Matthew 24:36-51 | Kingdom Now: Wake Up and Get Ready

Amen.

Thank you.

Jacob.

Today we're going to

we're going to conclude Matthew 24.

And just to set this up,

I want to remind us of the section

of Scripture that we're in

from Matthew chapter 21 through 25.

Matthew 21 · chapter mention

All takes place during Thursday,

sorry, during Tuesday before the crucifixion on Friday.

So all these chapters,

Jesus is setting the stage and he's preparing

the way for his crucifixion.

There's a lot that goes in that.

What happens on Tuesday?

Jesus starts that day.

He is part of the process, cleansing the temple

and casting out those who were who were getting it all wrong,

who had made it about a spectacle and a show, and taking advantage of people

rather than about him.

He confronts the religious leaders and calls them hypocrites,

because they had

made it all about their own spiritual superiority, rather than submission

and repentance to the Christ and the kingdom of God.

He tells the disciples what's coming.

He tries to get them ready.

And through all of this,

he's setting the stage because he knows that

what has been orchestrated by his father, with his agreement in heaven

from generations past, since the beginning of time, would be his crucifixion.

This was all set in, in motion,

at the will of the father, with the agreement of the son.

But he knows that the Jewish

people have no authority over life and death outside the temple grounds.

And he knows that the only ones who can carry out

the act of crucifixion are the Romans.

And so he starts pushing and pushing and pushing

those who claimed to be God's, the God's own kids,

so that they would be on such as set on edge,

and so angry towards him that they would work it out

with their own government, hand him over so that he would be crucified.

He knows what he's doing and it's all done on purpose.

He knows his life on earth has to culminate in the cross,

so that it can go to the grave so that it can be resurrected.

And so he's pushing push and pushing.

Tuesday before crucifixion

on Friday is a huge day.

And all these chapters, chapter 21, 22 to 3 to four, 25 all happens on Tuesday.

And so that's where we are in this,

in this Passion Week

after chapter 25 that we'll look at next week comes Wednesday and Wednesday.

He takes a day off.

And it was on that Wednesday

that the Jewish leaders conspire

with Rome together first crucifixion.

They make their plan.

And so as we look at chapter 24, we're going to see Jesus.

Keep pushing.

Now he's pushed the religious establishment.

He's pushed and confronted the religious leaders.

He's tried to prepare his disciples.

He knows what's coming.

He knows Friday is just a few days away.

His disciples don't realize it yet.

His disciples aren't yet aware of what is on the horizon.

And so, over and over and over in Matthew 20,

the last part of 24, and then all of 25, he's going to give them one message.

Get be ready.

Wake up and get ready.

Over and over and over.

Wake up and get ready.

You don't know what's coming.

I do, and I'm telling you, don't sleep on this.

And he's going to teach this hard truth in Matthew 24 and then in Matthew 25,

he's going to tell parables

that will explain the truth, because that's what parables do.

A parable is a story in the context of everyday life

that's thrown next to a truth to help you understand the truth.

And that's what it's going to do in chapter 25, going to tell these parables.

But the truth comes today, the last part of Matthew 24.

Wake up and get ready.

Matthew 24 has a lot of prophecy to it,

and that's why I've chosen to teach it in two weeks.

There's so much here.

There is prophecy and future foretelling.

There's also flesh and bones for what it means for us today and today.

It's really the second part of our birthday message.

Last week our church turned 21

and I started Matthew 24 with our kind of birthday message.

This is the follow up to that.

This is birthday part two,

and the focus shifts from what's coming

and who's coming to how we live until he comes.

So the focus in this part of Matthew 24

is not prediction.

The focus is ready,

faithful and finish well.

And so to help us understand the big idea

for this, the last part of chapter 24, here's

the big idea because we don't know when Jesus will return.

Disciples must live ready.

Stay faithful and be vigilant in doing the work he's given us to do.

We don't know when he's coming back.

He's given us some hints and some things to look for, but nobody really knows.

And because we don't know

if we

call ourselves a disciple, we have to live ready.

And we've got to stay faithful in the moment

and be vigilant in doing what he's asked us to do.

The two words I would use to kind of describe

the theme of this part of the chapters, repentant and expectant,

because we don't know when he's coming back.

Live a repentant life

and an expectant life that it could be now.

Let me let's just unpack this.

Let me let me read verses 39, 36

through 39 of chapter 24.

But concerning the day and hour, no one knows

what day and hour.

Well, if you remember back in verse three, this whole discussion started

because the disciples asked him, when are all these things going to happen?

You just talked about the destruction of the temple.

You know, the end of time, the vision in their minds, the end of time.

And you know, this Messiah, like, when is all this going to happen?

So he he finally answers their question.

You want to know when this is going to happen?

What he says nobody knows.

Concerning that day or hour.

No one knows.

Not even the angels of heaven, nor the son, but the father.

Only for as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.

For as in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying

and giving a marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark,

and they were unaware, until the flood came and swept them all away.

So will be the coming of the Son of Man

says, listen.

Nobody knows.

And so if you're going to be a disciple,

you've got to live ready.

You've got to stay faithful, and you've got to be vigilant because nobody knows.

In essence, here's what he's saying

don't allow normal life to be normalized in your life.

Don't allow normal life.

That's just that's the way life goes. This is what we all we're all part of.

A kind of swept up in the whole thing.

Don't allow that to become normalized.

He's saying that's what the people are like.

In the days of Noah,

swept up in the normality of life

so that the normal life was normalized in their life,

just like everybody else.

In the days of Noah.

Where were the days of Noah like, well, they're full of violence.

They're full of sexual immorality.

I mean, that's that's not too far off from where we are, right?

But it was more than that.

It wasn't just that.

It was more than that.

They were completely

indifferent spiritually.

Sure, they wanted to be good people who must be a bad person,

but they were just indifferent

to kingdom stuff.

They didn't realize that there was more

than just being a good person.

They were consumed with ordinary life.

And they were not at all ready for judgment.

They just keep living life

as if God was never going to show up.

So there was no spiritual urgency.

See, they had allowed normal life to be normalized in their lives.

Anybody?

Go about our day?

We go to work. We live for retirement.

Hopefully it all goes well.

Want to be happy?

We want to be joyful and have a peaceful home.

Want to be successful.

It's normal life and I want to go to heaven.

And all of a sudden,

people of the kingdom have allowed normal life to be normalized in their life.

Just like the days of Noah.

Jesus says

life will look amazingly ordinary

right up until the moment where he shows up.

See the problem

in the days of Noah and in our day with us,

is not that we were eating and enjoying life and married and marriage.

That wasn't the problem.

The problem is that we live life

as if that's all there was.

We should enjoy all the good things that God has given us.

The Bible even says God provides us with everything for our enjoyment.

You should enjoy it.

Just don't live as if that's all there is.

Normal life can't become normalized.

One of the things

I just so desperately want, desire and pray

for my for my son so specially is that they don't

grow up given their lives to a job they can't wait to get out of.

To me, that's just miserable.

I'm going to give my life the best years of my life.

My energy, the best my mind.

I'm going to give all of that to a job.

I just cannot wait to quit so I can retire.

To me, that's hell.

I want them to understand

why God made them in the first place, regardless of their like,

why did God put you on this earth and pursue that passionately?

Don't allow a normal life to be normalized.

So all you do is the grind, and you work for success,

and you work for your retirement because you think that once you've done it

well, you can retire and relax and then go to heaven.

What a waste.

My dear friend.

And so churches are full of people who call ourselves

disciples, who have allowed normal life to be normalized in their life.

Just like in the days of Noah.

See, the point is this.

Don't get so comfortable with today that you forget Jesus could come back tonight.

I am very grateful.

I look back at our church over 20 winters.

I look back over my life, my marriage, my kids, all God has done.

I look back and God has been so gracious and so abundantly favorable

towards me and awards us.

It blows me away not deserve it of any of his grace.

But as I look back on all of it,

and while I'm grateful for it, I never want to grow complacent

because of it.

And never want to say, God,

you've been so good, I can relax now.

I think for me,

a lot of processing this stuff, 21 years in this church have been fantastic.

I can't imagine stopping this.

I cannot imagine getting

to the point where I retire and coast until I die.

That just sounds so horrible to me.

I just I just want to press in and not grow complacent

and not get and not like, drift and not like, hey, I just want to draw.

Like I want to be doing what I'm doing right now until I see Jesus face to face.

Like I don't want normal life to be normalized

at all.

I praise God for all he's done, but I want to be careful that while we celebrate,

we have done in the past, we never settle for what God has done in the past.

There is so much to be done.

There is so much for this church to do.

There's so much for me to do.

There's so much for you to do.

I'm grateful for all God's. I'm.

But dad. Gum.

I don't want to settle for what he's done.

The normal life cannot be normalized.

You tracking with me?

Look at verses 4344.

Then two men will be in the field.

One will be taken on one left.

Two women will be grinding at the mill.

One will be taken on one left.

Therefore stay awake.

For you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.

But know this,

that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night

the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake

and would not have let his house be broken into.

Therefore, you must also must be ready, for

the Son of Man has come in an hour you do not expect.

He said, listen,

you've you've got to stay awake and live ready.

Don't let yourself get lulled into a normalized life

like everybody else.

Stay awake and live.

I told you, he's pushing the disciples because they don't know what's coming.

He dies.

Guess what?

You and I don't know what's coming.

And so Jesus says, listen, don't drift right now.

Stay awake and live. Ready?

This is exactly what Jesus will say in the report card to this church in Sardis,

as recorded for us in revelation chapter three, verses one, two and three.

Look at what he says.

I know your works.

You have the reputation of being alive because you're always at church,

but you're dead.

Wake up and strengthen what remains and is about to die for.

I have not found your worst complete in the sight of my God.

Remember then what you received and heard.

Keep it and repent.

If you will not wake up.

I will come like a thief, and you will not know what our.

I will come against you.

Wake up!

This idea of living a ready life.

It means to live today in such a way that Jesus is

return will not expose the life you wish you never lived.

That's what it means to live.

Ready

to live right now and everyday.

Following

in such a way that when Jesus shows up, you won't.

It won't expose a life that you wish you had never lived.

Wake up.

Live.

Ready?

In this these few verses,

a lot of people get sidetracked with something that I don't think is the point.

They get sidetracked by the words.

Two men will be in the field, one will take, and one left

to one would grind at the mill, one of them taking one left.

I'm like, what's that mean? When is that going to happen?

You're missing the point.

Now, this is often times what was referred to as the rapture.

And I'm going to talk about this next week in the context of one of the parables

Jesus tells.

And it has everything to do with how they did weddings back

in Jesus's day, when the groom comes for his bride.

And so I'm going to talk.

But most people get they miss the main thing here.

The main thing is not the one, and the one

is different.

The main thing.

Is that you better wake up.

Now the truth is, we talk a lot about our huddles in this church.

There's 8 to 15 people around our lives

kind of have the the front row of our lives.

Some of them are family.

Some of them are friends, coworkers, like,

they're the ones that we're really connected with.

And the fact is that some people in your huddle,

some people in my huddle, have a very different spiritual reality

and future than what I have, not what you have.

That's the truth.

And if we don't wake up to our role in their lives,

and if they don't wake up to the reality of Christ. Yeah,

Jesus is eternal is going to be very surprising

and very costly.

Listen,

spiritual sleep happens very gradually.

When concerted prayer becomes occasional.

And when the study of Scripture, the deep study of Scripture becomes secondary.

And when obedience becomes delayed and the things of the spirit

and the things of the kingdom, the urgency slowly fades.

There is truth that there are two people in the same office,

two people in the same ball field, two people in the same classroom.

Two people in the same household

have very different spiritual realities, without a doubt.

And the fact that Jesus may return at any moment

ought not ever cause panic, but it ought to create urgency.

Live.

Ready.

My readiness must never become occasional.

Your readiness must never become occasional.

So what Jesus is saying.

Here's the point.

The point is this.

Because you and I don't know how much time we have.

We better not waste the time we have.

And I just wonder how much of the time that we begin

has just been wasted on normal life,

when we've allowed it to be normalized in us?

And Jesus says, wake up.

Quit sleeping on this

repentant and expectant is what he says.

Verse 45,

who then is the faithful servant whom his master has said

over his household to give them their food at the proper time?

Blessed is the servant

whom his master will find him doing fine, so doing when he comes.

Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions.

He says, listen.

The point of this is to wake up and be faithful.

Faithfulness can be described in real.

Simply do your job.

Just do your job.

That's what Jesus is saying.

How many of you have ever like

you've been a boss, or you've been in charge of a group,

or a group of people, or a team or something?

And how many times have you just wanted to scream, just do your job.

Anybody do your job?

What?

What don't you understand?

Do your job, quick.

Inside track.

Weren't about anybody else.

Quit trying to do someone else.

Just do your job.

Am I right?

So what Jesus is saying now?

I've been coaching football for over two decades.

You know how many times.

Do your job

you got one job?

Do you know how good a football team is when you just do your job?

And Jesus is saying,

listen, wake up and do your job.

You know what?

I love the fact.

Honestly, God knows us really, really, really well.

He knows he can't give many of us many jobs just to keep it simple.

Got one job.

And I just wonder how many times do you say,

listen, you've allowed normal life to become so normalized in your life.

You're no longer doing your job.

You're just kind of coasting like everybody else in this world.

You've lost your expectancy that I may show up.

Right now.

You're just trying to make it through this world.

So you get to heaven.

One day, you're falling asleep and you've slumbered.

Do your job.

And he says, for those who do their job,

be greatly rewarded.

Those who are faithful,

greatly rewarded, come rule over all my possessions, he says.

In eternity. It's amazing to me.

And his definition of faithfulness

is remarkably simple.

Remarkably simple.

Faithful servant is one who does the job, the master game to do.

That's it.

Faithfulness is not famous.

Faithfulness is not impressive.

Faithfulness is not big.

Faithfulness is just doing what the master has asked.

That's all.

What earns

the master's happiness is not great accomplishment.

It's just consistent faithfulness.

And so the question that you and I have to ask ourselves,

as am I being faithful right now

to the opportunities God has given me with the resources

he has placed in my hands, with the gifts he's given me, with the influence

that he's given me with other people.

Am I being faithful?

These rewards for the faithful.

I'm going to set you over all my possessions.

We have to understand this that there are rewards

in eternity for how we live on earth, not salvation.

Don't misunderstand me.

Salvation is not earned by anything we do.

Salvation is the gift of God because of God's grace that we freely receive,

because it has been costly given and we don't earn it.

It's not a reward, it's a gift.

But once I've received the gift of salvation by faith,

then I live my life in the pursuit

of eternal rewards.

And I want to be in heaven

one day, having lived my entire life until my heart stops on earth

in such a way that my father in heaven tells me, Carl, well done.

I want you to be in charge

throughout eternity of certain things.

Can you imagine?

And he says, those who are faithful will be.

Here's the point.

Discover what Jesus asks if you and do it

the same.

Rocket science.

What has Jesus asked of you now?

Do it!

He's giving you

certain gifts and talents and abilities and resources and influence.

Use those things for the expansion of the Kingdom of God.

Do your job now.

We want to help you do your job.

And so we've created this flip side flow.

And the first step of that flow is just belonging to the family of God.

Not because you've earned it, because he's good and merciful

and has paid the price for you to be a part of the family of God.

So be adopted into his family.

And once you're adopted in, then you begin to become

more like Christ.

It's the work of sanctification,

and there are things that we do that help us become more like Christ.

This is the 201 class that we just talked last week.

And as you learn how to become more like Christ than you

learn how to keep doing your one job, and you learn how to give

not just of your finances, but of your life, your energy, the skills

and abilities, the spiritual gifts that he's gifted you with.

That's it's our 301 class.

We want to help you understand how you have been been

lavished upon, so you can give back to the Kingdom of God.

And then we want to help you go.

Not not.

I mean, you're welcome to go with me to all these other countries.

I'd love to have your company with me,

but at least go across the street and across the hallway

and help people understand who this God is that loves them.

And I'm going to teach a 401 class to teach you very easily

how to share your faith.

To discover what

Jesus asks you to do, and then do it.

That's what Jesus said.

Look at verse 48.

But if that wicked

servant says to himself, my master's delaying coming back.

Anytime soon.

Now, how long he's been gone?

Why would I expect him to come back today?

The wicked servant says he's not coming back right now.

Don't worry about it.

Live your life.

Do what you do.

As long as you get there in the end.

That's really what this is about.

The wicked servant.

There's no urgency.

And because of that attitude, he begins to beat his fellow servants.

He eats and drinks with the drunkards.

The master of that servant will come on a day

when he does not expect him in an hour.

He does not know,

and will cut him in pieces, and put him with the hypocrites in that place,

so they'll be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Oh my goodness!

Jesus ain't playing.

And some of us have lived our lives

as if he is.

Never let God's delay

become an excuse for your complacency.

Both of these servants are rewarded

the faithful.

With authority and blessing

the unfaithful.

With beating and

being thrown out where they'll be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

We've talked about this before and that final day weeping and gnashing of teeth.

There will be some who will realize

the folly of their life.

When a normal life was normalized, they cared nothing of the kingdom of God.

They rejected his rule over their life.

And they'll realize the folly of that, and they will weep with great tears.

Oh, God, please.

And it'll be too late.

And there's others whose hearts are so hard that even on that day,

when forced to realize the reality of who Christ is and the rejection of him

will still, in demonic anger, say, how dare you think you can.

Condemn me?

Can you imagine?

Jesus uses a pretty strong word.

You're cut to pieces. Are you kidding me?

What we best can understand from that cut to pieces by being whipped incessantly

and thrown out with the hypocrites who are the hypocrites?

Do you remember

the scribes and Pharisees, those who thought they were right

with God because of their religion had no relationship with him?

The scribes and the Pharisee in the wicked.

The lazy.

Same result.

You know, it's so interesting,

I think, back over this church in the early days, so dependent

upon God's hand and protection and favor and blessing, so dependent.

I felt the same when I got married.

I'm like, God, I was this

if this thing is going to work, you've got to intervene here.

You know, it's just like, same thing with raising kids, like, I can't do this.

These kids are just like, you start a business.

It's the same way. Like in every you start adultery.

It's the same way.

Like there's so much dependance. God, please.

And then what happens is God responds.

And because God responds and

things have become normalized.

We drift

and we stop living with incredibly dependance

upon God.

See, there are two primary lies.

The devil is going to tell every one of us.

He's going to tell this lie to those who haven't accepted Jesus as their Savior.

And what is the lie he's going to tell them is this there is no God.

You're the ruler of your own life.

Do what you want. It's your life.

The only way I tell you any different.

Once you come to faith,

the light changes because you know there is a God.

So the lie isn't.

There is no god. Now the lie is.

There is no hurry.

There's no urgency.

God wants to bless you and be comfortable and enjoy life and go to heaven.

There's no hurry with this other stuff.

That's a lie from the devil.

And so many of us

disciples have believed it.

Live ready.

And readiness

will always be seen in how we live in this world.

If we live ready or not.

The doctrine of the return of Christ

is the foundational doctrine that undergirds all of Scripture,

and the doctrine

of the return of Christ changes everything about how we live right now.

If we understand it, it changes everything.

If you knew

that Jesus was coming back tomorrow,

would you speak differently today?

If you knew that Jesus was coming back tomorrow,

would you treat people differently today

if you knew that Jesus was coming back tomorrow?

What would you stop doing right now if you knew

Jesus was coming back tomorrow?

What would you start doing right now if you knew that

Jesus was coming back tomorrow?

How would you start giving right now if you knew

Jesus was coming back tomorrow?

How would you start serving right now

if you knew he's coming back tomorrow?

And so many of us.

Have lulled ourselves into sleep and slumber

because we don't live with the expectancy of his return.

So we live in normalized life.

Never allow God's blessing or his delay

to make you comfortable or apathetic.

Get ready.

What does the way you and I live

say about our readiness for his return?

If you knew he was coming back tomorrow, what would change right now?

What does that say about our readiness?

If you know what

Jesus has asked you to do and you're doing it, rejoice.

Celebrate that.

Take great joy and pleasure in that because you know

that you will enjoy his pleasure over you.

If you know what he's asked you to do and you're doing it,

man, put a smile on your face.

That's good. Good for you.

Keep doing it.

Okay, well, maybe

we're part of the other group, then.

If you're not doing what God has asked you to do,

you're not ready to repent.

Repent.

And live.

Ready.

From this day forward.

No more excuses and no more delay.

One day your career is going to end.

And nobody's going to remember a thing you did.

One day, all your possessions that you've accumulated

are going to pass on to somebody else.

One day, everything that you've worked for in

life is going to be gone.

One day.

Nobody else will ever remember you or talk about you.

But your faithfulness will matter forever.

Get ready.

Be vigilant

about doing what God put you on this earth to do.

Live to hear these words one day.

Well done, my good and ready servant.

Come and share your master's happiness.

Right?

Wake up and get ready.

I want you to pray with me.

Father, thank you that you love us

and that your love for us doesn't change

based on how ready or not we are.

But I thank you that you love us enough

to caution us to get ready.

None of us want to be surprised.

None of us want to live a life

that we wish we would have never lived.

If you showed up right now, we don't want that.

So, father,

by the power of your spirit, I pray your conviction would fall.

Convict us where conviction is needed.

Some of us, man.

Our lives are so normal.

We've allowed a normal life to become normalized in us.

Forgive us. Father.

I pray your conviction will fall by the power of your Holy Spirit.

Not for our shame, but for our repentance.

And then as we repent

and wake up and ready ourselves,

that you would allow us all that your grace is capable of.

And so, my dear friends,

please, in this moment, would you just agree?

If this is you, would you disagree with God?

God, I'm sorry

because I've allowed myself to slumber

and sleep in my own sin.

Wake me up.

I confess that I'm far from

you and I repent of my sin.

Jesus, I accept what you've done on the cross so that I can be forgiven.

Thank you for that.

Today I reject my sin and I turn from it

and I pledge my allegiance

to you, Christ and your kingdom, without delay,

without excuse and without hesitation.

And then ask him, say, God, I cannot do this in my own power.

So clothe me with the power of your spirit

that will enable me to live a holy life and an obedient life

and a life of righteousness.

God, you you know our weaknesses.

You know our failings.

Thank you that your mercy is new for us every morning,

and that the power of your spirit is available to us to allow, to enable us

to live a holy, ready life.

So we repent

and we give ourselves to you.

Make us new people.

In your name I pray. Amen.

Friends, listen, I love you.

I'm proud of you.

Some of you need to repent.

Some of you have done that internally. Good.

Live in that place of repentance.

But some of you need to solidify that

with praying with somebody just to confess it.

Because right now it's personal, but it's not powerful yet.

And sometimes the confession with somebody

praying with somebody makes what is personal powerful.

And so some of you, whether we're up here or back there during this song

or after the service, would you just stay and let's approach God together and agree

together with this internal transformation

that God will do and Washington is doing in your life?

Don't walk out without doing that.

Don't walk out without doing that.

Some of you need to jump into this flip side flow.

You need to go through 301

to 401 to become the person God made you to be, so that you're on task

and on mission with him in this world and you quit sleeping on your job.

If we can help in any way, get you into that flow, stop by the Welcome Center.

Let us know I love you, I'm proud of you.

We're going to press into this next week, and it's going to be if this.

I want you to be encouraged.

It's a tough message. I want you to be encouraged.

So put a smile on your face.

At least act. Encourage right now.

We're going to stand up and sing.

And we're going to wrap up this whole Tuesday next week in Matthew 25.

Stand up listening together.