Will you take your Bibles and turn to Mark chapter 16. We will be looking at the very last portion of Mark's gospel under the heading, "The Preservation of Divine Revelation." And I'm sure you will agree with me that given the depraved world in which we live, as we look at all of the blasphemous ideologies, like the whole woke system and so forth, as we look at all of that, isn't it wonderful that we can find refuge in the Word of God and to allow our Lord to speak to us and encourage our hearts.

Mark stated that the purpose of his gospel, in chapter one and verse one, is this, "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus, Christ, the Son of God." And ultimately this is what he proves throughout his gospel. And he does this in a very unique, succinct, staccato style. And ultimately what he tells us, with such clarity under the inspiration of the Scripture, is that indeed Jesus of Nazareth was the promised Messiah of Old Testament prophecy; that he was indeed the suffering Savior, that he was the Son of God and his resurrection, which was witnessed by numerous eyewitnesses, puts a capstone on that glorious reality. The response of his followers was one of wonder, one of awe, one of worship, and that should be our response as well, and we see this in the final verse of Mark's gospel, where he describes the reaction of the women when they saw the empty tomb.

Notice verse eight of chapter 16, "They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid." Indeed, they were overwhelmed by what they had just witnessed. But I would submit to you that verse eight is, in fact, the last verse of Mark's gospel, even though in your Bibles, you will see verses nine through 20 continuing on. And you will notice that they are in brackets. And what we are going to see is that this is what scholars called the longer ending of Mark. And there is almost universal agreement that this was not part of the original divinely inspired text, but this was added at a later date. I might add that the same can be said of John seven, verses 53 through verse 11 of chapter eight. You will recall that's the story of of the woman caught in adultery, and Jesus stoops and he writes something in the sand, "He is who is without sin, cast the first stone." That also is highly unlikely that that was part of the original inspired text.

But you will notice brackets at the beginning of this last section in verses nine through 20. Unless you have a King James version or a New King James Version, then you will have no distinction between verse eight and verse nine, because those translations are based on a medieval text, a later text. But since then, since they were translated earlier manuscripts, in other words, more ancient manuscripts have been discovered. So the 20th century NAS, or the NAS update, or the 21st century ESV, NIV, etc, are all based on those earlier manuscripts that omit verses nine through 20, and some late manuscripts even contain a shorter ending. You may see that in italics at the very end of verse 20, but some translations even will put that at the end of verse eight. Nevertheless, let me read this to you, and I want to explain these things and give you great encouragement that the Bible that you have in your hand is an accurate translation of the original autographs. Let me read the passage now.

"[After He had risen early on the first day of the week, He first appeared to Mary Magdalene, from whom He had cast out seven demons. She went and reported to those who had been with Him, while they were mourning and weeping. When they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they refused to believe it. After that, He appeared in a different form to two of them while they were walking along on their way to the country. They went away and reported it to others, but they did not believe them either. Afterward, He appeared to the 11 themselves as they were reclining at the table, and He reproached them for their unbelief and hardness of heart because they had not believed. Those who had seen Him after He had risen, and He said to them, 'Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned. These signs will accompany those who have believed in my name. They will cast out demons, they will speak with new tongues; they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.' So then, when the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God, and they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the word by the signs that followed.] And then you will notice even another ending that was added, [And they promptly reported all these instructions to Peter and his companions. And after that, Jesus himself sent out through them, from east to west, the sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation.]

I recently heard a critic of the Bible, and there are many, who essentially said, and this is a bit of a paraphrase, there is no evidence that Mark's gospel is authentic. Even conservative scholars agree that verses nine through 20 of chapter 16 were written by some unknown scribe. So how can you trust your Bible? It's a good question. I want you to be able to answer that very clearly by the end of this time this morning. It's a great question, and today, I will give you reasons to know with absolute certainty that the Bible you have is indeed an accurate translation of the original autographs, assuming it is a reputable translation based on formal equivalency, which is an actual translation, not a paraphrase. Formal equivalence is something that is a term that scholars use. It speaks of a word for word rendering of the original language and whatever language the reader needs, it's translated into that. And so every effort is made to make sure that both the word order and the sentence structure are consistent with the original Hebrew and the Greek. I will also explain to you why verses nine through 20 is believed to be a later addition and not the original ending of the gospel of Mark and should therefore never be used as a basis for doctrine or for practice, as unfortunately, some people do.

But more importantly, than all of this technical textual criticism stuff that you are about to hear, and I hope I won't make it too boring for you, because it is important, most importantly, I want to stir your affections for the word of God, and the God of the word. You know, what we have in our hands and what I preach from every Sunday morning is the greatest treasure we have on Earth. It is the Word of the living God. Do you realize it's banned in 52 countries around the world, and it's increasingly mocked here in the United States, because what is contained in the Word of God is contrary to the Neo-Marxist socialist agenda that's being perpetrated upon our culture. In fact, in North Korea, Afghanistan and Somalia, if you own a Bible, you can be killed. I remember when I was training pastors in Siberia, I got to know them. In fact, one of them and his dear wife were in my home a few weeks ago. They were able to come over and visit. I remember them talking about how precious it is to have the Bible. In fact, in that culture, you will never set your Bible on the floor, and it will always be on top of every stack of books. That's how they treasure it. And every church that I went to to minister had people, in fact, the majority of the people who had had grandparents that were killed by the communists because they owned a Bible and because they were Christians.

In fact, I remember on a number of occasions we'd be driving along in the van, and they would stop, and they would say, you see that block wall out there in the woods, and you could see through the trees, yeah, and see a block wall. And in most cases, they were about 20 feet long and about seven or eight feet high. And they said, that's where they would stand Christians up and shoot them, and they would describe family members that they knew that were killed there because of their faith. This is a treasure dear friends of inestimable worth. When the moderator of the Church of Scotland handed a Bible to the new monarch in Britain's coronation service, he said, "The Bible is the most valuable thing that this world affords. Here is wisdom. This is the royal law. These are the lively oracles of God." In the words, those same words are echoed in by the King James translators many years ago, who wrote this in 1611 they said, quote, "God's sacred word is that inestimable treasure that excelth all the riches of the earth."

Now, sadly, in one study by the state of theology, it's called a state of theology study in 2022 they said that "For the first time in history, a majority of Americans, 53%, say the Bible, like all sacred writings, contains helpful accounts of ancient myths, but is not literally true. And 40%, the highest percentage yet, say modern science disproves the Bible." The study goes on to say that "A growing percentage, up to a high of 32%, says God is unconcerned with their day-to-day decisions, and three in five, or 60%, say religious belief is a matter of personal opinion, not objective truth." Is it any wonder we are enduring the things that we see in our culture today? Because, dear friends, once you deny the objective truth of Scripture, you're on a slippery slope to deny all objective truth. And we see that even in the objective truth of biological gender, which is now produced as transgender insanity, most people couldn't care less what God's Word says. Frankly, even many people that go to church every Sunday really don't care what it says. They really don't know what it says. It has no impact on how they live. And sadly for those people, unless they repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, they will perish in their sins and in the solitary confinement of an eternal hell, they will blaspheme the God that is judging them as a consequence of their arrogant dismissal and rejection of Christ and His Word.

Now many people are offended even with the phrase "the word of God." I remember in my doctoral studies, one of the things we would have to do is write position papers, and then we would have to present them in a group of our peers and a panel of professors in the back, and I remember being raked over the coals by one professor from University of Aberdeen, because I said on several occasions the phrase "the Word of God." He says, "You can't use that in scholarly papers. You don't know that that's the word of God. How do you know that's the word of God?" And we talked about that a little bit, but I could tell I was going nowhere with him. And he said, "You can call it the sacred writings, you can call it the Holy Scriptures, you can call it the Bible, but you can't call it the word of God, or you will lose all credibility." And obviously I have disregarded his advice. Folks, I don't care about person credibility in the eyes of man, what I do care about is personal integrity in the eyes of the Lord, because I am his spokesperson. I have nothing to say other than what he has said in his word. And my mind always goes back to Second Timothy three, beginning in verse 16, "All Scripture is inspired..." literally breathed out, "...by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His Kingdom, preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. But you, be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry."

Dear friends, I hope you join me in treasuring this book. I believe with all of my heart that it is indeed the inspired, inerrant, infallible, authoritative, all sufficient word of the living God. Otherwise I would have not dedicated my life to studying it, to learning it and explaining it and applying it to you and others, most of my adult life. Like no other document, God has revealed himself and his plan of redemption in his word. And what's fascinating is that he has done this by using 40 authors who wrote over a course of 1500 years from three different continents in three different languages, primarily Hebrew and Greek. There's only two passages in Aramaic. And as a result of this, we have a collection of 66 documents gathered into two testaments, 39 books in the Old, 27 in the New. And it contains 63,779 cross references; references that speak of similar themes or words or events or or people. And there's varying numbers here, but some say there are 1817 prophecies in the Bible, and about 800 of them have been fulfilled. Precisely no other book can even come close to making that claim. In fact, over 300 of them were fulfilled at Christ's first coming. There are five recurring motifs that are constantly emphasized in Scripture, and you can see these if you have a MacArthur Study Bible. At the very beginning of that particular Bible, you will see: the revelation of the character of God, the revelation of the divine judgment for sin and disobedience, the revelation of divine blessing for faith and obedience, the revelation of the Lord's savior and sacrifice for sin, and the revelation of the kingdom and glory of the Lord's savior. And you will see these themes emphasized over and over again, overlapping in virtually every passage of scripture. We have the canon of Scripture, and the way we received that, there were really three tests of canonicity. The first test was that the passage that would be, or the book that would be included in the canon, had to have been written by a recognized prophet or apostle or one of their close associates. Secondly, what was written could not disagree or contradict previous scripture. And then, thirdly, there had to be a general consensus by the church that it was an inspired book, and there were councils of theologians that would meet to determine this. But what is really fascinating, and what I want to dwell on much of our time this morning, is the miracle of God's preservation of his divine revelation down through the ages.

Now remember, prior to the invention of the printing press, which was about 1450 ad, biblical manuscripts were meticulously hand copied by scribes, and of course, that made the remote possibility, but certainly the possibility of error or alterations possible or additions. And it is believed that this particular section of scripture is a scribal addition to compensate for Mark's rather abrupt ending in verse eight. Now, scribes originally copied the original autographs by hand. Imagine that. And they wrote them on a papyrus scroll - papyrus was basically ancient paper made from a plant. And it's fascinating, historians tell us that the scribes that copied the Hebrew Old Testament would write one letter and then go take a bath, and then they would come back and write another letter and take a bath. And they would do this until every letter of divine revelation had been copied. They would even clean their writing instrument and wash their entire body when writing the most holy name of God, Yahweh. They would do this every time they wrote it. So you get an idea of the sacred nature of the holy scriptures and how they perceived what they had what they were copying, that this was the word of the living God. They treated it with utmost reverence, profound importance. You know, I have to tell you that I think of this every time I study the word of God, especially when I'm in the original languages; every time I exposit it. Second Timothy 21:5 says that we are to, "Be diligent to present ourselves approved by God as a workman that does not need to be ashamed accurately handling the word of truth."

Now, with respect to the preservation of these ancient manuscripts, I want you to understand that there is no other, there are no other manuscripts that even come close to what we have in terms of ancient manuscripts of the Bible. Some manuscripts that we have are only 25 to 50 years removed from the original autographs. There are 5600 ancient Greek manuscripts of the New Testament, including everything from small fragments of papyri to complete codices containing all 27 books. Codices - a codex - was a later on was a bound leather volume, okay? Some manuscripts date back to the second into the third century. One fragment, for example, from a papyrus codex of the Gospel of John - it's called P 52; it's about the size of a credit card, I've seen it in pictures. I haven't been there to actually witness it, but it's got a like a plexiglass, and you can see on either side of it, but it contains parts of seven lines of John 18:31 through 32 on one side, and parts of seven lines of verses, 37 through 38 on the back. And it's dated about AD 100 maybe to 150. Think about that, I mean, the apostle John wrote the book of Revelation somewhere between 94 and 96 ad. There are numerous other papyri manuscripts containing verses in books of the New Testament that have been collected, some as far back as 175 ad. There are over 350 copies of the Bible in Syriac, dating back to the two hundreds. There are 8000 copies of the New Testament in Latin - that's called the Vulgate - and they date back to 382 to about 405 ad. And it's astounding to think that 1000s, all of these 1000s of copies of the original autographs survived the vicious persecution of Christians during the Second and the Third centuries. Two of the most prominent codices are Codex Sinaiticus. It was written about 350 ad. It's probably the earliest known manuscript of the Bible. And then Codex Vaticanus, that contains the Greek Old Testament, the Greek New Testament, it's probably written, they believe, around 325 ad. And by the way, both of those end Mark's gospel with chapter eight. Nine through 20 are not there. And you will recall when Constantine came into power, along with his mother, who came into power, Helena, who, by the way, was responsible for the construction and the beautification of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, a number of us had been there before, as well as the church of Ileana on the Mount of Olives, which were basically the site of Christ's birth and Christ's ascension, respectively. But during that time, Constantine obviously allowed Christianity to flourish, rather than it being outlawed. And in 331 he commissioned 50 bibles to be written and prepared by Eusebius of Caesarea, and they were made for the use of the Bishop of Constantinople. And the growing number of churches that were popping up in that new city Constantinople, it's Istanbul today, and I was just there not too long ago, a city of 25 million. A number of you with me, but it is certainly not a Christian country anymore. It's very Muslim. But it is believed that Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus are possible surviving examples of these Bibles, and because of Constantine, 1000s more manuscripts were copied and written and disseminated. And Constantine, you may recall, called for a council of Christian theologians. He called them together to refute different heresies, especially Arianism in that day, and establish orthodox doctrines. And they did this in a place called Nicaea. You've heard of the Council of Nicaea. This was in 325, ad. Nicaea is a town in northwestern Turkey, today it's called Iznik. It's just a kind of southeast of Constantinople or Istanbul today. And those pastors and theologians came together in this council, and they were called ante, maybe you've heard of ante-Nicene fathers. Ante, "A N, T E dash Nicene" fathers, meaning they were church fathers who lived before the Council of Nicaea. So these were men who lived in the two and 300 era. And today we can read much of what they have written. There are Commentaries that contain approximately 32,000 quotes from the New Testament, enough to reconstruct the entire New Testament. And surprise, surprise, everything they wrote is consistent. There are over 19,000 quotes from the gospels that we can read from early church fathers, and they are all consistent. So whether they had Greek manuscripts, Syriac Bible, a Latin Vulgate, all of them are identical translations. And again, folks, no other ancient document even comes close to enjoying this kind of preservation. The next closest, well established ancient work is Homer's Iliad. It was written in the eighth century BC. Remember, it was an epic poem, I believe, in 24 books. It describes the Trojan War and the Greek warrior Achilles and all of that. There are only 643 surviving copies that exist today, and the oldest one is from the 13th century AD. You compare this to the some 25,000 ancient biblical manuscripts, which would also include the Latin and the Ethiopic translations, and you can see that nothing even comes close to what God has done in preserving his word.

And then we can add to that now, much more recently, the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls; the Old Testament manuscripts there that further validate the accuracy of the other ancient manuscripts of the Old Testament. These were discovered over about a 10-year period, from 1946 to 56 at the Qumran Caves on the northern shore of the Dead Sea. A number of us have been there. It's a fascinating place. And they are approximately 2000 years old, dating all the way back to the third century BC to the first century. And guess what? They all say the same thing. I mean, God has gone to supernatural lengths to preserve his word.

Now through the science of what's called "textual criticism" that analyzes and compares ancient biblical manuscripts to determine if they are indeed part of the original autographs, scholars are able to detect possible scribal errors or embellishments, and this final section of Mark's gospel is missing from the most reliable manuscripts. In fact, early church fathers like Clement of Alexandria, who lived between 150 and 250 AD and Origen who lived between 185 and 253, they were not aware of this ending. And the church historian, Eusebius of Caesarea, who lived from 265 to 340, and the Bible translator, Jerome, that lived from 347 to 420, both say that almost all of the Greek manuscripts available in their day omitted verses nine through 20.

So the question comes up, well, why was it added? Who did it? When did he do it, or whatever? We can't answer that completely, but it is assumed that because verse eight appears to be an abrupt ending to Mark's gospel, unlike the other gospels, it must be incomplete. And so when you study all of the science with textual criticism, you see that sometime in the early to mid-second century, some scribe or scribes had to have come to that conclusion, and they wanted it to read more like other gospels. Because when we look closely at verses nine through 20, we see that, and we do a comparison, verse by verse comparison from the other gospels, you will see that there are undeniable parallels. Now I'm not going to bore you with all of this, but for example, if you look at verses nine through 10 of Mark 16, undeniable that they parallel John 20 and verse one, Luke eight and verse two, and John 20, verses 17 and 18. Mark 16:11, parallels Luke 24:10 through 11. Mark, 16:12 and 13, parallels Luke 24:13 and 35. So you can see that they took these verses and kind of cut and paste, shall we say, to make a little bit nicer ending.

Even the vocabulary, the style, the structure of this ending is inconsistent with what we see in the rest of Mark's gospel. For example, there's a transition here between verse eight and verse nine that seems to be a non sequitur. In other words, it doesn't fit, it doesn't logically flow from the previous statement. Let me read it for you. Verse eight says, "They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. Now, after He had risen early on the first day of the week, He first appeared to Mary Magdalene, from whom He had cast out seven demons." You can tell it just doesn't fit. In fact, if you look at, in the original language, the Greek conjunction, the word "now" implies continuity with the previous statement, but verse nine shifts the narrative to talking about Mary Magdalene. And even introducing her as if she's she's kind of a new character, a new person in this whole drama. But in fact, she was previously mentioned three times in the same context, in Mark 15:40, also in verse 47 and then in chapter 16 and verse one. You could add to this, the whole issue of diction. When you look at the diction used in these verses, you discover that there are 14 words that are used that are not found in any previous portion of Mark's gospel. You know how it is when it's like when I help my grandchildren write a paper, okay? And I want to make sure they're saying the right thing. I got to make sure I don't use language that I would use right? Otherwise the teacher going to, now, you didn't, you didn't....you don't even know what the word ubiquitous means, you know, or whatever. And so it's the same type of thing here. And there are also words that are used in ways that are totally different, and phrases that are oddly different.

And then you look at the insertion of being able to pick up venomous serpents or drink any deadly poison. I mean, that clearly lacks biblical support. I mean, where are you going to go? What's that talking about? And this basically means, dear friends, that no doctrine or Christian practice should be founded upon this section that languishes in such serious dispute. As I have said before, for example, snake handling is a bad doctrine that will always come back to bite you.

Now, concerning this added edition, John MacArthur says, quote, "Careful students who have made a serious study of the transmission of the biblical text would virtually all agree that verses nine through 20 are a gloss; that is a later uninspired scribal edition appended to the original inspired text. Indeed, those last 12 verses bear the hallmarks of an attempt to cover up a perceived imperfection. That section does not fit the style and structure of the rest of Mark, and this is also the conclusion of the church fathers in the first four centuries." Now, it would take a long time to give you all of the external and internal evidence that would discredit the authenticity of this section, I've probably already bored you to death, but if you want more of the technical information, please see me and I will give you enough to keep you busy for the next three months, okay?

Now I hope you can see beloved that the supernatural preservation of divine revelation is supernatural. I mean, it's a miracle in and of itself. No other document comes close to this, and the reason is because no other document has this value, right? I mean, who wants to preserve Homer's Iliad, right? And so many of the other things that are out there. And so I hope you can understand that you can have confidence in the veracity of Scripture because of the enormous care that went into copying the original autographs and the scholarly science of textual criticism. I have friends that are brilliant scholars, and they have devoted their life to these types of things. They can analyze and compare ancient documents to determine if the contents are of the original autographs and so on and so forth. And so all of this should bolster your confidence in the veracity of the Bible, and it's for this reason that we can say to the critic that the Bible does prove itself to be what it says to be - the inspired Word of the living God. I love Spurgeon's quote, you've probably heard it before, he put it this way, he said, "The Word of God can take care of itself and will do so if we preach it and cease defending it. See you that lion? They have caged him for his preservation. Shut him up behind iron bars to secure him from his foes. See how a band of armed men have gathered together to protect the lion. What a clatter they make with their swords and spears. These mighty men are intent upon defending a lion. O fools and slow of heart, open that door. Let the Lord of the forest come forth free. Who will dare to encounter him? What does he want with your guardian care. Let the pure gospel go forth in all its lion like majesty. And it will soon clear its own way and ease itself of its adversaries." End quote.

Folks, just think what the Word of God has done to you, how it has absolutely transformed your heart to a point that you would absolutely die for the truths of the word of God. Because through the word of God, you have come to know the God of the word.

Now let's close this morning by focusing on Mark's ending. Go back to verse eight. "They went out and fled from the tomb..." these dear women, "for trembling and astonishment had gripped them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid." This beloved, is the text the Holy Spirit inspired; this is the text that he has preserved down through the ages, and I think it is a very fitting closing after making his case that Jesus was indeed the Son of God, validated by his resurrection from the dead. What else can be said, but what he has said? It's just complete astonishment that this has happened. And like the women who fled from that tomb, trembling, overwhelmed with emotion, awestruck, amazed, trembling at the power of God, shouldn't we have the same response when we see what God has done in the resurrection from the dead? Let me ask you, what amazes you? What causes you to be just overwhelmed with a sense of awe? You know the feeling when you see things like a tornado or lightning or thunder, right? The Northern Lights, if you've been there, or if you've been in parts of the world where there's no light pollution, like I've been and up in the northern reaches of Canada and the Arctic Circle, Siberia, Africa, those places you look up in the sky. And folks, I tell you, it doesn't look anything at all like what we see. There are so many stars. It will just practically take your breath away. Now, those are things that can bring awe. Let me ask you, does the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead cause you to have that same reaction? Does it cause you to react the way those dear ladies did? Let me put it to you differently. If there is anything on earth that exceeds your awe of the death and the burial and the resurrection of Jesus Christ, there is something terribly wrong with your heart.

You know, I think of this, the resurrection, every time I'm in the presence of a corpse; we've all been there. I've been there when loved ones died, especially I remember with my sister as I held her hand as she took her last breath. I've been around other corpses many times where you touch that body, and it's cold and stiff. It is lifeless. And whenever I do that, I'm reminded of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and what that means for me and all who belong to him. I think of this every time I think of my departed loved ones that I miss so desperately. Don't we all have those? I think of this every time I think of my own departure; that there's going to be a resurrection. You know, the Bible teaches that at death the soul vacates the body. And for believers, according to First Corinthians, five, "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord," right? What an amazing thought. And we await that time, according to Philippians, 3:21, when Christ will, "transform our lowly body" and conform it into his glorious body that produces within me a sense of awe that excels the Northern Lights. In Acts 20 and verse 15, we read that there will be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and the unjust. Every human being that has ever lived is going to have a resurrection. There will be two groups resurrected, the "just" meaning those that have been justified or declared righteous by faith in Christ. They are just, and therefore they will enter into eternal glory, where there is fullness of joy forevermore. And then there will be the resurrection of the "unjust," those who place their faith in themselves or some false religious system. They will also be outfitted with a resurrected body that will withstand the torments of hell. And for those who have placed their faith in Christ, we can rejoice. And such has been the promised hope of God's people down through the ages; a hope based upon the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

In fact, Jesus said in John 14, "'Because I live, you shall live also.'" Because of his resurrection, the great terror of all terrors, that of death, has been forever vanquished for the believer. We have been released from its grip. We can actually look forward to it. I don't look forward to those things that will precede it, none of us want that, but boy, when we pass through the veil, oh my. Of course, we won't receive that resurrected body until Christ returns, but when that happens, our glorification will be complete. And that's the hope that we have in Christ. That's why Paul would say in Philippians, 1:21 "For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." First Corinthians 15, "O death where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?" I hope you anticipate the full completion of the glory that awaits you because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And I hope that stirs your heart with holy affections for all that God has given us through Christ. And when you do nothing else in life will really matter. Nothing else in life will really matter, except knowing and loving and enjoying and worshiping and serving Christ.

There's been a video that goes around, I've seen it a couple times from various people, and I didn't write it down, but it impacted me, because it was so exceedingly sad. Maybe you've seen it, it's and this is kind of a summary of what it says, life is so short that that we need to live it up. And it's essentially saying life is short, we live it and then we disappear. And it talks about how you know, after a couple of generations, no one will know that you ever even existed. They asked the question, "What do you know about your great grandfather's grandfather." Well, it's a good point. Talks about how all the things that you spend your life trying to achieve or acquire, that new car, that fancy home, that prestigious reputation, all of that will vanish at your death. And the point is, because life is short and essentially meaningless, and because you will soon vanish into the empty universe of forgotten people, you need to slow down and smell the roses. You need to essentially eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die. Because no one's going to ever remember you anyway. I'm so glad that is not what I have to tell you this morning. But you know, that's where most people live. No wonder we have such a drug problem, such an alcohol problem, such a pornography problem, and on and on it goes. "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain."

Our life dear friends, as believers, has a purpose, and that purpose is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. Beloved the only thing that matters in your life is what you do for God and his glory. Yes, the world will forget. If the Lord tarries, in three generations, certainly in four, no one will ever know any of us existed, but the Lord does, and the Lord will reward. And because of this, our heart longs for the perfection of God; of God manifested in us when we enter into his presence. And therefore we can live with that exhilarating joy of knowing what awaits us, that one day we will actually partake in the glory of God. And this will be the attitude that that rare man will have who is truly looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus, who gave himself for us. O the hope of seeing and sharing and the glory of Christ, all because of the resurrection. This is what should fill our hearts with praise, and this is why Paul would say at the close of his life, prior to his martyrdom in Romans five and verse two, "...exult in hope of the glory of God." And I pray that this will be the desire of your heart. And I pray that you will be exhilarated knowing that you will eventually stand in the presence of his glory, blameless with great joy, Amen?

May I challenge you, treasure your Bible. Treasure it more than perhaps you ever have. I'll give you kind of a corny story, but I laughed about it later on. Number of years ago, I was sitting in my office at my house. It used to be in the garage, and I had a window, and I could see out to the west, and I could tell the weather was getting extremely bad and suddenly there started to be a lot of hail. And I could hear it beating on the house, and it started to get darker and darker, and I could look out and I could see a big tornado coming my way. Nancy wasn't home, and I thought, "This is bad." And it kept getting darker. I thought the window was going to blow out, and right behind me is a little opening that you could just barely get, maybe you might squeeze two people in there, but it was a thing in the fireplace where the bricks are at a little wooden door, and that's where you could put wood for the fireplace. And I thought, I'm just going to get in there. And I had my two blue heelers at the time that many of you have been bitten by. I grabbed the dogs, and I grabbed my Bible, and I got in the little hole, and I could hear, you know, the train noise going up over me. I thought the house was gone, but it lifted up over me, and it went down, and unfortunately, it landed over in Coopertown, further and took out a number of homes. But after it was over, I thought, you know, that was just my knee jerk response, to grab my Bible.

Folks, let it be the most precious possession that you have, and may I challenge you to read it every day, even if it's a small portion. I challenge you get a good study Bible. I love The MacArthur Study Bible; I think it's the best out. Read the word of God, even if it's just a little bit every day. Meditate on it, memorize it, talk about it, and you will see how the Lord will use it to nourish your soul. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the eternal truths of your word, and my, how you have preserved your word down through the ages, so that the very things that we would say today were those things that the apostle Paul would have said, that John would have said, that Timothy would have said, that Jude would have said, that the Lord Jesus would have said. Thank you for your word. May we cherish it as we should, and for those that know nothing of what it is to be in fellowship with the living God, having been reconciled to him through saving faith in Christ, will you bring that conviction to bear upon his or her soul, that today they will repent and be saved. We thank you. We give you praise in the name of Jesus, our Savior and coming King, amen.