24. The End of the World According to John (End-Times Series Part 5)

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Welcome to the broadcast where we prod the sheep and beat the wolf. This is episode 24, the end of the world according to John.

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It's a rare occasion when only four words can summarize a major chapter of your life or an organization in which you belong, but hurry up and wait certainly fits that bill.

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From my earliest moments of hurrying up to wait at MEPS, which is military entrance processing station to the chaotic screams of drill sergeants prodding us urgently off of buses, leaving us standing there for hours in an empty parking lot, letting us wonder what it was that was going to happen next or when we were going to get new orders to the meticulous packing and shipping of all of our gear thousands of miles away to Iraq so that we could sit in empty bedrooms waiting for months for orders to come down for us to leave.

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The military is a hurry up and wait kind of place. Now perhaps this is how

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John the Baptist would have felt as he was sitting in prison near the end of his life soon to be executed.

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The Lord had called him to preach fiery, desperate sermons to the apostate Jewish nation and he sort of pops up out of nowhere preaching, repent for the kingdom of God is coming, for the

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Messiah is going to be here soon, repent. Like the prophets of old in the

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Old Testament, the Spirit of God came upon this man and stirred up these incendiary words within the vagabond prophet's mouth, which did not make him any friends, but it certainly made him a lot of foes.

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See to John, the warnings that God had told him to declare to the people felt grave.

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They felt pressing, they felt urgent, they felt imminent, they felt dire, and he was certainly urgent in his presentation.

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He had done everything that God had called him to do, but now sitting inside of a dank

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Jewish prison cell, John must have wondered when all of these events were going to take place, when the judgment that he had declared was going to happen.

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We know that at the end of John's life, at least very near to the end of his life, he sent a delegation of his own disciples to Jesus and he says, are you the one that we're looking for?

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Did I spend all this time preaching that you were coming and that you were going to bring this imminent judgment like the prophet

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Malachi told us about? Are you the one or are we waiting for someone else? Did I waste my time?

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You see, John understood something that you and I don't really understand today. John understood the imminent urgency of the message.

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He knew that when he proclaimed judgment upon the people of Judah that it was going to happen quickly and it was going to overtake them ferociously so that when he saw a gap in time, it was bothersome to him and he needed to make sure that what he had been preaching was true.

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I'll give you an example. Imagine John is like a traveling geologist.

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He is visiting this sort of mountain town in the backwoodsy part of a nation and this town that's right at the base of the mountain and he sees something that causes him to go to them and to warn them about urgent destruction that's going to happen.

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He notices that the rock structures above the city were so unstable that a deadly rock slide was imminent and was going to destroy the town.

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So he enters into the town urgently warning them to flee from the disaster that is to come, leave their homes, leave the nation, or leave this city, go because everything is going to be ruined and lost if you don't.

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But as he was doing that, few of the people actually listened to him. In fact, they became so annoyed by this geologist that they arrested him, they threw him into the local prison, and to add insult to injury, they viciously mocked the poor man, discrediting his expert opinion, leaving him there to rot in the bottom of the dampened cell.

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Before long they executed this poor man, believing that his quackery had all but been disproven, but all the while the city was being lulled into a false sense of security because the imminent nature of the prediction had a delay in its fulfillment.

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Not long after the execution of the poor geologist, the deadly landslide consumed the entire town.

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There wasn't a single survivor. That is the kind of ministry that John the

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Baptist had. He came preaching urgent destruction is going to come upon the people, repent and leave your sins, turn, run from this.

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Run from the wrath of God because it's coming and because it didn't come as instantly as the people thought it would.

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They were lulled into a sense of false security, false hope. They were lulled into slumber.

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And then not long after John's death, destruction came to the people of Judah and it overtook them and there was no one left.

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I want us today to understand the eschatological significance of John the

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Baptist. John the Baptist is not normally seen as an eschatological figure. He's seen in a different light, but I do want us today to look at him as a man who is telling us something about eschatology.

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And we'll begin with his connection back to the book of Malachi. As we learned last week,

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Malachi is often called the prophet of doom because of the calamitous prophecy that he proclaimed against the belligerent people of God.

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He warned them that God was going to send a sudden devastation by fire that would overtake the nation,

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Malachi 3 .3. Now he prophesied this 400 years before the

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New Testament. So there's a gap, there's a delay, there's a time period where the people of Israel were told that this destruction is going to happen.

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They were told that it's coming, but they didn't pay attention. This fire, this judgment of flame, according to Malachi, would coincide with the appearance of Yahweh's messenger, whom

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Malachi called Elijah, Malachi 3 .1. And that coming Elijah -like messenger,

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Jesus tells us, was none other than John the Baptist. So by the time we get to the New Testament, where we see this man

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John the Baptist coming about, appearing, preparing the way of the Lord who would save his people from their sins, we know that the appearance of John the

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Baptist was to usher in the period of imminent eschatological judgment against the

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Jews. John came to prepare the way for the Lord. Yes, he also came to warn the rebels that judgment was coming against them and it was going to happen soon.

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Now you may ask yourself, why is this so important as a historical event, it doesn't have any relevance to my life? Because we tend to think about John the

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Baptist wrongly. We tend to think of him as Jesus's eccentric first cousin who shows up eating grasshoppers dressed in camel -skin pajamas, who shows up in order to introduce

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Jesus to the world and that was his only job. I mean, that's kind of true, I guess. But it misses the entire theme of why

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John came. John came to a particular nation. He didn't come to all nations to introduce

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Jesus, he came to the nation of Judah and he came there for a purpose because judgment was coming to this people.

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When John steps onto the scene in Judea, his goal is to warn the people that the Christ has come.

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For those who repent, they will be saved, but for those who resist, they will experience a kind of hell on earth.

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John is that good -hearted citizen who's trying to pull people off the highway before the

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Greyhound bus barrels over them. That was the nature of his ministry.

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Now while we don't have a panoply of quotations from John, we have more than enough information to validate what

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Malachi says about him. Malachi told us that he's the prophet who will precede imminent judgment at the hands of Jesus Christ.

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For instance, Zechariah, who's John the Baptist's father, through the power of the Holy Spirit fully anticipated that this boy would grow up to become the messenger of imminent destruction foretold by Malachi.

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We see that in Luke 1, 76 -79. John himself even believed that he was this forerunner of the light -bearing

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Christ, the one who would come with healing in his wings, Malachi 4 -2, John 1 -6 -8 -23.

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We know that John believes that he's the one who would welcome the

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Messiah, who would bring healing to some but yet disaster to others. We know that John's focus was this, that the

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Messiah is coming to bring destruction to others because of the tone of his ministry, that all of his ministry is all about repentance.

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It's not a joyful sort of ministry. It's not a ministry of, let us get together and feast and celebrate and let us throw parties because the

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Messiah has finally come. No, his ministry was one of weeping, his ministry was one of gnashing of teeth, his ministry was one of you better repent because the

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Lord is here, he's coming, and don't miss out because it'll be too late.

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His ministry is all about repentance. We see that in Luke 3 -3, Matthew 3 -1, the nation had so deeply offended her

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God that repentance was critically and corporately necessary.

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In John's view, they were so far off course as a nation that the only remedy would be for them to humbly return to their national origin stories, to rewash themselves in the same

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Jordan River where they were declared a nation, Joshua 3, Matthew 3, 5 -6, and to wait for the

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Davidic Messiah to come and reconstitute them into a new nation. They went back to the moment where the nation began, where they were washed in the waters of the

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Jordan, they entered the promised land to conquer it. John the Baptist is basically saying, all of your history is null and void.

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You've so tarnished and stained your own record, a new nation needs to be made out of you, and if you don't go back to the

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Jordan and go back to the beginning, repent, and get yourself ready for this new messianic king,

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King Jesus, to come and lead you, then it's going to be too late. Anyone who refuses to turn from their sins, like the

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Pharisees and the Sadducees, and come under the reign of this Messiah, this Messiah King, would become their great enemy.

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And John outlines this, and he outlines how it will take place, and he does so in highly covenantal terms that goes all the way back to the

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Garden of Eden and to the covenant God made with Adam. He calls the Pharisees and the Sadducees a brood of vipers, which first and foremost gives us the picture of that ancient serpent of old, the symbol of the

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Adamic curse. But there's more going on in the designation than just that.

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The religious leaders truly believe that Abraham was their covenantal father, Matthew 4 .8. So John, when he calls them a brood of vipers, he is casting them as the offspring of the devil himself,

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Matthew 3 .7. And you can see also John 8 .44, where Jesus makes the same claim.

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This meant that they were not children of Abraham, they were children of Satan. And like Satan, they would undergo the same curse of the covenant, which was the crushing of their head by the true and better Adam, who would come and put all of his enemies under his feet,

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Psalm 110. That's Jesus. The same Jesus who would crush the serpent will also put all of his enemies under his feet.

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This eschatological and covenantal crushing by Christ was so imminent upon the horizon that John could rightly say to the people that the theoretical axe is already at the root of the tree.

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In layman's terms, one more swing of God's axe and the entire house of cards of Judah is going to come crashing down.

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The tree has not had one swing of the axe. The tree has not even had two swings of the axe.

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It is at the point where one more swing will bring it all crashing down.

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John was letting the Pharisees, the scribes, and the Sadducees know that woe would soon come upon them if they didn't repent, and it would be unavoidable.

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They, like this rotten tree that John is describing, would be chopped down by the Messiah himself and thrown into the furnace,

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Luke 3 .9. This is the kind of doom that Malachi pictures

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Christ accomplishing, and it's confirmed by John the Baptist, who says it in the most explicit terms that he possibly can, later on in John 3, verses 15 through 17, when he says,

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Now while the people were in a state of expectation and all were wondering in their hearts about John as to whether he was the

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Christ, John answered and said to them, As for me, I baptize you with water, but there is one who is coming who is mightier than I, and I am not even fit to untie the throng of his sandals.

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He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. Now notice what he says next, his, that's

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Jesus, his winnowing fork is in his hand to thoroughly clear the threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, it's a picture of heaven, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.

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John is telling us that Jesus' ministry was a ministry to separate, to separate the wheat from the chaff, to separate the lamb from the goats, to separate the wheat from the tares, to separate the faithful elect of God from among the

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Jewish nation and to burn with unquenchable fire those who reject the

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Messiah. Jesus is saying that he came to save some and to destroy others, and that is a message that doesn't often get preached.

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We always talk about how Jesus came to save the elect or to save sinners, but we rarely talk about that Jesus intentionally came to destroy apostate

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Judah. John the Baptist is telling us right here that eschatology matters and eschatology teaches us that the impending destruction upon Jerusalem is a part of the end -time events that we need to understand, and it's all in the

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New Testament. Now so far, I just want to recap for a second, we've had the privilege of seeing that sort of overlooked aspect of John the

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Baptist's ministry. He would be like the Malachi predicted prophet, the Elijah -like man who would prepare the way for the

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Lord so that salvation and judgment could occur. His appearing meant that salvation would soon come to the elect of God through Christ, but his appearing also meant that judgment would come upon the turncoats of Judah by the very hand of Christ.

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But there's another aspect of John the Baptist's ministry that we need to cover. His appearing also meant that the end of the

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Jewish age had come and that the end of the Old Covenant era was here, and we know that because Jesus, who reflecting upon the ministry of John the

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Baptist, rebuked the Pharisees, and he rebuked them with these words in Luke 16, 14 -16.

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He says, Now the Pharisees, who were lovers of money, were listening to all of these things, and they were scoffing at him.

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And he said to them, You are those who justify yourself in the sight of men, but God knows your hearts.

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For that which is highly esteemed among men is detestable in the sight of God. Then Jesus tells them, listen very closely,

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The law and the prophets were proclaimed until John, until John. Since that time, the gospel of the kingdom of God has been preached, and everyone is forcing his way into it.

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Now, I don't want us to downplay the significance of this statement. Jesus is rebuking the

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Pharisees and telling them that their era is coming to an end. The era of the law and the prophets is coming to a close.

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He says that God has spoken until John. The law and the prophets,

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God spoke through that and proclaimed through that until John. So there's an end of this era that is coming.

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The era of the law of the prophets is coming to a close. The world of temples and priests and sacrifices and feasts began to come to an end with the appearing of John the

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Baptist. That era is going away. And Jesus is looking at them saying, now that I'm here, you will either join and be a part of my kingdom or you will lose your place entirely.

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John's coming marked the very beginning of the end for the old covenant era.

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And for 40 years, this is a unique period of time, there was a 40 -year overlap.

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After the resurrection and until the destruction of the Jewish temple, there's a 40 -year overlap where the church of Jesus Christ, the kingdom of God, existed alongside of and simultaneously with the old covenant

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Jewish kingdom, Jewish temple, Jewish sacrificial system, but that only lasted for 40 years.

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John inaugurates that era. The Romans, when they destroyed the temple, finish it.

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The Romans who destroyed that temple in Jerusalem are executing the

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Malachi judgment of fire upon the city of Jerusalem. You see, for 40 years after the ascension, the temple still stood, the sacrifices continued to be on the altar.

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The Jews had 40 years to wander in the wilderness of their dead religious trappings before their bodies would litter the streets of Jerusalem like their ancestors of old.

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Think about it. In the Old Testament, for 40 years, the Jews wandered around in the wilderness before they could enter into the promised land.

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Now, 40 years Jesus has given the Jews, 40 years from the proclaiming of John's gospel to repent and to turn for the kingdom has come, for the

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Christ has come, 40 years from that event to repent before they would be allowed to enter into the promised land.

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And many, even most of that entire generation, and this is not an over -exaggeration, almost all of that generation, their dead bodies would be lying in the streets of Jerusalem because they refused to repent and they refused to believe in God's one and only

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Son, the true Joshua. Isn't that a fascinating feature as well?

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Jesus's name in Hebrew is Yeshua, which is the Hebrew way of saying

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Joshua. Joshua led the first people, the first group of Israelites into the promised land after 40 years of wandering and after all that generation had been laid dead in the streets.

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Jesus now, the true and better Joshua, after all those dead are lying in the streets of Jerusalem in 87, he's leading his church to the promised land, to the new

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Jerusalem, to heaven. Interesting parallels for sure. Now while the ministry of John the

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Baptist, this is our conclusion for today, may not seem like it has important eschatological themes, it contributes so much to our understanding and to the history of redemption.

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His coming begins the cataclysmic and seismic shift that happens from the old world of Judaism to the new world of the kingdom of God.

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His coming signaled the end of the old covenant era and heralded the beginning of God's one and only kingdom that would never end.

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A monumental life that this man lived, a monumental life and role that the Lord allowed this humble servant to have.

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It was he who Jesus said was the very best man out of all of the

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Old Testament men to ever be born of woman, but the caveat is fascinating.

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Although he was the greatest man of that entire era, better than Adam, better than Moses, better than David, he was the greatest man born of woman in that era.

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He would be least in the kingdom of God, Matthew 11, 11. The reason, very simple.

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The kingdom of God is better. The indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the forgiveness of sins perfectly, permanently, never having to go to a temple again, never having to rely on a sacrifice again, never having to go to a high priest to mediate a relationship between you and God because now

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Jesus is our faithful high priest. He's the faithful sacrifice, the perfect temple, the everything.

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This covenant with Christ is better than the old covenant. John was telling the people, repent, turn to this

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Christ or you're going to miss out forever for those who repented.

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They're with Christ now in eternity. The same is true today. John appeared to call all of the remaining elect of people out of Judah to repent and turn to Christ so that they would be a part of his never -ending kingdom, and they did.

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But to the Sadducees, the scoffers, the scribal liars, and the whitewashed Pharisaical tombs, he came to heap condemnations galore.

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Why? Because that generation was the generation that would crucify

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God's one and only Son, and they would be punished for it. In true Malachi -like fashion, the prophet preceded the awful, fiery judgment of God.

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Nearly 40 years after John was beheaded, it was the Christ who would set flame to the schismatic city and remove its religion via the

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Roman armies, never to be built again. It's a harrowing story.

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It's an awful story. It's a sad story, but it's a story of God's glory.

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The Jews, while they did not repent, serve as an example to us. The Jews who heard the urgency in this wild, camel -wearing, grasshopper -eating kind of man, they heard the urgency and they hardened their hearts.

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Let us not be the same. Let us, when we hear the message of the gospel, when we hear the message of Jesus' kingdom, let us not be like the

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Jews and harden our hearts, but let us run to Christ and enter into that glorious kingdom forever.

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Amen. Join us next time as we continue this theme of near -term judgment upon Jerusalem.

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And let me just encourage you that these preliminary discussions that we're having right now are absolutely essential for us to understand if we want to understand eschatology.

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I know that talking about Malachi and talking about John the Baptist and talking about things that were happening in the downfall of Jerusalem don't seem very eschatological to us.

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But if you miss those details that we're sharing right now and you overlook these early lessons as sort of irrelevant to the topic, then you'll misunderstand everything that follows.

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You'll misunderstand things like the rapture of the great tribulation, the abomination of desolation, the signs of the time, the mark of the beast, and so much more.

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So hang in there. We're making progress, but we're trying to develop a story, develop a theology here of what is going on in the

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New Testament when it comes to end -time studies. Next week we will look at what Jesus has to say about the topic.