So we're wrapping up our study of Revelation, which means we're in chapter 22 of that book. And it's the last words that God has to say in his Bible. And we always talk about people that they passed away, and it's like, well, their last words were this, or their last words were that, because they should have some significance. And this text certainly has some. significance to it. The Bible begins with God, you know, in the beginning was God, and we go into the whole story of the garden, the fall, and then the long story of redemption that God accomplished. And now we get to Revelation, and now to chapter 22, to see God's people with God in glory. So I'm going to start out with prayer. And then I just look at verses 1 to 5. Verses 1 to 5 really tie into chapter 21. If I had more time last week, I would have just kept on racing through to the end of chapter, verse 5 and chapter 22. So we're still in these verses looking at the new Jerusalem that came down from heaven. So kind of getting a new, deeper view of it. But let me pray for the word. Our Father and our God, we pause before we read your word to ask your blessing on it. Lord, your word is mighty, it's powerful, it's sharp. Lord, but we're at times dull and inattentive. So we pray that you do a work in us, Lord, that we would have ears that are open and can hear, and minds that can comprehend and understand, hearts that can receive and rejoice your word. And we thank you, Lord, in Jesus' name. Amen. So let me just read the five verses here. And I think last week I said, it kind of speaks for itself, but I'll try to unpack a little bit here. And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, was the Tree of Life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and his servants shall serve him. They shall see his face, and his name shall be on their foreheads. There shall be no night there, They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light, and they shall reign forever and ever. Some of that you probably think, well, it sounds a little bit like what we read in chapter 21 and elsewhere in the book, and it does. Some of it's repetitive for emphasis, I believe. But just to unpack it a little bit, it starts out and says, and he showed me. And then the student of the Bible goes, who showed me? Right. So we have to go back to Revelation 21 verse 9, where it talked about who was showing them these things. And it says, then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls filled with the seven last plagues came to me and talked with me saying, come, I will show you. The bride, the lamb's wife, and this angel is taking John on this visual tour and telling him things. And that's who's showing him. And what does he show him? where he sees a pure river of water of life, the water of life. And that's a theme you see throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament. And I'll poke around with a few scripture verses just so we can kind of underscore what this is really talking about here. So the source of this pure crystal-like river is the throne of God and the Lamb. The source, the fountain, is the throne. This is all proceeding from God himself. It's a little tough in the New King James. I read you out of my New King James. And some of the other translations probably are picking it up a little bit better, but the idea is that this crystal river of the water of life is flowing from the throne of God and basically is going down Main Street. It doesn't quite read like that in the New King James, but that's the picture in the original language. And you can imagine this crystal clear water and this vision, and then the streets being made of gold, what that might look like. to look down through this clear water to see the gold pavement beneath. Just get a little bit of a picture in your mind of what John's envisioning here. The focus in the text, though, isn't so much here, not that it's insignificant, but the focus is not so much the throne, The focus is on life, right? And this water, this river of the water of life is feeding the tree of life, right? So it's getting its nourishment from this water that's flowing from the throne of God. Well, we see that theme in the New Testament quite a bit about the water of life, right? And Jesus is the one who did most of the teaching on it, but it's elsewhere too. In John 4, and I know this is familiar text, but I want you to listen to it in context with Revelation here. In John 4, when Jesus is having that conversation with the Samaritan woman, and in that conversation, and I'll pick it up in verse 10, Jesus answered and said to her, If you knew the gift of God and who it is who says to you, give me a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water. The woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?" And the answer is, yeah, I am greater than Jacob. But Jesus answered and said to her in verse 13, Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again. But whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water, springing up into everlasting life." That's the picture on Revelation. is that we have continual access to the pure, crystal-like living water, the water of life. The tree of life, we'll look at it in a minute, but we have access to this water. It's a picture of the Spirit of God inhabiting us and a picture of us being reborn. We were spiritually dead, Ephesians says. And God, in his mercy, brought us back to life through a work of the Spirit, right? When we repent and put our faith in Jesus Christ. That's the picture here. A couple other texts, in John 7, and this is again Jesus, it says in verse 37, that on the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out saying, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. It's the same picture here, right? And Jesus makes that open invitation. He didn't pick people out. He's basically, if you will, jumping up on a stone and just shouting out to the crowd. Anybody that's thirsty, anybody, if you come to me to drink, but you have to come to me to get the living water. And anybody that comes to him on his terms, he receives and accepts and we get that fresh living water. That's the picture. And John 10.10 says, Jesus again teaching, the thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly. And you guys probably know, because you're students of the Bible, that that's coming from the Greek word. I said I wasn't going to do it, but I'm going to give one Greek word. Zoe, it's spiritual life. Jesus says, I came to give you spiritual life. But we have to come to him and ask him for that water, which is his very self. We have to come to him. And a lot of what we see in this final chapter of Revelation 22 is giving us a picture, we'll see as we move on, of the finality of the end of things when either you're in or you're out. And the call in the chapter is, but today's the day of grace. Come to Jesus now. Receive the water now, is really the call, the beckoning of chapter 22 of Revelation. We saw in Revelation 7, verse 16, where it says of the, well, let me just read it to you, 16 and 17. They shall neither hunger anymore, nor thirst anymore. The sun shall not strike them, nor any heat for the lamb who is in the midst of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to living fountains of waters. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. It's the Lord Jesus who is the living water, but he provides in this symbolism a picture of we're going to always have access to this living water in glory. And then we see the water is feeding, the picture gives us the tree of life. Again, my New King James puts trees into the plural. Some of the other translations going with earlier manuscripts don't put it into plural. I woke up this morning a little bit early and Karen and I were looking through the internet trying to find people like artist renditions of what this might have looked like. And there's a couple of really good ones out there, just beautiful pictures, where the tree's coming down and branches out, and the roots are on either side of this river, but the roots are rolling into the river from both sides. It's kind of the picture it's giving in the Book of Revelation. I don't know that there's tons of significance to all that. It's more that the water is flowing from the throne of God, and there's this tree of life again. Kendall Easley, who is the author of the Holman Commentary on Revelation, he had this insight, and I think he's going in the right direction with it. He says, John's vision of the New Jerusalem concludes with a few details from the center of the city, the throne, the river, and tree. The nearer he gets to the center of the city, the less like a city it seems, and more like a garden, something surpassing the original Garden of Eden. And so I'm not a city guy. So when I read the symbolism about the city, I'm sure if it's that kind of a cube city and God's there, I'll rejoice in it forever. Hopefully, it's not like the cities I've been in in the United States. But when you start talking to me about being in a garden, like at the center of the city, and now the symbolism turns to the water, the river, the tree, the throne, now you're talking my language. I'm like, OK, I can get into that, a Garden of Eden kind of atmosphere, whatever glory truly is going to be, a lot of symbolism in the book. Taking you back to Genesis for a minute, and Genesis 3.22, it says, then the Lord God said, behold, the man has become like one of us, to no good and evil. And now lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat and live forever, Therefore, the Lord God sent him out of the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken. He was cast east of Eden. And if you remember, there's an angel sent with a flaming sword to block the pathway back to that tree of life. But now we have the tree of life in our midst. The picture is we have free access to this tree of life. Revelation 2.7, He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, I will give to eat from the tree of life which is in the midst of the paradise of God. And the word paradise usually is translating a Greek word that means garden. The garden paradise. God, the lamb, the throne, comes the water, feeds the tree, and then the tree itself has fruits. and leaves. And I don't know how deeply that symbolism goes, other than some of the commentators say, well, there'll be food in the lorry. That'll make foodie people that like to eat happy, because there's fruit there. It's a picture of variety. There's 12 different kinds of fruit. Every month, it's coming onto the tree. I don't think it's all there's going to be, but that's some of the symbolism I think that's tucked in there. But even the tree's leaves. are for the healing of the nations. Which leads a lot of people to say, well, why do we need healing leaves if we're in perfection and glory? And maybe this is the idea. A keist maker said, the tree in the renewed paradise provides healing for the nations, which means that its inhabitants can enjoy eternal life free from physical and spiritual needs. Everything's been provided for us, in other words, in glory. It's all there. There'll be no pain. There'll be no disease. There'll be no sickness. There'll be no death. And just to assure us, there is a tree that heals. The leaves have healing powers, but we're going to be perfected. So I think that's some of the symbolism there. In verse 3, it says in this glorious state in the New Jerusalem that God's servants shall serve him. And that's us. That's us. We're God's servants. Even God's angels will serve him. And we're going to be there, maybe working side by side with angels and all kinds of creatures we haven't even been introduced yet to that God created for his own glory's sake. And we'll be serving God. It tells us that there's great activity in heaven and glory. Great activity. We'll have eternal purposes and usefulness, right? And we're made that way, beloved. I mean, that's just the way God designed human beings. You know, we really can fall into depression if we don't feel like we're being utilized and doing something useful for me, for the community, for the church, for my workplace, my family, that somehow I'm being productive and useful. And it's going to be blissful, joyous servitude to a perfect master, the Lord Jesus Christ, for all of eternity. So that makes me happy, that it says that we will serve Him in whatever capacity He'll have us to do. And then you get this in verse 4, that in this place, those that go to be in glory when the new Jerusalem descends, that they shall see His face. And that's a significant thought. They shall see His face. Jesus taught a little something in Matthew 18.10 And he's teaching and whatnot. He gives us a little take heed statement. Take heed that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I say to you that in heaven, their angels, that's like the possessive there, T-H-E-I-R. In heaven, their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven. And Albert Barnes picks up on that and says, well, maybe what is being conveyed here that we'll see his face is they would be constantly in the presence and be permitted continually to behold his glory. Now, remember in the Old Testament, Moses asked for that. Moses said, God, can I see your glory? And God's answer was, no. No man can see my glory and live. No man can see my face and live. And he showed his goodness to Moses instead. Basically, he pronounced the gospel by hitting the cliff to the rock. In the New Testament, I believe it was Philip asked Jesus, said, hey, show us the glory of the Father. That's good enough for us. And Jesus gave a little bit of a different answer, if you remember. He said, have you been with me this long and you don't know who I am? You don't recognize me? When you see me, you have seen the Father, is what Jesus said. So we get a glimpse of the Father of God in the face of Jesus, but the full unveiled glory of God, nobody can see in this life, but we will see it there. We will see it there. It's a transformative thing when we're there and we get to see the Lord as He truly is. Beloved, this is 1 John 3, 2. Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. will actually have restored to us God's design that we would be his image bearers, right? Without all the sin and imperfection that clings to us now. God's names on their foreheads. We saw that before in Revelation. I believe it's evidence of their citizenship in the kingdom of Jesus Christ. We belong there, we got your name on it. And it's also possession, that we belong to God. That's some of the symbolism there, ownership, citizenship. There's no night there. We've seen this before. Verse 5, there shall be no night there. They need no lamp. Don't need the light of the sun. The Lord God gives them light. We'll never walk in darkness there. Which reminded me of an old song. I had to look it up because I couldn't remember who wrote it. Back when I, probably in the 90s, back when I first started walking with the Lord, There was a song out, a popular Christian song, called Shadow and Light by Bruce Carroll. And in that song, and I really liked that song because I was going through my own struggles as a brand new Christian, putting things out of my life that didn't belong there, and beginning to walk in the light where God is. And you'd have good days, you'd have some days where you took two steps back, and you feel like you're a failure, but God would dust you off and pick you up, and you begin to move on again. And that's what that song's dealing with. I'm light. But I have my shadow days, those days where just so much sin clings to me. But then I'm shadow and I'm light. There, it'll be all light. But no shadow any longer for us. We'll be purified. I alluded to this last week, but I wanted to read it to you. This is 1 John, beginning in chapter 1, verse 5. This is the message which we have heard from him and declare to you, that God is light and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin. And that verse, that section, is saying a lot, but it's at least saying that to have fellowship with God, we have to walk in the light. And I think part of what's going on in Revelation is that we'll have unbroken fellowship with God for eternity. Because the darkness is gone. We've been changed. We've been glorified. And there He is in His brilliant light. We get to behold His glory of all things. Look Him in the face and enjoy His company forever. And it ends that verse 5 saying, and they, God's people, shall reign forever and ever. That's a theme you see throughout the scriptures as well. To reign. It has to do with rule. To reign and rule with Christ. In glory. Accomplishing God's purposes for God's glory's sake. unhindered by sin. That's what we have to look forward to, and I'm looking forward to that. And that's actually one of the early sayings in the church is recorded for us in 2 Timothy 2.11. Could it even have been an early hymn? But he writes, this is a faithful saying. For if we died with him, we shall also live with him. And if we endure, we shall also reign with him. With Christ. We'll reign with Christ. And it's a call to what? To Christian endurance. That we stay in the faith all the way to the end. Until he returns, or until we are caught up to go with him. At our death. I read an article, I want to read you a little teeny piece of it, at Ligonier's website, Ligonier.org. It was an article called, Reigning with Christ, and it was from April 3rd, 2012. Just a little excerpt, it reads like this. We may not often think of ourselves as kings and queens who will rule over creation, but this consequence of our redemption flows directly from who the Lord made us to be and what salvation accomplishes in repairing his broken images. God made us to have dominion over creation, to rule it for his glory, We forfeited our ability to fulfill this vocation in Adam, but Christ has succeeded in reigning over creation as the last Adam. In him, we are now able, once more, to achieve our original purpose as righteous rulers of the world. Beloved, I believe that's what eternity is going to look like. Don't have all the bits and pieces put together, but I think it's going to be something like that. Something like that. When I read that, I reminded me of the Narnia series by C.S. Lewis, where he was always saying, you know, once a king or queen in Narnia, always a king or queen in Narnia. And C.S. Lewis gets that right out of text like this. So let's move on. Verses 6 to 11. The time is near. Then he said to me, These words are faithful and true. And the Lord God of the holy prophets sent his angel to show his servants the things which must shortly take place. Behold, I am coming quickly. Blessed is he who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book. Now I, John, saw and heard these things, and when I heard and saw, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel who showed me these things. Then he said to me, See that you do not do that, for I am your fellow servant. and of your brethren, the prophets, and of those who keep the words of this book. Worship God. And he said to me, Do not seal the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is at hand. He who is unjust, let him be unjust still. He who is filthy, let him be filthy still. He who is righteous, let him be righteous still. He who is holy, let him be holy still. Well, we'll try to unpack that verse 11 a little bit. But again, my new King James is taking a different original manuscript than some of your other versions, like the ESV and the NIVs. They're pulling from older manuscripts that were found and discovered. So when mine says, He says, then he said to me, these words are faithful, true. And the Lord God of the holy prophets sent his angel. The original literal Greek, probably the best manuscripts, have that as the Lord God of the spirits of the prophets. So the NIV is taking that original. I was trying to say, well, let me try to unpack that a little bit for you. So the NIV will translate that the Lord, the God who inspires the prophets. And I think that's a good translation. So we're talking about the God Almighty who has his true prophets, and he is the God of their spirits. In other words, God is moving in their spirit that their words are the very word of God. Even though he doesn't set aside the personalities and all that, yet the Word of God is the very Word of God. Not just the words of men. And I think that's being underscored here because John is being given this revelation through an angel. And so it's that very God that has sway over the true prophets, and also sent his angel. Ultimately, the truth is flowing from God through Christ, through his angel, to John, to his saints, to the churches. There's a pattern, and you see that all the way back in Revelation 1, that same idea is conveyed in chapter 1. So God himself is the source of this truth. So it is truly true, because God is its source. It's not simply the thoughts of an angel or some crazy experience that John had and wrote it all down. Ultimately, the source is God. It's God's truth. Angel worship is forbidden. And John's already done this once, and now he's fallen to it again. And the angel immediately stops him, refuses to receive the worship, and does what anybody should do that's caught up in something like that, redirects him to God. Here, let me show you who you're supposed to worship. You direct your worship to God. Beloved, sometimes we help each other, and we're like, well, praise God. But the worship goes to God. We thank God that He sent you to help me, or whatever it might be. But God gets all the praise and worship. We just simply give you all the thanks because of what you did, that kind of a thing. But all worship goes to God. I alluded to this when we looked at this last time that an angel was worshipped, is that that was a problem in the early church. And the apostle Paul had to deal with that. And in Colossae, we don't exactly know what the false teachings were that were going on. I've heard one theologian say it was almost like a folk religion was creeping in, kind of getting into the church. And Paul had to deal with that. It's kind of a weird hodgepodge of things. But let me read you a section of that. So this is Colossians 2, beginning in verse 18. And it says, "...let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility and worship of angels, intruding into those things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding fast to the head, Right? He's talking about the Lord, not holding fast to the head. They re-diverted their attention to angels and philosophies and whatnot. He says, "...not holding fast to the head, from whom all the body, nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments, grows with the increase that is from God." And Paul there is simply trying to redirect the church. You don't find a higher level of Christian living by turning to something other than Jesus Christ. That's what I get out of that text. Every time I teach Colossians, it focuses me back on the centrality of Jesus Christ. Anything I want of God, of goodness, of glory, I turn to Jesus. I don't turn to some other thing or some other program or pattern or whatever. David Jeremiah, I found this on his website, he wrote, the sight of God's true angels must be awe-inspiring beyond anything we can imagine. This may be why they are invisible to us most of the time, to prevent us from sinning through angel worship. And I thought that was an interesting idea. Maybe that's why the angels, even though they're probably attending church with us today, We can't see them, and maybe that's part of it. I mean, if the apostle John was susceptible to this, then yeah, it's probably good that they are invisible to me. So Jesus is coming. You see this over and over in chapter 22. I'm going to read you verse 7, 12, and 20. Behold, I am coming quickly. Blessed is he who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book. And behold, I am coming quickly, and my reward is with me, to give to everyone according to his work. He who testifies to these things says, surely I am coming quickly. Amen. All right. So Jesus is saying, I'm coming quickly. And then we say, well, it's been 2,000 years. Where is he? What does that mean? I don't know exactly. People go in different directions with what is exactly being conveyed. Some people say, well, yeah, but once you see these things, these prophecies begin to unfold, it'll be in short order, a number of years of tribulation, and then there Jesus will return, and these things will come quickly at that point. In the Strong's Dictionary, for that word in the Greek, τάκυλοι, it says, it can either mean shortly, without delay, soon, or it can be by surprise and suddenly. And that might be what's being conveyed here, is that, behold, I come suddenly. And that would go with the message of Revelation 22, which is a call to those that are not in the kingdom yet to come and drink of the living water. That's the church's call at this point. Why? Because he's coming quickly, he's coming suddenly. It could be today, the imminent return of Christ. You don't know. So that might be it. Let me read what John MacArthur said on this. I thought it was pretty good. He says, with the Lord, one day is as 1,000 years and 1,000 years as one day. The amount of earthly time that passes is of no consequence. It is certainly irrelevant from God's timeless point of view. A moment is like many eons in his mind, and eons pass like moments. He is not bound by time as we are, and no amount of time can ever nullify his faithfulness. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering towards us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. In other words, John MacArthur picks up on that. In other words, the real reason for the Lord's delay is not that He is negligent or careless in fulfilling His promises, but simply because He is long-suffering and kind, delaying Christ's coming and the wrath that will accompany it while He calls out people to salvation. And Christ will not return before the merciful purposes of God are complete. Far from suggesting apathy or neglect on God's part, the long delay before Christ's appearing simply underscores the remarkable depth of His nearly inexhaustible mercy and longsuffering." And isn't that how Peter tells us to look at this? Don't think, where is he at? Think, isn't God merciful? He gave us one more day to win one more soul into the kingdom. What a merciful kind God he is. Because he could have just closed the book on the whole thing right now. But he gave us one more day to witness to somebody, to make a phone call, to send a card, right? One more day. And then John's told not to seal up the book. Don't seal it up. This is like 180 direction change from what Daniel was told in Daniel 8.26 where it says, the vision of the evenings, the mornings, which was told is true, therefore seal up the vision. And Daniel might say, why? Well, it tells you why. It says, "...for it refers to many days in the future." So seal it up for now, Daniel. John's told of the immediacy, the imminent return of the Lord Jesus Christ. It could happen at any moment. So don't seal up the book. The church needs to hear these words. The people need to hear this. Get the word out, is the idea. He said to me in verse 22, I'm sorry, verse 10, chapter 22, do not seal the words of the prophecy for the time is at hand, right? The time is short. Philip Hughes on that says, the time of fulfillment is eminent. This interval between the comings of Christ is the time of the last days. And the last of these last days is always impending. The Lord is always coming soon, but at an un... Revealed, I put that word down wrong, but at an unrevealed hour. And those who are wise will live their lives in the expectation of His coming. And that's how the Bible really tells us to live our lives. Always looking for the doorknob to turn, right? One of the parables talks about that. You're always looking, hey, the doorknob's turning. I think the Lord's coming in, you know? So we're always looking for the return of Christ. Like a train running down a track, the consequences will ultimately come for the choices that we make. God is always calling people to repent, but when Christ returns, the opportunity will have passed. This is the call to the readers to make up their minds now. Now to live for God. And that's the idea of verse 11. The permanency of our condition once Jesus returns. The unjust, let them be unjust still. The filthy, let them be filthy still. The unjust, the filthy won't be in the city. But those who are righteous, let them be righteous still. And those who are holy, let them be holy still. There's a permanence at that point in our condition. My old auto mechanic teacher in high school used to always say, the habits you form now will be with you for the rest of your life. Because I was always coming into class late. And I wasn't a very good student. I was very non-studious. And he was basically telling me when he saw me come in the room 15 minutes late or whatever, the habits you form now. And when I finally made a decision to change my life, This was before I came to Christ. I think God was working on me. But I changed. I got a work ethic. And I went to work early and I stayed a little late. I wasn't the guy I was in high school. I went back and visited him. And I told him how much it meant to me. I said, I can't remember anything. I can't even change a tire hardly. But I remember what you said. And you said, the habits I have will be with me forever. unless you definitively break those habits. And that's kind of the call in chapter 22. The person you are, you will remain forever unless you purposely break that and come to Christ. Repent is a breaking of our self, breaking down and turning to God in faith. So verses 12 to 17. And behold, I'm coming quickly, my reward is with me, to give to everyone according to his work. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Blessed are those who do his commandments. that they may have the right to the tree of life and may enter through the gates into the city. But outside are dogs, and sorcerers, and sexually immoral, and murderers, and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie. I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright and morning star. And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him who hears say, Come. And let him who thirsts, Come. Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely. That's one of the most beautiful verses, that last verse there. It's one of the most beautiful verses in the Bible. The warning that the end is coming, Jesus is going to return, the permanence of our condition at that point, but then goes out the gospel call. Come and drink, come and drink. That's the message of the church. Come to the waters now. And do you see that? One little correction here, if I can. My new King James, another place where it kind of stumbles a little bit, is verse 14. My translation says, blessed are those who do his commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life. Almost sounds like works righteousness, but probably the original language, the better word in translation is, blessed are those who wash their robes. And the idea there would be the ones that have the right to the tree of life are those that came to the Lord Jesus and had their robes washed by him and his blood, by his atonement. I think it's probably the better way to look at it. But the idea here is either you're washed or you're not. Either you eat of a tree or you're barred from the tree. Either you can go into the city or you're barred from the city. You're outside the city. You're either in the kingdom or you're not in the kingdom. And that's the truth. There's no third condition. You're either in Christ Jesus or you're in Adam and connected to the fall. Or you're connected to Christ and his victory. One or the other. There's no third option there. So the bride says, come. That's the invitation because of that very thing. And then Jesus self-discloses. He says, he's the alpha, the omega, the beginning, the end, the first, the last. It's almost like saying the three things the same in different ways, right? He's before all things and he's eternal. He's God. He's the creator. As a matter of fact, that's what's going on when he says, I'm David's root. What's he saying there? I'm David's root. David existed because Jesus Christ is the creator God. He's the root of David. But then he says he's also the offspring of David, right? That he could look back at his own human line, and we see that in the genealogies. He says, yeah, David is my forefather. So he's both David's root, because he's creator God, and he's the offspring of David. There's a psalm that gets into that, I won't get into it too deeply, but you know, where the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand, I'll make your enemies my footstool. And remember Jesus said, how did David call the Messiah, who's supposed to be his descendant, his Lord? Remember that? Jesus kind of had him on the horns of a dilemma there. So he's also the bright and morning star, and probably hearkening back to Numbers 24.17, where it says, a star shall come out of Jacob, a scepter shall rise out of Israel. Robert Mounce on that says, he is also the bright morning star that heralds the end of the long night of tribulation and the dawn of a new day of eternal joy. I think that's well put. And then 18 to 21, the final warning here. For I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book, if anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book. And if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the book of life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book. He who testifies to these things says, surely I am coming quickly. Amen. Even so, come Lord Jesus. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen. So the warning, don't tamper. Don't tamper with God's word. I was thinking all the things we have that have warning labels on them. You know, over-the-counter medicines. I buy my prescription medicine, I get a whole sheet of all the stuff that can happen to me for taking medications. Alcohol has warnings on it. Cigarettes have little warnings from the Surgeon General. They're warning labels. If you abuse these things, this is what could happen to you. This is God's warning label, at the very end, is don't tamper with God's Word. It's a strong warning to anybody that would dare to stand up and teach anybody God's Word. And I take teaching God's Word very seriously. I try not to make mistakes. I try to really prayerfully study that I can deliver to you the Word of God and expound it in an accurate way. Not to just run down the hill with speculations and curiosities, but to stick to God's Word because of this. We're not to add to his word and to say God said something that God never said, like the false prophets do. We're not to take away and withhold what God clearly wanted to say to his people and we withhold it from them. God takes great offense at that, obviously, from the punishments that are listed here for anybody that would dare to do that. One more time, Robert Mount says, it is a warning that should cause every commentator on Revelation to do his prayerful best in telling others what this book is all about. And I think that's really true. I do try to come at it cautiously. And Jesus' assurance that he's the one who's behind all of this, surely I'm coming quickly. He who testifies that all of this is true, surely I'm coming quickly. And what's the church's response? Amen. Even so, come Lord Jesus. And that should be on the heart of every Christian. You know, Lord Jesus, is today the day? We're looking behind the clouds, waiting for the sky to roll back like a scroll. You know, is today the day? You know, ushering in the return of Jesus Christ, sharing the gospel with those that we have influence with. And that's the same idea that Paul has, and I'll end with this verse in 1 Corinthians 16. In verse 22, you see both sides here. Either you're in or you're out. Same idea. And he says, if anyone does not love the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be accursed. O Lord, come, Paul says. Let's pray. Our Father and our God, we thank you for your word. And Lord, what a journey it's been going across all these 22 chapters and all the incredible things that you just have for us there, Lord. And I just pray that you take not only today's sermon, but all that we've studied. And Lord, just help us to hold it in our minds and our hearts. And Lord, as your spirit does so often, just pull those things up into our thinking when we need to have those passages in our minds, Lord. I pray, Lord, that you just let us see you tarrying as an opportunity to get the gospel out. But Lord, we do pray, as the scripture tells us, oh come Lord Jesus, oh come. In Jesus' name, amen. I'm gonna pronounce God's benediction. on you, and then I'm gonna ask Paul to pray for the meal downstairs. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Go in the peace of Christ Jesus to a world that desperately needs to hear the gospel. In Jesus' name, Brother Paul.