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English Lecture 10

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"Learning How to Forecast the Future: How Close Are We to the End?"

The problem with weather forecasters is--They aren't always right!

Illus: Although imagine my surprise to learn that someone has invented a special ribbon that can actually forecast the weather!
1. What it is--is a cheerful little ribbon of yarn woven in all the colors of the rainbow.
2. The directions that come with the ribbon are simple: [show on screen]
  1. #1--Hang outside window.
  2. #2--Check each morning.
  3. #3--If it's wet, it's raining.
  4. #4--If it's stiff, it's freezing.
  5. #5--If it's white, it's snowing.
  6. #6--If it's moving, it's windy.
  7. #7--If it's faded, it's sunny.
  8. And #8--If it's gone--it's ripped off.
3. What an ingenious devise------works every time!
Don't you wish forecasting the weather were really that simple?
Don't you wish forecasting the FUTURE were that simple!
1. But then again, knowing what lies just ahead of us in the foreboding march of the human race may be more simple than you first thought.
2. Because what we are about to share together in tonight's lecture is the astounding ancient prediction of how this world will end.
3. What you are about to read are some high-octane prophecies that literally, actually, precisely describe human civilization just before the world ends, just before Jesus Christ returns.
4. And any resemblance to the present is absolutely intentional.
5. Before we even examine the evidence together, I must tell you that I believe with all my heart that WE ARE LIVING IN THE FINAL GENERATION OF EARTH'S HISTORY.
6. I am not a prophet--nor the son of a prophet--but I have read the prophets- -and I am convinced in my own mind and heart that WE ARE THERE, WE ARE HERE AT THE END.
Illus: Jesus made a statement once that forecasted the future--a single provocative statement about the state of mind on earth just before He returns --and when I read that statement I think to myself: "God help us--we are living at the end of time!"
1. Let's read those provocative words of Christ in Luke 21:26 (p 1019).
2. The New Revised Standard Version translates His words this way: [show on screen] "'People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world.'"
3. And note carefully what generation this will be--read v. 27--it is the last generation living on earth before the return of Christ!
4. Jesus describes a civilization frozen in fear, in global cardiac arrest!
5. And all the emergency measures in the world do not seem to help anymore!
6. Because the old political treatments and the ancient economic remedies simply cannot heal earth's debilitating sickness.
The question is: Is that good news or bad news?
1. Well, that depends upon your perspective.
2. Last evening we noted that over 1500 times this Book predicts and promises the return of Jesus Christ to this planet at the end of the world.
3. One and a half thousand times you may read throughout these pages the clarion announcement that life as we know it on this planet is NOT doomed to an endless cycle of escalating despair and hopelessness.
4. This tragic experiment in rebellion and suffering in the heart of God's universe is destined to come to an end--AN END THAT IS PROPHESIED AND PROMISED.
5. The God of the Cosmos has given His Word that He Himself will personally intervene and will physically, visibly, literally return to this planet and liberate His friends from its destructive end.
6. Illus: And please note, HE HAS GIVEN US HIS WORD IN ADVANCE-- which is exactly what you'd expect a friend to do, isn't it?
  1. Take a look at this side of God in another vignette tucked away in a little book in the Old Testament--Amos 3 (p 889).
  2. I want you to see this portrait before we turn to the great Bible chapter prophesying the signs of the end of the world and the second coming of Jesus.
  3. Read Amos 3:7.
  4. Friends don't spend their lives trying to catch each other off guard!
  5. If you love someone, you'll do everything in your power to alert and protect that one from impending disaster.
  6. Illus: If I knew my son Kirk's dormitory was going to catch on fire tonight, don't you think I'd move heaven and hell to warn him of the imminent danger?
  7. Reread Amos 3:7.
  8. Why? Just turn one page over to the text we read on opening night together--Amos 4: 12--"Prepare to meet your God!"
  9. Why does God send messages through the ancient prophets to this generation? Because He wants His friends to know that the end is near and He is about to return: "Prepare to meet Me, O Earth!"
7. I ask again: Is that bad news or is it good news?
8. But of course, it is extremely good news for the terribly bad news that we are all living with in Bosnia and America and Rwanda and China and Russia and Korea and Liberia and India today!
9. I say it is good news indeed to know that the God of the universe is coming to end our human heartache and planetary misery.
THE QUESTION IS: HOW CLOSE ARE WE TO THE END OF ALL THINGS AS WE KNOW IT ON PLANET EARTH?
For the rest of our time together I want to take you to the 2000-year-old words of Christ that appear tonight as if they were but the reading of our very present global headlines!
1. There isn't a person present today who will be able to read these words and not simultaneously conclude that in fact we are imminently close to the sudden and explosive closure to human history as we know it!
2. But one word of counsel as we prepare to read the prophetic words of Jesus: Keep recalling in your heart that promise of His we shared last evening, "Let not your heart be troubled....I will come again."
3. While you are about to encounter the depressing statistics of amassing global bad news--keep reminding yourself that all of this is but the harbinger of the very best news the human race has ever clung to--the ushering in of God's eternal and victorious kingdom of peace and joy and love in the eventual familyhood of all the human race.

We begin with one of the epic chapters of Scripture, entirely devoted to the second coming of Christ--Matthew 24 (p 960).

Begin with v. 1.
1. When it came to their glorious temple, every Jew practically glowed--they were very proud of that edifice.
2. Illus: One of my favorite past times whenever I travel is to visit the most famous places of worship in the city or country--and it's been my privilege to quietly walking (sometimes tiptoe) through some of the greatest cathedrals and temples and mosques in this world--and every one captures a unique human glory and beauty that is stunning to behold.
3. Archaeologists tell us Herod's temple in Jerusalem during the time of Christ was a spectacular showcase of architectual wonder and glory!
4. Illus: When I was in Jerusalem this summer I visited an astounding small scale recreation of the very temple the disciples were extolling to Jesus spread out over an acre of land it is breath-taking wonder just the model by itself! One can only imagine the shimmering glory of the towering temple regarded by some as one of the seven wonders of the ancient world!
5. So you can understand he disciples bragging about their national edifice, when Jesus suddenly stops them short!
Read v. 2.
1. Illus: I must tell you to that to a man our Jewish tour guides all referenced these words of Jesus in noting that in fact His dire prediction had indeed come true when in AD 70 the Roman armies of Titus literally razed the glorious temple to a heap of rubble.
2. In fact, all that remains today is a portion of the foundation on the western side now called the "western wall" formerly the "wailing wall."
3. That heap of rocks is today the most holy site in all Judaism the stoney remains of their revered ancient temple.
Moments after Christ's shocking prediction, the stunned and startled disciples draw near to their Master and inadvertantly blend two separate questions into one pointed query: When will our mighty temple be destroyed and this world come to an end? Read v. 3.
In response to their two-pronged question, Jesus gave a single prophecy that included predictions about Jerusalem's tragic destruction 40 years later and predictions about this planet's tragic end which reaches down into our own day all swirling together IN A LITANY OF DRAMATIC SIGNS THAT WILL TELL HIS FOLLOWERS WHEN THE END IS NEAR.
First, Jesus predicts SIGNS IN THE RELIGOUS WORLD.
1. Read v. 4,5
2. Illus: I'll never forget attending a religious service as a teenager on the island of Guam.
  1. Some out of town dignitary was standing behind the lecturn speaking.
  2. When a scrawny, bearded man in tattered clothing got up out of the audience and silently walked up onto the stage and stood beside the visiting guest speaker.
  3. The speaker, uncertain of who this man might be, deferred to the interrupter.
  4. And the bearded stranger stepped before the mike and announced to all present: "I am Jesus Christ and I have returned to this world."
  5. I must confess that as a young teenager I was really startled by it all--and in the confusion of the moment, wondered, Could this be Christ?
  6. Well, when the police came and took him away in their squad car, I concluded, It must not be Jesus!
3. But please note that Christ is not describing at the end of time an isolated incident here and there--it is clear by His use of the word "many" that He is predicting rampant and extensive religious chicanery and deception.
4. Illus: The proliferation today of religious cults of every hue and shape is alarming!
  1. In my nation the NEW AGE movement has struck a responsive chord deep in the heart of America's psyche.
  2. Illus: In survey results first released by USA Today some 20,000 in a sample group of 113,000 claimed they accepted the theories of the New Age movement.
  3. Our bookstore shelves are lined with the suave, sophisticated yet sometimes bizarre and banal claims of this modern religion.
  4. And movie stars and executives and intellectuals are flocking to its pied piper chant.
  5. Why? Because organized religion in the Western World has failed to meet the gnawing hunger that eastern and western civilization is experiencing for the supernatural.
  6. How did Jesus put it earlier, "Men's hearts failing them for fear."
  7. A religion of cold formality and rote liturgy cannot assuage the fears or satisfy the longings of contemporary humanity!
5. "Many will come in my name" Jesus predicted just before the end.
  1. Illus: Does the name David Koresh ring a bell with you? The world knows the tragedy of Waco, Texas, April, 1993.
  2. How about the name Jim Jones? The world remembers the tragedy of the mass suicides of Jonestown, Guyana, in November, 1978.
  3. And lest you think that all religious charlatans come from the U.S. I remind you that the flower children of the East and the West have wandered after their own strange pipers.
  4. Scientology, the Rev. Sun Yung Moon and his Unification Church, et al--the world is filled with the proliferation of cults and self-proclaimed spiritual messiahs!
6. Reread v. 4,5
Then Jesus predicts SIGNS IN THE POLITICAL WORLD.
1. Read vv. 6,7a.
2. We are living in a time for the proliferation of war!
3. Obviously no one war can predict the end of the war.
4. Illus: On a flight to Poland I was reading the International Herald, a newspaper for English readers in Europe, which noted that the Atlanta- based Center for Conflict Resolution has counted an average of 35 to 39 wars per year within the last decade across the face of this globe--from Rwanda to Bosnia to Somalia to Ireland to Korea to Cambodia to Liberia to Palestine to Khazakstan to Afganistan and on and on and on.
5. It is a sad fact of life today that many of our viewers tonight need no introduction to the heartache reality of coping within a nation at war.
6. Within a world at war.
7. Not to mention cities torn by gang wars in our own embattled nation.
8. When you see this proliferation of war, this ascendency of conflict among the nations of earth, then you will know that the end is near, Jesus prophecied.
9. It isn't that there haven't been wars on this earth before.
10. What is significant is the escalation of the frequency of these conflicts.
11. The two bloody world wars of this century have done little in the end to resolve our basis human conflicts!
12. Our own nation has suffered through the Korean and Vietnam wars--and what did we get in the end--but endless rows of white crosses and white stars of David in our military cemeteries.
13. In a world awash and adrift, career diplomats now use the buzz word, "destabilization."
14. Welcome to life in the twilight of the twentieth century on the eve of the NeXt Millennium!
15. So shell-shocked is our generation that we now take war for granted-- just another television news flash during our evening dinner.
16. Illus: And shall we talk about nuclear proliferation?
  1. Iraq, Iran, North Korea, India, Pakistan, and only God knows how many of the break-away republics in the former USSR have joined the uneasy Nuclear Arms club of earth.
  2. Where are the disappearing Soviet stockpiles of nuclear armaments headed? What little, third-rate Third-world nation is assembling a weapon with which to blackmail the world community?
  3. Illus: When atomic scientist Charles Urey witnessed the first atomic explosion in 1945, he tearfully muttered, "I am standing on the place where the end of the world began."
17. Reread v. 6,7a
18. Illus: One UN diplomat described man's vain attempt to establish world peace with these words, "We have tried so hard but we failed so miserably."
19. But Jesus' predictive chronicling of earth's last headlines is not over yet.
Next He predicts SIGNS IN THE NATURAL WORLD.
1. Read v. 7b
2. Famines!
  1. Do you realize that 40,000 babies die every single day in the Third World (which really should be called the Two-thirds World)!
  2. That's one baby dying of starvation every 2.16 seconds!
  3. India and Asia, Somalia and Africa.
  4. 37% of the people cannot buy enough food to sustain the bare necessities.
  5. 800,000,000 people are undernourished tonight in this world!
  6. Illus: According to the United Nations agency, the Food and Agriculture Organization, the global grain harvest increased by just 2.3 % since 1990, while the global population was growing by 10%.
  7. According to Robert S. McNamara, President of the World Bank, "Population growth is the gravest issue the world faces during the next decade...and will have catastrophic consequences if we do not act. The problem will be solved by famine, riot, insurrection, and war."
3. But Jesus goes on--pestilences!
  1. "Mad cow" disease, ecoli virus, 100 different strains of cancer, the AIDS epidemic the list could go on and on and on.
  2. (And by the way, I need to insert here parenthetically that I do not believe that the AIDS epidemic or any epidemic is a punishment from this God who is not to be afraid of but a friend of. It is a sad day when Christians or any other believers in God endeavor to heap further shame and guilt upon the sufferers of AIDS by claiming that they suffer at the hands of a vengeful God. Jesus was always right, "An enemy has done this." Lucifer, not God, is the author of the pestilences Christ predicts will exponentially increase just before He returns to this earth.)
  3. And shall we talk of the ecological crisis that threatens our ozone and is depleting our rain forests and our animal habitats?
  4. The Save the Earth summit held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, was a global effort to somehow grasp for straws in the efforts to turn our ecological nightmares around!
  5. Polluted oceans, radioactive garbage--if Jesus Christ does NOT return soon we will destroy ourselves and our planet anyway!
  6. Illus: Lester Brown, president of the Washington-based World Watch Institute, said, "We do not have generations, we have only years in which to attempt to turn things around." (1/2/89 TIME)
4. But Jesus goes on--earthquakes!
  1. The rise in global quakes is both astounding and alarming!
  2. Whereas in the 19th century there were only 2,119 recorded earthquakes during those 100 years, in 1993 alone there were 21,476 recorded!
  3. Of course there have always been earthquakes in earth's history --but never before have we seen such a numbing ascendency!
  4. Prior to the 20th century there were only ten major quakes (over 6 on the Richter scale) recorded in history we are now recording 3000 MAJOR over 6 pt. quakes among the 6000 earthquakes every single year on this planet!
  5. 1.5 million people have perished in earthquakes in the last 90 years.
  6. Illus: As a boy in Kobe, Japan, I remember many a night awakening in bed to the trembling vibration of an earthquake--the same Kobe that was leveled by a killer quake in 1995.
  7. And with trepidation, seismologists and geologists await the BIG ONE!
5. And not just earthquakes but with alarm meteorologists are chronicling an alarming ascendency in all natural disasters.
  1. Illus: One of my parishoners who is a CPA sent me the following statistic from his CPA Letter: "According to the Federal Register [a U.S. government publication], 40 of our 50 states had every county within them reporting some sort of disaster in 1996!
6. What's going on, ladies and gentlemen?
7. No, the question is NOT what's going on?--the question is, WHO'S COMING BACK?
8. COULD NATURE ABOVE AND BELOW THE VERY CRUST OF THIS PLANET BE TRYING TO SHAKE US UP, WAKE US UP TO THE HOUR IN WHICH WE ARE LIVING?
9. "Men's hearts failing them for fear" is how Jesus put it!
Having noted signs in the religious world and the political world and the natural world, Jesus now turns to SIGNS IN THE SOCIAL WORLD.
1. Note specifically His prediction in v. 12.
2. Before commenting on that SOCIAL indicator, it is imperative we juxtapose these words of Jesus with a corollalry prediction of signs in the SOCIAL world that Paul makes in II Timothy 3:1-5 [show on the screen]
3. Placed side by side these two social indicators of the final generation on earth describe a civil lawlessness and a moral lovelessness that will destroy the social fabric of our civilization!
4. Is it happening to us tonight?
5. Without question! But before I share three exhibits with you, first this caveat:
  1. The moral dysfunction of life on this planet has affected all of us.
  2. We are all sinners, and we all fall short of God's ideal for us as human beings.
  3. Some of us fail in much more public ways than others, but all of us have failed.
  4. And all of us are freely offered God's compassionate and forgiving grace for every failure, public or private.
  5. In the litany of statistics you are about to hear, there may be a category or condition that describes your own life journey.
  6. Please remember that the greatest statistic that is true for you and for me is that God is inviting us all to be His friends forever, no matter which of the following exhibits has touched our lives.
EXHIBIT A comes in a litany of disturbing social indicators anotated in an essay written by William Bennett (PhD and JD), former drug czar and Secretary of the Department of Education in the United States--an essay in which he notes with alarm the moral free fall of this proud capitalistic nation, the United States.
1. I realize that the statistics he quotes do not refer to every nation on earth.
2. But I have a hard time imagining that the trends are any different, especially in the developed and developing nations of earth. "Something has gone wrong with America....America is not in danger of becoming a Third World country; we are too rich, too proud, and too strong to allow that to happen. It is not that we live in a society completely devoid of virtue....But there is a lot less of this than there ought to be. And we know it. Let me briefly outline some of the empirical evidence that points to cultural decline....
  1. "Since 1960, the population has increased 41%; the gross domestic product nearly tripled.
  2. "But during the same thirty-five year period, there was a 560 % increase in violent crime; more than a 400 % increase in illegitimate births; a quadrupling in divorces; a tripling of the percentage of children living in single-parent homes; more than a 200 % increase in the teenage suicide rate"
  3. Bennett's unmistakable point--some tonight may try to point to an elevated economic status and condition here in the United States as proof that life is on the up in this nation--but the rise in our economy has been matched by a very disturbing and even higher rise in our social and moral dysfunction as a nation. Bennett goes on: "And then there are the results of an ongoing teacher survey. Over the years, teachers have been asked to identify the top problems in America's schools. In 1940, teachers identified them as talking out of turn; chewing gum; making noise; running in the hall; cutting in linve; dress code infractions; and littering. When asked the same question in 1990, teachers identified drug use; alcohol abuse; pregnancy; suicide; rape; robbery; and assault."
Illus: Let me now share EXHIBIT B in corroboration of Jesus' and Paul's signs in the SOCIAL WORLD--Exhibit B is the alarming statistics of crime: In this country there is one serious crime every 2 seconds! A murder every 23 seconds, a forcible rape every 6 minutes, a robbery every 58 seconds, a motor vehicle stolen every 28 seconds, and a burglary every 8 seconds.
1. How did Jesus describe it in Matthew? "Lawlessness will abound, and the love of many will grow cold!"
2. How did He put in Luke? "Men's hearts failing them from fear and the expectation of those things which are coming on the earth!"
3. Illus: And lest we think that crime is endemic only to the United States, the Associated Press headlined a report, "Rise in crime rocking Japan"-- having enjoyed an international reputation for safe streets, Japan is endeavoring to come to grips with a rash of gruesome and cold-blooded crimes, eroding their sense of security.
4. The entire globe is awash in lawlessness--from Russia to England to Brazil to Japan to the U.S.
5. Illus: According to a study done for Kaiser Permanente by an advocacy organization called Oakland's Children Now, American youth today in large numbers fear for their personal safety.
  1. Among children ages 7 to 10, 63% worried about dying young.
  2. 71% feared getting shot or stabbed at home or school.
6. Today 1/4 of all juvenile gun-related victims are killed by other children.
7. "Children's hearts failing them for fear."
8. A fear that is epidemic and endemic!
Finally I submit EXHIBIT C for your consideration tonight--the profound collapse of mores and morals in the global pursuit of sexual freedom.
1. Describing the world's moral and social condition before His return, Jesus predicted, "Because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold."
2. Or as Paul put it, "Men will be lovers of themselves." (And that would also include women, to be sure!)
3. Illus: A few evenings ago we noted a New York Times editorial that warned of the rising STD (sexually transmitted disease) rates among Americans, who average 7 sexual partners in a lifetime. The reason for our high STD rates? Quoting the editorial, we "initiate sexual intercourse early, marry late and divorce often."
4. Illus: In the US in 1870 there was one divorce for every 34 marriages.
  1. In 1900 one for every 12 marriages.
  2. In 1930, one divorce for every 6 marriages.
  3. And from 1978 to the present, one divorce for every two marriages.
5. Illus: Moreover, America owns the highest rate of babies born out of wedlock in all the world--30.5% of all babies born in this nation are born out of wedlock.
6. IllusA fear that is epidemic and endemic!: And when Magic Johnson, one of the most popular sports stars in history, sadly announced to the world that because of his illicit and runaway sexual escapades he had contracted the AIDS virus--the world was reminded again of how high the price we pay for our moral freedom.
7. Illus: Tragically, the moral calamity is compounded by an abortion culture that now witnesses the abortion of 4,200 fetuses every single day in this country! If permitted to live, the babies sacrificed since 1973 would comprise fully 12 % of our entire population to this point!
8. Illus: And lest you think that this moral tragedy is unique to the United States, I have in my files a reporter's eyewitness account of how one of the major nations of earth tonight keeps the aborted fetuses from its state hospitals and markets those fetuses for human dietary consumption "to improve complexions and promote general well-being." (Dobson 10-95)
9. Ladies and gentlemen, only a fool would deny that the moral fabric of our society globally is shredding before our very eyes.
10. Describing the human race just before His return, Jesus somberly predicted the moral fallout, "Because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold."
What does all of this mean to us who survive tonight? Note carefully the words of Jesus in Luke's parallel account to Matthew--Luke 21 (p 1019).
1. Read v. 26 and 34.
2. Did you catch that--"Hearts failing them for fear, weighed down with the cares of this life."
3. What a poignant description of the economic anxiety in the last generation!
4. Because nothing can weigh a heart with fear more quickly than instability in the world's financial markets!
5. Every investor knows that what goes up must come down.
6. And one day the bubble will burst!
7. Illus: I was visiting over supper with an investor in the foreign currency market in England, and it only took a few sentences of his to sense the knife-edged precariousness of high stakes financial investing! When he described his own physical and emotional anguish over a falling market, it wasn't difficult to imagine the colossal global catastrophe a world-wide collapse could bring once again to this civilization.
8. Illus: I remind you that for the first time in history we are experiencing a truly global economy, with financial markets in Tokyo, London, Paris and New York intricately interwoven.
  1. Let one of our financial superpowers collapse, and the reality is that there will be a domino-effected global collapse in its wake.
  2. Indonesia, Japan, Hong Kong, the United States and the runaway domino chain is set loose!
9. America's economic strength and future is uncertain.
  1. Our stock market has been soaring, but every analyst knows that all it takes is a sudden disaster in our national--natural or political--and that house of cards can come crashing down!
  2. Many may think America a wealthy nation--and on the scale of the Third World it may appear so--but the U.S. has become the largest debtor nation in the world whose straw house can collapse literally overnight.
10. Reread Luke 21:26.

How then shall we live, we who live tonight on the edge of eternity?

Let us close with the simple but somber admonition of the returning King, who just before giving His life to win our friendship, spoke the words of Mark 13 (p 984).
1. Tonight we have carefully noted Jesus' predicted signs in the religious world, the political world, the natural world, the social world, as well as the economic world.
2. We have read the headlines of the newspapers of the world this evening and found in them ominous warnings that planet earth is plummeting to its predicted ending--and all of it within this single generation!
3. Ladies and gentlemen, I cannot express it with any greater conviction than this: WE ARE LIVING AT THE END OF TIME.
4. Soon, and very soon, this planet will be the recipient of a cataclysmic visitation from outer space: the personal return of Jesus Christ for all His friends.
5. I repeat--the world is coming to an end.
6. The events in your homeland and mine are portents of that reality.
Are you ready?
1. You say, But what am I supposed to do? Pack my belongings, store up food supplies, sell my possessions, go into hiding?
2. My friend, the answer is, NONE OF THE ABOVE.
3. Jesus' instructions on how to be ready are clearly expressed in Mark 13:32--read.
4. We have touched on only a few of the major prophecies regarding the Second Coming of Christ tonight--but did you notice that not one of them offers a date for His return?
5. Do you know why? Because you can't cram a friendship at the last minute, that's why!
  1. Oh, you can cram for an exam at the last minute--that's how a lot of got us through or are getting through school!
  2. But have you ever tried to cram a friendship with someone?
  3. "Hey look, honey--we've only got thirty minutes together--so tell me everything about you and I'll tell you everything about me--and then I got to run--but we'll be the best of friends, I'm sure!"
  4. You'd be crazy to try it!
  5. Because friendships take time to grow.
  6. And so from the beginning the friendly God of this universe has given us time to come to know and love the One who knows and loves us so deeply.
  7. NO DATES, NO DEADLINES--JUST TODAY AND TODAY AND TODAY.
  8. Because cramming for a friendship is too shallow for a God whose love is as deep as Calvary.
6. Which hardly means there is no sense of urgency tonight, living as we are in a world rapidly running out of time!
7. That's precisely why Jesus said what He did--read vv. 33-37.
8. "WATCH AND PRAY"--WHICH BEING INTERPRETED MEANS, KEEP AWAKE AND KEEP IN TOUCH....FOR IT IS MY FRIENDSHIP ALONE THAT WILL SAVE YOU IN THE END.
My friends, Jesus is coming very soon!
1. Believe Him, trust Him, follow Him, obey Him.
2. Accepting His friendship is the only way any of us will be ready.

Illus: They called him the man of the mountain, old Harry Truman, not to be confused with the president by that same name.
1. [show on screen] "'So you also,' Jesus said, 'when you see these things happening, know that it is near, at the very door. And what I say to you, I say to all: Watch!'" (Mark 13:29, 37)
  
  Let us pray: Jesus: Every sign in the Book declares your coming is near. Please don't let one man, one woman, one young adult make the choice Harry Truman made. As the Bible prays, "Even so, come, Lord Jesus." Amen.
  
  Further Study:
  
  About Your Future (Lecture Study Guide from Discover Bible School)
  Topical: Signs of the Times.
  
  © 1998 NAD. HTML by: Vincenzo Annunziata.

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