Just Passing Through

Good morning, Ozzdoll, and good morning to all of you. Happy eighth day! Appreciate very much the special music. Just incredible special music. And yes, we do. We long for that day. Well, interesting, I've not really had a lot of experience speaking in locations with balconies, so if I don't look at you in the balcony, I'm sorry. I did, however, grow up on a steady diet of the Muppets. So, the left side of the balcony, I'm watching you guys. That's where Stadler and Waldorf were, if you remember the Muppets. They were always kind of castigating and whatever else.

But, brethren, we've had a wonderful time here at the Feast of Tabernacles in Lake June, Alaska. I was mentioning at the Bible study, this is the first Feast of Tabernacles that my wife and I actually spent in the church east of the Rockies. All of our Feast of Tabernacles experiences have been west of the Rockies, and so it's been wonderful to come and to get to know everyone on this side of the country. So, appreciate that wonderful, wonderful warm welcome that we've had. Well, I don't know if you've ever considered this or not, but when you think about the Feast of Tabernacles in the eighth day, and you think about how God has called his people together, wherever they may be, and wherever they may be keeping it, that each location where people keep the feast is unique, in the sense that this mix of people will never happen the same way that it has happened this week, ever again. It's like a fingerprint. No two feast sites are alike, and even if Lake Junaluska is a feast site next year, it will not be the same fingerprint. God has brought us together at this place where he has placed his name to learn to fear him as these last seven days have gone by. And as a result of that, I don't know if you've noticed, but there has been a theme which has surfaced at this feast of this idea of temporary to permanent, from this idea of this physical creation in which we are all in, now moving into the spiritual and the permanent. And this split sermon is going to be no different.

In the sense, I got very nervous a couple of days ago when both of the messages were around this topic. I got even a little more nervous this morning when the first split sermon was around this same topic. But I think in those moments, it's worth us asking ourselves, why is God hammering this concept home so hard for us this year in Lake Junaluska? And what is it about the lessons that we can learn from this as we leave this place and as we go and we consider these seven days of the feast and today, this eighth day? When we think about the transition that takes place from the Feast of Tabernacles into the eighth day, when it comes to God's plan for mankind and what's to come, this transitional day is significant. The meaning and the symbolism behind this day is significant. You know, we've just spent seven days during the Feast of Tabernacles, also again known as the Feast of Booths, and it is a time in which God's people are commanded in Scripture to come before His presence, and in doing so, they are commanded to do so in temporary dwellings, to be in places that they are not normally in. And again, we've heard a lot about this concept this week as we've gone through this feast, and probably in our discussions with others as we've gone through the conversation starter pages, and we've gone through our discussions that we've had. You know, I used to teach—I was a middle school teacher for 15 years before I came into the ministry, and one of the jokes that we used to say in education was that repetition is one of the best teachers. Repetition is one of the best teachers. Repetition is one of the best teachers, right? It helps to reinforce these concepts in our minds, and it helps us to be able to take them and anchor them to something that we will then remember. If you would, let's turn over to Leviticus 23. Let's turn over to Leviticus 23. I'm not going to go through this whole passage because I believe we've gone through it 800 times at this feast already, but I am going to emphasize one portion of it, and that is what begins in verse 42. Leviticus 23 and verse 42, built into the instructions with regards to this feast and this eighth day. We see that it says, you shall dwell in booths for seven days. All who are native Israelites shall dwell in booths. Now why? Verse 43, that your generation may know that I made the children of Israel dwell in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt. And he says, I am the Lord your God. So as part of the command, God provides the reasoning. God gives us the reason why. We are to dwell in temporary dwellings so that all of our generations—that means myself, my mother's here with me, my children are here with me—those generations will know that God made the children of Israel dwell in booths when he brought them out of the land of Egypt. So that means that there is something more to this command than just simply staying in a vacation rental or a hotel room in the place where God placed his name.

In this seemingly simple command is something that has deep, deep spiritual meaning. Not just for God's people then, but for us as God's people now. You know, God brought Israel out of Egypt with a high hand. Okay, you can think back to what we rehearse and what we go through as we consider the spring Holy Day season. Israel had been in the nation of Egypt for 400-plus years. You know, the time that they had been in there, a significant portion of that time, they spent enslaved. Slavery had become so ingrained in their society that multiple generations knew its horrors.

Parents lived to watch their children enslaved, perhaps even their grandchildren, and their great-grandchildren. Hope, as we heard about in the first split sermon today so beautifully, hope would have been something very hard to come by. Because what options do you have? What options do you have? I'm a slave, my kids are slaves, my grandkids are slaves, their kids are going to be slaves. How are we going to get ourselves out of this mess? And the answer for the Israelites at that time was we can't. We're stuck. This is our existence. Hope would have been difficult to come by. But yet we know the story. God miraculously delivers his people through a series of miracles. Ten plagues were poured out on the land and the livestock and the people of Egypt. Pharaoh finally allows the Israelites to go free. God had redeemed his people. He had managed to deliver them from their affliction. They went out into the land surrounding Egypt, crossing the Red Sea for the place where God was preparing for them. They crossed, as we heard about in some of the messages earlier this week, into a very inhospitable land. The land in which the water was hard to come by, the food was hard to come by, and they struggled mightily as they followed their God's lead. As they followed God in that wilderness, they struggled. Their faith wavered. We might even say their hope wavered.

And they turned on one another. And they turned on their God. They turned on one another, and they turned on their God. Numbers 14, you can reference it if you'd like. We're not going to turn there for sake of time. But the nation of Israel concludes they can't go into this promised land that God has given to them because its inhabitants were too mighty. Right? They sent the spies in. Again, you know the story. They sent the spies in. They came back and said, look, they're huge! There ain't no way! We're not going to be able to do this! Joshua and Caleb say, of course we can! God is on our side. But there was enough of a fomentation of rebellion that they turned on Moses and Aaron. They hatched a plan to overthrow the two of them and to return to Egypt. And as a result, God punished Israel. He gave them a year for every day that they spied out the land. And he let the generation, which showed so little faith in him and his promises, die in the wilderness without even seeing that land. And that began 40 years of Israel wandering through the wilderness. What we would call their sojourn. Right? We were using the term their sojourn. Bible records that Israel sojourned in Egypt for the time that they were enslaved. The Septuagint lumps their wandering in the wilderness into that sojourning. But as Israel wandered, what we see in the pattern is that they would occupy an area for a time. They would set up camp. They would stay in one place for a time. They would then pack up their tents and their belongings, and they would move. They would set back up in another area. They would pack up their tents and their belongings. They would move. They would set up in another area. And that pattern repeated itself over a 40-year period as they occupied various locations, whining through the wilderness of Sinai, waiting to enter the Promised Land. So until that promise was fulfilled in full, they were sojourners and pilgrims. They were sojourners and pilgrims. They were, we might say, they were just passing through. They were just passing through. Title of the second split sermon today on this eighth day is just passing through. Just passing through. You know, when you consider the concept of a sojourner and ultimately what it implies in that concept is the implication of a permanent home existing. If you're a sojourner, yes, you're not in your permanent home currently. You're in a temporary location, but that permanent home does exist somewhere. Otherwise, how could you be a sojourner? You just live in the van life, as they say these days. You're going place to place to place to place. There isn't a permanent home. The van is the permanent home. You're sojourner. You're going place to place to place. In that case, you're just passing through. So a sojourner is someone who may reside someplace temporarily, but that's someplace that's residing. That's not home. They're just passing through. Now, there are physical sojourners. There are, you know, such as Israel, for example, there are spiritual sojourners, such as the faithful throughout time. Let's go to Hebrews. Hebrews 11. Hebrews 11.

Book of Hebrews is an incredible book of Scripture to look at. You know, in it, the author does a masterful work of connecting that which occurred in the Old Testament to the Hebrew people, and ultimately to the Hebrew people, to Christ, and through that connection establishes and it explains a number of the types and the anti-types of these scriptural concepts. Hebrews 11, and we're going to pick it up in verse 13. Hebrews 11 verse 13. Hebrews 11 and verse 13 says, these all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them. They embraced them, and they confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. They were sojourners. They were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For those who say such things declare plainly that they seek a homeland. And truly, if they had been called to mind that country from which they had come out, they would have had opportunity to return. But now, verse 16, they desire a better that is. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them. We see in Hebrews 11, a laundry list of faithful over the years, all whom died in the faith. Everyone in that chapter died in faith.

They had hope. They had faith in these promises that were to come. They'd been assured of them. As a result, they recognized a very important concept, that those promises that they had been given were going to come true. They were sure. They were certain that God absolutely would deliver. He absolutely would deliver. And their time here on this earth was temporary. It was temporary. It was fleeting. Verse 32 says, We kind of pause there in a minute because we shift gears in this passage. When we think of hope, when we think of faith, and we think of God's blessing, that's what we think of. Tearing down strongholds. Dead raised to life again. All of these different things. But notice there's a list of people that are unnamed in this passage that had a very different series of circumstances. And yet they are listed in this group of faithful individuals. He says, Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. Still others had trials of mockings and scourgings, yes of chains and imprisonment. They were stoned. They were sawn in two. They were tempted. They were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute and afflicted and tormented. The writer of Hebrews says, Of whom the world was not worthy.

They wandered in deserts, in mountains, in dens, and in caves of the earth.

As a result of that faith, as a result of those promises, and as a result of understanding that this life is not all that there is, they were able to accept these things. They could accept these challenges.

What makes someone capable of being able to do that? Being able to look a diagnosis in the face.

Being able to look at the loss of a loved one in the face and still continue on in faith and in hope in those promises that are to come. It's a recognition.

That we in this life are but sojourners and pilgrims. We are here temporarily. And in fact, that's the way God designed it. Right? We are here temporarily because that is the way that God designed it for us. And we understand that this right here for this week, Lake June Alaska, it's not our home. We're here visiting. But you know when I go home to Oregon? It's not my home either. United States, it's not my home. Earth, not my home. There is a kingdom that is coming. That is my home. That kingdom is our home. That is what God is calling us to.

And so as a sojourner, as a pilgrim, they're looking forward to, they're pressing towards, they're pushing toward another home in which we see in Hebrews as described as a city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God. So this earth, their lives, everything that's in it, it's temporary. It's fleeting. It fades. It's like the grass that flourishes, and then when the wind comes, it vanishes.

Right? It's temporary. We recognize we could store up every bit of wealth and all the things in this earth, and in the scope of eternity, none of it matters. None of it matters. Rust, moth, destroys that which we store up here on this earth, because we see that this life, this existence, this physicality, it's corruptible. And I don't mean that in the sense of, you know, physical humans as absolute power corrupts absolutely, though that is in fact true with humans as well, but it means it in the sense of the Greek word pithora, which is this idea of rot and decay, that everything in this physical life is designed to have an expiration date, including ourselves.

Right? We are designed to have an expiration date, and that's a concept that the Apostle Paul knew all too well. Let's go ahead and turn over to 2 Corinthians 5. Apostle Paul was a tentmaker. He worked with tents by trade, and at this point in time, the kind of tents that Paul were working with were not the Coleman easy pop varieties that we have today.

You know, these were not lightweight tents that you take backpacking. These were made out of lots and lots and lots of thick leather hide. In fact, the Roman army used these wall-style tents, and the term that they used was sub-pelibus. Sub-pelibus means that they would sleep under the skin, because this was made of goat skin, and it was stitched together. They were these big, long pieces of leather that they would string with a rope, and they were heavy.

You know, the Apostle Paul was not a weak man. You know, the Apostle Paul was slinging leather around all the time. He was likely a very strong, very powerful man in that sense. But as often happens, as speakers or writers, we draw analogies from the things that we have experience with. And in this case, this is what Paul had experience with. 2 Corinthians 5. 2 Corinthians 5 and verse 1 says, Paul uses this concept of a tent. The Greek term here is skein to describe this physical body that we're in at this time.

And interestingly, the word skein is one of the root words for the word tabernacle, which is skinacobia. Okay. In Feast of Tabernacles, the other root is pegnemae, which means to pitch or to set up. So, in Greek, the Feast of Tabernacles is literally the Feast of Pitching or Setting Up Tents. That's the general concept in Greek. The Feast of Pitching or Setting Up Tents. The booths which the Israelites stayed, or the booths in which we have symbolically stayed this week, are temporary. They're designed to be set up and torn down, so to speak.

They're not permanent. Tonight or tomorrow, we will leave our accommodations. Someone will come in. They will rapidly clean it. They'll do all the laundry. They'll reset the beds. And somebody else will come in behind us and stay for a beautiful week in Lake June, Alaska. Right? Our presence in that place was temporary. And this temporary nature, this presence of this kind of temporary dwelling, is integral to the symbolism of this transition and the importance of this eighth day going forward.

As we transition from that Feast of Tabernacles, which ended yesterday, to the eighth day of God's plan for mankind, we see a transition from physical to spiritual, from temporary to permanent, from corruptible to incorruptible. Right? We see the fulfillment, so to speak, of God's plan for mankind as we observe these days. Let's go just a couple pages over here to 1 Corinthians 15. 1 Corinthians 15. 1 Corinthians 15. We're going to pick it up in verse 42. 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 42. We'll see this general concept of this shift.

Verse 42 of 1 Corinthians 15 says, So also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown in corruption. It's sown in decay, in rot, in temporariness. But it's raised in incorruption. It is sown in dishonor. It is raised in glory. It's sown in weakness, and it's raised in power. It's sown a natural body, and it's raised a spiritual body. Paul says there is a natural body, there's a spiritual body, and so it is written, the first man, Adam, became a living being. The last man, Adam, or the last Adam, became a life-giving spirit. Verse 46. Note the way that God set this up. The spiritual is not first, but the natural, and afterward the spiritual. The first man was of the earth, made of dust. The second man is the Lord from heaven, of course, referring Christ. As was the man of dust, so also are those who are made of dust, and as is the heavenly man. So also are those who are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly man. Paul tells the brethren in Corinth that this life is temporary. This body is planted, or sown, we might say, in corruptibility, but it is raised in incorruption. The resurrection, first resurrection, it's raised in incorruption. Right? We see these aspects built in. It's raised a spiritual body. Quick show of hands. How many of you would love to live forever? You should see everybody's hands, right? Now keep your hands up if you would love to live forever in a corruptible body.

Yeah, every hand went down. Oh, sorry, put mine down, too. Every hand goes down, because we realize immortality in a corruptible body is terrible. Can you imagine telling somebody as you're hobbling out? Yeah, I blew my knees out 15,000 years ago. I've been hobbling ever since.

There's a natural body which is corruptible and breaks down and stops working like it should.

And there's an incredible spiritual body that we see that God has processed, because we desire that incorruptible body that we should be like Him, that we should be like Him. That spiritual body doesn't come first. The natural does, and afterward, the spiritual. God purposed that man exist physically, temporally, corruptably, in this earthly tent before he raises them a spirit being. And you know, it's amazing humankind and the way we operate. Despite this very purposeful design, man has spent thousands of years of trying to figure out how to postpone death. There were whole expeditions to go find the fountain of youth. The whole expeditions finance ships of people traveling across the world, dying, looking for a fabled fountain of youth. Society is focused on looking young, being young, remaining young, doing everything humanly possible to postpone aging. I don't know if you're actually aware of this or not. Small tidbit if you're not.

In the early part of 2021, Jeff Bezos, who is loaded, right? Absolutely loaded, guy that started Amazon and some other stuff, became a substantial investor in a tech startup called Altus Labs. A-L-T-O-S, Labs, and they're out of Silicon Valley. Altus Labs is one of a number of startups that are working on determining how to rejuvenate human cells, aka stop aging. Okay, that's their work. That's what they're working on doing. He actually sold, in July of this past year, Jeff Bezos sold 1.25 million shares of Amazon stock, valued around $305.2 million, and reinvested those funds in Altus Labs. Why would Jeff Bezos want to be immortal? Why would he want to live forever?

Because when your bank account has that many zeros, you can't spend it all in one lifetime.

You can't. You can't. And I'm sure there's other reasons, too. But these technologies that Altus Labs is working on and they're deploying, they're known collectively as Fountain of Youth technology. Right? Humans have spent money and effort to try to figure out how to thwart this corruptible existence that we are in, and they are fighting a losing battle. They're fighting a losing battle. This body is not designed to last. It's not. Those of you who have blown out a knee or have had a hip replaced or have done any of those things or are experiencing the effects of aging, you understand this all too real. You understand that these bodies aren't made to last. We have an expiration date and we look forward to what is promised to come. But you know, it's amazing. God has a plan to remedy this fact of human existence. He has a plan. Back up to verse 20. 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 20 says, But now Christ is risen from the dead and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by man came death, by man also came the resurrection of the dead.

For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. But each one in his own order. Christ the firstfruits. Afterward those who are Christed is coming. Then comes the end when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when he puts an end to all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign until all enemies, or until he is put rather, all enemies under his feet. And verse 26, the last enemy that will be destroyed is death. The final enemy that will be destroyed is physical death itself. We've just gone through seven days of looking at the beauty and incredible aspects of the millennium. We have focused on what that is, and at the beginning of the millennium, for the firstfruits of God's plan, that change has already taken place. Right? The very beginning of things, that change has already taken place. Spirit beings working with Christ during that millennial period. But for physical man, that life cycle, that cycle of birth and death, is going to continue through that 1000 year period. And despite all the prosperity, despite all the restoration, despite all the incredible things that we read about in the book of Isaiah that are going to take place during that time, mankind is going to have the opportunity to see that the removal of Satan, the word of God going out as the waters cover the sea, a restored earth, healed waters, it's not enough. Because death still exists. It's still there. That last enemy has not yet been conquered.

God's intent for eternity was not to have physical life going on at infinitum, the cycle of life and death just occurring forever and ever and ever and ever. Go to verse 50. Verse 50 of 1 Corinthians 15 says, Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, Paul here says, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. In a moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet, we see that description for those that are firstfruits, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible has put on incorruption and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your sting, O Hades, where is your victory?

So we see that change for the firstfruits of God in the very beginning part of the millennium, but we have at the very end of the millennium a change that is going to be taking place in many, many more. God's plan was never intended to only work with one small group of people. God's plan was for all of mankind. Everyone who would hear His Word, who would change, who would repent and come to Him in covenant. You know, this day that we're here to keep today, in some capacity, is as though we're standing on the precipice of eternity.

You know, it's very similar in a way to how Moses was kind of given the opportunity to climb Mount Nebo and look out over the Promised Land and see what was promised.

That's the way it is with us on the eighth day. We have a chance to stand on this edge and look out over all that we've been provided on a description of eternity.

There's not a lot there. There's not a lot up there as to exactly what that's going to look like, but there are a few things. And I'd like to kind of take just the last little bit of this to look at some of those things, because those are those promises. That is that fulfillment that we see in many ways. Let's go to Revelation 21.

Revelation 21 will fast forward, so to speak, to the fulfillment of that plan, kind of as we get clear of this physical existence that is portrayed by the millennial period. We start to get into this time that is represented by the eighth day. Revelation 21, you know, judgment is taking place, and I'll go easy on it if Mr. Van Ozzel is going into that piece or not today, so I'll try not to stomp all over that. But we see these incredible descriptions in Revelation 21. Revelation 21 in verse 1. Revelation 21 in verse 1, it says, Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more seed. And then I, John, saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God, the dwelling place of God, is with men.

And he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people. God himself will be with them and be their God, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. There shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying, nor shall there be pain for the former things, the things so rooted in corruptibility, will have passed away. The plan of God accounts for the removal of death, for the removal of that very thing which makes us physical and makes us temporary. As was pointed out earlier this week, death is the great equalizer, right? It doesn't matter if you're rich, it doesn't matter if you're poor, it doesn't matter if you're famous or if you're unknown. Powerful, weak, death comes for everybody, right? And we all end up heading in that direction. But the time that's symbolized by this eighth day, as we come into this point of judgment, as we come into the end of this plan of God, and we see a time after this millennial period when death no longer has sting, where it no longer has victory, a time in which God dwells in tabernacles with his people, when he will wipe the tears from their eyes, removing one of those significant causes of sorrow that we experience in this life in the death of loved ones. God has a plan to remove the temporary nature of this life and to transition us from temporary to permanence. Verse 9, then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls filled with the seven last plagues came to me and talked with me and saying, Come, I will show you the bride, the lamb's wife. And he carried me away in spirit to a great and high mountain, showed me the great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, having the glory of God. Her light was like a most precious stone, like a jasper stone, clear as crystal. Also, she had a great and high wall with twelve gates and twelve angels at the gates, names written on them, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel. Three gates on the east, three on the north, three on the south, three on the west. And a wall of the city had twelve foundation, and on the plains of the twelve castles of the lamb. And he, who talked with me, had told me to measure the city, its gates, and its wall.

Note the description here in verse 16. The city is laid out as a square. Its length is as great as its breadth. He measured with the reed twelve thousand furlongs. You're going, What's a furlong? And we'll get there. Twelve thousand furlongs. Its length, its breadth is high, equal. Then he measured its wall, 144 cubits, according to the measure of a man that is of an angel. The word that's used for measurement here in furlong is the Greek word stadia, which is roughly a furlong, which is about one eighth of a Roman mile, which means that if we run all the math in the background and let it do its thing, its length, its height is 12,000 stadia, meaning that 12,000, 12,000, 12,000. Okay? So a cube in this case. 12,000 stadia is approximately 1,381 miles.

1,381 miles. For a bit of perspective, I tried to find a city in the United States. Now mind you, the New Jerusalem is likely not landing here in the United States.

And that location is El Paso, Texas. Anybody from around El Paso? Okay. That's a hall. That is an incredibly long drive. In fact, it's 21 hours if you could just go straight. If you could just go straight, it would be 21 hours drive to get from here to there. We can go ahead and put the slide up there to give you perspective here. Corner to corner is 1,381. This is a footprint, right? This is unreal, you guys. This is incredible. To think that driving from El Paso to Lake June, Alaska, one side of the city is a 21-hour drive. Mark Graham, we're going to be flying. It's going to be so much faster to get from place to place, right? But imagine going from El Paso to the upper corner near Hudson Bay. Right? That is 2,672 miles. And then this doesn't even tell the whole story because it goes that same distance straight into what we call the heavens today. It goes straight upward from there. There is a Carmen line which is in space today, and it's about 62 miles above the Earth's surface. And we consider that space. About 62 miles up, we call that space, basically, once you cross that Carmen line. For those of you that maybe sat on the porch this week or sat in your hot tub at your rental and looked up at the sky, if you see those train of Starlink satellites going by, you know they're Starlink because they're all in a line. You see them all going by? Those are at about 300 miles up. This is 1,380 miles up. That's higher than medium orbit satellites. So if the new heavens and new earth were to be remade in the current, you know, place where we are, the new Jerusalem would be firmly in space. Now it likely won't be. It's likely not going to be, but it's incredible to consider. It's incredible to consider the beauty that's contained within it, the gold, the precious stones, the pearls. In fact, for our human minds, it's almost impossible to fathom. It's almost impossible to fathom. Difficult for our minds to process, but I can assure you of one thing. It will be the most beautiful thing you have ever laid your eyes on. And it has to be, because within it will reside God the Father and His glory. It has to be the most incredible thing that we've seen. Skip down to verse 22. It says, But I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. The city had no need of the sun or the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it.

The Lamb is its light, and the nations of those who are saved shall walk in its light. The kings of the earth bring their glory and their honor into it. Its gates shall not be shut at all by day, but there shall be no night there. And they shall bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it. But there shall be no, by no means, rather, enter into it anything that defiles or causes an abomination or alive, and only those who are written in the Lamb's book of life. I mean, can you imagine this? And I don't mean in a rhetorical sense. I want you to stop for a minute and visualize this. Think about this. Consider it. Taste and see in that sense that God is good, that these are the promises that we see. Visualize the coming of the city to this earth, or the new earth, rather. A city where there's no need for light, because the glory of God will fill it from corner to corner with light. No night, the light of God's glory being there and illuminating it. Imagine the light bouncing off of and reflecting off of all that gold and precious stones and pearls reflecting and glinting and glittering throughout all 2,633,789,341 cubic miles of the New Jerusalem. It's incredible. It's truly incredible. And brethren, this is the promise.

This is the promise. When we read what the people in Hebrews 11 were promised and what they were waiting for and the things that they endured and what they looked forward to, to be able to endure those things, this is the promise. This is what God has given them and promised them that there would be a new heaven and a new earth. That they would dwell with the Father and they would dwell with Christ. That those former things had passed away and that all things would be made new. They would be raised to incorruptibility, no longer subject to decay. As a part of the resurrection of the firstfruits at the return of Christ, becoming part of God's family, this New Jerusalem, according to the record of the Book of Life, but not just them. Not just them.

When we get to the eighth day, we commemorate the Great White Throne Judgment. We commemorate the aspect of God's plan, this general resurrection in which all of the dead who have ever lived stand before God with the Scripture opened and the Book of Life opened. Turn over quickly to Revelation 20, verse 11. It says, Then I saw a great white throne in him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away, and there was found no place for them. I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. The dead were judged according to their works by the things which were written in the books. The sea gave up the dead who were in it. Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each one according to his works. Then Death and Hades were cast into the Lake of Fire. This is the second death, and anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the Lake of Fire. God is going to be adding brothers and sisters. God is going to be working to bring his children home. His creation home. Verse John 3 and verse 16 tells us that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him will not perish, but will have everlasting life. Brethren, this is the fulfillment of that love.

This is the fulfillment of that love, bringing his children home. For the last 6,000 years, humanity has just been passing through. We've been here, temporary in these earthly tents, subject to the aches and the pains of this life, to corruption and to decay. The eighth day helps represent a time in which we see a transition in God's plan. We move from physical, temporal human life to eternal life in the God family, not just for those whom God is called now, but for those whom he will work with and call going forward and those he has worked with and had opportunity to call from other times as well. We see that death is done away. All things are made new. No longer will mankind be so journeying in the desert, so to speak. No longer will they spend their lives in uncertainty of their purpose or their reason for existence. The promise will be fulfilled and their God will be here. Their God will be here. They'll be standing before him with the same opportunity that's been offered to us as firstfruits in his plan today. They'll have the opportunity to dwell with him for eternity. Let's go to Revelation 22 here to close. Revelation 22 in verse 1. Revelation 22 in verse 1 says, And they shall reign forever and ever.