe at the end of a song, maybe when something somebody says something that's really true and meaningful, we're like, Amen.

That word means yes.

It's true.

It's yes, it is.

So be it.

That's what it means.

So think about this.

This is what John is saying.

John hears, I yes, I am coming soon.

And John says, Yes, Jesus, you are coming soon.

Friends, I hope that we can say the same thing.

That we would know that Jesus is indeed coming soon, and that we would say the next phrase.

With full hearts, come, Lord Jesus.

You know, I think in some ways this might be the final exam of Revelation.

How is it that we respond when we hear that Jesus is coming soon?

Can we actually say and long in our hearts to say, Come, Lord Jesus?

See, I fear that for many of us, when we hear that I am coming soon from Jesus, we say, wait, Lord Jesus.

Or not quite yet, Lord Jesus.

Could you hold on just a little bit, Lord Jesus?

And here's where I think we can see our idols.

See, here's where I think they begin to creep up.

Where we begin to see that we actually want certain worldly things more than we want, Jesus.

That we actually think that this world offers us more than what Jesus offers.

If you want to see, if we want to see whether our hearts are actually attached to this life in this world, I think all we need to do is to see if they catch a little bit when we say, Come, Lord Jesus.

If they hesitate a little bit.

But let me encourage you with this.

If they do, it is only because we have been deceived.

It is not at all because this world is actually better than Jesus.

Friend, we need to understand that this morning.

The call of Scripture is never be miserable.

The call of Scripture is never give up your joy so that you can follow Jesus.

Give up your satisfaction, sacrifice for Christ.

That is not the call of Scripture.

I used to think when I was a younger Christian, I used to always think I had two options, joy or Jesus.

Friends, the Bible is so clear that actually the option of the Bible is joy in Jesus.

And it is only the only true joy.

You know, we read this passage last week, Psalm 16, 11.

We need to understand it.

You reveal the path of life to me in your presence, God, is abundant joy.

At your right hand are eternal pleasures.

It's not joy or Jesus, it is joy in Jesus.

If revelation has shown us anything, think about all that we saw last week.

It is that it has told us this, that what Jesus offers far surpasses anything that sin, Satan, or this world might offer.

Maybe my favorite Lewis quote of all time is this if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak.

We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us.

Like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea.

We are far too easily pleased.

Friends, Christ is coming soon, and he is the holiday at the sea, but so much more.

See, here is the cry of the Christian and a world that so madly wants to have us give in to its charm or give in or give up under its crushing force.

The call of the faithful is come, Lord Jesus.

That's present faithfulness.

That's what our hearts need to believe.

He is coming soon.

The promise of Christ's return actually fuels our present faithfulness.

Let's pray.