The End of All Things

Pastor George Dronen

Midland SDA Church

May 4, 2013

 

OPENING HYMN—462 BLESSED ASSURANCE, Jesus IS MINE

TEXT 1 COR 1:17-21

CLOSING HYMN—457 I LOVE TO TELL THE STORY

 

1 Cor 1:17-21 17 For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of no effect.

Christ the Power and Wisdom of God

18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

 

CORINTH was a principal city of Greece, in that particular division of it which was called Achaia. It was situated on the isthmus (or neck of land) that joined Peloponnesus to the rest of Greece, on the southern side, and had two ports adjoining, one at the bottom of the Corinthian Gulf, called Lechæum, not far from the city, whence they traded to Italy and the west, the other at the bottom of the Sinus Saronicus, called Cenchrea, at a more remote distance, whence they traded to Asia.  It is no wonder that Corinth should be a place of great trade and wealth; and, as affluence is apt to produce luxury of all kinds, neither is it to be wondered at if a place so famous for wealth and arts should be infamous for vice. It was in a particular manner noted for fornication, insomuch that a Corinthian woman was a proverbial phrase for a strumpet, and korinthiazein, korinthiasesthai--to play the Corinthian, is to play the whore, or indulge whorish inclinations. Yet in this lewd city did Paul, by the blessing of God on his labours, plant and raise a Christian church, chiefly among the Gentiles, as seems very probable from the history of this matter, Acts xviii. 1-18, compared with some passages in this epistle, particularly 1 Cor. 12.2, where the apostle tells them, You know that you wee Gentiles, carried away to those dumb idols even as you were led, though it is not improbable that many Jewish converts might be also among them, for we are told that Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue, believed on the Lord, with all his house, Acts xviii. 8. He continued in this city nearly two years, as is plain from Acts xviii. 11 and 18 compared, and laboured with great success, being encouraged by a divine vision assuring him God had much people in that city, Acts xviii. 9, 10. Nor did he use to stay long in a place where his ministry met not with acceptance and success.

 

We see from the Apostle Paul’s manner of working that he had success working among the gentile people, even the most degrading.

 

The experiment with sin has been going on for six thousand years and it is about over. Sin has reached a point were it to continue no flesh would survive. It is dangerous to live in this world. Men, women and little children are in danger and it is only through the mercy of God that our lives are spared.

 

We are not the only people who are preaching the 2nd coming of Jesus Christ. The air waves, newspapers, and TV presentations are filled with the idea of Jesus coming again. I “googled” 2nd coming of Jesus Christ, do you know how many hits there are, about 1,700,000.  That is phenomenal! There are hundreds of ideas on the internet about the return of Jesus Christ. This world is looking for Jesus. Are we giving them the answers to their questions? Does that make you to think soberly and want to live uprightly?

 

We have come to a time and an age when people do not know what sin is any longer. People look at their bodies as some kind of a toy. Something to exploit to see what happens if you do this to it. People live like animals, crawling into bed with anyone anywhere anytime. Children are being born with hardly any identity. Some have no idea who their father is.

 

Body piercing is awful. A lady born in Brazil has 6005 body piercings. People have metal dangling from every conceivable part of their bodies and think nothing of it. 53-year-old Vladimir Franz is a Czech theatre and opera composer and painter. He is also a candidate in the 2013 Czech presidential election. 90% of his body is covered by tattoos. He has so many tattoos that it is hard to tell what his original skin color is. Yet God says don’t do it, you are made in the image of God and don’t deface my sculpture.

 

Do you wonder what it was like before the flood?

I want to read from the MESSAGE Bible GENESIS 6:5-13 “God saw that human evil was out of control. People thought evil, imagined evil—evil, evil, evil from morning to night. God was sorry that he had made the human race in the first place; it broke his heart. God said, “I’ll get rid of my ruined creation, make a clean sweep: people, animals, snakes and bugs, birds—the works. I’m sorry I made them.”

But Noah was different. God liked what he saw in Noah.

This is the story of Noah: Noah was a good man, a man of integrity in his community. Noah walked with God. Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. As far as God was concerned, the Earth had become a sewer; there was violence everywhere. God took one look and saw how bad it was, everyone corrupt and corrupting—life itself corrupt to the core.

13 God said to Noah, “It’s all over. It’s the end of the human race. The violence is everywhere; I’m making a clean sweep.

 

America’s most dangerous city is Detroit, Michigan

The city that has the dubious record of the most forcible rapes per 100,000 is Anchorage, Alaska.

 

Can you feel the heart throb of a God who John says “IS LOVE,” crying out for His creation. I love you but you don’t love Me. You have forgotten Me and turned to another lover.

 

Feel the heart throb of Jesus as He sits on the donkey that Sunday afternoon when He rode triumphantly into Jerusalem. Than a few days later as HE leaves the temple. Matthew catches the pathos of Jesus in Matthew 23: 37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! 38 See! Your house is left to you desolate; 39 for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!’

 

There was nothing more Jesus could do for His people they rejected Him, they rejected God in the Person of His Son.

What is the gospel? It is the good news about salvation in Jesus Christ. But is our brand of the gospel superior to other brands of the gospel. What makes the gospel that we preach unique? What is different about the gospel of the kingdom that we declare comparing it to any other gospel that you might hear Sunday morning.

 

In Revelation 14:6-12 we have what we have labeled: THE THREE ANGELS MESSAGE. What is different about this message than what is preached in any Sunday church.

 

This is what the Apostle Paul came preaching. He preached a gospel that was for his time. Jesus Christ had come into the world. lived among men and preached the and taught the people going about doing good and healing all manner of disease and sickness. The Apostle Paul’s power was in preaching the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Read the Pauline epistles. “I am crucified with Christ.” “I am not ashamed of the gospel.” The world was waking up to what took place in Jerusalem when a man called Jesus was crucified and three days later came up out of the tomb. Unheard of, it was something to preach about.

 

Today we live on the other side of the gospel. The Word is going around the world. The world is in trouble. The world is teetering on total chaos. Crime, money, weather, you name it. The world is looking for the second coming of Jesus Christ.

 

What is the remedy? Is there any hope for planet earth? What is the good news?

 

God has given us every opportunity to be saved. God wants to save us but we won’t let Him. 1)We have rejected Him in the poor and suffering. 2)We have rejected Him in the outcasts of society. 3)We have rejected Him in the people who are sitting in the prisons of our society. 4)We have rejected Him in people living next to us. For thirty-three years Jesus lived among the people. For three and half years He ministered and it ended with the people saying we want Barabas crucify Jesus.

 

Today the world seeks answers in government, in social programs.

 

Everyone wants security. Job security, social security, health benefits, some kind of a safety net. Let me down slowly. Don’t tell me what I need to hear. Tell me what I want to hear. Prop me up just a little longer. See how far the rubber band will stretch before it breaks.

God called a man, Moses, to lead God’s people out of Egypt into the promise land. We live in Egypt and God wants to call us into the promise land. Egypt was known for wickedness. Remember the story of Joseph and Potiphar’s wife.

 

The descendants of Jacob needed a home of their own. Moses was the man God called a man eighty years old.

 

Trained in all the arts of the Egyptian world, military, arts, language, he was the pride of Egypt until he set out to do it on his own. Then he spent 40 years in the desert unlearning what he had learned and learning to trust the Almighty.

 

When God called him he was slow of speech, timid, he humbly plead with God to find someone else but God had His man and God called him and he lead the people.

 

They were in the desert, not in the promise land. I want you to understand that. God may have lead us out of Egypt but we are still in the wilderness and not in the promise land.

 

And before God can lead us into the promise land He has to get us ready.

 

God wanted to meet with His people. He wanted them to learn His ways. He said to Moses, “make Me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them.”

 

The sanctuary had three parts. Do you remember what parts they are: 1) the Courtyard, 2) the Holy place, 3) the Most Holy place.

 

This was a type of the heavenly sanctuary that God showed Moses on the mount. A miniature of the heavenly sanctuary, kind of like Sabbath School for our children. We have a lesson in sandboxes.

 

Where is the sanctuary now?

Let’s look at those three parts again.

Where is the courtyard? This is where the animals were killed. This earth is the courtyard. Jesus came to this world for one purpose to die.

 

Where is the Holy Place? In heaven. John saw Jesus walking among the candlesticks. Revelation 1:12 Then I turned to see the voice that spoke with me. And having turned I saw seven golden lampstands, 13 and in the midst of the seven lampstands One like the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band.

 

Later on in the book of Revelation 11:19 Then the temple of God was opened in heaven, and the ark of His covenant[h] was seen in His temple.

 

We see Jesus in the Most Holy place. The ark of His covenant is in the Most Holy place.

 

We see Jesus as our High Priest bearing the sins of His people into the Father’s presence now to intercede for us. Jesus pleads His blood, His merits in our behalf.

 

Both our title and fitness for heaven is seen in the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the perfect sacrifice.

 

The Bible says Jesus is a priest and a king on His throne. Our challenge our only hope is in Jesus.

 

It was a lovely evening when a man in well dressed garments made his way out of Jerusalem down the Kidron valley up the other side to a garden called Gethsemane. Jesus spent His nights here while in Jerusalem.

 

The narrative picks up in John 3. Rabbi, who are You and how do you these great miracles? Nicodemus wanted to know who this Man was. Was He the One Israel had hoped for.

Nicodemus knew he was okay. He was a member of the Sanhedrin. He was one of us. Surely he was ready for the kingdom. He was an elder in the church. He performed the duties required of him. He was okay. But this Man says, “Nicodemus, you must be born again.” Nicodemus knew what He was talking about but it was revolting to him to think that he wasn’t ready for the Kingdom of God.

 

Nicodemus, Jesus said, “the only way you are going to make it to heaven is to be born again.”

 

I ask you this morning, “Have you been born again?” have you come to the sanctuary to confess your sins? You say, “I don’t have any sins to confess.”

 

I am okay. Does that kind of rhetoric sound familiar to you? It should. It is addressed to this church. have you read this admonition given to us by the Lord to His aged messenger John on the Isle of Patmos.

Listen to it, I am going to read it from the MESSAGE again. You follow along in your translation.

Verse 14 Write to Laodicea, to the Angel of the church.  God’s Yes, the Faithful and Accurate Witness, the First of God’s creation, says:

15-17 “I know you inside and out, and find little to my liking. You’re not cold, you’re not hot—far better to be either cold or hot! You’re stale. You’re stagnant. You make me want to vomit. You brag, ‘I’m rich, I’ve got it made, I need nothing from anyone,’ oblivious that in fact you’re a pitiful, blind beggar, threadbare and homeless.

18 “Here’s what I want you to do: Buy your gold from me, gold that’s been through the refiner’s fire. Then you’ll be rich. Buy your clothes from me, clothes designed in Heaven. You’ve gone around half-naked long enough. And buy medicine for your eyes from me so you can see, really see.

19 “The people I love, I call to account—prod and correct and guide so that they’ll live at their best. Up on your feet, then! About face! Run after God!

20-21 “Look at me. I stand at the door. I knock. If you hear me call and open the door, I’ll come right in and sit down to supper with you. Conquerors will sit alongside me at the head table, just as I, having conquered, took the place of honor at the side of my Father. That’s my gift to the conquerors!

 

Doesn’t that make you want to cry? What scares me most is it sounds like Jesus’ words to Jerusalem in Matthew 23:38.

Dear people this is God speaking to His last day church. True revival will never come until we heed this message.

2 Chronicles 7:14. 14 if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

 

Have we caught what the message is? The message for us is this—we don’t have it. We aren’t on the cutting edge of what it is going to take to be ready when Jesus comes. We are concerned with ourselves when there is a world dying all around us.

 

Do we really want to know what it means to have eternal life? Then we must heed what Jesus is saying to us.

 

The Sheep and the Goats

 

The Son of Man Will Judge the Nations

31 “When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the holy[c] angels with Him, then He will sit on the throne of His glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate them one from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats. 33 And He will set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on the left. 34 Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: 35 for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; 36 I was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.’

37 “Then the righteous will answer Him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You drink? 38 When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? 39 Or when did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ 40 And the King will answer and say to them, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.’

41 “Then He will also say to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels: 42 for I was hungry and you gave Me no food; I was thirsty and you gave Me no drink; 43 I was a stranger and you did not take Me in, naked and you did not clothe Me, sick and in prison and you did not visit Me.’

44 “Then they also will answer Him,[d] saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to You?’ 45 Then He will answer them, saying, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ 46 And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

 

This is my message for us today. How do we respond? Just another Sabbath, another sermon, go home eat lunch, sit around, take a nap, or do we really take seriously the hour of earth’s history?  Does the precipitous balance act of the monetary system concern you?

 

We have developed the Training Center Church concept. It is a well thought out program not of human invention but gleaned from divine inspiration. If put into practice it will bring revival to our churches. I highly recommend it to you and pray that it will be carried out with every church member involved.

 

Dear people, there is hope. God doesn’t leave us hanging without hope. In the message to God’s last day church He says: “BEHOLD I STAND AT THE DOOR AND KNOCK.” That is hope. He, Jesus, has come knocking, asking for entrance. He wants to give us what we don’t have. Long has Jesus waited for the spirit of service to take possession of His church.

 

Don’t wait any longer? Time is running out, a moment as it were remains.

 

CLOSING HYMN 457 I LOVE TO TELL THE STORY