Christ in Scripture

Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, 2 Kings, 1 Chronicles, 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, Jude, Revelation.

I could do it in Spanish too, I learnt that as a kid.

66 books authored over 1500 years by over 40 authors in three languages spanning three continents. God, spirited and servant, inscribed. The word of God in the voice of man, the Bible has brought life, shone light into darkness, spoken goodness to evil. It's brought kings down, lifted the lowly, encouraged the downcast, educated the wise, corrected the curious, guided the humble, blessed the meek, frustrated the sincere, blinded the arrogant, and turned our world upside down.

Sixty-six books, one unified story that leads to Jesus. This is the Christ in Scripture project. Over the next two years, Lord willing, we're going to spend a week in every one of those sixty-six books that I said at the start of our message. We’re going to spend a week in each book, seeing how that particular book of the Bible points us to the person of Jesus Christ and to his life, death, resurrection and ascension. We've already started the project.

We started in January with the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Very easy to find Christ in the Gospels. He's on every page. Next week, we go back to the beginning of the story of the Bible in Genesis.

We'd love to encourage you to read the Bible, read the book of the Bible that we're going to be covering next Sunday before it happens so that you have an understanding of the way that that book points us to Jesus.

We would love to, as a community of faith, read the entire Bible in two years. That's an audacious project, but one that we can do because we are aiming to see Christ in Scripture. I think we're aiming to see Christ from three altitudes.

Firstly, ground level, that is to read every book of the Bible, to see every word of each book of the Bible, to study it. A word of advice, if you were planning on reading the whole Bible in two years, you have to move quickly. If you're reading Genesis in one week, it's seven chapters in each day before next Sunday. You don't have time to stop and inspect some cool passage and dig around. You have to move pretty quickly. That's the first level, ground level, to see Christ in Scripture.

The second level is a 30,000 foot view, and that is each of the 66 sermons that we will, Lord willing, preach in 25, 30, 40, sometimes 45 minutes. We're going to have one message which looks at that book of the Bible as a whole, from 30,000 feet.

And then the third altitude of the Christ in Scripture project is today, 100,000 feet view. This is looking at not one book, but the Bible as a library of books, looking at the story of the Bible as a whole. That's our project for today.

The aim of today's message is to, in 10 chapters, tell the story of the Bible, in order that this might be a message that you could come back to over the next two years, in order to place each book of the Bible within the context of the larger story.

So today, we're hovering at 100,000 feet. We're hovering over the surface of the entire Bible to see how it points us to Jesus. I'm going to try and discipline myself to do this in less than 15 minutes, which we...

don't clap, just wait till I do it and then clap. We're going to look at the story of the Bible in 10 chapters, Creation, Promise, Deliverance, Law, Land, Kings, Exile, Messiah, Church and Spirit and New Creation. But let me pray before we dive in.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, we have a daunting task before us these next two years as we seek to read cover to cover your word. We believe that you will help us in this task by your spirit.

We pray that you would reveal to us Christ in Scripture as we skim over the surface of the entire Bible right now, that you would make his presence in the words of Scripture real to us in the many places that we've come from today.

We pray you would speak to us and correct us and form us into the image of your son in Jesus name. Amen.

CHAPTER 1: CREATION (Genesis 1–11)

Chapter 1, Creation. Genesis chapters 1 to 11. The Bible presupposes in Genesis chapter 0, if you will, a triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, three persons but one being, a triune God in need of nothing.

God did not create because he needed anything, but out of the overflow of the love that God is, he created all things. Genesis 1 and 2 is the story of creation. Seven days, however you interpret those passages.

The bottom line is creator creates creation. In Genesis 1 and 2, God places human beings in the Garden of Eden as the image of God. The image of God is a 45-degree mirror.

That's what it means to be made in the image of God. On one hand, we reflect God's goodness, truth and beauty from God to the world. We care for this world under God.

And we also sum up the praises of creation and reflect that back to God. A 45-degree mirror.

Human beings, that's you and I, all of us were given the vocation to expand the Garden of Eden, to be fruitful and multiply and fill and subdue the whole earth, to bring God's blessing to the ends of the earth.

In Genesis 3, an enemy whose origin is unexplained appears. Now, the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, did God really say, you must not eat from any tree in the garden?

The woman says, yes. You will not certainly die. The serpent said to the woman, for God knows that when you eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.

Two lies at the heart of all sin. You will not certainly die and you will be like God. Adam and Eve believe the lie.

They eat the fruit of the knowledge of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And in doing so, they introduce a rupture into creation, into their relationship with God.

Genesis 1 to 11, as you read it, is the unfolding story of sin and murder and violence and envy and all bad things, rather than the blessing of God expanding its the violence of humanity. So, is all creation doomed?

Or will God act to restore all things to the way they were meant to be? That brings us to chapter 2, Promise. Genesis chapters 12 to 50.

CHAPTER 2: PROMISE (Genesis 12–50)

In Genesis 12, God chooses one man through whom to bless all nations. The Lord had said to the one man, Abram, go from your country, your people and your father's household to the land I will show you.

I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you. I will make your name great and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you and whoever curses you, I will curse and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.

God promises four things, land, nationhood, a great name and blessing. God promises Abram and Abram believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness. Abraham believed that God is faithful and God was faithful.

Abraham and his wife Sarah had Isaac, Isaac and his wife Rebecca had twins, Esau and Jacob. Jacob and his multiple wives had 12 sons, and those sons become the tribes of Israel. Jacob's name is changed to Israel.

So that at the end of the Book of Genesis, through the Joseph story, the family of Israel numbers 70 people, the patriarch, 12 sons and a certain number of wives and children. 70 people end up in Egypt by the end of Genesis.

God has begun his long-term rescue plan for humanity by choosing one man to bless all nations, which brings us to chapter 3, deliverance. This is Exodus chapters 1 to 15.

CHAPTER 3: DELIVERANCE (Exodus 1–15)

The family of Israel are in Egypt, and they start Exodus as 70 people, but God is with them, God blesses them, they are fruitful and multiply, they grow and grow and grow and grow.

But rather than the blessing of Israel flowing to the nations, Egypt becomes jealous and enslaves Israel for 430 years. God hears the cries of his people in slavery.

So God raises up a prophet called Moses, he calls to him in the wilderness from within a burning bush, and the Lord said, I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt.

I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering.

So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey. God reveals his name to Moses, Yahweh.

I am the ground of being itself, the God who is and who was and who is to come. God sends Moses to Pharaoh. Moses says to Pharaoh, let my people go.

That's what God says. And then you have this epic showdown between the gods of Egypt and Yahweh. Ten plagues, where at first Yahweh does incredible things, but the Egyptian sorcerers by their magic and demonic powers do the same things.

And so it's back and forth and back and forth until finally God shows that he is the only true God. And the Egyptian gods can't match him. The ten plagues at the start of Exodus culminate in the tenth plague, the death of the first born.

All of Egypt's animals, livestock, and humans lose their first born, apart from the Israelites. Because God makes a way for them through the death of an innocent lamb and the blood smeared over the door post.

God makes a way for the destroyer to pass over Israel. And so it's called the Passover lamb because the destroyer passed over the people of Israel. God delivers Israel from slavery in Egypt.

He leads them through the Red Sea, leads them by the pillar of cloud and by fire. I was in Greece a couple of years ago, and on top of all the car parks is the word Exodus, because it just means exit, ex-hodos, way out.

The book of Exodus is the way out. God delivers his people from slavery in Egypt through the blood of the lamb, which brings us to chapter four, law.

CHAPTER 4: LAW (Exodus 16–Deuteronomy)

This is Exodus 16 to the end of the book of Deuteronomy.

Having left Egypt, Israel enter into the wilderness on their way to the promised land. And God's plan is to dwell among his people, the people that he brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. He intends to make his own.

We read in chapter 19, God says, You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, how I carried you on eagle's wings and brought you to myself. Now, if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations, you will be my treasured possession.

Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. God intends to dwell among his people, to dwell in the middle of them. So God gives them instructions for the tabernacle.

That's this tent. And the presence of God is going to live in this tent. But there's a problem.

A holy God cannot dwell among a very unholy people. So God gives the law with all sorts of revelations of his heart for love, love of God, love of neighbour.

But also part of the law is the ritual sacrificial system so that Israel can, through the sacrifice of animals, cleanse themselves of their sin in order that a holy God might dwell among his people. This chapter ends with Deuteronomy.

Moses leads the people for 40 years in the wilderness. And finally, at the end of Deuteronomy, they get to the edge of the promised land. This is the moment they're about to enter in.

And Moses has his famous last words. He puts them before, puts before Israel two choices. If you are faithful to God, he will bless you.

You will be blessed in the country, blessed in the city, blessed in everything you do. But if you turn from God, he talks about the curses of the covenant. And he says, so choose life.

These are the two options. Choose life. And then Moses dies. Which brings us to chapter 5. Land.

CHAPTER 5: LAND (Joshua–Judges)

This is the story of Joshua and Judges.

Moses dies and Joshua takes the lead of the nation of Israel. Joshua 1 verse 6 says, Be strong and courageous, because you, Joshua, will lead these people to inherit the land I swore to their ancestors to give them. That's a key line in Joshua.

Be strong and courageous, because Joshua has a pretty hectic job to lead Israel to enter the promised land. The problem is the land is not empty. The promised land is full of wicked, pagan nations that God is calling Israel to drive out.

Now, this part of the story is pretty heavy.

When we read it, there's a lot of tough questions about violence and the fact that God condones or even commands Israel to do things, which are pretty heavy, tricky questions that we're going to get to at some point over the next two years, but not

questions without good responses, I think, and we'll see that over the next two years. Under Joshua, Israel conquer the promised land. They inhabit the land flowing with milk and honey, and they're blessed, and it's incredible for like three seconds.

And then they turn from God and become faithless. And just like God said, they are conquered by one of the surrounding nations and subjugated. And they cry out to God.

God raises up a judge to lead Israel to overthrow the conquerors, which brings them back to peace and blessing. And then they get too comfy, and then they become faithless. That cycle plays out 12 times in the Book of Judges.

This cycle of 6 times with a minor judge, 6 times with a major judge, becoming faithless, getting conquered. God raises up a judge, delivers them, they're blessed, they become faithless. This cycle over and over again.

In those days, Israel had no king. Everyone did as they saw fit. That's a common line in the Book of Judges.

So looking back on the promise that God made to Abram, Israel have made it to the land. They are a nation, they've grown and multiplied. But Abram's name is great, but they can't seem to keep the covenant. Which brings us to Chapter 6, Kings.

CHAPTER 6: KINGS (1 Samuel–1 Kings 11)

And this is where the story starts to go downhill. This is the story of one Samuel and one Kings 11.

The story was already going downhill. It's like seriously going downhill from now. The last of the judges is a prophet called Samuel.

Now Samuel was a great prophet and a great judge, but a terrible father. And as Israel, look at Samuel, he's getting old, he's about to die. The prospect of Samuel's sons coming to lead Israel is terrifying for them.

So the people of Israel come to Samuel and they say, give us a king. We want a king like all the other nations around us. And Samuel says, you don't want a king.

If you get a king, he will take your daughters as his wives. He will send your sons to war and they will die. He'll take your money.

He'll take your produce. You don't want a king. One Samuel 8, but the people refused to listen to Samuel.

No, they said, we want a king over us. Then we will be like all the other nations with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles. When Samuel heard all of the people said, he repeated it before the Lord.

The Lord answered, listen to them and give them a king. The first king of Israel was a man called Saul. And Saul started out good.

He was a good king for like three minutes. And then he seems to grow arrogant in his relationship with God. He shows a blatant disrespect for God's commands.

And so God raises up a man after his own heart, and that is the shepherd boy David. And David is great. He starts awesome.

He slays the giant Goliath. He's a musician, a poet, a king, a military leader. He's humble, he's faithful, he's handsome, the Scripture says.

That's great. But in 2 Samuel 7, God promises to bless David so much. He says, your line will never fail to have a king on the throne of Israel.

It's called the Davidic Covenant. Two chapters later, in 2 Samuel 9, David, at the peak of his kingship, says, who can I bless? Who wants a blessing? I just, God has given me so much that I just want to pour out on my kingdom. Two chapters later, we read this:

In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king's men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah, but David remained in Jerusalem. What follows is David commits adultery, he murders, and he conspires to cover it all up. He tremendously fails.

He repents. Psalm 51 is a beautiful psalm of repentance. But his life from that moment on goes downhill and downhill.

He's got family conflict, his marriages fall apart, his sons are terrible, and his story doesn't end well. The third king of Israel is David's son, Solomon. And Solomon prays for wisdom.

God listens to that prayer, and Solomon becomes the wisest human who up to that point in time had ever lived. He's a great king. Solomon, his name means peace, shalom, Solomon.

And so Solomon builds a temple for God. No longer this portable tent called the tabernacle. Solomon builds a temple with pillars and bricks and mortar for the presence of God to dwell in.

In 1 Kings 8, Solomon dedicates the temple, and he prays these words:

Will God really dwell on earth? The heavens, even the highest heaven, cannot contain you. How much less this temple I have built. Yet give attention to your servant's prayer and his plea for mercy. Lord, my God, hear the cry and the prayer that your servant is praying in your presence this day.

He starts off really good, dedicating the temple to God. But then Solomon's heart is led astray by his many, many, many, many wives to worship false gods. And in judgment, God splits the kingdom from Solomon.

The kingdom of Israel, 12 tribes, 10 of them in the north, secede and are ruled by King Jeroboam, and two tribes in the south, Judah and Benjamin, are ruled by Solomon's son, Rehoboam.

Under wicked kings, what hope to Israel have of keeping the covenant and entering its promises? Which brings us to chapter 7, Exile.

CHAPTER 7: EXILE (1 Kings 12–2 Kings)

This is 1 Kings 12 to the end of 2 Kings.

Now we have 2 train tracks of kings. We have the northern kingdom of Israel, 10 tribes, and the southern kingdom of Judah, 2 tribes.

And the book of the second half of 1 Kings and all of 2 Kings is pretty much just the train track story of the decline of the monarchy, of both the north and south.

We have a bunch of stories and then it said, someone so was king in Israel for this long, they did evil in the eyes of the Lord. Then someone so was king of Israel.

I went through last year in our Kings and Characters series and counted and graphed the trajectory of the northern and southern kingdoms, the northern kingdom is evil every single time. I think it's 17 kings. Evil, evil, evil, evil, evil.

The southern kingdom of Judah is slightly better. They go evil, evil, evil, good, good, good, evil, evil, evil, good, evil, evil, evil.

All throughout the decline of the kings, God is speaking to his people by the prophets, calling them to come back to faithfulness to him. And if they will turn back, then God will bless them.

But if they don't, well, as the prophets foretold, the Northern Kingdom of Israel is exiled by the great superpower Assyria. They are taken from their land and assimilated into the Assyrian Empire, and they're gone.

They lose all sense of ethnic, national, cultural identity. They're gone, assimilated into Assyria. Ezekiel, in chapter nine of his book, sees a vision of the glory of God in the temple, above the Ark of the Covenant, behind the curtain.

And in his vision, he sees the glory of God departing and resting on the threshold of the temple. And then he sees the glory depart. The presence of God in Israel leaves them.

The glory of God departs from Israel's midst. Very soon after that, Judah are exiled by the great superpower Babylon. They take all the best men and women and children and resources and take them to the city of Babylonia, or Babylon.

This time though, they're not assimilated into history and lost. They are kept together to keep sort of a national identity in exile. Psalm 137 says this:

By the rivers of Babylon, we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. For there on the poplars we hung our harps, for there our captors asked us for songs. Our tormentors demanded songs of joy. They said, sing us one of the songs of Zion. How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land? Israel exiled by the great superpower Assyria. Judah exiled by the great superpower Babylon.

The next superpower that comes sweeping over the ancient Near East is Persia. After Persia comes Greece. After Greece comes Rome.

Israel are in exile. They do return from exile before the end of the Old Testament, but the glory of God never returns to the temple again.

Even though they rebuild the temple, even though they're back in the land, they don't have a king because they are under the control of Rome. All the people of God have is the promise that one day God will rescue them from exile. Which brings us to Chapter 8, Messiah, the story of the Gospels.

CHAPTER 8: MESSIAH (Gospels)

The New Testament opens with the Gospel of Matthew, and these words in Matthew 1 verse 1. This is the genealogy.

Literally, the Greek word is Genesis. Kind of cool. The Old Testament and the New Testament start with Genesis.

This is the Genesis of Jesus, the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham. And what follows is a long genealogy of where Jesus comes from. And those names are familiar by now, are they not?

David and Abraham are some of the key figures in the story of Israel. Jesus is presented by the Gospel of Matthew as the fulfilment of that line. That's what Messiah means.

The Hebrew word is the same as the Greek word Christ. It means anointed one. It means chosen one, the one that the entire Old Testament points towards.

After the genealogy, Matthew strings together seven quotations of Old Testament prophecy. And he has the same line. This happened in order to fulfil what was spoken through the prophets seven times.

Seven is the number of perfection. Jesus perfectly fulfils the Old Testament. We read in Matthew 423.

Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness among the people.

News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon possessed, those having seizures and the paralysed, and he healed them.

Large crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and the region across the Jordan followed him. No one has ever seen anything like this in the history of the world. The Messiah is here.

The one who fulfils the entire story of Israel is living in Israel. He's from Nazareth. He lives in Galilee.

He moves to Jerusalem. What follows that passage is the Sermon on the Mount, the greatest speech in the history of the world, greater than Martin Luther King's I Have a Dream, the greatest teaching in the history of the world.

The four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, paint four portraits with different emphases of the one Jesus.

And every one of the gospels shows the climactic moment of the story is when Jesus, the son of God and son of man, died for the sin of the world on the cross.

And all four gospels record that Jesus rose again three days later, defeating death and inaugurating the kingdom of God. It is the climactic moment of the gospels, the death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth.

Jesus' final words on the cross were, it is finished. And in one sense, he meant the story is over. The old age of sin and death is finished.

But in another way, he meant the new story has begun. Those words were the end of the old age and the beginning of the new age. Which brings us to chapter nine. Church and Spirit. We're almost there. Acts and epistles.

CHAPTER 9: CHURCH & SPIRIT (Acts & Epistles)

In the Book of Acts, the ministry of Jesus continues through his Holy Spirit, filling his people and empowering his church. In Acts chapter two:

When the day of Pentecost came, all the believers were together in one place, suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

Peter preaches a sermon right after this, and 3,000 people respond to the good news that Jesus died and rose again and now offers forgiveness and eternal life to all who would believe. 3,000 people in one sermon. That's good preaching.

Peter and Paul and the rest of the apostles begin to spread the good news, the gospel. That's what that word means, the euangelion, the good news of the death and resurrection and reign of Jesus.

All throughout the known world, they start planting communities of faith.

Believers held together not by social status or gender or money or any of the things that human beings build their identity on, but built only on their shared allegiance to Jesus as Lord. Communities of faith pop up all across the ancient world. And this is what they look like:

They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship. There's no New Testament yet.

They devote themselves to the story that they heard, that the apostles told of the things that Jesus did. To the breaking of bread and to prayer, everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles.

All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts.

They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favour of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved. They don't have a New Testament.

And so at times they get the facts of the gospel wrong, and that leads them to act not in line with the truth of the gospel. And so the apostles write letters. We call them epistles from Romans all the way to Jude, the second last book of the Bible.

Letters written by those who saw Jesus, knew Jesus or knew very well the people who did know Jesus. They write letters to firstly, correct the story of the gospel that the church had been believing and the way that it had erred.

And secondly, to apply the correct gospel to the way that they live their lives. That's why when you read the letters, often there's sort of two halves.

Firstly, kind of theory, knowledge, facts of the gospel, and then secondly, practical application of what that means. You see it so clearly in Ephesians.

Chapters one to three is the story of the gospel, and then four to six is the application of the gospel. These are the letters that the apostles wrote.

From the day Jesus rose again, the day that the Holy Spirit came on his church, the mission of Jesus has been continuing. The kingdom of God has been coming on earth as it is in heaven.

The good news is being preached from Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, to the ends of the earth right up to today. Which brings us to the present moment. Because this is the chapter of the story that we live in.

We live in chapter nine. We live in the church and spirit time. The same Lord that they had is the Lord that we have.

The same faith they had is the faith we have. The same spirit that did wonders 2000 years ago is the same spirit that dwells in us and in us as a community. It's the same God.

The mission of Jesus has been continuing for 2000 years. And so one of the reasons that we learn the story of Scripture in 15 minutes, however long this has been, is to take our place in the story.

To not stand back and say that's Israel's story, but to be involved and to realise that we live in chapter nine. We have the same Holy Spirit that they had. We have the same church, the same body of the people of God, continuing the mission of Jesus.

Every couple of years, we have a different emphasis as a church on how we apply that to what it means to follow Jesus today. But it's the same mission for 2,000 years. Love God, love others, make disciples.

We take our place in the story. Fie Fie read for us Psalm 1: “blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked… but who meditates on his law.”

Meditating on the story of Scripture brings blessing in our life, and it helps us to step into the story and to take our place. Over these next 2 years, we want to study the Scriptures diligently.

We want to, on the ground level, on the 30,000 foot level, on the 100,000 foot level, study the story of the Bible in order that we might take our place in the story. John 5 39, Jesus says, You study the Scripture diligently.

Wouldn't that be a nice thing for him to say to us at the end of these 2 years? You study the Scriptures diligently. You wrestle with the parts of the story and how you fit into the story.

You study Scripture diligently. This Christ in Scripture project. But Jesus goes on…

He says, “You study the Scriptures diligently because, and he's talking to Pharisees, because you think that in them, in the Scriptures, you have eternal life. But these are the very Scriptures that testify about me. Yet you refuse to come to me to have life.”

And so as we undertake this Christ in Scripture project, yes, we study the Scripture diligently to take our place in the story. But more than that, we seek to find Christ in Scripture.

Not just as a bunch of facts that we know about him, that he's the Messiah and he's this, but to know him. Jesus said in John 17 verse 3, this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God in Jesus Christ whom you sent.

In the Bible, knowledge is relationship. To know Jesus, to read these words, and to realise that they point us to a person, and that person is eternal life. This story, it leads to Jesus.

It's all about Jesus. Yes, there's different pieces of the story that fit in their own part, but it leads us to Jesus. Jesus is the true human image of God.

This is the story of creation. The true human image of God made to rule and reign over the cosmos. In promise, Jesus is the promised seed of Abraham, through whom God blesses all nations.

For deliverance, Jesus is the Passover lamb, the one slain for us to redeem us from bondage to sin and death. For law, Jesus was perfectly holy. God dwells in fullness in the person of Jesus, and he dwells in our midst.

Jesus is the once for all sacrifice for sin. For land, Jesus leads us home to the promised land in heaven, a land flowing with milk and honey and blessing. For kings, Jesus is the king of kings and the lord of lords.

He rules with justice and righteousness, and he has never done anything wrong, and he never will. For exile, Jesus voluntarily went into the exile of death on our behalf in order that we might be reconciled with the father.

For Messiah, Jesus is the gospel of Matthew's Messiah, he's Mark's suffering servant, he's Luke's spirit-anointed king, and he's John's word-made flesh. For the church and spirit, Jesus' mission continues through his spirit-filled people, the church.

From 2000 years ago right up to now, we are his hands and feet and his eyes and ears.

The whole story leads to Jesus. Sixty-six books written over 1500 years by over 40 authors in three languages spanning three continents, but one unified story that leads to Jesus. This is Christ in Scripture.

We study the Scriptures diligently so that we might come to Jesus. We might know him better. But the story is not done yet.

There's one chapter missing, and this is what we finish with. Chapter 10, New Creation, Prophets and Revelation.

CHAPTER 10: NEW CREATION (Prophets & Revelation)

The kingdom is now.

Jesus said, it is finished. The kingdom is here. Healing and the teaching of Jesus and the life of the kingdom of the heavens is available now, in part.

And so we wait for the kingdom to come fully. The kingdom is now and it's not yet. We live in the overlap of the ages.

The old age is finished and the new age is here. But in this in between time, we live mysteriously in the tension between those two things. We live with pain and suffering and death and sorrow and tears.

But we look forward to the end of the story. In Revelation 21, the Apostle John saw a heaven, a new heaven and a new earth. For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride, beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, look, God's dwelling place is now among the people, and He will dwell with them. They will be His people, God Himself will be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.

This is what we look forward to. We live in Chapter 9, Church and Spirit, but we look forward to Chapter 10.

We look forward to Jesus coming again, bringing the fullness of His kingdom to earth, restoring all things. That's what this story leads us to. It leads to the new creation.

And while we wait, we pray these words, the Spirit and the Bride, that's the Church, say, Come. Come, Lord Jesus. Let the one who hears say, Come.

Let the one who's thirsty come. Let the one who wishes take the free gift of the water of life. He who testifies to these things says, Yes, I am coming soon.

We thank you for that, Lord. Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.

In the grace of the Lord Jesus be with God's people. Amen. That is the end of the Bible.

Amen is the last word. That means, so be it. Let it be done.

Come, Lord Jesus. Come and bring your kingdom on earth in fullness.

J.I. Packer said “theology is for doxology.” What he means is the reason we study theology, the reason we wrestle with who Jesus is, who God is, is that we might praise him. Doxology is just a fancy word which means praise.

We learn about God in order that we might praise him and glorify him for who he is. And so now we have a chance to do that. We do it through music.

We do it through song. We also do it in coming under the word of God. We do it in community.

We do it in prayer. We do it with our lives.

But now we have a chance to give God the praise that he is worthy of, to see Jesus, this Jesus, the promised seed of Abraham, the lamb slain before the creation of the world, the Messiah, the King of Kings, to see him and having seen him, to glorify

him and praise him. I think I did that a bit quicker than I expected. So we have time. I'm going to read for us Revelation 5.

Would you like to stand? The band are going to come up. I'm going to read for us Revelation 5.

And as I read it, you might want to close your eyes and picture Jesus. Picture these words of who he depicts Jesus as. And then as we see Jesus, that we come to him for eternal life and to praise him.

Revelation 5
I saw in the right hand of him who sat on the throne a scroll with writing on both sides and sealed with seven seals. And I saw a mighty angel proclaiming in a loud voice who is worthy to break the seals and open the scroll.

But no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth could open the scroll or even look inside it. So I wept and wept because no one was found who was worthy. Then one of the elders said to me, Do not weep.

See, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David has triumphed and he is able to open the scroll. I saw a lamb looking as if it had been slain, standing at the centre of the throne, encircled by the four living creatures and the elders.

The lamb had seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth. He went and took the scroll from the right hand of him who sat on the throne.

And when he had taken it, the four living creatures and the 24 elders fell down before the lamb. And they sang a new song, saying, You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals because you were slain.

And with your blood, you purchased for God, persons from every tribe and language and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth.

And I looked and heard the voice of many angels numbering thousands upon thousands, 10,000 times 10,000. They encircled the throne in a loud voice.

They said, Worthy is the lamb who was slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and praise.

And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea and all that is in them, saying to him who sits on the throne and to the lamb, be praise and honour and glory and power forever and ever.

And all the people said, Amen, let's worship him now.

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