Intro / Review:
Progress Report: Thyatira (Rev 2:18-29):
- The COMMENDATION. You're Growing! (Rev 2:19)
- The CRITICISM. You Tolerate Jezebel! (Rev 2:14-15)
- Watch out for someone that says, God ToldMe..."(Rev 2:20)
How to spot a Jezebel
- Watch out for the person who is starting a Curch within the church. (Rev 2:20)
- Watch out for the person who refuses to Repent. (Rev 2:21)
- The COMMAND. Hold fast! (Rev 2:24-25)
- The CALL. You will Rule with Jesus! (Rev 2:26-29)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:40-00:43
Open up your Bibles to the book of Revelation in chapter 2.
00:44-00:56
The pastor of a very large and growing church is taking long trips out of town telling his wife that it's for work, and it's for sexual immorality instead.
00:57-00:58
And this pastor is fired.
00:58-01:04
Another pastor is meeting a woman privately for counseling, which turns into an affair.
01:05-01:11
And as he's fired from the church, He just decides to start a new church meeting at the school down the road.
01:12-01:14
And many people from that congregation follow him.
01:15-01:22
A pastor in training was caught molesting his neighbor's daughter, a little girl.
01:23-01:25
And he goes to prison for a long time.
01:26-01:28
These are not headlines that I've read.
01:29-01:30
These are people that I know.
01:30-01:39
By virtue of being a pastor and serving God and His church in the same area for a long time, you get to meet a lot of pastors.
01:39-01:44
And I could tell you a lot more stories like that, believe it or not.
01:44-01:47
I have more down here, I'm not even going after them.
01:48-01:51
But it's not just local and the people that I know.
01:51-02:01
A few years ago, two of the biggest Christian leaders, two of the biggest leaders in Christian ministries in our country, about the same time we're caught in sexual immorality.
02:02-02:03
What is going on?
02:03-02:06
We live in such a sexually charged culture.
02:06-02:08
I don't think anybody here would deny that.
02:09-02:12
But the problem is, it has come into the church.
02:14-02:15
Talk about sex scandals in the church.
02:15-02:18
The Catholic Church is still reeling from it.
02:18-02:27
And I don't know what's sadder, how widespread this issue is among churches, or how long it has been happening in the church.
02:29-02:34
Because we're going to see today, at a church we're looking at today, a sex scandal is nothing new.
02:35-02:41
Another problem with the church we're looking at today is the leaders sort of knew what was going on and they were okay with it.
02:42-02:54
And this passage that we're looking at today is a call for all of us to wake up and stop pretending sexual sin isn't a problem in the church, and do something about it.
02:55-02:59
If you're visiting with us, we're studying Revelation verse by verse.
03:00-03:06
And in chapter 1, we saw that John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, he was exiled on Patmos for preaching the gospel.
03:07-03:12
And Jesus showed up in all His glory and majesty, and said, "John, I'm giving you an assignment.
03:13-03:25
I'm going to show you some things, and I want you to write them down." In chapters 2 and 3 in Revelation, we're calling this series "Progress Report," Because this was Jesus' evaluation of seven churches.
03:25-03:27
These were seven real churches at the time.
03:28-03:31
And Jesus said, "I got a message for each of these churches, John.
03:31-03:39
I want you to get it out to them." These churches were in Asia Minor, which is modern-day Turkey, and these are messages for all churches of all time.
03:39-03:43
And today, we are at a church in Thyatira.
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Look at verse 18.
03:46-03:58
"And the angel of the church in Thyatira writes, The words of the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and whose feet are like burnished bronze." Let's talk about the setting.
03:58-04:04
Thyatira would have been probably the smallest church, definitely in the smallest town.
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That's encouraging to me, especially living in a culture where we're surrounded by very big churches.
04:10-04:14
This letter is proof that Jesus cares a lot about what's happening in the little church.
04:15-04:16
What do we know about Thyatira?
04:17-04:24
Not a lot. We do know from the book of Acts that Lydia, Acts 16, was from Thyatira.
04:24-04:31
And even though this is the smallest church of the seven in Revelation, it's the longest letter.
04:32-04:35
So Jesus introduces Himself as the Son of God.
04:36-04:45
I think that's the only time in the book of Revelation that phrase appears, pointing to Jesus' divinity. But look at what it says about the Son of God.
04:45-04:47
Eyes like a flame of fire.
04:48-04:52
This is a serious gaze that Jesus is giving to this church.
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It says His feet are like burnished bronze, which speaks to His power and judgment.
04:58-04:59
That's what that's referring to.
04:59-05:08
You go to Revelation 19, the Bible says that when Jesus returns, He's going to return to stomp out His enemies, literally.
05:09-05:15
So, Jesus appears to this church, eyes like a flame of fire, Feet like burnished bronze.
05:16-05:20
Do you sort of get the attitude that Jesus is showing up with?
05:21-05:23
He's not tiptoeing in like a kitten.
05:24-05:25
How's it going?
05:25-05:33
He's stomping in with the blazing eyes looking at this church as the offended Almighty.
05:34-05:36
So if you're taking notes, this is serious business today, church.
05:36-05:38
Let's look at the progress report for Thyatira.
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Number one, the commendation.
05:41-05:51
Here's the commendation, "You're growing." "You're growing." Now, we're not just talking numerically, we're talking spiritually.
05:52-05:52
Look at verse 19.
05:53-06:09
Jesus says, "I know your works, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your latter works exceed the first." So the commendation, Jesus says, "I know your works." And that "works" is sort of the heading for everything that follows.
06:10-06:16
Looking at these quickly, Jesus references a handful of things that He knows about the church that He's commending them for.
06:16-06:24
First of all, He says, "Your love." Interestingly, Thyatira was very strong, where Ephesus was very weak.
06:25-06:30
Actually, Thyatira is the first of the churches to be commended for their love.
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Jesus says, "Your faith," or "Your faithfulness." You're consistent.
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You're dependable. You're faithful.
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To the Lord, you're faithful to your people.
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Your service, that's meeting the needs of others.
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Your endurance, that's holding up in the faith.
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We've talked about these things, but you have to note the one thing that really sticks out.
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In verse 19, Jesus says, "Your ladder works exceed the first." Jesus says, "You're a maturing church." I love that.
07:00-07:01
And if you've been around...
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I know we have a few people here that have been around Harvest a very, very long time, since day one.
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I thought about that a lot for our church this week.
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The latter works exceeding the first.
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I definitely feel like we fall into that category.
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But you look at this report from Jesus, it's like, "Wow, this sounds like the ideal church, doesn't it?
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I mean, it sounds like the perfect church.
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I mean, what have we got here?
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We've got love and faith and service and endurance and growing, and it sounds like the perfect church." Well, the only perfect church is in heaven.
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And even a church that had all of these things going on so well had a major problem.
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Number two, let's look at the criticism.
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The criticism, "You tolerate Jezebel." What does that mean? Look at verse 20.
07:52-08:25
"But I have this against you, that you tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, It is teaching and seducing my servants to practice sexual immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols." So the problem this church had, we had this woman running around the church leading people astray with false teaching, which included idolatry and sexual immorality.
08:25-08:30
This woman was running around the church, and Jesus said, "You church leaders are allowing this to happen.
08:31-08:36
And you have to see again, Jesus puts the burden of correction on the church.
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I want you to highlight that.
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The burden of correction is on the church.
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Jesus did not address this message to Jezebel.
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Jesus didn't say, "Jezebel, knock it off." He says, "Listen church, this is on you.
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You're tolerating this woman." Wicked people are going to be wicked.
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Worldly people are going to act worldly.
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Our job as a church is to protect the church from these people, not make them a Sunday school teacher.
09:03-09:04
Right?
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Now, you might be thinking what I first thought when I read, like, Jezebel, was that really her name?
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I mean, let's be honest.
09:13-09:16
Wouldn't that be a red flag if a woman shows up at your church?
09:18-09:20
It's like, "Hi, I want to join your church.
09:20-09:23
Oh, what's your name?" You might have heard it before.
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It's the name synonymous with wickedness in the Old Testament.
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I just go by Jez, Jezebel.
09:33-09:36
I mean, wouldn't that set off some red flags?
09:37-09:45
Like somebody comes in to our church, and they're like, "Hey, I'd like to get involved in your ministry. My name's Hitler." Like, what?
09:46-09:50
So Jezebel might not have been her real name.
09:51-09:57
It might have been the name the Lord used to describe how wicked this woman was in the church.
09:57-10:02
Like the Old Testament Jezebel, Satan used the woman to corrupt God's people.
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I have to explain this. I'm going to make a very long story very short to help you understand what's happening in this passage.
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But in this culture in Thyatira, there were a whole bunch of different cults that were associated with the workforce.
10:17-10:24
And if you were in a certain trade, your trade had its own little temple to a false god.
10:25-10:47
And in this culture, I know it's hard for us to imagine, but in this culture, like where you worked, you had your own little church, and part of your own little church, not a church like Jesus' church, but a temple, a cult, They would have these festivals that included idolatry and sexual immorality.
10:48-10:52
You would go to these work parties for sexual sin.
10:52-11:03
And apparently, this Jezebel was discipling people in the real church, in God's church, to imitate the pagan orgies.
11:04-11:08
Maybe Jezebel was like, "Hey, you know what? We could probably win more people.
11:09-11:13
We just lighten up on the whole sexual purity thing?
11:13-11:16
Like, look at what everybody else is doing, and they're getting a crowd.
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Let's bring some of that into the church.
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Well, Jesus is fired up, and you're going to see more of that in a minute.
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But Jesus is pretty fired up that this stuff is being tolerated, so I want us to take note on how to avoid this scene at Harvest Bible Chapel.
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So on your outline, "How to spot a Jezebel." Okay? It's not likely somebody's going to come in and introduce themselves as the Jezebel here to destroy your church.
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Therefore, we have to be diligent to learn how to spot her.
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Okay? And it's all right from the text.
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Letter A, how to spot a Jezebel.
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Watch out for the person that says, "God told me." Look at verse 20 again.
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He says, "You tolerate that woman Jezebel," look at this phrase, "who calls herself a prophetess." Watch out for the person that says, "God told me." Now listen, make no mistake, do I believe that God still speaks today?
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Absolutely.
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In His still small voice, in accordance with His Word, yes, the Lord does speak to people.
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I absolutely believe that.
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But the danger is when people go around saying, "The Lord told me to tell you something that the Lord never said to say." That happens a lot, and some people use it, it's almost like the big Trump card.
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I gotta tell you something because the Holy Spirit told me to tell you.
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Like, what do you say to that?
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You have to watch out for people that say, God told me to tell you something.
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One example, in a former ministry I was involved in, there was a single lady that had some issue with the church and she wanted to talk to me about it.
12:59-13:15
And she said, the Holy Spirit said, you need to come to my house by yourself, that we need to meet about this, just you and I." And I said, "The Holy Spirit did not say that." But you see how some people use it to try to get what they want.
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And that's what Jezebel was doing.
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Jesus said, "Yeah, she calls herself a prophetess. I don't call her that." Church, this is why we have the Bible.
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This is why God gave us His Word.
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We have this objective source of truth so that when people are running around saying, "Hey, God told me, God said, God told me." We don't have to wonder if God said it, because we have this book that says, "Okay, is what God is saying, does it line up with this?
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Is it in accordance with the truth that He's already revealed?
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Thank you, God, for giving us this source of truth." Otherwise, you can have everybody running around saying, "God told me this, Holy Spirit told me this, Jesus told me that." And we wouldn't know who was telling the truth.
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We do know, because God gave us this outside source that we can point to and say, "Okay, this is God's truth.
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God speaks through this and His Holy Spirit will never contradict this." So church, watch out for the person, red flag, watch out for the person that's running around saying, "Yeah, God told me.
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God told me to tell you something." Letter B, watch out for the person who's starting a church within the church.
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Verse 20, look at the next phrase.
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She's teaching and seducing my servants.
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to sexual immorality and to idolatry.
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Watch out for the person who's starting a church within the church.
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See, Jezebel wanted people under her authority, but she didn't want to be under authority herself.
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And she obviously went rogue from what the church was teaching.
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Listen, you have to watch out for that person that says, "I go to church here.
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This is the church that I identify with.
14:56-15:04
I go to church here, but this is my Bible study." Others don't tell me what to do in my Bible study.
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This is my men's group, okay?
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It has nothing to do with what's happening in the church.
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I go to church here, but this is my men's group.
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You've got to watch out for that guy.
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Or that lady that says, "This is my women's ministry." You've got to watch out for that.
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These are my people.
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This is my team.
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They listen to me.
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They're under my jurisdiction.
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This is my small group.
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This is my youth group.
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red flags when it's about their team, their teaching, thinking they have this pocket of people that are not under the church's authority but theirs. That's certainly what's happening with Jezebel and that's certainly something we have to watch happening in the church here. So watch out for the person that says God told me, watch out for the person who's starting a church within a church, how to spot a Jezebel, let her see, watch out for the person who refuses to repent. Look at In verse 21, Jesus says, "I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her sexual immorality." Watch out for the person who refuses to repent.
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Now see, this is a very important verse to help us understand what's going on.
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Because see, Jezebel wasn't some poor, misguided, innocent woman.
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Jezebel willfully rejected the truth.
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And again, it's an authority thing.
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It's an authority thing.
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She wouldn't come under the authority of God's Word, and if anyone in the church addressed her, she didn't listen to them.
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She willfully chose to reject God's truth.
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Willful sin by a professed believer must be addressed immediately and definitively." I'm going to say that again.
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I don't want there to be any ambiguity here.
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"Willful sin by a professed believer must be addressed immediately and definitively." Please understand me, church.
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I don't want anybody misunderstanding what I'm saying.
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You are struggling with a sin.
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That is a completely different story.
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If you're coming to church, you're coming to the elders, you're coming to...
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If you're in youth group and you go to Dan and Elisha and you're like, "Hey, I am struggling." That is different.
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We want to help you.
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We want to love you.
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We want to encourage you.
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We want to get you out of whatever sinful situation you're in.
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We will do anything that we can to assist you, to encourage you, to allow the Lord to change you where you need changed.
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I'm not talking about the person that's struggling with sin and wants to repent.
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Hear me close.
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If you call yourself a believer, and you are in sin, and you refuse to repent, you are not welcome here until you repent.
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Like, "repent." We say that word a lot, right?
18:10-18:19
"Repent." You've talked about it before, and it's in all but two of these letters, "repent, repent, repent." And the Greek is literally "change your mind." But can we...
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Since we're talking about repentance so much, can we dig a little deeper on what it means?
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I think the subject matter we're addressing here certainly calls for some clarity when it comes to repentance.
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Yes, it literally means to change your mind.
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But that is not the sum total of everything that repentance entails.
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What I want to do for you is contrast repentance with other things that we confuse for repentance.
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And show you very clearly and biblically what the difference is.
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So first of all, something we confuse repentance for is regret.
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What is regret?
18:59-19:01
Regret is being sorry mentally.
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And the poster boy for that is Old Testament King Saul.
19:05-19:08
Remember when he was caught red-handed in sin?
19:09-19:18
He was like, "Yeah, I was wrong. That was wrong. My B." And that's what regret is. Regret's just in here.
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Regret stays between your ears.
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Like, "Yeah, you know what? That was wrong. Yeah. My bad." That's regret.
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Another thing we confuse with repentance is remorse.
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That's another layer though, isn't it?
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Remorse is being sorry mentally and emotionally.
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And the poster boy for that is Judas Iscariot.
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Judas, when he sold out Jesus, he had remorse.
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Meaning he was sorry, he acknowledged it was wrong.
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He goes, "I should not have done that. That man was innocent." And he was so emotionally distraught, what did he do?
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He went out and killed himself.
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So he was sorry mentally and he was sorry emotionally.
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And the person that has remorse says, "That was wrong. I am so upset that I did that." Listen, regret and remorse are not repentance.
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Because repentance is taking it all the way to the third layer.
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Repentance is this, being sorry mentally, emotionally, and volitionally.
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The poster boy for that in the Bible was Peter.
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Remember Peter denying Jesus?
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That was wrong. I am torn up about that.
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I am making a change now.
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True biblical repentance leads to fruit of repentance, which means it leads to a real life change.
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Being sorry mentally, emotionally, and volitionally.
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That was wrong. I'm so upset I did that.
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I'm making a change right now.
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We're going to circle back to that in a second.
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But part of Jezebel's problem wasn't just in her refusal to repent, but she also led other people astray.
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See a person in sin is bad enough, but it's even worse when somebody is sinning and leads other people into sin with them.
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That makes it exponentially worse.
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So bad, what did Jesus say?
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It's better if you lead somebody into sin, it's better that you have a millstone tied to your neck and you're thrown into the sea.
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That's how serious Jesus is about people who mislead His people.
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And this misleading, this shepherding people astray that Jezebel was doing explains Jesus' hard words that follow.
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Look at verses 22 through the first part of verse 23.
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Jesus says, "Behold, I will throw her onto a sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her, I will throw into great tribulation, unless they repent of her works." There it is again.
21:59-22:06
23, "And I will strike her children dead." Does Jesus sound serious?
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He addresses three groups here, three units.
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First, he addresses her.
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Now this is a weird phrase here, right?
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He says, "Behold, I will throw her onto a sick bed." What does that mean?
22:19-22:23
Well, actually, in the original Greek, sick is not there.
22:25-22:30
It says, "I will throw her onto a bed." That sounds weird to us.
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Like what does that mean?
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Jezebel was an adulterer and Jesus was using a play on words to describe how he was going to bring the hammer down.
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Let me illustrate it this way.
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My wife, Erin is an office manager for a New York Life up in Butler.
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Imagine one day I show up to surprise her.
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And when I go into the office, I see that one of the clients there is leaning over the counter. He knows she's married.
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Okay, he knows she's married.
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But he leans over the counter.
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He says, "Oh, come on. How about just a kiss?
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Come on, baby. How about just a kiss, baby? How about a kiss?" And I walk into that.
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And I say, "Hey, you want a kiss? I'll kiss you.
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It will be on the mouth, but it'll be a lot harder than you were expecting." See, I think that's what Jesus was doing here.
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Like, "Oh, you want to commit adultery? Alright, I will put you down." So He addresses her, He addresses the believers who were caught up in her sin, those who committed adultery with her.
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He says, "I'll put you in great tribulation. You're going to go through hard times." And we understand that when the Lord does that, He's not punishing His people.
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He's disciplining, and there's a huge difference.
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If you're a child of God, you will never be punished for your sin.
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Because all of your punishment for your sin went on Jesus Christ on the cross.
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But, God will discipline you as His child.
24:08-24:12
And God will allow wayward children to suffer so that they come back to Him.
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And then Jesus addresses Her children.
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I don't think that He means Her babies.
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Like, "I will kill Her babies." He's talking about her disciples.
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That terminology is used in the Bible, like Paul and Timothy in 1 Timothy 1-2, Paul calls Timothy his son.
24:32-24:39
They weren't biologically related, but he was a son in the faith, and that's the sense in which the Lord's addressing Jezebel.
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"Your spiritual children, your disciples, I'm going to strike them dead." I know there's a lot of hard terminology in that section, But is there any ambiguity about how Jesus feels about what's happening in the church right now?
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Not at all.
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Look at verse 23 again, the rest of it.
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Jesus says, "And all the churches will know that I am He who searches the mind and heart." The churches, notice that plural, the churches will know.
25:10-25:11
Not just Thyatira.
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Jesus says, "I'm going to show up, and I'll show everybody who I am, And everybody's going to know.
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That I am the one who searches the mind.
25:23-25:28
So other churches, including Harvest Bible Chapel, you need to beware.
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We need to beware that Jesus' blazing eyes saw the sin in Thyatira.
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Do you think Jesus' blazing eyes sees the sin happening in this church?
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You see, their sexual sin in that culture, it was pretty much out in the open.
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It's what people did in their pagan cults.
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See, the danger in our church, I would suggest to you, could be a little harder, in that it's not something flagrantly in the open to address.
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The sexual sin in the church today is the private stuff.
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I want to talk about pornography for a minute.
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It's a serious sexual perversion.
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And I could spend a whole sermon series talking about the dangers of messing with this garbage.
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But understand that when someone views...
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Man, I'm speaking to you.
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When you view pornography, Biochemical reactions take place in your brain that leads to addiction.
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William Struthers, a neuroscientist, a psychology professor at Wheaton, who wrote the book "Wired for Intimacy, How Pornography Hijacks the Male Brain." Listen to this man.
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He shows that pornography alters the anatomy and physiology of your brain.
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He says that pornography results in an anatomical rewiring of your brain.
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And they found that an addiction to pornography, physically, biochemically, is no different than an addiction to heroin or cocaine.
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Your brain becomes rewired and you become dependent and addicted.
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This is serious business.
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Husbands, if you're messing with this stuff, you are ruining intimacy with your wife.
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There are a few guys that are here that are unwed, thinking, "Well, it's okay for me because I'm not married." Understand that you're ruining a future relationship.
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With any future spouse, you are rewiring your brain.
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You are sabotaging yourself.
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The question I have for the men, specifically, in this church, is do you need to repent?
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Remember what we saw about repentance earlier?
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It's not just acknowledging it was wrong.
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Because I think if we took a poll, I think 100% of the men polled in this room right now would say pornography is wrong.
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And if you're involved with that, and you're confronted on that, you would say, "Yeah, it's wrong. That's regret." And honestly, I think most men in the church, I think they live at the second step - remorse.
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"I know it's wrong and I feel bad that I do it, but I can't seem to stop myself." That's remorse.
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What did Jesus very clearly say to do?
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He said to repent, which means, "I know it's wrong, I feel bad that I do it, so I'm going to make some changes in my life." Do you need to repent?
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Do you need to have filters on your computer?
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Do you need online accountability like covenant eyes?
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Married men, your wife should have full access to any phone, tablet, computer.
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She should have full access to that.
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Maybe you need to talk to your small group leader, or your youth group leader, or one of the elders, and immediately...
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"I'm afraid, if I say something, I'm afraid of what people will think." Well, maybe you should be more afraid of what Jesus does think.
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This is a time of grace.
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This is a place of forgiveness.
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There's no judgment here, right?
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We're like Planet Fitness that way.
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Nobody's going to condemn you.
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Nobody's going to make fun of you.
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Nobody's going to make you feel bad about yourself.
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If you step forward and say, "Look, I have a problem. I need help." We want to love you.
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And we want to point you to the healer and understand that you're not alone in having this problem.
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Look at the next part of verse 23, Jesus says, "I will give to each of you according to your works." Wait, wait, wait, wait, I thought salvation was not by works, I thought salvation was by grace.
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Absolutely. You're saying by grace through faith is not of works, then why is Jesus giving according to works?
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Because works reveal a person's true spiritual condition.
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It's a common theme throughout Scripture.
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We'll bark at that tree another time, but your works prove who you really are.
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That's the point.
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Your works prove what's going on in here, whether you've been transformed by Christ, or you still live in the sinful flesh.
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Your works prove that.
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And Jesus said, "I'm coming back.
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I'm going to repay everyone according to their deeds." Let's close up here, number three, the command, hold fast.
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Hold fast, look at verses 24 and 25.
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"But to the rest of you in Thyatira "who do not hold this teaching." Now see, Jesus here is addressing like the congregation at large, right?
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The leaders should have dealt with this woman and they didn't.
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Jesus is like, I'm gonna talk to the rest of you now.
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He said, "The rest of you in Thyatira "who do not hold this teaching, "who have not learned what some call "the deep things of Satan, to you I say, I do not lay on you any other burden.
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Only hold fast what you have until I come." So this command is for those who have stayed faithful by not buying in.
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Like, what are the deep things of Satan?
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Well, the Bible in 1 Corinthians 2.10 talks about the deep things of God.
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And this just shows how far some people in the church have strayed. Right?
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Like remember when we were in Smyrna, they dealt with Satan's synagogue.
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Pergamum, where Satan's throne is, and Thyatira was going after the deep things of Satan.
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Jesus says, "I'm not putting any other burden on you.
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You have been through enough. You have dealt with enough.
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Enduring all of this garbage happening in your church.
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I'm not putting a burden on you.
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His encouragement to them, He goes, "Hold fast. Stay strong.
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You have so far. Keep after it." Then the call.
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I don't know about you, but the call at the end of all these letters just fires me up so much, and this is no exception.
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Here's the call. Write this down. "You will rule with Jesus." And when I say, "You will rule with Jesus," I don't mean that in slang.
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Like, "You rule!" I mean, "You will rule with Jesus." Look at verses 26 and 27.
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"The one who conquers and who keeps My works until the end to Him, I will give authority over the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron, as when earth and pots are broken in pieces, even as I Myself have received authority from My Father." I could spend a whole sermon just on this.
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This is taken from Psalm 2, verses 7-9 specifically, and it refers to the ruling of the Messiah in the millennial kingdom.
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We're going to talk about that down the road.
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Here's the short version.
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The Bible says Jesus Christ is going to reign on the earth for a thousand literal years, and during that time, we are going to get to rule with Him.
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Are you kidding me? No, you're not. He's serious.
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Why am I still talking like that? We will rule with Him.
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I want to remind you, for the person that's here, like, "Yeah, I'm going to rule and everybody's going to tell me what to do. Is that how Jesus rules?" No, no, no, no. How are we going to rule? It's going to be tending His people, feeding His people, shepherding His people, loving His people.
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But how awesome is it going to be to be on Jesus' ministry team?
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Are you kidding me?
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But those staff meetings are great.
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I could say so much more, but I'm not going to.
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Look at verse 28, "And I will give him the morning star." Like, what's that?
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That's a title Jesus uses about Himself in Revelation 22.16.
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Like manna, we saw previously, Jesus is promising Himself.
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Verse 29, "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches." In other words, if you're tuned in, turn the volume up.
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Listen to what I'm saying.
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Jesus promises the morning star again, the promise is to give Himself.
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Kay, do you remember a few years ago, we were living in Prospect and I came home, and you had a very good question for me.
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You asked me if you were going to have your action figures in heaven.
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Do you remember that?
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Yeah, we had this great discussion, 'cause Kate's like, "Am I gonna have my action figures in heaven?" I'm like, "I sure hope so, 'cause at our house, Saturday's action figure day, alright?" And if you're nice, I'll let you come over and play with us sometime, but we play action figures every Saturday.
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And I thought that was a great question that Kate had.
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And I want to share with you the truth that I shared with him, as Jesus promises to give the morning star, and you're like, "What kind of a promise is that?" Well, the truth is, you will find everything you need in heaven to be happy.
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And you will find in heaven that every golden road to joy leads to the same place.
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To the morning star Himself, Jesus Christ.
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You know, I don't know how many action figures, or will my dog be in heaven?
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There's a lot of questions people have about heaven.
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And I'll be honest with you, I'm not really sure.
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Here's one thing I do know. Jesus will be there.
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And when you see Jesus there, you're going to find Him.
Small Group Discussion
Read Revelation 2:18-29
GROUP
What are the signs the church is maturing (Rev 2:19)? How would you evaluate HBCPN?
Review the “red flags” of a Jezebel. Have you ever encountered a Jezebel at a church? How was it handled?
Explain the difference between REGRET, REMORSE, and REPENTANCE. Why are REGRET and REMORSE not the same as Biblical REPENTANCE?
BREAKOUT
His is a safe place to discuss struggle with sexual sin. What steps have you taken to avoid sexual sin? Do you need to repent of anything (inappropriate relationship, pornography) NOW?
Pray for one another to “hold fast” (Rev 2:25).