Advent 4: Consummation

SERMON: 2010-12-19--ad0410--advent-4-consummation SOURCE DURATION: 00:32:04.000 PROPOSED CUTS: 1 CONFIDENCE: 0.95 APPROVED: false REASON: The recording begins immediately with theological exposition based on Scripture (Revelation). The ending material includes sustained acoustic music intervals and devotional prayer/reflection, which are considered part of the sermon's conclusion. Acoustic segmentation found sustained music at the end edge and moved the boundary to the adjacent transcript segment. ACOUSTIC EVIDENCE: available ACOUSTIC MUSIC INTERVALS: 00:27:00.400-00:30:36.040, 00:30:42.240-00:32:03.500 ACOUSTIC SPEECH OVERLAP: yes ACOUSTIC BOUNDARIES APPLIED: end Inline CUT markers identify each proposed audio boundary after the relevant word. --- ORIGINAL TRANSCRIPT WITH PROPOSED CUTS MARKED --- Now the word hallelujah, interestingly enough, occurs only four times in the book of Revelation. And all four times when it occurs, it occurs in Revelation chapter 19. And interestingly enough, the first three times the word hallelujah is used in that chapter is in the context of the destruction of Babylon the Great. Listen to these verses, "After this I heard what sounded again like the roar of a great multitude in heaven shouting hallelujah. Salvation and glory and power belong to our God. For true and just are his judgments. He has condemned the great prostitute who corrupted the earth by her adulteries. He has avenged on her the blood of his servants, and again they shouted hallelujah. The smoke from her goes up forever and ever." And then the passage goes on to say that the 24 elders and the four living creatures, they all fell down and worshiped God, and they said, "Amen, hallelujah." Babylon the Great there represents the pagan nations of the world who are called a prostitute. That is to say, they buy and they sell their loyalty for the satisfaction of their own needs. It stands in sharp distinction, as we'll see this morning, to the bride who has made herself ready to marry the lamb. And so the fourth time then the word hallelujah occurs in this passage is in connection with the wedding feast of the lamb. And listen again, if you will, to these verses, "Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder shouting hallelujah for our Lord God Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory." And here you have it, "For the wedding of the lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready. Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear." And then we note this editorial comment, "Fine linen stands for the righteous acts or deeds of the saints. The wedding of the lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready." And all through Scripture we have this comparison between the institution of marriage and the relationship of God to his people. Let me just quickly run you through a series of Bible passages that underscore this, and then we'll talk a little bit about what that is for and what are the implications of that for you and me. First of all, Genesis chapter 2 verse 24, this well-known verse, "For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh." Now, we're accustomed to thinking of that verse as establishing the institution of marriage, and indeed it does. But allow me to remind you that when Paul quotes Genesis 2 verse 24 in Ephesians chapter 5, in the context of husband-wife relationships, he adds a fascinating insight, because he says in verse 32 of Ephesians chapter 5, "This is a profound mystery. That is, a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife." He says that's a profound mystery, but I'm talking about Christ and the church. There is something he says about the relationship between a husband and a wife in marriage that connects with the relationship of Christ to the church. Now hold on to that, because later on in the course of my message this morning we'll be coming back to that. Similarly, throughout the Old Testament, God frequently describes his relationship with his people in the terms and in the context of the marriage relationship. Again, just very quickly, a couple of verses, Isaiah 62 verse 5, "As a young man marries a maiden, so will your sons marry you. As a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you." Jeremiah 2, 2, "I remember the devotion of your youth. How as a bride you loved me and followed me through the desert, through a land not sown. Then Ezekiel 16, 8, I gave you my solemn oath and entered into a covenant with you, declares the sovereign Lord, and you became mine." And if you read further on in that chapter, there's no doubt but that the covenant referred to here is the marriage covenant. In that chapter, God is filled with grief because his bride has committed adultery. And then of course in the Old Testament you have the Song of Solomon. The Song of Solomon, which on the one hand is a very erotic, almost love song, but by many interpreters is seen as describing in love language the relationship between God and his people. And then of course you have the book of Hosea, and you have Hosea having to marry a prostitute because God wants to model in Hosea's life his love and his passion and his grief about the people of Israel who continually committed adultery and whom he wishes to bring back to himself. That's the Old Testament. You find the same thing in the New Testament. Listen to these words of Jesus, Matthew 9, 15, "How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them, for the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them, then they will fast," he refers to himself as the bridegroom. Matthew 25, the story of the foolish and wise virgins. At that time the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom, but if you know the rest of the story, he's a long time in coming, five run out of oil, five have brought extra supplies, the five without the oil have to go and fetch more oil, they are too late and they get walked out of the party because the bridegroom's feast has already begun. And then the words of the Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians chapter 11 verse 2, "I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. I promised you to one husband, to Christ, so that I might present you as a pure virgin to him." And then of course these words in Revelation, Revelation 19, 7, "Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory for the wedding of the Lamb has come and his bride has made herself ready." One more verse, it won't be on the screen, Revelation 21, 9, "One of the seven angels who are the seven bulls full of the seven last plagues came and said to me, 'Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb.'" And then we see the holy city, the New Jerusalem, coming out of heaven as a bride adorned for her husband. I had a smile the other day, as I told you before, I'm still reading Jack Frost's book from spiritual slavery to spiritual sonship. And Jack Frost at one point talks about the fact that the Bible typically speaks about the sons of God and not the daughters of God. And the reason for that is that in biblical culture it is sons who inherit and daughters do not. And so the phrase "sons of God" encompasses both male and female because we are all joined heirs with Christ. But you know, in this very politically correct society there are people who get bent out of shape that God talks about the sons of God and not the daughters of God. And so he says to those women who were upset by that, "Just tell the significant men in your life that for all eternity all the men are going to be called the bride or the wife of Christ." And so that will even any sense of injustice that you have received in history because that will be eternal. All through scripture then we have this comparison between husband and wife in marriage and God and his people. And so the question to ponder for a moment together is why this parallel, why this constant emphasis that God's relationship with his people ties into the relationship between husband and wife and very quickly and almost immediately as I've been thinking about that a little bit, there are two reasons that come to mind and the first is this, the institution of marriage is intended as an earthly reflection of the relationship between God and his people. Let me say it one more time, marriage is intended as an earthly reflection of the relationship between God and his people. You'll recall a few moments ago I quoted for you Genesis 2 verse 24, "A man shall leave his father and his mother and be united to his wife and the two will become one flesh." And I said Paul goes on then in Ephesians 5 verse 32 to make the observation, "This is a profound mystery but I am talking about Christ and the church." And you and I say Paul where are you going with this? Well Paul uses the word mystery in a very technical sense. You and I think of mystery as something to be solved, a murder mystery or it is a mystery of what happened. That's not how Paul uses the word mystery, Paul in the New Testament uses the word mystery to indicate something that was once hidden but now has been revealed. And so he says in the past everybody thought Genesis 2 verse 24, "A man shall leave his father and his mother and cleave to his wife" referred to a husband and wife relationship but he says I want to tell you there is a deeper meaning because it's really talking about Christ and the church and you say how in the world is that possible? Well think it through with me a little bit. How did Eve come into existence and why did Eve come into existence? Well Eve was created you will recall out of Adam's side and when she was presented to Adam what did Adam say? "Flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone" because it's in the context of there wasn't a suitable helper found for Adam and so all the creatures when marching by none of them was suitable and God made Eve out of his side, presented her to him and they were joined together. And the Bible uses that not only to establish the institution of marriage but also to explain why for all the struggles between the sexes you know men are from Mars and women are from Venus despite all the conflicts men and women boys and girls continue to be drawn together. They come out of each other and they long to be back together. There is a complementarity there the feminine and the masculine complete each other. You with me here? Very important to understand that. Now take it a step further. Think about the relationship of Christ and the church. How does the church come into origin? Well first of all originally all mankind was created by God we proceed from the hand of God but more than that in our redemption the church is born out of Christ and this is a little tricky to get our heads around but it's Christ in you the hope of glory. And so the church has the substance of Christ living in us and even as in marriage man and woman are drawn together into the consummation of marriage. So there is a longing in the heart of God's people to be reunited to Christ and to be joined to him in marriage. Now if you understand that that marriage is an earthly reflection of the intimate relationship between Christ and his people you will understand why in the new creation there is marriage no longer. Some of us we look at that and we say boy that's a bummer. Benson how good your marriage is I suspect. But here's what you need to understand. Make your most sacred moment in marriage the time when you have felt the most intimately connected with one another at the deepest level of your life. Or for those of you that are not married think of a friendship you may have had a love relationship that you have experienced a place where you felt understood a place where you felt wanted a place where you know you tingled to the bottom of your toes as somebody told me this past week multiply that by infinity and you have not yet begun to understand what happens when in eternity Christ and his people are joined in an eternal marital relationship. And what in a few moments we celebrate communion together that communion celebration is a foretaste of that great big wedding feast where all of heaven and earth rejoices because marriage has finally reached its pinnacle. So marriage is an earthly reflection of Christ's relationship with his people in a far deeper sense than most of us ever realize but there's more. Both marriage in God's relationship with his people can be described as a covenant relationship. Let me walk you through that just very quickly a covenant as you know is a solemn agreement between two parties and the best example of covenant that we have in today's society I believe is the marriage covenant boy meets girl they're drawn together for the reasons that I've just described they decide they like each other they want the most intimate union possible they decide to get married and marriage and you've all been to weddings marriage follows a particular routine because it copies ancient covenant relationships both the bride and the groom leave their family of origins to be joined together in the presence of witnesses they declare certain vows to love and to be faithful to each other until death do them part this is really a parallel of the ancient form of oath-taking whereby you called the curse of God on your life if you broke covenant and you invited the blessings of God on your life if you were faithful to covenant that's why we have witnesses to the celebration it is a legal happening and then as vows are exchanged there is always in the context of marriage the exchange of a symbol and in our culture that is a wedding ring and the wedding ring indicates for all the world to see that we belong to each other and then when the ceremony is concluded there is a party and the richer you are and the more friends you've got and the more family you've got the bigger the party is and that is a celebration of the fact that you are joined together now and you are sharing each other's resources and then after that you go do things you consummate the marriage and the two have become one that's a covenant relationship that is an earthly reflection of God's covenant that he enters into with mankind and the history of scripture is very clear on this God created us to have that most intimate union with himself when the world fell into sin he judged it in Noah's day to preserve the purity of the human race and then when it became clear that the nations of the world were still going to go on and be adulterers breakers of covenant then God decided to pick Abraham out of Ur of the Chaldees and he chose the nation of Israel and at Mount Sinai he entered into a sacred marital covenant with them he said I will be your God and you will be my people and so throughout the history of the Old Testament you have this struggle Israel is almost always unfaithful God is almost always trying to bring his people back his heart breaks the law cannot make the wife faithful to her husband it's not within her but it keeps her in check a little bit until you come to the New Testament which of course is the New Covenant and God says in the person of Christ I'm entering into the human experience and in the person of Christ by his incarnation by his life by his death and by his resurrection it's ascension into heaven and then the outpouring of the Holy Spirit Jesus says I am winning my bride back to myself and what makes this chapter in Revelation 19 so highly significant is that here at long last his betrothed has made herself ready can you believe it you and I we look at our own lives and we say I don't know how I'm ever going to be a pure bride dressed in fine linen which are the righteous deeds of the saints you know we think of the him prone to wander Lord I feel it all of which is true but under the terms of the New Covenant God in Christ has committed himself to taking you and me if we're joined to Christ and he is going to present us to himself as a pure spotless bride and history moves forward and as it moves forward there will come a day when the bride has made herself ready and she is ready for the great wedding feast of the lamb and in that moment she will have laid aside all her adultery she will no longer have a straying eye she will know that her only hope is in belonging to the Lord Jesus Christ she will have doled herself up with fine linen which is the righteous deeds of the saints and in that day we will experience the completion of history in that day God's judgment will fall on Babylon the great which you will recall it's called what a whore one who prostitutes herself out who sells herself to the highest bidder and Jesus will have redeemed from all the nations throughout the course of history men and women boys and girls who are faithful to Jesus and who in that final day will share in his wedding feast and will for all eternity experience the glory of redemption and we can't even begin to imagine what that's going to look like but Revelation 21 puts it this way I saw the holy city New Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God prepared as a bride adorned for her husband and I heard a loud voice from the throne saying behold the dwelling of God is with men he will dwell with them and they shall be his people and God himself will be with them he will wipe away every tear from their eyes death shall be no more neither shall there be mourning or crying or pain anymore for the former things have passed away prepared as a bride adorned for her husband and for all eternity sharing in the glory of God I said a moment ago take the happiest moment of your life the place where you felt most secure most understood most belonging multiply it by infinity and that's what God promises to his children and it may well be that you're here this morning and you have a hard time visualizing that you have a hard time entering into the joy of the consummation some of you have lost loved ones and it never hurts more than in a season like this some of you are in marriages that struggle some of you have friendships that have been severed for whatever reasons some of you look at your own heart and you say I just can't do this Christian life thing some of you you face illness struggles infirmities and you say oh life is hard and there's some of you here you've sought to follow Jesus with all your heart you've opened up your heart you've given of yourself and you've laid it on the line and you've hoped and you've dreamed and you've longed and your longings have been broken you've been misunderstood you've been misrepresented and you wonder Lord what's the use is it ever going to happen well this story tells us that nobody who puts their hope in the Lord will ever be ashamed because no matter how long it takes and the Bible is filled with examples of longing and how long does it take Jesus Christ has committed himself and when the church has been tested when we've washed our robes in the blood of the lamb when we can stand righteous in Christ and we know our position in him when sin has run its full course Jesus will come in glory and then the saints of God will hear those words well done faithful servants you've been faithful over little I will put you over much enter into the joy of your father's kingdom and in that day our joy will be complete and in that day whatever version of hallelujah choruses we sing now are going to pale in comparison to when all the voices of heaven and earth shout together hallelujah the Lord our God the Almighty reigns for the wedding [CUT] [PROPOSED CUT 1 START at 00:27:00.400; remove through 00:32:04.000] feast of the lamb his car Lord we seek you every heart year waits as one Lord draw near us for we need you Maranatha, oh Lord Jesus come oh Lord come, oh Lord come we await your presence oh Lord come and meet us we long to see you Maranatha, oh Lord Jesus come when your people join together Lord your spirit fills that plain you are here now Lord forever now in spirit but one day face to face oh Lord come, oh Lord come we await your presence oh Lord come and meet us we long to see you Maranatha, oh Lord Jesus come now we watch, Lord, for your appearing when the veil is sown away as we see I am free and near me may this prayer grow stronger every day oh Lord come, oh Lord come we await your presence oh Lord come come and meet us we long to see you Maranatha, oh Lord Jesus come oh Lord come, oh Lord come we await your presence oh Lord come come and meet us we long to see you Maranatha, oh Lord Jesus come Maranatha, oh Lord Jesus come Maranatha, oh Lord Jesus come [CUT] [PROPOSED CUT 1 END at 00:32:04.000; resume after this marked segment]