You may tell me that you are going to eat of the tree of life and enter through the gates into the new Jerusalem by grace, that is, by forgiveness. I am going to respond to you that you never will enter the new Jerusalem solely by forgiveness. According to God's holy, unchanging, eternal word the only way you can eat of the tree of life and enter through the gates into the holy city is by doing His commandments and washing your robes.

How do we get a clean robe?

The next verse tells us.

Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear. (Fine linen stands for the righteous acts of the saints.) (Revelation 19:8—NIV)

The only way a believer can wash his robes is by confessing his sins and then turning away from them. The fine linen of the saints is not imputed righteousness but the actual righteousness produced by the righteous acts of the saints.

But what about the Great Commission? Aren't we to go to every nation and tell people they can enter Heaven by grace without keeping God's commandments?

I know this is how the Great Commission is viewed today. But do you know what the Great Commission actually states?

"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." (Matthew 28:19,20—NIV)

I can hear the Dispensationalists saying, "But this is Jewish ground because we are saved by grace. We do not have to obey everything Christ commanded."

Oh no! We are commissioned to teach the nations to obey the commandments of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Christian Gospel is not that we do not have to keep God's commandments (out of which bottomless pit was this teaching drawn?) but that God is ready to forgive us and furnish us with Divine assistance so we can begin to keep His commandments.

Grace is Divine assistance—the authority, power, and wisdom to serve God. We have made grace an alternative to righteous behavior. Can you imagine such an error?

Did the Lord Jesus say we are to keep His commandments?

"If you love me, you will obey what I command." (John 14:15—NIV)

Oh, I forgot. "This is Jewish ground. This statement was made by the Lord prior to His resurrection and was superseded by the writings of the Apostles."

Then how about being a room in the Father's house, found in the same chapter? Is this venerable hope of the Christian people also Jewish ground? The hope of being a room in the Father's house also was given by the Lord prior to His resurrection. Was this hope also superseded by the writings of the Apostles? Are the Jews to be the only rooms in the Father's house?

John said:

Anyone who runs ahead and does not continue in the teaching of Christ does not have God; whoever continues in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not take him into your house or welcome him. Anyone who welcomes him shares in his wicked work. (II John 1:9-11—NIV)

Jesus Christ taught us to keep His commandments. The modern Evangelical teaching is Gnostic heresy, the very doctrine John was resisting.

The Jews do not have the grace of the new covenant to enable them to keep the commandments of the Lord Jesus Christ. Only born-again Christians have this kind of Divine enablement.

To be continued.