His Perfect Love

Matt VanderVen: So if you had the last 24 hours, how would you want to spend that? Would you rather spend that with the people that you love and know are going to be with Jesus, or would you rather spend that with the people you don't know so that they can become born again believers and spend eternity with you and Jesus? Because I assure you that you can catch up with everybody else in heaven at that time. Amen?

It's a different perspective, isn't it? That's eternal thinking. But how we spend that time and who we be with is interesting if we knew we had the last 24 hours. It might also reveal where our hearts are at on certain things.

Guest (Male): We hope you're having a wonderful day in the Lord and glad you could join us as we get back into the book of Revelation here on His Perfect Love. In this marvelous book, the Apostle John receives a vision of the glorified Savior. Fortunately for us, he wrote it down and we're about to read his incredible description of what he saw.

We'll be listening to part two of Pastor Matt VanderVen's introduction, and that will help us grasp what's to come in our study and where we're at right now on the prophetic timeline.

Matt VanderVen: All right, Revelation chapter one, verse one. And it's with that that we'll conclude our introduction as I mentioned last week. I had a few more comments that I just want to make sure we went through to have a proper foundation. We got as far last week looking at what we called the history that was dividing or the way the church historians described the epochs or eras, and it's really important because we're living in what's called the church age.

Now, the reason I say that and the reason it's certainly important is because chapters two and three are all about the church and the church age, the days we're living in. And if we don't understand that—and there's those that try to interpret the Bible that say, "Oh no, we're past the church age, we're living in the millennial reign or the millennial kingdom"—I really struggle with that right now, friends.

That's supposed to be a thousand years of peace with a theocracy established on earth. This doesn't look like a theocracy or Jesus Christ on the throne in Jerusalem, at least to me. I don't know, maybe to you. So it's important to understand very clearly what God is saying. Biblical history can be divided really into two periods roughly following a division of the Old and the New Testament.

The Old Testament was known as the age of the law and the New Testament is the church age. How do we know that? Well, Jesus told us so in Matthew chapter 16, verse 18. He said, "I will build my church." Now we know God is not grammatically challenged. The church age began from the time of Pentecost, Acts chapter two, and it will go to the time foretold in First Thessalonians chapter four, verses 13 through 18.

There it describes what we know as the harpazo, that's the Greek word for rapture, the rapture of the church. At the end, when the church is no longer here, you no longer have a church age. Makes sense? Makes sense to me. If the church isn't here, how can you say you have a church age? It's called the church age because it covers the period in which the church is on earth.

It corresponds, and not coincidentally, to what we know in seminary or scholars that are theologians as they study the word. They have what they describe in church ages as dispensations. That's what they call it, a dispensation. So the dispensation we're living in today and makes tons of sense is the dispensation of grace. For it's by grace you have been saved, right? Not of man, lest anyone boast. I'm paraphrasing, but you understand that it's the dispensation of grace.

Now, in prophetic history, if we're looking at this from a prophetic or prophecy perspective, we would go well to the book of Daniel, Daniel chapter nine, verses 24 through 27, or even Romans 11, and we would find that the age we're living in, the dispensation of grace, actually happens between the 69th and the 70th week of Daniel's prophecy. So if you're looking at it from the prophetic timeline, we even know we're between the 69th and 70th week.

Jesus has been growing his church for well over 2,000 years. The church is composed of individuals who by faith have accepted Jesus Christ as their Savior and Lord. We know that because John chapter one, verse 12 and Acts chapter nine, verse 31 make that very clear to us. Therefore, the church is people. It's not denominations, it's not religions, and it's certainly not a building.

It's the body of Christ, which He is the head. He declares that in Ephesians chapter one, verses 22 and 23. Now the Greek word for church, ekklesia—He's the one that authored it. He gets to define the term. He also gets to define what it looks like and how it should operate. In Acts 2:42, he's pretty clear on that. The church, ekklesia, he says in Acts 2:42, they are to gather together in the apostles' doctrine.

Don't be confused, this is not that word, we're going to get that in a moment. But Acts 2:42 makes it very clear that it's the apostles' doctrine. They gathered for the Word of God. They gathered in fellowship, that's a time where they would come together and encourage and be encouraged. They gathered for a time of prayer, right? And then they even gathered for a time of breaking bread.

Now we do all of that here and it's very significant. But he called it ekklesia and it's important that we understand that term because it means specifically in the Greek, a called-out assembly. It doesn't mean anything else, no matter what somebody tries to retranslate that today, or for the last 2,000 years as we have been warned about other doctrines in John, first, second, and third John.

We were warned about that in first and second Peter where many were going to come and they were going to try to change the ekklesia to mean something else. And I think of the men and women that have suffered because of that. When you go back to the earliest church, the roots and the foundations, they didn't have buildings back then like we have today. Most of the church back then met in houses.

As a matter of fact, many of the Calvary Chapels that you've either traveled, visited, or have heard about, this Calvary Chapel began actually at a Prosser Hall, we rented a community hall. But many of the Calvary Chapels started in a home, in a home church. Not as much anymore, we don't see that as much because the times we're living in, but God can still certainly do that.

It was as they would gather together in a home like that, it wasn't just one person, it was a grouping because it's the called-out assembly. And so they would gather, sometimes 20, 30 people, and they would get to a point where they recognize we don't have any more room in the living room. Guess what we gotta do? Besides moving the dining room table and moving the couches and everything else, we have to find another place to meet.

Now sometimes we're fortunate enough that the Lord opens a door and we get a building right away and the whole point is that more people can come in to read the Word of God and be discipled, the apostles' doctrine. The whole point again is fellowship, being able to encourage and encourage others. The whole point again is that we can pray together. The church is not a club. The ekklesia is never meant to be a club.

It's not about having ministry for ministry's sake. No, it's always been about discipleship. And that's Ephesians four, equipping saints for the work of the ministry. Not a pastor, not a human being gets to redefine God's word for ekklesia because he called it a called-out assembly. Now what's that mean, a called-out assembly? It means you are called out and you are supposed to what? Assemble, right? That's what we do.

That's what you're doing here this morning. It's a called-out assembly. So when he's talking, and this is important because you're going to say, well wait a minute, chapters two and three, he's talking to seven churches that are in Asia Minor, modern day Turkey, that were called-out assemblies. Wait a minute, we're not one of those seven churches per se. We don't live in Asia Minor, right? We're not in modern day Turkey.

Well, it's really important to also understand that the church age comprises of the entire dispensation of grace. If you look at John chapter one, verse 17, it says the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. Because grace and truth came through Christ and Jesus, as we already read in Ephesians, is the head of the church, that means anywhere, everywhere where the body of Christ is called out and assembled all around the world.

When we think of the ekklesia, that is the called-out assembly. It's not just the smaller group that we have gathered here on Sundays or Wednesdays, but all around the world people are gathering and that is the body of Christ. So as we'll read in chapters two and three—and again, this is why I'm making a big deal about this—is because we could err by coming to chapters two and three and go, "Well wait a minute, Calvary Chapel Harrisburg West Shore, we don't fit into one of those seven churches."

That would be wrong because as he's going to use the plural in the Greek, he's going to show us the plurality that every single church around the whole world, even for the last 2,000 years since he established the church, can fit into one of those seven templates, if I can say it that way. Certainly he's talking to literal churches that lived in that area, but also the church as a whole today can be patterned, if you will, into one of those.

For example, if you were ever to attend a church and you walked into church and the church was all about all these other things, but it wasn't about Jesus. They didn't even read his word. There was nothing like that, right? And there's places like that all around us today. You can walk into one of those, they're like clubs, right? You go in, I won't go any further in regards to that, but you know what I'm talking about.

And you walk into a place like that and the Word of God is not taught, Jesus is never mentioned, people aren't trying to grow and mature in Christ Jesus, and yet we would say, what church in chapters two and three would that most likely fit? And many of you would say, well probably that's Ephesus because they left their what? First love, Jesus, right? So we can clearly see that that's point and parcel of what we're talking about here.

That God, it's interesting here, God's going to teach us that part of the church is the indwelling of his Spirit in his people permanently. And really when you think about it, for the first time in human history, God did that under the new covenant. That wasn't part of the other dispensations. One of the dispensations of the Holy Spirit was always, excuse me, while the dispensation of the Holy Spirit was always present and at work, He would come upon people temporarily.

If you're looking for a good example of that in the Bible, that would be First Samuel chapter 16:14, when he would come upon an artisan, maybe somebody that was going to make a part of something for the temple. They were going to make something and the Spirit of God would come on that person for them to do that work, and then it said the Spirit of God would then leave that person because they were no longer needed with that gifting.

Not so for us. The church age, the church age that we're living in is marked by the Holy Spirit's permanent indwelling of his people. And again, if you want a specific reference to that in scripture, that's John chapter 14:16. Now, we need to talk about something else because we're talking about the church, we're going to be talking about Israel as we go through this. We need to understand that the Bible makes a clear distinction between the church and Israel, okay?

There's something called replacement theology, there's a lot of different alternate doctrines out there and people get into trouble when they start to say, "Well it's all just an amalgamation. It's this, you know, the church and this, it's all just one." No, he makes a distinction between the nation of Israel and the church. And if you want a specific passage on that again, it's First Corinthians chapter 10, verse 32.

Now, some might say, well there's a little bit of overlap. I mean, because individually many Jews believe in Jesus as their Messiah. Well, yes, but then they're identified as born again believers. We don't see a person that's Jewish and go up to them and go, "Oh, like you would a Gentile, you're born again." We don't go up to a Jewish person and go, "You're a Jew again," right? You've never heard anybody ever say that, you're a Jew again.

No, you're a born again believer in Christ spiritually speaking, understanding exactly what he's telling us. And therefore they're part of the church. Truly and biblically, and I'm not trying to offend anyone here, but we need to understand these things, there is no such thing what we call as a Messianic Jew. You've heard the term. There really isn't a biblical precedent for anything like that. We understand what that means, that those individuals would like to practice some of the feast days and some of the Old Testament rituals and or traditions.

And that's, there's nothing wrong with that, that's not sinful, they can absolutely do that. But in no way is that going to draw them any closer to somebody that doesn't practice a given feast day or anything like that. But a Messianic Jew, a Jew in Christ, is just like a born again Gentile. You are now identified and you are blood-bought by Jesus Christ. Do we understand that?

Because this is where the problem comes in is when people start trying to slice and dice this in an unbiblical way that somehow comes out and says, "No, no, no, there's a third category. There's Messianic Jews that still practice the rabbinical teachings but believe in Jesus." That's not biblical. That's not what the Bible teaches. It's not a law plus grace. As we already talked about, there's two divisions in the Old Testament and the New Testament.

One is of the law, one is the dispensation of grace. We are all living in a time of the dispensation of grace. Therefore, any born again believer is a part of ekklesia, they're part of the church. But that also means that God's covenant with the nation of Israel hasn't been fulfilled. The promises await fulfillment during the millennial kingdom after the church age, right? Ezekiel 34, Jeremiah 30 or 31:31, Revelation 19, we're going to read about that.

And again, the church age is going to end when God's people are raptured out of the world and taken to be with the Lord. And a beautiful picture of that in direct reading is First Corinthians chapter 15, verses 51 through 57. You can't miss it. And the rapture is going to be followed in heaven by a marriage supper of the Lamb. And that's really interesting, Revelation 19:6 through 9.

As the church, now I use that term liberally at that point, because technically it's inaccurate for me to call it that after chapter three. Because in your Bible, as you read Revelation—again, this is the unveiling of Jesus Christ, this is his revelation to you and I—after chapter three, we don't see what we know as the church because we're raptured after these things. Chapter four, the church is out of here and been raptured up.

At that point, Jesus Christ doesn't speak of the church as we know it and understand it until Revelation 19 where he says it's the what? Body of Christ, right? The wedding feast of the Lamb. He refers to that as the bride. Henceforward in Revelation from that point on, it's all about the bride. No longer are we in the dispensation of grace, now we have entered into what? A different dispensation we're also knowing that as a theocracy or the millennial kingdom after the thousand-year millennial reign.

The bride of Christ receives her heavenly reward. Till then the church carries out in hope, exhorted. What are you and I to do today? What have we been commanded by the scriptures to do today? Again, God didn't leave us without an instruction manual. He didn't leave us to form our own opinions about this. I'm thankful for that, and it's sobering and humbling. In First Corinthians, please turn in your Bibles, First Corinthians 15, verse 58.

What did Jesus command the church to do, the ekklesia, in this church age, in this dispensation of grace? First Corinthians chapter 15, verse 58 or verse 58. I'm incredibly thankful for this because we don't have to wonder. He says in First Corinthians 15:58, stand firm. It's first thing he commands us to do, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord. What does that mean in the English?

I mean, we can read it here, when the Greek, what does that look like? It means always, always, we know what always means, give yourselves fully. What is fully? Does that mean partially or does that mean completely? Right? To the work of self? Hobbies? Importance? Things that we determined that are useful and fun and that's, no, that's not in your translation. No, that must be the Matt VanderVen translation, right?

No, that's not what this says. What's this say here? Right? We care about the Lord. He says the work of the Lord because he even gives us the reason. You know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. He says absolutely without any doubt, the work that you are doing and he calls it labor. What we do is real hard work, it's not easy and it comes at a cost, but there's labor to this.

And being a Christian has labor involved because it's not about being comfortable or what's easy for you and I. We would all love to hear that. We would all love to have our ears tickled that way this morning, but he said no, we are to give ourselves fully to the work of the Lord. That is what the ekklesia is here for. That is why you and I and the church age still exists today because there are men and women walking around, children, that don't know Jesus Christ.

So we need to be giving ourselves fully to that. If I was to say to you, and we're going to get into this passage a little bit later as we as we look at it when he says the time is near, but if I was to say to you this morning you only have 24 hours to live, what would you do with the next 24 hours? I mean really think about that. You've probably pondered it in your head or thought about it before, but if you knew you only had 24 hours to live, would you want to gather your family members around, the people that you love, your maybe saved family, and maybe have a time of worship and just really, really, you know, enjoy the last 24 hours on this earth with brothers and sisters in Christ?

It's certainly not a terrible thing, it's not wrong, right? It's good, we love to be together. Or do you think the last 24 hours would be better spent with perfect strangers that we don't know, or prodigals, or people like that that we know that when we leave this earth, God's hand and the Spirit is going to be removed and there's going to be a great tribulation that's going to come like anything else a human being's ever experienced?

We're going to read that as we go through this book as we get into chapter six and we start looking at the billions of people that are going to literally suffer and die in just horrible ways because of the judgment of rejecting Jesus Christ. So if you had the last 24 hours, how would you want to spend that? Would you rather spend that with the people that you love and know are going to be with Jesus, or would you rather spend that with the people you don't know so that they can become born again believers and spend eternity with you and Jesus?

Because I assure you that you can catch up with everybody else in heaven at that time. Amen? It's a different perspective, isn't it? That's eternal thinking, you know. But I'm not anyone's Holy Spirit, that's something I guess we all have to make individually as a decision, but how we spend that time and who we be with is interesting if we knew we had the last 24 hours. It might also reveal where our hearts are at on certain things.

As we're going to read in chapter two, the church is set before us as a figure of seven churches that were real churches in the existence of John's day. The church, as I mentioned, is not mentioned again in the book of Revelation after chapter three, and you may wonder why. Where's the church then? Well as we read, she leaves the earth and she goes to heaven and she appears to be with the bride of Christ, right? With Jesus as the bride of Christ, excuse me.

When we see her in the last part of Revelation, she's not the church but the bride. Now the beginning with chapter four, as we're going to understand this, everything is definitely future from a vantage point and present time. When we get to chapter four in Revelation, it's all forward, okay? And the book of Revelation may be unfolded as follows: In chapter one, again, it's not just the suffering servant, it's now the glorified Christ, it's the glorified King.

Chapters two and three, we see the churches. Chapters four and five, we see the church in heaven. Then on earth, the great tribulation takes place from chapters six through 18. In chapter 19, we see that Christ returns to the earth and establishes his kingdom, right? You and I are coming with him, the bride of Christ. In chapter 20, he gives us a thousand-year reign of Christ where the theocracy happens on the earth.

Then there's the Great White Throne Judgment. It's set up and the place where the lost are judged begins. And then in chapters 21 and 22, technically eternity begins then.

Guest (Male): That is Pastor Matt VanderVen on His Perfect Love. We're going through Revelation at the present time, and I'll remind you that you can hear the program again when you visit hisperfectlove.org. That's hisperfectlove.org. We're also at oneplace.com and look for us wherever you get your podcasts. We also offer a mobile app.

This is a great way to take Pastor Matt's teachings with you on the go. You can learn more about the mobile app and start your download when you visit our website hisperfectlove.org. We can't thank you enough for your prayers for this ministry. Please pray that as God's Word goes forth, that lives will be greatly impacted for the glory of God and people would grow by His grace and love, or even enter into a relationship with Him.

And if you have a prayer request, please send that our way. You can email that to us through our website at hisperfectlove.org. If you live in the Mechanicsburg, PA area, we hope you'll stop by for a visit. Just like you hear on the radio, Pastor Matt teaches verse by verse through the Bible here at Calvary Chapel Harrisburg West Shore.

Sunday morning services begin at 8:30 and 10:30. We have a midweek gathering on Wednesdays at 7:00 PM. We're located at 28 North Locust Point Road in Mechanicsburg, PA. Go to ccharrisburg.org for more information. And then join us next time when Pastor Matt will pick up where we left off in Revelation here on His Perfect Love.