Rev 22:20+21, He who testifies to these things says, "Yes, I am coming quickly." Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.
	Today we come to the end of our reading and consideration of the Book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ. When we began, more than a year ago, we did so with apprehensive awe and reverence as to what God’s Word would entail. As with all our studies of God’s Word, we want only that which the Holy Spirit chooses to open up in the course of our feeding and nourishment in the Word. We were not, and should never be seeking after human interpretation and conceptions. We should ever more fully and carefully search for the Holy Spirit to make His Word life in us. 
	I know that there has been a transformation in my heart with regard to this final Book of the Bible. In the course of our time in it, I have come to love the truth of Our Lord Jesus Christ that has been shown. There are mighty messages for all the people of God in terms of our commitment to Jesus and our Love for Him at this very moment in time. What I once looked upon as a writing simply for the end of days has become a living revelation of how we are to conduct our lives in this very time period. This is no longer simply a book of what will be, it is the revelation of the Living Lord Jesus Christ in His Church today. Let us never again shelve it away as an obtuse volume with too many hard and intricate details of the after-life. It is to be fully appreciated as the message for this very instant. 
With that depth of understanding, let us now conclude our deliberation on these final verses of scripture. Rev 1:3, Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and heed the things which are written in it; for the time is near. 
	We have already dwelt upon the fact that the Church is to be longing for the imminent return of Her Bridegroom. In that reality, our lives on this earth are to characterize a faithful and holy desire to please Him in the manner in which we carry out our lives on this earth. We know that we will not be treated with anything but the anger and the abuse of this age because we do absolutely represent Him, Whom this world crucified, in its animosity against the purity and the holiness of God.
	Despite all the rage and hatred of this realm, we have been resurrected in the same power that raised Christ, Our Savior, from the grave. God has set us free from the dominion of this darkness and translated us into His kingdom in Jesus Christ. It is the Bride of Christ, that we eagerly await His return, as does all this created universe. Isa 35:1-5, The wilderness and the desert will be glad, And the Arabah will rejoice and blossom; Like the crocus It will blossom profusely And rejoice with rejoicing and shout of joy. The glory of Lebanon will be given to it, The majesty of Carmel and Sharon. They will see the glory of the Lord, The majesty of our God. Encourage the exhausted, and strengthen the feeble. Say to those with anxious heart, "Take courage, fear not. Behold, your God will come with vengeance; The recompense of God will come, But He will save you." Then the eyes of the blind will be opened, And the ears of the deaf will be unstopped. 
	We do not look for Christ to come to pay back those who have harmed us. So often, we hold forth the idea that God will make everyone who has caused us grief to suffer. Sadly, many of us blatantly hold an accounting within our minds as to those whom God needs to grind under His heels when He returns to judge the earth. But carefully read this passage. Yes, God will come with vengeance, but the whole context of this Word is that He will bring with Him gladness and rejoicing and blossoming and joy and glory and majesty and encouragement and courage and salvation and healing. 
Yes, there will be those to whom recompense and vengeance will be the order of the day, but that should not be our goal and our heart’s desire. Purity of heart and spirit requires that we rather hold forth His love and His hope to those in our lives who are in such desperate need. We are to proclaim His salvation and His glory with the prayer that the blind and the deaf will be healed by His Word of life, Jesus Christ. 
We need to be very careful with our attitude toward those who do not know Jesus. We need to treat them as we have been treated by God, in love and forgiveness and patience and humbleness of spirit. It is a vial motive, if our desire after the return of Jesus, is that of waiting for the judgment to fall upon those whom we feel deserve it. Rather, we are to manifest earnest love for the swift return of our betrothed, for His sake and for His glory. We do not seek Him to bring His fiery sword of retribution, because to do so is to miss the yearning heart of His love. We rather call for Him with the shout of joy and of rejoicing in His beauty and in His splendor and in His awesome presence.
Phil 4:4-8, Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice! Let your forbearing spirit be known to all men. The Lord is near. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, shall guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things. 
This takes a commitment on our part that has been declared throughout the Word of God. This is something that is at the core of what ails the Church today. Our society decries commitment because it means that we have to set aside our self-interests for the sake of something or someone else. Commitment means that we cannot just do those things which we want to do, but rather must choose to do those things that are required, despite our personal wishes and desires of self-interest.
The entirety of our society is based on me, me, and me. This is sadly so evident in every stratum of our worldly realm, and especially within the Church proper. There is no evident desire after the Lord with all our hearts and with all our minds and with all our beings. We rather choose to deal with Him on the basis of what we pick and choose out of His Word, mixed in with those elements of our psychological and educational stands of self-understanding. We make God fit into our pattern of fairness and lovingness as long as He meets our requirements of how God should act and react in every given situation. We choose our gray areas of morality with careful consideration of how everything is centered in me and how I feel at the moment. A big part of this is that we do not have the time for anything other than our plans and what we want to do. Currently, there seems to be very little true commitment to the Living God Almighty, setting all time aside for Him and meeting His standards of what is right and what is wrong, period! 
We are losing the commitment to Christ, the unwavering, all encompassing obligation, promise, pledge, and dedication to honor Him with all our heart and mind and being. This is described by the parable of the 10 virgins in Matt 25:10-13, "And while they were going away to make the purchase, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding feast; and the door was shut.” And later the other virgins also came, saying, 'Lord, lord, open up for us.' "But he answered and said, 'Truly I say to you, I do not know you.' "Be on the alert then, for you do not know the day nor the hour. 
We do not know when Christ will return, so we are to be on the alert at all times. We are to be utterly committed to doing everything that He asks of us so as to be prepared to honor Him. In our constant death to self, and all that that entails in our day-to-day walk with Him. We often find our self-interests overriding what it means to be utterly committed to Him. This includes being on time and prepared to worship Him each Sunday morning. This includes having ourselves and our children ready to honor Him with our family devotions and prayers. This includes reading His Word and absorbing the spiritual food that He has prepared for us. This includes giving ourselves to Him in prayer and fellowship. This includes desiring to be of complete service to all the saints. All these elements of setting aside our personal goals and ambitions and wishes and comforts and preferences and habits and laziness for the sake of His name are part of this commitment and dedication to Him! 
Many of us hold onto the idea that we do not have to make such a firm vow to God at this moment. We think that there will be time enough in the future, much like those foolish virgins without the oil in their lamps. In actuality and practicality, there is no longer time for the imprudence of this age. Rom 13:10-14, Love does no wrong to a neighbor; love therefore is the fulfillment of the law. And this do, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts. 
This is not a concept to be taken lightly and tossed away with disregard. Our time on this earth is very limited and we know not the full course of our days to live. We are to be fully settled in the fact that every moment of every day gone can never again be recovered. Each instant of our lives is precious in the sight of God and needs to be dedicated to that which is honoring to Him. James 5:7+8, Be patient, therefore, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it, until it gets the early and late rains. You too be patient; strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. 
I know that this is a very hard Word to preach in this day. It is not easy to hear that all that this world has instilled into us in our learning years and in our habits and practices of life and in our devotion to ourselves needs to be hurled from us like the garbage that it is! But that is exactly what must happen! There needs to be an upwelling, starting with us within God’s church, an upwelling after the commitment and the dedication to overcome all in this world for the sake of Jesus Christ, Alone! 
This commitment is fully part of the very table of the Lord of which we freely partake. Do we partake of it in humbleness of heart? Do we remember Whom it represents? Or, do we partake of it as a casual ritual, because it is what we have always done? More perverse than that, do we come to His table in the self-righteous arrogance that infests us with the lie that we deserve it because we are someone of value and standing in the sight of mankind? 
1 Cor 11:23-29, For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it, and said, "This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me." In the same way He took the cup also, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me." For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself, if he does not judge the body rightly. 
	This is but one area of the need for our seeking after the Holy Spirit to examine us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. We need to put our hearts before the Lord in order that He can instill in us the complete craving after being wholly and absolutely faithful and devoted to Him, Alone. We must do this in order for His life to be evidenced on this earth as He so desires it to be. We are to become those overcomers after the heart of God. We are not to look left or right or behind us, but rather proceed with all determination and passionate love forward in Christ Jesus. 
	Heb 10:36-39, For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what was promised. For yet in a very little while, He who is coming will come, and will not delay. But My righteous one shall live by faith; And if he shrinks back, My soul has no pleasure in him. But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul. Can we, individually and corporately, honor the Lord in all that we say, and do, and think? Will we give ourselves over to Him in our every behavior in the manner that puts Him first in our every stance and situation? Can we earnestly pledge ourselves to Him whole-heartedly and without reservation, knowing that it means the complete death to self that He will live forth from us? These are not rhetorical questions, just to be dismissed as unreasonable and beyond our capabilities. He has promised to help us in this course of life by His faith and His Holy Spirit and His Word of instruction and encouragement, as we have read throughout the scriptures. This is not just a futile exercise in self-determination. 
	As we are instructed by Jesus, Himself, in Rev 2:25, 'Nevertheless what you have, hold fast until I come. And we find His great promise and warning to us recorded in Rev 3:10+11, 'Because you have kept the word of My perseverance, I also will keep you from the hour of testing, that hour which is about to come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell upon the earth. 'I am coming quickly; hold fast what you have, in order that no one take your crown. 
	We are in the time when our commitment to Him is being sorely and completely tested. Let us rise to the challenge and throw off all those things which would otherwise bind our hearts and minds! Let us press on into Jesus with the singleness of heart to honor Him as we earnestly and faithfully await His triumphant and glorious return. So be it!
He who testifies to these things says, "Yes, I am coming quickly." Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.

This morning’s benediction is Ps 16:5-8. The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and my cup; Thou dost support my lot. The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places; Indeed, my heritage is beautiful to me. I will bless the Lord who has counseled me; Indeed, my mind instructs me in the night. I have set the Lord continually before me; Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Amen.