Sermon Cloud

The Jesus we've been worshiping this morning, he's coming back someday. And today we ask "when?" Now there are some people who think they've got it all figured out. When I was a kid, there was this book that sold millions of copies, 88 Reasons why the Rapture (a view of Jesus' return that I'll explain in a bit) will happen in 88. Man did this cause a stir. This guy figured out Bible codes and he had it pinpointed to the day. I remember sitting out in the lawn, watching the Eastern sky, convinced I was about to go to heaven. Well, obviously I missed it. He was wrong, but he was laughing all the way to the bank. He recalculated and next year came out with 89 Reasons the Rapture will happen in 89.
Tim LaHaye is convinced he knows a lot about the end of the world. He's a self-proclaimed Bible prophecy expert. He wrote this series of ‘fictional' books entitled Left Behind. But he claims this is exactly how Jesus will come back. He started out writing a 7 book series. Sold a few copies. And boy did he cash in. Hold up books. And then he released a prequel trilogy. And now, for $300 you can enroll in Left Behind Prophecy Course and become yet another expert in "Biblical Prophecy." They promise that you'll gain insight that your pastor doesn't have, because seminaries won't teach what they teach. You can come to your own conclusions as to why seminaries don't teach it.
My dad used to tell me, "Boy, if you want a crowd to show up, just talk about the end of the world. Everyone wants to talk about it, but no one wants to change their life and get ready."
This morning we're going to look at what Jesus had to say about his own return. What did Jesus say and how does that affect us now?
Matthew 24 Josh Vance Gospel Response End of the World mp3
Jesus' disciples in this story and the early Christians who would've first read Matthew's gospel wanted to know the same things we want to know - When are you coming back to end all things? and What do we do in the meantime?
Jesus addresses all of that in this chapter. There's so much here that it will help to break it down into sections and we need to discuss the literary genre of this chapter. There are several different types of literature in the Bible; letters, narratives, preaching, poetry. And to understand the intent of the author, you need to understand the type of literature.
Apocalyptic literature explains earthly events using dramatic images. The book of Daniel in the OT is a great example. Apocalyptic literature is written to people going through series trials. This spiritual imagery is meant to encourage people, to remind them that although things are hard now and evil seems to be winning - God really is still in control. Just hang in there, someday he'll come an rescue his people. Jesus is teaching here in such a way to connect his teaching into the tradition of apocalyptic literature.
It will also help us to break down Jesus' teaching into different sections.
1 - Events leading up to the great tribulation: 24:1-14
2 - The sacrilegious act and the great tribulation: 24:15-28
3 - Jesus' coming in glory: 24:29-31
4 - The timing of all these events: 24:32-44
5 - 3 parables about faithful waiting: 24:45 - 25:30
6 - Judgment parable: 25:31-46
Let's just dive into this.
1 - Events leading up to the great tribulation: 24:1-14 Just the reference, not the actual verses for the title of these sections
In Jesus' day there was a shared ideal around the Roman Empire, Pax Romana, which mean Peace in Rome. You could compare it to our war on terror, and ideal that said "peace at all costs". We'll kill whoever we need to kill in order to keep peace.
In Jesus' day, things were fairly peaceful. But in 70 AD (about 30/40 years after Jesus) a group of crazy Jews declared war against Rome. They wanted to secede from the empire and Rome smashed them. Destroyed the Jewish temple. And Jesus is predicting the destruction of the Jewish temple and the chaos that would come after that.
And at the same time, there was an outbreak of persecution against Christians. The Roman Emperor Nero was using Christians as human torches. And this terrible persecution caused a lot of Christians to give up and fall away from their faith. There was some serious fighting that went on, "the love of many will grow cold." Jesus is preparing his followers for some terrible events that are coming. But he encourages them, don't give up. The end isn't here yet, keep telling people about me.
2 - The sacrilegious act and the great tribulation: 24:15-28 Then Jesus gives a more specific description of the terrors during this war with Rome and the Christian persecution. Vs. 15 The Roman General Titus lead his armies into Jerusalem, walked right into their temple, into the place called the Holy of Holies, where only the High Priest could enter and in that most holy place dedicated the worship of the true God, he offered a sacrifice to a false, pagan God. Jesus says, when this happens, look out because Rome is dropping the hammer. And you'd better get out of Jerusalem. And both Christians and Jews got the heck out of dodge.
If you look in the 12th chapter of Daniel, you'll see a similar description. You see, the same thing happened about a 100 years later. Jesus and Daniel are making the same point. There are people who hate God and will do all they can to make life miserable for those committed to God, but hang in there, because contrary to the way it looks now, God is still in control.
And there is this spirit of evil that other NT writers call the spirit of antichrist. An evil movement that hates Jesus and wants to take him on but someday that rebellion will be put down. But we're still living in the meantime, waiting for that final victory.
And after Christians fled Jerusalem, rumors started going around that Jesus had returned and was hiding out in Jerusalem. But Jesus was forewarning his followers not to listen to those rumors. Vs. 26-27 When I return, you'll know. Everyone will know.
3 - Jesus' coming in glory: 24:29-31 Jesus then goes on to describe what it will be like. Vs. 30-31 In calling himself the Son of Man, Jesus is again referring back to the OT book of Daniel. Daniel 7:13-14 Daniel is describing what people back then called The Day of the Lord It's the day when God comes to earth to open a can on evil,he'll finally make everything right again. Jesus is saying, when I come back again, I'm going to be the one to make it all right again. Evil will stop and right living will rule. And the description of stars falling and the heavens shaking is a function of apocalyptic literature in describing how dramatic this will be. The point isn't will stars actually fall from heaven, the point is there's gonna be a major shakeup.
4 - The timing of all these events: 24:32-44 Jesus then goes on to describe the timing of these events. Vs. 32-34 As I studied, I found a couple different options for what Jesus may have meant in vs. 34. He may have meant that before this generation (those standing there listening to him) passes away, everything that needs to happen for him to return will have happened. So the possibility of Jesus' return has existed since the end of the first century.
Another option is maybe Jesus believed he'd be back before all his disciples died, that his return was just a few decades away. Now before you freak out and accuse me of dissin' Jesus, know that from the earliest creeds of the Christian church there's the belief that while Jesus was fully God, he was also fully human. Like any human, his knowledge was limited. God revealed stuff to him, like the fact that he'd be returning, but he didn't tell him everything. Which Jesus himself admits in vs. 36
But one thing Jesus was clear on, his return is going to be sudden. Vs. 40-41. This isn't a description of how Jesus is going to come back, people will just one day disappear, he's simply making the point that his return will be sudden. We don't know when it's coming. We don't know how it's going to all go down. But he's coming back. And it matters what we're doing when he returns.
5 - 3 parables about faithful waiting: 24:45 - 25:30 So Jesus goes into great detail explaining how we're to live during this time of waiting. Vs 45-46 The servants that are held accountable in this parable have authority over other servants. They have the responsibility of feeding other servants. He's speaking to people who know God and because of their relationship with God, they are responsible for offering spiritual nourishment to others. That's us. We who know Jesus are expected to share Jesus with others. And if we don't vs. 50-51 "cut to pieces" was their day's equivalent of the threat "break every bone in your body." There's gonna be hell to pay, literally. We'll be thrown out to the place reserved for hypocrites. Hypocrite literally means "actor." Putting on a show, but it's not real. You can say you know Jesus, think you're ready for his return, but if you're not sharing his love with others, you're just putting on a show. It's not real.
6 - Judgment parable: 25:31-46 And Jesus ends his teaching about his second coming with a parable about the final judgment. The sheep go to eternal reward, the goats go to eternal torment. The judgment was based upon how they treated the poor, the sick, the weak. You took care of them, here's your reward. You ignored them, no matter what you may have thought about me, you're going to hell.
Faithful living is not "well I'm right with God, so I'm ready." No, faithful waiting is taking every opportunity to tell people about Jesus and give to people in the name of Jesus.
There has been a tendency for people to forget that it matters more what we're doing when Jesus returns than the actual timing of his return.
In 1831, there was a new group of Christians called "Millerites." We need another group of Millerites. They were following this guy named William Miller. Miller claimed to have new insights into the book of Revelation. Whenever anyone thinks they can prove something that is happening now was predicted in Revelation, just change the channel. Especially if they're calling the book Revleations. And I will be preaching through Revelation this summer, but I won't be studying Tim Lahaye.
Miller figured out that Jesus was going to be returning on March 22, 1844. Thousand of people sold everything they owned and got ready for Jesus' return. But Jesus didn't show up.
But Miller realized he forgot to take into account year 0 between BC and AD so he recalculated for October 22nd. He had all these charts and graphs, proving his timing. By this time there were 100,000 Millerites. People were dressed in white robes, climbed up on roofs and hilltops to be closer to Jesus. Thousands came to Millers farm. Guess what happened, they saw a beautiful autumn sunset.
But about this same time in London, there was a group of people claiming that God was giving them visions and direct words from God, new teachings. A pastor named Edwin Irvin was convinced that all this cool new stuff was proof that Jesus was getting ready to come back. The Presbyterian church thought he was nuts and just being a trouble maker, so they kicked him out of their church.
There was a lady named Miss Margaret McDonald that was a follower of Irwin and a part of this movement. And on her deathbed, Margaret McDonald claimed to be seeing a vision from God. In this vision, God told Margaret that Jesus wasn't just coming once, as Christians had taught for the last 1800 years, nope, he was coming back twice. Once to take his true followers and once to judge the rest of the world.
This guy named John Darby picked up on that idea. Darby just started teaching this new idea that said the history of the world can be broken into 7 different sections. And he liked this idea of Jesus coming back twice, it fit into this new system he'd developed.
And an American named Cyrus Scoffield, took Darby's teaching and methods for interpreting certain Bible verses and he took a bunch of notes around these verse and brought it all together in what was called the Scoffield reference Bible. And these notes were intertwined with the Bible and people started to think that Scoffield's perspective was the biblical perspective. And Scoffield pulled all these verses out of context all to prove that Jesus would come back once to "rapture" his church and then a second time to judge everyone else.
Scoffield was teaching this at the turn of the century, but it took awhile for his ideas to spread. This idea of the rapture is dependent upon the world getting worse and worse, deteriorating until Jesus comes back and rescues his followers from this terrible world. But at the turn of the last century, there was a belief that the world was actually getting better and better and things would continue to improve and we were preparing the world for Jesus' return. New technology, great things happening in the early 20th century.
Until WWI. And the optimism of a lot of Christians changed to pessimism. The world screwed up beyond repair, humans are always going to be sinful, we might was well quit trying and wait for Jesus to rapture us out of this place.
Can you see the danger of this pessimism? Let's get outta here before it gets too bad. Although as Americans, we forget that it already is bad for Christians in other countries. More Christians were killed for their faith in the 20th century than the previous 19 combined.
We have to remember what Jesus is teaching us in the early part of Matthew 24, it's not about escaping, it's about infiltrating our world with the scandalous love of Jesus. In case we missed that point in Mattew 24, we're reminded again in Acts 1. Acts 1:6-11 The disciples wanted to know the timing of Jesus' return. But Jesus deflected their question and told them what they're to be about in the meantime. Don't sit around and wait on me, take my message all over the world.
There is a day coming, when those who incite wars will be judged. When evildoers will get what's coming to them. A day when death will be no more, no more pain, no more miscarriages, no more cancer. Jesus is coming back.
But until then, we comfort those in pain, we work to stop war, we develop new cures for diseases, we help the poor out of poverty, we tell people how Jesus will make them new.
And when we get a letter from the child we've sponsored in another country or when a friend of ours encounters the love of God through the worship here at Trinity Family, we'll discover something. In a way, Jesus has come back. He's active in the world right now. Through us! We are Jesus in our world.
In the meantime, while we wait for Jesus' return. Let's work, work and commit ourselves to transforming this world into the type of place Jesus intended for it to be. Jesus is working through us.
And if you have yet to make the decision to turn from your sin and commit yourself to following Jesus, then you aren't yet ready for his return. This morning we want to present that opportunity to commit yourself to Christ as we celebrate communion together. As the servers come forward to prepare, listen to what the apostle Peter wrote, 2 Peter 3:9-15b
The bread represents Jesus' body that was broken on the cross and the juice represents his blood that was shed on the cross so your sins could be forgiven and you could enter into a right relationship with Christ. And so you could join the work of transforming this screwed-up world.
If you're ready to commit your life to Jesus, I invite you to receive the elements. If you're not ready, that's okay, just indicate that for the server and let them serve the next person.
Explain serving process
While you're serving, you'll be saying these words to each other:
This represents the body and blood of Jesus Christ.
Now you represent the body and blood of Jesus Christ.
Communion
At the end of the millennium, there were a bunch of people convinced Jesus was coming back and the world was ending. All the disease, famines and earthquakes proved that the end was coming. Some were scared, some were just waiting.
But the morning of Jan. 1st 1000 dawned and everything was normal. The world hadn't ended, Jesus was still in heaven, computers were still working.
So the Christians that had been so scared or had been just sitting on their butts waiting for him to come back, they committed themselves to doing what Jesus wanted them to do. Europe was still suffering the effects of the fall of Rome and the centuries of the dark ages that had followed. So Christians recommitted themselves to rebuilding civilization.
And they committed themselves to spreading the love of Jesus by starting new churches. The 11th century was one of the greatest periods of church planting in the history of the western world. In early 1001 a monk made the comment that "the landscape was covered with the whiteness of new churches as though by snow."
We don't know when he's coming back, but we know what to do while we wait.