History is His Story, Matthew 24:1-35, On the last days

Matthew chapter 24 be reading from verses 1 to 35 hear the word of the Lord 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 as he said 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 close of the age and Jesus answered them see that no one leads you astray for many will come in my name saying

I am the Christ and they will lead many astray and You will hear wars and rumors of wars see that you are not alarmed for this must take place

But the end is not yet For nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places

All these are but the beginning of birth pains Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake and they will make and Then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another and many false

Prophets and will arise and lead many astray and because lawlessness will be increased the love of many will grow cold

But the one who endures to the end will be saved and this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed

Throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations and then the end will come

So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the Prophet Daniel standing in the holy place, let the reader understand

Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains let the one who is on the housetop not go down to take what is in his house and Let the one who was in the field not turn back to take his cloak and alas for women who are pregnant and for those who?

are nursing infants in those days pray that your flight may not be in winter or on sat a Sabbath for then there will be a

Great tribulation such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now No, and never will be and if those days

Had not been cut short. No human being would be saved but for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short

Then if anyone says to you look here is the Christ or there he is Do not believe it for false

Christ and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders So as to lead astray if possible, even the elect see

I have told you beforehand So that if they say to you look he is in the wilderness

Do not go out if they say look he is in the inner rooms Do not believe it for as the lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the

West So will be the coming of the Son of Man wherever the corpse is There the vultures will gather

Immediately after the tribulation of those days the Sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light and the stars will fall from heaven and the powers of the heavens will be shaken then will appear in the heaven the sign of the

Son of Man and Then all the tribes of the earth will mourn and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power in great glory

And he will send out his angels with the loud trumpet call and they will gather his elect from the four winds from one end

Of heaven to the other from the fig tree learn its lesson as soon as the branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves

You know that summer is near So also when you see all these things, you know that he is near at the very gates

Truly I say to you this generation will not pass away until all these things take place

Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away

And the Lord had his blessings to the reading of his Holy Word What's the meaning of history?

Henry Ford is famous for saying that history is bunk That is he says it's just tradition and who cares about that that the he said the only history that's that's worth anything

Cleaning up his language a little bit is is the history that we make today By but by history,

I don't just mean, you know the events in the past But I mean the whole story of past and present and future, you know, where is it going?

What is it for? This the secular kind of atheistic person Would have to admit that for him history is meaningless

His own life then is pretty much meaningless. It's just one random event after another, you know

He make them maybe make the most of it. Maybe you don't but you know, it doesn't mean anything as Shakespeare wrote in Macbeth Life's but a walking shadow a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more

It is a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury Signifying nothing

But others have said that history does indeed have a meaning it has a goal

It is going somewhere according to Karl Marx the father of communism It is going toward the goal of the working people what he called the proletariat taking over and creating a classless perfectly equal society where everyone just shares

After the fall of the most of the communist countries which kind of proved that his theory didn't work But after the fall of most of the communist countries of the late 80s an

American scholar Francis Fukuyama published a book that got a lot Of attention entitled the end of history in this book

Fukuyama wrote that the early He kind of used the earlier ideas of philosophers like Hegel and Karl Marx and applied it to his times by now the 1990s

You know, he said the Cold War is over America especially now feels vindicated and apparently there would be peace and prosperity forever

Fukuyama said that finally all the struggles all the wars of history had been resolved.

He wrote that we had fought Quote the last bloody battle He believed that there was nothing else to fight for and nearly everyone in the world

Recognized that democracy and politics and capitalism in any economics were the undeniable victors the end result of history was democracy and capitalism with that triumph the quest of History was in it at an end time would keep ticking

But there was according to Fukuyama nothing higher for which to strive at about 9 a .m

New York Time on September 11th 2001 that Fantasy of a human centered end of history went up in smoke with the

World Trade Center It turned out that Muslims had a very different idea about the goal of history

And we've been fighting wars and heard lots of rumors of wars ever since What's the goal of history?

Well, that's a good Christmas question because Christians have answered that question

With Christmas, right we divide History right in half at the very point that we believe

Jesus What was born BC before Christ a D on your Domini in the year of our

Lord after he's born Recently more secular people have tried to obscure this you'll see that sometimes in some recent history.

Well, they'll say BCE That's before the Christian era and CE the

Christian era You're trying to eliminate, you know trying to cover up the any references to Christ But obviously that just kind of begs the question what what was it that happened in the year one?

That started the Christian era. Well Christ was born and we're still back to Christmas Chris history is his story and It's his story that we are right now right in the middle of and it is going somewhere it's not just you know facts in the past you may be kind of bored you in school or whatever or Facts that we can remember fondly at Christmas time with nice Christmas carols and doing our traditions

It's not the bunk that Henry Ford said it was and it's not just repeating. What has happened

I personally am NOT fond of speaking about Advent as some tradition. I'm not gonna condemn it, you know, just Shouting and bounding the pulpit, but I'm just not fond of it

I don't think it gives a good impression the word Advent means coming and Advent is the season

We're in right now in the weeks before Christmas and according to some traditions you prepare for Jesus to come

To kind of recreate his coming almost as though in that course They would never say this but it kind of the way they

Celebrated it kind of leaves the impression that we need to have him born all over again Almost as though history is circular that it repeats itself and we need to continue this the cycle

But it isn't circular Understood the way the Bible teach particularly here teaches history is as it is linear.

It says it's a line. It has a destination It's like a train track. It has stationed along the way, but there's a final station

It's going to it's going somewhere and we can remember where now we can remember fondly where we been Remember the great views back there when we turn that bin or we could remember that Jesus was born at a certain time

We could do Christmas and remember that that he was born to bring the kingdom of God on earth But remember when we are remembering the past the future history is

Going somewhere it has a goal God's goal

And we see that in Matthew 24 where Jesus speaks of history that is to him

Us in the future It's coming and this is really a controversial passage and somewhat difficult and I'm gonna handle a little bit differently than I do most

Passages try to break it up topics rather than verse by verse It's a controversial passage and now almost 2 ,000 years later because the question really for this passage

Is is this all history that we just read for us? Everything in this chapter.

Has it already happened? Jesus just kind of saw it You know in the he saw it coming

But to him it already had already happened and and there would be some basis for that after all he says

This generation will not pass away until all these things are fulfilled. So in one sense everything in here at least happened in part

Before that generation to come that's how I would answer that verse some people look at that verse say how could that have happened? How could all of these things been fulfilled?

Well, they were in some way. Maybe not completely but Everything here had some meaning in in Jesus's time

And so the question is has it all been fulfilled in the past in our past?

as some believe or is it For us just is it just or should say or is it all still in our future?

And I've already kind of dismissed that haven't I? So it's not a mysterious question, but there are still some who read this say well

Jesus is coming and so everything here has Jesus has a calm has to be in the future

And so they'll play with that that thing about this generation as well generation Maybe it means the race of Jews, but that's not very convincing.

But you know, is it all in our Future now, I'm getting the things I would usually talk about on Wednesday night.

This is difficult passage But anyway, that's the main question to interpret this passage. Is it for us?

past or is it for us future Well notice the first question the disciples asked that gives us, you know, this long answer all right, you understand this whole chapter fact actually this chapter and chapter 25 is an answer to their question and They are leaving the temple and that's symbolic.

Okay, because Jesus has just basically condemned That whole religion going on there in chapter 23.

The temple was very impressive You know, it would be not just to them because they're peasants from this, you know,

Judean village, but it would be impressive to us today the the temple complex itself took up about one -sixth of the whole city of Jerusalem and it

Dominated this hill if you coming into Jerusalem You would just see it at the top of this hill with this huge wall all kinds of things just be magnificent large structure some of the stones

You see this no stone will be unturned We may have the idea of you know, like this this kind of size stone stuck in there with mortar

No, I mean you're talking like pyramid kind of style, you know But they used to build the pyramids with huge stones some of the stones were 42 feet long 11 feet high

That's a foot higher than a basketball goal. Okay weighing over a million pounds

Okay, try to grasp how big these stones were it would be difficult today

To build with stones that are that huge. I mean you'd have to get some kind of specialized very expensive

Cranes to move something that heavy and they did it without him Don't ask me how they probably a lot of manpower and logs to roll it on whatever however, they did it, but they did it and Disciples so are impressed with the magnificence of this temple that they pointed out to Jesus and you know in Jesus response

You see these do you not? Truly I say to you and he's saying this as he's leaving the temple

There's probably a lot of people around him truly I say to you there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down Later in verse 3 so probably how many people heard him say that ago.

Whoa How's that gonna happen and later in verse 3 the disciples ask him privately and here's the key question

Here's what they ask him this sets off this whole rest of this chapter. Tell us when will these things be and What will be the sign of your coming and the end of the age?

Pay attention to that question because to understand what he's answering you need to understand what the question is

Notice two things about it. Okay there there I should say notice that they're asking two things

They're asking first. When will these things be other words what Jesus just said that this temple will be destroyed

When is this temple going to be destroyed that they were so impressed by so magnificent, you know

Who's gonna do that? When is it gonna happen? That's one thing they ask and to what will be the sign of your coming and the end of the age now

They may have thought of these all gonna happen at the same time and whatever but that they asked two things Now that last part sign of your coming in the end of the age

There's one of these I hate having to do things like this, but I need to explain it because you think well He's asking they're asking three things.

No, it's actually two because that last phrase the sign of your coming in the end of the age that Is one thing and chose if you're reading

Greek in which it was written it have one definite article on the words one V there V right the way we say it in English.

What is the sign of your coming and of the end of the age? We put in to these because that's proper

English, but in Greek it has one V What would be the sign of your coming and into the age which means it's one thing.

Okay, so they understood that's one And and when Jesus returns it is the end of the age

Jesus returning In this chapter actually these two chapters and and the two questions

Because to us we look back Well, they didn't destruction of Jerusalem is one thing and the end of the age is something entirely different We that's the way we tend to think but really they're not the way he answers them shows that they're not

They are related the destruction of Jerusalem is such a calamity that it is like The end it's a preview of the end and really it's more so even than that it really is part of the end

It is the end having come already In our past and and yet there is also still

The end that is not yet come that is still in our future So we live now in this world.

We're living in The middle of the end Okay, are we living in the end times some people like to ask that question.

Yes Definitely. We've been living in the end times since Jesus came.

It's the last days. Okay last means there's no more after this There are no more eras.

Okay, there's not another era another step. There's no more. There's no more revelation Okay, you know like a new revelation a new

You know, whatever big prophet who being is something entirely new dispensation from God There's no

New Testament of Jesus Christ that you find out in golden tablets at the woods. Sorry Okay, there's none of that and between the time of Jesus's first coming and the end

So that's why this is the last days Matthew 24 then is about this

Time time we're still in right now and for us he tells us three things Okay about the past about the future and About the present and that's the way

I'm dividing up the things we find in this as part of the chapter We read first 35 verses what's about the past?

What's about our past? What's for our future? And what about our present? First about the past the key idea

About what we learned from the past is to believe believe that history is

His story and so he can he he can tell it in advance That's the reason he can tell history in advance because it's his story

We see here that Jesus knew what was coming before it came, especially from verses 15 to 20

Maybe some after that but especially in those verses there because what he says there is is specifically about the siege of Jerusalem So it's in our past from 80 67 to 70

Okay a year before then in 80 66 the Jews finally rebelled and in Jesus, you know,

Jesus had told them Just a couple chapters earlier rendered a Caesar to things that are Caesars But they decided not to believe him and instead in 80 66

They started this revolt throw out the Romans and the Roman general Titus then invaded

Judea He laid siege to Jerusalem killing an enormous amount of people. It's estimated that he crucified 500 people a day during that siege

And when they finally broke through the wall of Jerusalem in July, I heard July I heard

August but it was in the summer He asked him to pray that it not happen in winter. Apparently they did pray it God granted it because it happened in the summer

They they broke into Jerusalem in the summer of 80 70. They slaughtered the Romans dead many

Josephus Estimates that 1 million people died from the war That's 1 million and that means every one of them killed by a sword thrust an arrow something like that.

Okay, we're not talking bombs Anything like that. We're talking swords and arrows 1 million and Enslaved another 100 ,000 hauled away in chains what started for the

Jews It was it started to be a great struggle for independence and some thought that they were doing it based on faith and God's promises

To Israel, but it resulted in a catastrophe that they never could have imagined unless of course

They had remembered the words of Jesus Because there were some of them That knew it was coming the

Christians at the time many of them still Jews and Earlier would have been living in Jerusalem.

They remembered Jesus's alarming words. I mean right he's telling us here You know if you see it coming and you're on your rooftop

I mean you just jump down and you run don't go back inside, you know, get your Photo catalogs or anything, whatever you pick your pet dog.

Don't do anything. Just run. Okay when he's talking that Alarming and the

Jesus the the Christians just remembered that when they saw then this invasion starting to take place

Titus What what Jesus refers to the abomination coming like what had been foreseen in Daniel or again sort of the same thing happening?

Well, they fled the Christians took Jesus's instructions here. Literally they got out of there and they did what

Jesus said with urgency They believed him and so they saved their lives

There's no record. I'm told of even one Christian being killed in that war

Remember, I said a million of them killed in the war Jews and Romans mostly

Jews, but the Christians were all gone Because they they believe

Jesus Believe in what God has done for his people in the past.

He came into flesh. He bore our sins He was raised from the dead history is not meaningless.

It's his story of him saving and protecting his people He protected them by warning the early church of the calamity coming on Jerusalem.

And so they got out of there lesson for us is believe and Heed Some could say well, that's interesting history nice history lesson would be nicer with a video

But we don't want to try any more technology right now. It's just not working But it you know, what does it have to do with me now?

It tells you that God protects his people Right if he protected them then he will do so now and much of what

Jesus says in this chapter is to warn us Warn us Warn us of dangers will be facing of dangers of this entire time

From his first coming to his second coming if we believe him will heed him

He warns us of the danger of false teachers Over and over again in this chapter and he begins at verse 4 knows the first thing

That he starts with to warn us see that no one lead you astray

He says in verse 5 many Will come in his name And some of them will say

I am the Christ and you know It was so common for Jewish leaders to rise up against Rome That when the

Apostle Paul is arrested in Acts chapter 21, the Roman officer thinks hey, you're the Egyptian, right? You're that guy that led 4 ,000 assassins out into the wilderness and Paul goes.

No, no Can't you see the photo 844 a man named

Theodos declared himself to be the Messiah taking 400 people with him into the desert when the Romans caught up with Him they beheaded him

You know, he lost his head more more ways than one When the Jews didn't learn their lesson, unfortunately after the devastation of ad -70 about 65 years later another man rose

Claiming to be the Messiah man named by the name of Bar Kokhba who started another revolt It was again crushed and much the same way with thousands more killed

Israel was almost made barren of trees because the Romans cut them all down to make crosses out of And we've had the same thing happening in our day, you know just this year in September I think

Sun Myung Moon My Koreans not very good, but that's his name Sun Myung Moon who claimed to be

Messiah. He died. He led many astray Including into mass arranged weddings

You know, they had a huge way I'm like thousands tens of thousands of couples getting married at the same time with they arranged them

They didn't ever met each other before their weddings and which I suppose a Mass arranged wedding is better than I'm the mass suicides that some false messiahs

Lead their people into although you could joke that a mass wedding and a mass suicide are pretty much the same thing

Well 20 years ago a man by the name of David Koresh Really is original name was

Vernon Wayne Howell He renamed himself David taking it says he's inheriting the promises to David and Koresh Which is actually just an alternative spelling or pronunciation of the name

Cyrus whom God calls his anointed in Isaiah he claimed to be a new

Christ he led a cult the branch Davidians that resulted in the deaths of at least 82 people including 26 children and There are many others who claim to be the

Messiah notes. Jesus said many will come claiming to be the Messiah well, he certainly he's been right hasn't he a man by the name of John Nichols Tom who lived from 1799 to 1838.

It was a Cornish tax rebel he claimed to be the Savior of the world and the reincarnation of Jesus and he in 1834 he was killed by British soldiers at the

Battle of Boston Denwood on May 31st in 1838 and Kent Eaglet.

He didn't last very long Our man American man by the name of Arnold Potter, I believe he was living in Washington State from year 1804 to 1872.

He was an early Mormon leader And he claimed that the Spirit of Jesus entered into his body and he called himself

Potter Christ Son of the Living God he attempted to he died because he attempted to ascend to heaven by jumping off a cliff believing that he would flying upwards instead gravity took him down or There's Ernest Norman who lived from 1904 to 1971 an

American electrical engineer who co -founded the Uranus Academy of Science in 1954 He claimed that he was

Jesus in the past life. Okay, by the way, the Bible teaches against it What do you call it?

Reincarnation, right you die once after that the judgment there's no reincarnation But anyway, besides that he didn't he said he was

Jesus in the past life He also said he was the reincarnation of Confucius Socrates Mona Lisa, which is the strange one

I don't know why they get that Benjamin Franklin Queen Elizabeth the first and Tsar Peter the first, you know czar of Russia and and others and Then there's

Jim Jones live from 1931 to 1978 founder of the People's Temple who claimed to be the reincarnation of Jesus Akhenaten, you know one of the pharaohs

Buddha Vladimir Lenin why he would want to claim that I don't know but father divine who's another cult leader in the 1970s

He led his followers in a mass murder suicide at Jonestown, Guyana on November 18th 1978 killing 918 people

Or there's Marshall Applewhite who lived from 1931 to 1997 who posted an internet message

With internet's been great for people like this, by the way He started with I Jesus son of God He introduced himself

Applewhite in his Heaven's Gate cult committed mass suicide on March 26 1997 and order what they thought would help them to rendezvous with what they believed was a spaceship hiding behind the

Hale -Bopp comet And there are many others. I mean you could just go on and on The list

I just picked out some of the more notable ones here With what Jesus calls false Christ false prophets in verse 24 who will lead many astray

Even he says if possible verse 24 even the elect and the implication is there

You can lead a lot of people astray But you can't lead the elect astray. It's not possible if possible they would but it's not it's not possible

Could God protects his people? That's what the past Teaches us false

Christ lead their people and to suicide and disaster Jesus leads his people into life

Jesus kept his new church from being destroyed in Jerusalem by warning them of the disaster that was coming ahead of time and He'll keep his people throughout all of history because history is

His story of how he is saving people from every nation While so many others are deceived so the lesson of the past believe

Then there's the lesson for the future And that lesson is have hope

While it's true that Jesus here clearly speaks at the destruction of Jerusalem That happened within a generation of his warning just as he said it wouldn't verse 34.

This generation will not pass away He also spoke as if something else was going to happen. It's going to take a long time

It you know because think about it If all that Jesus had in mind was to warn about the destruction of Jerusalem that would happen in less than 40 years

It doesn't make much sense that he would spend So much time as he does here actually goes on into chapter 25 warning of this

We didn't read all of it so much time warning of the dangers of being deceived or of lulled into complacency by a long delay

But that's the way he begins think about the way he begins at verse 4 all these wars these disasters are just the beginning he says don't be alarmed and That's the way he concludes that final warning starting in verse 36

Which we left off just before that all about the the dangers of being caught unaware Because because Christ's coming is delayed again

Understand that part of what this teaching in chapter 24 is clearly about is about the destruction of Jerusalem in 8070 but other parts especially after we ended after verse 35

Wouldn't make any sense if that's all that it was about He spends a lot of time warning us of the temptations that will face during the long time

Until his coming all that, you know all the way from chapter 24 verse 36 to chapter 25 verse 13 is all about that You know, don't be lulled in complacency while you're waiting.

That's all that's what it's about now Why would he do that if this was entirely about the destruction of Jerusalem?

So I conclude that part of what Jesus is telling us here is for the future for our future

Now those who think this is all past, you know that there's no future in it for us. They could be tempted to lose.

Hope Everything has happened after all you read this everything's happened. It's all over His return was just spiritual his resurrection.

Jesus is better bodily resurrection. Really is all the resurrection there will ever be and for us

Everything just kind of keeps on going just as it always has history Including the history of our own lives

Really just kind of meanders on meaninglessly full of sound and fury signifying nothing, oh

We can believe believe in what God did in the past But we but we would if we have this idea that it's all fulfilled already

There's nothing to hope for for the future at least not on earth and people who believe that will be tempted then to slide into Depression thinking there's nothing better here on earth to look forward to there's no future coming to sacrifice for to work for to hope for But here

Jesus tells us that just as we we can look back at Christmastime to Jesus's first coming

We can look forward to the future for Jesus's second coming

But some cynical people, you know say well Come on it's been 2 ,000 years already 2 ,000 years of delay.

Well, I think it's kind of funny that so many people want it to end now You know after they've had their shot, you know, they've had their time at bat

Now they've been born and they've been able to believe and they've enjoyed some of the good things in life

Now they want him to come and of course before they die That was just perfect for them right after they get all the good stuff and before they have to taste death

They want the timing to be right for them as though history is their story, but it's not

And think about it. What if God hadn't delayed? I mean what if ad -70 had turned out to be the end that exactly when the

Romans, you know tore those Stones down and the temple was destroyed Proving that Jesus was right

Right at that moment that he appeared in the clouds and great glory and there was his coming What if that had happened?

You would never have been born There'd be no you or he could have appeared in 8410 when the

Rome was first sacked by the barbarians, but some people thought at that time. That's this is the end of the world This is the end of civilization

The mighty Roman Empire is now collapsing under barbarian invasions Or he could have appeared in 1914

Charles Russell the founder of the Jehovah's Witnesses calculated he's gonna return 1914 they want to kind of make people forget about that That's what they're based on predict that prediction, but they are and of course now all that is proof false

And aren't you glad? If they were right You would never have been bored.

You would never have heard the gospel. You would never have enjoyed life as Peter said

The Lord is not slow To fulfill his promise, but his patient toward you in other words patient for you

Not wishing that any of you should perish but that all of you

Should reach repentance in 2nd Peter chapter 3 verse 9 now people in the late 1st century were already complaining that he's waiting too long

You know, it's it's it's 80 90 already But but God was prolonging history for you and Now before we we start to complain, you know, he's waiting too long.

It's 2012. It's gonna be 2013 soon Consider that he may have others in the future that he is patiently waiting for History is his story the story of how he is saving all kinds of people all

Nations he says here and that's the most meaning that history could have So I have hope

So the delay tells us right from the beginning that this is also about our future a future in which

Jesus is Coming and here Jesus tells us three things about His coming his second coming it will be delayed as we've already suggested

Second it will be sudden and third it will be Unmistakable His coming is delayed.

He started out telling us this and from verse 4, you know There'll be he says look at that people people often fast on that of the end times

There'll be wars and famines and all this kind of stuff and then they just stop reading that and he does say that there'll Be wars and famines and earthquakes and disasters and apostasy and division of the church will be falling away

There'll be lawlessness and lovelessness, but notice what he says Those are just the beginning

If somebody look at all that let's have a Prophecy conference it's coming soon. But he says that's just the start.

Don't be alarmed You know, it's just it's just the early birth pains Don't panic

Justin when the early birth pains start and drive a hundred miles an hour down to Greensboro The implication is it will take a while More about that and we'll see more about that next week.

We look at Matthew chapter 24 verses 36 25 verse 13 his coming It's not only delayed it's sudden

Like lightning for verse 23. The implication is is that when he comes it will be sudden

You'll you'll and you will know it suddenly It's not something that kind of slowly evolves over time

You know, he kind of begins to come in some obscure place out in the mountains and you're just supposed to go hike deep into the woods to Some secluded spot to find him there in verse 25.

Jesus warns if someone tells you, you know, he's in the wilderness He's in some inner room some shack somewhere hidden Don't believe it from verse from verses 29 to 31

Jesus uses words like immediately a sign will appear people will see him coming and that's all sudden

Yes He says there is a season in which signs will show that he is near is in verse 32

It's like a fig tree budding in spring It's a sign when you know trees start to bud in spring that summer is near but he is at the very gates

He says right there when he's near he's at the gates and when he appears it will be like suddenly the doors open and in he comes and Finally his coming will be unmistakable

In other words you It'll be obvious One trick that you know the date setters, you know, they'll set a date 1914 whatever

And when they don't pan out one trick they play is to say well, actually

Jesus did come, you know He did he did it's secretly. It's mysteriously spiritually

And when the Jehovah's Witnesses 1940 date 1914 date didn't materialize. They said Jesus spiritually came to seal was 144 ,000 it's only that you carnal people

Couldn't discern it. It's your problem. You couldn't figure it out. You couldn't see it Now some who say that this chapter was entirely fulfilled in the first century

Say that Jesus really did come back then in AD 70 that he came back spiritually

With in that Roman conquering army, you know, like the battle hymn of the Republic mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the

Lord in An army, that's what she wrote it about Symbolically in an army spiritually the problem with that, you know

And I say one thing yes, God can come into history sort of spiritually here and there he acts in history

It's his story. But the problem with saying that is the coming Is that that is exactly what

Jesus says his coming will not be like in verses 23 to 28 He says three different things there gives us three different pictures of his coming

Showing us that it is unmistakable first. He says if someone says he's returned, you know, he's over there

He's in some faraway place. You go see him He says do not believe it in verses 23 and repeat it again in verse 26.

Don't believe it a Second he says that his coming is like lightning it flashes

Across the sky now you may not be Exactly where he's coming if he doesn't come to North Carolina, you may not be

I mean physically where he's coming, but you'll know it When it happens wherever you are

Then he says it's like vultures Flying over a carcass, you know, you can you can see it right the buzzards

You can see it for a distance over the over the carcass. I'm clearly from far away.

And so the conclusion is If you have to ask whether Jesus has come

He hasn't If there's a debate about whether Jesus has come

Someone is willing to get up and debate the point. He hasn't his coming is unmistakable and That's what we can hope for Not a mysterious coming that many people can deny and debate over and you know

Argue about but in coming that is obvious that is public Now we can look back at the past and believe we can look forward to the future with hope and now in the present

We persevere Now yes, this is prophecy and many people want prophecy to be you know tomorrow's headlines

Revealed in advance But what it is really for is protecting God's people

The purpose of prophecy is not to give us history gonna written in the future tense

But it is like a film preview to raise our expectations So we have hope for the future or it could be parent to like hazard warning lights on the highway

Tell us hey be careful. There's something coming up Be wary and one of the main hazards we are warned against are false teachers

There's a danger of being deceived at least three separate times in this chapter

We are put on notice and verse 4 says don't be led astray and verse 11 many false prophets will arise and verse 24

He says they'll be so persuasive So convincing that they would lead the elect astray if that were possible

But it's not possible because God preserves his elect So then how do we know if someone is elect if they said the right prayer

If they've come forward the right invitation if they've gotten baptized as important as that is

No, if they persevere Right he who endures to the end will be saved if they persevere perseverance is proof of Preservation God's preservation which is proof of election

And in verses 4 to 14 Jesus tells us that we'll have a lot to have to persevere

Through there will be wars and he says rumors of wars. In other words lots of war talk You know don't call a prophecy conference and stock up on canned goods and ammo every time a war breaks out

You're just gonna go out of your mind with panic Jesus tells us in verse 6 see that you are not alarmed

You know, we shouldn't we should be the people who are not too surprised When you know, we're doing good times like the 90s

Prosperity there's peace big people say well, this is nice to enjoy it, but it's not gonna last

We shouldn't be surprised by the wars and the terrorism wars famines earthquakes terrorism economic collapses nations falling apart

Hopefully not ours But all of that is the way the world is and it's all the way up until the time that he comes again

Tribulation isn't just seven years before the end that the happy Christians happily get to avoid

Notice that the gathering of God's elect from the earth Jesus says here in this chapter is is after tribulation and his coming

Tribulation is what happens during this entire period from the first Christmas until his return so Merry Christmas They will deliver you up to tribulation

Now we may not suffer death today, but we may be hated by some as in verse 9

We might get banned from a college campus. We might be accused of being self -righteous. We might be accused of Hate speech for saying what the

Bible says about some sins or we might be labeled a hate group for just being faithful We could suffer loneliness for not being willing to be unequally yoked with an unbeliever

We could lose money because there's just some jobs. We won't take because they take us away from the Lord There is tribulation now in the world

You'll have to persevere through it Then there is tribulation in the church

Hopefully not our church our local church, but I'm talking about those who call themselves Christians. There'll be tribulation in verse 10.

Many will fall away This could be those who who seem so faithful to the

Lord at one time seemed so on fire for the Lord Maybe they fall into some open sin preferring the temporary pleasures of sin to being faithful now or It could be those who fall away into basically into false churches and do hypocrisy and into religion that just flatters people's egos

And it's so much easier than really following Jesus, you know with this cross Instead people will betray one another and they will hate one another and he's talking about I Think in the church there from verse from verse 10 on in the church.

He says in verse in verse 12 lawlessness will increase and Surely we live in that situation now.

I mean if you If I choose one word for a lot of the church that you just lawlessness people just do you know

Whatever they want and the time of the church history I studied The time of the Puritans from this 16th century to the 17th century some into the 18th century

Christians Christians then just knew that antinomian ism lawlessness is wrong

They just everyone just kind of seemed to understand that now most Christians probably even don't even know what it is and when a few

Christian leaders, you know say what the Bible says about having to Take up your cross and follow

Jesus and make him your Lord But Jesus here calls the gospel of the kingdom when some

Christian leaders say that well They're denounced by many as is legalist their heretics

They're teaching work salvation something like that instead of the free grace

You know the in the irony our logic today is so twisted we think

Lawlessness as total freedom from from any lordship. We think that is love

That if you if you love, you know, let it go people And in we think that that law and love are in total opposition to each other you can't have both and in reality here

Jesus says lawlessness Decreases love. I mean look at that verse in verse 12 because lawlessness will be increased the love of many will grow

Cold think about that the thinking behind that verse is totally the opposite of the way the modern person thinks

People today aren't afraid of commitments and Vows and covenants and meaningful membership

They aren't afraid of all that because they love so much today Okay, the reason we have so much opposition to those things today.

Is it because we just have so much more love today No, it's the opposite precisely the opposite reason because we don't love lawlessness cools love

That's the tribulation in the church during this whole time Between Jesus's two comings.

There's many fallings away. There's heresies. There's divisions. There's lawlessness in the name of so -called grace

There's cold dead churches, but he says at the beginning of verse 13

Despite all the disappointments the disillusionments caused by many so many people betraying you, you know

People who with a great passion tell you I've got your back and then the next day, you know They're trying to put a knife in it hypocrites you thought

Hypocrites who you thought were real believers, maybe even one time looked up to now they're hating you lawless so -called

Christians with cold love Despite all of that Sounds pretty bleak, doesn't it?

I mean Sound like you want to give up hope with that But he said despite all that if you endure through all that keep following Jesus Then you will be saved you will be saved from whatever disasters come on this world

If you lived in the first century in Jerusalem, you would have been saved From the slaughter by the

Romans because you believe Jesus is warning and you fled today, you will show that you have been saved by heeding his word and fleeing sin temptation

You'll prove it by your perseverance the preserved Persevere and so prove their salvation and then those preserved who persevere

Take this gospel What he calls in verse 14 this gospel of the kingdom and look at this in verse 14 because after it looks so bleak

There's all these wars the disasters even though so much of the church is cold and dead and loveless and lawless

Despite all that after all that this gospel of the kingdom the good news that the rule of God is coming on earth

It will be proclaimed throughout the whole world To the whole world to every nation every ethnic group so that God can gather from them his elect and then then

The end will come Notice verse 14 the meaning of history. There it is.

There'll be false teachers. Sure Starting in verse 4 will be wars and disasters and tribulation Outside there'll be apostasy betrayals and divisions within but still

God will see to it. This gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world

You can't stop it. That's what history is for Heaven and earth

Will pass away but my words Will not pass away

Jesus said in verse 35 Jesus here speaks you think of those words.

He speaks as only God can speak in the Sermon of the Mount. He said that Until heaven and earth that's the whole heaven the whole universe and earth pass away the

Word of God The law will not pass away here He says it's his words that will not pass away that his words are

God's words and so we should be more attached to them Then we are to the things of this creation

It's the Word of God Which is gives us faith and what God has done in the past It gives us hope for what he'll do in the future and gives us the power to persevere in the present

Now according to the Mayan calendar This world will end this

Friday. I Suggest that you still go to work or school Pay your bill pay your bills

I plan on seeing you next week. I don't believe the Mayans understood that history was his story and That story is that joy has come to this world because the

Lord has come Let earth receive her

King But history his story tells us that before the king receives his earth

We will have tribulation After all the same one who warned us that we could be killed was killed

The same one who saved his people's lives by telling them to urgently flee from the coming disaster

You know, he didn't flee he walked right into it He endured to the end

He endured all the way through betrayal and beatings and floggings and mockery and crucifixion

He endured to the end So that we could be saved Now he invites us

To endure with him to believe and what he's done for us in the past To hope for what he will do in the future and to persevere