Heaven (Part 2)

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No Compromise Radio Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author,

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Dr. Mike Abendroth. Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the

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Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

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Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the Scriptures, verse by verse, with no compromise.

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Heaven's not just some state of consciousness. Heaven is not some adjective where we just use, well, would you ever use the word heaven?

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I was thinking about the word heavenly hash ice cream, you know, it's just some kind of word we use. No, it's a real place.

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It's not some spiritual consciousness. Here the language is, it's a city.

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Look at verse 2, and I saw the holy city. It's got a capital, and the capital is

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Jerusalem. Hebrews 13, listen, for here we do not have a lasting city, but we are seeking the city which is to come.

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And by the way, if you've got a city, it's got measurements. How do I know it's a real city? Because it has real measurements.

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Look down at verse 17. How weird is this in the book of Revelation? This is one of the weirdest verses in all the

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Bible, as far as I'm concerned, especially if you have a spiritual city, and I don't know how you spiritually measure a spiritual city.

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He also measured his wall, 144 cubits, by human measure, which is also an angel's measurement.

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The good news is we're not saying, you know, this is kind of English, and now we've got to translate into metric.

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One inch equals 2 .54 centimeters, and I can't really figure out all the other stuff, how to do it the other way around.

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One centimeter is how many inches? I don't know how many inches it is. I don't know either. But here it's easy.

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The way we measure things, the angels measure them the same way. Okay, that's helpful, John. I don't know why they measure figurative things.

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Well, the answer is it's not figurative, it's a place prepared by Jesus.

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That's the same language from John. Heaven's new. I need new compared to the old, sin -tainted, wrecked kind of world.

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Give me something new made by God. Maybe a place. Why do you think we're going to get bodies?

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To go to a real place with our real bodies? All right, we're still building this. Number three, heaven is holy.

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I like new, I like a real place, and I like holy places.

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Revelation 21 -2, and I saw the holy city. This is the character of the city that reflects the character of its owner, creator, mayor, if you will,

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Christ Jesus. A crime -ridden world will be gone for us.

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This is a far cry from Revelation 11, talking about Jerusalem on earth as Sodom and Egypt.

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Now, we have the holy city reflecting God Himself, God's holiness.

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Just how holy? Look at verse 8 of Revelation 21. How holy is heaven going to be? Well, the unholy aren't going to be there, but as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.

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The old days, you'd have a city, and you'd put up a wall, and you'd put up a wall to keep out the marauders, to keep out the prostitutes, to keep out the criminals.

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They're not going to be in heaven. They will be excluded from the intimate family relationship.

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Thomas Watson said, the great Puritan, heaven is not like Noah's ark, where the clean beast and the unclean enter.

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No unclean beasts come into the heavenly ark. What is

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John trying to get you to do? He's trying to get you to think of how holy it's going to be, how secure, how protected, how you're going to long to be in such a guarded place, and how you should be the opposite of every one of those people on that list.

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Not cowardly, but fearless. Not unbelieving, but believing. Not abominable, but holy.

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Not a murderer, but a lover. That's where I want to go.

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John Bunyan was asked a question about heaven. He said, you know, this text doesn't really tell me what you're asking.

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I can't answer it, because the Bible doesn't state the answer to your question. So I advise you to live a holy life and go and see for yourself.

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I like that. These kind of unholy people that we put in jails now, but somehow escape, shall never look at the text, a future of emphatic negation, shall never, ever, ever, ever come into this city.

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You can count on that. Safety, security.

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It's a new heaven. It's a place. It's a safe place. And you know what?

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Number four, the fourth description, is it's from God. Found in verse two.

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I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

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Well, it's got to be good if it's not made by human hands. It's got to be great if it's from God. What kind of gift, what kind of creation, what kind of thing does

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God make and give that isn't great? I don't even have to know anything about it, but if somebody says, would you like to receive something from God?

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Yes, I would. Prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

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Prepared as a word in John's revelation for the result of God's decree.

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It's from God. But you know what? Here's maybe the best one. Number five, heaven will be where God himself is.

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Heaven's new. It's a place. It's holy. It's from God. And number five, the fifth description of heaven designed to make you declare death as gain, is

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God is there. 20 years ago,

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I had a boss and he was a very kind man, not a Christian man. But when my father was dying, it must be 25 years ago by now, he said, you can go back to Nebraska as often as you'd like.

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Take some trips back there. See if you can go sell some of your operating room stuff back there. You can expense a trip to see your father.

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Kind man, nice man. I began to preach to him.

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We would drive around and I would just preach and preach and he was very excited about the Lord and wanted to tell him the things of God.

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So he started going to church and he would go to Calvary Chapel with me and sometimes on his own. And the thing is, he loved his dog.

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When you walked into his house, there was a picture of he, his wife, and in the middle, the dog.

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They had no kids. There were three table settings at the main dining room table for himself, his wife, for Max, the

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Pomeranian. He said to me one day in the car, when

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Max dies, will Max go to heaven? Now if Max would have been a cat, that would have been an easy answer.

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I love all animals, creations of God. I know what it is like to love a pet.

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I love my dog and dogs don't have a soul, neither do cats.

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They've been affected by the fall. Jesus didn't die for dogs and cats and he's not going to use his blood to cleanse those.

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If there are cats and dogs in heaven, fine, but there are cats and dogs that God made for heaven. They weren't cats and dogs on earth and somehow

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God, you know, the effect of the fall cleaned off through Jesus' blood and then now they're in heaven.

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So I said, you know what, Max ain't going to be in heaven. And then he said to me,

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I'll never forget it, if Max ain't in heaven, it won't be heaven. Now some people think the same way about people.

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If my unbelieving father's not there, how could it just be heaven? One of my unbelieving kids isn't there, how could it be heaven?

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Or you could say to yourself, when I die and go to heaven, the first thing

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I'm going to do is, I can't wait to see my family and friends who have died in the Lord. By the way, is that a good thing to want to see them?

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Of course. Of course. But what makes heaven heaven is not going to be

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Evie being there. I can't wait to see her, I'll probably just notice her right at the beginning.

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We'll both realize, oh, we're both here together praising the Lord, but what makes heaven heaven is

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God himself is there. He's the star of heaven and without Jesus there and a real body with scars on his hands and his feet and his side, it's not going to be heaven.

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And if no one in your family is there, but you're there with Jesus, it will be heaven. If everybody's there, and including your dogs are there, and Jesus is there, it still will be heaven.

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It's like, you know, the best part about grandpa's house, you know, the little mug or t -shirt, the best part about grandpa's house is what?

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Free M &Ms. No, the best part about grandpa's house is grandma.

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No, all right, let's go. The star is

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Christ Jesus himself. How can you say death is gain unless you're going to go see

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Jesus face to face? So look at this unfold. Revelation 21 .3.

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And I heard a loud voice, that's about 20 times in Revelation, by the way. It means it's important, authoritative.

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And I heard a loud voice, listen up, from the throne saying, behold, the dwelling place of God is with man.

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He will dwell with them. They will be his people. And God himself will be with them as their

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God. The dwelling place of God is with man.

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Can you imagine the intimacy with God that Adam and Eve had before the fall, and then destroyed and wrecked by sin, the whole garden catastrophe, and there's been a lack of communion with men and God for all those years, and then in heaven, restored.

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Eden restored, fellowship restored. A virgin shall conceive, and she will bear a son, and you shall call his name

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Emmanuel. When was Jesus ever called Emmanuel? You read

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Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, and you work your way all the way through, and find me one place

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Jesus is called Emmanuel, God with us. And you know what? You won't find it until right here.

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God with us. God who no longer turns his head away.

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God who no longer, like Habakkuk says, he's too pure to look upon evil. When Jesus is face to face with God, in John chapter 1, with that intimacy before God in his presence, in his face, we see that now, not between God the

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Father and God the Son, although that's true, but here, us and God himself.

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We're not hiding ourselves, we're not in shame, because Jesus has paid it all, and he's been raised from the dead, and here we have

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Emmanuel. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their

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God, Emmanuel.

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Could it be this is where we call him Emmanuel? Fellowship with God, full fellowship, complete fellowship, unlimited fellowship, a lifelong fellowship.

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How many relationships have you had with people, they've been broken by them, or you, or both, or somebody from the outside, and here is the relationship that will not end.

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And this relationship dominates the rest of the chapter. God himself, emphatically, will be with them as their

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God. It speaks of intimacy, closeness. Think of marriages, and how marriages have problems.

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Marriage problems are usually stemming from, well, we've got what? Communication problems, problems of intimacy.

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And here, no communication problems, no shame, no lack of being close, sin is gone, death is gone, hell is gone, and who is there?

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Jesus, the best privilege of all. And it gets more personal, jump to chapter 22.

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What are we missing at service at Bethlehem Bible Church today? What are we missing? Some might say we're missing tongues, we're missing rock music, we're missing we can't feel the spirit.

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I'll tell you what we're missing. It's not that we're missing rock music, it's not that we're missing the alleged, you know, we're missing the

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Holy Spirit. I'll tell you what we're missing, is you can't see the face of the

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God you're worshiping. But one day, can you imagine, with Grandma Evie, you see the face of God.

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It's not going to be like the Robe movie, where Jesus is turned to the side, and you think that's

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Jesus, but I can't see his face. It's like holding a little kid, and the kid's trying to talk to you, and you're talking to someone else, and you're talking to another adult, and you're holding your kid on Sunday night at service, and you're talking to the adult, and your kid's trying to get your attention, and finally the kid just grabs your face and turns it to you, turns it to them,

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I need to see your face. Intimacy, closeness, what are we missing today?

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Revelation 22, 3 and 4, no longer will be there anything accursed, but the throne of God and the

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Lamb will be in it, and His servants will worship Him. What is worship today?

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It's by faith, but here when you worship God in heaven, I'll tell you how much gain there is in death if you're a

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Christian, they will see His face. That's what's missing in our worship today.

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And His name, personally, privately, uniquely, with ownership and possession and intimacy,

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His name will be on their foreheads. Talk about the antithetical mark of the beast.

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This is the hope of a Christian. If you're a Christian, you should be saying, I can't wait for the day that I can worship

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Him and see His face. The vision of God.

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That's a far cry from Exodus 33, God said to Moses, you cannot see my face, for no man can see me and what?

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Live. But life in heaven isn't heaven until you see His face.

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The divine glory of Jesus Christ, the God -man. Do you know in the ancient world, criminals would not be allowed to look at the king's face?

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You can't look at the face because you don't get that kind of intimacy because you've just sinned against the king.

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Now when the king returned from the palace garden in the place where they were drinking wine, Haman was falling on the couch where Esther was and the king said, will he even assault the queen with me in the house?

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As the word went out of the king's mouth, they covered Haman's face.

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Second Samuel, however, the king said, let him turn to his own house and let him not see my face.

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So Absalom turned to his own house and did not see the king's face. But now, for those who have believed in the

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Lord Jesus Christ and God has made them born again by the Spirit's power, does this verse mean anything now, more to us?

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Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

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Isn't that good? And that name on the forehead shows that we're personally sons, personally daughters.

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He owns us. It's a metaphor that talks about ownership, reminiscent of Exodus 28 with a name on the forehead of Aaron, the priest.

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The most wonderful thing about grandpa's house is grandpa. And the best thing about heaven,

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I'm going to be glad when I see you there, but pardon me if I don't say hi to Fred Tebow for about 10 billion years.

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And then I'll say, Fred, great to see you. I always knew you were here. Pregnancy in between Luke and Haley, I don't know if it was even a baby, lost the baby,

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DNC, all these things. But I think to myself, am I going to get to heaven and see what, do

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I have another kid in heaven? If I do, I do. If I don't,

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I don't. But I know God will be in heaven and I can trust him for that. Number six, and finally for this morning, heaven will be new.

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It'll be a place. It'll be holy. It's from God. It's where God is. Number six, it's curse -less.

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It's curse -less. If you'd like to be more positive in the way

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I phrase this, it will be a place full of compassion, a compassionate place.

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Just how uncompassionate is the world today, how we are uncompassionate.

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And here, free from the curse, free from all the effects of the curse, and if you look at Revelation 21 .4,

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back down to chapter 21, 21 .4, you talk about the mercy and stooping grace of God who cares for his people.

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How could God care for such insignificant thing as a tear, the minutia that God is concerned about when it affects his people?

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Revelation 21 .4, he will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

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No more sadness, no more sorrow, and death shall be no more. Wouldn't it be a great day when there's not another funeral?

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No more funerals. They're just done. Sometimes the phone rings and I think, it's going to be a funeral.

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There'll be no more death. Neither there shall be any mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.

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Wow. No more bad moods, no more headaches, no more migraines, no more sorrow, no more sadness, no more depression, no more

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PMS, no more edginess, no more backaches, no more anything. By the way,

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I didn't say that to get a laugh. I don't know why people are laughing. Just shame on you.

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The effects of sin that rip and tear and bereave are gone.

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Every tear, literally every single tear. No more sadness, no more pain, no more disappointment, no more misfortune.

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Nothing sad, nothing wrong. Every tear. Psy said something that was very interesting.

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Why do we need God to wipe our tears away? This is what Psy said. Human hands are poor at drying tears.

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The compassion of a great transcendent God who's close to His people, who's so compassionate.

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No more death, no more graves being dug. But when this perishable will have put on imperishable and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, death is swallowed up in victory.

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Chapter 22 verse 3, chapter 22 verse 3, no longer will there be anything accursed, it's gone.

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To live is Christ, to die is gain. I wonder if you could say that. For the rest of my years on earth,

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I'm going to serve the Lord right where He has me. And I'm going to look forward to death because God has saved me and death is going to be profit.

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Death is going to be advantage. I just saw

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Nancy Shepard sitting right there and as much as I miss Tom, I'm sure Nancy misses him a thousand times over.

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But for Tom Shepard, to live for Tom Shepard was Christ and to die for Tom Shepard was what?

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Gain. I'm happy for Tom, I'm happy for Grandma Evie and I'm happy for these texts to make us live for what we should be living for.

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Because if you live for anything but Christ Jesus, death is a loss. Let's pray.

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Thank you Father for this text. Thank you more for Christ Jesus, our great Lord, who makes heaven new, makes heaven holy, to be in the presence of God forever.

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We don't even know what it could be like, it's indescribable. It's not some story for kids, it's not just for families who have lost babies and loved ones and grandmas, it's the truth from the holy word of God.

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Thank you Father for placing the curse on Christ Jesus, who became our curse and thank you for then giving

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Christ our righteousness, that with Christ we might be resurrected and be in heaven with you forever, in Jesus' name we pray, amen.

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No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 10 .15 and in the evening at 6. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston.

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You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.