The Day of Judgement
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24 Jesus left the temple and was going away, when his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple. 2 But he answered them, “You see all these, do you not? Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.”
Signs of the End of the Age
3 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?” 4 And Jesus answered them, “See that no one leads you astray. 5 For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and they will lead many astray. 6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. 7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are but the beginning of the birth pains.
9 “Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. 10 And then many will fall away[a] and betray one another and hate one another. 11 And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. 12 And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. 13 But the one who endures to the end will be saved. 14 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.
The Coming of the Son of Man
29 “Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. 30 Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. 31 And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.
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The Day of Judgement
A couple of weeks ago we looked at the Parable of the talents [Speaking with interpretor - saying nothing new] - I hope it is not the case today because I have asked to have this text to give us an angle on our title for the day “The day of the Lord: Judgement & Salvation.” I will not refer to the talents as such except to emphasise what is meant by Judgement and Salvation.
“qwertyuio”
Matt 25:30 ‘…cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness’
The Context
Jesus gave this parable in reply to a question (posed in Matthew 24) asking what will be a sign of the Second Coming. As always, Jesus was speaking into his present situation and forward to The Day of Judgement. So how are we going to read this parable. It’s known as a judgement parable and I think we have to take note of it as a warning, we should not read it thinking I’m all right because I’m saved. We should read it with a Godly fear, “So there is such a thing as judgement, there is a reckoning up at the end of our lives, there is a place of (v21) sharing the masters joy (a picture of heaven) and there is a place ( a hell of a place) (v30) ‘where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ (a picture of hell). I think if we recapture the reality of The Day of the Lord/a day of Judgement and live our lives as if we believe in such a place as hell, then we will be more deliberate about sharing the gospel, the good news that Jesus broke the chains of hell. It’s difficult stuff but maybe if we recaptured the warnings in the stories like today’s parable we would recapture the urgency of telling our gospel stories. CT Studd (the former England cricketer (of 1920’s) who gave up his career to spread the gospel) “Some want to live within the sound of church bells, I want to run a rescue shop within a yard of hell.” He was obeying the command in Jude 23 “save some by snatching them out of the fire.” Can you think of the last time you spoke to someone about Hell as a place. Come to think of it can you think of the last time you described + as a judge who will sit on the judgement throne in heaven?
The Judge
Let’s look at Jesus the judge. In the parable Jesus, makes this shocking judgement “throw the worthless servant o/side into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth”. It doesn’t seem right, surely he could have shown some mercy, at least give him another chance (I’ll come back to the second chance later) Who’d be a judge, In the last couple of months I’ve had two run ins with the law and on both occasions I had to stand before a judge. 1st I contested a parking ticket I recd in Durham, there was a loading van parked in the disabled bay and so I parked in the loading bay. I figured if it’s OK for the van to park in my slot w/out getting a ticket, it’s OK for me to park in his - wrong, I was breaking the law, parking in a loading bay, end of story, I may have your sympathies, but the bottom line was - I was guilty. The second was a little matter of a police video camera capturing me driving at 46mph in a 40mph restricted area. Not much 6mph over(quite good for me) but over non the less - I was guilty on both accounts. I prayed for mercy to God, I wanted out of both sins. I appeared before the judge(magistrate) & explained my pathetic case, guilty & looking for a pardon, mercy for the fool I had been. On one account the judge said guilty but I will show mercy, on the other account he said guilty & I will add 3 points to your driving license and you pay £40. Who’d be a judge. We expect them to be just until it’s personal and then we desperately seek mercy.
Do you really believe God is a judge, really believe it, or do you prefer God ‘our heavenly father’, God my Lord/master/friend, God my helper in times of trouble, I like God who loves me despite my failures and weaknesses but throughout the bible OT to NT there is this image of God the Judge, it’s an awesome picture. {Gen 18:25 as Abraham interceded for Sodom he recognised in the end despite his pleas “shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is right” Judges 11:27 “Let the Lord be judge this day b/n Israel & Ammon” Ps 75:7 “It is God who judges, he brings one down he exalts another.” He judged Adam&Eve banishing them from the garden for ever, he judged the people of Noah’s day, and for some reason we act as if he won’t judge us as people of today - we’ve fallen into the I’m saved & that’s OK trap but we are a people of our day, we belong in our society, our Country, our world even. We need to own our society and plead for our country, and our non Christian friends to hold off judgement - you are their best chance. Look at our OT reading of today Ezek 2:3 “I am sending you to a rebellious nation v4 the people are obstinate and stubborn…v5 whether they listen or not they will know a prophet has been among them} and if you’re thinking it’s OK Jesus is our knight in shining armour - it gets worse, the talk of the Judge and the Judgement day, day of wrath intensified in the NT, to make matters worse Jesus takes on the mantle of Judge. Jn 5:22 “The Father judges no-one but has entrusted all judgement to the son that all may honour the son”. James 5:9 “Don’t grumble against eachother or you will be judged” what does that mean I thought the cross sorted all that out for me. Matt 16:27 “the son of man will come.. and he will reward each person according to what he has done.” OH dear I haven’t done much Rev 20:12 “death and Hades gave up the dead and each person was judged according to what they’d done.”
Yes it’s true we will all appear before the judgement seat of Christ “ 2 Cor 5:10 “We must all appear before the judgement seat of C, that each one may receive what is due to them for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.” I don’t like the sound of that, I’m doing bad all the time & I don’t mean parking in loading bays and speeding - there’s the good I don’t do there’s the bad I do - (I’m a mess). And on that judgement seat is Jesus, holy & pure, knowing all my secrets, knowing all about me, my whole life before him - and I am not fit to stand before him. Does that make me like the man with the one talent.
Repentance
The problem with the Man in Matthew 25 who received one talent wasn’t that he dug a hole and buried his Talent but that he showed no sign of sadness or remorse. I expect if he’d said he was sorry, he’d mucked up, he’s not fit to be his servant, the parable would have had a different ending. But that’s not the way it went. Where there is no repentance there is no hope of salvation, where there is no remorse the people will never do anything to change their ways. So Judge Jesus said throw him into darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And I’m afraid that’s a picture of Judgement Day.
The place of eternal judgement for those who go through life without any remorse, without believing in Jesus actually self-fulfil the words of John 3:18 “whoever does not believe is condemned already…Light has come into the world but people loved darkness rather than light.”
Repentance is what it’s all about - I can’t overemphasise it enough - The first recorded words of John the Baptist was “Repent.” The first recorded words of Jesus was “Repent.” Peter’s first word after the outpouring of Holy Spirit at Pentecost was“Repent.” It’s not just a message to the non-Christians, to the seven churches addressed in Revelation - five of them were called to ‘Repent.’ Repentance triggers for the non-Christian New Life in the spirit and for the Christian continued cleansing and forgiveness. It may surprise you that I say this, but, many people who repeat the prayer “almighty God we have sinned against you and against other people…. We are truly sorry…” are not repenting. [Why] because if we’re just trying to gloss over sin then we don’t detest the sin. Even in the Church (let alone the world) we’re not serious about sin - but God detests sin (abhors it will take vengeance against it).
Sin is the only thing that separates us from knowing God. So it’s right to have a Godly fear of his great anger against sin.
In the papers this week the Christian Advertising Committee are portraying ‘Jesus the revolutionary.’ The church has played down the wrath of God in recent years, perhaps we’ve become conditioned by a society which accepts as normal things like materialism (my possessions), greed, pride in self achievements, and sex whenever it’s agreed on by consenting adults. In response our response is to talk about the love of God - it doesn’t touch the problem - only by talking of Judgement now and Judgement Day to came can we be woken up from our apathy. Yes, Jesus the judge on the day of Judgement frightens me but the same Jesus the judge on judgement day is Jesus my Lord and saviour today - because 2 Corinthians 5:21 “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us.” What a saviour, true, we will all appear before the Judgement seat but I’d rather know him as my saviour than as a stranger on that terrible day and hear him say “I never knew you.”
I know I’ve ranted a bit today but I’ve basically looked at 3 things
1> From the parables there is clearly a place where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth (a hell of a place) & we need to recapture our urgency to tell people(through our stories) how they can avoid hell.
2>We looked at the bible references behind God & Jesus as Judge of human kind & he will rule with justice and I asked can anyone stand before that judge.
3>I said the problem amounted to a watering down of repentance and yet the only grounds for the judge showing mercy is through repentance. Let us pray.
