was caught up to Paradise. The things he heard were inexpressible, things that man is not permitted to tell.how he was caught up into Paradise and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.How that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.how that he was caught up into Paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.
4 sermons cite this verse
But the Lord said to me, and by the way, can we all read this next verse together? It's such a powerful statement. My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Again, one more time. My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then, then I am strong. This is the word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God indeed. You may be seated. You may be seated. Does anybody else in here feel like it's super embarrassing when a Pixar movie really gets you in the feels? Like when Buzz rejects Woody's counsel and gets himself in serious trouble, but then Woody risks everything anyway to come and rescue him because you've got a friend in me. Or when Andy discards his toys and he goes off to college. …
What is the meaning of the sentence, "I am a stranger with You"? I think it means, first, that although we are strangers in the world, we are constantly under God's eyes and care. "The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous and His ears are open unto their cry." Beloved, you are always under Gods discerning eyes. He searches you, tries you and sees if there is any wicked way in you—and leads you in the way everlasting. You are all constantly under Gods protecting eyes. You know what He said of old concerning His vineyard—"I the Lord do keep it; I will water it every moment: lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day." Further, you are continually under Gods directing eyes—"I will guide you with My eyes." You are also always under Gods pitying eyes. "Like as a father pities his children, so the Lord pities them that fear Him." You, too, are never absent from Gods providing eyes. One of the Lord's most precious names is Jehovah-Jireh, which means, "The Lord will see, or provide." And you are perpetually under God's delighting eyes. He says to you, "You shall no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall your land any more be termed Desolate: but you shall be called Hephzibah, and your land, Beulah, for the Lord delights in you, and your land shall be married." Further, that sentence means that although we are strangers in the world, we enjoy peculiar fellowship with God. The Apostle John says, "Truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ." We are not strangers to God, for, like Enoch, we walk with God in hallowed and intimate union and communion. He has told us some of His greatest secrets, for "the secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him; and He will show them His Covenant." He has given us the high privilege of dwelling in the secret place of the Most High and abiding under the shadow of the Almighty! He has brought us into His banqueting house and His banner over us has been love. And we have had such rapturous fellowship with Him that we understand what Paul meant when he said that he was "caught up into Paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter." …
1. The nature of this glory and blessedness. 1. I would begin with the lowest part of it, viz. the glory of the place. We have already observed that heaven is a place. They shall dwell in the most glorious part of the whole creation of God. It is called paradise. Luke xxiii. 43. “And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.” 2 Cor. xii. 4. “How that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for man to utter.” Rev. ii. 7. “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God.” The word paradise signifies a most pleasant and delightful garden, of which the garden of Eden was a type. The garden of Eden was without doubt a place that was delightful beyond what we can easily conceive; but if this earthly paradise was so delightful, how pleasant and glorious may we conclude the heavenly paradise to be; that was not made merely to be the residence of some of the innocent creatures of God during their time of probation, as Eden was, but was prepared by infinite wisdom and skill for the everlasting dwelling-place of the great King of heaven and earth, and of his Son Jesus Christ; the place where they might show their glory, and wisdom, and love for ever, and which is to be the habitation of confirmed saints and angels! When God made the universe, he made many parts of it for inferior uses, in which he displayed marvellous skill; then he made the earth, and the sun, and moon, and stars, and the visible heavens, which appear truly glorious; but there was one part of the creation that God made more especially for himself, to be his own dwelling-place, the place of his glorious rest; and we may conclude that this is beyond all comparison more glorious than the other parts of it. If some parts of the visible world are so glorious, as the sun, moon, and stars, how glorious may we conclude the highest heavens to be! This is the heavenly mount Zion, the royal city of the great God. It has been the ambition of earthly monarchs to make the cities where they dwell exceedingly magnificent. Thus the king of Babylon boasted, “Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom, by the might of my power, and for the honour of my majesty?” Dan. iv. 30. Especially will kings have their own palaces most magnificent. But if those earthly cities and palaces are some of them so glorious, which are for the habitation of worms, how glorious may we think that to be which is for the glorious habitation of God Almighty! As the third heavens are higher than the earth, so we may expect that it is proportionally more glorious than any earthly garden, city, or palace. Heaven is not only the city of God, but his palace; not only his palace, but his throne: Isa. lxvi. 1. “Thus saith the Lord, Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool: where is the house that ye build unto me; and where is the place of my rest?” We read how magnificent was Solomon’s throne. 1 Kings x. 18, 19, 20. “Moreover, the king made a great throne of ivory, and overlaid it with the best of gold. The throne had six steps, and the top of the throne was round behind: and there were stays on either side of the place of the seat, and two lions stood beside the stays. And twelve lions stood there on the one side and on the other upon the six steps: there was not the like made in any kingdom.” But what is the throne of a glowworm? God does not want skill to make his palace and throne glorious enough to become the majesty and glory of him whose house and seat it is. The builder is God, and there is no want of skill in the architect. How glorious and magnificent was the temple of Solomon, that was built only to be the place of the special symbols of God’s presence on earth among his people Israel! How much more glorious is that heavenly temple which God himself has built, to be the place of his glorious presence among glorified saints and angels throughout all eternity! This is a place contrived on purpose to show the boundless riches of God’s grace and love; and therefore, God has not spared as to the delights and glories with which he has adorned the place. God is rich enough to make the place transcend all created glory. Earthly kings build their houses and palaces, and make them magnificent, according to their wealth and ability; but God is infinitely rich, he does not spare for the cost of the treasures to be laid out in adorning heaven, through fear of impoverishing himself. The glory of his residence is what we cannot conceive of; and this is one of those things spoken of in 1 Cor. ii. 9. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” Therefore in the descriptions that are given of it in the Scriptures, the images made use of to shadow it forth to us, are the most glorious with which we are conversant in the world. Such is the glorious description of it by John, as represented to him in the apocalyptic vision. Rev. xxi. 10,11-18, 19, 20, 21,22, 23. “And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, having the glory of God: and her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a jasper-stone, clear as crystal. And the building of the wall of it was of jasper: and the city was pure gold, like unto clear glass. And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was jasper; the second sapphire; the third a chalcedony; the fourth an emerald; the fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, a topaz; the tenth, a chrysoprasus; the eleventh, a jacinth; the twelfth, an amethyst. And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one pearl; and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass. And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof.” Heaven is here represented by a city, whose very walls were made of precious stones. And the foundations were also all precious stones, and the gates were each a single pearl, and the very streets of the city were of pure gold; and yet it was something so excellent, as it appeared to John, that his comparing it to pure gold did not represent the excellency of it; it had also the beautiful transparency of clear glass. The apostle could find nothing on earth excellent enough adequately to represent its surpassing beauty. “The streets of the city were pure gold, like unto clear glass. ” He goes on with the destruction in the beginning of the next chapter. Rev. xxii. 1, 2-5. “And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light: and they shall reign for ever and ever.’’ This glorious place shall be the residence of the saints for ever. They shall dwell in this house of God, as the king’s children dwell with him in their father’s house; they shall dwell in this house, for it is Christ’s house. He is the heir and owner of it, because he is the only-begotten Son of God; and the church shall dwell in it with Christ, because she is “the Lamb’s wife. “God has made heaven to be his own peculiar dwelling-place, and the dwelling-place of his children; when he made the world, he made heaven for them, and therefore Christ says to them at the close of their trial, Matt. xxv. 34. “Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” …
Again, He forewarned His Apostles that they in like manner should be persecuted, for righteousness' sake, and be afflicted and delivered up, and hated and killed. Such was to be their life in this world, "that if in this world only they had had hope in Christ, they had been of all men most miserable." Well then, observe, their trial too was preceded by a season of peace and pleasantness, in anticipation of their future reward; for before the day of Pentecost, for forty days Christ was with them, soothing, comforting, confirming them, "and speaking of the things pertaining unto the kingdom of God." As Moses stood on the mount and saw the promised land and all its riches, and yet Joshua had to fight many battles before he got possession, so did the Apostles, before descending into the valley of the shadow of death, whence nought of heaven was to be seen, stand upon the heights, and look over that valley, which they had to cross, to the city of the living God beyond it. And so again, St. Paul, after many years of toil, refers back to a time when he had a celestial vision, anticipatory of what was to be his blessedness in the end. "I knew a man in Christ," he says, meaning himself, "about fourteen years ago, caught up to the third heaven. . . . And I knew such a man . . . how that he was caught up into Paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter." St. Paul then, as the twelve Apostles, and as our Lord before him, had his brief season of repose and consolation before the battle. …