July 11, 2021 - Antichrists, Far, Near, and Right In Front Of You // Daniel 7-8

[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] you [Music] hey welcome to summit online if this is your first time joining us i just want to say welcome we're really glad that you're here in fact go ahead and pull out your phone and text the word welcome to 33933 so someone from our team can connect with you summit online is a platform that aims to reach people with the gospel and help them take their next step with christ so let me tell you some ways to watch and engage with us option one you can join the live chat on sunday mornings at live.summitchurch.com come connect with other online viewers engage with the message and even pray with a live host option two join or host a home gathering and watch on demand on our youtube channel for resources on hosting your own home gathering visit summitchurch.com next steps and click on service resources and of course our end goal for you is that you'd be investing in a local church near you if you live in the raleigh-durham area be sure to check out all of our locations at summitchurch.com locations or if you don't text welcome to 33933 to connect with us and we'll help you find a church near you service will begin in just a moment so grab your bible and notebook and get ready to worship with us today we're really glad you're here [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] hey summit family whether you're watching from canada thailand guatemala or right here in north carolina i am so glad that you're joining us today yeah and i want to give you a warm welcome to those of you that are the very first time today you're watching you'll hear us call ourselves a family and as a family this is a place to be known the best way that we can begin to know you is by texting the word welcome to 33933 and someone from our staff can say hey yeah we absolutely love our first time guest and pray that this is a place where you can grow as a disciple of jesus one of the areas that i'm personally trying to grow in right now is prayer i can tend to be pretty self-sufficient and then of course i wonder why i'm all stressed about the little things but i'm trying to learn how to take those fears and anxieties to the lord in prayer instead of just trying to solve everything by myself yeah kelsey it's amazing what god's word tells us about a prayer and that he hears us first peter 5 6-7 says this humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of god so that at a proper time he may exalt you casting all your anxieties on him because he cares for you like you mentioned we first humble ourselves knowing that god is bigger than all of our concerns and we are also able to tell him our worries because he cares so deeply for us in fact let's take a moment wherever you are to bring whatever anxieties you have to the lord this morning take a moment right now and let's pray [Music] [Music] [Music] amen i can give him my anxiety and he exchanges it for peace that's a pretty sweet deal if you ask me so in light of his goodness compassion and steadfast love let's worship him this morning welcome summit online we are so glad you're here to worship with us and this morning we have a new song to teach and this is how part of it goes no greater friend i know no greater peace i know no greater hope i know no greater joy i know i could search high and low any everywhere i go no greater river flows than you jesus sing with us [Music] [Music] i've seen many places and many faces i've come to know times i've celebrated sweet drink i've tasted they come and go [Music] but there was a treasure poured without measure over the earth [Music] a light that's so bright it outshines the brightest lights of the world the greater friend greater friend i know no greater peace i know no greater hope i know no greater joy i know i can search high and low any everywhere i go thank you my great inspiration heart's motivation still comes from you yeah [Music] no one more forgiving no one more healing no one more true your love is a treasure born no than you jesus [Music] [Applause] [Music] so with all my heart i lift you up with all my heart and with all my strength i'll lift you up with all my strength oh [Music] than you jesus [Music] [Music] yes [Applause] no greater love have we seen than the love that jesus has shown us there's no greater friend that we have than the friend that we have in jesus and god calls us to reflect that love to others in john 15 it says this this is my commandment that you love one another as i have loved you greater love has no one than this as someone lay down his life for his friends and we see that in the gospel that though we deserve sin and and we or we sinned and though we deserved death that jesus called us a friend he was a friend of sinners and he laid down his life for us there's no greater love that we know than the love of jesus he is emmanuel he is god with us he's a love that is constant a love that is consistent he is jesus and he is worthy of our praise he is worthy of the name jesus let's sing [Music] rumors of the son of man [Music] stories holiness with human hands treasure for a trainer [Music] the image of the father [Music] until heaven came to live with me i'll rescue like no other you are worthy you are worthy of your name you are worthy you are worthy of your name my jesus you are worthy you did not speak you made no sound [Music] you died for your accusers and as your blood fell to the ground [Music] you redefine my future for the king of jesus christ [Music] jesus [Music] you're my author my [Music] my refuge my hiding place is you're my helper and my healer you're my blessed redeemer my answer my saving grace [Music] jesus [Music] [Music] you are [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] you are worthy [Music] you your name jesus looking around at the world it's easy to feel defeated or in despair we aren't the first people to feel this way centuries ago god's people were taken into exile under hostile rulers yet god equipped them not only to survive but to thrive through the book of daniel god invites us to do the same shining like stars in the midst of the darkness well hello my name is jd i am one of the pastors of the summit church and i am not the president of the southern baptist convention and all god's people said amen to that and uh i will um i will tell you that serving um in that role uh over the last three years was one of the greatest privileges of my life uh to be able to uh support and stand behind our missionaries and our church planters in this way but it has been a long 30 years these past three years and it is good to jump back in now with renewed vigor to my favorite ministry role outside of of course the role of husband and daddy and that is being your pastor i never stopped being your pastor but now i can do so without as much distraction um the baby is supposed to do two years but then i got a bonus year because of lockdown and so here we are i'm excited though to jump back into the book of daniel so if you got your bibles i want you to take them out and open them to the book of daniel some of you thought we forgot about daniel after chapter six or maybe you just assumed that i was too scared to deal with all the weird stuff that daniel gets into in chapter seven and beyond and i am maybe a little uh the second half of the book is a bit bizarre uh it is a little intimidating daniel has these dreams about beasts and dragons and the antichrist and end times and let's just be honest i know some of you love that stuff let's be honest who in here is really really excited to get into these prophecies just raise your hand and identify i know you're in here um all right safe space who wishes that we just stopped at chapter six put a bookmark in it and said that's the book of daniel uh you put your hands up just be honest you will notice my hand went up both times i've told you the church that i grew up in capital l loved end times prophecy our annual prophecy conference was our best attended event of the year and our pastor made rapture jokes like there was no tomorrow now i've heard that there are two surefire ways to fill up a church one is that you preach on sex and the other is that you preach on the end times that always makes me wonder what would happen if i preached a message on the question will there be sex in the end times maybe that is something worth considering but today we're going to look at daniel 7 and 8. let me encourage you though in this for those of you that are a little faint-hearted not to be discouraged and to do the hard work of getting into this um 25 of your bible 25 of your bible is prophecy for every one mention of christ's first coming there are more than eight regarding his second so this is necessary and i think it's gonna be good i want you to recall before we really begin how the book of daniel is set up the first half of the book chapters one through six chronicle the adventures of of four hebrew immigrant teenage boys seeking to live faithfully in the midst of a very hostile culture and that is babylon where they had been taken captive daniel shows us how it is possible to not only survive but to thrive in such an environment these first chapters are written mostly not in hebrew which was the language of the rest of the old testament the language of israel those first six chapters i told you were written in aramaic which was the language of babylon because the focus is on shining out there in babylon well chapter 7 is going to shift back into the hebrew language because these prophecies are specifically given to god's people to prepare them for the future they're not so much messages for people out there as much as they are for us in here that's why we go back into hebrew these are dreams that are given to daniel you know up until now the dreams of the book of daniel have been given to pagan kings and daniel has been the interpreter well now daniel himself is the dreamer and the angel gabriel is going to be the interpreter my point is that these prophecies are for you they teach you how how you are to look at the future how how you've got to look at the future how you must look at it if you're going to shine in the present let me just say when it comes to looking at the future i would say that people fall into into one or two categories some people when they think about the future are just depressed i mean they're obsessed with the news they get mad at the news they cuss at the anchorman or the talking head on the news your whole mood your whole mood can be ruined by seeing the wrong thing on cable news in fact let me just ask consider this about yourself or your spouse about each other are you the kind of person who if you feel like the wrong person got elected as president you just you can't sleep or maybe you struggle with hating i mean genuinely hating those who voted the other way i mean you're like i mean i can't believe they're so blind and so dumb and they even call themselves christians maybe you spend all your time trolling the internet looking for people who have the the wrong views so that you can just blast them are you genuinely depressed about the world that we're leaving to our kids how many times do i hear that chur christians in churches say stuff like that like i can't believe this world we're going to give to our kids how are they going to survive or are you the kind of person who while you're worried about what's going on i mean where the world's going you certainly should be you still have a sense of optimism though about what god is doing you even find that you can love those who voted the other way you might strongly disagree with them but you love them what word characterizes your outlook on the future what word character is it stress or is it peace i share that because daniel's prophecy is the difference between those two attitudes we left off in chapter six when daniel was about 80. you're like man how old is he now well we're going to go back a few years to daniel in his mid 60s there's a lot of detail in these chapters daniel's dream has bears with and leopards with wings and and talking horns and a chariot with wheels of fire and you first read all of it you're concerned that daniel might need to be drug tested but but i want to show you that running through these details is a simple easy to follow stream in fact reading these chapters kind of reminds me of of the disney world ride it's a small world that ride in many ways i don't know when the last time you've been on it is but it is an assault on your senses everywhere you look there are things spinning and individual small scenes and all kinds of detail and different themes and sounds coming at you from every direction but through it all there's a river that's just moving you through and there's one dominant song that's being played and if you just sit still and don't lose your mind you will make it out and guaranteed you're going to be singing that tune in your head for the rest of the day to the point that you might need to go see a psychiatrist to make it stop right you know what i'm talking about that's kind of what reading these chapters is like so here we go daniel seven verse two daniel said in my vision at night i was watching and suddenly the four winds of heaven stirred up the great sea four huge beasts came up out of the sea each different from the other now beasts throughout the old testament are metaphors for world governments all right verse four the first was like a lion but had eagle's wings i continued watching until the wings were torn off it was lifted up from the ground said it set on its feet like a man and given a human mind now this is babelot the wings getting torn off represent god humbling nebuchadnezzar by making him go insane and you know grow his fingernails along and eat grass and like a cow for seven years after which he is lifted up off the ground and given a human mind which represents him coming to his senses and his conversion we saw this in chapter four verse five suddenly another beast appeared a second one that looked like a bear it was raised up on one side with three ribs in its mouth between its teeth it was told get up and gorge yourself on flesh this bear represents the the medo-persian empire which conquered babylon as we saw in chapter five the fact that the bear is larger on one side than the other represents the fact that persia was bigger than the the mede part of the empire and would eventually throw them out verse six after this while i was watching suddenly another beast appeared it was like a leopard with four wings of a bird on its back it had four heads and it was given dominion this third animal is going to represent greece under the leadership of alexander the great it is a leopard with wings which communicates the speed at which greece overtook the world alexander conquered the world by the time he was 30 years old the four wings and the four heads are a prophecy that when alexander died his kingdom was going to be divided between four generals all of this happened by the way verse seven after this suddenly a fourth beast appeared frightening and dreadful and incredibly strong with large iron teeth it devoured and crushed and it trampled with its feet whatever was left it was different from all the beasts before it and it had ten horns this fourth beast is rome who would conquer the greeks it is iron teeth which represents rome's incredible strength it's got ten horns now horns in the bible usually represent power the ability to damage i mean that makes sense right this is not hard it's not rocket science i mean raise your hands if you've got an animal that lives in your home you got an animal that lives in your home okay so what would those animals be i won't take a survey but i would imagine it'd be dog bunny hamster fish some of you even still have cats um anybody have a pet in their home with a horn typically the answer is going to be no there might be somebody at our alamance campus that raise their hand but we typically avoid animals with horns now think of what what what would animals with horns what would that be a bull a ram a rhino what happens when an animal without a horn like your bunny runs up against an animal with a horn like a bull well the horn wins every single time so these horn nations represent conquering nations see this is not hard it all kind of makes sense once you figure out the imager now so far this vision is tracking along with nebuchadnezzar's vision of the statue in daniel 2. i feel like this all feels familiar it's because it's very similar to what nebuchadnezzar dreamed of daniel 2 but now a new detail is going to be added verse 8 while i was considering daniel said the horns suddenly another horn a little one came up from among them and three of the first horns were uprooted before and suddenly in this horn there were eyes like the eyes of a human and a mouth that was speaking arrogantly out of rome out of rome comes a little horn this is our first prophecy of somebody you've heard of called the antichrist notice daniel says that this little horn has eyes like the eyes of a human they're like the eyes of a human they seem human but when you look into them you see something different behind those eyes let me just think here of one of those horror movies where you look into the killer's eyes and and you see something not human but something demonic he had a mouth daniel says that was speaking arrogantly he boasted and blasphemed against god verse nine as i was watching thrones were set in place and the ancient of days took his seat his clothing was white like snow and the hair of his head like white as wool his throne was flaming fire its wheels were blazing fire a river of fire was flowing coming out from his presence thousands upon thousands served him ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him the court was convened and the books were open here is god in the midst of all this calmly coming to take his place as the judge by the way i love that phrase the ancient of days it reminds me of a phrase that we parents sometimes use on our kids when when we feel like they're trying to pull something on us one of my teenage girls comes up and says to me dad say just for illustration purposes is there a way to get a dent out of the front fender of a car and i say what did you do and they say i never said i wrecked the car and i say kid i wasn't born yesterday now when i say that what do i mean right you track it my son comes to me and says dad just taking a survey how many hot wheels do you have to flush down the toilet before it clogs up and i know exactly what he's asking for and i say that then i wasn't born yesterday what do i mean i mean i've been around the block for a while and i see through your ruse we tell our kids i wasn't born yesterday the ancient of days is god leaning into the backseat of human history and saying hey i wasn't born at all so nothing gets by him nothing surprises him he never learns anything he never misunderstands anything nothing ever catches him off guard has it ever dawned on you that nothing has ever dawned on god he's the ancient of days that means that there's never been a time that he was not fully in charge oceans rise empires fall as they say his throne remains the same his hair is white like snow which means he carries the authority and the wisdom of the ages his clothes are white like the purest wool which means that he is pure he is wise and righteous all together without the slightest blot of imperfection his throne blazes in fire which means it consumes all before it he alone is worthy to judge the nations and that's what he's about to do so sit down little horns greatness has entered the room this is no game of thrones here there's no game at all god is in the room and the judge is about to speak you know how you feel you know you feel when a rapist goes free gets off on a technicality when you see injustice of any kind go unpunished in fact i would dare say that for some of you that's personal to you you got wronged by your spouse or your boss or a business partner who gutted you and it seems like they just got away with everything do you feel that sense of despair don't do that daniel would say the ancient of days has his book of deeds and he's about to speak daniel's very name in fact you might remember means god is my judge and that's not an accident that is a crucial thing for believers to cling to in the midst of babylon god has the last word by the way did you notice god's throne has wheels and they're on fire i mean how cool is that i'm like is this like a big tricked out you know monster truck maybe but what what what it's communicating scholars say is that the ancient of days is not stationary uninvolved in things on earth this is separated from us by a great distance no his throne has wheels that means he goes to where his people are and he doesn't have to leave his throne in order to get there verse 11 verse 11 i watched then because of the sound of the arrogant words the horn was speaking as i continued watching the beast was killed and its body destroyed and given over to the burning fire i continued watching in the night visions and suddenly one like a son of man was coming with the clouds of heaven he approached the ancient of days and was escorted before him he was given dominion and glory and a kingdom so that those of every people nation and language should serve him there's our messiah by the way king jesus his dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away and his kingdom is one that will not be destroyed let's move on to the vision of chapter eight because it comes at the same thing but from a slightly different angle and then what i want to do is i want to draw some conclusions for you from both of these visions okay chapter eight stay with me this time the vision is about a two-horned ram and a goat where basically the ram gets pulverized by the goat chapter eight verse five the goat came toward the two-horde ram and rushed to them with savage fury he struck the ram and the ram was not strong enough to stand against him my research assistant who is a duke grad saw in this a clear prophecy he said about unc sports demise at the hands of mike schuszewski the ram gets pulverized by coach k who was the goat he says i told him i did not think that was the main point of this passage though i certainly appreciated his attention to detail no the horned ram here the two horned ram is the kingdom of the medes and the persians and the goat is alexander the great uh again maybe the greatest military general that the world has ever known in 323 bc alexander was going to march his greek army against king darius the persian king and even though alexander has vastly is vastly outmanned he had only 35 000 soldiers to to darius's a hundred thousand alexander won magnificently um persia in that battle lost 20 thousand soldiers and alexander only lost a hundred and persia was on their home turf so it's talking about alexander verse eight then the male goat acted even more arrogantly but when he became powerful the large horn was broken four conspicuous horns came up in its place pointing toward the four winds of heaven and from one of them a little horn emerged and grew extensively toward the south and the east and toward the beautiful land verse 16 daniel said i heard a human voice calling gabriel explain the vision to this man so gabriel approached where i was standing daniel said when he came near i was terrified and i fell face down son of man gabriel said to me understand that the vision refers to the time of the end the shaggy goat represents the king of greece and the large horn between his eyes represents the first king alexander the great verse 22 the four horns that took the place of the broken horn represent four kingdoms they will rise from that nation but without its power get this alexander died in his early 30s some say of alcoholism the large horn in other words was broken when alexander died his kingdom was subdivided under four generals there ensued a vicious power struggle between these four greatly weakening of course greece's power by the way dana wrote all of this over 200 years before any of it happened it's pretty amazing in the detail of the prophecy verse 23 near the end of their kingdoms when the rebels had reached the full measure of their sin a ruthless king skilled and intrigued is going to come to the throne his power will be great but it will not be his own he will cause outrageous destruction and succeed in whatever he does he will destroy the powerful along with the holy people he will cause deceit to prosper through his cunning and by his influence and in his own mind he will exalt himself he will destroy many in a time of peace he will even stand against the prince of princes yet he will be broken but not by human hands so out of those four horns a ruthless small horn arises early readers of daniel see in this a clear prophecy of a guy by the name of antiochus epiphanes who's going to come from one of the four sub-kingdoms in greece and he's going to set out on a violent campaign of conquest for himself verse 9 says that this little horn aims his conquest toward the south and the east which would have been from greece's perspective egypt and israel the specificity of this prophecy is amazing because sure enough that's what antiochus epiphanes does and as daniel prophesied in daniel 8 he was ruthless he's been called the hitler of the old testament he murdered 80 000 jews upon entering jerusalem old women pregnant women kids he set up a he set up a statue in the holy of holies most people say of himself and made the jews worship him right there in the holy of holies it's almost impossible to describe the blasphemy and the offense that that was to the jews and we just think about it here in our church if we somehow saw that there was a communist invasion and they began to teach atheistic communism from right here and they had a an abortion clinic in the back and a sex slave trade and another part of this how offensive that would be that just scratches the surface of what this did for the jews scripture calls it the abomination of desolations then he made jewish people eat swine flesh in the temple he issued coins um in israel with his image on the coin that read king antiochus god in the flesh and then out of nowhere he developed uh what what most scholars say it was a stomach virus went insane and then died just like daniel predicted he died not by human hands but by god's hands by the way a lot of these events are recorded in the apocrypha which is that little section of books that catholics have in their bible between the old new testament you ever notice that ours is a little lighter and a little easier to carry around than theirs those books are great for history but they have never been regarded by at least for throughout history as scripture by the church they're good for history they're not but they're not inspired by god but you can see a lot of the detail on this stuff that takes place in that what they call the inter-testamental period the point is it is safe to say that antiochus epiphanes was the specific fulfillment of this prophecy but let me show you something that is really interesting about how later bible writers treat this prophecy because it will teach you what to do with a lot of prophecies in the bible okay two things here first even though the events of daniel 8 were clearly fulfilled by antiochus epiphanes both jesus and the gospel of matthew and the apostle john in the book of revelation who were going to live 200 or so years after antiochus epiphanes both of them used daniel 8 to point to something still in the future something that had not happened yet namely the rise of the antichrist in the final chapter of human history which leads us to our first point if you're writing stuff down number one many old testament prophecies have what we call an already not yet fulfillment for many prophecies there is both a near fulfillment and a far one and the near fulfillment gives you a picture of the far one and a lot of times old testament prophets are going to talk about both fulfillments as if they are one but they're separate think of it like this if you've ever been to the rocky mountains you can stand on one peak and you can look off in the distance at what looks like one mountain with two peaks but if you were to actually travel to them you would see that in between those two peaks that look to you like they're they're part of the same mountain um they're actually individual mountains that are separated by dozens of miles from a distance they look like one but they're actually separated by a great distance if you get close to him that's what a lot of old testament prophecies are like the bible presents these peaks as together but there's a near fulfillment and a far one antiochus epiphanes was the near picture of what the ultimate antichrist would be like the book of revelation the last book in your bible is going to quote the prophecies of daniel more than any other book any other books let me show you let me show you one more thing on this the apostle paul in 2 thessalonians 2 talks about the future antichrist listen listen to it listen to what he says and how he describes um the antichrist he's answering the charge that the end times have already occurred here's what he says don't let anybody deceive you in any way for that day will not come the last day unless the apostasy comes first and the man of lawlessness is revealed the antichrist the man doomed to destruction he opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god and object of worship so that he sits in god's temple proclaiming that he himself is god the coming of the lawless one is based on satan's working with every kind of miracle both signs and wonders serving the lie the lord jesus will destroy him with the breath of his mouth and will bring him to nothing at the appearance of his coming you see it that's all daniel 8 imagery a future antichrist is coming paul says and he'll do all the things that this antiochus epiphanes did by the way what's very interesting is that the temple the jewish temple got destroyed in 70 a.d and has not been rebuilt yet there's been talk of it but there's never been any follow-through the passages like this one imply that it will happen eventually and that the antichrist will aim for it and seat himself there just like antiochus did in a couple hundred years after daniel first wrote that my point is that the prophecies of daniel 7 and 8 are both behind us and before us antiochus was the first fulfillment and the antichrist is the ultimate one which leads me to our second point which might be even more important than this the first one number two in every age the spirit of the antichrist satan spirit is at work you've got antiochus over here an antichrist out here and in between them or a bunch of little antichrists watch this in mark 14. i don't need to turn there let me just walk you through it in mark 14 jesus is going to quote daniel 7 and 8 in his trial before the pharisees mark 14 the high priest getting ready to try to crucify jesus continues to question him are you really the messiah are you the son of the blessed one finally jesus says i am and jesus continues you will see the son of man seated at the right hand of power and come in with the clouds of heaven that is a direct quote from daniel 7. here's what's significant about that jesus took daniel 7 and he applied it to his situation you leaders of jerusalem he says you're playing the part of the wicked beast who blasphemed god and i'm the faithful people of god about to be trampled under your feet but it's okay because i trust in the ancient of days and daniel 7 promises me that the moment you defeat me that's the moment that i defeat you because the moment you kill me i the son of man am going to ascend into the clouds in other words even though jesus is in between antiochus and antichrist separated by several hundred years from either one he can still apply the principles of daniel 8 to his situation so again in every age the spirit of the antichrist satan's spirit is at work empowering some world and cultural leaders that's what the apostle john says too first john 2 18 children it's the last hour you've heard that antichrist is coming even now though many antichrists have already come he's like yeah there's there's one antichrist coming and he's going to be bad news but even now we've got a bunch of small antichrists running around at work against us so we can read these prophecies and we can apply them to our situation they help us understand the powers that are at work in the world help us understand what to expect from them and even how to prevail against them i'll give you just one example here chapter 7 tells us that the goal of the antichrist is to devour much flesh chapter seven verse five look at human history how do you look at things just in the last hundred years like the holocaust or the inhumanity of the slave trade or the abortion industry today and just chalk that up to human evil adolf hitler uh flunked out of art school and developed some nationalistic leanings and the next thing he's marching six million jews toward gas chambers there's something more than human cruelty it has the eyes of a man but behind it is something demonic i mean again church just think of the genocides in our world in the last 100 years just before the turn of the 20th century the turkish government troops had killed over a hundred thousand armenians living in the region in the space of a year then in 1915 the turks accused some of the remaining armenians of assisting russian invaders and said april 24th is what they called armenian liquidation day as many as six hundred thousand died on that one day many by the most gruesome means like having their heads placed in in vices and squeezed until they collapsed um you've got a 1919 when koreans protested japanese tyranny over their nation men and boys korean men and boys had their fingers passed over red hot wires toenails ripped from from flesh with pinchers some were flogged repeatedly until they died then there was that black friday during world war ii when japanese troops went through alexandra hospital in singapore bayonetti and all the patients and doctors and nurses and then tied hundreds of chinese hand to hand and with them on the beaches 1932 you get joseph stalin who executes over 10 million of his own countrymen and then starves to death another 7 million through enforced grain quotas then we've got mouse to tongue and pol pot and kim jong-il and hutus and tucci's and rwanda and that's all just within the last hundred years the point is don't you see that it has the eyes of a man but it's more can we not see satan at work today in the abortion industry or the or the myriad places around the world that oppression is celebrated and religious liberty or basic human dignities are denied the point is the spirit of antichrist which has the eyes of a man but is much worse has as its aim the devouring of flesh and you can expect that today and you can expect it in days to come daniel says verse 25 he will cause deceit to prosper through his cunning and by his influence and in his own mind he will exalt himself the spirit of anti-christ does two other things he questions god's word that's the deceit part and the exalts man he is at work in university classrooms and entertainment studios and newspaper offices and and magazines and and the creators of social media making people question god's word and then puffing up our obsession with ourselves you say well i'm i'm just questioning what the bible says about sexuality and try to find myself no you're not you are dabbling with hell you are exalting yourself and you're putting your thoughts above god this this is god's word this is god's word it comes down from heaven it exalts god humble yourself before it because what the antichrist is doing is he's exalting your thoughts of yourself and your reason over against that here's the bad news you can expect these things until the end of history history is going to get worse before it gets better and some of you like well jd are you trying to make me feel better this is terrible i'm not trying to make you feel better no i'm trying to tell you the truth but there's some really good news in the midst of the bad news too and that is this number three even in the age of antichrist the ancient of days still rules it's interesting to look at how all the events that daniel predicted which seemed so dark at the time how they actually worked out for the furtherance of god's purposes for example god raised up persia and they rebuilt the jewish temple they paid for it and everything something everybody around them assumed would never happen that temple would become crucial for jesus's ministry then god raised up greece and they united the world under one trade language coin a greek which made it much easier for the gospel to spread rapidly throughout the world through the writings of the apostles because there was a common language then god raised up the romans who built a system of roads that made it possible to transport the gospel from place to place paul's going to summarize all this in galatians by saying when the fullness of time had come god brought forth his son and all of this mess god was creating a situation that was perfect for the coming of the messiah and perfect for the spread of salvation around the world the point is god does everything everything everything for his purposes more good news that's going to be true of your life also the good the bad it's all for his glory he is at work in every disaster moving his church forward and moving the gospel forward in your life and your impact on those around you i read a story this week that reminded me of that it's a story of dawson trotman how he started a ministry called the navigators it's still around but it had a big impact on our church in the late 1930s dawson was working at a texaco gas station in lomita california he had just escaped going to jail and gotten saved in the process he started ministering to two young sailors stationed nearby who frequented his gas station just sharing his testimony with them and he told them that they would trust god that he knew that god would save them just like he'd saved him dawson those two sailors called two more sailors and they began to do this little bible study in the in the service station garage at one point he told them that he believed god wanted to use the five of them to change the world later he was saying his biography it was kind of silly it was silly i mean it was just for sailors and him none of them had any money um two of the guys he said we're coming more for the free food than the bible study and here he is talking about how god is going to use this group to change the world well eventually the other two get saved and these four sailors say to dawson they're like dawson if you will quit your job at the gas station we will donate part of our salaries to make you a missionary on our ship of course they didn't have any money either but but they're like come on our ship we've talked to our captain and he said you can start a bible study on there well six months later there's been a hundred conversions on that ship and there's twice that many meeting regularly on the deck of the ship for a bible study they called the navigators the name of that ship was the uss west virginia and just a few months after the bible study really got going the uss west virginia got deployed to a place called pearl harbor where it was sunk on december 7 1941. now that sounds like a terrible tragedy right and it was but all those sailors in the navigators bible study got redeployed onto other ships and by the end of the war there were 800 ships that had bible studies led by these navigators these young men then came back to the united states after the war and under the gi bill they were spread out into universities all across the nation and began leading bible studies on campus that resulted in the formation of groups like intervarsity and campus crusade in a presentation years later dawson um was talking about his what he called his so-called ministry success and he said that the need of the hour is no technique he said the need of the hour is just to believe that god is god and that he's the ancient of days and that he sits upon the throne and he will be true to his purposes at all times and all places and it'll be true to us if we're obedient to his will god's calling to us today he said is to recognize that in our circumstances as difficult as they may be as hard as they may be to understand they do not counteract the eternal truth that our god sits upon the throat what i'm trying to tell you through all of this is god is doing the same thing in your life i've been reading a book recently by john piper called providence and dr piper demonstrates that throughout the bible god is up to hundreds and hundreds of things in people's lives at any given moment and usually the person is only aware of at most one to two of them but he's working in all of them true to his purposes he's the ancient of days and even better even better daniel tells us number four number four one day one day he says the god who rules over the world is gonna come to rule in the world remember in daniel's first vision in chapter seven daniel said in the midst of the raging of one of the beasts verse 13. he says suddenly one like the son of man was coming with the clouds of heaven he approached the ancient of days and was escorted before him he was given dominion and glory and a kingdom so that those of every people nation and language and servant his dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away in his kingdom is one that will not be destroyed one day one day daniel says the god who is working in history invisibly is going to come to assume the throne personally and in that moment the power of the antichrist will literally evaporate in front of him paul said in 2 thessalonians that jesus on that day would destroy the antichrist and all his armies with just the breath of his mouth john in the book of revelation says he does it with just a word all daniel says about the defeat of the antichrist is that it happens not by human hands for antiochus epiphanes it was an invisible stomach virus that killed him what mighty armies could not do got accomplished through a microscopic virus the defeat of the antichrist doesn't happen to a stomach bug of course it happens to the resurrection of jesus which happened also entirely apart from human hands jesus was the messiah who came to the lion and the bear and the ram and the goat of the world's kingdoms with their mighty horns of power but he showed up not with a horn of his own he showed up as a lamb and he allowed himself to be gored by their horns of power but he was doing that to die for our sin through that death he broke satan's power so that the word of the gospel is mightier than all their horns of oppression and their chains of captivity so allow me to close with two applications okay one for the church and then one for you who may not yet know jesus for the church seeing the secret behind history may not keep you from pain but it can keep you from panic you may experience fear at times but you need never feel frantic the ancient of days daniel says is on the throne and the god who rules over history promises to one day come and rule in history and he's moving everything in the world and in your life to that end so be encouraged every step back you face is ultimately going to be used for the advancement of his glory the cancer the broken marriage the wandering child the chronic pain the frustrating lack of promotion in your job god's good hand is in all of that it might look and feel dark to you but it's all flowing by the hand of god it looked dark in that time period but when the fullness of time was come god brought forth his son when the fullness of time has come in your life god's going to bring forth jesus from all of it in your life also church we got something to do in the meantime in between antiochus and antichrist and that is we preach the word of the gospel we're just a dot on this great timeline we live in an age of mercy and light when god desires he says all men everywhere to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth he's given us his spirit and told us that greater is he that is in us now than he that is in the world than the spirit of that antichrist he tells us no weapon formed you will against you will prosper all those who rise against you will fall that all authority has been given to him and that we are to go and make disciples and in all the world and then nobody can stop us this is the age of the church it is our time to spread the gospel it's what we're supposed to be doing so that's the application for the church here's one for you who still don't know jesus personally or if you're not you're not fully submitted to him yet the goal the goal of our enemy through the antichrist and all the little antichrist is to destroy faith he gives satan gives the antichrist the power to deceive sometimes supernatural power to deceive sometimes you wonder why people who don't know god why they're the ones that are the most attractive and they have the most money it's because they are empowered by the anti-spirit of the antichrist which is satan's spirits and he is going to make it progressively harder to be a christian if you are looking for accolades from the university you're not going to get them if you're waiting for cnn or fox news or msnbc or the new york times to congratulate you you're not going to find it the world is going to get a whole lot worse before it gets better if you're not prepared if you haven't counted the cost if you haven't leaned yourself fully on jesus those lions and bears are going to chew you up and spit you out there is a reckoning coming that is going to separate false christians half committed christians from true ones the question is where are you going to be but where are you going to be in that reckoning if that scares you if that scares you then you can give yourself fully to christ right now today by admitting that you cannot save yourself and that you need him to do all the saving and then submitting yourself fully to his authority right now right now the question is do you want to do that for the church we go and preach for you you need to run to christ don't you buy your heads if you would at our campuses those of you joining us at homes [Music] throughout the triangle and even around the world if you're a believer and i often in this way but i want you to pray for boldness boldness to share your testimony boldness to do what dawson trotman did and just believe that god's going to do something amazing because that's what he's got us here for right now [Music] maybe you need to reinterpret some things that are happening in your life that feel dark to you and say god i'm looking forward to how you're going to weave this to point to the gospel if you're not sure and these kind of all this stuff terrifies you you need to run to christ right now he died for you to forgive your sins and give you his salvation to be with him forever the ancient of days on the throne if you have never submitted to him and received him you can do it right now just by a prayer of surrender and a prayer where you receive him as your savior [Music] i'm going to leave you here for a moment our worship names are going to come at our campuses or they'll come to lead here for those you and homes and i want you just to to listen to the holy spirit and let him write this word in your heart and then our worship teams will come to lead us if you heard this message today and you realize maybe for the first time or god's been convicting you for a while today can be your day of salvation this is no small decision and we want to help you and make sure you understand what god is calling you to right now if that's you pick up your phone and text the word ready to 33933 and someone from our team will be there to respond and walk you through this decision yeah and if you're like me you could use some prayer after today's message we need christ's power in order to live out our faith and preach the gospel to ourselves daily and to those around us so if you're joining the live chat you can click request prayer and a live host will pray with you right now seriously we want to pray for you right now and if you're watching on demand why don't you take a moment and pray with those around you or you can always email us at prayer summitchurch.com summit as we respond by claiming christ on the throne and at the center of it all take a moment to respond by either receiving salvation or praying with us let's continue to worship [Music] jesus at the center of it all jesus at the center of it all from beginning to being it will always be it's always been you jesus jesus jesus at the center of it all jesus said the center of it all from beginning to the end it will always be it's always been you jesus [Music] jesus and nothing else nothing in this world will do [Applause] jesus you're the center everything revolves around you [Music] jesus jesus be the center of my life [Music] jesus be the center of my life [Applause] [Music] it will always be it's always been you jesus oh jesus nothing else [Music] everything revolves around you you from my heart to the heavens jesus be the center it's all about you yes it's all about you from my heart to the heavens yes it's all about you from my heart to the heavens [Music] from my heart yes jesus be the center of your church jesus the center of your church and every knee will bow and every talk shall confess you jesus jesus jesus jesus jesus [Music] jesus jesus yes it's all about you from my heart jesus be the center it's all about you yes it's all about you from my heart [Music] jesus at the center of it all [Music] jesus at the center of it all from beginning to the end it will always be it's always been you [Music] jesus [Music] summon as you go this week remember that the ancient of days is on the throne and as we wait in this already but not yet we are called to preach the gospel summit your scent [Music] you

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Published: Sat Jul 10 2021