The Second Coming of Christ (Part 4)

Now, I uh somebody sent me a little tip of a fellow singing, an American chap singing about the return of the Lord.

And can we play that maybe at the end if it's possible?

It'll only be audio, but uh I I enjoyed the singing and and you might as well.

So we'll play that at the end.

Um by way of uh of a recap, if you like, we talked at the very beginning about the promise of the return of Jesus.

Why do we know he's coming again?

Simple answer, because he promised to do so.

And that promise has sustained believers down the centuries, especially when they have been going through dark times and facing persecution.

Open Doors, the organization that works very much with persecuted Christians, say on one of their websites that forty million, forty million Christians have died for their faith since the beginning of the 20th century.

In other words, over the last 126 years.

And two million of them have been put to death for their faith since the year 2000.

The Christian has two hopes.

The individual hope of personal salvation through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

And you understand when I use the word hope, I'm using it in the biblical sense, not in the sense that people use it today, oh, I hope so, when they think it's very unlikely.

A Bible hope is a hope founded and established upon God Himself, and therefore it is a certain hope.

There is the individual hope that each of us can have that we are truly saved through faith in the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And then there's the corporate hope that all believers have collectively across the world, spanning every age, every century, this hope that by the power of God the whole church and every believer will enjoy a glorious future through the mighty power of God.

Sometimes we think that Satan is winning the battle.

But friends, if you're ever tempted to think that, give yourself a bit of a kick because you're absolutely wrong.

The devil is already a defeated foe.

And by the time we get to the main thrust of this evening's talk, the devil has been cast into the lake of fire and is there for all eternity.

He has been totally and comprehensively defeated.

Now we talked about the things that happen before the Lord returns.

We talked about the time when he comes back, the rapture of living saints, the resurrection of the saints who've already died, and the rapture of those who are alive in renewed bodies, we enter into the presence of our Lord and Savior.

We talked about the prize giving.

That's my name for it.

The just judgment seat of Christ, when rewards are given to believers for faithful service.

Followed by the wedding feast, the marriage supper of the Lamb, which symbolically describes Christians of every age coming into wonderful fellowship with their Lord and Savior.

I mentioned, I think, a lady who was interviewed on Songs of Praise two or three Sundays ago.

She works for the Torch Trust for the Blind and has been blind herself from birth.

She was born blind, she has never seen.

And she said, When I think about the future, I realize that the first face I will ever see will be the face of the Lord Jesus Christ when I meet him in glory.

And following those events, we move into what is called the millennium.

Somebody said to me before the meeting began that I'd reminded them that there was a millennium.

Well, friends, let me remind you again, if you can forget a thousand years, you've got a pretty good capacity for forgetting.

Before this earth, this earth comes to an end, Jesus is going to rule over it.

Why?

In order, I think, to demonstrate how it should have been run from the first.

A perfect, peaceful, harmonious, productive world.

That's the world that Adam and Eve were set into in the Garden of Eden.

And that's the way the world should have continued, but for the entrance of sin and Satan.

And Jesus is going to rule over this earth for a thousand years.

And the Bible says that we are going to reign with him.

You pleased about that?

That sounds a pretty important and a pretty glorious future for the Christian to reign with Christ here on this earth for a thousand wonderful years.

During that time, Satan is imprisoned in what's called the bottomless pit.

But God lets him out.

Why?

Why let him out?

You've got him there.

Why not keep him there?

God lets him out, and he's allowed to go out to receive the nations of the world again.

Now, we who have already lived in this age and have died and been resurrected or who have been raptured and are in our resurrection bodies, we will not be involved in this.

We've passed through all that.

But there will be millions of other people still living on earth.

And many of them sadly will listen to the voice of Satan.

And Satan will lead his last rebellion at the end of the millennium.

But it won't last for long because we're told that God will send an angelic army to destroy the army of Satan.

And to destroy, seize Satan himself, and put him this time into what's called the lake of fire, his eternal residence, the place where he will be incarcerated forever.

Following this, we're told that earth and heaven pass away.

There's the judgment of all those who rejected Jesus, called the great white throne judgment.

Where is that throne established?

We don't know.

The Bible doesn't tell us.

It can't be on this earth because this earth has gone.

It can't be in heaven because heaven as it was has gone.

Somewhere in space, God sets up his eternal throne.

And Jesus the Savior judges those who rejected the offer of his love.

And after that, there come the new heaven and the new earth.

Let me read to you from Revelation 21.

And I saw a new, this is John the Apostle, a prisoner on the prison isle of Patmos, a prisoner for the gospel.

He sees all these visions that are recorded in Revelation.

And now we come near to the end.

And he says, I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away, and there was no more sea.

And I, John, saw the holy city, a new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle, the dwelling place, that is, of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God, and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away.

And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new.

And he said unto me, Write, for these words are true and faithful.

Those are the first verses of Revelation 21.

This is the climax of the story that began in Genesis chapter one, the creation story.

We read there about creation, the six days of creation.

We read about it there, and then we follow the history right the way through the Bible, and we come to the end.

This old earth and the heaven as it was, replaced by a new heaven and a new earth, and we're at God's beginning again.

What does new mean, a new heaven and a new earth?

What does new mean?

Well, nobody seems to be quite sure.

Does it mean completely new?

Does it mean that every atom of matter in this universe will be destroyed?

And a new universe created?

Or does it mean that this creation as it is will be renewed?

All evil will be washed away from it.

It talks about it being consumed in fire, it will be burned away, all the evil.

But essentially the new heaven and the new earth will be this heaven and this earth, but gloriously renewed by the power of God.

Now, friends, I don't know what the answer is.

And frankly, I'm not the least bit worried.

Because I'm perfectly happy to accept that whatever way God does it, it will be absolutely perfect.

Have to say that the language does imply a complete change, a completely new earth and a completely new universe, and even a new completely changed area where the angels live.

After the flood, there was a new world.

We are called new creations in Christ Jesus when we're saved.

We're new people.

I've heard people give their testimonies and talk about how they are new.

I heard a man say that he was so transformed when he trusted Jesus Christ as Savior that when he went home his dog bit him because it didn't recognize him.

I wonder if that's true, but that's what he said anyway.

But friends, we're completely transformed.

What are we transformed by?

We're transformed by the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.

So the world before the flood was transformed by water, cleansed by water.

We are transformed, we are cleansed by blood.

And when the end comes, the old heaven and earth will be cleansed by fire.

And of a new heaven and earth.

But I can't say whether it will be completely new or renewed.

But frankly, as I said, I'm not too worried about that.

Two images are found in these verses.

The first image is that of a city, and the other is of a bride.

And the two images are kind of merged together.

An angel appears to John and says to John, I will now show you the bride, the Lamb's wife.

The Lamb, of course, is Jesus.

The angel says, I'll show you the bride.

And John says, He carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain and showed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem descending out of heaven from God.

That's funny.

He was going to show him a bride.

And in fact, he shows him a city.

How can a city be a bride?

And how can a bride look like a city?

Friends, these are pictures to help us to understand the relationship we will have with God in the new heaven and the new earth.

Well, what is a city?

Bricks and mortar?

Steel and concrete?

Well, in a way, yes.

But in another sense, a city is people.

And that is what is significant here.

The city pictured in Revelation 21 is made up of millions of people, all those redeemed through the precious blood of Jesus.

And we're told that all of them have their names inscribed, their names written in the Lamb's Book of Life.

Now, I've heard a pastor talk to people about having their passport stamped.

Can't think who it was that said that, but I seem to remember someone talking about that on more than one occasion.

Well, there's no mention of a passport, but there is the idea, the idea of having your name inscribed in a register of those who are saved.

Now, when Pastor Michael talks about having your passport stamped, I don't think there's anybody in the congregation believes that you have to have a passport to get into heaven.

You know that as you breathe your last, you're clutching the passport to you to get you through into heaven.

We understand its picture language.

It's to help people to understand.

And when the book of Revelation talks about the book of life, I don't think there's a big book somewhere in heaven with a whole lot of names written in it.

I think it is simply that God knows all who are his.

The talk of the book is a symbol, a picture.

And Revelation is full of pictures.

You say, well, that makes it harder to understand.

Not really.

That's how it's explained.

My name is recorded.

God's heart.

In God's mind.

He knows me.

And that's amazing.

When you think of the universe, so vast we can hardly even imagine its extent.

And God knows all about me.

And he knows all about you.

He knows every need, every trouble, every fear, every blessing, every joy.

He knows you through and through.

Isn't that marvelous?

A city is not just bricks and mortar.

If you talked of Glasgow, you would say that what makes Glasgow Glasgow is its people, not its tenements or its multi-story blocks or whatever.

It's the people.

And this heavenly city is an image of the people of God.

The bride is also a picture.

She's not a woman in a white dress.

She is made up of all those same millions of people who have put their trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.

So what we're finding here is that our relationship with God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is pictured in terms of the closest, intimate human relationship, that of marriage.

Now in the ancient world, the groom had to buy his bride by paying a dowry to her father.

Maybe a sum of money, maybe a flock of sheep or a herd of cows, but he had to pay something for his bride.

I remember speaking to a man who had spent many years as a missionary in East Africa.

And he said on one occasion one of his African pastors wanted to get married.

He wanted to marry a Christian girl.

But the Christian girl came from a family that was pagan.

Her father was a pagan and he demanded a price for his daughter.

I think it was measured in cows, how many cows she was worth.

And the young assistant pastor had no money, or very little, not enough to pay for his bride.

So the missionary said, I stumped up the money and he paid me back over a period of time.

The only problem was, he said, was that in native law, the rule was if you defaulted on the payment, the bride became your.

So he said, if the young pastor didn't pay me, he said the bride became mine, which was rather an embarrassing thought.

A bride had to be bought.

Friends, we, the bride of Christ, have been bought.

At what price?

The price of his precious blood.

And there's the symbol of a building when you're talking of foundation.

The church is one foundation, is Jesus Christ our Lord.

She is his new creation by water and the blood.

From heaven he came and sought her to be his holy bride.

With his own blood he bought her, and for her life he died.

There's a very detailed description of the city in Revelation 21.

First of all, we're told it's a cube in shape.

Width, depth, and height are all the same.

And the figure, as it's recorded in the Bible, I'm reading, is 12,000 furlongs each side.

That's 1,500 miles.

So it's described as a city which is in the shape of a cube.

Each side Of which is 1,500 miles.

That's a cube that encompasses 2.25 million square miles.

If you place this over Central Europe, it would completely cover France, Germany, Italy, Poland, the United Kingdom, and several other countries as well.

It is a vast thing.

It has a wall, which obviously will be 6,000 feet long, 6,000 miles long, sorry, with 12 foundations.

There are 12 gates.

Each gate is made of one single gigantic pearl.

There is a central avenue of pure gold.

You can read it for yourself.

Genesis 20, Revelation 21.

The question is, is that literal or figurative?

Is there really going to be a city?

That size, that shape, with twelve foundations, twelve gates, and each gate one pearl?

Or is it a picture?

Now, friends, I have no difficulty believing that God could make a city just like that.

He can do anything.

And my preference is always to take any passage of the Bible literally, unless there is good reason to do otherwise.

But sometimes in the Bible we find figurative or pictorial language.

I've already said that the city and the bride fall into that category.

And as I read of the description of the city, I think we have here symbolism.

There's not going to be literally a giant square city floating down from heaven.

Here we have a symbol.

But what might it symbolize?

Well, it's huge in size, which reminds us of the vast number of the redeemed.

I did say briefly last week that I think there will be more people in the new heaven and the new earth than there are in the lake of fire.

A lot of people think that those who are saved in the end will be a tiny minority of the human race.

Rabbi Burns in Holy Willie's Prayer said in this bogus prayer, he says, O thou who in the heavens do dwell, who as it pleases best thyself, says, Ain to heaven and ten to hell, all for thy glory.

So Rabbi Burns pictures God as delighting in saving one person and damning ten.

I think he's wrong.

I think the heart of God is to see people saved, redeemed, born anew, and sharing in the life of the new heaven and the new earth.

But have I any evidence for that?

Well, one writer drew my attention to this: that all the images of hell are confined images.

They're of small places, like a pit or a lake.

They're small.

They're confined.

Whereas all the pictures of eternity for the believer are vast.

This huge city, as a symbol of the vastness of what God has for us.

I think it's true also that many trust in the Savior at the very last moment of life.

I'm sure there are people who have closed their eyes preparatory to slipping into unconsciousness and death, having never made a public profession of faith in Jesus Christ, who knowing that the end is near, call upon God.

The Bible says that's all we have to do to call upon Him.

I've sat beside people who were dying and apparently unconscious, and I've preached the gospel to them and urged them to trust Jesus.

I've said all you need to do is to think the prayer.

You can't talk, I know.

Just think the prayer.

Just call upon the Lord.

And I believe there are people who at the last moment of life are saying, there'll be many in heaven, I'm sure, whom we didn't expect to see there.

During the millennium, which I mentioned a little while ago, this earth will be populated.

And there will be millions on earth there.

Not the redeemed, but millions of ordinary people who will not listen to Satan when he seeks to lure them into a final rebellion, but will live through the millennium, trusting in the goodness and mercy of God, they'll be there.

In bygone ages of our world, stillbirths were a common factor of life.

Many, many babies died before they ever really began this life on earth.

But we believe that our soul is born, is a is a living eternal soul from conception.

And there will be millions in heaven, I am sure, who never really lived life on earth.

Because they died immediately before or immediately after birth.

And they'll be in heaven.

And by the way, they won't remain babies in eternity.

They'll grow to maturity.

In just the same way as those of us who are getting on a bit.

We'll not be hobbling around on xenophrames either for all eternity.

We'll all be, I think we'll have bodies like the glorious body of Jesus.

30 years of age.

Maturity anyway.

And we won't age, we won't grow any older, but we might grow wiser, as we'll see in a minute.

Now, we talked about this great city.

It symbolizes size.

And friends, I want to encourage you to believe that millions, millions of human beings will enjoy the new heaven and the new earth in God's presence.

You among them, of course, because you're saved, but all those whom you're going to witness to and encouraged to turn to Jesus.

This use of numbers in the book of Revelation.

There are all sorts of significant numbers, and we haven't time to think about them this evening, but uh think about this number 12.

This city is twelve furlongs, each side is twelve furlongs.

And it's 12,000 furlongs high.

12,000 furlongs each way, 12,000 furlongs high.

There are 12 tribes of Israel mentioned, 12 apostles, 12 gates, 12 foundations, a tree of life with 12 kinds of fruit, 144,000 of the tribes of Israel.

Well, that's a multiple of 12, isn't it?

And 24 elders sitting before the throne of God, that's two times twelve, and so on.

The number twelve keeps cropping up.

But why?

Why?

What does it signify?

It must mean something.

It is generally believed that the number twelve speaks of perfect order and completeness.

So when all these number twelves crop up in relation to the description of this great city, we are being told this is God's perfect final gathering of people.

Nobody is missing who should be there.

Nobody has been left out.

Nobody has been forgotten or overlooked.

This is complete.

The body of Christ as a vast multitude gathered together in perfect order to serve and to worship and to follow the Lord.

We're told in 1 Corinthians 15, 24, then cometh the end, when he that's Jesus, shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father.

It doesn't mean that Jesus stops reigning, but there comes a point when we reach the new heaven and the new earth, when Jesus in effect says to God the Father, I came into the world as we agreed that I should.

I provided salvation through dying and rising again.

I've been with my people all the way through to the end, and now, Father, here it all is.

Here they all are, this vast multitude of men and women gloriously saved, new resurrection bodies, living in the perfect new heaven and earth for all eternity.

I have a few other things here which I'm going to miss out on as time rushes on.

I must have been preaching about heaven or the eternity to a youth group years and years ago.

And there were questions asked afterwards.

And I just remember one young fellow, one young teenager, who was a terrible fidget, always fidgeting in the meeting, could never be at rest, always wanted to be doing something different.

And he said, Do you not think we might get a bit bored in heaven after the first million years or so?

And I thought he's the one to talk about getting bored.

He gets bored in a meeting after five minutes.

But it's a sensible enough question.

I mean, some people have a funny idea of heaven or of the new heaven, the new earth, whatever you want to call it.

They have a funny idea.

They think we'll all be sitting around wearing white robes with crowns on our heads and playing harps.

Well, friends, as far as I know, there's no harp playing in my future.

And I hope I don't get a white robe.

I don't think I would suit one at all.

We are told we'll receive crowns.

But what do we do with them?

We cast them down at Jesus' feet.

We recognize he is the one who's made it all possible.

What will we do?

The Bible says his servants will serve him.

So in this new world, we will serve our Lord and Savior.

And we will do so with greater capacities and abilities than we can ever do down here.

We will worship him.

And our worship will be unimaginably greater than anything that we can give in this life.

The scripture says that we will judge worlds.

Now, think about the universe.

Whether it's renewed or completely new, if it's anything like the present universe, it will be unimaginably vast.

And we are going to be ruling this universe as God's representatives.

Ruling the universes.

Now, do you think there are people on other planets?

Is that a thing you've ever thought about?

Are we getting into the realms of science fiction?

Well, friends, whether there are now or not, I do not know.

And I'm not particularly caring one way or the other.

But do you not think it might be possible that the God who created this world and us and millions like us, and the God who creates the new heaven and the new earth?

Do you not think that he might do a bit more creating?

Do you not think that if there are planets, millions and millions of them, the Milky Way and far beyond that, that he might decide to populate some of them with sentient, intelligent beings?

Whether they would look like us or not, I don't know.

But is it not possible God might decide to create more and more?

And then say, now, Howie, there's a planet there, I've just put 10 million people on it, and uh they need to know all about my love and my goodness.

I'm going to make you their ruler.

And your job is to teach them and to lead them and to guide them and to direct their attention to me.

And if you did a good job, which you would do, I'm sure, he might give you a few more, and all the rest of us.

The Bible says we will rule worlds.

And of course, it says that in connection with the fact that Christians on earth were quarreling with each other.

You know, you sit in a church session meeting, not here, I've never been in a church session meeting here, so I could speak freely.

You sit in a church session meeting and spend three hours arguing about what colour you're going to paint the walls, or something like as equally unimportant as that.

And you think, how the heart of the Lord must be grieved when Christians fall out over trivial issues.

And the word says, Don't you know?

Don't you really grasp the fact that one day you're going to be responsible for ruling over whole worlds?

So let's seek the grace of God to live well in the here and now.

I think we'll learn new things.

You see, I don't think when we get there, we'll know everything in an instant.

Whoosh, suddenly we know everything.

There's no indication in the Bible that that is so.

But we will learn new things.

Now, life down here on earth is short.

And we have so little time to do all the things that we're capable of doing.

When you were young, I mean a teenager, you perhaps had a choice of different career paths.

And you didn't know which one to choose.

And for whatever reason, you settled on one career path, and you got a job doing whatever it was.

And almost by doing that, you're cutting yourself off from all the other things.

There are people called polymaths.

People who are so clever they can they can succeed at all kinds of different things.

They can be a fantastic sportsperson and a marvelous musician and a wonderful artist and so on, all at the same time.

They just seem able to do everything wonderfully well.

But most of us are not polymaths.

If we seek to succeed at one thing, it means we have to forget about something else.

If we're going to concentrate upon being the best footballer Scotland ever saw, then we're not going to be able to be the finest artist Scotland ever produced, or the best musician Scotland ever produced.

We have to choose because life is short.

But friends, eternity is not short.

Eternity has no end.

And I reckon we'll be able to learn all kinds of things that we only dreamed about learning or studying.

We'll not be sitting around wasting our time idling away on puffy clouds playing harps, unless you wanted to specialize in harp playing, of course.

There might be some of that.

But friends, we will be doing things that will enlarge our capacities.

We're told that we only use a fraction of our brain power.

Most of our brain power never gets properly used.

Friends, in eternity, we're going to use our capacities to the full.

We'll be able to master a thousand skills and abilities and do them all for the glory and honor of God.

Just quickly in closing, we're told that his name, the name of Jesus, will be in our foreheads.

Now, again, I'm not sure whether that is literal, whether we'll have something on our foreheads that denotes the name of Jesus, or whether it's symbolic that in our hearts and minds and in our brains our thoughts will be of Jesus.

I don't know.

But it does mean that there will be a close fellowship between us and our wonderful, wonderful Saviour.

And it says also, we shall see his face.

We're going to see Jesus.

Isn't that marvelous?

And you know, if you got an invitation to go to some special do, uh maybe to some a royal garden party.

Uh Jennifer and I got an invitation to a royal garden party, didn't we dear?

And we dressed in our finest, and we went and we didn't know who we were going to meet, but uh uh the the guest of honour was Prince William, and he went round and talked to people, but he didn't talk to us.

We weren't among the the group selected to actually talk to Prince William.

We were just there, which was an honour in itself and quite nice and interesting.

But he was about six or eight feet away and he passed by and smiled politely in our direction, but there were a hundred other people all around us, so he wasn't smiling especially at us, you know, and and that was an honor and quite interesting, and so on.

But friends, when we see Jesus, it won't be like that.

He won't just come.

I was reading an email that came, just a general email, but it came from a fellow I know.

Um and I've said to Jennifer before, if we meet somewhere, say at some Christian meeting, I said, if we meet, he'll talk to me until somebody more important comes along.

And as soon as somebody more important comes along, he kind of finishes the conversation with me and buzzes off to somebody else.

And uh, it'll not be like that.

Jesus will not be talking to me, and then he'll spot you and just push me to one side to go and meet with you, or vice versa.

We'll see him and we'll get to know him, and we'll have fellowship with him for all eternity.

Now I finished with this little quotation from C.S.

Lewis.

The last of his uh Lion Witcher Wardrobe uh series of books is called The Last Battle.

Uh and the kids who went originally through the wardrobe into the magic land of Narnia.

Um actually, in this last book, they really die.

I think they're involved in a train crash and they die.

And uh this is how Lewis puts it.

He says, after they've really died, not just gone through internal or whatever, they've really died.

He says, the things that began to happen after that were so great and so beautiful that I cannot write them.

And for us, this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after.

But for them, it was only the beginning of the real story.

All their lives in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page.

Now, at last they were beginning chapter one of the great story which no one on earth has read, which goes on forever, in which every chapter is better than the one before.

I like that, friends.

The idea that our life here on earth isn't the whole story.

It's not even a big part of the story.

It's just like the cover of the book and the title page, and the whole story is still ahead of us.

Think of it, a million years from now, you will still be alive, a sentient being in the presence of God, and you'll look back on your lifespan down here on earth, just a little tiny little bit of life for a few short years, and then a great eternity beyond.

And he said, uh Lewis says, This eternal story ends the way all good stories ought to end.

They all lived happily ever after.

We may have to go through the tribulation.

We may have to face all kinds of trials and troubles and difficulties in this life.

Sickness and pain and sorrow and bereavement and all these things.

The Bible nowhere says that Christians are exempt from these in this life.

The great truth we hold on to is that we don't endure them alone.

He is with us every step of the way.

But then when we get to the new heaven and the new earth, friends, all those things of God, all those sorrows and pains and sufferings and sicknesses and fears, they've all been wiped away.

They've gone.

And we enter into this new realm, a glorious story, which is a true story, which has no end, goes on forever, and we all live happily ever after.

And that's me finished.