The Approaching Day (Hebrews 10:24-25) - Worship Service | Adult Sunday School

Still we confess and strain towards such mystery and magnificence.

My Savior's love, My Savior's love,

What could compare? What tongue could tell? My Savior's love could carry on its wings

The beauty of that final breath. What words dare paint the awesome scene

When God stood in the stead of man? When Jesus Christ, the radiant one,

Took on the shadows of our fate, Then rose again just as the sun

With light and power and foolish grace. My Savior's love,

My Savior's love, What could compare?

What tongue could tell? My Savior's love.

And when in death this tongue is still, My song of life has reached the end.

Though as a flower I may wilt, This everlasting truth will stand.

No death or life could separate Me from the love of Christ my

Lord. This hope is sure from age to age, My song will be forevermore.

My Savior's love,

My Savior's love, What could compare?

What tongue could tell? My Savior's love.

My Savior's love, My Savior's love,

What could compare? What tongue could tell? My Savior's love.

My Savior's love. My Savior's love,

My Savior's love, What could compare?

What tongue could tell? My Savior's love.

My Savior's love, My Savior's love,

What could compare? What tongue could tell? My Savior's love.

My Savior's love. My Savior's love.

My Savior's love. What could compare?

What tongue could tell? My Savior's love.

My Savior's love. I think we're good. I think we're good. Yeah, I know.

I didn't say. I think we're fine. Thank you for that, Jeremiah. In this side monitor only, can you turn my microphone down just a little bit, please?

And turn the piano up a little bit. You sure it's just in that side monitor? Not like in a bad way.

Your voice is really nice. Oh, thanks, Jason. Nice to meet you, Jason. Nice meeting you. Let's do...

Let's do the Ann Kennedy. The what? Is that one of the ones you were talking about?

Thank you. How great thou art is what we're doing. Let's just do the first verse and chorus.

My God, when

I in awesome wonder Consider all the worlds

Thy hands have made I see the stars,

I hear the rolling thunder Thy power throughout the universe displayed

Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee How great thou art, how great thou art

Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee How great thou art, how great thou art

Okay, my bad. Maybe it's just having a day. We'll be flexible.

Yeah, there's four verses. Are we doing all four verses? Well, if he prints me off the...

Good morning, technology issues. Here we are. Welcome to Kootenai Community Church, Adult Sunday School.

I apologize for the lack of voice. Hopefully, the microphone will make up for it. This morning, we're going to learn a whole new application for the term or for the phrase

Where's the beef? And you will see when we get there. Meanwhile, while you're getting seated, we'll go ahead and open in prayer.

Father, we're always delighted to come to your word for out of it are the issues of life. From it, we learn how to worship your son, the

Lord Jesus Christ. From it, we learn how to trust you and enjoy salvation. From it, we learn how to live this life in a way that might honor

Christ. And so this morning, as we look into your word with anticipation, with fear, and with joy, we ask for your teaching.

Lord, help us to understand what you would have for us this morning that we might bring your word to a world who is just in turmoil.

And we thank you for the peace that Christ brings. In Jesus' name, amen. So, last time

I was with you, we were in the book of Daniel. We're still there, probably for the next 23 years. But we finished with verse 18.

And in verse 18, we find out that Nebuchadnezzar is going to have something happen to him.

Chapter 4. Yeah, that's a good thing. You probably need to know the chapter. So turn with me, if you will, to Daniel chapter 4.

And we will read verse 19 through the end of the chapter. Daniel chapter 4.

So to set this up, Daniel, it is very likely that this chapter was either written by or through the auspices of Nebuchadnezzar himself.

It could very well be that Daniel wrote it in transcribing what Nebuchadnezzar said to him.

But at any rate, it is the retelling, the story of what has happened to, at the time, the greatest king on the planet.

He had no end of struggle with pride. Every time something happened that was good, he took credit for it.

And he had an opportunity to, he had several, he's had several opportunities to repent of that.

And at this point, we will see God provides him with an awesome opportunity to repent of it.

And many believe he did. But this is the story of Nebuchadnezzar being, taking on the identity of a beast.

Not far from some of the things that happen today with identification. Let's turn to, as we've already turned to Daniel 4, verse 19.

Then Daniel, whose name is Belteshazzar, was appalled for a while, as his thoughts alarmed him.

Actually, I'm gonna read verse 18 first to launch into it. This is the dream which I, King Nebuchadnezzar, have seen.

Now you, Belteshazzar, tell me its interpretation. Inasmuch as none of the wise men of my kingdom is able to make known to me the interpretation, but you are able, for a spirit of the holy gods is in you.

And with that, Daniel is made responsible for telling Nebuchadnezzar what's going to happen to him. Then Daniel, whose name is

Belteshazzar, was appalled for a while, as his thoughts alarmed him. The king responded and said,

Belteshazzar, do not let the dream or its interpretation alarm you. Belteshazzar answered and said,

My lord, if only the dream applied to those who hate you and its interpretation to your adversaries.

The tree that you saw, which became large and grew strong, whose height reached to the sky and was visible to all the earth, and whose foliage was beautiful and its fruit abundant, and in which was food for all, under which the beasts of the field dwelt, and whose branches the birds of the sky lodged, it is you,

O king. For you have become great and grown strong, and your majesty has become great and reached to the sky and your dominion to the end of the earth.

And if the king saw an angelic watcher, a holy one, descending from heaven and saying, Chop down the tree and destroy it, yet leave the stump with its roots in the ground, but with a band of iron and bronze around it in the new grass of the field, and let him be drenched with the dew of heaven and let him share with the beasts of the field until seven periods of time pass over him.

This is the interpretation, O king, and this is the decree of the Most High, which has come upon my lord the king, that you be driven away from mankind and your dwelling place be with the beasts of the field, and you be given grass to eat like cattle and be drenched with the dew of heaven, and seven periods of time will pass over you until you recognize that the

Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind, and he bestows it on whomever he wishes.

And in that it was commanded to leave the stump with the roots of the tree. Your kingdom will be assured to you after you recognize that it is heaven that rules.

Therefore, O king, may my advice be pleasing to you. Break away now from your sins by doing righteousness and from your iniquities by showing mercy to the poor in case there may be a prolonging of your prosperity.

All this happened to Nebuchadnezzar the king. Twelve months later, he was walking on the roof of his royal palace, of the royal palace of Babylon.

The king reflected and said, is this not Babylon the great, which

I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?

While the word was in the king's mouth, a voice came from heaven saying, King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is declared, sovereignty has been removed from you, and you will be driven away from mankind and your dwelling place will be with the beasts of the field.

You will be given grass to eat like cattle and seven periods of time will pass over you until you recognize that the most high is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whomever he wishes.

Immediately, the word concerning Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled and he was driven away from mankind and began eating grass like cattle and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair had grown like eagle's feathers and his nails like bird's claws.

But at the end of that period, I, Nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven and my reason returned to me and I blessed the most high and praised and honored him who lives forever for his dominion is an everlasting dominion and his kingdom endures from generation to generation.

And all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing but he does according to his will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth and no one can ward off his hand or say to him, what have you done?

At that time, my reason returned to me and my majesty and my splendor were restored to me for the glory of my kingdom and my counselors and my nobles began seeking me out.

So I was reestablished in my sovereignty and surpassing greatness was added to me.

Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise, exalt and honor the king of heaven for all his works are true and his ways just and he is able to humble those who walk in pride.

So it is in every age. So in verse 18, we remember

Nebuchadnezzar had summed up that he had gone to his other counselors with this dream and they had no idea or likely they had an idea and were terrified to say.

At any rate, regardless of what happened there, he gives this dream to Daniel to interpret and Daniel understands it and he is, as the scripture says, he is appalled at what he's going to have to say.

It's awful what's going to happen to this king. So then Daniel, whose name is

Belteshazzar, in verse 19 says, he was appalled for a while as his thoughts alarmed him.

The king responded and said, Belteshazzar, do not let the dream or its interpretation alarm you.

Belteshazzar replied, Lord, my Lord, if only the dream applied to those who hate you and its interpretation to your adversaries.

So note that both of Daniel's names are used, both his Hebrew and his Babylonian name.

He was both a servant of God and an official in the court of Babylon, which is the most appropriate and likely reason why most of Daniel is written in Aramaic, the language of the court of the kings of Babylon or the court of Babylon.

The word translated appalled comes from a root which means to be stundered, to be stunned, stunned or rendered, that's stundered.

To be stunned or rendered desolate. The strength went out of him.

He just didn't know how to move on from, to go on from here. Although he had trusted in the Lord, it was still terrifying to tell the most powerful man on the planet that you're going to be eaten grass like an ox, you're going to look like an idiot and everybody is going to whisper about you and talk about you.

While the King James translates the time here, a while, that word actually means, it doesn't mean a specific length of time, but it is rendered a moment or a while.

Likely here, it refers to just a short period of time.

He stepped back, he took a breath, he thought, okay, I'm going to have to tell him what this means and how am

I going to do that? Daniel was, as we have seen earlier throughout the early parts of the book, very careful and thoughtful man and he was specific when he retailed or explained the dreams or the prophecies that the

Most High gave him. So he was rightfully concerned about what he knew he had to tell the king because it was not a friendly message.

This king was known for dealing with people who disagreed with him in rather unfortunate ways, chopping them up, throwing them in furnaces and various and sundry other ways.

He was not a man to cross indiscriminately or actually at all. So one wonders at this point if there was a furnace nearby.

Sensing his discomfort and fully understanding why the king reassures Daniel that it is safe to tell him what his dream means.

Daniel's compassion for the king is seen here in that he wishes to apply this dream to the king's adversaries and not to the king.

While it is a common oriental phrase, it is likely that Daniel truly cared about Nebuchadnezzar and he was sad to see that this man was about to pay the price for his pride.

Verse 20, the tree that you saw which became large and grew strong whose height reached to the sky and was visible to all the earth.

So Daniel starts the interpretation by repeating the facts of the dream just as the king described them.

He uses the same descriptive terms. The king will know that he is indeed interpreting exactly what the king told him.

Verse 21, and whose foliage was beautiful and its fruit abundant and in which was food for all under which the beasts of the field dwelt and in whose branches the birds of the sky lodged.

So repeating this dream as I said in the manner exactly as the king told it would assure him that Daniel had paid attention.

Even these details reveal Nebuchadnezzar's pride. Daniel is explaining to the king what he thinks about himself.

In some of the inscriptions that Nebuchadnezzar left and that historians have discovered he bragged about the peaceful shelter and giant quantities of food that he provided for his subjects.

He often used language including descriptions of trees. In one inscription it says quote, the produce of the lands the product of the mountains the bountiful wealth of the sea within here

I received under her everlasting shadow I gathered all men in peace a rain of abundance years of plenty

I caused to be in my land unquote. This is Nebuchadnezzar in inscriptions that have been found in documents, historical documents.

Some of his military campaigns were conducted in the forests of Lebanon. He was enthralled by the huge cedar trees.

Another inscription states mighty cedars tall and strong of costly value whose dark forms towered aloft the massive growth of Lebanon.

He even bragged at one point about cutting one of the trees down and had an inscription of had an inscription in stone made of him doing so cutting one of these trees down by himself.

The trees had great significance in ancient Babylon. So then in verse 22 it says it is you oh king for you have become great and grown strong and your majesty has become great and reached the sky and your dominion to the end of the earth.

So now Daniel begins the interpretation here in verse 22. He acknowledges that this dream does in fact describe

King Nebuchadnezzar and there was no doubt that his might had increased and he was the most powerful ruler of the time.

Nebuchadnezzar made this evident in many of his inscriptions bragging all the time about how powerful he was how many things he had done how many conquests he had made how many peoples he had subjected and this was rife throughout the kingdom and in the libraries of the day this is what you would have read about.

Any questions or comments about those verses? Verse 23

In that the king saw an angelic watcher a holy one descending from heaven and saying chop down the tree and destroy it yet leave the stump with its roots in the ground but with a band of iron and bronze around it in the new grass of the field and let him be drenched with the dew of heaven and let him share with the beasts of the field until seven periods of time pass over him.

So Daniel continues repeating Nebuchadnezzar's dream acknowledging the watcher the destruction of the tree with the stump left intact and the impending insanity.

The word let him share essentially means that he would have the same portion or live the same way as the beasts of the field.

He would undergo the same difficulties and deprivations and he would be essentially in the same manner wary of men and men would treat him in the same way that they treated other beasts of the field.

Verse 24 This is the interpretation, O king and this is the decree of the Most High which has come upon my lord the king.

So now comes the interpretation and Daniel doesn't dance where Nebuchadnezzar made oblique references to the angelic watcher.

He pointedly states that this is a decree of God. This is a decree of the

Most High. Verse 25 And here is the decree, part of the decree. That you be driven away from mankind and your dwelling place be with the beasts of the field and that you be given grass to eat like cattle and be drenched with the dew of heaven and seven periods of time will pass over you and you will pass over you until you recognize that the

Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whomever he wishes.

This is a truly remarkable judgment in that the greatest of kings would begin to live like the dumbest of animals.

And I think I saw a meme earlier today. He's going to act like a cow. Some have called this lycanthropy.

That's actually a specific term. It's a form of boanthropy where he thinks he's a cow. And if any of you have ever driven cattle, you know why we eat them.

Yeah. Tell you what, I have. Back when I grew up on a cattle ranch. And I think shorthorns are the stupidest creatures on the face of the earth.

Somebody out here has had shorthorns. Okay. Anyway. So he's going to be living like a beast of the field.

His life would take an incredible turn from the opulence and decadence and comfort to just barely surviving.

Getting rained on, snowed on, all kinds of things. He would live out among the animals separated from his own people.

He would eat grass. He would be subject to the weather. And he would do this apparently for seven years.

Echoing the theme of the book of Daniel, Daniel tells the king that the judgment is being made because of his pride.

And that he will eventually recognize that God is not his false deities.

Jehovah is the ruler over all. And that his kingdom itself was a result of the graciousness of God and not of his own efforts.

How important that lesson is to be learned in every age by everyone.

Especially and most importantly those in the church. What we have today in America is by the grace of God.

It is a wonderful opportunity to spread the gospel in every way and shape and form that we can.

And it is a freedom that is given to us by God himself. Nebuchadnezzar did not recognize this.

And for the purposes of what had to happen in history and in prophecy, God chose to humble this man in an unbelievable and heretofore unheard of way.

So then verse 26. And in that it was commanded to leave the stump with the roots of the tree, your kingdom will be assured to you after you recognize that it is heaven that rules.

Two interesting statements in these last two verses. Excuse me, in this verse.

He says you will recognize that it is heaven that rules and that your kingdom will be reestablished, will be assured to you.

Those are both promises. You will have your kingdom reestablished and you will recognize that it is the

Most High who rules over all of the universe. So God, now, God would sovereignly maintain his kingdom while he was away from ruling it once he had learned his lesson.

And here it is clearly a promise that he would learn the lesson. God would restore the kingdom to him.

It is interesting to note that this is the only time in the Old Testament where the word heaven is used in place of God.

You will recognize, after you recognize, that it is heaven that rules. This comes on the healing...

Well, part of the reason, I guess I should say. Daniel was not acknowledging the astrological silliness of Babylon but was rather pointing out to Nebuchadnezzar that Jehovah who inhabits the heavens, the real

God who inhabits the real heavens, rules in the affairs of men.

This comes on the heels of his statement just prior to this that the Most High is ruler, a common phrase referring to God.

Daniel is cementing the fact before he goes into his insanity in Nebuchadnezzar's mind that his kingdom was given to him by God and that his kingdom is being taken to him by God and that his kingdom will be given back to him by God.

Don't miss any of those things, Nebuchadnezzar. Don't miss them. So then

Daniel preaches the gospel to him. Therefore, O King, may my advice be pleasing to you.

Break away now from your sins by doing righteousness and from your iniquities by showing mercy to the poor in case there may be a prolonging of your prosperity.

Apparently, Nebuchadnezzar's tendency was to mistreat his subjects. Duh! Especially the poor.

Here, Daniel, in keeping with his desire that this calamity would not come upon Nebuchadnezzar, strenuously encourages him to change his ways and avoid his judgment.

Now, Daniel would have known whether or not this calamity could have been avoided.

Therefore, this calamity could have been avoided and all it would have taken was for Nebuchadnezzar to repent and to begin doing righteousness.

Now, for those of you who haven't read the rest of the story, what do you think? Do you think he's going to repent? All of you have read the rest of the story.

Well, that's not fair. So, verse 28. All this happened to Nebuchadnezzar the king.

Assuming Nebuchadnezzar or one of his scribes or he... Assuming he or one of his scribes penned this or he dictated it to Daniel, this is like a statement of certification that these things indeed happened to the king.

So, now, interestingly enough, as is often the case in the

Word of God, we have a period of time past in which nothing has happened that we know of.

An awful lot happened in the 12 months between this statement and verse 29, between verse 28 and verse 29, of which we don't have in Scripture any record.

But we know one thing. Nebuchadnezzar didn't repent. And he had... God gave him a year.

He gave him a year to change his mind, to repent. And so, what do we find a year later after this dream was related to him by Daniel in detail, telling him that you need to recognize that the most high rules in the affairs of men, all you need to do is repent and this coming calamity that you had a dream of and you kind of knew what was going on, it won't happen to you.

What do we do? We forget. We get on about the business of our day.

We stop worrying about the things that were so terrifying yesterday that we really should take note of.

And here's what happens. Twelve months later, he was walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon.

And who does he think built that? He thinks he did. Now, physically he did, but it was by the grace of God and he's forgotten that.

So it's unknown, and I have to be fair here to Nebuchadnezzar, whether or not

Nebuchadnezzar humbled himself for a short time or simply continued as normal. In any event,

God gave him one more full year to repent of his pride. And here's what happened a year later.

Verse 30. The king reflected and said, Is this not Babylon the great which

I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?

How many times did we hear the word my in there? My, my favorite.

Oh my. Nothing about Jehovah, nothing about God, nothing about grace, nothing about blessing.

I did this. Aren't I the best? So it's very clear that Nebuchadnezzar had not repented of his pride.

He is taking credit for everything that has happened to him in his lifetime. He was well known for his boasting about his accomplishments.

And there are numerous inscriptions we have from the libraries of that day that reflect this.

Numerous clay foundation cylinders describe Nebuchadnezzar's greatness as a builder have been discovered.

Ancient Mesopotamian kings would commission clay cylinders to be inscribed in cuneiform script describing and dedicating their construction.

And then they would bury them in the foundations of structures they were building or repairing. On one clay foundation cylinder,

Nebuchadnezzar describes the construction of the outer city wall of Babylon. Here's what he says.

I built a strong wall that cannot be shaken with bitumen and baked bricks. I laid its foundation on the breast of the netherworld and I built its top as high as a mountain.

It was wide enough that chariots could pass each other on the top of this. It was impressive.

There's no doubt about that. He's not bragging about something that didn't happen. It really did happen.

One of the most famous Nebuchadnezzar inscriptions is called the East India House inscription so named because it was presented as a gift to the

East India House Museum. It describes Nebuchadnezzar's achievement in building the great temples of Asgila and Asida as well as the city walls and royal palaces in Babylon.

In it, in this one he boasts, I am Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, the exalted prince, the favorite of the god

Marduk, the beloved of the god Nabu, the arbiter, the possessor of wisdom, who reverences their lordship the untiring governor who is constantly anxious for the maintenance of the shrines of Babylonia and Borsippa.

By thy command, merciful Marduk, may the temple I have built endure for all time and may

I be satisfied with its splendor. Unquote. There's no doubt that Babylon, there's really no doubt that Babylon deserves the title of one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.

Nebuchadnezzar's building projects consumed tremendous amounts of time, money, and the lives of many of his subjects.

The lives of his subjects. The palace from which he surveyed Babylon was one of the citadels of the north side of the city.

It had large courts, reception rooms, throne room, residences, and the famous hanging gardens.

A vaulted terra structure with an elaborate water supply for its trees and plants. Apparently built by Nebuchadnezzar for his

Median queen. From the palace he would see in the distance the city's 27 kilometer outer wall which he had built.

His palace stood just inside the double wall of the inner city which was punctuated by eight gates and encircled in an area, you can tell this is from European encyclopedias, encircled in an area three kilometers by one kilometer with the

Euphrates running through it. The palace adjoined a processional avenue that Nebuchadnezzar had paved with limestone, hence his mention of Baichumen, and decorated with lion figures emblematic of Ishtar.

This avenue entered the city through the Ishtar Gate which he had decorated with dragons and bulls which were emblems of Marduk and Bel, two of his gods.

It continued south through the city to the most important sacred precincts to whose beautifying and development

Nebuchadnezzar had contributed. The ziggurat, the Tower of Babylon, crowned by a temple of Marduk where the god's statue resided.

In Marduk's temple there were also shrines to other gods and in the city elsewhere temples of other Babylonian gods restored or beautified by Nebuchadnezzar.

It was a beautiful city. It had a lot of incredible structures and sculptures and buildings in it.

It was remarkable, unbelievably. So far, 49 building inscriptions regarding Nebuchadnezzar have been discovered.

He rebuilt and then built two more palaces. He erected 17 religious temples in Babylon and its suburb

Boshlepa. He completed the two walls that surrounded the city with the outer wall wide enough for two chariots to pass each other on top.

In addition to the hanging gardens he built for the Median princess, he satisfied her hopes in addition he built the hanging gardens.

He satisfied her homesickness by replicating the mountains of her homeland on the roof of the royal palace complex.

In one of his prayers to Marduk that has been found he said, Like dear life

I loved by exalted lodging place in no place I have made a town more glorious than thy city of Babylon.

From a human perspective his boasting was relatively accurate although everything was done by slave labor over the years he was in power.

Imagine how many people it took to build those things and how many lives were disrupted by it.

These were what God was talking about when he said do righteousness and take care of the poor.

These are the people that he would have forced to build these things. Any comments or questions?

Yes. The question is if they've come up with the clay cylinders that have the blueprints.

I don't know. I didn't look into that. Brian. So the question is didn't

Saddam Hussein set out to recreate ancient Babylon? Essentially. That's what

I heard. I don't know. Yes, it was. Yeah.

Yes. This would not have been lost on the

Jews of the day. The stories would have been understood to those who were paying attention that they were under the thumb of a king like this and none of them liked that.

At least the faithful ones would not have liked that. Well, the scripture does say blessed is the nation whose

God is the Lord and it is clear that as nations turn from God they come under judgment.

I believe the question is do we see similarities to this? And I would say yes, we do.

You can't go step by step but definitely when a nation turns from God his hand is removed from it.

And when the Jews would not follow the law

God had to take them into captivity and they stayed there 70 years. And they stayed there 70 years under this kind of a person.

These kinds of persons. There were more rulers in Babylon that were worse. Some were better. Some were really short -lived.

Some were ruled for quite a while. But yes, God judges his people. It's the church that should make a difference in the country.

If the world can't tell the difference between the church and the world around it verse 31 while the word was in the king's mouth a voice came from heaven.

Remember what verse 31 was. Or 30. He was bragging about himself. While that word was in his mouth a voice came from heaven saying

King Nebuchadnezzar to you it is declared sovereignty has been removed from you.

The judgment pronounced upon Nebuchadnezzar after the 12 month grace period was executed immediately upon this latest expression of pride.

The word translated sovereignty connotes kingdom, rule, dominion. Everything about his rule of Babylon was dissolved for 10 years or for 7 years.

Verse 32 And you will be driven away from mankind and your dwelling place will be with the beast of the field.

You will be given grass to eat like cattle and seven periods of time will pass over you until you recognize that the most high is ruler over the realm of mankind and he bestows it on whomever he wishes.

So the dream came true exactly as it was described by Daniel. He was driven out from the palace and lived as an animal.

Verse 33 Immediately the word concerning Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled and he was driven away from mankind and began eating grass like cattle and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair had grown like eagle's feathers and his nails like bird's claw.

I'm missing one of my pages so I'm going to bring it up on here. But somehow

I got here this morning and had left it at the store. So there's very little known very little known about the 7 year period of Nebuchadnezzar's life this period.

He suffered from a form of Boanthropy which is a medical term for thinking one is a cow. Where's the beef?

Remember what I said? It's out in the garden. Scholars believe that Nebuchadnezzar was most likely kept in the gardens which were extensive and huge and were large enough to provide isolation from people.

John Wolverine in his commentary surmises that Daniel led in protecting Nebuchadnezzar from death because remember what would happen in this culture when a king showed some weakness and was actually in a position to be deposed.

Do you think his subject would have said oh let's put him in the sanitarium and take care of him for a while until he comes to his senses and then we'll make him king again.

No, had it not been for this he would have been killed and somebody else would have taken over the kingship right away which is you'll see as we get farther into Daniel you'll see the successive kings and the times that they lasted and how they in one case well they murdered each other let me put it at that and we'll get to it when we get to it.

So Wolverine says this Scripture draws a veil over most of the details of Nebuchadnezzar's period of trial.

It is probable that he was kept in the palace gardens away from the abuse away from abuse by common people.

Although allowed to live in nature he was protected and in his absence his counselors probably led by Daniel himself continued to operate the kingdom efficiently.

Although Scripture does not tell us it is reasonable to assume that Daniel had much to do with the kind treatment and protection of Nebuchadnezzar.

He undoubtedly informed the counselors of what the outcome of the dream would be and that Nebuchadnezzar would return to sanity.

God must have inclined the hearts of Nebuchadnezzar's counselors to cooperate quite in contrast to what was often the case in ancient governments when at the slightest sign of weakness rulers were cruelly murdered.

Nebuchadnezzar seems to have been highly respected as a brilliant king by those who worked with him and this helped set the stage for his recovery.

So it's not known. This is supposition. But something accounts for seven years in which the kingdom could have been taken over by other people other kings other generals in the army and it wasn't.

It was left to be redistributed or re -given to Nebuchadnezzar. So one other thing that comes up here is and that was on page 83 which is in my office so I'm going to be doing this from memory but there's a story called the story of Nabonidus and apparently one of the later kings which we will look at was gone a long period of time and came back and had the kingdom restored to him and that was chronicled in the second century

B .C. That was found in second century B .C. Liberal scholars say aha!

This is really the story of Nebuchadnezzar. It's this Nabonidus guy. Well there's a couple of problems with that.

Nebuchadnezzar really existed. Nebuchadnezzar really did serve as king of Babylon for a number of years.

He really did disappear for a period of time. It's chronicled in the Babylonian chronicles. We don't need that.

We have scripture and the scripture is the truth. But interestingly enough there's nothing that supports this liberal interpretation.

In fact, conservative scholars who recognize the genuineness of the book of Daniel as a sixth great century

B .C. writing see no conflict. They see no conflict in accepting both

Daniel 4 as it is written and the prayer of Nabonidus as having some elements of the truth though apocryphal.

In fact, as the discussion we will see in Daniel 5 will bring out the fact that Nabonidus lived at Tema for extended periods well attested to in tradition and history gives a plausible explanation as to why he wasn't king when chapter 5 starts and he should have been.

He was the successor to Nebuchadnezzar. Belshazzar was king. He was in charge in Babylon in Daniel 5.

It is not necessary to impugn the record of Daniel in order to recognize the non -inspired story related to Nabonidus.

So, and we will trace the kings when we get to chapter 5 to show you the historical context give you the historical context.

I'm talking about because the successive kingship was given to different people and when we get to chapter 5 one verse away from the end of chapter 4 a whole new king is in place and we're missing a king and we'll see why.

But verse 34 But at the end of that period I, Nebuchadnezzar so the period is over now

I raised my eyes toward heaven and my reason returned to me and I blessed the

Most High and praised and honored him who lives forever for his dominion is an everlasting dominion and his kingdom endures from generation to generation.

That's a different Nebuchadnezzar from prior to this. It is unknown if he turned his eyes to heaven and his reason returned or if this is simply a narrative of his coming to his senses.

In any event, seven years have passed he regains by God's grace he regains his senses by God's grace and what's the first thing he does?

He begins by praising God in a manner that is completely different from his acknowledgement of his false gods.

From this point there is no indication of his attitude toward the false gods of Babylon and with the lack of information some have concluded there is insufficient evidence to conclude that Nebuchadnezzar became a believer.

Others, excuse me, see this change and recognize that in every age men are saved without being completely correct in all of their beliefs except for us.

Some live long enough and find that with study their beliefs more and more conform to biblical truths.

Others die before they have the opportunity to have their false ideas corrected. Whatever the situation here is it is clear that Nebuchadnezzar has a much clearer understanding of just who

Yahweh is. When you came to salvation was your theology perfect? By the way, when we check out our theology is still not going to be perfect.

Just thought I'd remind you that. But you knew enough by God's grace.

He changed your heart. He regenerated you and gave you the understanding so that your faith could be placed in him.

And as you grow in Christ and study the word of God and spend time with other believers sharpening iron you have jettisoned some wrong ideas and understood

Scripture better haven't you? Nebuchadnezzar may get a chance to do that. The thief on the cross never did.

But he's just as saved as if Nebuchadnezzar is. So, there's a chance and Calvin doesn't believe it happened here.

Sorry John, I disagree with you. But I believe that Nebuchadnezzar became a believer. But it's just a personal belief based on what

I see later. And by the way at the end of this chapter we move on to different kings.

All the inhabitants of the earth verse 35 says are accounted as nothing but he, Jehovah does according to his will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth and no one can ward off his hand or say to him what have you done?

This is Nebuchadnezzar talking. He just stopped being a cow. He's going to get to eat beef now instead of eating grass.

And he's saying no one can say what have you done? He continues in his psalm like tribute to God.

He notes that God's sovereignty exists both in heaven and on earth and that nothing can change his will.

And by the way nothing has changed. Nothing can change his will. Nothing surprises God. The crazy world we live in is exactly what he anticipated.

Exactly. Verse 36 At that time my reason returned to me and my majesty and splendor were restored to me for the glory of my kingdom and my counselors and my nobles began seeking me out so I was reestablished in my sovereignty and surpassing greatness was added to me.

It is likely that Nebuchadnezzar as we pointed out earlier his officials were watching out for him and upon seeing his return to sanity quickly moved him back into positions of power.

Even greater supremacy was given to him subsequent to his return to sanity. They would have had to have been pretty watchful.

This guy running around out there with hair as long as seven years growth of hair and claws, fingernails like eagle cat talons.

All of a sudden he stands up and goes where am I? What's this all about? Why don't I have any clothes on?

That's probably something like what happened. Now I Nebuchadnezzar and here's how the chapter ends remarkably different from the beginning.

Verse 37 Now I Nebuchadnezzar praise, exalt and honor the king of heaven for all his works are true and his ways are just and he is able to humble those who walk in pride.

How well he would know that. Here again he extols Yahweh in a manner that is not given to his pagan gods.

It should be noted that there are those skeptics who laugh at this account unable to believe that something could happen.

Something like this could happen to a great king. One commentator noted skeptics have scoffed at the account of Nebuchadnezzar's mental illness and Daniel.

They have claimed that it is preposterous to believe that such a thing happened to such a mighty king. However a

Greek writer named Megasthenes who lived from 312 to 280 BC related an interesting story that had been told to him by the

Chaldeans. According to the story after he had completed military conquests

Nebuchadnezzar was possessed by some god or other while on the roof of his palace. The story also talked about a man driven through the desert where wild beasts sought their food.

A lonely wanderer among the rocks and ravines. Although this story differs in several respects from the scriptural account in Daniel the similarities were strong enough to have prompted the conclusion that the

Chaldean account to Megasthenes was a perversion of what actually happened to Nebuchadnezzar. In addition it is interesting to note that for several years

Nebuchadnezzar's name disappeared from the historical and governmental records of Babylon and then it reappeared for a brief time before he died.

Do you think he would have allowed his name to disappear from the historical records of Babylon?

This guy who was creating and building and was the most awesome guy who had ever been on the planet?

His final words here are an indictment of his own pride and a recognition that not only is

God sovereign over men but he was sovereign over Nebuchadnezzar himself. It is only when

God crushes pride in men that man becomes truly useful. None of this would have been lost on the

Jews of the day. It was important that they saw that their God was still sovereign. God was reminding them that even though they were in captivity he was still in control.

Thus ends one of the strangest stories in the Old Testament. And that same

God is still in charge today no matter what you read on CNN.

Let's pray. Father we acknowledge that you are sovereign over everything.

That nothing escapes your sight. And in that we take great comfort knowing that you as God as Jehovah have ordained everything that is and everything that will be.

We trust you. We love you. We look forward to more worship with you this morning.

And we thank you for all you're doing in the lives of your children your believers here at Kootenay Community. In Jesus name.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

And good morning, and welcome to Kootenay Church. Please stand as we sing this morning,

Let Your Kingdom Come. Your glorious cause,

O God, engages our hearts.

May Jesus Christ be known, wherever we are

We ask not for ourselves, but for your renown

The cross has saved us, so we pray, your kingdom come

Let your kingdom come, let your will be done

So that everyone might know your name

Let your song be heard, everywhere on earth

Till your sovereign work on earth is done

Let your kingdom come Give us your strength,

O God, and courage to speak Perform your wondrous deeds, through those who are weak

Lord, use us as you want, whatever the test

By grace we'll preach your gospel till our dying breath

Let your kingdom come, let your will be done

So that everyone might know your name

Let your song be heard, everywhere on earth

Till your sovereign work on earth is done

Let your kingdom come Let your kingdom come, let your will be done

So that everyone might know your name

Let your song be heard, everywhere on earth

Till your sovereign work on earth is done

Let your kingdom come Could tell my

Savior's love, what song of angels could describe Could endless praises be enough, to echo full

His sacrifice How worthy is the Lamb of God, beyond all might or skill of men

Still we confess and stranger wars, such mystery and magnificence

My Savior's love, my

Savior's love What could compare, what song could tell, my

Savior's love What tune could carry on its ways, the beauty of that final breath

What words dare paint the awesome scene, when God stood in the stead of man

When Jesus Christ, the radiant one, took on the shadows of our hate

Then rose again just as the sun, with light and power and told

His praise My Savior's love, my

Savior's love What could compare, what song could tell, my

Savior's love And when in death this tongue is still, my song of life has reached the end

Though as a flower I may wilt, this everlasting truth will stand

No death or life could separate me from the love of Christ my

Lord This hope is sure from age to age, my song will be forevermore

My Savior's love, my Savior's love

What could compare, what tongue could tell, my

Savior's love My Savior's love, my

Savior's love What could compare, what tongue could tell, my

Savior's love My Savior's love

Holy, holy, lordly and all, our song shall rise to Thee Holy, holy, holy, merciful and mighty

God in three persons, blessed

Trinity Holy, holy, holy, all the saints adore

Thee Casting down their golden crowns around the glassy sea

Cherubim and seraphim falling down before Thee Who were and are and evermore shall be

Holy, holy, holy, though the darkness hide

Thee Though the eye of sinful man

Thy glory may not see Oh without heart holy, there is none beside Thee Perfect in power, in love and purity

Let's do this last one a cappella Holy, holy, holy, lord

God almighty All Thy works shall praise

Thy name in earth and sky and sea

Holy, holy, holy, merciful and mighty

God in three persons, blessed

Trinity You may be seated

Will you please turn in your

Bible to the 96th Psalm Psalm 96 and we're going to read the entire psalm together before we pray

Psalm 96 Sing to the Lord a new song, sing to the

Lord all the earth Sing to the Lord, bless His name Proclaim good tidings of His salvation from day to day

Tell of His glory among the nations, His wonderful deeds among all the peoples For great is the

Lord and greatly to be praised He is to be feared above all gods For all the gods of the peoples are idols

But the Lord has made the heavens Splendor and majesty are before Him Strength and beauty are in His sanctuary

Ascribe to the Lord, O families of the peoples Ascribe to the Lord glory and strength Ascribe to the

Lord the glory of His name Bring an offering and come into His courts Worship the Lord in holy attire

Tremble before Him, all the earth Say among the nations, the Lord reigns

Indeed the world is firmly established It will not be moved He will judge the peoples with equity

Let the heavens be glad and let the earth rejoice Let the sea roar and all it contains

Let the field exult and all that is in it Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy before the

Lord For He is coming, for He is coming to judge the earth He will judge the world in righteousness

And the peoples in His faithfulness Let's pray together Our Father, we do bless and praise

Your great and glorious name You are worthy of all our praise And all the honor and adoration that we could give

You And if we had a thousand tongues to sing And we had all of eternity to sing Your praise

We would never give to You even a portion of that which You are due For You are worthy of so much more than we can offer to You Even in this worship service

And in all of the life that You have given to us And so it is our joy to simply describe

Your grace And describe Your glory To ascribe it to You To worship You in holiness and with reverential hearts

We thank You for the promise of salvation in Jesus Christ And we thank

You that though You have promised judgment upon the nations You have promised salvation to those who will turn from their sin

And repent and trust in Your Son and His sacrifice for their deliverance We thank

You that as the day of judgment upon all the nations draws nigh So does the day of our redemption and the day of our deliverance

And the day of our eternal glory And so as Your people we look to You We set our mind and our hearts and our affections upon eternal things

Upon heavenly things And upon the hope that is firmly fixed before us That will be revealed to us at the coming of the

Lord Jesus Christ We ask Your blessing upon our worship And our fellowship here

The preaching of Your word which is to follow me You be glorified in the hearts and by the lives of Your saints

Your people, Your righteous ones Who ascribe to You the glory that is due to Your name We praise

You in the name of Christ our Lord Amen Let's stand and sing how great

Thou art O Lord my

God Awesome wonder

Consider all the worlds Thy hands have made

I see the stars I hear the rolling thunder

Thy power throughout the universe displayed

Then sings my soul my Savior God to Thee How great

Thou art How great Thou art

Then sings my soul my Savior God to Thee How great

Thou art How great Thou art

When through the woods and forest glades

I wander And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees

When I look down from lofty mountain grandeur

And hear the brook and feel the gentle breeze

Then sings my soul my Savior God to Thee How great

Thou art How great Thou art

Then sings my soul my Savior God to Thee How great

Thou art How great Thou art

And when I think

That God His Son not sparing Sent Him to die

I scarce can take it in That on the cross

My burden gladly bearing He bled and died to take away my sin

Then sings my soul my Savior God to Thee How great

Thou art How great Thou art

Then sings my soul my Savior God to Thee How great

Thou art How great Thou art

Let's do this a capella When Christ shall come

With shout of acclamation And take me home

What joy shall fill my heart

Then I shall bow in humble adoration

And there proclaim My God how great

Thou art Then sings my soul my

Savior God to Thee How great

Thou art How great Thou art

Then sings my soul my Savior God to Thee How great

Thou art How great Thou art

In Romans 11, 33 -36 it reads Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God How unsearchable are

His judgments and unfathomable His ways For who has known the mind of the

Lord or who became His counselor Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to Him again

For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things

To Him be the glory forever. Amen We'll trust

God's word alone Where His perfect will is known

Our traditions shift like sand While His truth forever stands

We will live by faith alone Clothed in merit not our own

All we claim is Jesus Christ And His finished sacrifice

Glory be, glory be to God alone

Through the church that He redeemed and made

His own He has freed us,

He will keep us till we're safely home

Glory be, glory be to God alone

We are saved by grace alone Undeserved yet freely shown

No accomplishment on earth Can achieve the second birth

We will stand on Christ alone The unyielding cornerstone

Nations rage and devils roar Still He reigns forevermore

Glory be, glory be to God alone

Through the church that He redeemed and made

His own He has freed us,

He will keep us till we're safely home

Glory be, glory be to God alone

Glory be, glory be to God alone

Through the church that He redeemed and made

His own He has freed us,

He will keep us till we're safely home

Glory be, glory be to God alone

You may be seated. In your copy of God's Word, will you please turn to the book of Hebrews, to the 10th chapter please.

Book of Hebrews chapter 10 and find your place at verse 22. Actually we'll find our place at verse 19 and we'll read 19 through verse 25,

Hebrews chapter 10. Therefore brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which

He inaugurated for us through the veil that is His flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.

And let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near.

Let's pray together. Our Father, we do ask Your blessing upon our study, our reading, and our hearing of Your Word.

May You impress upon our hearts and minds those things that the Spirit of God would use to transform us and conform us to the image of Christ.

We pray that You would open our eyes and our hearts so that we may behold in Your Word wonderful things, and that we may be transformed more and more into the image of Christ by the power of the

Spirit through the instrument of Your Word. We ask this for Your sake, for the glory of Christ, and in His name.

Amen. Well, there are thousands of things that compete each and every week for our attention and our affections.

Some of those things seek to crowd out our Sunday morning worship and our attendance here on the

Lord's Day. And those temptations and those allurements, they are common to every man.

They are what all of us face, men, women, young, old. There are things that you would think of right now that you could probably be doing other than being here this morning.

There are maybe nothing that you would rather do than to be here this morning, but certainly you could fill this morning with other things.

And sometimes even during a worship service, our minds and our hearts sort of drift away and our thoughts go to something else that we should do or maybe we'll have to do immediately after we get done with worship.

Things related to our office, things related to our business, things related to our home, and maybe your estate and other things that need to be taken care of.

There's all of these allurements and things that would try and keep us from worshiping on a Sunday morning. And technology has a way of creating its own separate set of temptations.

Spurgeon battled this in his day. Spurgeon, who preached in England in the 1800s, he was known for what was called the penny pulpit.

Every time Spurgeon would preach, there would be people on the front row at the front of his service who would be transcribing what

Spurgeon was saying. Spurgeon didn't write out a manuscript for his sermons. He had a very rough outline, sometimes something that would fit on a 3x5 index card.

And Spurgeon would take that into the pulpit and from that he would almost extemporaneously preach every

Sunday morning. And if you've read Spurgeon's sermons, which are available online for free, then you know what kind of an accomplishment that is to come up with something like that, almost extemporaneous.

But Spurgeon would preach and there would be people in the front of his church that would be transcribing that. And then after the service, those transcribers would get together and they would compare notes and they would put together what they felt was the transcript of his message.

And then later that week, Spurgeon would edit that and then approve it for publication. Then that sermon would get printed and then it would be distributed all over England and all over London for a penny a piece.

And it was called the penny pulpit. And those sermons actually made their way across the Atlantic Ocean into the

United States and they were quite popular over here, Spurgeon's penny pulpit. That made

Spurgeon one of the most read and one of the most influential preachers of his time, which is a good thing that the

Lord blessed that. Far better to have Spurgeon's influence spread all over the world than Joel Osteen or a hundred others that you could name like that.

But the penny pulpit gave people an excuse to misworship. Because you could get the sermon from last week, pay only a penny for it, and then you could stay at home and read the sermon.

And Spurgeon commented on that one time and he said this, there are some who make a bad use of what ought to be a great blessing, namely the printing press and the printed sermon, by staying at home to read a sermon because they say it's better than going out to hear one.

It is a bad example for a professing Christian to absent himself from the assembly of the friends of Christ.

I wish that some who stay away from the most frivolous excuses would think of this verse, not abandoning our meeting together as is the habit of some."

See, in Spurgeon's day, people reasoned, I could go buy the sermon, I could stay at home and read the sermon,

I don't have to get up early, I could actually read the sermon with my coffee on a Sunday morning, I could read the sermon with my coffee in my pajamas on a

Sunday morning, and then I could save all of the time of traveling to the church and coming home from the church,

I could save those awkward interactions with the people who annoy me each and every Sunday, I don't have to worry about finding a seat,

I don't have to worry about listening to the music, I don't have to worry about the music leader missing his cue and screwing everything up,

I don't have to worry about the slide runner not getting the slides right, any of that, I don't have to be irritated by any of that.

I can just pay a penny and have all of that frustration disappear, and I can stay at home and just read the sermon.

I mean, after all, it's the same thing that Spurgeon preached the week before, right? That was the excuse. Now, the excuses are different in our day, aren't they?

But only because the technology is different in our day. So the penny pulpit has been replaced by a podcast, or a live stream, or a live audio feed, or a television broadcast, or a newsletter, or even a printed sermon, or a book which is a collection of sermons, or sermon archives online.

You see, we live in our day, you don't have to pay a penny for a sermon, you can get hundreds of thousands of sermons preached by good men, solid men, good expositors from all over the world, from almost every age of Christianity up into the present, even last week, you can get all of that, and it doesn't cost you anything.

Every sermon John MacArthur has ever preached is available on his website for free, the transcript and the audio, and so many videos.

It's a wonder why anybody shows up here. When all of that is available, right? Or is it really a wonder why anybody shows up here?

Because isn't there something that we gain by being here that cannot be replaced by the penny pulpit, or a podcast, or a live stream, or anything else?

There are things, there are benefits and blessings, there are graces and sanctifying effects that are present here with us when we gather together as the

Lord's people that are not present through any of those other mediums. You see, a podcast and a live stream, those are good supplements, but they're not good substitutes.

They're good ways of supplementing what we normally get on a week -by -week basis of coming to church and gathering together for worship, but they're no substitute for the live gathering and assembly of God's people.

They're great if you can't be here because you're sick, or because you're injured, or because you're traveling, or because you're away, or some other constraint keeps you from gathering with God's people.

They're great supplements, but they're no substitute for the gathering and collecting together of God's people. Because when we fail to gather here, we don't assembly, we turn our back on God's people and not assemble with His people, we miss out on a whole bunch of things.

We miss out on what it means to be part of the body of Christ that is built up by being here with one another and fellowshipping and worshipping together.

We miss out on being strengthened by His Word and by the encouragement that we receive from fellow believers, the strength that we need to go out and face a hostile world tomorrow morning, we miss out on that.

We miss out on the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry and what each individual part of the body of Christ contributes to the whole.

You can't experience that on a live stream. You miss out on what it means to submit to authority and to be watched over by shepherds of your soul.

You miss out on what it means to enjoy friendship and fellowship with people face to face and personal and intimately with one another.

We miss out on corporate worship and observing the ordinances and the spiritual resources that are provided in and through and by the body of Christ for the body of Christ.

And not only do we miss out on those things, but listen, this is equally as significant. We cause other people to miss out on those things when we are not there.

It's not just what we miss by us not being present with the assembly of the saints. It's what we deprive other people of getting when we are not there.

We're not just missing out ourselves, we're depriving other people. When you miss, or when I miss, you deprive other people, we deprive somebody else of not only our spiritual gift, but also of our voice being added to the worship and corporate praise that is offered on a

Sunday morning. People on live stream or listening to a podcast, they can sing along with us, but can you hear them?

Maybe you don't want to hear them, but you should want to hear them. But you can't hear them, they're not adding their voice to our corporate gathering here.

They're not joining with us in worshiping at the same time and in the same way and they're not able to hear all of your voices, you're not able to hear their voices.

And so by neglecting our gathering together with the saints of God, we not only deprive ourselves, but we deprive other people of the graces that God would give to them through us when we gather together with His people.

This is why the assembly of the church is so vital in every single age. This is why the early church had to be reminded, do not turn your back, forsake the gathering together of God's people on the

Lord's day when the people of God get together. Do not forsake that, do not neglect that, but encourage one another in all the more as you see the day drawing near.

This is a reminder that every generation needs because the temptations are still the same.

Technology just makes them different, we just call them different things now. Human nature is still the same, our needs are still the same, and the hostile world around us is still the same.

So every generation of Christians needs to be reminded that we are to consider how to stimulate one another, to provoke one another, to love in good deeds by not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as is the habit of some, but instead we are to encourage one another in all the more fervently as we see the day drawing near.

And that is our text for this morning. This is our third week in this text actually, in verse 24. This is the third of the let us statements, let us draw near, let us hold fast.

In verse 24, let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and to good deeds. That's the exhortation. Then we saw the explanation of that is that we are to do this by not forsaking and turning our back on the assembly of God's people as is the habit of some, but, and now we look at the motivation, we are to encourage one another in all the more as you see the day drawing near.

So we looked two weeks ago at the exhortation, last week at the explanation of that, not forsake the assembly, but encourage one another, and now there is a motivation that is stated at the end of verse 25.

We are to do this all the more as you see the day drawing near. And we are to not forsake one another, we are to not forsake the gathering of one another, but instead, and this is the opposite, encourage one another.

I want you to notice how encouraging and not forsaking, these things are set in opposition to each other.

We are to not do this, but we are to do this. That means that whatever, that one of the things that is withdrawn from the assembly of people when we turn our back on the assembly and stop gathering together, one of the things that is lacked there is encouragement that we receive and that we give to one another.

So the opposite of forsaking is encouraging. We are to not forsake, but we are instead to encourage.

And that word encourage is a word that describes being called alongside of somebody else to encourage them or to comfort them, to exhort them.

It describes coming alongside to comfort or to exhort, to appeal, and to urge somebody.

It kind of has the idea of stepping up beside somebody and putting courage into them by exhorting them and appealing to them and motivating them on to a certain activity.

What is that certain activity? Love and good deeds, verse 24. We are to consider how to stimulate, provoke.

This is how we provoke one another, by encouraging one another. And this is the means by which we do it.

You want to know what it looks to provoke somebody else in a good way? Remember, provoke is the negative word, but we're provoking in a good way.

What does that look like? It looks like coming alongside of somebody and encouraging them in love and good deeds.

This is not the first time that this author in Hebrews has talked about encouraging one another. Back in chapter 3, verse 13, he says, but encourage one another day after day as long as it is still called today so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

And that reference to encouraging one another, just like in this passage, occurs in the context of one of the warning passages.

The warning passages that describe the danger of apostasy and drifting away and falling into disobedience and hardness of heart.

That's chapter 3. That's the warning passage in chapter 3 and chapter 4. Well, here we have this encouragement, that we are to encourage one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near, and the very next verse, verse 26, begins the next warning passage.

And we are to do this all the more. That is a comparative adverb. It describes us doing something with an increased fervency, an increased frequency.

We are to do it greater still, to a greater degree still. It means to do this especially or still more or even further or greater than otherwise.

And notice that the idea here is not that we are to do something that we don't do under other circumstances. It's not that in extraordinary times that we are to do something that we don't ordinarily do.

Rather, it is that in extraordinary times we are to do something that we ordinarily do, but we are to do it in an extraordinary measure or with an extraordinary frequency.

He is not asking Christians to do something that Christians had not always done, and it was not the normal habit and the normal lifestyle of believers.

It was the normal pattern, the normal custom for Christians to get together. Like a bunch of magnets and lead balls in a drawer, you put

Christians anywhere near each other, and they're going to gather together. They're going to assemble. And this is exactly what happened in the early church.

Even from the earliest chapters of the book of Acts, you see Christians getting together. Initially, right after the

Lord resurrected, the disciples met together on the Lord's Day, on Sunday that evening, and the Lord appeared to them. And then one week later, again on a

Sunday night, the Lord appeared to them. And then what was the custom of the early church? They would meet daily in the temple for the breaking of bread and the preaching of the word and to adhere to the apostles' doctrine and to fellowship and to encourage one another for worship and praise and the reading of the word.

They would meet daily in the temple for this. And then when that became too hostile, they spread out and they started meeting in synagogues, at least some of the synagogues outside of Israel that were friendly to the

Christian presence. But when hostility spread to the synagogues, they would then begin to meet in homes. No matter where it was, no matter what city

Paul went to, there were always, after he preached the gospel and people got saved, what Christians instinctively do is get together, they gather together, and follow the pattern of the early church, which was to get together for the breaking of bread and to worship and praise of God, to follow the apostles' doctrine, and to observe the ordinances.

That was the pattern of the early church. This is what Christians always did. So notice that the author is not telling them, now you need to do something that you've never done before.

In light of this approaching day, now you're to do this. No, this is what they always did. What he is calling for is an extraordinary fervency in this practice in light of the extraordinary times in which they lived.

This is counterintuitive for most of us. Most of us think that when times get tough, we ought to scatter.

That's how most of us would think. We would think instinctively, just in ourselves as human beings in our fallenness, we would think that when times get tough, that you need to scatter.

Stay away from people, stay away from Christians. If the church is a target, we're going to stay away from the church. If those

Christians are hunted and hated, stay away from them. Keep your distance. But the author doesn't suggest that.

Instead, he suggests that they do with increased fervency what they had always done, which was to gather together and to not neglect the assembly of the saints.

We are called to do this especially in light of extraordinary times. Do we live in extraordinary times?

Yeah, if you don't think so, you're not. Were you sleeping for the last three, four, five years? Do we live in extraordinary times?

Extraordinary, at least in terms of our experience here in the modern West, right? These are extraordinary times.

Do you think they're going to get extraordinarier, more extraordinary as time goes on? Or do you think that we're going to return to some sort of normal in the years ahead?

You might hope and pray for normal, but I'm telling you, I'm expecting more extraordinary. Well, the call for us then is not to neglect what it is that we have always done, but to do it with increasing fervency and increasing passion and increasing faithfulness.

He is calling us to selfless devotion to others during such times. Now, I say during such times because I would just remind you beginning at verse 32, these

Christians were facing persecution and hostility, the seizure of their property, reproaches and trials and tribulations and suffering just for their

Christian commitment. That was what they were experiencing at the time that he wrote this, at the time that he said this.

So then he is calling them to this selfless devotion and care for others, almost a lively, fervent interest in the spiritual affairs of others in a good way.

And there is some wisdom in this. Homer Kent in his commentary says this, one who is genuinely involved in assisting others usually has little time to indulge the fears or nurse the resentments which might cause him to forsake the fellowship of the saints.

There is wisdom in that. One who is lively and actively involved in ministering and serving others, who lives their lives focused on other people and doing good for them, they have little time to indulge the fears or to nurse the resentments that usually would cause them to absent themselves from the body of Christ.

There are a couple of things that these early Christians probably were facing which might have caused them to make themselves absent from the body of Christ.

Number one was a fear. They had every right to fear persecution. They were experiencing it. They had every right to fear that by gathering with the

Christian assembly they would become targets for those who hated the Christian assembly. They had every right to fear that.

And as chapter 12 verse 25 suggests, there may have been a root of bitterness there that was causing some resentments among the members of the congregation.

And he says later in chapter 12, do not let this root of bitterness crop up by which many people are defiled.

But when you live so focused on other people and so impassioned by motivating others to love and do good deeds, when your life and your

Christian service and your worship and your fellowship revolve around being with other people, serving other people, and being a grace to other people, that leaves you little time to indulge the fears which rise in the heart and then perpetuate themselves in our minds.

And it leaves us little time to nurse those resentments, that root of bitterness that crops up that defiles other people.

You can put those things, the fears and the resentments aside and say, I'm just going to give myself to other people. Maybe even those people that cause me to fear and maybe even those people with which

I would normally have resentment. There's a wisdom there. He's calling us to a lively faithfulness and a lively gathering and a frequent and fervent gathering together in the light of this coming day.

You'll notice verse 25 says we are to encourage one another and all the more as you see the day drawing near.

Now, what is this day? What is the day drawing near? And we might even ask, has that day passed?

Are we past that day? No longer that day is drawing near, but now it's going further away from us. If we've already gone past that day, then does this still apply to us?

And how would this apply to us if that day has already passed? What is the day that he has in mind? I want you to notice that there is no description of this day given.

He doesn't say the day of and then give us a description. There's no adjective here that describes this day. There's no other nouns that might qualify this day as to what day he has in mind.

He doesn't tell us when this day was coming. He doesn't tell us if the day is going to soon pass after it arrived.

He doesn't tell us any kind of a date on the arrival of this day. He doesn't describe that. He doesn't even say what this day might look like.

He doesn't describe how we would know that the day has arrived or if it's arrived or if it's still on the horizon.

In fact, you'll notice that he doesn't even tell us how it is that we might recognize that the day is drawing near. There's no description for this day whatsoever.

So now the question is, which day does he have in mind? Is it a date? Is it a season? Is it a period of time?

Is it an event? What is this day? Before I give you the four options that I think have been historically offered as explanations of this,

I want you to observe a couple of things, not just that no qualifier is mentioned, but I also want you to observe that it is something that we can see drawing near.

Notice verse 25 says, the more as you see the day drawing near, he is assuming that whatever this day is, that those to whom he is speaking and writing would be able to apprehend this in some sense, that we'd be able to see that it is coming near in some sense, that we'd be able to see it on the horizon.

It's something that they could watch approach them, as it were, over the course of time. And he's saying that the closer that this day gets, the more fervently you are to follow this admonition.

Second, well actually the second and the third, these are going to be patently obvious, but they need to be said.

Second, whatever the author had in mind, or sorry, whatever this day means, the author knew what he was talking about when he wrote this.

See, that's not all that profound. No, it's not. But the third one is not all that profound either. But here's the third one. The original audience knew exactly what the author meant.

The author knew what he meant, and the original audience knew what he meant. So whatever it is that he is describing, he didn't need to qualify it for them because they knew exactly what he was talking about.

And whatever it is he was describing, he has in mind specifically he knew exactly what it was, and they knew exactly what it was, and it was something that the author and the readers, the original readers, would have been able to see approaching them.

Now, with that in mind, here are the four options that we have for what this day was. First, someone suggested that this was a day of persecution that was on the horizon, a day of persecution, just a season or time of hardship or difficulty that would strike this early church, this early gathering of Hebrew Christians, and that this persecution is what he has in mind here.

Now, it's true that persecution, increased persecution, was on the horizon when the book of Hebrews was written.

But it is also true that that day of persecution for them had already arose, arose, risen, however you'd say that, it already had arrived.

There we go. It had already arrived. Chapter 10, verse 32 describes it. They were suffering reproach and tribulation and afflictions, and they were cast out of the synagogues.

That persecution had already, in some sense, arrived on their doorstep, and they were dealing with it, and they had had their property seized, and some of them had been put in jail already.

So persecution, it can't be persecution because that was already their current reality. And just remember that even with persecution as their current reality, he is still telling them to get together.

He is still telling them, do not neglect the assembly of the saints. Even in the presence of persecution, do not neglect it.

Some have suggested that it is the day of death that is in the author's mind here. As you see the day, you know the day that you're going to die, that day, whatever that day is, as you see that day of your death drawing near, do this with increased fervency and frequency.

Gather together and encourage one another, and do this especially as you grow older and get closer to the day of your death.

I don't think it's the day of death that is meant here. Certainly you and I can see that day approaching, right?

Yeah, if you're still alive, you can see the day approaching. That's one of the benefits of being alive, is that you can see the day of your death approaching.

Now I'm almost, even though I don't look it, I don't sound it, I don't act it, and I don't feel it, I'm almost 50 years old. Hey, who was that?

I'm almost 50 years old. So I can say with pretty good certainty that there are more days behind me than there are ahead of me.

I can say that with pretty good certainty. I would almost guarantee that I will not live to be 100 years old.

I almost promise that. I didn't take care of myself well enough during the first 50 to think that I will ever hit the mark of the next 50.

But even at 50 years old, almost, almost 50 years old, I'm still south of that, but almost at 50 years old, and I emphasize almost,

I can see the day of my death approaching because I know that that is coming. And the more time goes on, the more aware of that I am, the more

I wake up sore, the more I suffer whatever it is and sprain my ankle and hurt myself playing games in Adventure Club as those things unfold and I experience all those pains.

I'm reminded again that this life is passing, it is passing quickly, and my life is coming to an end.

My opportunities for service to the Lord are going to quickly come to an end. And if the Lord should tarry and I should die in this world,

I am able to see the day of my death drawing near. All of us can see that. And if you're young, you may be not even thinking about it.

I didn't, which is why I didn't take care of myself well enough to hit the 100 -year mark. But we can see the day of our death approaching.

I don't think it's the day of their death that he is describing here. I'm going to show you in the context why that is here in just a moment.

A third option, and this is probably one of the two most likely options, a third option is that the day that he is speaking of was the day of judgment predicted by Jesus in Matthew 24 when the

Roman Empire and the Roman general Titus would come into Jerusalem and they sacked the city of Jerusalem and tore down the temple and put an end to the sacrifices and to the priesthood and judgment was poured out upon the city of Jerusalem in fulfillment of Jesus' prophecy and promise in Matthew 24.

Matthew 24 verses 1 and 2 says, Jesus came out from the temple and was going away when his disciples came up to point out the temple buildings to him and he said to them, do you not see all these things?

Truly, I say to you, not one stone here will be left upon another which will not be torn down. And he predicted the destruction of Jerusalem and that came to be in 70

AD. Now, the book of Hebrews was written prior to 70 AD, I believe. And so even before 70

AD, it might be that what the author has in mind here is that day that Jesus had predicted which would be the end of the temple worship and all of the

Old Testament customs and the sacrifices and the feasts and the priesthood and all of the functions of the temple that he has already said in the book of Hebrews that they're passing away, they're obsolete, they are no more, they're being done away with because something new has come that has replaced all of that.

So it might be that in the context of the book of Hebrews, particularly his message that all of those old things have passed away, that what he has in mind is the sudden destruction of that old system not just in terms of God's dealing with them as a nation and under a covenant, but also the destruction of that old system physically when the temple would be torn down and Jerusalem would be razed and the priesthood would come to an end.

And after 70 AD, there has never been another functioning priesthood that has offered sacrifices on the temple mount since 70

AD. That prophecy that Jesus gave in Matthew chapter 24 has been fulfilled. Now, it is the position of John Owen, the great

Puritan, who wrote this many volumes on the book of Hebrews, John Owen's position is that this refers to the destruction of the temple in 70

AD. The principles then would come forward and apply to us in this way.

If that's the day that the author has in mind, that it's the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD, which for them was only a few years away.

And it might be that the author is simply saying, look, you can see that this is coming to an end. You can see that the time of this fulfillment is coming close.

If that's what the author has in mind, then the principle here would apply to us any time we feel that we are on the brink of a judgment, a destruction, or difficult times.

So the principle would remain the same. The principle is, as you see the day of difficulty drawing near, do not neglect the gathering of the saints together.

Do not neglect to gather together with the saints, even as you see prophecy being fulfilled and as you see judgment about to be meted out on God's people.

That's the third option, and that is a very strong possibility. I don't necessarily think that that is it.

I think that the author has here something in mind that is broader still than that. And I think that what he is describing, this is the fourth option, that what is being described here is the day of the

Lord, sometimes known as the day of Christ. And this is just a reference to judgment writ large. Just the idea of that end times, eschatological final judgment of God that we read about in the

Psalms, that we read about in the book of Revelation, that day of the Lord when it comes. The end time judgments that are being described here, generally speaking,

I think is what the author is speaking of here. That day, that day of the Lord has already dawned in the sense that the

Messiah has come, the one who has been appointed the judge of the living and the dead. He has already arrived and having died and born the sins of His people and been buried and rose again and ascended to the right hand of God, He makes intercession for them now.

He is coming again and returning again. And I think it is that final return of Christ, the eschatological end times, final judgment that is being described in this passage.

This is the judgment that is described by the Old Testament prophets. It's called the day of destruction, the day of God's wrath, or God's day upon the nations.

You see this in prophecies in Isaiah, Ezekiel, Amos, Joel, and Zephaniah. I'm going to read to you one passage from the book of Isaiah that describes this.

And I want you to listen to the cataclysmic nature of this judgment as Isaiah describes it.

Isaiah 13 beginning at verse 6. Wail, not w -h -a -l -e, wail, w -a -i -l, wail for the day of the

Lord is near. It will come as destruction from the Almighty. Therefore all hands will fall limp and every man's heart will melt.

They will be terrified. Pains and anguish will take hold of them. They will writhe like a woman in labor.

They will look at one another in astonishment, their faces aflame. Behold, the day of the

Lord is coming. Cruel with fury and burning anger to make the land a desolation. And he will exterminate its sinners from it.

For the stars of heaven and their constellations will not flash forth their light. The sun will be dark when it rises and the moon will not shed its light.

Thus I will punish the world for its evil and the wicked for their iniquity. I will also put an end to the arrogance of the proud and abase the haughtiness of the ruthless.

I will make mortal man scarcer than pure gold and mankind than the gold of offer. Therefore I will make the heavens tremble and the earth will be shaken from its place at the fury of the

Lord of hosts in the day of his burning anger. Now that's just one.

I could probably fill the rest of the hour with other quotations from Ezekiel and Amos and Joel and Zephaniah.

This day of the Lord will affect the entire world, all of the nations, and all of the cosmos.

It will all be changed. Things will happen that we have never seen happen on the face of the planet ever before.

That is the day of the Lord. It is the final eschatological judgments. And all of the temporal judgments that take place in this world, they are all foreshadowings, little tastes, little glimpses of what that day of the

Lord is going to be. Every time God pours out His wrath in this world and we see it in the form of a natural disaster that takes life or we see it in the form of a nation falling or a nation being judged, those are always precursors.

They're foreshadowings of that ultimate day of the Lord. That day of the Lord will be like any of the judgments that, unlike any of the judgments that have come before it, and it will be greater than any of the judgments that have come before it.

But all of the judgments that have come before it all remind us that that final day is coming and we cannot escape it.

And it will come at the end and God will have His way. Everything else that happens in this world is precursors.

They're just the earth shaking, little bit trembles, little minor tremors that remind us that the big one is coming.

When I was a kid, I had some relatives who lived down in California and they would sometimes call up and say, well, we had another earthquake or we'd hear about an earthquake on the news and the radio and what happened in California.

There's always some earthquake in California. California is always being shaken. And when that would happen, my family and my relatives would always say to us, those are just, these are the small ones.

One of these days, the big one is coming. And when the big one comes, California is going to fall into the ocean.

Let's just all imagine a day, shall we? Now, if you're here and you're from California, don't get mad at me.

You left there. And if you're listening to this and you're still in California, don't get mad at me. You want to leave there and move to Spokane.

But every tremor that would happen before the big one always reminded you that there was something big that was coming.

And so it is with the day of the Lord. When God judges a nation and a kingdom falls, when the

Medo -Persian kingdom fell, and when the Babylonian kingdom fell, and the Greco -Roman kingdom fell, and then the

Roman Empire fell, and the Hasmodean Empire fell, and the Chinese Empire fell, and the Empire of Egypt fell, and the

Russian Empire fell, and the American Empire fell. Did I just say that out loud? Every last one of those is a reminder that there is coming a judgment upon all the nations and nobody can escape.

As you see that day drawing near, with increased fervency and with increased frequency, you gather together to encourage one another.

All the more as you see the day drawing near. He will not tarry. His judgment will not tarry forever.

God's patience, it's not that God's patience ever runs out because God is infinite in His patience, but the time of His mercy does run out.

The time when God gives mercy and grace and is patient, that will come to an end. Not because His patience is exhausted, but because His timing has been made complete.

And when His timing has been made complete, then that judgment upon all the nations will come. And it will fall, and it will fall severely, and it will fall swiftly, and it will take up and overcome and overtake any and all who are not in Christ Jesus.

Any and all who have not found refuge in the Son of God will be overtaken in that final eschatological judgment.

It must be, it will be, and it cannot be otherwise. As you see that day drawing near, gather together even more.

Why would I say that I think that this is the eschatological end times judgment that's being described? Because of the very next paragraph in the book.

I want you to begin reading with me at verse 26, and I want you to notice the language of judgment. Verse 26,

If we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.

Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.

How much severe punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled underfoot the Son of God and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the

Spirit of grace? For we know him who said, Vengeance is mine, I will repay, and, again, the

Lord will judge his people. It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Now it does not sound to me like what he is describing here is persecution in this world, because persecution in this world is nothing compared to the eschatological end times wrath of God when it is poured out upon the nations.

These things cannot be compared. I do not think that the author here has in mind necessarily trials and difficulties that we experience here right now, but he is looking towards something that was future to them, it is still future to us.

It is that final day of the Lord, the fire that will consume the Lord's adversaries. He is looking forward to that day, and he is saying that is a day that you and I can see drawing near.

They say, but Jim, they think that this, we have always thought that this is drawing near. We thought this has been drawing near for 2 ,000 years.

And that is right, we have. And guess what? It is 2 ,000 years nearer today than it was when he wrote this.

You can always see the tremblings and the rumblings. You never know when the big one is going to hit.

Now by the grace and the mercy of God, as he has gathered in his elect around the world, it has taken this amount of time and still longer before the

Lord is finally going to wrap up this clown show. But when he does, it will all come crashing down, and those who are in Jesus Christ will receive grace and blessing.

As you see that day drawing near, you can watch it. Can you watch it?

Can you see it in your own day? Can you see it in our own age? I thought the coming of the

Lord was near in the 1980s. I thought it was nearer still in the 1990s.

And I was right, it was nearer in the 1990s. But in the Clinton administration, I thought, whew, I don't know that it can get much worse than it is right now.

I mean, the Clinton years, we survived that. And then we've kind of fumbled along.

And then, whew, another administration. The Lord has got to come quickly.

It is not getting better. And listen, as the day of the Lord draws nearer, it's not going to get any better.

It won't. All of the empires of the world will crumble.

No empire lasts forever. No kingdom lasts forever, except one. There is one kingdom that Revelation describes that will last forever.

And when He establishes it in truth and righteousness, it will mean the complete destruction of every nation on this planet.

We are living, I think, in our day, and I'm just going to say this probably against my better judgment.

We are living in our day either at the end of the American era, at the end of the

American age, or we are living at the end of the age. One of those two.

I'm not predicting a date. I'm not making any predictions. But I'll tell you what, we can see the day of the

Lord drawing nigh. We can see that every nation on this planet is ripe for judgment.

Ripe, ready, deserving, more than worthy of every judgment that the

Lord might pour out upon this world. Every last one of them. As we see that day drawing nigh, that is when we must, with increased fervency and increased frequency, make sure that we are considering how to stimulate one another to love and to good deeds, and not forsake the assembling of ourselves together, but instead to encourage, to put courage into one another as we see that day approaching.

We are to live our lives in the light of future events. Far too many Christians and far too many churches live their lives as reactionaries against whatever is taking place today.

Whatever news event or headline hits, they react to that. And everything that they do is a response to that. We're not called to do that.

We are called to live our lives in light of future events. One event in particular. The coming of the

Lord and the drawing nigh of that day, that is the event that we are to look forward to. We are to look forward to the arrival of the day of the

Lord, knowing that it will be judgment upon God's enemies, but also knowing that it will be the blessing and grace and redemption of His people and their final deliverance.

And we are to look forward to that day. In fact, we are, in the words of 1 Peter 1 .13, to fix our hope entirely on the grace that is to be brought to us at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

We're not to fix our hope on earthly structures of government or 2022 or 2024 or whatever next election cycle is or whatever governor of whatever state is going to run for president.

We're not to fix our hope upon a political party, Republican or Democrat, or some grassroots movement.

None of those things are our hope. We are to fix our hope entirely on the grace that is to be brought to the people of God at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

And when He is revealed, we will be made like Him. And that will mean for us immeasurable grace, immeasurable joy, and untold glory for the people of God.

We're to fix our hope on that. And our hope is that certainty, that absolute certainty that we know what the future holds.

We know who wins. We know how this ends. And we are to look forward to that, fixing our hope entirely on that, knowing that the day is drawing to an end.

The night is coming soon. This is what Paul says in Romans 13. Do this knowing the time that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep.

For now salvation is nearer than when you first believed. The night is almost gone. The day is near.

Therefore, let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave properly in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, and not in strife and jealousy.

We are to live our lives in light of the times. We know the times. We can see from the times what is happening.

And we are to be like the sons of Issachar, to be aware of what's going on around us, but to live our lives looking past that to the hope that is set before us.

1 Peter 4, 7. The end of all things is near. Therefore, be sound judgment, sober in spirit, for the purpose of prayer.

2 Peter 3, 9 -14. The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance.

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up.

Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat?

But according to his promise, we are looking for a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.

Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by him in peace, spotless and blameless.

Notice that the author, Peter, says that we are to look forward to this and to hasten the coming of the day of God.

He is saying we ought to look forward to and anticipate and hasten the judgment that is to come.

Why? For us, it will be glory. For us, it will be our redemption. James 5 .8,

you too be patient, strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near. Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together, as is the habit of some, but encourage one another, and all the more as you see that day drawing near.

You watch it and you say, man, surely the end has to be soon. If that's your thought, then the thought that follows that should be that I need to really be about the business of building up and encouraging and strengthening and provoking the love and good deeds of my fellow believers, not forsaking the assembling of myself together.

No matter what difficult may come, no matter what suffering may entail, no matter what persecution is promised, no matter what it costs,

I will gather together and I will do it, and I will not turn my back on them, because the day of the Lord is nigh.

His judgment is nigh, and His grace is nigh. And when we neglect these duties, it weakens us, does it not?

It's hard to be encouraged and hard to be strengthened to face those trials and those difficulties and difficult times that are coming, if you're absent yourself from the body of God's people, if you neglect those graces.

But when we are gathered together here on a Lord's day, then it is a foretaste of the gathering together with the

Lord, with Him, when He returns. I hope, I pray, and I would love to know today that the coming of the

Lord will interrupt my plan for this next week and that we will never have another worship service in this world again, as this world is currently.

I would love to know that. But as that day draws near, it's not going to get any easier for us to do this,

I don't expect. Therefore, we are to draw near, we are to hold fast, and we are to encourage others to do the same.

With increased fervency, as you observe God's judgments coming down on the world around us.

Look up, Christian, because your redemption draws nigh. The kingdom is yours, the inheritance is yours, the

Lord of the harvest is coming back. He will have His way. He will give you glory. He will save you and secure you and take you to be with Himself.

He will abundantly reward those who are faithful to His word. Let's pray. Father, we thank

You in Jesus Christ for the deliverance that we have from this coming day of judgment. We thank

You that because we are in Your Son, He has borne all of our sin, and we will never see Your frown, we will never face condemnation, we will never face any punishment or see

Your wrath because of our sin, for it was all borne by the Lord Jesus Christ. So we thank You for that.

We praise You for Your goodness and grace to us and for making that salvation not just available to us, but for changing our hearts and our minds and giving us a new nature and drawing us to Your Son.

These graces and these gifts that have resulted in our salvation, we praise You for them. And we do pray that as we see the times get more difficult and this age draw to an end, we know that we are closer now than when these words were originally written.

We pray that You would give us wisdom and discernment that we may walk circumspectly and that we may live in light of the future reward and the future works that You are doing.

Make us more diligent, more fervent, more faithful than we've ever been before so that we may give glory to our great

God and King and welcome His appearance when He comes at last and we receive that great hope, that great grace that is brought to us when

He returns. Thank You for that. We praise You as Your people and all God's people said,

Amen. Please stand. ♪ ♪ Turn your eyes upon Jesus, ♪ look full in His wonderful face, ♪ and the things of earth will grow strangely dim ♪ in the light of His glory and grace.

♪ Turn your eyes to the hillside ♪ where justice and mercy embrace.

♪ There the Son of God gave

His life for us ♪ and our measureless debt was erased.

♪ Jesus, to You we lift our eyes.

♪ Jesus, our glory and our prize, ♪ we adore

You, behold You, our Savior ever true.

♪ O Jesus, we turn our eyes to You. ♪

Turn your eyes to the morning ♪ and see

Christ the Lion awake. ♪

What a glorious dawn, fear of death is gone, ♪ for we carry

His life in our veins.

♪ Jesus, to You we lift our eyes. ♪

Jesus, our glory and our prize, ♪ we adore

You, behold You, our Savior ever true.

♪ O Jesus, we turn our eyes to You. ♪

Turn your eyes to the heavens, ♪ our

King will return for His own. ♪

Every knee will bow, every tongue will shout, ♪ all glory to Jesus alone.

♪ Jesus, to You we lift our eyes. ♪

Jesus, our glory and our prize, ♪ we adore

You, behold You, our Savior ever true.

♪ O Jesus, we turn our eyes to You. ♪

O Jesus, to You we lift our eyes.

♪ Jesus, our glory and our prize, ♪ we adore

You, behold You, our Savior ever true.

♪ O Jesus, we turn our eyes to You.

♪ O Jesus, we turn our eyes to You.

♪ Daily barrister, the prisoners chained, ♪ and set them free.

♪ God shall arise and His foes be scattered.

♪ God shall arise, boasting His praise.

♪ Lift up your head and see your

Savior, mighty Savior. ♪ God shall reign in the skies.

♪ You became a servant, clothed in flesh. ♪

In You was no sin. ♪ You were counted guilty, died or dead.

♪ God shall arise and His foes be scattered.

♪ God shall arise, boasting

His praise. ♪ Lift up your head and see your

Savior, mighty Savior. ♪

God shall reign in the skies.

♪ Nations say You are awesome. ♪

Let every kingdom sing praise.

♪ Nations say

You are awesome. ♪ Let every kingdom sing praise.

♪ God shall arise and His foes be scattered.

♪ God shall arise, boasting His praise.

♪ Lift up your head and see your

Savior. ♪

God shall arise and His foes be scattered.

♪ You became a servant, clothed in flesh.

♪ In You was no sin. ♪ You became a servant, clothed in flesh.

♪ Don't worship the one true mighty.

♪ Holy supply of life.

♪ You restore my weary soul again and again.

♪ Lead me in Your righteousness and peace. ♪

You lift me through every dark cloud. ♪ There's nothing that I have.

♪ You are there to comfort me again and again.

♪ Protecting me, assuring me You're near. ♪

The Lord is my shepherd.

♪ The Lord is my shepherd.

♪ I shall not want. ♪

You gave Your whole life for my ransom. ♪

So I could rejoice at Your side.

♪ You have shown Your faithfulness again and again.

♪ There's nothing good that You will not provide.

♪ The Lord is my shepherd.

♪ The Lord is my shepherd.

♪ I shall not want. ♪

The days of my life I will dwell.