He Is Knocking

Revelation 3:20

Following the messages to the seven churches of Asia, which are types of the seven church ages since Pentecost, Christ changes from addressing the churches directly to “any man” in verse 20. Until this point He has ministered directly to the church but now shows us that the last great push before the rapture of the church will be answered by individuals, if not the entire church.

For what cause is Christ standing outside of the heart’s door in this verse? What has caused the church to push the Master to the front porch of our lives instead of allowing Him to dwell freely in the living space of our heart? This final invitation is directed to the individuals within the church at Laodicea, and I believe that we are seeing this fulfillment even now.

In this final hour there is a mixture of covenants in the modern pulpit. The cold tablets of the Law are being preached with force in most sermons, teaching people to work for their righteousness and sanctification. If that was the only message being preached then perhaps some would grow so miserable beneath works that they would long for Christ. Unfortunately, there is just as much preaching on the grace of God along with the ministry of the Law. I say that it is unfortunate because this mixture says that all are saved by grace but then maintain their salvation by individual works of righteousness. This is often referred to as “balance” in many churches, but Christ calls it “mixture”.

He tells Laodicea that because they are “neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth” (Revelation 3:16). Faced with a message of the heat of God’s grace and the coldness of God’s law, the end result will be a lukewarm Christian message. It will be attractive to the sinner because of the grace of God offered freely, but it will quickly become a bondage to the one who is born again.

This combination forces the beautiful presence of Jesus to the front porch of the church, where He then knocks on the door of the church, seeking permission to come back inside. His invitation is extended to “any man”, denoting that in these last days there will be individuals within the modern church system of Laodicea who will answer the call of Jesus Christ and will open up to His wonderful New Covenant.

I see people opening up to the message of pure grace every single day. Individuals who have grown weary beneath the message of works and progressive sanctification are finding rest in the finished work of Jesus Christ. They are opening up to the simplicity of Jesus Christ and Him crucified and they are experiencing the wonder of supping with Him and He with them. This mutual relationship, in which they speak freely to Jesus and He ministers freely to them, has rejuvenated their Christian walk, and there are more and more rising up every day who say as Paul said, “I am not ashamed of the gospel (good news) of Jesus Christ!” (Romans 1:16).

If you have mixed grace with law and are floundering beneath a sea of dead works, listen carefully for the knock of Jesus. He awaits perfect fellowship with you once again. Won’t you open the door today?

What Makes God Sick?

Revelation 3:15, 16

The messages to the seven churches of Asia are messages from Jesus to the church ages. Each church listed existed in the world of that day, but their order speaks to the different era that the body of Christ has gone through since Pentecost. We are now in the final era, listed as the church of Laodicea. Each era overlaps the other, and actually, each era does not end until the rapture of the church.

When Jesus delivers the message to Laodicea, He says that their works are neither cold nor hot (verse 15), and that He would rather them be cold or hot. For most of my life, I heard this passage preached as a warning to “get off the fence” and “stop being apathetic”. Preachers, myself included, denounced any semblance of lukewarm activity, going so far as to say, “Either get fired up for Jesus, or go ahead and backslide”!

I always had a problem with that message, even while I was preaching it. It seemed pretty bad to be lukewarm, neither on fire for God nor all the way backslid from Him, but it certainly seemed better than not even being saved. I could understand God wanting the church to get “on fire”, but to tell them that He would rather them be “cold” seemed a far cry worse than at least having some heat.

When you are fed an interpretation of scripture, you often swallow it and don’t pay much attention to the questions that arise in your heart. You just assume that you are missing some deep theological point that surely time and experience will bring out, even though the text certainly needs more consideration. Finally, as God began to open my heart more and more to the message of His grace and goodness, things like Revelation 3:16 began to clear up.

The hot and the cold are descriptions of temperature. Both are symbolic of something else. The “hot” is equated with fire, and the Holy Spirit fits this description. Jesus is the baptizer with “fire” and the Holy Spirit sat on them at Pentecost as “cloven tongues like as of fire” (Acts 2:3). Anything associated with the New Covenant is of the ministry of the Spirit, thus “hot” (2 Corinthians 3:8).

The “cold” is equated with death, just as a corpse goes cold when it sits, or a stone left alone will retain no heat. The Ten Commandments were written and engraved in stone, thus the “cold” is anything associated with the Old Covenant, or the ministry of death (2 Corinthians 3:7).

Jesus is ministering to Laodicea of its obvious mixture of the Covenants. They are preaching a portion of the New Covenant with God’s grace and love but then trying to balance it with the hammer of the law. What man calls “balance”, God calls “mixture”, and while trying to strike a balance with the Old and the New Covenants, the end result will be a lukewarm mixture that turns the stomach of God.

Jesus declared that you cannot put new wine into old wineskins, for the old wineskins will not hold the new wine (Luke 5:37, 38). The new wine is the New Covenant, with the old wineskin being the Old Covenant. To place the glory of God’s grace within the container of Mosaic Law is to ruin the taste of God’s grace. It is our habit however, because we often prefer works to grace to actually like the sound of the law being preached, over the sound of grace (Luke 5:39).

Either embrace God’s grace which leads to victory or embrace God’s law which will serve as your schoolmaster to lead you to Christ (Galatians 2:24), but never mix the two. This gospel is too important to be lukewarm.

A Revelation of Jesus Christ

Matthew 16:13-19

I am convinced that what we need now more than ever before is a fresh revelation of Jesus Christ. When John saw Jesus on the Isle of Patmos, it put him on his face and pushed his pen to write (Revelation 1:17). There is nothing worth bragging about that is not started by a revelation of the loveliness of Jesus. Paul had a revelation of the New Covenant and concluded, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world” (Galatians 6:14).

Jesus took His disciples to the headwaters of the Jordan near the village of Caesarea Philippi, a city named for Philip, son of Caesar. This city was notorious for sacrificing children to their false god, and the blood of the sacrificial offerings would run into the waters, turning them red. The disciples are watching this red blood float past when Jesus asks them, “Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?” (Matthew 16:13) The disciples have a myriad of answers, but Peter states, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God” (verse 16).

Jesus proclaims a blessing on Peter, “For flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven” (verse 17). The kind of revelation that Peter had was one that could not be had by hearing people talk about the healings and the miracles. No man can be convinced of the power and presence of God without feeling Him for themselves. We are all Thomas at heart; we must thrust our own hand into the Master’s spear pierced side before we will ever believe.

I have preached to countless thousands of people about the saving grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Many have come to know Jesus through this preaching of grace and favor but many have walked away, content to live in their sins. I wish that all would be fully persuaded in their own mind and heart that Jesus was exactly what I preach to them that He is, but that is simply not the case. Without a desire to see God loving them, they will relegate God’s love as a big blanket for the whole world, never seeing themselves as anything special. Millions spend day and night with knowledge no greater than this; all the while gaining more and more earthly intelligence. No degree of higher education; and no life experience can ever fill the void and thirst for knowledge like a heart open to the love of God.

When man hungers and thirsts for the righteousness that is found in Jesus Christ, God is happy to fill that heart. Commission will follow revelation, just as God empowered Peter to preach the first sermon under the New Covenant (Acts 2:14). As we have more of Jesus revealed to us, our commission in this world becomes equally clear.

Jesus is the rock of verse 18 upon which the church is built as this verse is a bit of a play on words. Peter means “stone” in Greek, and Jesus is of course “the Rock”. Though we are but stones, Jesus remains the rock and His church is powerful enough to take on hell, thus the reference to gates. Peter holds no higher place than any believer does today. You are built on the same Rock that He was, and in Christ, you have the same revelation.

Come, Lord Jesus!

Revelation 22:17-19

Oh the joy that John must have felt as he received the Revelation of Jesus Christ! The apostle was already identified as “the disciple whom Jesus loved” because he recognized the love that Jesus had for him, but to see the incarnate, glorified Christ and then catch a glimpse of the future of planet earth must have been overwhelming.

On closing the book of Revelation, John wishes for Jesus to come quickly (Revelation 22:20). All that he has seen has not caused him to wish that Christ would delay his return, which would be the natural response if believers were going to go through the horrendous events of Revelation. Instead, knowing that the church will be removed so that these things can come to pass, John invites Christ to come back as soon as possible.

The visions of the Revelation were so awe inspiring that John claims both the Holy Spirit and the bride (church) ask for Jesus to come (Revelation 22:17). This is interesting, because it shows that the Holy Spirit on this earth is longing for Jesus to come and take the church home. We may feel ready to begin our eternity in heaven, but can we imagine how the Holy Spirit longs for this to end? Just as the Spirit and the church long for Christ’s return, John longed for any that was thirsty for Jesus to come now, while there is time to “take the water of life freely” (Revelation 22:17).

A couple of oft quoted verses come next in this chapter, both warnings of doom and judgment. Verse 18 warns that no man should add anything to the contents of Revelation, and verse 19 furthers it by adding that no man shall take away from the words of this book. This warning is to keep us from reading too much into or from taking away from the importance of this great Revelation. This book falls at the end of the New Testament, not just because the events are largely futuristic, but because they are in the deeper end of the knowledge of the redeemed. Unfortunately, many new converts jump right into Revelation with no foundation on the grace of God to help them. This causes some to add and take away from the revelatory power of this book. Let each one of us find the truths of this book as we grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ.

The original Greek rendering of verse 19 also clears the clouds a bit about a popular, but untrue teaching. The text reads “God shall take away his part out of the book of life”, but the Greek actually says “God shall take away his share of the tree of life”. The difference is crucial, because the first rendering brings a doctrine into the church that God has a cosmic book that contains all names and that some are being erased or blotted out, while others are being re-written and added back based upon the way that they are living. God has no such book, for His redemption is paid for in blood, not in works. Do not fear, He is not removing your name from “the book”!

Just as John prayed for Christ to come soon, I pray the same; not because life is miserable here, but because He is so great, and when we see Him, “we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:3).

No More Curse

Revelation 22:1-4

What a beautiful scene is laid out in front of us in this text. The pure river of water of life flowing from beneath the throne of God, with the Lamb Jesus sitting there as well; all of it a picture of God’s wonderful provision and love. It takes place in the new Paradise, known as New Jerusalem on the New Earth which is our eternal home. God’s provision, as wonderful then as it is now, provides living water and trees which are “for the healing of the nations” (Revelation 22:2).

There will also be no more curse on this New Earth. The earth that we occupy dwells under a constant curse of death. When Adam sinned in the Garden, God told him that from that day forward, “cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground” (Genesis 3:17-19). God also multiplied a woman’s sorrow in conception and cursed her to dependence on her husband, with him being over her. There was also an obvious separation placed between man and beast, as before the fall, Adam had perfect interaction with them.

Death is the most obvious result of the curse, as all of us will meet that same fate someday. When Christ died at Calvary, He became the curse for us so that we could live in the blessings. His death at the cross conquered the entire universe, but He has yet to take claim of all that He conquered, choosing instead to allow time to pass so that more people will accept His payment.

The author of Hebrews wrote that Jesus offered one sacrifice for sins forever and then sat down on the right hand of God. From that moment forward, that same Jesus is waiting as one-by-one, all of His enemies are made His footstool, meaning that Jesus is resting His feet over the forces of darkness, but He has yet to put all things there (Hebrews 10:12, 13). The very last thing that He will slide up under His victorious, nail-scarred feet will be death, thus finishing the curse (1 Corinthians 15:26).

The scene of Revelation 22 also shows us that the name of Jesus will be written in the foreheads of the redeemed for eternity. We will bear a mark on us that identifies us with Him, and this is the opposite of the mark of the curse of this world. Satan will duplicate this action during the Great Tribulation with what we refer to as “The Mark of the Beast”, but where his denotes a curse, God’s denotes a blessing.

This action of the marked forehead providing the cure from the curse was first introduced in Genesis 4, when God told the murderous Cain, “Now art thou cursed from the earth” (Genesis 4:11). Cain complained that his punishment was greater that he could bear and he appealed to God for help. God, who is rich in mercy, marked Cain in the forehead so that anyone who saw him would not kill him. What could God have placed on the forehead of Cain that would make a potential killer back away? It must be something that identified Cain as being protected from God, for the curse shrinks away from the life-giver. Just as we are marked in the New Earth, Cain was marked in the old one. Thank God for His wonderful grace and mercy!

No More Tears in Heaven

Revelation 21:4-6

Three things jump out at me from these three verses regarding our future residence in New Jerusalem. One is “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes” (verse 4); then “I make all things new” (verse 5), and finally, “It is done” (verse 6).

“God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes” is a reference to God finishing His work on the earth. For those who enter into the New Jerusalem they will never cry again, nor experience death or sorrow or any more pain. All things that plagued us before will be gone, for the old earth and its curse will have been removed. I like the promise that we will never cry again for all of our losses and hurts. Why would any of us even have tears in our eyes when we stand before an Almighty God? I think that it will have something to do with how great that He is when we see Him, and possibly we will cringe and cry when we remember how small that we made God, and how angry and how distant.

“I make all things new” is a promise that the new heaven will not be a stagnant place that we will become accustomed to and eventually bored with. Christ will always be creating wonderful and bountiful things for His beautiful bride to enjoy. I remember this line being used by Jesus in the film, “Passion of the Christ” when He is carrying His cross up Calvary’s hill. There is no biblical indication that He actually said that on the way to the cross, but His death there was certainly paying for the right to say it!

“It is done” guarantees that the whole of the redemption plan is accomplished. Jesus cried “It is finished” at the cross, and all has been finished every since, but the future events of Bible prophecy are yet to come to pass. Though already “finished” in heaven, they are yet to be “done” here on earth. When God is “done”, you and I will place our hands on our heavenly inheritance (verse 7), and we will drink of His fountain forever (verse 6).

Take these three glorious prophecies and reevaluate your own personal perception of your heavenly Father. See God now as you will see Him then. Make Him a big God, with boundless love, ready to bless His people and show them all of heaven’s mercies. When you stand before Him then, may He be just as big and wonderful as you believed that He was in this lifetime.

As He will make things new in heaven, may you know that He has made things new even now! All of your old is gone and your new is in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17). If you see remnants of the old still lingering in your life, don’t fret, just rest in His finished work and let the Holy Spirit glorify Jesus.

Finally, see God as a finisher, not someone who is catching up. Too often, we see God as responding to the attacks of the enemy, but it is actually the other way around. Satan stirs when God has spoken and it is to frighten us away from where God wants us to be. God has done the work and Jesus has paid the price. Any fears and anxieties that come over you are a blatant attack of the devil to dissuade you from God’s intended plan. See your Father as having it all in His hands, and you will see His concern for you.

He Is Knocking

Revelation 3:20

Following the messages to the seven churches of Asia, which are types of the seven church ages since Pentecost, Christ changes from addressing the churches directly to “any man” in verse 20. Until this point He has ministered directly to the church but now shows us that the last great push before the rapture of the church will be answered by individuals, if not the entire church.

For what cause is Christ standing outside of the heart’s door in this verse? What has caused the church to push the Master to the front porch of our lives instead of allowing Him to dwell freely in the living space of our heart? This final invitation is directed to the individuals within the church at Laodicea, and I believe that we are seeing this fulfillment even now.

In this final hour there is a mixture of covenants in the modern pulpit. The cold tablets of the Law are being preached with force in most sermons, teaching people to work for their righteousness and sanctification. If that was the only message being preached then perhaps some would grow so miserable beneath works that they would long for Christ. Unfortunately, there is just as much preaching on the grace of God along with the ministry of the Law. I say that it is unfortunate because this mixture says that all are saved by grace but then maintain their salvation by individual works of righteousness. This is often referred to as “balance” in many churches, but Christ calls it “mixture”.

He tells Laodicea that because they are “neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth” (Revelation 3:16). Faced with a message of the heat of God’s grace and the coldness of God’s law, the end result will be a lukewarm Christian message. It will be attractive to the sinner because of the grace of God offered freely, but it will quickly become a bondage to the one who is born again.

This combination forces the beautiful presence of Jesus to the front porch of the church, where He then knocks on the door of the church, seeking permission to come back inside. His invitation is extended to “any man”, denoting that in these last days there will be individuals within the modern church system of Laodicea who will answer the call of Jesus Christ and will open up to His wonderful New Covenant.

I see people opening up to the message of pure grace every single day. Individuals who have grown weary beneath the message of works and progressive sanctification are finding rest in the finished work of Jesus Christ. They are opening up to the simplicity of Jesus Christ and Him crucified and they are experiencing the wonder of supping with Him and He with them. This mutual relationship, in which they speak freely to Jesus and He ministers freely to them, has rejuvenated their Christian walk, and there are more and more rising up every day who say as Paul said, “I am not ashamed of the gospel (good news) of Jesus Christ!” (Romans 1:16).

If you have mixed grace with law and are floundering beneath a sea of dead works, listen carefully for the knock of Jesus. He awaits perfect fellowship with you once again. Won’t you open the door today?

What Makes God Sick?

Revelation 3:15, 16

The messages to the seven churches of Asia are messages from Jesus to the church ages. Each church listed existed in the world of that day, but their order speaks to the different era that the body of Christ has gone through since Pentecost. We are now in the final era, listed as the church of Laodicea. Each era overlaps the other, and actually, each era does not end until the rapture of the church.

When Jesus delivers the message to Laodicea, He says that their works are neither cold nor hot (verse 15), and that He would rather them be cold or hot. For most of my life, I heard this passage preached as a warning to “get off the fence” and “stop being apathetic”. Preachers, myself included, denounced any semblance of lukewarm activity, going so far as to say, “Either get fired up for Jesus, or go ahead and backslide”!

I always had a problem with that message, even while I was preaching it. It seemed pretty bad to be lukewarm, neither on fire for God nor all the way backslid from Him, but it certainly seemed better than not even being saved. I could understand God wanting the church to get “on fire”, but to tell them that He would rather them be “cold” seemed a far cry worse than at least having some heat.

When you are fed an interpretation of scripture, you often swallow it and don’t pay much attention to the questions that arise in your heart. You just assume that you are missing some deep theological point that surely time and experience will bring out, even though the text certainly needs more consideration. Finally, as God began to open my heart more and more to the message of His grace and goodness, things like Revelation 3:16 began to clear up.

The hot and the cold are descriptions of temperature. Both are symbolic of something else. The “hot” is equated with fire, and the Holy Spirit fits this description. Jesus is the baptizer with “fire” and the Holy Spirit sat on them at Pentecost as “cloven tongues like as of fire” (Acts 2:3). Anything associated with the New Covenant is of the ministry of the Spirit, thus “hot” (2 Corinthians 3:8).

The “cold” is equated with death, just as a corpse goes cold when it sits, or a stone left alone will retain no heat. The Ten Commandments were written and engraved in stone, thus the “cold” is anything associated with the Old Covenant, or the ministry of death (2 Corinthians 3:7).

Jesus is ministering to Laodicea of its obvious mixture of the Covenants. They are preaching a portion of the New Covenant with God’s grace and love but then trying to balance it with the hammer of the law. What man calls “balance”, God calls “mixture”, and while trying to strike a balance with the Old and the New Covenants, the end result will be a lukewarm mixture that turns the stomach of God.

Jesus declared that you cannot put new wine into old wineskins, for the old wineskins will not hold the new wine (Luke 5:37, 38). The new wine is the New Covenant, with the old wineskin being the Old Covenant. To place the glory of God’s grace within the container of Mosaic Law is to ruin the taste of God’s grace. It is our habit however, because we often prefer works to grace to actually like the sound of the law being preached, over the sound of grace (Luke 5:39).

Either embrace God’s grace which leads to victory or embrace God’s law which will serve as your schoolmaster to lead you to Christ (Galatians 2:24), but never mix the two. This gospel is too important to be lukewarm.

A Revelation of Jesus Christ

Matthew 16:13-19

I am convinced that what we need now more than ever before is a fresh revelation of Jesus Christ. When John saw Jesus on the Isle of Patmos, it put him on his face and pushed his pen to write (Revelation 1:17). There is nothing worth bragging about that is not started by a revelation of the loveliness of Jesus. Paul had a revelation of the New Covenant and concluded, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world” (Galatians 6:14).

Jesus took His disciples to the headwaters of the Jordan near the village of Caesarea Philippi, a city named for Philip, son of Caesar. This city was notorious for sacrificing children to their false god, and the blood of the sacrificial offerings would run into the waters, turning them red. The disciples are watching this red blood float past when Jesus asks them, “Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?” (Matthew 16:13) The disciples have a myriad of answers, but Peter states, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God” (verse 16).

Jesus proclaims a blessing on Peter, “For flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven” (verse 17). The kind of revelation that Peter had was one that could not be had by hearing people talk about the healings and the miracles. No man can be convinced of the power and presence of God without feeling Him for themselves. We are all Thomas at heart; we must thrust our own hand into the Master’s spear pierced side before we will ever believe.

I have preached to countless thousands of people about the saving grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Many have come to know Jesus through this preaching of grace and favor but many have walked away, content to live in their sins. I wish that all would be fully persuaded in their own mind and heart that Jesus was exactly what I preach to them that He is, but that is simply not the case. Without a desire to see God loving them, they will relegate God’s love as a big blanket for the whole world, never seeing themselves as anything special. Millions spend day and night with knowledge no greater than this; all the while gaining more and more earthly intelligence. No degree of higher education; and no life experience can ever fill the void and thirst for knowledge like a heart open to the love of God.

When man hungers and thirsts for the righteousness that is found in Jesus Christ, God is happy to fill that heart. Commission will follow revelation, just as God empowered Peter to preach the first sermon under the New Covenant (Acts 2:14). As we have more of Jesus revealed to us, our commission in this world becomes equally clear.

Jesus is the rock of verse 18 upon which the church is built as this verse is a bit of a play on words. Peter means “stone” in Greek, and Jesus is of course “the Rock”. Though we are but stones, Jesus remains the rock and His church is powerful enough to take on hell, thus the reference to gates. Peter holds no higher place than any believer does today. You are built on the same Rock that He was, and in Christ, you have the same revelation.

Come, Lord Jesus!

Revelation 22:17-19

Oh the joy that John must have felt as he received the Revelation of Jesus Christ! The apostle was already identified as “the disciple whom Jesus loved” because he recognized the love that Jesus had for him, but to see the incarnate, glorified Christ and then catch a glimpse of the future of planet earth must have been overwhelming.

On closing the book of Revelation, John wishes for Jesus to come quickly (Revelation 22:20). All that he has seen has not caused him to wish that Christ would delay his return, which would be the natural response if believers were going to go through the horrendous events of Revelation. Instead, knowing that the church will be removed so that these things can come to pass, John invites Christ to come back as soon as possible.

The visions of the Revelation were so awe inspiring that John claims both the Holy Spirit and the bride (church) ask for Jesus to come (Revelation 22:17). This is interesting, because it shows that the Holy Spirit on this earth is longing for Jesus to come and take the church home. We may feel ready to begin our eternity in heaven, but can we imagine how the Holy Spirit longs for this to end? Just as the Spirit and the church long for Christ’s return, John longed for any that was thirsty for Jesus to come now, while there is time to “take the water of life freely” (Revelation 22:17).

A couple of oft quoted verses come next in this chapter, both warnings of doom and judgment. Verse 18 warns that no man should add anything to the contents of Revelation, and verse 19 furthers it by adding that no man shall take away from the words of this book. This warning is to keep us from reading too much into or from taking away from the importance of this great Revelation. This book falls at the end of the New Testament, not just because the events are largely futuristic, but because they are in the deeper end of the knowledge of the redeemed. Unfortunately, many new converts jump right into Revelation with no foundation on the grace of God to help them. This causes some to add and take away from the revelatory power of this book. Let each one of us find the truths of this book as we grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ.

The original Greek rendering of verse 19 also clears the clouds a bit about a popular, but untrue teaching. The text reads “God shall take away his part out of the book of life”, but the Greek actually says “God shall take away his share of the tree of life”. The difference is crucial, because the first rendering brings a doctrine into the church that God has a cosmic book that contains all names and that some are being erased or blotted out, while others are being re-written and added back based upon the way that they are living. God has no such book, for His redemption is paid for in blood, not in works. Do not fear, He is not removing your name from “the book”!

Just as John prayed for Christ to come soon, I pray the same; not because life is miserable here, but because He is so great, and when we see Him, “we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:3).

No More Curse

Revelation 22:1-4

What a beautiful scene is laid out in front of us in this text. The pure river of water of life flowing from beneath the throne of God, with the Lamb Jesus sitting there as well; all of it a picture of God’s wonderful provision and love. It takes place in the new Paradise, known as New Jerusalem on the New Earth which is our eternal home. God’s provision, as wonderful then as it is now, provides living water and trees which are “for the healing of the nations” (Revelation 22:2).

There will also be no more curse on this New Earth. The earth that we occupy dwells under a constant curse of death. When Adam sinned in the Garden, God told him that from that day forward, “cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground” (Genesis 3:17-19). God also multiplied a woman’s sorrow in conception and cursed her to dependence on her husband, with him being over her. There was also an obvious separation placed between man and beast, as before the fall, Adam had perfect interaction with them.

Death is the most obvious result of the curse, as all of us will meet that same fate someday. When Christ died at Calvary, He became the curse for us so that we could live in the blessings. His death at the cross conquered the entire universe, but He has yet to take claim of all that He conquered, choosing instead to allow time to pass so that more people will accept His payment.

The author of Hebrews wrote that Jesus offered one sacrifice for sins forever and then sat down on the right hand of God. From that moment forward, that same Jesus is waiting as one-by-one, all of His enemies are made His footstool, meaning that Jesus is resting His feet over the forces of darkness, but He has yet to put all things there (Hebrews 10:12, 13). The very last thing that He will slide up under His victorious, nail-scarred feet will be death, thus finishing the curse (1 Corinthians 15:26).

The scene of Revelation 22 also shows us that the name of Jesus will be written in the foreheads of the redeemed for eternity. We will bear a mark on us that identifies us with Him, and this is the opposite of the mark of the curse of this world. Satan will duplicate this action during the Great Tribulation with what we refer to as “The Mark of the Beast”, but where his denotes a curse, God’s denotes a blessing.

This action of the marked forehead providing the cure from the curse was first introduced in Genesis 4, when God told the murderous Cain, “Now art thou cursed from the earth” (Genesis 4:11). Cain complained that his punishment was greater that he could bear and he appealed to God for help. God, who is rich in mercy, marked Cain in the forehead so that anyone who saw him would not kill him. What could God have placed on the forehead of Cain that would make a potential killer back away? It must be something that identified Cain as being protected from God, for the curse shrinks away from the life-giver. Just as we are marked in the New Earth, Cain was marked in the old one. Thank God for His wonderful grace and mercy!

No More Tears in Heaven

Revelation 21:4-6

Three things jump out at me from these three verses regarding our future residence in New Jerusalem. One is “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes” (verse 4); then “I make all things new” (verse 5), and finally, “It is done” (verse 6).

“God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes” is a reference to God finishing His work on the earth. For those who enter into the New Jerusalem they will never cry again, nor experience death or sorrow or any more pain. All things that plagued us before will be gone, for the old earth and its curse will have been removed. I like the promise that we will never cry again for all of our losses and hurts. Why would any of us even have tears in our eyes when we stand before an Almighty God? I think that it will have something to do with how great that He is when we see Him, and possibly we will cringe and cry when we remember how small that we made God, and how angry and how distant.

“I make all things new” is a promise that the new heaven will not be a stagnant place that we will become accustomed to and eventually bored with. Christ will always be creating wonderful and bountiful things for His beautiful bride to enjoy. I remember this line being used by Jesus in the film, “Passion of the Christ” when He is carrying His cross up Calvary’s hill. There is no biblical indication that He actually said that on the way to the cross, but His death there was certainly paying for the right to say it!

“It is done” guarantees that the whole of the redemption plan is accomplished. Jesus cried “It is finished” at the cross, and all has been finished every since, but the future events of Bible prophecy are yet to come to pass. Though already “finished” in heaven, they are yet to be “done” here on earth. When God is “done”, you and I will place our hands on our heavenly inheritance (verse 7), and we will drink of His fountain forever (verse 6).

Take these three glorious prophecies and reevaluate your own personal perception of your heavenly Father. See God now as you will see Him then. Make Him a big God, with boundless love, ready to bless His people and show them all of heaven’s mercies. When you stand before Him then, may He be just as big and wonderful as you believed that He was in this lifetime.

As He will make things new in heaven, may you know that He has made things new even now! All of your old is gone and your new is in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17). If you see remnants of the old still lingering in your life, don’t fret, just rest in His finished work and let the Holy Spirit glorify Jesus.

Finally, see God as a finisher, not someone who is catching up. Too often, we see God as responding to the attacks of the enemy, but it is actually the other way around. Satan stirs when God has spoken and it is to frighten us away from where God wants us to be. God has done the work and Jesus has paid the price. Any fears and anxieties that come over you are a blatant attack of the devil to dissuade you from God’s intended plan. See your Father as having it all in His hands, and you will see His concern for you.

He is Knocking

Revelation 3:20

Following the messages to the seven churches of Asia, which are types of the seven church ages since Pentecost, Christ changes from addressing the churches directly to “any man” in verse 20. Until this point He has ministered directly to the church but now shows us that the last great push before the rapture of the church will be answered by individuals, if not the entire church.

For what cause is Christ standing outside of the heart’s door in this verse? What has caused the church to push the Master to the front porch of our lives instead of allowing Him to dwell freely in the living space of our heart? This final invitation is directed to the individuals within the church at Laodicea, and I believe that we are seeing this fulfillment even now.

In this final hour there is a mixture of covenants in the modern pulpit. The cold tablets of the Law are being preached with force in most sermons, teaching people to work for their righteousness and sanctification. If that was the only message being preached then that would serve to work as a schoolmaster which would lead people to frustration, turning them to the hope afforded them by Jesus Christ (Galatians 3:24). Unfortunately, there is just as much preaching on the grace of God along with the ministry of the Law. I say that it is unfortunate because this mixture says that all are saved by grace but then maintain their salvation by individual works of righteousness. This is often referred to as “balance” in many churches, but Christ calls it “mixture”.

He tells Laodicea that because they are “neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth” (Revelation 3:16). Faced with a message of the heat of God’s grace and the coldness of God’s law, the end result will be a lukewarm Christian message. It will be attractive to the sinner because of the grace of God offered freely, but it will quickly become a bondage to the one who is born again.

This combination forces the beautiful presence of Jesus to the front porch of the church, where He then knocks on the door of the church, seeking permission to come back inside. His invitation is extended to “any man”, denoting that in these last days there will be individuals within the modern church system of Laodicea who will answer the call of Jesus Christ and will open up to His wonderful New Covenant.

I see people opening up to the message of pure grace every single day. Individuals who have grown weary beneath the message of works and progressive sanctification are finding rest in the finished work of Jesus Christ. They are opening up to the simplicity of Jesus Christ and Him crucified and they are experiencing the wonder of supping with Him and He with them. This mutual relationship, in which they speak freely to Jesus and He ministers freely to them, has rejuvenated their Christian walk, and there are more and more rising up every day who say as Paul said, “I am not ashamed of the gospel (good news) of Jesus Christ!” (Romans 1:16).

If you have mixed grace with law and are floundering beneath a sea of dead works, listen carefully for the knock of Jesus. He awaits perfect fellowship with you once again. Won’t you open the door today?

What Makes God Sick?

Revelation 3:15, 16

The messages to the seven churches of Asia are messages from Jesus to the church ages. Each church listed existed in the world of that day, but their order speaks to the different era that the body of Christ has gone through since Pentecost. We are now in the final era, listed as the church of Laodicea. Each era overlaps the other, and actually, each era does not end until the rapture of the church.

When Jesus delivers the message to Laodicea, He says that their works are neither cold nor hot (verse 15), and that He would rather them be cold or hot. For most of my life, I heard this passage preached as a warning to “get off the fence” and “stop being apathetic”. Preachers, myself included, denounced any semblance of lukewarm activity, going so far as to say, “Either get fired up for Jesus, or go ahead and backslide”!

I always had a problem with that message, even while I was preaching it. It seemed pretty bad to be lukewarm, neither on fire for God nor all the way backslid from Him, but it certainly seemed better than not even being saved. I could understand God wanting the church to get “on fire”, but to tell them that He would rather them be “cold” seemed a far cry worse than at least having some heat.

When you are fed an interpretation of scripture, you often swallow it and don’t pay much attention to the questions that arise in your heart. You just assume that you are missing some deep theological point that surely time and experience will bring out, even though the text certainly needs more consideration. Finally, as God began to open my heart more and more to the message of His grace and goodness, things like Revelation 3:16 began to clear up.

The hot and the cold are descriptions of temperature. Both are symbolic of something else. The “hot” is equated with fire, and the Holy Spirit fits this description. Jesus is the baptizer with “fire” and the Holy Spirit sat on them at Pentecost as “cloven tongues like as of fire” (Acts 2:3). Anything associated with the New Covenant is of the ministry of the Spirit, thus “hot” (2 Corinthians 3:8).

The “cold” is equated with death, just as a corpse goes cold when it sits, or a stone left alone will retain no heat. The Ten Commandments were written and engraved in stone, thus the “cold” is anything associated with the Old Covenant, or the ministry of death (2 Corinthians 3:7).

Jesus is ministering to Laodicea of its obvious mixture of the Covenants. They are preaching a portion of the New Covenant with God’s grace and love but then trying to balance it with the hammer of the law. What man calls “balance”, God calls “mixture”, and while trying to strike a balance with the Old and the New Covenants, the end result will be a lukewarm mixture that turns the stomach of God.

Jesus declared that you cannot put new wine into old wineskins, for the old wineskins will not hold the new wine (Luke 5:37, 38). The new wine is the New Covenant, with the old wineskin being the Old Covenant. To place the glory of God’s grace within the container of Mosaic Law is to ruin the taste of God’s grace. It is our habit however, because we often prefer works to grace to actually like the sound of the law being preached, over the sound of grace (Luke 5:39).

Either embrace God’s grace which leads to victory or embrace God’s law which will serve as your schoolmaster to lead you to Christ (Galatians 2:24), but never mix the two. This gospel is too important to be lukewarm.