If the lake of fire
is the second death,
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how can it burn forever?
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The subject of hell fire
has been one that has had a
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great deal of controversy.
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People say, "How is
it that a God of love
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could burn people for
a little tiny life here
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forever and ever and
ever, into eternity with no end?
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How could that be?
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It doesn't match this
God of love we talk about.
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How could Jesus do
something like that?
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It doesn't add up."
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Well, let's go to the
Scripture today and see
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if it really says that.
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So if you have your Bibles, if
you're nearby and you have one,
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maybe on your
phone or something,
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I invite you to turn
with me to Hebrews 12.
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Now we're going to go
back to the book of Revelation,
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of course, in just a
little bit because there's where
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some of the language gets people
very interested and confused.
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And you can see why
when you ready it sometimes.
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So I want to go to Hebrews 12,
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and we're looking
at verses 28 and 29.
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Now the apostle Paul is
speaking here, and he's saying,
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"For consider Him who
endured such hostility
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from sinners against Himself..."
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So there's no
question that Jesus has endured
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a lot of hostility.
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In fact, sin has caused a lot
of hostility among human beings,
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and trouble and
sorrow and heartache.
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"Therefore," he goes on to
say, "since we are receiving
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a kingdom which cannot be
shaken, let us have grace,
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by which we may
serve God acceptably
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with reverence and godly fear."
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Now the next thing I
want you to notice about this,
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first of all
he's saying that Jesus
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has received a
lot of the hostility.
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I suppose, if anybody
deserves eternal punishment,
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and we'll talk about that
eternal business in a moment,
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would be those who really
created great problems for Jesus
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who is so kind and so good.
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I mean, you think
about the crucifixion,
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you think about Caiaphas
and Annas and the Sanhedrin.
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Think about all the mocking,
and you think about all He
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went through at
the hand of sinners.
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I mean, He could
have some serious concerns
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about the way He was treated.
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If you want to put it that way.
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But let's listen to this.
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It says we should serve God
with reverence and godly fear.
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Godly fear.
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Fear of a fire
that burns forever?
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No, no. Listen to what he says.
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"...with
reverence and godly fear.
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For our God," says the apostle
Paul, "is a consuming fire."
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What does the
word, "consume," mean?
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Well, if you consume a
nice Mexican meal, for instance,
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at some nice restaurant,
or Italian restaurant,
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or something, what's left
when you get done consuming it?
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It's gone.
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There's an old saying that says,
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"You can't have you
cake and eat it too."
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You can't consume the
cake and still have the cake.
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God is a consuming fire.
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So in other words,
it burns things up.
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He destroys things.
Puts an end to things.
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The apostle Paul borrows that
expression, "a consuming fire,"
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"Our God is a consuming fire,"
he borrows that from Moses.
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And he gets it
from Deuteronomy 9:2-3
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where the apostle, not the
apostle Paul, but Moses says,
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"...of whom you have heard
it said," talking about God,
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'Who can stand before
the descendants of Anak?'
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Therefore understand
today that the LORD your God
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is He who goes
over before you..."
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Now these were the
giants, Anak, and he was saying,
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"Your God is
going to go before you."
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He's going to fight
against these people
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as they were entering Israel.
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Notice what he says,
"He who goes over before you
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as a consuming fire.
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He will destroy them and
bring them down before you."
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So when God destroyed
the enemies of Israel,
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He destroyed them
as a consuming fire.
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And they weren't still
living when He was done
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with the consuming fire part.
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So our God is a consuming fire.
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Now that word again,
"consuming," in the Greek
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means to utterly destroy.
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Utterly.
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Were the giants that
stood up against Israel,
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were they utterly destroyed?
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Of course they were.
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How about their other enemies?
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The Canaanites, were
they utterly destroyed?
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What about the
people in Jericho?
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Were they utterly
destroyed? Of course they were?
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Well at the end of the 1000
years we're brought face to face
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with a great
white throne judgment.
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Now the last time, of course,
we talked about the 1000 years.
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And I'm going to
review that a little bit
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here so that we
still have the setting,
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because context
is always important.
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You've got to
look at that context.
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It's crucial.
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So we want to look
at that context again.
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So I'm going to
review that 1000 years.
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Well that 1000 years,
sometimes called the millennium,
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which simply means 1000
years, that 1000 years starts
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when Jesus comes back in glory.
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Now the judgment that's
going on in heaven right now
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decides between the
wheat and the tares.
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But this white throne
judgment judges the wicked
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and gives them their sentence.
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And that's what the
judgment in heaven is about
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during the 1000 years, is
the righteous are the jury.
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So this coming of the Lord
Jesus starts this beginning.
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And we have, of course, the
saints, the resurrected saints
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are resurrected,
they're with Jesus in heaven.
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And the righteous
living are changed
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and you get that new body.
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Isn't that going to
be a wonderful thing?
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And we won't be old age.
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Positive. That's
going to be marvelous.
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So we'll all be eternally young.
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And all the
righteous from all the ages
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are going to be resurrected.
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And the living righteous
caught up with the Lord,
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to the Lord to
meet Him in the air.
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The wicked who are
alive on the earth,
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the Bible says
they're going to slain by the
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brightness of His coming.
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And of course, you've
got that sober picture
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in Revelation 19.
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So during the 1000 years there
is this judgment of the saints,
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as I mentioned it earlier.
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Deciding the severity of
the punishment for the wicked.
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And also getting all
their questions answered
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about God's justice.
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They're going to have all the
information when that's done.
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Now at the end of the 1000
years, just doing this review,
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at the end of the 1000 years,
Revelation 20:7-8 says this,
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"Now when the
thousand years have expired,
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Satan will be
released from his prison
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and will go out to
deceive the nations
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which are in the four corners
of the earth, Gog and Magog,
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to gather them
together to battle,
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whose number is as
the sand of the sea."
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Now God and Magog was, I
think, Ezekiel's code word
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for Babylon.
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And so the whole wicked
dead that are resurrected
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are kind of
described as Babylon,
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even though they
come from all the ages.
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And they're gathered now.
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Now they're like
the sand of the sea.
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And the devil is back
in business, if you please.
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He's going to deceive them.
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He's got
somebody to deceive now.
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Of course the question is,
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what is he going
to deceive them about?
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Well first of all, they're
coming from all over the earth.
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And he has to deceive
them into gathering together.
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Now what are they
going to gather together for?
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Well, because the camp
of the saints has come down.
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The New Jerusalem has come down.
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And it's there now on the earth.
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Because the great
white throne judgment,
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everybody stand before
God's great white throne;
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the righteous and the wicked.
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The nice thing
about the righteous is
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they've already been cleared.
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They're covered
with the blood of Christ.
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So when the great white
throne Judge looks at them,
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all He sees is the Lord Jesus.
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It's that wonderful?
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He sees that
beautiful, powerful character,
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that righteous
character of the Lord Jesus.
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But with the wicked
who are not covered,
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that's another story.
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So at the end
of this 1000 years,
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Satan is released
from his prison because
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the wicked dead
now are resurrected.
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And as soon as he's got a
crowd, he starts deceiving.
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And he gathers them
from all over the earth.
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Now the Bible says
in Revelation 20:9,
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"And they went up on
the breadth of the earth
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and surrounded the camp of
the saints, the beloved city."
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The beloved city.
The camp of the saints.
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That's the New Jerusalem.
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And John says in
chapter 21 verse 2,
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"I, John, saw the holy
city, the New Jerusalem..."
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Not old Babylon. Hallelujah.
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The New Jerusalem.
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Let me tell you this.
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That there's nothing in
Babylon, with all of its cities
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and its electricity,
and all of its comforts,
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there's nothing that
compares to the New Jerusalem.
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We're going to talk
about that in another session.
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"I saw the New Jerusalem coming
down from God out of heaven,
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prepared as a bride
adorned for her husband."
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Now question and answer,
where is now the New Jerusalem?
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The New
Jerusalem is on the earth.
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Don't lose that.
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The New
Jerusalem is on the earth.
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Keep that in mind.
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So it comes down from heaven,
and now it's sitting here.
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And the wicked dead
have been resurrected.
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Satan has deceived them,
that they can take the city.
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Now obviously he would
like to have the New Jerusalem.
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Now he doesn't want the
unselfish people who are
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full of God's unselfish
love who are in the city
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and protected by its
walls and its mighty gates.
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He doesn't want them,
but he wants the city.
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So they're not going to
blow this up with an atom bomb.
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No, they want to take the
city, they want to kill all the
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righteous, and
live in it themselves.
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And Satan convinces
them that he's their leader
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and that he can
lead them into it.
00:11:30.22\00:11:31.62
Now I don't know what
kind of deception he uses,
00:11:31.65\00:11:33.99
but he uses some kind of
fancy footwork, I suppose.
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He's cunning.
And they buy into it.
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Well, they've been buying into
Satan's lies all their life.
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And they buy into it.
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But let's go on with the story.
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Revelation 20:9-10,
and let's see what happens.
00:11:51.27\00:11:55.48
And the Bible says,
"And fire came down from God
00:11:55.94\00:11:59.51
out of heaven
and devoured them."
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What?
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Devoured them.
00:12:06.55\00:12:08.09
"Devoured," means to consume.
00:12:08.82\00:12:11.69
It goes back to that part that
our God is a consuming fire.
00:12:11.73\00:12:15.30
Just like He destroyed
the enemies of ancient Israel.
00:12:15.33\00:12:19.00
The consuming fire.
00:12:19.50\00:12:21.50
He devoured them.
00:12:21.54\00:12:23.20
They're over,
they're finished, as it were.
00:12:23.74\00:12:26.74
He goes on to say, "And
the devil who deceived them
00:12:27.08\00:12:31.05
was cast into the lake of fire
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where the beast and
the false prophet are."
00:12:33.78\00:12:36.25
The lake of fire is actually
right there on the earth.
00:12:36.28\00:12:40.32
It's right there.
00:12:40.72\00:12:42.06
"And they will be tormented
day and night forever and ever."
00:12:43.16\00:12:48.16
Now that's the little phrase,
and there's about three of
00:12:48.20\00:12:51.27
those phrases in the Scripture,
particularly in the book
00:12:51.30\00:12:53.70
of Revelation,
that describe this fire.
00:12:53.74\00:12:58.34
They'll be
tormented day and night,
00:12:58.37\00:12:59.77
and their smoke
goes up forever and ever.
00:12:59.81\00:13:03.04
So it sounds contradictory.
00:13:03.08\00:13:05.71
It sounds contradictory.
00:13:05.98\00:13:07.32
But let's finish the
story before we get into that.
00:13:07.35\00:13:09.68
The next few
verses give us a picture
00:13:09.72\00:13:12.52
of the final judgment.
00:13:12.55\00:13:14.19
Revelation 20:11-15
00:13:14.76\00:13:17.96
"Then I saw the great white
throne and Him who sat on it,
00:13:17.99\00:13:22.10
from whose face
heaven and earth fled away.
00:13:22.13\00:13:26.13
And there was no
place found for them."
00:13:26.17\00:13:29.34
In other words, God
didn't have any place
00:13:29.37\00:13:31.51
in His universe for
the resurrected wicked.
00:13:31.54\00:13:34.88
They're now going to be judged.
00:13:34.91\00:13:36.95
There's not going to
be any place for them.
00:13:36.98\00:13:39.95
Don't forget that
as we go into that.
00:13:40.28\00:13:43.08
"And the books were opened."
00:13:43.12\00:13:45.85
And God has a record
of absolutely everything.
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