Are You Ready for Jesus?

0 (0s): So glad to be able to worship together this morning. Hello to everyone here on campus. Thanks for coming today. Hello to everyone tuned in from home or wherever you're watching. Just pray that the Lord would meet us with his presence today. Fill our hearts with joy and Thanksgiving and praise. So if you're able, would you stand and prepare your hearts for worship and your body is by some worshiping space and let's pray together. As we begin this morning, Lord, we look to you for all that we have need of today. And God, we just pray that you would fill our hearts with praise this morning that we need to be reminded of your faithfulness towards us. 0 (40s): Your goodness, your mercy is that follow us all the days of our lives. Thank you for my pay for anyone this morning, whose heart is hurting, who has concerns weighing on their mind? Anxiety just bubbling up. God, would you bring peace like a river? Would you restore our souls? Would you encourage us today? But there's nothing happening in our lives and our world. That's out of your sight. So we thank you that we can rest in your unfailing love this morning. And so we choose to worship you tonight in spite of maybe how we feel in spite of things, maybe not working out exactly as we hoped whatever's going on, Lord, you are still in control. 0 (1m 26s): You are God, you are Lord. So we just submit our hearts. Our cares our concerns to you. Jesus we asked you in, meet us now as 1 (1m 39s): strengthen our hearts this morning, the trust is yours Jesus but as we worship in the heavenly places, legs, we thank you. 1 (5m 60s): We can rest power in your name. thank you that we can rest in there. 1 (12m 22s): Give us eyes to see what you're doing and 0 (16m 50s): Yeah, the song reminds was of how you should open those prison doors when they sang Lord God, that song of was our praise. That that breaks chains. It brings freedom. And so as we bring us a scoring, even over our city and over our world will be to speak or just your freedom, your light, your flaw, or that you would break chains, have people bound, lost, and alone and hurting. Would you come just with your love and your repentance? How would you heal hearts that are broken and the need of you this morning? So we just submit every care, every concern weighing upon us. 0 (17m 32s): We just lay it all at the cross. The feet of Jesus. We've come here, Lord, to worship you, to recenter our hearts on you. So we look to you, God, would you point us on the path or would you be that lamp to our feet and a light unto our path? So would you open our hearts to receive all that you have for us today in Jesus name? Amen. Amen. So good. Go ahead. So what a powerful morning to worship together and lift up our Lord. Those of you here on campus. If you want to say hello to someone around you, this would be a good time for that. 0 (18m 15s): Those of you at home, you can take a coffee break, restroom, break, whatever you need. We're going to be back here in just a couple of minutes of seminar since, so we'll see you soon. 2 (18m 27s): My name's Jeremy. I am the youth and family pastor here at Harvest Church. And before I jump into announcements, I just, I came across some news that just kind of blew my mind, made me trust in the word of God, even more. So what it was was back in November, there was kind of hidden kind of underground. There's a lot of other news that kind of covered up, but what scientists found as they sent out the new frontier space probe, it's now over 4 billion miles away and they're taking these pictures of the lights of the stars and the galaxies. And what they found is they found light that doesn't have a source. And there's so much light that there's actually just as much light that doesn't have a source as the known sources in the galaxy and sciences are there. 2 (19m 15s): These researchers are actually having to like figure out how do we, how do we explain this? And it's amazing because we look at our Bibles and God says, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth and God spoke the light, let there be light. And God spoke the light into existence. That was day one, day four was God's created the sun moon and the stars. So here science is pointing the, the, the first chapter, the first chapters of the Bible are true. We can trust God all the way through the Bibles. So I was just so encouraged by that this week, I had to share it with you. So welcome if you're joining with us this week, we're so glad to have you please feel free to, to jump over to the info center, sign in, check in with us. 2 (19m 60s): We'd love to give you a gift. If you are, have been coming to this church and you have, I want to give you a reason to go to the info center. We have bumper stickers and we would love to get a bumper sticker on your car. And I think what I would love to do is as you see these bumper stickers on, on others, other folks, cars pray for them. And I think that would be just a great way to unify our church. So come, go grab us a bumper sticker over at the info center. We've got plenty of them. Stick it on your car. Hey, if you are still curious about checking in with us and, and, and coming back to in-service, I just want to let you know what, what the options are. So we have the loft and parsonage, and those are indoor, and those are the mass are required in those, in those rooms. 2 (20m 43s): And just so you know, those have been empty the past few weeks. So feel free if you're just, if you're just curious about what's what's available, the Lofton parsonage, our indoor mass only the patio is outdoors, and we have our mask optional. Currently the sanctuary is closed, but we're, we're, we're looking at possibly open up in February. So we'll keep you posted on that one. If you are in fifth and sixth grade, and you're wondering when and where do I go after sir, after second service, after you you'll stay with your folks during worship service, and then you'll go off to your classrooms after announcements fifth and sixth grade, go up to the parsonage. And then currently youth is coming to the sanctuary for our youth group for lastly is given to 2020 giving state statements. 2 (21m 32s): And I want to say, Church, you were incredibly generous this year and you're giving, we were so blessed. We felt the love God is on the move and he's, he did some incredible things in 2020. So thank you so much for those of you gave, we want to make sure we give, send out the correct giving statements to you. So make sure that if you are unsure, if we have your correct email address, just send an email to info at Harvest ag Harvest dot org, and we'll make sure we'll get those skip giving statements out. Those will be going out in the next few weeks. And then lastly, I just want to bring up Terry Bruner. She's going to be coming and letting you know about the baby bottle drive and our local lifeline pregnancy center. 2 (22m 14s): Thank you so much, Terry, for joining us. 3 (22m 17s): Thank you Jeremy. Good morning, everyone. I would just want to take a second and introduce to you our brand new director at lifeline pregnancy center. She just joined us in October. This is Tracy bug Nuta. Yeah, so we have two tables outside. Tracy will be one of them. So please stop by and say hi to her to meet you. Thanks. Good to be here. Good to be with lifeline. Thanks Terry. Okay. As I mentioned, there's two tables outside. One is near the loft and one is near the patio. Lots of information there. 3 (22m 57s): So please stop by to say hi and learn more about the pregnancy center. January is our baby bottle fundraiser. So that's what we're here to do today is we just want to invite you to participate with this fundraiser. You're going to come by the table, grab a bottle, take this bottle home and fill it up with change cash, a check of any amount and bring it back with you to Church next week or soon after. And we'll start collecting them. And yeah, that's a easy, but very profitable fundraiser for us. 3 (23m 38s): We do ask that you definitely return your bottle. Even if you don't get it quite full, we do reuse them. And that helps keep our expenses down for online viewers. You can still participate in this fundraiser. We have our website lifeline pregnancy center.org, and you can go right on there and find the donate button. So please use that as your option. Okay? For those of you who are not quite familiar with lifeline pregnancy center and what services that we provide to our community, I had this all planned yesterday in one manner, but God changed it for me early this morning. 3 (24m 25s): He does that sometimes. So instead of rattling off a bunch of services that we offer, I'm going to share with you a personal story of what lifeline pregnancy center does for our community. 29 years ago, I found myself in a unplanned pregnancy. And so I had a friend who took me to a pregnancy center. I met with a client advocate. I was educated on all of my options. I chose life for my baby, that baby who is now almost 30, just became a father last night. 3 (25m 9s): My new granddaughter lifeline pregnancy center does that for women in our community. And so I just, I can't impress upon you anymore. How important this ministry is in our community. And we need to be supporting them now more than ever the yeah. Now more than ever. So I invite you to come to the table. We do have our specific services listed out. I'd love for you to get on our list for our quarterly newsletters. 3 (25m 49s): We do like sending those out online. So if we, we need your, your email addresses, we can save on postage and printing. If we can get these to you via email. So please stop by the tables and sign up for that and such exciting news. We finally have our permit for our construction on our new location that we've had for a while. The walls are going up and we are excited. We have a picture of the volunteers that are working and putting that together. So come by the table, see the pictures, sign up to help. 3 (26m 32s): If you have those skills, we have specific needs out there that you can learn about and sign up. If you'd like a tour of the new building, we're going start towards soon, even before it's done. So come on by and say, hi, thank you so much. 4 (26m 53s): Thank you very much. Awesome announcement on that. My, I was sharing earlier with Jerry, that my niece also had an, an expected pregnancy and she went to a crisis pregnancy center in her town and they helped to educate her about her options as well. And she decided to keep her baby and her baby is now a year old and the baby's name is grace. And so just a great picture of God's faithfulness in the midst of just brokenness and God can restore and just do amazing and wonderful and supernatural things. 4 (27m 35s): If we will just to let him allow him the space to do so. So God, God is faithful. God is faithful. Amen. Amen. Hey, are you guys ready? Okay. You're ready for Jesus. The Bible says that he's coming like a thief in the night. Speaking of a thief in the nights, 3 (27m 58s): I've got a joke. 4 (28m 1s): So this poor old lady wakes up in the middle of the nights to a burglar in her home. And she's so scared. She's so scared. She yells out the scripture verse acts two 38, hoping that the scripture verse will drive her out. And, and sure enough, sure enough, it was successful. The criminal fell to his knees and surrendered to the old lady and the old lady called the police and the police were sober. Blacks. What in the world, they asked the, the thief. What in the world froze you in your tracks and caused you to surrender? When that woman just simply said, acts two 38. She just, she yelled at him a scripture verse and the thieves said a scripture verse. 4 (28m 44s): I thought she said she had an ax and two 30 eights. You probably heard that before, but it fit the servant today. As we talk about Jesus coming as a thief in the night, we're in second Thessalonians, chapter two, we're going to be I'm in the new living translation and also the English standard version going back and forth between the two. These are events prior to the Lord's second coming. Let's take a moment, pray. Let's in fact, let's go ahead and stand up all over the campus. And if you're home, go ahead and stand up in honor of the word and in honor of the Lord, and we're going to pray for the service. So Lord, thank you for the opportunity to have Church in crazy ways. We're having Church we're online, we're in person on we're on the patio. 4 (29m 27s): We're all over the place, but we're having Church. And so we're thankful that even in this crazy season in our world, you are still giving us opportunity to gather it's different, but we're still gathered. And we're just so thankful that Lord. So I pray that as people are watching from their homes, that they're encouraged, I pray that they are able to gather with a couple of people in their homes and just be encouraged, able to worship, able to be edified and built up in their most Holy faith. And I pray the same thing, whether people are in the loft or in the parsonage or on the patio Lord here in the sanctuary, we've got like six people in the sanctuary Lord. So we're so thankful for 5 (30m 6s): What you're doing as we gather the best we can 4 (30m 8s): Lord. And so as we open up to second Thessalonians chapter two, and talk about the rapture and talk about the second coming of Christ, talking about all these exciting things, Lord, I pray that we would be encouraged and excited about our faith even more. 5 (30m 21s): And Lord, for those who don't know you, 4 (30m 23s): Maybe who are just kind of checking things out, maybe just kind of in a discovery process, I pray that you would reveal yourself and powerful and significant and legitimate ways Lord, so that people might come to know you and I pray that every heart listening would be tender, ready, and responsive to hear your, your message of truth. So thank you Lord, for bringing this truth to us, use me. I pray Lord in Jesus name. Amen. You can be seated. Second 5 (30m 50s): Indians chapter two verse one says now dear brothers and sisters, let us clarify some things about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and how we will be gathered to meet him. This verse is talking about the rapture and the rapture will be gathered to meet the Lord in the air. Whether the rapture happens before the tribulation, whether the rapture happens midway through the tribulation or whether the rapture happens after the tribulation, we need to be able to answer this question. Are you ready? Answer the question. Are you ready? Am I ready for the return of Christ? I'm going to speak some truth to you today and give you some points to consider. 5 (31m 33s): And hopefully as we get through this message into the end of the message, you will feel ready. And if you're not already, you will be taking some time 4 (31m 40s): Steps to get ready for the return of the Lord. Jesus Christ 5 (31m 45s): Person Christ will be gathered together to meet Jesus in the air. We see that in first Thessalonians chapter four verses 16 through 18, it says for the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an Archangel, with the sound of the trumpet of God and the dead in Christ will rise. First, verse 17, then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. So we will always be with the Lord. 4 (32m 19s): And then Paul is saying, therefore, encourage verse 18. Therefore encourage one another. With these words, 5 (32m 25s): I was in Santa Maria yesterday, Santa Maria, California, 4 (32m 28s): And I was driving around and it occurred to me that I hadn't been to the cemetery for awhile. We'd have family members who were buried in that cemetery. My wife's grandparents in particular. 5 (32m 38s): And as I drove around, I was trying, I hadn't been there for many 4 (32m 40s): Years and I was trying to find their, their, their gravestone. And so I'm driving around and I'm 5 (32m 46s): Thinking about where, where is their gravestone? And as I'm looking around, I saw some other, yeah, 4 (32m 52s): Gravestones, obviously there's thousands of them around and I'm 5 (32m 55s): On one particular gravestone. 4 (32m 57s): I saw this epitaph 5 (33m 0s): Epitaph. I have finished the work, which now gave me 4 (33m 3s): For me to do John 17 four. I have finished the work which thou gave us me to do. Now, this woman who had this epitaph on her headstone was born in 1897. And she passed away in 1960. And then right next to that grave stone was another grave stone with the same epitaph. And it was her daughter who also said, I have finished the work that gave us for me to do 5 (33m 33s): What did it, what a profound statement. I don't know, what else would we be better on, 4 (33m 38s): On a tombstone then that statement I have finished the work, which I gave us me to do. 5 (33m 45s): I thought about that verse. 4 (33m 47s): And I thought about the impact of that verse. So you've got mom who lived her life, apparently for Jesus has that epitaph. And then her daughter generationally, as we 5 (34m 0s): Jesus, we've got the opportunity to impact those who come after us. We will impact those who come after us one way or the other. What a, what a great option 4 (34m 11s): Trinity. We have to impact the next generation and generations that follow with the gospel of the Lord, Jesus Christ. 5 (34m 18s): And then I was thinking about that verse and the dead in Christ will rise first. I thought, man, it's going to be a crazy, crazy moment. When that happens all over the earth, I thought about all of the dead in Christ, you were in that cemetery or in the ocean who are, you know, wherever they may be. 4 (34m 38s): And in a moment they're going to at the, at the appearance appearing of Christ in the air, he never touches down at the rapture, but he's, he appears in the clouds in the air. And I can, I can just imagine. And just a moment, 5 (34m 54s): The dead in Christ and then those who are still alive, well, we'll catch up. So if we're still alive during the rapture, we will be caught up as well. So it's like, I don't know how, how much time there's going to be in between, but it's gonna be like, it's like, you know, we're going to see the dead in Christ rise. And then, and then we get a chance to rise as well. It's going to be just amazing. Are you ready for that? Are You Ready for Jesus we don't talk about the second coming of Christ that often as a Church, but it's like, it's like waiting for Christmas. It's the best thing in the world. I mean, it's like we should be anticipating it. Ready for it. Excited about it. I mean, the rapture is going to wreak havoc in the earth. 5 (35m 36s): Imagine people in planes and automobiles, walking in homes all over the earth, being caught up believers in the Lord, Jesus Christ being caught up 4 (35m 48s): In the rapture. I want us to be Ready 5 (35m 52s): As a church. I want 4 (35m 54s): Us to be ready as a leader, a pastor, a shepherd. I want us to be ready in Jesus' name for what is coming. And it's not that difficult. God, hasn't made it complicated for us to be ready. It's a matter of us trusting in him, believing the gospel message that Jesus died for our sins, that he took the penalty for our sins upon himself. And that when our life is hidden in Christ, when we were adopted into his family, when our sins are forgiven, we are, we come into faith. We come by faith. We come into this relationship, the saving relationship salvation. We experienced salvation in Christ. It's just that simple. 4 (36m 34s): Are you ready? Are you ready for Jesus? Is this something that you did years ago, but then have allowed to go by the wayside. I want to encourage you to be ready today. And then everyday following. I want you to be ready for the return of Christ. Meaning getting your life in order, making Jesus, your first priority, focusing on him and your in your day to day life. Every moment, wanting to please him and honor him and serve him with everything that you have. Are you ready? Are you ready for Jesus? Number one in your notes. If you're not ready, get ready. 4 (37m 15s): If you're not ready, get ready. How do you get Ready? Well, we'll get there in a minute. I'll show you how to get ready. 5 (37m 22s): But verse two says don't be easy. Don't be so easily shaken. The second Thessalonians two, two says don't be so easily shaken or alarmed by those who say that the day of the Lord has already begun. Don't believe them. Even if they claim to have had a spiritual vision, a revelation or a letter supposedly from us. 4 (37m 43s): So the day of the Lord, what is the day of the Lord? 5 (37m 46s): The day of the Lord is when God is coming with judgment to judge the unbeliever, The festival Indian Church was experiencing so much persecution. And then they were receiving these false letters from people who said that they were the apostle Paul, maybe hearing words like thus sayeth the Lord. They heard people with maybe a spiritual vision of revelation or a letter as the verse has a supposedly from us telling the Church 4 (38m 22s): Church that the day of the Lord had already happened. And so maybe in there 5 (38m 27s): Thinking with all of their persecution, maybe Jesus has already come. We missed it. And what we're experiencing is 4 (38m 35s): Is the tribulation period they'd received. Maybe people with vision revelation, a letter that they had miss Jesus verse three, it says don't be fooled by what they say for that day will not come until there's a great rebellion against God. So there are some things that must take place prior to the coming of the Lord. Jesus Christ. That great rebellion. The Greek word, there is a pasta CA. So where we get our word apostasy, it's a great falling away. People who once knew God will fall away from him. They will be a great rebellion, a great apostasy, a great falling away in the last days. 4 (39m 20s): This is what will happen. We see it in second, Timothy chapter three verses one through five. But understand this, 5 (39m 27s): Understand this, that in the last days they will come. Times of difficulty, four people will be lovers of self lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive disobedient to their parents. 4 (39m 41s): Navel unholy, heartless on a peaceable 5 (39m 45s): Slanderous without self-control 4 (39m 48s): Brutal, not loving 5 (39m 50s): Good treacherous, reckless swollen with conceits levers of pleasure, rather than lovers of God. Having the appearance of godliness. These people will look like 4 (40m 2s): They're godly. They will look pious, but denying its power, they will look godly, but lacking the power that belongs to the godly. They will 5 (40m 14s): Have the appearance of godliness, but be liking it's Powell. 4 (40m 17s): And Paul Paul told Timothy avoid such people. These pious people who are arrogant full of themselves, loving pleasure rather than God. And this is what will happen in the end days. And we think maybe we're seeing that now. And we do see that now. And we've probably seen it down throughout the Church age, beginning with the first Church the episodic Church. And throughout the church age, we've probably seen this, but with increasing 5 (40m 46s): W w increasingly, so we will see this title, 4 (40m 49s): But a pasta. See this walking away. Number one, if you're not ready to get ready, how do you get ready? I would just encourage you to become a student of the Bible, become a student of the Bible, often 5 (41m 4s): Reading all kinds of things, Christian books, Christian biographies, Christian stories, but we're not actually reading as 4 (41m 11s): Much the Bible. We can read it 5 (41m 14s): All about the Bible and all about what God does in the earth. But if we're not investing ourselves in the truth of God's word, we're going to be, we could possibly be deceived. And I just want us to 4 (41m 25s): Me aware that we could be, 5 (41m 29s): If we're not grounded in the word of God, understanding the truth of God from the old, all the way through 4 (41m 34s): The new Testament, become a student of the Bible. It's brand new year. Maybe you take this year for the first time and you read through the whole scripture, all the new Testament this year, it's not too late to jump into, do something like that. Maybe this year, you decide I'm going to really study this book of the Bible, because it really is perplexing. Maybe you're going to study the gospels or the epistles, or some, some prophecy books that you're going to study Genesis or revelation or the revelation. Maybe you're going to study a book of the Bible and get it, really get your mind around it and get your heart invested in it. I would just, if you're not ready and you're struggling to be ready for the return of price, maybe, maybe there's doubt or just unbelief, fear, anger, whatever. 4 (42m 17s): It may be, just become a student of the Bible and then be humble and teachable. We don't want to approach the word of God unless we're humble and teachable. But if we approach the word 5 (42m 26s): With humility and teachability, 4 (42m 30s): We're told that the Holy spirit will speak to us and we'll download truth to us. And then there's amazing Bible study tools out there, commentaries, Bible dictionaries, all kinds of online stuff and book stuff that that can help us to become students of the Bible to approach it with humility and teachability. And then 5 (42m 50s): I just encourage you to listen to the truth, listen to, to the truth. We hear all kinds of prophetic words, visions, people's dreams, all kinds of stuff. Listen, those things are fine 4 (43m 7s): That the gifts of God are for today, but they must be submitted to the word of God, to the truth of God. And if what we're hearing and visions and seeing, and dreams and all kinds of, if they're not, if they're not lining up with the word of God that we need to stick with the word of God, we need to stick with the word of God. First Timothy four, a chapter, a chapter four verses one through five, Paul instructed Timothy. He said, I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus 5 (43m 36s): Jesus who is to judge the living in the 4 (43m 39s): Dead and by his appearing and his kingdom. 5 (43m 42s): He said, preach the word. So Paul told Timothy, he told his protege the most important thing you can do is to preach the word, teach the Bible, be ready in season and out of season. Part of preaching the word 4 (44m 5s): And teaching the word is what comes next, right? 5 (44m 8s): Groove, rebuke, and exhort with complete patience and teaching for the time is coming. When people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions. So people won't be satisfied with 4 (44m 29s): The truth of God's word. They want to hear what they want to hear, whatever that 5 (44m 34s): That is. They want to hear what they want to hear. And so they find teachers who will tell them what they want to hear. Listen, the Bible is full of stuff that we don't want to hear. There are, it's hard sayings, hard truths of God. And they're hard for us to listen to because it requires that we bring our lives into alignment with God. And with his word, it requires that we move, not that God moves, but that we move and that we align our lives with the message and the person and the truth of the word of God. 4 (45m 11s): So people will find it 5 (45m 12s): Teachers to suit their own passions and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, Timothy always be sober-minded endure suffering. Do the work of an evangelist and fulfill your ministry. 4 (45m 31s): Part of 5 (45m 32s): With these ministry was that he would preach the word it's tempting, I guess, as a pastor, too, 4 (45m 38s): When you say less difficult things to say 5 (45m 44s): Things that are easier on people's ears, that's always going to be a temptation, 4 (45m 50s): But when we are face-to-face 5 (45m 54s): With God's word and with the reality that there's a judgment on what we say and how we communicate the truth we have to by God's grace, 4 (46m 5s): Speak the truth in love. 5 (46m 9s): In revelation, God spoke to the church in Laodicea and he had this complaint against the church. 4 (46m 17s): They were neither hot or cold. They were losing 5 (46m 21s): Warm. And Jesus said, because you are not hot or cold, you are lukewarm. I will literally spit you out of my mouth. He's called the church to be on fire 4 (46m 32s): For him, not lukewarm 5 (46m 34s): In revelation three 17. It continues for you say, I'm rich. I have prospered. I need nothing. Not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and 4 (46m 45s): Naked. 5 (46m 48s): There are those who believe that those seven churches in the beginning of revelation, those seven churches represent the Church age, Church history. And so the first Church in there know the Church and emphasis represents the Church, the apostolic church. And then down throughout the history with those seven churches, those seven churches represent the Church age Church history. So the seventh church is the church of Laodicea that we just talked about. And so if indeed we are in the last days of the end time 4 (47m 26s): Times, I wonder if this to see in Church 5 (47m 30s): Represents the Church in the world today, 4 (47m 34s): Today, are we hot or cold? Or we Luke warm. I'm not sure 5 (47m 42s): You're not Harvest Church in particular, but I am talking about Harvest Church but I'm talking about the Church the Equis SIA, the capital C Church of the world that Church, that belongs to Jesus Christ. It is in the world. Do we look like the layer to see in Church or are we on fire for Jesus? 4 (48m 1s): We faced the same judgment that the lady to see in Church the same rebuke that the land lady to see in Church received. Are we ready for Jesus? Are we ready for Jesus? The temptation is to kind of keep Jesus in our back pockets for fire insurance, whatever that may look like in your life, but that's not discipleship. That's not what Jesus called his disciples to. That's not what he's called you. He's not called you to send me more. Christianity is called You to 24 seven Christianity discipleship. He's called you to be a follower of his, to abandon everything so that you might call him so that you might know him. If you're not 5 (48m 41s): Ready number one, get Ready number two, make sure you're only following. Jesus make sure you're only following Jesus what's the temptation or the temptation as we've already talked about or attempted to follow man, and believe what men say. We hear a prophecy. It's exciting to hear a prophecy. We're tempted to believe the prophecy without actually checking out the prophecy. When I say we need to make sure we're following Jesus, where we need to make sure we're following his word, where in his word we understand the person and the work and the character of Jesus. We understand who he is so that we can make sure we're only following him. 5 (49m 21s): We hear prophecy. We get excited about it. We need to check it out. Somebody shares a vision or a revelation. Someone writes a compelling letter. That's what was going on here with his Church. Someone had written a letter letting, letting the Church there and festival the festival. And I could, Church letting them know, telling them that the return of Christ had already happened. And they began to believe it. It was signed by Paul, a fictitious Paul, somebody who wasn't the apostle Paul. So the temptation is to believe something that isn't from God and we follow men. We're tempted to follow men. Second Thessalonians two, two, again, don't be so easily shaken or 4 (49m 59s): Lauren by those who say that the day of the Lord has already begun. Don't believe them. Even if they claim to have, 5 (50m 4s): I had a spiritual vision, a revelation or a letter, supposedly from us, 4 (50m 10s): Paul had told the Church and first Thessalonians one 10, that they would be delivered from the wrath to come. 5 (50m 19s): You heard true throughout the course of our lives, hopefully in Church as we studied the word of God. And as we've understood who God is, we've heard truth. But then we forget circumstantially our lives go through hard things and we forget, we go through difficulties and we want to hold onto something of comfort, even if it's not truth. And then sometimes we're holding onto the wrong thing that doesn't bring comfort to us at all lies from the enemy. So this Church was experiencing persecution because of their faith in the Lord, Jesus Christ. And that is something that we know we can expect as followers of the Lord, Jesus Christ. 5 (51m 1s): We should expect persecution. But the persecution that they were experiencing was from men. It was from human beings who were persecuting them for their faith. We see that type of persecution throughout the old Testament and the new Testament. We will see it. We'll see it all the way till the very end. The wrath of the tribulation period is God's judgment on unbelieving people, the wrath and the tribulation period that seven year period comes from God. And it's on those who were unbelieving. 5 (51m 43s): God's wrath is for the unbeliever. It's not for the believer. Remember the story of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis chapter 18 and 19, God was about to destroy the cities and Abraham spoke up and he asked the Lord, he pleaded with the Lord Genesis 1823. The second part of the verse says, will you indeed sweep away? The righteous with the wicked Abraham continued in Genesis 1825. He said far, be it from you to do such a thing, to put the righteous to death with the wicked so that the righteous fare as the wicked far be that from you shall not the judge of all the earth do what is just so Abraham challenged. 5 (52m 36s): What was going on? Challenge. God Abraham said, what if I find 50 righteous people? Will you destroy the land? If I find 50 righteous people, God said, if I find at Sodom 50 righteous in the city, I will spare the whole, whole place for their sake. What happened? Abraham couldn't find 50. So he said, Lord, we're about 45 for, for the sake of 45, a wallet. I will not destroy the city. What about 40, 30, 2010? I said, if you can find 10 righteous, I won't destroy the city. Abraham couldn't find 10 righteous people within the cities. 5 (53m 18s): And so God saved lot in his family and he destroyed the city. 6 (53m 27s): He destroyed it with sulfur and fire. 4 (53m 31s): The people of festival Annika can confuse, thought that God God's wrath was upon them. Listen, we can't handle God's 6 (53m 39s): Wrath. 4 (53m 42s): Most of the time, his wrath ends in death. Ultimately it always ends in death for the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ. Our Lord Jesus died on the cross to take our penalty so that we wouldn't have to endure the wrath of God. Are you ready? Are you ready for Jesus? If you're not ready, 6 (54m 9s): Ready? Get ready. Get ready. Okay. 4 (54m 15s): Make sure that you're only following Jesus verse three. Again, don't be fooled. Don't be fooled by what they say for that day will not come until there's a great rebellion against God. The apostasy 6 (54m 29s): And the man of lawlessness, 4 (54m 31s): The man of sin. The antichrist is what that means. The man of lawlessness is revealed. So there's a great apostasy and the antichrist is revealed. So some things need to happen before the return of Christ. 6 (54m 49s): No ma'am 4 (54m 49s): Lawlessness is revealed. The one who brings destruction, he will exalt himself and defy everything that people call God and every object of worship, he will even sit in the temple of God, claiming that he himself is 6 (55m 5s): Okay. 4 (55m 5s): So a couple of things need to happen. First. The great apostasy, right? Falling away 6 (55m 9s): Way. 4 (55m 13s): There are those who believe that the antichrist will be one who is a part of the apostate. Church one who at one point maybe knew God and abandoned God abandoned God's principles and God's plan. There are those who believe that the antichrist will be from the apostate Church. 6 (55m 36s): So 4 (55m 37s): I believe this'll be in scripture, bears this out. He will be an influential leader. It'll be easy to follow. He will make big promises. He will speak of peace. In fact, he will bring a temporary peace to the middle East. Something that the world will be odd by middle East has been at war for years. 6 (56m 2s): He 4 (56m 3s): Will even rebuild the temple in Jerusalem for the Jews, 6 (56m 8s): But 4 (56m 10s): Three and a half years into the tribulation. We will see verse four, take place, verse four. Again, he will exalt himself and defy everything that people call God and every object of worship. He will even sit in the temple of God that he himself is God. People will worship him as God. People will worship him as Messiah, 5 (56m 32s): Verse five. Don't you remember that? I told you about all this when I was with you. And this is a, this is a brand new Church. This is a brand new Church Paul Paul 4 (56m 42s): Writes the first letter 5 (56m 47s): And there's some confusion about what he was about what he wrote. But prior to that, he was with them for a few weeks. And he, he taught them all of these things about the end times and about Jesus, about the gospel. He taught them all of these things. And so he's asking him, does she remember that? I told you about all this. When I was with you, he was with him for such a short amount of time. And then he laughed and he wrote a letter. And then within a month, or within one to 12 months, somewhere in there, a very short list for a short time later from Corinth, he writes the second letter, correcting their, their misunderstanding of what he had communicated to them. 5 (57m 29s): It's it's we need to understand this truth. Some of you are here and you're like, man, I'm a brand new Christian. I can understand this stuff. You can, you met your meant to understand this Paul's expectation of the early church. A young, early church was that 4 (57m 42s): We would understand it for six and you know, what is holding him back, the antichrist, where he can be revealed only when his time comes and that interesting. So God's not flustered by the times, things that are unfolding that will unfold. The Holy spirit is holding back the anti-Christ until his time comes. Why? Because God's in charge of all things. He's not flustered by the, in times he's not scared, but at the antichrist, he's not scared of Satan. He's not, he's not scared of anything. And you shouldn't be either. You should be wise. Why is the serpents? Harmless is, does. We should be wise. We should be humble, but we should be confident in the word and confident in our God that he is in charge. 4 (58m 29s): So, you know, what is holding it back? The Holy spirit is holding it back for you can be revealed only when his time comes for this. Lawlessness is already at work secretly and it will remain secret until the one who is holding it back steps out of the way. Then the man of lawlessness will, will be revealed, but the Lord Jesus will slay him with the breath of his mouth. It's just that simple God's power. Isn't just a little bit more than the enemy. He's not just a touch, bigger, a touch, more powerful. 5 (59m 6s): It's not a, it's not a competition at all. It's not a competition 4 (59m 11s): At all. You'll be slick 5 (59m 14s): With the breadth of his mouth and destroy him by the splendor of his coming. Let's read. It's not on your screen. I just to read this this morning, revelation chapter 19, verses 11 through 21, I'm just going to read it. Not going to comment a lot on it, but it just gives us a picture of what's going to happen to this enemy who likes to wreak havoc in our life. And I saw heaven open and behold, a white horse. The one sitting on it is called faithful and true. And in righteousness, he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire. And on his head are many diadems many crowns. 5 (59m 56s): And he has the name written that no one knows, but himself. He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood and the name by which he is called the word of God, who are we talking about there? My Jesus right. He's the word of God. And the armies of heaven, arrayed in fine, linen, white and pure were following him on white horses from his mouth comes a sharp sword. Or we just read about the breadth of his mouth ringing destruction, right from his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. And he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the wine press of the fury, of the wrath of God, the almighty on his robe and on his thigh, he has the name written King of Kings and Lord of Lords. 5 (1h 0m 45s): Then I saw an angel standing in the sun with a loud voice. He called to all the birds that fly directly overhead. He said, come gather for the great supper of God to eat the flesh of Kings. The flesh of captains, the flesh of mighty men, the flesh of horses and their writers, the flesh of all men, both free and slave both small and great. And I saw the beasts and the Kings of the earth with their armies gathered to make war against him who was sitting on the horse and against his army. Then God is trembling. You think Jesus is scared. He's got nothing to fear. And the beast was captured. And with it, the false prophet who is in its presence, let me see it. 5 (1h 1m 30s): And the beast was captured. And with it, the false prophet who in its presence had done the signs of which he deceived those who had received the Mark of the beast. And those who worshiped his image. These two were thrown alive into the Lake of fire that burns with sulfur and the rest were slain by what, by the word that came from the mouth of him who was sitting on the horse and all the birds were, were gorged with their flesh, big battle Kings of the earth gathered to battle the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And God goes Jesus And that's it. 5 (1h 2m 16s): The battle is over 4 (1h 2m 24s): As it is done. It's not a battle at all. It's a breath of his mouth that destroys and brings the splendor of his coming that communicates the splendor of his crumbing coming this man, verse nine seconds 5 (1h 2m 42s): Bessel. And in chapter two, verse nine, this man, the antichrist will come to do the work of Satan with counterfeit power and signs and 4 (1h 2m 49s): Eric goals. Some describe this antichrist is kind of like You, 5 (1h 2m 57s): You know, Jesus is the incarnation of God. This would be like, like Satan has given this person 4 (1h 3m 3s): And all of his power, all of his authority to deceive the nations, counterfeit power and signs and miracles reminds me of Exodus. Again, when Pharaoh's magicians imitated, Moses and imitated Moses miracles, it was, it was counterfeit signs and miracles. This antichrist will be able to do powerful things. 5 (1h 3m 42s): But I think about it, I think about going to a good magician show, you don't understand how the tricks are being 4 (1h 3m 47s): Performed, but when 5 (1h 3m 49s): You see behind the curtain and you begin to see how the tricks are being performed, they're not narrowly 4 (1h 3m 55s): Is impressive. You're like, Oh, well, that's not impressive. It's impressive when you don't know the tricks or what's happening behind the curtain. But we know that God knows what's going on behind the curtain. And he describes the worst of the antichrist is counterfeit power signs and miracles, counterfeits fake. 5 (1h 4m 17s): I use every kind of evil deception to fool those on their way to destruction because they refuse to love and accept 4 (1h 4m 25s): The truth that would save them. 5 (1h 4m 29s): I refuse. These are unbelievers who refuse people who refuse to love and accept 4 (1h 4m 34s): The truth that would save them. I wonder if that's you today. I wonder if you've heard the gospel, you've heard the truth, but you're refusing to love it and accept it. And you're refusing to allow the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ to save you. This is not something to be played with. It's not a game. Is that something that you wait to do? It's something that you do now. 5 (1h 4m 60s): Now in Jesus' name. You when you believe you receive, you don't wait. You don't say, well, I'm going to wait until I get through high school 4 (1h 5m 8s): And 5 (1h 5m 9s): Then give my life to Jesus, because I want to have some fun in high school. I'm going to wait until I get through college because I want to have some fun in college. And then after college, well, I want to wait until I'm more established in my career until I have a family. And then I will give my life to Jesus. Well, I want to wait until I'm retired. When I can really invest myself in Jesus and that's when I'll give myself to Jesus, I'm going, I'm going to wait until I'm close to death on my death bed. And then I will give my life to Jesus. 4 (1h 5m 46s): And then it's too late. You harden your hearts, your whole life, your heart. Won't all of a sudden be tender towards Jesus. When you're an old man, a woman, your heart will be harder than, than ever. Don't wait, don't wait. Are you ready? Are you ready for Jesus? If you're not ready to get ready, make 5 (1h 6m 16s): Sure you're only following Jesus. 4 (1h 6m 19s): And then number three, as we wrap this thing up, stand firm, you will need to 5 (1h 6m 25s): Learn how to stand firm 4 (1h 6m 28s): In Jesus. Yeah. 5 (1h 6m 31s): If you cannot stand firm in the days and times in which we live now, 4 (1h 6m 35s): Now your faith is weak. You will never endure when things really get difficult. If you can't 5 (1h 6m 45s): Not endure. Now, I'm going to tell you the truth. Your faith is 4 (1h 6m 49s): Weak. That's not a 5 (1h 6m 52s): Judgment statement. That's a statement of fact, 4 (1h 6m 56s): Dada, 5 (1h 6m 57s): Racist, sufficient, and that he will strengthen you for the day 4 (1h 6m 60s): CA beginning now. 5 (1h 7m 4s): And if you don't figure out how to stand firm, now you will never figure out how to stand firm 4 (1h 7m 9s): Later. 5 (1h 7m 12s): You need to figure out now how to stand firm. And Jesus 4 (1h 7m 15s): Jesus first third, 5 (1h 7m 18s): Jean believers is stand firm. As for us, we can't help, but thank God for you. Your brothers and sisters loved by the Lord. We're always thankful that God shows you to be among the first to experience salvation salvation that comes through the spirit who makes you Holy and through your belief in the truth. He called you to salvation. When he told you the good news. Now you can share in the glory of our Lord, Jesus Christ, with all these things in mind, dear brothers and sisters stand firm and keep a strong grip. 4 (1h 7m 53s): That means 5 (1h 7m 53s): It requires efforts on your part by God's grace. We stand firm and take a strong grip. Then decide once again that Jesus is Lord, and then I'm going to trust him no matter what, no matter what comes my way, I'm standing firm in him and I'm trusting him. I'm taking a renewed grip, a strong grip on the teachings we passed on to you in person. And by letter, 4 (1h 8m 16s): Paul wrote, you're holding onto the teachings of the Bible. You're understanding the, the, what was passed on by the apostle Paul. And for that matter throughout the whole scripture, the old and the new Testament, all 66 books of the Bible. Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God, our father who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal comfort and a wonderful hope comfort to you and strengthen you and every good thing you do and say, and that's how Paul wraps up this chapter. Are you ready for Jesus? I've said some hard things today, but the things that we need to hear, things that we need to understand, things that we need to believe. 4 (1h 9m 6s): If you're not ready to get ready and make sure you're only following Jesus in his word and the truth of God and stand firm in Jesus name, stand firm in Jesus with that, I want to pray and we're gonna invite the worship team forward, and we're gonna sing some more. And then we're gonna just spend some time as we sing, just contemplating what has been said. So if you're here today and you need to stand firm as a follower of Lord, Jesus Christ. Choose to do that. If you're here today and you don't know, Jesus choose to give your life to him. I've given you the gospel today. Jesus died for your sins. The Bible says all have sinned and fall short of the glory of standard of God. 4 (1h 9m 49s): The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ. Our Lord we're saved by grace through faith. So receive Jesus into your heart today. You receive him by simply saying, Lord Jesus, I receive you. I need you. I give you my life. I want you to be the Lord and the leader, the King of my life. You get to say what I do from now on you are Lord let's pray, Lord. Thank you for this time. Thank you for what you're doing. God continued to penetrate hearts and minds with your truth and be glorified with the response. We pray Lord in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Let's worship 1 (1h 10m 43s): . 1 (1h 19m 18s): Thank you. 0 (1h 19m 36s): Giving us boldness and courage to all the earth around us and examples of your love to everyone 1 (1h 19m 44s): We're in contact with. So you 0 (1h 19m 46s): Keep us all safe. Keep us healthy until we're together. Again. 1 (1h 19m 50s): Love you, 0 (1h 19m 52s): Honor. And praise in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Church love. It's so awesome to worship our Lord for you, that you have a wonderful rest of your day. If you're here on campus, make sure you use this. Take some kind of fellowship and encourage one. Another. Those of you at home, just love on each other today. Be good to each other. If you're at home today, call a friend, call a family member, reach out to somebody. If you're feeling alone, there's chances are someone else's too. So let's be the church. Let's be family to one another and spread God's love this morning. So have a great day. We'll see you next Sunday.