“GOD, SEND A SPIRITUAL TSUNAMI!”
Mt. 24:37-39
INTRODUCTION
A. HUMOR
1. A pastor and song leader at one church weren’t getting along. When the pastor preached on giving, the song leader sang, “Jesus Paid It All.”
2. The next Sunday the pastor preached on gossip and the song leader sang, “I Love to Tell the Story!” The pastor got so mad he decided to resign.
3. The Pastor told the congregation, “Jesus led me here and Jesus is leading me away!” The song leader sang, “What a Friend we Have in Jesus!”
B. DEFINITION OF TSUNAMI
1. Tsunamis are giant waves caused by earthquakes or volcanic eruptions under the sea. The sea bed is forced up, displacing the water over it and a major wave is begun.
2. Out in the ocean, tsunami waves may only be two feet tall, but as they travel toward land, they get higher and higher. Tsunami waves have been known to travel 600 miles per hour.
3. When the waves reach shore they may rise as high as 100 feet. As a tsunami wave approaches, waters near the land often recede and expose the shallow sea bed.
C. THESIS
1. The Bible’s clear that we’re in the Last Days. Peter said we were in the Last Days in HIS TIME (Acts 2:16-17). So this means we’re close to the Second Coming of Christ & the Rapture. We’re going to see that we’re in a time like Noah’s, where they knew the flood was coming, but many of them didn’t take God seriously until it was too late.
2. My prayer today is “God, Send A Spiritual Tsunami!” We need a new move of the Holy Spirit that will carry the Gospel to all the people of our generation. Programs & politics won’t get the job done. Will you agree with me?
I. RIPPLES IN HISTORY
A. THE ORIGINAL TSUNAMI
1. We’ve all thrown a rock into a still lake/pond and watched as the ripples went out in circles from the point of impact to the distant shores. An entire lake is affected by that one splash.
2. The greatest ripple in history was the impact of the life of Jesus Christ. First He impacted one disciple, then three, then 12, then 120, then 3,000, then 5,000 . . . and the rest, as they say, is His-story. The waves of the Gospel spread out from Jerusalem, through Palestine, to Asia Minor, then Greece & Italy, Spain & North Africa. Those ripples have continued until 2.5 billion people today have been transformed by the life of Jesus.
3. You and I are saved because one of those ripples, set in motion by others, has reached us. But what about those who haven’t heard the gospel? Will we do OUR part to spread the good news of Jesus?
4. Now it’s easier than ever to share your faith. In fact, it’s so easy that even a dog can lead someone to Christ! [I have several stories about dog-witnesses!]
B. ILLUSTRATION
1. There was an incident that occurred in connection with a camp of Chinese soldiers located at Shanghai.
2. One day a dog came into their camp with some pages from a book in his mouth. The soldiers caught the dog and began to read the papers. They were pages from a Bible printed in their language.
3. They became very interested and followed the dog to a Christian hospital, asking for more of this kind of literature. The Christian hospital was glad to help. This gave an opportunity for Dr. Jonathan Goforth and a Chinese evangelist to visit the camp. Two hundred men became seekers of Jesus.
4. If God can use a dog to deliver his Word, then he can use any of us, including you. [Walter B. Knight, Knight’s Master Book of New Illustrations (Eerdman: Grand Rapids, 1956), 622.]
II. THE SYMBOLISM OF EARTHQUAKES
A. THIS WORLD IS TEMPORARY
1. Earthquakes happen because the tectonic plates – large slabs of rock (often 1,000s of mile across) – are floating on the surface of the Earth’s magma, or liquid core. Their movement is stopped by some jutting rock. Pressure builds up and then the rock breaks and the plate lurches, shaking everyone/thing violently.
2. Earthquakes are a symbol of the fact that this world is temporary and will someday end. In Hebrews 12:26-29 God said, “Once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.” 27 The words “once more” indicate the removing of what can be shaken—that is, created things—so that what cannot be shaken may remain. 28 Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, 29 for our “God is a consuming fire.” Heb. 12:26-29.
B. SHAKING OF THE WORLD’S GOVT’S
1. We can see the shaking going on in the political world around us. California is on fire. Bashar al-Assad of Syria has been defeated and fled to Russia. Hamas has been overthrown. There’s war is in the Middle East and war in Ukraine with Russia. Macron’s Govt in France has been rejected. Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada, has resigned and stepped down. Italy has flipped to a conservative government. The U.K.s Nigel Farage has led the Reform party to victory against the Labour & Conservative parties. Governments all over the world are shaking.
2. In the US, the Democrat party, which has dominated the country for 20 years has been broken and Donald Trump – who looked certain to go to prison - is now becoming the next President. Who would have thought it? The landscape around our world is rapidly changing.
3. Aren’t you glad that we are citizens of a Kingdom that will never be shaken? Our King Jesus shall reign forever and ever!
C. FOUR THINGS THAT CAN’T BE SHAKEN
1. RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD
a. What kept Job during his terrible trials? Or the many women who suffered? They knew their God!
c. Paul said, "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I've committed to Him against that day (1:12)."
d. Jesus is also OUR BEST FRIEND. He said, “I will never leave thee or forsake thee!” No one ever loved you like Jesus! Thank God for our eternal Friend!
2. THE WORD OF GOD
a. The psalmist said, "Your Word, O Lord, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens" (119:89).
b. I’ve told the story about the atheist who tried to burn a Bible. But a page floated out of the fire, which taking, he read God’s message to him; "Heaven and earth shall pass away but My words shall never pass away" Matt. 24:35.
c. Another thing that will survive the great cataclysm...
3. THE PEOPLE OF GOD
a. Revelation 7:9 says, “there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb.”
b. No matter what happens down here, we WILL be united with Jesus in Heaven!
4. THE LOVE OF GOD
a. Paul said, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord” Rom. 8:38-39.
b. God loves us with an everlasting love! God's love for us will not change. Circumstances may look bleak or contradictory, but the love of God will never fail!
III. HEEDING GOD’S WARNINGS
A. A TSUNAMI OF JUDGMENT IS COMING
1. In Matt. 24:7-8, the Lord Jesus warned us there’s a spiritual tsunami that is coming upon this earth. Not a tsunami of water, but the tsunami of final Judgement on this Christ-rejecting world. Paul called this "perilous times" 2 Tim. 3:1. The Lord said if these times weren't shortened, no flesh would survive!
2. On Sunday, December 26, 2004, a massive earthquake measuring 9.0 on the Richter Scale occurred under the Indian Ocean. This earthquake released energy equivalent to 1 million atomic bombs.
3. Its tsunami waves reached speeds of 600 miles per hour and once on shore, were as tall as 50 feet. Their impact was devastating; 150,000 were killed and tens of billions of dollars of damage occurred.
4. But some recognized the coming danger. Asian elephants that were being used to give children rides sensed the approaching waves, broke their chains and headed to higher ground with the children still on their backs.
5. On one beach, a ten-year-old English girl, vacationing with her family, saw the water recede from the beach and remembered her studies of tsunamis in school. She warned her parents and they spread the alarm and over 100 people fled in-land and were saved.
6. The Lord Jesus said, “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew not what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.” Mt. 24:37-39.
7. The people were warned by Noah for 120 years, as he built the ark (2 Pet. 2:5), but the people ignored his warnings. The phrase “took them all away,” is tragic. People were going about their daily business when the flood came and they went into a Christless eternity without being prepared!
B. WE NEED A TSUNAMI OF THE HOLY SPIRIT!
1. On the Day of Pentecost, the early Church heard the sound of a hurricane force wind blowing. But it wasn’t wind, but a tidal-wave of the Holy Spirit that empowered them to be witnesses for Christ. The Holy Spirit fell again in Acts 4:31, “After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.”
2. The Holy Spirit fell in Samaria, in Antioch, in Greece & Italy. A new outpouring of the Spirit happened in 1901 in Los Angeles when the modern Pentecostal outpouring started that has swept 84 million souls into the Kingdom of God.
3. But we need a new Holy Spirit tsunami NOW. Will you pray that God will again pour out His Spirit on us?
CONCLUSION
A. ILLUSTRATION: WHY ONE TRIBE ESCAPED
1. When the tsunami hit Southeast Asia in 2004, a wave 100 feet high came crashing on shores across the region. Over a quarter million people died in the rampaging waters. Entire island populations and coastal villages were wiped out – every man, woman, and child.
2. According to the Associated Press, there was one notable exception; the Morgan Sea gypsies who live on the beaches of Thailand.
3. They were directly in the path of the tsunami, yet every member of the tribe survived. Why? The tribal chief explains, "For generations our fathers warned us that if the waters ever receded fast, they would quickly reappear in the same quantity in which they disappeared."
4. On December 26 when the sea suddenly drained away, many neighboring tribes ran to the beach with baskets to pick up stranded fish.
5. Not the Morgan Sea gypsies. The chief ordered his tribe to run in the opposite direction, to the mountains and safety. When the tsunami hit, the entire tribe was spared. (David A. Sargent)
6. What was the key to their survival? They were warned and listened to the warning. Today we are being warned of another tsunami that’s coming: the Second Coming of Christ! Everyone must seek shelter from that judgment and it’s only found in Christ!
B. THE CALL
1. If there was ever a time the church needed to go into “the highways and the hedges and compel them to come it,” it’s now! From the future terrible tsunami, only those who are found in Jesus will be saved.
2. Are you sure that you’re ready to meet Him? Are you doing all you can to sound the alarm and warn others of the dangers ahead?
3. I want us to come to the altars and spend some time in prayer – for ourselves and also for others who need Jesus!
4. PRAYER
