Well dear congregation I invite you to take your copies of God's Word and turn in them to Zechariah chapter 1. I'm just going to read one verse in your hearing this morning. And for those of you who are visiting we have started a series on the night visions of Zechariah. And just to let you know, as you're turning to Zechariah, it's the second to last book in the Old Testament. I'm not gonna be giving a lot of review this morning. There's a lot of content, really rich and important content that we're going to look at. If you feel lost as we are going through this verse, I encourage you to go to sermonaudio.com and check out the prior sermons from the last few weeks, and hopefully they will give you some context for what we're gonna be talking about. I can't think of a more relevant topic of what we're gonna talk about this morning than what has transpired in the last seven days. I know many of you have a flood of different thoughts and concerns, but the Word of God has something to say to us this morning, and I pray that the Lord would give us ears to listen. So I'm gonna read this morning Zechariah 1, verse eight, Listen carefully, this is the word of the living God. Zechariah said, I saw in the night, and behold, a man riding on a red horse. He was standing among the myrtle trees by the deep, and behind him were red, sorrel, and white horses. That's part of the reading of God's word. Grass withers and the flower falls, but the word of our Lord stands forever, and we are thankful for it. Would you bow with me and let's pray? Father, before we once again come to your word, I forgot to pray for a few things and so I would lift them up to you this morning. I lift up to you my wife, Christina Henson, who is home even now with a debilitating headache, and pray, Father, that you would give her grace to hear these exquisite and real promises from your Word, and that they would put wind in her sails, and that, Father, she would be reminded that she is a daughter of Sarah, a daughter of Jesus Christ. And He has given to her the exquisite gift of the eschaton, and I pray, Father, that that would comfort her in this time. We lift up to you also our dear Sister Lizzie, who is home and battling through pain right now, Father. I just pray, Father, that you would give her the same, that you would remind her that she is a daughter of Sarah. the daughter of Jesus Christ, that Christ has given her the double benefit of the covenant that our sins are paid for, and she stands robed in the righteousness of Jesus Christ. And as a result, on that final day, she will enter into his rest without any pain, no tears, no heartache, but the shackles of pain and grief and despair will have been broken, and she will be a child of liberty. Father, we lift up to you Dr. Roster, who has had some health complications this week. And first off, just thank you that he is here with us. What a beloved brother he is to us, Father. And I pray that you would comfort him, that you would heal him, and that he too would hear with the rest of us these blessed promises from your word. Father, open our ears this morning. Open our eyes. We do indeed seek to see Jesus. We wish to see Jesus. And we pray, Father, not that, as I often say, we could forget about what has happened out in the public square this week. No, Father, help us to bring it into this place. This is not a movie theater where we escape from reality. This is a place, Father, where we bring reality into the sanctuary and we ask you as we place it upon the altar to give us eyes to see how it fits in the grand scheme of history and how eschatology will swallow it all up. and how kingdoms will be plucked up and destroyed and thrown down and the kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will reign forever and ever and ever. A kingdom, Father, and a king who needs no recount. A kingdom and a king, Father, whose splendor is from eternity past. A kingdom and a king who has worked for this kingdom so that our broken cistern of works will not have to because they can't. Father, show us this kingdom in the night visions of Zechariah this morning, we pray. In Christ's name, amen. The last two weeks, and now this third week, we have been focusing on Zechariah 1, verse 8. And the reason for that, I just want to remind you, is because Zechariah 1, verse 8 serves as an interpretive key to understand the visions in the book of Zechariah. And, in particular, it's these three figures that we're just going to get to in just a moment that serve as something of a cipher, something as an interpretive grid. And just to give you an example, it was Jesus in the parable of the soils, if you recall, in Mark chapter 4. Maybe you've caught this, maybe you haven't. He tells the parable of the soils, and it's kind of the first parable that he tells in this series of parables, but there's this one little verse that people often miss after he tells that parable and after he interprets it. He says, in effect, he says, if you understand this parable, you will understand all the parables. And that's interesting because that's exactly what Zechariah is doing here. If you understand what Zechariah is doing in these three figures as he lays them out in the night visions, then you're going to understand in the rest of the night visions what's going on because these three figures, even though their exact names are not gonna come up, that which they represent is going to come up again and again and again and again. It's gonna be this repeating cycle where Zechariah, like John in the book of Revelation, is going to be repeating the same story over and over and over again. And so just to come back by way of review very quickly, we've seen in the last two weeks that this man who is mounted on the red horse is the angel of the Lord, and the angel of the Lord tradition in the Old Testament draws our attention to the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ. This is Jesus Christ before his incarnation, the second member of the Trinity, who, listen to me, appears as a theophany. And that word is going to be very important as we continue to plow through Zechariah. A theophany is a manifestation of the Lord God in the Old Covenant. We see that example in the three men that came to visit Abraham. That was a theophany of the triune God. And then also we saw that the deep of the sea, which I translated for you in the reading of Zechariah 1.8, it is not ravine as we see in the ESV, but it is by the deep. This angel of the Lord is mounted on his horse by the deep, the deep of the sea. And we traced that motif, that theme through scripture last week and saw that in essence, it represents the satanic kingdom. that through all the age of redemptive history is constantly oppressing and attacking and persecuting the people of God. And the satanic kingdom does not come as a demon or Satan himself and say, hi, I'll be your demon for tonight and I will be persecuting you. No, he and his hordes come through the puppetry of world powers, through the puppetry of world governments. That's why even John in the first century would refer to even powers in that time as beasts because they're doing the bidding of Satan. And we saw last week that even Satan as he is unsuccessful in Revelation chapter 12 to chase the woman throughout the wilderness and grab her and attack her and snuff her out. He stands by, at the end of Revelation chapter 12, he stands by the sea. And in Revelation chapter 13, he calls out of the sea the beast and the false prophet and others to inflict more havoc upon the people of God in the earth. He is trying to imitate our God who draws life out of the chaos of the sea. So what we're going to see this morning now is the identity of the myrtle tree. And I'm very excited to talk about the myrtle tree because, number one, it is incredibly rich. Number two, like last week, it's going to help us make some connections to concepts and motifs in the Bible that have come before the book of Zechariah and are going to come after the book of Zechariah. It's really going to open up the windows of biblical revelation for us and help us connect dots and find hope, whereas before we did not find hope. But thirdly, it's gonna help us to put this whole picture together of the man on the horse by the deep among the myrtle trees and see the big picture. And if I could just sum it up in one pregnant phrase, I would say it this way. While God's people are in the world wilderness facing the satanic deep, while they are in the throes of their historic earthly struggle, Emmanuel, our mighty God, is present with them. That's what we're gonna see this morning. So what are these myrtle trees? Boys and girls, listen very carefully. Your mommy and daddy or your grandpa and grandma or whoever brought you to church today after church is going to ask you what the myrtle trees are, and I want you to answer them, okay? Let's begin this morning by looking at these myrtle trees. Now, what are these myrtle trees? Well, let me begin by saying this. Smells often bring associations to our minds. I know that when I smell a Douglas fir or an evergreen tree, okay, I smell Christmas in the air, okay? I smell a white peppermint mocha and I taste it, I smell Christmas in the air, okay? There's certain smells that bring about associations when we smell them. And that is also the case with the Jews. When the Jews heard Zechariah say that in his night vision, he saw a myrtle tree. They immediately made a connection between the myrtle tree and the feast of booths. Why? Well, in Nehemiah 8, verse 14, this is the exilic era. And Nehemiah is instructing the people of God to celebrate the feast of booths, which we're gonna get to in just a moment. They had been celebrating the feast of booths or tabernacles or in gathering for a long time at this point. But he instructs them to build their booths with three things, myrtle trees, olive trees, and palm trees. These myrtle trees, olive trees, and palm trees were the raw materials from which they constructed these rustic booths that they would live in for seven days. And what was that to commemorate? That was to commemorate the time when Israel came through the Red Sea and wandered through the wilderness for some 40 years until they came into Canaan, which was the fulfillment of the promise. That wandering time where, listen, They roamed about the earth as sojourners. They roamed about the earth as pilgrims. They roamed about the earth, much like our Lord, without any place to call their home. They did not have a home. and they were looking to another place that would one day be their home. For them, on that typological level, it was the land of Canaan. And even to this day, Jews continue to celebrate the Feast of Booths, the Feast of Tabernacles. And so when they heard Zechariah mention the myrtle trees, Their association immediately went to the materials that were made, or the materials that were used to make these myrtle trees. Now, they're all kinds of myrtle trees. They are from the Mediterranean, but they have a very aromatic foliage to them, and they have a pleasant smell, much like a Christmas tree, but it's a little different. It's not as strong, but you can immediately recognize that it is the smell of a myrtle tree. They will sometimes grow to as large as 15 feet and they will blossom out and they have these beautiful white blossoms that if you stand back and look at them as they're laid out, it almost looks like a glory cloud. The word for myrtle or myrtle trees is Hadass and the reason I mention that is because it's the word from which we get the Hebrew name of Esther. The Hebrew name of Esther is Hadassah. and how she is described in the book of Esther as one who is full of glory, one who is beautiful, one who is pleasant to look upon. And so these myrtle trees were pleasant to look upon, and the myrtle tree was chosen by Zechariah in this imagery to direct attention primarily to the glory aspect of the tabernacles, that it was beautiful, that it was full of splendor, but also to what those tabernacles represented. So secondly, I want you to consider for a moment the typology that comes out of this feast of booths. Oftentimes when we look back on the feasts of the Jews, there are seven feasts in total, but there are three feasts in particular that are sort of agricultural feasts. They're celebrated every single year. And the one that we're most familiar with is Passover. And we know from the New Testament that Paul in 1 Corinthians 5-7, he takes that feast of Passover and he shows its fulfillment in whom? Jesus Christ. It says Jesus Christ is our Passover lamb. And so that which the Jews were supposed to be looking forward to in the celebration of the Passover finds its apex, its culmination in Jesus Christ. But oftentimes we stop there and we don't take that same hermeneutical lens that is looking for Christ in the feasts, in the tabernacle, in all these things in the Old Covenant and apply them. But what we also need to be reminded of is that next feast, Pentecost, okay? It's called Pentecost from 50 in the Greek because it is 50 days after Passover. And that feast was celebrated by the Jews in the Old Covenant to commemorate the first fruits, the first fruits of harvest. Not all the fruits, but the first fruits. And it's very interesting. Because what happened in Acts chapter two? The Spirit was poured out on the church. And the way Paul in his letters describes the Spirit is he says that the Spirit is an arabon, a pledge, a guarantee, something you might say like a first fruit of that which is to come. God gives the Spirit of God to the Church of Christ to say, this is the environment of heaven. He is in you now, but one day, that which is in you will be expanded to all of creation, and you will be in the new heavens and the new earth. So here's just a pledge. Here's a guarantee that this Spirit in you is an indication that one day, all things will be made new. If any man is in Christ, literally in the Greek, new creation. He is a new creation. So the Day of Pentecost represented first fruits to the Old Covenant people of God, but to us, the first fruits of that which is to come, the indwelling of the Spirit. But then now, this third feast, the Feast of Booths, and it has many different names, it's very interesting because what it commemorated for the Jews in the Old Covenant was the ingathering of all the rest of the fruits from harvest. If Pentecost was a celebration of the first fruits, the Feast of Booths, or the Feast of Tabernacles, or it is also called the Feast of Ingathering, is to celebrate the end of harvest, where everything is brought in, the chaff is thrown away, the fruit is kept, and we celebrate the fruits that God has given us. Well, this has rich typological meaning for the people of God. And I would submit to you this morning that in this figure of the feast of booths, which were constructed, the booths were constructed from myrtle trees, we smell two aromas in one feast. Let me say that again. We smell two aromas in one feast. The scent of the myrtle tree provides for us the aroma of the eschaton. The scent of the myrtle tree provides for us a whiff of that which is to come. And there's two ways in which it does that. Number one, as I've already mentioned, Feast of Booths was called the Feast of Ingathering And what this basically means is, for us, is the final consummation. In fact, Jesus tells a parable where He says, in the world, it's not the church, it's in the world, there is wheat and there is chaff. And somebody said, well, should we send angels to take out all the chaff? He said, no, no, no, let the wheat and the chaff grow up together. And at the final day, I will send angels to cut down all the chaff and burn it, and only the wheat will stand." That will happen in the final judgment. Okay? He's talking about the final consummation in agricultural final harvest terms. And in fact, in Revelation chapter 14, the final judgment is once again described as a final harvesting. the angel will take basically a harvesting tool and cut down all the wheat and the chaff and will burn the chaff and keep the wheat. And so what this represents to us in this Feast of the In-Gathering is the final consummation. So that's the first thing that it represents. But the second thing it represents, and this is very important to us, especially in this week, is our present identity. What did the Feast of Booths also communicate to the people of God? That you are a pilgrim people, that this place is not your home, that you are waiting for and looking for and anticipating and desiring with ardent cries in your prayers and ardent desires in your heart something better than you see today, something better than the aspirations of political parties in the public square. You're looking for something better. You're looking for a place whose builder and foundation is God. That's what Abraham was looking for. That's what Jacob and Isaac were looking for. That's what David was looking for. And that's what we as the people of God were looking for. We're looking for something that is better. So the Feast of Booths reminds us that right now is not the time that we should expect glory to be here. We're waiting for the glory to break in on the final day. So, until then we live in these rustic booths, these slapped together booths, these bodies that are decaying, that are breaking down. We live in these booths until Christ comes back. Now I have a very important question at this point. Because many of you may be tracking, but there's some of you, and God bless you for this, you're like, yeah, I don't know, Josh. I don't know, myrtle trees, Feast of Booths, is that really what's going on? So let me ask this question. Is the connection between myrtle trees and the Feast of Booths and what the Feast of Booths represents, is that just a coincidence? Or is it the divine intention of the Lord? That's a very important question, glad you asked. Let me answer it, okay? If you recall, and you can go back and look at this later, in Hebrews chapter 8, just jot down Hebrews chapter 8, specifically verse 5. The author of the Hebrews tells us that when God gave instructions to Moses to build the tabernacle, he was very intentional that Moses construct that tabernacle exactly the way that he instructed. Why? Why was Moses not given any liberty, any creative liberty, any architectural liberty to make that tabernacle however he wanted? I'll tell you why. Because in that tabernacle, and this is very important, God was typifying to the people of Israel various aspects of the person and work and promises of Jesus Christ. And so he wanted every single detail to be just so, so that later it could shine forth as a type of Jesus Christ. And so Moses had to get it precisely right. And so when we come back to Zechariah 1.8, and Zechariah mentions myrtle trees, and we make that connection, because it's only used a handful of times in the whole Bible, there is an intentional connection that is meant to be made to the Feast of Tabernacles, the Feast of Booths, the Feast of Ingathering, for us to see, number one, the promise that we are waiting for, and number two, the identity that we have in this life as we look to that promise. So I think that it is very intentional and very important. So the scent of the myrtle trees carries the aroma of promise and identity. What I want to do is I want to zoom in on the rich typological associations that are conjured up by the scent of the myrtle tree and focus on these two things, the promise that it gives and the identity that it tells us we have. So number one, let's look at the myrtle tree as the consummated kingdom of God, the consummated kingdom of God. Here's what's interesting. The myrtle trees appear in scripture as these idyllic pictures of fertility and luxuriance of the earth. In fact, if you turn in your Bibles very quickly to Isaiah 55 verse 13. Isaiah 55 verse 13. Isaiah here is describing the messianic age. He's describing the earth as it will be when Messiah is reigning over all things. Now just keep in mind, Isaiah is describing things from his vantage point as he understands it. He's not going to describe it the way you would think of heaven. He's going to describe it in the way, in the categories that he as a Jew in the 7th century, 8th or 7th century, has for what heaven looks like, what worship looks like, and so he's going to describe it in kind of old covenant terms, but it's a new covenant, eschatological, new heavens, new earth idea. And what he says is, instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress. Instead of the briar shall come up the myrtle. And it shall make a name for the Lord, an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off. Now what was one of the promises of the fall? When God punished the man and Eve and the serpent, what did he say? Well, you've worked up until this point, but now, because you've sinned, thorns and thistles shall infest the earth. Thorns and thistles were not there before the fall. Thorns and thistles, which poetically, and even in some cases literally, makes man's toil difficult, right? You go to pick something, you go to plow something, you go to harvest something, and there's thorns and thistles. It pricks your finger and blood. It's difficult. It's not desirable. Thorns and thistles infest the ground as a result of the fall, but Isaiah is describing a time where in the place, in the wilderness, and remember last week we saw that the wilderness was a picture and a type of the tohu v'bohu, the chaos and disorder. In the midst of the chaos and the disorder, God will cause myrtle trees to spring up. where there is no water, myrtle trees will spring up. And there is a rich theology in the Old Covenant, which shows itself in the New, of how God turns disorder into order in these eschatological terms. And so the myrtle tree will spring up, and what we see, much like what we saw in creation, how God, the Spirit of God is hovering over the face of the deep, remember that? And it's chaos, and there's no life, and there's disorder, and God brings, Isn't that interesting? He brings a garden out of the chaos. He brings a garden out of the disorder. We're going to see that this thing comes up again and again and again. So here with Isaiah and Zechariah, the myrtle tree, especially in the desert land, has associations of a place where the curse is reversed. And instead of thorns and thistles, one finds fragrant, luxuriant, arboreal settings. Boys and girls, arboreal means a place where there's a bunch of trees. In fact, I think at the botanical gardens in Norfolk, there's something called an arboretum, which is a place where there's just a bunch of trees. Now I want you to trace this picture, this image of an arboretum, if you will. I want you to look at three images very quickly, and I'm gonna go through them pretty quickly. Remember at creation, as I said, the glory spirit is over the face of the deep, he causes land to come out, he causes order, and what does he do? He brings man into a garden, Eden. And remember I said last week, and I didn't do much with it, I'm gonna do more with it now, that that garden becomes a microcosm, a small example of a temple that is going to expand into all the earth, okay? Now we'll come back to that. Put a bookmark there, okay? Secondly, in the Exodus, we talked about this last week, you had the deep of the sea and it's standing as an obstacle to the people of God. You've got the deep of the sea in front of them and Pharaoh and his arm is behind them. Who's going to redeem them? God comes with the pillar of cloud and he parts the water with a wind, a ruach, and the people of God go through. Now here's what's interesting. I didn't mention this last week. They go through the deep, much as the Spirit brought order out of the deep of the chaos. At the Exodus, they go through the deep, and it tells us in Exodus chapter 15, verse 27, that they came to the place of Elim. And if you're familiar at all with the place of Elim, it says it was the place of 70 palm trees. We see this concept again of after being brought out of the deep through redemption, they come to a place of trees. Isn't that interesting? We see this also when Joshua, as the new Moses, leads the people of God into the land of Canaan. They pass through the deep of the Jordan, and they come into a land flowing with milk and honey. If you've ever wondered what that means, milk refers to the rich livestock that is throughout the land, and honey refers to the flora and fauna and arboreal settings that are there in Canaan. But not only that, they came to the place of Jericho. After they went through the deep, they come to the place of Jericho, and Jericho is what? The city of palm trees. We see this arboreal image once again. Now here's what's interesting. Listen to me very carefully. Remember how I said the garden, that place of trees and shrubbery and just arboreal, fragrant, luxuriant, richness in life? That becomes a microcosm of the temple. Now when Solomon's temple is constructed, we read in 1 Kings 6, verse 29, that engraved on the inside walls of the temple were palm trees. Isn't that interesting? Why is that? Because the temple, the place where God and man meet in unfettered communion and fellowship, like the Garden of Eden. is the place where God and man meet as a sacrifice is given. And so this image of trees surrounding the place where God and man meet is in the temple. And not only there, but it was the palm trees and the cherubim and open flowers engraved upon the walls. When we get to the book of Ezekiel, we find this very interesting set of chapters, Ezekiel 40 through 48. And if you're a recovering dispensationalist, you know exactly what that is because it's describing a future temple. And some of you have had to wrestle with that. What is that? Is Ezekiel talking about a literal temple that's gonna be in the millennium? But what's interesting is that number one, in the description of that temple, Ezekiel tells us once again that engraved on the inside walls of the temple are palm trees and cherubim. And then when we go to Revelation chapter 22, verses one through two, and by the way, just as an aside, I encourage you to read Revelation 22 together with Ezekiel 40 through 48, and I'm just gonna submit to you what I think is the answer. I think that what Ezekiel is describing in chapters 40 through 48 is the new heavens and the new earth in in seventh century terms that he could understand as a Jew who thought of worship via the temple. He's describing future worship as temple, but we know biblically and theologically Jesus Christ is our temple, and that temple will be there in the new heavens and the new earth. But in Revelation chapter 22, I'm gonna read verses one and two, this is what John says. Then the angel showed me the river of life, brightest crystal flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb, through the middle of the street of the city, also on either side of the river, the tree of life, with its 12 kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. What do we see in the new heavens and the new earth? Arboreal settings where once again God and man meet in unfettered fellowship. So, the first thing that the Feast of Booths tells us, the Feast of Booths that were constructed with myrtle trees, is that there is a place, there is a time, there is a kingdom coming, that once again, paradise lost will be paradise restored, but even better than it ever was, in such a way that it'll never revert back to sinful conditions because the greater Adam, the second Adam will be there and he will keep the temple from being defiled. And that temple and the new heavens and the new earth will expand to fill all of creation because every square inch of the new heavens and the new earth will be a place where God and man will have unfettered fellowship with one another. What's the second thing that the myrtles represent in the Feast of Booths? Well, very simply, temporal sojourning. Temporal sojourning. The rough simplicity of the booths underscored the unsettled, impermanent, temporary character of the wilderness situation. You know what's interesting is the kingship under David, even then, Okay, even then, the Jews still celebrated the Feast of Booths. Why? We had a Davidic king. The promises were being fulfilled. We had the land, right? We had this man that was a man after God's own heart and fulfillment of what they thought at that time would be the Messiah. So why are we still meeting in Booths? Hasn't the real thing come? No, it hasn't come yet. Well, it must come with Solomon. Because the Bible says that under Solomon, Israel had peace throughout all the land. And if you look back at the promises of what God gave Israel in the beginning, he said, there will come a time where you will dwell in your land, and every man will dwell under his olive tree, and there will be peace throughout the land. Well, then under Solomon, this must be the time, right? This must be the antitype. This must be the fulfillment of God's promise. But no, God instructs the people of Israel, under Solomon, you keep meeting in booths. Why? It's a very important question. Why? because Solomon's temple and Solomon's kingdom was not ultimately what God had promised. He was promising a greater Solomon and a greater kingdom, a kingdom that could not be shaken, a kingdom that could not be taken, and a king who would not be wooed away by the idols of his many, many wives, a greater king whose name was Jesus Christ. So they continue to meet in Booths. Now, the Spirit of God, was with Israel in the Old Covenant and would move around with Israel in the New Covenant. In fact, the Spirit of God manifested Himself to the people of Israel through these theophany types, through the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night. That was God manifesting Himself to them. He was with them, the Spirit of God was with them in the tabernacle as it followed the people of Israel around, or better, as the people of Israel followed it around. But what was distinct about the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, and Jesus makes this clear in the book of John, John chapter 14, verses 16 and 17, he told the disciples, the Spirit is with you, but he shall be, what? in you. One of the unique promises of the new covenant is that the Spirit of God takes up residency in the people of God. Now that does not mean that in the old covenant the people of God were not regenerated. The Spirit of God can regenerate without actually indwelling. But it does mean that there's something new about the new covenant people of God and what it is is that now the Spirit of God dwells within them. It is no longer the case that in the old covenant, the Spirit of God would come upon somebody, like a judge of Israel, like Samson, or whatever the case may be. Now, for all the people of God, the Spirit of God dwells in them. They are, as it were, an environment of heaven, where the Spirit dwells. And that's why the promise of the new covenant says, in those days, you will not have to tell one another, know the Lord, within the community of faith, because they will all know the Lord. The Spirit of God will dwell within all of them. Now what is the New Covenant equivalent to this? Well, the Jews dwelt in booths, but if you turn, and you know I'm not asking you to do this, but if you look at 2 Corinthians 5, Paul gives this very rich picture of we as the people of God dwelling in temporary tents. We have this body, this temporary tent, right? And it's in this body that we wait. It's in this body that we groan. Sometimes we're groaning because of this body, right? We're groaning and we're waiting for something more. We're waiting, Paul says, for a permanent building. We're waiting for the resurrection of our bodies. And so just like the covenant people of Israel and the old covenant, we, the new covenant people of God, are dwelling in these bodies waiting for God to make them new. We are a temporal kingdom. And though these bodies are not our permanent home, the Spirit of God within us is a foretaste of what shall be. As I said, Paul says that the Spirit within us is a guarantee, a pledge, a promise of glorification within our mortal bodies. So, how else is this applicable? You know, life for the people of God has always been a pilgrim journey. It's always been a pilgrim journey. We're always going through a foreign land, an alien wilderness under the shadow of death. And if you look at Hebrews chapter three and chapter four, what you will see is that the author to the Hebrews there describes the church, not Israel. He uses Israel as an example, but the church as those who are pilgriming and sojourning through a wilderness land, and what is that wilderness land? It's this world that we live in, beloved. It is this world, it is this country, it is this domain, the domain of darkness, it is this rule. has behind it Satan and his hordes trying to accomplish their purposes, trying to summon from the deep more and more hordes that would attack and oppress the people of God, that would rob their hope, even rob their hope through something like a lost election. Is your hope lost because of what happened in the last seven days? If it is, beloved, number one, I understand where you're coming from, and I in no way, shape, or form want to browbeat you, but I do wanna lift your gaze to something better. I wanna lift your gaze to a kingdom that, as the author of the Hebrew says, cannot be shaken. And as I've agonized on my knees before the Lord that the Lord would just continue to build up my spirit and my hope in this time, not looking to faltering kingdoms, but looking to His kingdom, one of the conclusions I've come to is, Lord, I don't know what you're doing, I don't know. But it's very possible that what you're doing with your people is this, I want you to be completely dependent upon me. And so if I could take anything out of your lives that might make your life a little more comfortable, and you might long for heaven less, you might want heaven less, you might want those promises less, those promises of eschatological bliss have kind of sort of lost their luster because there's more luster in what you see in this kingdom than God can just Kind of take those things away, right? You just take those things away, and what it's going to do, hopefully the intended effect, is cause us to look with greater longing and greater ambition upon this kingdom that cannot be shaken. Maybe that's what the Lord is doing. I don't know. I don't know. But I know this, we are promised a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and now is not a time for glory, now is a time of suffering. Worldly kings are often dupes and lackeys of the beast, but Jesus said, when he was standing before Pilate, and this is very important, you would not have any authority unless it was given to you by heaven above. You remember that. Because I don't care who is in power in this country or any other country, we believe in providence, do we not? We believe that God can strike a straight blow with a crooked stick. We believe that God can do wondrous things through horrible people and horrible policies and horrible platforms. We believe in a sovereign God, do we not? And so during this time, one of the things we need to come back to is not only these promises of the future, but secondly, come back to this is not our kingdom. We are wandering through as pilgrims, as sojourners, and we should not expect to find a permanent building here. We are pitching our tent in this place and in that place, but none of this soil is soil that will be eternal. It is soil that will be burned up by molten lava and a new heavens and a new earth created. So this is not the time of glory. But it's interesting, these booths also serve as something of a glory covering. Think about this for a second. Think about this for a second. When the Israelites were in the wilderness, they needed to be sheltered from the glory of God, not that God's full glory was being shown upon them. But remember when Moses went up on the mountain and he saw God, and once again, I wanna make this qualification, he did not see the full glory of God. If he saw the full glory of God, he would have been dead, really dead, okay? But God accommodated a vision of himself to him, and Moses came down and his whole face was transformed. And one of the things that the booths communicate to us is while we are sojourning through this wilderness, we need booths to shield us from the full glory of God. God was with them in the pillar of cloud and the pillar of fire and in the tabernacle, and they needed to be shielded from this glory cloud presence, thus they were instructed to dwell in booths. And it reminds us of something. Listen to me. God's glory either gives life and life more abundantly or it kills. Let me say that again. God's glory either gives life and that more abundantly or it kills. And one of the things we need to be reminded of as a people of God is when you come into corporate worship, you are coming into the presence of God in a very special and unique way. Right? I mean, we believe in the omnipresence of God, that's true, yes and amen, but just let me remind you of something. When the minister gets up here in the morning on Sunday and he calls us to worship, he is on behalf of God, as a minister of God, calling you as his people to come into God's presence and worship him. And beloved, all we have to do is look back on Acts chapter five, Ananias and Sapphira, when they were struck dead by the glory of God because they sought to come into his presence and lie. They sought to come into his presence in an irreverent manner in their worship and God struck them down. We should be grateful that every time we come into this place to worship, God does not strike us down. And why does he not strike us down? Because through faith we are found in the righteousness of Jesus Christ. And it reminds me of another arboreal image. It reminds me of that arboreal image that Moses saw, that burning bush, and it is a perfect example of how we can be in the presence of God and not be consumed, because that bush It was on fire, the fire of judgment, and yet it was not being consumed. Why? It was a picture of our being hidden in Jesus Christ. We could be in the presence of God and not be consumed because Jesus took that consuming for us so that we would not have to take it. So God's glory, rather than consuming us because we believe in Jesus Christ, what is it doing? It's transforming us. The veil has been lifted and we behold the glory of God and the person and work of Jesus Christ through faith. We are spiritually indwelt by the Spirit of God and He is transforming us, as Paul says in 2 Corinthians 3.18. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another, for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit. Now let me make one final connection this morning. when you think of this man upon the horse by the deep, okay, by the deep among the myrtle trees. It reminds us of another picture in the New Testament, and it is that picture depicted for us by John in Revelation chapter one, where the risen Lord, Jesus Christ, is described, and He is among His lampstands. Now many of you know, or if you don't know, I'll tell you, those lampstands refer to menorahs. And if you've ever seen a Jewish menorah, it has six branches on this side, six branches on this side, one in the middle, okay, so there's a total of seven. What is the menorah? It's a tree. It's a tree. And once again, we see this picture of Jesus Christ among His churches, the tree, And in that same chapter it says, and when He comes, every eye will behold Him, even those who pierced Him. There is the deep. The realm of those who pierced Him is the deep. So we see the deep, we see the risen Lord Jesus Christ, and we see the myrtle trees, as it were, among the picture of Revelation chapter 1. And what does this tell us? Jesus Christ is among His church during this tumultuous time. And those who are elect, those who believe in Jesus Christ, they do not need to worry. His eyes are like a flame of fire, John says, but that flame of fire is not for those who believe in Jesus Christ. And yet, those flames of fire are upon the hypocrites in the church. The flames of fire are among those among the lampstands who feign to be Christians but deny it by their life, deny it really by their whole existence. And so this morning, if you are an unbeliever and you are among this lampstand, Grace Covenant Church, this tree among whom Jesus Christ is the head and the Savior and the Lord, I would call you this morning to turn from your sins. When Jesus comes back, He will look upon those who pierced Him. And the fact of the matter is, we are all those who pierced Jesus Christ. But the only reason why God's consuming fire through the eyes of Jesus Christ will not consume us on the final day is because we have His covering. His blood has covered us and His righteousness has given us the ability to stand. But you, unbeliever, listen to me this morning. If you do not have the covering of Jesus Christ through faith in Him, by turning from your sins and trusting in Jesus Christ, then those eyes which serve as a flame of fire are for you. but you can escape it this morning if you turn to Jesus Christ and believe. In fact, it was on during the Feast of Tabernacles in Jesus' day in John chapter seven, during that feast that he said, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. Come to Jesus this morning through repentance and faith and be reminded, dear people of God, Jesus Christ stands among the myrtles and He will never leave you nor forsake you. In Him you have a firm foundation. Stand upon it and be confident. Let's pray. Father God, we thank You for this wonderful promise that Jesus Christ is among the myrtle trees. We thank You for the twofold reminder that we have the promise of the new heavens and the new earth, but also, Father, of identity, that this home is not our own. Father, forgive us when we try to make it our home. Forgive us, Father, when we build up hope in things that will not last, and help us to remember, Father, that You are doing something above and beyond anything that we could ever imagine So Father, plant that deep into our hearts this morning, that we might ever and always long for the new heavens and the new earth, and may that manifest itself, Father, in how we turn to our brothers and sisters, to encourage them to lift their countenance, and how we turn to those who do not believe, so that we might extend to them this promise, which if they believe, is for them as well. We ask all these things in Christ's name, amen. Let's stand this morning.