1 Kings 8 • King’s Cross

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(This transcript was prepared using software tools and has not been reviewed for complete accuracy.)

1 Kings chapter 8. Did you faint when you saw the passage? Only 66 verses.



 I figure we'll be getting out about 4 o'clock this afternoon.



 Not really. We can't cover it all, but we should recognize here is wonderful beauty on display as God, remember, answered David the king who said, "I'm ready to build a house for you, God." And the Lord said, "Not you, a man of war, but your son, a man of peace." He would build the house of worship. We'll pick up the account, 1 Kings chapter 8 verses 10 and 11, just after the priests have brought the ark of the covenant into this new temple that Solomon has built. I'll ask that you stand as we honor God's Word, 1 Kings chapter 8 verses 10 and 11.



 The priests have just taken the ark of the covenant into the holy place and we read, "And when the priest came out of the holy place, a cloud filled the house of the Lord.



 So the priest could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord." Let's pray together.



 Father, it would be our prayer too that the glory of the Lord would be known in this place, that you would fill the place, fill our hearts with the knowledge of our Savior.



 For we gain knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus.



 So even by this text of temple worship, teach us of Him, this we ask for the glory of our Savior in Jesus' name. Amen. Please be seated.



 Abdu Murray is a Christian but former Muslim who is sometimes asked to explain his faith to others who are part of his former faith. A family of a sweet and dear man in the hospital asks Abdu to go speak to the older man.



 He writes about it. He said as he went to meet the older man in the hospital bed, the man spoke with quintessential Arab hospitality.



 So he said, "I understand that you used to be a Muslim like me and may be able to answer some of my questions about Christianity."



 The greeting was warm in Arabic with a true desire to know.



 Abdu wrote, he asked many of the usual questions that Muslims ask about Christianity.



 Isn't the Bible corrupted by the languages into which it is translated? The Koran is kept in one language so that it would not be corrupted. Isn't the Trinity a denial of belief in the one God of Abraham?



 How could God die on a cross?



 Abdu writes, "I provided philosophical, theological, historical answers, but with every answer the sweet man in the bed became stonier and stonier and I became more discouraged.



 Until I asked him about his children, then his veneer cracked, his lip quivered.



 They are all a have in this life.



 Without them I die alone."



 Abdu asks, "But what if you knew that God would always be with you and that He cares about you?" Replied the man, "God is too great for any human to know."



 Then summoning up his courage and his tenderness, Abdu asked, "So what would happen if you believed in the God who wants you to know Him and that He cares for you?"



 Inside the sweet man in the hospital bed, "My children would disown Me.



 It would be a shame and unforgivable to so believe."



 And suddenly the real issue became clear. What Abdu, who spends so many occasions in his life explaining Christianity, said he had to learn again.



 The primary objection people have to faith in Jesus Christ is not historical. It is not theological. It is not philosophical. It is something deeply human.



 If I have to give up the loves that I know for God, then why is that worth it if He is a God that I cannot know?



 Why would I risk giving up the person or the organization or the career or the pattern or the path that I love and know for a God that you tell Me I should love, but do not believe that I can know?



 As strange as it may seem when we read a passage of Solomon's dedication of the Old Testament temple with all of its amazing pomp and circumstance and pageantry and intricate architecture, one of the great wonders of the ancient world, one of the largest architectural structures of the ancient world, we look and we see only the marvel of the building and forget what God was actually saying.



 You can know me.



 And what I want you to know, what I put on display for you here is that I am near and I will listen to you and I will love you.



 As old and odd as it may seem, our God is saying through this temple, "You can have a personal relationship with Me and I will love you more than any love that you have and it will be not only more dear but more powerful than anything you think you have to put aside in order to know Me." God simply makes clear first, I'm near. I'm right here. I'm near. It's this amazing, verses 10 and 11 of 1 Kings 8, "When the priest came out of the holy place, a cloud filled the house of the Lord so that the priest could not stand to minister because of the cloud for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord. They have just brought in the Ark of the Covenant." And that Ark of the Covenant was in itself a nutshell expression of the gospel of Jesus Christ. What was in that Ark, if you get away from the movies and the mythology, it's just this box with some gold around it. And inside the box are the tablets of the Ten Commandments that Moses got from God.



 There are the rules, the standards for the people of God. But if the rules really apply, if God is really saying through the Ten Commandments, "You people, you be holy because I am holy," the commandments disqualify absolutely everybody.



 And so those Ten Commandments that are in the Ark of the Covenant are not the only aspect of the Ark, but rather covering it is a lid that God calls the mercy seat.



 The angels surround it. And on the mercy seat, blood is sprinkled. As God is saying, "By sacrifice I will make atonement. I will cover the transgressions of the law of my people." And when atonement has been made, what happened even in the ancient tabernacle, that tent



 where the people of God carried the Ark around, God Himself descended and He was on the mercy seat in power and great glory. No matter where the people went, no matter their sin, their transgression, the law was covered by the blood of God's provision and God Himself became present.



 Now we've moved to the next stage. No longer is there a mobile tent in which the Ark of the Covenant is placed, but rather there is the temple that Solomon builds. It is fabulous. It is glorious in all of its dimensions, but nothing more glorious than when the Ark of the Covenant is brought into the Holy of Holies of Solomon's temple. It doesn't stay there the glory of God, but rather the glory that has lived, existed between the cherubim of that covenant. Now the glory fills the Holy of Holies, not just the Holy of Holies, it fills the whole temple of Solomon. So much so the priest who have carried the Arkian cannot stay. The glory drives them out. And Solomon, who's been standing with his hands upstretched before God, falls to his knees. Even the king is humbled by the glory of God. And what the people are recognizing is that same glory of God that appeared on Mount Sinai in cloud, lightning, and thunder, that same glory of God that led the people of God through the wilderness in pillar of cloud by day and fire by night. That glory is now near and among them and so powerful and so wondrous that even those who are to minister in God's place cannot stay in the temple. He's right here. He is near. And God is saying to his people, "You think I'm far away. You think I'm out there in the desert. You think I'm up there in heaven." I'm right here.



 And it is the message that they were meant to get from the beginning.



 Because it is God explaining how wondrous it would be that a Creator God desires to be near to his people.



 It was a message that began a lot earlier.



 Remember Eden, where we began the story. And God would walk in the cool of the day and talk to his people.



 Because the one who had made earth and stars, the universe, would say, "I desire to be near to my people."



 But by their sin and their transgression, they are separated from God, from that glory of the garden itself. And yet God is saying, "I've never forgotten the garden. I've never forgotten the desire to be close to my people." And so even as the tabernacle and now the temple of Solomon are described in detail, if we were to go to all the pieces, we would begin to recognize just in the proportions, the shape of the tabernacle and the temple.



 The garden is being reflected. After all, this temple of Solomon, we are told, is the shape of a cube in the Holy of Holies.



 It's reflecting the Garden of Eden that itself was surrounded on four sides by river. And if you had looked at the furniture and the decorations of the temple, you would begin to see light and water and fruit and smell fragrance in all the decorations as though God by his instruction of what the temple is to be is saying, "Here's Eden again.



 Here's why I'm present again. I have not walked away from you because you've walked away from me. Rather, I want the garden again. I want the relationship again. And I'm coming near to you." And what's hard for us to understand when we read this kind of climactic account of God saying, "Here is Eden again. I want to come near," is we are not even halfway through God's explanation of his willingness to come near. I was talking to somebody this week who says, you know, in this "Through the Bible in the Year" thing, he says, "I feel like we're just flying through the Bible." And that's true. You know, in our first few weeks, we've only covered a few thousand years. But look, we're only this far. We're not even halfway through the story. And God is saying, "But I desire to come near. Remember the garden. Remember the tabernacle. Now the temple." And it's not the end of the story because there will be another time in which the glory of the Lord shines around his people. There will come a time when there are shepherds in the fields and the angels will come again and they will declare the one who comes whose name is Emmanuel, whose name means God with us. He is here. He's come near again. And now not in a building, but in a person.



 He's right here. He is near. He is among his people. And the reason that's supposed to happen, it's what our hearts should have been longing for from the beginning.



 As you read the tremendous account of the structure of Solomon's temple and recognize the wonder it must have been to the people in the ancient world, you kind of get the question that they would be wondering, "Is God really here? Is he really present?" Since we're entering the vacation season, I think back to when our children were little and we would go every summer out to Colorado.



 And on the very first trip with our oldest son at the time, who would only have been three or four, we'd kind of said, "We'll see the mountains. We'll see the great and amazing Rockies that God made."



 But as we were driving through eastern Colorado, he fell asleep.



 And so he didn't recognize we were getting close to the mountains. Finally as we were starting up the foothills of the Rockies, he was still asleep. So we woke him up and said, "Colin, here are the mountains." And he woke up and he looked around and he said, "Where's God?"



 Well, it's the right question.



 The people of God, when they were to see the glory of God in the temple of Solomon, the glory that was so intense that for a thousand years plus more when the pilgrims would go to Jerusalem to Solomon's temple, 20 miles out, they could see the gold being reflected off the sky in the clouds. Surely they would have come and said, "Where's God?"



 And then the angels came and said, "He's with us." We gain knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus.



 And even that is not the end of the story. Remember Jesus himself would explain, "He is the new temple." He would in his day walk the streets around the temple of his day. And as he would walk in the courtyard, he said one time to people, "You destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up."



 And they thought he was talking about the structure. What was he actually talking about?



 Himself. "I am the temple of God. I am the revealer of the God who has come near. I am He whom you seek." You study the Scriptures diligently because you think in them you will find eternal life. But the Scriptures speak of, "And I'm here. Here is the temple of God." And that's not the end of the story. If you keep going, you recognize God would not only say, "Here is the temple among you." But ultimately Jesus and his apostles would declare, "Now you are the temple of the Holy Spirit as I will be in you and you and me and we and the Father." As there is this wonderful union that God is ultimately saying occurs when God is not just a person or a structure, but the one who indwells you in thought and spirit and heart coming so close. He's actually inside uniting his soul with your soul and spirit. And that working of God is saying, "I am near.



 I'm right here."



 And it's not even the end of the story because you begin to recognize when God ultimately would describe what is going to come in the book of Revelation when you get all the way to the end of the story. You would recognize that God will describe another structure, the new Jerusalem, the new city of God coming down out of the heavens. And that new structure will itself be 12,000 stadia square. It's a Greek measurement.



 But it ultimately would mean that this new city coming down is going to be 1,500 miles square and that high as well. It's going to be a perfect cube.



 There's only one other structure in the Bible that's described as this perfect cube. Do you know what it was?



 The Holy of Holies inside the temple. And now we are being told that the whole city to which we are bound is going to be the Holy of Holies. Not only will Christ be with us, He will be the actual means by which we worship God. Listen, now says the prophet in the New Testament, "The dwelling place of God is with man."



 We have Christ inside us. We have the light of the city, which is the Holy of Holies all around us. Heaven and earth are joined inside and outside so that the song that we sing becomes reality. "Underneath me, all around me is the current of God's love, leading onward, leading forward, leading to that, rest above." What God is doing is saying, "I'm so close.



 I'm with you, in you, around you, taking earth and heaven and putting together. I want to be with you."



 Is it too remote an image?



 I hope not being in any way disrespectful. What's almost as God the Father, from the first page of Scripture all the way to the last, is saying what some of you fathers and grandfathers will say to little kids later today.



 You'll chase after one and you'll say, "I'm going to get you. I'm going to get you. I'm going to get you." And it's a delight to both of you. And what God is saying in the Scriptures is, from garden to temple to Jesus to the new creation is, "I'm coming close. I'm coming to get you. I'm coming to get you."



 And it's a God who is willing to humble Himself as Jesus did not consider equality with God something to be grasped but made Himself nothing and took on Himself the form of a servant coming in human likeness to sacrifice Himself for you and me. And if you can take away all the religious trappings, it is God saying, "I'm going to get you. I just, I'm going to come closer and closer and closer."



 And that is precious to us.



 One of those treasured possessions in our house is a little statue only 18 inches high or so that was made by a former student of mine. And it shows a Hebrew father with turban and robes but on his knees.



 And he's holding above his head a little child who's kind of airplaining in the grasp of his father. And on the face of both of them is absolute joy in the plaque beneath.



 He will rejoice over you with singing.



 The depiction of the father's love for us as he's saying, "I'm going to get you. I'm going to get you. I'm coming for you." And his embrace is what is holding us, what desires us to come close. What does God want from us to know of His love for us? That He delights to be near, that He wants that relationship. It's what we have to say, what we have to believe because we want to know that He's not remote and that He really cares.



 And so in this temple as Solomon is dedicating things, he's not only saying, "Your God is near," but he listens to you.



 In Solomon's prayer are these words, verse 27 and 28, "But will God indeed dwell on the earth?



 Behold heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you. How much more this house that I build you have regard for the prayer of your servant and to his plea." Oh Lord, my God, listening to the cry and to the prayer that your servant prays before you this day, "Listen to me, God.



 I know you're up there in heaven. I know you can't be contained by this house, but will you listen to me?" Verse 30, "And listen to the plea of your servant and of your people Israel when they pray toward this place. And listen in heaven, your dwelling place. And when you hear, forgive," why do you want a relationship with God?



 Not just because He's near, not just because He's willing to claim and embrace and hold you, but because He will really listen.



 That's what that house of prayer is about. That's why we would come here to believe that we're not just here for a rote and ritual reasons, that God is not just here, but He's listening to the cries of our hearts.



 So much of what this dedication prayer is about is Solomon willing to say what God will listen to if he really listens.



 We can't cover all the details, but you can follow along in your Bibles as I mentioned in the verses. What will God listen to? Verse 31 and 32, "He will listen to those who are in dispute with one another.



 Even if the dispute has been caused by one who is being evil toward us." We can take that to God. Now plain talk. Some of us on this holiday weekend will go to be with family members, and some of us will choose not to because we are in dispute.



 And God is saying, "You can take that to me. I am willing to deal with those who are in tension with one another." I can't talk to God about that. I should have straightened this up or they should have. God says, "Take it to me.



 I'll listen."



 Not just dispute, but those who are in defeat. Verses 33 and 34, "When they are in trouble, not due to another sin, but people who are in trouble due to their own sin." God promises to hear their plea and to hear their confession.



 God, I'm in so much trouble, and I know the reason for my trouble is what I did.



 Perhaps it's failure to my family. Perhaps it's a failure of integrity. Perhaps it's a failure of impurity. Whatever it is, God, it is my fault.



 God is saying, "Bring it to me.



 Tell me what it is. I will listen, even if you are in defeat because of your sin." What if it's great distress in my life? Can I talk to God about that? When the people's sin caused God to withhold blessings from heaven, or it has actually caused disaster on earth, God says, "I'll listen."



 Verse 35 and 36 say, "When there is a drought from heaven." Maybe for the current circumstance we have to say, "Or when there is a flood from heaven."



 We can ask God from heaven for help. Or if there is affliction on earth, verses 37 through 40, God will hear and act, and then amazing words at the end of verse 39, "Because you know the hearts of the children of mankind."



 God is being here identified not just as the one who has control of heaven and earth, but their intimate knowledge of the hearts of His children.



 I will listen to your prayer and do what is best for your heart. God is not the genie in the bottle. You just rub the Bible enough and say your wrote prayers and God will give you what you want. No, He's not saying that. God is saying, "I know the hearts of my children and I will do what is best for their eternity. Is it to bring them to dependence upon me? Is it to show through their suffering, faithfulness to their children or to their neighbors that even when they go through hard things they trust me for eternity? What is best for the hearts of the children?"



 That God says He will answer and respond to even if we have grown distant from Him.



 Verses 41 and 43, a remarkable statement of the mission of God even in the Old Testament.



 For there God is promising that He will listen to the prayers of those who are distant from Him because they have traveled from foreign lands. "Oh, I'm not a Jew. I'm not accustomed to being in this building." Well, God listened to me.



 And God says when they come to my temple, even if they are not part of my church family,



 I will listen to them.



 And what if it's not just travelers from foreign lands but those who have been taken to foreign lands because of their sin? Verses 46 through 52, Solomon spends the most time here not just in prayer but in prophecy as he is predicting the exile of his people who despite their worship on the day of glory are going to turn to idolatry again. And as a consequence of their idolatry, they will experience exile from the blessings and the perimeters of the land of God. And God is saying even when you are away, I will listen to you. Solomon prays of those who have turned from God who are distant by their own idolatry, give ear to them whenever they call upon you. And it's God's great promise, "You walk away from Me, but call upon Me and I'll still hear you.



 You cannot go so distant from Me that I will not hear you." God will take care because He is listening. Now you have to know that at this point people might be objecting, "Wait, if I'm in that foreign land, how is God going to hear me when He's here in this temple house? I mean, if He's confined either to that ark or to that room or to this temple, it's glorious.



 But how will He hear?"



 Solomon himself answers in verse 27, "Heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you. How much less this house that I have built."



 It's really the mystery of godliness that gets displayed over and over again that God is capable of being intimate in His presence and still infinite in His rule so that He can be in this place and still be in charge of all things. So that when Jesus came, He could still be so close that He would be the child in the manger and at the very same moment to continue to uphold all things by the word of His power.



 The child in the manger and the ruler of the universe at exactly the same moment. And here is God saying, "I'm so willing to be in a relationship with you that I'll show you I'm right here. I'm right here. But no matter where you are, call out to me and I will hear from heaven and will answer in a way that is absolutely best for your heart." God is not confined here or there. He's not the grandmother who's got power inside the house, but when the woodpeckers knock outside she just bangs her cane and hopes they'll go away.



 No God is saying, "I'm here, but there's no place you can go apart from me."



 How does that become important?



 Because of where some of you will go from this place.



 This time of year we have to recognize that we will deal with some students who will be off to college and may never for a lengthy time be under their parents' household again. They may never be in this church again.



 And we have to say, "God is here, but there's no place you can go that He is not."



 Every place He will be.



 We may say to people who so much feel the presence of God in this place, but tomorrow morning they will go to a place of work or to a group of people that they feel God is far away.



 And God is saying, "I'm here, but I'm there too. Talk to me and I will listen." There are people who don't just go to daily jobs. They are listening to me right now in the seclusion and the drudgery and the discouragement of a nursing home.



 And God is saying, "I'm in this place, but I'm with you too.



 Though you make your bed in hell, you cannot get away from me. I who am intimate and care for you am near and I am with you at the same time." It's the marvel, the wonder of a God who cares so much for us that says, "Talk to me. I will listen. I am near to you wherever you go, whatever you're going through." Those of you who've received cards from me probably recognize there's no more common expression that I know to make as a pastor when you are going through trial or affliction or persecution or health problems or difficulty. The most common thing I will write is, "The Lord is near." Why? So that you're not thinking, "He's here only. He's with you in trial, affliction, and difficulty. He's there. Talk to Him.



 He will listen. He's the God of the temple, and He's the God of the hospital bed, and the trial at work,



 and the terrible professor, and the ones who are tempting you. He is there too."



 We of course will want to pray to Him unless we begin to recognize the only people who can pray to Him are the one whose prayers are put together and their lives all put together.



 And so He's making clear in the temple, "Listen.



 I'm not just near, and I don't just listen to you. I love you.



 Beyond your weakness and your sin, your distance, your disputes, whatever it is you think that would make me walk away, I want you to know that my love is greater than all of that, so talk to me."



 How do we know of His love? First by the magnitude of the sacrifice that Solomon describes. We have trouble reading it. It is so foreign to our way of thinking about worship. But verses 62 and following begin to explain what Solomon did to dedicate and therefore to consecrate, to set aside as holy from the sins of the people, this temple of God. And we read these words. Verse 62. "The king and all Israel with him offered sacrifices before the Lord. Solomon offered a peace offering to the Lord, 22,000 oxen, 120,000 sheep.



 So the king and all the people dedicated the house of the Lord."



 Wow.



 A lot of blood, a lot of sacrifice, more than they were even accustomed to.



 Verse 64. "The same day the king consecrated the middle of the court that was before the house of the Lord. For there he offered the burnt offerings and the grain offerings and the fat pieces of the peace offerings because the bronze altar that was before the Lord was too small to receive the burnt offerings and the grain offerings and the fat pieces of the peace offerings."



 Those of you who are engineers, you can do the math, right? How many oxen did you get it? There are 22,000 oxen. How many sheep?



 120,000 sheep.



 And we know from the other sources another 2,000 sacrifices in this middle court. The middle court was the place that those people who were Jews but had not been born of Jewish parents, that's as far as they could go into the temple. And now God is saying, "I'm not just consecrating the holy place for the Jews. The glory and the sacrifice and the mercy is now extending outward to those who think they would have no right, no place here.



 144,000 sacrifice." We have trouble taking it in. The ceremony of dedication goes across seven days. So you got 20,000 sacrifices per day. Some of you do the average. There's a sacrifice every 4 seconds.



 I have to cover your sin.



 Alright, sacrifice a sheep. I have to cover your sin. Alright, sacrifice an ark. Not enough. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. 144,000 sacrifices. It's not just an expression of great sin. Ultimately, it's an expression of great mercy.



 That God would say, "I got it covered. I'm going to be merciful to this people because this place is now set apart. It is holy so that I would be near to them and listen to their prayers. I know their sin. Look at the blood. I know the sin.



 But I will look from heaven and forgive and heal."



 God is saying what His nature is. And it's not just for the people who expected. It's for those who felt like they were excluded because they didn't have the right background. They didn't have the right church background. They didn't have the right national background. They didn't have the right ethnicity.



 No, the sacrifices extend out to you as well. It's an expression of amazing mercy.



 But the mercy even more apparent when you recognize it is in the face of a poison pill.



 Those of you who do business recognize that a poison pill is a problem that's interjected into a business deal to keep the deal from progressing.



 Moses, no, Moses, Solomon's business here is on display. Yeah, a lot of sacrifice for this amazing temple which itself was expensive. And so in the next chapter, chapter 9, we learn the business dealings that provided the finances for the temple. And in the business dealings, in the fine print, you'll see the poison pill.



 Verse 16 of chapter 9, after we read, "This is the account of the forced labor that King Solomon drafted to build the house of the Lord."



 Didn't know that, did you?



 Israel used slaves too against the command of God.



 More than that, you read in verse 16, "Pharaoh, king of Egypt, had gone up and captured Giza and burned it with fire and had killed the Canaanites who lived in the city and had given it as dowry to his daughter Solomon's wife." Whose daughter?



 Pharaoh's daughter. Pharaoh's from what land?



 Egypt. Oh no.



 Solomon gets the money for the temple of God by going back to Egypt and making an alliance with Pharaoh by marrying his daughter who introduces idolatry back into Israel and becomes the door, not just through which Solomon will marry many wives, but will introduce many gods and more temples to those gods in Israel. It is the poison pill.



 And God knows it.



 God recognizes that Solomon's sin will be this awful, this bad. We're going to have to have some more sacrifices. We're going to need some more. How many more?



 Just one more.



 The one that will actually come from the lineage of Solomon's father David. That one will come. When he comes, he will be announced by the angels. The glory cloud will be around them again. And they will say, "His name is Emmanuel. His name should be Jesus because he will save his people from their sin." And it is ultimately this Jesus, this accomplishment of the salvation of his people that Solomon and everyone else will depend. And what we understand is there's not just the poison pill and evidence here, but the massive antidote on display. What God is ultimately doing through this temple is he's preparing us to understand what Christ would do and how massive it is. When I said that there were 144,000 sacrifices, I hope that rings a bell somewhere, 144,000. Where do you hear that number again?



 In the book of Revelation, where we are told that in that new Jerusalem that descends from heaven with the proportions and the size of the holy of holies, not the size, the proportions, but the size so much bigger than the holy of holies, in that place will be 144,000. Now you want to have a neat debate, try to decide who they are.



 Here's what you should know.



 As many sacrifices as there were, they're enough for all the people in the new Jerusalem. They are covered.



 And if that is not enough, we should remember that the writer of Revelation, John himself says this, "I saw no temple in the city."



 Wait, wait, we need more sacrifices.



 No, I saw no temple in the city.



 For the temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.



 The perfect sacrifice has been made. The perfect atonement has been made. And everybody who ought to be in the city is covered. And this city, which is now just like the holy of holies, means there's not just covering for everybody. There's a place for everybody. And you recognize it when we are told of that place, the gates will never be shut. We need a place. God, can I come near? The gates will never be shut. Is there a place for me? For everybody, there is a sacrifice. If not enough from the Old Testament, remember the new temple is here. And that temple is the Lord Jesus. And He is the perfect sacrifice who is made away for every person. And what that means is the blessings that God intended from the beginning will come to His people. Is He caring at all?



 Do we want to have a relationship with Him? What do we have to give up? God has said what ultimately will be promised, because the new Jerusalem is the temple of the Almighty and of the Lamb. Behold, the dwelling place of God is with men. The temple is with us now.



 And then what?



 He will dwell with them. They will be His people.



 God Himself will be their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore. For the former things are passed away. All things have become new. We don't even need light in that new place. Why?



 Because the light of the world is the Lamb.



 There is no night there, no suffering, no pain, no hurting. Do you want to know that God? Do you want to know if He cares? He will wipe away every tear.



 No more pain, no more suffering, made right with God because of the one who not only is near, but hears, even those who are in dispute, those who are distant, those who are defeated, He hears and makes a way so that we would know His love. I think of us, so many of us on this particular day. Where do you go from here?



 To family?



 To difficulty? Day after tomorrow? Back to job or school?



 Some listening to me are already in the hospital.



 Some are in nursing homes.



 Some in prison and all need to hear.



 God says, "I'm right there.



 I'm here with you.



 And I hear you.



 And I love you."



 When we know that, God, we say, "God, I want you to be with me." And He says, "I'm going to get you.



 I'm going to get you."



 And our hearts say, "Thank you, Jesus, the one who came for me."



 Father, would you bless our hearts that we who read ancient accounts but begin to perceive how much we need to know the Savior they represented would now seek Him afresh anew, to not believe He's confined to these walls, but the very one who is here is everywhere we need Him. And no matter what this life holds, He loves us so much that He has prepared the future of blessing beyond our imagining through the work of His Son. Have we walked away? Have we turned away? Have we not listened? The gates are still open?



 They will always be open as our hearts turn to Him and say, "God, forgive." And He says, "I'm the one who told you to pray that.



 And I will forgive.



 And I will hear from heaven.



 And I will heal your heart."



 So Father, we pray in the name of Jesus, the temple You made for us, in Jesus' name.



 Amen.