SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/19/2015
10:45 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-1 Because
the Marriage of the Lamb is Completed
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Revelation
19:7-10
Message of the
verses: “7 “Let us rejoice and be
glad and give the glory to Him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and His
bride has made herself ready." 8 It was given to her to clothe herself in
fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the
saints. 9 Then he said to me, "Write, ’Blessed are those who are invited
to the marriage supper of the Lamb.’" And he said to me, "These are
true words of God." 10 Then I fell at his feet to worship him. But he said
to me, "Do not do that; I am a fellow servant of yours and your brethren
who hold the testimony of Jesus; worship God. For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.’”
Let me say first that this section
will take longer to go over than what we have been looking at, and what we have
been looking at in these last few SD’s is why heaven was rejoicing, and why
were they shouting out all of the Hallelujahs we have read in this chapter so
far. The last rejoicing we see in this
section is because the marriage supper of the Lamb will be completed. On November 4, 2005 I wrote the following on
verses 7-8 and I want us to look at what I wrote then: “The question that could be asked of verse
seven is how has the bride made herself ready?
I think part of the answer is found in verse eight where John states
what it is that the bride will be wearing and that is fine linen, for fine
linen is the righteous acts of the saints.
“After a person is born again they
still continue to sin and do things wrong by not keeping the commandments of
the Lord. They also do things wrong by
not doing the works that God has prepared for them to do for one reason or
another. When the rapture of the Church
takes place all believers from the Church age will go before the judgment seat
of Christ to be judged. At this judgment
believers will not be judged for sins committed because Christ was judged for
all of their sins at the cross, however believers will be judged on what they
did for the cause of Christ while they were in the body and some will receive a
reward of gold, silver, or precious stones, while others will receive wood, hay
or stubble. All of those who are present
have been saved, but some will be without rewards. The rewards will be thrown at the feet of
Christ, for He truly is the reason for anyone to receive a reward. Ephesians 5:27 states, “that He might present to Himself the church in all her
glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy
and blameless.” Dr. Wiersbe
states that after the judgment seat of Christ the bride will not have any spots
or wrinkles, and will then be presented to the Lord Jesus Christ who is the
bridegroom.”
As we begin this portion of this SD
we want to talk about marriage, for after all when we once again go back to the
book of Genesis we will see the first wedding that God ordained and after
making Adam and Eve we see that God’s design for marriage is one man and one woman
forever. However we know that sin came
in and although this did not change God’s design for marriage sin caused
marriage to be changed by man in ways that God did not design it to be.
Now as we look at marriage John
MacArthur writes that “A marriage was the single greatest celebration and
social event of the biblical world.
Wedding preparations and celebrations in ancient times were even more
elaborate and involved than those of today and also lasted longer. They consisted of three distinct stages. First was the betrothal, or engagement. This was an arrangement by both sets of
parents contracting the marriage of their children. It was legally binding and could only be
broken by a divorce (cf. Matt. 1:18-19).
A betrothal contract was often signed long before the children reached
the marriageable age of thirteen or fourteen.
Since a marriage represented the union of two families, it was natural
for the parents to be involved. And
there were years of preparation for the time of marriage, as the boy prepared
for his bride. The second stage of a
wedding was the presentation, a time of festivities just before the actual
ceremony. Those festive could last up to
a week or more, depending on the economic and social status of the bride and
groom. The third and most significant
stage of a wedding was the actual ceremony, during which the vows were
exchanged. At the end of the
presentation festivities, the groom and his attendants would go to the bride’s
house and take her and her bridesmaids to the ceremony. After the ceremony would come a final meal,
followed by the consummation of the marriage.”
I realize that this was a rather long quote, but what we will see in the
way marriages were conducted during Biblical times goes along with what we will
be looking at in this section of Scripture, at least we need to understand it
before we can understand what John is writing about in these four verses.
I wish to make one more point before
we stop for today and that point is that the Bible uses the familiar imagery of
a wedding to picture our Lord’s relationship with His church. Let us look at 2 Corinthians 11:2 “For I am
jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, so
that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin.” We can see from this verse that Paul states
that he has betrothed the Corinthian believers to One Husband that is of course
Jesus Christ. Some of the comments that I
made on my SD from November 4, 2005 speak of this kind of thing as I also
quoted passages from the book of Ephesians in that SD which I want to look at
again here: Ephesians 5:25-27 says “25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ
also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, 26 so that He might sanctify her, having
cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory,
having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and
blameless.” John MacArthur writes “That
presentation will take place at the Rapture.
Speaking of both the present time of preparation, as He makes a home for
His bride and the moment of presentation, as He comes for her, Jesus said, ‘In
My Fathers’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have
told you; for I go to prepare a place for you.
If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you
to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also’ (John 14:2-3).” Now we have already looked at the imagery of
an ancient wedding and so the Rapture marks the time when the Bridegroom who is
the Lord Jesus Christ will take the bride to the Father’s house, which of
course is in heaven. We believe as
stated in the earlier SD that once the Rapture takes place and the church is
taken to heaven that the judgment seat of Christ will take place and then at
the end of the tribulation period Christ will bring His bride back to planet
earth and the celebration will take place on earth during the Millennial
Kingdom age. We said that some of these
weddings took a long time well this choosing of the bride took place in eternity
past and then Christ came to pay for the sins of the bride and went back to
heaven to prepare a place for His bride and will then return to take His bride
to the Father’s place in heaven and will then bring the bride back to celebrate
for a thousand years on earth. Talk about
patience for the bride, we have to be patience.
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: As I look
at how God set up marriages I can see where I am in this process at this point
and that is waiting until the Lord comes for His church and doing His bidding
while here on earth.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Dot the work
of the Lord while I am waiting for Him to return.
Answer
to yesterday’s Bible question: “Jesus
Christ” (Matthew 11:28).
Today’s
Bible question: “Goliath was from what
country?”
Answer
in our next SD.
9/19/2015
11:34 AM
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