Birth Pains of the New Creation

Welcome to the Teaching Ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church. Kungsvinger is a beacon for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and is located on the plains of northwestern

Minnesota. We proclaim Christ and Him crucified for our sins and salvation by grace through faith alone.

And now, here's a message from Pastor Chris Roseberg. The Holy Gospel according to St.

Mark, Chapter 13, verses 1 -13. As Jesus was leaving the temple, one of His disciples said to Him, Look, Teacher, what massive stones!

What magnificent buildings! Do you see all these great buildings, Jesus replied?

Not one stone here will be left on another. Everyone will be thrown down. And as Jesus was sitting on the

Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, and John and Andrew asked Him privately, Tell us, when will these things happen and what will be the sign that they are about to be fulfilled?

Jesus said to them, Watch out that no one deceives you. Many will come in My name, claiming

I am He, and will deceive many. When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, don't be alarmed.

Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, kingdom against kingdom.

There will be earthquakes in various places and famines. These are the beginning of birth pains.

You must be on your guard. You will be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogues.

On account of Me, you will stand before governors and kings as witnesses to them, and the gospel must first be preached to all nations.

Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say what is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the

Holy Spirit. Brother will betray brother to death, father his child. Children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death.

All men will hate you because of Me. But he who stands firm to the end will be saved.

In the name of Jesus. The one who endures to the end will be saved.

Now a little bit of a side note before we dive into our text. And that is that you'll notice that we're going to spend two weeks on the end of the world.

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel quite fine, thank you. But there is a lot of speculation, and in fact there's a morbid fascination with the end times.

And as much as we all chuckle at the man with the bullhorn who wears the sandwich board saying that the end is near, deep down inside we all know that that guy's right.

And the thought of it actually sends shivers down our spines. And one doesn't have to watch the evening news for long before realizing that these birth pangs that Jesus was talking about, that they seem to be upon us.

In fact a good way to think about it is the Titanic has already struck the iceberg. And we know the ship is sinking.

It's only a matter of time before the lazy list of the ship will give way to a steep list while the bow begins to disappear beneath the sea and the stern races to catch up.

And the chaos that will ensue between those two times is going to be, well, rough. You can think of it this way.

We're all doomed and we already know it. And Friday night the world felt one of those strong birth pangs as ISIS terrorists murdered hundreds in Paris in cold blood.

So we know there's something deeply wrong with the world. But I want to point something out. And that is that if you understand biblical eschatology correctly, it should be comforting, not frightening.

And unfortunately there's a lot of people today who make a buck, you know, out there preaching and teaching on the eschaton.

And one of the reasons why they make so much money is because they do a lot of fear -mongering. They really do.

They don't preach Christ and Him crucified and the comforting words that are taught regarding the end of the world.

And as a result of it, there's a lot of people who have, well, a lot of fear and anxiety about these things.

And you'll notice here that Jesus is comforting us. He's telling us ahead of time what to expect.

So for us, it's kind of like no big deal. And you're thinking, no big deal? The world's coming to an end. Yeah, I know.

We'll talk about that. So let's return to our text. We're in the Gospel of Mark, chapter 1.

And with your permission, I will be reading from my translation. It says this,

While Jesus is proceeding out of the temple, one of His disciples say to Him, Teacher, look what magnificent stones and what great buildings.

Yeah, that's kind of the thing. Everything in this world just seems so marvelous. Look at our

Washington Monument. Look at the White House. Look at all the things that we've made.

Aren't they just magnificent? They're amazing. And Jesus here is going to say something that's unthinkable.

And that is that the very temple of God, with its magnificent stones and amazing buildings, is not going to endure.

In fact, you can kind of put this text kind of into two categories. What endures and what doesn't, right?

So Jesus said to Him, All right, do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be by no means left here, which will by any means not be torn down.

All this is coming down. None of this is permanent. The temple isn't going to endure, is what He's saying.

And by the way, this kind of talk in Jesus' time and where He was, it could get you arrested, could get you killed, to preach and speak against the temple as a blasphemous thing.

The destruction of the temple in the minds of the Jews at the time could only mean one thing, the end of the world.

If there's no temple, there's no forgiveness of sins. It has to be the end of the world then. Verse 3, so while He was sitting on the

Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew, now we've got the inner core, the fishermen, right?

We're going to have to have a chat with Jesus. It's like, all right. So they came to Him privately.

This is not for everyone to hear. Tell us, when will these things happen? What will be the sign when all these things are about to be accomplished?

We want to put together an algorithm, some kind of a code that we can crack so we can have the inside skinny and know when you're going to come.

And so rather than give them a specific date and a specific time, Jesus didn't say,

I'm coming back in October of 2015 on the fourth blood moon. Yeah, that kind of came and went without any events, didn't it?

He didn't say anything like that. Instead, He kind of gives us a pattern of things to look for. He says, be watching out that no one may deceive you.

First thing out of His mouth. You want to know why? Because in 2

Thessalonians, the Holy Spirit prophesies to the apostle Paul that in the times of the end, immediately before Jesus' return, there would be a great apostasy, a rebellion against God within the visible church.

And as a result of it, the first thing you've got to know about the end times is you better know your

Bible. You better have that catechism memorized. You better understand what's going on in those creeds and our confessions because that's sound doctrine.

The end times is marked with all kinds of crazy, false doctrines.

So first thing, don't let anyone deceive you. He says this, many will come on the basis of my name.

Oh, there you go. You see, it would be really nice if the false teachers in the church would, well, they would say,

I come in the name of Lucifer. It would just make it a lot easier for us to spot them. But no, deceivers, they are always coming to us in the name of Jesus.

And they will say, I am the one. And Jesus says this, they will deceive many.

The time of the ends will be marked with all kinds of deceptions and a whole lot of people who call themselves

Christians being deceived and listening to the deceivers. In other words, you can kind of think of it this way.

If you believe the truth, if you actually know your Bible and you stand firm on the word of God and you say, well, this is what the word says and that guy is saying something different, there is going to be a whole lot of people who have been deceived and saying, what is wrong with you?

This is what Jesus is describing. Then comes the fun part. You will hear of wars and rumors of wars.

Now this part Jesus said, don't be alarmed. This kind of stuff must take place. Remember the 20th century? Any of you remember that?

Hopefully everyone was here for that. That was the bloodiest century in all of human history.

Hundreds of millions of people killed in wars, conflicts. You had the rise of the Nazi party at World War I.

You have the rise of Bolshevik communism and all of the different wars in Asia and Southeast Asia as a result of that.

Remember all that? That was not a good century. This one looks like it is warm enough to try to outdo the 20th century.

That is what I fear. But Jesus says, all that stuff, don't be alarmed about that. They must take place.

The end is not yet. So the end is not marked by some world conflict.

Here is what he says, for nation will rise against nation, kingdom against kingdom, and oh by the way, there is going to be earthquakes in various places, there will be famine.

These things are, well get this, the beginning of what? Birth pains.

Now, all of you women who have gone through this ordeal, right? Yeah, Jesus' description of the end times.

He is describing the turmoil as birth pains. Here is a good way to think about it. This present creation is pregnant.

It is pregnant with the new creation. It is pregnant with the kingdom of God. In fact, the kingdom is already present.

It is here right now. You just kind of can't really see it. But also it is not here.

In kind of the same way when a woman is pregnant, her baby is present, but not yet.

All right? So the earth, the creation is pregnant. So when my wife was pregnant with our children, each time we both could not wait until that day when we could see the faces of our babies.

We could not wait to hold them. We could not wait to touch them, and to hear their voices and their first cries, right?

But at the same time, we dreaded that whole ordeal of labor. And worse, having heard and read horror stories, we feared that something terrible would happen during labor.

There is always that risk. You always hear the story of the woman who doesn't make it through.

All right? So Jesus here is telling us that the end of the world will be as bad and worse than any labor that any woman has experienced.

And though the world is pregnant with the kingdom of God, the world's not going to survive the labor.

The world's going to die in the experience. So keep that in mind. So Jesus says, but you, be watching yourselves.

And here comes the fun part. Are you ready? They are going to hand you over to councils.

You're going to be beaten in synagogues. You know, every time I read that sentence, you're going to be beaten in synagogues,

I'm thinking, what kind of church is that? You know? You're going to be beaten in a synagogue.

Wonderful. I mean, where's our flogging pole in here? Those of you who aren't tithing.

No, I'm joking. I really am joking. All right? I mean, seriously, in the name of God, we're going to beat you in church.

Yeah, I don't get that. So you're going to be beaten in synagogues, and you're going to be stood before governors and kings for my sake for a testimony to them, and the good news must first be proclaimed to all nations.

In other words, the kingdom of God. Remember that creation is pregnant with the kingdom. It's here but not yet, right?

Well, Jesus is telling us that the kingdom of God must come to term. It must fully develop and will only be given birth to once it develops for the full nine months.

The kingdom will not be born prematurely. And there's some reasons for this. So it says the good news must be first proclaimed to all nations.

We read in the back of the book, in the book of Revelation 5, verses 8 through 10, it says this. And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the 24 elders fell down before the

Lamb, each holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints, and they sang a new song.

Listen to the lyrics of this song. Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation.

And you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.

Or Revelation chapter 7, verses 9 through 12. After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the

Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands and crying out in a loud voice,

Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb and all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne.

They worshiped God, saying, Amen. Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our

God forever and ever. Amen. So the earth is pregnant. The creation is pregnant with the new creation.

It's here, but not yet. The creation is not going to survive the labor, folks. And we're going to go to full term.

That means people from every nation is going to hear the saving message of the forgiveness of sins won by Christ and His crucifixion for us on the cross.

That's the term. So, in the meantime, so whenever they lead you, while handing you over, don't be anxious beforehand as to what you should speak.

In other words, you notice here that Jesus is kind of anticipating, hey, you know, being a Christian is kind of a dicey business. Proclaiming me in the midst of such darkness among a whole world of sinners could get you in a lot of trouble.

And when that happens and you go on trial, don't even worry about what it is that you're going to say. Don't sit down and work this out with your attorney what your defense is going to be.

In that moment, the Holy Spirit will speak through you so that you can testify to Christ. Even if at the end of the trial they have to lop your head off.

Right? Which is not a bad thing. It really isn't. For it's not you who are speaking, it is the

Holy Spirit. And then describing the end of days, brother will hand over brother to death, father his child, children will rise up in rebellion against parents, and they will put them to death.

Whole families, whole families will be in conflict with each other as a result of Christ.

A complete collapse of the fourth commandment is how the last days will be.

Sounds treacherous, does it not? But these are all the birth pangs. All of you women who have been in labor can testify.

It's quite the ordeal. So it's going to get stronger and stronger and stronger and stronger and more intense.

And then Jesus says this, and you will be being hated.

You know, present tense. You are going to be hated by all because of my name. There we go.

So we'll never really be friends with the world, not because we don't love them, but because they hate us because of Jesus.

In other words, don't take it personally when people in your own family or your neighbors mock and curse you and hate you because you proclaim

Christ. You don't take these things personally because we're just servants.

We're just the messengers. We're ambassadors of the King of Kings, and it's not you that they actually hate.

It's Jesus that they hate. Right? And so that you don't lose heart in all of this, let me remind you what

Hebrews 11 says, that great hall of faith passage. I'll read two portions of it.

And notice here the great things that the people who had faith did and also their hope.

They all kept their eye past the labor pains to the kingdom that is coming.

By faith, Abraham... This is verse 8, chapter 11. By faith, Abraham obeyed when he was called out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance.

And he went out not knowing where he was going. By faith, he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise.

For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is

God. Abraham did the things he did looking forward to the city whose builder is

God. And we are as well. By faith, Sarah herself received power to conceive even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised.

Therefore, from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants, as many as the stars of heaven, and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.

These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, did you catch that? They died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth.

And so are we. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return.

But as it is, they desire a better country, that is a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their

God, for he has prepared for them a city. You see, our homeland is not Norway.

I'm German anyway, but... Right? Our homeland is the heavenly kingdom, right?

Which will come to earth. And then moving forward to verse 32. Listen to this. And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, and David, and Samuel, and the prophets, who through faith, they conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword.

They were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Women received back their dead by resurrection.

Pause there. You're sitting there going, well, I haven't stopped the mouths of any lions.

You know, I haven't seen any resurrections, right? Okay, but now watch this next part.

They were stoned. They were sawn in two. They were killed with the sword.

They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, and mistreated, of whom the world was not worthy.

Wandering about in deserts, and mountains, and dens, and caves of the earth. In other words, the persecutions and afflictions that we face as Christians, as a result of proclaiming, and trusting, and confessing

Christ, and the forgiveness of our sins, that affliction is every bit as mighty as stopping the mouth of a lion, or raising somebody from the dead.

It's in the same list, you see? And all of this is done, not by our greatness, but done by faith, because we trust in the promises of God in the kingdom and the city that is to come.

All of these though commended through their faith, they did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, so that apart from us they should not be made perfect.

You see, when Jesus returns in glory to judge the living and the dead, all of the people in their graves are raised from the grave.

That would be you and me if we're dead at that time, right? And so, so is

Abraham, so is Moses, so is Isaac, so is King David.

They're all raised from the grave on the same day. In the new kingdom, in the new earth, when the new creation arrives, after the labor and the birth pains, we're all going to have the same birthday as Moses, David, and the prophets, because God has chosen that they are not going to be perfected apart from us.

God wants us to be perfected with them too, on the same day. Coming back then to our gospel text, then

Jesus says this, but the one having endured to the end, this one will be saved. We all hear this and go,

I better get busy enduring. Kind of the wrong way to think about it. These are not words of a threat, these are words of a promise.

In other words, Jesus is saying this, take heart, the one who endures to the end will be saved. There's salvation at the end of this road.

The sufferings of this present time, whatever they might be, do not compare with the glory that will be revealed on the day of Jesus' coming.

Okay, think of it this way. On a Friday afternoon, the sun failed, the moon was turned to blood, and just outside the gates of Jerusalem, there was

Jesus nailed to a cross, suffering in the darkness of God's wrath, bleeding, dying, while suspended between heaven and earth.

Jesus endured to the end, and he endured for you.

Remember that? There he was, hanging on the cross, and he cries out, it is finished.

Let me read again from the Gospel of Mark, chapter 15. When the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.

And at the ninth hour, Jesus cried out in a loud voice, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani, which means, my

God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And some of the bystanders hearing it said, behold, he's calling

Elijah. Someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed, and gave it to him to drink, saying, wait, let's see whether Elijah will come and take him down.

And Jesus uttered a loud cry. John tells us what that loud cry was. Tetelestai.

It is finished. And then he breathed his last. And then the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.

Think of it this way. What was going on at Jesus' crucifixion?

It was the end of the world. All of the signs at the end of the world were there, present.

The darkening of the sun, the moon turning to blood, the destruction of the temple.

Jesus' death on the cross was a mini end of the world. And so because you, brothers and sisters, are in Christ, remember when you were baptized?

You were baptized into Christ's death and into his resurrection. You are tucked into him.

He's already gone through the end of the world for you. He has endured to the end for you.

If you are in him and you believe, then you will endure to the end because he has already endured.

And so think of it this way. The destruction of the temple is the end of the world. Typologically, when, well, the temple was destroyed, it truly was the end of the world.

And then it all then points to the real eschaton, to the end of days.

Jesus is the first fruits of the new creation, Scripture says. So the end of the world and the new creation have already come.

This is why the kingdom is present, and yet not yet. Just like a pregnant woman can say, my baby is here, but not yet.

You've already gone through the end of the world because you are in Christ. You are forgiven. Your sins are washed away.

You've already endured because Christ has endured for you. In fact, your life is now hidden in Christ.

So the temple, the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The temple and the world were destroyed in Christ's death.

And then we come back, we'll end with these words from Hebrews 10, from our epistle text.

Talking about, well, that old temple that used to be there. Every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifice, which can never take away sins.

But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet.

For by a single offering, he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

And that's you. His death has perfected you. And the

Holy Spirit also bears witness to us after this saying, this is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, declared the

Lord. I will put my law on their hearts and write them in their minds. And then he adds, I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.

Your sins are lost now in the sea of God's forgetfulness, in a watery grave where God never goes fishing.

So enduring to the end is not trying hard to make yourself worthy so that you can survive.

Enduring to the end is simply believing and receiving these amazing promises that you are already perfected, that you are forgiven, that God no longer remembers any of your lawless deeds.

And where there is forgiveness of these, there's no longer any offering for sin. Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence, catch that word, confidence.

That's the word that we're looking for. Confidence. You have the ability to say,

I have confidence I'm forgiven. I have confidence

I'm saved. I have confidence that I will endure to the end because Christ has endured.

That's a big difference from that other word that we all like to kick around, doubt. Well, I doubt.

I look at my life. I look at my life and I go, I don't measure up. Will I endure to the end?

Stop looking at yourself. You're the problem.

Jesus is the solution. Believe. Have confidence. He's done this all for you.

Trust Him. He doesn't want to let you go. Therefore, we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that He opened for us through the curtain that is through His flesh.

And since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith.

Oh, that's right. You can approach God in full assurance and in great confidence. You are forgiven. You are beloved.

You are redeemed. He has you. In full assurance with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and with our bodies washed with pure water, talking about baptism.

So then let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering. And why can we not waver?

Here's the last words. For he who promised is faithful. The reason why we can approach with hope and confidence is because, well, not because you are so great, but because the one who made the promise,

Jesus, He is faithful. He went all the way to the end and endured for you.

Trust. Believe. Have confidence. You are in Him. He's got you.

And so you don't need to fear the end of days, even if it requires you to be hated by others, despised by your own children, or beheaded by ISIS.

None of that means anything because all of that is nothing compared to the surpassing worth and greatness of our crucified and risen

Savior. In the name of Jesus, Amen. And again, that address is

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again, thank you for listening. Amen.