Welcome to the podcast of the White Church in Adelaide, South
Australia. Well, it's good to have everyone
here. When I was when we were singing,
I just I was reminded of this verse and I was just going to
read it for us here. It says that this is Paul
writing in one Corinthians. He says I has not seen nor ear
heard nor have entered into the heart of man the things which
God has prepared for those who love him.
And I was just thinking about that just in in the moment
there. And it was just like, we have no
idea the things that God has in store for us as his people.
We have no idea the things that, you know, we live in a fallen
world. We've got a fallen body.
We've got we're fighting fallen ways of thinking and all this
stuff. We have no idea what it's what
God has even made us to be like. We have some idea, but it's like
you couldn't comprehend the way that God intended things to be.
Isn't that amazing? It's like we sing here together
and we lift him up and we, we, you know, we, we do the best
that we can with the, with the understanding that we have, with
the revelation that God's given us.
We do the best that we can, but it's like it's, it's becoming
clear to me that I have no idea, like I have no idea how amazing
this God is that I serve. I have no idea how amazing, you
know, the, the, the church that he's building actually is.
I have no idea. You know, the the things that
he's got laid out for us in into eternity.
We just can't wrap our head around how amazing our God is
and the plans and the purpose that he has for us.
He gives us some idea and we need some idea because otherwise
we're just here doing nothing, right?
But we're, we are here doing something.
We're doing the best we can with the revelation that we have and,
and all of that stuff. So yeah, I, I hope that just
excites us. I'm saying that just to to build
us up and just to go, you know, as much as life is a struggle
here, because it is, we have our good moments and we have our
tough moments. Sometimes it feels like we're
having more tough moments than good.
But you know, we do have good moments.
So we do enjoy life to the for the most part, I think.
But yeah, just be putting our our mind beyond this place and
beyond the time that we're living in.
And that's sort of what we're going to be speaking about this
morning. We're going to spend the next
few weeks talking about heaven and hell.
So this week is sort of like a, it's kind of an introduction, I
guess, to the coming weeks. We're going to spend the whole
of next, you know, unless things change, we're going to spend the
whole of next week talking about hell and then we're going to
finish. But the week after we're going
to talk about heaven. You know, the Bible has a lot to
say about these things. Jesus has a lot to say about,
you know, like Jesus didn't just come and talk about heaven.
Can I say that Jesus had a whole lot to say about hell?
So there's plenty that we can look through and work through.
So we're just going to have a look at some scriptures today
just to be sure, just to settle that the scripture teaches
heaven and hell. It teaches a, a place, places
when we, when we leave this place that there is a place
where people are going to spend an eternity with God.
And there is another place where people and fallen angels and
Satan are going to spend eternity separate from God.
That is the truth of the Scripture.
But let's have a look and, and see what the word of God
actually says. Can I just say as well, just to
set us up like, what are we, what are we expecting to, to get
out of talking about these things?
Well, I would hope that for us as believers in this room that
it fills us with hope, right? But when we talk about heaven
and we talk about hell, us as believers who have given our
life to Christ and know him and follow him and serve him, it
should do nothing but stir us with hope and strength for the
future. You know, should take our, our,
our doubts and our cares away to know that our God has made a
way. He has set things in stone.
He has written in his word. He is faithful and true.
What Jesus says will come to pass.
That is a good thing for you and I.
That is the good news. You know, the gospel talks about
these things. It's the good news of the
gospel, you know, So that is that should be the expectation
for us in this place. It should stir us with hope
where we're talking about preparing the bride.
You know, we we as the church, we as the bride of Christ, we
need to be prepared for for Jesus to come.
One of the things that you know, one of the purposes and you know
the vision for this church. One of the big things that that
God has put us here to do is to prepare the bride is to make
sure that we are looking to his coming.
We are prepared. We are putting aside the things
of this world. We are, we are entering into the
things of God now and that when he comes, we are prepared and we
are ready. This is something that the
church, this local church, this is high on our list of things
that we want to be talking about, stirring each other on
about. Make sure that we're aware about
being prepared for his coming. This should stir a sense of
urgency in US. It really should when we think
about, you know, those that we care about and our loved ones,
those that, you know, might even be in our homes or whatever.
Like there's people that don't know him.
There's people that don't understand the truth of the
things that we're going to be sharing here.
These truths as believers should stir us up with a heart of
compassion for the lost around us.
It shouldn't, we shouldn't just be able to live carelessly in
these things. You know, and I think sometimes
for me and I think for others, you could say that sometimes
we're guilty of that, just living a little carelessly when
it comes to people that God's put in our lives that we don't
really think too much about the the solid reality that every
single person is going to stand before God.
God and those that aren't written in the book have an
eternity of being separated from him.
We should care about those things.
Jesus cares greatly about those things.
Jesus is building his church. The church should care greatly
about those things. And again, that's that's not a
heaviness. That's not a like, oh, I need to
do something. I'm not doing anything.
That's just compassion. That's just God's heart.
That's just saying, Lord, like if that's not my reality, that's
just a point of saying to the Lord, why, why is there no
compassion here? Lord, I believe this to be true.
Why does it seem like I'm able just to, you know, go through my
life and not be burdened, You know, the, the prophets in the,
in the, especially in the Old Testament Scripture that were
burdened for what God had said, you know, especially on the fall
of Jerusalem and stuff like that, that were burdened for the
things that God was about and the things that God was doing.
And we should have a burden here.
And I pray that we would, maybe we just pray right now, Lord,
if, if there's work to be done in our hearts, Lord, we seek you
for that thing. We seek you to transform us to
be like you. Lord, we want to take on your
burden for the loss around us. We want to have a heart for the
people that you have the heart for.
So just help us with that, Lord. Take away any heaviness and
you're feeling like we've missed it or all of those things.
It's not about that, Lord. It's it's about us just wanting
to to see what you see and, and feel what you see.
Feel what you feel so that we could be effective, Lord, in the
things that you've called us to. Amen.
Thank you, Lord. So, you know, when we're talking
about heaven and hell, we're talking about a great
separation, We're talking about a final judgement, you know,
and, and, and what I am talking about is like, it's like the
end, the end point. It's like there's a whole lot
that needs to happen. You know, if you read through
the Scripture, there's, you know, we would say that Jesus
has done it all. And, and he has in terms of our,
you know, assuring our salvation, but Jesus has things
to do. You know, the word of God says
that there's stuff that God still needs to do, but after
that, there's a, there's going to be a final judgement.
There's going to be a new heaven and a new earth.
That's this is what I'm talking about.
I'm talking about the thing down the road for all eternity where
God's done what needed to be done when the separation takes
place. And those that belong to the
Lord are gathered together with him forever and those that do
not, are not in his presence anymore.
This is what I'm talking about. This is heaven and hell and it's
for all eternity. It's forever, you know, it's,
it's final. The word of God is very clear
that it's just like there's no do overs after that.
It's like once this is done, God's not playing games anymore.
It's just like this is the sure thing.
This is going to happen. God will have his desire.
God's word will stand. That will be it.
There's no, there's Satan's not going to break out of hell and
come and call some more done God.
Satan's allowed to do certain things because God allows him
to. You know, the, the our Lord is
Lord, that Satan doesn't do anything that he doesn't allow.
That's a hard truth to for us to try and get our heads around.
Sometimes it's tough, but the Word of God says that that
Satan's going to be bound for 1000 years and then he's going
to be released again. I'm not getting into all that
today. I'm getting sidetracked.
But I'm talking about after that, you know, when Satan is
locked up and bound forever done.
All right, so let's open up some scriptures and have a look.
We're going to we're going to start in Daniel 12, verse 2.
And I just want you guys to notice that it says that all
people experience a physical resurrection.
All people. Let's just read the Scripture
and then we'll talk about it. Daniel 12, verse 2, it says, And
many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake,
some to everlasting life, some to shame and everlasting
contempt. This is the separation.
This is the the two groups here. Same in the New Testament.
If we have a look at the book of John, so John 5 verse 28, it
says this. It says do not marvel at this
for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will
hear his voice and come forth. Those who have done good to the
resurrection of life, those who have done evil to the
resurrection of condemnation. Do you see what it said there?
So to the resurrection of condemnation, to the, to the
resurrection of life. So the Greek word for
resurrection in the Scripture, it's the same, it's the same
word, but to be resurrected into life and to be resurrected into
condemnation. So that means everyone's going
to be woken up in a physical sense.
You know, there's they they're going to be in a state of full
consciousness. I think we have to realize that
those that are going to spend eternity separated from God.
It's not like ignorant bliss. Now they're conscious.
They know which is that would have to be the most tormenting
thing ever to know that you're conscious and separated from God
and there's no getting over the void.
There's no getting to the other side.
That's it. Now that's that's horrifying.
And those are these are the some of the things that need to stir
us up, you know, for the people that are around us, for our
friends and and our family. It's just like, I don't want to
be like, I don't want to be, you know, standing there one day and
having my friends look over me and say, why didn't you tell me
this? Right?
I don't want them in this place just going.
I had a friend that knew him and they're there and I'm here and
they never told me. You know, the Bible talks about
that, right? I'm not going to, I don't know
the Scripture off the top of my head, but it talks about those
that don't warn, you know, we got to warn.
You know, it's, I know that sharing these things with people
is hard. It's not an easy thing to do,
but better for you to make them uncomfortable hearing that than
them to be uncomfortable here living it, right?
So we're at some like there's a reality in this for us where we
have to get over ourselves for the sake of others.
You know, they don't want to hear about the gospel.
They're going to want to hear about it if they're going to end
up in this place, right? And it's going to be their
decision whether they choose to believe it or not.
OK, So Matthew 25 verse 31, it says, when the Son of Man comes
in his glory, and all his holy angels with him, then he shall
sit on the throne of his glory, and the nations shall be
gathered before him, and he will separate them one from another.
As a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats, and he will set
the sheep on his right hand and the goats on his left.
Then the king will say to those on his right hand, Come, you
blessed of my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you
from the foundation of the world.
And verse 41 says, and then you will say also to those on his
left hand, depart from me, you curse into everlasting fire,
prepared for the devil and his angels.
Do you see that this is over and over again this?
It's not unclear. The Lord's making this very
clear that this is the reality, this is the truth.
I think that, you know, people were shying away from this
truth. Now, even in the churches,
that's a scary thing that we would shy away from the things
that Jesus taught, from the things that the word of God
teaches. So another scripture, just give
us another one. Matthew 13, verse 41, it says
the Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will gather out
of his Kingdom all things that offend and those which practice
lawlessness, and it will cast them into the furnace of fire,
and there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom
of their Father. He who has ears to hear, let him
hear. Are we listening?
Who's got an ear in this place? Ryan's got teeth.
Good job. We've got ears.
Are we listening because it's not just having an ear, it's
having an ear to hear. He who have an ear to hear, let
him hear. That's not just saying just
because you've got an ear and it's coming into your into your
ear. That's saying that if your ear
is listening, if you are listening up and you're saying,
Lord, show me the truth. You know, like I said, like many
are shying away from this reality and, you know, saying
things like, how could a loving God send anyone into that place?
Because it's horrific. It's a horrible place.
How could a loving God do that? Well, the Bible talks about
these things as well, right? It's like in order for God to
love his beloved, he has to. I want you to think about that
for a minute. It's like, you know, that
question of how could a loving God do that?
How could a loving God not do that?
How could a loving God allow evil to reign with his chosen?
Does that sound like a loving God?
Does that sound like a loving father?
Of course it doesn't. See how we twist things, See how
we like, try and put our understanding of what love is on
God and God's understanding of love.
God is love. God's love is so much more
complete than mine. And so, you know, I was thinking
about this. It's just like just a couple of
pictures to help us understand that.
I'm sure that us sitting here realise that that's true, that
he has to do this. But I'm just thinking about like
my boys. It's just like, it's a very, you
know, this falls way short. OK, just so you know, but like,
if my boys are playing and one of them is hurting the other
one, do you know what I do? I separate them, right?
I'll pick one up and I'll put him in his room, right?
Because I'm not going to allow him to hurt the other one.
The other one's just sitting there having a good time or
whatever. I'm not going to as a loving
father, I'm not going to allow the other one to ruin this guy's
day, right? I'm going to separate him.
I'm going to put him in his room.
I'm going to deal with it. That's what a loving Father
does. He deals with it.
He doesn't allow things to go on.
God's grace and mercy is allowing things to happen right
now, but mercy and grace come to an end and then judgement has to
happen because God is loving. You know, another, another way
that we can sort of help us understand this.
It's interesting to me because society understands this
concept, right? When someone hurts your family,
you know, if, if people like you hear it on the news and stuff
like that, there's horrific things going on.
When when someone comes along and inflicts pain or or
suffering upon a family or a people, what are the people cry
out for judgement, call the cops, grab this guy away, get
him away from here, lock him up. You know, throw away the key.
Like we understand this. There's certain crimes where you
just go this, this person can't be living in our society, right?
So to say that how could a loving God, it's a ridiculous
thing to say. My, my non believing friends
would agree that God would have to do this if he was real,
right? So anyway, I hope that, you
know, we can land that. It's just like God has to deal
with these things. So heaven is God's dwelling
place. It's where God dwells, right?
And to be in hell, like I've said, to be in that place is to
be separated from God. It's like an eternal separation.
You know, the Garden of Eden was a very special place.
You know why it was special when I think about it.
Because God walked there, isn't it What a what a place.
It's not just because it was perfect and it was beautiful and
you know, God said it's very good, but God was there.
God was work walking in the cool of the day.
Do you know what happened when you guys know what happened when
sin came and man fell? What what did God have to do
separate? He had to he had to drive him
out of the garden. You can't be here anymore.
I am wife, you can't be with me anymore.
You're cut off from life. You're cut off from the lights,
from the source of life. You know that he puts a flaming
fire in front of it. Flaming sword.
It's kind of the same picture, isn't it?
It's just like you're not getting in, you're in the fire
now there's there's no getting out.
So it's to be separated from God's presence.
So before, you know, just talking about eternity, you
know, eternity is just like this never ending period.
It's like it's not time. It's like it's not a very, very
long time. It's not like the clock just
keeps going. It's just like there is no time
now. It's forever.
It's eternity. And I was thinking about that
this week. I was like, before death entered
the world, did time mean anything?
Not really. It's just like today's another
day. Do you know what I mean?
Like the sun's going to rise tomorrow and here we are.
It's just like before death came along.
It's like things in the way the way that they were supposed to
be. And as soon as death comes
along, now the clock's ticking. You see what I'm saying?
And so when there's no death, the clock's not ticking anymore.
It's like, like it's just just live, just live and enjoy life
if you're where you need to be. I just thought that was an
interesting thing when I thought about that today during the
week. You know, fear of death is
fearing life ending, isn't it? That's what fear of death is.
It's not just fearing, you know, the things to come.
It's just going, I'm not going to be alive anymore.
And we like to be alive, don't we?
We love, we love life. Life is good.
You know, our life is good because God gave it to us and he
said it's good. It's part of who he is.
Life is good. So we don't fear death because
Jesus has conquered the grave. Revelation one verse 17, it
says, And when I saw him, I feel like his feet is dead.
This is John speaking and it said, but he laid his right hand
on me, saying to me, do not be afraid.
I am the 1st and I am the last. I am him who lives and was dead.
And behold, I am alive forevermore.
Amen. And I take and I have taken the
keys of Hades and of death. This is what Jesus has done for
us. He's taken away the fear of
death. He's taking it out the way.
You're going to have an earthly death here, but we're going to
be resurrected. We're alive in the spirit.
We'll be with him forever. You know, when we leave this
place, we're going to be with the Lord.
Can I just say that I'm not sort of talking about that today, but
when we die as believers, we're going to be with him.
That should stir up some, some hope in US.
You know, many of you are a little older than me, just a
just a just a little bit. But in a sense, you know, like
it's I envy the fact that you might get there first.
I don't know. That's a stupid thing to say in
the natural. That is the dumbest thing that
you could ever say, right? But in God's word to say that,
you know, and Paul said this himself.
He said it's better that I go, but for your sake, I stay.
It's just like I would prefer to be where he is.
And I hope that all of us in this room could say that like, I
would prefer to be where he is. It's not like I want to just end
this and get out of here, sort of, sort of do.
But it's not what I'm saying. Like it's like, we got to be
like Paul, OK, This is my point. It's like we got to be like
Paul. We got to know that, hey, it's
better to be where he is. But Lord, I want to stay here
because because of what? Because of there's people around
me every day who are destined to be separated from the Lord
forever. And I want to stay here and I
want to play my part because I want to see some people saved.
I want to see some people come to know him the way that I've
come to know him. And so don't be in a hurry to
get out of here. You hear me?
You know what I'm saying? And so from Genesis to
Revelation, God's purpose was what was God's purpose through
the Scripture, all through the Scripture.
I'll give you a hint. It says I will be their God and
they will be my people. How often does that come up in
the Scripture? Over and over and over and over.
And what do we see in the Scripture?
We see God creating man and woman.
We see the God walking with them in the garden.
This is great. I will be their God.
They will be my people. And we see a whole bunch of
other stuff in between, but God's constantly saying I will
be their God, they will be my people.
God calls up a nation of Israel. Why?
To reveal himself to the world. I will be their God.
They will be my people. The purpose of God raising up
Israel was so that the nations would know who he was.
Right. And then Jesus has come and
revealed the Father. You know, he says that he's not
just your father now, He's not sorry.
He's not just my father, He's our father.
Do you see what he's saying? He's saying he's, he's
fulfilling this. He's saying, you know, God's
saying I will be their, their Father.
They will be my people. And obviously the Book of
Revelation talks about exactly the same thing.
This is what we're talking about.
Heaven in eternity with him forever.
He will be our Father. We will be his people.
That's an amazing truth. And that is the truth that is
all through the Scripture. If you could believe one thing,
believe that that is the thing that God's trying to get us our
attention to. Believe that everything that
He's done, everything that He will do, everything that He's
planning and all these things is to fulfil His great purpose,
that He would be honoured as God because He is worthy of honour.
You know why? Because He is God.
He created all things. None of us have any existence
outside of what He did. He is worthy of honour, He is
worthy of praise, He is our Lord and we in all eternity will be
sons and daughters of the King and we will have the privilege
of being with him and the privilege of singing it out and
the privilege of of enjoying the things that God has for us.
But we get to do that here. We get to sing praises, we get
to lift Him high, we get to tell others that He is King.
Amen. Amen.
So we tell people. What do we tell people?
Do we tell people that God loves them?
Yes. Is that all we tell them?
What else do we tell him? Yes, we tell him that and we
tell him the rest. So John 316, very famous verse.
You know, you just realized this morning from reading that that
Jesus is talking to Nicodemus. I didn't like, I've never put
two and two together. That's pretty cool.
Anyway, that's just some trivia for you.
It's not trivia. John 316 It says, For God so
loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever
believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting
life. For God did not send His Son
into the world to condemn the world, but that the world
through Him might be saved. God loves you, what else?
All right, let's keep reading verse 18.
He who believes in Him is not condemned.
Catch this. But he who does not believe is
condemned already. Jesus said that because He has
not believed in the name of the only begotten Son.
Do you see what we do with Scripture?
Sometimes we leave out half of it and we say, you know, oh,
John 316, such an amazing verse of God's love.
And it is it's amazing. But then if that's all you tell
someone, you miss the bit where Jesus says, hey, if you believe
that you're saved, If you don't believe that you're condemned
already. It's almost like that's, you
know, that's like you can't speak to people like that.
Jesus. Did you know, like was Jesus out
to save people or not? Yes, of course he was.
He, he, Jesus thought that that was a necessary side to the
gospel to share, right? And so we need to, when we're
sharing the gospel, when we're sharing the truth with people,
we're going to make sure we share it the way that God
presented it. I think that's pretty important,
isn't it? So we can't miss out the the way
people are condemned already. They need a savior.
If they don't understand that they're condemned, what need do
they have of a Savior? It's like, what are you saved
from? You're saved from eternal
separation from condemnation. You're, you're saved from God's
judgement that leads you to a place of separation from him.
That's what salvation is. Oh, we just, you know, I'm
saved. You know, I hoped that people
would be saved. Saved from what?
Saved from judgement. Jesus took the judgement upon
himself. You know that that doesn't
always sound pleasant. It doesn't really sound that
pleasant, does. It doesn't necessarily feel good
to say to someone that you care about, you know, that you're
condemned. You know that God loves you, but
you're condemned that you're dead, that you need some life
and God's willing to give it to you.
That doesn't sound very, you know, pleasant does.
It doesn't feel good necessarily to say that to someone, but it's
not about feeling good. It's not about like what you
know feels good and feels right in our own understanding.
It's about the truth. It's about sharing the truth
with people and letting them decide whether they're going to
get a hold of this or not. Because ultimately our decision
is going to be the thing that's that sends us there.
You know, we could, you know, it's an interesting thing when
you think about that, you know, people would say God doesn't
send anyone to hell. It's kind of true, but it's kind
of not as well because who's going to send them there then?
Because it's like, if someone rejects Christ, I'm not going to
believe that how are they going to get to hell unless God sends
them there. Do you see what I'm saying?
It's like God does send them to hell, but they choose it.
So be careful. Even in our language we like,
we, we don't even like to say that language because it doesn't
sound good. Do you see what I'm saying?
It doesn't necessarily matter. We're going to be tactful in how
we talk to people, but so long as the truth is being
proclaimed, that is more important than us sugar coating
things, fluffing it up a bit, you know, because my, all my
friends, you know, he's a bit of a hard man.
So you know, he's not going to want all this, you know, this
sort of stuff or whatever. So I have to tell him a certain
way and, you know, make it seem a certain way or whatever.
Just tell him the truth and let God, like the Holy Spirit is the
one that saves, right? You and I didn't get saved
through anything other than the Lord doing a work in our heart
and now us receiving it like we made a choice short, but it was
the work of God in here that got in and and it wasn't your
amazing words. It wasn't your your tactfulness
that helped someone receive the gospel.
It was the Spirit of God right God, you know that God chose
you. You know we would say that you
know I with the day that I chose the Lord.
That's not what Jesus said Jesus said I have chosen you.
He said to his disciples. He said I have chosen you.
He said that, you know, that those that the Father gives me,
do you see the language? Do you see how we twist things
up? We're going to be careful of our
language. Anyway, I'm getting sidetracked.
Let's just keep moving. All right, so I'm bringing this
to a close. But again, let me just just
remind us of of the hope that you know what we're hoping to
get out of this in the coming weeks.
Next week's going to be difficult.
Talking about Hell's not fun, but we're just going to relay
the truth of the word of God and let God deal with it.
Do you see what I'm saying? That's what we're going to do
so, but with this is stirring up a reality that all of us must
face. You know, this is, I hope that
this would drive us into having real conversations with people
that don't know him. You know, we can sit around our
tables and we can go and play, you know, with their kids and
stuff like that and have a great time and leave.
But if we're not seeking to have real conversations with those
that we care about, how's the gospel going to come through?
Right. We're going to, we are going to
have to be purposeful in how we go about this.
You know, when we plan to see our friends, be prayerful, be
purposeful. Don't just, oh, you know, we'll
just we'll just see them. We'll see what happens.
Be purposeful. We need to be purposeful in our
meetings. Amen.
All right, because other otherwise nothing happens.
I'm sure you guys know you have these meetings with your friends
and then they leave and you just go, oh, that was sort of bit of
a bit of a non, non, non event. Why?
Well, they're not going to bring it up with you.
Maybe they might, but you know, we know the truth.
If someone doesn't know the truth, how they're going to
bring up the truth with you. So it's us that has to steer in,
in, you know, the conversation in a certain direction.
All right, Can I just say as well, you know, I, I stand here
and I sound really flippant when it comes to life and death.
Death is hard. There's a reality to death that
is very hard for us here. You know, we've said, you know,
we've said goodbye to people that we love and we care for and
we're, you know, we're unsure where they are.
This is tough, man. This is not easy.
And so I just want to, you know, just make sure that we know that
these are real, real things in here.
Yeah, we're all going to face it one day.
And it's not easy, but we do have hope.
And so we just got to make sure that we're living in that hope.
Amen. Awesome.
I just just on this as well. You know when I said that, you
know, you don't know, I've got some friends that are no longer
here, That's tough. How do you land that?
How do you deal with that? You know how you deal?
You got to trust the Lord. You got to trust that He knows
better than you and I, He knows every single person.
He knows it's God's will that all men would be saved, that all
would be saved. That's God's will.
You got to trust that will, like I said before, it's God that
calls he chooses. So you just got to trust that
our loving God, our father, whose whose plan and purpose is
for his to be with him forever. He will sort it out.
He will make sure that you know, he's across this.
I guess we could just got to trust him.
That's what that's all I'm saying.
Don't just like let your your mind race around these things if
it's making you, you know, just if you're losing your comfort,
if you're losing your peace, just give it to the Lord.
Just give it up. Don't try and work it all out.
Amen. Is that OK?
He knows. All right, I'm going to close
with one more scripture here. This is an amazing one.
I love this. I've read this to you before.
This is John 17 verse 17. And it says Jesus spoke these
words. He lifted up his eyes to heaven
and he said, Father, the hour has come, glorify your Son, that
your Son also may glorify you as you have given him authority
over all flesh, that he may give eternal life to as many as you
have given him. And this is eternal life.
This is the one right, and this is eternal life, that they may
know you, the the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have
sent. I've glorified you on the earth.
I've finished the work which you have given me to do.
And now, O Father, glorify me together with yourself, with the
glory with which I had with you before the world was.
Isn't that cool? Jesus was not created.
Jesus is God. Amazing, but that they may know
Him. What is eternal life?
It is the fulfillment of God's plan and purpose.
I will be their God. They will be my people.
Eternal life is knowing Him. And the privilege that we have
as believers now is that we get to live in that reality now.
That is our reality. That is our hope.
That is our peace and one day, even as we started, you know the
verse that I started that you can't comprehend it.
You don't know the things that God has planned.
This is like the you know, again, this is like the what we
have now knowing him is like this sure hope it's this.
It's this like it's the rock that that holds us now to know
that these things are true. But gosh, that stirs
anticipation and faith and joy to know that we will be with him
in a way that we can't comprehend or know now because
I, I experienced God now, you know, in a real way.
And it's wonderful, you know, and when I'm struggling and
when, when I need him, you know what he does, he shows up, he's
that good. And that's amazing.
But one day, do you know that like one day, if we're
privileged enough, we'd be able to give Jesus a hug?
You know, he comes to his disciples and he says touch me.
He says look at my hands and look at and look at my feet.
He says I am flesh and bone. I'm like you resurrected body.
Jesus is a man, Jesus is God. We will get to relate to the
Lord the way that you and I can relate to one another.
I think that's a pretty cool thing, isn't it?
This is like you can't wrap your head around that.
Being able to talk to God, walk with God again.
This is like the Garden of Eden all over again.
Being with God, that is eternal life.
All right, so why don't we just pray together?
I've said enough, but I do hope that this serves us on.
Hey, let's seek the Lord together.
Father, we, we thank you that that we can seek you now and
that you can be found. Lord, I thank you that you're
with us in this place. I thank you, Lord, that you use
us and guide us and shape us and grow us.
You have plan and purpose for us here, Lord.
I pray that that the reality of the truth of heaven and hell of
eternity with you or separated from you will stir us up, Lord.
We'll grip our hearts and it will compel us, Lord.
To be faithful witnesses here on this earth, I even just pray
right now. Holy Spirit, come and empower
us, Lord. Empower us, Lord, we can't do
these things on our own. We pray that you would bear
witness of Your name in US and through US.
Lord, when we pray for others, when we pray for salvation, when
we pray for deliverance, when we pray for healing, we pray, Holy
Spirit, that you would come and touch lives around us, that you
would declare the name of Jesus wherever we go, we want to see
your mighty hand to save. We want to see people around us
come to know you to experience this amazing God.
So Father, we just close today with in just honor of you.
We love you Lord, You are a good, good Father.
We don't question your judgment, we don't question your ways, we
just trust you. We leave it in your mighty hand
and all of these things we pray in Jesus mighty name, Amen.
Thank you for joining us for today's message.
For more information about The Way Church, please visit
ourwebsite@thewaychurch.com dot AU.
Have a blessed day.