Jesus Is Coming Soon: Living in Light of Revelation

Again, it's good to see everybody tonight. We're back in the book of Revelation

tonight. And as you remember, we started talking about the imminency of Christ's return.

And I tell you, we don't plan this stuff like this. We're not this coordinated, okay?

But like this morning's message in the Gospel of Luke was about what?

Christ's return, right? And so it really lines up well with what we're studying

in Revelation at this point, right?

And so I'm going to pick up tonight, and.

I just want to share with you to start with, there are a number of New Testament

texts that reflect the early church's belief in what we call eminence,

and that's just meaning the imminent return of Christ. It's going to happen.

It's a certainty, even like we were talking about this morning in Luke's text.

Paul actually commended the Corinthians because he said they were awaiting eagerly

the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ in 1 Corinthians 1, verse 7.

1 Corinthians 1:7

And he further actually gave them praise, saying, therefore,

do not go on passing judgment. He exhorted them in this before the time.

But wait until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the things hidden

in the darkness and disclose the motives of men's hearts.

And then, he said, each man's praise will come to him from God.

First Corinthians four or five because y'all as we know look we can wear smiles

on the outside sometimes we do look like we're baptized in sour vinegar sometimes

the baptists do but we can't even wear smiles look good on the outside,

but God really knows the motives of our hearts all of us and he's saying here look,

each man's praise then will come from God that's where it should come from.

And the apostle included really this untranslated Aramaic word,

Maranatha. Y'all have heard it before?

Anybody know what Maranatha means?

Yeah. Oh, Lord come. All right. Oh, Lord come, Maranatha.

You probably thought of that word, probably heard Maranatha music and those

kind of things. But yeah, Maranatha, oh Lord come, it's that expectancy of his return.

And in a letter to the Greek-speaking Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 16,

22, that word had evidently become a familiar byword.

And it really expresses believers' longing for Christ's imminent return.

And to the Philippians, Paul also wrote, for our citizenship is where?

In heaven. That's what he said, from which we also eagerly wait for a Savior,

the Lord Jesus Christ in Philippians 3.20. So it's all throughout, y'all.

We are supposed to be hopeful, eagerly waiting for the imminent return of Christ. It is a certainty.

And then he commended the Thessalonians because they turn, listen to this,

he says, they turn to God from idols to serve a living and true God and to wait

for his son from heaven, 1 Thessalonians 1, 9-10.

So later though, in that same epistle, Paul actually expressed his own hope.

That he might be alive at the Lord's return.

How many of you would love to be alive at the Lord's return?

I mean, listen to what he said, for this we say to you by the word of the Lord,

that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will not precede

those who have fallen asleep.

In other words, we're not going to go before those who've died in Christ,

okay? They're going first, 1 Thessalonians 4, 15.

And the apostle rebuked those believers at Thessalonica who were so preoccupied,

with the second coming that they weren't working, okay?

So yes, we're supposed to look forward to Christ's imminent return.

But it's not, you know, nowhere in scripture, you know, you read the word of

God, we're called to be workmen. We're called to be out in the fields laboring, right?

We're called to be out fulfilling the great commission and expecting God's return.

But there were some people probably like there are today, too,

that get so caught up in like the sense they get out of balance that,

you know, Christ is coming back. So I don't even need to work.

You know, he's coming back today. You know, why do I need to work? Why do I need to serve?

And obviously, you don't know your Bible, right? You obviously are not reading scripture.

But listen to what he said. For even when we were with you, we used to give you this order.

If anyone is not willing to work, then he is not to eat either.

I can't tell you how many times we've quoted that verse to our kids.

He says, for we hear that some among you are leading an undisciplined life,

doing no work at all, but acting like busybodies. Y'all know what that is, right? Right?

Now such persons we command and exhort in the Lord Jesus Christ to work,

I love this part, in quiet fashion and eat their own bread.

Come on, right? And so though they drew improper conclusions from it,

they believed, nonetheless they believed in Christ's imminent return.

And that's so important for us to see. We've got to have that hope,

that faith, that expectancy for his return.

Paul actually reminded Titus that Christians are to be looking for the blessed

hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Christ Jesus in Titus 2.13.

And James actually encouraged his readers to be patient, brethren,

he said, until the coming of the Lord Jesus. That's in James 5.7.

And in fact, in his first epistle, the apostle John actually exhorted his readers as well.

Now little children abide in him so that when he appears we may have confidence

and not shrink away from him in shame at his coming beloved now we are children

of god and it has not yet appeared,

as yet what we will be we know that when he appears we will be like him because

we will see him just as he is come on no more you know dizzy head miss martha

no more dizzy headedness No more falling down, right?

I mean, we're going to be whole. We're going to be like him.

And he said these passages here, y'all demonstrate the early believers' anticipation.

Of their Savior's coming again.

And just like out of Luke's gospel this morning that we talked about,

that we've got to live those kind of lives because the days are short, y'all.

Time goes by so quickly. I was talking with someone the other day and was talking

about eight or eight and a half years down the road about some projection planning.

And it was kind of like, you know, do y'all remember COVID?

That was back in 2020, right? What year is it now?

That's almost eight years later from COVID. Did y'all realize that?

You see how quick that much time can fly?

Not too much further to be a decade away, right? And so time is ticking away.

I almost sang it, but I didn't. Time is ticking away, and we have a job to do,

and we need to be anticipating.

Y'all, that's why we're here. We don't come to—yes, look, we want a fellowship.

We need fellowship. We need community, and that's all part of this church.

That's what we need, and that's what the Lord wants us to have is fellowship,

community, real community, real fellowship, koinonia, right,

and working together, striving together for the same cause to reach this world for Christ.

But y'all if that's all we have here is just fellowship,

and we're not about the father's business working in his kingdom because the

days are evil the time is short jesus is coming again that's why we're supposed

to be here as his church representing him on earth right,

because if we're not there man why are we here,

we don't really need to exist i mean you can you can get some communities you know other places right.

You can't get it the way christians can get it with other believers.

But let me tell you, when we're really fellowshipping and we're really in that

community all, it just spurs one another on, it says in scripture, towards good deeds.

And it also builds each other up in the faith and our giftings.

We've talked about this before.

The giftings of everybody in here, God has given you all at least one spiritual

gift, some more than one, is needed.

Your spiritual gift is needed for somebody else in the body, right?

And theirs may be needed for you know you may need that or someone else but

the threefold repetition of the phrase i am coming quickly in this passage in

revelation in verse 7 12 and 20,

reinforces y'all the reality of the imminent return of jesus,

that that adverb that used as used there in the greek it just quickly.

It doesn't refer to the speed at which Christ will travel from heaven to earth

when he returns. Instead, it has the connotation of soon.

Soon. And before long, the point is that the judge, I'm quoting scripture here,

the judge is standing right at the door, James 5, 9, poised to return at any moment.

You know, you've heard that song, the midnight cry, just waiting for the father

to say, son, go get your kids, right?

I mean, that's how close it is. And here, as we look in this passage,

and we started last week, as the epilogue opens, John records

that he, the angel who had shown him the new Jerusalem back in chapter 21,

verse 9 and 22, verse 1, said to me.

These words are faithful and true.

So the angel's words, y'all, provide heavenly attestation to the validity here,

of all that John had heard, all that he had seen throughout this whole apocalypse.

And the angel actually repeats the same affirmation given earlier to John by

God himself. Did you notice it? Listen to what he says.

He says back, if you look back in chapter 21 for a moment, verse 5,

he's talking about he who sits on the throne said, write for these words are faithful and true.

So that phrase faithful and true, also appears twice in Revelation as a title

for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Faithful and true. It's all the way back in chapter 3, verse 14,

and chapter 19, verse 11.

So the words of the apocalypse are as faithful and true as the one who revealed them to John.

The angel's words here reinforce an important truth to us.

Everything John has seen in

Revelation And where is he at? What aisle is he on? The island is he on?

Patmos, right? Everything John has seen in Revelation will come to pass.

What the inspired apostle has written in Revelation is not mystical.

The apocalypse is not a record of his bizarre dreams that he had after he ate

too much pizza or the result of an overactive imagination.

It's not an allegory from which we can read it and extract some kind of hidden

meaning from it and make our own concoction out of it.

It is an accurate description, church, of events and persons yet to come.

And verses 18 and 19 of this chapter give a sobering warning against tampering

with revelation. Let me read it to you again.

He says, I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book.

If anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues which are written in this book.

And if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy,

God will take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city,

which are written in this book.

Do you think God's taken seriously tampering with his word and his revelation?

John affirmed the angel's emphatic testimony, y'all, to the truthfulness of

what he had seen and what he had heard.

And he actually He wrote this, look at it. He said, the Lord,

the God of the spirits of the prophets sent his angels to show his bondservants,

that's us, the things which must soon take place, the God who moved the spirits,

Of his spokesmen, the prophets, to inspire both Old and New Testaments,

it's the same God who sent his angel right here, it says, to show to his bondservants.

That's us, all believers, the things which must soon take place.

And that's nothing short of a claim by John for the full and complete inspiration of Revelation.

The prophecies recorded by those earlier biblical prophets, he's saying,

were literally fulfilled and

those in revelation will be also this coming is it's a it's a certainty,

the exactness church the detail the precision with which earlier prophecies have already,

been fulfilled already come to pass from the pattern of those yet to be fulfilled,

They form that pattern. And God's prophetic record, y'all, you know what his

score is? He's undefeated.

It's perfect. His record's perfect.

Every future prophecy has come, is coming to pass. You know,

it's coming one after another, and he's never been wrong.

And he predicted, by the way, that Israel would go into captivity, and the nation did.

Studying about that too in Luke, aren't we? and he predicted the destruction

of Babylon and Tyre, and those cities were destroyed.

He predicted that Messiah would

be born in Bethlehem to a virgin and be killed by sinners, and he was.

So when God predicts future events that we're studying about in the book of

Revelation, such as the rapture of the church, that's us, the rise of Antichrist, the seal.

That we looked at, The trumpet, the bowl judgments, the battle of Armageddon,

the return of Jesus Christ and his thousand-year earthly kingdom,

that literal thousand-year reign, those events will just as certainly, church, come to pass.

God will do exactly what he says he will do.

And as he himself declares in Isaiah chapter 46, 9 through 11, listen to this.

Isaiah 46 · chapter mention

I think it's so important, y'all, to look back into the Old Testament too.

Listen, this ties in just perfectly.

He says, remember the former things long past, for I am God and there is no other.

I am God and there is no one like me, declaring the end from the beginning.

And from ancient times, things which have not been done, saying my purpose will

be established and I will accomplish all my good pleasure.

Truly I have spoken, truly I will bring it to pass. I have planned it, surely I will do it.

Y'all god's gonna accomplish his word it's coming to pass coming to pass he knows what he's doing.

And when he speaks it, you can be assured that it will happen. It will happen.

The reality of our Lord's imminent return, Eastwood calls, I think,

for at least four responses.

We'll see if we'll get these all tonight, but four responses,

at least on the part of all of us, of every believer.

I believe one of them is immediate obedience, immediate worship,

immediate proclamation, and immediate service.

Okay? So we're going to break those down, okay? We'll at least get to some of

those tonight, but we'll talk first of all about immediate obedience.

Listen to what he says. Go back to verse 7 of chapter 22. And behold, I am coming quickly.

Blessed is he who heathes the words of the prophecy of this book.

Kai, and that word, that Greek word there, it marks a change in speakers.

The speaker is no longer the angel who actually spoke back in verse 6,

but the Lord Jesus Christ, the one who is coming quickly.

He pronounces, y'all, the six of seven beatitudes in Revelation.

What does he say? Here's the sixth one. Blessed is he who heeds the words of

the prophecy of this book.

Three other times the words of this book has been used in Revelation.

There and we're called prophecy right through the prophecy by definition it

can truly can refer to any message about the past present or future and the

apocalypse as we're studying revelation is,

this you know this book largely consisting of future predictions and promises right and.

But these words here, to keep, to hold fast, to guard,

that same term is used all the way back in chapter 14 to describe,

and we've talked about this before, the perseverance of the saints who keep

the commandments of God and their faith in Jesus.

Remember, I said this first part is immediate obedience, right?

And believers are called to guard, according to the original language here,

or protect the book of Revelation.

It must be defended against detractors who deny its relevance and maybe all around us, right?

People who just dismiss it, against critics who deny its authority,

as well as against confused interpreters sometimes who actually obscure its meaning.

In fact, all of Scripture, y'all, all of it is to be so guarded, right? Right.

Paul actually commanded Timothy, by the way, guard what has been entrusted to you.

Retain the standard of sound words. That's talking about when I say sound words,

he's talking about sound teaching. Right.

Teaching that is of sound theology.

Right. In other words, sound doctrine. And which you have heard from me in the

faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.

Guard, he said, through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, the treasure which

has been entrusted to you.

Y'all, we have a high calling. We got a lot to guard and protect, don't we?

A lot to proclaim too, we're seeing the future here. But believers are called

not only to guard scripture, but also to obey it, to obey it.

Jesus said, and y'all have heard this verse probably many times, if you love me.

You will keep my commandments. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in

my love. In other words, you'll make your home in my love, just as I have kept

my father's commandments and abide in his love.

So the need to obey the commands of scripture was a foundational theme in John's

first epistle, by the way.

Listen to what he said. It's so important. He said, by this we know,

Not we guess, we think, possibly.

But he said, by this we know that we have come to know Jesus.

Do you want to know that you really know Jesus, that you really have assurance?

He said, by this we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments.

That's the surest sign in the world, that obedience to the Father.

If you can look at a command in scripture and you can dismiss it and say,

oh, that ain't for me or don't apply to me in this situation, bad news. Bad news.

The one who says, I have come to know him and does not keep his commandments

is a liar, and the truth is not in him. That's not my words. That's God's words.

So does that mean we're perfect? No, but it means that we are striving under

the authority and power of the Holy Spirit.

And for us to sin is not normal as a Christian.

In other words, you should not get up today and say, I plan to sin.

That is a lost person who is a slave to sin. But scripture teaches that those

who have truly been born again are no longer slaves to sin. They have actually

died to sin and now are alive to Jesus Christ.

You know, even that famous passage where Paul talks about, I want to do this,

but I end up doing that. You know, that struggle with the flesh.

He goes back and forth, man. But you know what? He doesn't leave it there.

At the very end of that passage, if you read it, he says, but thanks be to God

who gives me the victory through Jesus Christ, my Lord.

We sing that hymn, don't we? Victory in Jesus. Y'all, we can have victory over sin.

That doesn't mean we have sinless perfection, but it means that we go down the

path, we keep our eyes on Jesus, we obey his commands, and when we sin, and we will at times.

It won't be because we're slaves to it. It'll be because we chose to give in, right?

And we can repent and say, Jesus, forgive me. And the truest sign of a real

believer, sin will eat you up. Sin will bother you.

You won't be able to sleep at night because the Holy Spirit will be convicting

your heart so hard that you're out of fellowship with him or you're out of fellowship with somebody else.

You will be a miserable person and you will stay a miserable person if you're a believer.

If sin don't bother you, it's your sign you don't know Jesus.

If you don't have a problem with sin, you don't know Jesus.

If you don't have a problem, I love people saying, I struggle with pride or

I struggle with lust, because that tells me they know the Lord, because they struggle.

There's a war going on, right? But he says, the one who says,

I've come to know him and does not keep his commandments is a liar. The truth is not in him.

By this, we know that we love the children of God when we love God and observe his commandments.

For this is the love of God that we keep his commandments and his commandments,

I love this part, are not burdensome.

In other words, it's not like this long face. Oh, I have to share my faith.

Poor pitiful me, right? No, that's not what he's talking about.

There's joy in Jesus. There's joy in serving.

Man, when our heart is transformed, y'all, there's a life change.

It's changed. And that's what he's pointing out here. Those who live as if Jesus

could come at any moment, you know how they'll live? They'll live in obedience to Scripture.

Because if you believe Jesus is coming back tonight, are you going to want to obey his word?

You see, just believing that he's coming back and his return is imminent will

radically change how we live.

The question, I think, arises as to what words and revelation believers are called to heed here.

Before this command, there are no specific, I'll get it out in a minute,

commands addressed to Christians in the portion of the apocalypse covering future

events here, though there are some addressed to the seven churches,

right, that we studied earlier.

But what does it mean to heed the book of Revelation to us today?

It's a general command, y'all, to long for Christ's return and our eternal fellowship with him.

It calls on us as believers here at Eastwood Baptist Church,

anywhere in this world, to desire heaven, to desire holiness,

to desire to see Christ vindicated and triumphant over his enemies, the desire to.

That the end of the curse would come, right?

And to desire the glories of Christ's earthly kingdom and the new heaven and

the new earth that we've been studying about.

And after reading Revelation, Christians should, y'all, you know what our response should be?

We should love Christ more, long to see him vindicated in his glory,

living in light of that reality, y'all, that, you know what,

that we will one day see him.

One day we will see him disconnect ourselves from the perishing world system.

In other words, today, pursue heavenly reality, seek to be made like Jesus,

seek to grow in him, hope for our resurrection bodies. Anybody had a knee pop lately?

Every time it pops, you can say, whoo, praise the Lord, I'm going to get a new body, right?

I mean, anticipate the eternal rewards of being faithful even.

We should also understand the fearful judgment that awaits non-Christians in

the process and call those sinners to repentance, just like we came to repentance

and saving faith in Jesus Christ.

God does not command believers to read Revelation merely to satisfy their curiosity,

about the future. In fact, sometimes I think that's what initially draws people to it.

They want to get a little bit of that what's coming, you know,

these mysteries and all that kind of stuff.

And he did not inspire it to provide material for detailed chronological charts

of end-time events or anything like that.

But because y'all know on the bookshelves, there's a stream of books,

you know, on prophecy that's churned out, you know, different types of things.

But it was not God's purpose to give Christians a detailed analysis of the prophetic

significance of our contemporary culture, our political, military,

social events or trends or anything like that.

God inspired revelation, according to scripture here, for one purpose.

That purpose is to reveal the glory of his son and call believers,

don't miss this part, to live godly, obedient lives in light of his soon return.

The purpose of revelation is not to provide entertainment, but to provide motivation,

y'all, for godly living.

The apostle Peter, y'all, also taught that believers' knowledge of end-time

events should actually cause them to live holy lives.

In a passage, by the way, describing the future day of the Lord,

the destruction of the present universe that we live in, and the coming of the

new heaven and new earth that we studied about, Peter actually wrote these words.

He said, since all these things are to be destroyed in this way,

what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness,

looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God?

Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent,

be found by him in peace, spotless and blameless.

The glorious future realities described in Revelation here,

they actually compel a commitment on the part of us believers to lead holy lives what i mean by holy,

set apart right set apart to god holy lives christ imminent return and i close

with this tonight christ imminent return demands,

immediate obedience from his followers.