[ This sermon was given on the Feast of Trumpets ]

My wife and I lived for two years in the earlier part of our ministry down in the coal fields of eastern Kentucky - Pike County, Floyd County. Some of you will know where these regions are, having been either from there or having family from Kentucky. They were two very good years for us. Short years, but we had a good time, lots of interesting experiences; and it enabled me to get acquainted with the culture of coal mining in eastern Kentucky, which is the heart and soul of that area.

We had members who were coal miners, whose families had been coal miners; and they all knew the stories. One of the stories that I learned and read about during the time I was there was a practice that took place in the early days of coal mining - before technology - when miners would go down into the deep pits. Mining at those levels created many problems, cave-ins, and explosions; and the explosions would come from the buildup of deadly gases in those coal mines. In the early days of coal mining, they didn't have any gauges or meters to detect the methane gas or the carbon monoxide gases that would build up as they were working at those depths. And so, as a result, to kind of counteract that and at least give some warning of the problems that were building up, they hit upon a solution.

The solution was to take canaries in cages down into the mines, because it seems that canaries have a particular sensitivity to those gases - carbon monoxide and methane. We used to have a canary when I was a kid, a little yellow canary. We named him Tweety. Not a very original name, I understand. That was before twitter and tweets, but his name of Tweety. Tweety got loose one day and we never saw him again, but Tweety would sing. That's what canaries do. They were created to sing, and so the miners would take the canaries down into the deep coal mines, and they'd be singing along as they [the miners] would be working. But if those canaries ever stopped, it was because they were dead; and if they were dead, it was because the gases were at such a level that an explosion was imminent and it was time to get out. That's how they knew.

Now, today they don't use canaries. They have sophisticated methods now; but, unfortunately, even today there are still some explosions and accidents in the deep mines of West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Kentucky. There are fewer now, but that's how they did it [measured the gases] at that particular time. And so, this has continued on as part of, not just mining history and mining lore, but also it has become a kind of metaphor for the times and for world and social conditions that we have, because you will occasionally hear someone refer to the idea that "the gases are rising and the canaries might be dying," as people comment on our world - whether it's the political, economic, or the cultural aspects of our modern society.

This provides us a very interesting jumping off point for this sermon, for this entire meaning of the Feast of Trumpets, as we heard in our sermonette and we heard in a sermon down in Cincinnati on the Sabbath about our times, the events to look for leading up to the very fulfillment of this day and the other holy days that flow from this Feast of Trumpets. The idea that the canaries are not singing or the canaries might be dying has become something for us to listen to and to watch for and to understand, because I firmly believe that the canaries have been dying for years, and you wonder how many more might be left.

Sometimes I think the smaller ones are dying and there is some big canary that hasn't yet, because we continue to go right up to the edge of the abyss at times in our world, and we think, will this be the event? Will this be the time that will trigger certain events toward the time of the end and the close of the age that prophecy tells us about? And yet, events pull us back and life goes on. And that creates various interesting scenarios as well. But I think that the one thing that all of us in the church have come to understand is that the toxic fumes of culture and our world continue to rise. And though the canaries still may be singing, it may be just a little bit less, and some have dropped by the wayside. There is danger in the problems of suffocation and dying, and ultimately something that will trigger that final explosion is still ever present. There is still that ever-present danger. As I look around today, the canaries, it seems, are starting to drop again.

We're living in a very interesting period in our world, and we have been for the last eleven years, as the sermonette brought out, since the events of 911, which jolted America to its knees. We did not buckle. We have survived, and we have come back; but it did have an impact. You cannot go to a site in New York City - those two twin towers - without understanding that the scar is still open. These two pits are still there. There is a very nice memorial in that region now and a waterfall that goes down into it, but the pits are open; and the names surround that pit of everyone who died on that day. And the scar is still there. Nothing has really been the same since then.

Again in September of 2008, the world came close to a financial collapse, especially in the United States, when over a weekend in September in 2008, Wall Street nearly collapsed - the financial crisis that had been brought on because the housing bubble had burst and other issues had come together. The western nations have not yet recovered. Some of the reading I've done on that time and just how close we came...they say that we were within 48 hours of you and I putting our debit cards into a machine and they were not going to work. That's how bad it got. That's how close we came to a collapse of our economic structure. But over a weekend, they cobbled it together, did their shifts, did their bargaining, worked their "magic" and pulled it back from the brink at that time. But yet, we have not recovered; and we continue to hobble along.

The European Union lumbers along in a crisis that still grabs the headlines on a regular basis, with leadership that cannot break the logjam of debt that is there and the problems that we see. Europe, it seems, is a world power in search of a leader. Prophecy shows us that the EU and the world economy will likely come out of this particular slump, and whether it is this crisis or another one to come, though, there will be a moment when ten leaders will give absolute authority to one person who says that he has all of the answers. That's what Revelation 17 shows us. When we look at our world economy, the toxic fumes, it seems, are still rising.

In the Middle East, the last two years have seen unrest and turmoil. Longtime leaders in Egypt and in Lybia have fallen. Syria is tearing itself apart in a civil war; and just a few days ago, the American ambassador to Lybia and three other diplomats were murdered by a terrorist attack. Since then, unrest has flamed up once again in Egypt and in Lybia and in Yemen, Tunisia, and other locations, reminding us that "it's not the economy, stupid." It's foreign affairs. You see the presidential candidates have been focusing upon the economy, either saying how bad it has been for the last four years or saying recovery is just around the corner; and all of a sudden, overnight, those papers got swept off the table and foreign affairs came front and center once again.

There us the threat of terrorism and the problems there. And so, in that region, again, the fumes rise. It's almost like someone is trying to strike a match in these particular spots and within these particular situations...you know how you've had a book of matches and it may be a little damp and you strike it and it doesn't spark. And it seems like every time one of these situations comes to rise once again, it's like someone is trying to strike a match.

You know, in 1914 it was a short little man in Sarajevo who killed the archduke that set off the 20th century conflagration of wars that we still deal with today. He did it with a gun. They don't need a gun today. Today they use a camera phone, the internet, or some film. Those are the guns that are striking and trying to ignite a toxicity that continues to build and rise on the world scene. It hasn't fired off yet. I don't know when or what will be the spark that will eventually do it, but the explosion that will trigger the events that the Bible tells us about are yet to occur. And yet, the fumes continue to rise.

I recently did a Beyond Today television program on the sanctity of human life. We had not covered that subject of abortion on Beyond Today with the detail that we felt we needed to do, and I drew the straw to do the job. What I said on that program will not get me elected to any office in the United States. It will not even get me elected to rodent exterminator of the smallest county in the United States, because all I did was open the Bible and read what the scriptures say about taking the life of an unborn child. As I was researching this topic, I was stunned. Steve Myers and I had done some short BT dailies earlier in the year about the subject, and it had been on our mind. We tend to, even in the church, put it out of our mind, but the statistics are staggering. Every day in the world, 120,000 lives are terminated by a chosen medical procedure that is legal in most countries in this world. One hundred twenty thousand! As I was preparing it and thinking about it, I wondered if the legal murder of unborn children could be the one sin that fuels the cultural decline of the West and all other areas of culture, if that is not the rot that causes the decay from head to foot that Isaiah 1:6 talks about. And yet, the toxic fumes of society continue to rise.

So what does this have to do with us and what does this have to do with the Feast of Trumpets, which we are here today to celebrate, to observe? When we look at our world today, Satan is herding this world into a box canyon from which there is not going to be an escape. We keep being shoveled into narrower and narrower confines of behavior and actions. Powerful spiritual forces are at work in an effort to thwart the purpose of God and His work. Before it all concludes, as this day shows us, the world is going to go through a very complex period when it will appear to finally produce world peace and prosperity; and there will be proclamations of peace, peace. They will be made. People will be deceived by a clever melding of politics and religion. But all will not be so, because there will be a moment when that false mask of prosperity and security and benevolence will be ripped aside to reveal a hideous bestial image which will unleash a worldwide time of terror such as the world has never seen. Daniel 12 tells us about it.

Out of this period of time will emerge the hope of mankind, the return of Jesus Christ. And so, that brings us to Trumpets and this holy day, which is really a pivotal hinge. We've had the Days of Unleavened Bread, we've had Pentecost already in the sequence of God's plan that the holy days bring out. And those days, in one sense, have had actual physical occurrences - the children of Israel coming out of Egypt, certainly the death of Christ, the beginning of the church on the day of Pentecost. They are yet to be fully realized by all of the world, but the Day of Trumpets hasn't had its full meaning yet. We look forward to that time of Christ's second coming and His appearing as Lord of Lords and King of kings and then the events that will flow from that. So this day is kind of a hinge that we look forward to in its fullness, and it will catapult this world through a complete transformation.

Leviticus 23 tells us that on the first day of the seventh month is a memorial of the blowing of trumpets and all that that means. The trumpet symbol throughout scriptures represents not only a time of war, but it is also a calling to a time of judgment, because when we look at this Day of Trumpets and pull together a number of scriptures on this, we are reminded that this is the time when Jesus Christ will come - this time not as a human infant as the first time, but in His second coming, He will come as a judge, as a righteous judge.

Let's turn over to the book of Jude 14 where we are told of this patriarch, this ancient, this very long-deceased individual Enoch, the seventh from Adam, who prophesied. We don't know all of his prophecies. All we know is what Jude was inspired, led by God to write here; but it gives us a little bit of a glimpse:

Jude 14-15  – Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men [the ungodly that the previous verses talk about] also, saying, "Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him."

So notice, this is specifically talking of the coming of the Lord, this time with ten thousands of His saints, that the scripture tells us about in Revelation; butit says He is to execute judgment on all, on all who are ungodly. Christ's judgment will be upon all humanity, upon all nations. Many scriptures point to this, but it is a time of judgment. Now, that's a very powerful statement here, a very powerful concept. Christ's coming at the Feast of Trumpets will be a time of judgment that will be poured upon the nations of this world. There is no getting around those very plain scriptures which we will read a few of in a moment. But let's talk a minute about judgment.

The concept of judgment - from scripture, of eternal judgment from God - is a very uncomfortable idea for a modern mind to think about. Modern religionists and modern thinking doesn't want to wrap itself around the idea of judgment and the idea of eternal judgment. [The idea] that God would judge today's culture? Today's society for something called sin? "Inconceivable!" as the short guy from The Princess Bride would say. Inconceivable to a modern mind, that God would execute judgment, that there would be a day of reckoning for the morality, for the culture that promotes sin and unrighteousness.

The nations go on. Everything goes on just as it was. "There's no God; and if there is, He's gone way off. And if there is, He's certainly not a God that's going to judge wrong behavior, because He's a merciful, forgiving God; and He didn't specifically talk about this sin or that sin in the gospels. Therefore, it's OK." That's the way a modern mind thinks. That anyone would be called to account, any one person would be called to account for how he lived his personal life? Inconceivable! The modern mind. And so, people have a wrong concept about judgment.

When you look at the scriptures that talk about judgment...during the offertory, Mr. Myers read a short portion of one. Judgment in the Bible is a different thing from God's point of view. Judgment is a good thing. God's righteous judgment is a good thing. That's what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about human judgment. I think we as humans have a lot to learn yet about judgment. I know I do. But when it comes to God's judgment, scripture tells us it's a good thing.

Look at Psalm 98. This, again, is one of those psalms that we will remember. It has been put to music. It's in our hymnal.

Psalm 98:1, 4, 6-9 – Oh, sing to the Lord a new song! For He has done marvelous things; His right hand and His holy arm have gained Him the victory...Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth; break forth in song, rejoice, and sing praises...With trumpets and the sound of a horn; shout joyfully before the Lord, the King. Let the sea roar, and all its fullness, the world and those who dwell in it; let the rivers clap their hands; let the hills be joyful together before the Lord, for He is coming to judge the earth. With righteousness He shall judge the world, and the peoples with equity.

With fairness, with justice. God's righteous judgment the Bible tells us is a good thing. Let everyone shout and let everyone take joy in God's time of judgment. It almost seems anachronistic, I know, when we look at all the scriptures that this day tell us about and that time of judgment. But again, this and many other scriptures tell us that God's righteous judgment is something to look forward to. It's a good thing because wrongs will be made right. There will be a time of justice instead of injustice, righteousness instead of unrighteousness. Bullies will get theirs. Those who abuse people, those who take advantage of the poor, they will be judged for that; and the tables will begin to be turned. But God will do it in His time and in His way. God's righteous judgment is something that this and other places tell us to rejoice in and to take joy in. And so, when we apply that to the Day of Trumpets, the Feast of Trumpets, then we have some things to learn.

I'd like to focus on three areas here in the remainder of my time that talk about judgment in connection with the Feast of Trumpets - three areas of judgment that will occur when this day becomes reality. We can focus on (1) the nations, because God's judgment will be upon the nations. We can look upon (2) the church, because there is a judgment even for the church, we are told. And we can look upon (3) the individual and the time of judgment for the individual. And that's where it brings it down to something personal.
Of course, that's when we start meddling. Someone reminded me before services that sometimes ministers start to meddle when they preach. And I said, "Yeah, I know. When we read scripture, that's just what happens." But as long as we read God's word, He's meddling with us and we stand behind that. That's the way it happens.
Let's look at the first one:

1. God's Judgment Upon the Nations

Let's turn back to Revelation 11. The sequence of the story of Revelation is the unfolding of the seven trumpet plagues. Let's come down to verse 15 and the sounding of the seventh trumpet, the seventh angel, because this is the focus, then, that brings it down to this day, what this day pictures - the sounding of a trumpet on this day, a time of alarm, leading to the return of Jesus Christ.

Revelation 11:15 – Then the seventh angel sounded: And there were loud voices in heaven, saying, "The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever!"

That sums it up. At this moment, with that sounding, it's all over for the nations of this world. They will become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and His reign will commence from that time, forever. It will never cease. The time of the reign of humans - governments and nations - will come to an end. It goes on:

V. 16-18  – And the twenty-four elders who sat before God on their thrones fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying: "We give You thanks, O Lord God Almighty, the One who is and who was and who is to come, because You have taken Your great power and reigned. The nations were angry, and Your wrath has come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that You should reward Your servants the prophets and the saints, and those who fear Your name, small and great, and should destroy those who destroy the earth."

This is a completely different manner of Christ's appearing on this earth than His first coming, in the human form as a child. No longer the helpless infant in a manger, but this time as conquering King. And this figure that we see here in Revelation strikes a pose which we should consider with the requisite amount of fear and respect. We can be lulled to complacency at times. [We think of] the image of a Christ who emphasizes only certain emotions, and I know that there are [such images of Christ] because of where we may have come from, where we may be at times in our life, and sometimes even connected with the time in the church and the number of years that we have been in the church. At times we lose sight, again, of a balanced approach to Christ and we want just, perhaps, a softer image, a more loving image of Christ; and I recognize that that would be for a time and a place as well because of, perhaps, a trial or loss or time that we have been through, but we must understand the fullness of Christ in His person and who He is and what He is going to do. We have to always keep that in mind. And this day is a day to focus upon that aspect of Christ in that way and to understand that what He does, as these scriptures say, is done in His time and way and by His righteousness. We cannot lose sight of that. When Christ returns, it will be with a judgment that this world, perhaps some of us even in the church as well, may not like to think about. Nonetheless, we must. We cannot ever forget about that as well, even if we might hold it out there for a period of time as we go through a storm or go through a difficult period.

Christ who appears here at this moment in time is one that the religious and political leaders of today's world will not welcome at His appearing. There will be no big balloon drop for Christ when this happens. We really should never forget that if we happen to like to watch balloon drops, if you know what I mean. We love our country; we love our nation. We have a patriotism. We don't want to see it decline. Sometimes we can lose sight that human solutions are not solutions. Human promises will fail. When we come to this day, what God tells us to consider on this day, we have to remember that no matter what affiliation, no matter what party, no matter what religion, no matter what ideology, the political-religious leaders and leaders in any walk of life are not going to welcome Christ's appearing.

We go back to Revelation 9, which details some of these events, of the sixth angel and the events that have been taking place, the pouring out of various plagues and the time of the tribulation. V. 13 begins a description of what happens after the sounding of the sixth angel and all that has been prepared, the marching in v. 16 of a two-hundred-million-man army, and John's description of these pouring out of their mouths in v. 17 - fire, smoke and brimstone - a condition of war and a time of trouble, and plagues in v. 18 that are going to be poured out, and a power that will be unleashed that will cause suffering. What is interesting is what begins in v. 20. All of that will not bring about change of a Godly kind - a repentance - because it says:

Revelation 9:20-21 – But the rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands, that they should not worship demons, and idols of gold, silver, brass, stone, and wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk. And they did not repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.

As human beings, you and I think we could righteously judge the nations or a city or a state or even a person because of unrighteousness. We might want to call down fire from heaven and thunder from heaven, like James and John [wanted to do], thinking that that's going to show them, that will correct them, that will bring them around. No! When God does this, it says that they will not even repent. When heavenly signs take place and God's time of judgment begins to be poured out, they will not repent. In Revelation 19 we come to the time that is shown here of His actual appearing and descent, with the opening of heaven and Christ on a white horse, with eyes like a flame of fire, and His robe dipped in blood in v. 13 - that's pretty heavy stuff - and armies in heaven behind Him, in v. 14, with white horses and:

Revelation 19:15  – Now out of His mouth goes a sharp sword, that with it He should strike the nations.

That's what He is going to do. We've already read about that in Revelation 11 and then back in Jude, because He is King of kings and Lord of Lords.

V. 17-21  – John saw an angel standing in the sun...saying to all the birds that fly in the midst of heaven, "Come and gather together for the supper of the great God, that you may eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of captains..." This is an interesting supper! Sometimes people get focused upon the marriage supper and think they've got it all figured out. This is a pretty plain one right here, and it's a time of horror upon this world. What has happened is, v. 19 tells us that the beast, the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against Him who sat on the horse and against His army. Then the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who worked signs...And the rest were killed with the sword which proceeded from the mouth of Him who sat on the horse. And all the birds were filled with their flesh.

This is what will happen when Jesus returns, and the leaders from every walk of life that govern this world will not have repented and will not understand and will not accept His kingship, His Lordship. And so we need to keep that in mind. You know, we look for Christ's return...and that's such good news; but when Christ returns, "He's got blood in His eye," as the old saying goes, and there will be a time of judgment upon the peoples. And the nations will be gathered to fight Him at His coming.

Now, what we should understand as we view our world even today is that this is the King that we have submitted ourselves to when we were baptized, Jesus Christ; and we accepted Him as our Lord and our soon-coming King. For some of us, that "soon-coming" has been a long time coming! We had friends visiting us over the weekend and he was relating a story that he was talking to someone who couldn't figure out why Christ hadn't returned or how things were, and he said, "I got baptized in 1974 to save my backside," as he put it. He used a different word, but he said, "I got baptized in 1974 to save my backside, and I'm still waiting to be saved." His point was he was scared by these prophecies, he understood them; but he's still here, because he's grown beyond that point. He still wants to get his backside saved, but he wants eternal life as well. He's still faithful. But these events are pretty large.

Jesus Christ has rejected the rule over today's nations. A Christian needs to understand that when we were baptized, we accepted Christ as our Lord and as our King, and no other human leader can make the kind of promises that He can. The reality of that is very, very important - and that Christ has rejected the rule over all of the modern nations. We're told that in Matthew 4 because Satan took Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of this world and said, "If You bow down to me, You'll have power over all of these," and He rejected it. And He's going to come to judge those nations and their descendants and this earth. He rejected that [submitting to Satan]. Christ, at that point, became Lord over those who live by the sermon on the Mount; and that should be us. And that's the good news. That is the good news. We can keep that in mind.

Christ's coming is a little bit like the good news/bad news jokes. He's got blood in His eye, but the good news is He's going to establish His Kingdom at His coming. And yet it says that many will not repent.

2. God's Judgment Upon the Church

The second area of judgment that we should consider is that of the church.
Let's turn back to 1 Peter 4:17, another well-known verse and concept that we have in the church:

1 Peter 4:17 – For the time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the end of those who do not obey the gospel of God?

Judgment must begin at the house of God, the church. The Church of God is in a time of judgment, as the books have been opened to the church, the books of the Bible, to understanding the truths of God. Those have been taught and preserved and taught through the generations. As the scriptures tell us in either Daniel 7 or in Revelation 20, when the books are opened, it is a time of judgment. It is upon the church. And so, those who have been a part of it, who are enduring, who are called, chosen and faithful - of which we are a part - that [judgment] continues on.

This day marks a lesson and a message for us as well, because as we think about our job and our calling, and we look at the verses, the prophecies that culminate on this day, we understand that we have a job to do, which is to preach the gospel of the Kingdom of God as a witness before the time of the end comes. The gospel does contain a warning message. We have spent the last year, over and over in our Kingdom of God seminars, going through Mark 1:14-15. And we have read them many, many times in those seminars, when Christ came preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, and saying, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel."

The gospel of Jesus Christ and the Kingdom of God has a component of warning within it; and every generation of God's people have had a job to do, a very clearly laid out mission to accomplish within the church. That gospel is to go to all the world, and it is a gospel to bring from the nations those whom God calls to repentance. In Acts 17:30, as Paul was speaking to the philosophers in Athens, he brings this out.

Acts 17:30-31 – Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.

Paul had a way of summing up quite a bit within just a sentence or two; and in this one, he says quite a bit. He tells the Athenians that God commands all men everywhere to repent. It is not just one nation or one grouping of people that is to repent. It is a message of repentance and of the gospel of the Kingdom to all nations. And God will judge all the nations. There is a day of judgment coming for all of the world, and it will be done in the righteous timing and manner that only God can do. And so, the collective duty of the Church of God - and one of those things for which the church will be judged - is to carry on the work that Christ began and that He left with His apostles. That is what we are to do - and to make disciples. We understand that; and we have embedded that within our governing philosophies within the United Church of God, because it is scriptural and it is true.

There is a scripture back in Ezekiel that we well know in the church. I remember it being read in the earliest sermons that I heard in the church. This year will be my 50th Feast of Tabernacles. I know that that's not a record in this room. There are some of you who have had many more than that. But I tallied it up the other day and I thought that I was maybe one or two years away from it, but this is my 50th Feast to attend consecutively. It's quite a blessing. Those of you that have gone longer, you understand what a blessing it is. There's still something to learn. But in probably the very first Feast of Tabernacles that I attended, I heard Ezekiel 33 being explained as part of the responsibilities of the church. Let's read it again, because it does have something for us to understand in terms of this matter of judgment upon the church. It says:

Ezekiel 33:1-2  – Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying, "Son of man, speak to the children of your people, and say to them: ‘When I bring the sword upon a land, and the people of the land take a man from their territory and make him their watchman...'"

The watchman was to stand on the walls. In Israel, they would even erect towers out in the fields for shepherds to watch over their flocks. So the meaning of a watchman and the idea, as the scripture talks about it, is multi-dimensional because they would have to watch over their flocks from predators or even marauders; but as he is speaking here, it has a sense of a man standing on the wall of a city, looking for the enemy army to come and to surround it and being alert and watching and sounding an alarm as to what was going to take place - kind of like that canary in the cage of a coal mine when the fumes would begin to rise.

V. 3-5 – "‘...when he sees the sword coming upon the land, if he blows the trumpet and warns the people, then whoever hears the sound of the trumpet and does not take warning, if the sword comes and takes him away, his blood shall be on his own head.'" [So easy to understand.] "‘He heard the sound of the trumpet, but did not take warning; his blood shall be upon himself. But he who takes warning will save his life."

A warning to prepare, a warning to repent in a spiritual sense that connects with what Christ said in Mark 1, to repent because the knowledge of the Kingdom has come. This has multi-dimensional application for God's people, God's servants, as they listen to what God said to Ezekiel but is embedded here and is carried through even into Christ's use of the term, the idea of watching. You cannot get away from, again, the full impact of it here. He says if one listens, there is salvation - physically, spiritually - as part of this; but in v. 6 note this:

Ezekiel 33:6-8 – "‘But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet, and the people are not warned, and the sword comes and takes any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity...'" Judgment for sin is judgment for sin. Sin must be repented of, regardless of who or whatever; and in God's plan, all individuals will have a chance for those sins to be forgiven. But there is a time of judgment; and it will be if a person does not turn, then their blood will be theirs. He said he would be taken away in his iniquity; but notice what the end of v. 6 says: "‘...but his blood I will require at the watchman's hand.'" The one who was told to warn, the one who was told to preach the gospel and to say, "Repent, turn from your ways, follow the ways of the Kingdom of God." God says, "I will require the blood of those who die in their sins - there will be a judgment upon that watchman." "So you, son of man: I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel; therefore you shall hear a word from My mouth and warn them for Me. When I say to the wicked, ‘O wicked man, you shall surely die!' and you do not speak to warn the wicked from his way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood I will require at your hand."

It is repeated twice in this section of scripture. Twice God says what the watchman was to do to warn; but if he doesn't do the job, people will suffer for their sins, but "I will require their blood at your hand." That's judgment upon those who had a responsibility, a duty, who had knowledge and did not do their job. Those are pretty strong words. This is a critical key to the Feast of Trumpets and the warning message that is associated with the blast of the trumpet - whether as we see it in Old Testament times or as we see Christ's application of it to the people of His day and for our understanding today - to watch and to understand and to warn, by preaching the gospel. God has always provided a very clear message of warning to mankind. That is something we see throughout the scriptures, and that is something we can see even in the work that the church has done since its founding.

There has been the witness of the church and the truth - dim at times, strong at others - but it has always been there since 31 A.D., because Jesus said that the gates of the grave will not prevail against it, and "I will be with you until the end of the age." So the church has always existed and always will exist. The spiritual body of Christ as the Church of God will know what it is supposed to do and does know what it is supposed to do.

As I said, I heard this in my first Feast of Tabernacles, and I'm pretty sure in about every one from that point forward in those early days. I've not forgotten it. I guess like that little puppy or bird or whatever, that the first person they physically see, they imprint with, they bond with. Well, this is one of the concepts that I first bonded with in the church, and I learned and I understood the mission of the church and this particular picture of the watchman.

The church has a clear mission from scripture as to what it is to do. The summation of every command to the church in the gospels and in the book of Acts is to preach the gospel of the Kingdom in all of the world. It's very clear, very, very plain. There is no equivocation with what the church is to do; and wherever it goes, it is to do that. That is the story of the church in Acts; that is the teaching from Jesus Christ, and to be found so doing when the Good Man of the house returns. That is our job, and to make disciples wherever that gospel goes, as God calls and adds to the church, those whom He will. The church will be judged according to how it has done this job, because the watchman is told that they'll die in their iniquity, but "I will require the blood at your hand." That has always meant something to me.

I believe Jesus Christ raised up His church in this time period of which we have all been a part for fifty years, sixty years, seventy years, or seven years - whatever length of time that we have been a part of something that God has done, a very great thing in this age of man, as He restored the truth, as He raised up a work of which we are all descendants, physically and spiritually. I believe Jesus Christ raised up His church in this time to restore the truth of scripture for a people that He would prepare for the events of this day. That's what I came to understand in my 12-year-old mind 50 years ago and I believe to this day. I believe that Jesus Christ intends His church to sound a warning message to the nations before the sounding of the seventh trump. That's what I read from scripture. That's what I believe. And I believe that if the church does not do it's job, then Jesus Christ will require the blood of the nations at our hand. That's what I believe, and I do not want this to be said to me. I don't want what God says here in Ezekiel to be said to me, that "I will require their blood at your hands."

The church is [composed of] those who are fitly framed together by the clear mission to preach the gospel. That's how I've come to sum up five decades of experience in the Church of God. That's why I'm still here today, doing what I believe that I should be doing, and why you are here. I believe that's why you are here, to whatever degree you have embedded that in your life and in your mind and endured what you have, because you believe that. And it's not just to save your backside, as my friend said, because I think God matures us beyond that. I think we, as we grow to love God and each other, something deeper kicks in that allows us to be able to endure the traumas and the challenges of personal life, collective experience together within the church, and all that Satan throws at us from this world and, unfortunately, we even throw at ourselves.

This is our collective duty and responsibility. As I said, I do not want what is said here in Ezekiel to be said of me when my time in the work, in life, whatever, if it comes before Christ returns and in my judgment, I don't want that on my responsibility. That's what I learned fifty years ago. And I see the toxic fumes continuing to rise in society, and I see that it is time to work. It is still day and we still have that opportunity.

Let's look at the third area of judgment, then, that this day points to, and that is:

3. God's Judgment Upon the Individual Christian

Hebrews 4:11-13 – Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest...and his subject is the rest, spiritual rest - not only a relationship with God and Jesus Christ but also of the Kingdom of God...lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight...we can't hide; we can run but we can't hide...but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.

One translation puts the ending of v. 13 as "to whom we must explain all that we have done." As we have come to know the truth, as we have had God's calling and the power of the Holy Spirit and a lifetime of obedience and work within the body of Christ, we have gone through and are going through a period of judgment. And when this day comes to pass, our judgment will be set.

2 Corinthians 4:16-18 – Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing...that means we're getting older - that's what it means! You can just write that in your inspired margins. We are reminded of that...yet the inward man is being renewed day by day, as we learn to take the knocks and get up and keep going, to put it in God's hands and learn faith...For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.

Spiritual values, things that we can't see, the intangible spiritual values of love, joy, perseverance, longsuffering, all that are laid out in the scriptures, those things that we can't see. They're the hard things, as we said. They're the hard things, the tough things to deal with. They're not seen, but they are eternal. They have lasting weight and lasting benefit for us.

2 Corinthians 5:9-11 – Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad. Knowing, therefore, the terror of the Lord [speaking of the judgment - there is a proper amount of fear toward God], we persuade men; but we are well known to God, and I also trust are well known in your consciences.

We are going to have to explain what we have done since receiving this calling. You don't need to worry about the things you did before baptism. If you truly repented and you accepted Christ's shed blood for your sins and His sacrifice, God doesn't even remember that anymore. And if you do, then you need to take that to God because He's forgotten it. The things that we have done  [refers to] what we have done since baptism, since this time of judgment has been upon the house of God. And that is what these scriptures speak to, and that is what we will have to give account for.

That is something for us to think about as we come to the Day of Trumpets. It is a time to think about our destiny as sons of God, called to glory, because when the events of this day arrive, the elect of God, it says, will be caught up in the air, those who are alive and remain and be changed to a glorified spirit body. We will then fully inherit the Kingdom of God as spirit beings. This is the day when the saints enter their glory - either through what is called the first resurrection in scripture or those who are alive and remain - we enter eternity. And it is going to be something far beyond anything we could ever imagine.

1 Corinthians 15 is the classic scripture that speaks to this. Paul writes:

1 Corinthians 15:50-53 – Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed - in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.

We will enter eternity at that time, just as Jesus Christ and the Father today live in eternity, with a glorified body; and we will see Him as He is. That is what this day tells us. This will be, in a sense, our moment of truth; and our judgment will be set for eternity.

I have always taken heart in the scripture back in Philippians 1, because at times we doubt ourselves and wonder if we will make it and is God pleased with us and...this is the one scripture that has always meant a great deal to me. As Paul said in v. 3, he thanked God for the people and every prayer, for their fellowship, the gospel in v. 5, and in v. 6:

Philippians 1:6 – ...being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ...

Until the day of the Feast of Trumpets and what it pictures - the day of Jesus Christ and His appearing and all of these scriptures. We can have confidence in that. We have to overcome, yes. We have to endure to the end. But the confidence is that God is there to help us and that what He has begun in us, He will complete it.

Let me leave you with this today. What if we took very seriously, you and I from this day forward, from this one Feast of Trumpets, today, forward, what if we took seriously our belief that Jesus Christ is Lord of Lords and our King? And that we are waiting for His signal, in whatever way that signal will be given, when the Father will tell Him, "Now! Now is the moment; now is the hour; now is the day. Go!" And the heavens unfold, however they're going to unfold, and the appearance of that King on a white horse takes place and astounds the world. What if we take that very literally and very seriously? Because it is literal and it is serious. That we are waiting for that time to set up His Kingdom on this earth. If we did, if every thought, every action, every part of our life would flow from that belief, that He is our King and that He is Lord of Lords, and in His rejection of all of the nations we can understand that He is going to, one day, be the King over all the nations and rule them forever and ever, and we with Him - that fantastic, almost impossible to conceive promise. But if we would take that literally and seriously, what would it mean to your life? What would it mean to every thought and every action that we take?

We have the knowledge to think and to act differently from those who do not believe this. We are here today professing our belief that He is coming. Let's live that reality, that Christ is our Lord and our King. The toxic fumes of this world continue to rise. Somewhere there is a canary still singing, but some day the last one will keel over and events that this day pictures will take place. Let's live with that reality. Let's get to know the world to come and let's look for the coming of our King.