We come now to the preaching of the word. So if you have your Bibles, I invite you to open them and turn with me to Genesis 49. Genesis 49. Now, if you have been with us for a while, you know that we're preaching through the book of Genesis. And our pattern is to do what's known as Lectio Continua preaching. That is to preach through the Bible verse by verse, chapter by chapter to preach, and then to move through exegeting or explaining each passage. But every once in a while, there's an issue in the text that we pause for a moment and consider not only the text, but the theme and how it is developed through scripture. This is gonna be one of those sorts of sermons. I like what John MacArthur says about occasional or textual sermons, that you should do it once a year, repent of it, and then go back to doing expository regular preaching. So I'm gonna get mine out of the way this year. As we consider the latter days from Genesis chapter 49 from the first verse, give your attention now to the reading of God's holy and errant and life-giving word from verse one of chapter 49 of Genesis. Then Jacob called his sons and said, gather yourselves together that I may tell you what shall happen to you in the latter days. Amen. The grass withers and the flower falls, but the word of our God abides forever to the praise of his glorious name. Let us pray. Our Father, we rejoice that you have revealed to us in scripture everything we need for life and godliness. And we pray that as we think about the end times, that you would bless us with greater knowledge and wisdom, and that it would increase our faith in Jesus Christ. We pray in his name, amen. On October 7th of last year, the terrorist group Hamas perpetrated almost unspeakable acts of atrocities in Southern Israel. This rightly prompted a moral outrage and outcry throughout the entire world. It seemed as though as divided as we are in America and in the West, we could all agree that those acts of violence were senseless and completely inappropriate. It seemed that in our culture, only those who were students or perhaps former presidents of Harvard had a lack of moral clarity on this moment. We all agreed that this was wrong. Now, as soon as I saw those events and then the unfolding conflict that still to one degree or another is going on to this day, I anticipated and inevitably saw many of my fellow Christians begin to ask a question. Well, since there is violence and warfare going on in Israel and the Middle East, does this mean that we are close to the end times? Does this mean, because we're seeing instability in the Middle East, that we are close to the last days? There are many Christians, and I was raised in this way myself, who think that whenever you see violence in the Middle East, that could be like a two-minute warning, letting us know that the end is close at hand. And that raises a question for us. What does the Bible say about the last times? What does it say about the last day or the last hour to use some of the different metaphors that are described in scripture? And as we begin thinking about that, that's actually something that the first time that phrase is used in the Bible is here in Genesis chapter 49 verse one. And so, As we've preached through Genesis 49, I want today for us to consider what this text begins to teach us and how the Bible and the Old Testament unfolds this concept of the latter days. Now, there's a great resource on this that I would direct your attention to. Greg Beal, who's a New Testament scholar, has a number of wonderful lectures that are for free on the internet. I'll send that out in our email this week. But he begins those lectures by saying, that I can boldly tell you when the end times will begin, when the Messiah is coming, and when the end of the world will begin to occur. And I agree with him. We can, from Scripture, very clearly say those things. Now, no, I'm not going to tell you when Jesus is going to come back in this sermon. Church history is full of those who have made those predictions, and they have all been wrong. But I do believe when we think about the latter days, there are things that are very clearly revealed to us in Scripture, and as we conform our thoughts to those, it will bring us encouragement, consolation, and conviction to live the Christian life in devout faith. So this being said, as we look at the latter days from Genesis 49 and the rest of the scriptures, there are three questions I want us to ask. First, what are the latter days? What does the Bible mean when it uses that phrase? Second, when are the latter days? When do the latter days start? How close are we to the beginning of the latter days? And then finally, Why do the latter days matter? Why does you knowing something about the latter days from scripture change the way you think, the way you worship, and the way you live your life? So as we begin talking about the latter days, I've told you that the first time that phrase occurs is in this verse that we have before us, but you might be sitting there thinking, well, pastor, I'm reading from the same version you are, the English Standard Version, and I simply don't see that. Look with me at verse one. Then Jacob called his sons and said, gather yourselves together that I may tell you what shall happen to you in the days to come. That's how the English Standard Version renders this text. Well, where's the phrase the latter days? It's actually in the text very clearly in Hebrew. It's just the English Standard Version doesn't render it literally. If you render it literally, it says, gather yourselves together that I may tell you what shall happen to you in the latter days. This is the first time in scripture that Hebrew phrase, the latter days occurs. And through the rest of the first five books of the Bible, the Pentateuch and the prophets, this becomes something of a technical phrase to describe a future time. As you look in the scripture, what are some of the things that it tells us about the latter days? I'd note that there's some room on the back of your bulletin for taking notes. I'm gonna give you some references, and if you want, you can go and look at those later. When you look at the phrase, the latter days, as it appears here in Genesis 49.1 and through the rest of the Old Testament, there are some themes that it's almost always connected with. First, it's almost always connected with prophecy. When the Bible speaks about the latter days in the Old Testament, it's almost always looking forward to a time from the perspective of the Old Testament that is coming in the future. This is what we see going on in Genesis 49, where Jacob blesses his sons, but in blessing them, he foretells what's going to happen to them hundreds of years later when they come out of slavery in Egypt and go into the promised land. This is true if you look at other occasions like Numbers chapter 24, verse 14, where Balaam finally succumbs to the hand of God and instead of cursing Israel, he blesses them on God's behalf and he describes what will happen to Israel in the latter days in Numbers 24, 14. So the phrase the latter days in the Old Testament is a prophetic term speaking about something that is coming in the future. Second, when you see the phrase the latter days used in the Old Testament, it's almost always connected with the work of Jesus as the Messiah and his sending of the Holy Spirit. You can see that in our own text in Genesis 49. Remember last week from our sermon, we talked about verses eight and following where Jacob blesses and prophesies, Judah, your brother shall praise you, your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies, your father's son shall bow down before you. And how in this text, the theme of Judah being a lion and then also Shiloh predict the Lord Jesus. Judah is a lion's cub. From the prey, my son, you have gone up. He stooped down, he crouched as a lion, and as a lioness, who dares rouse him? The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet until Shiloh comes, and to him shall be the obedience of the people. Oftentimes, when the Old Testament talks about the latter days, it connects it to prophecies about the future that deal with Jesus Christ and his work, or his sending of the Spirit to continue his work as the Messiah. Third, in the Old Testament, when the latter days are described, these are periods where the Gentiles will be brought in. It's not just a blessing upon the people of Israel, but as we've seen anticipated from Genesis 12, the latter days are when Christ will bless the whole world. In Isaiah 2-2 we read, it shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be lifted up above the hills, and all the nations shall flow to it. all the goyim, all the people, all of those people who are not physically descended from Israel will be drawn unto the house of the Lord and will worship God as the text goes on to describe. So the latter days are times of prophecy from the Old Testament concerning Christ in an era where the Messiah will draw people to himself from all over the world. It's also a time when blessing comes upon Israel. In Hosea chapter 3 verse 4 and 5, Hosea writes, and they shall come in fear to the Lord to his goodness in the latter days." So the latter days is not just a time when the Messiah will come and bring blessings to the world, but he will also draw people from Israel to himself. The exile, the time being sent off into Babylon, will be brought into conclusion and God will work in their midst. And finally, when you see the phrase, the latter days used in the Old Testament, it's connected to the kingdom of God and the beginning of the resurrection. In Daniel chapter two, verse 28, you see Daniel beginning to describe for King Nebuchadnezzar the vision that he's seen of this statue with a head of gold and all the different parts to this statue. And finally, a rock falling from the sky and breaking the feet of this statue. And Daniel explains that it's the flow of world history leading up to the coming of the Messiah. And he says, oh King, the Lord has revealed to you what shall come to pass in the latter days. And so that rock coming from heaven, not hewn by human hand, that breaks the kingdoms of this world and fills the whole world is, as Jesus tells us, the kingdom of God that began its great work with the inauguration of Jesus's work as our Messiah. And as Daniel goes through all the predictions of the Messiah and him being cut off, It concludes in Daniel chapter 12, verse 2, speaking about when will all these things occur? It will begin at the time of the resurrection. And so as we look at the Old Testament to summarize this phrase, the latter days, gather yourselves together that I may tell you what shall happen to you in the latter days. is a phrase of prophecy used from the Old Testament to describe the Messiah who will come and bring his spirit, who will bring redemption in Israel and among all the nations, who will inaugurate the kingdom of God and bring in the age of the resurrection. So if that's what the Old Testament tells us with this phrase, the latter days, the question then is, when are the latter days? Are we close to the latter days? Should we be looking for some event that will inaugurate the latter days or the last times? Well, it turns out as we look at the Old Testament, our Lord and the apostles carry forward this phrase, the latter days, and they use this term as well. Jesus and the apostles all throughout the New Testament. And here is the striking thing. As you look at the New Testament, they clearly tell us when the latter days are. that you and I are in the latter days right now. It's not something that we have to look forward to, it is something that we are in, in the church age. You see this in a number of places. When Peter is speaking to the believers who are exiled throughout that region of Asia Minor in 1 Peter 1, 20 to 21, he says this, speaking of Jesus. He, Jesus, was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but was made manifest in the last times. for the sake of you, who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God." There, Peter says to believers who are alive in his day, Jesus Christ was manifested in the Greek version of these latter days. And it's particularly in connection with his life, his death, and his resurrection that in the last days Christ is working salvation for those of us who believe in him and the glory he received at his resurrection is the way that Christ blesses us. So as Peter is concerned, you and I are living in the latter days. He makes this even more clear in Acts chapter two when he's preaching on the day of Pentecost. You might remember from that time, the Holy Spirit was poured out on the church and then this thing happened that had not been seen to that point. You had all of these people for the festival of Pentecost gathered together from all over the Roman world, Jews who spoke all of these different languages. And when the Spirit was poured out, they could all hear the message of the gospel in their native tongues. And all of them were saying, well, wait a minute, I speak Latin and you speak Parthian, but how are you both, how am I hearing it in Latin? How are you hearing it in Parthian? This doesn't make sense. Well, Peter does what any good preacher would do. He seizes the moment to preach. And as he begins preaching, he says, no, this is not a random event. This is according to what God foretold would happen in the latter days. And he quotes Joel chapter two. He says, Joel says, and in the last days, it shall be God declares that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy and your young men shall see visions and your old men shall see dreams. So Peter says, God foretold this was going to happen. That in the last days, he would pour out his spirit and there would be visions and speaking in tongues and things of that nature. Now the interesting thing about Acts 2 is that when Peter quotes Joel, he says, Joel says, in the last days, this would happen. The interesting thing is if you go back to Joel chapter two, Joel does not say, in the last days. He says, and after these things, and then gives what Peter quotes. So Peter is authoritatively interpreting Joel, saying what Joel was talking about was the last days, and that's us right now living in the age of the spirit after the resurrection of Christ. And so we are in the last days. John makes this very clear in 1 John 2, verse 18, where he says very clearly, little children, we are in the last hour. And so if you look at the words of Jesus or Peter or Paul, you can see very clearly we are living in the last days that began with the resurrection of Jesus. And so when do the latter days begin? When Christ was raised and when he was ascended up into heaven, he sent his spirit to signify that we are in the latter days. You have been in the latter days. If they were in faith, your parents and grandparents, all those of us who have been in the church, have been part of the latter days. Now, one final question that we have is what are the latter days? It's the era of the Messiah. When are the latter days? They were inaugurated with the resurrection of Christ and blessed with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. But why do the latter days matter? Verse one, then Jacob called his sons and said, gather yourselves together that I may tell you what shall happen to you in the latter days. Jacob could have under the inspiration of the spirit just simply said, I'll tell you what will happen at some point in the future. Why did God, at this point, begin from the very book of Genesis to start getting his people thinking about the latter days? And why did the apostles emphasize that we need to know that we are in the latter days before Jesus comes? First, it's an encouragement to us to know that history is going somewhere. As we look at everything around us, sometimes it can be hard to see intention and purpose. We wonder why things happen the way they do. But the glorious message of the fact that God tells us there are the former and then the latter days shows us that history has a point that it's going to, that history has a purpose, that God is the architect of everything we see and everything we see has purpose. When I was in school, we would oftentimes have teachers who would be gone for sickness or pregnancy or a family issue or something. And so we would have a substitute teacher. And there was one period of my middle and high school time where we had two different substitute teachers that they used regularly. There was one that I really enjoyed having as a substitute. Then there was another that I was not as happy to see. Why is that? Well, the substitute that I really enjoyed having, he was a very cool guy who was just out of college, and whenever he was our substitute, he would let us watch movies. It was great. He knew that there was no way he could drop in and fill in for the teacher, so we might as well enjoy it. I remember quite vividly he filled in for a science teacher one time and he said, well, we're going to watch something that's very science oriented. We're going to watch the X-Files and then we're going to talk about it afterwards. There was another substitute, and she was a woman who was more kind of of the old school mindset that children in school needed to be busy every moment of the day. And so when she came in, we had a whole day's worth of busy work. She wanted us busy the whole time, but when she left, none of our work was graded. It wasn't connected to what we were learning the week before. It wasn't gonna be on the test. It was just a full day worth of stuff but it never really had any meaning and it didn't do anything. There are entire cultures who look at the flow of history in that way, that it is cosmic busy work. From the ancient Greeks to the Hindus, they think life is just this kind of cycle that goes on and one thing follows another, but it never really has a beginning and it never really has an end. But in the Christian faith, we believe history is going somewhere and that Jesus, by supernatural powers, is guiding and preserving and directing all of his creatures and all of their actions towards a point at which he will bring the latter days to a conclusion with his coming to judge all men, bring salvation to his people, and judgment to those who do not follow him. God is in control of everything. No matter how out of control the world might be, it's not actually out of his control. And that's true on a cosmic scale, but that also means it's true on a small scale. Your life and my life is not out of control. Your life and my life is under the superintention of God and is part of the overarching plan to bring all things to a consummation in Christ, so that for us there is not a wasted day, a wasted time, a wasted task, all of our life in front of us. is prepared by God so that there is no busy work. There is only the kingdom work that we have to do that will be a beautiful tapestry at the end of the world that we'll be able to see how all things led to Christ. Second, I think we need to understand that we are in the latter days because the latter days is a time of spiritual danger. This is what Jude reminds believers in his day and is as applicable to us as it was to them. Jude writes in verses 17 to 19, But you must remember, beloved, the predictions of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. They said to you, in the last times there will be scoffers following their own ungodly passions. It is those who cause division, worldly people devoid of the Spirit." Did you catch what Jude said? The apostles predicted that there will be these men who are scoffers following their own ungodly passions. And then Jude says, It is those that the apostles predicted who will cause divisions within the church. The fact that we're living in the latter days is a glorious time because we're living in the age of the Messiah and the Spirit has been poured out, but it also means that there is spiritual warfare and that we must be cautious and on our guard and vigilant to stay close to the Lord Jesus because we live in an era where the devil would like nothing more than to distract and to tempt and to attempt to destroy God's church and God's people. As we think about the beginning of the new year, there are many Christians, myself included, who try to read through the Bible once a year. There's nothing particularly holy about that, but that is a very good practice. But I would say that as we begin the new year, if you don't try to read through the Bible in one 365-day period, it is good at least to dedicate yourself to daily being in the scripture not just as individuals but particularly if you're married and you have children to be in the scriptures together as a family doing family worship because we live in an era where there is much spiritual temptation and it is being close to the Lord Jesus and letting his word be in us as individuals as families and attending to the preaching of the word Lord's Day morning and evening that will help us stay on guard and alert in this time of spiritual chaos. And finally, I think knowing that we're living in the latter days should encourage us in our work in evangelism. I've run into Christians over the years who've been very discouraged because they've tried to share the faith with their children or their brother or their mother or some friend, and they just say, you know, I share the faith from time to time, but I never see anybody except the Lord Jesus. I don't think I'm very gifted at evangelism. That really should be left for someone else. They kind of look at their life as though, you know, evangelism is just not something for me. That's not going to be something I'm terribly good at. And I think particularly there's an attitude in the church today that can say, because of all the confusion and the chaos in our post-Christian world, that we should not be surprised if there are not effective evangelism going on in our day. I think those of us who are Clemson fans can understand something about this attitude. As we look back on 2023, I and other Clemson fans in conversation have said, well, you know, this just wasn't our year. And in a lot of ways, it wasn't. Though I can remember years when winning eight games and barely winning the Gator Bowl would be the cause for greatest celebration ever. But sometimes in football or other sports, you just look back and go, well, you know, this just wasn't our season. And I think there are many in the church who look at our time in America with all the chaos and confusion and say, well, This just isn't the time for the church. I would respectfully disagree because we are living in the latter days. This is the age of the Messiah. This is the age where Christ has come and has given us the great commission and has poured out his spirit so that we have spiritual power to accomplish all that Christ has purposed for us from before the ages. We should be encouraged in our evangelism because this is the time when the nations are being brought in and when the Church has for 2,000 years and will continue until Christ comes, go from victory to victory and strength to strength. Yes, there are causes for discouragement. Yes, there are challenges, but that's true in every century of Church history and every age of the world. But the glorious thing about living in the latter days is that the gospel is going forward. We see wonderful things happening in Asia and Africa, and we see wonderful things happening in America, even with all the moral chaos that we see. And so don't give up, don't be discouraged, don't let the newspaper or the TV channel or wherever you get your news discourage you. Rather think, this is the latter days, and Christ is accomplishing his work. And that's what I'd say to any of you here who are gathered today and you haven't repented of your sins and you haven't come to the Lord Jesus Christ, these are the latter days. And we do not know for how long we will have them. It could be that Christ will return by the end of this worship service. It could be a thousand years from now, we don't know. But all that you know is that today is the day of salvation and Jesus Christ offers to all those of you this morning who are here who don't know him, the free offer of the gospel, that if you'll repent of your sins and accept him savingly, he will save you from your sins. And I would implore you as a minister of the gospel to receive Christ as he's freely offered. For those of us who do know the Lord Jesus Christ, let us rejoice that we are living in the latter days. Let's not let good events or terrible events throw us off into speculation, but let us firmly know that we are in the latter days and what we have to look forward is Jesus Christ coming for his people to set all things to right and until he comes, Let us be about the work of prayer, let us be about the work of godliness, let us be about the work of evangelism, and rejoice that we have the great privilege of seeing what Christ is doing in the latter days. Let us pray. Our Father in heaven, we rejoice for everything that you reveal to us in scripture, particularly the truth about the latter days that we live in. We pray now, Lord our God, your blessings upon us, that we would live in this time accomplishing all for us that you have planned and seeing the glory of Christ come in. We pray in his name, amen.