Living In The Mean Time

like me recently the Lord has done something above and beyond.

Could you just thank him for that?

Lord I thank you.

I praise you for your goodness.

With every breath that I'm able I will sing of the goodness of God.

I don't want to stand before him one day with strength left that I didn't pour out praise

on him.

I don't want to stand there in front of him having just brought part.

He's worthy of it all.

He's worthy of it all.

So with every breath he's good.

Amen.

If you have your Bibles return with me to Mark's Gospel 13th chapter.

Mark 13 again thank you so much for being here in the house of the Lord today.

I honor all our graduates, our high school graduates this morning.

Also just prior to service we found out we had a master's graduate.

Let me just say I congratulate him in that.

I'm not going to call him out.

That's a great honor, a great accomplishment.

Amen.

So congratulations sir on your great task and accomplishment.

Amen.

I remember when late in life I got my first one.

I remember that.

And it was hard to get.

And so anybody that gets one they need a little recognition.

Amen.

Wow.

Presence of the Lord's here today.

I started to say 12 is out but it's just 25 after 11 so there's potential.

At least 20 after maybe you'd be good.

We're continuing in this series the Lord is.

Late on my heart.

Living in the meantime.

Just a few weeks ago we celebrated the resurrection.

We're resurrection people.

Hello.

We're resurrection people.

It's Christ.

It's all about him.

Everything else is contained in him.

All before him he's the top and shadow and the fulfillment of everything before his birth.

Are you hearing me?

Everything.

It's Christ.

From now on it's Christ and Christ alone.

We're resurrection people.

And we're living in between the time of the promise.

The promise of his return.

And so we live in the meantime.

Mark's gospel 13 verse 31 says heaven and earth shall pass away.

My word shall not pass away.

But of that day and that hour knoweth no man.

He's in referencing his return and his coming.

Not the angels which are in heaven neither the son but the father.

Make ye heed watch and pray for you know not when the time is.

For the son of man is as a man taking a far journey who left his house gave authority

to his servants and to every man his work.

That's going to be our emphasis today.

And he commanded the porter to watch.

Watch ye therefore for you know not when the master of the house coming.

At even or at midnight or at the cock crowing or in the morning.

Lest coming suddenly he find you sleeping.

What I say to you I say to all.

Watch living in the meantime.

As we pray over the word and the message this morning the Lord open our hearts to hear and

receive for the meals gave a request this morning of a missionary in Africa who has

been diagnosed with a very serious condition that only about 50 percent of the people who

have this come down with this survive.

I forget the sister's name but the Lord knows and we're going to hold her up before him.

She's been flown out to another hospital area in the region in Africa for better care.

So let's just ask the Lord to do a work today would you.

Heavenly Father we come before you as we've broken the bread of life.

The bread of life declares that there's healing in you.

And so Father we pray for our sister who is now in jeopardy of life and death.

You are the holder of life the giver of life.

We pray for her body.

Lord you are the healer you are the creator and we ask God that you would touch her in

the name of Jesus.

And fathers we're here this morning standing in your presence so near as we've lifted our

voices and lifted our hearts to glorify you for you are God.

Hallelujah.

We magnify your name.

Now touch us again.

Move on us again.

Where the spirit of the Lord is there is liberty.

So let the liberty to preach the good news of the gospel be in this house and the liberty

to hear and receive what the spirit said to the church in this hour in which we live.

Do you be praised forever.

In Christ's name the church says.

Amen.

You can be seated this morning as I approached the pulpit today I did a little research since

our subject is living in the meantime.

What time is it.

Many of you may know or heard of the doomsday clock.

The doomsday clock was set in order in 1947 and it was set in accordance by the Bulletin

of the Atomic Scientists.

And when they first set the clock it was set to seven minutes till midnight.

And since 1947 the doomsday clock has went backwards eight different times.

They've set time back on the doomsday clock.

It's went forward 17 times for a total of time adjustments clock adjustments for 25

times.

The latest time setting was 17 minutes.

It had reversed with mankind it kindly beginning to mind their own business enough to set time

back and time back and the jeopardy of annihilation of the earth when the big red buttons get

pushed and we just wipe ourselves out.

That's what it's all about.

It's a metaphor for the ending of time.

How long is man going to last till he destroys himself.

Well the latest has been 17 minutes till January of this year they moved it up 10 whole seconds

and we're now closer than at any point since they set the doomsday clock to the end of

humanity.

90 seconds till they've moved the clock up because of the jeopardy that mankind is putting

themselves in as more world powers rise up and get nuclear capability.

These scientists say that it's only just a matter of time until someone pushes the

wrong button.

So we're living at 90 seconds to midnight.

We're living in the meantime.

I think the church is going out before the button gets pushed.

Can you prove that?

I don't know that I can but I just feel that way.

I just kind of just preach from my heart a little bit.

I feel like the Lord's going to get us out before some idiot and I know the magnitude

of the word pushes the red button.

I firmly believe that we're going to be out of here.

So we're living in the meantime.

If it's 90 seconds until man destroys himself how close are we to hearing the alarm of heaven.

How close are we to hearing the trumpets blast.

How close are we to hearing the archangel's voice.

How close are we to seeing the Lord in the air himself calling the church up.

We're close baby.

We're close.

That just gives me cold chills.

I'm ready to see Jesus but until we see him we've some work to do.

Until he appears in those clouds we can't just be sitting idly by waiting for that event.

Why?

Because our souls are in jeopardy of not being ready for that event.

And we have been commissioned to help get others ready for the event.

Commission.

The great commission.

Going into all the world right.

Teaching, preaching, spreading the gospel, baptizing, make disciples.

That's our mission.

To this moment the church and its mission is unaccomplished.

The mission is still before us.

All we have to do is stop for a moment take a good look around us and we'll see that there's

a lot to do.

Society and its degradation and its despair as it's beginning to manifest more daily and

currently there is a work to do.

And that work has been left for us in the meantime.

We stop to think about what Jesus said about the coming of his return as it was in the

days of Noah so shall the coming of the Son of Man be.

I think about how bad it must have been in Noah's day if he's not come to get us out

of here yet.

We go back into Genesis we'll read we'll see where man's heart was only on evil continually.

And in the midst of that evil Noah found grace in the eyes of God.

My Lord there's going to be some folk find grace and it's those who are living in that

grace hallelujah who've discovered the grace of God that frees them from sin.

There's a flood that came then but there's a trumpet that's going to sound and we're

going to be saved from it all my Lord.

But when we think about how the church is operating in this world when we think about

how the world is in such despair offering our young and our children and generations

that are rising we offer them up seemingly without resistance to the God of this world.

Just let them go their way.

We talked about a little bit of that authority last week in the generations how they look

at authority and how they despise authority as time goes on.

So they believe that themselves are the authority but the church it is our responsibility as

we are living in the meantime to fulfill what the master had left to be done.

He left them his house which the church is his house.

We talked about that.

He gave them authority it's his authority it's not ours but it's his authority and

we move in his authority.

Now he has left them a work to do.

Can I tell you today that there has been no permission from Jesus Christ for the saint

of God to be on a seat of do nothing?

Hello?

Can I tell you it's not just come sit and soak and get sweet and go on about your business.

No we've been left a work to do and the work that we have been left to do is to fulfill

and complete the mission that Jesus Christ himself came for.

He came to seek and to save that's what was lost and you and I have been empowered.

We've been left behind the spirit we've been left his word we've been left the power of

prayer whereby we are to accomplish the mission that he has mandated us to be about.

He has commanded us he has commended you and I that we cannot sit idly by but we are to

occupy until he comes and to occupy means that military dominance we are to rise up

and take over.

What are we taking over pastor?

We are to arise and take over darkness and let the glorious light of Jesus Christ that

lives within us shine into a darkened world.

You've been mandated oh just by a poll this morning how many of you claim in salvation?

How many of you have been saved by the blood?

Your sins have been washed away.

Then I'm talking to you this morning.

If you're a sinner in this house I'm going to give you the best news that you can hear

and that is the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

He was sent to this earth.

He was born in a manger.

He was nailed to a cross.

He was placed in a borrowed tomb and he arose on the third day.

Whereby to seal your redemption when you confess your sin and accept him as Lord you got the

best thing going.

If you couldn't raise your hand you get the best news of the house this morning.

But before you leave if you decide to get in condition where you can raise your hand

then I'm going to tell you what your work is.

We live in an age of laziness.

I wondered why the preacher in Proverbs Solomon wrote so much about the sluggard.

Evidently the Holy Ghost knew there was a day coming when we were going to raise a whole

... well there's going to be a whole group of sluggards rise up and they know what a

sluggard is.

Oh no wonder you're not a man.

Let me tell you what a snail... have you seen any more slimy snails that go across

your porch and leave that mud streak behind them?

That's a sluggard.

How long does it take them to get across the sidewalk?

All day.

Right?

A sluggard is a slow moving individual.

They don't get in a hurry about nothing.

You can set their tail on fire.

They're still just going to eat right along.

They're not going to get in a hurry.

The Spirit knew that there was going to be some sons because Proverbs is talking to the

sons.

There's going to be a generation of sons raising up one day that wasn't going to be fit for

nothing.

Well, hear me sons of Jesus Christ.

You and I can't be as the sluggard.

We've been given and mandated.

We've been given responsibility for the house.

We've been given authority to get the job done and the work has been laid out for us.

That work is commissioned by his mission.

He's not giving you and I anything more to do than he came to do himself.

And he gave you the authority and the power in which whereby to get the job done.

But what we have in the church world today, we have too many who have compromised and

are sitting by the wayside.

We have too many under the guise of acceptance have compromised the faith and the truth because

we don't want to offend anybody.

But let me just tell you this morning, you cannot come before the cross of Calvary and

not be offended by your sin because there is a righteous God who sent a righteous son

who gave his righteous life and righteousness is an offense to sin.

Now you won't get this kind of preaching in a lot of places because it gets offensive.

Hello?

We got too many hirelings and pulpits.

I'll just call on my own kind.

Hello?

We got too many hirelings and pulpits that want to be a big numbers and big buildings

and big crowds and have a lot of feel good.

I don't really care if you feel good or not.

I want you to feel prepared for the trumpet to sound and make heaven your home.

And if I can get into your mess in your business, I'm going to.

You cannot be comfortable in your sin.

The church has lost the convicting presence of the Holy Ghost and the Holy Ghost is the

convictor of sin.

And I want to stir up some conviction.

You know, you know, Jesus didn't have to say anything when he went down the street.

Demons cried out when they walked by.

He didn't have to look them in the eye and he didn't have start rebuking and casting

them and stirring them up to get them out.

He just walked down.

He's just in the marketplace and it start screaming out.

He tell him, hush.

Wouldn't it be wonderful again that the lifestyle of the church was so convicting that when

you just get in their presence, I love it when it happens to me.

I love it.

Oh, I do.

Saturday, yesterday morning, went over to what?

Well, it's Friday first and then yesterday to Friday evening.

I went to get me a bottle of said lane and some some hard gone from a well room, a little

hobby shop I got going there.

And so they know when I come in as the preacher and he preaches over at that church of God.

So I come in, there's an announcement, hey, preacher out loud so that everybody in there

knows that the preacher's in here.

Hello.

And then when others come, I'm sitting on the stool, people start coming in.

Hey, you remember the preacher?

He's the one that builds those smokers.

Oh yeah.

Putting them on notice.

Guy gets a phone call.

He normally just puts it on speaker.

He gets off the phone.

They said, well, why didn't you put it on speaker?

He said, well, it was so and so.

I'm glad you didn't do that.

The preacher was here.

What do you what do you what point are you trying to make?

I'm trying to make the point that your life is so filled with righteousness that your

presence becomes a conviction of those that are around you.

That's what I'm talking about.

You don't have to say anything.

You don't have to announce yourself.

You've been commissioned.

You've been given authority.

You've been given a work to do.

But would it be good for the church to be so separated again that when you showed up,

they start announcing your presence.

Happened again yesterday out running dogs.

Hey, preacher.

Oh, you're a preacher.

Yep.

Are you really one?

I am.

It's not just a nickname.

Haven't preached one sermon in front of them.

Haven't stood up and proclaimed anything.

Hello.

Just merely walking in the room.

That's the way it was with Jesus.

He just walked in.

Devil start crying out and it just makes me smile.

I'm thinking, yep.

So I'll leave them with a little something.

They know who I am.

I got to fulfill the role.

So I'll leave them with a little something.

You know, they always want to throw in their little jabs.

Well, I'm a Baptist.

The other said, well, I'm a Lutheran.

They start talking about, you know, the difference between the Baptist and the Lutheran.

That is said, no, he said, what's that?

So well, we Lutherans, we go into beer store.

We can talk to each other.

You Baptist cake.

So I looked at him.

I said, well, boys, I'm Pentecostal.

We can't even pull into the parking lot.

You see, you don't have to put on a big sign.

You don't have to cover the back window of your car with Jesus stickers and crosses and

all of these things.

You don't have to do that.

All you got to do is when they cut you off his wave with the whole hand.

Hello.

Slow down and bless them and let them get in for they hurt you or someone else or themselves.

I thought about just be Christ in the world and we can do that.

We've been commissioned to be that.

Let your presence be the conviction of those who are around you.

You don't have to say anything.

They recognize and since they have more discernment than a lot of believers do, they can discern

at this point.

He different.

Why?

Number one, I'm not saying what they're saying, not agreeing with what they say when they

say it.

Don't chuckle at a joke.

Hello.

My, I got so far off track.

It'll take us 30 minutes to get back.

I mean, I just thought it was worth a little footnote that if the church would get back

to being the church, the body of Christ, come on, the bride, you do realize that he's coming

for his bride.

But he's coming for his bride that is without spot, wrinkle.

Were you at Bible readers or blemishes?

So iron your wrinkles out in your prayer closet, get under the water of the washing of his

blood, which is that regenerating factor and clean up the blotches.

Let's be the church because we're living in the meantime.

We've compromised our mission because there's such a fear of being rejected, ostracized,

deemed unloving.

We have believed that to be loving, we must be accepting.

No, Jesus was the most critical person of sin of any of us, but yet he was the most

compassionate and loving of all of us.

It was his example.

He never shied away from directly confronting sin ever.

But too many in the church today, we think we have to be accepting.

Yes, we accept people, but I'll never accept the sin of the people.

People is what's requiring our compassion and love.

People are those who need to hear the good news of the glorious gospel that Jesus saves,

Jesus saves and Jesus saves.

We don't have to compromise our belief in order to declare that message.

You can't look at talk like the world except to have the world see you separate.

But your and my lifestyle must be convicting enough of the righteousness which we've been

clothed in, not of our own, but of Christ so that the world may see.

People are lost in sin.

And it's so sad that the church has lost its way, but we must redeem that way.

We have been commissioned, Matthew 28, 19, go therefore, make disciples of all nations,

baptizing them in the name of the father, son, the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe

all that I have commanded you.

Behold, I'm with you always to the end of the age.

Mark 16, 15, and he said to them, go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the

whole creation.

And again, in Acts one and eight, you shall receive power when the Holy Ghost has come

upon you and you will be witnesses of me in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the other

most parts of the world.

He didn't just give us a commission without telling us what to say.

We've been commissioned in our speech.

He has told us what to say.

When we think about the mission of Jesus Christ, first and foremost, to seek and to save that

which are lost.

Matthew 4, 23, and Jesus went about all Galilee teaching in their synagogues, preaching the

gospel of the kingdom and healing all of many sicknesses and all manner of diseases among

the people.

Jesus's mission, according to Acts 10, 38, how that God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with

the Holy Ghost and with power who went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed

of the devil for God was with him.

You ever felt like you've been oppressed?

You ever felt like you've had a weight attached to you?

It's like the devil's riding piggyback on your life.

Well Jesus has come by to get him off your back.

He come to deliver the oppressed and if need be cast out the possessed.

Hello?

And you and I have been sent and commissioned in like manner.

Better works than these shall you do because I'm going to the Father and as I go to the

Father and the Holy Ghost is coming back, I will send you another Comforter.

That's his mission.

His mission has been passed on to you and I, Acts 10, 42 and 43.

He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he, it is he which was ordained

of God to be the judge of the quick and dead, the living and the dead.

To him gave all the prophets witness that through his name whosoever believeth in him

shall receive remission of sins.

It is important that we receive remission of sin for without it there is no access into

heaven.

Now I know we're in the world today, in a church world today that tries to tell you

there's 19 different ways to get to heaven but there's not.

I'm sorry.

There's one.

And the way himself declared it, I am the way, the truth and the life and no man cometh

unto the Father but by me.

He made that declaration.

It doesn't matter how good a life we try to live.

Doesn't matter how kind you try to be.

Doesn't matter how much you try to give.

It matters on what you have received.

What is that?

Remission for your sin.

How do I do that?

You simply ask him.

According to 1 John 1 and 9, if we are faithful and just to confess our sin, he is faithful

and just to forgive us of our sin and all our iniquity.

If a man sinned, we have an advocate with the Father, Christ Jesus, the righteous.

We've been left a task to perform and the ability to perform that task has been provided

by him.

It's through that anointing that touches our life.

Isaiah 10, 27, the yoke shall be destroyed because of the anointing.

1 John 2 and 27, the anointing which you have received of him abideth in you.

So what is the anointing?

It is that divine enabling of the human through the impartation of the power of God which

is at work in mankind.

That's what it is.

It's that touch of God.

It's the hand of God that rests upon our life enabling us to do and perform the work that

we have been given to do.

We have, like so many other things, we have magnified the work to where we work and never

accomplish the committed task.

We get busy doing church stuff but we never do the right stuff.

As you leave this place today and you enter into the world that you're living in and the

circumference of your life and the people that you come into contact with daily, that's

your mission.

That's the mission.

To seek out, to teach, to testify of what good things the Lord has done for you so that

others may receive it for themselves and come to the knowledge that they must accept him

as Lord and Savior.

That's our mission and we've been commissioned to do that.

We've been given the authority to do that.

We've been given the power to do that.

We simply must obey and get busy while we're living in the meantime because no man knows

the hour.

It's in our text.

No man knows the day nor the hour when the Master's going to return.

The angels in heaven do not know.

The Lord himself, he's reserved it from me.

It's the Father.

I'm waiting on my commission to return.

So when I see and I look at our world and I think about the jeopardy that we're in,

when I think about the condition of the hearts of humanity, sinners sin.

I was a good one when I was a sinner.

Anybody else?

You did your best too.

I did pretty good at sinning.

I'm just trying to put in as much effort now as a child of God.

My concern for the world is that they hear the gospel.

That they hear the gospel.

My concern for the church is that we live the gospel.

That we live it out.

Do you realize that your life is the only God some people see?

It's the only Jesus that some people come in contact with is you.

Do people start cleaning up other people's language when you walk in the room so that

you don't have to?

It just makes me smile.

I just agree.

There's at least a little bit of conviction in the world.

You just may have to take it in with you.

What if you're the only conviction that they're receiving?

I better stop.

You need to stand.

Somebody say we get a little reprieve next week.

It's Mother's Day.

So we'll get a little reprieve on living in the meantime.

Actually, you're going to get two weeks reprieve.

I'm going to preach a good sweet loving sermon next week.

Hopefully the Lord will give me something sweet for Mother's Day.

Say amen, Mama.

The pastor needs something sweet.

This is hard gospel truth, isn't it?

It convicts me when I preach it.

Convicted by the word.

Is my life lining up enough?

So it encourages me a little when you walk into places and other people.

That's the preacher.

And see, one or two of them, those little boys had actually come and visited and they

got to hear it for themselves.

And so when I'm in front of them, I got to be that same guy.

There has to be a consistency in my testimony.

What they saw here, they need to see come through the door of the store.

That's what they need to hear.

Doesn't it make you feel good to know that you're doing something right?

When others recognize the Jesus that's in you, they recognize it.

Which were the only conviction that a lot of people see.

Your life that you're living.

We've been given a work to do.

The master of that house left them a work to do.

He called each one of them up and he gave them their assignments.

We've been given one assignment.

Tell the good news.

Just tell the good news.

You don't have to get into theological discussions with folks.

You just have to tell them.

You know Jesus loves you.

And if you don't know how to go into any further and witness into that, say, I've got a pastor.

If you'll just come listen, he'll take you.

It might be a little rough for some folks, but I'm going to tell them the truth and try

to love them all the way to the cross of Calvary.

You do realize I love you, right?

I know my children sometimes used to say, Dad, you've got a hard way of showing it.

Well, if I didn't love you, I'd just let you be a heathen and do what you wanted to

do.

But I love you enough to try to bring some correction into your life.

Because as a father, that was part of my commission.

To teach and to raise up my children.

So I did my best.

It just transpires over across this podium.

I know sometimes that I sound really rough.

My eyes bulge out and that blood vein gets big.

It's because I'm passionate about your life and the well-being of your life and the well-being

of those people that you come in contact with.

Because see, I understand that you're the conviction that's in their presence.

It's Christ in you, not you.

It's not me.

It's Christ in us.

So that when he shines through, that's a good thing because you're crucifying yourself daily

and he's shining through you.

Bring them to the fountain.

That's all you got to do is get them in here.

My responsibility is to preach the gospel.

You get them and we'll preach them and love them.

Amen, Father, I love you.

Prepare me to be a sanctuary.

Lord, we're the body of Christ.

We're endeavoring to be you to the world.

That we are your express image.

It may be our face and our body, but it's your glory that shines through us.

It's your testimony that others see in our life that yes, even in this world, you can

live right and enjoy life.

You don't have to sin to have fun.

It's a good life that we live, but it's eternity that we're concerned about and where they

spend it.

Father, recommission us this morning that as we're going into this world, that we be

your light, that people see you before they see us and begin to announce it to those who

are around us, to those that are around us.

I wonder how many of you have some folks that you'd like to see saved.

You'd like to see them in heaven one day, but right now that if the Lord came tonight,

most likely it wouldn't happen.

If he came right now, you know it wouldn't happen.

I'm not trying to cast judgment on people, but you know you see an apple hanging on an

apple tree, it's an apple.

We know by the fruit of our life and the fruit of their life what's on the inside.

I'm not casting judgment, I'm just calling it like it is.

Father forever hand is lifted.

Represents a soul, loved ones, neighbors, friends, acquaintances.

They need you.

And I pray Father that they see you through me.

That they see you through me in my testimony, in my witness.

It's not that I'm perfect, it's not that I'm without mistake or without failure, but that

they see me in my failure, repent.

Be a right and new before you.

That they long to have what I possess.

Save our friends, save our family.

Holy Ghost you are the convictor.

Begin to draw them, begin to draw them in.

Bring them Lord to Calvary.

I don't care what church they go to, as long as it's one preaching Jesus.

Take them to Calvary.

Take them to Calvary.

May we be about the Father's business.

Amen and amen.

Give the Lord praise for his word.

Don't forget the ladies brunch Saturday, I think it starts at 10 from 10 to 12, I think

is what it is.

Ladies you need to sign up.

It's a Mother's Day.

Hallelujah there it is, killed that battery.

So with that, going grace, going peace.

If you're visiting with us today, please stop by out those doors to my left.

We have some folks waiting for you.

We want to give you something special.

You say what is it?

Well, it's something's got our church name on it.

When you look at it, I want you to pray for me and this church.

Amen.

So take it with you.

God bless you.

Going grace, birthday and anniversary folks for April, May, what month we in?

May go get you a cupcake or a cookie.

God bless you.

Happy birthday and happy anniversary.