Jesus on the End Times - Part 1

[0:00] All right, well, let's open up our Bibles to the book of Mark. As Ron mentioned, we're going to be back in the book of Mark. We took a little break to do a series on, what did we call it, reasons to believe.

[0:14] And so, but we're back in Mark here. We've been going through verse by verse, studying the life of Jesus. And today, as Ron mentioned, we're in Mark chapter 13.

[0:30] Mark chapter 13, the entire chapter, some call it the Olivet Discourse. And the reason they call it that is because Jesus gives this discourse, this sermon, if you will, this message from the Mount of Olives.

[0:46] We'll look at that more later. But this is Jesus talking about what we would call the end times, what's going to happen in the future.

[0:58] And he gives a fair bit of detail. As Ron also brought in, he brought in that scripture from Daniel that also talks about the time of the end.

[1:11] And as we study this passage, this chapter 13 of Mark, we'll see some of the similarities, some of the, that what Jesus is teaching is not something that's brand new that Jesus is sharing.

[1:24] But it's actually something that the prophets spoke of. Now, when we get into end times type things, there are typically two reactions.

[1:35] And I've experienced both of these in my life. One is your eyes glaze over and you look for the exits. Can I get out of here? The end times, that's, that sounds too complicated.

[1:49] And then other people get excited. You know, I really want to know what's going to happen in the end. And so, we'll, we'll try to provide this morning reasons why you should be excited and interested and not bored.

[2:08] Today, we're really just going to do an overview. Today is mostly going to be a setup. We'll read, we'll, we'll read a few of the verses from Mark 13, but we're not going to go through many of them.

[2:19] But we're really just going to provide some context for this chapter, for this whole end times prophecy or telling that Jesus gives.

[2:31] We're going to look at a few things. We're going to look at one, what is the purpose of prophecy? And specifically, the foretelling of the future. You know, not all prophecy is foretelling of the future.

[2:42] A lot of times, I think we assume that. We think, oh, prophecy is something about the future. But really, most prophecy in the Bible is not about the future. It's either about the past or the present. Prophecy is really just God speaking through his prophets, his people.

[3:00] We're going to look at why we should pay attention to this. Why is this important to us? We're going to look at some different views on the end times. And so, the little sheet that you got.

[3:11] By the way, did everybody get one of those? Anybody not get one of those sheets that wants one? Okay. We're going to look at a few different views on the end times.

[3:27] And then we're going to, again, look at some of the context and assumptions that we'll be taking as we go through this passage. Let's go ahead and read at least the first few verses of Mark chapter 13 to kind of get our minds set in what we're going to be reading about here.

[3:48] So, let's read Mark chapter 13 verse 1. Now, as he sat on the mound of olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately, Tell us, when will these things be and what will be the sign when all these things will be fulfilled?

[4:28] That's their question. That's their ask. That's their interest as Jesus continues on in the rest of this chapter telling them what is going to happen. A few questions to get us started.

[4:43] So, one, why should I care about the end times? Why does it matter? There's sometimes some big words used when it comes to talking about the end times. Pre-trib, post-trib, mid-trib, pre-millennial, post-millennial, amillennial.

[4:56] We'll talk about some of those things. Try not to bore you too much. But some people say, well, I'm either, I'm a pan-trib or I'm a pan-millennial. Well, what in the world does that mean?

[5:08] And so, it's kind of a joke about the end times. It says, well, I just believe everything's going to pan out in the end. And that is true, right? Everything will. And so, why does it really matter to us what happens in the future?

[5:23] God's got it in his hands, right? And we'll talk about that in a minute. Why should we care? Another question, what is the purpose of God foretelling the future? So, why does he want us to know about the future?

[5:36] What's the purpose behind that? He didn't have to tell us about the future, but he does. And then another one is, how deep should I dig into these end time things?

[5:47] Is this something I should spend a lot of time, a little time on? And those questions are, of course, kind of difficult to answer. But as we go through it today and even into the next few messages, because we'll spend probably a few weeks on this, we'll get into answering those questions.

[6:02] I'm going to start with the first one. So, should I care about end times things? You know, people in general are really interested in the future, right?

[6:13] Not just Christians, but everyone in the world. There are things like astrology, looking up into the stars and trying to determine.

[6:24] People have this concept of determining the future by looking up at the stars. There are things, you might see these. I don't know, do they still have these when you're in the checkout line at the grocery store?

[6:35] You can get your horoscope. They've got these little magazines or something. And again, those are using the stars, the signs of the stars, to try to determine what does my future look like?

[6:49] You have, in the Bible, you have people who are fortune tellers. And today, you have people that are fortune tellers. Sometimes you'll drive by and you'll see a little house or a little business.

[7:04] And we'll say, hey, come, learn your fortune. And for some of those things, they're just complete scams, people making things up. But then as we look in the Bible at fortune tellers, what was involved with the fortune tellers?

[7:19] Evil spirits. Evil spirits, sometimes called familiar spirits, who are involved in telling people things about themselves that no man, no human person, maybe could possibly know.

[7:33] Of course, even spirits really can't tell that much about the future, just like we can know a little bit about the future, at least the brief future in front of us. We can make predictions about what kinds of things are going to happen.

[7:46] Even evil spirits can do that. But God is the one who is in control of the future. So, has anybody heard of the prophecies of Nostradamus?

[8:00] He was, I don't remember how long ago he lived, but he created this book of prophecies, and lots of people have been interested in that. You look at ancient civilizations, and they had prophecies about the future, and when the world was going to come to an end.

[8:13] This desire that we have to know the future, is that something that is bad, or is that good? I really think that that's part of God.

[8:25] God put that in there. God put in us a desire to know really two big things. Where do we come from, and where are we going?

[8:36] Right? And that feel, and knowing those things, there seems like a hole that is in us in not knowing those things. And what does the Bible tell us?

[8:46] What's the very first book of the Bible? It's called Genesis, which means the book of beginnings. God tells us where we come from. The last book of the Bible is called Revelation, and it's telling us about where we're going, what's going to happen in the future.

[9:03] And is Revelation the only book that tells us about our future? Well, we're reading here in Mark 13 more. But really, the Bible is filled with Scripture about what's going to happen in the future.

[9:19] Now, it doesn't tell us everything that's going to happen in the future. Sometimes our curiosities, there's no extent, probably, right, to our curiosity. We want to know all the little details.

[9:30] But the Bible doesn't tell us all the details, but it does tell us some. I'm going to share a few Scriptures here. Deuteronomy 29, 29. This is Moses.

[9:42] He is, I forget, on one of the mountains. Moab, I think, or one of the mountains. And he's giving a renewal of the covenant, going over Israel's covenant with God through the law of Moses.

[9:58] And he ends it with this, and he says this, The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of the law.

[10:13] See, there are secret things that God holds on to that he doesn't share. But then there are things that he does share, and he shares them. Why? Because he wants us to know.

[10:24] And so we should hold on to those things. And we should, at the same time, be okay that we don't know everything. Another Scripture verse from Isaiah 46. Isaiah 46, verse 9, talking about God's foretelling of future things.

[10:40] And it says this, Remember the former things of old, so the past. For I am God, and there is no other. I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning.

[10:56] And from ancient times, things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure. See, God, at times, declares what's going to happen later, the end, before it starts.

[11:14] Then he says this, Calling a bird of prey from the east, The man who executes my counsel from a far country. Indeed, I have spoken it, and I will also bring it to pass.

[11:26] I have purposed it, and I also, and I will also do it. So God tells us, at times, his plans for the future, and he is committed to bringing it to pass.

[11:42] Another one, 1 Corinthians 2, verse 9. Again, speaking of the secret things that are revealed. Paul says this, But as it is written, So God has prepared a future, an amazing future, a future that is really beyond imagination for those who love him.

[12:15] But not all those things have been revealed. But here's the rest of the verse. But God has revealed them to us through his Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.

[12:27] These things weren't always revealed. In fact, the Bible is a book of, we call progressive revelation. Over time, God has revealed more and more and more. Another one from Revelation.

[12:40] This is Revelation chapter 10. John is seeing all these visions, mostly about the future. And he's writing down what he sees for our benefit.

[12:54] But there's this one passage, Revelations 10, verse 4, that's very interesting. Now, when the seven thunders uttered their voices, I was about to write, but I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, Seal up the things which the seven thunders uttered, and do not write them.

[13:16] Now, what does that do in your mind? That makes me even more curious, right? What in the world were these seven thunders saying? What did he hear that he wasn't supposed to write?

[13:29] You know what? God said, I don't want him to know. It's just for you, John. You heard it, but I don't want you to write it down. Now, maybe in the future, we will know, right? And our curiosity will be satiated.

[13:42] But for now, this is something that God did not want to reveal. Another one, this is from Paul. Paul was, he received many revelations from God, and he talks about that in several places in his writings.

[13:59] But he, in fact, in one place, he says, you know, I spoke to the Lord. I'm not sure. It was like I was in heaven, but I'm not sure that I was actually in heaven, or if it was just a vision and a dream. I'm not sure.

[14:10] But he received lots of revelation from the Lord. In 2 Corinthians 12, 4, he says this, and he talks about himself in the third person, so it's a little bit funny.

[14:22] But he says this about himself, how he was caught up into paradise, and he heard inexpressible words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.

[14:33] Paul heard things that he said, I'm not allowed to repeat these things. This is something that God has meant to remain a secret until a future time.

[14:49] So what should our attitude be when it comes to end times prophecy? Just a few notes. One, humility.

[15:01] You know, if you've ever looked into end times prophecy, what's going to happen in the future, one of the things you'll find out very quickly is that there are lots of different viewpoints that are quite varied.

[15:13] There's a spectrum from here all the way to here, in this direction, in that direction. People have different views of what's going to happen in the future, and all of them, or most of them, are based on from the Bible.

[15:28] There are certain assumptions, and we'll try to get into this. We'll talk about this this morning, and maybe into the future, too. What are those assumptions that cause people to go this way or that way when they're trying to interpret what's going to happen in the future?

[15:43] Prophecy about the future can be challenging. It was for people back in the time of Jesus, even in the Old Testament, and it is the same today.

[15:55] Some aspects of what's going to happen in the future are more important than others. For example, one of the things that Jesus focused on, or a question that was given to him, and in fact, it was in Mark chapter 12, he was asked about the resurrection.

[16:15] There were some people who believed that in the future, men would be raised from the dead, and others who believed, nope, when you're dead, you're dead, and that's it. That's kind of an important thing, right?

[16:26] Don't you think? Whether we should know that is this all that there is to life, and then it's over, or does God have a future, an eternity planned out for us? And so Jesus thought it was important enough to address and answer this question, and he said, no, there's evidence, there's things in the scripture that point to a resurrection for both the righteous and the unrighteous.

[16:56] Some prophecy, I believe, is meant to be murky, cloudy, to not have a lot of detail, and we should be okay with that.

[17:08] Certain things you see, and we'll look at this specifically with what Jesus is talking about, there were prophecies in the Old Testament that spoke about many of the same things Jesus spoke of, but he provides some more detail that was not provided by the Old Testament prophets like Daniel.

[17:24] And then when we look at Revelation, and we'll make this point too as we go through, Revelation provides even more detail than what Jesus provides here in the Olivet Discourse.

[17:38] So some prophecy is meant to be murky. God wants us to know a few details, and then that's it. And we should be okay with that. Our emphasis and interest in end times things, I think we need to be careful about becoming too obsessive about what's going to happen in the future.

[17:59] Again, like we've already reiterated, God has things that he wants us to know about, but then he doesn't tell us everything that we may want to know. And so we might be digging and digging and trying to figure out all the details, and really, God didn't mean for us to understand all the details.

[18:15] But at the same time, not being dismissive. All the details can sometimes make our eyes glaze over. This is just too much information.

[18:27] But really, when we look at the life of Jesus and his ministry, one of the things that we see over and over and over again, in fact, if you have a Bible, a digital program that you can search the Bible, if you look through the Gospels for the phrase, have you not read, you'll see that over and over and over and over again, a phrase that Jesus repeated over and over again when he was speaking to his people, specifically the leaders, the ones who were supposed to be the academics, the ones who were studying the Scripture.

[19:03] Just a couple of examples. In Mark 12, the previous chapter to this one, Jesus says, have you not even read this Scripture, the stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone?

[19:16] That was an important one because that was a Scripture, a prophecy about him. And so Jesus is making the point, hey, you should be studying these things.

[19:26] You should know about my coming, about all the details of me. You shouldn't be surprised that there's this guy coming. You should have been looking at the prophecies and know that this was coming and know some of the details.

[19:44] Another one, the same chapter, Mark 12, Jesus says something similar, but concerning the dead, and we talked about this, the resurrection of the dead, that they rise. Have you not read in the book of Moses in the burning bush passage how God spoke to him saying, I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.

[20:02] So God wants us to look at the Scriptures and he's revealed things for a reason that we might know about them. Next we get into kind of the next question.

[20:15] So why is it important that we know about the future? What is God's purpose in telling us about the future? And I'm going to look at four things. Number one is that he would give us hope and comfort for the future.

[20:33] The future can be a very foreboding thing, right? What's going to happen in the future? Is it just darkness and death? Or is there something else that we should look forward to?

[20:46] And God speaks over and over and over again about the future for those who love him, that there is a bright future full of life for those who love him.

[20:58] In 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, Paul speaks to the future specifically to those who have lost their loved ones because he wants to reiterate this to give them hope for the future, not only for their lives, but that they would see their loved ones again.

[21:16] And he says this in 1 Thessalonians 4, verse 16, For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout and with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet of God and the dead in Christ will rise first.

[21:30] Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord.

[21:41] And then he finishes up with this, Therefore comfort one another with these words. God telling us about the future is for our comfort, for our hope.

[21:56] Number two, the second purpose I think we find is God wants his people to be prepared. There are things that are coming that his people need to be prepared for.

[22:08] This is, I think, one of the big reasons for the Olivet Discourse. One of the things that comes into mind, well, who should be prepared? Who is he speaking to?

[22:19] What's this future going to be like? And in what ways should we be prepared? This Olivet Discourse, and we'll look into this, of course, as we go on, is to prepare his people for a time called the Tribulation or the Great Tribulation, also called in the Old Testament the time of Jacob's trial or Jacob's trouble.

[22:47] A few verses from this passage that kind of speak to this. Mark 13 and verse 5, We'll be getting again into more of the details, but big picture wise, Jesus wants them to listen carefully.

[23:08] The reason I'm telling you this is because deception's coming and you need to be prepared. Another one in verse 9, But watch out for yourselves, for they will deliver you up to councils and you will be beaten in the synagogues and you will be brought before rulers and kings for my sake, for a testimony to them.

[23:31] Be prepared. This is what's going to happen. Number three, the third purpose, I think, for the foretelling of the future is confirmation.

[23:44] Confirmation. I think the life and ministry of Jesus is the number one example of that. One of the, another phrase you'll see in the Gospels many times, like the one we just spoke of, have you not heard, is another one.

[24:02] And it goes something like this, that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by the prophet Isaiah or Jeremiah or Hosea or Micah. And you see this over and over in the Gospels, that these things happened, that it might be fulfilled.

[24:18] God spoke, and now it's coming to pass. And us knowing what was spoken before, we can find confirmation that the things that we're seeing in the people during the day of Jesus, the things that they're seeing with Jesus, it's a confirmation.

[24:38] Those prophets spoke what was going to happen, and it's an additional testimony testimony that what Jesus was doing and what he was saying was true.

[24:51] I think that's the same case for us. There will be things that happen in the future, and there will be questions. Is this part of God's plan, these things that are happening? We'll be able to go back to the prophecies that were foretold, Mark chapter 13, Daniel, the book of Revelation, other places, and when they actually take place, we can look back and say, wow, this is what the prophets told about.

[25:18] These things are being fulfilled. The fourth purpose, and this one I think is probably less talked about, is God tells the future because he's looking for repentance.

[25:36] He's looking for people to change. This one, again, is not commonly talked about, but sometimes God tells what his future plans are because he wants people to change so that he can turn away from his plan.

[25:57] I think the biggest, the most clear example that most people are familiar with is the book of Jonah. Jonah the prophet. Remember what God asked Jonah to do. You are my prophet, and I want you to go to the people of Nineveh.

[26:10] These are Gentiles. They were basically like the terrorists of the day menacing the people of Israel, murdering and killing people in Israel. They were the enemies of God.

[26:23] And God told Jonah, I want you to go to the people and I want you to give them this message. In 40 days, Nineveh will be destroyed.

[26:33] In 40 days, Nineveh will be destroyed. And as we all know, in 40 days, Nineveh was not destroyed.

[26:44] And that was because, what did they do? They repented. It's wild for a godless Gentile nation like that to repent and turn to God.

[26:55] But that's what they did. And it says in the scriptures that when they repented, God says, I repented of my wrath towards them. I turned.

[27:06] We think about, well, God doesn't repent. Well, repent just means to turn. He had this plan. He was planning to destroy them and he let them know it. It was an opportunity for them to turn and they did.

[27:20] And so, he also turned from his wrath. Okay. Now, we're going to get into some technical details and some jargon. Are you ready?

[27:32] Everybody got their little sheets? So, there are, in general, two major categories of views. There are lots of little ones.

[27:44] Again, there's this full spectrum. But if we can divide up the viewpoint about the end time into two major categories, what we would call those are preterism and futurism.

[27:58] Let's talk about those. preterism, which is just a, I can't remember if it's Greek or a Latin root, but it's just a word that means past.

[28:10] And of course, futurism, that one's pretty easy. It's about things that are in the future. the big difference is, with a preterist view, most, many, some amount of prophecy, usually a fairly large part, is considered to have already come to pass.

[28:28] The fulfillment is in the past. Whereas, with futurism, the large swath of prophecy, specifically about these things, the end times, is still in the future.

[28:41] So, a little bit more detail on preterism. Again, many or most of the prophecies about the future, specifically the ones about the end times, have already been fulfilled.

[28:56] In fact, for preterists, with this, all of the discourse that we're studying the next few weeks, preterists say that all the things, or almost all the things that are spoken of in this passage, have already been fulfilled.

[29:13] It's already happened. The typical things that they would say have not been fulfilled yet are these three things. One is the final bodily return of Jesus, his second coming in the flesh, which the Bible speaks of many times.

[29:34] So they say, well, that's still in the future. The other thing is judgment day. Judgment day when God judges the whole world. That's still in the future. And then the other thing still in the future is the new heavens and the new earth.

[29:47] When everything comes to an end and only the righteous are left and God has really the future glory, which really beyond that, there's no other detail.

[30:02] We call that the new heavens and the new earth. It's described in a little bit of detail, not too much, in the last book of Revelation, the last chapter in Revelation.

[30:14] The preterist view typically uses a lot more symbology, symbols, and metaphors than the futurists would.

[30:26] So they look at many of these things that Jesus talked about and they see them more as symbols or metaphors. And we'll, as we go through and studying verse by verse, we'll talk about some of the specifics of how that works.

[30:46] The preterist view has actually been pretty popular over the centuries. and even from early on in the Christian, in Christianity, even through the Reformation.

[31:02] And it has some amount of popularity today, though I think the futurist view today is probably more common. There is a view called full preterism.

[31:12] And so, if you ever talk to somebody about this, just keep this in mind. Most preterists, they call themselves partial preterists, but there are some who would say, I'm a full preterist.

[31:26] And what that means is, is they think every single prophecy about the future, including Jesus returning, the judgment day happening, and the new heavens and the new earth, it's already here.

[31:40] That's all, it's already happened. It's a very, a fairly small minority, but there are, there are people out there who hold, who hold that view. All right, let's talk about futurism.

[31:52] Futurism, this other category, large category, says really the opposite. Many or most of the prophecies, specifically these that we're going to be studying in Mark chapter 13 in the Olivet Discourse, most of them have yet to be fulfilled.

[32:05] They're still in the future. Even, so, if you look at the book of Revelation, a futurist would say, everything except for the last one or two chapters of Revelation is, am I getting that right?

[32:22] Or most of Revelation is still fulfilled. I guess it's the preterists who say everything, most of the things have already been fulfilled except for the last couple of chapters. But a futurist would say, hey, the book of Revelation is all about future things in regard to, relative to us today.

[32:37] The other thing that you should know about futurism is it tends to read prophecy much more literally. As we read things, there's less metaphor involved. It takes things much more literally.

[32:51] So what really is behind these two views of prophecy? So we're going to look at two more kind of theological systems that really relate. And typically, if you're a preterist, you fit into one of these theological systems.

[33:05] And if you're a futurist, you typically, not always, but typically, fall into another. And these two systems are called covenant theology and another one called dispensationalism.

[33:19] All right, so what are these? Really, and to try to summarize, it can be difficult to summarize, but covenant theology says this, that really, God has had one people, one group of people that are his people, people who believe in him throughout all the ages of history.

[33:43] From the very beginning of creation until the very end, there's one people that are his people and his group. And that that group of people, though, right, they change as far as through the generations, they're new generations that come to pass, that they have the same promises, the same requirements for how they ought to live and how they ought to serve him, and three, that they have the same future.

[34:12] So there is one group, they might look different, they might be from different nations or peoples. A few things might change, but in general, they have the same promises, the same requirements for how to live, and the same future.

[34:32] Where this really gets, comes into play, and tell you what, let's talk about dispensationalism. Because dispensationalism has a different view. Dispensationalism says actually God has two different groups.

[34:46] Now some people might divide it in more, but in general, there are two groups that we should consider, and God actually has some different promises, not all the promises are different, but there is a significant amount of promises for them that are different.

[35:00] The requirements for how they ought to live is different, and their future is also different. And what are those two groups of people?

[35:12] The two groups are Israel, the children of Abraham, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. So there's this nation of people called Israelites, the Jews, and God has a specific plan for them that he has provided prophecies about.

[35:31] And then there's another group of people, a people who are more of a Gentile people, or really, as the Bible says, made up of both Jew and Gentile.

[35:42] And Paul uses a term about this group that he calls them the body of Christ. So these are two groups, and so a dispensationalist will say, hey, we need to be careful as we study the Bible that we make sure what is being written about.

[35:58] Is this being written about the one group, Israel, or is this something that's being written about the other group, the body of Christ? One of the things that really comes into play today, when it comes to those two views, is, well, what about modern-day Israel?

[36:24] And so, if you are a preterist or hold to this covenant theology view, you would believe that Israel has no future, ethnic Israel, the Jewish people, but that ethnic Israel has been replaced by a new group, people who trust and believe in Jesus, like us, and so, the promises to Israel about them having a land and them having a kingdom where the Messiah would rule, these are all more metaphors and symbols and they apply to Christians today so that we are kingdom people.

[37:11] and so, there are typically three and if you get out those pieces of paper, in fact, I forgot to grab one. Is there any extras? Could you get one for me?

[37:25] So, there are these four kind of major views. Thank you, sweet. The first one in blue here is called post-tribulational premillennialism.

[37:36] Man, is that a mouthful. And, the second one, pre-tribulational premillennialism. So, they're both premillennial and what does that mean? Well, millennium just has to do, it's talking about the kingdom.

[37:49] God has promised a kingdom to Israel, a restored kingdom. You know, in the Old Testament, the Jews had a kingdom. They had kings but then they lost it. So, there are all these prophecies where God says, I'm going to restore your kingdom and it's going to be great and you won't be the tail, you won't be behind the other kingdoms.

[38:07] There's coming a day in which the Jewish kingdom will be the head over the whole world. You will, you will actually as a nation rule over all the other nations.

[38:18] And that has never happened in the history of the world. But it's been prophesied that that will happen. And so, the millennium and it comes from Revelation, the book of Revelation speaks of a thousand year kingdom and so millennium means thousand years and so the millennium is the kingdom.

[38:36] What is, and so really this comes down to what is the nature of the kingdom and when will it come to pass. So, the first two, premillennialism, are futurist views.

[38:48] They view the millennium as still in the future. The second two, postmillennialism and amillennialism, view the millennium as in the past and in the future.

[39:03] So, both of those views see the kingdom as happening right now. Postmillennialism takes more of a literal view of the kingdom.

[39:16] A postmillennialist would say this, that God is establishing a kingdom on earth not through Jesus physically coming down and sitting on a physical throne in Israel, kingdom.

[39:29] But he's kind of ruling and reigning in our hearts as Christians and he expects us as Christians to take over the kingdoms of the world.

[39:42] Typically, they would say the millennium is not a literal thousand years. It might be five thousand years or ten thousand years or even a hundred thousand years. But God's plan is to rule over all the nations of the earth through Christians.

[39:57] And so, it is part of your Christian duty to take over the political kingdoms of the world. And so, you actually see these kinds of attempts throughout history creating Christian city-states even during the Reformation.

[40:18] Calvin's Geneva. Really a big, a large history of the Catholic Church but even also the Protestant Church. It's certainly not a Catholic thing but to have this church-state union.

[40:34] And a big part of that is this view that this is the duty of the Christian to have a political influence and not just influence but to eventually take over. The amillennial view says this that we are in the kingdom today but it's not actually a political kingdom at all like the Post Mills would say.

[40:55] Amillennial just means there is no millennium and the amillennialists don't like that because they say well no we believe in a millennium we just say it's more spiritual. And so they would say there's really two kind of views that the millennium has happened the kingdom is just in our hearts and so as we lead other people to Christ we are helping to expand God's kingdom just through people trusting in Christ and sharing our faith with others.

[41:23] Or some would all say well this the kingdom that we're going to experience as Christians after they die they go to heaven and they're experiencing the kingdom in heaven. So those are kind of the two different views of amillennialism.

[41:38] So the first two are a futurist view the second two are a a preterist view. Let me get back to my notes here I'm getting lost.

[41:51] So back to dispensationalism what is dispensationalism? So two groups of people Israel and the body of Christ dispensationalists who say hey there are some different promises some major differences in the promises to these two groups for the Jews God promised them an earthly king called the Messiah and an earthly kingdom a land and a rule on the earth but for the body of Christ has been promised really a heavenly a heavenly home of course not all the promises are different both Israel and the body of Christ are promised eternal life for those who trust in Christ but the promises are a little bit different another difference the requirements so for the Jews they were required to keep these commandments called the law of Moses you must do these things in order to be my people you have to circumcise you have to do you know eat certain foods and abstain from other foods you have to farm in a certain way you have to keep the

[43:08] Sabbath make sure you don't work from sun up or from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday these things are very important to being the people of God but for the body of Christ there are different requirements where God says if you want to be my people you just need to trust in the death burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ no rituals no works to do to be my people trust in Christ alone in a finished work that is completed and the outworking of the Christian life of course we ought to look at what is right and wrong and the law actually can help us with that but it's not a requirement for having a relationship with God like it was for the Jewish people and then also a different future again Israel was promised a restored nation a righteous messianic king who would come and rule over the Gentile nations but for the body of Christ there is a different promise for the future and that's something and here's another controversial thing in eschatology is something called the rapture and I'm sure most of us have heard about the rapture a lot of controversy there but most dispensationalists or all dispensationalists

[44:32] I think would say the future for the body of Christ this group of people Christians today is to be raptured up and taken taken up to be with the Lord and before some of the other things in the end come let's look at some of these details so the post tribulational premillennialism so again this is a futurist view the tribulation is coming in the future the second coming and then the kingdom before the final judgment so we have these two premillennial views what's the difference well if you look at this the blue one compare the blue and the red one there's only one difference right and what is that it's the rapture it's the rapture so there's these things coming in the future and the dispensationalists will say hey before all these troubles come the tribulation and the kingdom the believers today will be raptured up they'll be taken away up into heaven but the the first one the blue one post tribulational premillennialism says actually the christians us christians today if we live that long if we live to see the time of the tribulation we will experience it and go through it now the post millennial view when it comes to that's the yellow one says hey listen the tribulation that's already happened and right now we are living in the kingdom the kingdom period that's where we are right now and then amillennialism of course everything is symbolic when everything is symbolic you can imagine that there is a huge spectrum of viewpoints on kind of what things mean and that certainly is the case for amillennialism a few just different other details about dispensationalism dispensationalism as a kind of organized system of viewing the bible has been popularized just in the last couple hundred years there's a guy famous his name was

[46:45] John Nelson Darby who first started putting all these things together he wasn't really happy with the differences he saw between the promises made to Israel and the promises that he found in the New Testament it seemed like those were different there was a guy named C.I.

[47:07] Schofield who created what we would call today a study bible anybody have a study bible there's all kinds today right you can get a study bible from John MacArthur or Tony Evans or all kinds of different people or sometimes different groups or the ESV has its own study bible that comes with that translation and those are helpful right they have little study notes because you can sometimes scriptures can be hard to interpret but he put together one of the early study bibles and he had this view called dispensationalism and it actually people like the study bible and they took on those views and they thought they really made the bible easier to understand and I think that that is true but since that 200 years dispensationalism has really grown in popularity now especially so beginning in 1948 dispensationalism just took off and why would that be in 1948 what happened in 1948

[48:15] Israel became a nation again and that was wild and remember that if you're not a dispensationalist or at least you're not premillennial these first two you're not a futurist you believe that well the nation of Israel is there's nothing left for them it's just the Christians you know and you could be a Jewish Christian but you know there isn't anything specific there's not like a nation or a land or anything like that for the Jewish people so when Israel and it seems miraculously how in the world could a nation that was deprived of their land 2,000 years ago form again into into a nation again has that ever happened in the history of the world where a people group were conquered scattered and then 2,000 years later they regrouped to form a nation again it's never happened before not even close usually within what one two maybe three generations your people that was once a nation has just been assimilated into the nations around them that's the history of the world there's this amazing thing in which these people the

[49:28] Jews who have maintained their identity in Russia and Brazil and America and all over the world they've maintained their Jewish identity and they've gathered together back into a land where they originally had a home and started a nation once again and so with that this whole concept of dispensationalism where Israel has a future still God can keep those literal promises to Israel became much more popular and I think rightly so but I will say this dispensationalism has kind of declined over the last I don't know maybe 30 years and it's it's hard to know why things like that happen but regardless of the decline I think most churches today and this is hard to gauge right would be dispensationalists would be dispensational think about most of your

[50:29] Baptist churches are probably dispensational a lot of your non-denominational churches like ours are dispensational charismatic Pentecostal churches a lot of those are dispensational typically the ones that are preterist or non-dispensational are maybe your older mainline denominations like your Presbyterians or where are some of the other ones Lutheran yeah Methodist even I think oh boy all right let's see where can I go from here maybe I should just save this for next week yeah let's just do this we'll wrap up with this and we'll save the rest for next time we've already talked about the literal interpretation of futurists and the more symbolic of preterists again so just some more differences between the futurists and the preterists the covenant theology versus the dispensational when it comes to law and grace dispensationalists tend to make a bigger distinction between grace and law somebody who holds to a covenant theology would say actually when

[51:51] Moses brought down those ten commandments off the mountain he was bringing down tablets of grace and we would say no way Jose those ten commandments those requirements the law said do these things and you will live that's what that's what the law said whereas grace says believe trust only in Christ and you can have eternal life so that's another that's a big difference when it comes to rituals dispensationalists if you go to a dispensational church typically there will be less rituals involved if you go to a more of a covenant theology church you're going to see more rituals among them because why because there's this continuation that we are kind of continuing from Israel and did Israel have a lot of rituals yeah they did again when it comes to modern Israel dispensationalists will typically have a positive view towards Israel and their place in the world and their existence whereas somebody who holds to a covenant theology would have a negative view of Israel in fact sometimes not always with those who hold that view there is what we call anti-semitism there is more of a kind of a hatred or a disgust or a strong dislike for Israel and then when it comes to the outlook of the future a dispensationalist would typically have a kind of a negative outlook towards where things are going in the world things are kind of getting pretty bad whereas somebody who is a covenant theology who holds to covenant theology specifically the post-millennial version would say hey you know things are going to eventually get better and you actually see over over history because history has been there have been times where things have been really good for Christians and times when things have been really bad and typically people's view of the future relates to how things are going right now so when things are really good for Christians there's more people that hold to this more optimistic view of life on earth for the Christian and when things are really getting really bad or are really bad people tend to have a view of hey we're just we're looking forward to when

[54:10] Jesus comes and rescues us from all of this so those things impact kind of the popularity of these views tell you what next time we're going to get into looking at these two groups and the importance of understanding the difference between Israel and the body of Christ but our time is up today tell you what was this helpful to anybody by the way okay two of you no I saw more than I appreciate that can we just take some time is there are there any questions from all this this is kind of a lot of information I know there's as we go in the next few weeks we're going to get into what Jesus actually said and I think maybe it'll be a little bit easier to follow but I thought it was important to just provide this big picture of overview before we jump into the details and go verse by verse any questions or comments let's see how awkward the silence can get before we have one oh two comment this week we saw some of that hatred for the Jews there is really leader over here in America oh yeah in D.C.

[55:38] right in D.C. all the people outside so it's real it is yeah yeah and it's not just one event right I mean over and over and over again and anti-Semitism has been around for a long time and regrettably it's been part of the Christian church at different times and different seasons and among different groups too yeah yeah you know what I was gonna say I think it's helpful what you've put together and just remind everybody the message is recorded so it might be good to go back and listen again and just kind of point by point even take some time to read about some of the different things because it's what's interesting as you went through it is thinking about a lot of different you know Christian people that we talk to that have different viewpoints or maybe pastors that are preaching certain messages and it does you know it can point back to what group or viewpoint that they have and I think there's some people that may not realize certain things are kind of connected so that's helpful yeah and then I really liked what you said in the very beginning somewhere in there that humility right and we really

[56:46] I think that really jumped out at me this is stuff that man people can get real wound up about and I think that we should be passionate about scripture and what it means and our understanding of it but we need to be humble realizing that there's a lot of details that God remains their secret and so just make sure that we don't let our search and study of these things push us apart but rather hey have some humility and let's listen to each other as we kind of work through look at the scripture and we should always I think always be in a place to be ready to be maybe directed a little bit yeah right always learning and growing I certainly don't ever assume that there aren't things that I need to learn or change so I like the humility point yeah thanks for emphasizing that yeah we can we can and this these are internal debates within Christian circles that doesn't determine whether you're a real Christian or not sometimes I think people tend to do that with certain things but yeah we can agree to disagree or just have differences on these views and it's okay not trying to like cap it or anything but I just want to say that we know one of God's big things and one of

[58:08] Jesus' preaching is faith is we just we have to remain faithful you know we we're tested our faith is going to be tested that's going to be our our ticket I mean we have to believe it's all it's faith based yeah so yeah anything else all right let's close in a word of prayer father thank you for telling us about our future giving all the details that you have it's tremendous you didn't have to tell us about all these things but you chose to and we're grateful and we pray that we would be diligent to look to the scriptures that we could look to the future with confidence knowing what you have told us about what our future holds and being diligent studiers of the word to learn about the things that you have revealed and to learn them rightly and also as Joe said and repeated once again that we would be humble in that study and kind and generous to those around us even if we disagree but that you would give us the insight that we need to be prepared and also have that hope and comfort for the future in Jesus name thank you amen creator you open the following this next