If you'd be so kind this morning as to turn your Bibles again to the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 24, as we continue to talk about future things. What the Bible has to say about the second coming of Jesus Christ, it is clear today in much of our preaching that we don't talk about the second coming of Christ and all of the myriad of information that the Bible gives us on the second coming of Christ, what will be the conditions of society when he returns, or even the evidence of his return. What amazes me in the Gospel of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, who record the second coming of Christ here, is the amount of information given. It is concise. It is clear. It is straightforward. Even in Matthew chapter 24 and verses 29 to 31, we see three verses pertaining to the second coming of Jesus Christ. Mark has four, Luke has four. Such a monumental coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, and yet it is contained in three magnificent verses in Matthew chapter 24. The title of my second installment of this sermon is The Glory of His Coming. the glory of His coming beginning in Matthew chapter 24 and verse 29. And the Bible reads, immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light. The stars will fall from heaven and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven. and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory honor, esteem and he will send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet and they will gather together his chosen his elect from the four winds from one end of the heaven to the other Jesus goes on to say Now learn this parable from the fig tree. When its branches have already become tender, full of sap, and it puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. So, you also, when you see all these things, know that it is near at the door Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will by no means pass away." Again, Jesus clearly gives us his details or his answer to a question posed to him by the apostles, or let's just say the disciples. If you look back again at Matthew 24, verse 3, Jesus is in a private setting with his disciples. They were expecting Jesus to bring into the kingdom, the kingdom of heaven in Nala, or to restore Israel to its glory and the promises of God. Little did they know that he would have to pay the price for sin first. And so, as he leaves the temple, And he has his disciples sitting with him in this private setting. They ask him two questions or three questions according to what theologians say. Verse three, now as he sat on the Mount of Olives, verse three, the disciples came to him privately saying, tell us, When will these things be? What things? Well, if you look back at verse 2, the Bible tells us that Jesus said to him, Do you not see all these things? Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left upon another that shall not be thrown down. Jesus is talking about the temple. Corrupt Judaism had rejected the Lord Jesus Christ, and we see that played out in Matthew chapter 23. Judaism had been corrupted by men. It had become a corrupt religion. And so, therefore, Jesus, weeping in verse 37 of Matthew 23, leaves the temple. He and his disciples, according to the other accounts of this passage, say that he was sitting on the Mount of Olives. And the Savior, the God-man himself, is rejected by religion. And so, therefore, they asked him two questions. When are you coming back? When will these things happen? The prediction of what we saw in verse two, the destruction of the temple, which happened in 70 A.D. And then, again, the second question, again, in verse three, what will be the sign or the evidence of your coming and the end of the age? And Jesus goes on to then give them a concise, straightforward answer to that question. He said there will be worldwide deception, this was religious deception, worldwide conflicts, disputes constantly. There will be worldwide disasters, calamities, worldwide disdain or contempt for Christ and His Word. There will be global defection from the apostasy, from the true Word of God. There will be global, worldwide a more immoral immoral depravity in the world and literally in spite of all of the Depravity and sin that is happening in the world today And as we can sin increases and wicked it works wicked and wickedness works its way out There will still be a worldwide declaration of the gospel Jesus said the signs of the evidence of his second coming will be those things worldwide deception disputes disasters disdain defections depravity and The declaration of the gospel the gospel continues to spread around the world And so he answers that question and he goes on to tell him in verse 15 that the Antichrist is coming he calls him the abomination of desolation in verse 15 And then he goes on to tell them, when they see this happen in the middle of the tribulation, to flee for their lives, their very lives. Now, in Matthew chapter 24, when Jesus gives this answer to this question, we have to remember, he is not talking about the church. He is dealing with Israel. God has made many promises in the Old Testament and we need to understand that many of the promises made to Israel do not apply to the church, does not apply to us, the Gentiles, the church, which is also inclusive of some Jews. He was talking specifically to the Jewish nation. In Matthew chapter 24 you see a tinge of the character of this passage because it is dealing with Jewish terms. So again we see that he is dealing with the nation of Israel, the Jews, not the church. Now, This, Jesus says, if you look at Matthew chapter 24 again, and look at verse 21, Jesus tells his disciples, there will be great tribulation, the adjective describes great trials, tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world, until this time, nor, nor ever shall be. And verse 22 says, unless those days are shortened, no flesh or humanity will be saved. But for the Chosen's sake, those days will be shortened." Now, if you are here during this, what Jesus calls the worst time the world has ever seen, and this is what we have coming towards us, the worst time the world has ever seen. Even John the Baptist, when he was approached by the religious leaders of that corrupt, Judaistic system, And remember Christianity will be corrupt and is being corrupted even today. It's being corrupted by false teachers, false doctrines. Even Paul, the Apostle Paul says that in the latter days the Holy Spirit clearly and distinctly warned us that there will be people who give heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons. Paul goes on in 2nd Timothy chapter 4, and he says that men will become extremely selfish. Women will become extremely selfish. He said it would be the most stressful time, Paul says, in 2nd Timothy chapter 4. It all works our way as to what is going to happen. And corrupt Judaism, he has dealt with that. But if you are here during this worst time the world has ever seen, it means that you have missed the rapture. Jesus is going to come back at a time none of us know nor expect. Literally, Paul says, in Thessalonians, they will say, peace and safety. Everybody will be lulled to sleep. There will be an atmosphere of indifference, carelessness. There will be laziness in our society toward the Word of God. And therefore Christ will come back as a thief in the night unexpectedly, finding us not doing what the Lord commands. Even in Matthew chapter 24 we see many terms of Master and Lord that not only apply to believers, but unbelievers. See the Bible clearly says, and it doesn't matter whether one accepts Jesus Christ or not, he's still Lord. Revelation chapter 19 says he is king of kings and Lord of lords even Philippians says Philippians 2 says that every knee will bow and every tongue will confess so it doesn't matter whether one rejects the Lord Jesus Christ here in this life you will bow You will bow today humbly, admitting that you are a sinner before God, that you owe him a price you cannot pay, and that he came to this earth to die on Calvary's cross so that you and I could have eternal life through faith in him. For by grace are we saved through faith, not of ourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, so no one will brag." Paul goes on to say, we are God's workmanship. And you can bow your knee now humbly and admit that you are a sinner before a holy God and call upon Jesus and be saved because the Bible says everyone that calls upon him shall be saved. Genuinely call upon the one whom they can't see, they will be saved. Even the communion reminds us of his crushed body and his shed blood. Christ died for a reason. He died to save us from the coming wrath. He died to save us from this time. and you can bow now or you will bow later but you will bow and references here in Matthew show us that he is the Lord of the obedient slave and the disobedient he is Lord of the saved and he's Lord of the sinner you will give an account I will give an account to the Lord To those who come by Jesus Christ in faith in Christ alone, not by works of righteousness, which you have done, but by God's mercy, you are saved. If you come believing and calling upon the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation, God will erase every debt that you owe against him. Your sins will be forgiven. How, Rod? Because 2 Corinthians 5, 21 says, he who knew no sin became sin for us. He died on the cross for every one of my sins. And the Bible tells us in Romans 8 that He forever lives as my defense attorney. Lisa, I don't have to worry about it. I may have sinned today, but I have a defense attorney who has put His blood upon me. I am not saved by my works, nor am I damned by my works. I am saved by His works. He became sin for me that I might become the righteousness of Him. He has taken my sin, my coat of sin, or my garment and filthy, dirty garments off of me, put them upon Himself, went to the cross of Calvary, and His Father crushed Him for you and I." Again, reminiscence of the communion. Crushed Him. And then at the same time that He took my filthy garment off, He put his garment of righteousness upon me. And it is though I live the life of Christ. I know I didn't live the life of Christ. I'm the chiefest of sinners. There's no worse sinner on the planet than me. I Christ Paul, I'm the chiefest of sinners. But it makes me more dependent upon the Lord Jesus Christ. I see now that I can't keep the law perfectly, so I call out to my Lord. And I am trusting Him. And He says He is coming back. And He is coming back gloriously. He's not coming back hiding in some cave. He's not going to be in a Holiday Inn in some conference room. He is coming out of the sky like lightning from the east to the west. And it flashes across the sky. And He tells us all of these magnificent truths right here in three verses. And you will give an account. You will pay now or pay later. But you will bow. And if you're here, it means you have missed the rapture. God is dealing with the church. He is dealing with the Gentiles. That's you and I. But He made explicit promises in the Old Testament that have not been fulfilled. And He will fulfill them during this period. He had promised that he would reign over Israel and Jesus never, if you studied your Bible, ever reigned. He came and they rejected Him. He came unto His own and His own would not receive Him. And we're doing the same thing today. We're rejecting Jesus now as they rejected Jesus then. We embraced the Gentile nations, embraced the church, embraced the gospel at one time 2,000 years ago. But now we are rejecting it. We are defecting from the truth. We are ashamed of our relationship with Jesus Christ. We are ashamed of the gospel. We are ashamed to proclaim that we belong to the Son of God. That we are the children of God. Because we're ashamed of the gospel. The Bible predicted an apostasy. And then again, the thirdly, if you are here, you missed the rapture. And the rapture, according to most theologians, including myself, could happen at any moment. Any moment when Christ will come, he will come in the air, according to 1 Thessalonians 4, and he will shout with the voice of an archangel and the trump of God, and the dead in Christ rise first. And every one of us whose heart belongs to the Lord Jesus Christ and who has total faith in Christ, we're going to And this will be the signal that starts the final seven years of the seven years that the Bible talks about of tribulation, the worst time the world has ever seen. Daniel speaks clearly of this time. We see it in the book of Revelation. Paul speaks of it. It is evident that it is going to happen. The Bible says the world is going to get worse. We see it getting worse. It's getting worse and worse and worse and one of the indications of the abandonment of God's truth is the direct consequence or the antithesis of it is immorality. We have the most ungodly generation of people the world has ever seen. That is a sign that we are not getting better, we are going exactly where Christ said we were going. homosexuals getting married, promiscuity all over the place, thievery and covetousness rampant, no thought for God, all of that declared right in this passage of Scripture. It's all here. This literally, Matthew 24, is a call to discernment. It is literally a call to believers and unbelievers to wake up Pay attention, literally in the three accounts of the Synoptic Gospels, in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, literally we're told to watch, watch, watch, watch, watch. Commands, not options, commands. We're told to watch. Watch for what? Watch for the signs of the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a wake-up call to believers and unbelievers, because when the Lord comes, there are two things He's going to do. He's going to save the saints and he's going to sentence the sinners. He's going to separate the saints from the sinners. Literally in this account given to us by Matthew, when he comes at the end of the seven years, he's going to eradicate every unbeliever. Do not confuse the rapture with the second coming of Christ. The rapture, this is the difference. Listen clearly. The rapture, number one, can happen at any moment, right now while I am preaching. And believe me, the Bible says God knows our hearts. We may profess that He knows we know Him, but our works deny Him. And He says the Lord knows those who are His and let everyone who claims Him depart from wickedness. See, He knows who is His, but in the rapture He comes and He takes His saints from among the sinners. At the end of the seven years of tribulation, he takes the sinners from among the saints. Before these seven years, he comes into the air, according to what Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 4, he shouts, believers who are dead go first, believers who are alive go right behind them. He takes the saints from among sinners. And if you're here today and you're rejecting Jesus Christ and you don't feel like Christ could be your Lord, then guess what? If you rapture the church, you're here. Because no sinner will go to heaven. He raptures his saints, he leaves his sinners in the rapture. At the second coming, he leaves his saints and eradicates the sinners. See, when the second coming, Jesus will deliver the believer and destroy the unbeliever. And so it has a Jewish tinge. We're talking about the second coming. You and I who believe in Jesus Christ, Lisa, we'll be in heaven. We'll be enjoying rest, eternal rest, with the Lord Jesus Christ. We'll be in His presence. During this seven years of tribulation, many theologians believe this is the great banquet that the Bible talks about. That Christ will be celebrating with His bride, the church. And in the seven worst years the world has ever seen. And then Christ comes back to the earth. And this is what we see here. There are four things I want to present to you in this passage of scripture. Number one, the Lord's arrival described, the Lord's analogy declared, and the prevailing attitude disclosed, and then finally we'll see the person's actions decided. Number one, look at the Lord's arrival described in verse 29. The Bible says, immediately after the tribulation. Here is immediately after the worst time the world, Jesus says, has ever seen. Don't let this go over your head. Listen to what Jesus says. He is either a liar or he is Lord. Jesus says it is the worst time the world has ever seen He is calling for you and I to be sober be alert be vigilant He is telling us to watch to not be asleep to wake up from our stupor To wake up from our indifference to wake up our carelessness towards his truth He is coming back It will be a personal return. It will be a powerful return. It will be a visible return. It will be a universal return. Every eye will see him, the Bible declares, but he is coming back. What is he coming back for? To establish his kingdom. to fulfill the many promises in the Old Testament, to sit upon the throne of David just as he promised. He is the king of Israel. He is the one who had been prophesied by Moses and the Old Testament saying he has never sat and ruled Israel, but he will. He's coming back. And it really doesn't matter whether you believe that or not. It doesn't really matter whether we believe it. If God says it, that settles it. It doesn't really matter. See, it's not God said it, I believe it, that settles it. It's that God said it, that settles it. There's no in-between. God said it, that settles it. So, you know, it really doesn't matter what we believe. And our hearts can be so hard that we can just harden our hearts against God's truth, but it doesn't matter. His truth will be executed. Jesus Christ is coming back. He's going to deal with sinners. He's going to deal with sinners. immediately after the worst time the world has ever seen. We see the time. Notice, I like to call it the Creator's announcement. He doesn't come secretly. He doesn't come hiding. He doesn't sneak up. The Bible says something happens before he returns. Look again at verse 29. Immediately after this trying time, the worst time the world has ever seen, the rise of the Antichrist and the false prophet, all are included in this. That's revealed to us in Revelation chapter 13, the most wicked man that has ever lived and the most wicked religious leader that has ever lived will be cohorts in deceiving the entire world, the Bible says. That is all over Scripture. All over, even in Matthew chapter 24, Jesus three times warns of a false Christ and false prophets. Where are they? If Jesus has never lied, And He is God who is human, a man. He's 100% God and 100% man. He said that these deceivers are coming explicitly to lead us spiritually astray. Where are they? If we're near the end of time, where are these false Christs who claim to be deliverers? Claim to be saviors of our souls? Where are these prophets who claim to speak for Christ? who are leading people astray, and yet, unfortunately, the Bible says in Matthew chapter 24, many, many, many will be misled. It is always many. Always. Old Testament and New Testament, the many are always led astray. The many are always indifferent to truth. The many hearts are always hardened against scriptural truth and the commands of God. It's a hard heart. Man, his mind, his heart is desperately wicked. He doesn't even understand the depths of his wickedness. He doesn't even understand why he can't believe and embrace God's Word. He don't understand. But yet, that's what the Bible says. The Bible says that the false Christ, the false prophet, offers another salvation and another way to go through the door. They offer us peace. They offer us safety. They appeal, as Peter said, to the flesh. And yet, Jesus said, unfortunately, Lord, no matter how much you preach, they're not going to listen. And even think about this. Brother Mike and I are both pastors here. We make mistakes. Jesus made no mistakes, yet they rejected him. Not one time could he have lied, not one time could he have thought an evil thought, not one time could he have done an evil deed, yet what did the world do to him? Jesus said in John 15, they hated him. Hold on a minute. You're healing everybody, no matter what the malady is. You're feeding people, thousands of people, miraculously in front of possibly 20,000 people. You're walking on water, you're raising people from the dead. Your healing drops in, your healing paralyzes people, issues of blood. I mean, the Bible says everybody that came to Him, Jesus healed. And what does He get for it? Crucified. Rejected. Sculpted. I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, well, if I'd have been there, I wouldn't have crucified Him. If Jesus come here today, you'd do the same thing, because you're doing it now. We're doing it now. What do we do? If we find some truth in God's Word that we don't like, that's what we do with it. We crucify. We crucify. Now you think about it in our lives. What is it that you refuse to abandon? What is it? Where is it in your life that you know whether it's selfishness or covetousness, sexual immorality, whether it's thievery, whether it's lying, slander, whether it's blasphemy, idolatry, what is it in your life? You don't tell your neighbor because if you do it's going to be in the Times Union tomorrow with your picture. But you examine your own heart and tell me where is it that Jesus is off limits. And you don't care what the Bible says. You are going to do it. But yet, we think that if we were in that day, we wouldn't crucify Him. We'd do the same thing. We'd crucify Him because we're crucifying Him now. The Bible is predicted again that we will reject God's truth. And we're doing it right now. We're no better than they were. The Bible from Genesis to Revelation continually shows that we're nothing but sinners. And we're nothing but rebels. We're nothing but anarchists. We refuse to bend the knee to Jesus Christ. We refuse in our hearts. Our hearts are wicked and dark. And the Bible tells us that. And the same thing that they were doing in Matthew chapter 23 and 24, and during the time of Jesus, we're doing right now. Right now. The Bible says Christ comes back at the end of the worst time the world has ever seen. Verse 29. Notice that the creation announces his return. The creation will not compete with the return of Jesus Christ. Look what it says. The Bible says in verse 29, immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be what? The sun is going out. I know you've heard scientists say, well, the sun, because of its massive amount of internal fuel, will burn for billions of years. Oh, no. Wrong. No. The Bible, Old Testament and New Testament, say that sun's going out. The Old Testament prophets were told to prophesy that one day the sun is going dark. Notice what else he says. Secondly, and the moon will what? Well if the sun goes out, naturally what happens to the moon? Because all the moon does is what? Reflect the sun. So the sun goes out, Jesus is scientifically correct, the moon has to go out. And then he says, this is the incredible thing right here, the third thing he mentions in here, he says the stars will fall from the heavens. Now that one I hadn't figured out other than the fact that I was thinking about this in preparation for this sermon. And I remember that the Bible says it is Christ who holds everything together. And so Christ said the sun will go out, snuff, the moon will turn to blood or go dark, the stars will drop down from the heavens. Notice the fourth thing he says there. And the powers of the heaven will be violently shaken. We are talking about some type of universal catastrophic event that literally shakes the very foundation of not only the earth, not only our solar system, but the entire universe. The entire universe is shaken. It is, it is don't, it is, it is don't God just takes it and just shakes it up. Bet you that would get your attention, wouldn't it? Sometimes, you know, in our lethargy and our laziness, we tend to go to sleep, don't we? In our disobedience, we defy God. I don't care what you say, God. I'll do what I want to do. I'm the man right here. I don't care about God. Blankety God. Yeah, you know, you ladies, hell, man, I don't care nothing about God. I'll do what I please. But let God shake up the earth. Let Christ shake up the earth. Let him shake something a little bit. Maybe he needs to shake a few things in our lives. It shook me up. I remember I sat on my couch when my wife Charlene went to church and the Lord saved her and she said, Roy, come go to church. Go to church? Going to church is chicken. That's where I'm going. I ain't going no church. Lay right there on that couch. She went on off. I got up, put my clothes on, went to the crystal. Like to be a hangout. That's where I had church at. Yeah, I've been there and I was the high priest there. And I had the crystal and we'd break out our crystal burgers and goodies and we'd have us a good time cussing. And a few, among other things, we were really vile individuals. And then she would continue, she'd just stop bothering and continue to get up and go to church with this big head boy. And he used to just go to church. And then one day, the Lord had to shake some things up. I'm laying on the couch, kicking back. God ain't on my mind. Rod's on my mind. When she go, I'm here to speak to the Christian. And all but one day, the Lord just grabbed me, shook me up a little bit. And I said, oh, I need to get up and get up out of here. I got to go to church. And I done told this before. I put on my too young suit. Had a black suit that I had in the closet for funerals. And I just had a name. It was there for funerals. I wasn't wearing it or nothing. If somebody died, I was going to slap it on. And it was one of those polyester suits, you know, if you get too hot, it'd catch fire. So I had to stay away from stuff, you know. I kept it in a cool place. So the next Sunday, I slapped that suit on and the high water pants, and I had some shoes that I mean, the heel, I don't know what the, ice skates, I don't know what, I mean, them things was, thump. I slapped them all on. You could have told me I wasn't clean. And them pants were so tight that I went in church, they said, hey, Ron, how you doing? I said, hee, hee, hee. I said, it's Michael Jackson. I was just, I do a move. But what I'm saying is this, God had to shake me up. The Bible says God shakes up the powers of heaven. See, in that verse, contained in verse 29, is something that is indescribable. See, you don't understand what's happening here. See, the Bible says that Christ Will come and the announcement will be the creation even the psalmist said the creation declares your glory Even romans 1 says by looking at creation. I should know god exists Who can create such a massive universe? How do you explain the stars explain air to me can you explain air? Can you explain water? How is it a liquid and then a solid and a gas? Oh boy, I got to tell you this one charlene Charlene told me the other day Now, if you don't know this, don't let on and be embarrassed like she was. She was watching, what's that, Caillou? Anybody know who Caillou is? It's a cartoon. But she religiously watches it. And Caillou's got a big round orange head. A big round head like an orange. The big and round. She watched that stuff religiously. I go in there to all the TVs on Caillou. You know, but Caillou's mother, Caillou asked his mother about the hydrological cycle. You know, how does clouds and rain come from and so forth. And so the mother goes on to explain to Caillou that, you know, the water is evaporated and becomes gaseous and goes into there and then it condenses up there and then it gets too heavy and the water comes back down. And Charlene says, I wonder if Caillou's mother is telling him the truth. And she called me and said, What is the clouds and rain come on say Charlotte you don't know that? And she says no I Said you go to school. I just told us that in first grade Now some of y'all laughing you didn't know that Guarantee y'all how many y'all don't don't don't raise your hand. I don't put you on the spot You didn't know that you didn't know anything, but you didn't know anything about the hydrological psyche yet the old testament tells us about it But how do you explain water? How do you explain air? I mean, you breathe it into your lungs, yet it'll hold up a million-pound airplane. Or, if you get it going fast enough, it'll blow your house down. How do you explain that? How do you explain air? What is gravity? I don't have a clue, and you don't either. What is it? What is a star? And what is the fuel that's burning? How does it... Here's another one for me. I know I'm... I'm the pastor here, so I'll tell what I want to talk about. What amazes me, when I look at the universe, and the Bible says that the universe declares the glory of God. It's so massive, I'm not even going to talk about that. But you ever notice that scientists say that we evolved, evolution, right? That's what we're taught in our school, that It just came out of nowhere. Everything just boomed. This air, water, the variety of life, plant, and animal, humans, all just came out of nowhere, blim, and then all of a sudden, you know, eventually sunlight mixed with chemicals in the water, and it ignited, and all of a sudden life just came up out of nowhere, and then it somehow subdivided into all the different types of life you got today. Now if you believe that, you're cuckoo. That's what you're the cuckoo one that is harder for to believe that nonsense than it is to believe in the beginning God Created the heavens and the earth But with that said if an explosion The big bang created the universe Why did it make almost every planet and star round? You ever thought about that? How did it all come out round? Now you've got asteroids and you've got comets and so forth that are not, but they believe there's like chunks of like ice and in the asteroid they believe might have been a planet that, you know, exploded or crumbled or whatever. But did you notice everything is symmetrical round as though it was created by an intelligent person? Can't explain this stuff. So you see, the Bible says the creation declares the glory of God. The Bible says that by looking at creation without any evidence of scripture, you should know that there is an intelligent, massive mind behind this. Now the Bible says that. It says that should be expected of everybody. Yet the book of Romans tells us we deny that. We will not give God glory for this creation. We're going to give it that it happened by mistake. It was an accident. So it should be no amazement if the Bible says that about God's creation that Christ is in total control And he shakes the very foundation of the universe The Bible talks about earthquakes Old Testament New Testament It talks about a massive earthquake that will literally cause the earth to wobble like a drunkard Well, Ron, I don't believe that you don't read the news that massive earthquake that hit They called the tsunami a couple years ago. They actually said that affected the rotation of the earth and that was just in one region. But they're talking about one so massive that it literally caused the earth in its rotation to start to wobble. Do you know what kind of catastrophic results could have if you were to knock the earth off of this intricate balance? Do you know what would happen? Now how did the writer Matthew know this? How did Isaiah know it? How did Ezekiel know it? How did one or the other, I can't think of the prophet, right, maybe Amos, how did these guys know that? How did these writers know this was going to happen? Jesus Christ is about to come back and the Son will not compete with the Son of God. The moon will not compete with the coming of the Son of God. The stars, in their light, will not compete with the coming Son of God. They will all go silent and dark. Pitch dark. Blackness. And the Lord's glorious return. Now let me throw this at you real quick. And I'm going to close out. I thought I was going to finish this. The Apostle Paul on the road to Damascus, remember he was persecuting the church and he wanted to destroy the church. He even said that he tried to destroy, that he lived his every moment to destroy the church of Jesus Christ in which they call in the early, in Acts, the way. He said, I'm going to destroy that as long as I live to the day I die, I'm going to destroy the church. And we know the story. He ran into the Lord Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus. And we saw that conversion in Acts chapter 9. But as we look at the other two accounts in Acts 22, Paul recounts in Acts 22 and 26 his transformation. And in one of the passages he says, I saw a light brighter than the noonday sun. Somebody should have flipped on that one. Now don't flip, please, because the insurance, we want to keep our insurance rates low. So don't start flipping and diving and running around, please. But he said, now how? No one can look at a noonday sun with their naked eyes, can they? What can make the sun pale? What light, what kind of light makes the sun look pale? Jesus showed up in this account of glory, and it was brighter than a noonday Sun the Sun goes out the moon Does not give its light the stars fall from the heaven every bit of light and then the Bible says in verse 30 the sign of the Son of man I Can't imagine that kind of brightness Literally it will It will illuminate the entire universe. Every eye will see light brighter than the sun. How? He comes and the Creator is announced by the universe. Now I want to show you, I know you think that this, well Rod, you know, you're kind of being a little skeptical. Go over to Isaiah for a moment. Let me show you two verses, as we talked about the Creator announced. I'm going to show you two verses, or two passages, and I'm just showing you two of the many. Isaiah, and I want you to go over to Isaiah 13. Isaiah chapter 13, that's in the Old Testament. He is considered one of the major prophets. 66 books, considered a miniature Bible. 39, divided into 39 and 27 chapters. And I want you to notice here now, in the Old Testament, let me explain this to you a little, that Israel, and specifically the Old Testament deals with Israel, not the church. The church was in the mind of God. They knew nothing about the church. They knew nothing about the inclusion of the Gentiles to be saved by the Messiah. They didn't understand this. God told them they didn't understand it. The church was a mystery to the Jewish people of the Old Testament. And so, Isaiah is proclaiming that because of the people's wickedness that God was going to exile them. And he would use Nebuchadnezzar. And we know the story of Nebuchadnezzar. It's given to us in Daniel and how he came in and he took Daniel away. And yet he talks about deliverance. He talks about destruction. He always talks about deliverance. He would talk about temporal deliverance during that period of time, but then inject it into the passage would be something that could not apply to that time, but had to apply to the future. I think theologians call it The theory of double fulfillment or something like that. There's a temporal fulfillment than an internal fulfillment Because some of the things that God says here in isaiah 13 could not have been fulfilled during that time So it means you have to have a future date. Is that understandable? Now see I know y'all I know y'all don't a lot many of us don't hear this because usually when we go to church The pastor's calling on the ceiling See, no, no, this is, we have to learn, my people. And all we get, get wisdom, understanding. Paul prayed for wisdom and understanding. Paul prayed for the Colossian church, the Ephesian church. Wisdom, understanding. Wisdom, understanding. Understanding, because the theory, faulty theology leads to faulty thinking that leads to faulty living. You cannot avoid it. Know what God says. But notice in Isaiah 13, I want to begin in verse 9. Notice now, not only is he talking about a temple deliverance or a temple destruction of Babylon and the deliverance of the people, but notice what he says now. He has to go past this. Verse 9. Behold the day of the Lord. Now, whenever you hear that term, you see it in the New Testament as well. It talks about the day when God judges. It's called the day of the Lord and literally the one who will be doing the judging is Jesus Christ John 5 says that all power has been given to Jesus That he'll be honored just as the son and he's the judge it is something you reject the son you reject the judge Can you imagine not rejecting Jesus Christ and then finding out when you die you're standing before him? Say you the one I deny but yet the Bible clearly says over and over and over that all power is in his hand and He is the judge. He is the one who will be sitting on those great white throne judgments, judging people who have rejected him. But notice now, the day of the Lord is the day that Jesus Christ, the one who they put the crown of thorns on his head, the one who they slapped in his face, the one who they blasphemed, the one who they smote and beat abusively, the one that they beat with a catamaran whip, the one that they ridiculed and reviled, will be the one now the table is turned. And he'll be the one doing the punishment. The day of the Lord comes. Notice, he says, cruel. With both what? Wrath. And I love the adjective they throw in the front. Fierce anger. That's just to let you know it's not just going to be some simple anger. Some simple wrath. It's going to be fierce. Cruel. He's going to lay the land, he says, desolate. And he will destroy what? Whoa! Doesn't say saints, does it, Angle? That says sinners. Look at verse 10. Hmm. For the stars of heaven and their constellations will what? Will not give their light. The sun will be what? And it is going forth. And the moon will what? Hmm. Isaiah wrote this about 700 years, approximately 600 or 700 years before Christ came to this planet. Who told him this? Notice what else he says, verse 11, I will punish the world for its evil and the wicked for their iniquity. I will halt the arrogance of the proud. That's the ones who said, well, you know, they're puffed up. God can't do anything to them. They don't care about God. Yet he's going to punish. He said, I'll halt their arrogance. I'll stop it. I'll stop those who are proud. I will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible. Verse 12, I will make a mortal more rare than fine gold. Do you know the Bible predicts that billions upon billions in the book of Revelation will die during this seven year period? Billions, I didn't say millions, I said billions. I pretty much estimated that if you got six billion people on this planet Benny, if the Bible, and the Bible is correct, and if I kind of deduce based on what I read in the book of Revelation, then probably if you got six billion people, four billion of them dying. Because the Bible talks about half and half and I mean you start accumulating the totals and we're talking about billions of people. And yet this is exactly what Isaiah said. Now he is what? Prophesying far into the future now with this. Because we know in the past during Isaiah's time the sun did not go out and the moon did not go dark and the stars did not fall from heaven. So he could not have been talking about that time. He had to be talking about something in the future. and arrogant, proud, evil, wicked people rebel against God, and yet when God executes judgment, what can you do? Nothing! You may have been arrogant, you may have been haughty, you may have been proud, you may have lived in your wickedness and loved your evil, but when God, the day of the Lord comes, it doesn't matter how arrogant and haughty and proud we are, God is going to deal with it. He says, I'll make, in verse 12, a mortal more rare than fine, fine gold, a man more than a golden wedge from offer. Look at verse 13, therefore I will shake the heavens and the earth will, what? Move out of its, what kind of shaking is this? In the wrath of the Lord of hosts. You see that? He's going to shake it! And the Earth will move out of its place! Is that a reference to moving out of this orbit? Will He shake it enough that it begins to go into an elliptical orbit of some sort? What kind of massive shaking is this? What kind of God can do this? Yet Ezekiel talks about this very same thing. Same thing. Same scenario. Sun goes out. Moon turns. blood or goes dark. Go to Revelation chapter 19. Actually, go to Revelation chapter 6, I'm sorry. Revelation chapter 6 and I'll close on this one. Let's go back to John the Revelator. Jesus Christ appeared to him in chapter 1 and told him to write these things down of what was going to happen. Now it is not a pretty picture in the book of Revelation, that's why many preachers don't preach it. It is not pretty unless you're under the blood of Jesus Christ. It is a horrific picture of carnage and wrath and death and destruction and devastation, unprecedented. Don't want to hear that. But it sure makes you wake up, doesn't it? Makes you challenge and examine yourself, doesn't it? Look at verse 12. Christ, in Revelation chapter 5, has received the scroll from His Father. He's the only one the Bible said was worthy to take the scroll from the Father. It's a title deed to the universe. And Jesus begins to break those seals. It is the wrath of God. He breaks the seal of the Antichrist. He breaks the second seal, and it's war. He breaks the third seal, and it's famine. He breaks the fourth seal, and it's death. Then the Bible talks about a massive earthquake. Look at verse 12. John says, I looked, and when he opened the sixth seal, and there were seven of them, and behold, there was a great, not just an earthquake, a great earthquake. And the sun became what? Black as sackcloth and hair. And the moon became like what? Blood And the stars of the heaven what? As a fig tree drops its late fig when it is shaken by a mighty wind. Then the sky receded as a scroll when it is rolled up and every mountain and island was moved out of its place. It is they saw every, every Look at verse 15. Now when this happens, this is, see, Jesus in three verses gives us, in one verse actually, gives us this. In one verse. Then we come to Revelation, and the Revelator, John, as given to him by the Holy Spirit, expands on this. And he says, then the sky, verse 15 again, 14 again, then the sky receded as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island was moved out of its place, and the kings of the earth and great men, the rich, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave, every free man, hid themselves in caves and in the rocks of the mountains, didn't matter what socio-economic class, didn't matter whether you were rich, poor, male, female, doesn't really matter. When the earth starts to shake and sun go out and the moon turns to blood, stars fall from the sky, it doesn't matter where you are, you are afraid. Luke even said that this brings such fear that people die from fear. They actually expire from the fear of what they see. They hide themselves. There's no repentance in verse 15. You think if they understood the scriptures, don't you think they would call on the Lord? The Bible says He'll save them. He saved a thief on a cross. He would save them if they would humble themselves, realize they were sinners and why this wrath was coming and God would save them. But there's no evidence that they do that. Man's heart is so hard. His heart is so hard. Even under judgment, he will not repent. I think it's a convenient reason, one of the reasons why he will not repent in verse 15, but I won't tackle that right now. Verse 16. Look what they say now. Instead of saying, Lord, forgive us! Save us, Lord! Hosanna! You are the Christ, so I am a sinner, please save me! Look what they call, they call on the very creation. They say the mountains in verse 16, and it says, for the mountains and rocks fall on us and hide us. from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of who? The wrath? Is that a Nazi moron or is it just me? A lamb that gets angry? A lamb is a docile animal. They have nothing to fear from a lamb. Yet somehow this lamb gets angry. And notice verse 17. For the great day of his wrath has come, and who is able to stand?" The question is, who? When he gets angry, when Jesus Christ gets angry, the same one who mingled among people, the same one who washed the feet of the one who betrayed him, the same one who healed all types of maladies, The same one who preached the gospel and asked people to come to be saved. The same one who allowed us to revile him, to blaspheme him, to use his name as a curse word. The same one who we have reviled and rejected and we have no thought for. The same God who allowed all of that and then died on the cross to save us. Our opportunity, the period of grace is now. If you hear His voice, don't harden your heart. If you hear what the Word of God said today, examine your heart and call out to Jesus Christ. I can't save you. Joining this church can't save you. Shaking the path of hand can't save you. You have got to realize that you are a sinner and call upon Jesus for salvation. He is sitting there waiting to hear. To call upon Him is to act in faith because none of us see Him. All of the evidence of what He does and who He is and what He is doing and what He will do is all revealed to us in the Word of God. The day of His wrath is coming and if you are not standing on the foundation of Jesus Christ, you will not be able to stand. Oh, but thank you. Thank you, Lord. That He died and made a provision for all of us. That by believing on Him, we escape His wrath. I'll close with this. John said, in the Gospel of John, chapter 3, verse 36, one of my favorite verses, He who believes on the Son has, present tense, eternal life. He who believes on the Son of God has eternal life. Right now, present tense, Greek present tense, right now, right now, It is the grace of God that is bestowed to you, not because we're good, because He's good. It's at His benevolence, His kindness, His gentleness, His compassion that He bestows upon people who are sinners His salvation. freely Because it has already been paid for at the cross of Calvary He says right now the true believer has eternal life, but John says he that does not believe it Does not have life eternal life but the wrath of God is present indicative in the Greek on him right now If you're saved, God is forgiving you for every sin. You call out to Jesus Christ, and you know that you know that you know that He is your Savior, all your sins have been eradicated. The Bible says that over and over and over. But if you are not, and you are wicked, and you are evil, and you're rejecting Jesus Christ for some temporal reason, as Jesus said in John 3, 19, people don't come to the light because they love darkness, He said, they don't come to me because they love their sin. If you have not confessed Jesus Christ, John says, present tense, His wrath is upon you right now. Even though you haven't died yet, His wrath is awaiting you. It's there, and He may not execute judgment now. But continue to reject him and he will execute his judgment. But the Bible says, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. It's about