Speaker 2: Alright, so I want you to imagine that you work all four
years of your high school career.
You put in three really amazing years in your junior high to get the best
grades possible to go to your best and most favorite school, Texas a and m.
No.
Okay.
Utah, Utah State?
No.
Okay.
UCLA.
I see it.
Alright, so you wanted to go to UCLA with Sean.
You put in all the, the effort, all the work you get, you get the best
score and the SAT, you take the a CT, you do all the work, you get
the extra credits so that you could have the best possible application
to go to the school of your choice.
The week of the deadline shows up.
You think, you know what I'll, I will submit my application after work and then
I've got, I've got a baseball practice.
Oh, and then I've got cheer.
'cause you're doing both baseball and cheer.
And then I've gotta do a couple chores around the house.
My parents told me I have to clean up the floor and I have to do some babysitting,
but then I'm gonna get the application in.
I know I'm gonna do it.
The deadline approaches, it comes and you miss it.
You've totally missed the opportunity.
All three years of middle school, all four years of high school only to miss
the opportunity to attend your school of choice for the next four years.
Imagine what you might feel with a situation like that.
Imagine what, what you would be doing to yourself or saying to
yourself if that were you, how would you talk to yourself after that?
If you're like me, you might say, man, you are such a dummy.
Like, what is wrong with you?
You could not get this right.
You worked your whole life for this basically.
'cause if you're working junior high and high school, or middle school
and high school, that's basically most of your life at this point.
You might feel like all that work and all that effort was
wasted because it basically was.
One of the things that I'm concerned about for you is that you guys realize
tonight that there is, there is a deadline fixed, a deadline that God has written.
It's a date and a time, a specific date and time whereby Jesus will come
back and take his people home with him.
This is often called the Rapture, and here's the thing.
We have no clue when that deadline is.
In the illustration I just gave you, if you know the date and time that
your application is due for your school, you know when to turn it in.
But in this particular case tonight we're gonna look at what the
Bible says about the future, and here's what Jesus is gonna say.
You have no idea when the deadline is.
Therefore, you really have to be ready.
In fact, the whole point for tonight is that Jesus is gonna warn us about the
answer, that we can be ready for the end.
He's gonna tell you, you gotta be ready.
You can't wait.
You can't assume that you have all the time in the world
because you really don't.
You have no idea when Jesus is coming back, and the challenge for you is,
oops, lemme get outta the way here.
The challenge for you is to believe that.
I remember a long time ago, I've told you guys this before, but
I just gotta tell you again.
I Okay, so twice.
Twice I talked to a psychic.
Okay?
You, you guys know what a psychic is.
Psychic is someone who supposedly has access to the future.
They could tell you about the things that are gonna happen.
So one time I called a, a, a phone number.
Back in the old days, there was phone numbers that you
could call to talk to people.
Uh, one of those phone numbers would lead you to talk to psychic mediums,
people that would tell your features.
I called the number, it was a, it was like a one, 900 something, something or other.
A lot of bad one 900 numbers at that time in my life.
I called, uh, I don't think my parents appreciated that, but
they never found out it was me.
So I called and I spoke to a psychic about my life, and I said, here, I
want to know what's happening next.
And I, it was only about your age?
Honestly, I wasn't very old.
I don't even remember what she said.
I, I do not recall this, but the second time I talked to a
psychic, I was on the radio.
I was listening to my local radio station and they're like, so and so this amazing
psychic's gonna be on the radio, call in now if you want to talk to them.
And I'm like, I'm gonna talk to a psychic.
And so I called the radio station and I said, yeah, I'm I, I changed
my name 'cause I don't want my parents to find out and kill me.
And said I want to talk to the psychic.
And I talked to the psychic on the radio.
And so I asked, I wanna know what my future love life looks like.
I wanna know who I'm gonna marry.
I was in middle school at this time and she said.
Uh, I'm not seeing it.
I, I guess she saw, thought I was gonna be single for the rest of my life, she said.
But I feel like I'm hearing something from someone close to you.
A relative perhaps that recently died.
Now, here's the funny thing.
I did not have any relatives that died at that point.
I had nobody.
So what was I to do?
I didn't wanna embarrass her.
And so I said, oh yeah, my uncle Tom recently died.
I guess I lied on the radio 'cause I don't wanna embarrass the poor lady.
But she made her whole life, her work, her effort.
She wrote books and she made lots of money telling people, here's the future that
you're gonna, that you're gonna have.
Here's what you need to know.
So funny and so strange.
And honestly, if anyone has that power in real life, it's because they're
working through the power of the enemy.
What you need to know is that God does wanna tell you the future.
God genuinely wants to tell you what the future is for you, but you have
to have the wisdom to say, okay, am I gonna submit to what he says?
And here's again the punchline.
I'm telling you, the end of my sermon right now, Jesus is gonna tell you a
lot of things about what you can expect for the future, but the punchline is
that you just gotta be ready for it.
Your job right now is to be sure that you're ready for Jesus' return
because it can be at any moment.
Jesus could legitimately, if we're understanding our Bible
rightly, he could return right now before this sermon is over.
God bless you.
He could return before small groups are finished.
At any moment Jesus could return.
Let me show you though what Jesus has to say about the end times.
Turn to Matthew chapter 24.
I want you to see the things that Jesus is gonna warn you about,
and honestly, it's frightening.
It's terrifying.
Not being ready for this is not just gonna be like, oh, bummer, I missed the
deadline to go to my favorite school.
Not being ready for this means, oh no, I'm not right with Jesus.
So being right with Jesus is gonna mean being ready for Jesus return.
Look at Matthew Chapter 24.
We're not gonna be able to read a lot of these things, but we're gonna
read a few portions together and we're gonna start with Matthew 24.
We're gonna start at verse three, starting at verse three,
as he sat on the Mount of Olives.
This is Jesus talking to his disciples, and this is one of the
longest teaching sections that Jesus has with his disciples.
Second only to the Sermon on the Mount, which is Matthew
chapter five through seven.
He sat on the Mount of Olives.
Disciples came to him privately saying, tell us Jesus, when will these things be?
And what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?
They wanna know, when are you coming back to establish your kingdom?
And how do we know?
What do we look for to find out that it's the last days?
Pay Close attention to what Jesus says about the last days.
He says this.
Jesus answered.
See that no one leads you astray.
The first thing out of Jesus' mouth about the last days is be
careful because there's gonna be a lot of liars, people that want
to trick you about what's to come.
You need to be aware that there are a lot of voices out in the
world that want you to believe the wrong thing about the future.
So Jesus says, first of all, he puts a finger in your chest.
Imagine Jesus putting his finger in your chest right now like this.
See that no one leads you astray.
Do you feel Jesus finger in your chest?
He's talking to you.
See that no one deceives you listen.
For many will come in my name saying I am the Christ.
And they will lead many astray, lots of people who are claiming to be
Jesus and saying, Hey, follow me.
I'm actually Jesus in the flesh.
And in in the past, I mean there's been literally thousands of people
that have claimed to be Jesus.
Or some form of the Messiah.
And so Jesus says, you need to be prepared.
People are coming and they're going to be successful.
They're gonna be successful.
They're gonna create cults.
And cults are really good at causing you to believe something that is a lion.
So Jesus says, be aware of this.
You need to be aware that they're coming.
Many will come in my name saying I'm the Christ, and they will lead many astray.
Verse six, and you'll hear, listen to this, you're, you're gonna
hear of wars and rumors of wars.
See that you were not alarmed for this must take place, but the end is
not yet For nation will rise against nation and kingdom against Kingdom
and, and there will be famines.
That is, there's gonna be a lack of food supply.
There's gonna be earthquakes in various places and all these are,
but the beginning of the birth pains.
And so Jesus is talking about a period of human history.
This is the future where things are gonna get progressively worse.
False teachers are gonna come after you and he's saying there's gonna
be, you hear about wars right now.
You got Ukraine, you got China, and you got Russia.
You've got different nations right Now that America is saying, these are
our threats to our national security.
And so Jesus is saying this is to be expected.
In fact, there's gonna be a period of human history where this is gonna
be become so intense and so high in its importance that Jesus is saying
this is gonna characterize the end of times he says in verse eight,
but these are just the beginning.
This is just the start.
In fact, before we even go any further, let me just say this.
When I put Jesus' finger in your chest to say you need to
be, be ready and be careful.
My whole point in that is actually the first point.
You need to make sure, in fact, here we go.
You need to make sure to study.
Study what Jesus says about the end because Jesus is holding you accountable
to make sure that you are not deceived.
So everything that we're just about to read, this might, this might apply to you.
This might be your marching orders.
Jesus is coming back to take the church away at some point.
And again, we believe if we're understanding the Bible correctly, that
that could be any actual moment right now, which means then that if we're not gonna
be deceived by false teachers and false Christ, I need to know what Jesus says.
I need to know what the master is saying.
What is Jesus who actually knows the future?
Say the future is gonna be like.
And that's what we're talking, that's what we're talking about tonight.
In fact.
What we're looking at right here.
Some people think about Jesus like this.
Have you ever played the Shell game?
Uh, the shell game is where someone takes three shells, right?
And they'll hide a ball or, or something small and circular like that.
Or, or cylindrical, not a cylinder cir circular.
Ball.
It's a ball.
Let's just call it a ball.
They're hiding a ball in these shells, right?
You ever play this game?
You go to the carnival, you'll see vendors that do something like this.
If you're a tourist in a different country, you'll see people that
are doing this say, Hey, win $20.
And so you'll go and you say, I'll play that game.
I'm really good at this.
And so you put $20 on the table and they say, thank you very much, sir.
Ma'am.
Now keep your eye on the ball.
They put the cover, they put the shell over the ball, and
they start doing this right?
And then.
They say, okay, pick which one is underneath.
Uh, pick which one you think the ball is underneath.
And you say, oh, it's clearly that one.
You didn't go that fast.
I saw exactly what you did.
And then what happens when they pick up the shell
con?
It's not there.
It's gone because the shell game is actually a con.
This is a very common con because being quicker with your hands then you are with
your eyes is actually part of this skill.
I can trick you into thinking that the ball is under this shell when in
actuality it's under the shell over here.
Actually, if they're really good, the ball is under none of them.
You could pick any of the shells.
They're all empty because they're hiding it under their hands somewhere.
And then when you say, oh, I missed, how did I miss that?
Then they secretly sneak it under the shell that they pick up and say,
oh look, here it was the whole time.
So the game, the game of the shell is a con game.
Some people think this is what Jesus is doing right here.
They're confusing them.
'cause I see wars and rumors of wars right now and, and Jesus is saying,
no, I'm not trying to trick you here.
I'm trying to help you understand what's to come.
The problem is that Jesus knows that there's lots of competing voices.
There's lots of people that are trying to tell you how to live your life
and how to understand the future.
There's lots of people that want to make you think, oh, this is
how I should live your life.
Oh, the future not a big deal, or the future is a big deal.
You should be terrified and afraid and Jesus is warning you
against following other voices that are gonna really confuse you.
And so I, I'm afraid, I'm sorry that I have to do this, but I
need to show you a chart, okay?
Because what Jesus is talking about here is super important
to how everything unfolds.
Jesus wants you to know the future.
Here's what it looks like, okay?
Now, let me also say this.
Some Christians disagree about some of these things.
I'm just gonna say that if your friends go to a different church and they say,
well, my pastor taught me something different, uh, we're not mad at them.
We're not, we're not enemies.
We, we just understand this differently.
We teach the right way.
I'm just gonna say that we obviously, we teach the right way.
Jesus in Matthew 24 and 25 is talking about this section right here.
Okay?
We are presently right here in the church age, so this is us in 2025.
We are in what is called the church age at some point.
Jesus is going to come down.
This is called the rapture and take believers up with him.
The rapture is his, is his idea that Jesus is going to secretly, sometimes
people use that word, they to come take Christians away with him.
This could happen at any moment.
Jesus could return right now.
Take people away.
There's movies written about this, but that's the idea.
This could happen at any time.
He's gonna take believers when that happens.
That begins a seven year period of time called the tribulation.
Say tribulation.
Tribulation means fantastic.
You're doing a great job.
This begins a seven year period of the tribulation.
After this seven years, Christ is gonna come back with Christians and he's
going to establish his millennial reign.
Does anyone know what millennial stands for or means?
Thousand means thousand.
His millennial reign is his thousand year reign.
Jesus will live on the earth in his resurrected body and govern
for 1000 years with Christians.
It'll be a thousand year reign.
At the end of that thousand year reign, there's going to be a
rebellion in uprising against Jesus.
Crazy, right?
Who would do that?
But it's gonna happen at the end of that thousand year rain,
Jesus will squash his enemies.
He'll vanquish the foe.
He will judge unbelievers and we will then enter into the eternal
state, which is the forever and ever, all things happily ever after.
This is a snapshot of what's to come.
Again, this is us.
The next thing in line is called the rapture, and the rapture can
happen at any moment even now.
Who gets raptured?
Who gets taken up to be with Jesus?
The answer is believers Christians, people that have trusted in Jesus Christ are
raptured and taken to heaven with Jesus.
Okay?
This is a very simplified overview of what's to come in.
Matthew 24, we're talking about this period of time right here,
the seven year tribulation.
This is.
After Christians are taken away to go with Christ.
This time now is what we're looking at right here.
We're looking at what people are doing during the tribulation, and
if Jesus is telling us what to expect, go back to Matthew 24.
Matthew 24, let's pick it up back at verse nine.
Lemme show you more what's to happen in the tribulation that Jesus describes.
Verse nine.
Then they will deliver you up to tribulation.
There's that word, and put you to death.
You will be hated by all nations, for my name's sake.
So Jesus is saying, the future for people on the earth at this time who become
Christians is that they're going to be hated because they are Christians.
Now, if you're a Christian, now there's some of this that we can expect.
Even today, you should be experiencing at least some, some, some level
of persecution as a Christian.
Verse 10, he says, and then many will fall away and betray one
another and hate one another.
There's gonna be increased hostility against Christians.
Verse 12.
Verse 11, and many false prophets will arise and lead many astray.
Again, you have influences that are trying to steal your attention away
from Jesus and put it on themselves.
Verse 12.
And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will go, will grow cold,
but the one who endures to the end will be saved, and this gospel of the kingdom
will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations.
And then the end will come.
So everything Jesus just talked about, this is the tribulation period.
Now in verses 15 and onward, we're not gonna be able to cover these verses,
but 15 through 20 through 28, 15 through 28, this is Jesus talking about
the second half of the tribulation.
It's called the great tribulation.
This is where the rise of the antichrist comes and he's going to say, I am God.
You should worship me.
This guy is powerful and he's effective in his work.
You don't wanna be here during the tribulation.
There's a lot of bad things that are gonna happen.
It's gonna be really hard to be on the earth at this time because
the tribulation effectively is God's judgment upon the earth.
He's judging all the unbelievers.
He's judging everyone who ever stood against him.
And even though judgment is coming, there are gonna be Christians here,
there are gonna be Christians.
That's why there's, there's gonna be people that are gonna be saved.
They're gonna put them to death, but you don't want to be here during this time.
This is all the more reason why you need to make sure that you're ready for this
to study the end times to study what Jesus says is to be ready for what's to come
because Jesus is saying here, you don't want to be here for this period of time.
Heavy stuff I know to start with, but you gotta know that's what we're,
that's what we're working with here.
So this is what Jesus is talking about.
Matthew 24, rapture is next on the on the time clock.
And that could happen when, anytime, once the rapture happens, that initiates
a seven year period of time called the.
Very good.
Okay, so that's the starting place of this.
You gotta make sure that you're ready for it.
In fact, you're on summer break right now, right?
Yeah.
I was just talking with one of you just a few minutes ago saying, what
are you doing for your summer break?
And he's like, well, really nothing, nothing preach in a sermon next week.
But besides that, nothing.
If you got some, if you got nothing to do this week, let me encourage you.
There are cool, easy books to, or even sermons to go through that
talk about this period of time.
Why not pick up.
YouTube and, and do something productive with it.
Watch a sermon or two about the end times.
Lewis has plenty of recommendations for you that he
will give you if you want them.
Okay.
I, I need to keep going 'cause there's so much more.
Okay.
Here's what school does.
I, I'm glad we're in a classroom.
School teaches you this awful learning habit.
You learn something so that you can regurgitate it on a
test, and then what happens?
What do you do with it?
Forget it.
Jesus doesn't want you to do that.
He doesn't want you to play the school game.
Jesus wants you to remember it so that you could do something with it.
In Matthew chapter 25, he's gonna tell two parables.
Parables are like stories that have a punchline.
The two parables.
The first one is the parable of the 10 Virgins.
That's what it says in your Bible.
Now, you might not understand what he's mean, what he means by that,
but a, a virgin is like a bridesmaid.
Uh, when you get married, ladies, you're gonna pick several gals
that stand next to you, and those women are called bridesmaids.
They're ladies that stand next to you and give, uh, the, the,
the witnesses to your wedding.
They stand with you to affirm your vows and all those things.
Uh, fellas, you'll stand up there and you'll have what?
Not bridesmaids, but groomsman.
Groomsmen.
Very good.
Okay, so these are the 10 bridesmaids.
They're here waiting for the arrival of the groom in ancient times.
This is how they did it, so let's just keep it at that.
Five of them are well prepared.
They're waiting for the nighttime wedding to happen, and so they have lots of
oil in their lamps so that their lambs are able to burn all through the night.
Five of them are ready, five of them are not.
Jesus.
The, the groom comes at, at, at, at a time that they're not expecting and
they're unprepared and they're like, oh, no, we don't have enough oil.
Ladies who brought more, can you give us some?
And they're like, sorry, we don't have enough.
You have to go to the market and buy your own.
And so they go off to do that.
They go buy some more oil for their lamps to help light the ceremony.
They depart and after they depart, the groom comes and they go into the wedding.
Here's the punchline, verses 10 through 13, while they're going to buy more
oil, the bridegroom came and those who were ready went in with him to the
marriage feast and the door was shut.
I.
No opportunity to come in afterward, the other bridesmaids came
also saying, Lord, open to us.
But he answered Truly I say to you, I do not know you watch,
therefore for you neither.
You know, neither the day or the hour.
The whole point of that parable is that Jesus is coming at an hour.
You don't expect.
You gotta be ready for it.
The second, the second story.
The second story is the parable of the talents.
You know this one, you've heard of this one before, right?
The master goes away for a long time, but before he does, he entrusts an
amount of money to three servants.
Two of those servants were faithful.
One of those servants buried his treasure, and when the master came
back, that servant said, oh, you were kind of a, you're kind of a stingy
hard guy, so I hid your money here.
You got back what you gave me.
What did Jesus say, or what did the master say to that servant?
Here's the punchline.
Pay attention.
Take the talent from the one who hid it and give it to him.
Who has the 10 talents for everyone who has will more be given and he will
have an abundance, but from the one who has not, the one who is taken from
even what he has will be taken away.
Look at verse 30.
This is the important punchline.
Cast the worthless servant into outer darkness.
That's a way to talk about eternal judgment.
This is the concept of hell in the Bible.
The Bible, Jesus talks a lot about hell, far more than he does about heaven.
And in this instance he's saying, look for someone who hears what I say and
doesn't respond the right way, they don't do the thing that they should do.
They're gonna cast a servant into outer darkness.
He calls him a worthless servant because he didn't do his job.
In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
Think about someone crying, great tears, and not only crying great
tears, but what do you think about when you think about gnashing?
Does gnashing bring to mind this idea of like, oh, that's, those are happy tears.
Gnashing is someone grinding their teeth, and oh, it either means anger
or agony, and maybe it's a bit of both.
The servant who is sent to the outer darkness, hell is angry.
In agony that he's there.
He's not happy about this.
This is a place where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth,
and so this is what Jesus says.
Again, the punchline here is that Jesus says this is the end.
This is what you can expect.
This isn't school.
Don't learn it and forget it.
Learn it and do something about it.
Point number two, you gotta always be prepared for Jesus' return.
You gotta always be prepared.
And when I say prepared, I mean action.
There's gotta be something that you do in response to Jesus' return.
If Jesus is saying, look, I'm coming back and I want you to be ready, the most
foolish thing you could do is nothing.
I mean, imagine what your parents will say, okay, your parents.
I imagine mom and dad go to the grocery store and they say, when we come back,
we want these five chores finished.
I want you to make your bed.
I want you to wipe off the counter.
I want you to empty the trashes.
I want you to sweep up the floors.
I want you to clean up the table.
Whatever it is that they say, they give you five chores to do, and they say,
we're gonna be back in a little bit.
These things better be done when we get back, or there's gonna be consequences.
You're one of two kids.
You're either the kid that says, I'm on it.
As soon as they said it, even before they leave, I'm already doing the thing
'cause I don't wanna get in trouble.
Or you're the kid who says, how long does it take you to get to the
store again about how long you think it's gonna be before you get back.
Okay.
Can you text me before you leave the store?
Maybe, or, or, or maybe may.
How long do you think this will take me?
You're the kid who delays and just drags your feet for the whole time.
Jesus doesn't want you to do this because the problem is.
You have no idea when Jesus is coming back.
Your parents maybe you'd be able to guess, okay?
I know that the Kroger is about 10 minutes away.
Uh, if dad is with mom, I know mom loves a shop.
It's gonna be two hours.
I've got a solid two and a half hours before they get back, and
so I can hang out for 45 minutes before I even do anything.
It'll be fine.
That might work with your parents.
It will not work with Jesus because you have no clue when Jesus is coming back.
So you gotta always be prepared.
You gotta always be prepared.
Remember the chart, we are presently here.
The next thing on the end Times calendar is surprise everyone.
We're going to heaven now.
And that moment is any moment.
Therefore, the only way to be ready for something that you can't be ready
for is to be ready all the time.
You gotta be ready all the time.
You gotta be prepared.
Here's the, here's the lessons from the parable of the virgins
and the parable of the talents.
Here's how you're ready.
Okay?
Jesus wants you to be ready in three areas.
Number one, you gotta be ready in your time.
You gotta be ready in your time.
How you spend your time reveals what matters most to you.
Remember the virgins who are there, the bridesmaids.
We're wasting time.
They could have gotten oil earlier, but instead they just laid there.
They were drowsy, they got sleepy.
Who knows?
There's lots of reasons that they could have offered lots of excuses.
Jesus doesn't want you to do that.
Here's the beautiful thing about your life right now.
You're young.
You've got all your life ahead of you, right?
And you're gonna live until you're 85, 95, maybe 115 years old.
You got so many years ahead of you.
Is that right?
Healthy life ahead of you.
Is that right?
You've got 95 a hundred years ahead of you.
Is that right?
Yes.
No, you have no idea, right?
You don't know.
You just don't know that man.
I, I, I just reached over 40 years old.
I think that's a pretty amazing thing because I've had friends
that didn't reach that far.
I had a friend that I was in the same room with praying to
Jesus with who died in that room.
I'm older than he is right now.
At least physically.
Isn't that crazy?
We were, we were just around a table praying and then he went
to the bathroom and he died.
Isn't that crazy?
You and I think and, and I understand why.
We think like we just have the rest of our lives.
We've got a hundred years maybe.
You know, I'm gonna get married, I'm gonna have kids.
I'm gonna go to this college, I'm gonna do this thing.
I'm gonna accomplish these things.
That's great to have dreams and and desires.
That's a good thing.
But when you assume and prism upon God that I've got this much
time, you're making assumptions that you just can't assume.
You just don't know.
You don't know how long you got, and one of two urgent realities, you've
got to feel A, you're either gonna die or B Jesus is gonna come back.
Both of those things you don't know when they're gonna be.
Secondly, then, you've been given talents.
This is where the idea of stewarding your talents comes from.
The parable of the talents.
Talents is actually a form of money.
And so you've got resources that God has given you.
Some of you guys have gifts that you need to use to further Christ's
kingdom, and that's exactly what God wants you to do with them.
If God has given you gifts.
Skills to use talents that you have.
He wants you to use those things to bring honor to his name.
This is why he was so mad at that servant.
That servant was given something by God, and God said, go do something with that.
And he's like, great, thank you.
Let me just hide this right here.
You know, don't look at that.
I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna pretend I don't have it.
Not even gonna think about it.
You've been given a gift.
Every single person in this room, you have something to offer the world.
God wants to use you for that purpose and to not use it is unfaithfulness your time,
your talent, and lastly, your treasures.
Some of you guys don't have very much money.
Some of you guys have more because your family gives you
cash to work with or whatever.
Really, the amount of money you have doesn't matter.
What does matter is that you use it to further Christ's
kingdom, whatever that is.
You've been given time, you've been given talent, you've been
given some form of treasure.
The question is whether or not you're using it.
To further and build God's Kingdom or just to build your gaming setup.
Being prepared is super important
because the consequences are so important here.
In fact, that's where we're gonna land this plane here.
Jesus doesn't want you to play the school game, learning about the fact
that there's an end time coming, that he's coming back at some point.
Just so you can forget about it and go about your day.
He tells you so that you can be prepared.
And being prepared looks at least like these three things, stewarding your time,
your talents, and your treasures to say, I wanna be ready for when Jesus returns.
And if you don't do it, you have to feel the weight of the fact that if, if I'm not
being faithful in these areas, it means that I'm probably not right with God.
I don't have a faithful relationship with him.
Now all of us sin in a variety of ways.
And so you should not expect perfection, but you should expect, I see direction
that's I'm going the right way.
In this last section that we're gonna look at, Matthew 25, uh, verses 31
through 46, take a look at it with me.
I'm not gonna read the whole thing, but I'm gonna summarize for you a few
important passages in the final judgment.
When Jesus comes back in his glory, he's gonna, he's gonna judge the
nations, he's gonna judge people.
And here's what's interesting is for the people on his right,
Christians, believers, he's gonna say, look, uh, go on my right side.
And enter into the joy of your master and says, he says here in verse 34, the
king will say to those on his right, come, you who are blessed by my father,
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
And then he is gonna say, look, you saw me and you fed me.
You saw that I was thirsty.
You gave me something to drink.
You saw that I was naked, you gave me clothing.
And those people are gonna say, Jesus, when do we ever see that?
And he's gonna say, well, as whenever you, he's gonna say this.
Um, verse 39.
When did we see it this way?
Verse 40.
The king will answer.
Truly I say to you, uh, you, as you did it to one of the least of
these my brothers, you did it to me.
So he's looking at their works and he's saying, oh, because of the way
that you treated other believers, the way that you treated them
showed me that you cared about me.
Conversely, he's gonna look at the goats, the people on his left hand side, and,
and he is gonna say, depart from me.
Depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.
He says, depart from me.
You curse it into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
Jesus is talking about serious judgment and he's saying, when I was hungry,
you didn't feed me when I was thirsty, you didn't gimme anything to drink.
When I was a stranger, you didn't welcome me.
I was naked.
You didn't clothe me.
And then they're gonna say, well, Jesus, when did we even
have the opportunity to do that?
Well, when did you, when did that ever happen?
Then he will answer them.
Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of
these, you did not do it to me.
Here's the punchline, verse 46, and these will go away into eternal punishment,
but the righteous and into eternal life.
When Jesus is judging people, at least in this occasion,
he's looking at their works.
He's not saying that their works save them.
No one can do enough Good works to be right with God, but he is
saying their works demonstrate whether or not their faith is real.
The consequences of your faith will be shown by your works.
If you love somebody, you can say, I love you.
I love you, I love you.
You could say that all you want, but if you love somebody, how do
you actually know if you love them?
Answering your brain.
How do you know that you love somebody?
Well, by the way that I treat them, the words that I say to them, the the
things that I do for them, I, I show my love in tangible expressions of love.
Jesus is saying something very simple.
If you love him, there will be tangible expressions of that
love for him, tangible, real expressions that you love Jesus.
And so he's saying it is not that your works save you, but that your works
reveal whether or not you are saved.
For those on his right, he says, come into the joy of the master.
Again, notice the stakes though.
Verse 46.
Pay close attention to what he says is the duration of life
and the duration of punishment.
I know this is heavy, guys, and I'm so sorry, but I'm grateful that
I get to talk to you about this.
It's such a heavy subject.
I I, I'm grateful I get to say it, but it's heavy and I, I, I know it is.
It's awful.
It's painful, but we need to know what it is.
Notice a duration.
I wish the Bible didn't say this.
Let's just be real about that.
I wish the Bible didn't say what it says, but here's what it says.
For those who are not right with him, how long is the punishment?
It says eternal, right?
And that's, it's not a translation issue.
It's not like, oh, there's a Greek word that means it's
actually only a couple weeks.
We have good reason to believe that that's what it means.
It's eternal.
And it makes sense because the righteous, those who are saved by grace through
faith, enter into eternal life.
There's eternal life and there's eternal punishment the way
that you respond to Jesus'.
Sobering words will either show that you are being prepared for eternal
punishment or prepared for eternal life.
I need you to know how difficult this is, but I also want you to
feel how high the stakes are.
Everything that we're talking about through all the gospel of Matthew
really is culminating to this point.
Jesus, after, after this section of teaching, Jesus is gonna go to the cross.
You're gonna see his betrayal.
You're gonna see his resurrection and everything else after that.
This is the stakes that are at, uh, these are the stakes, the, the
consequences that are on the line for us.
All
the stakes are very, very high.
A couple years ago, 2012, actually, a guy by the name of Felix
Baumgartner did something incredible.
He went up in this balloon right here.
Lemme see if I, do.
I have it.
I do.
He went up in this balloon right here, up to space.
Um, and from this balloon, he jumped out from space to the ground.
Pretty impressive.
He did this with Red Bull and he jumped in 2012, so this is him preparing for it.
The video's only like a minute and some, some change.
Long.
He jumps out of this thing.
It's incredible.
Now, here's what's more incredible.
The jump itself really didn't last very long.
There's the launch.
They're stoked about it.
Here's what's most incredible about this launch.
They planned it for seven years.
His jump lasted a minute.
The planning of it lasted seven years.
And here's what's super interesting.
During this whole ordeal, the most important part of the
jump was the first 10 seconds.
If he got the first 10 seconds wrong, the whole thing ends up
in destruction, he would've died.
This really is a jump of life or death.
And so for the fir, for seven years leading up into this, he spent
practicing that jump over and over again.
Ensuring that he was stable and that he was jumping exactly as he
needed to because entering in the Earth's atmosphere, if he came
in the wrong way, he burns up.
He dies.
Gnarly, right?
Just incredibly crazy.
But you see the chute successfully opens.
This guy makes it all the way down.
Did I just mention from space?
Like this guy was just, he's super high in the, and he makes it all the way down.
It's a moment where it's celebrating.
He doesn't last very long, but he spent seven years planning.
Planning this jump.
Crazy, crazy.
Someday you and I are gonna jump.
We're not jumping from space to the earth.
We're jumping from life to death, and that jump is the most important
jump of your life for Felix.
The result for him.
If he gets it wrong, maybe he dies.
Kinda a bummer for you and for I, the jump is not just a matter of
life and death, it's a matter of eternal life and eternal death.
And so it really matters that you get it right.
The stakes are high because when that moment comes, your parachute isn't
just this, this, this piece of this, this piece of fabric on his back.
Your parachute has got to be Jesus Christ.
And here's the thing, your parachute isn't church attendance.
It isn't coming to student ministry on Wednesday nights.
It's not good in good grades or giving out good vibes to people and
being kind, even though that is good.
It's not your family's faith.
It's not, oh, my dad's a pastor, or My sister has a dog.
My family owns a cat.
Isn't that worth something?
Jesus.
It's not.
What really matters is that your parachute is Jesus Christ because he's
the only one that can successfully get you from this life to the next.
Free from his judgment.
One, because he himself takes on the judgment, everything
that we're talking about.
Super scary.
Super scary because I realize if what we're saying is true, that
means, again, tonight could be our last night before Jesus comes back.
Or something else happens and we, something, some part of our body fails.
You need to ensure that you're ready for his return.
And of course, what that really means for us is that you're right with him.
That you've turned from your sins and put your faith, your
full weight into Jesus Christ.
And if that's true, if that, if that is you, if you've turned to him in
faith, man, now's the time to get busy.
Now's the time to get to work and say, what do I do in the meantime?
How do I prepare for Jesus' return?
'cause it could be at any moment.
Hebrews chapter three.
The preacher says this today.
If you hear his voice, don't harden your heart.
It's possible that God's been working on you for a long time now.
And scripture says, if you hear his voice, don't harden your hearts.
It's possible to hear God's voice and say, no thank you.
I don't want that.
It's possible to feel conviction and say, oh no, I won't do that.
I don't wanna do that.
And either the conviction for you tonight is, oh man, I should get saved.
I need to be right with God.
Or the conviction is I need to do.
I need to do something about it.
I need my faith to show that it's real.
That's a good thing.
Conviction doesn't feel good, but it produces good.
And so I'm gonna ask you tonight not to try to put that away.
One of the things that we do after a sermon like this is like we go and
we start making jokes and talking about the video that I saw and, oh,
this really cool thing that I saw I was watching and it was funny.
We try to laugh things off and get rid of the discomfort.
I get that nobody likes feeling conviction
unless, unless we know that we want to be right with God, in which
case we welcome the conviction.
'cause it means, man, uh uh, God, thank you that you're opening
my eyes to the truth, and the truth is Jesus is coming back.
We don't know when and because he's coming back, we need to be ready.
He tells us to warn us, to prepare us.
So I wanna know, are you ready to meet Jesus?
If tonight he called your ticket, called your number and said,
Hey, it's time to come on up.
Come see me.
Are you ready?
And if not, let's fix that tonight.
Okay?
Let's pray.
God, thank you for the night to go through Matthew 24 and 25, or at least part of it.
Please help us now to spend.
Helpful, productive, useful time in our small groups.
Help us to be focused and attentive.
We ask all this in Jesus name.
Amen.