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Our Old Covenant reading this
morning comes from the prophet Daniel. Daniel chapter 9. I'll be reading the entirety
of the chapter. Though it's long, I think it's
important that we see the entire context here. This is the word
of the Lord. In the first year of Darius the
son of Ahasuerus, by descent of Mede, who is made king over
the realm of the Chaldeans, in the first year of his reign,
I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that according
to the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet must pass before
the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years. I turned my face to the Lord
God, seeking him by prayers and pleas for mercy with fasting
and sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to the Lord my God and
made confession, saying, O Lord, the great and awesome God who
keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him
and keep his commandments. We have sinned and done wrong
and acted wickedly, and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments
and rules. We have not listened to your
servants, the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our
princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land.
To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us opens shame. as at
this day to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem,
and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far
away, and all the lands to which you have driven them, because
of the treachery that they have committed against you. To us,
O Lord, belongs open shame to our kings, to our princes, and
to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. To the Lord
our God belongs mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against
him and have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God by walking
in his laws, which he set before us by his servants, the prophets. All Israel has transgressed your
law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice. And the curse
and the oath that are written in the law of Moses, the servant
of God, have been poured out upon us because we have sinned
against him. He has confirmed his words which
he spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us by bringing
upon us a great calamity. For under the whole heaven there
has not been anything done like what has been done against Jerusalem. As it is written in the law of
Moses, all this calamity has come upon us. Yet we have not
entreated the favor of the Lord our God, turning from our iniquities
and gaining insight by your truth. Therefore the Lord has kept ready
the calamity and has brought it upon us. For the Lord our
God is righteous in all his works that he has done, and we have
not obeyed his voice. And now, O Lord our God, who
brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand,
And we have made a name for yourself, as this day we have sinned. We have done wickedly. O Lord,
according to all your righteous acts, let your anger and your
wrath turn away from your city, Jerusalem, your holy hill, because
of our sins and for the iniquities of our fathers. Jerusalem and
your people have become a byword among all those who are around
us. Now therefore, O our God, listen to the prayer of your
servant and his pleas for mercy. And for your own sake, O Lord,
make your face to shine upon your sanctuary, which is desolate. O my God, incline your ear and
hear, open your eyes and see our desolations and the city
that is called by your name. For we do not present our pleas
before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy.
O Lord, hear. O Lord, forgive. O Lord, pay
attention and act. Do not delay for your own sake. O my God, because your city and
your people are called by your name. While I was speaking and
praying, confessing my sins and the sins of my people Israel,
and presenting my plea before the Lord my God for the holy
hill of my God, while I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom
I had seen in the vision at the first, came to me in swift flight
at the time of the evening sacrifice. He made me understand, speaking
with me and saying, O Daniel, I have now come out to give you
insight and understanding. At the beginning of your pleas
for mercy, a word went out, and I have come to tell you, for
you are greatly loved, therefore consider the word and understand
the vision. Seventy weeks are decreed about
your people and your holy city to finish the transgression,
to put an end to sin, and to atone for iniquity, to bring
in everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and prophet,
and to anoint a most holy place. Know therefore and understand
that from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem,
to a coming of an anointed one, a prince, There shall be seven
weeks. Then for 62 weeks it shall be
built again with squares and moat. But in a troubled time,
after 62 weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have
nothing. And the people of the princes
who come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its end shall
come with flood, and to its end there shall be war. Desolations
are decreed, and he shall make a strong covenant with many for
one week. And for a half a week he shall
put an end to sacrifice and offering, and on the wings of abomination
shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured
out on the desolator. Our New Covenant reading this
morning comes from the Gospel of Matthew. Matthew chapter 24,
continuing on in Jesus' Olivet Discourse, the Eschatological
Discourse. We'll be reading verses 15 to
28. This is the word of our God. Jesus said, So when you see the
abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel standing
in the holy place, let the reader understand. Then let those who
are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let the one who is on the housetop
not go down to take what is in his house. Let the one who is
in the field not turn back to take his cloak. And alas for
women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants
in those days. Pray that your flight may not
be in winter or on the Sabbath. For then there will be great
tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the
world until now, no, and never will be. And if those days had
not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for
the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short. Then
if anyone says to you, look, here is the Christ, or there
he is, do not believe it. For false Christs and false prophets
will arise and perform great signs and wonders so as to lead
astray, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand. So if they say to you, Look,
he is in the wilderness, do not go out. If they say, Look, he
is in the inner rooms, do not believe it. For as the lightning
comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be
the coming of the Son of Man. Wherever the corpse is, there
the vultures will gather. The grass withers and the flowers
of the field, they fade and they fall. But this, the Word of our
God, it endures forever. Let's pray together. Our Heavenly
Father, we come to your Word this morning, to a portion of
Scripture that is in many ways difficult to understand and often
misunderstood. We come knowing that our own
hearts make all of Scripture difficult to understand. as our
internal corruptions and the blindness of our hearts keep
us from seeing the truth. And so, Lord, like we pray often
and like we pray eagerly, would You send forth Your Spirit among
us to give light to our dark minds and our dark hearts? Would
You open our deaf ears that we would hear from You, O Lord?
according to what you have spoken. And may you use that word in
our hearts to teach us, to grow us, to make us to love Christ
all the more and to surely walk in His ways. We ask these things
in Christ's name. Amen. As a new year is before us, in
such times we often find ourselves with many hopes, many dreams,
and expectations about what the new year ahead might hold, whether
experiences, whether progress of various kinds. The future
holds uncertainty that from our perspective as creatures, on
the one hand, can offer excitement, But at the same time, such uncertainty
can elicit fears and anxieties about what may lie ahead for
us. Jesus at the beginning of chapter
24 of Matthew's Gospel confirms his previous pronouncement that
the temple in Jerusalem and Jerusalem itself was heading for destruction. In response, Jesus' disciples
asked a question of when and what, while at the same time
assuming that the end of the temple meant the end of the world. that conflation of events Jesus
distinguished in the previous verses by making clear to the
disciples that they will face many troubles in this world. In fact, tribulation is what
marks the present age as the world remains under the curse
of sin until the day when God makes all things new. Having
set the disciples' expectations there for the course of the world
in terms of the troubles that lie ahead for Christians through
the ages, Jesus turns in our passage this morning to address
the more immediate horizon of history as it relates to the
very landscape upon which Jesus and his disciples set their gaze
during this discourse. See, amid the ordinary course
of troubles that the disciples will face, there is a particular
trouble that is on the horizon. And that is the coming judgment
upon Jerusalem. As we look at this passage this
morning, we will find that much of it is in fact concerned with
that very immediate geographical and historical event. Yet of
course, like all of Scripture, the Lord speaks to us too through
the Lord's words, as we likewise anticipate what lies ahead for
us. We'll look at this passage in
three parts this morning. First, trouble ahead. Second, don't believe the hype. And third, you'll know when Christ
comes. First, trouble ahead. Second,
don't believe the hype. And third, you'll know when Christ
comes. This passage begins with a reference
to a prophecy from the book of Daniel, some of which we read,
which is notoriously difficult to understand. Jesus here references
the abomination of desolation, which is spoken of by Daniel
in a number of places in the book of Daniel, and particularly
in chapter 9 that we read. And Jesus takes that prophecy
of Daniel and applies it to what's going to take place in Jerusalem. Now if you were a Jew in the
first century, and you were asked about the abomination of desolation
from Daniel, Someone would likely say, they would likely tell you
that that event already happened. They would likely cite the desecration
of the temple by Antiochus Epiphanes in 167 BC when he conquered Jerusalem. And he stopped the regular sacrifices
in the temple. And he set up pagan sacrifices
in their place. Including the slaughter and offering
of pigs, unclean animals, on the altar of the Lord. But here,
Jesus applies the prophecy of Daniel and the abomination or
devastating pollution, as it could be translated, to what
will take place in Jerusalem in the coming years. As many
prophetic words of scripture, we recognize that there can be
multiple vistas of fulfillment. We see that even in the prophecy
of Christ's birth by a virgin, which had a specific historical
fulfillment to an extent, but was ultimately fulfilled in Christ. Matthew's editorial comment,
let the reader understand, clues us into the fact that Daniel's
prophecy has a further fulfillment that is in what Jesus has pronounced. Now Jesus doesn't specifically
tell us what this desolation or this defilement will look
like. History, even, does not definitively
record an event in the temple, standing in the holy place, as
Jesus says, to which we can attribute this prophecy. That need not
worry us, though, because there are things that we know of this
desolation. Martin Luther helpfully instructs
us to utilize that hermeneutical principle that I mentioned last
week, letting clear texts interpret less clear texts. And so Luther,
speaking of this passage, says you should take a look at the
rest of Luke, since he speaks more clearly and plainly than
Matthew about the destruction of Jerusalem. And Luke says in
Luke 21-20, But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies,
then you know that its desolation has come near. So that even from
what Luke says, we at least know that it is something which will
be completed when the Romans conquer Jerusalem in 70 AD. We
also know that it's something that can be seen. It's something
that can be discerned. Because as the next few verses
show, there can be a response to it. And its devastation can
be avoided by fleeing the region. Yet what is clear is that this
desolation, as in the case of Daniel's prophecy, is an act
of divine judgment. which is predicated upon the
pollution that has already come to define the temple, right? The temple has already been polluted,
right? That's why Jesus renounces the
temple, right? They had rejected God's Christ
and they had made God's house into a den of robbers. So whatever
we can say about the abomination of desolation and what it is
specifically, it at least comes with some warning. It is observable
and it stands as the fulfillment of what Daniel had prophesied. Now after telling the disciples
that they will see this abomination, This is to be a warning signal
to the people living in Judea to flee. Now last week I said
that the setting for this discourse is really important for us to
recognize as we seek to understand Jesus' words. And I want us to
note how carefully Jesus ties this desolation to the specific
geographical location where he and his disciples are sitting. They're sitting on the Mount
of Olives. They're overlooking the Kidron Valley and they see
the temple. They see the buildings and they
see all of Jerusalem. It is those in Judea that will
need to flee. It is the abomination that takes
place in the holy place, in the sanctuary of God in the temple. And so I don't think we have
freedom here to generalize and disassociate those things, especially
since Jesus will say that this will come upon this generation. When the desolation comes, Jesus
says that there must be a swift and determined step taken by
anyone who would wish to survive that judgment. We should note
that this instruction to flee would make it very difficult
to understand Jesus as speaking about consummate judgment or
final judgment at this point. Because, of course, there is
no fleeing the final judgment. The final judgment is a decisive
judgment. There's nowhere to flee and there's
nowhere to escape. But for the destruction that
is coming upon the temple, and more generally Jerusalem, there
is escape. Like in the days of old when
the people were to head for the hills to flee for the caves. Certainly survival in the wilderness
is going to be difficult. But the people who flee to the
wilderness, who head for the hills, will have a better chance
of survival than any who remain in the city. Jesus says to the
one on the housetop, a housetop would have been accessed by an
exterior ladder. He says, just go. Don't go in and try to take anything. He says to the one in the field,
don't even turn back so as to get your cloak. Escape. Flee. For those for whom a swift
journey would be difficult, Pregnant women and nursing mothers, he
says, alas, woe. Jesus says, pray that your flight
may not be in winter, right? That would be when the temperatures
would be much colder. It would be the rainy season
when the torrential rains would make it difficult, if not impossible,
to travel through the mud and the rivers that would be born
of flash floods. Or on the Sabbath, when finding
provisions on your way out would be next to impossible. And for Jesus, talking with His
disciples on the mountain overlooking a city that will soon be in ruins,
Jesus is telling them that this will be terrible. This is going
to be terrible. He says in verse 21, When Jesus
speaks this way, I think it's best to see him speaking in a
heightened, hyperbolic language in order to communicate the seriousness
of what lies ahead. Have you ever given a Father's
Day card to your father that says, world's best dad? You recognize
that when you give that card on Father's Day, you didn't do
a systematic analysis of fathers. And you did not conduct interviews
with every father to see whether or not your father is indeed
the best father in the world. It's simply a hyperbolic figure
of speech intended to communicate something very important to the
audience. In your card, you're simply trying
to say, Dad, I love you, and you're wonderful, and you are
my world, right? Those Christians living in or
around Jerusalem will see a horror like they have never seen. They
will see a horror that exemplifies the gross wickedness of sinners
in this cruel and cursed world in a unique way. in a tragic
and horrific way. But in addition, we must not
miss that Jesus' heightened language is pressing a central theological
truth about this desolation. It's not just an event of history. It is specifically an act of
divine judgment for the rejection of Christ. It marks the decisive
end of an administration, the removal of an already sacrilegious
system. And so in the movement of history,
it is a pivotal moment when God brings judgment upon Jerusalem
by the hand of a pagan instrument, as he did with Babylon. So he
will do finally. with Rome. Though we must not
forget that the demise of the desecrated temple does not mean
the end of God's redemptive purposes. But rather, God's redemptive
purpose will center no longer on the temple in Jerusalem, But
it centers upon His Son, who is Himself the way to God, in
whom God's people worship in spirit and in truth. And the
temple's destruction makes that truth absolutely, undeniably
clear. A reality that will soon come
in Matthew's gospel as Christ fulfills in His flesh all the
purposes of the temple. wherein upon his death the curtain
will be torn in two, and the former things will be rendered
obsolete. As theologian Greg Beale notes,
the transferal of the kingdom's stewardship also includes the
transferal of stewardship of the new temple, centered not
in an architectural sphere anymore, but now in Jesus and all who
identify with him. By His death and resurrection,
Christ brings in a new era of redemptive history in which the
age of promise gives way to the age of fulfillment. But the beginning
of the end is not the end itself. So that though this specific
event of destruction will show forth divine judgment, it is
not consummate judgment. Now, how do we know that? How
do we know? Well, we already saw that there
would be an opportunity to flee, which in the end, there's no
opportunity to flee. The fact is further clarified
in verse 21, which is the reason or the grounds for verse 20.
Pray that your flight may not be in winter or on a Sabbath
for or because there will be great tribulation. But we also
see in verse 22 that this judgment is restrained. So that when we get there, we
find God's care in the trouble. Look at verse 22. And if those
days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect,
those days will be cut short. We see further that this judgment
is not the final eschatological judgment because as Jesus says,
the days will be cut short. That is, this judgment, though
devastating, will come to an end and there will be survivors. There will be people who come
out the other end. Now I think it would be helpful
for us to get a broad view of God's purposes in relation to
judgment and mercy in the span of history to help us here. We
recognize in our understanding of theology, in our understanding
of the cosmos, that at any moment God would be just and he would
be right to unleash the full extent of his wrath for sin.
Right? So that each and every moment
that the sin-cursed world continues to exist is a testimony to what
we call God's common grace. Where the rain falls on the just
and the unjust. Where sinners are given life
and breath for a time. After the fall of man in sin,
all of his life is lived in the context of common grace. wherein
God withholds His wrath for sin for the sake of redemption. And
once His redemptive purposes are complete, that wrath will
be unleashed on what Scripture calls the day of the Lord. There are times in history, in
the history of redemption, that we see intrusions of God's judgment. as temporary loosening of the
restraint of common grace. And this destruction is one of
those. But the Lord continues to uphold
the world. He continues to restrain sin
and withhold His final judgment, which He does for the sake of
His redemptive purposes. See, common grace cannot save. But it does provide the context
for God's special grace of salvation through Christ. So that so long
as it is called today, there is time for the gospel to go
forth and for sinners to be saved. And maybe that's you today. And in this passage, Jesus reminds
us of an important theological truth. One that would be essential
for the disciples of Jesus living in Judea during this time. A
truth is that God has his eye on the elect. Even as they come
to see, as they come to live through, or perhaps even suffer
at the hand of this destruction. Even in this intense trouble,
the Lord has regard for his own. As Jesus spoke generally of the
necessary troubles that Christ's disciples would face in verse
6, here in the specific trouble in Judea, God will not abandon
his own and will even offer unmerited reprieve in judgment for the
sake of his elect living in Judea. And that has effect for us, too,
down to this age, that God did cut those days short, that His
mercies would flow to the ends of the earth through the ages
down to you and to me, that we would have hope as those who
trust in Christ. See, there's troubles ahead. But Jesus goes on, don't believe
the hype. Verses 1 to 14 that we looked
at last week, I mentioned that Jesus is less concerned with
the precise when and what of the disciples' initial question
in verse 3, and he is far more concerned in that discourse with
the so what of how they should live once he's gone. Jesus comes
back to that very concern in verse 23. Jesus had previously
warned his disciples about the false Christ and the false prophets
more generally in verse 5 when he talked about the normal troubles
that disciples from every generation can expect. But here in verse
23, in light of the specific calamity that is coming upon
Jerusalem, Jesus warns that this will provide an opportunity for
false teachers and false prophets to capitalize on the chaos. Now that fact shouldn't surprise
us. When there are disasters, when
people feel as though things are out of control, whether it
be because of wars, whether it be because of economic factors
or natural disasters, such instability is a petri dish for conspiracy
theories and for false narratives of hope. Even in our day, with
even relatively minor instability, such conspiracy theories are
all over the place. much of which can easily be dismissed
as the ravings of a few loud voices. But when such things
enter the realm of religious life and the interpretation of
Scripture, things get very serious, very dangerous, very quickly. Jesus tells his disciples up
front in verse 23 that if anyone says, look, here is the Christ
or there he is, do not believe it. This time of turmoil, specifically
in Judea in the first century, is going to be a time when false
Christs and false prophets will arise. And the really troubling
thing is that not only will they make claims concerning Christ
with their lips, but they will also perform signs and wonders. They will have some type of evil
supernatural power at their disposal, like Pharaoh's magicians who
were in some cases able to replicate Moses' signs. Do you remember
that? There is a deceptive plausibility
to these false prophets. And they will do so in order
to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Now, of course,
elsewhere Jesus speaks of the security of the elect in the
care of God, who will not let them go. But in using this striking
language, Jesus is pointing out the real and present danger ahead
for the disciples. The deception is not targeted
at the ignorant, but it is targeted at the initiated. Those who know
better will be tempted to believe the lies. And notice the message
of their deception. They deceive people by telling
people in the midst of chaos and calamity that Christ has
come. Now if we think back to the disciples'
initial question of Jesus in verse 3, we remember that the
disciples assumed the same thing that these false prophets assume
in their false gospel. That is, that the troubles, and
in this case specifically the destruction of the temple, means
the coming of Christ. The tribulations mean the end
of the age. But of course, that kind of thinking
is the very thing Jesus is warning his disciples about. Calamity
does not mean the coming of Christ. That connection is a means of
leading people astray. There is some type of secret
knowledge about the Christ that only a few people have. And to
know it, you need to go into the wilderness. You need to join
a certain community. Those kinds of things are the
things that are defining features of cults, aren't they? Because the true gospel and the
true Christ are not hidden. They're proclaimed freely and
openly to the ends of the earth. Christians don't have secret
knowledge. They have the revelation of God
that they spread freely and openly. Of course, this warning has specific
bearing on the disciples sitting there on the mountain with Jesus.
And for those Christians who first read Matthew's gospel before
Jerusalem was destroyed. But that doesn't mean that these
words don't have any bearing upon us in the 21st century.
Because of course, even as we ourselves have observed in our
own lifetimes, chaos and calamity breeds speculations. And when
it comes to the religious sphere, such chaos gives plausibility
to the words of false prophets and false saviors and false gospels. Is it not true? that the temptation
to doubt God's Word comes most often in the context of hardship
and disappointment. When things get really tough
and the pressure is really on, aren't we a little more willing
to hear other voices? Did God really say, Did Christ
really say that He's going to prepare a place for you? Did
He really say that He's coming back for you? Are you sure He
told you all that you need to know? Are you sure there isn't
more that you need? Or if He really loved you, wouldn't
He not make you go through these troubling times? Wouldn't He
just relieve your distress? Come to the wilderness and see
for yourself, the false teachers say. Let's not forget that in
the gospel already, the wilderness is a metaphor for the realm of
chaos and the realm of Satan, for the arena of temptation.
And so essentially what they're saying is come out into the wilderness
and be tempted. Be tempted to walk away from
the Lord, be tempted by falsehood. If not in the wilderness, maybe
he's in a secret chamber. Perhaps there's some secret knowledge
that you need to know beyond the scriptures. Just a little
bit more. Just a little addition that will
make things clear and give you greater peace. See, when the
chaos tempts the people of God to doubt and look elsewhere,
Jesus says clearly and plainly, do not believe it. For as Jesus said in verse 13,
the one who endures will be saved. We don't need to be tossed around
by the troubles of this world as if chaos means that Christ's
word and plans have failed. As if we need to look for the
blueprints of a plan B because plan A just didn't seem to work
out. See, the Christian life is not
a scavenger hunt. Everything is right before us.
We have only to listen and to believe. Even amid the greatest
horrors that this world would face, just as Judea faced in
70 A.D., the mission and the plan of God and Christ is unchanging. Remember verse 14, this gospel
of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as
a testimony to all nations and then the end will come. You see
here Jesus comes back around to those earlier foundational
verses at the beginning of the chapter to assure the disciples
and to assure those early Christians that they need not give in to
the doubts and the chaos because the end is not yet. And though what we face is not
exactly what they faced, the danger and the warning still
speak to us right now. Don't believe the hype. You'll know when Christ comes.
Knowing how things end, well, not knowing exactly how we get
there still provides God's people with immense comfort and assurance. And that's where Jesus takes
his disciples in these final verses. As during the time of
calamity that will come upon Jerusalem, there would be those
who would be determined to predict the coming of Christ or even
to say that he's already come. But Jesus tells them not to believe
it and goes on in verses 27 and 28 to tell them why they must
not believe it. Jesus makes an essential distinction
between the true appearance of Christ at the end of the age
and the false Christs and the prophets who show up during the
chaos. Look there at verse 27. For as
the lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the
west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. The first thing we must note
here again is the clear separation Jesus makes between the two things
that the disciples in their question and the false prophets that will
arise have conflated. In their minds they thought there
was an immediate chronological relationship between the destruction
of the temple and the coming of Christ, but that's not the
case. The temple being destroyed is not a sign of the end. It
is part of the troubles of the world. It's not time for speculation
and time for doubt. But rather, when the end comes
and Christ returns in glory, it can't be missed. And it's
not because you have some sort of special knowledge or insight. that you won't miss it. It's
not because you've calculated the day and the time that you
won't miss it. You're not going to miss it because
no one is going to be able to miss it. As R.T. France puts it, the coming of
the Son of Man will be as unmissable as a flash of lightning which
blazes across the whole sky. With this, Jesus is setting the
parousia and the end of the age decisively apart from the coming
destruction of the temple. Unlike the messianic pretenders
with their offer of signs, the Son of Man will give no warning
sign of his coming. But when he comes, no one can
escape the sudden illumination. As lightning comes from the east
and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the
Son of Man. And that's the reason why you
don't need to believe the hype. Jesus employs another image to
reiterate the same thing, to reiterate the perspicuity of
His coming. He says in verse 28, wherever
the corpse is, there the vultures will gather. Now this image is
slightly more difficult to interpret than that of the lightning. There
have been a number of interpretations that refer this back to the siege
of Jerusalem or a coming siege, some of which allegorize the
corpse as being Jerusalem and the eagles as being the Roman
army, that eagles could be translated vultures. Yet the fact that Jesus
relates this proverbial saying after speaking of his coming,
and the fact that Luke in Luke 17, 37 explicitly refers to this
as Christ's coming, there's no need to press the image beyond
the simple meaning that when you see the vulture circling,
you know without a shadow of a doubt that a corpse lies below. Though ominous in its force,
the point is the same as it was in verse 27. As another scholar
says, no one will have to tell you when the Lord returns. Do
not be deceived. Do not believe the hearsay of
rumor mongers and go out and find him. You will know. Everyone
will know. You see, the world does not need
claims and signs and proofs that Christ is coming. What the world
needs is the gospel of Christ that on the day of His appearing
they would rejoice and be glad and not cower in fear in face
of judgment. That the world and we with them
would on that day Welcome our Savior and King, shouting, Hosanna
to the Son of God, the Son of David. Blessed is he who comes
in the name of the Lord. And if we miss that point from
what Jesus is saying here, we've gone in the wrong direction. The point is to keep Christ ever
central amid all the troubles that this world may bring. It
is Christ who stands supreme and His gospel that must go to
the ends of the earth. Let's pray together. Our Lord, we rejoice that You
have been so kind to us. to give to us Your very Word,
to record for us the words of our dear Lord, and to instruct
us in the way of truth and in the way of godliness. Lord, we
ask that You would bless us with these words that we have heard,
that You would strengthen us, that You would establish us,
that You would grow us by Your mercy and Your grace. We pray
these things in Christ's name. Amen.
That Man is Blest - Matthew 24:15-24
Series Matthew
| Sermon ID | 162501313594 |
| Duration | 45:49 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | Matthew 24:15-24 |
| Language | English |
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