Come, Lord Jesus! || Victory Church [Heaven #4]

I had been a little intimidated by it, but maybe you're like me, and that intimidation has begun to lift over the last six months. And just honestly, I'm looking forward to getting into some more familiar waters, which we're gonna do over the next few weeks. But honestly, it's also bitter, because I've loved this series, and I've fallen in love with this book, and this is not an exaggeration. My life is forever changed, because of some of the things that God has done over the last six months. Does anybody else resonate with that? Yeah. God's done some fantastic things in this journey through Revelation. And what we've been doing the last few weeks is we kind of wind this thing down. We've been in the last two chapters, Revelation 21 and 22, talking about the best thing ever. We're talking about heaven. Yes, heaven, heaven. We're kind of spending the beginning of the year getting hungry for heaven. And in fact, this is how Peter says it, okay? The Apostle Peter 2 Peter 3. He says, we are looking forward to the new heavens and new earth. He has promised a world filled with God's righteousness. We are looking forward. I don't know about you, but if you have felt that hunger, that looking forward rising up on the inside of you, you have a new excitement about life. But let me guarantee you, if you have not felt that looking forward rising up, that explains why he's thinking right now. Right? Because if I don't know what's ahead of me, I have no reason to not be depressed. I will lack joy. I'll lack peace. I'll be compromising with sin. But if I actually get this picture of what's out there ahead of me, now I have something to live towards that will radically transform my life. Okay? And let me kind of say it like this, all right? There's a saying that many of us hold onto in church world is I don't know what the future holds, but I do know who holds the future. Right? That's a spiritual truth. It's kind of in our DNA. I've even said it in the series, but maybe over the last few weeks, you're actually coming to discover that that may not be actually 100% true. Now, give me grace. Don't burn me at the stake. Here's what I mean. Because in 96 AD, there was a man named John who was exiled to an island called Patmos in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and there God showed him the future. And actually, when we get over into Revelation 21, 22, we actually see that we do kind of know what the future holds. So maybe a better way of saying this is, "Hey, I know who holds the future, and I actually kind of do know what the future holds." Because that's what we've been walking through, guys. So in Revelation 21, in the first week of this, we saw what heaven's going to look like, what we're going to look like, what we're going to do. Week 2, we talked to my 80-year-old dad who's thinking probably too much about heaven right now, dad. Calm down. And then last week, we looked at maybe one of the most beautiful verses in the entire Bible, Revelation 22.4, which says, "For the people of God, they will see His face." Which is the supreme desire of every human soul, whether we realize it or not. And today, everybody say it today. Today, we're going to do two big things. We're going to read the final words of the Bible together, and we're going to discover what God actually wants to hear from His people. What does God want to hear you say? We're going to dive into that, but we've got to get to it. So we're going to get back into Revelation 22, the final chapter of Revelation, and the final chapter of the entire Bible. We're going to pick back up in verse 6. So at this point, sorry to say it again, we're winding listening now. At this point, the Revelation itself is actually over. So God's not going to show John any new things. He's already showed him more than enough. And he says, "Don't seal this up. Reveal it." So the Revelation itself is over, but God's not done speaking quite yet. Let's pick it up in verse 6. He says, "The angel who had kind of been John's tour guide on the Revelation, the angel said to John, these words are trustworthy and true. The Lord, the God who inspires the Prophet, sent his angel to show his servants the things that must soon take place." Everybody say soon. Soon, okay? So the Revelation is over, but Jesus isn't done speaking quite yet. In fact, if you have your Bible, an actual physical Bible, very likely, there's a lot of red letters left between verse 6 and the end of the Bible. So if you're new to reading the Bible, and many Bibles, the words of Jesus are actually in red. So Jesus still has some things to say to his people before we finish. We pick it back up in verse 7. Jesus says, "Look!"

Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy written in the scroll. Then we jump ahead to verse 12. Look, I am coming soon. My reward is with me and I will give to each person according to what they have done. I am the alpha and the omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. What is the theme of some of the final words of the Bible? It's that Jesus is coming soon. We see it all throughout the book of Revelation that Jesus is coming soon. Even the first words of the book, maybe you forgot them. We read these six months ago, verse one. This is the revelation from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. Jump forward two more verses, verse three. The time is near, Revelation 3.11. Jesus says again, I am coming soon. We jump ahead to Revelation 22. He says, look, I'm coming soon. He says again, look, I'm coming soon. See guys, I told you this before. I know when Jesus is coming back soon. Put it on the calendar. It's coming back soon. And I know we've been in this journey for six months, but just this week was the first time I actually looked at like, what is that word soon in the original language that it was written in, which is Greek?

And I had to apologize last night to Saturday night. I don't have to apologize to you because the fast is over. And the Greek word for soon is toggos. And I know you're drooling. And you can get Mexican food this afternoon. Bless the Lord, all right? But the Greek word for soon is toggos, which means soon. Quick, speedily. In fact, it's connected to our English word taxi, toggos, taxi. Now, kids, there was a day before Uber, where if you wanted a ride, you literally, in some of the city areas, you had to go to the side of the street and find one. And hold on, you say taxi. What are you saying? You're saying, get me there fast. Speed me up, expedite my journey. And so this is what the Bible's saying. It's like Jesus is hailing a taxi. It's saying, I'm coming soon, church. Jesus is coming back soon. This is not a possibility. It is an absolute certainty that Jesus is coming back soon. And so John sees this whole revelation, right? All the way through. It pinnacles, it peaks at Revelation 19, like two thirds of the way right at the very end. It peaks at Revelation 19 with the trumpet blast of God, the shout of the archangel, the clouds part. Jesus comes back riding on a white horse, sword coming out of his mouth.

And the angel says, these words are trustworthy and true. In other words, we can build our life on those words. We can trust those words. What are we building our life on? We're building our life on the fact that Jesus is coming back soon. Jesus is coming soon. So here's the big question for today. What's our response? What is the people of God? What's the church's response to the fact that our King is returning soon? Let's walk through it for a minute, OK? And light of his soon coming return. We must first think, get ready for his return. Everybody say, get ready. Come on, say, get ready, get ready, get ready. All right, here's a big question for us. How would I live different? If I live like Jesus was coming back at any second? Come on, guys. I have an educated guess that Jesus will not return Sunday morning while we're in church. Because everything about him is like, I'm going to surprise all you guys when I come back. I think he's going to come back Friday night while we be in our stanky selves. You know what I'm saying? Like, you're going to be doing your stuff, then you're here. Like, Jesus is coming back, guys. And I think that-- how would we live if we actually live like Jesus was coming back at any second?

That's what it looks like to get ready. All right? And in fact, if you just kind of move Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and then the rest of the New Testament, the rest of the New Testament is really wrapped around answering the question, how should we live since Jesus is coming back? And I'll just give you a little bit of insight. Our next series is going to kind of be wrapped around that idea. How would we live if we actually live like Jesus was coming back? Jesus himself, again, more red letters says this in Matthew 24. He says, therefore, keep watch. Because you don't know on what day or what hour your Lord will come. Keep watch. Live aware. Here's the question, how do we get ready for his soon-coming return? Well, Revelation kind of answers that for us, all right? And if you're looking for your theological study for today, there's what's called a chiastic structure inside Revelation. In other words, there's brackets. How Revelation begins is how it ends. And then there's brackets that are kind of in it, echoes itself. So how Revelation begins it ends. Blessed is the one who reads aloud, the words of this prophecy. Blessed are those who hear, and blessed are those who keep what is written in it for the time is near. We just read this Revelation 22.7. Look, I am coming soon. Blessed is the one who keeps the words

of the prophecy written in this scroll. We get ready for Jesus' return by keeping the words of this book. How do we get ready? We keep the word. Listen, family, if we need the reminder. The blessing doesn't just rest on reading or hearing, it rests on obeying the word of God. God's supreme desire for our life is not for us to sit in a building on a Sunday morning and learn things about God. We're not just about information. We're about transformation. We don't just wanna read and hear the word of God and deceive ourselves. We want to do the word of God. We have to incarnate the word. We have to live it out. We have to put skin on it once we leave this building. Guys, listen, very few of you are sinning right now. Right? I'm taking a big leap of faith right here, right? You're probably sinning less now than you would out there. Here's the deal, our holiness can't be confined to 90 minutes on a Sunday morning. What would happen if we didn't just read and hear? What would happen if we actually obeyed and kept the word when we walk out these doors right here? So what are the words? What does God tell us to keep?

What does God tell us to do in this book? Here's just a few of them. In the book of Revelation, he says, "Remain faithful, "resis evil, live in hope, love radically, "worship no matter what, tell others the good news, "listen to what the spirit says. "Oh wait, his return." And here's what he says, "If you do those things, "what is the promise?" He says, "You will be blessed. "You will be blessed." So guys, we get ready for Jesus' return by obeying the word and when we obey that word, it's not just for itself. We're actually blessed by obeying the word. Now, how does God's blessing come upon us? Let me say two primary ways. There is really good news, guys. God honors those who honor him. If you honor God in private, he will honor you in public. If you are faithful in private when the lights are off, he will be faithful in public when the lights are on. God will give supernatural favor and honor to those who obey his word. That's just how it works. You will find blessing coming in from the left and the right, it's crazy. The supernatural favor of God will come upon your life when you start keeping his word. That's the first way. The second way is this and it's very subtle, but listen.

There is a blessing sewn into obedience itself. In essence, the obedience itself produces the reward. Here's what I mean. When you live life, God's way, God's way works. God, here's what I mean. When you drive the car, according to the owner's manual, you get the optimal drive out of that car. Don't complain about how your car's driving when you take your Camry off-road. And you banging into trees, driving over curbs, wrecking into cars, driving at 300,000 miles. You ain't even changed the oil. Haven't rotated the tires. You got a little fan about, (laughs) come on, your brakes are like, (screams) and then you get out of it and you're like, what's this piece of junk? This thing's worthless, right? But that's the same thing people do with God. They completely disobey God, they do their own thing. They sleep around, they go this stuff. They curse God, they live purposeless. They're getting crazy debt. They eat terrible, their life is in shambles. Then they stand back and be like, what's the deal with God? God didn't bless me. God didn't give his promises. Bro, you ignored the owner's manual.

Toyota's the one who made the Camry so they know how to get the most out of that Camry. God's the one who made you. So he knows how to get the most out of your life. And if you live the way he tells you to live his way works. He knows if you live his way, if you keep his word, what does the blessing look like? The blessing looks like actually the fruit of living out his word, which means you'll be blessed and not cursed above and not beneath the head and not the tail. And so many people in today's world say, I don't need God. Bro, you need God to go to Walmart. You need God to get on that stupid interstate out there. Last night there's a tractor trailer on its side right in front of Jimmy Carter. Goodness gracious. God bless us who had to drive self. I need God. And your life will work if you build it God's way. Guaranteed, guaranteed. The blessing, so listen, we get ready for Christ's return by keeping his word. But when we keep his word, the blessing comes upon it. You obey God's word. Listen guys, you get joy. If you do not have joy and you do not have peace, it's because you're not keeping God's word. Listen, I'm not saying that your circumstances are all great,

but you can have joy and peace in the middle of a hurricane when you keep God's word. When you keep God's word, you get purpose. Listen, and when you keep God's word, God's word will take you to the source of life, Jesus Christ Himself. And when you get Jesus through the instruction of the word, it leads you to Christ, you get forgiveness. You give life everlasting. You get life to the fullest. You can actually take that and then give it away to the people around you. You get Christ Himself when you keep His word. Listen, I've heard so many amazing stories over the last six months on this journey through revelation. Just by people keeping the word, the stuff that we just put up there, right? One of my favorite stories is very simply that at Hamilton Mill, a woman came up to Pastor Lisa there and said, "Hey, she's like in her 50/60s." And she said, "I've been afraid of death my whole life. "But through this series, God set me free. "I'm no longer afraid of dying." Listen guys, you have not seen Christianity yet until you have seen Christians who are not afraid of dying. Pastor Kendra even talked about that when we were in talking about the mark of the beast and saying, "We will not bow no matter what it cost us." And listen, she's got little max. And she talked about how even when I pray,

she'd offended her. Listen guys, the gospel should offend all of us. And she said, "God just took that like a knife "to her heart." And she had to process it and go to the Lord about it and pray about it and say, "God, change me. "Make me more like ah." And she finally got to the place of saying this, "I will not bow no matter what it cost me." Guys, you have not seen Christianity yet until you've seen a church of Christians who will never bow no matter what it cost us. We will not bow to the government. We will not bow to the enemy. We will not bow to the devil. We will not bow to the antichrist. We will not bow to any antichrist system. We will only bow to Christ himself. We will stand strong and we believe that he will be the fourth man in the fire. But even if he doesn't, we will never bow. You haven't seen Christianity like that in generations. Listen, even myself guys, as I've been seeing the Jesus Revelation 4, Revelation 5, he holds the scroll. He holds the future. The government rests upon his shoulders. What that's done is it's freed me from the political cycle. All the chaos today, like tomorrow, yesterday, this week, you know what I'm saying?

It's gonna be messy. And here's the deal, it has not removed from me the care for the people on the other side of these things. But I'm not caught up in the offense. I'm not caught up in the squirrel. I'm not living on CNN, Fox News. I'm not living on MSNBC because I have a kingdom that's higher than that kingdom. I'll belong to something that's much greater and much bigger. I'm not caught in that cycle. I can actually live in it, but above it, in it, but not of it, right? And that's what blessing actually begins looking like. We start living differently, guys. But let me say this only happens when the Christian life is primary, not secondary or peripheral, right? When you're getting ready for Christ's return, that does not look like 90 minutes on a Sunday morning. That's part of it, but we have to live it out as part of our whole life outside of this place as well. Like on Friday, I was with one of our staff members and we're working out at the gym. And at the gym was the dude who's at every gym. And if you work out, you know what I'm talking about. Like we're sitting there doing shoulders. And there's this dude like 18 inches in front of me, like on his phone. (laughing) Literally, I'm telling you, like he's laughing.

It's like, (laughing) Dude, I did like five sets for everyone of his set. This dude's a bean poll, and I promise you, right now he's at home looking in the mirror. Like, I'm just not getting the gains. Why am I not getting the gains? 'Cause I'm in the gym all the time. Bro, 'cause you did like two sets. And listen, fam, there's people who've been in the church for 30 years. Look at themselves in the mirror. Like, why am I not getting the gains? 'Cause you do 90 minutes a month. And then you just put it on the side and go live like everybody else out there. Guys, we're never, we're not getting ready for Christ. You're turning just 90 minutes on a Sunday morning. No, it's our life now. That's what it looks like to be a disciple. We go and follow him day in, day out. Lights are on. Lights are off. Good, bad, ugly people around. You're alone, whatever it is. We're living loud for Christ, prioritizing Christ. And we're not gonna put it up here, but Mark 13 in the message prayer phrase. Jesus says, stay at your post, keep watch. Stay at your post, keep watching. I've had this consuming thought for the last week.

Listen, there's a lot of people in this church, a lot of men in this church. And there's how I feel like God's been saying it. Give me a thousand men who stay at their post and keep watch and we'll change the city. Give me a thousand men who'll stay at their post and keep watch. We will change this city. We will change Atlanta with a thousand men who stay at their post and keep watch. Give me a hundred men who go over and serve. Give me 100 men who show up and serve in our youth ministry and set the example and provide security and mentor the next generation. And we'll change the high school. Do you want to see a revival come to the high school? Don't just pray for it, show up for it. Give me 100 men who love their wives as Christ loves the church and trays up their children in the fear and the admonition of the Lord. And we'll change the generation, guys. But it's not going to happen 90 minutes on a Sunday morning. It's just part of it, guys. But this is part of our whole life of staying in our post, keeping watch day in, day out. This is who we are now because Jesus is coming back soon. We have to get ready. We have to stay ready. We have to live ready because Jesus is coming back soon. In light of his soon coming return, we have to get ready for his return. The second thing is we have to gather for his return. We get ready for his return and we gather for his return.

One more verse later from what we just read a second ago, verse 17. It says, "The spirit and the bride say come." "Spirit and the bride say come, I want you to notice." It's not the spirit and you say come. All right, now you are part of the bride. Let me clarify this real quick because a lot of people get stuck on this. Okay, men, you will not wear a wedding dress in heaven. All right, you are not the bride of Christ. Okay, in other words, ladies, the Bible calls you sons of God. You are not sons. There's no gender confusion in the body of Christ. No, in this cultural context that the Bible has written and the sons got the inheritance. So in other words, ladies, you're included in the inheritance. It's not just for the men. In that sense, you are sons of God. So in this sense, guys, we are the bride of Christ. Who's the bride of Christ? We, us, y'all. You and us, like we, we and us, like we are the body of Christ. We are the bride of Christ. And not even victory, like victory with 12-some victory with these guys over it, like victory. Like, come on, we, throughout past and present and future, we, the church, is the bride of Christ. There's talking about you being united to God forever. That's what it's talking about. Why? Because the church, the people of God, are a gathered people, not a scattered people. And there's the rub. There's the problem. Because Hebrews 10 says it like this. It says, "Let us consider how we may spur one another on towards love and good deeds."

What? Not giving up, meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another. And maybe, lots of times, we stop right there, but pick this up for the day. And all the more as you see the day approaching, maybe you're new to reading the Bible. Okay, whenever you see the day, that capital D day, that's significant, the day is Revelation 19. Is Jesus coming back? So what it's saying is, guys, don't let anything stop you from meeting together. In fact, gather more as you get ready for His return. Here's how I say it, guys. The message of the New Testament is this. The closer Jesus gets, the more we should gather. The closer Jesus gets, the more the bride should gather. The closer we get to His return, the more the bride should gather. But let's be honest, the opposite is happening right now. We're meeting less now than we ever have. Why? Because there's more distractions than there's ever been. There's more excuses than there's ever been. Why? Because, listen, we're gathering less now than we ever have. Like, back in the day, it was like at least two times a week. You know what I'm saying? Some of you are like, two times a week. I'm Latino, bro. Like, we slept in the church. You know what I'm saying? There's 18 services a week, you know? But at least two times a week. Now, it's maybe two times a month. That's what the statistics actually say.

Some of you are like, you haven't been here in, like, two years. Hey, what's up, guys? Hey, we've been here every week. You know what I'm saying? Like, we're forsaking the assembly. But here's what it says. As the day draws near, we should be gathering more, not less. But now there's more things to distract us. There's sports, there's work, there's vacations, there's politics. There's rainy days and there's sunny days. You guys don't know how pastors pray. You don't know it. Listen, I open up my phone. I see the, oh, it's supposed to rain on Sunday. Oh, Jesus. A third of the church is not going to show up. That's usually about what it is. A third of the church doesn't show up when it rains. Because like it says in first opinions nothing, Christians can't stand rain. And the most fascinating thing is online numbers don't go up. When we see rain, we just check out. So I'm praying like, God, let it just be overcast. You know what I'm saying? And then the opposite phenomenon happens in the summer. Like, it's too nice. And so I'm like, oh, Jesus. No, no, no, no. It's not a leg day. It's not a leg day. We're not forsaking the assembly for the leg.

Make it cold in the middle of the summer. Like, drive them indoors. Bring them back, God." 'Cause we just are weird. We make all the excuses in the world. But it's the opposite of what it should be. We should be gathering more now than we've ever gathered because we're closer to his return than we've ever been. You know, my son Isaac just turned 16. Happy birthday Isaac. And some of that I've been talking. We've been planning. We've been preparing. We've been saving up. We said, "We're gonna buy him a car." Right? And so called up my friend who runs a local car dealership and we get there and the guy he assigned, the salesman that he assigned comes out. And he knew that I was a pastor. So as it always is, within six seconds we're talking about church life. And he says, "Hey, I go to the church and I know which church he was talking to." He said, "I go to the church." Then he stops. And it was like the conviction of the Lord hit him that he just lied to a pastor, you know? And this happens all the time. I'm just gonna be honest.

I can't read your mind. I know you think I can and you get nervous. I can't. I'm not a prophet. I'm a pastor, okay? So he said, "I go to the church." Then he stops and he says, "Well." We don't really go. This is verbatim. We don't really go there. And he says, "Well, during COVID, we just started streaming and we just kind of never went back." And he said this. He says, "I know it's not the same, but it's just kind of what we do now." And listen guys, if I had a dollar for every time I've heard that story, I would be a very wealthy man. Because here's this great guy. In fact, I hope you're streaming right now, friend. (congregation laughing) I hope you are, 'cause you're a great dude. This is a great guy. Here's this great guy whose heart has cooled towards God over the past four years because he's settled into this really comfortable rhythm. - Yeah. - And listen guys, I know I'm preaching to the choir, but there's a lot of people on the other side of this camera. We still have people watching church from home,

not because they can't make it to the building, but because they've lost the urgency. You lost the fact that Jesus is coming soon. And guys, listen, we stream for a lot of reasons. We do, we stream, people are admittedly. I take vacations, I stream, okay? We stream people are in vacation, people are sick, people are in the hospital. We actually have people, I get messages. We have people in prison who stream this, praise God for that stuff. People are out of state, people around the world, whatever that is. There's a lot of reasons we stream, okay? (congregation applauding) Here's one reason we do not stream, is if you're sitting at home right now, in your PJs, drinking your coffee, and you could make it to a building, but you're just comfortable. I wish right now I could reach through our IT network and turn off your stream. (congregation laughing) I say that as your friend, as your pastor, who cares for your soul. I wish we had a camera in your living room, and we saw what you're doing, and we'd be like, not, not, not. He could make it in. And I'm gonna replace your feet with Apple Maps,

they give you the directions, say brush your teeth, get your hair going, get in the car, get to the campus. Why? Because we have to get our urgency back, because Jesus is coming back soon. (congregation applauding) Come back soon. And the bride of Christ is a gathered people, not a scattered people. You know this, it's not the same. It's like watching a fire. Listen, you can't watch a fire through his screen and feel the warmth, you have to draw near, you have to get in it, you have to get the colds, you have to get around the other colds to get the fire guys. That's what Dietrich Bonhoeffer said this in the last generation. He said, the physical presence of other Christians is a source of incomparable joy and strength to the believer. The physical presence, Proverbs 27, 17, says iron sharpens iron, but only if it comes into contact. Physical presence. Guys, this is why the gathering's so important. This is why small groups are so important. Guys, we gather small for community, for accountability, for livability, we support each other, we cry when we others cry, we rejoice when others rejoice. We safe seats for each other.

If you say, I've been coming to this church for two years, nobody saves me a seat, 'cause you're not in a small group. And people come out to me at the door all the time and they complain and I get it, I get it. I'm the complaint desk, I accept it. But they say, the church isn't doing enough of this, we should be doing more of that, we should do more of that. Why aren't the pastors doing this? Nobody's coming to my house and doing that. And I always ask, I say, hey, are you in a small group? 99 out of 100, the answer is no. Well, good news. I stood up here last August, if you're over here at the beginning of the series, I stood up here last August, and I said, hey guys, I hate to say this. All of our small groups are full. Okay, it's not because we didn't have anybody in small group. We actually had, I looked at the numbers. We had 4,400 people in small groups. Okay, praise God for that. But that meant there were not enough leaders to open up more groups to create more space for more people, for many of you guys. sitting on the sidelines for a little while, okay? Good news. At that time, we said, hey, we need some people to step up and you stepped up, okay? So across all the victory, good news, okay?

Hot off the press. We now have, across all the victory, we have 277 new small groups. (audience applauding) 277 new small groups. That means in total, victory has right around 700 total small groups here in the church. Just here in Norcross, we have 144 new small groups. We touch the numbers. There's right at 1,500 open spaces in small groups. That means there's a small group near you. That means there is space for you, for you. And your mama, and your daddy, don't hide your wife and your kids, bring them to small group. Why? Because we need to gather. Here's what I'm saying, guys. As soon as I said small groups, that conceptually sounds great. And so you start thinking, oh, I don't know. I'd have to do this and I'd have to, oh, I'm not gonna do it. I'll do it next time around. That's what half the room just said. We gotta stop making excuses. We have to make space for what's most important in our life. We have to prioritize the gathering even more so as we see the day approaching.

And here's what it looks like, guys. We have to gather here until we gather there. So in light of Jesus' soon-coming return, we have to get ready for his return. We have to gather for his return. The last thing is this, we have to grow for his return. Have you ever looked at the state of the world? Have you ever looked at the state of your life and you just say, Jesus, fix it? Jesus, fix it, God. Let me help you identify what that is. You are joining in with the groan of creation since Genesis 3, since the fall in the garden. Here's how Paul says it in Romans 8. He says, "For we know that all creation has been groaning "as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. "And we believers also groan. "Even though we have the Holy Spirit within us "as a foretaste of future glory, "for we long for our bodies to be released from sin "and suffering." Let me clarify that last part right there because there's a really bad tendency in Christianity today. We walk in the front door, put on the really nice Christian facade. Hey, how are you doing today? I'm blessed in highly favored brother PTL. Praise the Lord, amen. (congregation laughing) And our life is falling apart.

Our marriages and shambles, our kids are in rebellion, we're broke. They just took the house. We're like, we're in praise, worship, right? Got our nice clothes on, right? Because we think, I'm a Christian. I can rise above this stuff. I'm nothing, it just bounces off of me and sticks to you. You know what I'm saying? Nothing bothers me. And what Paul is clarifying is yes. You have the Holy Spirit is a future for taste, but it's a taste, it's a taste. We still grown because we're not there yet. We still grown for the future glory. We still grown for our resurrected bodies. We still grown to embrace the ones who went before us. We still grown for Jesus to fix it. What we're growing for is for Jesus to fix the world. We're growing for Jesus to fix us. We're growing for Jesus to kill the devil. We're growing for Jesus to do away with sin. We're longing, we're growing for the day when sickness and disease will be thrown into the lake of fire. Listen guys, I praise God that we can stand on this sanctuary and give testimonies that God healed people of cancer. He is Jehovah-Rufa. I praise God for that. But listen, Vam, you were never meant to get cancer. That's why it feels so foreign.

That's why it feels such an enemy 'cause it is an enemy. Because there was no cancer before sin in Genesis 3. Sin, the wages of sin is death, physical and spiritual. There was no brokenness. There was no environmental pollution. There was no extinction events. There was no sickness, disease, cancer, migraines, arthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, Alzheimer's, there was none of that. And we've grown for the day. Jesus will pick it up and throw it into the lake of fire. Guys, it's okay to grown. That's what he's saying. He's saying family. It's okay to grow. It's okay as a child of God. To look at God and say, God, thank you for every good and perfect gift that comes from above. I am blessed. I am highly favored. But there's so, so much brokenness. Jesus, come and fix it. Come and fix it. Guys, this is the grown. Listen, identify. This is the grown. You heard your mama praying in the middle of the night for you and your siblings. Growning. There's no groaning like groaning for the family members who are far from God.

This is the grown you hear every single time we gather and we pray for the sick. There's this groaning in the room. You're gonna hear this grown at thirst tonight. Ah, Jesus. You hear this groan in Revelation 22, 17, just a few verses before the very close of the Bible. Says, "The Spirit and the bride say, 'Come.' And I let the one who hears say, 'Come.' And I let the one who is thirsty, 'Come.' And I let the one who wishes take the free gift of the water of life." Guys, what is fascinating to me? Think about this. What's fascinating to me is that 99.9% of the Bible is God inviting us to come. Come on, think about it. Think about what you know of the Bible. The whole Bible is God calling the rebels home. He says, "Come to me. You are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest." The Father is standing on the doorstep, saying, "Prodigals, come home." Jesus tells His disciples, "Come. Follow me, and I'll make you fishers, amen?" Even at the last supper table, Thomas is like, "I don't know the way to heaven." And Jesus says, "Come on the way, on the truth, on the life. Come follow me, and I'll get you there." The whole Bible is God saying, "Come."

But here at the very end, it changes directions. Instead of only God calling us to come to Him, His kids now look at Him and say, "God, you come to us." See, listen, John is the one who got this revelation. John, there's the very end. John had 22 chapters of Revelation. He knew what it meant for Jesus to come back. He knew if Revelation 19 happens, that means 18 has to happen, and 17, and 16, and 15, and 14, and 13. What John knew was that there is tribulation and martyrdom. And Antichrist, and Mark of the Beast, and false prophet, and wars, and rumors of wars, and famine, and plagues, and judgment of God on the world and lake of fire. And he looks right at it and says, "Even so, come Lord Jesus. Come, Lord Jesus, for your people." And guys, when you respond to His invitation and you come to Him, and He changes your life, He saves your soul, He puts its spirit on the inside of you. All you want is for Him to come back and fix it. Listen, when my kids were little and my sons were little, and I would go on a trip, a mission trip, a business trip, whatever, and I would call home. What do little kids ask their parents? When are you coming home? And listen, I knew, but also they're two. They have no concept of time. I could say five minutes. I could say a year. They don't know. They don't know.

I know I'm coming home in four days. And so what I would tell them, I'd say, "I'm coming home soon." Listen, fam, we have no concept of time. We don't get it. We're stuck in it. We're in temporal bodies, temporal lives. We don't see time how God sees time. And so we're asking God, "Jesus, when are you coming back?" And Jesus says, "You wouldn't get it even if I told you." Here's what I can't say. I'm coming back soon, soon. And whenever I would say that, my kids would say, "Dad, just come back. I want to see you." If you want to know what God wants to hear from His people, what is God want to hear from His kids? Come, Lord Jesus. Because I think that's what changes when you finally get it. You finally begin to understand that this story is not about us. Sorry to break it to you guys. This whole thing is not about you. It's not. It's about Him. It's about Him. It's all about Him. We're beginning to end. Alpha and Omega. It's about Him. And so let me say this. At the end of the day, whether we can or ever will understand all the details of Revelation, whether we can or ever will fully get the details of Heaven on this side,

it really doesn't matter as long as you love Him and you surf with all your heart, mind, soul and strength. Because it's all about Him. And I heard a story about a dear old saint that's stuck with me. She had spent her whole life memorizing much of the Bible. And at the very end, and she would say it over and over again. It's Paul, what Paul said in 2 Timothy 1. He says, "I know whom I have believed, "and have convinced that he is able to guard "what I have entrusted to him until that day." Here's what that means. We all have this false sense of control in our lives. Guys, at the end of the day, you can't control anything. Hopefully you know that. But especially when that heartbeat monitor. (ticking) Flatlines, you better trust somebody besides yourself with your soul. And that's what Paul said. He said, "He, him, Jesus, is able to guard "what have I entrusted to him, my soul." And so what day, that day, that day when he returns? I have trusted my soul to Jesus Christ until he returns. And this is what this dear Elderly Saint And again and again and again and again. And as the time drew near, all she could remember was I have entrusted to Him until that day. What I have entrusted to Him, what I have entrusted to Him, what I have entrusted to Him, what I have entrusted to Him,

what I have entrusted to Him, and trusted to Him until the final breast to Him, to Him, to Him, Him, Him, Him, Him, Him. And at the very end, she had lost the whole Bible except for one word, but in that one word, she had the whole Bible. And guys, at the end of this journey of revelation, I just pray. I pray that I, we have made much of Him. I pray that you love Him more today than you did six months ago. I pray that you trust Him more today than you did yesterday, more tomorrow than you did today. Because this whole thing is about Him, the King of all kings and the Lord of all lords, Jesus Christ. It is about Him, and He's coming soon. C.S. Lewis, one of the most amazing authors. He had such a divine insight at the very end. He wrote Chronicles and Narnate, the last words of this series. He gives us a hint of heaven even in the context of this book, and I love it. He says, "And for us, this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them, it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page. Now at last, they were beginning chapter one of the great story, which no one on earth has ever read, which goes on forever in which every chapter is better than the one before." So with all this said, and heaven to look forward to, there's only one more thing for us to do. I want us to read the final words of the Bible together. This is Jesus speaking to us. This is us crying back out to Him.

This final period is the final period of the Bible. Let's read it together. He who testifies to these things says, yes, I am coming soon. Amen. Come, Lord Jesus, the grace of the Lord Jesus be with God's people. Amen. Revelation does not end in fear. It ends in grace. [applause] Because God did not give us this book to scare us, but to prepare us. Come, Lord Jesus. Amen. And amen. [applause] We're going to share something that the family of Christ has shared for the last 2000 years. We're going to take the Lord's Supper communion with each other. And so if you're at the end of the aisle, when you reach down, grab that bucket and pass that down. If you're online with us today, I thank God that we can have a tactile moment, a tangible moment here. In fact, don't watch this moment. Like go share, grab bread, go grab a cup of some form, and we're going to take the Lord's Supper. The Apostle Paul in Corinthians, he actually writes of this moment. He recalls this moment of the Lord's Supper. And he actually says this. He says, "Is often..." "We are proclaiming the Lord's death until he comes again." I don't know if you've ever connected, like communion's connected to heaven.

Can you mean communion's connected to the second coming of Jesus Christ? Because here's the idea, guys. This bread represents Jesus' body. The cup represents his blood. The body and the blood come from somebody, come from Jesus. So we're remembering that what we're doing right here, it costs something significant. Jesus is life. Every time we take communion, we're pronouncing that Jesus died. We're pronouncing that Jesus rose. And we're pronouncing that Jesus will come again. So let's take the bread out of the top here. At that last supper table, Jesus took the bread, he broke, and he said, "This is my body broken for you." Father, I thank you for the broken body of Jesus Christ. Let's just take that bread and break it in our hand. Father, our lives are fragile. And the result of life, trauma, drama, hurt, pain, sickness, disease, got many of us are broken, but I thank you, Jesus came, and he was broken, so we could be made whole. So Father, right now I speak over broken hearts, I speak over broken minds, broken spirits, and broken bodies, and I say be made whole, experience the shalom of God, the peace of God, be healed. And no other name than the one whose body was broken, the name of Jesus Christ. And we take this bread right now and we do it in remembrance of Jesus. Jesus then took the cup, he poured it. He says, "This is the cup in the New Covenant." It's a big word, covenant. It means an unbreakable God promise. He was saying on that day, it's so important for us to remember. He's saying that we are made right with God, not based on any other sacrifice, any other name, any other good deed, than the finished deed of Jesus Christ on the cross.

His blood is what sealed it, that's why it is finished. It's one sacrifice, it's done. We don't have to keep making sacrifices. We are made right with God, you are made right with God, alone based on what Jesus did of the cross. That's it, that's it, so we're going to pray and there's an invitation here in this moment. Let's go ahead and pray. Father, I thank You that You so loved the world that You gave Your Son. Jesus Christ bled out on the cross to show us how extreme our sin is and how extreme God's love and grace are. Thank You that Christ freely laid down His life so He was freely able to take it back up. We can thank You, God, that by the sacrifice of Christ and the power of the New Covenant, our sins are separated from us as far as the East is from the West. We don't stand before You today as sinners who are lost. We stand before You as children who are found because of the grace of God. And the truth is this, guys, the table is set. The door is open, the invitation is out for the prodigals to come home in this moment. If You have been far from God, if You have been rebelling against God, if You have said I don't want anything to do with Christ, today's the moment. Right now is the moment to come home. Here's what it looks like. It looks like saying, "Jesus, I'm going to get off the throne of my life and I invite You to come and sit on the throne of my life. I repent of my rebellion, my sin, my way, I'm leaving it to go your way for the rest of my days." If that's You today, I want to pray with You. In this moment, I don't want to invite the family to pray with You. Let's pray like this. Say, "Jesus, You are the Son of God, You died for my sin, and You rose again.

Jesus is alive." So right now, I turn, I repent of my sin, and I step out of the darkness to step into the light. "Jesus, You see me, forgive me, make me clean, buy your blood. You are my King. You are my Savior. I will live for You, the rest of my life. Give me Your Holy Spirit so I can follow You. Give me Your grace so I can continue every day. Show me Your glory so I can love You more every single day in Jesus' name." Father, thank You for the blood. Thank You for new chances and new beginnings, all because the tomb is empty in Jesus' name. There's another bucket at the end of your aisle. You take that, pass that down. Hey, if you're able, just for their final seconds here, I want us to do something special. Would you stand up to your feet if you're able? And I want us to pray this prayer that was right there at the end of the Bible. For the last 2,000 years, the church has prayed in Aramaic. It's actually Marunatha, which means come Lord. Marunatha, come Lord. We find the same idea here at the end of the Bible, come Lord Jesus. That's what I want us to pray, and I want us to pray three times. There's something biblically in the Bible about saying something three times. It's like a divine exclamation point. So together, I just want us to say come Lord Jesus three times, okay? But first time say it, okay? Let's say come Lord Jesus, now pray it. Come Lord Jesus, now pray it like you mean it. Come Lord Jesus, the spirit of the bride say come Lord.

And may the grace of God be upon the people of God until you do return. I'll pray His glory and honor to the King in Jesus name. Everybody said, amen, amen. Come on, let's give God glory. Thanks for being a part of Victory Church on the Pando app. We hope this content was a blessing to you. But we want you to know that you're not done yet because we want to hear from you. So send us a letter and tell us things like what God is doing in your life. How we can pray for you are even content that you would like to see us create in the future. We just want you to know that we see you. You're important to us and we'd love to continue to create some things in the future that will bless you. So send us a letter and we hope to hear from you soon.