According to the Scriptures

Guest (Male): Christian Living in anticipation of Jesus's return next on According to the Scriptures. There's coming a day when God will judge a Christ-rejecting world, and then Jesus will return. But will Christians who are alive today live to see it all unfold? Or will we be removed from the earth prior to the day of the Lord? We'll talk about that here today on According to the Scriptures.

Welcome to the program. We're returning to Pastor Damian Kyle's series, While We Wait. We're examining the kind of Christian life we are to have as we wait for the Lord's return. We're in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5.

Damian Kyle: Now you notice the day of the Lord and how it applies to a group that Paul calls in verse 3, "they." So if he's writing to Christians here, and he is, then "they" has to refer to people who are not Christians, and so those who have taken and rejected God's offer of salvation through his son. And in verse 2, we're told that the day of the Lord, which begins the moment after the Rapture of the church, will come upon them as a thief in the night.

And so because the day of the Lord essentially begins with the rapture of the church or it immediately follows it, both events are going to come upon the world as a thief in the night. And so like a thief, it's going to take the world by surprise. And you might imagine that it would. So here you have a world that has no interest in the God of the Bible, no interest in his savior, no interest in his salvation, no interest in his wisdom or his truth, no serious consideration of his warnings.

And of course, that's going to leave a person entirely vulnerable to this taking them by surprise. And with the rapture of the church, and immediately after that happens, then the first domino then falls. And that progression of those dominoes falling then without interruption continues all the way to the final chapter of the book of Revelation, from chapter 6 through to the end of the book. He says in verse 3, "When they say," so again, an unsaved world, but unsaved and responsible for that condition. It's not a fault of God.

So when they say, "Peace and safety," verse 3, "then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman." So they're going to cry peace and safety. Now the cry of peace and safety hearkens back again to the Old Testament. It hearkens back to ancient Israel and to ancient Judah, who were saying in the face of God's warnings to them that they needed to turn from their wickedness and their sin and their idolatry.

And he sent this message to them for decades through one prophet after another. And they responded to those warnings of God by declaring peace and safety. We are at peace and everything looks safe to us. And so they responded to God's warnings with kind of a collective yawn. Everything looks fine to us. Everything looks peaceful and safe. No need to heed God's warnings. Everything is just fine.

You prophets need to calm down related to this. And having made the mistake of dismissing the warnings of God through the prophets because they addressed their situation to be one of peace and safety based upon anything and everything other than how God would view them and how God viewed the world and not how they viewed the world. And God viewing it in his holiness as he watched their ever-growing sin and rebellion against him.

And thus because they looked around and they didn't judge the world or look at it or assess it in the light of God or his word, or to recognize if there is a God and that Bible is true, we are all in big trouble in terms of the lives that we're living. They said peace and safety and as a result, their destruction came upon them suddenly and unexpectedly. The image of a woman beginning her labor pains communicates related to the day of the Lord and they is that there will be no escape from the day of the Lord once it begins.

So you have a pregnant woman, and once those labor pains start, then they don't stop until you have a baby that has been born. There are no timeouts. You don't get to challenge a call of the refs or anything like that to buy five minutes or something. It just is going to go. And so when those birth pangs hit a woman, then she will make the declaration, "the baby is coming." And the baby is coming and nothing is going to stop until that baby does come.

And no one and nothing is going to be able to stop the day of the Lord from running its full course. Not all of the collective money or power or knowledge of man will be able to make a dent in it at all. Then Paul speaks to us on a little cheerier note for us. The day of the Lord, he speaks of it related to us as he uses it speaking to us as Christians. And so he says that the day of the Lord is not to take us by surprise.

In other words, despite the fact that we don't know the day or the hour of the rapture of the church, we say how can we not be surprised if we don't know the day or the hour? Well, the solution to that is always being ready. A lifestyle of watching and waiting and expectation of the Lord's return and to be prepared for it. And Paul gives us instruction for what that will look like here. Nothing takes a person by surprise that we're expecting.

And so we are to expect the day of Jesus's return at any time and then the unfolding of the day of the Lord that immediately follows. Now critical in regard to all of this is to realize that God has not appointed us as Christians to wrath. That is, we are not appointed to God's wrath. We are not appointed to his judgment against sin or wickedness or rebellion that is against him. So we are not appointed to the judgment for our sins after this life, which is the wrath of God.

We're not appointed unto hell and eternal judgment, but we're also not appointed to his wrath or his judgment upon the world during the seven-year tribulation period. Which means that because the tribulation period constitutes the wrath of God, we have to be raptured and taken into heaven prior to the start of the tribulation period. Because that seven-year tribulation period is an expression of his wrath upon a world that has not only rejected his son, but rejected his son in order to continue to live in rebellion and in sin and in darkness.

And so what an affront that is to God, not only to reject his son but to reject his son for that. And that could be a pile of ten million dollars, but it isn't a pile of ten million dollars. It's my sin and I esteem my practice of this and my enjoyment of this and the importance of this in my life than you offering even your son to me. Well, you can imagine how great that goes over in heaven. And so judgment is going to be coming forth related to that.

The tribulation period is an expression of the wrath of God. And it is from the opening seal, that first seal that begins Revelation chapter 6 and with the Antichrist then being revealed, he goes out conquering and to conquer all the way through the seven trumpet judgments and then all the way through the final bowl judgment. And all of it constitutes the wrath of God, which God says we are not appointed to.

Now let me read you three passages from Revelation chapter 6, verse 15. And the kings of the earth, this is during the tribulation period, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains and said to the mountains and rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne," that is the Lord, "and from the wrath of the lamb."

I always like that statement. The tribulation period is an expression of the wrath of the lamb. Jesus is the lamb. What does it take to provoke wrath in a lamb? I imagine it takes quite a bit. And the world is on its way, if we aren't already there, in provoking that wrath. For verse 17, "For the great day of his wrath has come and who is able to stand?" This is one of the reasons I believe that the Bible teaches a pre-tribulation rapture as opposed to a post-tribulation rapture that the rapture happens after the seven years, that we as Christians go through the tribulation period, or the mid-tribulation rapture that it happens at the halfway point, three and a half year mark of the seven years.

Because people who hold a mid-tribulation view or a pre-wrath rapture view because it's from the three and a half year mark on when the most devastating judgments of God are going to be poured out in the seal and the bowl and the trumpet judgments. But at the very beginning of the rapture, the first seal broken, the rise of the Antichrist at the beginning of that seven years, that constitutes the wrath of God as well.

Though he will bring in a three and a half year period of tremendous prosperity and a period of peace to the entire world. And so I don't think it's wise to look at all of the physical destruction of the rest of the seals and the bowls and the trumpet judgments and then somehow look at the spiritual deception that will come upon the world in the revelation of the Antichrist at the beginning of the seven years.

And here you have the Antichrist completely energized and controlled by the devil himself. I don't think that should be discounted as being less consequential than the most overt acts of God's judgment. And again, even the order of Paul's addressing the rapture of the church and the day of the Lord here in chapters 4 and 5 and make it clear that the one event, the rapture, occurs prior to the other event, the day of the Lord.

Now notice why we're not appointed to wrath as Christians in verse 9. It's because Jesus bore all of the wrath and the righteous judgment that our sin deserved upon the cross when he died upon the cross for us. And our faith in him for salvation and from that wrath, from that judgment that we know our sin deserve, it delivers us not only from the judgment of hell, but also from the wrath of God expressed in judgment during the great tribulation.

When he talks about salvation there in verse 9, the context isn't salvation in terms of eternity, but salvation from the wrath of God in the great tribulation. Sometimes those of us who believe that the Bible teaches that Christians are going to be removed before the horror of the tribulation period as opposed to others who believe that as Christians we're going to go through it, and so people like me who hold a view that will be removed prior that I'm just someone who's wanting to escape all of that judgment. You're yellow! You're a coward!

And it has nothing to do with that at all. It has everything to do with what the Bible teaches concerning the timing of the rapture. If the Bible taught that we're going to go through the tribulation as Christians, I would believe it and I would teach it without any hesitation at all. But concerning not wanting to go through the tribulation period in as it's described in the Bible, yes, you can count me as among those who are thankful that Jesus's death on the cross saves me from that and every Christian from that.

You notice when I read the passage earlier about people trying to find, and this is in Revelation chapter 6, just the very beginning of it. You have all of the powerful men, all of the warriors, all of the commanders, all of the leaders, you have all of the slaves and people who aren't slaves trying to find a cave or whatever they can find in order to get out from under the judgment of God. There will be no tough guys in the tribulation period.

Navy SEALs, special forces, they will all wet their pants like everybody else and try and find a place to escape the judgment. And so it's not a game and it's something that God has promised that we're going to be delivered from, and I'm glad for that. Otherwise, how in the world would we make any sense of Paul's words there in verse 11? If he talks about the fact that we're not appointed unto wrath and there he says, "Therefore comfort each other and edify one another."

Well, that makes sense if we're not appointed unto wrath and we're not going to go through the tribulation period, but it doesn't make sense if we are. "Therefore comfort each other and edify one another just as you also are doing." And so the comfort and the edification comes from Paul's clear teaching here where he makes a very clear delineation between them and we. Those who have trusted in Jesus for salvation, including salvation from the judgment our sins deserve, and those who have not.

And from his clear teaching that we're not appointed unto wrath as Christians. The second thing I want us to notice here in verse 5 in terms of instruction for us as Christians is that in order for the rapture not to take us by surprise, Paul tells us as Christians that we need to live consistent with the recognition that we are the sons of light and the sons of day and we're not the sons of night or the sons of darkness.

In other words, we are to be committed to living our lives, as the old saying goes, as different as night and day from the world and from those who are going to be overtaken by the rapture as a thief in the night. And then he tells us in verses 6 and 7 thirdly that we are not to sleep as the world around us is asleep to all of this, but instead we're to watch and be sober. And so we're not to sleep.

Our hearts, as he tells us to watch and be sober, our hearts waiting expectantly for his coming. Why would that affect our hearts? Because we are the bride of Christ. And that's our heart is we are longing for his return. And then when he talks about being sober, we talk about sober in terms of alcohol or in terms of drugs, but Paul is using it far more broadly than that though it includes that. We're not to be under the influence of anything in this world.

I am not to love anything in this world more than I love him. And then he gives us the reason for that in verse 7 lest we fall asleep spiritually to his coming and we become drunk on everything else that the world is drunk on or under the influence of in life other than God. And so we're to live our lives with that kind of a spiritual sobriety in a world that is dark, a world that is spiritually completely spiritually asleep related to all of this, and we're to be spiritually alert and not engaging in that with them.

And then fourth in verse 8 positively, we're to wear the breastplate of faith and love as we await Jesus's return. So here Paul, he shifts to military imagery because it'll be a battle. And in order to live this way in the world and stay spiritually sober-minded and on guard and victorious in the moral condition of the world as the day of the Lord approaches. And so he speaks here of a breastplate of a Roman soldier. That covered of course a Roman soldier from his neck to his waist.

It would cover and protect most of his vital organs and communicating that we're to view this instruction here that Paul gives us with the sobriety of a soldier entering into a battle for his very life. I've never been in the military, but I suspect that is a sober moment for a soldier and we're to view it the same way. And here Paul also tells us that we're to keep our hearts surrounded by and protected by a faith in God's word and number two, a love for people, which means sharing the gospel with them.

And those are to be two marks of distinction in our lives. That we continue to live in obedience to the word of God and we continue to love the world around us, however ungodly they might become, and those are to mark our lives as we watch and wait for Jesus's return. And so a faith in God and in his word, a love for people, it'll protect our hearts. It'll keep our hearts well-directed in the last days and set upon sanctified themes and it will mean that we are most useful as people in a world that will be growing ever more ripe for judgment.

So awaiting the rapture of the church doesn't mean Christians hiding from the world or hiding and hoping this judgment comes and puts an end to all of this. We're to stay, we all still have a great commission to stay engaged with the world, stay engaged with our relationships and the opportunity to share the gospel, to show them a different kind of life and stay in the mix of things.

Guest (Male): Pastor Damian Kyle on According to the Scriptures, and what you've heard today is just part of our message called The Day of the Lord. If you'd like to obtain this series called While We Wait on CD, well give us a call at 209-545-5530. Again, reach out to us by phone at 209-545-5530. I should also mention that Pastor Damian's messages are found at accordingtothescriptures.com, also at oneplace.com, as well as on most of the major podcast platforms.

So if you missed one or two messages on the radio, you can catch up online. It would be our honor to pray for you, so keep those prayer requests coming. Leave a comment or prayer request at accordingtothescriptures.com, or you can email us at ATTS@ccmodesto.com. Again, that's ATTS@ccmodesto.com. Your financial support is greatly appreciated in helping us bring Pastor Damian's messages to the radio on stations like this one all across the nation.

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