I want to just encourage you this morning
to just open your heart to being fully
surrendered to God.
And I often notice up on the PowerPoint
we sing about it, but we rarely apply
it.
And being dead to the world and being
alive to the things of God.
So with that said, the title of the
sermon is Dead Men See God.
Dead Men See God.
And I'm going to talk about the rapture,
believe it or not, this morning.
And kind of tie that in with the
Matthew 24.
The rapture is an interesting concept because some
people believe it doesn't really happen.
Some people believe it's already happened.
Some people believe it's coming soon.
And I want to try to unpack a
little bit of that, but I would probably
need a couple hours.
And I don't want to keep you here
that long.
So if you can turn, I'm sure you
already are, Matthew 24, verse 32.
Then learn this parable from the fig tree.
When its branch has already become tender and
puts forth leaves, you know that summer is
near.
So you also, when you see all these
things, know that it is near at the
door.
Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will
by no means pass away till all these
things have taken place.
Heaven and earth will pass away, but my
words will by no means pass away.
So if you have not caught the last
few weeks worth of messages, you might say,
what is he talking about, all these things
shall come to pass?
Well, we talked about, we actually opened in
Matthew 24, when Jesus talked about the destruction
of the temple.
And they asked, when is going to be
the sign of your coming?
When is going to be the end of
the age?
And Jesus said, well, be prepared because dire
times are coming.
And don't be deceived, there will be false
teachers, false prophets.
There will be wars and rumors of wars.
There will be pestilence.
The earth and the heavens will be shaken.
And he talked about the abomination of desolation,
reader beware.
When it stands in the holy place, flee.
Get out of Judea and come down from
the rooftop and just run and flee.
So we talked about all of that.
So now he's saying, he's bringing it all
together.
He's saying, when you see all these things,
know that it is near at the door.
What?
The second coming of Christ.
He's returning for the church or for judgment,
depending on what you believe.
Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will
by no means pass away till all these
things take place.
Now, here's the interesting thing.
That word, genia, I believe, in the Greek
language meaning generation.
This is the tenth time that Matthew uses
this word.
And every time he uses this word, he's
talking about those living at the time of
Christ.
So that's the challenge that I spoke about
a few weeks ago, is on this side
of the debate, this generation means the generation
in which Jesus was living, and all these
things have already happened.
And this side says, no, these things are
coming.
We haven't experienced those things.
We are the generation.
We are the group of people that are
going to see all these things.
And I don't have time to go over
that again because that would take a few
hours.
So I would encourage you to get those
messages.
I talked a lot about those things.
But suffice it to say, here's what we
need to remember, that times are not getting
easier, they're getting more difficult, and we need
to be ready.
That's what Jesus is talking about.
Learn from the fig tree.
He says, learn from the fig tree.
And that's what we're going to talk about
here for the next 45 minutes or so.
Now no one knows the day or the
hour.
Verse 36 But of that day and hour
no one knows, not even the angels of
heaven, but my Father only.
What day is that?
When Christ returns.
But as the days of Noah were, so
also will be the coming of the Son
of Man.
For as in the days before the flood
they were eating and drinking, marrying and given
in marriage until the day that Noah entered
the ark, and did not know until the
flood came and took them all away, so
also will be the coming of the Son
of Man.
So here we have this imagery of Jesus
coming again, but at a time when nobody
expects it.
They're not ready, many people.
That's why he would say, be ready, learn
from the fig tree, are you prepared?
Because the coming is going to be like
in the days of Noah.
People were eating and drinking, carrying on with
their life, and they were marrying and given
into marriage, and then suddenly that day came
upon them.
And that's what Jesus is speaking about here.
And I just want to encourage you, or
remind you, that we are actually living on
borrowed time.
We are living on borrowed time.
We don't know the day or the hour.
Many people live as if they can get
right with God right at the end.
In other words, they want to enjoy the
world, and then I'll do it someday, Shane.
Really what they're saying is they enjoy the
fleeting pleasures of this world, and they don't
want to be in a right relationship with
God.
And let me tell you one of the
biggest lies the enemy is telling, primarily to
young people, is that once you fully surrender
your life to God, all the fun will
be over.
That's why many people don't want to do
it.
I know, I need to stop doing this
and stop doing this.
I need to get my life.
I know, but I'm just not ready to
do that yet, Shane.
I want to enjoy all this.
Really enjoy?
Do we really enjoy those things?
As I talked about last night, the need
for medication, they're calling it an epidemic.
America being medicated because of all the fear
and anxiety and depression.
And so if everything's so fun, why are
all these things being called an epidemic?
Suicide rates increasing, fear, anxiety, all these things,
but I'm enjoying life.
Really, are you?
See, the devil reminds you of the party,
not the hangover.
And I need to be real with people.
That's what he does.
He will tell us, and remember then, remember,
he'll just show just a tiny sliver of
what the flesh desires and not the cost
of what caving into that will cost us.
And that's the big lie right now.
You don't need to get right with God.
And I talk to believers, they are Christians,
but they're very carnal.
And what carnal is, and we all can
be susceptible to this, is when we give
in to the world and we look just
like the world and we don't want to
have much to do with God except on
Sunday.
You can bother me about God on Sunday
morning, but the rest of the week, leave
me alone.
And that person is usually very miserable because
they're caught between two worlds there.
And full surrender to God will be the
best thing you could ever do.
And we're scared because he's going to make
me give up that, or he's going to
make me do this, and he's going to
send me to Africa and Uganda on the
backside of the desert, and I'll never be
able to have it.
Listen, wherever God sends you, the desire is
there.
God will give you the desires of your
heart because they're God-given desires.
So when you fully surrender your life to
God, now the creator of the universe has
you.
He's guiding you, he's directing you, he's filling
you with his Spirit.
So you can wake up in the morning,
there's so much joy and peace.
You can't wait to put on worship.
You can't wait to get in the Word
of God.
You can't wait to do what he's called
you to do because you've surrendered your life.
But when we fight against God, there's no
joy, there's no peace, because we know what
we need to be doing, but we're not
doing it.
And the devil keeps this elusive carrot.
You know the carrot that he used to
put in front of the horse so the
horse would keep walking to catch the carrot?
And you never catch it, it's elusive.
It reminds me, I wish I had the
story, I'd read it to you verbatim, but
I think it was in the 1920s, they
called this person the human fly.
And he would actually climb buildings, skyscrapers, and
climb them and reach this and grab on
this little crevice and this little rock.
But one day, one day, he was climbing
and he saw what appeared to be a
solid rock on the edge of the building.
He leaped up, grabbed it, and fell to
his death.
And it was, I think, in the papers
back in the, I don't even want to
give the year because I don't remember, but
when they looked in his hand, all they
found was like a froth from an old
spider web, gray that looked like a rock.
And that's exactly what the pull of the
world does.
If I could just, nope, and we fall.
And I just want to encourage you because
we are living on borrowed time.
I guarantee I won't talk to this same
group of people next week.
New ones will be here and some people
will be gone.
I have to shoot you straight.
We are living on borrowed time.
We're not even guaranteed getting out of this
service, let alone tomorrow.
That's why Jesus is saying, be ready.
You don't know when I'm coming.
You don't know.
And I would just encourage you, get your
heart right with God this morning.
Then verse 40, Then two men will be
in the field.
One will be taken and the other left.
The two women will be grinding at the
mill.
One will be taken and the other left.
Watch, therefore, for you do not know what
hour your Lord is coming.
Jesus apparently wants us to watch, doesn't he?
But know this, that if the master of
the house had known what hour the thief
would come, he would have watched and not
allowed his house to be broken into.
In a nutshell, a thief does not knock
on the door and tell you when they're
coming.
They come, usually when is the house usually
robbed?
One in the morning or two in the
morning until about four?
And they stake out houses now and make
sure there's no vehicles.
Nobody's home.
They watch.
A thief watches.
We need to be watching as well.
And how does a thief normally enter?
Often through an open door, a cracked door,
a window, some point of access.
And that's the imagery also that we get
throughout the New Testament, that the thief comes
to kill, to steal, and to destroy.
And he's looking for that open door.
He's looking for that access.
And that's why I preach so hard against
modern-day entertainment.
People sometimes are tired of hearing it, but
I don't care.
I'm going to preach it until the day
I die.
When we start as a church to glorify
witchcraft and vampires and the occult and all
these things that are dark and demonic, and
we allow that to entertain us and come
in and influence our children on a daily
basis, we are opening the door.
It's a subtlety, but it's an open door.
How else does the enemy get in?
Does he get in while you're praying and
fasting and worshiping God?
No, sir.
He'll run for cover on that day.
But he's waiting for that open door through
things on the website.
Because what we allow into our mind influences
us.
And people think they can stay neutral.
Oh, that's not going to affect me.
Yes, it will.
If you open your mind to it and
you enjoy it, and you allow that to
come in and renew your mind according to
the world, it will influence you.
As much as we like to think we
are the master of our own destiny and
the captain of our own ship, we're not.
We're controlled by what we allow into here.
That's how God has created us.
We allow the things of the world into
our mind.
We'll go that direction.
There's no other direction.
It's like a robot being programmed, being renewed
to go that direction.
Or we feed our mind with the things
of God, with the Word, with worship, with
those who build us up, not tear us
down, with positive things.
But yeah, there's positive things, there's negative things.
I have no problem with that term.
I think Paul told the church in Philippi,
Finally, brethren, whatever things are good and pure
and honest and noble and upright, meditate on
these things.
So whatever we choose to obey becomes our
master in this area.
But back to this.
He's talking about one will be working and
will be left, and the other will be
taken.
I know many of you right now are
thinking of Left Behind.
That series, right?
I don't know if that movie's quite accurate.
So it's a good movie, I guess, if
you'd rather watch that than I'm trying to
think of one.
Deadpool.
Right?
Definitely choose Left Behind instead of Deadpool.
But that's the imagery.
People will be taken up and another left.
Now the question is, well, who's going where?
Is the one leaving the believer and the
one staying the unbeliever?
Or is the one staying the believer and
the one going the unbeliever?
And you'll have as many opinions as people
you ask.
It's not straight across the board on this.
Now, we can look at Scripture to interpret
Scripture.
It's what you usually want to do.
They call it hermeneutics in Bible study and
looking at the Old Testament and all of
Scripture.
But if you just look in the immediate
context, taken seems to be the negative if
you cross-reference it with verse 39.
And did not know until the flood came
and took them all away.
Well, we know what happened to those people
when they were taken all away.
That's not a good thing.
They were killed and destroyed.
But left seems to be in the negative.
If you cross-reference verse 31 that we
read last week.
When the angels come and they gather the
elect from the four corners of the earth
and they grab them, they take them, then
that's more of a positive.
In my opinion, if you look at Enoch,
he was taken to see the Lord.
Elijah was taken to see the Lord.
Philip was caught up and taken and moved.
Stephen looked up and was taken as he
was being martyred.
Jesus was risen and taken up into the
right hand of the Father.
So, I have no problem with believing that
those who are taken are taken to be
with the Lord.
Do I hold that position firmly?
No, not at all.
Just looking at all this, looking at...
But also to be left, you can have
some scriptures in the Bible that being left
is not a good thing.
You're being left here.
God has taken, you know, and so there's
ways that you can support each.
Left could be, we're left here.
We're not taken to judgment.
We're left here believers.
So, it doesn't really...
I don't think the point is, is it
good to go up or good to stay
here?
The point is, you better be ready.
You better be ready.
Do we have a good relationship, the right
relationship with the Lord?
Are we ready?
Are we prepared?
So, I don't care if I'm taken, I
don't care if I'm left, as long as
God is with me.
As long as He is on my side.
Now, you know what?
I should probably talk about this for a
minute.
I actually redid the sermon this morning early
and brought in some new points.
But we often talk about, are you ready?
Yes, I'm ready.
People say, oh yes, I'm ready.
Well, what does it mean to be ready?
Because you can ask a lot of people
who have religion and not a relationship.
And they're not ready.
You can go through many churches in our
valley this morning.
Some with big cathedrals and stained glass windows
and you ask the people, yeah, they're ready,
but they're not ready.
They think they are because they have religion.
They went through the motions, but they're not
truly ready.
So, what does ready mean?
I looked at Oswald Chambers for this.
If you have not read his devotional classic,
My Utmost for Your Highest, or His Utmost
for My Highest, one of those terms, I
didn't bring it with me.
It's an incredible devotional that you should read,
you should study.
Every single day it will give you just
a page of truth referencing the Bible.
He says this, If I am in the
habit of continually holding God's standard in front
of me, my conscience will always direct me
to God's perfect law and indicate what I
should do.
So, in other words, if I'm in the
habit of putting this before me and saying,
Lord, Thy will be done, what is Your
will?
God, direct me, guide me.
I don't trust myself, but I trust You
and I trust Your Word.
I'm putting this before me.
He says, My conscience will always direct me
to God's perfect law and indicate what I
should do.
The question then is, will I obey?
That's how you know if you're ready.
Do we have God's standard in front of
us?
Are we ready?
Now, of course, things fall in here.
People, you know, even last night we had
a good time of prayer afterwards.
And they are ready because they're saved, but
they're not ready because their lifestyle is not
going in a good direction.
And people might say, well, doesn't your lifestyle
reflect your faith?
It does.
But often, the prodigal son will waver, the
wayward daughter will stray from God, and God
is pulling them back.
That's what I love about God.
You can be wrong with God last night
and be right with God this morning.
You can be out of His will and
say, I'm so confused, I've done all these
mistakes.
But God, He just says, repent and return,
come home.
How simple is that?
Thank God He doesn't say pray for ten
years, or pray for a year, and go
to this holy city and fast and bow
and do all these things, and then maybe
I'll consider it.
He says, no, if you're like David, oh,
that the bones that you broke would rejoice,
return to me the joy of my salvation,
create in me a clean heart, and renew
a right spirit within me.
That's it.
You can go from death to life.
Over and out, over a minute, just like
that.
Now, obviously, I'm talking about those who don't
know the Lord, but also there's believers caught
in sin.
They're caught in depression.
They're looking to Facebook rather than Matthew, Mark,
Luke, and John.
They're looking to the media instead of the
Gospels.
They're looking to all their ungodly friends instead
of the truth.
And that's why many times we are pulled
astray, because the love of the world pulls
us in that direction.
So regardless of what, the taken or left,
the whole point is watch.
Watch and be ready.
How?
When we live according to God's standard.
And people say, I don't want to follow
a bunch of rules.
And I say, neither do I.
This isn't about following rules.
These are guardrails through the canyons of life.
It'd be like taking those guardrails off of
60th Street, Goaty Pass, if you lived here
a long time.
Take off those guardrails and just get a
big old excavator out here and trim off
that whole 10-foot embankment and just have
the edge of the road go off.
Yeah, now we're having fun, right?
Now let's remove those stupid guardrails.
Let's just live life vicariously.
Let's live in the fast lane, Shane.
Who would do that?
Nobody, because one little turn and you're dead.
But that's the same thing with the Word
of God.
It's not a bunch of rules and do's
and don'ts, although it is, because it guides
us, but it's here to guide us.
And see, when I stay within that, the
guardrails are safety and protection.
I'm not losing fun, I'm missing death by
living within those.
It's interesting, as in the days of Noah,
Noah preached, but they didn't listen.
I've actually had atheists tell me that if
there is a God, they're going to be
mad.
Mad because, God, You never showed me.
You didn't show me.
You never showed me.
And I say, no, that's not true.
God's invisible attributes are clearly seen.
Everywhere you look, it screams Creator.
Look at the birth of a child.
Look at the human body.
Look at everything.
The sun, the moon, everything screams Creator.
Not only that, the Holy Spirit has been
convicting you and convicting you and convicting you.
That's why you're so mad.
Because you're running from the conviction.
Then you have the Word of God going
forth.
Then you have preaching.
So there's no excuse.
No excuse.
And then what about the people, Shane, who've
never heard from God?
You ever hear that?
They've never heard about God.
That's not fair to them.
Africa or the jungles of South America.
What about those people?
And I say, well, all I know is
that God is just.
God is loving.
God is righteous.
And I've heard many stories, I'm sure you
have too, where people, they're convicted.
They're convicted.
They know when they go in Papua New
Guinea and they translate the Bible, they talk
to the people, spend years down there.
And I think we actually, one of the
mission groups we help is Whitecliffe here, translating
the Bible.
And they'll talk to the people.
And they'll say, in their language, of course
I don't know their language, but they'll say,
oh, I know I can't take my neighbor's
chicken.
I know I can't take my neighbor's wife,
though they do it anyway.
Oh, I know I can't take that.
I know we shouldn't kill.
Well, how do you know that?
You live here in a remote area.
We just translate the Bible for you and
you already know this.
Why?
Because God's law is written on the heart
of every person on this planet.
That's why I believe there's no excuse.
Because a person, like many Muslims are doing,
they can say, I don't know what this
is.
I'm convicted that I'm not right.
Like Cornelius, he prayed.
And God said, I see your prayers, I
see your heart.
I'm sending one of the apostles to convert
you.
And if people cry out to God in
Africa, in the jungles, I believe that God
can give them a vision, a dream, show
them who Christ was, and they can bow
their knee to Christ.
There's no excuse.
Should we get them the Word?
Absolutely.
But it's not like people just live vicariously
and they have no clue about anything.
They know.
Who put that conviction in them?
See, that's one atheist from those, I don't
know what their names are now.
One of them recently passed away.
Another one.
They're famous atheists.
They cannot answer that question.
Why is every single human being convicted about
right and wrong?
Why?
And if I could add to that, I
would, that every single human being worships something.
Everybody worships something.
No, that's all right.
I don't worship anything.
Well, you worship yourself.
You worship the God of materialism.
You worship the God of lust.
See, we all give our heart and our
affection, our time, our energies to something.
That's worship.
Everybody has that heartbeat of God.
So the first point of application in a
long introduction is this.
Death is separation from the body.
So when we're talking about some belief of
the rapture or the catching away or being
caught up, the reason we have to die,
the reason dead men seek God, is because
flesh and blood, Freudian slip, right?
It is filth.
1 Corinthians, flesh and blood cannot inherit the
kingdom of God.
So flesh and blood, as good as we
think we are, we cannot inherit the kingdom
of God.
This body is not going to stand before
God.
It would probably evaporate.
It's impossible.
So what has to happen, when we die,
death is the sensation of the body, but
not life eternally.
It's been said that we have a body,
a soul, and a spirit.
So I reside in a body.
I have a soul.
It's who I am.
It's my intellect.
It's my character.
It's my nature.
But I am spirit eternally.
I'm going somewhere for the rest of eternity.
And that's all death is.
So that's why a believer, like for example,
I talked last week with my mom, as
she's getting older, and she's ready to go.
And people can't understand that.
She could be here another 20 years, I
don't know.
I'm just saying, she's ready to go, her
kids are raised, and where's that joy and
that peace come from?
Because she knows when the body dies, she's
present with the Lord.
So that's separation.
That's all death is, is separation from the
body to be present with the Lord, or
to be eternally separated from God.
That's why these are heavy weighted matters.
Now you know why people want to avoid
them, don't you?
Who wants to, Shane, just tell me how
rich I'm going to be.
Tell me that the Lord loves me.
Tell me that I'm more than a conqueror.
Tell me I'm the head and not the
tail.
Just tell me I'm a king's kid, but
don't talk about any of that other stuff.
Well Jesus did, often.
So that's what has to happen.
That's why when the Bible talks about the
body being caught up, and I'm going to
read that in just a minute, it's because
flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of
God.
We have to have a different body to
be in God's presence.
The DNA, in my opinion, the DNA of
Adam, that Adamic nature, theologians call it the
Adamic nature, that DNA of Adam has to
die in that grave.
That's the body, the DNA of Adam dies
in the grave.
It's done.
Now the body, the resurrected body, the spirit
can be with Christ because of what Christ
did, imputed righteousness.
I take on the new body, the spirit,
and that's getting complicated, I probably need a
whole new sermon on what do we do
until the resurrected bodies?
Well, just hold tight, maybe I'll get there.
But because of what Christ did, I can
stand before God.
Whether it's spiritually, until the resurrected bodies, or
with the resurrected bodies.
The reason we can have fellowship with God
is because of what Christ did on the
cross.
They call it imputed righteousness.
I took on Christ's righteousness.
And also part of that is propitiation.
You'll read it three times, I believe in
the New Testament.
It's a big term, it just means that
Christ absorbed the wrath of God on the
cross.
And then because of that, I can stand
before God redeemed and set free and cleansed.
Now if that isn't a glorious truth, I
don't know what is.
If that doesn't give you goosebumps, I don't
know what will.
If that doesn't change the way you worship,
nothing will.
Because we sing the songs that He bore
my sin.
He took my place.
And that's why the body has to be
resurrected.
Now on this debate, or on this whole
thing of the body being resurrected, there's two
sides of this as well.
All the way over here, I don't know
how far I can go before the mic
cuts out, is this side that believes the
resurrection of the body occurs at death.
As soon as it happens, we get our
new body, resurrection, that's it.
The first Thessalonians I'm going to read doesn't
really apply.
Now the other end of the spectrum is
way over here, they believe in soul sleep.
Have you heard that term before?
Soul sleep.
It's where you just go night-night.
That's what I tell my kids, go night
-night, shh, shh, shh.
Time to go night-night, shh, shh.
Just go to sleep for a while.
And when you have kids, you want them
to go sleep for a long while, right?
So you can get things done.
So you're just in a state of soul
sleep, I don't know how long, a couple
thousand years?
So you have this huge pendulum swinging back
and forth through these two extremes.
But I believe what the Bible talks about
is as soon as we leave here, Paul
says to be absent in the body is
to be present with Christ.
However, I believe that, again, according to Scripture,
there's a lot of different things, that at
some point, we get our resurrected bodies.
Jesus walked through walls.
They could touch Him.
It wasn't the same Jesus that walked on
the earth.
That physical body, I don't believe, it was
a resurrected body.
And like Christ, we will have that resurrected
body in the future.
So that's the first point of application.
Death is separation from the body.
Dead men see God, so we have to
be separated from this body.
1 Corinthians 15.35, someone will ask, how
are the dead raised?
With what kind of body will they come?
They're asking Paul.
So Paul says, what you sow does not
come to life unless it dies.
So there has to be death first, death
of the old body.
And he uses the analogy here of a
seed.
And are you aware that you don't plant
the plant in the ground?
You plant a seed, right?
I'm hoping everybody knows that.
You don't take a little broccoli bush.
I didn't even know broccoli made bushes, but
it does because we plant a whole bunch
of broccoli seeds I forgot about.
And we have all these, they're about this
tall, just green things.
They look like little broccolis at the end.
And I come to find out I did
that wrong.
I should have cut them off and let
them, you know, turn into big pieces of
broccoli that you can actually eat.
But we didn't plant that.
We planted these tiny little seeds.
And what happens is the seed actually dies.
And then there's life.
And that's the concept.
Christ had to die.
And then there's life.
That's one reason we do baptisms.
It's dying.
It's showing death, burial, and resurrection.
It's a picture of that.
And we are having baptisms, if you're interested,
on June 4th and 5th here in Lancaster.
So Paul is answering the question, what you
sow does not come to life unless it
dies.
So the body has to die first.
The sin nature of the DNA of Adam
dies.
So then here's the common text for the
rapture.
1 Thessalonians 4.13 Brothers and sisters, we
do not want you to be uninformed about
those who sleep in death, so that you
do not grieve like the rest of mankind
who have no hope.
So he's saying here, don't be uninformed.
There is hope.
Those who have died, do not worry.
They will see Christ just like you're going
to see Him.
1 Thessalonians 4.
If you want to read the whole chapter
today.
And then verse 14.
For we believe that Jesus died and rose
again, and so we believe that God will
bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep
in Him.
So he's saying here, those who have died
will rise again, and those who are alive
will also see Him.
It's both people.
Obviously they thought once you died, oh no,
you missed Christ coming.
They missed out.
We're so sad.
What happened here?
We thought He was coming again.
These people have died.
And Paul says, don't worry.
Don't worry.
It's just different stages of where you're at.
Verse 15.
According to the Lord's word, we will tell
you, or we tell you that we do,
we who are still alive, and who are
left until the coming of the Lord, will
certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep.
For the Lord Himself will come down from
heaven with a loud command, with the voice
of the archangel, and with the trumpet call
of God, and the dead in Christ will
rise first.
And after that, we who are still alive
and are left will be caught up together
with them in the clouds to meet the
Lord in the air.
There's your proof text for the rapture of
the church.
What he's saying here, if you take a
literal reading of this, is that the dead
who have died, probably thousands of years ago,
all the dead will begin to rise, and
those who are caught on the earth will
not precede them.
They will go up together and meet the
Lord in the clouds.
Now, I wish I could say everybody agrees
with that verse, or those verses, but they
don't.
They believe that that is imagery of what
will happen in the end.
Let me read N.T. Wright.
I don't know if you know who he
is.
He's a bishop in England.
He said this, Paul's mixed metaphors of trumpets
blowing and the living being snatched into heaven
to meet the Lord are not to be
understood as literal truth, as the Left Behind
series suggests, but as a vivid description of
the great transformation of the present world of
which he speaks elsewhere.
So apparently, that can't be taken literally.
It's more of a figurative language on what
is going to happen.
Now, with N.T. Wright on this, I
don't agree.
I believe that it's pretty straightforward.
Again, in my opinion, that the Lord will
come down from heaven with the loud command,
with the voice of the archangel, with the
trump of God, and the dead in Christ
will rise first, and after that, we who
are still alive and are left will be
caught up together with them in the clouds
to meet the Lord in the air.
I don't think he would go through all
of that language and nuances of words and
explanation if it was all figurative.
He's trying to say something that he's not
really saying.
I don't believe that.
I believe that this is going to happen
at some point.
I know people disagree.
It's ok.
And when this happens?
When is this going to happen?
Did it already happen?
In A.D. 70 that we talked about.
Is it going to happen before things get
bad?
And that's what a lot of people hope
for, right?
Now I hope that happens right before it
gets tough, right before it gets difficult.
I hope we're out of here.
Well, that doesn't fly with the majority of
the persecuted church in other parts of the
world.
They're being killed for their faith.
They're being persecuted.
I can't even tell you what's happening with
ISIS and different groups, what they're doing.
It's horrific.
It's unbelievable.
I never thought I would see a time
in my life where these atrocities are taking
place.
So it's kind of foolish for us here
in America to say, you know what?
We're out of here when it gets bad.
This text says we're out of here when
it gets bad.
No, it doesn't say that.
It just says there will come a time
when Christ returns.
If you believe it literally, the dead will
rise again and believers who are here will
be caught up with Christ in the air.
Now, does that come soon?
Does it come after what many believe is
a tribulation period?
Does it come in the mid-tribulation period?
All we know is that you need to
be ready.
And the one reason why I like to
show both sides or different sides is so
that you are aware that there are other
believers who believe different things and we shouldn't
shoot each other because of it.
Brother is shooting brother and sister is shooting
sister because they just don't believe on the
exact date or timing of something.
And there's different views.
All we know is that there is Christ
is coming again.
Be prepared.
And it will be much better than you
have ever dreamed.
Because people are like, why do I get
to do this in heaven?
It sounds like I just don't want to
worship.
Somebody actually told me, I don't want to
worship God in heaven for eternity.
That sounds boring.
If that's the case, you might want to
check your heart.
Because I truly don't think that you've been
converted if you have that type of issue
with heaven.
Because all we know is that it's going
to be glorious.
God will be there and there's tremendous peace
and joy.
No pain, no suffering.
Nothing.
To sit and say, I don't want to
worship God all of eternity means your heart's
in the wrong spot.
The word caught up, the words caught up
are the Greek word, actually it's a Greek
word, harpazo, means to snatch away.
My being caught up in reading the Bible
is a state of mind.
It's not a physical movement, some people would
say.
And that's how they can say that being
caught up is not really actually being caught
up.
It's like, you know, I'm really caught up
in the service right now.
I'm not going anywhere, am I?
It's a state of mind.
So that's why they say that all this
is really a state of what God's going
to do with the world and the new
heavens when He comes again.
Why are most terrified about death?
Let's just be transparent for one minute here.
Why are most people terrified about death, about
this text, about the rapture, about the catching
away of the church, of heaven and hell?
Why are most people upset and worried and
afraid and they don't want to talk about
it?
Now let me tell you up front and
be honest, I'm not looking forward to death,
but I praise God I'm not fearful of
it like I was when I was little.
But why is that?
The reason is this.
Most are terrified about death because they are
not ready.
They are not ready.
And so I don't want to just end
a sermon like this on those types of
notes.
I want to let you know that there's
tremendous hope, there's tremendous peace.
You can be ready with God if you
get your heart ready.
You don't need to be terrified by death.
I mean, if we think this through, because
most people don't want to die because of
the pain, right?
Painful and they miss their family.
But to be separated from the body, in
that instant, you'll be present with Christ.
Immediately, you'll be with your Savior.
And if you don't want that, you're not
sure about that, I would encourage you, get
your heart right today before God.
All you have to say is, Lord, I've
been riding my parents' coattails, I've been just
serving my own agenda, I've been going to
church for a social gathering, I've been going
to church to meet a future husband or
spouse or wife.
I've heard they go to church for all
the wrong reasons, but today you can say,
Lord, I'm surrendering my will, I'm surrendering my
heart, I'm repenting of my sin, and I'm
turning my life completely over to you.
I give you my life.
And you are ready.
You are ready to meet your Savior because
you've got the heart ready.
So death is separation from the body.
Dead men seek God.
And the last point of application, I'm going
to close on this, is death, we're talking
about dead men seek God, I want to
remind you also that death is separation from
the world.
Death is separation from the world.
And this really is the point, I actually
should have spent the majority of the time
on this because this is what affects most
Christians.
When Paul talks about being dead to the
world, so you can be alive to the
things of God, most people are not.
They're alive to the world and dead to
the things of God.
They have not separated from the world.
They love the world, the influence of the
world.
Now let me clarify that real quick.
When Paul says, not Paul, one of the
writers of the New Testament says, all that's
in the world is the lust of the
flesh, the lust of the eye, and the
pride of life.
He who loves the world does not have
the love of the Father in him.
And many people are like, that doesn't make
sense.
Well the world there is the word cosmos.
And that just means the world's mindset.
So if a person loves the world's mindset,
everything about the world, the way we spend
money, our entertainment, everything about the world and
nothing to do with God, if we love
the world, we can't have the love of
the Father in us.
It's impossible.
Why don't you try, when you get home,
mixing water and fire?
Just make a little fire and try to
mix it with a gallon of water.
What happens?
One or the other is going to take
over, whatever is stronger.
You can have a burning, raging house fire
and try to throw a gallon of water
in there.
What's going to happen?
Nothing at all.
Or you can be up in the mountains,
camping, big huge campfire, throw all the logs
into the lake.
What's going to happen?
Nothing.
Right?
The lake, whatever is greater, is going to
consume the other.
So if we have all the love of
the world, and this is a real struggle
for young adults.
How do you know Shane?
Because I was one.
I know, because we're cared about appearance and
who likes us and our husband or our
wife.
I'm talking about a wife, right?
But we love all these things about the
world and we're so caught up in the
world.
And we wonder why God is distant.
What happened to my relationship with the Lord?
It's because the world has came in and
pulled you away from God.
So that's why Paul says you must die
to the world.
Oh, I think Jesus said whoever dies to
himself and carries his cross, that's what he's
talking about.
Now let me bring that home a little
bit more.
Paul said in Romans 6.11, So you
also must consider yourself dead to sin and
alive to God in Christ Jesus.
So you must consider yourself dead to sin
and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
Now this is interesting.
The Bible says, I am dead to sin.
Right?
You're dead to sin.
And I read it, I'm dead to sin.
Sin has no power over me.
I'm dead to it.
I'm dead to the...
But then I say, but why in the
world is it so alive in me?
Have you ever thought that?
If I'm dead to it, what's going on
in here?
Wait a minute, Paul.
I don't understand.
If I'm dead to sin, why is it
alive?
I mean, I could go sin when we
leave this service.
Couldn't you?
All of us.
There's something there.
Here's what's happening.
James McDonald gives a great analogy.
And I want to quote him on this.
It means that because Christ died in our
place, we are dead to the power of
sin.
It's as if we used to live in
an apartment with an awful landlord who would
burst in whenever he wanted to.
But now we've moved to a new apartment
with a new landlord.
We have new locks.
We owe the former landlord nothing.
He can't get into our new apartment unless
we open the door and invite him in.
So here's what happens.
I'm dead to sin.
But I'm not dead to the influence.
In other words, you name it.
You fill in the blank.
I won't fill in my blank for you.
Right?
Same thing.
I'm dead to you.
You have no power over me.
Be quiet.
It's calling me.
Come here.
Remember?
No, no, no.
You're dead to me.
Wait a minute.
That was kind of fun.
Wait a minute.
I'm tired.
I'm lonely.
I'm mad.
And you turn back to that influence.
And you open the door.
And you sin.
And then you go home.
You cry.
Oh, Lord, I'm so sorry.
I'm never going to do that.
I'm never going to do that again.
You are dead to me, sin.
I'm still here.
No, no, no.
I'm dead.
Like patty cake.
Remember that game?
Patty cake.
And you turn right around.
You start playing patty cake with the devil.
And you're like, that's right.
I remember that.
I remember that glimpse.
That was fun.
And then you sin.
Oh, never going to do that again.
I'm getting farther away this time.
And what was that?
You're still there?
And see, that's how it works.
So I'm dead to it.
But the influence isn't dead.
The influence keeps pulling me.
Now, folks, why do you think I preach
so often about prayer and brokenness and humility
and in the Word of God and fasting
and all these things nobody likes to do?
Because that keeps you far away over here.
How's the devil going to influence a man
or woman who's spending hours in his Word,
hours praying, fasting, worshiping God, and they're filled
with the Spirit of God.
They're going to be more dead to that
than the person who's caught in their carnal
nature.
Actually, the person caught in their carnal nature
lives right here.
They just open the door.
Oh, it's you again.
I'm convicted.
That's bad.
I don't like that.
But it's you again.
You just keep opening the door.
And we get upset.
That's why people get depressed many times.
And please don't misunderstand what I'm about to
say, but I often tell people who are
struggling with depression, are you in the center
of God's will?
Not all the time.
Shane, there's chemical imbalances.
I know, I know, I know all about
cognitive behavioral therapy.
But many times, although not always, when we're
outside of God's will, when we're doing things
we know we shouldn't be doing, when we're
not pleasing our Lord and Savior, we are
very depressed.
We are very depressed.
You get a young Christian caught in sin,
you go ask them why they're so depressed.
Because that's what sin does.
See, here's the interesting thing.
Sin never stands still.
It always grows.
It either grows or it dwindles.
And it all depends on whether you're starving
it to death or you're feeding it.
I mean, this could be one of the
most important parts of the sermon this morning,
is what are you doing with that sin?
Are you feeding it or are you starving
it?
Because once sin gets a root, it doesn't
just stay there.
It takes you down slowly, one step at
a time, one wrong choice at a time,
until you're at the end saying, how did
I get here?
That's why Paul says, reckon yourself, consider yourself
dead to sin.
It's a constant battle.
I wish that battle was over on Sundays
at least.
Come on, give me one day.
It's that constant battle.
I mean, pastors battle with all the things
everybody else does.
I mean, I've always had a problem with
eating too much, right?
Well, Shane, that's little.
Well, no, that can lead to other things
too.
It's the flesh.
That's why fasting is so important.
You starve the flesh.
We just got an email from, I think
it was Norway and one from Africa, watching
the videos online on fasting, who said their
lives have been radically changed and transformed.
Like, why can't we get that in America?
Because you have to starve the flesh.
I better get off that topic.
You don't like that one.
You know why we don't?
Because it hurts and it hits home.
And it's hard, very hard.
John Owen said, he's a Puritan author, he
said, Grace changes the nature of man, but
nothing changes the nature of sin.
So grace changes me, but nothing changes the
nature of sin, that influence.
What happens?
Death is separation from the world.
The more I die to self, the closer
I get to God.
And I wish I could really get this
point across to all of you.
The more you die to self, the closer
you get to God.
The more you put down your self-interest,
the more you put down bitterness and self
-centeredness and anger and lust, and you just
die to self, Lord, I'm done with those
things, I'm following you, you draw closer to
Christ.
The devil, the enemy robs you of joy
by influencing you with bitterness.
He robs you with peace by influencing you
with fear.
And he robs you of a strong, vibrant
relationship with God by influencing you with lust
and addiction.
Also, as John Owen said, be killing sin
or sin be killing you.
Not real good English, but a powerful truth.
Think about it.
Be killing sin or sin be killing you.
Why don't we talk about this from the
pulpits much anymore?
I don't understand.
We need to hear about how heaven is
sweet and hell is hot.
We need to hear about how sin will
deceive.
Because when you hear the truth about sin,
you'll go home, I'll go home, and we'll
repent.
We'll say, Lord, change me.
Help me.
I don't want this cancer to keep growing.
But if we don't address the cancer, it
doesn't go away.
And maybe it's just me, but I grew
up in a lot of different churches.
I went to many churches in this valley
just stopping by.
And when we don't talk about what's destroying
me, it doesn't help me.
If all I go in and hear that
God is love, and that we're going to
go do all these wonderful things and just
be a trooper and get through it and
you're a king's kid, and all these things
that are true.
But if that's all I ever hear, all
I ever hear, then it will never bring
me to repentance.
Because there's nothing to repent from.
I'm good with God.
And what word of God does it goes
to heart and it shows us sins that
are not pleasing to God?
In this room, there's sins of bitterness and
anger and unforgiveness.
There's sins of lust so deep that people
are so addicted and there's such bondage they
don't know how to get out.
There's sins of selfishness.
Oh my Lord, if God could just expose
the pride and selfishness in this room, we
would be in trouble.
And God says, I want to remove those
things so you can draw closer to me.
I'm reading a book right now about the
revival that hit Argentina in the 1950s.
And the people were just, God's presence was
so powerful that they would just be in
confession of sin for an hour or two.
I'm like, wow, what did they do?
Because it's not just, oh, they did this,
it's confession, it's a broken heart, weeping and
crying out to God, God, I need you,
I need you to deliver me and set
me free.
And when the Spirit of God revives your
soul, you have, look at David, look at
the Psalms.
There's a heart on fire for God and
that's one of my concerns with the church
today is we've lost our zeal, we've lost
our passion for the things of God.
People actually come to church as if they're
doing God a favor.
Put that off the checklist.
I did that.
Really, is that what church has resulted in
now?
Be careful, be careful because the principle of
sowing and reaping, the dead bodies sown and
were reaped with a glorious body, it applies
to all areas of life.
We must first empty ourself in order to
be filled with the Holy Spirit.
Let me just repeat that.
If you want to be filled with the
Holy Spirit, I'm not talking about weirdness or
what you see on TV.
I'm talking about genuinely filled with the Spirit
of God because that's where bondages are broken,
that's where sin is crushed, that's where the
Word of God becomes alive and worship is
penetrating your heart because you're filled with the
Spirit.
But in order to be filled, you must
first be what?
Emptied.
Dead to self.
And I think that would be a good
way to end the sermon, the service too,
is to, Lord, less of me and more
of you.
Less of me and more of you and
you've got to mean it.
I remember I was also reading about the
Welsh Revivals, 1904, 1905 by Evan Roberts.
It started by a prayer, with a prayer
room of four or five people.
And they prayed one simple prayer, one sentence
with a broken and contrite heart.
They prayed, Lord, would you break us?
And you can read the diaries, God's Spirit
filled that room.
They prayed all night and just weeping for
their people, weeping for the church and then
they have prayer meetings and worship services every
night for weeks and months when a humble
heart finally says, Lord, Lord, Lord, break me.
I want to be fully surrendered to you.
Be ready.
Because that's a victorious life that Christ spoke
of.
Let me just leave you with this sentence.
Final thought.
You are either dead to the world and
alive to the things of God or dead
to the things of God and alive to
the world.
You are either dead to the world and
alive to the things of God or alive
to the world and God is dead to
you.
And I know I always, every time I
talk on a topic like this, I run
the risk of people not coming back.
You know what I say?
I don't care anymore.
You need to hear the truth because the
hound of heaven will not leave you.
What I just said will haunt you all
week long if you're, in a good way,
right?
Not ghosts and demons and all that, but
I just went on a tirade about ghosts
and demons and things.
But honestly, he'll say, am I dead to
the things of God?
Because most people don't have the joy-filled,
fulfilled life in Christ that the Bible talks
about.
People say, we need to get back to
the New Testament church.
Well, it first begins in here.
If we just get back to the New
Testament church, it begins in here.
The New Testament church was on fire for
God.
They were filled with the Spirit.