A new body?
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A new world?
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A new beginning?
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Brand new.
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The opportunity of a lifetime.
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You know, everybody
likes a new beginning.
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Particularly in a world that's
been filled with such sorrow,
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and difficulty, and failure.
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And today we're going to talk
about a beginning that's coming,
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a new beginning
that is just marvelous.
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Actually, we're going to
one of the parables of Jesus
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in the book of
Matthew chapter 13.
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And He talks about
a parable about tares.
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And let me just read that text.
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It says, "The enemy who
sowed them is the devil."
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In other words, there's a
field, and somehow they end up
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with tares in the field.
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Tares! How in the
world could that happen?
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But He says how it happened.
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So we live in a world
that's been filled with trouble,
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and sorrow, and difficulty.
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And there's somebody
responsible for that,
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and it's not the Lord.
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The devil sowed all of these
tares that are in the world.
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Now it says, at the end of the
age these tares are going to be
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gathered and burned, and the
wheat is going to be gathered
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in God's barn.
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And Ephesians chapter
1 talks again about this
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new age that is coming.
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A wonderful new age.
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It says, Ephesians
1:18-21, "...that you may know
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the hope of His calling..."
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I want to tell you, this
hope we have of a new beginning
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and a new age, that hope is
not going to be disappointed.
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It's going to be a reality.
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And you don't want
to miss out on that.
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"...what are the
riches of the glory..."
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We're talking about,
"...the riches of the glory
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of the
inheritance in the saints..."
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He goes on to say,
"...not only in this age..."
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So there's two ages here.
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"...not only in this
age, but in the age to come."
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Titus 2:11-12 says
this, "For the grace of God
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that brings salvation
has appeared to all men..."
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So everybody has an
opportunity for a new beginning.
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There's no need to
be left out of this.
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And then he goes on to say,
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"...teaching us that
denying ungodliness..."
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There has to be a
change in our hearts.
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Because this new
beginning is going to be a place
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where there's none of
this tares left in this world.
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No problems in this new age.
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We want to be
part of that new age.
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But I like the
way Titus ends this.
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He says, "...denying
ungodliness and worldly lusts,
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we should live
soberly, righteously, and godly
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in the present age..."
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The age that we're living in.
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In other words,
in this present age
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we're getting ready for
the new age that is coming
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that Jesus is going to bring.
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And then he says this...
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My mother and dad are sleeping.
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I lost my mother a
little over a year ago.
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Wonderful parents.
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And they looked forward
to the coming of the Lord.
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And there on their
tombstone are these words,
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from Titus, from
Titus, and Titus says this,
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"...looking for
the blessed hope."
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"...looking for
the blessed hope."
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Now I'm looking
for that blessed hope.
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That blessed hope is
that new age that is coming.
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Now Revelation
describes this present age.
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The present age,
we've been talking about it.
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It's not going to end pretty.
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It's going to end with
a great terrible conflict.
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The culmination of
these ages of conflicts
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between Christ and Satan,
this thing is coming to an end.
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It's going to end
with the mark of the beast,
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with the destruction of Babylon.
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And this home of the wicked
is going to be passed away.
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The Bible says
in 2 Peter 3:10-13,
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it says, "But the say of
the Lord will come like a
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thief in the night, in
which the heavens pass away
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with a great
noise, the elements melt
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with fervent heat;
both the earth and the works
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that are in it
will be burned up.
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In other words, this
age is going to pass away.
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This earth is
going to be destroyed.
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It's going to be replaced
with a new world, a new age.
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The start of a new age.
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Well, let's talk about that
new heavens and a new earth.
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And we're going to go
to the book of Revelation.
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And we get some
descriptions there that
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just boggle the
mind and the imagination.
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An it's exciting
when you think about it.
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So we want to go
to Revelation 21:1.
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And this comes on the heels
when the first age passes away,
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this new age starts.
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Then we have
Revelation 21:1 saying this,
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"Now I saw a new
heaven and a new earth..."
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There it is. Brand new.
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"...for the first heaven and the
first earth had passed away."
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Now there's no question what's
going to happen to this world.
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It's going to pass away.
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But there's also no question
about what's going to follow it.
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A new heavens and a new earth.
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"Also there was no more sea."
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Let's think about this for just
a few minutes here together.
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What does this mean?
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Well first of all, there's
going to be a lot of things
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that will pass away.
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And we'll be glad
that they passed away.
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Death will be done away with.
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And with it, the
decay that brings death,
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and the sorrow that
brings all of this death.
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And then in order for
this to happen, of course,
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what causes death
must also pass away.
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And what causes it is the
transgression of God's law.
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It's sin that causes it.
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No more old age. How about that?
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I'll go for that.
You'll go for that.
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No more old
age. No more disease.
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Filth.
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You know, I've been in
places where the sewer just runs
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in the gutters down
the street, open gutters.
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There are American cities
today that are experiencing
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typhus because of the filth
in the inner cities sometimes
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in these places where people
are living and congregating.
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I just heard about something
like that on the west coast.
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Typhus in America
resulting because of filth.
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There's not going to be
any filth in this new earth.
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And no disease
that goes with it.
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Hunger; there's more
than enough food in the world
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to feed everybody, but
you can't get it to everybody.
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It's a lack of access,
not a lack of resources.
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And then there's no more war.
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Think about World War II.
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Seventy million
people lost their lives.
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Think about what
happened in China
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under Mao; 70 million people.
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Stalin in Russia;
20 million people.
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I mean, the world
has just been filled with
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terrible, terrible
war and destruction.
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And I thank the Lord that
it's all going to pass away.
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Think of all the suffering
animals have gone through.
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I mean, I go through or
by not too far from my house,
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about twenty miles from
my house I pass it a lot,
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huge chicken farms there.
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These chickens
crammed four to a little cage
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where they spend
their whole life.
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No more suffering of
animals in this new age.
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No, the Bible says it's new.
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It's brand new.
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Brand spanking new, as we used
to say when I was growing up.
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No, a new heavens.
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And there's not
going to be any sea there.
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It says no more sea.
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That means there's going to
be plenty of land for everybody.
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Plenty of land.
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No more division, no
more great bodies of water
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that separate
nations and peoples.
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No, the earth is
going to be united.
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We're going to be one, we're
going to be in great harmony.
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I didn't mean there's not
going to be probably large
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bodies of waters, but not seas
or oceans like we know today.
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First of all, I
want to talk about the
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New Jerusalem a little bit.
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Now the Bible describes the
New Jerusalem in some detail.
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Now we have,
again, it's going to be
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really beyond our imagination.
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But this is just
a fantastic thing.
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Revelation 21:10-13
says, "And he carried me away
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in the Spirit to a
great and high mountain,
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and showed me a great
city, the holy Jerusalem..."
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The New Jerusalem.
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In contrast to that Babylon that
falls apart at the end of time
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that everybody was seduced by,
everybody wanted to be part of.
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But that Babylon passes away.
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But this New Jerusalem,
again, the book of Revelation
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so filled with
contrast, this New Jerusalem,
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this is the home of Jesus.
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Don't you want to
be where Jesus is at?
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The incomparable Jesus that
has made all of this possible.
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What a marvelous Savior we have.
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So this goes on to
tell us, and he said,
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"...and showed me the
great city, the holy Jerusalem,
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descending out
of heaven from God,
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having the glory of God.
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Her light was like a
most precious stone..."
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I got online on the internet
and I just kind of looked up
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on diamonds and
this kind of thing.
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And there's some
beautiful, beautiful stones.
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This whole city
shines like a precious stone.
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It says, "...like a
jasper stone, clear as crystal."
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Now we don't exactly
know what all that means.
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I went back and
looked, the ancients usually
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thought of jasper
as kind of greenish,
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but sometimes jasper is
not as clear as other stones.
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But this is going to be clear.
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The Bible says it's going
to be as clear as crystal.
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It was the best
John could do to describe
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kind of what he saw there.
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Now it says the city
is going to be square.
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It's going to be four square.
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And it says that it's
going to have a great high wall.
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216 feet tall
by my calculations.
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Now that's high.
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I mean, that is very high.
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Now some people say, "Well,
why would you need a wall?"
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Well, the wall
does a couple of things.
00:10:06.47\00:10:08.40
First of all, if you remember,
the devil and his evil angels
00:10:08.44\00:10:12.97
have the resurrected dead
at the end of the 1000 years,
00:10:13.48\00:10:17.15
we talked about that earlier,
and they surround the camp.
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This is the final
destruction of the wicked.
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And they want to take the city.
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And there's a little
time period in there.
00:10:23.92\00:10:25.42
So the walls, in a
sense, protect the city.
00:10:25.45\00:10:28.02
But it also defines the
city, and it glorifies the city,
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and it makes the city beautiful.
00:10:31.99\00:10:34.30
So it defines the city.
00:10:34.50\00:10:36.90
Now it shines, the Bible
says, like crystallized gold.
00:10:37.23\00:10:40.97
I don't know what that
means, but I wanted to see
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if I could find
some golden diamonds.
00:10:44.21\00:10:47.68
Well they do have
some yellow diamonds.
00:10:47.71\00:10:50.01
And they're very beautiful.
00:10:50.05\00:10:51.38
But all we know is
what John described it as.
00:10:51.41\00:10:55.52
And so it shines
like crystallized gold.
00:10:55.92\00:10:58.89
The whole city does.
00:10:58.92\00:11:00.26
It's going to have a
lot of other mingled colors
00:11:00.29\00:11:03.02
in with it as well.
00:11:03.06\00:11:04.39
Now it has twelve foundations.
00:11:04.43\00:11:06.13
Twelve foundations.
00:11:06.53\00:11:08.10
Evidently you can
see these foundations.
00:11:08.13\00:11:10.57
Because the Bible
says that the foundations
00:11:10.80\00:11:14.14
had the names of
the twelve apostles.
00:11:14.17\00:11:16.91
So I say this to people,
I say, everybody that walks
00:11:16.94\00:11:20.28
into the New Jerusalem is
going to be a true Israelite.
00:11:20.31\00:11:25.11
You know, the apostle Paul
says that the true Israelite
00:11:25.25\00:11:28.72
is not one
necessarily of the flesh,
00:11:28.95\00:11:31.09
but the one of the heart.
00:11:31.12\00:11:32.72
So all of us that
go into that new city,
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we're going to be true Israel.
00:11:36.32\00:11:39.43
Now there's also twelve gates.
00:11:39.73\00:11:42.16
Well I should say this
before I leave the foundations.
00:11:42.36\00:11:44.73
The foundations are made
of twelve precious stones,
00:11:44.77\00:11:49.97
beautiful gems.
00:11:50.01\00:11:51.91
Again, the colors that are
going to get intermingled here,
00:11:51.94\00:11:56.85
it's just beyond imagination.
00:11:57.18\00:11:59.51
It also has twelve gates.
00:12:00.22\00:12:02.25
Now on the twelve gates are the
names of the twelve apostles.
00:12:02.28\00:12:06.82
So I also say that
everybody that goes into that
00:12:06.96\00:12:09.96
New Jerusalem, they're
going to be a Christian.
00:12:09.99\00:12:13.29
They're going to be a
New Testament Christian.
00:12:13.40\00:12:15.63
Because we go through the
gates of the twelve apostles.
00:12:15.86\00:12:19.80
Each gates, and this
is hard for me to imagine,
00:12:19.90\00:12:22.30
each gate is
said to be one pearl.
00:12:22.34\00:12:26.17
Now pearls are beautiful.
00:12:26.61\00:12:28.04
You don't usually
think of them as gates.
00:12:28.08\00:12:30.25
But think of a
whole gate as a pearl.
00:12:30.51\00:12:33.95
So is this going to be
round or like a tear drop?
00:12:33.98\00:12:36.69
We don't know.
00:12:36.72\00:12:38.12
But it's going to be
big enough for all the saved
00:12:38.55\00:12:42.52
from all the ages to walk
through into that New Jerusalem.
00:12:42.56\00:12:48.46
Now it says it's
1500 furlongs, or miles,
00:12:48.76\00:12:52.30
the circumference of it.
00:12:52.33\00:12:53.67
Now some people think
that's all on one side.
00:12:53.70\00:12:55.97
I'm going to be a little
bit more conservative here
00:12:56.50\00:12:59.14
and just say that it's 1500
furlongs, or miles I should say,
00:12:59.17\00:13:04.71
furlongs translated into miles,
1500 miles divided by four.
00:13:04.75\00:13:09.72
That means you've got a city
that's 375 miles on each side.
00:13:10.32\00:13:16.49
Now that's big.
00:13:16.52\00:13:17.89
I mean, that's really big.
00:13:17.93\00:13:19.86
So it's going to have
about 140,000 plus square miles
00:13:20.10\00:13:25.20
in the city.
00:13:25.23\00:13:26.57
And if you want an
idea of how big that is,
00:13:26.77\00:13:30.74
take the state of Montana.
00:13:31.47\00:13:33.61
The state of Montana
and the New Jerusalem
00:13:33.64\00:13:36.14
are going to be
about the same size,
00:13:36.18\00:13:38.81
as far as the territory.
00:13:38.85\00:13:41.52
It's also going to
go into space 375 miles.
00:13:42.45\00:13:48.42
Think of that.
00:13:48.46\00:13:50.73