Sermon Tone Analysis

The Glory of God in His Glorious Church

As we saw last week, is a picture of eternity as it begins, and the fulfillment of God’s purpose in creating a people for His name.

The Church is pictured in two ways, as the Bride, the Wife of the Lamb, and as a City, the Holy City Jerusalem.

The Bride is described as adorned for her husband ().

The City is described as having the glory of God ().

What we see here is the glory of God in His glorious Church.

We don’t think of the Church as being very glorious, do we?

A pastor friend recently said that the Church is flawed, finite, and finicky.

Virtually every New Testament letter addresses issues of sin within the Church.

But we need to remember three things.

Paul described religion in the last days this way:

We know that these are religious people because they have an appearance of godliness; another way to put that would be that they have a godly form or structure.

But they deny the power of godliness.

What’s the power of godliness?

It’s the power that makes people lovers of God and others rather than self; lovers of generosity instead of lovers of money; humble instead of proud; kind instead of arrogant; peaceful instead of abusive; cooperative instead of disobedient; grateful instead of ungrateful; holy instead of unholy; affectionate instead of heartless; eager for unity rather than unappeasable; supportive instead of slanderous; self-controlled instead of out of control; gentle instead of brutal; loving what is good instead of hating what is good; loyal instead of treacherous; reasoned instead of reckless; modest instead of conceited; lovers of God rather than lovers of pleasure.

In short, the power of godliness is the power of God to make us like His Son.

First, the Church is not now what it is to become.

Second, the Church will become what it becomes by Christ’s power, not our efforts.

Third, once the Church has become what Jesus is making it, it will never go back to what it was.

Why ar

The Church is pictured as the Bride of Jesus Christ, the Wife of the Lamb of God.

We see this throughout the Bible.

For instance, says,

says,

And in the New Testament the apostle Paul writes in ,

The Church is the Object of Christ’s Affections

This is clear, isn’t it?

That’s why the Church is compared to a wife and a bride.

says that Jesus died for His Bride, giving His life to sanctify and cleanse her, in order to make her glorious, eternal, holy, and perfect.

He will not fail.

He will succeed.

He will not give up.

He will finish what He started.

We see the perfection of His work in .

The Church is described as having perfect and wonderful intimacy with the Lord; she is His Bride, His Wife.

We will have perfect unity with the Lord Jesus Christ.

We will have perfect and eternal communion with Him.

Each Christian will be made to be completely like Jesus Christ in His character, His holiness, His sinlessness.

The united community of His people – the Church – will know Him and be like Him and bear His glory.

The Church is also described as the Holy City Jerusalem, a perfect community, living in the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control.

We will have perfect unity with all believers.

That eternal Community of Believers will be comprised of all those who are in Christ, regardless of what they were in this life.

This is spiritually true today, true by God’s declaration, but He will make it literally true, practically true.

Consider the description given of the Church in .

She is described as the holy city Jerusalem, a perfect community of believers.

Jerusalem is the place where God directed His temple to be built; His people were to be centered around His presence.

Jerusalem is where the Savior suffered and died, where He was buried, and where He rose from the dead.

Of all the cities on the face of the earth, Jerusalem is utterly unique as the one place God chose to be the public stage of His relationship with His people.

The Church is described as Jerusalem because of that spiritual intimacy with God, and because the Church is a perfectly united spiritual people.

As says, the Church is spiritual Israel.

As says, the Church is formed of Jews and Gentiles alike; Christ’s purpose was to form one new people from Jews and Gentiles.

The Church has a Divine Origin

She comes down out of heaven from God.

In fact, this phrase is given twice, in , .

Why repeat it?

Because John is not merely describing an event, but an ongoing reality.

When God created the heavens and the earth, He rested from His creative work on the 7th day.

He will never cease giving life and existence to the Church.

The Bible regularly refers to the people of God as His Wife or Bride:

Because it is a picture of the Church’s divine origin.

In Jesus promised to build His Church, and has done so faithfully since Pentecost.

5 For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called.

The Church is not a human organization, but the Body of Christ on earth.

19 And I will betroth you to me forever.

I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy.

20 I will betroth you to me in faithfulness.

And you shall know the Lord.

The Church is not self-governed, but governed by Jesus Christ, the Head of the Church.

Perhaps most significantly,

The Church is not self-powered, but is empowered by the Holy Spirit who dwells within her.

The Church is not self-defined, but is defined by the Lord Jesus in the Scriptures.

25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

The Church is not self-defined, but is defined by the Lord Jesus in the Scriptures.

It’s common to hear so-called experts and theologians insist that the Church must change to suit the times, or fade into obscurity.

That claim is utter nonsense; in fact, the history of the Church shows that her weakest times have been when she compromised the truth, and accommodated the spirit of the age.

It’s common to hear so-called experts and theologians insist that the Church must change to suit the times, or fade into obscurity.

That claim is utter nonsense; in fact, the history of the Church shows that her weakest times have been when she compromised the truth, and accommodated the spirit of the age.

The Church has a divine origin and continues to thrive as she lives in faith and obedience to her Lord.

The Church has a divine origin and continues to thrive as she lives in faith and obedience to her Lord.

The Church has the Glory of God

This is clearly stated in , and is really described in glorious terms in the rest of the chapter.

Scripture speaks about the glory of God coming and settling in the old tabernacle, and the temple.

It speaks of the glory of God departing from the temple because of Israel’s idolatry.

But the Church will have the glory of God within her, because each and every believer will have been glorified, made perfectly like the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Church is the joining of all those glorified believers in Christ.

The Church is the Totality of God’s People

Her gates are described as bearing the names of the twelve tribes of Israel.

Her foundations are described as bearing the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.

This tells us that the Church is comprised of both spiritual Israel and the historical Church.

God doesn’t have multiple peoples and multiple heavens.

Jesus said in ,

There is only one people of God, and it consists of those who have trusted and obeyed Him as God.

The Church is spiritual Israel, as we see in .

says that Christ's purpose was to form Jews and Gentiles into one new kind of man.

The new city Jerusalem is a picture of that eternal unity.

We will be glorious by a constant infusion of life from the Spirit of God.

Jesus told His disciples that He would build His church:

How do you portray the glory of the invisible God?

 Simon Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” 17 And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah!

For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.

18 And I tell you, you are Peter (lit., a stone), and on this rock (bedrock) I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it."