Billy Graham - Will our world end?

for our message this evening I want you to turn with me to the 21st chapter of Luke the 21st chapter of Lu that's the third book in the New Testament and beginning at verse 7 and they asked him saying master but when shall these things be and what sign will there be when these things shall come to pass and he said take heed that she be not deceived for many shall come in my name saying I am Christ and the time draws near go ye not therefore after them but when ye shall hear of wars and commotions be not terrified for these things must first come to pass but the end is not by-and-by then said he unto them nation shall rise against nation and Kingdom against Kingdom the great earthquakes shall be in diverse places and famines and pestilences and fearful signs and great signs shall there be from heaven but before all these things they shall lay their hands on you and persecute you and put you into prisons and bring before you before kings and rulers for my name's sake the disciples had come and as when is the end of the world what is going to be the sign of your coming again they believe that Jesus Christ was coming again and there was going to be the end of the age not the end of the earth not the end of the world that we think of but the cosmos the world system that is dominated by evil then there's a strange little verse one of the shortest verses in the Bible back in Luke 17 32 beginning with verse 28 it says likewise also as it was in the days of lot they did eat they drank they bought they sold they planted they builded but the same day that lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed in that day he which shall be upon the housetop and his stuff in the house let him not come down to take it away and that he that is in the field let him likewise not return back remember Lot's wife that's my text tonight remember Lot's wife now why would Jesus say a thing like that a strange thing for him to say remember Lot's wife I heard about two little boys they were walking down the street pushing two old automobile tires in front of them they just come out of Sunday School where the lesson had been on that passage and one of them said say boy that's really something Lot's wife looking back and turned into a pillar of salt and he said that's nothing - my mom replied the other boy she was driving my dad's car downtown and she looked back and turned into a lamppost now many articles and many books are coming out these past few years about Armageddon using the word I'm again you see it almost every week in your newspapers somebody's using that word a newspaper headline just this past week said is Armageddon year and the word Armageddon has come to stand as a symbol of the last war of history General Douglas MacArthur the American general in command of the forces in the Pacific during the war said mankind has had its last chance the Battle of Armageddon comes next and he said that 40 years ago and jesus said except those days should be shortened there shall no flesh be saved and then in 2nd Peter the 3rd chapter the scripture says the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise and the elements shall melt with fervent heat the earth also in the works that are therein shall be burned out and you say Billy do you think those things are going to take place well let's go back and study why Jesus said remember Lot's wife it started with Abraham Abraham was called of God he was a friend of God he was a great man of God he was a great man of faith and when God told him one day to take his only sign son Isaac and offer him on Mount Moriah he did it and he was going to offer him as a sacrifice and God stopped his hand in midair as the knife was plunging down and God was testing him to see how much he really loved God and how much he obeyed God and he to it all around the Middle East he started with her down close to where they Iraq the Iranian Wars now being fought and then he went to Haran with his father Terah and he went from there to Canaan then went to Egypt and then back to Beth and back and forth throughout the Middle East and he became very rich he had large herds of cattle and sheep and he had his nephew lot with him and his wife's name was Sarah but there's a danger of riches and the fluency Abraham became rich and the fluency often brings spiritual poverty and Abraham committed some sins before the Lord he straightened them out he confessed and God forgave him the scripture says in Ecclesiastes 6 a man to whom God has given riches wealth and honor so that he wanted nothing for his soul and jesus said it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to get to heaven now who are the rich people the people that live in Europe in America in the United Kingdom in Ireland in this part of the world are considered rich by the standards of many other countries of the world even if we have clothes on and have shoes on we're considered rich and Jesus said it's going to be very hard for a rich person to get into heaven why because of all the allurement of the world and because of all the dangers that it brings now lot also became rich Abraham was rich lot was rich and they decided that they would separate because their servants were not getting along with each other and so Abraham said alright Locke said if you want to go to the right you go to the right and I'll go left if you want to go to the left I'll go to the right you make the choice so lot look down and saw in the valley the well-watered Plains of the Jordan and then he saw Sodom and his wife and family probably were urging him and he chose to go to Sodom Sodom a wicked City you could take all that you think of when you think of Wall Street or Las Vegas or Soho in London or the Reaper bomb in Hamburg or the red-light district of Amsterdam and rule it all into one and you'd have what Sodom was in that day Ezekiel the Prophet once said behold this was the iniquity of Sodom pride Sodom was very proud they excluded God they were proud of themselves and the things they had done and then they were filled with bread it says and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters in other words they had all the things that they needed to give them Lygia in their lives neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and the needy they they ignored the needy and the poor and the oppressed of the world many times we ignore those of other races we ignore those people in Africa that are suffering from famine or maybe we don't ignore them but we don't do much about it not as much as we could do and God is going to hold us responsible and they were hoarding and committed abominations before me in other words they were proud haughty rich they had it all and they neglected the poor and the oppressed of the world and God said judgment is going to come and in Luke the seventeenth chapter as we read as it was in the days of lot they ate they drank they bought they sold they planted they built but the same day that lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all even thus listen to this even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed as it was in the days of Noah as it was in the days of Sodom so it's going to be similar to the days just before the coming again of cry yes I believe the Bible teaches in more than 300 places in the New Testament that Jesus Christ is coming back again that's the hope that beats within the heart of every true believer Christ was raised from the dead he is alive he is at the right hand of God the Father and he's coming back now don't ask me win because I don't know he told the disciples don't try to guess the day know the hour don't speculate we don't know but he left us certain signs and it seems to me that these signs are coming together for the first time perhaps in history since he said it all the signs seem to be there that the coming of the Lord draws near we don't know we're not sure but it seems that way because one of the things that he told us was that the Middle East would be in turmoil he told us about the pestilences look at all that's happening in pestilences he said the whole world will be in turmoil look at the Terrorism that's going on in the world and the tremendous military buildups around the world all of these things he said are indications that the coming of the Lord is near because you see the world would destroy itself if God doesn't intervene General MacArthur said Armageddon is next and he was right it could be next and it's going to be a different kind of a war in which we were led by Sir Winston Churchill or Roosevelt a general DeGaulle or all the other leaders this is going to be a war of total destruction if it's ever fought and God is going to intervene I don't think we're going to have an atomic war personally I'm just giving you my personal feeling I don't think that anybody unless he's some crazy man and of course there are crazy people like Hitler I think he became demon-possessed and if he'd had an atomic bomb he would have thrown it and a chain reaction could take place but I believe the Bible teaches that God has other plans for the human race I believe that Christ is coming again and the kingdom of God is going to triumph and those of us that know Christ and have the kingdom of God within us we are going to reign with Christ I'm looking forward to that day when he comes again and he said to will be in the bed one taken the other left to might be flying in an airplane one taken the other left now the road to Armageddon is similar to the road to the destruction of Sodom said Jesus now notice they had that false security we have a false security - we trust in our economic strength in our military power all of that could go in on just a moment Isaiah the 31st chapter in the first verse says woe to them that go to a pagan country for help and stay on horses and trust in chariots but they look not unto God neither seek the Lord they're not looking to God we're not seeking the Lord we're trusting these other things we're trusting in our dollars and in our pounds trusting in our military power and these things will not save us we need God we need to seek the Lord this is what Isaiah was saying and then the second thing they had a false sense of security but they were involved in sinful pleasure they had become satiated we - of that way we now want brutal sadistic pleasure so much so that one of our television networks executives announced he said this next season we're going to have more action under the covers and he said the violence is going to be more brutal people want more and more because you see the kicks you have to give them more for the kicks it's very much like the Roman gladiators and the games in Colosseum in Rome they had to get more brutal and more violent to satisfy the people and the Bible warns the tramping of the wickedest short and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment it's only a moment in time the Bible says in proverbs 14 there is a way which seemeth right under man but the end thereof is the way of death it seems right to go this way but the end is death God says even in laughter the heart is sorrowful and the end of that mirth is heaviness even when you're laughing sometimes aren't you sad and then when you pick up the papers and watch the news and all the murders that are going on and all the things that are taking place I hear people say every day they they just cannot understand it and then the scripture says that the people of Sodom were too busy for God they were too busy making a living and having all their pleasures that give any time to God and that's the way we are we don't give God first place in our lives God doesn't demand a legalistic system under which we live but he does demand first place in our lives he wants to be the Lord that sits on the throne of your life and controls your life and rules your life and that's why he sent His Son Jesus Christ to die on the cross and shed his blood so that our sins could be forgiven because you see the problem in the world today is pronounced with one word sin and the Bible says we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God we're all sinners we were born in sin we're sinners by choice and we're sinners by practice and that sin separates between you and God's so that you don't have the sense of fulfillment you don't know the purpose and the meaning of your life and you can have all these kicks and all these pleasure but it doesn't satisfy something deep down inside is crying for something more it doesn't solve the problem of your home it doesn't solve the problem of your unemployment something is out of kilter something is wrong there was a man that Jesus told about he was a rich man and he said I will say to my soul soul thou has much Goods laid up for many years take thy knees and drink and be merry so he retired and decided that he would go to Bermuda the south of France a limited Majorca someplace like that and retire and live in the Sun and that night after he'd made his decision he had talked to himself he talked to his soul because you see your soul lives inside your body your soul is the real you and he was talking to himself and he said so you've laid up all these goods you've got all this money coming you've got good social security you've got everything you don't have to worry take it easy that night he gripped his chest and there was a voice from heaven that said thou fool this night thy soul is required of thee that night he died he didn't have one hour to enjoy his wealth you see he'd put his confidence in the wrong place and many of us are like that here tonight and then they were guilty of idolatry idolatry that's the sin that God hates the most and that's the sin of the Western world today and it's the sin of the whole world Romans 1:25 says they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and they worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator now you know what happened they began to make gods and those God's if you go back to those days were largely animal now they were making those gods are those images in the form of animals because the animals were really the expression of themselves they felt like animals within and because they were animals within they made God's out of it and in Revelation 21:8 it says idolatrous idolaters shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone which is called a second death that's what the Bible says that's not Billy Graham I didn't say that the Bible says and anything in your life that takes the place of God becomes your God anything that you think more of and takes your time more than the Living God becomes your God and then the next thing that they were guilty of was sex perversion one of the last directions that a nation takes before judgment is this usually found in an affluent society not normal sex relations perversions of various sorts trying to find new ways to get kicks out of sex that's the full-time occupation of many people and you go to the newsstands today and you see magazine after magazine dedicated to that trying to find some new angles some new way now in the midst of all this place Sodom lived lot he had chosen Sodom to make his home and the scripture says that he was miserable and he was vexed you see lots trouble was that he had one foot in the kingdom of God and the other foot in a sinful world and he was caught between he wasn't happy in the sinful world he wasn't happy kingdom of God and there many of you like that you go to church you're a member of a church and you believe in God with your head and once in a while you read the Bible and you have a religious outward appearance but deep inside your heart you know that your heart belongs to the world the cosmos this world system which is dominated by evil many of you have a Christian heritage your parents were Christians you learn from the Bible in school and you are now a man or a woman of the world or a young person but you're never really satisfied with your relationship to God something's wrong something's lacking something's missing you know what it is maybe you haven't been born again maybe you haven't really received Christ totally and completely as your Lord and Savior and tonight on this last night of this tremendous mission is your night to make that commitment and you can do it tonight Nietzsche who said that God was dead where Hitler got many of his ideas his father was a clergyman did you know that his father was a Kurd Djimon and he ended up in an insane asylum and how many of those people just went berserk as they got older that tried to denounce God and talk against God the clouds of God's judgment were gathering over Sodom the day of their Armageddon was drawing near the Bible says that God in addition to being a God of love and mercy who gave his son for us and who loves us is a God of rock there are two words in the Greek language for wrath one is called thumos suddenly boils up and then subsides like a flash of fire for a brief moment and it's over the other one is are gay that's not a temporary passion that's there all the time that's what the Bible uses so much God judgeth the righteous and God is angry or gay with the wicked every day he's angry every day with those that are away from him and live wicked lives in Romans 1:18 for the wrath of God our gay is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in unrighteousness you may hold the truth but you don't live it you serve me with your mouth jesus said but your life is far from living it your heart is far from me how many of us live that kind of a life in Revelation the sixth chapter it says and they said to the mountains and the rocks in the day of judgment fall on us hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne and from the wrath the or gate of the lamb for the great day of his wrath is come and who is able to stand nobody the Bible teaches that God's wrath will someday be poured out on the world I know that people no longer believe that I know that a lot of clergymen no longer preach it or teach it but it's in the Bible and I believe it because the Bible teaches it Jesus taught he taught more about it than anybody else and we ought to be listening to it do you know it's an interesting thing to me that the people who are talking about it today are the scientists the sociologists the historians the professors at our universities they are warning us but we don't listen and somehow the church is just too silent on this subject because we're the ones that have the hope beyond the judgment we have both in Christ we have something to offer people a new day a new kingdom a new world a new world is going to be born a new heaven and a new earth and we're going to be a part of it because we're in his kingdom but Jeremiah wept over Jerusalem because he saw judgment was coming and he was called a weeping prophet Jesus wept over Jerusalem seven hundred years later and he said all Jerusalem Jerusalem how often would I have gathered your children together as a hand of gather a brood under her wings but you would not you wouldn't listen to me you wouldn't come to me and now you're in for judgment God warns Sodom and he sent two messengers to warn them but Lot's wife didn't believe but he did the best in just warned the wife said don't look back Lot's wife disbelieved and turned into a pillar of salt as she had been warned the wrath of God was poured out on Sodom and Lot's wife and Abraham knew it was coming and he prayed he said Lord if you could find 50 righteous people in Sodom would you say that God said yes forty five years thirty years twenty yes ten years but he couldn't find ten righteous people ten people totally committed to God so the judgment came now what is the lesson we learned from that statement remember Lot's wife why did Jesus say it first remember she was the wife of Abraham's nephew and she lived in Abraham's tent and many times she had seen the power of God and to whom much is given much is required you've been brought up with Christianity all around with Bibles everywhere with churches on every corner almost and you are going to be held far more responsible at the judgement than those people in China or someplace that never heard and then secondly remember what a wrong marriage can do she was a Canaanite and God had forbidden his people to marry these pagan tribes round about them how many men and women have been destroyed by marrying the wrong person who influenced them the wrong way that's the reason you should marry God's choice and then thirdly I think Jesus said it because we're to remember her sin it seems such a small sin but it represented something far deeper it represented unbelief over many years it represented rebellion against God on many occasions God in His mercy was giving her another chance and God said don't look back don't look back to Sodom Sodom is controlled by the devil don't look back but she couldn't help it her heart was still in Sodom even though she was escaping the judgment her sin didn't seem to be so great just to look back but it was something deeper inside of her that caused her to look back and then remember fourthly that she was almost saved they with the gate of Zoar the city of refuge you see in those days they had cities where people could run to if they'd committed a crime I committed murder until they could get their lawyers set and get everything organized because people would lynch them I'll stone them just with the drop of a hat in those days so there were cities of refuge that they could run to and they were right on the edge of Zoar when she turned and looked back and it was that moment she turned into a pillar of salt now the Bible says that Agrippa the Great King heard Paul preach and he was almost persuaded but he hardened his heart many of you are almost persuaded to give you a life to Christ but you're going to take a chance that you can make it without it some of you are and then fifthly remember that she was offered salvation Christ is the place of salvation and refuge it's at the cross where God poured out his love and where our sins were born but Christ he was made to be sin for us who knew no sin he took your sins and my sins he took my judgment he took the hell that I deserved on that cross and when he said my God my God why I'll forsake in me it was because God was looking not at him God didn't forsake his son he pursuit the sin that he became because of you he took the hell that we bought that we deserve she was offered salvation she could have been saved that's what they were trying to do was to get her to the place of safety and then 6ly remember that God never judges without warning he always warns we had a flood some years ago in the United States had killed hundreds of people in Johnstown Pennsylvania and they went up and down the valley warning the people that the dam had a crack in it and it was could break at any moment and to evacuate but the people wouldn't evacuate the dam broke one night and schools of people lost their lives but they had been warned and someday you will see this picture when you stand at the judgment of God and you'll know that you were warned but you didn't accept and then seventhly remember when God warns there's danger and delay the scripture says prepare to meet thy God don't put it off he that hardly is hard being often reproved shall suddenly be cut off in that without remedy come to Christ while you can now is the accepted time today is the day of salvation I'm going to ask you to flee to the place of safety they own this safe and secure place in this old world is it the cross of Christ and the open Tomb I'm going to ask you to do something that we've seen thousands of people do this week here in this stadium and in other auditoriums throughout the country I'm going to ask you to get up out of your seat hundreds of you get up out of your seat right now and come and stand in front of this platform and say by coming I want to be sure that my sins are forgiven and that I'm going to heaven I want to be sure that I'm in the kingdom of God I want to be certain that when that day of judgment comes I will not be involved because the scripture says there's therefore now no judgment to them that are in Christ Jesus if you're in Christ you'll never be at the great white throne judgment and you're prepared for whatever is to come in the world in which we live now why do I ask you to come publicly because every person that Jesus called in the New Testament he called publicly he said if you're not willing to acknowledge me before men I'll not acknowledge you before my father which is in heaven there's something about coming publicly if you've come with friends or relatives they'll wait on if you've come in one of those coaches they'll wait or you can bring your friend with you and if you start from this stand over here it'll take you two or three minutes so start now and after you've all come here I'm going to say a word to you and have a prayer with you and give you some literature to help you in your Christian life you get up and come hundreds of you no one leaving the stadium please at this holy moment as people are already here in Bramall Lane the number on your television screen is a number that you can call for spiritual help and counsel people are standing by now all across the United States waiting to talk to you so write the number down if the line is busy just wait a few moments and fall again they'll be there as long as the calls keep coming in god bless you as you make that call you know the night I came to Christ they sang two songs and I came on the last verse of the last song and I was a leader in my church a youth leader and I'm glad they waited on me we're going to wait on you God is speaking use a little voice inside that says you ought to come you come you that are watching in other parts of the world you get up many people kneel beside their television sets and make their commitment some make their commitment lying in bed wherever you are you may be at a bar we get so many letters from people that watch the television in a bar and they make their commitment or in a hotel room if you're in America Canada pick up the phone and call the number on your television screen and make this tremendous commitment to Christ this is the last night of this great mission the scripture talks about the summer being ended in the harvest past and you're not saved when it'd be a tragedy if this closed with all the effort that went into this all the prayer that's gone into all the organization that's gone into it and you're this close and you're still not certain how you stand before God don't you let this night pass without you making your commitment we're going to wait on you from everywhere there's plenty of time you get up and come this is the greatest decision that you'll ever make in your whole life tonight once again we are seeing the hundreds and even thousands of people who are leaving their places in the stands to make their decision for Jesus Christ as mr. Graham has told you this too can be a moment of decision for you and he'd like to hear from you take a few moments to write to him today or to make that telephone call let him know about your desire to commit your heart and life to Jesus Christ

Channel: Our Only Hope

Views: 764,551

Keywords: armageddon, end of the world, Billy Graham, Joel Osteen

Id: whA0T7rex2A

Length: 36min 52sec (2212 seconds)

Published: Tue May 03 2016