The Son of God

1Jn 5:20  And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.

The Son of God is come.

Yet today so many would have us believe otherwise.

I really love this excerpt from C.S. Lewis' work 'Mere Christianity'-

'Then comes the real shock. Among these Jews there suddenly turns up a
man who goes about talking as if He was God. He claims to forgive sins. He
says He has always existed. He says He is coming to judge the world at the
end of time. Now let us get this clear. Among Pantheists, like the Indians,
anyone might say that he was a part of God, or one with God: there would be
nothing very odd about it. But this man, since He was a Jew, could not mean
that kind of God. God, in their language, meant the Being outside the world
Who had made it and was infinitely different from anything else. And when
you have grasped that, you will see that what this man said was, quite
simply, the most shocking thing that has ever been uttered by human lips.

One part of the claim tends to slip past us unnoticed because we have
heard it so often that we no longer see what it amounts to. I mean the claim
to forgive sins: any sins. Now unless the speaker is God, this is really so
preposterous as to be comic. We can all understand how a man forgives
offences against himself. You tread on my toe and I forgive you, you steal
my money and I forgive you. But what should we make of a man, himself
unrobbed and untrodden on, who announced that he forgave you for treading on
other men's toes and stealing other men's money? Asinine fatuity is the
kindest description we should give of his conduct. Yet this is what Jesus
did. He told people that their sins were forgiven, and never waited to
consult all the other people whom their sins had undoubtedly injured. He
unhesitatingly behaved as if He was the party chiefly concerned, the person
chiefly offended in all offences. This makes sense only if He really was the
God whose laws are broken and whose love is wounded in every sin. In the
mouth of any speaker who is not God, these words would imply what I can only
regard as a silliness and conceit unrivalled by any other character in
history.

Yet (and this is the strange, significant thing) even His enemies, when
they read the Gospels, do not usually get the impression of silliness and
conceit. Still less do unprejudiced readers. Christ says that He is "humble
and meek" and we believe Him; not noticing that, if He were merely a man,
humility and meekness are the very last characteristics we could attribute
to some of His sayings.

I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that
people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral
teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we
must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus
said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic-on a
level with the man who says he is a poached egg-or else he would be the
Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the
Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a
fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His
feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising
nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to
us. He did not intend to.'

1Jn 5:20  And we know that the Son of God is come…

The Son of God.

Too many people would have us believe that God doesn't even exist, and if He does exist it's in such a way that He has either abandoned the world or is very indifferent to it. It's so easy for people to believe that the story of our Savior is a fairy tale, not reality. The concept people create is how THEY perceive the world should be run should they be GOD.  They imagine a GOD who could create a world and all that is in it and then go about making suggestions as to how THAT God really should run the world if He truly existed. They love to take the state of the world from history's beginning till now and point out that no real God would let it continue like this, they would have snuffed it out of existence as a failed experiment long ago- otherwise it's a very sadistic God if anything. They absolutely love to place themselves and their perceptions in place of the truth, because they believe just because they happen to exist they have this right to not believe in the truth.  They believe just because they exist they have the right to place themselves and their ideas- as God.

Guess what? We do all have that right not to believe in the truth.

We have the right to choose to believe 'cunningly devised fables', we have the right to believe in ourselves and our own ideas, we have the right to believe in madmen, we have the right to believe in nothing at all choosing simply to exist without committing to any sort of belief in anything.  We have this right- it was given to us.

Having the right to choose. 

Ask any person who has ever been enslaved and had their right to choose taken away how awful that existence is. One thing they might tell you is that while their body was enslaved and they had no power over their own actions, they always retained the mental power to choose to believe in things- NO ONE could take away their power to choose what to believe in- no one. Imprisoned for believing contrary to another, the only thing that can be imprisoned is the flesh, no spirit can ever be imprisoned, not without our own consent.

That power to believe is a mighty, mighty thing!  That power to believe has brought many a man to the end of their lives because their oppressor couldn't strip that power from them. If they couldn't kill the spirit to believe in a man they'd rather just end the man's life so there would be no witness to the spirit choosing to believe when all physical choice is left in bondage.

1Jn 5:20  And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.

The Son of God is come.
The Son of God has given us an understanding- that we MAY know Him that is true-and we are in HIM that is true- even in His Son Jesus Christ.
This is the true God.
This is eternal life.

The Son of God is come.

If we believe this then we must believe that the Son of God has given us an understanding- that it is possible to know Him, to know that we can be in Him, and this is eternal life- KNOWING God, KNOWING the Son of God.

Joh 14:27  Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.

Wicked World

1Jn 5:19  And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness.

Again we talk about this world and its wickedness. Why? Because tragically this world is consumed by wickedness.

We don't want to talk about the wickedness in the world, we'd much rather talk about the good things, the things pleasing to our ears. Why expose the wickedness? Unfortunately when the wickedness is exposed it's mostly excused. So gradually over the last hundred years or so- step by step the world has reverted into acceptable depravity and far be it from someone to stand up and yell that it's wicked.

People love to bring up how things were way back in ancient Greece, ancient Rome and you know what, the world supposedly wanted to turn away from that sort of acceptable horror- it wanted to become civilized.

Standards were introduced, and yet today you'll hear so many say that it was all wrong to civilize society whose natural tendencies are not towards what it has deemed puritanical mores, but rather base desires.

It's true, I won't deny that man's flesh nature is what steers him towards depravity under the guise of normal tendencies, normal desire, normal actions.  Man's sinful nature will most decidedly desire to rule over all.

If you believe in GOD you have to believe that man became corrupted when He sinned, and that the natural man WARS against the spiritual man inside us all. So to hear people applauding the removal of moral standards and touting they are being replaced by BETTER more natural standards, more humane standards is heartbreaking. What they're really applauding is sinful flesh overcoming the spiritual nature. They are applauding the depravity coming up to reign once again in a very acceptable way rather than being fought against as something to abhor. They've made sin acceptable! They've made bad - good, and if you try to stand among those crying out against the sinful nature of man coming to rule once again in society you are deemed narrow-minded, old fashioned, a bigot, a fool, the list is endless and made to get you to believe you are in the wrong- as wrong seemingly becomes right. 

It's true, I know many, many people who LOVE the new standards coming to reign in society, they believe they have developed an acceptance of people when the truth is they've developed an acceptance of sin.  It's AWFUL that man even has the tendency towards sin, and how it reigns in everyone is different. My tendency to sin might NOT be something that calls for me to sacrifice the physical love of another, but another's might. I will however have to sacrifice in another way as my tendency to sin demands if I would seek NOT to indulge sin. We ALL have a path to walk and to say one person's is harder than another's is to be foolish because we DO not live inside anyone other than ourselves and we only know our own tolerances, and inability to tolerate.  I cannot believe that there is anyone who lives a life free of the horrible and very real temptation to sin.  Just because people have had to struggle NOT to indulge in sin, just because more and more people are struggling with the same or very similar sinful act- DOES NOT make it less sinful or acceptable! 

Yet we've made so many sins acceptable because the masses have succumbed to them.

The sin of selfishness is right up there on the top of the list, and worldwide in the smallest country to the largest this sin is alive and well and accepted, so accepted it's hardly ever called a sin.

As this WICKED world nears its end the depravity will abound so that the struggling follower of Christ will be turned against as an outcast, a non-conformer, someone who is a rebel, they will be considered the criminal one in the minds of the wicked. They will be called the compassionless, the unenlightened, the haters.

1Jn 5:19  And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness.

This world, this ENTIRE world, exists in wickedness, it was true in the days of our Savior and is still true today. 

With spiritual blinders removed by the Holy Spirit those who are of God will see, they will know and accept that the world is truly wicked, understanding they live for a world made new by our Savior, they live to inhabit the place being prepared by our Redeemer Jesus Christ.

May God keep our blinders off, enlightening us in all things Spiritual, all things in Him, in ALL truth so that we are not among those willingly allowing themselves be deceived as Satan lays his wicked traps to ensnare all but the very elect.

In HIS amazing LOVE!

All unrighteousness is sin

1Jn 5:17  All unrighteousness is sin: and there is a sin not unto death.

We talked yesterday a bit about there being a sin that is NOT unto death and today we're going to talk a bit more about it.

All UNRIGHTEOUSNESS is sin.

Righteousness is our Savior. It is HIS righteousness, His sinless-ness, His love that saves us.  It's because HE is righteous we have hope.  Anything that is unrighteous is sin, anything that is NOT done out of the love we have for our Savior, for God, for each other becomes sin because it's contaminated by our selfishness that leads us to sin.

Our Savior came and lived a life of serving. Our Savior TOLD us explicitly to be SERVANTS. Why would He  do that if we are NOT to be servants, if we are NOT to live a life of servitude?

Mat 4:10  Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou SERVE. 

Joh 12:26  If any man serve me, let him follow me; and where I am, there shall also my servant be: if any man serve me, him will my Father honour.

We are to SERVE the LORD our GOD.  When we serve the LORD our God we serve others because He wants us to serve others, He wants us to LOVE others. When we love- we serve.

We've taken the meaning of being a servant to be something repulsive, something to abhor. We want to be served ourselves rather than serve others. We call this a normal desire and maybe to some extent it is, because there are masters and servants upon earth. What people don't realize is that every master is accountable to be very, very loving and fair to all his servants. The reason why people have grown to  long to be masters rather than servants is because so many masters are abusive to their servants that being a servant has become synonymous with being abused, and not many people - in fact none I know- desire to be abused.

Being a servant is an honorable thing, honorable. To serve loyally, sincerely, with love  is a gift from God. To serve with a heart devoted to God, is a good thing. 

Also, we are to serve with love even when those we are serving unfortunately abuse us.

If you are a master with servants under your control- then you must love those servants even if those servants are abusive. Seriously, you cannot abuse them in return, but love them and discipline them out of love, not hatred for their abuse.

All unrighteousness is sin, and all unrighteousness is selfish, self-serving.

But there is a sin- an unrighteousness that is NOT unto death.

1Jn 5:18  We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not.

When we are born of God- we don't sin because we are completely trusting in HIM, in HIS righteousness.

We are BEGOTTEN of God- and that keeps us HIS.

Born of God- begotten of God- sinning not- and Satan cannot have us who give ourselves to God to be born of Him, to be begotten of Him- sinning not through HIM.

We seek forgiveness in our SAVIOR.

We have a SAVIOR and that SAVIOR is NOT US!

We have to realize this- we do NOT save ourselves, our Savior, our God saves us!

We seek forgiveness for our sins and are forgiven, those sins are not sinned unto death because we've truly sought forgiveness and we truly repent- seventy times seven if need be.

Our Savior SAVES us!

The sins that are sinned unto death surely are those that are NOT repented of, those where NO forgiveness is asked, no Savior sought, no Savior asked to save, to cover our filthy sins with HIS righteousness!

All by the grace of our LORD! All by HIS MERCY! His LOVE, His RIGHTEOUSNESS, His FORGIVENESS forever!

Seeing another sin

1Jn 5:16  If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it.

Not a sin unto death.

When we sin, we transgress the laws of God. We stop loving God and stop loving others and the actions we commit, the sin we do proves that we are NOT loving God and not loving others.

When we ask for forgiveness we are admitting our wrong in a humble, truthful way- because if it is anything but humble and honest our God knows!  When we admit our wrong doing, our ceasing to love God and/or others, and truly desire to be forgiven so that we might not be guilty of that sin, when we desire to have a chance to go and LOVE God and LOVE others as we are supposed to, then we are forgiven!

The sin that is unto death is the sin of us NOT asking forgiveness, it's the sin of denying God, denying salvation through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior, of rejecting the Holy Spirit as He strives to enlighten us to truth, it is shunning truth.  The sin that is unto death is the sin of unbelief, there is no hope if there is no believing. 

Being able to ask for another person to be forgiven is to ask for them to be forgiven of the sins- all the sins they might commit- but that one sin of unbelief. How can we ask God to forgive one who doesn't believe in Him and ask Him to allow that person to have eternal life with Him- One He doesn't even believe?  We must ask our God to soften the hearts of the unbelievers to bring them to His love, to believe in Him. But God will NOT force ANYONE to believe in HIM, not ever! We cannot ask God to force anyone to believe in Him, He cannot do that it would go against all He stands for- love.

By the grace of our God may we choose to believe always! May we choose to desire to love in truth with the love of God, the love of our Savior, the love of the Holy Spirit.

And all by His love may we find it in our hearts to pray for others. When we see another sin, we CAN ask our God to forgive them.  We SHOULD ask God to forgive them because only then can we really forgive them ourselves. When we ask God to forgive them we are praying for their eternal life, desiring eternal life for them.  Some might argue that it's presumptuous of us to assume someone is sinning, but the truth is we can often see others sin, can't we?  Right in this verse we are studying it says--

1Jn 5:16  If any man see his brother sin…

We CAN see others sin.  And it doesn't mean we are condemning them.  If we point out their sin to them or maybe to others, then often it seems to come across as judging to the point of condemnation, but it's NOT.  Oh, I'm not saying some people don't condemn when they judge, but that is NOT our place. We have NO right to EVER judge someone's eternal life, not ever- that is reserved for God and Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior, they alone have that right.  We do however have to judge actions and judge but NOT condemn.

So when we witness someone sinning we SHOULD ask our God to forgive them, shouldn't we? Our love for others should extend to them to that point, yes? It reveal our love for them. We need to ask for forgiveness for others when we SEE them sin. Will that save them to the point of eternal life? It's possible, it really is.

1Jn 5:16  If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and HE SHALL GIVE HIM LIFE for them that sin not unto death.

He shall give him life.

We cannot ask forgiveness for the sins we do not see, we haven't a clue when others sin privately out of our sight. We cannot presume they are sinning behind closed doors, sinning when they leave our view. If they are that's between them and God, but if we SEE someone sin we really, really should ask God to forgive them.  And if someone is in the process of sinning against us, we need to forgive them and it helps to forgive them when we recognize they are sinning against us and God needs to forgive them too. If we ask God to forgive them it really does make it easier for us to forgive them- because if GOD can forgive them, what right have we NOT to forgive them?

My mother told me and my sisters on more than one occasion that she heard God speak to her once and that was after my father passed away and she felt heavy with guilt, that maybe he would have lived if she'd driven him to the doctor's rather than his driving himself. She distinctly remember as she was feeling the weight of that grief heavy upon her as she walked up the cellar stairs, hearing a voice speaking to her saying- 'If I can forgive you, why can't you forgive yourself?'  How true! When we recognize the truth of God forgiving others, we have NO right not to forgive them, none.  When a person sins against us they are sinning against God as well, because God commands that we do NOT sin against others. God forgives and we need to forgive and we need to ask God to forgive others too- it's not presumptuous, it's not arrogance, it's truth! Satan would have us believe we sin when we do that, because Satan loves to pervert the truth in any way He can.

May God bless us, may God keep us in HIM forgiving and being forgiven.

According to His will

1Jn 5:14  And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us:
1Jn 5:15  And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.

According to His will.

His will.

We want OUR will to be His will, don't we?

He doesn't bend to our will, and by that I mean, God will NEVER compromise any principle whatsoever in order to allow us to have our will. God will NEVER condone wrong doing, anything sinful for us is INSTANTLY against His will.

What is God's will?

Mat 6:10  Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.

Thy kingdom come- Thy will be done.

For us, God's will is His kingdom.

Anything, and everything for His kingdom.

We've all heard, read, seen things - books, movies, shows about earthly kingdoms, fictional perfect kingdoms and how the quest for the kingdom and the things of that kingdom becomes all important. Slay the dragon, get the girl, live happily ever after in the kingdom, that perfect kingdom. This is a fantasy- and by that we mean it's a total fabrication- a mere dream- a wish- it doesn't exist on earth, not yet.  But we HAVE these longings for fantasy to become reality, these little pinpricks of hope for something better to replace the world we live in. Why do we have that? Because there REALLY, there TRULY is a KINGDOM, a better KINGDOM! It EXISTS! It's NOT FANTASY! It's REAL! And it is God's will that HIS KINGDOM COME- a kingdom for US to inhabit, for US to live in with HIM, a PERFECT KINGDOM.

The mistake people make is putting that fantasy kingdom on an earthly level, filling it with things that are of the world and sin,  and not things of God.  They bring their greed- their lust for riches, their lust for flesh pleasure, their lust for power- they bring all this to the kingdom they want to inhabit and that is NOT God's kingdom and will NEVER be God's kingdom.

If we ask any thing according to God's will He WILL hear us- there is NO DOUBT that He will HEAR us because we are asking in harmony with His will, in harmony with His kingdom, the kingdom our Savior left His place in heaven for and took on flesh so He could offer us a chance to live in God's kingdom one day.

His will must be our will, our desire, our longing- to be one with Him again some day free from all that separates us. Towards this end we must ask God our petitions.

1Jn 5:14  And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us:
1Jn 5:15  And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.

All by HIS LOVE and GRACE forever!

May His kingdom come, His WILL be done.

All we are should be HIS

1Jn 5:12  He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.
1Jn 5:13  These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.

Those who believe and those who don't believe- two categories exist. The believers and unbelievers.
Among the unbelievers are those who are not TRUE believers.  I make that distinction because a lot of people will make the claim that they believe and yet our Savior will tell them He never knew them.

Remember these verses-

Mat 7:22  Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
Mat 7:23  And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

They are saying to our Savior- didn't they do many things in HIS name?  And the 'they' are MANY. How does our Lord respond? By saying-

I NEVER knew you.
Depart from me- you who work iniquity.

Yet these people BELIEVE that they are believing. Obviously they believe their actions of belief, their show of being God's is what should be recognized as their belief.

We have NO right to EVER say to our LORD, look what we've done, NO RIGHT! All we can do is fall at HIS feet and beg for forgiveness for all we've neglected to do.

We have to be TRUE believers, not DECEIVED believers.

If we have the SON we have LIFE.

Having the Son as we've learned means believing, it means having faith, it means living with God in us as we KNOW God. And we know Him by loving Him and others and keeping His words of pure LOVE- His commandments.  By this we KNOW we have the Son.  We fool ourselves if we do NOT love others, if we do NOT love the words, the commandments of God, if we do not LIVE our LOVE for God. We are honestly deceiving ourselves, allowing ourselves to be deceived when we claim to love and yet live as if we don't even know God or what He desires of us. We must trust fully in our God, fully. We have to believe in the UNDESERVED righteousness that our Savior IS for us!

1Jn 5:12  He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.
1Jn 5:13  These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.

He that hath the Son hath life.
He that hath not the Son of God hath not life.

These things are written unto us who believe on the name of the Son of God- and we may KNOW that we have eternal life, and that we might believe on the name of the Son of God.

Know-believe- all in the Son of God, all in our Savior Jesus Christ our Lord!

Believe solely in HIM, not in ourselves at all.  Seriously. If we place our belief of salvation in ourselves we'll join the ranks of those who are not true believers in our ONE and ONLY SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST. We MUST believe fully in our God, our Savior. We must know that we have to surrender to HIM all we are!

Some might believe that to surrender all of themselves is to give up who they are, but in truth we have NOTHING to offer towards our salvation and the mistake we make so foolishly is to believe we do. And what do we live for if not for salvation in our Savior? If we are living for any other reason again we are living to self. In all we are and all that is ours, all that we possess, all that we make our lives our Savior MUST be first in ALL of that, not just part of it, not just the bits and pieces we choose to believe that  should be Christ's. All we are should be HIS.

BY HIS GRACE!
BY HIS LOVE!

Eternal life in the Son

1Jn 5:9  If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater: for this is the witness of God which he hath testified of his Son.
1Jn 5:10  He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son.
1Jn 5:11  And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.


God has given to us ETERNAL LIFE…and this life is in His SON.

Eternal life.

Read this--

Rev 21:1  And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.
Rev 21:2  And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
Rev 21:3  And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.
Rev 21:4  And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.

Rev 21:5  And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful.

Rev 21:6  And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.
Rev 21:7  He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.
Rev 21:8  But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.
Rev 21:9  And there came unto me one of the seven angels which had the seven vials full of the seven last plagues, and talked with me, saying, Come hither, I will shew thee the bride, the Lamb's wife.
Rev 21:10  And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and shewed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God,

Rev 21:11  Having the glory of God: and her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a jasper stone, clear as crystal;
Rev 21:12  And had a wall great and high, and had twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and names written thereon, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel:
Rev 21:13  On the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates; and on the west three gates.
Rev 21:14  And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.
Rev 21:15  And he that talked with me had a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof.
Rev 21:16  And the city lieth foursquare, and the length is as large as the breadth: and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs. The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal.
Rev 21:17  And he measured the wall thereof, an hundred and forty and four cubits, according to the measure of a man, that is, of the angel.

Rev 21:18  And the building of the wall of it was of jasper: and the city was pure gold, like unto clear glass.
Rev 21:19  And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, a chalcedony; the fourth, an emerald;
Rev 21:20  The fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, a topaz; the tenth, a chrysoprasus; the eleventh, a jacinth; the twelfth, an amethyst.
Rev 21:21  And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass.

Rev 21:22  And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it.
Rev 21:23  And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof.
Rev 21:24  And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it: and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it.
Rev 21:25  And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day: for there shall be no night there.
Rev 21:26  And they shall bring the glory and honour of the nations into it.
Rev 21:27  And there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie: but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life.

Rev 22:1  And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.
Rev 22:2  In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
Rev 22:3  And there shall be no more curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him:
Rev 22:4  And they shall see his face; and his name shall be in their foreheads.
Rev 22:5  And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light: and they shall reign for ever and ever.
Rev 22:6  And he said unto me, These sayings are faithful and true: and the Lord God of the holy prophets sent his angel to shew unto his servants the things which must shortly be done.

ETERNAL LIFE!

Amazing!

No curse.
No tears.
No pain.
No death.

All things that have made our lives miserable.

No one has lived (except those very, very few translated to heaven) - without experiencing pain, tears, death. NO one has live without living under the curse of sin.

Life without pain, tears, death, is just barely imaginable and only imaginable  through our Savior.

We must think of Eternal Life, it's something we can't stop thinking of and look for.

Our Savior came to earth to BRING the message of the gospel of the KINGDOM.

That's HOW important it is… SALVATION… a life with CHRIST forever! A real life! A life that is so hard for us to imagine, truly imagine.

This life offered to us is in the Son of God!

Only through the Son do we live and NO other way, none!

All by HIS GRACE!

His LOVE!