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That Mars is the most beautiful place. It adds to my amazement to find out that Mars is the source of all heavenly visions. But that's good. So welcome to our third study in the Book of Chronicles. We're studying that book under the general title, Man Shall Sit Upon the Throne of the Lord. And as you have heard, tonight we are to consider what it has to tell us by way of prototype and illustration of the high capital of the universe. So hook or by crook tonight, the danger of working you over hard, we have some or other at least to survey the contents of the second major section of the first book of Chronicles. So let our first task be to survey those three major parts of the second section of First Chronicles, and we begin to read in First Chronicles chapter uh eleven. First Chronicles chapter uh eleven. Then all Israel gathered themselves to David unto Hebron, saying, Behold, we are thy bone and thy flesh. In times past, even when Saul was king, it was thou that ledest us out and broughtest in Israel. And the Lord thy God said unto thee, Thou shalt feed my people Israel, and thou shalt be prince over my people Israel. So all the elders of Israel came to the king to Hebron, and David made a covenant with them in Hebron before the Lord, and they anointed David king over Israel according to the word of the Lord by the hand of Samuel. And David and all Israel went to Jerusalem, the same as Jebus. And the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land, were there. And the inhabitants of Jebus said to David, Thou shalt not come in here thus. Nevertheless, David took the stronghold of Zion, the same is the city of David. And David said, whosoever smiteth the Jebusites first shall be chief and captain. And Joab the son of Zeruiah went up first and was made chief. And David dwelt in the stronghold, therefore they called it the city of David. And he built the city round about, from Millo even round about, and Joab repaired the rest of the city. And David waxed greater and greater, for the Lord of hosts was with him. So far for the first major part of the second section of Chronicles that deals with the unification of Israel around David and in Jerusalem City. Within that newfound unity, there was also diversity, as the historian is now at pains to point out to us. So let us notice the second great element in this part of the book, beginning in verse 10 of chapter eleven: Now these are the chief of the mighty men whom David had, who showed themselves strong with him in his kingdom, together with all Israel, to make him king, according to the word of the Lord concerning Israel. And there follows here lists of the mighty men of David's armies, accounts of their tremendous exploits of valor and courage, and how, while all were brave, some were more brave than others and accomplished remarkable feats of valor on David's behalf and on behalf of the people. And they stand recorded here in holy Writ for us to read them today. They stand recorded in the annals of heaven itself, and who knows when we get home to glory, to the high capital of the universe, we shall at some stage hear the names of these mighty men read out in the honors lists of heaven. And then we also find in these chapters the varying degrees of courage that people were called upon to show as they came to make David king. So chapter twelve begins to tell us that these are they that came to David while he was still in Ziklag. As distinct, you see, for instance, to those who came to him, says verse 23, these are the numbers of the heads of them that were armed for war, which came to David to Hebron. And while it was a wonderful thing that they all came when he was in Hebron, it was a tremendously more courageous thing that some of them dared to come to David when he was still unpopular and in a little fortress called Ziklag. There were some even, so this passage reminds us, that had risked life and limb to come to David, when Saul was hunting David like a partridge on the mountains and had to spend many a night hidden in a cave, when to come to David was almost tantamount to signing your death. And these diversities, then, are recorded by the historian. They go alongside the wonderful unity that David produced among Israel in Jerusalem City. And then finally tonight, we shall have to look at chapter thirteen that records a false move that David made at this time. David, you'll see, chapter thirteen verse one, consulted with the captains of thousands and of hundreds and with every leader. And David said unto all the assembly of Israel, if it seem good unto you, and if it be of the Lord our God, let us send abroad everywhere unto our brethren that are left in all the land of Israel, with whom the priests and the Levites are in their cities that have suburbs, that they may gather themselves unto us, and let us bring again the ark of our God to us, for we sought not unto it in the days of Saul. And all the assembly said that they would do so, for the thing was right in the eyes of all the people. And so they set out to bring the ark of the Lord to Jerusalem, and their motive was good, but their method was bad, and it led to a very severe judgment and discipline of God upon the house of Israel at that stage. It was a false move, but it taught Israel a rigorous lesson that would stand them in good stead for centuries, and before the night is out, will be used of the Lord to teach us a necessary lesson too. So these are the bare bones of the topic of our study this evening, and may God help us as we think together about his word. So far, then, we've been finding our way around this interesting book of First Chronicles. And we've admired in the first place the marvelous sense that the chronicler had of the purpose of God in history, the majestic progress that under God his people had made, beginning with Adam at the very dawn of the human race, until the point where man, in the person of King Solomon, sat on the throne of the Lord amidst unparalleled splendor, peace, and prosperity. And as we thought of that ancient story, and our hearts were stirred by its sense of progress, we discovered that that was but a prototype of that bigger purpose that God has had in history. To see that, we start again with Adam, and we come finally not to Solomon merely or David, his father, but to David's greatest son, Jesus Christ, our Lord, born of the virgin, born truly human, our very bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh, and yet now ascended to the very right hand of God, so that as we sit here this night, we sit in celebration of this tremendous leap forward that human history has made. It is almost incredible. Some find it impossible to believe, but it's true nonetheless. That man who appeared in glory when God placed him in Eden has succeeded to an infinitely higher glory, and this, it now becomes apparent, by God's own design. Adam must have staggered around the Garden of Eden, surprised every day of the week as he found out its wonders, strawberries and cream and figs and dates and grapes and all those lovely things that God had prepared. And how marvelous when he got outside the garden to find all those exciting things, how he could develop earth. The historian gives us a nudge, doesn't he, in Genesis, and says, you see that river going down there? Yes, what about that? Well, there's gold down that river. And if Adam had any of the schoolboy in him, he couldn't have resisted the interest, could he? Where would he float his matchsticks? Down the river to see this gold, to make something out of it? That was man's original charge, wasn't it, to take over Earth as God's viceroy and a deputy, to make something of Earth for God. And that in itself would have been a marvelous thing, isn't it? But God being God, you know, he can never content himself with little things, the great God of eternity, and up his sleeve, so to speak, even when he made Adam, was an infinitely greater purpose for man. That man should sit on the very throne of the Lord, not merely in the sense that Solomon sat on it, a king appointed by God to be God by choice, but to sit literally on the throne of the Almighty. And tonight they are the words come in all sober sense from our risen Lord Jesus Christ. I have overcome, says he, and am sat down on my father's throne. I, capital of the universe, this. To which he adds the even more astounding promise. To you who overcome, I shall grant to sit with me on my throne, even as I also overcame and am sat down on my Father's throne. And then we found that in tracing man's progress from Adam to the time that man sat upon the throne of the Lord in Jerusalem here on earth, there were five major sections, in each one of them a signal advance was made. In the first one, we witnessed the rise of Israel out of the nations and the eventual appointment of David to be king. And then through the other four sections, we trace the gradual increase and build up of David's kingdom and then his empire, and then finally his preparations for the age of glory as he made preparation for his son to build the temple. Tonight we must notice another side to the story, as well as four great steps in advance, the rise of Israel, the establishment of Jerusalem, the coming of the Ark and of the Lord to Jerusalem, the putting down of the last enemies, the preparations for and the actual building of the temple, as well as those great leaps forward in the program. In each of the first four sections, there is a noteworthy wrong move and failure. In the first great section, the false move was King Saul, who proved a disastrous rebel and had to be put aside. Happily, it led to the finding of the true king that was David. Tonight we are to witness a great leap forward, the founding of the city of Jerusalem. We are also to hear about another false move, and that was David's attempt to bring up the Ark of the Lord to Jerusalem, which absolutely sounded in disaster because of the wrong way he went about it. So we shall find that pattern each evening in successive evenings, a great move forward, and then a false move, until we come to the last section, when there are no more false moves and nothing but true progress. I shall not weirder you with those details now. We must get down to our task. The second great movement then in the first book of Chronicles, and it has to do, first and foremost, with the unification of the nation of Israel. Up to this point, you'll see the nation had been sorely divided. King David had been anointed by God to be their king, but for many years he was in a terrible minority, hunted and pursued around the mountains by old King Saul, hunted like a partridge in the desert. Very few there were in Israel who had the courage to come and join him. And then even when he began to come back as king, he was king first in Ziklag and then in Hebron, but only two tribes followed him. We read in the Old Testament that there was long war between these descendants of Saul and the servants of David. And it stands obviously, doesn't it, that unless that situation could be solved and repaired, unless Israel could be brought to unity somehow, there would never be an age of glory. Isn't that obvious? As long as Israel were at each other's throats and slitting them all the time, and falling out and quarrelling and warring and battling, how could there be an age of glory and peace? It was one of the number one necessity, if ever Israel were to reach the age of paradise. And first of all, Israel must be united. And as we read that ancient problem, of course, we can see it spelt out on a bigger canvas, can't we? If God couldn't unite Israel and bring them an age of peace, how shall God get on bringing an age of peace to the whole world? As long as men and women, to this modern day, in spite of all Earth's progress, destroy each other in the most ghastly fashion. How can there ever be hopes of an age of peace and glory? And we could bring it a little nearer to ourselves, couldn't we? How shall there ever be a heaven if we Christians can't learn to live together without squabbling and fighting and destroying one another. You say, where lies the trouble? Well, it's easy to say it lies in the question of sin, and that's true, isn't it? But it lies in part in another lovely thing. It lies in the problem of human personality. Human personality on the one side is delightful, isn't it? Ho ho. Aren't you glad that God didn't make us all the same? We would have been monotonous, wouldn't we? We're all the same. There are some folks who think that when the Bible says that when we get home to heaven, we shall be like Christ, means we shall all look exactly the same, and you won't know me from you, and I can't know you from me. Well, that isn't going to be quite like that, is it? We shall all be like Christ, but we shall all be different. That lovely thing that is human personality is never going to be obliterated. The foot is not the eye in the body of Christ and never will be made to be. We are one body. We have many different members. God designed us so and will have us so for eternity. But while human, the variety in human personality is a lovely thing, it has its other side, doesn't it? How often have our human personalities been the source of disagreements and splitting and strife and struggle? Even we who are redeemed have to hang our head in shame on times, don't we? And own what a wretched exhibition and advertisement we have been before the world. I say now, if Christ can't cure it, there's not going to be any heaven, is there? How does God propose to deal with this problem? This is a topic that's going to be discussed in this book of First Chronicles. It assures us in its prototypical way that there's coming a day when the matter shall be solved. We shall all have our different gifts and our different personalities, like Israel had around the great temple that Solomon built. Some will blow their trumpets, and some will make the showbread, and some will be masons, and some will be carpenters, and some will be Levites, and some will be something else. But whatever their personalities and their gifts, David had them arranged so that they played their part like the instruments of a great orchestra. And with God dwelling in their midst, God revealed his glory to each one and a different aspect of it in each personality. And they gave vent and expression to the glory of God in their redeemed personalities. And their activities in all their lovely variety came back like the music of a great orchestra back to the ears of God as they devoted their gifts to serving him. A pale prototype of what it's going to be. Oh, what will it be to dwell above? And with the Lord of glory reign, when the last vestige of unworthiness has been dissolved out of our personalities, and we're left with redeemed personalities in all their wonderful variety and riches, expressing the variegated glory of God and returning it back in endless praise and service to him. And what was the key to it? What is the key to it? I can tell you at once what the key to it was in Israel's day. That is day God provided them with a king whom they could voluntarily accept. A king so wonderful they counted him that it was no hardship, they willingly they came to make him king and to obey him. He was a king they loved anyway, and because they loved him, they wanted to serve him, and in that individual loyalty to him, they found they were being brought closer to each other. Listen to the tribes now of all Israel as they gathered themselves to David and to Hebron, saying, behold, we are thy bone and thy flesh, they said. God knows better than to impose a ruler on us. God is no fascist, you know. God knew better than simply to give them a code of rules and regulations, though he did give them a code of rules and regulations, and his laws are not to be disregarded. But then it will take something more than just law, won't it, to keep heaven right? And the secret of it is that God has given us not just a law, but a savior and a king that we can admire and we can love. And this they loved in him first. They said, you know, to David, behold, we are thy bone and thy flesh. They felt they were one in the very core of their being with him. They thought he was one of the family. He was one of them, and they were one of him, so to speak. He wasn't some foreigner imposed. He wasn't some hoity-toity elevated person. He was, uh, like family to them. They said, we're thy bone and thy flesh. And when we translate that into the major key of the great reality, how wonderful it is. God's own sovereign son, God, our very God. And how would God win our hearts and bring our loyalty? Or not simply by remaining God and issuing his decree. Hear the story that God has given us a savior who is God and man. He became him, says scripture, for whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through suffering. For both he that sanctifies and they who are sanctified are all of one, and therefore he's not ashamed to call us present. Why shouldn't he be ashamed? Why should he be ashamed, anyhow? Would you think of any reason why the Lord might be ashamed to call us our his brethren? I could think of a half a dozen. But it's not that our Lord isn't proud, you know. The reason why he's not ashamed to call us brethren is because when he calls us his brothers, it is true. He means it. It's not an exaggeration. Verily God, yet becomes truly human, lower than angels, to die in our stead. How hast thou long promised seed of the woman, barred on the serpent and bruised his head? Oh, what can you say to a savior like that, my dear friend? Who, to get your heart, came from that throne of divine, unparalleled glory and consented to become a human being like you, so that he and we are all of one. You love him, don't you? You mightn't feel too a- a little ashamed of being too emotional to confess it, but you love him, don't you? Oh, my savior, come a man like me for my sake. And it was you, even when Saul was king, uh, they said, you who led us out to battle, and you who fought our enemies. And they saw with a clear-sightedness that had it not been for David, they long since would have been dead. Why, when the giant Goliath came, Saul stout in his tent, big man though Saul was, and that great excellent single hero combat co- uh com- single combat hero, Jonathan, Crown Prince of Israel, recognized by all as the greatest hero Israel had. Even he was afraid to go against the giant. And when David came back from the fight victorious with the head of the giant in his hand, not only did all Israel love him, and they sang their songs, he was the top of the pops for some years because of that was David, and all the girls sang his praise, but Jonathan, the great warrior, recognizing he had found his superior and for sheer admiration at David's genius in the fight, unbuckled his royal belt and his sword and handed it over to David. That's you, isn't it? Faced with an enemy that we could never have overcome. We should have lost the battle. Oh, how can we stay from loving Jesus Christ, the Son of God? He went out before us and faced the foe, and he has overcome the world. You love him, don't you? He grieves you when you grieve him. Because you love him, you find yourself rubbing shoulders with other people that love him for the same reason. And the more you love him, the more you get together. And they said, you know that was God anyway that said you were to be king. Yes. So when they made David king, they were merely consenting to what God had already done. And we've had the wisdom to see that too, haven't we? We'll listen to Peter preaching on the great day of Pentecost, and the Holy Spirit newly come down to heaven with all his divine wonders. And the significance of it, says Peter, is this. It is not merely that the Holy Spirit has come down from heaven after the ascension of Christ. There's more to it than that. It is that Jesus Christ, who once walked this earth, has received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, and Jesus Christ has poured forth this Holy Spirit that you see and hear. Well, if that be so, said Peter to his audience, pray, will you not consider for a moment who this Jesus Christ must be? Holy Spirit isn't so much stuff like electricity, is it? The third member of the Holy Trinity. If Jesus Christ, who once worked in a builder's yard, if Jesus Christ has poured out the Holy Spirit, who must Jesus Christ be? Let all the house of Israel know assuredly, said Peter, that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ. Oh, what fools we would be if we didn't gladly join in with God's verdict and bow in genuine loyalty at the footstool of our Lord. So the first key to unifying Israel was the provision of a king whom they could love and admire and obey. Christ will be the secret of the unity of glory and the unity of the universe. And the second secret was, the second device was the founding of Jerusalem city. And therein David in those far off days, showed the genius he had as a leader of men. You'll see hitherto the nation had had no capital city, except perhaps Saul's camp had been a capital for some of them. But now, for some many long years, the nation had been divided, tribe against tribe, family against family. Now they had a new king, but what they needed was, David immediately saw it, as a nation, if they were going to survive as a nation, they would need a capital city to which every tribe could feel it equally belongs. David had more wit than to say, right, now my capital home was Bethlehem, you know, so you will come to Bethlehem. No, no. Bethlehem was usually in Judea, and you know what Zebulunites are like, don't you? If it wasn't in Zebulun but in Judea, they would say, ah, what I'd place Bethlehem, you'll say. And if he'd have put it in Ephraim, the Judahites would say, you don't think we're going up to, uh, Ephraim, do you? So what David did, he went and took the Jebusite city that didn't belong to anybody in particular, an actual fact, the Jebusites were still there, and it was right on the border between two of the tribes, and it belonged to nobody until David took it and gave it to the nation as the capital city to which they might all belong equally, whether they came from Dan or from Beersheba. They all felt that Jerusalem was their capital city, and it worked like magic, didn't it? For over the centuries, in the flow and ebb of history, in victory and in defeat, while they were in the land and while they were scattered, Jerusalem became the very heart of every member of Israel. It still isn't is to this day, isn't it? Jews of the dispersion all over the world, from the waste of Russia to the heat of Africa, keep their Passover. They say this year in Moscow, this year in Lark, next year in Jerusalem. And you can sense the wonder of the pilgrims in the Psalms coming up to visit Jerusalem, and at last they get within its walls, and they say, all our feet shall stand within thy gates, all Jerusalem. The heart of the nation, and it welded them together as a nation in a way they had never been before. It was a very significant act, wasn't it? It was significant for history. It is significant for prophecy. When the city was destroyed because of Israel's sin, yet God promised them that one day the city should be restored. Daniel, the great prophet, prayed about it and was told, yes, the city would be restored, but only partially because of Israel's continued sin. It was restored. The temple was rebuilt. The great prophets, post-exilic prophets came, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, and they looked beyond that partial restoration to the time when Jerusalem will be completely restored, to that brilliant day when the Messiah should come and his feet should stand on Mount Olive and Jerusalem become Messiah's earthly capital again. He came, and his nation rejected him, and he stood outside Jerusalem and he wept, saying, O Jerusalem, thou who stonest the prophets and killest those that were sent unto you, how often I would have gathered you. But you would not. Jerusalem, he said, should be downtrodden of the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles shall come in. God has not abandoned Jerusalem, has he? We Christians got our marching orders from the risen Christ. He said we were to go and preach the gospel, but not start just anywhere. It had to start from Jerusalem. Why from Jerusalem? Why? Because the gospel is not a philosophy that anybody could invent. The gospel is about the great historical facts that happened here on earth. And where did they happen? They happened just outside the gates of Jerusalem City. Prophesied by endless generation of Israelites and prophets, God's incarnate Son was spiked to a cross here on our earth, outside the gate of Jerusalem City, and forever, and forever, and forever. Not eternity itself will forget the gospel is based on the great deeds that were done outside Jerusalem City. Jerusalem City shall itself be restored in the millennial age, but tonight we look beyond that ourselves, don't we? Beyond all partial and temporary things to the great and eternal New Jerusalem. Let's contemplate it briefly as we come to the end of our first session. Every true believer a member of that eternal city. We could tell our conversion in those terms, couldn't we? We once were Gentile, uncircumcised, afar off. Children of wrath, even as the others, strangers to the covenants of promise. But in God's abounding mercy, he came and preached to our peace to us who were far off, and now we're no longer strangers. We are fellow citizens with the same. And oh, what a city it is to be a member of, isn't it? Jerusalem that is above, says Paul, is free. She is the mother of us all. Every citizen in that city, a freeborn citizen, and why? Because entrance to that city is not on the grounds of our keeping even God's holy law. Entrance into that city is solely through faith, based on the great sacrifice of Christ. Justified by faith, we have peace with God, and not only justification, but our great inheritance on exactly those same terms. And all the wonder of it, says the writer to the Hebrews, we have come. We have come to that heavenly Jerusalem. He draws the contrast of the writer to the Hebrews with the experience of the Israelites in the desert. You may remember God had redeemed them out of Egypt, and God had promised them a great inheritance in Canaan. But God couldn't wait until they got down to Canaan to show them the wonderful reality of the goal for which he had redeemed them. Yes, there lay Canaan with all its grass and its cows and its honeybees and flowers. There was something more wonderful than that. And to show them what the goal of redemption was, God himself came down on Mount Sinai in the wilderness in all his divine splendor, until the Mount Sinai burned with flame at the weight of the glory of God. And said God to Moses, Moses, go down the mountain and lead my people and bring them to me. Oh, what a, what a sight that was, with Moses bringing the people by their hand and presenting the people to God. We have come. Oh, we're not yet in glory, are we? But as we pass through this life, the writer to the Hebrews says we have come to that heavenly Jerusalem, city of the living God, to the general assembly and the firstborn written in heaven, to an innumerable company of angels, and to the spirits of just men made perfect. And in these few moments, I would like to do, if I could, like Moses did, and bring you right here and now to the very threshold of that city. Oh, come and meet God. Can you hear the music? Can you see them in your mind's eye, the spirits of just men made perfect? There's Abraham, there's David, there's Solomon, we hope. Oh, I, I, I know what they, I know them, you know. Oh, I'm looking forward to seeing them, aren't you? I think of them now in glory with the Lord. I say, Abraham, I, I, I know about you, Abraham. I know what you experienced, you know. You were justified by faith, weren't you, Abraham? I know that. I, I've been justified by faith myself. Oh, I'm longing to get home to see Abraham, to talk over it and say, Abraham, you were such a help to me when I was on earth, you know. Your experience was an example for me. Thank you, Abraham. Thank you, Abraham. And then should you come across David and say, David, we were delighted on earth. We read about you. Oh, we felt our hearts moved. And do you know what, David? You became for us a picture of the blessed Lord himself and helped us to love the Lord Jesus more. Oh, my friend, don't you feel it already? Do you feel your heart stirred? You've come already in spirit to that great eternal city and can almost hear the music and the rejoicing of the redeemed. It is real, you know. You know it's real in your heart, don't you? One day, you shall be there. What will it be to dwell above and with the God, Lord of glory reign. This I can say. I have authority from the Lord Jesus himself to command you to rejoice. His dear apostles came home one day to the Lord Jesus after a gospel campaign, and they were getting lot hugely excited. They said, Lord, do you know what, Lord? He said, what? They said, you know, even the demons were subject to us in your name. Oh, weren't they excited? Wouldn't you be excited if a demon or two were subject to you in the name of Christ? That's good, said Christ, and then he calmed their excitement, but that's nothing much really, said he. If you want something to rejoice in, rejoice in this, that your names are written in the citizen lists of heaven. Oh, my brother, allow yourself the enjoyment. Rejoice, my brother, my sister, rejoice right now. Your name is enregistered in the citizen list of heaven. We go on our way like Abel, looking for the city that has the foundation whose builder and maker is God. Let's break there. We shall sing a long hymn, and then by your I shall ask uh ten minutes of your time after we have sung the hymn. And so we have spent the majority of our time this evening on what is, after all, perhaps the more important, the most important lesson in this second part of First Chronicles. How did God go around uniting the nation so as to make possible the coming age of glory. We have applied that lesson to our hearts because there is a bigger problem. How shall God unite his people to make possible the glories of the eternal world? In history, it was that God provided Israel with a king they could love and voluntarily serve, and that was David. For us, it has been the infinitely greater provision of Jesus Christ, our Lord. But now we must, very, very briefly, survey two other major lessons brought before us in this second section of Chronicles. For if the first lesson says that God achieved unity amongst Israel through David and through Jerusalem City, their high capital, then within that unity there was diversity. And the diversity and the differences that remained recorded and affected people's status within the city depended on a number of things. It depended upon the different degrees of loyalty that the people of Israel had shown to David. What difficulties they had overcome in coming to David. It was moderately easy to come and make David king when everybody was doing it, from Dan to Beersheba. It was, of course, still valid to do it then, but it was a far more significant thing to come to David when he was rejected and persecuted, and you took your life in your hands to come to him. And the differences for what people had suffered for David were recorded, and they were given different ranks in that city and country, the covenant. So it shall be in the eternal city. I fear if there are to be rewards in the eternal city for the difficulty of coming to Christ, then I'm not going to get a very big reward. It was so easy for me. What shall I say of those who in Islamic countries know right well, if they make Jesus king of their lives today, by Friday they may well be poisoned. I think as I speak of a little child of thirteen years old, was she child of an evangelist in East Germany under the old system. When she refused to join the Young Communist Party because of their atheism, the teacher told her outright, then no higher education for you. Secondly, there were differences of position in reigning with David, different responsibilities, some larger than others, because of the deeds of valor that people had done in fighting the enemies of David, or in carrying out his commands. So there shall be, in the eternal city. Oh, what have I done for Christ? Is my rank and position in eternity will depend on what I have dared to do for Christ and the battles I fought for his name's sake, I fear I shall get little. I must at least grab the opportunities that remain for me, mustn't I? If I really believe in this eternal heaven. You say, don't worry, my brother, you know, when we get home to heaven, uh, well, that's the main thing, we're going to be there. Some people seem to think that heaven is an old people's home, and what you do when you get home to heaven, you say, now all my labors and trials are over. You pull out a heavenly legrest, sink down in a heavenly sofa, and never do a stroke of work again. Not so, is it? You won't feel tired in heaven. And in heaven, everybody wants to work for the sheer joy of it. Not to be allowed to work would certainly be a lessening of our eternal joy. My potential for work. My position in developing from the high capital of the universe, developing all those plans that God has in store for me, depend on what I have done for Christ. Yeah. You say, that's not fair. I couldn't help being born in a Christian home. It was easy to come to Christ for me. Well, I couldn't help that, could I? I would like to have been a Russian who risked his life to come to Christ, or a Muslim too, I, but I couldn't help it. I take refuge in this, that when it comes to issuing rewards, then scripture assures us that the Lord w- is prepared to have mercy in certain cases, and to give people more than they strictly deserve. He told a parable to that effect, didn't he? There were workmen that went out at the first hour of the day, and they worked twelve hours, and they agreed that at the end of the day they'd get a penny. At the end of the day, they got a penny. That was that. Strict justice. There were other men who, who waited around till the eleventh hour of the day, and then the vineyard owner came to them and said, why aren't you at work? They said, nobody hired us. We said, would you like to work? Oh, wouldn't we like to work? We're fell up here doing nothing, they said, twiddling our thumbs. Work? Yes. Can we go and work in your vineyard? Yes, he said, go. And they ran off to work without waiting to see what wage they were going to get, just to see a joy in working. Now, they'd only worked one hour when daylight faded, and they came to get the reward. They got a whole penny. And the other men were jealous, and they said, this isn't fair. We'll tell the trade union because, I mean, uh, we worked twelve hours and only got a penny, and these have worked just one hour and they've got a penny. And the master said, is your eye jealous? Because I am good. He reserves the right to be more than just, to be good in the giving of rewards. Here's me converted at the age of ten and wasting I don't know how many years, and perhaps I get to thirty and start to take God seriously and work for the next forty years and go home when I'm seventy. Forty years work for the Lord. Wow. There's another poor man, he didn't hear the gospel till he was sixty. When he heard it, he started to work for the Lord with all these might and men, worked for five years and died at sixty five. He's only got five years to count. Shall he get a much less reward than I? Not necessary. The Lord reserves the right to give people more than they deserve, to have mercy in that day. But there are conditions, you know. Talking of Onesiphorus, Paul said, writing from prison, the Lord grant mercy to the house of Onesiphorus, because he often refreshed me, you know. When I was in Rome in prison, he visited me. He needn't have done so, of course. A lot of Christians didn't. They said, you know, well, Rome is a big place, and we wouldn't know where to find a prison anyway. And do you think it's prudent to identify yourself too closely with Paul when he's in prison and da- in danger of having his head cut off? I mean, wouldn't it be more prudent not to go? So they didn't go. But only Ciferus went out of his way and found Paul and stood with him. Says Paul, the Lord grant him mercy in the day of rewards and give him more than he may strictly deserve. My brethren, I tell you straight, if when it comes to the day of rewards, I simply get what is my just due, oh, how little I shall get. God help me. If I would have mercy in that day, to go beyond strict duty, give everything I can to Christ to work for him, for the sheer joy of working for Christ, and may he have mercy on me in the day of reward. Our time is gone, and I mustn't give the man who records these things a heart attack by going further. We have one more lesson to learn from this subject. Shall we reserve it to tomorrow evening? Take it under unfinished business when we meet tomorrow. These two things we need to get hold of. High capital of the universe. Entry there free, solely on the grounds of faith, and through the blood of Christ. Rejoice if your name is written in heaven. Make sure, my friend, that your name is written in the Lamb's Book of Life. All draw near as often as you can, till you can hear the very music of heaven, even while you tread the wilderness, for you have come to that heavenly Zion and may have fellowship with the blessed Lord Jesus there. And may God so burn on our hearts this reality, that every day till from now till we come to that eternal city, we may spend in love and loyalty and sacrificial service for the faith, that ours too may be a position of reward and responsibility in the development of the universe with God from its high capital, the New Jerusalem. Shall we pray? Now, Lord, we thank thee once more for thy word. And ask, Lord, how the world is so often with us, that sometimes our vision of glory tend to seem afterwards as though they were unreal. And therefore we thank thee now for thy holy word that has troubled to give us these pictures, these prototypes in actual history, things that actually happened on our earth, yet not only happened, but become for us a vision and prototype of the great glorious purpose thou hast in store for us in the high capital of the universe, where thy redeemed from every clime shall meet. Take thy word, we do beseech thee. Make these things by thy spirit's power real in our hearts, so that our joy may be abounding, that our names are written in heaven, so that our love and loyalty and service to the Savior shall increase as the days go by, that when we he comes and we meet him, we may share his bright reward for his name's sake. Amen.