If you go to any church website, you can probably find what they believe in a doctrinal statement. And this doctrinal statement will include the categories of systematic theology, and so it starts out with bibliology. Bibliology is the study of the Bible. How is it a reliable source? And it's the source we're going to get everything else we study from, including theology, which is the study of God. Perhaps that he is one God in the three persons of the Trinity, perhaps a study of his attributes that make up who he is, that could lead us into Christology, which is the study of Christ, one hundred percent God, one hundred percent man. Or how about Pneumatology? Do you know this one? The study of the Holy Spirit, which is a critical study. And then we get to Anthropology, and that's the study of us human beings, usually including Hamartiology, which is how we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, which is why we love to study Soteriology, which is the study of our salvation that we have through God in his son Jesus, by the power of the Spirit. And then there's Ecclesiology, which is the study of the church, how we should conduct ourselves in the household of God. And last of the whole list comes Eschatology. And there's a handout there if you want to take some notes and write some things down. Eschatology is the study of the end times, the study of the last things. Therefore, it's very appropriate that eschatology comes last, because it's the study of the last. But what has happened is that, because eschatology comes last, it is often viewed as least. And yes, eschatology is not an issue of salvation, and eschatology is not an issue where anyone should go and argue with somebody after the service, or Christians don't need to divide over the issue of eschatology, but what I've realized has happened, and I saw it happening in myself, and I see it happening among Christians today, is there's a level of ambivalence when it comes to the study of eschatology, almost like it doesn't really matter. And you can think whatever you want to think, and I can think whatever I want to think, and we can just agree to disagree, when really we should all be trying to figure out what does the Scripture say, just like we would in any of those studies. God gives clear teaching on what he wants to be revealed to us, and God has given us clear Scripture that you and I can study together about how things are going to end. And we're going to study what Jesus teaches in Mark chapter 13. So I invite everyone here, will you please open up your Bible and turn with me to this epic chapter where Jesus is going to teach us. It's going to take us four different weekends to go through this chapter together, but we want to begin here this morning, and so out of respect for God's Word, I invite everyone to stand up for the public reading of Scripture. And this morning we will go through the first eight verses of Mark 13. That'll kick off our four-part study of eschatology. So here we go. This is the Word of God. Pay attention to what Jesus has to say. Mark 13, verse 1.
And as he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher, what wonderful stones and what wonderful buildings!” And Jesus said to him, “Do you see these great buildings? There will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.” And as he sat on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew asked him privately, “Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign when all these things are about to be accomplished?” And Jesus began to say to them, “See that no one leads you astray. Many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray. And when you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. This must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. These are but the beginning of the birth pains.
That's the reading of God's Word. Please go ahead and grab your seat. We've printed those verses there on your handout, and let's dive into studying this text together. The key word that I want to give to you is this word, telos. It's a Greek word, it means the end, and you can see this word right there in verse 7, where Jesus says the end is not yet. So, that's what we're talking about. That's why we're calling this a series on eschatology. It's not really an eschatology class, we're just going to explain what Mark 13 says, but it's going to be about the end. And what you can't tell by reading this in English, is that there’s a question in verse 4. This is the question that kicks off the whole teaching of Jesus through this chapter is, “when will these things be?” What will be the sign when all these things are about to be accomplished? Now circle that word accomplished, because it has telos in it, the word there is “sunteleo” in the Greek, so it's like telos in the verb form with the prefix there, sun, which means with. When are all these things going to come with the end? What's going to be the sign when all these things come with the end? So, it doesn't clearly say the end there in English, but that's what their question is about. In fact, look at how it says it here in Matthew 24, verse 3. We'll put it up here on the screen. And this is a parallel passage in the Gospel of Matthew, where Jesus teaches about the end. He also does that in Luke 21, but here in Matthew 24:3, it says, “As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, ‘Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?’”
So, Jesus says that the temple stones are going to be thrown down, and in the disciples' mind that kicks up this question of when, not just when the temple will be destroyed, but when will the end of the age come. And people have been asking that question for hundreds of years, ever since these disciples. When and how is the world going to come to an end? And so, that's the teaching that we have here from Jesus Christ. And there are two things that Jesus wants you to see, that's on your handout, if you're taking notes. “See” is the key word of Jesus' teaching, so if you look at verse 3, it says, “As he sat on the Mount of Olives,” and we have to remember that sitting was the posture of teaching at this time. We would be surprised if someone was teaching at church on a Sunday, or teaching even in a class at school, if they were sitting. We expect our teachers to stand up often with the pulpit or a podium of some kind. Well, no, their posture of teaching was you sat down in the synagogue. There was the Moses’ seat, where you would sit down and explain the Scripture. So, the idea that it says he sat on the Mount of Olives means that he's getting ready to teach us. And the key word that Jesus uses is this Greek verb, blepo. It means “look at this, look at this.”
Go back with me to Mark, chapter 4. Just turn back to Mark, chapter 4, because this is another example of his teaching that we had in the Gospel of Mark. I don't know if you remember the sermon that we did, “The Soil of Your Soul.” We did it almost a year ago now. We went through this teaching of Jesus, and it was very powerful, because he kept saying here, even here in Mark 4, “Again he began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him, so that he got into a boat.” So many people on the shore, he has to get out in a boat to do his teaching. And notice what it says, “he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea.” See, I would expect him to be standing on the edge of the boat, shouting at everyone, but he's actually sitting on the boat when he teaches. And if you remember from Mark 4, when he gave the parable of the soils, the main word was “hear”. Who can really hear what God is saying? Who can really take what God is saying to heart? They're the good soil, that's the good soul, the one who hears the Word of God and bears fruit.
Well, now if you go back to Mark 13, where he's sitting down again, this time on the Mount of Olives, rather than a boat by the Sea of Galilee. This is a mount right outside of Jerusalem. Well, now the key word is “see,” and really, this began back in chapter 12 verse 38. And if you can look back at Mark 12:38. In his teaching he said, “Beware of the scribes,” or you could translate it, “See the scribes.” He was talking about the religious leaders of the Jews. Can you look at them? See the long robes? See the greetings in the marketplaces? Yeah, they're not what they look like to you. Those guys are going to receive a greater condemnation. They are going to be judged severely. They may seem like they're in charge right now; they are going to be judged by God. See them for who they really are. Well, now, as they're going out of the temple after a lot of teaching in Mark, chapter 12, so now we're leaving. Oh, wow, look at this place, and the temple was a magnificent place. You can see what wonderful buildings, what wonderful stones. Some of us have been able to go. It's not even the temple anymore, it's just the temple mount. It's just the stones that were the foundation for the temple today. There is no actual temple on the mount, it's just the foundation, and even that is impressive when you see the stones and you see where the temple used to be. So, they're like, look at how awesome this place is. This place is wonderful. And notice verse 2. “Do you see these buildings?” You want to circle that word “see”. Jesus is using this repeatedly, intentionally. See this, see this. This is about what you can see, because things are not as they appear. The religious leaders are not really leading you to God, and even the temple is not really the way it should be. This temple is going to be thrown down, Jesus says. The temple, you see it one way, it's actually going to end up another way, it will be destroyed. It's not how it looks to you right now. And that statement about the temple is what produces the “when” question in the disciples, and when not just will this temple be destroyed, but when will all these things in the end come?
And so, there are two things that Jesus wants you to see in our text. The first one is he wants you to look at the temple, and he wants you to know it's going to be destroyed. And there we should have already been thinking this. What we've been learning, if you've been here at our churches, as we've gone through Mark is that a lot of the things Jesus teaches aren't new things that he's just saying for the first time. No. What is Jesus quoting a lot in his teaching? He's quoting the Scriptures, the Hebrew scriptures, what we would call the Old Testament.
Turn with me to Daniel, chapter 9. I need everybody to go back in your Bible to Daniel, chapter 9. Why would Jesus say that the temple is going to be destroyed, and why would the disciples associate the temple being destroyed with the end? These aren't new thoughts, these are coming from old thoughts that have already been revealed in the Scripture. So, as we come into this conversation in Mark 13, there are already things in the disciples' minds that they've learned in the synagogue that they've learned from the Scripture, and there are already things that Jesus is referring to. And one of the epic prophecies that we get about Jesus is in Daniel, chapter 9. Daniel 9 is really one of the most exciting chapters, I think, in the Bible, because Daniel, by reading Scripture, finds out that, based on the prophecy of Jeremiah, the exile is about to come to an end. If you know the story of Daniel, he got taken from Jerusalem to Babylon, where they tried to brainwash him and get him to worship their gods, but he did not defile himself, and he stayed true to YHWH, praying famously three times a day, looking out a window towards Jerusalem. And one day, he reads Jeremiah prophesy about how long the exile is going to b.e Daniel realizes we're coming up on the end of the exile, and he prays this powerful prayer that God would forgive the sins of his people and act in such a way to send them back to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple. And Angel Gabriel comes to Daniel in answer to his prayer and gives this prophecy in Daniel, chapter 9, starting in verse 24. It's a 70-weeks or 77s prophecy. It's a countdown from when they're going to go rebuild Jerusalem till an anointed one is going to come, and so it's a whole complicated mathematical countdown prophecy that's hard to comprehend, but Bible nerds love to geek out about it. Some of us got to study this prophecy earlier this year in our Easter week celebration, because we realized when Jesus came in, in Mark 11, on the donkey to Jerusalem., he was fulfilling this prophecy right here, and that was awesome. But look at verse 26, look at what it says. It says, “And after the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one,” and another way that you would say anointed one before translating it is, you would say a Messiah, “shall be cut off and shall have nothing.” So, one thing that's going to happen is an anointed one, or Messiah, will be cut off and have nothing, that we would see as a reference to Jesus dying on the cross to pay for our sins, which Jesus has been telling his disciples is going to happen when I'm going to go to Jerusalem, and the scribes, they're going to get me, they're going to kill me. On the third day, I'm going to rise. He's been preparing his disciples for that throughout the Gospel of Mark. Well, here it is. The anointed one is going to be cut off and have nothing, instead of becoming the king that they think he's going to be. He's going to end up dead. And then, look at what it says, “And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the” what everybody? The sanctuary, the sanctuary would be referring to the temple. So, you see how Jesus is leading his disciples into the fact that not only is he going to die and rise again, but now he's teaching them the temple is going to be destroyed, which are the exact sequence that we see here in this prophecy to Daniel, here in chapter 9. In fact, look at verse 27. “He,” this prince to come, he “shall make a strong covenant with many for one week, and for half of the week he shall put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out on the desolator.” So there's going to be some kind of abomination of desolation that's going to take place, and we'll get to that further into Mark 13.
So, you can see we already have prophecies about Jesus dying, the temple being destroyed, and some kind of prince coming and committing the abomination of desolation. So, Jesus is now expounding on a prophecy like this, and another thing I want to draw to your attention is not only the context of the conversation that the temple is going to be destroyed, but where are they having this conversation? Jesus sat down on where? The Mount of Olives. That is very significant. Who was here at our Ascension Day service? Was anybody here when we did a Thursday night Ascension Day service? In Acts 1, Jesus went up in the cloud, he ascended into heaven. And where did he ascend from, everybody? He was on the Mount of Olives. And what did the angels say? “Just as you saw him go up, so he's going to return. “Where is Jesus going to return on the Mount of Olives? That's where he's giving his teaching about the end, is the place that he's going to come back. And there's a whole lot of history attached to that.
Go to Zechariah, chapter 14. Here's another prophecy that might have been in the minds of the disciples when they're asking their question. They might have seen the destruction of the temple wrapped up with these prophecies that all these armies are going to gather around Jerusalem, and there's going to be a terrible battle. I mean, this is a very intense scene. We're going to read now in Zechariah 14, but this would have been a Mount of Olives prophecy that the disciples would have been familiar with, that people would have known and talked about. Zechariah is a prophet after the exile, after they came back to Jerusalem. And as they're rebuilding the temple, Zechariah, he is writing things like this. “Behold,” look at Zechariah 14. “A day is coming for the Lord,” or for YHWH. A day of Yahweh is coming, “when the spoil taken from you will be divided in your midst. For I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle, and the city shall be taken and the houses plundered and the women raped. Half of the city shall go out into exile, but the rest of the people shall not be cut off from the city. Then the Lord will go out and fight against those nations as when he fights on a day of battle. On that day his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives that lies before Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide valley, so that one half of the Mount shall move northward, and the other half southward. And you shall flee to the valley of my mountains, for the valley of the mountains shall reach to Azal. And you shall flee as you fled from the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. Then the Lord my God will come, and all the holy ones with him. On that day there shall be no light, cold, or frost. And there shall be a unique day, which is known to the Lord, neither day nor night, but at evening time there shall be light. On that day living waters shall flow out from Jerusalem, half of them to the eastern sea and half of them to the western sea. It shall continue in summer as in winter. And the Lord will be king over all the earth. On that day the Lord will be one and his name one.”
So, these are the kinds of prophecies that they're thinking the temple is going to be destroyed. Yeah, that might happen when all the nations gather. Okay, and that's when you're going to come. YHWH is going to come on the Mount of Olives. Who knows what kind of thoughts were racing through the disciples' mind when they asked Jesus, “When and what's the sign when all these things will come to an end? You can teach us what all the prophecies are about. Can you imagine sitting with Jesus on the place you know that the king is going to return, and he begins to tell you the future before it happens? This is the conversation that we are about to study together. What an amazing thing to get to hear Jesus teach about the future at the exact place that it is prophesied he will return. So, with that, go back to Mark, chapter 13, and what I want you to observe about what Jesus says to see there in the temple is that the temple is a kind of conversation that you and I don't have today. Okay, this is well.
A lot of people are talking about eschatology today, but I don't think they're really seeing what starts the eschatology conversation here with Jesus. It is a question about the temple. I'm a Christian person. I grew up when my parents got saved in the Jesus movement in Southern California. I go to church. I believe in the new covenant. I believe that Jesus, when he died on the cross for my sins, the curtain in the temple was torn. It was torn from the top to the bottom, as if the temple now is over, because Jesus is my temple. Can I get an amen from anybody on that? I don't think about the temple. I've never gone to a feast at the temple. When I was at the temple, there was no temple there. It's just the temple mount. No one's doing sacrifices there. There were no priests of the tribe of Levi there, doing what they do in the temple.
So, see what I have to realize, and what we often have to realize when we're studying the Bible is that this is taking place in a different context than the context that I am in. Okay, we come to the Bible, this is our attitude today. We come to the Bible, and we say things like, well, what does the Bible have to say to me? And I really want you to think about that thought, because it's a very common thought among Christians today. What does the Bible have to say to me? Well, Scripture is very important in your life. In fact, “Scripture is God-breathed, and it's profitable”; it has great benefit for you, “it's profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be equipped for every good work,” Everything God wants you to do in your life, his Scripture will equip you to do it. So, the Bible has a lot to say to you, but here's the point I'm trying to make: You're not the original audience of the scripture. None of these books were written to us in Huntington Beach in 2026. No, these things were said in an ancient context, and if you really want to get the right interpretation of Scripture, you have to study it in its original context. Who was the author writing to? What was his intent to say to those people, that's where you're going to find the proper interpretation.
Let's get this down for point number one: “Eschatology needs to be studied in its original context.” And we need to see that they're having a conversation about the temple. I don't think about the temple as a new covenant believer in the Church of Jesus, I don't think about the temple like old covenant people in Israel would think about the temple, and if you miss that context, you'll probably come to wrong conclusions about what the Scripture says. Okay, so the people that Jesus is teaching here, where has he been? He's been in the temple. And what has he been saying? The religious leaders of the Jews are corrupt. The temple is going to be destroyed. This whole system that's happening here is coming to an end. That's the context of this conversation. So, what happens today is people just start reading Mark 13, like, oh, I'll just read it like it's written to me today, and then they don't really get what Mark 13 is saying. And not just this chapter, you could do that about the whole Bible. The Bible is written usually to a specific church or a specific group of people, or at a specific time and place, and if you don't get your mind around the original context, you just try to take it straight for yourself. That's when a lot of scripture is going to be twisted. So, we just need to start our series. Did you know that the reason Jesus and his disciples had a conversation about eschatology, it all started with what's going to happen to the temple. See, I've never been a part of that conversation. Everybody that I'm talking about eschatology with, in fact, some of them are like, well, there's not going to be a temple in the future. Why would there be a temple when Jesus is my temple? And he already died for my sins, and he already completed the entire old covenant? He fulfilled the law.
Why would there be any temple in the future? Well, I just want to say to people who think that about the future, the whole conversation about the future began with what's going to happen to the temple, and we'll see the abomination of desolation is something that has to do with the temple. We'll get to more of that. So, for people today to act like, forget the temple, that's old news, I'm just about the new news. Well, actually, it's a conversation about the temple that started the conversation about the future, so you can't just disregard that, or you're going to end up coming to wrong conclusions because you're not studying the original context. Now, everybody, turn with me to 1 Thessalonians 4, because the question about what's going to happen to you or what's going to happen to me as believers in Jesus, as new covenant Christians, as a part of the church, that question is answered in the book of 1 Thessalonians, which I think is a critical text in the study of eschatology that is often overlooked by Christians today. In 1 Thessalonians, chapter 4, there's a context that is more the same as you sitting here at our church on a Sunday morning. Look at their question, 1 Thessalonians, chapter 4, verse 13. “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep.” Now, when he says “asleep” here in this verse, “asleep” means we don't want you to be uninformed about those who have what everybody? Those who have died. Now, the reason we're saying people who have died are asleep is just like when somebody is asleep, you would expect them later on to wake up, so those who are in Christ, who die, we should expect them later on to rise from the dead. And so, that's what he's getting to here. “We don't want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.” Hey, let's talk about our hope that we have, for since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep. So, notice here the context is, we know the gospel, we're gospel people, we know who Jesus is as the Son of God, we know that Jesus is the one who paid for our sins, we know that Jesus is the one who rose again, and in the resurrection of Jesus is victory over my sin, my death, my judgment, and I can live a new life because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He's saying we have that hope, and so look, let's think that through. “For this we declare to you,” verse 15. “For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.”
So, the Thessalonian question was like, hey, one of our brothers has died. What's going to happen to them? They missed the return of Jesus. They died before Christ came back. Well, how is that going to work out? And so, he says, hey, I don't want you to be uninformed about that. Do you know that those who die in Christ, to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, so their soul is with the Lord, but when Jesus comes back, they will rise, which means they'll get a resurrection body, and they'll be there in the air with Jesus. And then those of us who are still alive, we will also be caught up into the sky, into the clouds, and will be with Jesus. And once you're with Jesus, you will be with him forever. Is that encouraging to anybody here? We're supposed to be encouraging one another with these words. So, I don't know how eschatology became such a confusing thing among Christians when it's supposed to be this encouraging, uniting thing about Christians. We're supposed to be saying things to one another, like I'll see you there or I'll see you in the air, because that's what's going to happen to us, that's our promise. This is our context.
So, this is what I'm trying to make very clear in our first sermon on eschatology, is what Jesus is saying in Mark 13 is in the context of being there, talking about the temple with the Jewish people who are going to experience judgment. The context here in 1 Thessalonians is very different. We're talking to people who believe in the death and resurrection of Jesus, people who have hope, they're not going to experience judgment, they're going to experience Jesus, and so they're two different contexts, and if you confuse that, you'll come to the wrong conclusions. The context is what will lead you to the correct interpretation. And so, a lot of people are scattered in their eschatology because they're trying to take what Jesus says and apply it directly to us in the church when Jesus is talking about the temple there in Israel with the corrupt Jewish religion that's going on in that day.
Now go back to Mark, chapter 13, because the second thing that Jesus wants you to see is in verse 5. The second thing that Jesus says, now they've asked him a question about “when”; when will this temple be destroyed, and when will all the things of the end come with all these things come with the end? What's the sign that we can know the end is going to be there? That's their question. Now, Jesus is going to answer this question. You can see over 37 verses in Mark 13, starting here in verse 5, all the way to verse 37, so we're not going to get the full answer here this morning. It's going to take us four parts to get the full answer, and Jesus doesn't jump straight to let me tell you about the end. He actually wants to start with things that are going to happen on our way to the end. So, the second thing He wants you to see in our verses is, see that no one leads you astray. Okay, so you need to be on the lookout, you need to watch out, because between now and the end, people are going to try to lead you astray, that's what he's saying to his disciples. So, and then notice in verse 7, “the end is not yet,” so before he gives an answer about the end, he wants to talk about the in between, how things are going to work on planet earth, but in between this conversation and the end, and one thing he says is, look at verse 6. “Many will come in my name, saying, I am he, and they will lead many astray.” So, the thing you need to be on the lookout for now, you can see the false religious leaders, you can see the temple that's going to be destroyed. Now, something you can't see, but you need to start looking out for it, is all of the false Christs that are going to come, all the antichrists, all the people that are going to try to get you to follow them like they're the way, the truth, and the life, like Jesus. There's going to be a lot of them. In fact, next to that verse you can write down Acts, chapter 5, because in Acts, chapter 5, one of the Jewish religious leaders, Gamaliel, he even says, hey, remember this guy and how people followed him, and remember this guy and how people followed him? And they had a following for a while, and then it fizzled out. We shouldn't do anything to these disciples, because if they're just like all the other guys, they'll fizzle out about Jesus, too. So, there's Gamaliel saying, yeah, there's a lot of people that are trying to get people to follow them, but there's no real truth to it, and eventually it goes away. So, false Christ is something we're all supposed to see that we are not led astray.
Yesterday, I got to go to Central Park here in Huntington Beach, I got to take a walk. It was such a beautiful day in Huntington Beach yesterday. Can I get an amen from anybody on that? I mean, if somebody has to live in Huntington Beach, it might as well be us. You guys know what I'm talking about, like, wow, what a day we were having. It's just, there are animals everywhere, there's the blue skies, there's the green grass, and trees. I'm just enjoying God's creation. I'm driving down PCH. The boundary of the sea is still there. I'm praising the Lord. And guess who's out there? People ready to tell people about another Jesus. They're already set up by the time I get to the park. They've got their pamphlets; they've got their brochures. See, that's what I think is included in this warning, there's going to be false Christs, and they're going to tell you about a Jesus who is not the Son of God, he's just a prophet of God. They're going to tell you about a Jesus who was a man who became a God. They're going to tell you about a Jesus who's a spiritual being. The first being that God created was Jesus. Jesus is a God, but he's not the God, and Jesus created everything else. That's the kind of Jesus they were talking about at the park yesterday. There are a lot of false Christs. There are a lot of things that have the name Jesus on them, but they are actually not Jesus at all. Watch out. Before we get to the end, there are going to be so many imposters, so many antichrists that you need to see that you are not led astray. And then he says this, verse 7, “and when you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be” what everybody? Alarmed. Can everybody underline that? Can everybody circle that? Because I just want to share with you what happened to me growing up, going to church, mostly in Southern California. When I heard about wars and rumors of wars, I was one hundred percent alarmed, because I heard pastors say things like there's a war going on in Israel, which means rally everybody up, start praying for your loved ones. The end is going to be soon.
Now, is that actually what Jesus is saying here? That every time there's a war going on with Israel, we should start raising the alarm, because that means the end is here? Look at what he says, verse 7, “When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. This must take place, but the end is not yet.” Can everybody read that? We need some pastors to read that, because a lot of pastors are saying something totally different than what Jesus just said, and they're freaking people out. Hey, it's going to happen now. Look at what's going on in the news. Look at the current events. It's going to happen now. There's a war going on. There's an earthquake over here. There's a famine over here. It must be soon that Jesus is saying actually wars, famines, earthquakes, natural disasters, national conflicts. That's standard operating fallen world procedure. That's not even close to what's coming, that's what he's saying. Look at verse 8. “Nation will arise against nation, kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places. There will be famines. These are but the beginning.” He's saying these aren't the end, these are just the beginning of the birth pains. Okay, so I've heard it, and it affected me. It freaked me out. I was pretty sure that Jesus was coming back any moment, and I wasn't sure if I was ready, because there was a war going on somewhere in the world. That's not what this Scripture is saying. This Scripture is saying, there's going to be lots of wars, there's going to be lots of things like earthquakes, famines. That's just the first contractions of the labor, okay.
So, this idea of birth pains is a picture that Jesus brings up, the idea of going through labor to have a baby. Now I'm sorry to bring this up, but I don't have a choice about bringing this up, because Jesus brought it up. Okay, I don't like it when I'm watching a TV show or a movie. Maybe this is just me, you can decide. But I don't like it when all of a sudden a woman is screaming and yelling because she's about to have a baby. I always think to myself, why am I watching this scene right now? This is intense. I didn't know this was in this TV show. I don't know if I want to watch this right, because it's like, whoa, intense pain. All of a sudden, the idea of labor, Jesus is bringing that idea up. Whatever this end is going to be, it's painful, like a woman going through labor. That's something Jesus is saying. And wars, earthquakes, famines, they're just like the first contractions. They're not like the full process of giving birth to the child, that's just the beginning. When you see the wars and the earthquakes, we're just getting started.
I don't know if anybody started feeling contractions, started getting so hyped up, drove down to the hospital and said, "We're having contractions,” and they said, “You still have a long way to go, you should go back home.” I don't know if that happened to anybody. You don't have to turn yourselves in. I know people that did happen to at this church. You're like a bunch of Christians getting hyped up over some war that's going on. It must be the end. No, these are just the beginning contractions. That's what Jesus is actually saying.
So, let's get this down now, for point number two: “Eschatology is often sensationalized.” It's often used, even by pastors, to make headlines. They rip from the headlines to make their own headlines, and that's not what Jesus is teaching here. Jesus is teaching that even some of the brutal wars that have happened on planet earth, even some of the brutal natural disasters, earthquakes leading to tsunamis that destroy towns, villages, and people die. That is not even close to what the end is going to be like. If you ever hear somebody at our church say, well, it's just getting so bad, I can't wait to get out of here. I don't think it can get much worse than this. It most definitely will get much worse than this. This is not something that you should be comparing to how bad it's actually going to be. This is just like you're feeling a contraction. This is not the labor, that's what Jesus is teaching, and this idea of labor is a common biblical analogy for this day of judgment and tribulation that is coming.
Go back to 1 Thessalonians and look at chapter 5, because Paul is also, when he's teaching these Christians about their questions about the future, he uses this labor picture as well. So, in 1 Thessalonians, chapter 5, if everybody can please turn there with me, this is so important for you to see this, because Jesus now brings up birth pains. Okay, and I have to bring this to our minds. Okay? Some of you may not have been in the labor and delivery room. I have been in there three times, okay? And you need to go back in your mind with me, okay. Ladies, do you remember what it was like to go through labor if you've ever been blessed to have a child? Okay, I'm sorry to bring that up, but that's what the Scripture is saying. Men, do you remember what it was like watching your wife go through labor, and how that was so intense? Some of you almost passed out. Can anybody remember that? I can remember holding my wife's hand, watching her, thinking I have never seen her act like this before. Something extraordinary is taking place here. This is a kind of pain that is off the charts, and I was like, maybe I should sit down. Right, this is intense. Okay, that's the picture. So, a kind of pain that you would never want to go through, except for the joy of your child being born. And childbirth is such a joy that women even are willing to go through labor again, but it is intense physical pain. And so, look at what with that fresh in mind. Look at what he says in 1 Thessalonians 5, verse 1. “Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you. For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, ‘There is peace and security,’ then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief.” Okay, so we can see that Jesus is talking about the beginning of the birth pains. Well, here's Paul describing the full labor pains that are going to come upon us. Notice, who does he say those pains are going to come upon them? Who's Paul writing to? Paul's writing to a church of people who believe in the gospel. He's not acting like they're going to go through the labor pains. He's saying those out there who don't believe are going to go through the labor pains. Jesus is talking to a group of people who may be going through the labor pains, and he's going to warn them that they need to wake up, and they need to get ready. Paul is talking to a group of people who are already ready for the labor pains. Paul is clearly using some of the same language of Jesus. Jesus is the one who said he's coming like a thief in the night. Paul here is quoting that idea. It's going to be a surprise; it's going to be like a thief in the night. Jesus is saying it's like the pains of labor. Paul's continuing that analogy. Oh, it's going to be sudden destruction, like the pain of labor, but notice what Paul's saying. Paul's saying it's going to happen to them, not you, not those who are ready, because look at what he says there in verse 4, “You are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief.” You're not going to be surprised like a thief in the night, because you're already ready. You're not going to experience the pains of labor, that's what's going to happen to them.
So, wow, Jesus is teaching it, like, watch out, or you're going to end up in the labor pains, the thief's going to come, and you won't be ready. Paul has a different tone when he's talking to saved people in the Church of Jesus. He's saying it's not going to surprise you, he's saying you're not going to be there, that's what's going to come on them. But you, you're not like that, brothers, you're going to escape that surprise if you have believed in the death and resurrection of Jesus. You are ready because it's not going to be your judgment, your labor pains. That's encouraging what he's saying in 1 Thessalonians 5. So, on one hand, this is super intense. Whoever's there in the day of judgment, it's going to be as painful as going through labor. Oh, good thing that those who believe in Jesus, we won't be surprised like a thief. We won't experience the labor pains; that's for them. No, he says very clearly in verse 4, “you are not in the darkness.” Look at verse 5, “You are all children of light, children of the day, we are not of the night or of the darkness.” So, if you ever hear somebody say foolish things like it's okay if I don't believe in Jesus, now I'm going to believe during the tribulation, that would be like somebody saying I enjoy the pains of labor, I'd go through those pains just for kicks. You know what I mean?
I remember this one guy, he told me that he couldn't believe in Jesus now because when the tribulation came, he needed to lead all the new Christians to fight the zombie horde, that's what he told me as he was blowing smoke in my face, and I'm thinking, if this guy is the guy I'm following against the zombie horde, we've got no shot. You know what I mean? Like, that did not sound hopeful. That did not sound encouraging to me that we could all fight through the zombie horde together. But that's the kind of thing that people say regularly if you talk to people these days, because they have taken how terrible this day of judgment is, and they have minimized it. When the Scripture is trying to say, have you ever been robbed by a thief in the night? It's a terrible experience. Have you ever gone through the pain of labor? It's a brutal physical reality. These were trying to think of bad things that happen that people don't want to go through as warnings of like that's what it's going to be like on the day of judgment.
People are not afraid enough of the day of judgment that is coming, and you might be one of those people. You're supposed to be terrified, you're supposed to think you'll be living in a horror movie that it's a nightmare come true. Go back with me to Isaiah 13. This idea of labor is not original to Jesus or to Paul. They are continuing to use an analogy already established by the prophets, and so if you go to Isaiah, chapter 13, and so many of these prophets describe this day of the Lord, and this is why it's so important that you follow prophecy all the way back to the Old Testament, that you go all the way back to the original context. If you're just trying to figure out your eschatology from the New Testament, it will be skewed. You have to study the whole of Scripture. And in the prophets, over and over, they talk about the day of the Lord, and I've been blessed over the last year, I got to teach 1 Thessalonians, which we're referring to today, I got to teach that in Uganda, I got to teach it in Tokyo, I got to teach it in India, talking to Christians all over the world about this subject of eschatology. And these guys in Uganda, I don't know if you remember the pastors they're training up there in their seminary school. Maybe you remember the videos we showed here at our church of these men singing songs together in the breaks between our studies. Well, these men, they had been trained in a way I haven't really seen people be trained before at this seminary in Uganda. They do a whole year of Old Testament study, then they do a whole year of New Testament study, but then they talk about all the specific things you might need to pastor a church or plant a new church, but their whole study begins in the foundation of the Hebrew Scripture. And so, when I came to talk to these men about the day of judgment, they had a different attitude about it than I've seen in America, because these men had actually read through the prophets, they'd actually studied them in great detail, and I asked them, regarding Day of YHWH, what's the first word that comes to your mind, and the first word that they said was wrath. You don't want to be here when the wrath comes. We have not seen wrath yet. Wars, earthquakes, famines, that's not wrath, that's just contractions, that's not labor pains.
No, actually, we're living in a time of patience. We're living in a time of kindness. We're living in a day of salvation. You think it's bad now, you don't know about the day, the day of wrath that is coming. Look at what it says here in Isaiah 13, verse 6, just one example of so many prophets talking about the day. It says, "Wail, for the day of Yahweh is near.” When is the last time you wailed about anything? Wail, like crying out in agony, because the day of YHWH is near. As destruction from the Almighty, it will come. All hands will be feeble, every human heart will melt, they will be dismayed. Sorry, leader of the future attackers of the zombie horde. You're not going to be ready to fight with gusto. You're going to feel like you can't even move. You're going to be overwhelmed. The Bible gives a picture of the strong man of war in the fetal position in the corner, crying out for help, that's what's going to happen on this day. And then it says this, “Pangs and agony will seize them, they will be in anguish like a woman in labor, they will look aghast at one another, their faces will be aflame. Behold, the day of Yahweh comes, cruel with wrath and fierce anger to make the land a desolation and to destroy its sinners from it. It’s like labor with no pain medication all the time is the day of Yahweh, and if you're not afraid of it, you should be. You should have a healthy fear of what's going to happen on that day of wrath.
Now, go back to 1 Thessalonians, chapter 5, because in 1 Thessalonians, chapter 5, if you can turn back there with me, look at how that passage ends, because he's telling the Christians, you won't be surprised like a thief. He's telling the Christians it will be labor for them, not for you. You're not of the night, you're not of the darkness, you're of the day. You've already been delivered from wrath. Look at what he goes on to say here in 1 Thessalonians, chapter 5, verse 5, “For you are all children[b] of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. 6 So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober. 7 For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night. 8 But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation, for God has not destined us for” what everybody? Wrath. Okay, so let's think this through. Can everybody process this with me? The day of Yahweh is known as a day of what? Wrath. We are not destined for what? Wrath. Therefore, are we going to be there on the day of Yahweh? The answer to that is what? No, we won't be there. We have not been destined for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep, we might live with him. Therefore, encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing. We need to think seriously about this day of YHWH that is coming, and we need to feel the heaviness for everybody we know that doesn't believe in the death and resurrection of Jesus. There is such a nightmare coming for them, such a pain coming for them. You don't even want your worst enemy to go through the day of YHWH. We should have such compassion, such prayer for those who are on their way to judgment, and then we should cry out to God with such thanksgiving and praise him for his mercy, that we won't have to go through it.
See, eschatology is often sensationalized, that's point number two. “Eschatology is often sensationalized,” but here's what we need to add: “when it is serious.” It's not meant to make headlines, it's meant to be like something we think about all the time, it's meant to sober us up, it's meant to get us thinking clearly, like a great and terrible future day of judgment is coming upon everyone I know that doesn't know Jesus. And I should be so thankful that I do know Jesus, and that I'm not destined for that wrath, and I won't be surprised like a thief, and I won't go through those labor pains. Paul is telling the church, the Christians, the believers, it's not for you, but it is for them, and so that's the sober way that we need to see what is coming. And so, if you know that you don't believe in Jesus, I want to give you a strong sense of urgency that you're signing up for a future thief in the night, you're signing up for a future labor pain. If you don't put your hope, notice that's the helmet we put on, is the hope of our salvation. You need to have the living hope of Jesus Christ in your life now, or you have no hope for the future. And if you do have Jesus in your life now, you have all the hope for the future. So, this is just part one. There's a lot more to come, but I hope that you can see what is coming. Let's pray right now.
Father in heaven, thank you that we could start to get into the teaching of Jesus on the Mount of Olives. And Father, we confess that this text is often taken out of context. We confess that a lot of times wars, earthquakes, they are hyped up like this is the end, when the end is so much more terrible than anything we've experienced. So, Father, I pray that today, in this time, right now, that you will turn our eyes upon Jesus, that all of us who have the hope of his death, of his resurrection, that Jesus already took my wrath when he died on the cross for my sins. I pray that everybody who has that hope, that we will encourage one another with these words, that we will build each other up, and I pray for anybody who's here today, and they don't have the hope of Jesus for their future, that they will see this future that's coming. It's not something they want to mess around with. It's not going to be just like another bad time to get through. So, I pray that you will wake people up, even here this morning, to turn to Jesus now, before the day of judgment comes. So, Father, please teach us from your Word what to think about when the end is going to come, and let us look to Jesus as our living hope. We pray this in his name. Amen.