Understanding The Present Time Series

INTRO.- Do you know what time it is? Many people are living in their own little fairy tale world and they don’t know what’s going on spiritually.

ILL.- “Actress Katie Holmes Six Years Later” the article stated. Six years after what? Six years after meeting Tom Cruise. There are no more private jets. No more fancy dinners with David and Victoria Beckham. No more being the wife of the most powerful actor in Hollywood.

For Katie Holmes, after a jet-set start, a fairy tale wedding in Italy, and what would on Sunday have been six years of marriage to Tom Cruise, there is just ... being normal. And a source said that Katie couldn't be happier raising her daughter Suri on her own in New York City.

Apparently, Katie Holmes finally woke up to the fact that she was living in some kind of fairy tale world. She wanted out and she wanted a more normal life for a change. (normal for her)

Likewise, many people today are living a fairy tale kind of life in the sense that they are not living in the real spiritual world. They don’t recognize what’s going on and what is going to happen in this world and perhaps, in their own lives. They need a wake up call of some kind.

II Timothy 3:1-5 “But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them.”

ILL.- Back in November I went to see grandbaby Sophia. She was 14 months old at the time. Do you know what she wanted to do? We sat in the floor together and played with lock blocks. I would put them together and she would take them apart. And that’s all she wanted to do: play blocks. She just wanted to play.

That’s pretty normal for a baby her age, but it’s not normal for adults to want to play all the time, that is, unless they are still living in some childhood fantasy. Many people are lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. Play and pleasure rules.

The reality is this: life will come to an end and we’d better be prepared! And there is only way to prepare for the end of life and that is a matter of seeking the Lord in all things and doing His will as best we can.

II Corinthians 5:7-9 “We live by faith, not by sight. We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it.”

All some people do is live for play and pleasure when we all should be living to please God. Life begins with God and life ends with God. We need to sandwich God in between, that is, in all of life. He should be in the middle of everything we do in life.

11 And do this, understanding the present time. The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed.

PROP.- In the light of our salvation what must we do?

1- Put aside the deeds of darkness

2- Behave decently as in the daytime

3- Clothe ourselves with the Lord Jesus

I. PUT ASIDE THE DEEDS OF DARKNESS

12 The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light.

ILL.- The drunk husband snuck up the stairs quietly. He looked in the bathroom mirror and bandaged the bumps and bruises he'd received in a fight earlier that night. He then proceeded to climb into bed, smiling at the thought that he'd pulled one over on his wife. When morning came, he opened his eyes and there stood his wife. "You were drunk last night weren't you!" "No, honey." "Well, if you weren't, then who put all the band-aids on the bathroom mirror?"

Is there any darkness in your life? Any dark deeds? Are any dark thoughts?

ILL.- Robert Louis Stevenson’s story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Dr. Jekyll discovered a drug whereby he could transform himself into a man devoid of conscience and able to wallow in every kind of vice. Stevenson named this monster Mr. Hyde.

When Dr. Jekyll wanted to become Hyde, he could do so with a dose of this drug. And likewise when Hyde wanted to become Jekyll, he could transform himself almost instantly by the same means. But the time came when the inclination to remain the evil Hyde was so great that he could not recover himself to assume the kindly and respectable life of Jekyll. Against his will, he now became Hyde, and much as he wanted to return to the sphere in which Dr. Jekyll lived, he was unable to do so.