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 Sermon > Sunday Morning Service |
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Title |
Heaven(46) - New Jerusalem(4) |
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Speaker |
Rev. Jaerock Lee |
Bible |
Revelation21:19-20 |
Date |
2008-05-18 |
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Passage
Revelation 21: 19-20
"The foundation stones of the city wall were adorned with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation stone was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, chalcedony; the fourth, emerald; [20] the fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, topaz; the tenth, chrysoprase; the eleventh, jacinth; the twelfth, amethyst."
Introduction
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
This is the 46th session of the lecture series on 'Heaven'. Continuing from the last session, I will talk to you about the spiritual meaning that is contained in each of the 12 foundation stones of New Jerusalem. Each foundation stone represents a specific kind of spiritual heart.
The crystalloid and consolidation of the twelve different kinds of spiritual hearts is 'perfect love.' This perfect love is the key to enter into New Jerusalem.
In the last session I talked to you about the jasper and the sapphire, which are the first and second foundation stones among the twelve. In this session, I will talk to you about the third, chalcedony and the fourth, emerald.
I hope you will be able to check how much of the spiritual heart of each foundation stone you have cultivated in your heart.
But even if you do not have the beautiful heart like jewels right now, please do not be disappointed or disheartened at all.
Even the precious stones of this earth, when they are in the rough, they don't look good at all. Only after they are refined and crafted do they become beautiful jewels that give out brilliant lights.
Our Father God is an expert in refining the human heart.
He can make even the rough and impure heart of men into beautiful hearts that are like shining jewels. Proverbs 17:3 says, "The refining pot is for silver and the furnace for gold, But the LORD tests hearts."
Therefore, I hope you will commit your heart to God alone.
Please ask for a spiritual heart earnestly with faith. Even if the speed of changing is slower than you expected, you should never give up or be disappointed.
If you just keep on trying, you will be able to have beautiful heart of spirit that gives out brilliant lights like the twelve foundation stones. With this hope, I urge you to keep this message deeply in your heart.
Body
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, the third foundation stone of the city wall of New Jerusalem is chalcedony.
Chalcedony is usually semi-transparent white in color, and it has grey, blue, or reddish colors.
Chalcedony represents the spiritual heart that is 'purity and sacrificial love'.
Purity is the state of either action or having a clean and unsoiled condition of the heart that has no faults.
And with this purity of the heart, one should be able to sacrifice himself. This is the heart of spirit contained in chalcedony.
Of course, we don't sacrifice for perishing, fleshly things. We sacrifice for the kingdom and righteousness of God. Here, let us delve into sacrificial love in more detail.
Sacrificial love is to give up everything, not expecting anything in return.
We are satisfied only by giving. So, we don't have any kind of lingering attachment to what we are giving. We just give all.
For example, when the parents are sacrificing themselves for their children, do they want something in return? They just want their children to grow up well and they do their best to take care of them.
But even these parents, when their children grow up, want something from their children.
They also get disappointed when the children are not meeting their expectations. "How can he do this to me, if he thinks about how I raised him?" Thinking, this way, they may even get angry. It seems that the parents sacrificed for their children, but this is not true love either. It is only fleshly love that changes.
Likewise, if we have fleshly love, we want something back from others as much as we sacrificed ourselves for others.
If we do not receive as much as we expected, we feel disappointment because of them.
We may have resentment towards those people who do not understand us, and we may even hate them.
In this way fleshly love that is lacking in sacrifice is actually worse than not loving at all.
If we truly sacrifice for others, we will give up everything within the truth, and not want anything in return.
If we want something in return, it is not sacrificial love. Therefore, how beautiful it is to sacrifice ourselves with pure hearts without any blemish!
Who in the Bible showed this kind of sacrificial love?
Let me give you the example of Ruth.
Ruth was not an Israelite. She lived in Moab.
She married the son of Naomi, who came there to escape the famine in Israel.
Naomi had two sons, and both of them married Moabite women. But both of her two sons died.
Under these conditions, when Naomi heard the famine in Israel was over, she wanted to go back to Israel.
Naomi suggested to her daughters-in-law that they should stay in Moab, their homeland. One of them refused at first, but finally went back to her parents.
But Ruth insisted that she would follow her mother-in-law.
If Ruth had not had sacrificial love, she couldn't have done it.
Ruth had to support her mother-in-law because she was very old.
Furthermore, she was going to live in a land completely foreign to her.
There was no reward for her, even though she served her mother-in-law very well.
A Korean saying goes, "A long-lasting disease wears out children's respect."
It means it is very difficult to find children who can sacrifice themselves even for their own parents.
But Ruth showed this sacrificial love towards her mother-in-law with whom she had no blood-relation and thus was like a complete stranger.
It was because Ruth also believed in God whom her mother-in-law believed.
It means Ruth's sacrificial love did not just come from her sense of duty. It was spiritual love that came out from faith in God.
Ruth came to Israel with her mother-in-law and worked very hard.
In the daytime she worked in the fields to glean food and served her mother-in-law with it. This genuine deed of goodness naturally became well-known to the people there.
Finally, Ruth received many blessings through Boaz, who was the kinsman-redeemer among the relatives of her mother-in-law. Many people think that, if they humble and sacrifice themselves, their value will be lowered, too.
That is why they cannot sacrifice or humble themselves.
But those who sacrifice themselves without any selfish motives with a pure heart will be revealed before God and the people.
The goodness and love will shine for others as spiritual lights.
God likens the light of this sacrificial love with the light of chalcedony, the third foundation stone.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, the fourth foundation stone is emerald.
It is a jewel that gives out greenish light.
The spiritual heart that is represented by emerald is righteousness and clearness, justness and cleanness. It is same as the color of the fruit of light in Ephesians 5:9.
Namely, the color that has the harmony of 'all goodness and righteousness and truth', is same as the spiritual light of emerald.
Only when we have all of the goodness, righteousness and truth can we have true righteousness in the sight of God.
It cannot be only goodness without righteousness or just righteousness without goodness.
And that goodness and righteousness have to be truthful. Truth is something that never changes.
Therefore, even if we have goodness and righteousness, it is meaningless without truthfulness.
Then, who in the Bible showed the light of true righteousness in harmony of goodness, righteousness, and truthfulness?
David is one of them. David was the second king of Israel, just after Saul.
When Saul was the king, Israel was fighting against Philistines. David pleased God with his faith and defeated Goliath. Through this, Israel won the victory.
And when people loved David after this, Saul tried to kill David out of his jealousy.
Saul had already been forsaken by God because of his arrogance and disobedience.
God promised that He would make David the king in the place of Saul.
In this situation, David treated Saul with goodness, righteousness, and truthfulness.
Being innocent, David had to keep running from Saul who was trying to kill him for a long time.
One time, David had a very good chance to kill Saul.
The warriors who were with David were happy and wanted to kill Saul, but David stopped them from killing him.
1 Samuel 24:6 says, "So he said to his men, "Far be it from me because of the LORD that I should do this thing to my lord, the LORD's anointed, to stretch out my hand against him, since he is the LORD's anointed."
Even though Saul was forsaken by God, David could not hurt Saul, who had been anointed as the king by God.
Because the authority to let Saul live or die was with God, David did not go beyond his powers.
God says this heart of David is righteous. This righteousness came out along with touching goodness.
Saul tried to kill him, but David spared Saul's life. This is such great goodness.
He did not repay evil with evil, but only repaid it with good words and deeds.
This goodness and righteousness was truthful, which means it came out from truthfulness itself.
So, when similar situations took place, David could act in the same way.
When Saul knew that David spared his life, he was touched by that goodness and seemed to have a change of heart.
But soon he had his thoughts changed again, and again he tried to kill David.
Once again, David had a chance to kill Saul, but as before he let Saul live.
David showed goodness and righteousness without change that could be acknowledged by God.
Then, if David had killed Saul at the first chance, could he have become the king sooner without going through so much suffering? Of course he could have.
But the problem is in the trust relation with God.
Even if we have to go through more sufferings and difficulties in reality, we should have the heart to choose the righteousness of God.
And if we are once recognized by God to be righteous, the level of God's guaranteeing us will be different.
David did not kill Saul with his own hand. Saul was killed at the hands of Gentiles. And as God attested him, David became the king of Israel. Furthermore, after David became the king, he could make a very strong nation.
That is why David is considered the greatest king in the history of Israel.
The most fundamental reason is because God was very pleased with the just and pure heart of David.
Esther also had a just and pure heart with which God is pleased. As a Jew, she became the queen of Persia.
And because of a wicked plan of Haman, a minister of Persia, the entire nation of Jews was in danger of being exterminated.
In this situation, Esther did not just keep quiet thinking the danger would not come upon her. She did not try to survive alone.
She decided to either live with her people or die with her people.
She fasted for three days for the salvation of her people relying on God and then boldly went before the king.
God then gave them a great turn in the direction.
The Jews not only escaped from the danger of extermination, but they could kill Haman and their enemies.
Likewise, if you can just be acknowledged by God with true righteousness, you can receive answers to great problems, too.
If we do not forsake our righteousness even though we may lose everything, God will never forsake us either.
But many people cannot pass beyond this moment, and that is why they cannot receive great blessings or answers.
If they have some disadvantageous situations, they quickly change their mind.
Their decision to keep their righteousness becomes weaker, and they compromise, and even take unrighteous ways.
That is why they cannot receive either blessings or answers.
Those children of God who are longing for New Jerusalem should never stand in the same way that sinners stand.
They must not follow the wisdom of the wicked for their own benefits.
Only the pine trees maintain their greenery even in the cold of winter.
I hope you will give out the green light of justice like emeralds in this world that is full of swindling and falsehood.
Conclusion
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today, I talked to you about the chalcedony and the emerald, which are the third and fourth foundation stones of New Jerusalem.
The spiritual heart represented by chalcedony is the pure heart of sacrificial love without any blemish. This is the kind of love that gives up everything, not wanting anything in return.
Next, the spiritual heart represented by emerald is the heart of righteousness and clearness; it is the heart of justness and cleanness. It is same as the fruit of light, with the harmony of all goodness, righteousness, and truthfulness.
I will continue to talk about the twelve foundation stones in the next session, also.
I already told you that the crystalloid of all twelve kinds of the spiritual heart symbolized by each jewel is 'perfect love'. And this perfect love is the key to New Jerusalem.
When many of you had your spiritual eyes opened before, some of you saw the keys of New Jerusalem coming down from heaven and caught them. This was just symbolical.
The key to New Jerusalem cannot just physically fall down from heaven like that.
You can hold on to the key of New Jerusalem to the extent that you cultivate the spiritual hearts represented by the twelve jewels.
This is the sure and correct way to gain the key to New Jerusalem. Therefore, I hope you will first cast off all fleshly heart and fill yourself with the spiritual heart like the jewels.
I pray in the name of the Lord that you will take hold of the key of New Jerusalem that is decorated with the twelve different jewels.
Amen |
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