THE CHRISTIAN IN MODERN TIMES – THE LAST DAYS, AND HOW TO LIVE IN THEM – PART 1 - IMPENDING WRATH
[A]. INTRODUCTION TO THE TOPICS
Thanks for taking the time to study God’s word with us. Thanks to God for those He blesses. The purpose of these talks is to strengthen one another in days that are confusing and ambiguous and difficult; to encourage one another as we see that day approaching. We shall be considering where this world is going, and how the Christian is to live in it. When I was previously here in England, I was hugely impressed when I saw the inside of Centenary Methodist church in Boston, the sheer size and seating capacity of 1200, but the congregation there now is around the 100 mark. All through my area of Australia numbers are fast reducing in mainline churches and the church fellowships are growing older. If one becomes a Christian, the world reports say “got religion” almost with disdain.
I want to make this clear. Our days are going to become more unsettling, more uncertain, more confusing, and more difficult for Christians to remain faithful to the Lord. We will quickly delve into a relevant passage for our times –
2Timothy 3:1 “Realise this, that in the last days DIFFICULT TIMES will come” (especially for the Christian, but even more widespread – the rise of Islam and the spread of world violence and terrorism – the economic situation that sees the rich becoming richer and the poor ever increasing – and countries falling further into debt. The word “difficult” means “times of hardship”.)
2Timothy 3:2 for men will be LOVERS OF SELF (the me generation – Y generation – “it’s all about you.” It means selfishness and climbing upon others.). The ME generation - all about ME.
LOVERS OF MONEY (corporate greed is at an all time high – the whole of American philosophy that has permeated all societies now, seems to be about profit and more profit, and any corrupt method to obtain it is acceptable. Greed is so widespread, and also personal.)
BOASTFUL, ARROGANT (young female drivers in my residential area – police and politicians – people of demanding self-importance, inconsiderate to others.)
REVILERS, DISOBEDIENT TO PARENTS, UNGRATEFUL (it’s MY right – wanting more and more at the expense of others, users for their own promotion – never satisfied)
UNHOLY (we see the most profane and godless display across the face of the world – blasphemers especially in America – Government policies that promote godless practices like homosexuality and gender distortion in children – religious education being taken out of schools, abolition of prayers.)
2Timothy 3:3 UNLOVING, IRRECONCILABLE (lack of peace and harmony – all is conflict and entrenched positions – particularly bad in ethnic situations. Satan hates peace and harmony.)
MALICIOUS GOSSIPS, WITHOUT SELF-CONTROL (“reckless” the AV used – the old nature spurring on to more and more lack of restraint – more and more fuelled by drugs and alcohol – lack of ability to refrain from what is wrong.)
BRUTAL (brutality in ever more graphic movies and computer games and more lust for extreme violence in Internet material – desensitising of humanity – inhuman, heartless, cruel. The world is being prepared for times that are coming.)
HATERS OF GOOD – (all that is good in the bible, is being reversed – lying is acceptable, bribes are common place, marriage has been dishonoured – {{Isaiah 5:20 “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; who substitute bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter.”}})
2Timothy 3:4 TREACHEROUS, RECKLESS, CONCEITED, LOVERS OF PLEASURE RATHER THAN LOVERS OF GOD (Playstations, entertainment, sport continuously, computer games, many featuring sex, violence, the occult, nightclubs, gaming, etc, etc)
2Timothy 3:5 (and) HOLDING TO A FORM OF GODLINESS (these are the days of Laodicea with its contented Christianity and its insincerity – having a bit of religion to feel right; social and liberal Christianity.), although they have denied its power. Avoid such men as these.
We conclude this very small examination with “Now, how do we live in these days when these pressures are upon us as Christians? What resources and advice has God given us? How are we to understand our times?”
[B]. TOPIC 1 - LIVING IN THE DAYS OF APPROACHING WRATH
1 Thessalonians Chapter 5 Verse 9 - Destined not for wrath, but for salvation
{{1Thessalonians 5:9 “God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.”}}
We will begin by considering just this one verse. Plain and simple, what does this verse say? It has two parts – one part will not apply to Christians, and one part will apply. The part Christians won’t have, is the wrath. We are not ordained to any part of wrath. This is extremely important to understand because it is fundamental to the position we have in our Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. It says we have not been destined to wrath. That is, we are not appointed to wrath. We will never be part of God’s wrath.
[1]. WHAT IS THE WRATH OF GOD? I want to examine from the scriptures what the wrath of God is. ???? comes from the verb orago meaning, 'to teem, to swell'; and thus implies that it is not a sudden outburst, but rather (referring to God's wrath) a fixed, controlled, passionate feeling against sin . . . a settled indignation. It means anger, wrath, passion, punishment, and vengeance.
[2]. WHAT IS THE WRATH OF GOD THAT IS COMING? The coming wrath of God is connected with the Day of the Lord coming as a thief in the night, and many descriptions of that time are found in the Old Testament as well as in the New Testament. Paul spent 3 weeks at Thessalonica and in that time, as well as instructing the new Christians in the faith, he covered all the points of eschatology as he reminds them -
{{1Thessalonians 5:1-5 “Now as to the times and the epochs, brethren, you have no need of anything to be written to you for you yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord will come just like A THIEF IN THE NIGHT. (note now the 3rd person) While they are saying, “Peace and safety!” then destruction will come upon them suddenly like birth pangs upon a woman with child and they shall not escape, (now back to the 2nd and 1st person) but you, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day should overtake you like a thief, for YOU ARE ALL SONS OF LIGHT AND SONS OF DAY. We are not of (the) night, nor of darkness.”}}
The Lord does not come as a thief for His Church, and the Day of the Lord is not for us. The Lord is never a thief for His own people. The thief comes to steal and destroy. The Day of the Lord applies AFTER the Church is removed in the Rapture. The Holy Spirit inspired Paul to write of the Rapture at the end of chapter 4 when the Lord comes for His Bride to remove her from the wrath to come. God’s wrath is going to be manifest after the Church goes and is what occupies the book of Revelation. It will be a terrible time when God punishes this earth, and it will come upon sinners like the suddenness of a thief for destruction.
In Chapter 1 of Thessalonians there is this instructive verse – {{1Thessalonians 1:10 “and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is, Jesus WHO DELIVERS US FROM THE WRATH TO COME.”}} The verse tells us very clearly that wrath is coming but we are delivered from it, before it comes. The wrath will be the judgements coming from 7 seals, 7 trumpets and 7 bowls and the final great battle of Armageddon all through Revelation. {{Revelation 6:16-17 and they said to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb for THE GREAT DAY OF THEIR WRATH HAS COME, and who is able to stand?”}}
[3]. HOW IS THE WRATH OF GOD REVEALED? There was an Old Testament preacher called Jonah who was ordered by God to go to Nineveh, the depraved and cruelest city of that time and preach against it for God was going to destroy it in His wrath unless it repented. God gave the Assyrian people 40 days to repent and they did. They were spared. Fewer than 100 years later, the people returned to even greater sinfulness, and God destroyed that city with the greatest of judgements, wiping it out so thoroughly that it remained unknown for 2000 years (rediscovered near Mosul). You can not trifle with sin before a holy God.
In {{Revelation 9:20-21 – “The rest of mankind who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands, so as not to worship demons, and the idols of gold and of silver and of brass and of stone and of wood which can neither see nor hear nor walk, and they did not repent of their murders nor of their sorceries nor of their immorality nor of their thefts.”}} This is when the judgements of God’s wrath are falling, but even then, people will not repent. Not even when God’s wrath is revealed, will people take heed.
We need to look at Romans. Here is a lengthy passage – {{Romans 1:18-20 “The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them, for since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.”}}
Mankind is on the downward track because God has been rejected. Now we see humanism supplanting the knowledge of God - {{Romans 1:21-25 EVEN THOUGH they knew God, they did not honour Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, that their bodies might be dishonoured among them, for they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator who is blessed forever. Amen.”}}
When God is rejected, God will give people over to their own lusts and willfulness and the inevitable will happen. Sin matures and take its evil course – {{Romans 1:26-32 For this reason GOD GAVE THEM OVER to degrading passions, for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. Just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, GOD GAVE THEM over to a depraved mind to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful, and, although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practise such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practise them.”}}
Now we need to ask, “How is the wrath of God revealed?” “Do we see God today zapping evil sinners, or the Gay Mardi Gras in Sydney, or the proposed movers of the motion to legalise homosexual marriage? I put it to you that we don’t see the open hand of God in wrath and judgement against these things, but there is a principle operating whereby those who adopt these things will see leanness, and we will see a cancerous society, failing more and more.
We live in an age of grace where I think God’s hand is stayed, and while the Church remains on earth, so too will God’s wrath remain in storage. What about the earthquakes and disasters in parts of the world? Was that God’s wrath against Buddhists in Nepal or against Moslems in the Indonesian tragedy? I don’t think so, but the natural outworking of geological and geographical forces that God programmed in the physics of this world, and which He allows to progress. It is the same situation as the tower of Siloam – {{Luke 13:2-5 and He answered and said to them, “Do you suppose that these Galileans were greater sinners than all other Galileans because they suffered this fate? I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish, or do you suppose that those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them, were worse culprits than all the men who live in Jerusalem? I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”}}
God’s message now is that you will face wrath and perish if you do not repent. If you go to your grave unrepentant and unsaved, all you have to look forward to is the wrath of God in judgement at the great white throne. What then did Paul mean by the Romans verse, “the wrath of God is revealed from heaven”? Well, he was stating a truth, based on the history God recorded for us in history, such as the flood of Noah, the destruction of the Assyrians and the Babylonians, and of Israel and Jerusalem and Judah. Armed with the Old Testament events we can easily say that God’s wrath is revealed from heaven, especially as we can see in the Minor Prophets. That truth still operated but God’s hand is stayed in this age of grace. Then we must ask . . . .
[4]. CAN THE WRATH OF GOD BE STORED UP AS KEPT IN A BANK? Here is our verse – {{Romans 2:5 (addressed generally to the Gentile nations) but because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.”}}. Storing up wrath is very serious. An unrepentant sinner can’t get away from this one. My g/grandfather was the storekeeper and postmaster in Tiaro near Maryborough in the 1860s and 1870s. In those days it used to be the practice, when people could not pay, to put their bill on account, to be paid later. He was fairly generous it seems, and then all trouble broke over his head because he went into insolvency, meaning he went broke, because people could not, and did not pay him. The biggest debtor was his father-in-law! That is exactly what this world is currently doing, and has been doing for some time. It is putting on account the accumulation of sin which will result in the wrath of God, that will so come on this world in the near future with a mighty suddenness. You people in Britain have a different atmosphere from us in the tropics. Here you have twilights and periods of light before and after the sun rises and goes down. We don’t. The days we live in are like the English sunrise – the light appears for a while before the sun. Our days on this earth currently are like the light of the approaching sunrise.
[5]. IS THERE SUCH A THING AS GOD’S DISPLEASURE AS OPPOSED TO GOD’S WRATH? Part of this has been mentioned already. Australia has legislated for homosexuality to be openly accepted in marriage, with inbuilt penalties for opposition. It is already enshrined in laws that prevent one from speaking out to condemn the evil practice, laws called “sexual vilification” and homophobic hate. Do you know why marriage is no important in the form that God gave for it? Well the marriage of Adam and Eve (more the union) was instituted because way in eternity past, the Lord had destined to have a Bride, the Church, and human marriage flows from that.
Any distortion of true marriage is a total blasphemy of Christ and His Church. This will bring God’s wrath, but I also think there is a difference between God’s wrath and God’s displeasure. In the Church age we see God’s displeasure, expressed in the way nations battle to be economically viable, the droughts and floods, even though these come under the laws of Nature. This is not the wrath of God, and when that wrath will be revealed it will be terrible. Study the book of Revelation from chapter 6 to chapter 19 to see what the wrath of God is. Our countries are storing up for themselves an enormous degree of wrath that will be unleashed after the Church has gone. The men of Sodom were practising homosexuals as are numbers of men in Australia and all over, many in high positions, and the 60% of Australians who support them. If you support them you are as bad as they are. However we have gone further in angering God because we have made laws supporting the sin and may make even worse laws defiling what God has confirmed as true marriage. Those things the rulers of Sodom never did, and the men of Sodom will stand up in judgement against this nation and the world, in the judgement to come. Paul wrote – {{Colossians 3:5-6 “Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry, for it is on account of these things that THE WRATH OF GOD WILL COME.”}}
[6]. WHAT IS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE WRATH OF GOD AND THE HOLINESS OF GOD? They are closely linked, because the wrath of God proceeds from the holiness of God. God is holy, and no sin can stand. It must be burnt away. His holiness must lead to punishment, and that punishment is His wrath. Every single sin leads to judgement and must have its penalty. All God’s attributes are balanced – love, holiness, mercy, and a God of wrath. Our task in the last days is to seek those who have the wrath of God hanging over their heads, to bring them into the kingdom of God’s love and mercy. Will that task be easy? No. The human heart is becoming increasingly desperately wicked, but man is in as much need of a Saviour as he was in Paul’s time.
The message continues in Part 2.
ronaldf@aapt.net.au
