Paul’s First Epistle to The Thessalonians (5)

First Baptist Church Leominster

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That we just sang in the light of our passage has turned to 1

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Thessalonians, once again chapter 1, addressing what

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Paul declared regarding the Christians in this church at Thessalonica. Paul was confident that they were among the elect of God, a common expression found in the scriptures, which is applied to those whom

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God the Father had chosen in eternity, those he purposed by his will, it was in his purpose and grace that he would save them from their sins.

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If there were not an elect people, no one would be saved because we're sinners.

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No one would come to Christ. We would crucify him, wouldn't we, apart from the grace of God.

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But thankfully, God determined that the human race would not perish. He purposed to save his people and they're described in the scriptures as the elect.

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And Paul was confident these Christians in this church at Thessalonica were numbered among the elect.

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He was convinced that they had this standing before God. And so we considered last week

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Paul's reasons that convinced him they were numbered among the elect. And we considered these reasons in order to establish a firm basis for assessing our own condition.

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Paul knew they were the elect, and I know I'm one of the elect. In fact, we're commanded in scripture to give all diligence to assess ourselves regarding this matter.

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Imagine each of us give all diligence to something in life. Do we give all diligence to this matter?

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We're commanded to do so. As Peter wrote, Wherefore, the rather brethren give all diligence to make your calling and election sure.

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For if you do these things, you shall never fall. And as we stated last week, this command is not given to us so that we can become one of God's elect.

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That's not possible. That number was fixed and finite in eternity. But rather, the elect chosen by God, those who are elect, may come to know that they are elect if they use the right means that God has given in His Word.

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And so to make one's calling and election sure is not in order to become one of God's elect. Rather, it's to determine if God had numbered you, numbered us among the elect.

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And we are to give attention, even diligence, to make this determination.

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Again, we addressed the six reasons last week, but we want to rehearse them as we come up to our emphasis today.

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Six reasons Paul believed the Christians in this church were among God's elect. And they're found in verses 5 -10 of 1

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Thessalonians 1. First, Paul was convinced of their election by God because of the manner in which the gospel had been at work among them.

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Verse 5, because our gospel came to you not only in word but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction.

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It had an impact upon them, a wonderful impact. It was transformative. Secondly, Paul knew of their election by God because of the manifestation of the

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Word of God proclaimed to them. It had resulted in their changed lives. In verse 6, you became imitators of us and of the

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Lord. Paul says you became followers of us. You embraced what we believed. You began to live like we set a pattern for you.

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And more importantly, you know, you're living for the Lord. Imitators of us.

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For you received the Word in much affliction and with joy, the joy of the Holy Spirit. And thirdly, similarly,

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Paul knew of their election by God because they became examples of how believers ought to live in the world. Are you an example of what a

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Christian should be? That's a good question to answer, isn't it? Paul wrote in verse 7, so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia, the whole

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Grecian peninsula there, southern and northern region. Four, Paul knew of their election by God because they proclaimed the

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Word of God to others, seeking to evangelize the world in which God had placed them. They were concerned about the gospel.

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They were concerned about the lost. Paul wrote, for not only has the Word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere so that we need not say anything.

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And then fifthly, Paul knew of their election by God because of their repentance from sin to serve the true

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God. Paul wrote in verse 9, for they themselves report concerning us how you turned to God from sin to serve the true

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God. And here's another message for the folks in India. You talk about a land given over to idolatry.

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I saw a DVD this week. Some estimate they have as many as 300 million gods, idols everywhere.

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This would be a good verse to speak about conversion to Christ. Now again, last week we mentioned the nature of true repentance, and it was in your notes.

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I don't know how many of you followed up and read that. We didn't have time to address in detail the nature of repentance, and so I thought we would do so today, go over what we had in our notes.

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The matter of true repentance. Why is this important? Well, one reason is because there is much misunderstanding among church attendees, professing

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Christians about the nature of true repentance. The fact is, there are many false professors of Christianity.

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Some think there are a few, some think there are many. I tend to think that there are probably quite a few who think they have salvation, but they do not.

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They claim to have truly repented of their sins, but they have not experienced or exhibited true repentance in their lives.

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One of my favorite quotes, I've given it a couple of times over the years, I gave it about two years ago, two and a half,

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Charles Spurgeon, he wrote about how he was surprised there are not more false professors of Christianity than there are.

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We shall now turn to a second point. It's not surprising that there are false professors. There is an imitation of the externals of godliness which it is not easy to detect.

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In other words, you can look like a Christian outwardly and deceive people and deceive yourself.

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Art can carve a statue, should be statue not statute, art can carve a statue so it almost breathes and some of us in looking at very skillful paintings have mistaken them for realities.

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In a notable picture in the exhibition in the mid -19th century, there was the great London exhibition, the

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World Fair as it were, this is what he is referring to, you may have noticed an imitation of sunlight shining under a door so well effected that many go up to it to ascertain if it be not really a gleam from the sun.

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We know that men can counterfeit coins and note so well that only the most experienced can detect them and in all commercial transactions men are so well aware of the subtlety of their fellows that they look well lest they be deceived.

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The vital mysteries of godliness are mysterious. The inner life cannot be perceived by the carnal eye and the outer life of the godly seemeth to most men to be but morality carried out with care and hence it becomes a very simple task for a man to make himself look just like a

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Christian so as to deceive the very elect. To learn by heart that which others may say from the heart, to get the outline of a believer's experience and then to adapt it skillfully to oneself as our experience, this is a thing so simple that instead of wondering that there are hypocrites,

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I often marvel that there are not ten times more. And then again the graces, the real graces within are very easy to counterfeit, there is a repentance that needeth to be repented of, and yet it approaches near as possible to true repentance, reference to 2

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Corinthians 7, King James language, a repentance that needs repented of. Does repentance make men hate sin?

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They who have a false repentance may detest some crimes. Does repentance make men resolve that they will not sin?

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So will this false repentance, for Balaam said, If Derech would give me this house full of silver and gold,

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I will not go beyond the word of the Lord, and he did not have true repentance. Does true repentance make men humble themselves?

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So does false repentance, for Ahab humbled himself before God, and yet he perished.

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There is a line of distinction so fine that an eagle's eye hath not seen it, and only

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God Himself, and the soul which is enlightened with His Spirit, can tell whether the repentance be genuine or no.

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And as for faith, how easy is it to counterfeit this? Even in Christ's day there was a faith which wrought miracles but did not save the soul.

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Paul tells us that if we had a faith which could remove mountains, yet if it had not done charity, it would profit us nothing.

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I know it, that a man may say that he is saved by faith with our works, and his faith may give him comfort, his faith help him in trials, it may make him forsake some sins, and yet it may not be the faith which looks alone to Christ and saves the soul.

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To imitate these things, to sow cunning and well -practice to counterfeiters as Satan, is no great difficulty.

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And that is a truism. I would say if there is one great cause in my life, it is attempting to undeceive those who are deceived regarding the condition of their souls.

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So what is true repentance? Repentance simply stated is turning oneself from serving sin to submitting to God and doing

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His will. It is as simple as you can put it. And yet, having described repentance simply, that does not do so exhaustively for further clarification as needed, because again there is a false repentance that can look a lot like the real thing.

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And so what elements are found with true repentance, and they are listed here. First, with true repentance there is a true sense and acknowledgment of personal sin.

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Oftentimes, when evangelism is conducted, this is not a matter that is driven home to the conscience of the person being witnessed to.

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It is not enough to get a person to acknowledge that he is a sinner among everyone else who are sinners. Anybody will acknowledge that, unless he is so arrogant or self -righteous that he thinks he is perfect.

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They are rather rare. Most people, when you speak with them, will acknowledge that they are a sinner like all other sinners.

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But true repentance is personal. I am aware of my sin. It is me, my sin,

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O Lord. Not just me among the others. Repentance involves one's personal acknowledgment and recognition of one's own sin before the

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Lord. Secondly, with true repentance there is a sense of one's guilt because of his sin.

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That is, when a man repents of his sin, he feels the just condemnation of God upon himself for his sin.

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I am guilty and I know it, and God has a right to condemn me. Someone who is truly enlightened by the

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Holy Spirit will come to that conclusion. In fact, if you get a person who is convicted by the

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Holy Spirit of his sin, sometimes it is quite difficult to convince him that God will forgive him.

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But how can he when

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I am such a one? He sees his sin as an exceedingly great crime that is worthy of God's wrath.

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He sees his sin as exceedingly sinful, and he recognizes that there is no basis of plea before God for forgiveness, not because of my sincerity or my brokenness or my tears or nothing whatsoever.

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It has to be extended by God freely, of his own will, of his grace.

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It must be by the freedom of his heart, because he is aware of his just guilt before God.

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If God is just, he is going to damn my soul in hell, and the repentant person knows that and confesses that.

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It strips him of pride in every way, doesn't it? Forkly, with true repentance, there is a sense of shame due to one's sin.

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And shame is different than guilt. Guilt is a sense of one's condemnation.

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Shame is a feeling of utter disgrace due to sin. There are some who teach that you are never to experience shame or guilt, that God in his grace has provided such a perfect sacrifice in Christ that guilt and shame are never to be experienced.

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That is not so. Every Christian, when he starts thinking about his sin, experiences a sense of shame.

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We didn't quote it, but Ezekiel 36 declared those in the New Covenant. One day it was prophetic in the days of Ezekiel.

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When they are in the Lord and they are in the New Covenant, they remember their former ways and they are smitten by it with shame.

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Shame is a product of the Spirit of God, isn't it?

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I am ashamed of what I used to boast about. People are proud in this world today of things they ought to be ashamed for.

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The Christian is ashamed of them. If you haven't ever had a sense of shame concerning your sin, you have not received the forgiveness of sin.

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You have not repented. If our sin caused Christ to be treated as guilty and caused him to suffer shame, he despised the shame when he hung naked upon that cross, humiliated in the manner in which he died.

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If our sin caused him to have shame, should it not cause us to have shame? Adam and Eve sent great shame in the nakedness of their sin, and we should feel no less.

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A shameless man is a non -Christian man. For with true repentance there is a sorrow over personal sin, and it is an inward sorrow, a remorse for ever having committed it.

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This is in contrast to a sorrow or fear merely for getting caught and for the consequences.

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I have always been skeptical about the kind of evangelism that goes to an unfaithful husband who is caught in his sin and gains a profession of faith out of that man because he has been caught.

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How do you know that is true or not? Give it some time. But to say or tell a person that he is under conviction of sin just because he got caught does not necessarily mean that he is sorrowing over his sin.

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He is sorrowing over the consequences of his sin, not over the sin itself. Direct him to have sorrow before God.

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And so the sorrow is not simply a sorrow for having committed the sin itself, but it is really a sorrow before God. When one becomes aware of sin and God's attitude toward sin and His work through Christ in dealing with sin, the repentant sinner feels great sorrow.

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I have grieved Him. I have saddened Him. It was the cause of Christ's terrible shame and infinite suffering as the sin -bearer on the cross.

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Fifthly, with true repentance there is institution. You want to make things right.

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I have told the story about my friend Tony on Sacramento. He was a thief. He and his two brothers,

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I mean, they stole so much stuff, robbed, burglared everything in Sacramento. And when

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Tony was converted, he filled his van three times with stuff from his house and went around and returned it to stores, to people, to their houses, confessed his sin, returned their stuff, and was willing to take punishment for it.

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Only one person, the store owner, threatened him. And Tony was willing to take it. The store owner started threatening him.

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And then Tony said all of a sudden there was all this chaos. He had been called on the intercom. Everything was going on. Finally, he threw up his hands and said,

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Get out of here. But Tony went out with a clear conscience. Restitution.

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Remember Zacchaeus? We talked about him last week. He declared, Lord, I give half of my... He wanted to make things right.

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And by the way, he wanted to do that because Jesus was being criticized when he told

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Zacchaeus, You come down to that tree. I must have food. I must have a meal with you today. And they were criticized.

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Hey, this guy's a thief. He's a chief tax collector. He's robbed us blind for years.

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And Zacchaeus was concerned about the glory of Christ. And stood up and declared,

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I'm going to make things right. And it was an announcement before the crowds. Not just before Jesus.

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He's making an announcement. If I've cheated anybody, come. I'm going to repay you. And he aggravated his guilt too.

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I believe if I recall the law of God in the Old Testament, a thief had to restore, make restitution.

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But he really said, I'll restore fourfold. I will restore as if I was a rustler.

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And restore what I've taken from you. There's an effort toward restitution. Now, much sin, of course, cannot be corrected.

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There cannot be restitution made. But there certainly is a remorse and a desire for restitution.

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Acknowledgement of wrongdoing. Six, with true repentance, there is confession of sin.

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There is an owning of personal responsibility for one's sin. When one truly repents, he makes no excuses.

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He's a no -excuse sinner. I'm a sinner. I own it. I'm guilty. He doesn't lessen his guilt.

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Rather, if it were possible, it's not possible. But if it were possible, he would magnify his guilt.

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Again, Zacchaeus could be cited. Seven, with true repentance, there is confession of specific sin.

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Yes, there's a keen recognition of the pervasiveness of sin in one's entire being. But it's generally specific offenses that the

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Lord zeros in on. That we come to acknowledge and reveals to us.

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It was covetousness for Paul, wasn't it? That tenth commandment. He thought he kept all of them pretty well.

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In fact, perfectly. Until he got to number ten. Which dealt with the condition of the heart.

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Now shall not covet. And then he realized this one got him. He was filled with covetousness.

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Specific sin, sometimes. Eight, with true repentance, there is hatred of sin in all its forms, wherever it is detected.

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And so the non -Christian may grieve over certain sins. But these are commonly outside of himself.

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They hate sins which run counter to their understanding of what is right and wrong. Things they may identify as crimes against the environment.

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Sins of intolerance, prejudice, hypocrisy. But with respect to themselves, all behavior and attitudes are justified.

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And they justify others who view matters in the same way. And that's why people in power many times are given a pass.

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Because the people, rather than condemn them, they do the same things. And so they don't condemn in someone what they do themselves.

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And this just further causes a deterioration in culture and society over time.

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A true Christian, however, who repents, hates sin. Not only in others, but in himself.

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And we would say in himself chiefly. And we've often said, you know, you and I have been in the

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Lord for some time. You know, I, since January of 1972, when

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I sin, I'm sinning against knowledge. I know better when

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I sin. And there are others that are sinning maybe with the same kind of crime, but they're doing it in ignorance.

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Who's the more guilty here? And so true repentance is humbling as well.

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We could have added that as another one. Nine, true repentance. In true repentance, there's a cessation or a turning from the performing of those former sins.

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Now, Christians struggle with sins. And sometimes they're able to defeat sins for a while, they come back.

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We're not talking about that here. But we're talking about a change of life, a new life.

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When one repents of sin, he deals with it. It's not merely a confession of it without the intention to deal with it.

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And then ten, with true repentance, there's a turning to God and his son Jesus Christ. Repentance is not just turning from sin.

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It's not morality. It's not a 12 -step program in which God, the reality of the personal true

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God, is really absent from the picture. And you're only dealing with your personal addiction. Now, repentance has to do with turning to God, turning to Christ.

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And that's what Paul spoke about. He said, whenever I was among you, he says, I did not cease to testify both the

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Jews and Greeks' repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. Repentance and faith go hand in hand, don't they?

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Faith really generates repentance. I believe what God says, and therefore

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I'm going to turn. Now, before we move on from this description of true repentance, it's important to stress that although all the elements stated above that we've gone through must be present when true repentance has been experienced, the degree to which these things may be experienced varies greatly from individual to individual.

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And so some people can be just devastated with conviction and others less so. The bottom line is this, not that you have felt these things acutely, but that the essence of repentance has been exercised by yourself, that is, you have turned from serving sin and you're now submitted to God and doing

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His will from the heart. Whereas before you served sin and resisted

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God, now you're serving God and you're resisting sin. It's a different way of life. Sin still plagues you, troubles you, defeats you at times, but it doesn't rule over you,

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Christ does. And the very fact that you desire to be free from it is an indication it no longer reigns over you.

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And it's only by the grace of God, of course, that we can experience full deliverance.

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Now, that was the fifth evidence that convinced Paul these people were of the elect.

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And then the sixth. Paul knew of their election by God because they were joyfully anticipating the second coming of Jesus Christ.

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So verse 10, Paul wrote that these Christians were waiting for His Son, God's Son from heaven, whom

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He raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come. They were waiting for the second coming, looking forward to it, looking forward to the return of the

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Lord Jesus, when they will receive the fullness of their salvation, when they will escape the wrath of God on the day of judgment.

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And that's what's being spoken about here. Christ delivers His people from the wrath to come.

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And that is at the heart of salvation. There is a judgment that's going to take place one day when the

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Lord Jesus returns and all the world is brought before Him. And all the world will be judged, assessed.

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The standard will be the law of God. And every word we have spoken, every attitude we've exhibited, every action we've performed is going to be measured and assessed according to the law of God.

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And that law will condemn, except for the one who's in Christ Jesus, because Christ will cause that sinner to be exonerated as a believer, free in full pardon because of Christ's righteousness, because of Christ's suffering on our behalf.

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Let's consider something about the wrath of God. And I don't know that this is pleasant for anybody, but it's true.

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I was reading in Arthur Pink's book last night a word to preachers about preaching the wrath of God.

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He talked about how important it was and how sinful and unfaithful preachers are when they fail to preach on this subject.

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When we speak of the wrath to come, we're, of course, the idea of the wrath of God is not even polite.

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Even Christians will be heard to make apologies for those who speak ill of our

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God because of the manner in which the wrath of God is taught and presented in the Holy Scriptures.

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Here are a few words of Arthur Pink on this matter of people's attitude and reaction to wrath.

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It's sad to find so many professing Christians who appear to regard the wrath of God as something for which they need to make an apology, or at least they wish there were no such thing.

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While some would not go so far as to openly admit that they consider it a blemish on the divine character, yet they are far from regarding it with delight.

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They like not to think about it, and they rarely hear it mentioned without a secret resentment rising up in their hearts against it.

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Even with those who are more sober in their judgment, not a few seem to imagine that there is a severity about the divine wrath which is too terrifying to form a theme for profitable contemplation.

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Others harbor the delusion that God's wrath is not consistent with His goodness, and so seek to banish it from their thoughts.

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Yes, many there are who turn away from a vision of God's wrath as though they were called to look upon some blotch in the divine character or some blot upon the divine government.

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But what set the Scriptures? As we turn to them, we find that God has made no attempt to conceal the fact of His wrath.

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He is not ashamed to make it known that vengeance and fury belong unto Him. His own challenge is,

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See now that I, even I, am He, and there is no God with me. I kill, I make alive,

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I wound, and I heal. Neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand. For I lift up my hand to heaven and say

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I live forever. If I wet, that is, sharpen my glittering sword, and my hand take hold on judgment,

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I will render vengeance to my enemies and will reward them that hate me. A study of the concordance will show that there are more references in Scripture to the anger, fury, and wrath of God than there are to His love and tenderness.

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Because God is holy, He hates all sin, and because He hates all sin, His anger burns against the sinner.

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And he makes a reference to Psalm 711. God is angry at the sinner.

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What is God's wrath? Well, it is the manifestation of His perfect attributes. It would be wrong for Him not to have wrath, and He is not capable of wrong.

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The wrath of God is His holy anger and hatred for sin. It is the revelation of His displeasure and His indignation of all that is contrary to His nature and opposed to His rule.

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And His wrath is so intense and so unquenchable that it is set forth in Scripture as a just punishment for sinners in eternal hell.

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And how often is that proclaimed in today's world? J. I. Packer, who is one of the most meek and quiet guys you would ever talk to, wrote this.

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The New Testament views hell, and it is the Greek word Gehenna, as Jesus calls it the place of incineration, as the final abode of those consigned to eternal punishment in the last judgment.

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It is thought of as a place of fire and darkness, a weeping and grinding of teeth, of destruction, of torment, in other words, of total distress and misery, if, as it seems, those terms are symbolic rather than literal.

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And he states, and there is reason in this, fire and darkness would be mutually exclusive in literal terms.

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Right? How can you have fire and darkness? We may be sure that the reality which is beyond our imagining exceeds the symbol of the dreadfulness.

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It is worse than what is described. New Testament teaching about hell is meant to appal us.

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It does that, strike us dumb with horror, assuring us that as heaven will be better than we could dream, so hell will be worse than we can conceive.

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Good statement. When we speak of Christians who wait for His Son from heaven, whom

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He raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come, we are speaking of those who believe on the

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Lord Jesus Christ, who believe that He has delivered His people from God's punishment upon sinners in eternal hell.

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He delivers us from the wrath to come. Thanks be to God. Again, we have been speaking of God's elect, those whom

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God chose from eternity to escape His judgment, receiving freely and fully from God mercy and grace through Jesus Christ.

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But we have also said in the past, it is wrong for those to assume that we mean by teaching of election that God also elects or chooses people to go to hell.

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That is never expressed that way in Scripture. People who end up in hell do so because they choose to do so.

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They sin against a good and merciful God who has been long -suffering toward them throughout their whole lives, but He has been ignored or rebuffed by them.

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People will go to hell because they have chosen to go there, not because God had made the decision for them.

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They chose to do so. Here again we might consider the words of J. I. Packer, Mr.

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Reformed guy. He is solid. Scripture sees hell as self -chosen. Those in hell will realize that they sentence themselves to it by loving darkness rather than light, choosing not to have their

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Creator as their Lord, preferring self -indulgent sin to self -denying righteousness, and, if they encountered the gospel, rejecting

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Jesus rather than coming to Him. General revelation is what we read about in Psalm 19, 1 -6.

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The creation, the stars, the heavens, day by day, the sun, shouts to us, confronts all mankind with this issue, and from this standpoint, hell appears as God's gesture of respect for human choice.

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All receive what they actually chose, either to be with God forever, worshipping

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Him, or without God forever, worshipping themselves. And those who are in hell will know not only that for their doings they deserve it, but also that in their hearts they chose it.

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And I think that this may be the strongest or the greatest of torments of the damned, a sense of great regret for their folly and their failure to ignore or dismiss or discredit the word of the gospel.

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Why didn't I hear? Why did not I respond? And they are responsible.

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A second aspect of the wrath of God is there is an appointed day in which the wrath of God will be unleashed upon all who are damned in their sins.

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There is a day of judgment. Not one sin ever committed in history shall go unpunished.

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Thankfully for Christians, the punishment was meted out upon Jesus on the cross. But for all others, they receive a just recompense for their life.

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The Apostle wrote of the wrath to come. God is appointed a day in which he will judge the world by Jesus Christ, at which time salvation will be granted to those who believe upon the

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Lord Jesus, and damnation will be the fate of all who live and die in their sins. The Apostle Paul proclaimed this day of judgment before the pagan crowds of Athens.

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Another message for India, by the way. Truly these times of ignorance, and he was talking about times of idolatry, truly the times of these ignorance

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God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent because he is appointed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he has ordained, and he has given assurance of this to all by raising him from the dead.

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A day of judgment. This is the great and final day of history that begins with the visible, physical second coming of Jesus Christ.

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It is the final day of the law, which scriptures speak about frequently. Now you read through the

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Bible, and actually there are many days of the Lord mentioned through history. It is basically when

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God intervenes in history to punish men, punish countries, nations, peoples, and some of these great interventions of his judgment in history have foreshadowed and portended the great and final day of judgment, and so you can read the language, say, in the

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Old Testament of the day of the Lord that came upon Judah or Jerusalem, and the language suggests what the final day of judgment will be like as well.

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And so, for example, in Zephaniah, one of the minor prophets we don't read very much of,

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God revealed to Zephaniah of his intention to judge Judah and Jerusalem through his instrument

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Babylon. But listen to how this great day is described. Verse 14 of Zephaniah 1.

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The great day of the Lord is near. It is near and hastens quickly. The noise of the day of the

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Lord is bitter. There the mighty men shall cry out. That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of devastation and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness, a day of trumpet and alarm, against the fortified cities, against the high towers.

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I will bring distress upon men, and they shall walk like blind men. Because they have sinned against the

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Lord, their blood shall be poured out like dust, and their flesh like refuse. Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the

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Lord's wrath. For the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy, for he will make speedy riddance of all those who dwell in the land.

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Now that was a historic event that was fulfilled in 586 BC when

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Babylon destroyed Judah and Jerusalem. But its language reveals and suggests what the final day of the

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Lord will be when Jesus returns. Where Zephaniah prophesied of God's wrath upon Judah before it occurred to Prophet Ezekiel his judgment, the same judgment after it had occurred.

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Here we read of the language of the Lord. The word of the Lord came to me saying, and Ezekiel was in Babylon when he heard that Jerusalem was destroyed,

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Son of man, the house of Israel has become dross to me. They are all bronze, tin, iron, and lead in the midst of a furnace.

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They have become dross from silver. Therefore thus says the Lord, because you have all become dross, therefore behold,

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I will gather you into the midst of Jerusalem, as men gather silver, bronze, iron, lead, and tin into the midst of a furnace to blow fire on it, to melt it.

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So I will gather you in my anger and in my fury, and I will leave you there and melt you.

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Yes, I will gather you and blow on you with the fire of my wrath, and you shall be melted in its midst.

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As silver is melted in the midst of a furnace, so shall you be melted in its midst. Then you shall know that I, the

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Lord, have poured out my fury on you. The word of the Lord came to me saying,

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Son of man, say to her, that is Judah, you are a land that is not cleansed or rained on in the day of indignation,

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God's indignation toward them. Now we can just drop down to verse 31.

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Therefore I poured out my indignation on them, I've consumed them with the fire of my wrath, and I've recompensed their deeds on their own heads.

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These historic judgments of God, again, reveal the wrath of God upon sinners, and it's going to be unleashed in a way that is unimaginable on the final day of judgment when

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Jesus Christ returns. But again, thankfully, Jesus Christ delivers us from the wrath to come.

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Thank the Lord. And so God has appointed a day in which His wrath will be poured out upon all

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His enemies. And all those then who are outside of Jesus Christ will begin to suffer the eternal wrath of God upon them for their sins.

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Jonathan Edwards had a way of describing this. He preached this sermon in 1735, probably out here in Northampton, I suspect, in front of his church.

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Wrath will come upon them without any restraint or moderation in the degree of it. There will be no mercy then.

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God does always lay, as it were, restraint upon Himself. That is in history. He does not stir up His wrath.

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He stays His rough wind in the day of His east wind. He lets not His arm settle down on wicked men with its full weight.

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But when sinners shall have filled up the measure of their sins, there will be no caution, no restraint.

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His rough wind will not be stayed nor moderated. The wrath of God will be poured out like fire.

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He will come forth not only in anger but in the fierceness of His anger. And He will execute wrath with power so as to show what

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His wrath is and make His power known. There will be nothing to alleviate His wrath. His heavy wrath will lie on them without anything to lighten the burden or to keep off in any measure the full weight of it from pressing the soul.

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His eye will not spare, neither will He regard the sinners' cries and lamentations, however loud and bitter.

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Then shall wicked men know that God is the Lord. They shall know how great that majesty is which they have despised, and how dreadful that threatened wrath is which they have so little regarded.

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And then shall come on wicked men that punishment which they deserve. And God will exact of them the uttermost farthing.

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Biblical language throughout this. Their iniquities are marked before Him. They are all written in His book.

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And in the future world He will record with them, and they must pay all the debt. There is a day of judgment.

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If people really believed this, it would... Even non -Christians at one time believed this, didn't they?

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Everybody believed this. It wasn't that many generations ago that cast this idea off. But the very fear of God moderated society, didn't it?

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It held people in check. This is so far from the thinking of people now that people perpetrate terrible crimes, slaughtering off people, than thinking they can escape by doing themselves in after it's all over, as though that's going to escape justice.

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No. But not only will there be a future day of wrath, but history upon people who commit sin.

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The wrath of God is being revealed in everyone, everywhere.

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Paul declared this in Romans 1. The wrath of God is revealed from heaven.

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It's there. Against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.

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Because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. He's talking about general revelation again.

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Talking about their creation. They should know better. For since the creation of the world is invisible, attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even as eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse.

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You can't walk out into this world without rightfully concluding, justly, rationally, there's a

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God, and He's a great God, and He's a good God, and He's a wise God, and He must have a purpose for this world.

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And how do I stand in this purpose? Those are all legitimate conclusions that any rational human being ought to conclude, according to the

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Apostle. But they rejected that knowledge.

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They did not glorify Him as God, nor were they thankful, but they became futile in their thoughts. Their foolish hearts were darkened.

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Professing to be wise, they became fools. They changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man, birds, four -footed animals, creeping things.

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Here's another message for India, by the way. This is what they do there, of course.

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That's all coming together. See, this was the manifestation of the wrath of God in their lives through history.

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In the loss of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, worshipped and served the creature rather than the

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Creator, who is blessed forever. And for this reason, God gave them up to vile passions.

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And here's one of the most hated passages in the Bible. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature.

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Likewise, also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman burned in their lust for one another. Men with men committing what is shameful, receiving in themselves the penalty of their error, which was due.

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And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind to do those things which are not fitting, being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil -mindedness.

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Their whisperer, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful, who knowing the righteous judgment of God that those who practice such things are deserving of death and not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.

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Paul stated that the wrath of God is being revealed in history against all ungodliness and righteousness of sin.

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And he makes it clear here that the form the wrath of God takes in people's lives is that he turns them over to their sin.

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And so we see the result of God's wrath is they sin more and more egregiously.

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This is the righteous judgment of God upon a wicked nation, a society, a world.

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Sin is itself a manifestation of the wrath of God. But the more people sin, the more they are storing up for themselves the wrath of God that will be unleashed upon them on the final day of judgment.

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And Paul wrote of this coming day of wrath in Romans 2, verses 1 and following. Here he was writing to moralists who thought themselves better than others.

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Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge. For in whatever you judge, whenever you judge another, you condemn yourself.

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For you who judge do the same things. You practice the same things. But we know that the judgment of God is according to truth against those who practice such things.

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Do you think this, O man, you who judge those practicing such things and doing the same, that you will escape the judgment of God?

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Or do you despise the riches of His goodness and forbearance and longsuffering, not knowing the goodness of God leads you to repentance, but in accordance with the hardness of your heart, an impenitent heart, and here it is, you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will render each one according to his deeds.

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He gives eternal life to those who have faith. And the life of faith is described here. Who by patient continuance in doing good for glory, honor, and immortality, but to those who are self -seeking do this indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish on every soul of man.

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But the wrath of God is being stored up unto the day of judgment when it is all of a sudden unleashed.

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On that day God will render to every human being His holy justice and there will be no excuses accepted, no mercy extended.

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Justice will rule the day on the day of judgment. But further, God in His eternal decree set the limit to which every human being commits sin in his or her life.

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I find this interesting. When we get to 1

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Thessalonians 2, we'll see this stated and we'll deal with it in more detail then. But the apostle says something interestingly about people's sins.

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He's talking about those who opposed the gospel. Verse 16 of 1

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Thessalonians. Forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they may be saved. And here it is. So always to fill up the measure of their sins.

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But wrath has come upon them to the uttermost. People are filling up the measure of their sins.

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And what that simply means is that God has allotted a certain measure of sin that He allows each and every person to commit.

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And when that measure is accomplished, judgment comes. Edwards brought this out.

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I've never quite understood it this way, but I read it and he's absolutely right. He spoke about this in the sermon above.

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He followed the common manner of sermonizing. He first exposited his text and then he set forth a doctrine.

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This is the teaching of the text. And then he set forth certain propositions that follow.

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Very reasonable, very biblical doctrine. And it's based on that passage. So as always to fill up the measure of their sins.

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Doctrine. When those that continue in sin shall have filled up the measure of their sin, then wrath will come upon them to the uttermost.

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That is clearly what Paul was stating in that verse. And now he makes certain propositions based upon that doctrine, that teaching.

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Proposition 1. There is a certain measure that God has set to the sin of every wicked man.

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God says concerning the sin of man, as he says to the raging waves of the sea, hitherto you shall come and no further.

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This is described in the scriptures. God is the creator. He says to the oceans, you can come this far to the land, on the beach, no farther.

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He sets the boundaries of the raging sea. And so he does the same with wicked men. The measure of some is much greater than of others.

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Some reprobates commit but a little sin in comparison with others, and so are to endure proportionably a smaller punishment.

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There will be different degrees of punishment in hell. There are many vessels of wrath, but some are smaller and others greater vessels.

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Some will contain comparatively but little wrath, others a greater measure of it. Sometimes when we see men go to dreadful lengths and become very heinously wicked, we are ready to wonder that God lets them alone.

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He sees them go on in such audacious wickedness and keeps silence. Nor does anything to interrupt them.

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But they go smoothly on and meet with no hurt. But sometimes the reason why God lets them alone is because they have not filled up the measure of their sins.

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When they live in dreadful wickedness, they are but filling up the measure which God has limited for them.

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And here he kills it on the passage out of Genesis. This is sometimes why

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God allows very wicked men to live so long, because their iniquity is not full. Genesis 15 -16.

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This is what God told Abraham. You are not going to possess the land. You are going down to Egypt for 400 years. Why? Because the iniquity of the

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Amorites is not yet full. For this reason also

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God sometimes allows them to live in prosperity. Their prosperity is a snare to them, and on occasion of their sinning a great deal more.

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And wherefore God allows them to have such a snare, because he allows them to fill up a larger measure.

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So for this cause he sometimes allows them to live under great light and great means and advantages, and at the same time to neglect and misimprove all.

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Everyone shall live until he has filled up his measure. Proposition 2.

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While men continue in sin, they are filling the measure set them. This is the work in which they spend their whole lives.

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They begin in their childhood, and if they live to grow old in sin, they still go on with this work.

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It is the work with which every day is filled up. They may alter their business in other respects.

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They may sometimes be about one thing, sometimes about another, but they never change from this work of filling up the measure of their sins.

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Whatever they put their hands to, they are still employed in this work. This is the first thing that they set themselves about when they wake in the morning, and the last thing they do at night.

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They are all the while treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath and the revelation of the righteous judgment of God.

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It is a gross mistake to think some natural men who think that when they read and pray, they do not add to their sins.

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But on the contrary, they think they diminish their guilt by these exercises. They think that instead of adding to their sins, they do something to satisfy for their past offenses.

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But instead of that, they do but add to the measure of their best prayers and by those services with which they themselves are most pleased.

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We can cite Isaiah 1 to substantiate what he just argued. And lastly, Proposition 3.

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When once the measure of their sins is filled up, then wrath will come upon them to the uttermost. God will then wait no longer upon them.

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Wicked men think that God is altogether such a one as themselves, because when they commit such wickedness,

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He keeps silence. Because judgment against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the children of men is fully set in them to do evil.

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But when once they shall have filled up the measure of their sins, judgment will be executed. God will not bear with them any longer.

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Now is the day of grace and the day of patience, which they spend in filling up their sins.

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But when their sins shall be full, then will come the day of wrath, the day of the fierce anger of God.

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God often executes His wrath on ungoodly men in a less degree in this world. He sometimes brings afflictions upon them, and that in wrath.

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Sometimes He expresses His wrath in very painful judgments. Sometimes He appears in a terrible manner, not only outwardly, but also in the inward expression of it in their consciences.

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Some, before they died, have had the wrath of God inflicted on their souls in degrees that have been intolerable.

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But these things are only forerunners of their punishment, only slight foretaste of wrath. God never stirs up all

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His wrath against wicked men while in this world. But when once wicked men have filled up the measure of their sins, then wrath will come upon them to the uttermost.

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Is it any wonder that the Lord used Edwards to get people's attention? Careless, indifferent people in the church.

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And everybody was in the church in those days. But thankfully, again, we want to end on this wonderful, glorious note.

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Jesus Christ delivered His people from the wrath to come. And that's why we can look forward to the

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Second Coming of Christ without fear, terror, but rather with expectancy, with longing.

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Justice will be rendered. Righteousness will win the day. And we'll be delivered from our own sin, from its very presence.

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And we're going to escape the penalty of sin that falls upon the world, because it fell upon our

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Savior in our place when He died upon that cross on Calvary so long ago. The reason

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Jesus is able to deliver His people is because He bore the curse of God that was upon them for their sin.

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Galatians 3 .13 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law. And the curse of the law is

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God's wrath upon sin and sinners. And how He became a curse for us.

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As it's written, cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree. He hung upon that cross. And through His death upon the cross,

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Jesus bore the wrath of God. And He satisfied God's justice because of His infinite worth as the eternal

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Son of God who assumed our human nature and stood in our stead.

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And therefore, God's holy justice was fully satisfied. His payment for our sin was fully made when

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Christ died in our place. And so God is free to be just and the justifier of sinners.

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He can take the most guilty, hardened sinner and with a pronouncement, I pardon you, your sins are forgiven.

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And it's that easy and that's free. By coming to Christ sincerely, holy, humbly, to receive the gift of righteousness that will enable us to stand and only that can enable us to stand on the day of judgment.

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Why would anybody refuse? Why would anyone wait when we don't know when the

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Lord may come? I'm somewhat of the persuasion that He's going to come at a time when no one knows and life is going on as usual as in the days of Noah or the days of Lot.

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I don't anticipate a future seven -year tribulation that everybody touts as being taught in the scriptures.

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No, that took place in 8070. Of that day, no one knows the hour.

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But Jesus tells His disciples, you watch because you don't know when that hour is. You be ready regardless when that hour comes.

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But it's one that we can look forward with not fear or apprehension but rather with anticipation of fullness of joy.

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And can you imagine what it's going to be like when the multitudes are consigned to everlasting punishment and the pronouncement is made to you.

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You're justified, freely pardoned, and eternal life is freely granted to you.

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We're not going to be able to be even comprehend, are we, the glory of it and the wonder of it and the love of it.

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And that's why when we talk about the love of God, you cannot fully comprehend the love of God until you understand the wrath of God.