This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

Welcome, welcome to day one of Revelation chapter 22. I'm excited about it
because, as you may know, this is the last chapter of the book of Revelation. So
this means you have made it through the entire study.

You made it through all of the plagues and all of the trumpets and all of the
seals and all of the difficult parts of the book of Revelation. And here we are.
This is the sweet spot of this book, the last couple of chapters.

I'm glad you made it to the end. The wait is worth it. That is not just true
with the last chapter of the book of Revelation.

That is true with all of life. That's one of the themes of our life. The wait is
worth it.

The wait for Jesus to return, it will be worth it. The wait for evil to be
removed, it will be worth it. The wait for all to be renewed, it will be worth
it because of all that God has planned.

Last week we began looking at that. We did this guided tour or began this guided
tour of heaven together. We looked at the new heaven and the new earth and the
glories that God's going to create when he restores everything.

We talked about the fact that the dwelling of God will be with us. We began to
look at least at the detailed description of the New Jerusalem, its gates made
of a single pearl, its foundation stones made of twelve jewels that represented
those on the garments of the high priest, and also the names on the gates and on
the foundation stones being the names of the tribes of Israel and the names of
the disciples, the apostles of Jesus, showing that believers, saints of both old
and New Testament will be gathered there together. We looked at the size of this
city, 12,000 by 12,000 by 12,000, perfection cube.

We looked at the streets of this city, pure gold. We looked at the light of this
city, the glory of God, and the lamb will be the light. There's no need for a
sun or a moon because that's all the light that you need.

We looked at this place that is dripping with value and drenched in light and
draped in beauty. And as a follower of Jesus Christ, that is your future. As you
look at your life, never forget that.

You may be looking at your life today thinking, do I have a future at my
company, the place that I work? You may not. You may have lost your job this
week.

And you feel like, I don't have much of a future anywhere. The truth is, in this
world, we don't have much of a future compared to what God has prepared for us
forever and eternity in heaven. Every one of us, as a believer in Jesus Christ,
has an awesome future to look forward to.

And if you are not yet sure that you're a believer in Jesus Christ, do not end a
study of the book of Revelation without saying, Jesus Christ, I believe in you.
I trust in you. I trust in your forgiveness and your leadership, your lordship.

I want to follow you and not the ways of selfishness that are in this world. I
don't know everything that we're going to do when we're in heaven. We began last
week to talk about some of the things we're going to do.

We're going to serve him. We're going to relate to him. We're going to reign for
him for all of eternity.

That's where we're headed. That is your future. And Revelation chapter 22
continues this description of heaven, of the New Jerusalem.

Let me read for you Revelation 22, verses one and two. "Then the angel showed me
the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of
God and of the Lamb, down the middle of the great street of the city. On each
side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing 12 crops of fruit, yielding
its fruit every month.

And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. " So here we
enter into this city that we've been talking about. We've seen the size.

We've seen the foundation. We've seen the gates. We see the streets.

And we enter in. And what do we see? Down the middle is the river of life.

As you walk into this city, what do you see? What do you hear? It's not all
noise.

It's not all cars. It has more of the feel of a garden. And one of the things
you see is this river of the water of life, right down the middle of the center
street of this city.

Now for you and I, as we hear that, the water of life, the river of life, the
part that we hear first is life. It's a river of life. But for them reading in
that day, the first word they would have heard in the middle of this city was
the word water.

Any city in Israel in the ancient day, any city in the desert, one of the main
concerns was where is the water going to come from for all these thirsty people?
And they had very many different and most of them difficult ways to get water
into the city for the numbers of people who would be there. It was often a well
that was dug outside of the city and people would have to go in and out in and
out all day long getting water.

Every once in a while, you would have a city that had actual aqueducts into the
city at a great, great effort and cost to get that done. There were many, many
creative ways to get water into the city, but you always had to get it in for
all of those thirsty people. This city, it has the source of water right in the
middle of it, right at the throne.

And the river, it flows right all the way through the city. It's available to
all. This is the most awesome picture of abundance that they could have
imagined.

And that's what heaven's like. More abundance, more perfection than you could
imagine. And notice on each side of that river, on each side of that river is
the tree of life.

What a perfect ending God has decided for us. Remember, we've got this garden
setting and there's a tree of life right there. Now, if you've read the book of
Genesis recently, that's going to be a picture that you remember because in the
book of Genesis, there was a garden and in that garden, there were two trees.

There was a tree of good and evil and there was a tree of life. And God said to
Adam and Eve, "I want you to eat of anything in the garden. Just don't eat from
the tree of good and evil.

" He didn't tell them, "I don't want you to eat from the tree of life. " He just
said, "I don't want you to eat from that tree of good and evil. " And because of
their sinful nature, what became their sinful nature because of their decision,
they decided to eat of that tree of good and evil.

They thought it would make them like God. They weren't satisfied with what God
had done. And that tree of good and evil, I believe it gave them exactly what
the tree's name is.

It gave them a knowledge of both good and evil, a knowledge they could not
handle. Only God can know all there is to know about good and evil and never
choose to do evil. You and I as human beings, the minute we know about evil, the
selfish part of us, it wants to do evil, and they began to follow after evil.

But there is still the tree of life there. And something happens in Genesis
chapter 3 verses 22 to 24 that's very significant for what's happening here in
the book of Revelation. These are amongst the most important verses in the
Bible, but they're often ignored.

Let me read for you Genesis 3, 22 to 24. Now, why did God do that? Why did he
guard the way to the tree of life?

Because it would have given them eternal life. It would have prevented them from
dying as we do now. And God did not want us to live eternally in a state of
knowing good and evil, in a state of being separate from him.

He wanted us to live eternally in connection to him, in perfection because of
what his son has done for us. And so in the Garden of Eden, God prevented them
from getting to the tree because he didn't want us to live eternally separated
from him, apart from him. But here it is again, that tree, the tree of life.

Here it is right in the middle of the New Jerusalem, right in the middle of
heaven. And here God does want us to eat of the tree because this is how he
wants us to live eternally, in connection to him, because of the perfection that
Jesus Christ has given to us. And on this tree, there are fruits that are being
born, 12 kinds.

And they are born every month. That is a sign of the completion of perfection in
what God has given to us and the life that he gives us. And the fact that they
come every month shows that it's always there.

This is the kind of life that we're going to enjoy in heaven. Again, that
picture that's at the back of our minds because of what we've seen in movies or
because we get bored with our lives today anytime we have to do something for
more than five minutes, let alone an eternity. That picture that eternity in any
way is going to be boring or lacking, it's an absolutely false picture.

It is a place that's overflowing with life, more life than you could enjoy for
all of eternity. That's how much life. That's what we're looking forward to.

The fruit, it's born forever. The leaves of the tree, they are for the healing
of the nations. Now again, as we said last week, there won't be nations in
heaven.

We all have one King, Jesus Christ. But all the peoples of all the nations will
be there. And God's going to heal all of those things that have divided us for
all these centuries and millennia.

Again, here is the picture of restoration and renewal. God's going to take the
pain that was in this earth, he's going to take the separation that was a part
of this earth, and somehow he's going to restore, he's going to renew. Heaven is
not just about God starting over.

He's restoring, he's renewing, he's healing what has been in this world. That's
what heaven's going to be like. So let's take a moment just to tell him thank
you.

Our father, thank you. Thank you for the truth of heaven. We can barely begin to
grasp it.

And as we start to, we wonder if it's something too great to hope for. But it is
not. It is created by your perfection, out of your love.

It is created by a joyful God so that we can enjoy you for all of eternity. So I
pray that whatever circumstances we are facing today, help us to remember the
truth of our future. Help us to remember the hope that we look forward to.

We pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Tomorrow, we're going to see some more about
the amazing way that God brings us back to the first chapters of Genesis in
these last chapters of Revelation.