1. "What you prepare for depends on what you think the future will bring and how big a deal you think it's going to be. Some people prepare very seriously for a very bad future. If some apocalyptic event does take place, it's their door you're going to be knocking on. If you can find it. It's their well water you're going to be asking to drink and their freeze dried meat you're going to be asking to eat."

2. "What God says must take place is more certain than any weather forecast. It's more reliable than any market projection. It's more sure to happen than any plan you will ever make."

3. "Doubts often come to us as if they're just neutral, reasonable, something plain that any normal person would ask. You need to learn to critically question the doubts that you're having and the questions that you're asking. What does this doubt implicitly deny about God? What is this doubt asking me to believe about God?"

4. "Too often we think of obedience as stealing joy, but it's just the opposite. Obeying God is the source of joy. It's the source of the deepest, truest, most lasting joy."

5. "We are not saved by good works, but we are not saved without good works. The faith that saves transforms."

6. "One of the founding myths of the modern world is that we are all sovereign over ourselves. We are all autonomous, a law to ourselves. Each of us is the commanding officer aboard the ship of our own lives, and we steer that ship wherever we please. The only problem is it's false. You are not the Lord and master of your life, your fate, your destiny."

7. "If you trust in Christ, he completely frees you from your past. You're no longer defined by the worst thing you've ever done. God no longer holds any of that against you. Trusting in Christ gives you a whole new past. It also gives you a whole new future."

8. "The happiness that God promises in the new creation is something the world can never take away because the world can never give it in the first place."

9. "What's happening in those times of suffering is God is relaxing your grip on these worldly realities. It's easier to turn and say, 'Come, Lord Jesus.' But relaxing your grip on earthly realities is not the same thing as tightening your grip on the hope of Christ's return."

10. "These words are not a goodbye, but the pledge of a return. These words are a bridge that Jesus flings across the whole time of our absence from Him. You can only stay on that bridge by faith. But if you trust these words, they will carry you over that whole chasm from now until he comes back."

Observation Questions

1. In Revelation 22:6, what chain of communication does God use to deliver His message, and what does this tell us about the reliability of Scripture?

2. Look at Revelation 22:7, 12, and 20. How many times does Jesus say "I am coming soon," and what additional information does He provide with each statement?

3. In Revelation 22:13, what three pairs of titles does Jesus claim for Himself? What do these titles suggest about His nature?

4. According to Revelation 22:14, what blessing is promised to those who "wash their robes," and what two rights do they receive?

5. Examine Revelation 22:17. Who issues the invitation to "come," and what different ways is this word used in the verse?

6. In Revelation 22:18-19, what specific warnings does God give about His Word, and what consequences are attached to each warning?

Interpretation Questions

1. Why does Jesus emphasize that He is both "the root and descendant of David" (22:16)? What does this tell us about His identity and role?

2. What is the significance of the warning against worship in verses 8-9, particularly in light of the whole book of Revelation?

3. How does the invitation to "take the water of life without price" (22:17) relate to the broader biblical themes of grace and salvation?

4. What does it mean that the time is "near" (22:10), especially given that these words were written almost 2,000 years ago?

5. Why does verse 11 tell the evil to continue in evil and the righteous to continue in righteousness? What spiritual principle is being taught here?

Application Questions

1. When was the last time you encountered doubt about your faith? How did you handle it, and how might the sermon's guidance about questioning our doubts help you in the future?

2. What current situations in your life tempt you to compromise your faith or "add to" God's commands to make them more convenient?

3. Think about your typical week. What specific activities or practices help you maintain a longing for Christ's return? What tends to diminish that longing?

4. When you experience suffering or loss, how does it affect your desire for Christ's return? How can you ensure that difficult times draw you closer to God rather than away from Him?

5. Consider your response if Christ returned today. What specific changes would you make to your daily life if you truly lived in expectation of His imminent return?

Additional Bible Reading

1. 2 Peter 3:1-13 - This passage expands on the certainty of Christ's return and how this knowledge should affect our daily lives, particularly in response to mockers who doubt His coming.

2. 1 Thessalonians 4:13-5:11 - These verses provide additional details about Christ's return and emphasize the importance of staying alert and prepared, complementing Revelation's message of readiness.

3. Matthew 25:1-13 - The parable of the ten virgins illustrates the importance of being prepared for Christ's return and the consequences of failing to maintain spiritual readiness.

4. Isaiah 55:1-13 - This passage elaborates on the free offer of salvation and God's trustworthy promises, providing background for Revelation 22:17's invitation to "come."

Sermon Main Topics

The Urgency of Being Prepared for Christ's Return

Trust His Words (Revelation 22:6, 13, 16)

Keep His Commands (Revelation 22:7, 10-11, 17-19)

Long for His Return (Revelation 22:12, 14-15, 17, 20)

A Cry for Christ’s Coming and Final Assurance

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Detailed Sermon Outline

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If you're a visitor this morning, this sermon comes with a trigger warning. If you're not used to seeing a grown man cry in public, you've been warned. I've been a pastor of this church for seven years.

My relationship with the church goes back another 10 years before that. This is my last sermon as one of the church's pastors. Whatever you gotta do, get ready. I've got some tissues. I could maybe spare one if you're close.

You may not have come prepared for the crying, and I've tried to get you prepared. And this whole sermon this morning is gonna be about being prepared.

What you prepare for depends on what you think the future will bring and how big a deal you think it's going to be. Some people prepare very seriously for a very bad future. They have come to be known as preppers. As one resource for preppers puts it, Prepping is creating plans, gathering resources, and developing skills to overcome emergencies, disasters, and survival situations. The scope of preparedness is large and up to the prepared individual, ranging from simple power outages to apocalyptic events.

I'm not here to mock preppers. Some of them have learned serious survival skills. They have developed off-grid technologies. The most devoted of them have developed remarkably self-sufficient ways of life.

And you shouldn't mock preppers either. If some apocalyptic event does take place, It's their door you're going to be knocking on, if you can find it. It's their well water you're going to be asking to drink and their freeze-dried meat you're going to be asking to eat. What are you preparing for?

What are you unprepared for?

This morning, We come to the last passage of the last book in the Bible. It's a conclusion to the whole book of Revelation, and its main burden is to help you prepare for Christ's return by telling you what to do with the whole book you've just read or heard. The passage is Revelation 22:6-21. It's on page 1042 of the Pew Bibles. Just turn to the very back.

The question our passage answers, the question this sermon will answer, is how can you be prepared for Christ's return? How can you be prepared for Christ's return?

I'll read the whole passage. Please follow along as I do.

And he said to me, these words are trustworthy and true. And the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent his angel to show his servants what must soon take place. And behold, I am coming soon. Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book.

I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I heard and saw them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who showed them to me. But he said to me, you, must not do that. I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God.

And he said to me, Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book for the time is near. Let the evildoers still do evil and let the filthy still be filthy. And the righteous still do right and the holy still be holy. Behold, I'm coming soon, bringing my recompense with me. To repay each one for what he has done.

I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. Blessed are those who wash their robes so that they may have the right to the tree of life and that they may enter the city by the gates. Outside are the dogs, and sorcerers, and the sexually immoral, and murderers, and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood. I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you about these things for the churches. I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.

The Spirit and the bride say, Come.

And let the one who hears say, Come. And let the one who is thirsty come, let the one who desires take the water of life without price.

I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. And if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away His share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book. He who testifies to these things says, Surely I'm coming soon.

Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.

The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.

How can you be prepared for Christ's return? As our passage ties up the whole book, it weaves together a number of promises, assertions, warnings, commands. It braids them all together. But three main themes emerge, three main answers to how to prepare for Christ's return. So rather than walking back through the passage strictly in order, I'll draw out those three main themes, three answers to how you can prepare for Christ's return.

Point one, trust His words. Trust His words. The passage gives us reasons to trust Christ's words in verses six 13 and 16. Look again at verse 6. And he said to me, these words are trustworthy and true.

And the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent his angel to show his servants what must soon take place. As this passage concludes the book, it mirrors and repeats a number of elements from the first chapter of the book. So if you want kind of a refresher, you can go back and study chapter one. And there's an accent here on the trustworthiness of the words and the means by which they got to John and us. So verse six says that the whole words, all the words of the whole book of Revelation are trustworthy and true.

Why is that? Because the God who spoke them is trustworthy and true. Because this passage also helps us see again the chain of Revelation of how these words got from God to us. This chain of revelation connects God to us and us to God through words he has spoken. God is not silent, God is not mute.

The God who created this universe, the God who spoke all things into existence, has no problem getting his message across to human beings. This is no kids' game of telephone. There's no bake turning into cake, turning into lake, and who knows what it was originally. There's nothing lost in transmission. The God who gave humans mouths and minds can speak human words to human ears.

So what is this chain of revelation? Looking at verse 6, link number one, God. Link number two, the angel that he sends. Link number three, John, the human prophet who's commissioned to receive and transmit this message. And then link four, us, along with all of God's servants.

As verse six says, you should trust these words because they're spoken by a trustworthy God and what is true of Revelation is true of the whole Bible. God himself has handed you this book. As a guide to the future and said, Here's what's gonna happen. Now live like it. Notice the strikingly similar statement in verse 16 of our chapter.

I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you about these things for the churches. So we learned that link one consists not only of God the Father, but also of God the Son. God the Father and God the Son inseparably send this revealing angel. The revelation is not just about Jesus, but by Jesus. How can you prepare for Christ's return?

Trust Jesus's own words. This book is Triune Testimony to the Triune God. This book also shows us that Jesus, the one speaking in this book, is both the sovereign Lord and the promised Messiah. Look at verse 13. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.

Four times the book of Revelation uses this phrase or a phrase just like it. They come in two pairs. Two at the beginning of the book, two at the end of the book. So first, in chapter 1, second in chapters 21 and 22, in chapter 1, Verse eight, God the Father says, I am the Alpha and the Omega. Then in verse 17, the risen Christ says, I am the first and the last.

Then in chapters 21 and 22, chapter 21, verse six, God the Father says, I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. And then right here, chapter 22, verse 13, Jesus says of himself, I am the Alpha and the Omega. The first and the last, the beginning and the end. What's the point of those two pairs of statements? The book of Revelation begins and ends with first God the Father, then God the Son, declaring that he is the beginning and the end.

This is a divine title. It sums up God's sovereignty over all creation. God is saying here that he's the creator of all things and the goal and purpose of all things. He's the source of all things and he's sovereign over all things. Both God the Father and God the Son say this of themselves and yet there's not two gods but only one God.

Why should you trust these words? Because they are the words of the one true God who's the creator and ruler of all. This underscores what verse six says. When God sent his angel to show his servants what must soon take place. Note that little word must.

This is not a matter of logical necessity, it's not a matter of impersonal fate, it's not probably, it's not maybe, it's must. What underwrites that must? What grounds it? What guarantees it? It's that what God determines must take place.

What God wills must take place. What God promises must take place. Are you gonna stop him? Is any power in heaven or on earth going to stop him? What creature can stay the hand of the Creator?

That's what underwrites must. What God says must take place is more certain than any weather forecast. It's more reliable than any market projection. It's more sure to happen than any plan you will ever make.

Oftentimes, when believers begin to doubt something in God's word, whether that it really happened or that it's morally good, whether so that we can trust what it's saying. Oftentimes they kind of go all in on trying to get those questions answered and it can almost take over or consume their spiritual life. A kind of question and answer mode is kind of the only way in which they're relating to God or his word. It is important to seek good answers to real questions that you have. I'm not in any way denying or downplaying that.

But what people often miss is that doubt is not just an intellectual problem but a spiritual one. And so to the best of your ability, when you're struggling with doubt, you also want to make sure that you're meditatively and prayerfully engaging with parts of God's word that you can get edification and reassurance and comfort from. You want to make sure that Q&A mode does not take over your spiritual life. You also want to make sure that you don't treat doubts with credulity. That you don't treat doubts with a kind of charity and generosity that they are not due.

Here's what I mean. Doubts often come to us as if they're just neutral, reasonable, something plain that any normal person would ask. You can feel like the doubt weighs heavier than your faith. Like, oh, this doubt is coming at me and it seems to have good credentials and I don't know how to approach it. You need to learn to critically question the doubts that you're having and the questions that you're asking.

So here's a couple of good questions to ask about any doubt you're struggling with. What does this doubt implicitly deny about God? Oftentimes, a doubt is smuggling in some aspect of unbelief. What does this doubt deny about God? What is this doubt?

Forget about God. You can even put it like this, what is this doubt asking me to believe about God? What article of faith is this doubt proposing to me and trying to get me to embrace and act on? Doubts aren't neutral. They come at you with an agenda.

They come at you taking a stand and asking you to agree with that stand and then they cover their tracks behind them under the guise of pure objective scientific neutrality.

Our passage gives us another confirmation of the trustworthiness of God's words in verse 16 by revealing Jesus as the promised Messiah. Look at the second half of verse 16. I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star. This passage holds up Jesus as the fulfillment of two key promises of of the Messiah in the Old Testament. Isaiah 11:10 and Numbers 24:17.

Isaiah 11:10 promises a Messiah who will arise from David's line and who will rule over the nations. And Jesus declares that here in the fulfillment of this promise, he's not only David's descendant, he's also David's root. He's not only David's offspring. He's also David's source. He's both son and Lord.

Numbers 24:17 promises a ruler who will arise to rule over and defeat all the enemies of God's people. You should trust Jesus' words because he is himself the incarnate fulfillment of God's ancient promises. In Jesus, God made good on so much that he promised beforehand, just like Welton led us in meditating on in prayer. And one day soon, Jesus will fulfill all of God's outstanding, as yet unfulfilled promises. When Christ returns, God will do fully and finally what he already did in Christ's first coming.

Christ's return will be the perfect and final yes to all of God's promises that have not yet been fulfilled. If you struggle to trust these words, remember that their speaker is trustworthy, that the one who revealed these visions is also the sovereign ruler of all things. The one whose will must take place is the one who's already fulfilled that will for our salvation in Christ's first coming. How do you prepare for Christ's return? Trust his words.

And what will you do with those words if you trust them? Point number two, keep his commands. Keep his commands. This simple, crucial instruction comes to the surface again and again throughout our passage. The book of Revelation has an extremely practical purpose.

We hear it in the blessing that Jesus pronounces in verse seven.

Behold, I'm coming soon. Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book. The whole book of Revelation aims to provoke God's people to persevere in faith and obedience. To keep the words of this book is to keep trusting in Christ, keep confessing Christ, keep obeying Christ, and keep worshiping Christ. Faith, confession, obedience, worship, and enduring in all of it.

That is the practical purpose of the whole book of Revelation. That's the essence of what Revelation teaches us to do. That's how you keep these words. And what verse seven says is true of the one who does that is that they are blessed. Now, that little biblical word can get a bad rap or have some unbiblical associations.

In a superficial way, perhaps some people might tag their idyllic looking social media posts with hashtag blessed.

And you think, oh, is God blessing self-satisfaction, self-indulgence, a designer lifestyle? I'm not sure. But in a deeper way, on a more serious note, there's false teaching in abundance that says, if you believe hard enough, God will bless you with a stream of material blessings. But we can't let Instagram, or the prosperity gospel monopolize the word blessed. It means happy, it means fulfilled, it means flourishing.

And here, what God ties it to is obedience, meaning to obey is to be those things. To obey is to experience those things. The fullness of that blessing comes only in the new creation. But this is still a present promise. It's a promise for those who obey while they obey because they're keeping these words.

There is a blessing in the keeping. Too often we think of obedience as stealing joy, but it's just the opposite. Obeying God is the source of joy. It's the source of the deepest, truest, most lasting joy. This theme of obedience continues in verses 10 and 11.

We'll pause over them for a minute because there's a few puzzles.

And he said to me, Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book for the time is near. Let the evildoers still do evil and let the filthy still be filthy and the righteous still do right and the holy still be holy. That phrase, do not seal up, is a link with and a contrast with the book of Daniel. In Daniel 12:4, Daniel is told to seal up the words of the prophecy of this book until the end of time. The point of the contrast between Daniel sealing and John not sealing is that what God promised to Daniel, the fulfillment of it was far off in the future.

But the fulfillment of what God's promised to John is near. Now you say, near. Wasn't this book written 2,000 years ago? Yes, it was. So what kind of nearness are we talking about?

The nearness is that Christ's return is the next item on God's redemptive historical agenda. The nearness is that Christ could return at any time. The nearness is that we're meant to live in constant expectation of Christ's return, as if it could come up like the very next sunrise. That's what it means that this is near and soon to take place. But then what's up with the commands of verse 11?

The righteous are still to be righteous and the wicked still be wicked? Keep doing unrighteous things? The point here is that prophecy splits. Prophecy divides its audience. The prophecy of Revelation, like the parables of Jesus, forces a choice.

Will you believe? Or reject? Will you obey or disobey? Will you persevere or will you give up? These prophetic visions are like a wedge driving that choice every time you hear or read one of them.

So the first half of 11 saying that the wicked should still be wicked. That's prophetic irony. It's not meant literally. It's like saying, keep going down the path of sin. Keep sliding down that steep hill of unrighteousness.

See where it takes you. Find out where it leads you. Figure out if that's really where you want to be in the end. It's a wake-up call, it's a warning. The verbal irony is meant to provoke you.

God knows what's best for all of us. Sin will only entice for a time. God is saying that time is going to run out. And so, revelation is filled with wake up calls. It's like an alarm on your nightstand and one under the pillow and one across the room and then one like on your oven downstairs that you gotta get up and get out of bed and walk downstairs to go turn off.

God is saying, wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up. That's what each of these visions is doing. What moral path do you need to be woken up from pursuing? What thing you know God doesn't want for you do you need to turn aside from? Whatever it is, wake up, hear and heed this warning.

Another passage that hammers home the importance of obedience is verses 18 and 19. I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book, if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. And if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book. This passage echoes a number of passages in Deuteronomy, including Deuteronomy 12:32, which Kevin Gallagher is going to preach from tonight. Everything that I command you, and you, you shall be careful to do.

You shall not add to it or take from it. Here in Revelation, the primary point of this warning is that we all must do exactly what God commands. We should do no more, we should do no less, and the consequences of disobedience could not be higher. To illustrate how this works, we can think our way back into a temptation that would have been common for many of the book's original hearers in the first century. They lived in a world dominated by pagan polytheism.

That was the official civil religion. That was what you had to abide by and participate in to sort of get along normally in society. Many of them who had jobs would have belonged to professional guilds where there were regular dinners hosted in the honor of some god and they would, you know, offer incense or a sacrifice or say prayers to this god and normal participation in the whole meal, including its idolatrous aspects, was expected of you as a condition of your employment. So what do you do? You're a Christian, you want to obey Jesus, you want to keep God's commands, you also want to feed your family.

Maybe you start to think like this: I want to obey God and God wants me to provide for my family and I have this job and it might be hard to get another and so maybe I just, you know, do the sacrifice but cross my fingers behind my back or sprinkle the incense but pray to the true God while I'm doing it. Yeah, maybe God's okay with that. I'm sure he wouldn't want me to lose my job over something as silly as a little prayer or incense or something like that. What's happened in that moment is both adding and subtracting to God's commands. Adding in the sense that you're taking a permission God has never given you.

You are adding to the acceptable pathways of living the Christian life. Nope, not that one. You're also taking away. You're, as it were, erasing the first commandments that Marshall read to us. Whoop, that one's a little bit inconvenient.

No other gods before me. Well, we'll just pass over that one for now. What are some ways that you were tempted to add to God's commands?

What are some commands you're tempted to overlook or paper over? Are there any biblical commands that you'd be happier if they weren't there?

You prepare for Christ's return by keeping his commands. The most fundamental of those commands is that you worship him alone. We see this illustrated in verses 8 and 9.

I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I heard and saw them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who showed them to me. But he said to me, 'You must not do that. I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God.

It's hard to know exactly why John makes this mistake of worshiping the angel who's given him the revelation. He did the same thing back in chapter 19. Maybe it's that he just got so overwhelmed, he kind of lost his sense, lost his bearings. But I think the reason why these two accidental angel worship episodes are recorded for us is that they stand as a warning. They remind us how easy it is to slip into idolatry, how easy it is to fall into misdirected worship.

Even John the Apostle did it. How much more should you be on your guard about falling into worshiping false gods? There's even a special temptation here of fixating more on the messenger than on the message. There's a constant spiritual temptation to focus more on the one reporting the revelation than on the one who it reveals. What matters is the word of Christ, not the one serving up that word.

What matters is the revelation of God's saving plan, not the one doing the revealing.

But the command to worship is not the only one Jesus issues in this concluding passage. Verse 17, we hear another command from Christ through the angel through John. Look just at the second half of verse 17. We'll come back to the first half in a moment.

Second half of verse 17, Let the one who is thirsty Come, let the one who desires take the water of life without price.

Of course, this echoes the words of Isaiah 55 we read aloud earlier. Let the one who is thirsty come, let the one who desires take the water of life without price. Here Jesus is making explicit that the way into a right relationship with God starts with recognizing your absolute need, your emptiness, and your inability to make yourself right with God. He's speaking to all of us because we've all run away from God. That's what Adam and Eve did by sinning in the garden.

That's what they did literally after they sinned. And one way or another, all of us have repeated that pattern of sinning against God and running away from him, running away by sinning, running away farther because we've sinned and we don't want him to see us. Jesus here in this last invitation in the Bible is saying, come. Come back, come freely, come disqualified as you are, come with no preparation, because preparation is futile, come without cost, no cost to you. How can that be?

Because the whole point and purpose of Jesus's earthly mission was to pay every cost we needed to get right and get back with God. That's what he did by dying on the cross, paying the penalty, suffering the consequences, enduring God's wrath for our sin. He triumphed over the grave by his resurrection, defeating death forever. And now he reigns in power, pouring out his spirit on his church, sending people throughout the world to proclaim that there is a way back to God and that you can't do anything about it because he's done everything for it. So all you have to do is Turn.

All you have to do is trust. All you have to do is come to him. That is how and that is the only way how to get yourself right with God. Maybe that sounds different to you than what you thought Christianity is. Maybe that sounds different than a religion you practice and that you're committed to and that you think is going pretty well for you.

I would encourage you to let this challenge echo and resonate. What does it take to get right with God? Who can do that? How can it be done? The Scottish minister, Robert Murray M'Cheyne, who lived in the 19th century, has been a great influence on me and encouragement to me.

He wrote a letter to a friend who had not yet repented and trusted in Christ and he pointed to this verse, I must not weary you. One word more. Look at Revelation 22:17, sweet, sweet words, Whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely. The last invitation in the Bible and the freest, Christ's parting word to a world of sinners. Anyone that pleases may take this glorious way of salvation.

Can you refuse it? I'm sure you cannot. Dear friend, be persuaded by a fellow worm not to put off another moment.

This is a command. To come. It's a command of those who already believe to keep coming. It's a command of those who do not yet believe to start to believe. And he's inviting you to feast, to drink freely, to satisfy your appetites.

Sometimes people's invitations to eat, drink, partake are not always aware of what is in your best interest. My wife has German heritage. It is in both her cultural background and perhaps even in her genes to be a food pusher. If you hang around with members of older generations of her family, her mother, her grandmother, you will have food thrust upon you. Coffee, cake, heavy meals, multiple helpings of each.

Surely you must want more. I trust it's well intentioned. It's a form of hospitality, a form of generosity. But you're thinking, oh, I really couldn't. It exhausts my kind of repertoire of like polite denials.

I don't know how, you're trapped. You're trapped between cake and a full stomach. The person offering means well. They mean you all the best, but they don't actually know what's best for you. The person offering here.

Means you better than my sweet grandmother in law ever could, and knows what's best for you, knows what will satisfy you, knows what will give you eternal life, which is himself. Jesus is no food pusher. He's saying, come, come to him, come to me and drink. Brothers and sisters, those of you who already believe in Jesus, verse 17 says to you, Keep coming, keep coming back, keep coming for more. Jesus has living water that satisfies your deepest thirst.

What Christ commands is that you obey him, that you worship him, and that you come to him. If you do all that, how will it change your heart and your deepest desires? Point number three: Long for His return. How can you prepare for Christ's return? Long for His return.

It's not enough to wait. Waiting for Christ's return is not like sitting at a metro stop You check the little screen, only four minutes till the next blue line comes, no big deal. There's more to it than that. Christians aren't just waiting for Christ to come back. We yearn for it.

We long for it. Just to give a biblical example of this, listen to Paul's expectation in 2 Timothy 4:8. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me, but also to all who have loved his appearing. Here Paul defines what it means to be a Christian. He's characterizing all those who will receive a reward from Christ on the last day.

And he describes them as those who have loved his appearing, meaning they've looked forward to it. They've yearned for it. They've wanted it. To be a Christian is to long for Jesus to come back and make all things new. Now, what Christ's return will bring is reward to those who have believed.

It's also judgment. To those who don't. That's part of what makes us yearn for him. It's part of what keeps us walking in fearful self-examination before him. Look at verse 15.

It's a warning of all who will be excluded from this reward when Christ returns. Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters and everyone who loves and practices Falsehood. What all these people have in common is that they are characterized by these sins. These sins betray that they are worshiping some false god, whether that false god belongs to another religion or it's the false god of self. We should also remember the warnings of verses 18 and 19 that whoever does not obey God's commands will not receive this reward.

We are not saved by good works, but we are not saved without good works. The faith that saves transforms. One of the founding myths of the modern world is that we are all sovereign over ourselves. We are all autonomous, a law to ourselves. Each of us is the commanding officer aboard the ship of our own lives, and we steer that ship wherever we please.

The famous poem Invictus by William Ernest Henley states this sentiment exactly: It matters not how strait the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul. It's a noble sentiment. The only problem is it's false. You are not the master of your fate. You are not the Lord and master of your life, your fate, your destiny.

You are not the captain of your soul. Jesus is, whether you recognize that willingly or not. Jesus decides who will live in blessing with him forever and who will be excluded from that reward. Jesus is the master of your fate. The only way to set your soul right is to answer to Him as the captain of your soul.

And for all those who trust in Christ and live for Him, His return promises blessing and reward. Look at verse 12. Behold, I am coming soon, bringing my recompense with me to repay each one for what he has done. For believers in Jesus, this means everlasting reward. It means more than abundant repayment for all that you give up for his sake now.

It means a reward far beyond all that you could ask or deserve. And we get more detail about this promise in verse 14. Blessed are those who wash their robes so that they may have the right to the tree of life and that they may enter the city by the gates. This washing of robes refers back to our conversion. Our being cleansed with the blood of Christ, are being clothed with his righteousness.

Everyone who trusts in Christ is perfectly cleansed from sin, perfectly released from guilt, perfectly freed from condemnation. If you trust in Christ, he completely frees you from your past. You're no longer defined by the worst thing you've ever done. God no longer holds any of that against you. Trusting in Christ gives you a whole new past.

It also gives you a whole new future. Verse 14 promises the right to the tree of life. That's the right to feast in God's presence forever. It's the right to a perfect, unending life that no one can take away from you. The happiness that God promises in the new creation is something the world can never take away because the world can never give it in the first place.

This right to the tree of life, this right to enter the city is an image of living in perfect peace with God forever. No one can disqualify you. God's given you the authority. God's given you the right. Nothing any human could ever do to you could keep you from this eternal bliss in God's presence.

Trusting in Christ also gives you a new home in this new future. That's the city in which believers will dwell with God, the new Jerusalem. This is the home you never have to leave. In the new creation, there'll be no more boxes, no more loading up trucks, no more saying goodbye. The new creation is our perfect and permanent home.

The life of the world to come is perfect, perfectly free from sin, perfectly free from suffering, free from every effect of death, free from loss and transience and sorrow. Free from everything that could ever threaten your perfect joy in God. If you trust in Christ, that's the reward he will bring you when he returns.

So what's your stance toward Christ's second coming? What's your attitude toward it? Do you love it? Long for it? Or do you go vast stretches of time without giving any thought to it at all?

How would you feel if Christ came back today? Look again at verse 17.

The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let the one who hears say, Come. And let the one who is thirsty come. Let the one who desires take the water of life without price. In this first part of the verse, the bride represents God's people who are already with him in heaven.

The Spirit inspires God's now perfected people to call out for Christ to return to earth. But then the cry turns into an instruction for us. Let the one who hears say, Come, the heavenly cry for Christ to return, must be echoed in each of our hearts. One of the primary goals of the entire book of Revelation is to elicit that cry from your heart, Come, Lord Jesus. The whole point of this book is to make you want it.

It's to make you say, Come, Lord Jesus. The book of Revelation aims to make us long for his return. Do you want to see him face to face and be with him forever? Then let your heart echo heaven's cry. Come, Lord Jesus.

That cry tends to arise more easily and quickly from our hearts when things aren't going our way. You don't get the job you want or you lose the one you have. That old injury comes back this time worse. You feel trapped in a relational conflict. No matter what you do, you're going to hurt somebody.

Or worse, death approaches. The death of a loved one, death of someone close to you. It's only a matter of time or it's just happened. At times like those, it's not automatic, but it's easier to say, Come Lord Jesus. What's happening in those times of suffering is God is relaxing your grip on these worldly realities.

It's easier to turn and say, Come Lord Jesus, but relaxing your grip on earthly realities is not the same thing as tightening your grip on the hope of Christ's return. It's not automatic. When you're in those seasons of suffering and struggle, you might say, Come, Lord Jesus, but you might also be tempted to frustration, fatalism, resignation, even despair. So as you say, Come, Lord Jesus, pray for endurance. As you say, Come, Lord Jesus, pray that your heart would be filled with yearning of that hope, not just being fed up with suffering here.

Pray that you will faithfully bear up under whatever God himself lays on you until God himself lifts it off. Whether that end point is death or Christ's return, you need to endure now all the same. What type of things turn up the temperature of your longing for Christ's return? And what tends to chill it? Certainly one crucial way to tend the fire of that longing is through regularly gathering with God's people and throwing your heart into corporate worship.

When you read and sing and pray and hear about Christ's return in Scripture, that adds fresh fuel to your yearning for it. Think back over your last week. Is there any moment at which you would have been ashamed for Christ to come back? Right then. What can you do this week to change that?

So much of the book of Revelation has a laser focus on Jesus' second coming, and our passage in conclusion promises it three times. Verse 7, verse 12, verse 20. And behold, I am coming soon. Behold, I am coming soon, bringing my recompense with me.

He who testifies to these things says, Surely I am coming soon. Jesus has not forgotten or forsaken you. Jesus has not changed his plans. Jesus has not thought better about coming to bring you into his presence forever.

Verse 20, John adds his echo to this promise. It's a model for ours. Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.

There's a sense in which that promise in verse 20 is Jesus' last words. He who testifies to these things says, Surely I am coming soon.

But they're only His last words for now. These last words are words of promise and they're words of certain hope. These words are more sure to be fulfilled than that the sun will stay up in the sky for the rest of today. These words are not a goodbye, but the pledge of a return.

These words are a bridge that Jesus flings across the whole time of our absence from him. You can only stay on that bridge by faith, but if you you trust these words, they will carry you over that whole chasm from now until he comes back.

By faith, you can know that he's yours, that you're his, and that he is coming for you. Lo, he comes with clouds descending, once for favored sinners slain. Let's pray.

He who testifies to these things says, Surely I'm coming soon. Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. Father, we pray that that would be the cry of our hearts every day until Christ returns. We pray for those who don't yet cry that they will.

We pray you'd be glorified now. As we lift up our hearts to youo and confess this hope in song. In Jesus' name, Amen.