RevClass-12: WHY DOES GOD SEND THE TRIBULATION HORRORS?

[Music] welcome to our 12th class which might have one of the most intriguing titles of any of the classes we share why does God send the tribulation why does God send a time period when more than a fourth probably half of everybody on earth dies that's basically what we're studying in Revelation six to eighteen and you see that we've come to write here we're in this middle section of the book of the revelation because actually the second coming of Christ is the culmination of the tribulation so we're kind of right in the middle of the book of Revelation so as you see on your screen why does God send the tribulation this is our 12th of 20 lessons going through the 404 verses that are in the book of Revelation but they quote or allude to or actually give the the explanation to over 800 other passages in the Bible there's again the chart those of you remember the the two very important parts those you who are taking this for credit through the different Bible institutes that are watching this you will need to know this outline that's why I show it every time and it will it will come in all different forms on both your quizzes and your final exam and so that's why it's there it's also on the slide in front of you and you notice that I don't quite put all the wording on the board that you see on the slide like heaven I put and it's dwelling with God in eternity in heaven but basically it's for you to be able to for example on the quiz it'll say during the second coming of Christ in Revelation 5 would that be true or false look at the chart write false the Second Coming is in chapter 19 that's I mean I'm not trying to trick you it's just do you know it or not okay let's open the chapter six and actually I'm going to read only a couple of verses before we pray because we're going to be touching on them looking at the words in them but it says in chapter 6 verse 1 now I saw when the lamb opened one of the seals now skip down to verse 8 so I looked and beheld and a pale horse in the name of him who sat on it was death and Hades followed with him and power was given to them and this is only one of the seals the fourth seal and power was given to them over a fourth of the earth to kill with sword Wow 25% of the world is killed if you go a little bit later into chapter 9 if you look at chapter 9 verse 15 it says a third of mankind was killed now just for a second let me do I mean I wasn't a whizzo and math but 25 percent in one event in chapter 6 are killed and 33 percent in chapter 9 are killed look at this 58 percent now the reason I said about half is it's a third of the you know 25 percent are already gone so it's a third of the remainder so it's about half of all humans died so why did I read that text what an awful thing to read well doesn't that make you wonder why would God who said that he is the author of life he's a creator of the universe and he's not willing that any should perish second Peter 3 says why does he send the tribulation to kill more than half of all the people on earth that's what we're gonna study let's bow together for word of Prayer father in heaven thank you that you are with us thank you that as we've already seen in earlier classes every time we pray for your kingdom to come we're praying for this event not just your kingdom to come in in my life and in our lives but for your kingdom to come to end Satan's rebellion and so I pray that through this class everyone with a heart to understand your word and ears to hear that they would understand why you Oh God would send the tribulation in the name of Jesus we pray amen well that brings us to the next slide look at that what is God's purpose for disasters epidemics tragedies Wars earthquakes tsunamis massacres terrorist attacks and all other bad things you see on the screen it's an opportunity for people to change their mind about God that's what repentance is so why does God send the tribulation for the very reason that Jesus Christ told us hey I've already said that revelation here revelation this book is all repeated information from other parts of the Bible from all the rest Bible there's nothing new there's nothing first-time Greek term hey pox legume annoyed there isn't anything that is only revealed for the first time here what did Jesus say in Luke 13 you can turn there and I'll I'll track through it with you because this is a great passage for all of you they're gonna be teaching the Bible they're gonna be explaining the Bible that are going to be sharing the gospel with anyone and I think that would then cover all of us because we're all to go into all the world and share the gospel Jesus once had a Q&A and in chapter 13 it says there were present in that season some of those who told him that's Jesus this is Luke 13 one about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices well that was a horror story a group of people walking in with their lambs to the temple were killed by pilots Roman soldiers and the soldiers with their swords now he killed the pilgrims they killed the Sheep they were carrying so the blood of the pilgrims was mixed with the blood of the sacrificial animals that they were carrying so that was a disaster and jesus answered and said to them now this is this is the most unusual answer until you see the larger context Jesus answering said to them do you suppose that these Galileans were worse sinners and all the other Galileans because they suffered such things most people think disasters happen to people because there's something wrong with them when when like in Minneapolis the great interstate highway bridge over the river a few years back broke and cars plunged in the water and people ground immediately some people thought well you know if you knew there's probably something they did you know that fate got them or God judged him no no Jesus said do you think they were worse verse 3 I tell you no no we're all equally infected no we're all sinners no one has died yet in 42,000 people so far as of this morning that have died in the current kovat 19 pandemic that weren't going to already die because the wages of sin is what death but look at this I tell you no but unless you repent you will all likewise perish look back at your side an opportunity for people to change their mind about God repent repentance is a change about a mind about something that leads to a change of our action of our direction but it starts right here with our mind and God sends the tribulation to change people's minds about who he is that he is the creator that he did come to earth as Redeemer and that he will judge all who do not put their faith in Christ and then jesus said how about the 18 on that whom the Tower of Siloam fell and killed those do you think that they were worse sinners than everybody else in Jerusalem I tell you no and then here it is but unless you repent you will all likewise perish what Jesus said is indiscriminate disasters epidemics tragedies Wars earthquakes tsunamis massacres terror attacks and the tribulation are all to bring people the opportunity to repent number one lesson number one life is fragile the Lord your - in this word that our life is but a vapor and it just appears for a little while and then we vanish away number two death is inevitable though a few of us will be privileged to be changed in a moment in the twinkling of the eye at Christ's coming every other human on earth only has one thing to look forward to an appointment with death as it says in Hebrews nine but praise God Christ is the answer now you notice how I wrote that up here because I think this is what as as kovat 19 wears down and and you know it just becomes a seasonal illness and life gets back to normal in our world there gonna be a lot of people that every time there's a new bird flu or or a big tsunami or an earthquake or some other disaster or plane crash they're gonna go oh and they'll get afraid again you say oh why does God send the tribulation and all the other things that happen around us to remind us before we forget life is fragile were a heartbeat away from eternity of breath away death is inevitable because all have sinned and Christ is the only answer Christ is the only answer global deaths in 2020 with or without kovat 19r - people die every second 7,000 every hour a hundred and sixty-three thousand every day and 60 million people will die this year because death is inevitable because our lives our bodies are fragile so the purpose of this course is to understand Christ's wrath now remember one of the one of the attributes of God remember theologians have have discovered that there are 20-plus attributes of God this is God revealing who he is one of them most of us don't even think about is that God is revealed as characterized by wrath now you know some other ones the first one Aaron would say is love right God is love and you know the omni's you know all the omniscient and omnipotent and all those omni's but what about this one it's kind of like wrath God is a jealous God well there are over 20 of them and you know most of them you know he is faithful and he's wise and he is keeps his word you know that that that he's immutable that he doesn't change but but wrath and jealousy why does God send the tribulation because his wrath he's storing up against sin and he's jealous for everything that we pursue other than our Creator and if we want to understand Christ's wrath the best way to do so is to look at chapter 6 that we're gonna see today and this verse look at 2nd Peter with me I'm just gonna read it to you 2nd Peter chapter 3 in verse 4 and saying where is the promise of his coming for since the father's fell asleep all things continue as they were from the beginning who's talking verse 3 of chapter 3 scoffers will come in the last days walking according to their own lusts see God's wrath is because he hears all that scoffing he sees all that sin he so loved that he sent the answer Jesus Christ he is so powerful and so president so knowing but he has a jealous God who because of his justice and mercy will always punish sin revelation 6 opens with a period known in the Bible as the Great Tribulation and to some hearing talk about the impending arrival of tribulation that the world has never known makes them think it's another science fiction story a delusion of alarmist Christians and the scoffers oft and mockingly asked where is the promise of his coming everything's been going on since the beginning of creation why is God delaying well the reason God is delaying is the mystery of God's patience that's another thing about God he's very patient in his attributes well let's see what is going to happen on this world this chart you see on the slides again is a kind of a visual but I want you to see the flow of the book Christ Church is on earth because God loves so much that he wants all of us in the church to go into all the world and share the gospel and tell people your life is fragile and and that's a great way to witness I sure the gospel often with people and I say and I've done this it's it's terrible that I do this but I if if the setting is right like I remember I was at a we're having our car fixed we were in Minnesota visiting my son and we were in this big cavernous garage where they were checking in and the man with his iPad came up all chipper and he says checking in your car miss Bernette and we got to talk and he was kind of friendly so I said hey I asked you something so sure and he tucked the iPad under his arm here and I said hey if this big steel beam that's holding this building up crushed you you know fell down and crushed you right now do you know where you'd spend eternity and he looked right at me then he went you know he hadn't thought of that thing falling and he kind of took a step over out from under it and said oh why do you ask and I pulled out my track out of my wallet and shared the gospel with him and it was just a about a three-minute little blip I want people to realize their life is fragile I want them to realize it might not be that big steel beam falling but life is so fragile the death is inevitable and Jesus Christ is the only answer that's why we're here on earth but then we leave the earth in the doctrine called the harpazo is the greek word the rapture that's the latin word where christ takes his church out promised in all those verses you see on the screen while we're in heaven we give an account for member the shopping cart that we come up and put into the river of fire and whatever doesn't burn up we receive from Christ as our crown and that launches the tribulation the tribulation ends with the second coming of Jesus Christ his establishment as ruler sitting on the throne was father David but even in a perfect world the final rebellion takes place and the great white throne and then dwelling with God forever in heaven that's that's the lesson that we see of the patience of God he works with the church on earth while the church is in heaven he sends in the tribulation time the 144,000 the two witnesses he sends the angel preaching the gospel at the height of of the horrors he's offering salvation because God so loves that he gave Christ is the answer now chapter 6 I just want to go through the first verse with you one word at a time and I want you to learn a lesson and remember I remind you you should watch the video that's available with your course that talks about how to do your devotional journal where you summarize one chapter of the book of Revelation where you write down all the lessons those are the true the principal's all of the the doctrines you see in there and then you write a prayer where you apply those truths to your life remember that's the devotional method that's the that's your biggest project for those of you taking credit is 60% doing each of the 22 chapters finding summarizing what chapter 1 is about I've told you so many times it's it's when Christ reveals yourself to John and Patmos and what lessons do you see there and then you do that for every chapter you find all of the truths and principles and then this is the hardest part you write that application prayer let me show you how to do that in one verse so this will be easy when you get to chapter 6 all of you doing this for credit you'll already know what to write okay there are 29 words and we need to ponder every one of them in this this chapter here I mean in this verse truth number one now I saw those are the first three words this first you know what that means one of the keys that unlocks the events of tribute the tribulation is John's personal testimony his use of the phrase now I saw in English comes from a greek phrase kai aden literally I saw God directs and inspires John to use that phrase all the way through the book of Revelation this phrase shows us the chronological progression John as walkie says now I saw and he walks a little further now I saw walk slow further now I saw he's transported by the angel now I saw in fact that term that phrase is twenty four times chapter 6 verse 1 verse 2 verse 5 verse 8 verse 12 chapter 7 verse 2 chapter 8 verse 2 and verse 13 chapter 9 110 113 113 11 and all the way through through chapter 20 verse 11 it's a chronological progression just like this from chapter 1 all the way through the ending now I saw means on the screen that the events of Revelation are presented like one long chronological event never forget that their people say oh no no no you know this can't mean this you know this belongs there and now this is over there no no God gave us a movie it's like a shooting script and you get to read it truth number two when the lamb opened the next four words no other book in the Bible is introduced and given as a revelation about Jesus Christ but what is it exactly that God tells us he gave this church I read this book 4 verse 1 of chapter 1 for the church as we read we find Jesus as the risen Savior he's the glorified son but that's not all he's the Alpha and Omega verse 5 of chapter 1 he's the beginning in the end verse 8 he is the Almighty verse 8 the first and the last basically this book reveals that Jesus is the central character not the beasts not the seals not the demons from the pit not the Antichrist not anything but Christ he is the central character the lamb opened its the lamb right here that opens the first seal that goes through the seventh seal which when its open starts the seven trumpets and when the seventh trumpet sounds the seven bowls every event in Revelation is tied to the central character and that's Jesus Christ truth number three look at the next four words one of the seals when we looked at chapter four a few days back we saw God seated on the throne in heaven then in Chapter five we saw scroll in his right hand with seven seals the seals of the scroll couldn't be opened by anyone but the risen Savior the crucified creator that's now allowed to start the conquest see that's what we're studying here the lamb that was slain is starting the conquest back of planet Earth from the rebellion from Satan one of the seals truth number 3 reveals that God bases all of the tribulation judgments on the reality of his title deed to the universe as the creator and the owner see the the scene in chapter 5 is God's sitting on the throne and the seal is sitting there right next to his right hand and he picks up that seal and hands it to the Lamb Jesus Christ the central character and that is after the Lamb shows himself to John inspects the churches leads the worship of the saints in heaven and right here in chapter 6 takes that scroll from the hand of the Majesty on high and starts breaking those seven seals which launches this entire horror show truth number four and I heard the book of Revelation identifies the writer is John the Apostle four times John is called the writer of this book in chapter 1 verse 1 chapter 1 verse 4 chapter 1 verse 9 and all the way at the end in chapter 22 and verse 8 so from beginning to end the whole book is is authenticated as coming through the messenger John the Apostle the early church universally taught that the same John who is Christ apostle wrote a gospel three epistles and revelation according to church history the book of Revelation was written in the last decade of the first century basically Revelation was written somewhere around 94 to 96 about AD because John was exiled to Thailand by de mission and Domitian's reign ends here and so John is still in exile by Domitian and so before 96 God used John to write the book of Revelation so John is old he's a prisoner up atmos he's banished for his bold preaching that's what verse 9 says and and I heard is a reminder that John the Apostle personally witnessed these events okay truth number five the next thing we see is and one of the four living creatures said with a loud voice like thunder whoa now that takes us right back to here what creature we're talking about those does four cherubim that then are always circling the throne we're talking about the scene of the throne of God in heaven and one of the four living creatures with a voice like thunder emphasizes God's judgment always issues from another one of his attributes God is holy in fact that's the most emphasized of all the attributes it's the only one that comes to us in a triple form which is the ultimate emphasis so God's judgment his his wrath in his jealousy flow from His Holiness Wow truth number six the last one from the first verse last three words of it come and see that states to us that God wants us to know his plans so he asked John to share those plans with us we are allowed to see what no Old Testament prophet ever understood Peter tells us they searched then they tried to figure out and they they never saw the difference between the first coming of Christ and the second coming and finally John is allowed to explain that so basically we could say this the first verse 29 words say six truths to us now I saw it's one long chronological event when the lamb opened Jesus is a central character one of the seals the judgments are in reality the creator and owner of the verse claiming the title deed and I heard John witness these events one of the four living creatures saying with a voice like thunder god's judgment always issues from his holiness come and see God wants us to know his plans now look at this next slide I have on that screen basically what I'm showing you here the book of Revelation is kind of like one of those stacked doll sets I remember when we went to Russia they were called mystical dolls or something and you you bought this big doll and a wooden dowel or or plastic and you lift the lid off and there's another just a little bit smaller on the side you go it's a little different so you take that one out and put the head on this one and the second one you lift the head off and there's another one and the more you pay for it the more interconnected kind of nested dolls there are inside of the original one that's kind of what the book of Revelation is like the book of the revelation starts with this title deed taken from the right hand of the Majesty on high by the Lamb of God with seven seals remember it's kind of like a roll of paper towel and you couldn't start the roll until you broke the first seal and when the lamb broke that seal it starts those judgments but what's interesting is when you get to the seventh seal in chapter eight verse one the seventh seal actually launches the first trumpet see this this launches this and the seven trumpets one two three four five six and the seventh trumpet launches the first Bowl so it's like they're interconnected all issuing from the holiness of God exhibited in his wrath after demonstrating his patient love and all of that issues into this mega destruction revelation 68 we see seven seals then come to seven trumpets in eight through eleven then the seven bowls in chapter 16 basically you see that we could say that the first three and a half years of the tribulation would be about here so it's the idea of 42 months here from the seals and then in rapid succession from the midpoint another 42 months three and a half years to the ending and so everything about the book of Revelation is is amazingly symmetrical seven seals seven trumpets seven bulls seven years in two halves 42 months 42 months to bring the culmination of the second coming of Christ and his rule on earth let's talk now about some of the things that everybody has heard in Revelation those seals in chapter 6 the first two verses is the Conqueror what we see in the beginning of the tribulation in this first seal is what you see on that slide and the far left the white horse and the one who's coming a crown was given to him and he went to conquer and conquer verses 1 and 2 say the second seal of the seven seals is the conflict on earth peace is taken and people kill one another and a great sword so there's a lot of unrest on the earth that the launch of the tribulation the third seal is scarcity starting in verse 5 it's the black horse you see the third one there from the left and the black horse had a pair of scales and he's talking about the starvation scarcity of food the fourth seal which we already read starts in verse 7 and he's The Pale Horse and that's with that fourth seal right here is is what we see happening with the beginning of the massacre that's going on in the earth and so that is very very much likely happen as you saw in my little diagram in the first half of the tribulation of 4th of the people but what's interesting is as we'll see in a moment how they died and it says they they died through theron which are kind of savage vicious beasts and and some people thought hmm you mean lions tigers snakes well it's interesting this word is also very much used for microscopic and even smaller than microscopic as in viruses as in what we're seeing and most thing that covin 19 it's just a foretaste I mean to have millions of people infected in such a short period of time just think when a fourth of the earth is infected the fifth seal is the cry of martyrs and we saw yesterday in our class about the the virus contact tagging that's going on with Apple and and with Google well there's going to come a time when the Antichrist who shows up in the tribulation is going to use the the ability we have with computers to actually hunt down and that fifth seal is martyrdom of every believer II can find either you deny Christ or you're a martyr the sixth seal is interesting starting in verse 12 of chapter 6 it says there was a great earthquake the Sun becomes black as sackcloth of hair the moon becomes like blood stars of heaven fall the earth the sky recedes Wow what's going on here well it's basically a cosmic earthquake in which in this series of events 60% of people died now what are some of the things that God says well one thing we see from all this is in escapable climate change is coming I think I hear on the news every day that oh you know the a footprint for this or the methane gas for that in fact this morning I was reading the bridge paper and they said that they developed a little masks go over the nose of every cow and they're putting one of those masks on every cow in England because they want to cut methane production by a certain percentage to save the world from climate change God says inescapable climate change is coming God said that plants and animals will be decimated the ocean lakes and rivers will be poisoned the air will become so polluted it'll be deadly and solar flares and meteor showers are going to become lethal but for us we come back to this why does God send the tribulation for believers it's the inexplicable mystery of why God has waited so long to stop evil you see in chapter 19 what happens is Jesus comes and when he comes he writes all wrongs there no one escapes there's going to be no one that gets away you know how we have people that a technicality they're cases thrown out and they committed some heinous murder but you know there is a technicality in the tribe and they're released guess what the second coming of Christ is that the justice the holiness the all-knowing god of wrath that loved so much he writes all wrongs God seemingly just looks on over the centuries as missionaries are slain and churches are burned to the ground and millions and millions of people are oppressed and living in despair apparently God doesn't intervene he doesn't say anything he doesn't do anything sin just develops and goes on the mystery is why does God delay well somewhere beyond the starry skies there's a herald angel with a trumpet and by the decree of the Lord God Almighty there's a day an hour and a moment when Christ will return it's kicked off by the tribulation it's culminated by the judge who writes all wrongs returning let me give you an overview of the end of days in Revelation chapter 6 starts the judgments by the sixth seal that takes place in Revelation 6:12 2:17 we have an earthquake God sends such a big earthquake in 617 at the end of this chapter the Sun becomes black as sackcloth the moon kind of gets a tinge because the atmosphere is so full of dust like blood and meteors start falling now just imagine as these scenes flash by do you know what the people on earth are going to feel like let me read verse 15 with you for just a moment and think about watching this happen chapter 6 verse 15 and the kings and the rich men of Earth the great men the rich men and the commanders the mighty man every slave every free hide themselves in caves and in the rocks of the mountains and they say to the mountains and the rocks fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath for the great day of his wrath has come whoa we just went through these six seals and they say the great day is is coming what I like to say is revelation 6 through 8 it's like a movie trailer each of the disasters is only a preview of the devastating fire of God which he said thousands of years ago he's going to destroy the heavens and the earth this this beginning these seals we see starting in chapter 6 are followed by even more devastation are followed by even greater devastation that culminates here amazing to think about John sees angelic creatures falling like beer meteors to the Earth's holding a key in his hand now do you mind if I give you a little preview look in the next slide this is the real horror of the tribulation now we're not going to cover this for a couple days but look at Chapter nine more and more and more people are gravitating toward movies and I know all the theaters are closed right now and everybody's streaming something but when movie season is going full force about half of all the movies have some type of a supernatural element to them look what happens in Chapter 9 verse 3 I call it when the real horror when the real it's right here in the middle of the second you know right in the middle of the seals trumpets and bowls right here chapter 9 verse 3 right there this is the moment where the real horror is unleashed I'll read it and starting in verse 1 the fifth angel sounded and I saw a star falling from heaven and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit verse 2 he opened the bottomless pit and smoke arose out of the pit and the Sun in the air were darkened in verse 3 and out of the smoke locusts came on the earth and to them was given power as scorpions whoa demons rush out of that pit and sweep across the faith of the face of the earth like a dark thick plague of locusts if the terrifying quake of chapter 6 seemed bad this is so much more terrifying there's nowhere to go there's no escape there's no secure room because these creatures aren't stopped by physical barriers their demonic their spirit beings what comes with them verse 17 of chapter 9 the massacre arrives a world terrorized it says in verse 10 of chapter 9 for 150 days now has something to fear the searing pain is about to be replaced with horrific death and in 9:17 the six angel sounds and that's when look at this a third of all humanity die you know it's interesting I've been watching The New York Times talking about the the kind of the flu epicenter in America's New York City people are dying they're so rapidly that they're having trouble burying them all and they're renting semi trucks and parking them they're stacking people's bodies and body bags in them they've started this trench on on this island where they've always buried nameless people now they're burying boxes by the hundreds in that long long trench and now they're drone footage showing these forklifts taking stacks of caskets and putting them into the ground and bulldozers did you know during the tribulation there's going to be no way no way to in an orderly fashion deal with the death and carnage and destruction what's the conclusion to all this second Peter 3 and remember there's nothing new here it's just an explanation of everything else that's why it's very hard to stay only in the book of Revelation because to understand each piece you have to go back where it came from second Peter where we already saw the scoffers look at 2nd Peter chapter 3 verse 10 because this when you talk about climate change this is the ultimate climate change chapter 3 verse 10 of 2nd Peter the day of the Lord remember the day of the Lord in the Old Testament refers to the entire tribulation period culminated by the second coming day of the Lord so Peters talking about this entire event which we would call revelation 6 to 19 but 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 will burn with fervent heat both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up there's a fire coming that melts the entire universe down to the atomic level the elements in Greek this is the word they use for the basic particles we would call them atoms and subatomic particles now here's the lesson everything unconnected to God burns look at verse 11 therefore since all these things will be dissolved the universe is going to dissolve what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness wait a minute this is this book became so popular to the early church because they said everything unconnected to God Peter told us burns God shows us were the church on earth we should be doing what he left us to do we're gonna be in heaven in the currency of heaven is what we do for Christ on earth God is sending the tribulation no one can escape the second coming of Christ and there's gonna be this final burning before heaven starts Wow Jude this leads to Luke 21:11 it says in Luke 21 Jesus said that there are going to be fearful sites in the tribulation that cause people's hearts when they see these seals these trumpets these creatures and everybody dying around him they're gonna be so afraid they're going to expire interesting word op Sukho is the word in Luke 21 people are going to be scared to death look when they realize how fragile their life is people are dying so rapidly when they realize death is coming their way and it's stalking them what are we supposed to do sure that Christ is the answer let me tell you a real real quick event in our lives I see my wonderful wife sitting out there and when we were first married we moved out to Los Angeles and I went from seminary to being on staff with dr. John MacArthur at Grace Community Church and we were newlyweds Bonnie and I and we were pole and bonnie was working downtown for a temporary agency which gave her parking money and so we took our parking money which was three dollars a day been to LA lately that was a long time ago and we used our parking money to eat breakfast and we found a place that's on the corner of 9th Street and Figueroa and at ninth and Figueroa is a little place called the pantry open 24 hours a day had a 99-cent breakfast so we would spend $0.99 99 cents and still have a dollar leftover you know for something and we were sitting there every day as newlyweds we went there every day for six weeks in a row and we would read the Bible as we ate breakfast we we would discuss it we would hold hands and pray and what happened is our waiter we almost didn't notice him I mean he was really nice we tipped him about of our dollar and and but we didn't really notice him because we were so in love well one day as as I was eating and reading the Bible and holding Bonnie's hand the waiter came up now the waiter came up the waiter was a sight he wore this the ski cap in the summer it was hot his nose was big and red and running and he kind of had a little cough and you know what he was sick I mean Cobin 19 we wouldn't have even eaten there but this fella after I looked at him a couple times I realized by the capillaries of his nose he was a cocaine addict he would he would snort cocaine so I mean so we had a coke guy that was our waiter hmm well one day while we were reading he got down like this down to our level on the table he he said hey and he kept going down till I saw him his head came down low enough and he says hey I have a question for you and so I was still holding Bonnie's hand and I I was eating and I stopped I looked at him I said yes he said what are you two on in that moment I realized a verse from the Bible listen to what Jesus said in John 7:37 239 on that last great day of the feast jesus said if anyone thirsts let him come to me and drink and he who believes in me as the scripture says verse 38 out of him out of his heart will flow rivers of living water and in verse 39 says which is the holy spirit do you know what that waiter saw our waiter who snorted cocaine he snorted cocaine to start his day so you'd feel good enough to go to work and when he got enough money he'd get some more and he'd snort more so he wouldn't feel horrible the rest of the day but it wore off so quickly he always had to go buy more cocaine and he came to us and for six weeks he watched us with the joy of the Lord and the rivers of living water flowing out of us and what was going on was I was so much in love with Bonnie I wasn't even noticing my waiter and it was a wake-up call that this man wanted to know how he could be high because he said as Christians we were high all the time isn't that what happened the day of Pentecost remember when they accused him of being drunk let me ask you does anybody think you're drunk because you're so full of joy because they see that you're on Christ and he's flowing out of you this is the perfect time to share the gospel while we're in pandemics while we're living on this earth before the tribulation starts God is giving people an opportunity to avoid inescapable death like we see in revelation 6:8 Jesus gave us already a tour of the grave in Luke chapter 16 and basically if you know about the rich man and Lazarus you know that when you get to the grave your consciousness continues people that die don't cease to exist death is inevitable but cessation of existence is not and Jesus said that that people have their memories in the grave they still have their senses they can feel they can see they can they can feel an experience two strong desires and thirsts the Lord says we're supposed to remember that life is fragile and that for everybody we see whether it's out our window or come close to them in life death is inevitable and that Jesus Christ is the only answer did you know that's why God sends the tribulation right now individually in the church age we're supposed to reach out to the people that we come in contact with at work and at school when everything gets back to normal in our family our roommates people that we come in contact with in waiting rooms and when we're having something fixed or waiting for someone traveling whatever we're supposed to share Christ why because God is not willing that any should perish and everybody we see around us like us is fragile and all of us are infected with the SI and virus which is terminal and so we have to tell them that Jesus Christ loves them so much that he came and died on the cross to take away their sin and to place his righteousness on them the reason God sends the tribulation is because Christ is the only answer if the Lord does not return this year that statistics will continue every second - people are dying somewhere in the world every hour 7160 3,000 today 60 million this year without any extras from kovat 19 just normal life the book of Revelation is why God sends the tribulation so that people will repent are you doing what he left you to do while you're here on earth is a church are you going through his word and applying it to your life so that we can obey him and please him and put into our cart things that won't burn up in the fire that Jesus will take and say this this is the sum of your life that you live for me and I'm giving it to you as a reminder of your whole life it's your crown and you're going to get to take that crown and cast it at my feet and worship me because I saved you that's what revelation is about let's bow for a word of Prayer father in heaven thank you for opening our eyes to behold wonderful things even in the darkest hour you are sending the gospel in the tribulation Oh may we as we see the world darkening around us let your spirit welling up within us like a river of life-giving water give us the boldness to not only live for you O Christ but to go and share it with others in the precious name of Jesus we pray and all of God's people said amen [Music]

Channel: DTBM

Views: 36,001

Rating: 4.9365077 out of 5

Keywords: Bible, God, Jesus, Christian, teaching, biblical, teach, sermon, trinity, church, lesson, traditional, truth, true, divine, theology, freedom, guilt, testament, pure, interpret, spirit, holy, John, Barnett, christ, father, heaven, hell, doctrine, doctrinal, sinful, forgive, forgiveness, history, teachings, chapters, verses, discover, the book, ministries, dtbm, Dr. Barnett, controversial, repent, helpful, sin, the, book, dr, john, doctor, barnett, training, videos, series, resources, savior, god, jesus

Id: WAOZLvKRrLM

Length: 52min 30sec (3150 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 22 2020