Co-Mission sermons

Thanks, Craig. We're going to turn to the Bible now, and then Pete's going to come and open this passage up to us. So Pete, it open as well, while it comes. It's Revelation: Chapter 22, it's just 5 verses, glorious verses. Revelation chapter 22, it'll come up on the screen, but if you turn in your bibles as well.

Then the angels showed me the river of the water of life as clear as crystal flowing from the throne of god and of the land down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river, stood the tree of life bearing 12 crops of fruit yielding its fruit every month, and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the lamb will be in the city and his servants will serve him. They will see his face and his name will be on their foreheads There will be no more night.

They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of a sun. For the lord, god will give them light, and they will reign forever and ever. As Pete said, do keep that open. It is great to be with you. And I have been known of you and prayed for you since she started 20 odd years ago.

But I know I've been here, so it's great to be joining you. And also that video we saw earlier, the commission 1 was actually really helpful. Relating to this passage. It talks about, you know, life can be hard, but the future. But I was disappointed at 1 point that Philip was only there's gurning when he could have done some of that strange, dreamy dancing bit.

So Philip, next time. You can you can lead a liturgical dance group for cornerstone. Yeah. There we are. That's on.

That's the New Year plan. Keep that open, hopefully you can see it. I'm sorry you guys can't because I think I'm blocking it, but hopefully you've got a bible in front of you, let's pray. Father, It is a joy to belong to you right now. It's the best life to live.

But this life is not always easy. And thank you that this is our future that we've just read about. And I pray you would inspire us, encourage us, challenge us, and help us to live now in light of this future. Ahmed? So it is fair to say, I know a handful of you a little bit.

I don't know I probably know about 3 percent of you. And the rest of you I don't know what's your life like. Now if you were asked, well, I came up with our dudes and said, what's your life like? What's good about it? What do you find?

That's more challenging in life. What are your struggles in life? How do you think? How would you describe that? Over my life, I've told you a little bit about it.

I've got a job that I actually genuinely love doing. I've been blessed with twin children and nearly 13, you know, 4 weeks. I've got a warm home. I've got a loving wife and I'm reasonably healthy. I've proper describe it.

I've got a good life. But it's not a perfect life. It's quite a long way short of perfect. My job is tiring. There are frustrations being a pastor of a church.

Just ask your guys who are your pastors. My children aren't easy. I describe parenting when people ask me, I say, it's an exhausting joy. You're feeling that massively at the moment, I'm guessing. Bae me so tired.

That's parenting. Exhausting joy. We got a great home, but things go wrong. I managed to break 1 of the showers knobs yesterday. I'm not quite sure how to fix that.

We'll get on that. But things go to any work. My health is okay, but I'm on statins to control cholesterol. I'm due to have a knee replacement at some point in the next 10 years. I got a altruistic risk this side and carpal to tunnel on this risk.

You know, I'm vaguely decrepit. And I know quite a lot of you are younger than me. And for those of you in the twenties, you're like thinking, I don't really get what he's saying. That's not my life. But you will.

Famous deals are going I think he was in his twenties. He was surprised when he was reading through the bible, looking at the book of Psalms. And he was surprised at how many psalms of lament there are. Psalms we go, God, this is hard. What's going wrong?

How long will those kind of psalms? By the time he was 30, He was surprised there weren't more. Now that that's a little bit patronizing for you, I guess. But I know for you, life isn't always easy either. Friendships are challenging.

You get ill. Work is hard. People let you down. Love ones die. When I was 24, I was playing the best rugby of my life.

I was the fittest I've ever been. My dad actually would regularly come on watch me play. By the time I was 25, my knees had stopped working, and my dad had died. That's the reality of our life now. A life lived in the world of sin and decay.

Now, of course, it's not all despair. God is a gracious god. We've got joy, fun, family, purpose, love security so much. In our life to give thanks for. But it is hard.

You know that. It isn't perfect. For some, it's very hard. Many are struggling as we prayed about, great prayers, by the way, with their bills, cost of living inflation. On top of that, you've got health concerns, mental health, physical health, lots of challenges.

There is much that makes this life really hard. And that's obviously got nothing to do with whether you're a Christian or not. All people find life just like this. But do you realize that for non Christians, this is the best life they'll ever have. The future for them is bleak.

It's shocking. But an eternity separated from all of God's blessing. For non Christian, this life is the best life. They'll ever have. For a Christian, however, however good your life is, this life is the worst life You'll ever live.

However, good your life is. However, full of joy and blessing. It's a pale, dark shadow. Compared to the life to come. But don't hear me wrong.

Living as a Christian now is the best life to live now. Absolutely. He he gives you security assurance purpose direction. You're living as a child of God in his amazing creation. You're in an active real, 2 way relationship with the awesome creator God.

You've been saved by Christ to live for him now and for eternity. God has given you past tense every spiritual blessing. That's the life you have now as a Christian. So of course, being a Christian is the best life to live now. But being a Christian also means that you know that this life is the worst life You'll ever live.

The want to come is mind blowingly awesome. Look down at that passage. We'll look up here. Revelation 22, and consider your future if you're a Christian. This describes your eternity.

Now for those in here, you're very, very welcome. I'm sure I can say this. But Peter, if you're not a Christian, you Brilliant. It's a joy to have you here. Do keep coming.

But this doesn't describe your future. But of course, it's not too late for you to respond. All you have to do is to recognize Jesus as your lord and your savior. And then this can describe your future too. If that is you or anyone here, don't talk to me.

I don't live around it. But talk to Pete. He was up here. Talk to whoever sitting next to you. Talk to someone.

Ask them about this future. Ask them about the life now with Christ. This is too amazing to ignore. But let's have a look and think about what this future looks like. Firstly, for Christians, we're gonna live in the city of God.

Look there at verse 1. Then the angels showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as Crystal, flowing from the throne of Garden of the lamb, down the middle of the great street of the city. Now I I did history degree. I love history. And in ancient times, you'll know this probably.

Living outside the city was dangerous. There were walls there to protect you. Out there outside was banishment, bandits, the enemy, it was scary, safety meant living inside, the city walls, inside the city with security. We kind of lost this. The London City walls are somewhere up in the middle of London.

There's a little bit of wall left. We don't get there. I live outside of London on that map. Kingsborough, Edmonton, we're outside of that map. We don't have to pay the ULEZ when it comes in next year.

I've never come to visit you again because 12 pound 50. But in ancient times, you wanted to live in the city. You wanted to be inside those walls. To be protective. And this is God's sitting.

Future's living in God's sitting inside his protection. It's the throne of God. You sit there. Thrown of God and of the lamb in the middle of that great city. That's God the father and God the son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus is the lamb referred to there. Revelation John writes it, he regularly refers to Jesus as the lamb. John is the same guy wrote John's gospel. In there in John chapter 1 verse 29. John the Baptist actually another John talking about Jesus said, look, the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

That's this 1 referred to here. And we get to live in this city, God's city. For eternity because the lord Jesus Christ the lamb of God. He died as our sacrificial lamb. With citizens in god's holy city, not because of who we are, not because of our achievements or success, not because we're we're cool or popular or whatever.

We get a living god city in the sight of god's throne because Jesus die for our sins. He qualified us for this city. So right now, if you're a Christian, this is your true and eternal identity. Right now, your passport, it shouldn't be stamped whichever country you're from in their minds as citizens of Britain. Your passport should be stamped.

Citizens of God's Kingdom, Citizen of God's City. That is a glorious identity to have. You're there because of Jesus. Now I've got lots of South African mates who become British citizens. I've signed lots of their forms because I'm a church minister.

I can do those things. You know, I've signed their forms. And it's taken a quite some of them lots of years and lots of lots of money to become British citizens. I think some of them probably regretting that now, but that's a different issue. But it's a costly long term process.

But to become a citizen of this city of god city, to belong with him for eternity, costs you nothing. The huge cost was entirely paid by God and by the lamb. That's the throne. That's our city. That's where we belong.

That's where we're going to live. But what's that life going to be like? How will our future life eternity compared to our present life now. Well, firstly, importantly, God will rule perfectly. God will be present with us, and we'll rule, we'll reign perfectly.

You know, we all want to live in a place where we can we can trust and rely on our rulers. Think about our earthly rulers. It's kind depressing at times here last year. The year of 3 prime ministers How did any of them make you feel knowing that they were in charge over us? You know, let's say, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, Rishi Sunak.

If you want any of them ruling you for eternity, you might not want any of them ruling you for 5 minutes and 1 of them was dead roll 5 minutes. But you don't want them in charge for eternity. But in our future, God rules perfectly forever. Now I know, of course, Daniel, God rules all things right now. He is in charge he is sovereign.

This is his world. He chooses what goes on. He's in charge. But we're living in this world as we've talked about scarred by sin and decay. But this age will end.

God will bring in his perfect eternal rule. When all things will be done away with. He is waiting, giving time. For all to respond, that he's always chosen to respond, to his son, the Lord Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. And when the last will report and respond, then he's gonna bring in this kingdom.

This 1 we're reading about now. Just look again and see what that verse is going to verse 1 again. Then the angels showed me the river of water of life as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the lamb down the middle of the great sis tree to the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing 12 crops of fruit. The yielding is fruit every month and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.

That water. It's not like the thames, is it? That will ever go through the middle of our city. It's life giving. It's pure.

It's like crystal. I've always amused in Walton because we're on Walton intents as well. People fishing. They do get fish. You're not going to eat 1.

I don't think, oh, but this water Look at this river, purest crystal. And the tree of life is providing perfect abundant crops of fruit. Now, and I'm no gardener. I think we're up in Cornwall, so farmers all around us, but I I don't get it. I don't have an allotment, but even I know that trees only produce crops at certain times of year, the harvest season.

We actually, I don't quite know why we got it, but we got a tonnage of strawberries from test beers last week. They were awful. This hard. No sweetness. It was disgusting.

Don't know whether they've been grown somewhere else. They were probably shipped him from South Africa or somewhere like that, but they were awful. It's not the time of year to get GC strawberries. You have to wait for a decent harvest time. But look in the future, the trees will produce a crop every month all year round 12 times a year.

Basically is an image of having no hunger, no struggle, no cost of living crisis, no shortage of what we need. Everything there, perfectly provided every month, each month, all the time for us, all perfectly provided by God. We're all living in his city. Wow, that's quite different to now, isn't it? But what will that future?

Your future if you're a Christian What will it actually be like? What will you do? Because after all, eternity is quite a long time. What will it be like to live in God City under his perfect rule? So there's many asks wonderful aspects, and we're gonna build up that.

But the conclusion, you will reign with God in that city. But from those 3, let's go through these things. No longer, will there be any curse? Now the curse that goes all the way back to Genesis 3, right at the start of the bible. Adam and Eve, you know, they sent and God brought the curse in to judge the consequences in Genesis 3.

It's why life now is hard. It's work, friendships, marriages, health, death, all tough because of the curse. Life now is hard because of sin. But our future no longer will there be any curse. When I arrived this morning, first person I saw who was dead.

I've known dad for quite a long time. How are you looking forward to the from my future body or eternity or something like that? Wasn't he dead? Because he's falling apart too. And he knows the future.

There's no curse. His legs won't be knocket. He'll be sorted. That's our future. How?

Because look, it's it's where the God and the lamb reigns overall. There's no sin. There's there's no possibility of sin. You're completely free. Perfect.

Without staying or struggle. That's your future. How does that make you feel? And it's not a future, you know, floating around on a on a white cloud wearing white robes, strumming a heart that you see on the cartoons. Although as a parent, I actually think that sounds quite blissful.

For about 5 minutes, then how boring would that be? Be awful. That's not what our future. It's gonna be like as a Christian. Our future is living in that perfect city with God rolling over us with a job to do.

Look there, verse 3. The throne of God on the lamb again will be in the siffy, and his servants will serve him. We'll serve God. We'll be with him, serving him. But but this isn't hard work.

It's not an obligation not sure. It's not tiring. We're getting provision monthly all the time. It's being in God's presence physically. Being perfectly provided with all that we need, serving the God who saved us and made us a citizen of his city.

Now, I don't know exactly what that's going to involve, but I do know it will be glorious. It will be in God's family. A multicultural, multicolored gathering of real brothers and sisters from every nation, a family gathering, serving God. You know, a group made up of Kenyans, Nigerianians, Brits, Chinese, Russians, Ukrainians, yes, as brothers and sisters. Mexicans, Australians, Dutch, Peruvians, I don't know.

Other component, Australians. I'm not I'm not sure which countries you'll come from. But every tribe tongue, and nation, all perfectly united as brothers and sisters as God's family serving him. It's glorious. We will see God face to face.

Verse 4, they will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. Oh, you know your old testament, even Moses, they're they're the greatest of the old testament prophets. He wasn't allowed to see God's face. He saw the back of his head as the shadow. God shall we pass by, but you will.

You know, today we live by faith We don't physically see god in front of us. We know he's there, but that's faith. But in our future, we'll live by sight. Will be with God, an awesome great savior in Lord. We will see him and serve him.

How? Because we belong to him. His name will be on our foreheads. It's that an idea of kind of like a probably less violentness, but you know, you only do a cattle branding. You know, they heat the the metal thing up in the fire and then they go, that cattle belongs to me.

And then you see the cattle out in the fields and they've got the marks on them. That's how they know which farmer who belongs to, which cow belongs to which farmer. That's what God's gonna do to you, but probably less painfully, I think. It's marking out who you belong to. Our kids went back to school on Wednesday.

This is an easy return than September because it's September, you've got new uniform, new shoes, new peak, often new bags, new everything. And every single 1 you've got to do, you've got to label them. You've got to put their name on them. Otherwise, by the second day, you've got to buy a whole new uniform. So they can identify which bit of clothing lying around somewhere belongs to them.

Well, God's gonna name you. He's gonna identify that you belong to him. You'll be in his kingdom, seeing him face to face with his name on you. You're his forever. You belong to God.

That means we're secure. He's not You can't rub it out. He is. You're afraid to live in his kingdom and to serve him. It'll be beautiful and fruitful and glorious.

There'll be nothing bad. There'll be no hardships. There'll be no struggles. Nothing to be scared of. That's what he talks about here is there's, you know, darkness.

Think about a dark dark night. I mean, think of a dodgy alley down by the thames or under and you're under the railway bridges. You got that under there. That's dark. No.

That's I don't like that. That's a bit scary because it's dark. It can be scary walking around when it's dark. None of that, you're more like to get lost. You might bump into things.

You stop, darkness isn't a good thing. That our future is not going to be like that. Nothing to be scared of. No doubt. Look at that's why.

There will be no more night They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun for the Lord God will give them light. We're gonna be living in God's abundant, overwhelming, stunning magnificence, which is just gonna radiate from him, giving us light. How amazing is that? It is It feels completely overwhelming that what John's describing here. And I think that's right.

I think we should be overwhelmed by this. It's so fantastically removed. From our present struggles, our life now. I think I do find this hard to comprehend. What how is it gonna be that I'm not gonna ache?

How is it that my kids aren't gonna know me? How is it that I'm not gonna argue this for my wife. You know, what is that future? I'm not gonna be mad to actually, but let's not get a bad side. But how do I comprehend this?

There was a sixteenth century, I love this quote, that I've used many times in different talks. But in the 16 series said, in light of heaven, the worst suffering on earth, a life full of the most atrocious tortures on earth will be seen to be no more serious than 1 night. In an inconvenient hotel. Wow. If you're a Christian, This is your future.

And look there at the end of the verse 5. Look at the summary statement of your future. If you're a Christian, which is there. And they will rain forever and ever. You will rain forever.

Than ever. Just ponder that for a moment. It's an easy statement to say. Just remember who's sitting on that throne? Who's reigning?

It's almighty God, isn't it? He's the 1 who's running. He's the 1 in charge. You know, I get the idea. We're gonna spend eternity living in God's perfect city.

That's pretty awesome. Being abundantly and overwhelmingly provided for fantastic. And I'm going to reign with him. Not for a limited part time. On a rotor basis, you know, this side you're on this month and then it's you.

And, no, no, you will reign for eternity forever and ever with God. How does that make you feel? And what difference does that feature? Make to today. How does that future impact how you live today?

How does this reality change your decisions, your choices, what you do, what you think today? You can think about your own life. There's a few little things. Firstly, keep going now. In light of what's to come.

This life may be hard. It may be really hard for some of you. But keep going. Your feature is secure. A close friend of mine, he's he's very ill with cancer.

And his and his wife have been extraordinary examples of keeping faithfully living for Jesus. Living now in light of this future. And a few weeks back, they they shared this verse from Psalm 73. And in the context of them, very early cancer. This is the verse.

Whom am I in heaven but you? I know there's nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail. That God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. That's living now in light of the future.

So keep going as faithful disciples of Christ. Live now knowing you belong with God forever. But also, obviously, don't keep this feature to yourself. Your non Christian friends and loved ones don't have this future to look forward to, but they can. It's an offer to them.

Will you tell them about it? Will you work hard within all you're doing here at Cornerstone to reach out to Kingston in the surrounding areas? With this good news. Your loved ones. Non Christian loved ones' future is 1 of darkness and despair.

They will exist under the consequences of their sin for eternity. But there is hope. But only if you tell them, will you love your friends enough to tell them about this future? And finally, this life may be tough. And in fact, this life will be tough.

We know that. We're all decaying. You know, what are the 2 deficits in life, death and taxes? Both are pains. But more than that, your family, your work, your health and finances, so many areas of struggle we have.

But this life is temporary. And however hard your life is, whatever good your life is, the best life to live now. Is 1 striving to be a faithful disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. In your context, school, college, work, retirement, whatever it is for you, The best life for you to live is to live as a disciple of Jesus Christ today. Not just for the future, but yes, the future.

But today, that's where security is. But however good this life is, It is a pathetic, pale, dark shadow compared to the glorious beauty, magnificent technicolor of our future with God reigning with him in his kingdom. You are going to live in that kingdom under his perfect rule, and you'll ring with him forever and ever. I'll have a moment of quiet to think about that, and then I'll lead us to that in a prayer in a moment. FATHER, thank you for this extraordinary reality that you have given us through the lord Jesus Christ's death in our place on the cross.

Thank you that this is a guaranteed future. Jesus' resurrection proves this is true. Help us to delight in it. To look forward to it, to keep working hard through your work of your holy spirit, to be ready for it, to be prepared for it. And help us to live now in all that we do in light of this future.

Armin,