Session 2: The First Prophecy Conference

all right did you get a little bit of relief as your brain settled back down a little bit no well it get ready it's about to get worse no it won't it won't so now I will be reading from the new English translation I have my Bible open to Matthew 24 and I'm looking at verse 1: 3 says now as Jesus was going out of the temple courts and walking away his disciples came to show him the temple buildings and he said to them do you see all these things I tell you the truth excuse me coffee's working on me I tell you the truth not one stone will be left on another all will be torn down and as he was sitting on the Mount of Olives his disciple came disciples came to him private L and said tell us when will these things happen and what will be the sign of your coming and of the End of the Age conferences on Bible prophecy have been popular for years um people from all walks of life have filled churches and auditoriums and Conference Centers seeking to learn about the return of the Lord and the Antichrist um teachers specializing uh in the subject have spent countless hours sharing the scriptures and PowerPoint presentations back back in the day it was the old flannel graphs you know it was the best they could do some of you laughing because you can remember that yes I'm really that old um all of that as they attempt to show God's people how the last days will unfold here's a fun fact for you you know sometimes we talk about the end times do you know that that's actually not even a scriptural term you will never find the end times it's the last days that's why we call it looking at the last days I won't charge you for that one either in the passage before us we have what you might call the first prophecy conference by this point Jesus has said enough that his disciples knew something big was coming now the these wide-eyed young men want Jesus to lay it all out for them as to how things pertaining to himself and the end of the age are going to work out and the best thing about this is is that we get to listen in so let's listen carefully as the ultimate teacher shares with his eager students but before we delve into the text again let's set the stage just a little bit so that we can see where they're coming from and what their thinking might have been they'd had some very significant encounters with Jesus by this time I mean in Matthew 16 we had that whole encounter where Jesus says you know what's the Scuttle about who who are people saying that I am well some say John the Baptist and some say you know Jeremiah or one of the prophets whatever and then Jesus says but who do you say that I am and that's when Peter piped up said you are the Christ the son of the Living God and Jesus said blessed are you Simon son of John for Flesh and Blood did not show you this but it was revealed to you by my father who is in heaven right huge thing because he kind of kept that close to his vest then right on the heels of that we have the the Transfiguration in Matthew 17 and the significance of that is that three of the disciples got to see in fact what Peter saw by internal revelation of the father now all of a sudden there was no doubt about who they were dealing with as all of a sudden they see Jesus in all of his glory talking with Moses and Elijah about his departure and um during their time with him he' also spoke about another coming uh an example of that would be Luke 18 and verse 8 um where Jesus said when the son of man man comes will he find faith on the earth well obviously he wasn't talking about his first coming because he was already there so he must have been talking about another coming that would happen sometime in the future so there was all of that that they had under their belt that would have been enough to leave them wondering what exactly are we dealing with here and who is this guy right but then we have the whole encounter just prior to this between Jesus and the religious leaders in Matthew uh chapter 23 and of course he gives an absolutely scathing denunciation of their leadership I mean if if any preacher would try that today he'd be and feathered I mean it would just not go over very well at all uh that ends with a lament over Jerusalem in Matthew 23: 37 uh to39 where he's just saying oh Jerusalem Jerusalem you who killed the prophets how often I would have gathered you together but you would not have it and now your house is being left to you desolate and you will not see me again until you say blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord uh that was a quote from Psalm 118: 26 and possibly refers to Israel's conversion in the last days and then we come down to this whole statement here in Matthew 24: 1 and 2 where they're talking you know looking at the temple which Herod had built taken 46 years to construct Beautiful by any uh any way that you could could say it and Jesus said you see all this stuff all of it going to be torn down not one stone is going to be left standing on another and so I mean what he was telling them at this point is that the very center of your faith is going to be destroyed because everything in the Jewish faith centered around the temple through three times annually for sure they went up to the temple to worship it was always there it was something they always kept in mind they prayed towards Jerusalem because that's where the temple was even Daniel would open his windows and face Jerusalem because that's where the temple of God had been so this was the very center of their faith and Jesus has just said it's all going to be done away with and so historically that was a sign of judgment right just like during the Exile it was a scathing judgment that God poured out on the Israeli people because they were they were constantly uh re resorting to idolatry and so then this led to the questions of 24 and verse three uh basically when were all these things that have been talked about finally happen um what will be the sign of your coming and of the a end of the age that's caused and effect his coming causes the End of the Age and what follows is a profound expose on how the last days will unfold so now in answer to the question when was how's this all going to unfold we read Matthew 24: 4 to8 Jesus answered them watch out that no one mislead you for many will come in my name saying I am the Christ and they will mislead many you will hear of wars and rumors of War make sure that you are not alarmed for this must happen but the end is still to come for nation will rise up in arms against nation and Kingdom against Kingdom and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places all these things are the beginning of birth pains so there's four things that are going to be happening Jesus says first of all there's going to be widespread deception we could call that spiritual disasters people are going to be led astray they are going to be led to follow false gods that is a spiritual disaster because that leads to their ultimate destruction there's going to be Wars which are political disasters Wars happen when political negotiations break down right if we can't work it out in the boardroom we work it out on on the battlefield political disasters there's going to be famine which is an economic disaster anybody checked the price of food lately did I say that out loud WOW better have a drink and wash that back down right famine economic disasters things are falling apart economically and then finally earthquakes in various places that's natural disasters right and haven't we seen an escalation of those and Jesus says that all of these are the beginning of birth pains in other words this is where it all starts is with an escalation of these things and he calls them birth pains and that is a fitting illustration because any woman who has had a child knows that it starts off almost benign and gathers in in intensity until the time of delivery comes to pass I was thinking about it this afternoon as I was reviewing my notes my wife and I one night were at a at a uh a meeting and she was she was she was out here like this you know she beg and Pregnant and uh all of a sudden she Taps me on the arm says what time is it so I told her few minutes later she Taps me on the arm what time is it I'm clueless totally toally clueless here what time is it and I told her third time she Taps me on the arm what time is it and I'm looking at her going why do you want to know oh oh oh right things are starting to escalate we are seeing the beginning of the birth pangs and 1:00 in the morning we ended up driving to the hospital so it's a very fitting illustration these are very natural things but there is going to be an escalation of these things there's going to be an increase uh in the intensity of these things uh until they are completed now here's something that we have got to note in all of this okay very very important none of these things not the earthquakes not the wars not the famine not the deception none of these things are referred to as God's Wrath God's Wrath is not mentioned at all In this passage neither are these things called or designated as tribulation the word tribulation is not found here any place it sounds like tribulation but that is not the reference that is made here and as challenging as these things are they almost seem insignificant compared to what is to come which Jesus will get to in just a moment right but despite all of this even though all of these things will be present and escalate the end is still to come he says but the end is still to come the end is not yet this is not the end this is just a precursor to the end but then he starts talking about a time of big trouble big trouble look at chapter 24: 9-14 he says then they will hand you over to be persecuted and will kill you you will be hated by All Nations because of my name then many will be led into sin and they will betray one another and hate one another and many false prophets will appear and deceive many and because lawlessness will increase so much uh the love of many will grow cold but the person who endures to the end will be saved and this Gospel of the Kingdom will be preached throughout the whole inhabited Earth as a testimony to all the nations and then the end will come Jesus here says there is going to be a horrific time of persecution a horrific time of persecution they will hand you over to be persecuted the word persecuted in the Greek language is the word Philipus and that is the word tribulation the word tribulation here means to squeeze to really put the pressure on okay you're going to have the squeeze put on you this is the Tribulation and the reason this squeeze will come is because of my name Jesus says our allegiance to Jesus will cause us to be hated because the rest of the world is going another way and therefore we will have to endure like never before I know that's not the most popular thing to be said but it is something that needs to be said because it is true and if Jesus says it we can absolutely count on it but then he says something very significant and this is where the lights are going to go on so let's look at verses 15 to 22 he says so when you see the abomination of desolation spoken about by Daniel the Prophet standing in the Holy Place parenthesis let the reader understand then those in Judea must flee to the mountain Mountain the one on the roof uh must not come down to take anything out of his house and the one in the field must not turn back to get his cloak woe to those who are pregnant and those who are nursing their babies in those days pray that your flight may not be in Winter or on a Sabbath for then there will be great suffering unlike anything that has happened from the beginning of the world until now or ever will happen and if the those days had not been cut short no one would be saved but for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short look at this all of a sudden we have got somebody placing a monument of themselves in the temple and proclaiming themselves to be God and the result of that is that there will be great suffering read Great Tribulation and that is what Jesus was talking about in chapter 24: 9-13 and he tells them the minute you see this happening it is time to hit the road run for your life because now all of a sudden you will have a Target on your back because if you are not swearing ing allegiance to this individual who is exalting himself in this Temple you will be in trouble so don't go back and get your coat jump off the roof if you have to run like the Dickens like we used to say in Kansas but get out because there will be an unprecedented time of suffering the likes of which there will never be now let's stop and think about that for just half a second here through throughout church history there have been horrendous persecutions there have been times where people have given their lives for Jesus under tremendous pressure there's been times when the Jewish people were persecuted beyond measure and yet this will make that seem like nothing and verse 22 gives us some idea about just how bad this suffering is going to be be where he says if those days had not been cut short no one would be saved but for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short now wait a second here we've just heard this someplace before that sounds to me like what we read over in Daniel chapter 9 right where all of a sudden there was going to be an Abomination that causes Des con cration to take place in the temple and now Jesus is quoting that exact thing in this passage of scripture which tells us what Jesus is describing here is Daniel's 70th week this is what Daniel's final seven is going to look like the reference is Daniel 9 27 where it says the ruler will make a treaty with the people for a period of one set of seven seven years but after this time he will put an end to the sacrifices and offerings and as a climax of all his terrible Deeds he will set up a sacrilegious object that causes desecration until the Fate decreed for this defiler is finally poured out on him so this desecration that Daniel talked about and is here referenced by Jesus happen somewhere in the middle of that 70th week three and a half years everything will probably look pretty good he's going to make a treaty of Peace the Middle East might actually settle down for a while until all of a sudden this one shows up places of a monument of himself in the temple stops all other religious worship and says I am he and then the trouble Starts Now beloved listen to me this is a primary sign because it tells us where we are in God's timeline we know that when that happens there is only three and a half years left okay primary sign when that takes place we know count it from this point three and a half years until the completion of Daniel's 70th week listen to Daniel 1211 New Living Translation from the time the daily sacrifice is stopped and the sacrilegious object that causes desecration is to be is set up to be worshiped there will be 1,290 days there's that mysterious numbers again 1,290 days comes out to three and a half years so this is a primary sign this is something that needs to be paid attention to that is why I'm not going to get too excited about anything until I see a third Temple erected in Jerusalem the minute you see another Temple going up in Jerusalem it is time to start paying attention and watching the politics in the Middle East during that time because somebody is going to step forward that is going to offer an answer to all that conflict in the Middle East never forget this the conflict in the Middle East is not political that's why it cannot be settled by political means that's why even Warfare cannot settle it it is religious conflict That's the basis of it all and so until somebody offers some sort of a compromise that speaks to the religious side of things there will be no peace in the Middle East so watch for that Temple and from what I'm hearing and I don't research it a lot but from what I'm little I'm hearing there's already plans for that Temple to be made I mean they've said that for years but now now it sounds like they're actually serious but Jesus said when this suffering when this takes place the suffering of that day is just going to be absolutely horrendous there's going to be a persecution Unleashed life like never before nothing has ever been seen and unless that suffering is cut short nobody nobody is going to be saved it's just going to wipe everything out so how is God going to cut short the suffering because he says for the sake of the elect those days are going to be cut short so if you want to find that out let's go to verse 29 it's not that the other verses aren't important it's just we we don't have time to to cover everything Matthew 24:49 Jesus says immediately after the suffering of those days the sun will be darkened the moon will not give its light the Stars will fall from Heaven and the powers of heaven will be shaken then the sign of the son of man will appear in heaven and all the tribes of the earth will mourn they will see the son of man arriving on the Clouds Of Heaven with power and great glory and he will send his angels with a loud trumpet blast and they will gather his elect from the Four Winds from one end of Heaven to another so in the middle of all of this and all the chaos that's going on all of a sudden there's going to be something happening called a cosmic disturbance now what is that going to look like I don't know but it's going to be something that everybody will see it's not going to be something that people are going to go something something just happened no everybody's going to know it it's going to be shocking it's going to cause everybody's jaw to drop and um this is not judgment that's the thing we have to know this is not judgment but it is a sign that something big is about to happen and everybody will know it and we'll see more about that tomorrow so don't miss tomorrow Al don't miss he's got to work tomorrow so I'm just rubbing it in a little bit but everybody's going to know it and what's going to happen is all of a sudden the Lord is going to appear the Lord is going to appear and he is going to gather his Saints and this will cut short the intense suffering and this will then Usher In the End of the Age so now we can look at graphic here isn't that pretty I did that myself so now we see Daniel's final seven years so we divided it up into three and a half years the beginning of birth pangs the deception the war economic disaster natural disasters all leading up to the abomination of desolation which will give birth to the persecution right that will then be succeeded by The Cosmic disturbances that will be the time of the great suffering that's actually where the Great Tribulation comes in all right now let me step on your theology just a little bit um God ruins mine I figure I can ruin yours and so we all get along together for so long it has been taught that the entire 70th week was the time of the Great Tribulation that is not what the Bible teaches Jesus did not teach that he said the great suffering comes after the three and a half years okay so technically technically the Great Tribulation is 3 and 1/2 years that probably just reduced half my crowd right there but hang in there with me I promise you it's all going to come out okay it really will um the Bible is its own best interpreter and believe me tomorrow we're going to make all the connections and you'll you'll be very happy that we did so there's the there's the the Great Tribulation the um Cosmic disturbance with the Gathering of the Saints the time is uncertain Jesus said you know we don't know the day or the hour contrary to what some people say we don't know the day or the hour but he did not say that we could not know the season Jesus said just a few verses down I'm not going to take the time to read it read it yourself he says when you see the Fig Tree Blossom and all the trees you know that summer is near and but in the same way when you see all of these things begin to happen you will know know that he is near right at the door so we may not know the day or the hour but we can know the season in fact in Luke Luke quotes him as saying when you see these things happen lift up your head because your Redemption draws nigh so as scary as all of this may sound there is great hope in the midst of it all because go back to the beginning remember where we started from trying to read that sorry I should have made it bigger go back to the beginning the disciples asked the question when will these things happen What will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age and Jesus lays it all out and all of a sudden we see oh my goodness this is Daniel's 70th week and this is what is going to usher in the final times so the first prophecy conference taught by the master proved to be very very enlightening we now know what the final 7year period that was revealed to the Prophet Daniel will look like first 3 and A2 years seems to be an escalation of things we are already experiencing in in the middle of that period an individual that the scripture will later identify as the Antichrist will come to power he will unleash a wave of persecution against God's people the likes of which the world has never seen however there will be signs pointing to the fact that God is still in control and then Jesus will come and rescue his own now here's a question that I think needs to be asked what is your response to what Jesus shared If we're honest where most people are concerned any talk about the last days absolutely scares The Living Daylights out of us right nobody wants to go through that and we think you know like my goodness like I know one I I was sharing on on a slightly different topic it all all fit into the same context so I had one of my old men in one Church side Pastor come up he goes I'm sure glad I'm 80 years old meaning I'm not going to have to live to see all of that right and sure enough he didn't he just passed away here a couple of years ago but you know that that's the way a lot of people think and I'll never forget a dear dear friend of mine I mean she was one of the most beautiful Christians I had ever met in my entire life she just loved the Lord with all of her heart and yet in the church that she attended I think in can't remember if she was North Carolina South Carolina anyway the church she attended they had a banner across the back that said Jesus is coming again and every time she looked at that Banner she was just filled with fear and she couldn't understand it why would that scare me I I'm a Christian I know I'm a Christian I love the Lord I know that when I die I'm going to to to go to be with the Lord so why why does that scare me so badly and so one day she took it to the Lord and said Lord I don't understand why am I so scared of this and the Lord opened her eyes to see it wasn't herself that she was scared for it was her children she was afraid for her children what is going to happen to my children and the Lord made known to her I have cared for you all these years you can be sure that I will care for your children as well so while we can look at these things and yeah I mean scary in the last days if we are going to be true followers of Jesus we may have to get used to seeing the sight of our own blood but there's hope in the middle of all of that because all of it is sign of that what Jesus said is absolutely the truth and if that is the truth then his coming is true as well and if he comes he comes to rescue and all the suffering will be worth it in that moment so let your heart be at peace and know that the same God who saved you down on your knees however many years ago is the same God who will return to save us in that hour and that's our hope right so tomorrow morning we're going to go into the book of the Revelation and we're going to tie all of this together and all of a sudden the lights are going to go on and a lot of things are going to make sense so I know your brains are probably going like this right about now that's okay that's okay just marinate on it if you're like me it was so beautiful the other night I'd been uh putting together the final messages for this CU I had to De actually develop some new material in the middle of the night I woke up and all of a sudden the Lord just opened my eyes to see something in it I'd never seen before it was just fascinating it's like I've read these scriptures dozens of times why didn't I see that before but there it was and so I've been praying so much that God will do the same thing for you that your eyes will be opened and it'll all just fit together and make sense and you'll have great hope for the last last days so let's have a prayer and we'll release you to your homes and be back here what time are we starting tomorrow 9:30 huh 10 oh my okay I was going to tell them 9:30 that would be fair because if you tell people 9:30 they'll for sure show up for 10: if you tell them 10 they'll be here at 10:30 so ju just show up sometime yeah oh now now he's saying seven well that might be a little much let's pray father we are absolutely fascinated at how your word fits together and we are absolutely fascinated in the fact that you know the end from the beginning and so father I pray that as we go to our respective places tonight and as we dwell upon these things that your holy spirit will be active in each one of our lives and just continue to open our eyes to these things and give us understanding we recognize that we are the people of the last days I know every generation has felt that but there's just something about these days that just makes us feel it a little bit more and so we need to know these things and so Enlighten the eyes of our understanding by your Holy Spirit bless each one as they go their separate ways bless them in their sleep bless them in their service we pray in Jesus name am amen good night and we will see you tomorrow