The Great Tribulation
Matthew 24:15-31
-Last week we looked at the Birth Pangs that will continue to increase until the rapture of the church
we looked at six that Jesus gave his disciples in this passage False prophets, Wars, natural disasters and diseases, persecution of the righteous, a falling away from the truth, and the gospel being proclaimed throughout the world.
-Remember that the second coming of Christ happens in two parts. First- the rapture of the church which could happen at anytime now. It happens in the moment in the twinkling of an eye
1Cr 15:51 Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,
1Cr 15:52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed.
After the church is raptured there will be a seven year period of time that God will turn his attention to the nation of Israel for them to be saved. During this time period God will pour out his wrath upon the whole world and it will be a time of disease war, famine and natural disaster unlink anything the world has ever witnessed before.
We know from scripture that Christ will come for us before the great tribulation because of several reasons
-His pattern in the Old Testament Before he destroyed the world with the flood he saved Noah
Before he destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah he saved Lot
1Th 5:9 For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,
There is also a very interesting thing that happens in the book of revelation the church is mentioned in chapter 1,2,3, and then in chapter 4 beings with this verse
Rev 4:1 After this I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven! And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, "Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this."
Now look at what Paul said
1Th 4:15 For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, [fn] that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep.
1Th 4:16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.
Chapter 4 in Revelation and verse 1 is the first part of the coming of Christ, the Rapture
Chapter 5-19 of Revelation describe the tribulation period and then comes the second part of Christ coming when he comes at the end of the seven year period of time and judges the world for sin. This is when every eye sees him and ever knee bows before him.
Now back to our text here this morning Jesus gave the signs and referred back to the book of Daniel and then in verse 21 he said, “For then there will be a great tribulation such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no and never will be.
Dan 12:1 "At that time shall arise Michael, the great prince who has charge of your people. And there shall be a time of trouble, such as never has been since there was a nation till that time. But at that time your people shall be delivered, everyone whose name shall be found written in the book.
This morning I want to look at this period of time that Christ calls the great tribulation, time will not allow us to do an in-depth study of the tribulation but I want us to see 3 main points
Gods Wrath in the tribulation Mans Folly during the tribulation , and Gods Purpose for the tribulation
Mans Folly
This morning I want you to see the folly of mankind during the tribulation period.
The people realize that the natural disasters and everything that is taking place is a direct result of God's divine wrath, but they refuse to repent and turn from their sin
Rev 6:15 Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave [fn] and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains,
Rev 6:16 calling to the mountains and rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb,
Rev 6:17 for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?"
How foolish of man to think that he can hide from God. One of the many attributes of God is that he is omnipresent, which means that he has the ability to be everywhere at the same time. The psalmist said
Psa 139:7 Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence?
Psa 139:8 If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!
There is nothing new under the sun what has been always will be
In the garden when Adam and Eve sinned the first thing they done was hid themselves thinking they could hide from God. It was the response of a guilty conscience before a Holy God . Adam said, we saw that we were naked and we were afraid. But what were they afraid of? Afraid of being found out, Afraid of telling the truth that they had sinned against God
people today attempt to hide from God, the guilt of their sin causes them to not pray, not read the Bible, not attend church, not to be with Gods people. I have seen it time and time again when someone sits in the pew and seems to be so dedicated to God and then they start missing. It not because life is too busy. Its not because Sunday is the only day to sleep in
We have microwaves that cook our food in a minute, Cars that take us down the road at 60 mph s and remote controls so that we don't have to leave the couch. Computers that bring libraries of information into our homes. So we aren't too busy
it boils down to sin. The same thing that was in the Garden and the same thing in the tribulation. Mankind realizes that the day of Gods judgment of sin has come but instead of repenting they choose to hide from God
Remember that God is not omnipresent he is also omniscient, which means he is all knowing. God knows why we hide
Not only does mankind hide from God during the tribulation, but they also in their folly worship the anti-Christ and Satan
Look this morning at Revelation chapter 13
During the tribulation there will be an anti-Christ who will be a world leader that John calls a beast here, he receives his power from Satan, the dragon and then there will be a religious leader which will join with the anti-Christ he is called the false prophet
Rev 13:16 Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, [fn] to be marked on the right hand or the forehead,
Rev 13:17 so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name.
Rev 13:18 This calls for wisdom: let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666.
Instead of worshiping God, the creator of the universe, the one who controls the natural disaster and who at the sound of his voice can calm the waters the people in masses choose to worship the Antichrist, false prophet and Satan
why?
No one could buy or sell unless they had the mark. A phrase that became popular when Clinton was running for office was “Its the economy stupid.”
People choose to worship the beast for their own profit and gain, without aligning with the Antichrist you can have no part in the global economy during the tribulation period. When you read the book of revelation you want to just shake this people back into reality, the economy is temporal eventually Christ is going to come back, wake up people and turn to Him
Even today there are people who refuse to worship the true and living God because they love the present world more. John said
1Jo 2:15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
1Jo 2:16 For all that is in the world--the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions--is not from the Father but is from the world.
1Jo 2:17 And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.
Whenever we are out of town on vacation when it comes Sunday morning we find a local church to gather with to worship our Lord with Gods people. We do that because we want our actions to confirm our words and we want to show God that worshiping Him is more important to us than seeing another tourist attraction, more important to us than sleeping another hour, more important to us than whats on TV because if it weren't for God we wouldn't have another breath to take
People in their folly during this time period try to hide from God, turn to worship the anti-christ and false prophet and John tells us in the book of Revelation that they also refuse to repent and curse the very name of God
Rev 16:9 They were scorched by the fierce heat, and they cursed the name of God who had power over these plagues. They did not repent and give him glory.
It is like someone on their death bed cursing God, the giver of life and they one who controls everything
We see a lot of folly around us today and it carries over into the seven year period of time known as the great tribulation
God's Wrath
When we speak of God's wrath we are talking about righteous anger and judgment against sin. The Bible teaches there is coming a day when God will no longer hold back his wrath. Paul said men are storing up wrath for themselves that will be revealed in the day of God's righteous judgment.
Rom 2:5 But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.
Rom 2:6 He will render to each one according to his works:
Rom 2:7 to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life;
Rom 2:8 but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.
In our society where we preach and teach tolerance for sin it is hard for some people to come to grips with a God of Wrath because they only want to think of him as being a God of love and mercy, but it would not be love and most assuredly would not be mercy if God never judged sin. If there was never judgment of sin then there would be nothing Amazing about God's Grace.
Grace is Amazing because God who is the righteous judge chooses in his mercy to forgive us and save us from His wrath on judgment day because we have put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ, His son
On July 8th 1741 a Theologian by the name of Jonathan Edwards preached a sermon titled “Sinners in the hands of an angry God.” where he clearly laid out the message of Gods wrath and reconciled it with Gods mercy today. Even before he was done preaching people started yelling out in the service “What must I do to be saved?” That sermon went down in history as the most effective message ever preached starting a revival that swept across this great nation. Even today theologians in every seminary study the words of this sermon.
-In the book of Revelation Gods Wrath is mentioned 11 times so there is no way around the fact that the seven year period of time of tribulation will be a time of Gods wrath
One little boy came home from school and told his father he said, “Dad I flunked my math test at school today” His dad said “Son do you always have to be so negative tell me something positive.” so the boy thought for a minute and said, “Dad I am positive that I flunked my math test today.”
I'm not trying to sound negative today but I am positive from studying scripture that there is coming a day of Gods wrath. The positive thing is that the church, those of us who are saved will escape the wrath of God just like Noah and Lot
During the tribulation God will release 21 judgments upon the earth for the sin of mankind. Time will not allow us to go into all of them but they are divided up into three sets of seven
-The seven seals
The anti-christ comes to power in the name of peace 6:2
a time of war 6:4
Economic chaos 6:6
ΒΌ of the worlds population is killed by famine, disease
-The seven Trumpets
Hail and fire from heaven cause 1/3 of the earth to be burned up 8:7
1/3 of the sea life dies from a great ball of fire hitting the earth 8:8-9
The rivers and springs of water are made bitter 8:10-11
(many people think this sounds like either an asteroid hitting the earth or a nuclear war taking place)
-The seven bowls
sores come upon everyone who follows the anti-christ 16:2
the sea becomes like blood and every living thing in the oceans die
rivers and spring become like blood
The sun scorches the people with a fierce heat 16:8
World wide war gathers for the battle of Armageddon 16:16
Great earthquake that causes the mountains to crumble and the islands to vanish
Gods wrath will bring global chaos upon the earth and there will no way for people to deny that it is the judgment of God against sin but in their pride and foolishness they will still refuse to repent and acknowledge Him as Lord
God's Purpose
Finally this morning I would like to bring to our attention that God has a purpose for the tribulation. This is the great thing about our God. He does nothing haphazardly there is always a divine reason behind everything that he does even these 21 judgments on the earth.
In the passage we opened with this morning Jesus reveals the plan
look back to Matthew 24
Mat 24:16 then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.
Mat 24:17 Let the one who is on the housetop not go down to take what is in his house,
Mat 24:18 and let the one who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak.
Mat 24:19 And alas for women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants in those days!
Mat 24:20 Pray that your flight may not be in winter or on a Sabbath.
The plan of God for the tribulation is to reach out the Jewish people one last time and give them an opportunity to be saved.
Look at what Paul said in
Rom 11:25 Lest you be wise in your own sight, I want you to understand this mystery, brothers: [fn] a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.
Rom 11:26 And in this way all Israel will be saved, as it is written, "The Deliverer will come from Zion, he will banish ungodliness from Jacob";
and the Bible tells us in the book of Revelation that during this time period there is going to be at least 12,000 saved out of every tribe that will lead a large multitude from the whole world out of every nation to the saving Knowledge of Christ.
This comes full circle back to our God being a God of mercy and Grace. The whole purpose of the tribulation is to wake up the world to the existence of an all powerful God who controls the universe and to give them one more chance to acknowledge him and place their faith and trust in him.
And look at what the multitude cries out to God after the tribulation
Rev 7:9 After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands,
Rev 7:10 and crying out with a loud voice, "Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!"
SALVATION- God goes to great lengths to save souls and the reason for the tribulation is to reach this large multitude from every nation so that they can spend eternity in heaven
In closing
The tribulation is going to clearly reveal the foolishness of mankind, the folly of mankind. It is also going to clearly reveal the wrath of God and Gods ultimate purpose to reach out to all people for salvation.
Now here is the amazing thing- all this has already been reveled to us in Jesus Christ at the cross of calvary.
The foolishness of men to crucify the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the one who created the world on a cruel wooden cross
the wrath of God- when Christ took the penalty of all our sins and cried out My God My God why have your forsaken me
and Gods ultimate plan in revealing the folly of men by allowing them to crucify Christ and Christ taking the wrath of God for us was again to bring salvation to each and everyone of us who believe.
What about u?
Where do you stand with God?
