The Great Signs of the End Part I Matthew 24:1-51

when God created the world, everything was as it was supposed to be.

In the Garden of Eden, there were two humans, Adam and Eve, and they lived in perfect fellowship with their

Creator. The Garden of Eden was something that none of us have ever experienced. The Garden was a place of perfection.

There was no sin, no suffering, no death, no evil.

And we now live in a world where all of these unpleasant realities are present.

This is so because in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve ate the fruit that God told them not to eat.

Adam and Eve lived in complete contentment, but they were tempted by Satan to explore beyond the boundaries set by God.

When they ate the fruit, they thought they could achieve joy and contentment outside of God.

But what they found is they entered a state of shame, pain, and separation from God.

When Adam and Eve were ejected out of the Garden, what they left behind was sweet fellowship with their

Creator. What they received in its place was the experience of sin, suffering, death, and evil.

And this is where we find ourselves. We live every day in a fallen world.

The horrors of this life are normal for us, as if it's supposed to be this way.

We read on the news unimaginable horrors and these happen every day somewhere and sometimes it hits close to home.

And when you experience the pain of this life, you experience first hand what a dark place it is.

What you come to realize is there is darkness outside of you and darkness inside of you.

When Adam and Eve fell into sin, God promised a Savior who would make everything right. Genesis 3 .15

promises this Savior. He is the one who would crush the head of the serpent,

Satan. And He did crush his head at the cross when 2 ,000 years ago,

God the Father sent His Son Jesus on a rescue mission to save sinners.

Jesus came to the earth the first time to accomplish redemption. And for 2 ,000 years, people everywhere have been called to believe in this

God -Man, who is the only one who reconciles God and men. In this fallen world, people are called to repent and believe in Jesus.

But what we must understand is that this world will not go on forever. There is an end, no matter what people tell you.

The Scripture warns us that the world in its present form is passing away. The Apostle Paul wrote about this at 1

Corinthians 7, verses 29 -31. He said, Brothers, the appointed time has grown very short. From now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none, and those who mourn as though they were not mourning, and those who rejoice as though they were not rejoicing, and those who buy as though they had no goods, and those who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it.

For the present form of this world is passing away. This is bittersweet for our world.

It is bitter for unbelievers who hold on to this world tightly because this world is all they have.

But as followers of Christ, this is oh so sweet. This world full of sin and pain and suffering will come to an end.

The darkness that still remains in our hearts will come to an end.

This world ruled by Satan will come to an end. As the world plunges into deeper and deeper darkness,

Jesus is going to interrupt world history. Secularists think this present world is going to keep going.

And going. And the elite of this secular society think it's up to them to save this world.

They are the ones who offer the solutions to keep this world going. They think it's up to them, but they are in for a rude awakening as the

King of Kings and Lord of Lords will split the sky and bring this world as we know it to an end.

At that time, all the evil plans that humans devise will be thwarted. The just and righteous

King coming is the great Christian hope. This morning as we continue our sermon series through Matthew, Jesus is going to tell us about this all -important reality that the end will come.

He is going to tell us about signs that tell us that this present age ending is indeed going to happen.

So over the next several weeks, we're going to take a look at the Olivet Discourse or a much more interesting way to say it is, the end times according to Jesus.

So at this time, I encourage you to turn in a Bible with me to Matthew 24. And if you're using one of those red Bibles, it's on page 985.

This several week sermon is titled, The Great Signs of This World's End.

And here's our big idea. What this text is calling everyone to do. Very simple.

Anticipate the soon return of Christ. Anticipate the soon return of Christ.

This is not today. We're going to see 15 practices how. It might take a month or so.

I don't know how long this is going to take to get through this. But we'll see 15 practices how we are to anticipate the soon return of Christ.

And here's the first way how. Through looking at prophetic certainty through what has already been fulfilled.

And we'll see that in the first two verses of this chapter. And then we're also going to look at point 2 today as well.

Before we jump in, let me give you a little recap of where we have been. The last five weeks, we were in Matthew 23.

It's important to understand the context of Matthew 23. Throughout Jesus' ministry, the conflict between the

Jewish religious establishment and Him has been rising.

They have been on a collision course. Numerous times, Jesus had conversations with the

Jewish leadership of His day. And numerous times, He condemned them. But His greatest condemnation came at the very end in chapter 23, where Jesus pulls no punches.

He condemned the Jewish leadership the final week before His crucifixion.

So He's going out, making it very clear, these people are wrong. These people are evil.

Don't follow them. Follow Me. What's interesting is that the same ones

He condemns are the same ones who will deliver Him up to be crucified.

What we learn in chapter 23 is that Jesus condemns religion that has the appearance of godliness, but is in fact fraudulent.

Matthew shared that. There's a lot of that in Austria. There's a lot of that all over the world. Has the appearance of godliness.

The priests or the pastors wear garb that looks nice.

They have these fancy architecture. And you think, well, this must be where God is working.

No. He works through His true church.

There was nothing genuine about the Pharisees. All their supposed works were outward.

They did not love God. They did not love God's image bearers. They loved themselves and their own man -made religion.

And Jesus condemns this. He condemned it in the first century and He condemns it today. And Jesus is about to leave this world, but before He does,

He has something else that is very important for His listeners to understand. He's about to leave this world, but He wants people to know what is going to happen before He returns to the earth.

I've already mentioned that Jesus talks about the end of human history in chapter 24.

Now we will look closely at these sobering and intense words. And you've already turned there, so let's now look closely at what

Jesus says about the end. This is a conversation with His disciples that sparks this important discussion.

I'm going to read the first two verses here to start. Jesus left the temple and was going away when

His disciples came to point out to Him the buildings of the temple. But He answered them,

You see all these? Do you not? Truly I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.

Now in chapter 23, as Jesus condemned the Pharisees, we learn in the first verse of chapter 23 whom

Jesus was speaking to. He condemned the Jewish leadership to their face many times.

But in chapter 23, He condemned them publicly as He spoke to the crowds and His disciples.

Verse 1 of chapter 24 tells us the setting of Jesus' condemnation of the

Jewish leadership. He spoke to the crowds and His disciples on the temple grounds in Jerusalem.

What verse 1 of Matthew 24 says is that as Jesus left the temple and was walking away,

His disciples were bringing attention to the temple structures. The end of verse 1 says that the disciples pointed to the buildings of the temple.

And this is when Jesus did not miss an opportunity to say to them, You see all these?

Do you not? Truly I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.

The disciples are impressed with the temple. And there wasn't just one structure there.

There were multiple structures there. Anyone who studies the Bible and the history of Israel understands the important place the temple holds in Jewish life.

The temple was built by Solomon in roughly the 10th century B .C. The temple, just like the tabernacle before it, was the place of God's dwelling.

As the priest offered sacrifices for sins and the people followed God, God's presence would remain with the nation of Israel.

But because of Israel's idolatry, God would no longer dwell in the temple with the people of Israel.

In 605 B .C. and for several decades after, God used the

Babylonian king, King Nebuchadnezzar, to pillage Jerusalem and the temple.

The people of Israel were taken into exile and God's temple was destroyed. But God was gracious to Israel.

During the era of Ezra and Nehemiah, Israel was allowed to return to their homeland to rebuild the temple and the city.

As Jesus is speaking to His disciples, this is the second temple. And the second temple experienced improvements from the time it was built to the time that Jesus is talking right here.

We know this in John 2 .19. Jesus told the Jewish leadership that He was going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days.

He was, of course, talking about His body, but they thought He was talking about the whole temple structure.

This is why they said in the next verse, it has taken 46 years to build this temple, and you're going to destroy it in three days?

In 20 B .C., Herod the Great, Herod the Great was the king alive when Jesus was born.

He reconstructed and expanded the temple project. The main part of the project was completed about ten years after they started.

But the work continued on the temple all the way to the point where Jesus is talking right here.

And what we need to understand is that the temple structure with all of its buildings was impressive. Very impressive.

The temple of Jerusalem was one of the great marvels of the world. In our day, we see marvels that people in that day could not have imagined.

Even the skyline in Minneapolis and St. Paul would be beyond anything they could envision that man could do.

But man has done it because man is God's image bearer, and man is able to do some extraordinary things.

When you see the size and the architecture, you're blown away by it.

And this is how it was in the first century. People were amazed when they saw the temple. When you came to Jerusalem, that was the central place.

The disciples are among that number who were impressed. But Jesus shocks them when

He said these words in response to verse 2. What I've already said. You see all these?

Do you not? Not one stone here will be left upon another until it is all thrown down.

What is He referring to? Well, in 70 A .D., during the

Jewish rebellion against the Romans, the temple and the surrounding buildings were destroyed.

It was during the Passover in 70 A .D. that the temple was destroyed by the Roman general Titus and his forces.

And they flattened it and the massacre was enormous. It's estimated that about a million

Jews were slaughtered from this war in 70

A .D. The temple being destroyed was evidence of God's judgment on the

Jewish nation. We just saw in Matthew 23, Jesus delivers this judgment, this condemnation of this

Jewish religion that formed over the years, that God hated. And then, several decades later, after Jesus leaves the earth, the temple is destroyed.

In 605 B .C., God used the Babylonians to destroy the temple.

In 70 A .D., God used the Romans to destroy the temple. We see this throughout the history of Israel.

God uses the surrounding nations, nations that they would have abhorred,

He uses them to bring judgment upon them. To this day, the temple in Jerusalem has never been rebuilt.

Almost 2 ,000 years later. But what I want us to focus on is the precision of Jesus' words.

As Jesus speaks this, it's in 33 A .D. Some believe it's 30

A .D. I believe it's 33 A .D. But as He speaks, He is describing an event that will occur four decades from when

He told this to His disciples. What Jesus said came to pass precisely how

He said it would. He said that the temple would be destroyed, and it was.

And He told His disciples what it would look like after it was destroyed. Now, I've never been to Jerusalem.

My parents who are here today, they've been there. Some of you maybe have been there. But I have seen photos of the carnage that is still there to this day.

And it is precisely as Jesus says it is. There is not one stone left upon another.

There's stones that are piled up. And what I've made clear in my time here as your pastor, is that this is how biblical prophecy works.

It's not like Nostradamus, the 16th century French mathematician who supposedly told the future.

People say that he predicted the rise of Hitler, the assassination of John Kennedy, to name a few events.

But the thing about Nostradamus is that his prophecies were vague. Where any number of future events could fit into what he predicted.

On the other hand, biblical prophecy is narrow. The fulfillment of the prophecy comes to pass in vivid detail.

For example, Jesus said that He would ride into Jerusalem on a donkey. On the colt of a donkey.

And that's exactly what happened. And there's many examples of that.

When God makes a prediction, it is fulfilled precisely how He said it would be.

And we are in the unique position from the time that we live in to see how prophecy is fulfilled.

He points to the buildings, says they will be destroyed, and it was destroyed precisely how

He said it would be. When Jesus the God -Man makes a predictive prophecy, it comes to pass as He said it would.

And as we see this, including all the Old Testament prophecy fulfilled during the time of Jesus, it tells us that this book right here is a supernatural book.

I mean, there's lots of ways we know that this is a supernatural book. One of the ways we know is that it tells us the future.

It says this is going to happen, and then it happens in time and space.

It is the Word of God. When prophets, including Jesus, make a prediction, it is not a matter of if it will happen, but a matter of when it will happen.

And never let anyone tell you that predictive prophecy is phony. We have the evidence.

Events predicted centuries and even millennia before have already come to pass in the pages of Scripture, and so it will be for every future prophecy that is yet to be fulfilled.

This includes the prophecies that we will see as we go through this chapter. The signs of the end.

The signs that point ahead to the day that Christ returns. So anticipate the soon return of Christ in the first practice how?

Is by looking at prophetic certainty through what has already been fulfilled.

And here's the second practice how we are to anticipate the soon return of Christ. Through taking seriously why

Jesus provides end times details. Taking seriously why

Jesus provides end times details. And I'm going to focus in on two verses here. Verses 3 and verses 8.

As we go through this chapter, we're not just going to go like verses 1 -3, verses 4 -6. We're not going to go chronologically because some of these verses tie in with previous verses.

So that's how we're going to look at this. So Jesus said that the temple would be destroyed and it was.

And he said not one stone would be left upon another. And that's what happened. Now what is the disciples response to this?

Let's read their response in verse 3. As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately saying,

Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?

What we need to understand here is that the disciples are confused. I've explained already in Matthew the expectation of the

Jewish population and even the disciples concerning the coming of the Messiah who is coming to the earth in power was predicted numerous times in the

Old Testament. They're reading the Old Testament. They know He's coming. And they build a certain expectation of what things are going to be like when

He comes. And what His identity will be. What will the Messiah be like? What will He do when

He comes? The dominant view the Jews believed was that the Messiah would come, drive out their enemies, that was the

Romans at this time, where they would no longer be subject to other kingdoms, but they would reign over the world with their

Messiah. So they're thinking, He's going to come and Israel once again, like the days of Solomon, the days of the great kings, will be the most powerful kingdom in the world.

That's their expectation. But the temple being destroyed did not fit into their understanding concerning how things were supposed to play out.

Why would the temple be destroyed if He's going to come, drive out our enemies, and He's going to reign in power?

What also didn't fit into their understanding was that the Messiah would suffer. Isaiah 53 predicted the suffering of the

Messiah, but this was either ignored or misunderstood. Every time

Jesus told His disciples that the Jews would deliver Him to the Romans to be crucified, they were always perplexed, which tells us they bought into the false

Jewish narrative concerning the Messiah. What the Jews and the disciples believed was that when the

Messiah came, the kingdom would appear immediately, as Luke 19 .11

says. So if the temple is going to be destroyed first, then the disciples are wondering when will the

Messiah come in glory and reign from Jerusalem and have power over His enemies?

This is what the disciples are asking. So if the temple is going to be destroyed, then when will you reign in power?

As they are asking this question, they are not thinking that Jesus is going to go to heaven and then at least 2 ,000 years is going to pass before His second coming.

They are not thinking that. But of course, Jesus as the

God -man understands God's plan. Jesus told His disciples He would die, rise again, and return to His Father in heaven.

So when Jesus answers this question, He is operating from a correct understanding concerning the end.

And He corrects His disciples by describing His coming and the signs that will precede

His coming. And what we are going to see is that Jesus answers their question in reverse.

If you look at the text, they first ask in verse 3, when will you come in power?

And secondly, they ask, what are the signs of His coming when He will reign in power?

All the way to verse 35, Jesus describes the signs of His coming.

And then in verse 36 and on, He explains the grand event of His coming when

He comes to the earth in glory and the whole world knows about it.

Now the word coming in Greek is parousia. And this is why when people talk about the second coming of Christ, they sometimes call it

His parousia. But this whole conversation that Jesus is having with His disciples is on the

Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. And this is why people call it the Olivet Discourse.

And this shows up not just in Matthew, it shows up in the two other Gospels that are very similar to Matthew.

And those Gospels are Mark and Luke. And we will take extensive time looking at these signs of the end that Jesus describes.

But before we start looking at the individual signs, I want to explain a little bit about the timing of these signs and why it's important for every

Christian to understand the signs. From the perspective of Jesus and His disciples, the question is how many of these signs would be fulfilled in their lifetime?

And how many of these signs would be fulfilled after their lifetime in the far -off future?

Some view lots of these signs as happening in the first century as we go through this chapter that the signs described.

With a small amount in the future, others view this chapter as being somewhat fulfilled in the first century and some in the future.

Others view this as a small amount taking place in the first century and the rest is future.

Now when it comes to the second and third option, when Bible students say future, what they mean is that the signs that Jesus predicts have taken place in some measure over the last 2 ,000 years.

As I have studied this chapter, I hold to the third option. That most of what Jesus describes in the

Olivet Discourse happens after the first century, even though some of it did indeed happen during and after the life of the disciples in the first century.

I come to that conclusion for many reasons and one of the big reasons is because of verse 8. Verse 8 in this chapter.

The reason we need to see the signs of the end as progressively happening over the last 2 ,000 years is because of what

Jesus says in verse 8. After describing a series of signs, He says, all these are but the beginning of birth pains.

Now I am a man. I can't get pregnant. Right, we live in 2022. No, men cannot get pregnant, right?

We have to establish that. We have to deal with things that previous generations did not, right?

Aletheia was born in 2016 and Isaiah in 2019. And what many of you know about pregnancy, either going through the pregnancy yourself or seeing your wife go through it, is that the pregnant woman has contractions and those contractions increase as the birth of the baby draws near.

Now the pain, that intensity, these contractions are painful and it increases.

And this is how it is with the signs, pointing to the day when Jesus returns to the earth.

Jesus is telling His disciples in this passage that He's coming back, but before He comes back, certain things need to happen.

He wanted His disciples and all of His followers reading this to anticipate His return by observing the signs of His return.

By the way, Jesus knew that what He said would be written down for future generations.

In verse 15, He says, "'Let the reader understand.'"

Okay, so it's gonna be written down and He's saying, "'Let the reader understand.'"

Jesus does not want His people to be unprepared for His return. He wants us to be ready.

In a parallel passage in Luke 21 -28, Jesus said, when these things begin to take place, straighten up and raise your heads because your redemption is drawing near.

In 2 Peter 3 -11, the Apostle Peter says, since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God?

He's coming back, so don't be distracted. Don't be lethargic in your walk with God.

That's a clear message of the New Testament. Jesus wants us to look at the signs.

Why would Jesus give us signs if He didn't want us to look out for them?

He didn't say, just be faithful. Don't look at what is going on in the world.

As the disciples asked Jesus for signs, He gladly gives them signs of the end, and He doesn't just give them one or two.

He gives numerous signs, as we'll see in the coming weeks. And frankly, it's common to hear pastors say, it's not important to pay attention to the signs of the end.

The details of prophecy aren't that important. What matters is living a holy life. Now, amen to that last part.

Living a holy life is of utmost importance. But what many Christians miss is that the signs of the end are supposed to help us as Christians.

There's a reason Jesus gives us signs. He doesn't say, I'm going to come back.

You don't need to know what it's going to be like as it leads up to my return. Just know

I'm coming back and just do what I tell you to do. Yet we should do what He tells us to do, but He gives us signs.

I find that very interesting. What is interesting is that Jesus actually rebukes us if we don't pay attention to the signs.

If we pay no attention to the signs, we are like the Jewish leaders of Jesus' day. People we want to be nothing like.

Matthew 16, three, He condemns them. He says, you know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.

So they had no problem understanding the weather. Red sky at night, sailors delight.

Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning. But they didn't understand that something remarkable was happening before their eyes.

The voice of one crying out in the wilderness was preaching, calling them to repent.

People are going to Him to be baptized. John the Baptist is preparing the way for the

Messiah. And then right during John the Baptist's ministry, there's the

Messiah. He's in their midst. He starts to teach.

People start to follow Him. And yet, the Jewish leaders of Jesus' day did not pay attention to what was going on.

They knew how to understand the weather. Their reason was not the problem.

Their heart was the problem. And we need to understand that we live in unprecedented times.

It is true that we do not know the day that Jesus is going to return to the earth. But to think that Christ's return is way off into the future,

I think would be naive and foolish to say that. We have seen things that previous generations have never seen.

Our goal, I should say our world, our world has seen pandemics before.

I mean, think of the Black Plague in the Middle Ages, a horrible plague. You think of the Spanish Flu of 1918.

But what our world saw with COVID -19 was unprecedented in world history.

It was a global pandemic. Everyone on planet earth was affected by it.

Every corner of the earth, whether you're in Austria, whether you're in Eureka, whether you're in China where it started, whether you're in Hawaii or Russia, now maybe not

Antarctica, I don't know. But everywhere else on planet earth, they experienced and we experienced a global pandemic.

Nations have experienced economic crisis before. But never have nations been so attached to other nations.

We truly have a global economy. If the United States economy collapses, the carnage around the world will be enormous.

We also see a globalist agenda from nations who were historically nationalist.

Nations of old in the West held to a nationalism that was influenced by biblical

Christianity. But now the leadership of the nations of the West want to leave that past and embrace globalism.

And this globalism is built on a whole new morality. When we look at the globalistic effort, this is very spiritual because they're really pushing a false religion.

They're pushing a false agenda. And it's the opposite of biblical

Christianity. This godless globalistic effort used to be small, but now it's in the mainstream.

And this is a new movement the world has never seen as we see it now. These are not old events cycling through again.

These are new events. And all of them are global in nature. The book of Revelation describes this globalism and the table is set for all of it to happen very fast.

As Christians look at this, what should we conclude? We should conclude, yes, we don't know when the very end will be.

The last thing we want to do is start setting dates. That's an evidence of false prophets. Never want to do that.

But it is likely that the end is on the horizon. So we are to look at the signs of his return.

And Jesus gives us these numerous signs in this chapter. Now earlier

I read to you Luke and 2 Peter. Luke recorded Jesus saying that as we look at the signs, we are to straighten up and raise our heads.

The apostle Peter, speaking on the end, said what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God?

What Scripture says is that studying the signs of the end is a tool by God used to help you grow in your relationship with God.

If you study the end times the right way, your relationship with God grows.

Because you long for his return, the return of his son, and the one you long for you are close to.

I remember when Brianne and I were dating. We lived about an hour away from each other, but it seemed like about 10 ,000 miles.

And we would only see each other once a week. We would go sometimes a week or two without seeing each other. And that whole time, what was on the forefront of my mind was

I just want to be with Brianne. I was in seminary at the time. I'd zone out when the teachers are talking and go to work.

And I never really want to be here. I just want to be with Brianne. I want to be with my future wife. Every Christian down through history who has studied prophecy but did not see his return, did not waste their time as they longed to be with him.

Because the one you long for is the one you're close to. Your relationship with that person deepens as you long, and you wait, and you desire to be with that person.

And people down through history, they knew there were signs. And he didn't come.

And people would say, well, they wasted their time. God used that in their life to grow them in their relationship with God.

As they studied the signs from Scripture and could see that these signs pointed to his return, the one who studied deepened their relationship with God.

2 Timothy 4 .8 says that he will give the crown of righteousness to those who have loved his appearing.

The beginning of the book of Revelation, the most prophetic book in the Bible, says in Revelation 1 .3,

blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy. And blessed are those who hear and who keep what is written in it.

For the time is near. So Scripture says, pay attention to the signs of the end.

And a healthy Christian pays attention to the signs, not because it's interesting.

OK, let me be very clear on that. When we talk about the end of the world, I mean, who's not interested in that, right?

That's an interesting topic. It's not like we want to satisfy our curiosity.

Healthy Christians pay attention to the signs for the reason of loving

God more and wanting to be with Him and wanting to be freed from this world.

Because once He returns, the one who loves Him will enjoy sweet fellowship with Him forever. I love that line from Come Thou Fount.

Come now, Lord, no longer tarry. Take my ransomed soul away. Send Thine angels now to carry me to realms of endless days.

And actually, the start of that line, He says, oh, that day when freed from sinning. I can't tell you what a great day that will be when we don't sin anymore.

When we don't see sin in the world. When we don't see pain and suffering and the devil doing whatever he wants in so many places.

When that day is over, what a wonderful day that will be.

And as we think about His return, it fills us with hope. It fills us with longing.

It fills us with a deeper love for Him. And you know what else it does?

As we long for His return, as we see signs that point to His return, it makes us more urgent in His service.

Holiness of life becomes more urgent. Prayer becomes more urgent.

Evangelism becomes more urgent. Missions becomes more urgent. Like we heard today from Matthew, we want the gospel to reach the world before Christ comes back.

And one of the ways we do that is we spread the gospel wherever we are, whether we're at home or we support missionaries or we go to the mission field ourselves.

So when biblical prophecy is studied the right way, which by the way, so often it's not, but when it is studied the right way,

God accomplishes much through His followers. We don't want to miss that.

And in the coming weeks, we will look at the signs. And as we look at the signs, we want to do it with the right heart.

We want to be biblical. There's a reason Jesus gives us these signs about the end.

And we want to fulfill His purpose for that. And as we see what

Jesus describes happening in the past and in the present, in increasing measure, we are that much closer to being with Him.

And it should motivate us that much more to live every day for Him. So anticipate the soon return of Christ.

And the second practice how is through taking seriously why Jesus provides end times details.

Now, next Sunday, I'm actually gonna be gone. So sorry to start this out and then, okay, we're taking a week off here.

But the following Sunday, we will pick up with verse four and so on.

But this time let's bow our heads in prayer. Father in heaven, thank you for the

Bible. Thank you that this book indeed is the word of God.

All scripture is breathed out by you and profitable for teaching, reproof, rebuke, and training in righteousness that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.

And you want us to see the whole counsel of God. In this chapter, there's so much here to see.

So give us eyes to see as we go through this and help us to be people,

Lord, who because we know the end is coming, because we see what's happening in the world, because we know that Jesus is coming back, that we are better Christians, that we love our neighbors more, that we love you more above all, that we're more urgent in our life in all the areas that you've called us to be faithful.

So help us with this as we go through this. And my prayer to you, Lord, is if there's anyone here today who's never believed in the

Lord Jesus Christ, for their salvation, I pray that that person would understand their sinfulness, understand that Jesus is the only

Savior, and that that person would put their trust in Him for their salvation, for the forgiveness of their sins, and enter that sweet relationship with you that goes on forever.