John MacArthur : We Are Near to the End

the prophet joel also was given a revelation of this very same day listen to the words of joel in joel chapter 3 verse 1 for behold in those days and at that time when i restore the fortunes of judah and jerusalem this is when the kingdom comes before that i will gather all the nations and bring them down to the valley of jehoshaphat and then i will enter into judgment with them there on behalf of my people and my inheritance israel whom they have scattered among the nations and they have divided up my people i'm coming to judge them for what they've done to my people israel so let them know chapter 3 of joel verse 9 proclaim this among the nations prepare a war rouse the mighty men the army that has gathered to fight against christ will be assembled by god god calls that army together and then of course christ defeats them in an instant let all the soldiers draw near says god let them come up feed your plowshares into swords and your pruning hooks into spears even those who have farming implements will turn them into weapons let the weak say i am a mighty man hasten and come all you surrounding nations and gather yourselves there bring down o lord your mighty ones let the nations be aroused and come to the valley of jehoshaphat there i will sit to judge all the surrounding nations put in the sickle for the harvest is ripe come tread for the wine press is full the vats overflow for their wickedness is great multitudes multitudes in the valley of decision for the day of the lord is near in the valley of decision the sun and moon grow dark the stars lose their brightness the lord roars from zion utters his voice from jerusalem the heavens and the earth tremble but the lord is a refuge for his people in the stronghold to the sons of israel this is that day and god promises to spare his people israel final verse of that chapter i will avenge their blood which i have not avenged for the lord dwells in zion vengeance from god and by the way god's vengeance will be absolutely accurate with regard to its justice because of his perfect knowledge of every evil thing i can't resist drawing you also to ezekiel ezekiel chapter 38. the word is so powerful because this is the truth but i just want you to hear the word hear from god ezekiel 38 1 and the word of the lord came to me saying son of man set your face toward gog gog is a term that refers to a chief ruler a chief prince of the land of magog magog a middle eastern identifiable country in ancient times the prince of rosh raj may mean chief the chief prince meshech and tubal further identified landmarks prophesy against them and say thus says the lord god behold i am against you o gog o exalted one chief prince of meshech and tubal i will turn you about and put hooks into your jaws and i will bring you out and all your army horses and horsemen all of them splendid the tired splendidly attired a great company with buckler and shield all of them wielding swords persia ethiopia put surrounding the nation israel with all of them they will come with shield and helmet so god begins to gather the forces the first identities magog and the cities that are associated with it come from the north the rest from the east and the south gomer in verse six with all its troops beth to garma from the remotest part of the north with all its troops many people with you this seems to be references to ancient syria and what we would see as modern turkey be prepared and prepare yourself in other words all around the land of israel the nations are being gathered by god they're coming to make war and verse 8 says after many days you will be summoned in the latter years you will come into the land that is restored from the sword whose inhabitants have been gathered from many nations to the mountains of israel from which had been a continual waste but its people were brought out from the nations and they are living securely all of them so israel is living at this time securely in the future and now god gathers the armies of the world you will go up you will come like a storm you will be like a cloud covering the land you and all your troops and many peoples with you thus says the lord it will come about on that day that thoughts will come into your mind and that you will devise an evil plan and you will say i'll go up against the land of unwalled villages what that means is during the time of tribulation in the future israel is living at peace they have been gathered from all the nations they're there they have unwalled villages because they don't need to be protected because the antichrist has made a pact to protect them but when that antichrist breaks that pact their security disappears and the world gathers to come against them they come to capture spoil seas plunder they come after what ezekiel calls at the end of verse 12 the center of the world the hebrew term is naval god sees israel and jerusalem is the naval of the world so god is gathering all these forces to come against israel and you can keep reading but just go over to verse 16. all of these people are coming verse 15 from the remotest parts of the north you and many peoples with you all of them on horses this is speaking of armament this is a war machine coming from all over the globe and come against my people israel like a cloud to cover the land it shall come about in the last days that i will bring you against my land again the lord is bringing all these nations because it's time for final vengeance so that the nations may know me when i am sanctified through you before their eyes oh god god is going to be vindicated down in verse 23 i will magnify myself sanctify myself and make myself known in the sight of many nations and they will know that i am the lord chapter 39 shows them gathering verse 3 i will strike your bow from your left hand and dash down your arrows from your right hand you will fall on the mountains of israel you and all your troops and the peoples who are with you i will give you his food to every kind of predatory bird and beast of the field you will fall in the open field for as i who have spoken declares the lord god and i will send fire upon magog the powers from the north and those who inhabit the coastlands in safety and they will know that i am the lord my holy name i will make known in the midst of my people israel i will not let my holy name be profaned anymore and the nations will know that i am the lord the holy one of israel behold it is coming and it shall be done declares the lord this is the very day of which i have spoken now in verse 17 of ezekiel 39 as for you son of man term for ezekiel thus says the lord god speak to every kind of bird and to every beast of the field assemble come gather from every side to my sacrifice which i'm going to sacrifice for you as a great sacrifice on the mountains of israel that you may eat flesh and drink blood remember we saw in isaiah 34 that the nations will become their own sacrifice for their own sins the consistency of scripture about calling the birds to feast on the flesh verse 18 of mighty men and to drink the blood of the princes of the earth as though they were rams and lambs and goats and bulls and fatlings again the dead have been their own sacrifice there was no other sacrifice other than christ they rejected the only sacrifice by which they could be delivered from the day of vengeance and they are the sacrifice for their own wretchedness verse 21 i will set my glory among the nations and all the nations will see my judgment which i have executed in my hand which i have laid on him and the house of israel will know that i am the lord their god from that day forward when you come into the ministry of the apostle paul in the new testament you you have paul looking at that very day 2 thessalonians 1 6 it is only just for god to repay with affliction those who afflict you and to give relief to you who are afflicted and to us as well when the lord jesus will be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire dealing out retribution to those who do not know god to those who do not obey the gospel of our lord jesus there it is the people that are going to fall into this judgment around the globe are those who do not know god and do not obey the gospel of our lord jesus christ they will pay the penalty of eternal destruction away from the presence of the lord and the glory of his power this is terrifying truth this is nothing to tamper with this is nothing frivolous all those passages are pictures and prophecies of final judgment which is exactly where the world is headed people ask me from time to time uh do you think it's near it's nearer than it's ever been and beyond that all the pictures laid out in scripture indicate that when the lord returns there will be global unity religiously and global unity politically and economically and for the first time in human history we are experienced that kind of global identity there is nothing prophetically that has to happen before the lord would remove his believing church and unleash the terrors of the tribulation described in revelation 6-19 for that seven years god will judge with a fury opening the seals blowing the trumpets and pouring out the bowls of wrath that all culminates in that final judgment when christ returns at the end of that period to destroy all the ungodly it's one interesting thing to note back to revelation 19 that in revelation 19 you have the execution in the 19th chapter although you have the tribunal and the court in the 20th chapter judgment will be described in chapter 20 verses 11 and following as the great white throne judgment but their execution occurs before that that is their physical execution multitudes across the world are drawn into what is called the valley of decision or the valley of jehoshaphat they're not there to make a decision they're there to be the victims of the decision made long ago by god the judge has already decided and this is execution day our lord saw this day and we need to hear from him look at matthew matthew's gospel chapter 24 and verse 29 but immediately after the tribulation of those days that seven year period the sun will be darkened the moon will not give its light and the stars will fall from the sky we read that in isaiah the powers of the heaven will be shaken and then the sign of the son of man will appear in the sky and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn and they will see the son of man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory and he will send forth his angels with a great trumpet and they will gather together his elect from the four winds from one end of the sky to the other so when he comes he will gather believers together with himself and then he will destroy the wicked go to chapter 25 and we need to look at this verse 31 when the son of man and this is jesus speaking when the son of man comes in his glory and all the angels with him then he will sit on his glorious throne that's what we see in revelation 19 all the nations will be gathered before him and he will separate them from one another as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats and put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left the king will say to those on his right come you are blessed of my father inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world and then he describes the work that evidence their salvation then he says in verse 41 to those on his left depart from me you cursed ones into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels verse 46 says these will go away into eternal punishment but the righteous into eternal life so there's a separation of the believers from the non-believers at the return of jesus christ the believers are gathered together to go into the kingdom in which christ will reign for a thousand years we'll see more about that next time but the unrighteous will be destroyed you say this is too much this cannot be true i understand that that it's hard to hear and i also understand that most people completely reject it so let me take you in conclusion to ii peter 3. ii peter 3 verse 3. and let me read you verses three and four knowing this first of all that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking following after their own lusts and saying where is the promise of his coming for ever since the fathers fell asleep all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation the assumption of peter is that people will mock the notion of christ's return they'll mock it and there's an argument from just sheer ridicule verse 3 mockers will come with their mocking that's the argument of ridicule and then there's the argument from immorality following after their own lusts they they don't want that to be a reality because it would cause them to be terrified enough to give up their lusts which they're unwilling to do so you have mockers arguing by the avenue of ridicule and by the love of their own immorality then there's another argument that mockers can give on top of ridicule and immorality and that's uniformity all things continue just as there were from the beginning of creation nothing like that has ever happened no divine judgment has ever come we've never seen any divine judgment hasn't happened in our lifetime there's no god there's no judge there there's just uniformity just things just keep going down the same path that evolutionary chance creates as it goes so whether it's ridicule or the love of immorality or some kind of stupid argument from uniformity mockers have some avenues to choose in countering that believers also have some arguments there's an argument from scripture verses 1 and 2. this is now beloved the second letter i'm writing to you in which i am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder that you should remember the words spoken beforehand by the holy prophets and the commandment of the lord and savior spoken by your apostles you have heard from ezekiel you have heard from isaiah you have heard from the psalmist you have heard from joel you have heard from zephaniah you have heard from zachariah and there would be many others that i could have shown you our argument is the scripture says this is coming the argument from scripture

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Id: SDLnpPYbBZ8

Length: 19min 2sec (1142 seconds)

Published: Fri May 21 2021