How Is It All Going To End? | Pastor Chris Kouba

It is good to see you.

What a great crowd.

I'm gonna try to do the best that I possibly can to stay as still as possible.

I know we got some folks there on the corners.

Our sight lines are a little bit more affected today than normal as we continue in our construction.

Uh my name is Chris Cuba.

I am the lead pastor here at United City and so grateful to be back with you.

Been out for a couple of weeks and excited to see uh how been able to watch online and be able to connect and be with us, but it is really good to be back in the house.

For those of you that are new with us, we're under construction.

Thank you for adjusting with us and thank you for just uh being patient with us.

You can see the the project on the north side is coming along.

We've got uh really an incredible amount of demo that has already taken place and that is gonna continue to take place in the days ahead as we put that project together.

It's gonna be incredible just to have so much usable space out there on that north side to be able to gather even after we are here in the room.

And then in here, we're building this sadium seating.

It's coming together.

Uh we've got, I had to take out a couple of rows this week, and this is a we got a couple of weeks where it's just gonna be rough, all right?

We're in the middle of that, but at the back end, it's about to start coming together and be really great.

Just a reminder that's all gonna be finished.

We'll then open this up and then we'll start on the two sides.

And so that's how that project will take place.

We'll probably finish somewhere.

We're hoping Thanksgiving, Christmas time, uh, everything will be done.

And here's what's kind of cool, just so you'll know.

Both these projects are paid for.

That's a pretty exciting thing for sure as a church.

We got all stuff going on.

The North Side Project has been funded by our vision team.

We've got a group of people who have selected to be above and beyond givers to the vision of United City Church.

We'd love to talk to you about that.

There's a little card in the seat back there in front of you if you want to learn more about the vision team.

They have helped to fund that project.

And then just because of your faithful ties and offerings and the stewardship of our church led by our stewardship committee and David Dover on our team, uh, we've been able to have the money and resources to go ahead and fund this whole other project.

So really grateful as these things go along, how that's all gonna take shape.

I do want to take an opportunity to welcome all of the men and the women and all of our correctional facilities and those joining us online.

Let's give them a hand and celebrate them.

Folks, that'll never be the same being able to say that as it was two weeks ago when I had the opportunity to go to Lynchner State Prison, which is here in Umbull, and go lead a Bible study on a Tuesday night with a number of guys in our church who go and do this every single week.

Praise God for them.

If you want to find a ministry to get involved in, we have ministries in both the men's prison as well as the women's prison.

But Romero, this is a shout out to you.

I was unbelievable to be able to meet some of these guys who literally watch us every week, who were like, hey man, what's the next taboo topic?

What are you gonna talk about this weekend?

And I'm like, you're in jail.

What is happening right now?

This is this is so weird, you know, but it's just incredible just to see the uh the effect of the Pando app and how when we gather together, we don't just gather with ourselves, but instead we have the opportunity to gather with so many who would call United City home, who feel like they've been spiritually encouraged.

Guys were telling me in the jail just how much God's doing some things in their lives as a result of the taboo series.

I mean, it's just praise God for what he's doing and the gift of technology, and it's just been pretty cool to see that.

And so, all of you on the other side, welcome in every way.

We are finishing a series that we started this summer.

We've been talking about all time called taboo.

You're talking about the topics that you normally don't talk about in church.

The things that you normally try to avoid.

The things that if you're trying to thin the crowd, these are the topics that you mentioned.

That hasn't been our experience.

We've grown this summer.

Uh that's been what we've been able to do, which is kind of wild, but but we've been kind of dealing with some of those things.

We've kind of poked the bear.

We've kind of addressed some of the things that normally you would probably not try to talk about.

In fact, we've gotten such a good response.

Many of you have actually texted me.

Hey, you should talk about this, and you should talk about this.

We may do this in the future, a taboo 2.0 series, and maybe we can talk about a couple of the other topics that have been brought up.

But one of the things that I want to talk about today in our closing message of the series is the thing that came up overwhelmingly on our Easter survey earlier this year.

Uh if you remember, a couple of weeks ago, Dave Kinney preached about forgiveness, and by far the number one requested topic that we preach about here at United City was the topic of forgiveness.

Dave did an amazing job.

Go back and make sure to listen to that.

Number two on that list, well above the next one down, number three and beyond, was the study of end times.

How's the world going to end?

Do you think about that much?

You know, were you one of those Y2K people who basically thought the world was going to end at Y2K only to discover that it just sort of changed the calendar?

How about the solar eclipse?

The solar eclipse was when it was all supposed to go down just a few months ago, only to find that it was just kind of cloudy and you couldn't see a whole lot.

Wasn't that cool?

Maybe there's been times whenever you wonder if the world is going to end, or maybe you want the world to end.

My son, who's 15, he went, we went to the DMV this past week in order to get his permit.

We went through the whole process.

They were already backlogged because of the power being out for an entire week.

So it was already a big, full place.

We're waiting in line.

We get to the very end only to discover we don't have a form that we need, and I wanted the world to end right then.

Ah, it was such a frustrating experience.

If you've ever been in the DMV in general, it is, right?

Uh I'm telling you, as I watched the opening ceremonies of the Olympics, I think God's about to end this thing because he's tired of looking at what he's watching.

I mean, there's a lot of crazy stuff going on and the mockery of all of the things that we hold dear and things like that.

And I just gotta I I could totally see it if God would just be like, I'm done with this.

Like I'm tired of it.

I'm gonna go ahead and clean house.

I'm gonna come back, I'm gonna do what I need to do.

I remember the very first time I ever cognitively thought about the world ending.

I was in fifth grade.

I had a girlfriend.

Girlfriend is in air quotes.

It's very important that that's in air quotes because it wasn't a girlfriend, but that's what I thought it was at the time.

Her name was Heather.

Heather was the tallest girl in the class, and I was not exactly the tallest guy in the class.

I've always been a little short, and so therefore, I, the small guy in dating Heather, who is the tallest one.

I'm not even sure I ever actually talked to Heather at any moment in the midst of our dating relationship.

Uh, but I was dating Heather, and I thought it was really cool that all the other guys in the class thought it was a cool thing that I was dating Heather, which is why it hurt me so bad.

Whenever Heather came to school uh there when I was in fifth grade and told me that not only was she no longer going to be my boyfriend, but she was going to be uh the the wait a second.

That message was a few weeks ago.

You can go back and check a look at that.

Not only was she not gonna be my girlfriend, she was instead gonna be the girlfriend of Josh, my best friend.

And all the guys in the class started making fun of me.

They started making fun of me because they said that you got dumped because you were short.

I remember going into the bathroom, and I remember honestly thinking in fifth grade, I don't want to come out.

I don't want to go back and face this.

And I remember thinking, I wonder if the world would just end.

At that moment, it felt like my world was gonna end.

Let me ask you, I don't know what your story is, what your situation is, but you may have given a lot of thought to the whole world ending.

You may have a thought that you may want the world to end.

But a lot of times when it comes to this particular topic, the reason why it can be taboo is because people have one of two extremes.

On the one hand, what they'll do is they'll come over here and they'll begin to have their predictions and they'll begin to have their dates and they'll begin to have their charts and they'll begin to have their positions, and they know all that they stand on all the things in times, and they're thankful that finally this taboo series is the first time that Pastor Chris is actually dealing with something that should be talked about each and every week.

You're somebody who you already got figured out the passage in Revelation that points to the explanation of President Trump's potential assassination.

You already know how the hurricane is affected in Revelation chapter 13, and you've got it all figured out, and you're finally glad that we're dealing with this topic.

Revelation 13 · chapter mention

On the other hand, you've got everybody else who looks at you and they're like, I don't want to be that.

I don't want to be like them.

You hear about stuff like awe-mill or pre-mill or post-mill, and you're like, I don't really have any idea what any of that stuff means.

I'm just pan-mill.

I think it's all gonna pan out at the end, and I'm good with that, right?

Like I'm happy.

But here's what the problem you can be so extreme that you don't live in the reality.

Or, I think this is probably where most people are.

You can live so much apathy you don't really care.

Yeah, it's gonna play out.

Yeah, it's gonna happen.

Yeah, at some point, I'm supposed to kind of be ready and be mindful of this, but I don't want to think about it much.

You're probably the same people who still don't have a generator and you live in Houston, right?

I'll get to that at some point, only to realize you kind of already need to have one, right?

It's coming whether we like it or not.

Like it's gonna happen, right?

The wind's gonna blow, the power's gonna go out.

You gotta figure it out, right?

And so you kind of always have this mentality, like, I'll get to it at some point, only to discover when you need it, you didn't really get to it.

So we want to figure out a way to do it differently.

We want to allow God's word to tell us some insight into what we need to know related to the eschatology.

The word eschatology is a theological term that means the study of last things, the study of the end times.

So I want to give you a little bit of an overview, and then I want to tell you why you should care.

Okay?

Let's begin reading in Matthew chapter 24, beginning in verse 3.

Matthew 24 · chapter mention

We're gonna be all over the place today.

I'm gonna be giving you a ton of scripture, maybe the most scripture I've ever given in a message, and so I just want to encourage you to be ready to write references down, take pictures, whatever you need to do, everything will be up on the screen.

Matthew chapter 24, verse 3.

Matthew 24:3

As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, Tell us, this is speaking to Jesus.

Tell us when will these things be?

And what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?

The disciples are like, We've been walking with you for three years.

We gave up a bunch of stuff in order to follow you.

What's the cheat code?

Like, what's the answer key?

Like, what's the secret information?

They went out privately.

They didn't ask in front of everybody because they weren't, they didn't want to do the power of the information.

Because if you know when Jesus is gonna come back, then you can be ready for it.

You can cram at the end for the test, like some of you might tend to do.

Whenever you know the quiz is coming, you operate differently than if it's a pop quiz when you don't know that it's coming.

And what Jesus begins to do in Matthew chapter 24 is he outlines some signs and some symbols that have to take place, but ultimately he says this, but we're not really gonna know.

Matthew 24 · chapter mention

We're not actually going to know when it's all gonna go down.

But we know based upon biblical prophecy, we know based upon other passages in scripture, we can come up with an idea, maybe not the when, of course, but certainly the what and the how the world we're going to end.

Let me just go and give you a heads up as we get into this message.

This is gonna be the most lectury message that I've given all summer and probably for quite some time.

So I just want to encourage you to kind of get a heads up that that's the case.

There's really no way you can talk about the end times without me getting somewhat technical.

So just prepare yourself for that.

I also want to tell you this.

I am presenting to you Chris Kuba's educated, studied perspective on the end times.

There are certain things that I preach to you, and I'm gonna mention a few of those in a moment, which are black and white issues, meaning this.

If you disagree with me on this, you're wrong.

And I believe that because of what the Bible says.

And I would tell you, in fact, these are certain things that if you disagree with me on these certain things, you don't disagree with me, you disagree with God, and you are not able to call yourself a believer in Jesus.

Some of those black and white issues would be things like this salvation, the need for salvation, and the fact that salvation is found in no one else other than Jesus Christ.

The authority and the inerrancy of the Bible, that was the very first message of the series.

I talked to you about why I believe you can bank everything that you believe on this.

Like you can believe in it, and I believe it's important that that is the case.

The belief in the work of Christ on the cross and his physical resurrection from the dead.

These are black and white non-negotiable issues.

That being said, I'm about to present to you my perspective on the end times, and it's now black and white.

I might be wrong.

In fact, I would actually tell you, and I'll point out some various ways along the way, that here's what I believe is to be right and true, and I've thought about it, prayed about it, and I've studied it, but I can totally see how somebody might have a different perspective and come to a different conclusion.

And they could still be right, and we both could be in the same church, and we both could worship, and we both could be able to get along well.

So do not make this a black or white issue.

It is a gray issue.

Okay?

Now, in light of that, I want to ask you to take your phones out and I want you to take a picture of the QR code that's gonna be on the screens.

We've done this for every single message of the entire taboo series, all eight weeks.

And if you actually scroll down to the bottom of this link, you will find all of the resources for all of the weeks of taboo.

All put there together.

This particular one for End Times, it's gonna list some articles, some books, some various other things that are gonna help you see where there should be agreement and where there should be some, potentially there's some room for controversy and some room for difference of opinions.

And it can, if you disagree, you hear something I say today, and you're like, I disagree with that, there's a good chance there's an article on this website that explains what you think you agree with that's different than what I agree with, and we're okay with that.

Okay?

This is gonna be a guide for you as we go forward.

Now, it's not good preaching on the end times unless you got a chart.

So here's my chart, all right?

Here's my chart.

I got a chart up here.

Now, here's I know what's taking place as I put this chart up here.

Half of you are like, this is why I hate this stuff right here.

This is so boring.

Are you kidding me?

I'm in school all over again.

Am I gonna have to go over all this kind of stuff?

And I would tell you, the enemy wants nothing more than for you to dismiss this, that way you don't apply it.

So I'm just gonna ask that you not do that.

Lean in a little bit.

I got a chart, and it's a good looking chart, all right?

Others of you are already like, nope, that part's wrong in the chart, all right?

That part's not where it's supposed to be, this part's supposed to be over here.

I disagree with that, and I will simply tell you this.

That's okay.

It's my chart, it's not your chart.

I happen to be right, you happen to be wrong, it's fine, we're friends.

It's okay.

We can still be friends.

But this gives us a guide to at least walk through to understand.

Let's begin to walk this through.

First of all, the first thing you have here is the church age.

The church age.

The church is the time that we are in right now.

This is the time in the biblical prophecy and the study of end times that we find ourselves currently, and we know this is a very big summation, but the Bible tells us that the church age, the primary goal of the church, is that we are to operate under Matthew chapter 22, the great commandment, and that we are to live out the great commission in Matthew chapter 28.

Matthew 22 · chapter mention Matthew 28 · chapter mention

Matthew 28, verses 18 through 20.

Matthew 28:18–20

Let me read it to you.

It says, And Jesus came and said to them, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.

At United City Church, we've outlined our mission statement as this: everyone, every day, crossing every divide to live united in Christ.

This is what we're about.

We are on mission.

The goal is not just that we sit and soak and get more knowledgeable.

The goal is instead that we would be on mission, mobilized as a group of people who have a core set of beliefs that unite us together, but then who go out with the goal and the purpose of trying to, what does it say there?

Teach, obey, baptize, and disciple.

So, what this means is that the goal is that we would be able to see more and more people come into a relationship with Jesus, follow through in believers' baptism by getting baptized into the church and then getting involved in being discipled so that they can reach their friends, their neighbors, their people that they have a relationship with who don't know Jesus, who can go do the exact same process.

Can I tell you one of the things we're probably the most excited and proud about here at United City is how many people came here for the very first time in order to watch someone else's baptism, stood up there, sat in a church service, got saved, and then got baptized in the very same waters.

Like that's the picture of the goal.

That is what we are to be all about.

That's the church age.

That's how we're supposed to live.

That's what you hear majority of the time us preach and teach about, how to live in the church age.

What I believe is gonna take place next in the study of end times in the calendar, if you will, is something that I'm gonna call, the Bible actually never calls it this, but this is a phrase that I'm going to use that has been very popularized up to this point, which is the rapture.

It's the rapture.

Think left behind, Kirk Cameron, really bad movie, and everybody's kind of sitting there on the clothes or on the ground type thing, and you're like, what just happened?

That's what this is describing, okay?

That's what this is.

I get this from 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, verses 13 through 17, and it reads like this.

1 Thessalonians 4:13–17

But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.

For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so through Jesus God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.

For this we declare to you by our word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not proceed from those who have fallen asleep.

For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God.

And the dead in Christ will rise first.

Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.

I believe this passage is describing the rapture.

Where believers and those who died will rise first and meet their heavenly bodies in the air, and then those who are believers who are still alive will follow and be caught up with them, is what the Bible says, in the air from the earth.

Now I'm gonna tell you up front, this is a totally gray issue for me.

I 100% could see how someone could come to a different conclusion than what I have related to with the timing or if this is actually going to take place.

Uh, some people believe it's gonna happen later, some people believe it's gonna happen basically simultaneously to Jesus coming back.

There's all different, and I totally get how you could come up to that position.

Let me just go ahead and say up front, I do believe scripturally that this is the case, but I also would tell you pragmatically and practically, I hope this is the case.

Because of what's coming next in the calendar.

Next thing that's gonna be taking place is the great tribulation.

The great tribulation.

I believe that Jesus is gonna come, he's gonna take the believers out of the air, they're gonna die, if they're alive, they're gonna be going up.

If they've died before, they're gonna be made up with their bodies, they're gonna go up for seven years while the great tribulation takes place, which is described in Matthew chapter 24, beginning in verse 15.

Matthew 24 · chapter mention

So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel, that's speaking of Daniel chapter 9, standing in the holy place, let the reader understand.

Daniel 9 · chapter mention

Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.

Let the one who is on the housetop not go down to take what is in his house, and let the one who is in the field not turn back to his cloak.

And alas for women who are pregnant, and for those who are nursing infants in those days, pray that your flight may not be in winter or on a Sabbath.

For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no and never will be.

And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved.

But for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.

This is a time that refers to a great suffering and persecution that has never happened before in the life of the church.

We know suffering and persecution are guaranteed for us.

We are not immune from that.

Whenever you get saved, you are not protected from being persecuted or having tribulation.

You, in fact, will guarantee have those things, but what it's describing here in Matthew 24, I believe, is instead a more serious and specific time that is unlike anything in the history of the of the world.

It's defined as the great tribulation.

You can read about a lot of This judgment, an intense period of intense trial in Revelations chapter 6 through chapter 18.

Revelation 6 · chapter mention

It's got a series of bowls and a series of scrolls, and you see, it's just judgment after judgment after judgment as God is just pouring out his wrath upon the earth because of their unbelief and because of their rebellion.

I could be wrong on the timing of some of this stuff.

I get that.

But the next thing that's gonna take place in the end times calendar is not debated at all.

It's that Jesus Christ will physically return to the earth.

Jesus Christ is coming again.

This is gonna happen.

In the Old Testament, there are 1,500 verses that speak to the coming of the second coming of Jesus.

In the New Testament, one out of every 25 verses speaks to it.

For every one time the Bible mentions the first coming of Jesus, where he's kind of presented as being humble and lowly, the second coming is mentioned eight times where he is victorious and mighty.

Jesus speaks directly about his second coming 21 times in the Gospels, and 23 of the 27 New Testament books speaks to his return.

Jesus is coming again.

It's the central hope of the New Testament.

Acts chapter 1, verse 8 describes how it's going to go down.

Acts 1:8

It says, But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.

And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.

And when he had said these things as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.

And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes and said, Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven?

This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.

This is speaking of when Jesus lived on the earth in his first coming, and then he ascended up into heaven.

The Bible says that one day he will ascend yet again, and he will come back down in the same way.

With all the terror and the chaos and the judgment that was on the earth during the great tribulation caused by the Antichrist, there's gonna come an end as Jesus begins to rule and arraign and establish his kingdom here on this earth.

That longing that we have when we see injustice, that cry of our hearts which says, God, would you fix this?

This is when he's gonna do it.

He's gonna come, he's gonna set up his reign, and he's gonna take over.

It's what we long to happen and take place.

This ultimately, I believe, whenever this happens, we'll inaugurate the rule and the mark of a literal thousand-year reign where Satan will be bound and believers will get to rule and reign with Christ.

This is called the millennium.

The millennium.

Revelation chapter 20 is where we find this, beginning in verse 1.

Revelation 20 · chapter mention

Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain.

And he sees the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended.

After that he must be released for a little while.

Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed.

Also I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the Word of God, and those who had not worshipped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands.

They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.

The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.

This is the first resurrection.

Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection.

Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years.

This is the time marked by the millennium.

The millennium refers to a period of time where Jesus Christ will rule on the earth and Satan will be bound.

This is a time when Scripture speaks of Jesus being able to have clear authority and the gospel is able to go forth without hindrance.

Let me just mention this.

This is again a little gray issue, but it is one that I feel fairly strongly about, and that is the uh this is the time frame that I see when many of the promises to the nation of Israel, the land promises in particular, will be fulfilled.

I get asked this a lot.

Why should we care about Israel?

Like, is that like a theological thing?

Like, as Americans, should we care about Israel?

Like as Christians, should we care about Israel?

And I would tell you, as believers, this is my opinion, I believe as believers, we should care greatly about Israel.

One, because the Bible tells us that we're gonna pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

And I want to do whatever the Bible says.

So I want to pray for the peace of Jerusalem there in light of that.

I also believe the Bible teaches that those who bless Israel will be blessed.

So I think it is a wise geopolitical move for us as America to be in support of the nation of Israel so that we can be on God's good side as opposed to be on God's bad side.

And so, therefore, I don't necessarily think it's just a political thing, I think it's a theological thing.

That being said, I would also tell you this: I do not believe that the church replaces Israel.

Let me tell you why this matters.

This means that you can't just grab a passage from the Old Testament and basically apply it to the church and just basically act like all of those promises were given to us instead of a specific land with a specific people at a specific time.

So, for instance, do I think that we as a nation should pray and that's our way back to God?

Of course I do.

I just don't think we need to quote 2 Chronicles chapter 7, verse 14, in order to do that.

2 Chronicles 7:14

Because I think that was a specific promise given to the nation of Israel that telled them a specific thing that he would want to do.

That being said, we absolutely should pray if we want to be blessed by the Lord.

So therefore, the principles must apply.

The specific ways and passages can't always be that way.

So here's what I mean by that.

I think that we should care about Israel because I believe that God's gonna care a lot about Israel in the millennium, and that's when he's gonna fulfill some of those promises.

Let me keep going.

Uh, Revelation chapter 20, verse 11, it reads and continues Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it.

Revelation 20:11

From his presence, earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them.

And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened.

Then another book was opened, which is the book of life.

And the dead were judged by what was written in the books according to what they had done.

And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done.

Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire.

This is the second death, the lake of fire.

And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

At the completion of that millennium time frame, the next thing that takes place will be the final judgment.

The final judgment.

You may not realize this, but both believers and unbelievers will be judged.

Believers, you're not going to be judged based upon whether you are saved.

The Bible tells us that that comes because of Jesus and his resurrection on the cross, guarantees it, and it is sealed by the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives according to Ephesians chapter 1.

Ephesians 1 · chapter mention

However, 1 Corinthians chapter 3 tells us that the good works which we do will determine the amount of rewards we get when we're in heaven.

1 Corinthians 3 · chapter mention

So what you do matters.

And that will happen at the great white throne judgment.

In addition, at that time, unbelievers will be judged, and those who do not believe will be sent to eternal condemnation in hell.

It will ultimately lead to the establishment at that very same time of the new heaven and the new earth, described in Revelation chapter 21, beginning in verse 1.

Revelation 21 · chapter mention

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth.

For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.

And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man.

He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.

This is the new heaven and the new earth, which means this.

Your view of heaven being being dressed up like a baby in the clouds, playing a harp, has more to do with precious moments than it does with the scriptures.

It's not what it's gonna be.

Instead, what it suggests is that we're gonna have all the blessings and the benefits of this earth without being tainted by sin.

We're gonna have Houston weather without humidity, right?

Like, think about that.

It's hard to imagine, I know.

We're gonna be able to have the all of the wonder of the beaches and the mountains and everything in between and the hills and all the various things, and we're gonna get to enjoy all of these things with each other.

It's gonna be an incredible thing without sin.

Everybody take a deep breath?

Blow out.

You are now an expert on end times.

Congratulations.

We've accomplished it all here in 15 minutes.

Okay.

Let's talk about what you probably care about the most.

What should I do about this?

Like, how is this gonna help me on Tuesday?

Like, what does this matter at all when I go back to school next Wednesday and I'm sitting in my classroom and I don't like my schedule?

What is this?

Who cares?

Let me give you three things.

Three reasons why you should care.

Three reasons about what you should do and how you should live differently.

Number one, live with hope.

Live with hope.

First Thessalonians, this topic was brought up.

And the Apostle Paul says, you should not grieve like those without hope.

One, it tells us that until Jesus comes and fixes all this stuff, we're gonna grieve.

Maybe some of you are grieving.

Maybe some of you are hurting.

Maybe some of you are walking through difficulty, and that's fine.

You can grieve.

This Bible, one of the most comforting passages, and it happens to be the shortest verse in all the Bible is John 11, 35.

Jesus wept.

It's just amazing to me.

He knew what he was about to do with Lazarus, but he still cried.

What it says is that we don't cry is that those we don't have any hope.

We instead we have hope.

It's different.

It doesn't matter what your view of the end times are or the rapture or how the millennium is going to play out or what exposure you're gonna have during the tribulation.

A few things that we know are true.

Jesus is real, he will return, he will establish a new heaven and a new earth, and believers will reign with him in eternity.

Let me tell you why that matters.

And our church has had some incredibly tragic situations that we've had to lead through with families in our church that have dealt with unexpected, very, very difficult losses.

I've led many services in that way.

We'd been able to do that recently as well.

And I'm just gonna tell you when you're standing there in front of a family member who's dealing with the loss like that, there's no magic words that you can say.

There's no verse that makes it all better.

There's no think about this, and then all of a sudden you feel the loss goes away.

But every single time I stand here feeling inadequate to do anything more than this, yet at the same time realizing this is the greatest thing that I can do.

And I say, if you put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ, if you believe him for the forgiveness of your sins, if you believe that he died on a cross for you and that he rose from the dead, and you put your faith and trust in him, this one who also has died, who made the same decision to give their lives to Jesus, you will one day see them again.

Because let me just tell you something.

If that's not true, what are we doing?

There's no hope.

There's just overwhelming sadness.

I see these families that I know of that have been together for 50 plus years and then all of a sudden lose a loved one, and they just sit there and say, I don't know how I'm gonna keep going on.

And what you can do is I can't do anything that makes them come back, and I can't make it anything better, but I can tell you this you're gonna be with them.

And so my plea to you today is this regardless of where you land on the chart, would you live with hope?

With your head up and your chest out, knowing Jesus is coming back.

He's gonna fix all this crazy stuff, he's gonna make it all right.

And in light of that, we know God is not uncaring, turning his eye, just allowing us to be able to ruin this whole thing, this society, the way that it seems like that we are, but instead he is very attentive, and one day he will make all things right.

One day vengeance will come.

And we must know that we trust and believe, even if we're outnumbered, and even if no one's listening, because we ultimately believe that Jesus is gonna be the one that the Bible says every knee will bow, every tongue will confess, Jesus is Lord.

You can mock him all you want.

On worldwide television, at the end of the day, every single person will be bowing their knee to him.

Gonna live with hope.

Second thing I tell you is this live on mission.

Live on mission.

Matthew 24 says one of the times, signs of the ends of time will be the when the whole world has an opportunity to hear the gospel.

This is why we as a church give uh to a ministry whose sole purpose is to put the language of the Bible or put the Bible in the language of people who do not have a Bible.

That the whole purpose of that is to invest in getting the gospel out to as many people as possible.

This is the reason why we have a trip in Puerto Rico and a trip in Los Angeles.

This is the reason why we're gonna ask people to go on a mission trip later this year to Baltimore and to Amazon and to Southeast Asia and everywhere else God leads us to.

Also, praise God we live in a city where the world is right at our fingertips.

The world's coming to us.

Which means this what are you doing to advance the cause of Jesus and the gospel?

We don't just want to make sure that we know academically how it's all going to end.

We want to do everything as a church to mobilize to make it happen as quick as possible.

Because ultimately, this world is not our home.

We instead are living for the world to come, and so therefore, we must ask this question: who do you know that personally needs a relationship with Jesus?

Who do you know that you need to be praying for?

Building a relationship with, sharing the gospel with, pursuing them with the message of Christ.

Let it be said about us at United City that we do not talk more about our presidential candidates than we do about Jesus in the next few months.

Let it be said that we believe, like Ben talked about last week, that Jesus is king.

And so, in light of that, that is the number one thing that we're thinking about right now.

Is how do we get as many people as possible to go to heaven with us and experience the new heaven and the new earth.

I believe that the only reason that you have left to be here if you got saved, it doesn't make any sense why God would leave you here other than the fact that it gives you the opportunity to tell somebody else about Jesus.

It's who we are, it must be what we are all about.

Last thing is this live ready.

Live ready.

The end will come like a thief in the night.

And we know there's going to be a time of final judgment.

The last thing that you want is for judgment to come and you not be ready.

If you knew you only had a few months to live, what would you do there for?

What relationships would you reconcile and invest in?

What conversations would you have that you're avoiding?

What people would you invest and stay close to?

The Bible tells us that we're to live ready.

We're to have an urgency.

We're to recognize that our holy living is not just a thought and a suggestion, it's a command.

Let me ask you, are you ready?

You can be.

If you're a believer in Jesus, I believe it comes.

If whenever you experience the conviction of the Holy Spirit, which is the gift of the kindness of our God to you, telling you, stop doing that.

Stop messing with that.

Romans chapter 13 says, make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desires.

Romans 13 · chapter mention

That doesn't mean keep it around and see how close you can get.

That means you do everything that you can to run away from that stuff.

If God's pushing and pressing upon you, perhaps this is right now trying to prepare you for the time of judgment because you have no idea how long you're gonna have, you have no idea when your number is gonna be called, and so therefore you wanna make sure that you're ready.

You got all your paperwork ready to go.

You got your life in order, you got your relationships where they need to be.

Doesn't mean they're always gonna be perfect, the Bible says, as far as it depends upon you, live peaceably with all, which implies that you're not gonna get along with everybody.

But it does mean this.

Don't you hold that grudge, that bitterness.

Don't you hold that in, but instead you make it right.

Others of you, if you don't know Jesus, and that judgment time comes, the only thing that's gonna matter is not how much you've read your Bible, it's not how many times you've been to church, it's what did you do with Jesus?

I'm not asking if you know about him in a minute mental level.

I'm not asking about if you could pass a test about some basic facts about his life.

I'm asking, have you received him in your life and your heart?

I want to give you the opportunity to do that today.

Let me just tell you something.

It's too late when he comes.

But what you do right now will affect whether you're ready when that time comes.

And so I want to invite you to give your life to Jesus.

Would you just bow your heads and would you close your eyes all across this room?

If you're watching me online, I want to invite you to do the very same thing wherever it is that you're hearing these words.

Are you ready?

You can be if right now you give your life to Jesus.

Come to Him, seek Him, seek His forgiveness, His mercy for your sins.

Ask Him to forgive you and cleanse you from all unrighteousness.

Receive His gift, which isn't a payment to you, but instead it's a gift that's undeserved.

Just pray this prayer right where you are, just say these words right where you are.

God, I receive you into my life.

Make you my Lord.

Make you my Savior.

Thank you for giving your life on the cross.

I believe that you died, that you rose from the dead.

Right now.

Receive your forgiveness.

Your grace.

Some team members up at the heads of the aisles and also on the sides.

I want you to get your eyeballs on who's the closest one to you.

Because in just a moment, we're all gonna stand up.

We do it every week here at United City.

It's called an invitation.

We believe in public next steps.

We don't believe in private intentions, we believe in public next steps.

So if that's you today, I want to ask you if you just gave your life to Jesus, to just go to the person that's closest to you and tell them, I gave my life to Jesus today.

We want to pray with you, we want to answer questions that you might have, we want to get some information from you, we want to celebrate with you.

We believe you made the greatest decision you've ever made in your life.

Others, if you need to come and join the United City Church, you believe in the mission of what God has led us to do.

We're gonna be serious about his word, but we're gonna be serious about obedience to his word.

We want to be a place that, yes, takes care of those who are wounded, but we want to put them back together so they can be on the front lines on mission to go and advance the gospel until all people here.

We believe that God wants us to be faithful in our local context here in Northeast Houston, and we believe that he has positioned and allowed us to do that.

And if God wants you to be a part of that mission, you lead the way today.

Others need to be baptized to take that public next step.

We mentioned before the Great Commission says that you are to teach, you are to obey, and part of obeying means you are to be baptized.

If you've never been baptized the way the Bible teaches, we'd love nothing more than if you come today and schedule your baptism.

Others may need prayer today.

Maybe you feel the conviction of the Holy Spirit and you need to confess.

Maybe you're here today and you feel like you've lost hope.

You know Jesus, but you're struggling, and we want to pray with you.

We don't want you to hurt alone.

We want to come and believe Jesus for you.

Speak Jesus into your situation.

Others, if you need to come, maybe you've got a medical need, maybe you've got a relational need, maybe you've got something else.

And you just want the ministry of the church to pray over you.

We want to do that for you.

Father in heaven, I pray that you would move in these moments we have left.

Thank you in advance.

That the name of Jesus will be lifted up through our voice, through our actions.

In the name of Jesus, I pray.

Amen.

Would you stand and as you stand, our team is up front, on the sides, ready to receive you.

You come right now.