144. End Times Signs And Imminent Destruction

The PRODCAST

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:04

and welcome back to the podcast where we prod the sheep and beat the wolf. This is episode 144, the end time signs of imminent destruction.

00:35

Well, hello everyone, and welcome back to the podcast. We have officially passed 1 ,600 subscribers on YouTube and 2 ,500 subscribers on all platforms, which is a big deal for a brand new show that is focused on eschatology.

00:52

We're also heading into the best time of the year, which is the Christmas season, and I don't care what you think,

00:57

I am not a humbug. I love Christmas time. It's fun, it's joyful, and all of that.

01:02

Maybe we can get into that more later. But because we're heading into this Christmas season and because this show is post -millennial and trying to encourage you on how to have an optimistic eschatology, well,

01:15

I thought that maybe this Christmas what we could do is we could have a bonus episode for the show where I look at the

01:21

Old Testament prophecies concerning the birth of Jesus and show how they emphatically prove the post -millennial hope.

01:28

What I mean is that every passage that you hear every year at Christmas time in churches and on Christmas cards and all of that are some of the most bold and the most ostentatious passages concerning Jesus's reign.

01:42

And according to those passages, his reign is going to be total, global, and full.

01:49

My contention is that if you understand Christmas rightly, and I'm not talking about wrapping paper and pencils and Red Ryder BB guns, but if you understand

01:58

Christmas in the way that the Bible understands Christmas, then the only result is that you would be a post -millennial, that you would become post -millennial in your eschatology, but you would also be filled with the kind of joy that materialism cannot buy and liberalism cannot fake.

02:15

That episode, that special episode, is gonna be dropping on Tuesday, December the 24th, on Christmas Eve, and it'll likely be the last episode of the podcast that I do until the new year.

02:28

I've got family coming in town. I need to rest, I need to recover, and I need to get ready for as we continue in this series in the book of Revelation, which is what we're gonna do right now.

02:38

So welcome, welcome back to this series on Revelation where we have been looking at Matthew 24, and maybe you're like, maybe this is your first time, and you're like, why would you be going to Matthew 24 if you're in a series on Revelation?

02:51

Well, what we've argued is you should pause and go back and listen to those questions instead of sitting in your pajamas, watching

02:57

YouTube and questioning me, but just to give you an explanation, Matthew 24 and Revelation are saying the exact same things.

03:05

Matthew 24 is Jesus' Olivet Discourse, and since the Gospel of John, it's the same writer who wrote

03:12

Revelation, doesn't have an Olivet Discourse because it didn't make sense and it didn't fit with his purposes, well, he decided to write an entire book on the topic, and he filled that book with vivid images and apocalyptic symbols and fantastic depictions of judgment and salvation, about the collapse of the first century

03:33

Jews and the rise of the church who's the new covenant people of God. Because of that, Matthew 24 and the book of Revelation are saying the same things, but in a different genre, and because Matthew 24 is in a genre that is far easier to understand than the book of Revelation, we thought it'd be a good idea to begin there, to understand the end as Jesus describes it in Matthew, so that when we get to Revelation, all of these things will make good sense.

04:02

So with that, welcome back to the show. Thank you for tuning in, thank you for subscribing, thank you for sharing, thank you for clicking the like button, thank you for all that you've done, thank you for those who are

04:14

ProdSquad members, defenders and insiders, thank you for your memberships, thank you for your encouragement, thank you for your emails and your texts, and with that, let us jump back into the

04:24

Olivet Discourse and to Matthew 24 as we begin our time today. Setting the stage.

04:33

As Jesus leaves the Temple Mount for the final time in Matthew, he gives a dramatic prophecy about the coming downfall and the destruction of Jerusalem.

04:41

He told the Pharisees that the city was gonna be brought under the entire weight of the covenantal fury of God that had been stored up since the murder of Abel, Matthew 23, 35.

04:52

He announced to them that the temple was gonna be left in ruins and a desolation, Matthew 23, 38, that it was gonna be torn apart brick by brick in the day of God's covenantal wrath,

05:04

Matthew 24, one through two. And all of these things, he told them, were gonna occur within a single generation,

05:10

Matthew 24, 34, which, as we've argued so far, is about a 40 -year window.

05:16

Now, because the disciples were horrified by this assertion, they came to him after they left the city on the

05:22

Mount of Olives and they asked him three specific questions. They said, Jesus, you need to tell us, when are these things gonna occur?

05:29

That's the first question. The second question is, what's gonna be the sign of your coming in judgment against this city?

05:36

And finally, they needed to know about the end of the Jewish age. Was this the end of the

05:42

Jewish age? They wanted to know these three things. Now, thus far, we've been looking at these questions of when these things would occur, and Jesus has told them that the days of Jerusalem's destruction were near, not far, that false messiahs were gonna appear all over Judah and they were gonna mislead many people into following their violent revolutions.

06:03

That was the sign he gave. He also warned them that the Roman world, which had been categorized by the

06:09

Pax Romana, a total cessation of war at that time, was gonna be thrown into a temporary chaos as wars and rumors of wars were gonna break out all over the

06:18

Roman world in that 40 year window of time. He predicted that the earth itself was gonna be thrown into chaos and as earthquakes and famines ravaged the

06:29

Roman empire in that terrible generation. And if those things were not bad enough, in the lead up to 80, 70,

06:35

Christians were gonna experience tremendous tribulations as they would be persecuted violently for their faith.

06:43

Now, today, we're gonna look at more of these signs of the times by looking at several pieces of evidence that Jesus gave.

06:51

And what I'd like to do actually today is instead of going deeper into Matthew 24, we need to lay some crucial groundwork about what a sign is, something we haven't covered yet, so that we will understand what

07:05

Jesus is doing in Matthew 24, in John's gospel, in the book of Revelation, and in general.

07:11

We need to understand what a sign is, why a sign is so important, why a sign guarantees that Jesus is gonna bring imminent destruction to that people and that generation, all of this, we need to understand.

07:26

So with that, part one, signs and imminent judgment.

07:32

Today, we're gonna be talking about signs, and signs in the ancient world function much like signs do in the modern world.

07:39

For instance, when I pull up to a stop sign, I am not thinking that I should have stopped a mile earlier.

07:47

I'm also, when I see the stop sign, not thinking that I should stop somewhere miles into the future. Imagine if a cop pulled me over and said, why didn't you stop?

07:54

Well, I was intending to stop a mile down the road. Of course, that wouldn't make sense. I also wouldn't have the gall to say to the cop, that yeah,

08:03

I saw the sign, but I knew that it didn't apply to me. Actually, it applies to someone who has not even been born yet in the distant future.

08:10

They're gonna see this sign, and it's gonna make sense to them, and they're gonna obey it. It's not for me. That would be the kind of ignorance where I would expect my family to go searching for a well -secured padded room for me to live out my days.

08:23

And yet, this is how so many people treat signs in the Bible. They rip them out of their historical setting in their context where they make good sense, and they apply them haphazardly in our world where they don't make any sense at all.

08:37

They're actually are nonsense. This is how, by the way, we get Apache helicopters out of the locust in the book of Revelation, because people, mostly dispensationals, rip a perfectly good sign out of its world and out of its setting, and then they apply it to our world as if that's where it belongs.

08:55

Listen, I would create less confusion if I tore down all of the traffic lights in Manhattan and replaced them with cardboard signs written in Egyptian hieroglyphics than dispensationals have inflicted upon the church.

09:09

Now, back to the stop sign metaphor. When I approached that stop sign, I immediately realized that the sign wants me to make an imminent stop.

09:17

It's not a suggestion. It's a command. It wants me to do something, and what it wants me to do is to maneuver my car that's moving at a brisk 55 miles an hour to a total cessation of movement.

09:30

Then, and only then, once I've satisfied the conditions of the stop sign, then I get to move forward again in freedom, having fully obeyed it.

09:38

That is precisely the way that a sign works in the Bible. They are given to people who see them from a distance, who need to do some form of repentance and action before they can move forward in freedom.

09:52

If they disobey the sign, they're not going to get arrested by the state police, but they are going to come under the wrath of Almighty God.

10:00

So in that way, I guess you could say that signs are kind of a big deal. Now, throughout redemptive history,

10:06

God has used signs to authenticate his messengers, to warn of coming judgment, and to bring deliverance to his people.

10:14

Simply put, whenever you see a sign in the Bible, whenever you see a sign in the

10:19

Bible, which includes visions, parables, and miracles, then you ought to know that the generation that received that sign is getting ready to undergo a period of judgment and salvation.

10:33

Signs are warnings. If you keep going, you're going to drive over the cliff's edge and down into your doom.

10:39

But if you come to a stop, and if you repent of what you were doing, the sign actually is good news, and it's for your salvation.

10:47

In the same way that a sign right on the edge of a cliff would be salvation for those who obey it, and judgment for those who fall off the cliff's edge.

10:56

That is the two outcomes that every sign undergirds in the Old Testament. Every sign is either pointing to judgment or salvation for the generation that received that sign.

11:09

Let me show you what I mean. Example one, the Ark of Noah. Now, just before God drafted the covenant with Noah, he looked down upon the world that he had made, and he was sorry for having made it.

11:22

This wasn't because humans messed up the scenery and didn't plant enough palm trees for God's liking. In fact,

11:28

God was grieved at the fact that the world, a good world that he created, had devolved into pure chaos, misery, and death.

11:36

As you remember, God hovered over the great floodwaters of creation, and now was bringing a new floodwater upon the world that had devolved back into chaos.

11:46

Now that chaos returned, the primordial floodwaters returned as well. But just before God wiped out every living creature and creeping thing that creeped upon the face of the earth, he called a man named

11:59

Noah, and he told him to make an ark out of acacia wood coated with pitch, which was a really, really big boat.

12:06

And to add a little bit of irony and humor to the story, God didn't tell Noah to move to a port city near an ocean in order to build this massive titanic figure.

12:17

No, he told him to build a boat in the middle of a landlocked region, where the only way that a boat this size was going to float is if God unleashed a global flood.

12:28

That's why the Ark of Noah is considered a sign. It's a sign to the people who were living in that day that they were being warned that all of their evil rebellion against God was going to come to a pitiful end if they did not repent.

12:43

It was a sign for them to pump the brakes, to repent at the preaching of Noah and return again to their

12:50

God and their maker. And yet, after a hundred years of Noah preaching and Noah building this landlocked behemoth, at the end of that hundred years, no one repented.

13:02

And God called Noah and his family to enter into that ark, to close the doors and to abandon the world to its own destruction.

13:12

For Noah and his family, the ark was a symbol of their salvation. It was the vehicle by which they were delivered.

13:19

And yet, to the rest of the world, it was a sign of their imminent disaster. Example two, the confusion at Babel.

13:29

Now, undergirding the wonderful narrative of salvation and blessings that God offered to Abraham and his offspring in Genesis 12 through 20 is the dark black blot of Babel in Genesis 11.

13:42

At Babel, humanity united in order to defy God's law by building a glorified anthill as a celebration of their magnificence and glory.

13:53

Instead of spreading out to fill the world with the glory of God, they were seeking to consolidate their own power and to make a name for themselves on the earth, which turned out to be a really bad idea.

14:07

In response to their insolence, God performed a dramatic sign. He came down in their midst and he confused their languages, which accomplished two critical purposes in redemptive history.

14:18

First, it accomplished imminent judgment. When God confused the languages in the plains of Shinar on that pitiful day, the immediate effect was that everyone on earth started sounding a bit like Farmer Fran.

14:32

Me talk doggy out. Okay. Everyone was yelling out something, but amid the cacophony of the first multilingual seconds of earth's history, the once ambitious and prideful people were now reduced to helpless babes, crying out like no one could understand their shriekings because they couldn't.

14:53

By disrupting their ability to communicate with one another, God dismantled their unified rebellion and he ended their collective defiance of his commands to fill the earth with worshipers,

15:05

Genesis 11, eight through nine. That was their judgment. But this sign of confused tongues also signaled salvation for the people of God because in the aftermath of Babel's judgment,

15:17

God's plan of salvation came into really bright and beautiful focus. He turned from the rebellious nations and he chose one man, one people, who he was gonna make into a nation for his purposes.

15:29

Abram's call right after Babel was an act of grace by God.

15:35

All the nations had fallen short of his glory. All the peoples deserved his wrath and yet in grace he called

15:40

Abram out of the nations. He called him to become a nation, his family to exist in a relationship of blessing with their covenant

15:49

God. The sign of babbling not only executed judgment on the wicked, but it opened up a path of salvation and covenant blessings for Abraham and his family in righteousness.

16:02

God says this to Abraham in Genesis 12. Now, the Lord said to Abram, go forth from your country and from your relatives and from your father's house to the land which

16:12

I will show you and I will make you a great nation and I will bless you and make your name great and so you shall be a blessing.

16:21

Genesis 12, one through two. I want you to notice something here. The people who wanted a great name apart from God ended up nameless in the narrative and they ended up speaking nothing but babble.

16:34

But the man who obeyed God, who starts out with one name, gets a great name by the time that the narrative is over because he obeyed

16:43

God. The sign is showcasing both salvation and judgment.

16:49

Example three, the birth of Isaac. After Abram settles in the land, the

16:56

Lord comes to him and promises the most remarkable sign. He tells

17:02

Abram that even though he is long past the years of Cialis, that God is going to make him great by giving him more offspring than he could ever count.

17:13

According to God, Abram is gonna have more kiddos than the grains of sand on every seashore and more children than the countable stars within the

17:23

Middle Eastern sky. All of this, God tells him, will come through his nursing home aged wife named

17:29

Sarai getting pregnant and having a child of promise that they were going to name Isaac.

17:35

Wasn't that a phenomenal sign? Now, so far, and this kind of proves my point, we've seen that signs in the

17:42

Bible are far from ordinary. In fact, they're nothing short of norm -reversing. They're upheavals that are coming upon people who thought that they had a certain standard of living or a certain standard of way that they do things.

17:55

Sign involved things like building a boat in the middle of the wilderness or populations instantly being incapable of understanding one another, or a very, very, very, very, very old woman getting ready to have a baby when her womb has been dead for 40 years.

18:09

In this way, signs always define logic. They are spectacular on purpose, which signals that ignoring them will lead to ferocious judgment.

18:20

Because if God goes out of the way to do something that spectacular and you don't notice it, well, you deserve judgment, that's the point.

18:28

Now, in the case of Sarai having a baby boy in her octogenarian years, the same two purposes that we've seen already were likewise accomplished.

18:36

It brought judgment on God's enemies and salvation for God's people. Think about it. The promise of Isaac's birth is given in the exact same narrative context as God's judgment and destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.

18:50

They're literally right in the same part of the Bible. Two cities that epitomized human depravity, their moral decay, their rebellion against God's authority, and their attempts to violate the angelic visitors, which looked like Nephilim -like behavior that proliferated before the flood, that is happening at the same time that God is promising to Abraham that he's gonna have a son.

19:13

God even declared to Abraham in the same conversation that the outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great and their sin is exceedingly grave.

19:22

I will go down now and see if they have done according to its outcry, which has come to me.

19:29

Genesis 18, 20 through 21. Just like God did at Babel, he promises to go down to the wicked city, take an assessment of their behavior, identify their depravity, and unleash destruction upon them.

19:43

Thus, while living in the land of Canaan, God gave Abraham a multifaceted sign.

19:49

His sign was gonna bring life to Abraham's loins. It was gonna bring a child of promise into his family so that he would inherit the land, so that he would possess that nation, and he would receive blessings.

20:02

His son would receive the blessings that were promised to his father. And that sign also signaled the doom of nations like Sodom and Gomorrah and also the

20:11

Canaanites, because it was Abraham's son, Isaac, and his grandson, Jacob, and the family of Israel that end up pushing the

20:20

Canaanite tribes out of the land. So the sign is a blessing in the fact that it gave birth to one family and it brought death to another.

20:31

Example four, the collapse of the Egyptian nation. Now, after Abraham passed away, his grandson and children found themselves fleeing a massive famine and settling in the land of Egypt, which became a temporary cocoon for the newly minted people of Israel.

20:48

But as the centuries rolled on, the refuge that they were living in actually turned into a prison.

20:55

It says that Pharaoh forgot who they were and actually started attacking them. 400 years had passed since the time of Jacob and Joseph and Judah, and now the people who were becoming fruitful and multiplying across the face of the earth,

21:10

Exodus 1 -7, were now becoming hostile and a threat to the serpent -loving people of Egypt.

21:17

Instead of welcoming them as guests, they turned on them and made them slaves, thus setting the stage for God's amazing redemption and retribution on that generation.

21:29

Now, from the very first lines of the book of Exodus, the story explodes with a proliferation of signs and wonders like a firework show put on by old

21:38

Gandalf himself. If you remember the scene in the Lord of the Rings where Mary and Pippin steal the dragon firework and it explodes and it's this massive thing, that's sort of like what

21:48

Exodus was, but on a scale of magnitude larger. In fact, in the

21:53

Bible, there is no period of time that has more signs and more wonders than the

22:00

Exodus account, than Jesus's ministry in the book of Revelation. Tuck that away for a little bit, that's gonna be important.

22:07

Now, these are not just spectacles that are happening in the book of Exodus where Yahweh is just kind of flexing and showing his power over the gods of Egypt.

22:14

These are flashing neon signs of judgment, warning those people to turn from their wicked ways or else they're going to be destroyed.

22:22

God is using a megaphone that tumultuous things are getting ready to happen, upheavals were looming upon the horizon.

22:29

And for the discerning Egyptians, these signs should have produced repentance and contrition. And some of them actually did repent and follow

22:38

Israel out of Egypt, which is a sign of God's grace and his mercy as well. Now, let me give you a few examples of how this works out in the

22:45

Exodus. The book begins with a very subtle sign of the birth of baby Moses. This little baby is hidden in a miniature little floating ark that is covered with pitch, just like the

22:55

Ark of Noah, which means that Moses is like a second Noah. He's gonna deliver his people from the disaster that's getting ready to come.

23:03

Like the global flood, one group is gonna pass through the waters unscathed and the other group is gonna be drowned in their sins.

23:11

This baby Moses was a living sign that God was about to do something spectacular.

23:18

Signs are imminent expressions of salvation and judgment. Now, 80 years later, after thoroughly humbling

23:26

Moses from a piece of smoky quartz now down into a lump of pliable clay, God comes to him in the wilderness and speaks to him through a burning bush, which is a sign.

23:36

It is a bush where fire has enwrapped it, but not consumed it. And God gives

23:42

Moses, after giving him that sign, God gives Moses the ability to perform signs and wonders in order to convince the children of Israel that salvation is coming.

23:53

And signs in order to harden Pharaoh's heart because judgment is coming. By putting his hand into his cloak and it turning leprous, or by throwing his staff down and it turning into a snake,

24:06

God wasn't only wowing the crowds with the ancient Criss Angel kind of episode, but he was instead showing them that imminent rescue and imminent judgment were coming.

24:17

Israel's gonna be saved, Egypt's gonna be doomed. That's what God was doing. And then, that wasn't even enough, then shortly after this, the 10 plagues began, which were 10 devastating blows that were raining down on Egypt, like Muhammad Ali in the eighth round with George Floyd.

24:34

Every blow was like a hammer shattering the pantheon of false gods and their pride for thinking that they could stand against the

24:42

Holy One of Israel. Rivers of blood, swarms of frogs, darkness so thick that you could feel it.

24:48

Every plague was a vivid sign of an announcement that Egypt's end was coming. And meanwhile, in the land of Goshen, where the

24:56

Israelites lived, everything was peaceful, tranquil, and they were living out God's blessings. God spared his people, showing that his judgment was precise, that his mercy was intentional, and that he had divided them out for salvation as opposed to the

25:12

Egyptians who were divided out for destruction. Now, of the 10 plagues, the 10th plague was certainly the most severe.

25:19

God commanded the Israelites to paint the blood of a lamb on their doorpost, which would be a sign to the destroying angel that they were to be protected by the blood.

25:29

This was also a sign to that very same angel who went all over the land of Egypt, that if that blood was not there, then the

25:36

Egyptians who were left naked and uncovered, their firstborn son would die. That night, the angel of death swept through the land, taking every firstborn in all the homes that did not have the blood.

25:48

And that night, while we do not know specifically how many people it was, it was hundreds of thousands of Egyptian males who died.

25:57

Every old man who was a firstborn son, every middle -aged man who was a firstborn son, and every baby who was a firstborn son died that very night, which made this one of the darkest nights in all of human history.

26:10

But God gave them signs. He gave them 10 plagues. He gave them Moses who was performing signs.

26:17

He gave them warnings. He gave them the sign on top of the cliff, don't keep driving.

26:24

And yet they did, and it led to their disaster. And their disaster came very quickly after this 10th plague.

26:33

In a way, all of the previous signs were ratcheting up the intensity because they were leading to the final sign, a final showdown that happened at the

26:43

Red Sea. Picture it, God allowed the Israelites to draw the Egyptians hundreds of miles outside of their country for a brutal and a glorious trap.

26:52

Pharaoh's army had began charging the people of Israel, and they seemed to be pinned down right in front of this large body of water when just then and there

27:01

God acted. He parted the sea and he turned that ocean into a death trap for Egypt, but a highway for his people.

27:11

The Israelites walked across the firmest dry ground, likely taking note of the coral formations that once used to sit at the bottom of the sea, but now littered their newly minted freeway.

27:20

And as they hustled across the water, or across the floor of the sea, as they hustled across with water towering on both sides, the haughty

27:30

Egyptians followed in after them like a mouse that comes up to a finely set trap with peanut butter on its spring.

27:38

They went for the bait, the trap sprung, and they all lost their heads.

27:44

As the sea came crashing down, wiping them out in one final stupendous act of definitive judgment.

27:53

And it declared that God's salvation was for Israel as they sang that song in Exodus 15 on the banks of the sea, that God's salvation was for them.

28:04

They said, thus the Lord saved Israel that day from the hand of the Egyptians. And Israel saw the

28:11

Egyptians dead on the seashore. Exodus 14, 30. Judgment and salvation, side by side, given on the generation that received

28:22

God's warning signs. Now, let me give just a few extra just for fun. Before moving on,

28:28

I do want to add just a few more examples of this, because I want us to see with picture perfect clarity what this phenomenon means.

28:37

Because when we arrive at the Gospels and we see Jesus talking about signs and doing signs and performing wonders and telling parables that he says are signs, or making prophecies about signs and wonders, when we see that, we need to understand what he's doing.

28:50

He is calling down judgment upon the Jews. And when we see that in the book of Revelation, we need to know what signs mean.

28:57

We need to know why they're given. We need to know why that as people 20 centuries later that these signs are not for us.

29:05

We are not meant to figure out what they mean or to try to look at the news and to look at Reddit sub -threads and to look at news going on in other countries and try to discover what this means for us.

29:15

No, these signs were given to them. The signs that Jesus gives were given to them. The signs that John gave in Revelation were given to them.

29:23

So in order for us to get there, I just want to lay this on a little bit thick and I want us to see how these examples proliferate scripture.

29:31

So to that end, here are just a few more examples for us to consider. And maybe there are things you haven't considered before.

29:38

Number one, think about Joshua and the events of his day. Joshua comes to power just after Moses dies.

29:45

So everybody's going to be looking at him and saying, okay, are you the guy? Are you the guy that's going to lead us into the promised land?

29:51

Are you the guy that Yahweh's power is going to manifest itself upon? So what does God do to confirm that?

29:58

Well, he brings Joshua and the people of Israel to a new body of water to show them that he's the same

30:03

God and still perfectly mighty to lead Joshua as he did with Moses. He brings them to the

30:08

River Jordan, Joshua 3, 14 through 17. Then they come to the city called

30:13

Jericho, a massive fortified city in the ancient world with, it says, descendants of the

30:19

Nephilim called the Anakim who were soldiers that made the Israelites feel like grasshoppers.

30:25

And without a single arrow and without a single sword and a single javelin, God gave the city over to the

30:32

Israelites by first giving it a sign. He had the Israelites march the

30:38

Ark of the Covenant around the city for seven days, allowing every single person to see it.

30:44

There was no one inside Jericho who hadn't saw it. The guards who were on the wall told everybody, they're marching around the city and they're doing it for seven days.

30:54

That signified their judgment. That Ark marching around the city, not their military prowess, not their weapons, not their ability to fight in war, that Ark was a sign of Israel's salvation and Jericho's judgment.

31:12

And as they cried out with this massive roar on the seventh day, after they walked around the city seven times, the massive walls came crumbling down into pure rubble and dust, and the

31:25

Israelites burned the city into ash. Salvation and judgment follow immediately after the sign.

31:35

See the pattern? Same is true when God calls the sun to stand still in the sky under the conquest of Joshua.

31:42

Joshua, in order to win an important battle, the sun stopped and it hung in the air, and it became a sign of God's love and care for the

31:49

Israelites, and yet a sign of his furious anger for the Canaanites who decided to continue living in darkness,

31:55

Joshua 10, 12 through 14. God was bringing Israel home into a safe land where he would be their

32:02

God and they would be his people, which means salvation. To do that, he was literally going to bring calamitous judgment upon the peoples of the land.

32:11

That's Joshua. Think about Elijah and the prophets of Baal. The sign of fire was given. Salvation came out of the sky down and burned the sacrifices that were on the altar.

32:24

And because of that, salvation came to Israel and judgment came upon the prophets of Baal and eventually

32:31

Jezebel and Ahab's house. You think about the prayer that Hezekiah gave.

32:37

Judgment came upon the Assyrians in battle and yet salvation came to the Judeans. We can go on and on and on throughout the

32:43

Bible with these signs, but what do all of them have in common? That's the question. They're not just miraculous wonders, but they're showing that judgment is coming quickly on God's enemies.

32:57

Every time a sign is given, judgment is coming quickly and salvation is coming to God's covenant friends.

33:05

It never takes thousands of years to pan out. It just doesn't because that, again, would make nonsense of the idea of a sign.

33:11

A sign is for the people who see it. You don't see a sign and think that's for someone else. Signs require actions of repentance or the consequence of death.

33:22

That is how signs work in the Bible. Now, knowing this, the Judeans of the first century should have repented when they saw the signs that Jesus was performing.

33:32

When He came offering them signs and wonders through parables and prophecies, they should have known what was getting ready to happen, but they didn't.

33:41

And they missed it like a drunk driver who was missing the flashing warning signs on the freeway.

33:48

And to that end, they crashed. And to that end, we need to turn to the ministry of Jesus so that we can see those bright shining lights of His signs that He littered all through the gospel so that we can see that this theme continues, not just in the

34:05

Old Testament, but it continues into the New Testament. And it gives us great confidence when we interpret

34:11

Matthew 24 as the end of Jerusalem. Part two,

34:19

Jesus's signs and imminent judgment. The sheer number of signs in Jesus's ministry was not accidental.

34:29

Jesus, just like it happened before in the Exodus, was heaping up a litany of signs and wonders so that the

34:35

Jews would let His people go. Some, because of the signs, repented and they joined

34:40

Him and praised God for that. They become a part of the mixed multitude that was in union with Jesus, just like the mixed multitude come up out of the land of Egypt.

34:48

But many like the Pharisees and the Sadducees and the scribes and the upper echelons of Jewish aristocrat power, well, they refused to see the signs at all.

34:59

They hardened their hearts like Pharaoh did and they persisted in their sin. To that generation,

35:06

Jesus gave the signs to damn them. He didn't give them the signs to talk about the comings and goings of 21st century politics, but He gave them to them at their time to remind them that their ruin was upon the horizon.

35:25

For instance, let's look at the signs in John's gospel. Everywhere Jesus went,

35:31

He left some people in awe and others in violent opposition to Him, based entirely on the signs that He was given.

35:37

He was dividing the people into categories. There were some who were predestined for destruction and some that were set apart for salvation.

35:44

And He did that by using signs as a tool for His sifting. Nowhere is this more clear than in the book of John, where Jesus gives seven intentional and very explicit signs that actually use the word sign in the

35:59

Greek language. These are signs of warning for that generation, signs of disaster that are coming and also signs of salvation for His people.

36:08

For instance, in the book of John, the first sign is at the wedding of Cana in Galilee, where Jesus turned water into wine,

36:15

John 2, 1 -11. Jesus wasn't merely rescuing a poorly executed party or trying to help out the party planning committee who didn't order enough wine.

36:25

He was symbolizing the beginning of the Messianic age, a new covenant of spiritual riches and joy that were gonna be breaking into the world because of His reign and His reign had come.

36:36

That was the salvation that was coming to His people, but there was also judgment that was embedded into this sign.

36:43

Because immediately after this joyful event of celebration, He goes to Jerusalem and the

36:49

Jews there at the temple in Jerusalem are enraged because He cleansed the temple and they even demanded

36:55

Him, you show us a sign of your authority for doing these things, John 2, 18.

37:01

So it was at this point, Jesus gave them a sign. And what was the sign? He gave them a sign that was above all signs.

37:06

He gave them the sign which all the other signs are pointing to. He said that His resurrection after three days in the grave was the sign.

37:15

He promised them that because of that sign, He was gonna tear down the temple in Jerusalem and He was gonna rebuild that temple as a new temple that was made up of His own body after three days and they missed it.

37:29

Instead of clinging to the new temple of Christ's own body, they were clinging to the temple of Herod until they lost their bodies.

37:39

All of these happened because they refused to repent. They lost their temple, they lost their nation, they lost their place and the kind of Judaism that the

37:49

Bible actually speaks about, the temple centric Judaism hasn't existed now for 2000 years.

37:57

Yeah, there's a political country today called Israel. It's a modern day democratic secular state but it's not biblical

38:05

Judaism. That doesn't exist anymore. Jesus eradicated it and He signaled that He was gonna eradicate it when

38:12

He gave them the second sign, calling them to repentance and salvation, judgment and destruction.

38:18

That's the second sign. The third sign Jesus performed in front of the Jews took place in Galilee where Jesus healed the official son,

38:25

John 4, 46 through 54. Now the Jews responded in much the same way that they always did.

38:30

They rebuked Jesus and Jesus turned and rebuked them saying that unless you people see signs and wonders, you simply will not believe

38:39

John 4, 48. The irony was thick and palpable. Jesus was giving them a sign by healing this child and yet they were wanting more signs because they didn't believe in Him and they didn't believe in Him not as someone who wanted to believe eventually, they did not believe in Him ferociously.

38:57

They were like a child opening up a mountain of Christmas presents on Christmas morning and then turning to their father and saying, is that it?

39:04

I want more. Their response wasn't fueled by faith or even a kind of doubt that is seeking faith.

39:12

They were at a starting place of doubt trying to justify themselves in their unbelief, trying to find a reason why they should turn on Jesus and kill

39:21

Him and that arrogance began ratcheting up in the gospel of John after John 4,

39:27

John 5 continues their anger until John 12 where they finally sign the dotted line hiring the hit man to kill

39:35

Him. That's the third sign. The fourth sign is like I just said, escalated the conflict between Jesus and the

39:42

Jewish aristocracy and it marked a pivotal moment where they finally decided that Jesus had to die.

39:48

At the pool of Bethesda, Jesus healed a paralytic who had been suffering for 38 years, John 5, 1 through 15 which is so ironic because 38 years is the exact amount of time that the first or the old generation wandered in the wilderness, 38 years.

40:05

They wandered in the wilderness before they died. So right off the bat, you've got a man who's been sick for 38 years.

40:12

No matter what happens, no matter what Jesus does to this man, the fact that that's in the narrative shows that He's a representative of Judah and that they are going to die for their sins within a generation.

40:24

Now, Jesus did perform a miracle here and He performed a sign. The miracle was done right out in the open, right in the city of Jerusalem and it was done on the

40:31

Sabbath of all days which was Jesus deliberately challenging the legalism of the

40:38

Jewish leaders and putting them on notice. Instead of marveling at the mercy that Jesus showed to this man, they wanted to kill

40:45

Jesus for breaking their Talmudic traditions. John records, for this reason, the

40:52

Jews were persecuting Jesus because He was doing these things on the Sabbath, John 5, 16.

41:00

The Sabbath here is not biblical Sabbath teaching that they're angry about. They're angry that He broke their traditions.

41:07

Their traditions are the Talmud which is the same traditions they carry to this very day.

41:13

Jesus' healing signified that salvation was coming to this man and that salvation was gonna come to anyone who repented and turned to believe in Him.

41:22

He would make you well, but for the Jews who wanted to kill Him, they were about to die.

41:29

Like the wicked and adulterous generation of old, by seeing this sign miracle and not repenting and hardening their heart,

41:39

Jesus confirmed that judgment was coming. Now, the fifth time the word sign shows up in John is the feeding of the 5 ,000 which was witnessed by a massive crowd of Jews, John 6, 1 through 14.

41:52

This was a symbol of salvation that Jesus who was God in the flesh has come down to feed the people like God fed the people in the wilderness generation before, giving them manna as bread.

42:04

Now, Jesus is standing right in front of them multiplying a kid's happy meal and He's doing it in order to feed them in the wilderness.

42:11

He's showing them that I am God. But just like that wilderness generation that sacrificed to a golden calf, they misunderstood

42:18

His signs and they ended up complaining about Jesus like they did with their ancestor

42:24

Moses. In their confusion, they tried to make Him a political king, John 6, 15, but rejected

42:30

Him as the King of kings. How do we know that they rejected Him? Because as soon as Jesus rebuked them for trying to seek after His bread and His politics, instead of eternal life, they turned away from Him in disappointment and they left

42:44

Him in His movement forever. The sign of the multiplied bread was salvation for His disciples, but judgment upon the

42:52

Jews who rejected Him. That's the fifth sign. The sixth sign, the healing of the man born blind in John 9, one through seven, brought the conflict from a simmer to a boil.

43:04

Jesus' stunning act of mercy should have been celebrated by everybody who was in the crowd that day, but instead it was exposed as they were the ones who had the spiritual blindness and not actually the blind man.

43:15

They interrogated Him after He was healed and because they didn't like the outcome, they cast Him out of the synagogue, which was akin to saying that we're going to damn you from knowing and being in the presence of God.

43:28

Their rage boiled over, just as John records, that some of the Pharisees said, this man is not from God because he does not keep the

43:35

Sabbath, John 9, 16. Again, Jesus was breaking their Talmudic norms. Rather than rejoicing in this miracle, they condemned the healer and they hardened their hearts even further against Him, confirming that the sign produced salvation for some and judgment for others.

43:53

The pattern just keeps continuing. Now, the seventh and the most climactic sign in the

43:58

Gospel of John was when Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. John 11, one through 44, you can read about it there.

44:05

This miracle was the ultimate proof of Jesus' authority over life and death. It was a sign that could not be ignored and yet, instead of repenting, the

44:15

Jewish leaders who have never in their life seen anybody raise someone from the dead became consumed with rage, saying in John 11, 47 through 48, what are we doing?

44:25

Let me stop right there. That's a great question. That's a great question if you're gonna repent, but look at what they did.

44:32

What are we doing? For this man is performing many signs. If we let him go on like this, all men will believe in him and the

44:42

Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation. John 11, 47 through 48.

44:49

Do you see what they're admitting here? They admitted that Jesus was performing signs and as Jews, they knew what signs meant.

44:57

They knew that signs meant judgment. They knew that Jesus was saying that judgment was coming and they knew that it was coming at the behest of the

45:06

Romans. They knew the whole game. They knew everything, but even though they knew this, which modern day people struggled to capture it, they don't get this.

45:20

The Jews got it. They knew Jesus was performing signs. They knew the signs meant judgment and they knew that the judgment was gonna be poured out by the

45:28

Romans. That's what they say. But instead of repenting, they thought that they could stop the judgment from happening if they killed

45:38

Jesus. They thought that they could reverse God's wrath on them if they buried his body in a hidden tomb.

45:46

Clearly, they had become just like their father, Pharaoh, who chased the

45:52

Israelites to his own destruction because of his hardness of heart. That is who they became. And John captures all of this in the tragic reality when he says this.

46:03

Though he had performed so many signs before them, yet they were not believing.

46:10

John 12, 37. The more light that Jesus gave, the more they fled back into the darkness, marching like a dumb animal to the one who would be his butcher.

46:24

But this isn't just apparent in the Gospel of John. The sign motif and sign language shows up in the synoptic

46:30

Gospels as well. So for now, I wanna look at that, the signs in the synoptics. Now, despite the overwhelming flood of evidence that John has already given us and the rest of the

46:41

Bible has already given us, the Jewish leaders and the people continued to demand for more signs in the synoptic

46:46

Gospels. For instance, in Matthew 12, 38 through 39, the Pharisees boldly say to Jesus, teacher, we want to see a sign from you, which is foolish because he's been giving them signs the whole time.

46:59

And Jesus's response was blistering. An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign and yet no sign will be given except the sign of Jonah.

47:12

He was telling them, you don't need another sign because I've given you one after another, after another.

47:18

What you need is faith, which they did not have. Their refusal to repent wasn't due to a lack of evidence, but to the hardness of their own heart, to their rebellion.

47:32

Jesus pointed to the sign of Jonah, referring to his death and his resurrection as Jonah went down in the belly of fish three days and then was resurrected and cast out onto the land.

47:42

Jesus is saying the same thing's gonna happen to me. You're gonna kill me. You're gonna throw me overboard.

47:50

And three days later, I'm gonna resurrect out of that tomb and your fate is going to be sealed.

47:57

And sadly, while the city of Nineveh that was filled with hundreds of thousands of people repented, the city of Jerusalem at the time of the

48:09

Passover, which was filled with over a million, they did not repent. Even though there was hundreds of eyewitnesses to the fact of Jesus's resurrection, even though Matthew tells us that they lied about it, they knew that Jesus's tomb was empty.

48:23

They knew that he had rose from the dead or at least they had a hunch.

48:29

And instead they concocted a lie in order to lead other people astray because they could not believe his signs.

48:37

They could not believe that judgment was gonna be coming on their nation. That was a pill that was too big to swallow.

48:43

Their nationalism had become their idol so that even when a man rose from the dead, they would not believe.

48:52

In Matthew 16, one through four, the Pharisees and the Sadducees tested Jesus asking for a sign from heaven if Jesus would just provide it.

49:01

And Jesus rebuked them sharply again. He said, when it's evening, you say that it will be fair weather for the sky is red.

49:08

And in the morning, there will be a storm today for the sky is red and threatening. Do you know how to discern the appearance of the sky but cannot discern the signs of the times?

49:18

Matthew 16, one through four. Jesus was telling them, you can interpret the weather but you're blind to the spiritual storm that's brewing right in front of you.

49:28

Jesus is telling them that there is a hurricane coming after you and you can't even see it. And yet you can look up and you can tell that it's gonna be a good fishing day because the sky is red at night.

49:40

And my grandpa used to tell me a little poem, red skies at night to sailors, the light red skies in the morning sailors take warning.

49:46

This poem comes out of this particular curse that Jesus is calling down upon the people. He even said right after this that an evil and adulterous generation is the one who seeks after a sign and no sign would be given to them except the sign of Jonah.

50:01

In a similar way, Mark 8, 11 through 12, the Pharisees again demand a sign in order to test him.

50:08

And he deeply grieved by their stubborn unbelief, Jesus says, why does this generation seek for a sign?

50:14

Why did he say that? Because he's already given them signs. And then he says, truly I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation.

50:23

Like the Pharaoh in Egypt, they repeatedly rejected clear evidence that that judgment was coming and now a judicial hardening had settled down upon their soul and they were incapable of repentance.

50:37

Jesus expanded this indictment of the crowds in Luke 11, 29 through 32, where he declared that the people of Nineveh were gonna rise up and condemn that very generation.

50:47

The Ninevites who repented at the preaching of Jonah, Jonah 3, five through 10, yet the Jews who had seen far more signs and wonders than they had, the

50:56

Ninevites heard a half -hearted sermon from Jonah. These people, the Jews had heard sermon after sermon, sign after sign, miracle after miracle, and yet they refused to repent.

51:07

He told them that the Ninevites would rise up against them. He told them that Sodom and Gomorrah would condemn them on the final day,

51:14

Matthew 10, 15. That the Queen of the South would lord it over them, Matthew 12, 42. That Tyre and Sidon would rise up in judgment against that generation because the

51:24

Jews saw the most amazing signs and yet willingly accepted their own national and covenantal destruction,

51:32

Matthew 11, 21 through 22. What we're seeing is that signs always point to imminent judgment.

51:40

Every time that a sign appeared in scripture, it signaled that judgment was near. The ark signaled that the flood was coming.

51:46

The plague signaled that the death of Egypt was coming. The ark and shouting worship leaders signaled that Jericho's walls were getting ready to fall down.

51:54

Every time we see a sign in the Bible, we should hear the Bible proclaiming, turn back now before it's too late.

52:02

And the Jews should have known that. They had the scriptures and they knew that when

52:08

God gives signs, judgment is coming. And they knew that when signs proliferate in a particular era, like the era of Moses and Joshua or Elijah and Elisha, that catastrophic judgment is coming.

52:19

Yet, when the signs begin to multiply during the ministry of Jesus, they ignored it. They hardened their hearts, they killed the

52:26

Christ, and then they tried to kill his own followers to stop the judgment that he was initiating, which brings us to Matthew 24 and Matthew 23, where we've been examining this for now a few weeks.

52:39

This is where Jesus seals the fate of the Jews. In Matthew 23, he calls down the

52:46

Deuteronomic woes. In Matthew 24, he gives signs to his disciples to be on the lookout so that they would see when this judgment was coming.

52:57

Part three, Matthew 24, signs and imminent judgment.

53:05

Now, at this point in the episode, you should know full well what a sign means. They are not accidental inclusions in the narrative and they are not incidental details.

53:15

And they are certainly not mysteries to be entangled by people living thousands of years after the fact.

53:21

Signs are giving to the people that they apply to. Signs are warnings of judgment for rebellion and salvation for obedience and repentance.

53:31

That's precisely why the disciples asked Jesus for a sign in Matthew 24, 3, because they intuited that he was speaking about salvation and judgment.

53:41

For instance, as Jesus departed from the temple, his final words to the Pharisees were, your house is being left to you desolate,

53:47

Matthew 23, 8, which sounds an awful lot like covenant judgments to me. His disciples who were shaken by that declaration and who marveled at the temple's grandeur, they needed to make sure that they fully comprehended what

53:59

Jesus was saying. So instead of asking Jesus to repeat himself, they asked for a sign. Why?

54:06

Because they weren't confused about what he said. They understood what he said. What they were confused about was the meaning.

54:12

And a sign, like a signature at the bottom of a loan, was gonna make sure that Jesus was guaranteeing the outcome and placing it within that very generation.

54:23

And that's exactly what he did. After his disciples questioned, Jesus doesn't give them one single sign in order to hold on to.

54:30

He gives them a myriad of signs to overwhelmingly convince them that this destruction of it was coming in their lifetime.

54:37

He's heaping signs. I mean, the amount of evidence that he is giving is astronomical here.

54:45

So that anyone who's ever confused about Matthew 24 does so theologically without sense.

54:51

He told them that there would be false messiahs that would come as a sign of their national judgment,

54:57

Matthew 24 five. He told them that wars and rumors of wars were gonna turn the Roman Empire into a state of panic and confusion.

55:03

That's a symbol of judgment, Matthew 24 six. He told them that famines and earthquakes were gonna shake the

55:09

Roman world apart like no other period in its history, Matthew 24 seven. He told them that they were gonna be persecuted and they were gonna be martyred.

55:16

And that was gonna be a sign of the Jews' destruction and how great tribulation was gonna come upon them,

55:23

Matthew 24 nine. Over and over and over he gives signs and we haven't even covered them all yet.

55:28

We've only examined a few of them. But what we've seen is that they showcase that judgment is coming on that generation.

55:38

And in the weeks ahead, we're gonna look at more. We're gonna look at more of the signs. Next week, we're gonna look at three signs in one episode.

55:44

So stay tuned. But the point is simple. Matthew 24 and the book of Revelation are not about things that are far off in the distant future.

55:51

They're just not. That's not how signs work. These passages give us more signs per verse than anywhere else in scripture.

56:02

And the only way to rightly interpret these things is that they occurred in the past. The sooner we realize this, the sooner we can rightly interpret

56:11

Matthew 24 and Revelation and we can discover how to live like a Christian in our world.

56:18

There's a lot at stake. Instead of fearing the future because we think that their calamity is just around every corner, we can be free to look optimistically towards the future and committed and joyful in the present because we know that the future is where Christ is reigning and winning.

56:38

And the present is not about failing and losing. The present is where we build.

56:44

The future is where we celebrate where Jesus finally, fully and totally wins. And it's for that reason that I wanna end this episode by making sure that you can connect the dots to the book of Revelation.

56:58

Revelation is a hard book, but it's a book that's filled with signs. And you and I now know how signs work.

57:04

So we need to apply this to Revelation. Part four, how this connects to Revelation.

57:12

Throughout scripture, God has used signs, miracles, parables, visions and wonders to unleash two very clear and very obvious conclusions that judgment and salvation are coming on the generation to which the sign is given.

57:26

With that, the book of Revelation continues this pattern, giving us the most sign -centric book in all of the

57:33

Bible, which ought to tell us something. In the most sign -centric book of the Bible, signs ought to function as signs function.

57:40

The book of Revelation doesn't automatically decide that we're gonna use signs in a little bit of a different way.

57:46

What it tells us is that the same way that signs function in the Bible and specifically the same way that signs function in John's gospel and in John's writing is the same way that it functions in John's other book, the book of Revelation.

58:01

Just because we've changed genre to the apocalyptic doesn't mean that signs stop being signs.

58:09

In the same way that adding more gas onto a fire is going to cause an explosion, the book of Revelation adds more signs and more signs and more signs than any other part of scripture.

58:21

And in the same way that gas functions just like gas, signs function just like signs. And the warnings of God's judgment now are amplified to the level of screaming in the book of Revelation.

58:34

Revelation is God's multi signified emphatic warning that disaster is coming to Judah.

58:42

The people who've been in covenant with Yahweh since the patriarch Jacob was walking the earth now are about to experience a fundamental change in their relationship with God.

58:54

Many of the native born Jews are going to be cut out of the covenant like a dead olive branch and many like the

59:02

Gentiles and some of the repented Jews will be grafted into the tree by the grace of Jesus Christ.

59:10

Revelation is the story of the first century judgment upon the

59:16

Jews and the first century salvation and inauguration of his church.

59:22

For instance, Revelation 1 .1 sets the very tone by saying the revelation of Jesus Christ which

59:29

God gave him to show his bondservants and he sent and communicated it which literally means signified by his angels.

59:39

The Greek word for sign which is semeion shows up in the very first verse of the book of Revelation as the word semino which means that from the very beginning

59:49

God is using this book as a book of signs. He's designating it that this is a book of signs and these signs as we've noted before are about judgment and salvation and the meaning of the signs in the book of Revelation are gonna come right out of the

01:00:04

Old Testament so that anyone familiar with the book of Genesis through Revelation is gonna be able to discern what these signs mean.

01:00:12

Many of the signs in the book come out of the Old Testament but there are also many that come out of the first century context as well, a context of Roman imperialism and Jewish temple -centric occupation.

01:00:25

For a scripturally literate Jew who converted to Jesus Christ and who lived in the first century and who was aware of their social events that were going on in the

01:00:35

Roman world, this book would have made perfect sense. The confusion arises when modern readers who have no idea what a

01:00:44

Jewish context is, have no idea about the events that were going on in the Roman world and have no idea what these things meant in that time and in that place start making assumptions that this book and what it means about in our day and our time.

01:00:57

That's where the confusion comes in. That is why John explicitly calls this book an apocalypsis.

01:01:04

That word in Greek doesn't mean mystery. I need to rant for just a second, please forgive me.

01:01:12

The book or the word apocalypsis which John uses in the very first verses of the book means a revelation.

01:01:20

It doesn't mean a mystery. It is not its purpose to try to obscure the facts but to unveil and reveal

01:01:29

God's will that he was going to bring to the first century audience. We treat this book like this book is an utter mystery and the word apocalypsis means the exact opposite.

01:01:41

It doesn't mean to make something mysterious. It means to reveal the meaning. The book of Revelation is supposed to unveil the meaning to people who are confused, not confuse people who are looking for meaning.

01:01:55

And while the imagery may feel foreign to us today and I think it's because we've treated this book wrongly, it was deeply steeped in the cultural, historical and theological symbols of its time period.

01:02:09

And it made sense to the people who read it back then. Revelation is a grand and final climactic book of signs that bring the story of God's redemption to a crescendo and show that the old covenant people were put away, a new covenant people has come and this is the final era of redemption under the auspices of the

01:02:35

Christian church. The Christian church is the one who will make the gospel of Jesus known to all the nations.

01:02:41

They're the one who is going to, in true Israelite fashion, wrestle with God and bring the gospel to all peoples.

01:02:49

That is the crescendo, that is the final chapter of redemption. Why we think that there has to be a calamitous end in the future where everything falls apart, where Jesus's empire is rejected, everything comes crashing down in a blaze of glory before the end comes,

01:03:11

I do not know. The final chapter of human history is 2000 years old right now.

01:03:18

That final chapter is not somewhere waiting for it to be started in the future, it's already began in the death of Jesus and in the death of Judah.

01:03:29

Jesus rose to life and brought to life with him a church, that's salvation. Jesus put to death the

01:03:34

Jews and put away their temple and put away their sacrifices and put away the entire old covenant trappings, that is judgment.

01:03:43

A book filled with signs is signifying that. And with that,

01:03:49

I wanna close by looking at a few examples of this. We're gonna dive into all of these when we get into the book of Revelation and we look at these signs individually, but today

01:03:57

I'm just gonna give a smattering of these things. Revelation, a book of signs.

01:04:05

Now, as we've said, Revelation abounds with signs. There's no more sign -centric book in all of the Bible than Revelation and it serves the purpose that we've seen consistently through scripture.

01:04:14

And these signs specifically highlight the judgment of apostate Israel and Judah and the covenant blessings that are gonna be poured out upon the church, the true people of God.

01:04:25

Now, let me give you a few examples. The woman clothed with the sun in Revelation 12, one through two represents

01:04:31

Judah. She is the tribe that was the one who brought forth the birth of the

01:04:38

Messiah, so that's how she's pregnant in Revelation 12. She's the one who wears the crown on top of her head because she's true

01:04:44

Judah, who's the ruling crown, but she also in the crown has 12 stars, which symbolizes that she's a part of Israel, that she's a part of this people of God, and there's so much more that we're gonna get into on this woman.

01:04:56

But suffice it to say, the crown makes her the ruler of the 12 tribes, so she's Judah, and she's pregnant with the

01:05:02

Messiah, which is the Messiah came through the people of Judah. She's gonna bring forth the savior of the world.

01:05:09

Now, the male child that she gives birth to is the Christ. He's destined to rule all of the nations with a rod of iron,

01:05:15

Psalm 2 .9, Revelation 12 .5. Yet Judah, who's represented by this woman, becomes apostate in the book.

01:05:24

This woman, after she gives birth to the Messiah in Revelation 12, by Revelation 17, she's drunk with the blood of the saints,

01:05:31

Revelation 17 .6. She gives birth to the Messiah, and then she turns on him by killing him and killing his offspring.

01:05:41

For her covenant infidelity, she's judged and she's destroyed by her own resurrected son.

01:05:49

The judgment that Jesus brings on his mother, Judah, clears the way for salvation to flow to the church, which is now represented as the new bride of Christ, redeemed by his love.

01:06:02

Do you see that? The whore is replaced by the bride. Those are two symbols, one for salvation, one for judgment.

01:06:10

Next, the two witnesses in Revelation 11, three through 12. They symbolize the faithful testimony of God's church, who is proclaiming truth in the face of persecution in Jerusalem.

01:06:22

Their death at the hands of apostate Israel signifies that God is going to bring a violent judgment upon Jerusalem for killing his messengers.

01:06:32

However, their resurrection is the first resurrection, the spiritual resurrection in Revelation 25 through six, which is a sign of life to all who are in Christ.

01:06:44

This sign signifies that salvation is coming to the church who's gonna experience the resurrection. When we die, we're gonna be with Jesus.

01:06:51

And yet the sign also signifies judgment that was gonna come upon the ones who murdered them,

01:06:58

Revelation 11, five. Now, the next example is the seven plagues in Revelation 15, one through 16, 21.

01:07:05

These plagues are not invented out of mid air. They look like the plagues of Egypt. They were signs of judgment against Pharaoh and Egypt back in those days, and now they're signs of the apostate

01:07:17

Israel in the first century. For example, rivers turn to blood in Revelation 16, four through six, which recall the first plague of Egypt in Exodus 7, 20 through 21.

01:07:28

Darkness comes over all the land, Revelation 16, 10, which is the ninth plague in Egypt.

01:07:34

Another example, hell stones and fire in Revelation 16, 21 are the seventh plague in Egypt, Exodus 9, 23 through 25.

01:07:43

These signs affirm that the covenant curses of Deuteronomy 28 and the plagues of Egypt, like famine and pestilence and everything else are coming upon apostate

01:07:54

Israel. These signs are not for us in our time. These signs are for them in their time.

01:08:00

Judgment for the Jews, salvation for the church. Here's another example. The fall of Babylon, Revelation 18, one through 24 is the great sign of the book where judgment comes upon Jerusalem because Jerusalem has become the new

01:08:14

Babylon. At this time, Babylon doesn't exist. Babylon has been destroyed.

01:08:20

It was destroyed by the Persians. So who is Babylon? It's Jerusalem. It's Jerusalem and her spiritual adultery and her persecution of God's saints who have become the spiritual

01:08:32

Babylon and her destruction in 80, 70 mark the end of the old covenant system where she was the great tyrant who disobeyed

01:08:42

God. That's why Revelation says fallen, fallen is Babylon the great. He doesn't say fallen, fallen is

01:08:49

Jerusalem the faithful. Yet her fall, as much as that was judgment also was a sign of God's salvation to his people because right after the fall of Babylon in Revelation 18, you have the coming of the new

01:09:03

Jerusalem in Revelation 20. New Jerusalem is the church. It's God's holy dwelling place on earth.

01:09:10

It's where God now dwells with man on earth through the church. And this transition from Babylon to the new

01:09:17

Jerusalem represents that judgment has come on apostate Israel and salvation has come to God's elect, salvation and judgment.

01:09:24

You think about the rider on the white horse, Revelation 19, 11 through 21. This portrays Christ as the victorious king who's leading the armies of heaven to execute judgment against apostate

01:09:35

Israel in AD 70. I mean, Zechariah prophesied that this triumph, that this war was coming, that the

01:09:42

Messiah's reign was, well, part of his reign was he was going to come and make war with Jerusalem and cleanse it of its impurities.

01:09:49

Zechariah 14, one through five. The imagery of the rider treading over the wine press of God's wrath,

01:09:56

Revelation 19, 15 ties directly to the judgment upon Jerusalem in AD 70 and her being rejected by her

01:10:05

Messiah. This event signifies the salvation of the church because now she's free from the great persecutor and martyr of her faith.

01:10:13

And also the judgment that comes upon this whore that has devolved into all sorts of idolatry and sin and who's drunk with the blood of the saints.

01:10:25

Jerusalem is explicitly depicted as a whore in Revelation 17, one through six, symbolizing her covenant infidelity.

01:10:33

And just as the prophets of old condemned Israel for her spiritual adultery, you think about Ezekiel 16 and Hosea, the whole book, but especially one through three,

01:10:41

Revelation condemns her for prostituting herself with Rome and for shedding the blood of the saints, which is exactly what first century

01:10:50

Judah did. She's replaced, she's put away, she's destroyed so that the true bride of Christ who is made pure and ready for her husband can step in and lead

01:11:06

God's kingdom to the very end. Jesus put away the whore of Jerusalem and he installed the church as his bride and he has left us here to build his kingdom until he returns.

01:11:20

Here's another example, the sealing of the 144 ,000 in Revelation seven, one through eight, that represents God's protection of his faithful remnant.

01:11:28

This is not merely ethnic Jews here, but they're all who believe in God, both Jew and Gentile from every tribe, tongue and nation.

01:11:35

These are forming into one people of God throughout all history, which is what Paul says in Galatians 3, 28 through 29.

01:11:42

The sealing of this group ensures their preservation during the judgment that was happening on apostate

01:11:49

Israel. And it's why all of the churches of Revelation And this is the perfect example of a situation where Jesus says to them, if you will continue conquering, then you will be saved.

01:11:58

Jesus says that the one who endures to the end will be saved. This 144 ,000 are Christians in the first century who were marked and sealed by God who would remain, who would be saved, even in spite of the judgment that was being poured out on Judah.

01:12:14

through these signs revelation unfolds the dual message of God's covenant dealings the judgment of apostate

01:12:23

Israel for her rejection of the Messiah for her for her murdering of the church and on the other hand it communicates the salvation of his church his eternal bride his new

01:12:35

Jerusalem every sign in the book is underscoring the justice and the mercy of God the judgment and the salvation that they reveal his sovereign plan that was executed in the first century that ensures his kingdom will reign forever there is no more need for future signs listen the signs in the book of Revelation are not about the distant future we have proved that that's not how signs work they're not about future tribulations they're not about they're not about nano chips in your wrist they're not about vaccines and whatever other stupid silly ridiculous foolish things that have been put out there for 2 ,000 years people have been guessing what all this means when the evidence has been right here the entire time these signs were given to warn of imminent destruction in the first century not in the third century or the fifth or the seventh or the 12th or the 11th or the 20th these signs are rooted in the prophetic tradition they were fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem we have everything we need their purpose was to signal the conclusion of the

01:13:49

Old Covenant order and to establish the New Covenant Church not to forecast future judgments on future people in futuristic sci -fi ways and with that there is no longer a need for additional signs and additional wonders and additional revelations the

01:14:10

New Covenant is perfect the New Covenant is complete the New Covenant is sealed by Jesus's blood

01:14:17

Hebrews 1 1 through 2 says God after he spoke long ago to the fathers and the prophets in many portions and in many ways in these last days he has spoken to us in his son

01:14:28

Hebrews 1 1 through 2 unlike the covenants of old that required miraculous validation through signs due to their administration by fallible men the

01:14:39

New Covenant is mediated by Christ himself and it requires no further confirmation for those and I hope you're making the connection here but I'm gonna make it crystal clear right now for those of you who are in the reformed tradition who believe in the five solas who understand

01:14:58

Calvinism who who understand cessation ism right when you understand the cessation of the miraculous gifts and rightly understand that by the way you should also naturally understand that there was also not just a cessation of the miraculous gifts but there was a cessation of the signs as well the signs of revelation are the final warning signs that do not need to be repeated ever again they've already been fulfilled they've already pointed to the judgment of God that has come upon apostate

01:15:34

Israel and salvation that came to his church to hold to a cessationist view of speaking in tongues and miracle workings and yet to hold out that there is a future for these signs to be fulfilled at some point in the apocalyptic patent apocalyptic future is theologically foolish revelation signs do not speak of a future apocalyptic event both scripture and sound theology prove that signs are for that era at that time about things that are gonna happen in their lifetime the old covenant era has been poured out and passed away the era of relevatory signs has ceased dispensational to the ones who claim that future covenantal woes and new signs are gonna come and they're gonna fundamentally change the course of human history that's not what the book of Revelation is about that's not its purpose that's not its context the book is not about an endless cycle of ongoing judgments but it's about Christ's victory over his enemy the

01:16:37

Jews and the establishment of his kingdom the church its message is one of triumph it's one of growth it's one of restoration and that is the conclusion that Revelation reaches that's the thesis statement of the book that the kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our

01:16:57

Lord and of his Christ and he will reign forever and ever Revelation 11 15 that's what the book's about its signs proclaim the fulfillment of God's covenantal purposes the judgment of apostate

01:17:11

Israel and the salvation of his elect and the flourishing of his kingdom under this new covenant these signs affirm the sufficiency of Christ's prophecy in Matthew 24 the sufficiency of his work and the completion of his kingdom it leaves no room for future signs future tribulations future

01:17:28

Antichrist or any of it instead this book along with every book in the

01:17:37

Bible calls us to live confidently in the reality of his finished covenant and to focus on advancing his kingdom through the ordinary means of grace brothers and sisters postmillennialism and partial preterism are the only hermeneutical tools that can help you arrive at the proper understanding of the book of Revelation futurism doesn't work because that's not how signs work idealism doesn't go far enough because that's not because these things are not just for spiritual realities but they're actually physical things that happened in the first century and historism is just wrong preterism partial preterism we don't think everything has happened but everything in the book of Revelation we believe has preterism is the framework that allows us to see the book as it was intended to be seen a story of Jesus's victory a story of Jesus's judgment and a story of the church's great salvation conclusion as we wrap up our episode today we need to fix our eyes on the hope -filled reality that we are living in God's kingdom now we're not waiting for something to happen in the future it happened in the past and he inaugurated his kingdom then and you and I are 2 ,000 years into this kingdom advancing this kingdom triumphing this kingdom moving into where the gospel is going to penetrate the entire world and God's glory is going to be shown on as the waters covers the seas that's the sign that Jesus gave in the first century that's the sign that leads us to understand that revelation is about the triumph of Jesus Christ not the defeat of Jesus Christ may it never be said by anybody that revelation is about Jesus's defeat revelation is about the sum or about the total and glorious victory of the lamb who was slain who now is the lion who is roaring and who is conquering today we live in the era of the fully established and fully inaugurated new covenant kingdom of Jesus the judgments that were foretold in revelation have already been poured out the old has already passed away

01:19:56

Christ is reigning and he is being victorious and for 2 ,000 years that's been true

01:20:01

I mean it started with 12 men then it was 70 and then it eventually toppled the entire

01:20:07

Roman Empire and for 2 ,000 years the church has been growing it went from 12 to 2 .5

01:20:14

billion and it's gonna continue to grow even more than that it's gonna take over the entire world listen what we've learned today means that we're not waiting on some future apocalypse or some

01:20:27

Denzel Washington in the book of Eli kind of moment which we're just not what we're waiting on is for Christians to pull their heads out of the proverbial sands to stop acting like ostriches and scared little turtles who are hiding in their shell and to get to work we are standing on the solid ground of the kingdom that Jesus bought and paid for with his own blood the earth is going to be filled with the knowledge of the glory of God as the waters covers the seas brothers and sisters if that doesn't hype you up and if that doesn't pump you up and get you excited to serve

01:21:04

Jesus today I don't honestly know what will we are not arranging deck chairs on the

01:21:11

Titanic we are watching and responding and moving in a world that Jesus has already bought and paid for and he's entrusted us to bring it under his dominion so brothers and sisters go today go into your homes and bring the dominion of Jesus go into your workplaces go into your towns go into your cities go into your alleyways or your byways or your backyards or your dinner tables go in everywhere and bring the dominion of Christ bring the victory of Christ the signs of judgment are over you now live in the kingdom of Jesus's reign and he's called you to advance it and to advance it in your home to the ends of the earth until next time