July 1, 2017 THE ULTIMATE MARRIAGE
Revelation 19:6-8: “And I heard, as it were, the voice of a great multitude and as the sound of many waters and as the sound of mighty peals of thunder, saying, ‘Hallelujah! For the Lord our God, the Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give glory to Him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and His bride has made herself ready. And it was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.’”
What fantastic scriptures! As from the previous blog, God allowed John to see into heaven, to see what was happening there, and what John saw was so awesome that it almost defies imagination. The verses above express what has been in the Father’s heart for all of eternity-to be united to a people whom He redeemed through His Son, and to a people who love Him. Ever since Adam and Eve sinned and broke fellowship with God, God has been in the process of redeeming His people, and it culminates with this marriage of the Lamb to His bride. Jesus is the Lamb, and the church (believers) is the bride of Christ. This wedding of the Lamb and the bride is the epic celebration of the redemption of man that was made possible by the ultimate sacrifice that Jesus made. It was necessary for John to use words and pictures we understand in attempt to describe what was un-describable. It is interesting to note that the ‘fine linen’ was the ‘righteous acts of the saints.’ We may think that our actions have no lasting impact, but the fact is that the acts we do out of our being righteous in Him, are eternal acts, recorded in heaven-and God takes note of them! Obviously, it is the very heart of God for believers to live as His sons and daughters who overcome sin and all that is displeasing to Him. The book of Revelation makes it clear that what we do in this life has eternal consequences! Perhaps we do not have as many options in life as we think-our one option is to live according to heart of God as revealed in the scriptures. The good news is that we do not try to live by the gospel in order to please God or earn His approval; when we come to know Him as He desires us to known Him, it becomes our joy and our desire to please Him in all we do. We would do well to remember that there is purpose in life; that how we live and what we do matters greatly and has eternal consequences; and that God is preparing and looking forward to the ultimate marriage-the day when His Son receives His bride-the church.
Matthew 25:34: “Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.’”
John 14:2-4: “My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with Me that you may be where I am.”
Blessings,
Buddy
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