Well, good morning again. Aren't those just wonderful hymns to sing when we all get to heaven, when we all see Jesus? What a day of rejoicing that will be. Pastor Dale asks us when we're preaching to pick hymns, and I picked those three because looking in the future, it's so bright for us as Christians, what we have to look forward to. And I thank my brother Brody for playing the songs for us. Let's turn to the book of Jude. Jude, we're going to read, going through verses 14 through 16, as we talk about the second coming, the second coming of Christ. I'll read the verses here and you follow along. It was also about these men that Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam, prophesied, saying, Behold, the Lord came with many thousands of his holy ones to execute judgment upon all and to convict all the ungodly of all their ungodly deeds which they have done in an ungodly way, and all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him. These are grumblers, finding fault, following after their own lust. They speak arrogantly, flattering people for the sake of gaining an advantage. Let's go to the Lord in prayer one more time. Lord, again, we come to you in prayer and we thank you for this opportunity to hear your word, Lord. Lord, may Jesus Christ be glorified as we study your word, Father, as we talk about his return. Jesus Christ is coming again. He is coming to set up his kingdom. He is coming to free his people and coming to destroy his enemies, Father. We thank you for this word of yours, Lord, and we thank you for the joy we have looking forward to this, and for the warning for others, Father. Again, may you be glorified, and it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. Well, what we just read today is actually the earliest prophecy of the second coming of Christ. In fact, it's just the second earliest prophecy in the Bible, that being Genesis 3.15, where God prophesies about Christ crushing Satan's head. So let's go into who Enoch is, since we started out with Enoch, and that's in Genesis 5. So if you'll turn with me to Genesis 5, we're going to look into Enoch. Starting here in verse 18, we see Jared lived 162 years and became the father of Enoch. So we see here he was the son of Jared, and he was born in 622 after creation. So Adam is still alive, of Adam and Eve, and Adam would be his great, great, great, great grandfather. And if we're to continue on reading, skipping to verse 21 to talk about Enoch, we see, Enoch lived 65 years and became the father of Methuselah. Then Enoch walked with God 300 years after he became the father of Methuselah, and he had other sons and daughters. So all the days of Enoch were 365 years. Now 365 years by today's standard is a long time, but if we were to look throughout this genealogy here in chapter five, we'll see the average life spans around 920 years. What happened to Enoch? Why only 365 years? If we look here in verse 24, Enoch walked with God and he was not, for God took him. Enoch didn't see death. We get confirmation from that by looking in the book of Hebrews, and you don't need to turn there, I'll read this, Hebrews 11.5. By faith, Enoch was taken up so that he would not see death. And he was not found because God took him up, for he obtained witness that before being taken up, he was pleasing to God. I think that's the best thing someone can say about you if that was on your epitaph, that you were pleasing to God, right? So Enoch, like Elijah, never saw death. So both of them are held in very high esteem, and that's why we would see Enoch brought up here in Jude. However, this comes with a fair share of controversy. If you look at how Jude was brought in to the canon of scripture. Because Jude 14 and 15 is a direct quote from the book of Enoch. Chapter 1, verse 9 to be exact. Now, the Book of Enoch is an extra-biblical source. It is not one that is in the Bible. And in verse 9 of Jude, we also had a quote from the Assumption of Moses that we learn that Michael and Satan battled over the body of Moses. So it has two extra biblical sources here that these two books are not inspired. However, we know that Jude is inspired. The book of Jude being part of the Bible is Holy Spirit inspired. So we can say with confidence that Enoch did indeed preach the second coming and that Moses, that Satan and Michael battled over the body of Moses. Now back to Enoch. We see from Jude, and looking in Genesis, he was preaching around 700 years after creation. He's preaching that the Lord, Jesus Christ, is going to be coming back to earth. Which is interesting because there's another cataclysmic judgment just right around the corner from Enoch, and what is that? That's the flood. Yes, that's the flood. And we know the flood started right after Enoch's son, Methuselah. Now, Methuselah, I'm sure many are aware of, he's famous for what, living 969 years, longer than anybody else. But do you know what his name means? Methuselah means man of the javelin, or in Hebrew, his death shall send. His death shall send what? It sent the flood. So what we see, even with Methuselah living 969 years, we see the mercy, we see the patience of God allowing Methuselah to live that long life before this judgment came. Because the flood did come 1656 after creation, or if we were to go by BC, around 2348 was the time of the flood. So Jew tells us there was preaching before the flood. Second Peter 2.5 tells us Noah was preaching for 120 years before the flood. And Methuselah with the name, his death shall sin, it's most likely he was also preaching about the flood. Yet how many people were saved from the flood? Just eight. Just eight. And we don't know how many people were on the earth at that time. We do know they lived long lives, 900 years. Tradition has Adam having around 40 children. So depending on how many children people had, we estimate it could be anywhere from 3 billion people all the way up to 12 billion people at the time of the flood that were killed in the judgment of flood and the judgment of God. So let's just take 3 billion. That's three with nine zeros behind it. that God rained down literally his judgment upon, killing them for their disobedience towards him. I can't think of, can't fathom 3 billion people dying. I mean, the most recent disaster I can think of as I prepared this was back in December 26, 2004. Some of you may remember, off the coast of Indonesia, we had a 9.2 earthquake. And just about 300,000 people died there. That's three with five zeros behind it. Extraordinary amount of people died just in that one event. But the flood, billions upon people died. And there's another judgment coming, and that's the second coming. Now when we talk about the second coming, we're talking about eschatology. And that's just a fancy word for saying the study of the future. It's a study of future things. So the second coming is an eschatological event. And there are over 100 Bible verses that talk about the second coming and Christ's return. You know, and the world loves to speculate on how the Earth is going to end. We see that in movies. They use terms from the Bible, Armageddon, that movie many probably saw in 98. Well, Armageddon, I know it's hard to believe that Hollywood gets things wrong, but Armageddon is not about an asteroid. It's actually about a battle. How many here have seen a movie with the word apocalypse in it? There's dozens of movies with apocalypse. An apocalypse simply means revelation. In fact, if you had a Greek Bible, the book of Revelation would be Apocalypse. And all it means is God's peeling back the curtain and giving us a glimpse of what he's going to do in the future. So the Bible tells us what's going to happen in the future. I thought I would look up what man and the experts say what's going to happen in the future. So looking at different sites and things, there's about five items that man says that's going to happen that's going to wipe out mankind. Now, four of them I'll give credit to that they'll play a part in the end times. But the number one reason, way off. So let me just quickly go over and share some of the reasons man thinks we're going to end. AI, artificial intelligence. I think this comes from people who've seen Terminator too many times. But no doubt, we have great strides in technology. And their concern is that the technology will rise up against us. Now, I appreciate technology. Number one, being here in the desert, air conditioning, right? We all enjoy that. Technology has its good and its bad uses. Kids today don't need to do schoolwork. They can simply have AI write their reports. And we use things like our phone. I can remember phone numbers from my childhood, my best friend's, my mom's work. Ask me what my mother's cell phone number is. No, I'd have to go to my phone, of course. GPS, another thing, right? How many here remember having to map out our trips and plan which exits and be on the lookout that we don't miss the exit, right? We plug things into our phone. So technology can be a blessing but also a curse. If we don't use our brain, if we don't have that critical thinking, we can be easily deceived. Cognitive atrophy. Number four, nuclear war. That's been a threat ever since the Cold War, right? And then we have Russia and Ukraine. Russia has nuclear weapons. India, Pakistan. The Middle East, right? Israel just bombed Iran concerning nuclear weapons. Now, nuclear war, I do believe, will play a part in the end times, and we'll go over that. Number three is an asteroid. Our experts claim that 65 million years ago, an asteroid struck the Earth and killed the dinosaurs. We know from the Bible dinosaurs died out after Noah's flood. But there is an asteroid called Apophis. It's supposed to fly by here April 13, 2029. Actually come between Earth and our satellites right through the middle. So asteroids will play a part. We'll go over that. Two asteroids play a part. Number two is a pandemic, a super virus that wipes out mankind. And we just went through a pandemic on this. A virus will play a part in the end world, but it won't be the final cause. And the number one reason is what that's going to destroy the world, according to man? Global warming, right? We've been hearing that since the 70s. And we've missed so many dates of when Florida's supposed to be underwater and this and that hasn't happened. In fact, there's more ice in Antarctica today, they say. And we see the celebrities and the politicians who are concerned about global warming, what do we see them doing? They're buying up beachfront property. If you thought the world was going to flood, wouldn't you buy a mountain home instead? They fly in their jets, the carbon footprint. And most recently, if they're so concerned, they traded in their Teslas for SUVs. So global warming must be over, must not be a threat. And as Christians, we know that God has promised, Genesis 9-11, that the world will never flood again. So we don't need to be concerned about global warming. Yes, there'll still be floods. Yes, there'll still be deaths from floods in local areas. But it's not going to be like they're saying here with global warming. Another judgment is coming. It's going to be far worse than what man has predicted. We don't know exactly when, But we do have an idea of how it will happen to some extent because of God pushing back that curtain. Now, eschatology, even within the church, has its fair share of controversy. There's a lot of debate, different schools of thought on eschatology. You hear terms like pre-trib, mid-trib, post-trib, premill, amill, dispensationalist, And even pan mill, which I think is the worst view you can have. And pan mill are those who say, it's all going to pan out. Don't need to worry about it. But I would say that would be the worst view you can have, because what that says is you've given up. You don't care what God has told us in his word. You don't care to try to understand that. And number one, you miss out on a tremendous blessing. Let's turn to the book of Revelation, chapter 1. The apocalypses. And let's see what you miss out on for not wanting to know what God has said about the future. Starting here in verse one, Revelation 1. The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his bondservants, the thing which must soon take place, and he sent and communicated it by his angel and his bondservant, John, who testified to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Here it is. Blessed is he who reads in those who hear the words of this prophecy and heeds the things which are written in it. for the time is near. See here, it says, blessed is he who reads. In Greek, anagnosko, what it means is to read, to know. You are reading to understand what God is saying. And I get it. Revelation is full of symbology. There is a lot in here that still remains a mystery. But we have 90% and a good, clear picture of what God is going to do. We know Jesus is coming again. The question is how and what's going to happen in between and with all these views. But you don't have to worry about it today, because I'm going to tell you the correct view. Well, I'm going to share a view that is, that I, through my study, I believe is correct, as well as I know some of you share this view. But what I want to encourage everyone here is to be a Berean. Study the scripture. See for yourself what view you share, what are you pre-trib, post-trib, mid-trib. Study the scripture. That's what we're told to do. Two books I would recommend and two different views of thought. One is The Biblical Doctrine. That's John MacArthur. And then there's Everyone's a Theologian by R.C. Sproul. Those are very two different views of eschatology, but both books show all the different views and give their reasons why they believe these views. It's a great place to start if you haven't looked into eschatology before. In fact, both those books go over theology. And you've seen the partnership when Dr. Sproul was alive, those two had, even though they disagreed on eschatology and baptism, you see how unified they were in the gospel of Christ. So yes, we do have different views with our brothers and sisters, but we are united in Christ. So again, read, read the scripture. You will be blessed. It's a promise here. So before we go into the second coming, I want to talk about two events that must happen before. And this is what you call the pre-tribu. It's the rapture and the tribulation. Now the rapture was popularized a while back in the Left Behind series, and I do not recommend you read those books. But it comes from the Latin word rapture. It means to be snatched away. And I'd like to turn to 1 Thessalonians 4, chapter 4, verse 16. This is one of the key verses for the rapture. as there are others, but I can't spend too much time talking about the details of the rapture and the tribulation and the second coming as much as I'd like to because we're limited and that in itself would take several sermons. But let's look at 1 Thessalonians 4 verses 16 through 18. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore, comfort one another with these words. Another scripture you have there in your notes, you don't need to turn there, I'll read it. 1 Corinthians 15, 51 through 52. Behold, I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep, but we will be changed in a moment. And the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable and we will be changed. So what we see here is Christ returning to earth He's not coming to earth the land. He is in the air. We go to meet him in the air. The dead in Christ will rise first. And then we who are Christians here today, if we're still alive, when the rapture happens, we will be caught up and go in to be with him forever. This is the pre-tribulation view. You have a mid-trib view where it happens during the tribulation and the post-trib view. But this is the pre-tribulation view. And as I said, many different people have different views. Some people don't believe, some Christians don't believe there is a rapture. Some believe that the tribulation happened back in AD 70. But I want to share three reasons, three reasons, and there are many more, but it wouldn't be right to not give reasons as to why there's a pre-trib rapture. And we're hearing Thessalonians. What's going on in the Thessalonian church Or the Christians are concerned that those who have died have missed Christ. They're dead and gone, they won't be here when he returns. And Paul is comforting them with the words, saying, no, no, they didn't miss out. And we see here, therefore comfort one another with these words. If he wasn't talking about a rapture and the tribulation is coming, and that they would have to go through the tribulation, through the wrath of God, I think this would end differently. He'd prepare for the tribulation, prepare to face the wrath of God, which we don't see here. And that leads to Revelation 3.10. And again, you don't need to turn there. Revelation 3.10 says, because you have kept the word of my perseverance, I also will keep you from the hour of testing. This is Christ talking to the church. that hour which is about to come upon the whole world to test those who dwell on the earth. Jesus is telling the church he's going to keep the church from the hour of testing. He's going to keep them from the wrath of God that is going to go to the earth. God's wrath is against those on the earth who rejected him. And Christ here is saying, taking the church out. You do not have to go through this. Which leads to the third, the word church, ecclesia, the called out ones. The word church is found 20 times in Revelation. 20 times in Revelation. 19 of those are in chapters one through three. The last time it's mentioned, the 20th time, is when John is wrapping up the book of Revelation, Revelation 22, 16. Nowhere is the church to be found, the word church, during the tribulation. Now, yes, there will be believers during the tribulation. We do know that. But after the rapture and revelation, and the Bible tells us there's going to be two witnesses, God's going to set aside 144,000 to preach the gospel. So people will become Christians during the tribulation. And again, these are just three reasons I picked out for the pre-trib rapture. There's many more as you look in books. But again, and through the Bible, I just encourage you to study the end times eschatology. And in the back, at the bottom of the notes, I have other verses there you can look up for the second coming, which we'll get into here in a bit. But when will the rapture happen? It can happen at any time. It's what we call imminent. There are no other prophetic events that need to happen. In fact, if you look at Paul and read Paul, Paul sounded as if he was expecting the rapture to happen because there's nothing else that needs to be fulfilled. Now, after the rapture, we have what's called the tribulation period. This is a seven-year period prophesied by Daniel in the Old Testament in chapter nine. It's seven years. Three and a half years is going to be what I'll call a pseudo-piece. And then another three and a half years are going to be what people just label as hell on earth. It's going to be an absolutely hellish time here. In fact, Jesus tells us in Matthew 24, 21, for then there will be a great tribulation such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will. During the tribulation, several things are going on. One, Satan is going to have just about free reign. And I say just about because as we read in Psalm 10 and we talked about, Jesus is still in charge. He is sitting on his throne. But he's going to loosen the leash on Satan. And Satan, who loves to imitate God, is going to create his own unholy trinity, right? We have the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Satan is going to have Satan, the Antichrist, and the False Prophet. I've already spent some time talking about Satan in a previous message, so you're welcome to go back and look at our church website or sermon audio if you'd like to listen to that. Today I'll just talk about the other two of this unholy trinity. Number one is the Antichrist. Now the Antichrist, he's going to be a very impressive individual because he's going to be able to establish a one world government. Not only that, he's going to do something many presidents and other leaders have failed. He's going to have peace with Israel. Israel's actually going to feel safe with this individual. But Daniel 9.27 tells us this peace will end after three and a half years. Because at three and a half years, this man is going to go into the temple, which will be rebuilt by this time, and declare himself to be God. Let's look at Revelation 13, just so if you flip just a few pages over from where we're at to Revelation 13. Let's read a little about this Antichrist, which John calls the beast, the beast. And what we see here is the beast has come up from the sand. Here's the symbology there. And the dragon, which is Satan. And I'm going to start in verse 3. And I saw one of the heads as if it had been slain, and his fatal wound was healed. And the whole earth was amazed and followed after the beast. They worshipped the dragon because he gave his authority to the beast. And they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like the beast? And who is able to wage war against him? There was given to him a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies and authority to act for 42 months was given to him. And he opened his mouth and blasphemies against God to blaspheme his name in his tabernacle, that is those who dwell in heaven. And is also given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them and the authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him. All who dwell on the earth will worship him. Everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the lamb that was slain. What we see here is it appears that this man will survive a near fatal head wound. Perhaps it's an assassination attempt. And this obviously isn't a grazing. It's probably a direct hit. And he's going to survive. And people are going to be amazed, and that would be amazing. Think of someone who gets shot in the head that we think would die, and they survive. I mean, this day and age of superheroes, people will say he's the first X-Man or something and just be in awe of this individual. We see he's going to be arrogant. He's going to speak blasphemies. He's going to overcome Christians and kill them. But there's a key word or words in here that we see if you look in verses five through seven, and that's the word given. Given, again, Christ is in charge. He's given the ability to speak blasphemy. He's given the ability to rule the world. He's given the ability to martyr the Christians. So make no mistake, although this man will be terrible, and murder Christians and take over the world, Christ is still in charge. And he has an assistant, this antichrist, this beast, and that's who we label the false prophet, we call the false prophet. And let's read about him here in verse 11. Then I saw another beast coming out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spoke as a dragon. He exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence. And he makes the earth and all those who dwell in it to worship the first beast whose fatal wound was healed. And there it is, that fatal wound. It's almost like a fake resurrection deceiving many. And he performs great signs so that he even makes fire come down out of heaven to the earth in the presence of men. And he deceives those who dwell on the earth because of the signs which it was given to him perform in the presence of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast, who had the head wound of the sword and has come to life. And it was given to him to give breath to the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast would even speak and cause as many as do not worship the image of the beast to be killed. And he causes all the small and the great, the rich and the poor, the free and the slave, to be given a mark on their right hand or on their forehead. And he prides that no one will be able to buy or to sell except the one who has the mark, either the name of the beast or the number of his name. Here is wisdom, let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast for it is the number of man and his number is 666. There's where we get that number that so many people use today, 666, the number of the beast. So we see this false prophet, what does he do? He promotes the antichrist. I kind of see him as maybe like Joseph Goebbels was to Adolf Hitler. He's able to perform great signs, fire coming down from heaven. And he causes some image to become alive. Maybe it's through AI, some technology, maybe a robot. Maybe it's the demonic power. Satan has the ability to provide power. Christ is allowing it at this time. And he also makes it where you cannot buy. You cannot go to the grocery store, buy your food, unless you have this mark. And people speculate on the mark, what this mark might be, whether it's a computer chip in the hand. We do see that in Europe. People have a little chip in their hand, and they just scan it, and they're able to buy their food. And if you think about that, that's not a bad thing. I mean, you have a chip in your hand. It's not like it can be robbed. If you cut somebody's hand off and did that, that would probably bring about some suspicion, would it not? So it makes sense how the world would buy into this. But as bad as this unholy trinity is, it's nothing compared to what God is going to do. The wrath of God that's going to happen during this tribulation. And in your notes on the back page, I've summarized them, and I'd like to go through them and spend time, but we're going to give a high-level view of what's coming. So we had the Antichrist, he's been in charge three and a half years, he's had this and the world's been just flourishing under him, unless you were a Christian at this time. But now it's God's turn. He is going to bring his wrath upon man. And he's going to do that in 21 judgments. We call the seals, the trumpets, and the bowls. So I'll briefly go over them here. And in Revelation 6 and 8, we see the seven seals. Number one's the Antichrist, the coming of the Antichrist. And he comes with a bow but without arrows. So it shows he's not going to come as a warrior. It's going to be through negotiations. It's going to manipulate things. The second seal is a great war. World War III, maybe World War IV if there's a third war in between. A great war. The third seal is a great famine. Food prices are going to go through the roof. The fourth seal, a quarter of the population will die. Population today is just over 8 billion. So 2 billion people are going to die. And here's how they're going to die. They're going to die from war, famine, pestilence, and wild beasts. Think about that, eaten alive, wild beast, two billion people if it were to happen today. And this is just the fourth out of 21. Seal number five, we get a peer into heaven, and we see the martyrs there, and they're asking, Lord, when will you avenge us? These are the Christians who were martyred at this time, asking to be avenged. So they remember, they know what had happened. Seal number six, a great earthquake and the sun is going to be darkened. And yet, even through this, the Bible tells us people will not repent. Through these, just these six seals, the terrible judgments here, the people will still not repent. The seventh seal introduces us to seven trumpets, and those are found in Revelation 8, 9, and 10. The first trumpet is hail and fire mixed with blood. And with that, the Bible tells us it's going to burn up one-third of the earth, one-third of the trees, and all the green grass. Now, those of you who lived in Tucson, green grass is not symbolic. It's actually a thing that does exist in the world today. But notice, the Bible says the word green. It specifically has that in there. When we think of grass burning up, we don't think of the green grass, right? It's the brown, it's the brush fires that are burning up. God's going to destroy the lush green grass through his judgments. The second trumpet, a fiery mountain will fall into the sea. An asteroid, we talked about. falling into the sea where a third of it becomes blood, a third of the sea life die, and a third of the ships are destroyed. Think about that. The food supply is disrupted. Shipping's disrupted. You know, Amazon Prime's probably not going to be working as well as it does today. It's going to be a horrible time. The third is another asteroid. This asteroid actually has a name, Wormwood. And perhaps it breaks apart in the atmosphere because it poisons a third of the fresh water. So your rivers and your springs. And it says men are going to die from this. So perhaps it breaks apart in the atmosphere and pollutes the water. The fourth, a third of the sun, moon, and stars are blocked out. How's that going to do with farming and crops and nocturnal animals are going to be out of cycle and everything? The fifth, a bottomless pit. Revelation tells us a bottomless pit is going to be opened up and locusts are going to come out and torment man. And here's a perfect example of the symbology. Some people see this locust as actual locusts that are coming out. Some say it could be demons. There's a number of things it could be. We don't know exactly, it says locusts, but we do know what the result is. Whatever it might be, We know the result. What is it? They are going to torment men with excruciating pain, and men will want to die, but it says death will flee from them. God is not going to allow man to die from this, which in and of itself is an act of mercy, because if they were going to go to hell, it would be far, far worse. Hell is far, far worse than anything you can suffer here on earth. The Sixth Trumpet, I think, is just truly horrifying. Four demons are released, and they're allowed to kill a third of mankind. Again, that's another two billion people, right? We had a quarter. If we had eight billion, a quarter of that's two. So now we're at six. A third of that, another two. So by this time, half the population of the world has died. Four billion people have died through these various judgments. And during this sixth trumpet, it says they refuse to repent. They know it's the Lamb of God, they know it's Jesus, and yet they refuse to repent. The seventh trumpet is an announcement. It's an announcement that Christ is going to reign forever. And then we get into the seven bowl judgments. The seven bowl judgments. And these, we believe, happen in rapid-fire succession. They're probably almost back-to-back because when we read through the seven bowl judgments and the severity of them, you have to ask, how could life exist? And Jesus tells us that time had to be cut short or everyone would die out. So the seven bold judgments here. One, loathe them and malignant sores on people. So there's your pandemic right there. God's going to cause loathe them and malignant sores on people, cause great pain to those who are not Christian. I'll make this clear. These are people who decided to follow the Antichrist. These are not happening, this is not happening to Christians. Now the overall things, the events of asteroids smashing in in the darkness. Yes, the Christians will go through that, but when it's directed at these people, remember, this is the judgment of God falling upon the non-Christian. Number two, the oceans are turned to blood and all sea life die. I've been to Japan, a nation like Japan thrives on sea life, a big fishing industry there. I love seafood. Completely gone, all sea life are dead with the second bowl judgment. Then the third one, fresh water sources, the rivers and the springs, they turn to blood. So there goes drinking water. Again, as you can see, it's getting worse and worse. The fourth, sun. The sun scorches, burns up, this is the verb, it burns up men with fierce, fierce heat. See, this right here is global warming, not what we talk about with the flooding. Think of that. The sun turned up where it's scorching man. Five, this darkness and great pain where people will gnaw on their tongues. And again, we're told people will not repent when this Trump happens. They still refuse to bow the knee. Number six, dries up the river Euphrates so an army from the east can make its way towards Jerusalem. Perhaps this is setting up for the Battle of Armageddon. Perhaps it's an army that's coming to attack the Antichrist. After all, with all these judgments, the Antichrist has seemed to have lost control. Again, that's something that's debated among theologians today. What's the purpose of this army coming across? But we do know an army does come across. And then the last of the seven bold judgments is a great earthquake, such that has never been where the mountains come down and the islands disappear. Also has 100 pound hailstones that fall, and it talks about the men still blaspheming God. Now, one thing I enjoy here in Tucson are our mountains. And if you're ever in the city and you want to know where north is, right, we just look, up, there's Mount Lemmon, that's north. Imagine that mountain gone. All the mountains gone. That is just a tremendous earthquake that God has caused around the whole. And this is the final judgment here. And after this, we do have what's called the Battle of Armageddon. And I don't think it's much of a battle, and if you just turn a few pages over to chapter 19, we were in chapter 13, we'll read about the Battle of Armageddon. Now, if you are a Christian here today, we will be involved. We are actually going to be coming down, this talks about how Christ comes down to earth, with his holy ones, with his saints and angels. So if you're a Christian here today, you're going to experience this. You're going to experience coming down from heaven with Christ. He's going to be on his horse, and we're going to be with him as he comes for this battle of Armageddon. And we'll pick it up in verse 19. And I saw the beast, that's the Antichrist, and the kings of the earth and their armies assembled to make war against him, Jesus, who sat on the horse, and against his army. And the beast was seized, and with him the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast, and those who worshipped his image. These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire, which burns with brimstone. And the rest were killed with the sword which comes from his mouth of him who sat on the horse. And all the birds were filled with their flesh. So we see what happens here. Christ and all his people return to earth. The beast prepares for war. Christ speaks and it's over. The beast and the false prophet are thrown into the lake of fire, and the rest are killed with the sword from his mouth. Jesus just speaks, and it's over. So not much of a battle. And for those who may not be familiar, the lake of fire, the reason it calls out the lake of fire doesn't say hell, it's a different term. Right now, there are two places of torment. One is hell. If you were to die today and not be a Christian, you would go to hell, still a tremendous place of suffering. There's also a lake of fire the Bible talks about that God prepared for Satan and now for man who refuse. Population of the lake of fire today is zero. Hell is greatly populated. The Beast and the False Prophet, the Antichrist and the False Prophet are the first two people sent to this Lake of Fire. Later on, as you read through the Bible, you'll see that hell, everyone from hell has come up to judge, and then hell and everyone who was in hell get thrown into the lake of fire, including Satan and his demons. That is the eternal place of torment. So in case you weren't familiar with hell and the lake of fire, they are two distinct places that exist today. So Christ has come down, he has thrown the Antichrist and the false prophet, and he's killed everyone else. And that doesn't just include the people in the battle. Anyone around the whole earth who had not put their faith in Christ is killed. There is no mercy. Matthew 24 talks about this. There is no mercy at this time. Christ has come down and he is setting up his kingdom. This is the second coming. This is a day of terror for the unbelievers. as they are mercifully cast into hell. They had many, many times to repent, and they were not repentant. Through this tribulation and verse here about the second coming, I'll read it, Hebrews 9.28 says, Christ also having been offered once to bear the sins of many will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin to those who eagerly await him. I believe Hebrews 9.28 is going to be a verse of comfort to the followers during this tribulation. But the Second Coming, when that happens here at the Battle of Armageddon, Jesus has come to save them. There will be no more Antichrist. There will be no more Christian persecution. Jesus has come to set up his Millennial Kingdom at this time. And only those who have put their faith in Christ, those who became Christian through the Tribulation, will enter into this Millennial Kingdom. Jesus is coming. Both the Old Testament and the New Testament are very clear. Now, it's true the Old Testament doesn't distinguish the two different comings. Yes, the Old Testament talks about the suffering servant, and it talks about the reigning Messiah. But it does not distinctly, explicitly say there are two separate comings. So we have to cut the disciples some slack when they didn't understand what Jesus was saying, right? Because they were taught he's going to suffer and he's going to reign in all the same time. And we saw that through their conversations. Although Jesus said, I will have to come again, I will come again. So now we have the benefit of hindsight, right? We can look, we can look back at the Old Testament and see, ah, Christ fulfilled these prophecies, and these are yet to be fulfilled. But what's said in the Old Testament lines up what's said in the New Testament. So now that I've finished my introduction, let's go back to Jude. No, I didn't finish my introduction. We're wrapping up here, so. Oh, it's okay. But let's go back to Jude. Remember Jude? That's where we started out. Here. And I just want to read the first two verses again. Remember, these come from, this comes from the book of Enoch. But again, it's in the Bible. This is an actual event of Enoch prophesying about the second coming. And we'll see how it lines up with what we were just talking about. It was also about these men that Enoch in the seventh generation from Adam prophesied saying, behold, the Lord came with many of his thousands and holy ones to execute judgment upon all and to convict all ungodly of their ungodly deeds which they have done in an ungodly way and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken to him. Just as we read in Revelation 19, Jesus is coming back. He's coming back with his holy ones, which we just read about. And this word here, many thousands, that we see here, it's the word myriad. We get that, or myrios, we get the word myriads upon myriads. So instead of saying many thousands, I think it may be more accurate to say millions upon millions of his holy ones as we come back to earth with him. And it says to execute judgment upon all. That word, execute judgment, the Greek verb, is the word krisis, krisis, which we get our word crisis from. Hence the title of my message, impending crisis, because it's going to be a crisis for all when he comes back to wipe out everyone who didn't put their faith in him. You see, the second coming is also called in the Bible the day of judgment, the day of wrath. Listen to what Isaiah says about it, just another book in the Old Testament that talks about the second coming. Therefore, I will make the heavens tremble and the earth will be shaken from its place. Sounds a lot like the seventh bowl, does it not? at the fury of the Lord of hosts in the day of his burning anger. Jesus is coming back and he's angry. Let that sink in. The God of creation, the God of the universe is angry. There will be no second chance. as he strikes everyone dead who didn't believe in him. He's coming to execute judgment on who? Let's look at verse 16. These are grumblers finding fault Grumblers being people who complain, complain against God, finding fault, blaming everyone but themselves, following after their own lust. They speak arrogantly, flattering people for the sake of gaining advantage. Just this brief sentence describes everyone who ever lived. How many here have complained, complained to God? How many here have blamed others when it was your fault? How many here have followed after their own lust? or flattered someone to get gain. And Jude, if we were to go back and look at the earlier verses, he gives other examples of people that Christ is coming back to judge. He's coming back to judge, and it's a day of dread and terror for those who don't believe. Now, I know this message can fall on deaf ears. 2 Peter, and you don't need to turn there, but 2 Peter 3, 3 through 7. says, know this, first of all, that in the last days, mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lust, and saying, where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it has from the beginning of creation. I like what John MacArthur says about this. He says, this is a ridiculous argument. It's like saying, I'm not going to die because I haven't died yet. just because it hasn't happened and yes the sun rises and it sets day after day and people here say it's just been like that since the beginning of creation well if we look at verse 5 and continue on Peter talks about that. For when they maintain this, that the days just go on like they have been, it escapes their notice that by the word of God, the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at the time was destroyed, being flooded with water. See, the flood happened. It did stir things up. We were living, people were living 900 years. We had dinosaurs, lots of exotic creatures that we have the fossil record, the flood record, that all went away after the flood. So it hasn't been going back. Judgment came and judgment is coming. Again, Jesus is coming and he is angry. Now there may be people here listening who say, well, if I start seeing people disappear or see rivers turn to blood, then I'm going to, then I can repent, then I know that this is all real. No, no you will not. The Bible is very clear about that. 2 Thessalonians 2, it's just another scripture, again, talking about the end times. And listen to what Paul says, the warning here for those who reject the warning of his second coming. He's talking about the second coming and the tribulation, the Antichrist. Here it is, starting in verse 11. For this reason, God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false. Why? In order that they may be judged who did not believe the truth but took pleasure in wickedness. When people start disappearing from the rapture, You're not going to say, oh, whoa, I was wrong. I need to accept Christ. I need to put my faith in him. No, God said he's going to send a deluding influence on those who refused to do that. Whatever that delusion may be. My personal thought is, with the way you talk about aliens, is maybe alien abduction. People aren't going to think it's a rapture, because I imagine 90% of the churches will still be around. Right? We've seen the false churches out there. Do not be deceived. God is not mocked. He will not be mocked. You, we, do not determine when we're going to put faith. I'm going to wait and put faith in Christ a month from now. I'm not guaranteed that I'll get home today. You're not guaranteed we'll get home today. You don't get to choose when you're going to repent. God has given us a warning, very clear, what he is going to do, and this is an act of mercy. In fact, if you're refusing to submit to Christ, Peter warns us, 2 Peter 2.21, for it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than having known it to turn away from the holy commandment handed onto them. So I beg you, don't harden your heart. Jesus is coming, and he's angry. Psalm 711 tells us God is angry every day. Every day God is angry. You know, I picked these songs, When We All Get to Heaven, The Roll Called Up Yonder. I love those songs. They just think about the future and what we as Christians have to look forward to, but non-Christians, think about that for the non-Christians out there. What horrible, horrible things. It's not when we all get to heaven, it's when we all get to hell. It's just the start of the torment. Their name's not on the roll. We as Christians are so blessed that God has chosen us and allowed us to be here and to experience this. And what's something to look forward to? Something to look forward to? So again, I'd be remiss if I didn't say, how do you escape the wrath of God, right? You might be sitting here listening, okay, you talk about repent and believe. English, please. Yes, that's fair. All right. We all broke God's law. Everyone here in some time and place has heard about the Ten Commandments, which is ten laws of God. Thou shalt not lie. Let's pick that one. Everyone here, everyone on planet Earth has lied. If you're saying I haven't lied, never lied, you just did. I mean, we all be honest with ourselves, we lied. And that one little lie, one little lie, deserves an infinite judgment of suffering in hell. You think that, well, that's extreme. That's just one little lie. I didn't commit first-degree murder. It's one little lie. What we fail to think about is who that lie is against. It's against an infinite God. Therefore, there must be infinite punishment. So that's the bad news. The good news, the gospel, is that Jesus Christ came to live on Earth around 2,000 years ago. Spent about 33 years here on Earth living the perfect life, never lying, always obeying his parents, living that perfect life that we could not live. And then he went to the cross. crucifixion and people think how horrible a crucifixion is and yes I by all studies a crucifixion is probably one of the worst deaths somebody can face but what Christ faced that no other person on crucifixion faces he faced the wrath of God that punishment that infinite punishment that was made for you and for me Christ took that punishment that we deserved for all his people all the people that would choose Him to put their faith in Him and repent. So what does that mean, put faith in Him? That means to trust what He has done. Christ has lived that life, He took that sin, went to the cross, died, and rose again. Believing in that. As simple as belief. We don't have any works. In fact, if you try to do works, You just condemn yourself. It's all about Christ. It's nothing but the blood, nothing but the blood of Christ that he died. And with that faith, that is what brings about the repentance. And you're not going to be perfect. As Christians, we still battle sin. We still battle sin. It's a battle we face until the day we die, and it's a battle. It's like the Bible describes as hand-to-hand combat. But what will change, they say, it's not perfection, it's about direction. Those sins that you so loved and cherish are now going to be loathsome towards you, and you want to change your direction. So that is my prayer. What we have here is a warning from God. In his mercy, he has given explicit details just on how he's going to do things with the judgment, his judgments in the Antichrist and in the coming of our Lord and Savior. which enters the millennial kingdom, and after that, the eternal kingdom. New heavens and a new earth. So what a glorious future we have to look forward to. Let us pray. Again, gracious heavenly Father, we thank you, Lord, for this scripture. Lord, we thank you that you have revealed to us what you are going to do. As Christians, we thank you, Lord, for the joy that's before us when we all get to heaven and see our Lord and Savior who gave his all for us. Father, we thank you for that. And Lord, we thank you that this is also an act of mercy and a demonstration of your patience to those who have not put faith in your son, Father, that you have given them the warning of what they need to do. Today is the day of salvation. Today is the day to put their faith in Christ, as we are not given the promise of tomorrow, Father. So again, Father, we thank you that no matter what happens here in this world, whoever the next president is, or whoever sits next into the Kremlin, or whatever wars or pestilence come about us, Lord, before you come, Lord, that we can still rest that Jesus Christ is on his throne. and that we have a glorious future to look forward to that. And we thank you, Lord, and we love you. And it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.