Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Sermon Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/Sermons/zz19981115.htm

PROPHECY OVERVIEW
"Part VI: The Believer And Christ's Messianic Kingdom"
(Revelation 20:1-15)

Introduction: (To show the need . . . )

(1) Recently, Americans went to the polls to choose officers for congressional seats. In the process, I heard media political analysts often ask: "What do the votes cast signal regarding what Americans think of the White House sex scandal?" As it turned out, we voters evidently IGNORED the scandal in favor of OTHER concerns like the state of our economy.

(2) Frustration over what the polls showed of the electorate's upstaging morality with our economy surfaced in the November 2, 1998 issue of USA Today. The Tesamen Enterprises, Inc. ran a full page ad on p. 13B in the form of a mock letter that read as follows: "Dear Nation: We know that the president lies! And we don't care! We know that the president is immoral! And we don't care! We know he committed perjury to the Grand Jury! And we don't care! We know the president has been repeatedly unfaithful to his wife! And we don't care! We know our children want to be like him! And we don't care! Because the economy is great and he says he is the reason why and we know we can always believe him! Morality and integrity do not matter! Everyone knows that! We have more important things to worry about! Yours Truly, The American people."

(3) This frustration is not new. During the Viet Nam War, I heard a farmer in an implement store in Chico, California complain about the problem. He expressed something like: "When we grew up in World War II, our public school teachers taught that the Am erican Constitution was inspired by God (I wouldn't go that far!) and that we needed to respect our country's flag and obey its laws. Now hippies burn our flag and their draft cards and show no respect for the law!"

Had that farmer known then that a future president had fled the country as a draft dodger, and as president would get involved in a sex scandal in the Oval Office, there's no telling how eloquent he would have become!

(3) I recently talked with a Church member who expressed to me her deep disillusionment over the way the elections turned out. Her concern was that we were becoming like ancient Rome or Greece that fell because of apathy toward national moral decline!

Well, what is the ANSWER to this national moral decline?

(We turn to the sermon "Need" section . . . )

Need: "As seen by the voters' neutral response to the White House scandal, there is a deep moral drift in our nation in SPITE of our heritage! That BOTHERS me, for history reveals that governments haven't LASTED long without morals! What can I DO about it?!"
  1. When Christ INVADES our troubled world, He will set up His Kingdom to provide a GREAT ENVIRONMENT for BLESSING!
    1. After the Battle of Armageddon at the End of the Great Tribulation, Jesus will invade this world to judge sin in the world's environment:
      1. Coming as King of Kings and Lord of Lords (Rev. 19:11, 15-16), Jesus Christ will intercept and eternally doom the antichrist and false prophet at the Battle of Armageddon, Rev. 19:19-21.
      2. Following this event, Christ will have Satan bound for a thousand years in the Bottomless Pit so the world will not be affected by his influence during that time, Rev. 20:1-3b.
      3. We know from our past sermons that Jesus will also judge all men, removing unbelievers from the earth, Mtt. 13:49-50; 24:36-41.
    2. Then, Jesus will set up a Kingdom of strictly enforced righteousness:
      1. Thrones will be set up for raptured and returned, glorified Christians and resurrected Old Testament saints to rule in Christ's Messianic reign, Rev. 20:4a with Dan. 12:3, 13 and Rev. 1:5b-6.
      2. Martyred Tribulation believers will also be raised to rule with Christ, Revelation 20:4b,c.
      3. This kingdom will be one ruled with an "iron rod," meaning sin will be judged immediately and swiftly to keep great order, Rev. 12:5a.
    3. The arrangement of this kingdom will make for great blessing for man:
      1. The curse put on the earth when Adam sinned will be removed at this time, producing a worldwide Eden environment, Rom. 8:19-22. So bountiful will the earth's produce be that the p lowman will overtake the reaper through year-long growing seasons, Am. 9:13.
      2. Socially, poverty will disappear as the world returns to an agricultural society of private lands, Micah 4:4; Joel 2:21-27.
      3. Physically, health will abound so that the world's population will expand rapidly, and one who dies at 100 years of age will be considered dying a tragic death as mere a child, Isa. 65:20.
  2. However, the presence of SIN NATURES in UNGLORIFIED BELIEVERS who survived the Tribulation will remain a problem:
    1. Because an unglorified believer still has a sin nature, he struggles with sin and still produces sinful offspring, Rom. 7:15-24; Rom. 5:12.
    2. This presence of SIN even in believers who enter Christ's Messianic reign will be a problem stopping full unleashing of blessing at the time:
      1. We know from Jesus' words in John 1:51 that heaven will hover above the earth as separate from it in the Messianic reign as angels will travel between heaven above to Jesus below on the earth.
      2. This order contrasts with that of the new where heaven descends to the earth for the Father to dwell among men, cf. Rev. 21:1-3.
      3. So, sin, though inhibited, remains a divisive problem at that time.
      4. To prove it, at the end of the thousand year reign, God will release Satan, and he will stir up sinful descendants of Tribulation Period believers into a world rebellion against Jesus Christ, Rev. 20:7-9b.
  3. So, God will judge SIN in INDIVIDUALS to make a NEW world!
    1. Christ will respond to the rebellious descendants of Tribulation believers by calling fire down from heaven upon them, Rev. 20:9c.
    2. Satan will then be cast into the lake of fire for eternal torment, 20:10.
    3. Finally, at the end of this final battle that follows the Messianic reign's thousand years, God will eternally judge all unbelievers at the Great White Throne Judgment of Revelation 20:11-15:
      1. The Great White Throne judgment seat of God will be set, and the old heavens and earth, marked by man's sin, will flee away, 20:11.
      2. All unsaved individuals will give an account of themselves before God at this judgment, Rev. 20:5a, 12a, 13.
      3. God will judge them according to their works since they will not have availed themselves of the work of Christ for sinners, 20:12b.
      4. Since no sinner's works are good enough to provide an acceptable righteousness before God (Rom. 3:20), if one's name is not written in Christ's book of life that signals reliance on Christ's atonement, he will be cast into hell for eternity, Rev. 20:14-15; Mark 9:43b, 48.
Application: In light of the fact that even in the Messianic Kingdom, SIN in individuals will spoil a perfect empire, we EACH must (1) believe on Christ and await the transformation that GOD will produce to eradicate our sin natures at the raptu re, 1 Cor. 15:51-57. (2) Then, we must obey God's lead in participating in the discipling of others so that their names can be written in Christ's book of life as well (Mtt. 28:19-20) and one day themselves have God eradicate their SIN by the rapture in pr eparation for a SINLESS eternal state!

Lesson: No form of government CAN last until what SIN that is INSIDE man is ERADICATED by Christ's salvation and glorification of the believer. SIN in man makes governing him eventually a FUTILE effort!

Conclusion: (To show the need . . . )

 Kenneth L. Woodward, religion writer for Newsweek wrote a provocative article in the November 2 issue that exposes the key to our nation's moral decline ("Sex, Sin & Salvation," p. 37).

He reported that the President's view that adultery does not occur unless there is intercourse rises out of his Southern Baptist upbringing. Woodward writes that "Many of his coreligionists believe the president spoke [Southern] Baptist truth when he testified that he did not have 'sex' with Monica Lewinski." Woodward quotes Foy Valentine, "who was head of the Southern Baptists' Christian Life Commission for 27 years -- the years of Clinton's youth." He declares that Valentine stated: "'What he [the President] did [with Monica Lewinski] is disgusting, but not what I would consider adultery . . . and I think that most [Southern] Baptists would agree.'"

David Solomon, who now lectures in philosophy at Notre Dame University, is cited by Woodward on what values he recalls holding in his Southern Baptist upbringing: "You went to church to meet girls . . . And with a girl you listened to Billy Graham on the c ar radio Sunday nights before getting around to what you really had in mind."

In other words, regardless that JESUS said in Matthew 5:28 that to look on one of the opposite gender with lust is adultery in God's eyes, SIN in the hearts of those who attend Bible-believing churches has allowed church-goers to rationalize away Jesus' view so that the very SIN Jesus OPPOSED has been TOLERATED as merely "disgusting" activity! And NOW, this watered-down view of adultery has spread from Bible-believing churches through one who was raised in that view to plaster the Oval Office with scandal!

Evidently, just as those at the end of the Millennium will need to have sin in them eradicated though they came from believers who survived the Tribulation, today people in Bible-believing Churches need God to address sin in THEIR hearts for us just to start effectively addressing Washington's moral problems!

Thus, believe in Christ, live a holy life based on what the Bible actually says and work for the spread of the Gospel. Then we can look for God to create a new heavens and a new earth where no sin natures dwell, especially in US who attend Bible-believing churches (2 Peter 3:13)!