No Waiting for Believers!

Every day we have trouble on this earth. Someday all that we are doing and living for will no longer be important at all. Our time here on the earth will have been completed. Man's attempt has always been to create some type of Utopian culture and society, from Marxism, Mao, Saddam Hussein to even Hitler had dreams of creating a perfect place yet they have all attempted it without the help of our Creator. There is no heaven, no Utopia without the very Creator of the Universe being involved in it. No matter how valiant man's efforts are, there will never be that Utopia until Jesus Christ returns at the end of the Tribulation called His Second Coming.

The one thing we can never know with absolute certainty is who will be in heaven of those who have gone before us. We can never know what their heart condition was like and if they called out to Jesus in their final moments, like the thief on the cross did. Only God does. There will also be those who inherit Hell. Jesus said that there are a lot more going to hell than going to heaven. The bizarre thing is that is not by His design. Everyone who winds up in Hell goes there by their own choice. There are people going to Hell because they don't want anything to do with God or heaven. Everyone gets a least one prayer answered in life, either choosing to accept Jesus and have Him as part of your life, however brief that is, or to have nothing to do with Jesus. We are now in the concluding verses of our study into Revelation 7, known as a parenthetical pause.

Revelation 7:13-17 ~ "Then one of the elders asked me, "These in white robes - who are they, and where did they come from?" I answered, "Sir, you know." And he said, "These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore, "they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will spread his tent over them. Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst. The sun will not beat upon them, not any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."

It seems hard to fathom that the world one day might all come together to create a unified government, a unified church and a unified economy, yet that is just what the Bible says will happen during the Great Tribulation Period that will last for 7 years. That the nations of the world would destroy their borders and usher in peace and prosperity so we could all become one family. The concept is beautiful but the means to obtain that is different than what God has decreed. Once Eden was lost, man attempted to recreate that kind of Utopia here on earth. That was the whole inspiration behind the driving force of Nimrod and the creation of Babylon. That God could be brought down and man could create a Utopia on earth. It is the very doctrine behind the New Age movement. That somehow Utopia could be created by man. But as long as man attempts to govern himself, there will be a separation of nations, and of races, and of powers. There will be those that have, and those that have not. It will be that way until Christ comes and establishes His kingdom. That is the answer.

If you ever take the time to read the Communist Manifesto, what Stalin, Marx and Lennon preached in concept, was great! If you look at it very carefully, it sounds almost biblical. That you would be loving with one another, sharing with one another, yet in the deviousness of man's heart is someone who creates such a thing that is skimming off the top. We know that a man will come, we know him as the Son of Perdition or the Antichrist, who will have an idea to create a one-world government, a cashless society where man does business with numbers globally, and that this man will establish this Utopia under his rule and his reign. All things will be going along well, except for the preaching and presentation of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We have been learning how 144,000 Jewish men that will come to know Jesus as Messiah, and these guys will be spiritual tornadoes throughout all the earth. There will be a vast amount of people brought to the knowledge of Christ through their efforts, and salvation will be happening on such a grand scale during this time than during any other crusade in the history of the world. Whenever the gospel is preached, decisions are made. Some people will say yes to Jesus and others unfortunately will say no. When this happens during the Tribulation Period, it will make every crusade up to this point look like an attempt compared to what God is going to do during that time.

Revelation 7:3 speaks of the assignment and sealing of the 144,000, 12,000 from each of the 12 tribes of Israel. Revelation 7:9 speaks of their successes as a multitude were saved that went beyond anyone's ability to number them. We will get a sneak peek at the efforts of those 144,000 that those that are saved during the Tribulation period who die during that time will go into the everlasting arms of God, the Father in heaven.

The Bible says" to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord" in 2 Corinthians 5:8! No where in Scripture is there a waiting period or a place of holding. No where is Scripture is that a biblical truth. There is no doctrine of purgatory, it doesn't exist. It was created after the year 600, it doesn't exist. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, is a wonderful promise to anyone who believes in Jesus, especially if you are called to be a martyr for Jesus Christ. That is our assured hope and our guarantee!

When those that suffer and die for their testimony during the Tribulation, they go immediately into the presence of God. There is no waiting zone, place of purgatory, no, they go immediately into the presence of God and that is exciting.

Jesus says that heaven rejoices when people come to their faith in Him.

Luke 15:4-7, 10 ~ "Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Does he not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.' I tell you in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who do not need to repent."

Repent simply means to change your mind. When it says that the shepherd places the sheep upon his shoulders, shows that this sheep was wayward. It's prone to wander. When a lamb goes astray he will be paying for a little disobedience. In the days, shepherds would break the leg of a lamb that continued to go astray. It teaches the little lamb that it must be dependent upon the shepherd if it's going to survive in this evil world. Jesus reminds us how much He loves us despite how much we have wandered away from Him. Maybe God is trying to get your attention today to bring you back to Him. What circumstance are you going through right now, that has you here today? It is the work of the Lord. It is God's desire that our minds need to be changed. That we need to look to Jesus Christ for adoration and worship! We want to look toward Him as our shepherd.

We are taking a sneak peek at what believers of the future shall see. The church remember has already been long removed from the earth during the rapture. Heaven will be well attended.

Revelation 7:13-14 ~  "Then one of the elders asked me, "These in white robes - who are they, and where did they come from?" I answered, "Sir, you know." And he said,"

Where is John right now? He is in the Spirit in heaven seeing these heavenly revelations. John is a member of the church. Remember in Chapter 4 in Revelation, the church has already been caught up into heaven. John is watching this future event and one of the 24 elders, that represent the church, asks John a question. John doesn't know who these people are and where they came from because they are not part of the church.

We as Christians, live in a doctrine of immanency that Jesus could return at any time, the Bible says, without any warning. This is something that we, as a church, await! We live every day of our lives in anticipation of that. Heaven will be well attended by those who have suffered for Jesus Christ. I'm not talking about those who are suffering right now. It is alarming to see how many people are suffering right now in the world for Jesus Christ. There are statistics all over the world that there are people that today will die for their faith in Jesus from North Africa, to China to areas in the deep South Pacific, that if you are a Christian, you will die for Christ! I am not talking about those that are dying for Jesus today .

There will come a time, where the bulk of those who are Christians at that time, must die for Christ. You and I are called to live for Christ in this age. There will come a time during the reign of the Antichrist, where all those who pledge allegiance to Jesus Christ will suffer persecution and the bulk of them will die for their faith in Christ. They will suffer for their identification with Jesus Christ. This group is not the church though the church suffers at this hour. There will be a time when the rapture will take place, the gospel will be preached,  by 144,000, skipping ahead to Chapter 14, Jewish men who are virgins, we speak Hebrew and all kinds of languages, 12,000 from each tribe of Israel.

The people dying for Christ today are different from those that will die for their faith during the Tribulation period. Don't confuse the two groups. Voices of the Martyrs, VOM.org, there are a number of Christians today being persecuted for their faith to death more than any other time in recorded history. Globally, 100's of thousands are dying for their faith annually now. In the past 21 generations, there has always been a percentage of people who have died for their faith, they're martyred and we are seeing an increase in that today globally.

Those we are studying about in the Book of Revelation in Chapter 7 are not church age saints. These are not Old Testament saints. These are Tribulation saints, these are those that come to faith that are not part of the church , the church is in heaven. These are Tribulation saints, the ones who in future studies, Revelation 13 for example, they will not bow to the demands of the global leader, that we refer to as the Antichrist, they would not receive the mark of the beast. They would not pledge allegiance to his regime. They chose to give their faith to Jesus and honor the Lord. These are the Tribulation saints that will die for their faith, in that period of time. You don't have to be a Tribulation saint. You need Jesus right now and skip all of that. No one is guaranteed tomorrow. You don't know when your day is. Accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior and the only way you are getting out of here alive.

The Only Approved Cleansing Agent That Guarantees Salvation

We are going to finish up the remainder of Revelation Chapter 7 today and we are going to be talking a lot about blood today because God places a lot of value on the blood of Jesus Christ. In order for us to become justified before God, God needed to become flesh so that we might find forgiveness from our sins, because the wages of sin is death. We needed someone to take that punishment for our sins as the ultimate sacrifice to redeem us before God and that only happened when He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, as that perfect sin payment for all of us. We need a perfect blood to atone for our sins and nothing we have other than our faith in Jesus Christ will ever save us or be good enough.

We are going to look at the attire we wear in heaven and it's all based upon the blood of Jesus Christ. When God looks upon us, He sees the blood of His Son, and only through that sacrifice can we be granted righteousness because we have accepted that atonement only found in the blood of Jesus Christ. His blood is the only approved cleansing agent for sin. When God looks at us from the spiritual realm, He is looking for blood. Remember that the children of Israel were required to put blood of the lamb on the doorposts of their homes in order for the angel of death to pass by. It was told to only look for the blood. For us today, God looks for the blood. Are we covered by the blood of the Lamb? The simplicity of Christianity is mind boggling. It's not about what we do for God, but about what God has done for us. Its not about us trying to get His attention but Him coming down to wake us up from death.

All Jesus is looking for is faith in Him, much like the thief on the cross who uttered, "Remember me Lord when You come into Your Kingdom." Our faith will be an active living faith. Remember the thief on the cross didn't have a chance to be baptized, didn't have a chance to tithe, couldn't be an usher, involved in children's ministry, couldn't be a greeter or go on a missions trip, he just hung there and said, :Remember me Jesus."

By saying that he is saying, "I believe You are God, that You are coming back to establish Your kingdom and when You do that, will you remember that I turned to You?" Makes you wonder if that same person come forward today, would we accept him? We might say, the words, "Remember me aren't good enough." We just need faithfulness. A faithful Christian has his course set. Do you have a plan in your life?

What is your plan today or even tomorrow? You know we all have one. You might be heading out to your job today or tomorrow. It might be to visit a family member or friend, to go on a dinner date with someone you love. But do you have a spiritual course set? Don't wait around to find out what your course is Christian! We are so cautious about what direction we should take for God, waiting on the Lord until we die of old age. In every generation, God has called His people to be faithful. A Christian not only needs to set a course, but we need to stay on it as well.

Matthew 24:45-46 ~ "Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the servants in his household to give them their food at the proper time? It will be good for that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns."

We need to be a church that is busy doing. Why? Because our Master is coming back. If He were to look at your life under the column of faithfulness to account for the time He has given you, what would He find? What is there was only three things on that list, but under your name there was another column and He clicked on it and it listed all the things He wanted to do through you, but you didn't want to do them. All the things He wanted you to do but you weren't open to do them for God.? It would break our hearts. Lord give us the ability to do all the things You have engineered for our lives!

Matthew 25:21 ~ "His master replied, "Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness."

1 Corinthians 4:2 ~ "Now it is required that those who have been given a rust must prove faithful." 

It would be like our boss asking us to do something in our jobs, like make 10 copies of that document and make the print black. What if we said, "You want that huh? Well do it yourself." Would we even have a job after that? Jesus has laid out for us what He wants us to do, to abstain from sexual immorality, and follow Me. Would we tell Him, "NO! Why don't you do that?!" Jesus has called us to evangelize, and you might say, that is not your calling, you aren't cut out for that. Well Jesus didn't say for you to do anything persay, why don't you wear a t-shirt instead with Passion on it. Remember this, heaven will not be full of people who said No. It will be full of people who said, "Yes Lord!"

May the Lord put handles on our backs, so He can place us anywhere He wants. We need to pray every day that we would be willing to do whatever God puts in our life today to bring Him glory and honor. God wants more "Yes Men and Women!"

Colossians 1:2 ~"To the holy and faithful brothers in Christ at Colosse: Grace and peace to you from God our Father."

Matthew 7:20-24 ~ "Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them. :Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you, Away from me, you evildoers!' "Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and put them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock."

Matthew 24:21 ~ "For then there will be great distress , unequaled from the beginning of the world until now - and never to be equaled again."

A faithful believer is one who is committed. The ones were are reading about in Revelation are the ones who have washed their robes. They are faithful and secure in Jesus Christ. They followed Jesus in the Tribulation so faithfully even unto the point of death. They were killed in their faithfulness to Christ. They would not bow before the Antichrist or accept his mark or accept him as leader, and deny Jesus. They will pay for their faithfulness with their lives and in doing so, Scriptures says that they have washed their robes. Make no mistake, their death does not wash their robes! Their faithfulness to Christ does not wash their robes. They are following Christ, and it is Him that washed their robes white. He does this by His own blood. In the old times when blood was contaminated it need to be cleansed. We cannot cleanse our own blood from sin. You can't get a blood transfusion and all of a sudden begin to think holy thoughts. Only God can do that through the blood of Christ. It is the blood of Jesus that makes us ready for heaven.

Revelation 7:15 ~ "Therefore, "they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will spread his tent over them."

Looking back for a moment to Revelation 7:9 ~ "After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands."

Palm branches have always been a symbol of peace and security to the nation of Israel.

Leviticus 23;34, 40-43 ~ "Say to the Israelites: 'On the fifteenth day of the seventh month the LORD's Feast of Tabernacles begins, and it last for seven days. On the first day you are to take choice fruit from the trees, and palm fronds, leafy branches and poplars, and rejoice before the LORD your God for seven days. Celebrate this as a festival to the LORD for seven days each year. This is to be a lasting ordinance for the generations to come; celebrate it in the seventh month. Live in booths for seven days. All native born Israelites are to live in booths so your descendants will know that I had the Israelites live in booths when I brought them out of Egypt. I am the LORD your God.'"

From the days of Nehemiah and the return of the captives, as they celebrated their freedom in returning to their homeland Israel - palm branches and palm Sundays!

John 12:12-13 ~ "The next day the great crowd that had come for the Feast heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem. They took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting, "Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the King of Israel!"

They are symbols of liberation and independence!

Heaven in the midst of salvation is an absolute reality. Earthly perils will no longer trouble us.

Revelation 7:16-17 ~ "Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst. The sun will not beat upon them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. "

Remember that in Revelation 13, you can't buy or sell, eat anything or drink anything without the mark of the beast. These believers will be starving to death. They'll be dying of thirst, but they won't thirst anymore. The horrific environmental effects that are coming to the earth, will not affect them anymore. They are now with the Lord in heaven. The ozone layer will be completely gone and the effects of the sun will be to scorch people, they won't be impacted by the scorching heat any longer. Heavenly blessings will be theirs.

The four things listed here is the pathology of how they died. Starvation. Deprivation. Neglect.  Exposure. Remember that Chapter 7 breaks chronology so we are probably looking ahead to the sufferings imposed by the government of the Antichrist.

There will come a time, when we are long gone, that someone will come along and pick up a Bible, and read verses 16 and 17, and that will give them the endurance and the hope to live a few more days longer or a few more  hours longer before they go into the everlasting arms of Jesus. These verses will be read, perhaps in your Bible that is left behind, by someone who will say, "It won't be long for me now when I will according to these scriptures, die of hunger or thirst, or by this scorching sun that is permeating through the atmosphere that is causing us absolute exposure and exhaustion. I will soon be dead in this world and alive with God almighty." These verse will bring them absolute hope.

You don't have to wait that long. You can make a decision today to accept God's grace or according to 2 Thessalonians 2, if you don't and you keep putting Him off, and God calls His people home, before these events can take place, the Bible says you will never be able to believe again. You will never have that opportunity. God, Himself, says that because they did not believe the love of the truth I sent them, I will send them strong delusions so that they will believe the lie. The opportunity you once had will be gone.

It will be exactly as it was in the days of Noah, when the door on that ship shut, and you know who shut that door? God did! God closed the door.

You might be saying, "Well I'm going to wait and see how this all works out." God is going to close the door. Once the door is shut, it won't be opened. You're flirting around in the world and playing with Jesus, thinking you'll have plenty of time to make a decision, even if you miss the rapture. According to 2 Thessalonians 2, you won't be able to. God will do something to your heart and mind, like Pharaoh, and you will NOT be able to believe. You'll be lost. All because you refused the love of the truth. Don't be in that group of people. Respond to Him now!

You might be feeling some pressure, but I'd rather you feel the pressure than be lost forever! Why should we even care? I'm the one going to heaven for sure! I already got my ticket! And yet people, myself included, are pleading with you to get your ticket! For the amount of pain and blood that Jesus lost, I want Him to get every soul possible for what He suffered for! If you have lost vision of that, go see the Passion of the Christ. That will set your sights clear! Just how much you are worth to Him! So what are you waiting for? It's a nice day isn't it? You wouldn't want to walk away from him and slip and die would you? Step outside of your house on your way to their job or errand and get in a car accident and die, would you?

To those of us that are Christians, believers in Jesus Christ, it's a beautiful day! No matter what happens today, we are going to heaven! I hope you come with me!

Is There Any Precident That Must Happen Before the Rapture?

Most people have probably wondered about the very same statement I'm about to share, and wonder what the answer is? What about people living in the most remote places on earth, how do those tribes here about Jesus? How are they saved or are they? It's simple.

The answer is found in Romans 1:20 ~ "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse."

We still should however keep on with our efforts to reach the ends of the earth with the gospel of Jesus until He calls us home. But Scripture clearly points out that even if it doesn't make it through radio ministries or missionaries, His revelation to the mind of man is that He is Creator God. All of humanity, even the ones not yet reached are without an excuse. He is speaking to them and He will reach them even if we don't. That is how merciful our God is.

Right now you have the choice which type of saint you want to be. Either the Church Age saints, the Tribulation saints or you are going to reject God and be forever separated from the love, grace and mercy of Jesus Christ when your life comes to an end or until the Lord comes and raptures the church out of this world. There are some who have stopped by here today, and will say to themselves, well if that all really comes to pass, then I will accept Jesus if it happens like the Bible says it will. Be warned, there are some Scriptures that say if you had the opportunity to come to Jesus before this all happens, your heart might grow so hard, that you will buy into the deception and will forever pass up your opportunity to make that choice. Don't play games with God now. You might end up regretting it for the rest of all eternity.

2 Thessalonians 2:10-12 ~ "And in every sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness."

What this means is that if you understand today, that Jesus Christ is the Lord and Savior, that He died on the cross for your sins and mine, rose from the dead, and that He is the Almighty and that He loves you, there is a possibility that if the rapture were to take place today, and you were left behind, you might not be able to believe. Accept Jesus today, while you can!

The question might also be asked why was the Tribe of Dan deleted from the list of the 12 Tribes of Israel in Revelation 7:5-8? Dan was the first tribe to introduce idolatry into the tribes of Israel. The tribe of Dan also did not want to cross over into the Promised Land, they wanted to stay on the other side. Many Jewish and Hebrew scholars believe in the Scripture that concerns the tribe of Dan in the Old Testament, a rider shall come forth and he shall fall backwards upon his neck. It is a reference that the tribe of Dan will bring forth the Antichrist or that the Antichrist, himself will come out of the tribe of Dan. It is interesting to note however that the tribe of Dan is not mentioned in Revelation 7.

The people mentioned here in Revelation 7 are not the church age saints, they are the Tribulation Saints and it is clear that you must not confuse the two groups. The church age believers come to Christ in faith before the Tribulation. These other people find their faith in Jesus Christ during the Tribulation period. The church age believers are kept from the Tribulation period, while this group must go through the Tribulation period. The church age believers are seen in heaven wearing fine white linen whereas the tribulation believers wear white robes. The church age believers are called to express their faith by living for Jesus Christ, whereas the tribulation believers are called to express their faith by dying for Jesus Christ. The church age believers are seen seated in heaven before the tribulation period whereas the tribulation believers are found suffering on earth during the Tribulation. The church age believers, they are the heavenly wedding scene whereas the tribulation believers find themselves invited to attend the wedding as well as the Old Testament saints. The Bride and Groom are never invited to the wedding, they are the wedding party. The church age believers are married to Jesus Christ in eternity, whereas the tribulation believers are servants of Jesus Christ forever for all eternity. The church age believers wear crowns in heaven whereas the tribulation believers wear no crowns at all in heaven. The church age believers have harps and vials and the tribulation believers have palm branches. 

Heaven will be well attended by those who have come out of this world.

Revelation 7:13-14 ~ " Then one of the elders asked me, "These in white robes - who are they, and where did they come from?" I  answered, "Sir, you know." 

When John says, "Sir, you know," it is a subtle play on words, it is basically saying, "I don't know, how could I, I am new here." John was basically telling him he has no knowledge of these things because he is new in heaven. John knows intuitively that the elder knows both whom they are and where they come from. This is a significant truth here. Why? Because these are the ones mentioned in Revelation 6.

Revelation 6:11 ~ "Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and brothers who were to be killed as they had been was completed."

This tells us that in the first 3 1/2 years during the opening portion of the Tribulation period, there will be believers who die during the advent of the Antichrist and his antics. When they die and go to heaven, they cry out in the earlier portions of Revelation 6 about being under the altar and crying out to God how long do they have to wait before God vindicates them and they were told to wait a little longer for the others. Now in Revelation 7, these are the others in that parenthetical insert of the Scripture. We know that the 144,000 are Jewish converts to Christ, and that they do not belong to the church age believers. The preaching of the gospel in the earth will be prolific by this men at that time.

There are some who say, based on the way they have been taught in their churches or doctrines that Jesus Christ can not come back until the gospel has been preached to all the world. Did you know that this is not true? This is not true. There is nothing that proceeds the rapture of the church. There is no prerequisite. In fact, even after the preaching of the 144,000 during the Tribulation period, an angel has to be sent into the atmosphere to preach the everlasting gospel to all peoples and then the end will come. So the gospel will be preached in the world to all the ends of the earth during the Tribulation before the end comes but it is post rapture. The church is already gone. So will the church succeed in reaching every person on the planet? No, but that doesn't mean we give up our mission either through outreaches, because Jesus told us to go into the world and share the gospel to all the ends of the world. We will not reach everyone with the gospel.

The 144,000 will not reach everyone. There will come a moment, when we will study it later, that God will send an angel preaching. This will fulfill Jesus' prophetic words in Matthew 24, this gospel shall be preached in all the world and then the end will come. It will be a gathering of God's faithful in heaven. A faithful believer is one who has his course set.

Revelation 7:14-15 ~ " And he said, "These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore, "they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will spread his tent over them."

When you stand before the altar as husband and wife, what is the whole thing built upon? Faith! They make a pledge to be faithful to one another. Will rough times come? Will tribulation come? Yes! But will that husband and wife endure and make it through those tough times? We need to be faithful. Even if one of you in your marriage has been unfaithful, turn it around. Keep your focus on God and He can turn it around. Don't make things worse by walking away or become unfaithful as well. God can make you both faithful again. You want your marriage to be so strong in your faith, that if one of you walks away it will be leaving the most godly man or woman on the planet. Be faithful in your duties as a husband or wife. If they attempt to leave, let them know that they are leaving the best man or woman in the world. Faithful and that is just in marriage.

Let us be faithful in ministry. Faithful in loving God, faithful in all of the above. You know that is what heaven will be populated with? Faithful people. All Jesus is looking for is faith in Him. If we have faith in Him, our faith will be an active and loving kind of faith. Are you one of God's faithful people? You must believe and trust and faith in Jesus. We just need to yield to Him! Are you ready to meet him? Accept Jesus today, now is the time!



 

No Waiting Lines in Heaven for Believers!

Every day we have trouble on this earth. Someday all that we are doing and living for will no longer be important at all. Our time here on the earth will have been completed. Man's attempt has always been to create some type of Utopian culture and society, from Marxism, Mao, Saddam Hussein to even Hitler had dreams of creating a perfect place yet they have all attempted it without the help of our Creator. There is no heaven, no Utopia without the very Creator of the Universe being involved in it. No matter how valiant man's efforts are, there will never be that Utopia until Jesus Christ returns at the end of the Tribulation called His Second Coming.

The one thing we can never know with absolute certainty is who will be in heaven of those who have gone before us. We can never know what their heart condition was like and if they called out to Jesus in their final moments, like the thief on the cross did. Only God does. There will also be those who inherit Hell. Jesus said that there are a lot more going to hell than going to heaven. The bizarre thing is that is not by His design. Everyone who winds up in Hell goes there by their own choice. There are people going to Hell because they don't want anything to do with God or heaven. Everyone gets a least one prayer answered in life, either choosing to accept Jesus and have Him as part of your life, however brief that is, or to have nothing to do with Jesus. We are now in the concluding verses of our study into Revelation 7, known as a parenthetical pause.

Revelation 7:13-17 ~ "Then one of the elders asked me, "These in white robes - who are they, and where did they come from?" I answered, "Sir, you know." And he said, "These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore, "they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will spread his tent over them. Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst. The sun will not beat upon them, not any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."

It seems hard to fathom that the world one day might all come together to create a unified government, a unified church and a unified economy, yet that is just what the Bible says will happen during the Great Tribulation Period that will last for 7 years. That the nations of the world would destroy their borders and usher in peace and prosperity so we could all become one family. The concept is beautiful but the means to obtain that is different than what God has decreed. Once Eden was lost, man attempted to recreate that kind of Utopia here on earth. That was the whole inspiration behind the driving force of Nimrod and the creation of Babylon. That God could be brought down and man could create a Utopia on earth. It is the very doctrine behind the New Age movement. That somehow Utopia could be created by man. But as long as man attempts to govern himself, there will be a separation of nations, and of races, and of powers. There will be those that have, and those that have not. It will be that way until Christ comes and establishes His kingdom. That is the answer.

If you ever take the time to read the Communist Manifesto, what Stalin, Marx and Lennon preached in concept, was great! If you look at it very carefully, it sounds almost biblical. That you would be loving with one another, sharing with one another, yet in the deviousness of man's heart is someone who creates such a thing that is skimming off the top. We know that a man will come, we know him as the Son of Perdition or the Antichrist, who will have an idea to create a one-world government, a cashless society where man does business with numbers globally, and that this man will establish this Utopia under his rule and his reign. All things will be going along well, except for the preaching and presentation of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We have been learning how 144,000 Jewish men that will come to know Jesus as Messiah, and these guys will be spiritual tornadoes throughout all the earth. There will be a vast amount of people brought to the knowledge of Christ through their efforts, and salvation will be happening on such a grand scale during this time than during any other crusade in the history of the world. Whenever the gospel is preached, decisions are made. Some people will say yes to Jesus and others unfortunately will say no. When this happens during the Tribulation Period, it will make every crusade up to this point look like an attempt compared to what God is going to do during that time.

Revelation 7:3 speaks of the assignment and sealing of the 144,000, 12,000 from each of the 12 tribes of Israel. Revelation 7:9 speaks of their successes as a multitude were saved that went beyond anyone's ability to number them. We will get a sneak peek at the efforts of those 144,000 that those that are saved during the Tribulation period who die during that time will go into the everlasting arms of God, the Father in heaven.

The Bible says" to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord" in 2 Corinthians 5:8! No where in Scripture is there a waiting period or a place of holding. No where is Scripture is that a biblical truth. There is no doctrine of purgatory, it doesn't exist. It was created after the year 600, it doesn't exist. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, is a wonderful promise to anyone who believes in Jesus, especially if you are called to be a martyr for Jesus Christ. That is our assured hope and our guarantee!

When those that suffer and die for their testimony during the Tribulation, they go immediately into the presence of God. There is no waiting zone, place of purgatory, no, they go immediately into the presence of God and that is exciting.

Jesus says that heaven rejoices when people come to their faith in Him.

Luke 15:4-7, 10 ~ "Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Does he not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.' I tell you in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who do not need to repent."

Repent simply means to change your mind. When it says that the shepherd places the sheep upon his shoulders, shows that this sheep was wayward. It's prone to wander. When a lamb goes astray he will be paying for a little disobedience. In the days, shepherds would break the leg of a lamb that continued to go astray. It teaches the little lamb that it must be dependent upon the shepherd if it's going to survive in this evil world. Jesus reminds us how much He loves us despite how much we have wandered away from Him. Maybe God is trying to get your attention today to bring you back to Him. What circumstance are you going through right now, that has you here today? It is the work of the Lord. It is God's desire that our minds need to be changed. That we need to look to Jesus Christ for adoration and worship! We want to look toward Him as our shepherd.

We are taking a sneak peek at what believers of the future shall see. The church remember has already been long removed from the earth during the rapture. Heaven will be well attended.

Revelation 7:13-14 ~  "Then one of the elders asked me, "These in white robes - who are they, and where did they come from?" I answered, "Sir, you know." And he said,"

Where is John right now? He is in the Spirit in heaven seeing these heavenly revelations. John is a member of the church. Remember in Chapter 4 in Revelation, the church has already been caught up into heaven. John is watching this future event and one of the 24 elders, that represent the church, asks John a question. John doesn't know who these people are and where they came from because they are not part of the church.

We as Christians, live in a doctrine of immanency that Jesus could return at any time, the Bible says, without any warning. This is something that we, as a church, await! We live every day of our lives in anticipation of that. Heaven will be well attended by those who have suffered for Jesus Christ. I'm not talking about those who are suffering right now. It is alarming to see how many people are suffering right now in the world for Jesus Christ. There are statistics all over the world that there are people that today will die for their faith in Jesus from North Africa, to China to areas in the deep South Pacific, that if you are a Christian, you will die for Christ! I am not talking about those that are dying for Jesus today .

There will come a time, where the bulk of those who are Christians at that time, must die for Christ. You and I are called to live for Christ in this age. There will come a time during the reign of the Antichrist, where all those who pledge allegiance to Jesus Christ will suffer persecution and the bulk of them will die for their faith in Christ. They will suffer for their identification with Jesus Christ. This group is not the church though the church suffers at this hour. There will be a time when the rapture will take place, the gospel will be preached,  by 144,000, skipping ahead to Chapter 14, Jewish men who are virgins, we speak Hebrew and all kinds of languages, 12,000 from each tribe of Israel.

The people dying for Christ today are different from those that will die for their faith during the Tribulation period. Don't confuse the two groups. Voices of the Martyrs, VOM.org, there are a number of Christians today being persecuted for their faith to death more than any other time in recorded history. Globally, 100's of thousands are dying for their faith annually now. In the past 21 generations, there has always been a percentage of people who have died for their faith, they're martyred and we are seeing an increase in that today globally.

Those we are studying about in the Book of Revelation in Chapter 7 are not church age saints. These are not Old Testament saints. These are Tribulation saints, these are those that come to faith that are not part of the church , the church is in heaven. These are Tribulation saints, the ones who in future studies, Revelation 13 for example, they will not bow to the demands of the global leader, that we refer to as the Antichrist, they would not receive the mark of the beast. They would not pledge allegiance to his regime. They chose to give their faith to Jesus and honor the Lord. These are the Tribulation saints that will die for their faith, in that period of time. You don't have to be a Tribulation saint. You need Jesus right now and skip all of that. No one is guaranteed tomorrow. You don't know when your day is. Accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior and the only way you are getting out of here alive.