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What about the 2nd coming? Ep 3422 · Challenges of Faith Radio Program

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  Speaker 1: Dear Heavenly Gracious God, we thank you for who you
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  Speaker 1: are and who you continue to be in each of
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  Speaker 1: our lives. We praise you, we give you the honor
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  Speaker 1: and the glory. We thank you for allowing your only son,
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  Speaker 1: the Lord Jesus Christ, to die on the cross of
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  Speaker 1: Calvary for each one of us. As we enter today's message,
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  Speaker 1: we ask you to allow your Holy Spirit to take
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  Speaker 1: the message and make it real, make it clear. Out
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  Speaker 1: of it all may Christ and only Christ be glorified.
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  Speaker 1: In Jesus' name we ask you and thank you. Amen.
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  Speaker 1: Welcome back to Challenges of Faith radio program. I am
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  Speaker 1: Gary McCann. So, what are we looking for? That's the
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  Speaker 1: question for you and you and you and me too.
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  Speaker 1: When we're talking about the second coming, you know the
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  Speaker 1: greatest cataclysm of global history, you know, world history. You've
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  Speaker 1: heard about it. I know you have. Think about the prophets.
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  Speaker 1: They talked about the bad news of the return of
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  Speaker 1: God to earth in the person of Jesus Christ by
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  Speaker 1: a phrase that I know you've heard that's been mentioned
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  Speaker 1: a number of times in the Word of God. And
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  Speaker 1: the phrase is the Hebrew phrase Yom Adonai. But you
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  Speaker 1: and I, we translate it as the day of the
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  Speaker 1: Lord or the day of Yahweh. But the prophets, they
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  Speaker 1: stumbled over each other because they were trying to find
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  Speaker 1: the correct language to describe that which was going on
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  Speaker 1: in their day, you know, the trials, the horrors. So
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  Speaker 1: if you turn to the end of the Old Testament,
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  Speaker 1: to the little book of Zephaniah, I know you turn
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  Speaker 1: and You're going to see where Zephaniah shares with Joel
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  Speaker 1: and some of the other prophets of God a phrase
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  Speaker 1: that's a phrase of really of absolute horror. And it's
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  Speaker 1: called the great day of the Lord. So when you
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  Speaker 1: look at Zephaniah in chapter 1, verses 14 through 16,
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  Speaker 1: I know your turn. It writes that the great day
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  Speaker 1: of the Lord is near and is hastening quickly. The
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  Speaker 1: noise of the day of Yahweh is bitter. Mighty men
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  Speaker 1: will scream aloud. That's a day of wrath, you know,
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  Speaker 1: a day of trouble, distress, devastation, and desolation. And that's
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  Speaker 1: not to neglect or negate darkness and gloominess or clouds
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  Speaker 1: and thick darkness. But here's somebody, Zephaniah, he's really going
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  Speaker 1: through a thesaurus, if there was such a thing available
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  Speaker 1: during his time. But he's really trying to find the
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  Speaker 1: right words, the right terms, excuse me, to really showcase
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  Speaker 1: or describe the calamity of the day of the return
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  Speaker 1: of Christ to this earth. Because you've got to remember,
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  Speaker 1: when he returns, it's going to be in the worst
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  Speaker 1: judgment in the history of the world. And the question
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  Speaker 1: that you've got to ask and answer, if you truly
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  Speaker 1: are going to, how can that be? How can that be? Well,
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  Speaker 1: if Genesis 6 and 9, or chapter 6 to 9,
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  Speaker 1: describes the death of all living by the great flood,
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  Speaker 1: then how can that be given the fact that the
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  Speaker 1: suffering that we've experienced even in our own lifetime? You know,
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  Speaker 1: especially when you're talking about flooding and typhoons and tsunamis
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  Speaker 1: and earthquakes and hurricanes, all of these so-called acts of nature.
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  Speaker 1: How can there be anything worse than those things? As
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  Speaker 1: I grab a sip of my water. I think that
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  Speaker 1: what makes the second coming worse in judgment is that
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  Speaker 1: all those things God did through mediation. You know, that's
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  Speaker 1: through creation. Nature, God, riot. You're talking about creation and upheaval.
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  Speaker 1: But in the second coming, the judgment is going to
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  Speaker 1: be done not by water, not by flood, not by fire,
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  Speaker 1: not by storm, but by his own hand. Did you
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  Speaker 1: hear that? Think about it. We're all familiar with the
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  Speaker 1: story of the ten plagues. I know you are. But
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  Speaker 1: the question is, are you familiar with the wording of
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  Speaker 1: Exodus 11? I know you turned and wrote it down.
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  Speaker 1: And that's where the announcement of the tenth plague is given.
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  Speaker 1: You know, the last plague God used to deliver Israel
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  Speaker 1: from Egypt. Think about it, the most horrendous on the list.
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  Speaker 1: And there were others that were awful, but the turning
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  Speaker 1: of the now to blood, the darkening of an eclipse
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  Speaker 1: that lasted for days. I know you remember the story.
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  Speaker 1: Remember it was specific on the Egyptians and not the
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  Speaker 1: people of Israel? You remember the story, how the sun
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  Speaker 1: eclipsed that was? You had cattle disease, boils, gnats, flies,
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  Speaker 1: you know, all of that. But none of the plagues
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  Speaker 1: is like the 10th. Because in the 10th plague, we're
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  Speaker 1: told that from the house of Pharaoh to the humblest
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  Speaker 1: farmer in the land, and even extending out to the barn,
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  Speaker 1: that the firstborn of Egypt was going to die. They're
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  Speaker 1: not going to die, however, you know, when you're sitting
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  Speaker 1: at your place of worship, and you're sitting there on Sundays,
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  Speaker 1: and you're listening to those Sunday school lessons, you know,
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  Speaker 1: by the angel of death, but they're going to die
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  Speaker 1: by the hand of God. And so when you look
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  Speaker 1: at chapter 11, verse 1, the word, not Gary, the Lord,
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  Speaker 1: Yahweh said to Moses, one more plague I will bring
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  Speaker 1: on Pharaoh. He says, I will do this, look at
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  Speaker 1: verse 4, thus said the Lord about midnight, I'm going
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  Speaker 1: out into the midst of Egypt, You see what we've done?
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  Speaker 1: We've softened this because it's almost intolerable. It's something that
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  Speaker 1: you can't stomach God. No. You like it to be
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  Speaker 1: done by an angel. God, no. We like for it
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  Speaker 1: to be done by a demon. God, no. We like
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  Speaker 1: for it to be done by a storm or a disease.
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  Speaker 1: But God says, I will do this. And guess what?
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  Speaker 1: He did. And so if you turn to chapter 12,
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  Speaker 1: I know you're turning. And you look at the summary
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  Speaker 1: in verse 29. It came about at midnight that the
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  Speaker 1: Lord struck all the firstborn. Not an angel, not a seraph,
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  Speaker 1: not a messenger, but the Lord. And when you really
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  Speaker 1: look at it, there's a homily on these words in
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  Speaker 1: chapter 11 where God says, I will go out into
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  Speaker 1: the midst of Egypt. Listen to this. The Lord Yahweh
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  Speaker 1: brought us forth from Egypt, not by means of an angel,
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  Speaker 1: not by means of a seraph, not by means of
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  Speaker 1: a messenger, but the most holy. Blessed be in his
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  Speaker 1: own glory, as it is said, I will pass through
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  Speaker 1: the land of Egypt in this night. I will smite
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  Speaker 1: every firstborn of the land of Egypt, both man and beast,
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  Speaker 1: and on all the gods of Egypt, I will execute judgment. I, Yahweh,
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  Speaker 1: I will pass through the land of Egypt, I myself,
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  Speaker 1: and not an angel. I will smite every firstborn, I myself,
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  Speaker 1: and not a seraph. And all the gods of Egypt,
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  Speaker 1: I will execute judgment. I myself am not a messenger.
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  Speaker 1: I Yahweh, I am he. There is none other, and
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  Speaker 1: that's the way it was. Did you notice that? When
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  Speaker 1: you did your study, that's what you found. Think about
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  Speaker 1: when the final act of deliverance was done, it was
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  Speaker 1: God who did it, and that was to get his
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  Speaker 1: people out of Egypt. And then when they came to
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  Speaker 1: that watery mass, and the army was behind them, and
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  Speaker 1: the sea of reeds, or the Red Sea was before them,
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  Speaker 1: Then it was again that God acted in his own person,
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  Speaker 1: not by an angel, not by a seraph, not by
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  Speaker 1: a messenger, but in his own glory. You know, I
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  Speaker 1: shared a story. I don't mind sharing. That irrespective of
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  Speaker 1: the challenges of faith, that's how the radio program was formed.
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  Speaker 1: Remember now, you're either in a trial, coming out of one,
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  Speaker 1: or waiting for one. And I remember I would, when
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  Speaker 1: I was invited, I would share how that I knew
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  Speaker 1: that being near death's doorway at the time 16 times
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  Speaker 1: always gave honor to God because it was always important
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  Speaker 1: that there was no one there that could have saved me,
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  Speaker 1: delivered me, prevented, whatever. Nobody but God. In Exodus 15,
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  Speaker 1: this psalm, the first psalm in the Bible, It's a
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  Speaker 1: celebration of the deliverance of Israel from Egypt. And you
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  Speaker 1: notice it's celebrated every year by Jewish people all over
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  Speaker 1: the world. Have you paid attention? You know, Jewish people
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  Speaker 1: who follow their own Haggadah know this better than we
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  Speaker 1: as followers of Jesus Christ because they recite this every
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  Speaker 1: single year. Think about when God brought Israel from Egypt,
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  Speaker 1: not only was it he and he alone who slew
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  Speaker 1: the firstborn, but it was he And he alone who
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  Speaker 1: fought against their enemies and destroyed them. And when the
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  Speaker 1: song was sung, like in verse 3, it says that
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  Speaker 1: the Lord is a warrior. The Lord is his name.
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  Speaker 1: Yahweh is a man of war. Yahweh is his name.
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  Speaker 1: And in those words, you know, we're celebrating the fact
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  Speaker 1: that it was God and God alone who delivered him.
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  Speaker 1: Kind of like what I just shared as it relates
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  Speaker 1: to my trials, my sojourns. How about in your own life?
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  Speaker 1: Is Yahweh a warrior? Because his name is Warrior God.
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  Speaker 1: And that's what we have portrayed about our Savior, King
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  Speaker 1: Jesus in Revelation 19. Amen. Jesus, when he comes down,
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  Speaker 1: think about it. He's a man of war. Look at
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  Speaker 1: the words in verse 11. He judges and wages war.
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  Speaker 1: Look at the words over in verse 15. From his
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  Speaker 1: mouth comes a sharp sword. And the point is that
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  Speaker 1: he will fight directly, personally. We're talking about the second
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  Speaker 1: coming of our Savior. What are we looking for? Think
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  Speaker 1: about it. You're talking about the greatest calamity in all
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  Speaker 1: of human history. The people of the world, society, no
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  Speaker 1: matter what they happen to be, don't understand this. Think
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  Speaker 1: about it. They use the word Armageddon, which is our word,
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  Speaker 1: a biblical word. But they use Armageddon to describe nuclear holocausts.
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  Speaker 1: Think about it. They're talking about nation against nation. When
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  Speaker 1: you look back in history, you know, secular history, you
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  Speaker 1: look back in the days of the Soviet Union, there
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  Speaker 1: was such a threat at the end of the world.
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  Speaker 1: Think about one person, even today, look what's going on
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  Speaker 1: in Iran, lobbying missiles against another. And though it was
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  Speaker 1: thought that it was going to be Armageddon, it was not.
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  Speaker 1: It was not. It's not Armageddon. Armageddon is the nations
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  Speaker 1: gathered together at the end of the tribulation period to
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  Speaker 1: withstand God the Father putting his son Jesus Christ on
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  Speaker 1: the throne of David and Jerusalem. That's what Psalm 2
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  Speaker 1: is all about. And that's what Psalm 110 is about.
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  Speaker 1: I know you wrote it down. Because if you look
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  Speaker 1: at Psalm 2, the nations are gathered together against the
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  Speaker 1: Lord and against his Messiah, his anointed. And the one
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  Speaker 1: who is in heaven laughs and derision as he says,
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  Speaker 1: I set my king on my holy hill, Zion. Think
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  Speaker 1: about it. Do you think the nations can withstand the
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  Speaker 1: power of God? That's why there's that great cataclysm of
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  Speaker 1: all of history. Think about what makes it the worst.
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  Speaker 1: Is it not water? Is it not fire? Is it
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  Speaker 1: not disease? Think about it. It's the Lord himself who
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  Speaker 1: comes to do what? To judge.