You've probably heard the saying, "God helps those, who help themselves," and often times people will say that comes from the Bible. Did you know that it isn't? It is actually God helps those who cannot help themselves as a way of summing up the Bible. When we look at today's study, we are going to be studying all of man's greatest efforts as it references the best people in the world today, such as Apple, Microsoft, man's ability to establish cities and cultures, it's all going to come down. Man's attempt to govern himself, will fail and all of this stuff begins to crumble. So what should we be doing? We should be trusting in God. Earthly powers will always let you down.
You may have heard people say, "Well, I don't go to church because it's full of hypocrites," or "I don't believe in God because I had a pastor rip me off." "I don't believe in God because, and they will always cite something that plays on their emotions. Yet God never asked you to trust in any of those things. He asked you to trust Him.
You hear people saying, "Well I'm going to do this or we're going to establish that, or we're going to fix the environment for example," I hate to burst your bubble on what you ,for example the the Park Service, of all people in Alaska, has stated that the glacier is not shrinking but it's growing. It's getting bigger. When will you ever hear that on the news? Man's perception is constantly changing and shifting, to the point where it will crumble, but God's Word is always true!
When creation begins to break down, humanity will be brought to its knees and look who is affected.
Revelation 6:15 ~ "Then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and every slave and every free man hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains."
There will be no earthly power that will come to its help. The "kings of the earth," means the greatest of politicians. Are you looking to the government to be your answer? I hope not. When this great cataclysmic event happens, not even the kings of the earth, the greatest of politicians will have the answer. The "princes" are influential lords, we don't have that so much here in America, but in England they do. Kings, Princes, Queens, Blue Bloods, but even they won't be able to stop it. There will be no decree that anyone will make that will stop what is happening at that time. They won't be able to do anything. This is the frustration of human government. God will bring all of man's devices to a conclusion.
The Bible says that there is a way that seems right to a man, but that way ends in death. Decision making, those choices that seemed right, the Bible says will end in destruction. "The rich," those are your wealthy influential merchants and traders, those who traverse the world for trade. Can you imagine what it would be like to be Bill Gates for just one day? I say only one day because beyond that most of us would get into trouble with that. Can you imagine being the richest man in the world and you can't do a thing about what is happening? That's usually certainly true when some life threatening disease comes and all those avenues have been exhausted, but can you imagine that on a global scale?
Want to know a stupid analysis of Bill Gate's money? They actually broke this down. For every American at the time of when this study was written, that he could buy every single one a $44,000 vehicle, every American? Did you know that he is worth more than some countries? Than most countries actually? What are you going to do when the entire world begins to shake violently and asteroids fall from the sky and the mountains and islands are moved? Build a bomb shelter? What are you going to do? It gets even more interesting. "the generals," even the admirals and the top military minds can't do anything. They have no answers. Interesting. "The mighty," refers to power brokers, they don't necessarily have money or the military at their disposal they have amazing global persuasion and influence. They can't do anything about it either. Now you can see why these times are truly dark and sinister days coming. Aren't you truly glad that you are a Christian today? Aren't you glad that we don't have to go through what is coming?
Then it goes on to say, "and every slave and every free man hid in the caves and among the rocks of the mountain." There were two other people who tried to hide when they blew it, Adam and Eve. What were they thinking? I'm not saying that we would have done anything different, we probably would have done the same thing, but think about it. They knew God, they walked and talked with Him! If you read the Bible carefully, you will know that Eve was by herself when this happened. She was alone when the serpent came. A lot of people try blaming Adam as if he was there, but he wasn't. We don't know where he was, but he wasn't there when the serpent tempted her. She saw, she listened, she sinned! The Bible says, by the way, Adam never sinned like that, she sinned, he entered into her sin. She blew it.
Adam could have walked in and said, "Girl! What in the world has happened to you?" He didn't do that. In fact a lot of people see the story of the redemption of Christ and His people, she sinned willfully. Timothy, in the Book of Timothy, tells us that she sinned willfully, but Adam was not the one deceived, she was. She was deceived by Satan, but Adam just went for it, he entered into her sinful condition, willfully. It may be that Adam, in a sense, was acting out how Christ came and entered into sin willfully to redeem us in an act of love! Regardless, they hid themselves. How strange it is, that we can become so deceived that we begin to hide ourselves, and look we all do it. We do it because we are afraid of being known, because if we are known fully, we are afraid of being rejected, isn't that right? You are so afraid that if people knew you fully, they wouldn't like you or love you. That is human nature! It's wrong but it's human nature.
You want to know why? Because we all long for unconditional love! We yearn for it! We long for the love that accepts us just the way we are. A love that is not critical or judgmental, a love that loves us! Either when we don't see that love or believe that it is available, or we don't have it, we veil ourselves. That might be why vanity is so prevalent in our culture, I mean its one thing to look nice and you're not committing some sin to wear make up or to not wear make up. If it makes you look good, wear it. J. Vernon McGee once said, "If the barn needs painting, paint it!" Every body likes to focus on things that don't matter and make a big deal out of it. That's not the issue, but when you cross the line and vanity becomes such a big deal that a person surrounds them self with such falsehood because they are so afraid of becoming accepted. People can be so great looking but when you truly get to know them, they are mean, cold, cutting and they don't look so great anymore. You don't want to be around them anymore.
Then there are some people who are so-so and when you get to know them they are truly the most beautiful people on earth because they are tender, sweet, compassionate, and that is on the human scale. The amazing thing is that God loves us. He loves us all, despite how calloused, cutting, mean, prideful, selfish, rude and harsh we can be. Why don't we see ourselves that way? God loves you! It's not someone else's standard that we have to live up to. They didn't make us. God made us. Yes we we need to repent of our sin. Yes, we need to be born again. Yes, Jesus said, "I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No man comes to the Father but through Me." It's true. But He loves us and wants us to come to Him.
There is no safe place or place of refuge for these people that are left on the earth. Let's look at their bizarre prayer in the final verses. They pray but it's the wrong prayer. Why don't they call out to God? It shows how hard their heart have become.
Revelation 6:16-17 ~ "They called to the mountains and the rocks, "Fall of us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?"
Have you ever been to a petting zoo? Have you ever warned your child to stay away from "that mad lamb over there?" You ever seen a lamb out of control eating people up? It doesn't happen. Seems like a contradiction, "an angry Lamb?" That just weird. It's like getting bit by a worm! How does that happen? Lambs aren't supposed to be angry!
Jesus Christ came as the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, John the Baptist said. But now that Lamb that has been sacrificed and has risen from the dead, and is enthroned in heaven. He comes back in the Second Coming exercising His judgment. Why? Because it is a Christ rejecting age. It was an age that was religious but didn't know Him personally. It was an age that did they own thing and didn't consult God. It was an age that lived for themselves and cared a less about God. It was an age, which the prophet said, they did right what was in their own eyes. Are we not living a time similar to that? Where anarchy is happening in our own state at this very hour the breaching of the law? We have mayors in the state of California refusing to uphold the law on certain issues while looking away at others! That is a crime and it is the first step of anarchy! Unbelievable.
The Bible says that every man will do what is right in his own eyes. That is anarchy! These last two verses tell us that the earth will tremble before God and they are going to say a silly prayer, "Mountains, rocks and hills, fall on us! Fall on us and hide us from Him who sits on the throne."
God is not out of control at this moment, He is never out of control, but He is holy and just, and sin must be judged. You might not like to hear things like this, and believe me I don't like writing blog posts like this, but if one person today decides, "Wow! I don't want anything to do with that time!" You don't have to have anything to do with that time. Jesus Christ has provide the way, that we can escape the terrible age that is coming. Have you made that decision to say to Jesus Christ, I don't want to live in that time.
Now look we don't know when that time is coming, but honestly you look around at the world and you say it can't be long, but let's just think way out. What if everyone of us dies of old age, we are still going to go into eternity, and it all comes down to where you want to spend an eternity? Let alone the fact that things could happen, that bring in the advent of this horrific time. What is your decision, what is your choice? I will be put the invitation out before you, the scripture says that as many as who receive Jesus Christ, to them gave He the power to become children of God, to as many as who believe in His name.
Don't be mistaken, this has nothing to do with being religious. It has nothing to do with your church attendance, or history of giving or service, it has nothing to do with belonging. You know if this was my last day on earth today, I would say this to you, knowing that I would stand before my maker today, I would say this to you, my last chance, that the Bible says, to repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, that word repent means to change your mind. Trust in Him and if you confess that God put both Jesus Christ on the cross and that He rose from the dead, and if you believe that and confess it with your mouth, you shall be saved. That is what the Bible says.
You might say, "Well that is too simple!" Well then go ahead and try it. A lot of people can't do it. They find that offensive, but have you ever done this? Now hang on to your seat, when the scripture says that these things have been written so that you might know you have eternal life, that word means that it is a tangible, factual knowledge of, we would say today in our modern tongue, you can sink your teeth into it. Do you know that you are saved, going to heaven that securely? Do you know that? Here is the catch, everyone of you that are going to heaven, the Holy Spirit inside you bears witness with your spirit says the Book, says the Bible and you are assured of it. In other words, those of you that are going to heaven, and you know it because of what Christ has done, YOU are going!
For those of you that are saying, I hope so , I really really hope so. Listen, you aren't sure. You don't have that confidence. You don't really know. Those of you who are thinking well I hope it will balance out in the end, you're in trouble. If this was my last invitation to give you today, I would not change a word I am saying right now. YOU can decide NOW to have your guilt removed, your sin forgiven, your name written down in the Lamb's Book of Life, and have heaven assured to you, forever. It's called a relationship with God and do you have it?
You might remember the when your TV programming was interrupted by these words, "We Interrupt this Program... and they would announce things like President Kennedy was shot or the Apollo 13 astronauts are in peril or President Reagan has been shot...and it was gripping! The point I am making is that none of us are promised we will see the sun rise tomorrow or if we will even see the sunset tonight. Our lives will be interrupted with the events of life, and ultimately with the end of life. God reserves that right. To Him it is not an accident. The Bible tells us that all of our days have been numbered by the Lord. But to us it would come as a shocking interruption...we interrupt this program of your life that you have been called into question now to give an answer to your soul.
The Bible says we must all appear before God. When you look at these things, are you ready to meet Jesus? I hope this blog post has interrupted your normal way of living today. I want to interrupt your life today with the offer and invitation today to call out to Jesus that He might save you from your sins and give you a life worth living, a life that is more sure and more firm, than the foundations of this very earth. Will you accept this invitation today?
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1 comment:
only trusting God.
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