Good morning. Please turn with me to Jeremiah chapter 31. The month of February was an incredibly busy time, and so we've been away from our series on the new covenant for quite a while, but getting back into that this morning. In Jeremiah 31, we're going to be reading verses 31 to 34. The focus of our text this morning will be verse 34. So hear the words of the Holy Spirit. Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for they all shall know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity and their sin, I will remember no more. Let's pray again. Father, through the merits of Christ, we ask that the Holy Spirit would be poured out upon us, that you would give liberty and unction and power to the proclamation of your word, that you would rebuke the evil one in the name of the Lord Jesus so that he cannot snatch the seed of your word from any heart. But speak to us as we have need. And Lord, we would ask that Christ would be exalted, that he would increase, and that I might decrease. For the glory of God we pray, in Jesus' name, amen. We've noted that there are four effectual blessings promised in the new covenant. And it's almost like the scriptures give them to us like packages, presents wrapped up underneath the Christmas tree. And so what we've been doing is pulling each one of those blessings out and unwrapping it and examining it and thinking about it. And thus far, we've looked at two of those four effectual blessings. The very first of those is regeneration. what God means when he says, I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. Regeneration is the monergistic sovereign work of God alone, in which he takes someone who's dead and trespasses and sins and gives them spiritual life, granting to them the gifts of repentance and of faith, and then writing his law, not upon two tables of stone. but writing that same law upon our minds and upon our hearts so that we're driven from within out of love for God and love for men to walk in obedience to His law, not in order that we can be saved, but because we already are. And it's the evidence in the walk God enables us to walk upon the difficult path of discipleship once we've passed through the narrow gate of conversion. Well, here's the thing, in the Old Covenant, not every person who was an heir of the Old Covenant was born again. Not everyone was regenerate. As a matter of fact, most of the people were not. Yet in the New Covenant, the blessing here is that every single heir of the New Covenant is born again because you enter into the New Covenant, not by being born into a Christian home or into a Jewish home, but rather by being born again by God's Holy Spirit. And God promises to regenerate every single heir of the New Covenant, that is, all of his elect people. And then we looked at the second blessing at the end of January, which is identification. God says, I will be their God, and they shall be my people. That is, when God saves you, when he justifies you, he doesn't just give you the righteousness of Christ, that would be blessing enough. He doesn't just forgive your sins, and that also would be blessing enough. But He also adopts you. He adopts you as His own son or daughter, and He puts His name upon you and calls you His child, and you get to call Him your God. There's ownership there. There's mutual ownership, as it were. It's an amazing thing to think that this great holy God looks upon you, sinful as you are, and says, I'm unashamed to be identified with you. My name is upon you. When you're baptized, the triune name of God is stamped upon you for that day forward. You are marked out as a disciple of Christ, and you're given the honor of becoming a true child of God, and you're also given the right, by God's grace, to call yourself a child of God, to be called that before a watching world. So these are the first two of the blessings. We have two more to go. So we're going to unwrap that third package this morning, and the third package is reconciliation. God reconciles the heirs of the new covenant to himself through Christ, and it's right here in verse 34 of the text. And every man his brother saying, know the Lord, for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. Now there is an already and not yet dynamic going on in those verses. And so my three headings with which I'm gonna expound and unpack this to you reflect that already not yet dynamic. So I wanna tell you three things about this promise. First of all, it speaks of knowing God now. Knowing God now. Secondly, it speaks of making God known. And then it also speaks of knowing God then. So it's knowing God now, making God known, and knowing God then. First of all, knowing God now. How many times have I said this before you, that Christianity is not merely a system of theology or of doctrine. Nor is it simply a set of ethics or a specific worldview among many competing worldviews. Christianity is not merely an ideology that someone embraces and others reject. Fundamentally, What Christianity is, is a restored relationship with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. It is knowing God and walking with God and serving with God because he has reconciled himself to you and you to him through his only begotten son. Now in saying that, I am in no way minimizing that Christianity consists of theological truth and morally binding precepts. We unashamedly say so. As a matter of fact, the truth claims of Christianity are exclusive. They say there's only one religion and all the religions are false. It doesn't mean there isn't some truth to be found in other religions, but the truth that's found in other religions is found there because even a broken clock is right twice a day. But fundamentally, every other religion is a rebellious attempt to throw off faith in Jesus Christ, and therefore is wrong and sinful. No, the Bible says very plainly, there's only one true and living God, and any other so-called God is a man-made imposter. that all other gods are false, there's one God, one God only, and that God is the God who's revealed himself in the 66 books of the Bible. He's one God who is three persons, he's Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, yet he's not three gods, he's one God, because each of these three persons shares the same indivisible essence. There's one God, and that God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Furthermore, There's only one mediator between God and men. There are not two or three or five or 500 mediators between God and men. There's only one. And that one mediator is Jesus Christ. Jesus said, Pastor Matt quoted it earlier, I am the way. and the truth and the life. No man comes to the Father except by me." That is, there's no other way to God because Jesus says, I am the way. I am the mediator between God and men. There's no truth outside of Christ. Because I am the truth, he says. In another place, the Bible says, in him, that is, in Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and of knowledge. And furthermore, if you're outside of Christ, let me tell you this about yourself, you're dead. Because he is the life. And if you're not in him, you're dead. There's only life to be found in him. All of this tells us that all the other religions, all the other worldviews on earth are false. and their lies. There's only one way to God. But that being said, these truths I've just expounded to you, they are the basis of our relationship with the Lord. It's the basis of us knowing God. So let me set this before you under several thoughts. First of all, the regenerate heirs of the new covenant know the Lord. The regenerate heirs of the covenant, of the new covenant, know the Lord. You can turn to John 17 if you wish. This is Jesus' high priestly prayer on the night that he was betrayed. And it says in verse one, Jesus spoke these words, lifted up his eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hour has come. Glorify your son that your son also may glorify you. as you have given him authority over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as you have given him." Remember what we saw way back in the very beginning of this entire series, that before the foundation of the world, God made a covenant with himself. the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, that God had a chosen lamb, Christ, and he had a chosen people, his elect, and he entrusted the salvation of his elect people to Christ. And that's what Jesus is referring to here. You gave me a specific people that I might redeem them and grant them eternal life. Verse three then identifies what eternal life is. And this is eternal life. that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. Eternal life is found in knowing God. And Jesus grants that to us through his righteousness and through his shed blood. Think about it, to know someone, you have to know things about them. You have to know facts about them. But the reality is, you can also know a lot of facts about a person and yet not know them personally. But in the scriptures, when we are told about Christianity, it's not just that we are taught by Christ about God. It is we get to know God himself personally in an experiential way. That is the heartbeat of the Christian faith. And that leads me to Romans chapter five. Turn there if you will. Doubtless verses one and two are familiar words to you. It says, therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Now, did you notice the tenses of the verbs? Having been in the past justified by faith in Christ, we presently have peace with God. Now those words imply something. If they're saying you now have peace with God, what does that mean? It implies that there was a time you did not have peace with God. You were His enemy. You were at enmity with Him and God was your enemy and you hated Him. Think about this, if you're outside of Christ, you may think that you love the Lord, but the reality is your inclination is to hate Him. You hate him, you hate his law. Your natural inclination is not to run towards him, it's to run away from him, to do your own thing, to follow your own self-will, to do whatever you think is right rather than what God says is right. That is all of us by nature before we know the Lord. Our sinfulness makes us at enmity with him. But have you ever thought about this? Before you were in Christ, it wasn't just that you were at enmity with God, God was at enmity with you. He had a controversy with you. He had a controversy with you, not because of sin in his heart, but because he's perfect and holy and just. And his perfect justice and his perfect holiness caused him to be angry with you. God is a just God and therefore he is angry with a sinner, with a wicked every single day. God's anger smolders and burns against sinners because he's a just God. And the only way for you to be reconciled to God is if two things happen. One, if your sin was dealt with, and secondly, if God's justice was satisfied. Those two things had to happen. And that is exactly what Jesus Christ came to do. Jesus Christ became a man and he fulfilled the righteous requirements of the law in your place as a man because he perfectly obeyed God. But then he voluntarily laid his life down upon the cross and died in the place of sinners, took their sin upon himself and satisfied the justice of God, quenched the wrath of God and therefore he took care of your real sin and he took care of God's real justice. And by that, he made peace between you and God. Here's the thing I want you to see. God didn't look down upon sinners and say, you know, the righteous requirement of my law is just way too high for sinners to overcome it. So what I'm gonna do is lower my standard so that if the sinner gives it the old college try, he can jump right over that pole and he can meet my standard. That is not what God did. No, instead, he kept his standard high. He didn't lower it at all, not a jot, not a tittle. And he sent his son to become a man who met the standard, who fulfilled the standard in our place, so that everyone who puts their faith in the crucified and risen Jesus has his righteousness credited to their account, even as their sins were put upon Christ. Remember what the Old Testament prophesied about the Messiah, he would take God's law and make it honorable. That's exactly what Christ has done. And because of what Christ has accomplished, if you're in Christ, you have access to God 24-7. Remember the story of when Esther took it upon her, risked her life by going into the king, even though the king had not summoned her to come in. And if the king did not summon you in and you just presumed to walk into his throne room, he could order you to be killed right then and there. but your only hope was that your king would show you mercy and extend his scepter to you so that you could touch that scepter and be allowed entrance into the throne room. What God has done in Christ is he has permanently extended his scepter to you if you're in Christ so that you are always welcome into his throne, that you may obtain help in time of need. and you're told not to come timidly before the throne of grace, because you're an heir of the new covenant, you're supposed to come boldly. You're to become daringly to say, like a child walking into his father's castle, to be able to come in and say, I have access to God through Jesus Christ 24-7, because God has dealt with your very real guilt, and he's dealt with God's very real justice. And because of that, God is no longer at enmity with you, and you are no longer an entity with him. The Bible describes Abraham as the friend of God. The Bible says that Moses, each morning we go to the tent of meeting and he would meet with God. Remember the pillar of cloud and fire would come down and meet with him. And Moses would speak to God face to face as a man speaks with his friend. Jesus said to his apostles, he said, I call you, not just my servants, I call you my friends. Think about that. If you're in Christ, God is your friend. He's your dearest friend. Jesus Christ is the lover of your soul who loves you more than any other person on earth ever could. Who loves you more even than you love yourself. He is the great lover of your soul, the great champion of your heart. You have friendship with God. Is that not a marvelous thing to think about? How often do you think of God as your friend? Or do you think of Him as your antagonist? No, according to Scripture, if you're in Christ, God is your friend. You have been reconciled to him. But it's not just that the regenerate know the Lord. It's also important to recognize the regenerate heirs of the new covenant are known by the Lord. In other words, it's not just a one-way relationship here. It's a two-way relationship. In 2 Timothy 2, verse 19, Paul says this, nevertheless, the solid foundation of God stands, having this seal, the Lord knows those who are his. He knows those that truly are his and those who are not. And in Matthew 7, 23, Jesus says that many a professing Christian on the day of judgment is gonna hear him say to them, depart from me, for I never knew you. You who practice lawlessness. These are professing Christians who say, I know God, but God says to them, I don't know you. I never knew you. I never truly had a relationship with you. You see, the heirs of the new covenant, they are God's elect, and they not only know the Lord, the Lord knows them. I love reading in the Gospel of Luke about Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus was a wee little man, and a wee little man was he. But he had never met Jesus. He had never seen Jesus. He'd heard about him. And Jesus had never seen him or met with him. And yet here is Jesus walking through the streets of Jericho, and Zacchaeus, he's jumping over the crowds because he wants to see him, but he's too short to see him. So you remember what he does. He goes to a sycamore tree, and he climbs up into his branches so he can see who Jesus is. But when Jesus sees him, do you remember what he said to him? The very first word out of his mouth was his name. Zacchaeus, come down. I'm going to your house today. I'm inviting myself to enjoy your hospitality. You're gonna get to know me. But do you realize this? Jesus had never met Zacchaeus in his life. He'd never seen Zacchaeus in his life, and yet he looks upon him and sees him and immediately calls him out by name. I would suggest to you it's not because of divine omniscience that he said that. I believe what it is is that Jesus recognized one of his sheep, that the Father had given him Zacchaeus to redeem his soul. And remember what the Bible says, John 10? The good shepherd knows his sheep and calls them out by name. He'd see Zacchaeus and says, Zacchaeus, come to me. I know you. You see, it was not only that he came to know the Lord, Zacchaeus did come to know the Lord that day. But it is that Jesus himself knew who Zacchaeus was because he was part of his sheep. One more point on this heading before we move on to the second one. And that is, if you look back at Jeremiah 31, notice that there's a certainty here expressed. Verse 34 says, they all shall know me. Not they might know me, I hope they'll know me, they shall know me. Every last one of the heirs of the new covenant will know me from the least of them to the greatest of them. That is the nobodies from nowheres and the kings. Whoever it is, whether it's peasants or whoever it may be, no matter what your economic status or your social status, whether you're old or young, if you're an heir of the new covenant, you will know the Lord. Now, as a general rule, we're not born saved, are we? There are exceptions to that rule. John the Baptist was one. God said through his angel to Elizabeth, John's mother, your son will be full of the Holy Spirit even from his mother's womb. That is, he's gonna be born again before he's even born. But the whole point is that's the exceptional case. This is rare, this is the exception that proves the rule. As a general rule, most of us were older children or teenagers or adults before we were saved. But here's the thing I want you to see, how many of God's elect will God regenerate? All of them. Is there any that will be lost on the final day? No, it is the will of the Father that Jesus will apply to their hearts, the redemption that has been accomplished by him upon the cross. That is, all that the Father has chosen and whom the Son has died to redeem, the Holy Spirit will regenerate and save. Just a few minutes ago, I spoke of John 17 too, where Jesus says, I've come to give eternal life to as many as the Father has given me. In John 6, verse 37, he says something similar. All that the Father gives me, will come to me. Doesn't say they might come to me. Most of them will come to me. I hope they'll come to me. No, they will come to me. Why? Because God, through his spirit, will call them effectually to himself. He'll draw them with cords of irresistible grace, cords of irresistible love to the Father. It's what we call effectual calling. The Shorter Catechism defines it this way, quote, That sounds a lot like what Jeremiah 31 is saying. They all shall know me from the least to the greatest. So the first thing I want you to see from this text is it talks about knowing God now. In the second place, though, it talks about making God known. Look at it again. Verse 34, Jeremiah 31. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, know the Lord, for they shall all know me. Do you hear the language here? These are people telling their neighbors and their relatives to know the Lord. What does it mean when you're teaching someone to know the Lord? What is that describing? It's describing the work of personal evangelism. It's calling people to repent and believe the gospel, whether that's in your own family, or in your workplace, or in your next door neighbor, or wherever it may be, whomever God has placed in your sphere of influence, that you have a responsibility, if you're in Christ, to point them to the Lord Jesus. Now notice what it does not say. It doesn't say, no more shall every pastor teach his neighbor. Is that what it says? No more shall every deacon or gifted brother teach his neighbor. Is that what it says? No more shall every man, every person, every disciple of Jesus, man or woman, boy or girl, who knows the Lord, taking the opportunities to make Christ known wherever you are, to point people to Christ. You realize there are people in your life, you may be the only gospel witness they know. Because they don't go to church. They don't hear the gospel preached week in and week out like you do. And there may be other people who are gonna tell them to get decisions up for Jesus, but how many people who know the full gospel like you do, who are gonna give them good and wise counsel, are they exposed to? It's important for you to share that gospel as God gives you opportunity. Now, I would say that there's two things implied here when it says that, no more shall every man teach his brother or his neighbor to know the Lord. First is this, you don't have to evangelize someone who's already converted. That should be really obvious. But it's true, if someone's already in Christ, they don't have to be told the gospel and told to repent and believe. I remember many decades ago, Angela and I were walking around somewhere, I think we were like at a county fair or something, and a total stranger came up to me and handed me a gospel track. and invited me to read it, and I really appreciated the fact that this stranger cared enough to risk his reputation and the awkwardness of coming up to a total stranger to hand me a gospel tract. I'm not sure that's ever happened except for that one time in my life. And when I looked at what he had handed me and realized what it was, I smiled and I said to him, I said, well, thank you so much for this, but I'll tell you what, why don't you keep this and give it to somebody else? Because I don't need it. And the reason I don't need it is because I already know the Lord. I already am a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm your brother. And of course you can imagine the man's face lit up into a big smile because he had thought to give a gospel tract to a lost man only to find he's speaking to a brother in Christ. But what a joy there. I didn't have to be taught to know the Lord because my parents and my pastors when I was a kid had already taught me to know the Lord and by grace I do know the Lord. So you don't have to tell someone who's already a regenerate heir of the new covenant to know the Lord. There's a second implication here. And that is that evangelistic labor is peculiar to this present age. That is, it will cease to exist in the age to come. When Jesus comes the second time, it will be too late then to repent and believe the gospel. There will be no more opportunities to be saved once Jesus comes again. Because whenever he comes, the Bible's clear that when he comes, it will be on the last hour of the last day of this present age. This present age will be over. And the age to come will be inaugurated. And so there will be no opportunities to repent and believe. That's why I said earlier in the call to worship that if Jesus came back right now, some of you in this room weren't ready for him. Because once he comes, there's no more salvation. And therefore, there's no more evangelism. There's no more counseling anyone to know the Lord. As we'll see in a moment, in the age to come, the new heaven and the new earth will be completely filled with regenerate, redeemed people, and there will be no lost people in the world. So there will be no evangelism, and there will be no world missions. But has that day come yet? Is that day arrived? What's the day's day? Today, we're to still be sharing the gospel. And I wanna ask you this question, when the Bible says that every man, every woman is to share the gospel, to tell others to know the Lord, what does that mean? Brothers and sisters, when you tell someone about the Jesus, what are you supposed to say to him? I've told you this before, but I'm gonna give you a summary in three basic things you need to make sure you cover. First of all, You must tell them that a day of judgment is coming, that we all have a day in court. Martin Lloyd-Jones once said that the problem with modern evangelism is that we begin with Jesus. And he said, you shouldn't begin with Jesus. You should begin with God the Father. God the Father has a controversy with you. You have violated his law, you've sinned against him, and you have offended him. And he is angry with sinners, and he needs to be reconciled to you, and you need to be reconciled to him. You must use God's law, the Ten Commandments, which means you gotta know the Ten Commandments, to show the holiness of God to the person you're sharing the gospel with, because as you expose them to the holiness of God, what does it expose in them? their unholiness. It shows them their sins against God and what they deserve. It's been said that before you get a person saved, you got to first get them lost. It's not enough to say that Jesus is the answer because the world does not know what the question is. They don't know why they need a savior. You've got to show them why they need a savior. And once they're convinced that they need a savior, then you move on in the second place to tell them about who Jesus Christ is and what he's done for sinners. You must tell him he's the second person of the Godhead. He is God himself, but in the fullness of time, he became a man being born of a virgin. He's both God and man. Now you say, why is that important? We're just sitting there giving them a bunch of theology? Well, it's very important because you want them to put their faith in the correct Jesus. You don't want them putting their faith in the Jesus of the liberals, who's still dead. You don't want them putting their faith in the Jesus of the Jehovah's Witnesses, who is a man but is not God, or to put their faith in the Jesus of the Mormons, who is the brother of Lucifer. No, you don't want them to put their faith in Isa, who is the Jesus of the Muslims, who doesn't need to die to make an atonement, or who doesn't need to rise again, all those things. No, you need to put, you're telling them to put their faith in the true Christ, who is both God and man. You must tell them he lived a sinless life, did many miracles, and preached to many people. And then he voluntarily laid his life down upon the cross and died in the place of sinners. But whatever else you do, brothers and sisters, there's something you must never ever forget to do. There's something else you must tell them. And if you don't tell them this, you've missed everything. What else must you tell them? That he's risen. That is three days later, something else happened. He didn't stay in that grave. God raised him from the dead. If you leave that out, you've left out the cornerstone. That is the thing that says he is who he says he is and that God has accepted his sacrifice in the place of sinners. Tell them Jesus has risen, that he's ascended and he's gonna come again. And that leads you to the third thing, that is you must tell them what they must do in response to this good news. Tell them they must repent of their sins and that they must forsake their confidence in their own works and their own righteousness to save them. that they must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, depending upon Him entirely to give them the free gift of eternal life. That is what it means to tell others that they must know the Lord. That is what your responsibility is and that's what my responsibility is. The Bible College I obtained my undergraduate degree from had a motto, it's still their motto to this day, it's a great motto, to know Him and to make Him known. To know Him and to make him known. Is that not an accurate summary of what Jeremiah 31 verse 34 is telling us? That I know the Lord by God's grace and therefore I must make him known to others. So what have we seen? We've spoken of knowing God now. Secondly, of making God known. In the third place, let's talk about knowing God then. That is, in the age to come. The new covenant was ratified 2,000 years ago when Jesus died upon the cross. And yet our passage is anticipating something future. A day when evangelism and missions will cease because everyone on the earth will know the Lord. So let's consider two texts of scripture to drive this home to us. The first is Matthew 13. It's the parable of the wheat and the tares. First of all, read verses 24 to 30, which is the parable itself. Then I'll read verses 37 to 43, which is Jesus' explanation of the parable. First, verses 24 to 30. Another parable He put forth to them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way. But when the grain had sprouted and produced a crop, then the tares also appeared. So the servants of the owner came and said to him, sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares? He said to them, an enemy has done this. The servant said to him, do you want us then to go and gather them up? But he said, no, lest while you gather up the tares, you also uproot the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest. And at the time of harvest, I will say to the reapers, first gather together the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn. Now notice his explanation down in verse 37 to 43. He who sows the good seed is the son of man. Jesus says, I'm the one who is the farmer. I'm the one who sowed the good seed of the gospel. The field is the world. The good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one. Remember, there's two families on earth, the sons of God and the sons of the devil. The enemy who sowed them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age. That is when Jesus comes back. and the reapers are the angels. Therefore, as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age. The son of man will send out his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be welling and gnashing of teeth, then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their father. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. Those who would not submit themselves to the lordship of Christ, those who would not repent of their sins and believe on Jesus Christ that they might be saved, they are the tares. And Jesus says, I'm gonna send my angels to pull all of them out. All who don't know the Lord, they're gonna be consigned body and soul for all of eternity to suffer in the lake of fire, hell. But then everyone left will be my wheat, my elect people, all of whom know me. And then the prophecy of Jeremiah 31 will be fulfilled. No man will teach his neighbor or his brother to know the Lord, because everyone will know the Lord, because God will destroy the present heaven and earth, and he will make a new heaven and earth, and there will be nothing but God's perfect people ruling upon the world. That is, every single person will know the Lord, and not only that, will be perfected. We'll no longer struggle with sin. There will be no more turmoil between nations. There'll be no nasty church splits. There'll be no theological controversies. All those things will be done away with because Jesus will make everything perfect. But notice what it says here. Verse 43, then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their father. What's that all about? We're going to be given glorified bodies that don't get sick, that don't die, that don't require sleep, that don't get tired or fatigued or worn out, and we're going to shine reflecting the glory of God. Remember when Moses came down from being in the presence of God on Mount Sinai? Remember what his face was doing? It was glowing, it was reflecting the glory of God, and he wasn't even conscious of it. And the people were terrified when they saw him, so he had to put a veil over his face until the glow began to subside. Well, when we go to heaven, our faces are gonna glow like that as well. The only difference is the glow will never subside, nor will we terrify anybody, because we'll be reflecting the glory of God with the glorified bodies he's given us. But let me say something else about this new heaven and new earth. Turn to Revelation 21. Listen to verses one through eight. Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea. Then I, John, saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men And He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. There shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away." And he who sat on the throne said, behold, I make all things new. And he said to me, write, for these words are true and faithful. And he said to me, it is done. I am the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end. I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts. He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death. We're not going to go to heaven and float around like angels on some cottony, wispy clouds with a monochrome environment full of white and silver around us, playing a harp with a not-so-bright look upon our face. Isn't that how the culture represents what heaven is? It sounds very boring to me, and it also sounds very migraine-inducing. That is not what heaven's going to be. It's gonna be a new material universe that has no pollution, no corruption, no curse, no fall, no hospitals, no doctors, no cancer treatments, none of that. It's gonna be a perfect place where there are perfect saints worshiping a perfect God. I can't wait. How about you? Aren't you sick and tired of having to see your friends and loved ones and relatives suffering from physical hardships and difficulties and going to their funerals and burying them and all the things that we have to bear in this life? My dear friend, Pastor Martin Nisch sent me an email this morning. His father passed away this past week, but he died in the Lord. But we're gonna be in a place where none of those things are reality. Where there are no funeral homes, no hospitals, no medicines, no doctors, and no sin. And perfect, pure worship. And furthermore, perfect knowledge. Perfect knowledge. We'll never be omniscient the way God is, obviously. But in this life, we have the knowledge of revelation. We have what God has shown us And it blows our minds. But even there, our interpretation of it is so difficult because we see through a mirror dimly. But there, we're gonna see face-to-face. We're gonna have knowledge of vision. Our knowledge of God is gonna be multiplied exponentially. We're gonna know fully because we are fully known. And we're gonna see Him face-to-face. What a beautiful thing it's gonna be. But there will be no evangelism. There'll be no going telling your neighbor to know the Lord because your neighbor already will know the Lord. Everybody there will be born again of God's spirit. It will be God's elect completely safe for all of eternity because of what Jesus has done. Brothers, we don't think about it enough, do we? We need to meditate upon it more because it helps us endure this present age. And it cuts the strings that hold us to this present age by reminding us we are citizens of another place. We're just pilgrims here. We're just passing through, but we don't belong to this age. We belong to the age that is to come. I like what Michael Card says. He says, we belong to eternity. We're stranded in time, but Jesus is going to come and remove us from being stranded here. And we're going to live with him for all eternity. Well, there's three applications I wanna make from this. If you're asleep, please wake up because I want you to hear this first application. If you hear nothing else I say today. Hear my prayer, hear my question. Listen to it intently. Do you know the Lord? And does the Lord know you? Do you know the Lord? And does the Lord know you? I did not say, do you profess to know the Lord? I did not say, did you walk down an aisle in response to an altar call and pray the sinner's prayer and mean it? I didn't ask if you're baptized in a member of a local church. I'm asking, do you know the Lord? Do you have a relationship with God? Are you the friend of God through Jesus Christ? Do you know him and does he know you? Has His Holy Spirit broken you over your sins? Has He given to you a broken and contrite heart to cause you to mourn over your sins against Him? Has God given you faith so that your faith has been placed in Christ alone, apart from your works, trusting Him to do for you what you cannot do for yourself? Have you forsaken your sins? Have you come to loathe and hate them? And has God put a love for his law in your heart so that even though you know you fall short of it, you delight in it and rejoice in it because God has given you a new heart? Is there evidence that the gospel has transformed you into a new creature and that you're walking, imperfectly to be sure, but walking in newness of life? When you stand before Jesus Christ on that great and final day, will he recognize you as one of his own, the way he recognized Zacchaeus? There was a man named John Ryland Sr., English pastor, who on August the 29th of the year 1790 was preaching a very powerful sermon to his congregation in England. And he said this, quote, oh sinners, beware. If Christ says depart, it is all over. Your souls are within an inch of damnation. I am clear of your blood. If you are condemned, I'll look you in the face at the day of judgment and say, Lord, I told that man. I told those boys and girls on the 29th of August, 1790. I warned them. They would not believe. And now they stand shivering before your bar. Men and women, boys and girls, there are many a pulpit in this nation that you could stand under and never know that there's such a place as hell. You could never know that there's a judgment that is to come and never be told to flee from it. But in God's mercies, this pulpit that you're standing under is not one of them. Pastor Matt, gifted brother Jesse, all the pastors who've ever stood here and preached to you from any of our sister churches and me, We have all warned you over and over and over again to flee from the wrath that is to come by fleeing to Jesus Christ. Our hands are innocent of your blood. There is no excuse for any of you here to not know that there's wrath coming. There's no excuse for any of you here to not know how to be reconciled to God. The timeless gospel that has been preached for 6,000 years has been preached here multiple times, meaning that our hands are innocent of your blood. that you have no one to blame if you stand before God unforgiven than yourself. And I could say on the day of judgment, Lord, how many times did I warn them? I warned them over and over again, but they wouldn't listen. I warned them again on March the 2nd, 2025, still they wouldn't listen. They stopped up their ears. They procrastinated yet again. They put off the needs of their souls so they could pursue more entertainment and pleasure. And now here they stand having never come to know you. Here they are unregenerate, unconverted, unrepentant, unbelieving, and unforgiven. My hands are innocent. I warned them. Pastor Matt's hands are innocent. He warned them. I don't want to stand before Christ on the day of judgment and hear him say to any of you, depart from me, you workers of iniquity, into the fire, prepare for the devil and his angels. I want to hear him say to you, come, you blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. I want him to hear him say to you, come, Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of your Lord. Our task, Pastor Matt and I, our task is to present every man, every woman complete and mature in Christ Jesus before the throne of God. That's what I wanna hear him say. But you've gotta get serious about the Lord. You've gotta get serious about your sin. And you gotta quit trifling and putting off the needs of your soul and procrastinating, putting off to another day. Get serious, wake up and realize the danger that your soul is in. but that there is hope for you in Jesus Christ. There is forgiveness to be found in Jesus Christ. There is mercy to be found in Jesus Christ. He's able to save every last one of you in this room. He's just as willing to save as he is able. As a matter of fact, you realize Jesus is more willing to forgive sinners than sinners are to repent of their sins? Flee to him because there is grace abounding in Jesus Christ. Second application. If you do know the Lord, seek His face diligently so that you can know Him better. A relationship's not static, is it? You can grow to know the Lord more or you can grow to know Him less. It depends on how much time you spend having holy conversation with Him. And how do you have holy conversation with God? He speaks to you through His Word. And so you read His Word for all its worth and say, Lord, give me Your Spirit's illumination so that I can understand and comprehend and apply Your Word. And then you respond with prayer and holy songs of joy, and you respond with obedience. Now, don't get me wrong. Please don't get this in your head. If you spend 20 minutes or 30 minutes or an hour each day reading your Bible and praying, please don't get in your head that that's the sum total of the Christian life. I've checked my boxes, I've put my little foil star next to my quiet time chart, and therefore I can live how I want to live the rest of the day. No, you walk with God 24-7. You know, the Christian life is following God all the time. Even in your leisure, you're following the Lord, so that you are walking by faith in His promises and obedience to His precepts. But so often the battle is won or lost in the prayer closet, isn't it? That's often where we're emptied of ourselves and filled with the Holy Spirit. And if we neglect that, we begin to drift. We don't have the power we need from on high to be the husband and the wife and the parent and the child that we need to be, and to be the workman that we need to be, or to be the pastor we need to be, or whatever God has called you to be. We don't have that if we don't stay and abide in Christ and get the help of His Spirit. If you neglect private worship, quickly your soul begins to shrivel up. So my question is, have you grown negligent in speaking the Lord's face? If you have, then don't sit there beating yourself up and wallowing in misery. Confess it to the Lord as the sin that it is, and then this afternoon, find the time to spend time with Him. And just be faithful going forward. Be faithful and just do it. Some things in life, you just gotta do them. You do whatever you gotta do to find the discipline that you gotta do to set aside the time to spend in the presence of God, because you cannot go without it. If you do, you're starving yourself to death, and you're weakening your resistance to temptation. So, if you know the Lord, seek Him diligently that you may know Him more. Third and finally, if you know the Lord, seek to make Him known to others, for time is short. Brothers and sisters, I'm gonna just tell you something that I'm already aware of. The second and third application, I've hit you where you're hurt. I've probably hit you in your two biggest sins of omission. You ever think about sins of commission, transgressions we commit? They're like sharp stabs, like somebody stabs you with a stick in your conscience, aren't they? That's what sins of commission do. Sins of omission are a little bit different. It's like having a dull, constant fever that just don't go away. You just kinda don't feel good. Someday, sometime, somewhere, I oughta get serious and do something about what God told me to do, but not today. That's what a sin of omission is like. And I would submit that probably our two greatest sins of omission are prayerlessness and personal evangelism. Am I right? The things that we say someday, someday, somewhere, sometime, somehow, I ought to get serious about. And yet, what does our text tell us? What does it envision? It says, I'm telling my neighbor and I'm telling my brother to know the Lord until Jesus comes back. That's what the text envisions. It's our responsibility. And yet laziness, you know, sometimes there's things that God tells me to do and it's like, I think I'd rather do just about anything else but that because these things make me uncomfortable or they require time or diligent labor. And yet we need to be honest and say, Lord, you've commanded us to do these things. Help us to be obedient. Paul said to the Colossians chapter four, verses five to six, walking wisdom toward those who are outside, that is, people who are outside of Christ, redeeming the time. Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one. You know what he's saying? Time is short and hell is hot. Therefore, make the most of every conversation. to point people to Christ. You may not be able to give the full gospel from start to finish, but at least give them some salty speech to make them think about something, to make them salivate after the Savior. Put it out there, find ways to point them to Christ. You know, sometimes the Lord opens those opportunities. You're in the checkout line. You don't have the time to give the grocer the full gospel from front to end, but as you're talking to the cashier, you make mention of the Lord in some specific way. Ask me, ask them, how can I be praying for you? Or whatever it is. And you keep doing that every time you see them. And there the time comes when they have a crisis. And who do they come to? Who do they want to tell them about for help because they know, oh, this is a person who talks to God. This is a person who knows the Lord. And so they come to you and perhaps the Lord opens that providential opportunity then to share the gospel. All of us have different gifts and different circumstances. We have to walk according to the gifts God has given and within the boundaries He's established for us, but simply to make Christ known in any way that we can in the midst of it all, trusting that God's sovereign grace has the power to take those seeds and make them germinate and take root because we want to see many people go with us to the celestial kingdom. May God grant us grace to be bold in our witness. Let's pray. Father, I do pray For anyone here, especially, who does not know you, our children, our young people, even adults who have not yet closed with Christ, Father, please, I have pleaded as much as I know how externally to call them to Christ, but Lord, I beg you, would you call to them by your Spirit internally? to draw them to Christ. We don't want to hear you saying to anyone in this room, depart from me, but rather come, you blessed of my Father. Lord, may we have the grace and have the joy of seeing each one of our children, each one of our young people converted to you. Do this for Your glory and help us, Lord, who do know You, to walk more closely with You and to make You known to those who are around us and give us effectual opportunities to speak of Christ. Lord, we pray constantly for the lost. We confess, though, it's easier to talk to You about the lost than to talk to the lost about You. So grant us boldness and opportunity to share Christ with those who need Him. We ask in Jesus' name, amen.