Sermon Transcript — September 27, 2003
Good afternoon everyone on this wonderful Feast of Trumpets, a very special day for each and every one of us, designed to keep us mindful of the great plan and purpose of our heavenly Father and our elder brother Jesus Christ. A plan and purpose that they're working out here that will not only affect us in the years to come, but also all mankind ultimately.
The Feast of Trumpets introduces the fall or autumn festivals spoken of in the word of God, the Holy Bible and they are the culmination, as it were, of man's world, man's age coming to a conclusion as the scripture addresses. In fact, the Feast of Trumpets could be looked upon in the following manner: It's a day that pictures how the world will change forever; the world will never be the same. Just like Pearl Harbor was a marking point in time and how that suddenly the world was never the same after December 7th and then of course 9-11 came along and that marked time and the world has now changed again and will never be the same. But there's another day coming, the Day of Trumpets, the Feast of Trumpets and we're here to observe this day today as a tribute to our heavenly Father and to Jesus Christ to be reminded again of what God has purposed for not only us to know now, but also what the whole world will come to know concerning the living God and this is something that many individuals have not a clue to in terms of what is happening in this very very strange and changing world that they are living in.
In fact this day could also be classified as the explosive end of mankind's day and mankind's world because events are moving so rapidly in that direction. But for sake of title, I have titled this sermon today for your benefit, Trumpets: Turning Point in Human History, because that's exactly what's going to happen. This day discusses an incredible time, an incredible time when God is going to play a much more vivid and real part in the everyday life of human beings. Today God hides Himself, His plan and purpose for the most part is hidden from the world. In fact, the Christian man and woman, called of God at this time, according to the book of Colossians, it says our lives are hid in Christ and the world does not really understand why we are here today. It does not understand why these days are so important or why they should be observed. Many think these days belong to certain religious groups like the Judaic community and they are Jewish days when in reality they are not. And we'll go over some basic review in the time we have because we need to cover a lot of territory today to see how God's festivals are going to impact and especially this one today, the Feast of Trumpets, in the lives of every human being in the years to come. This holy day represents a dramatic turning point, as I've pointed out, concerning human history. The world will never be the same once this day becomes a full-fledged reality. Right now we are observing it as a matter of foretaste of something yet to happen, it has prophetic significance for the future.
But what we're going to be looking at today and what I'd like to do is give you, in the time we have remaining, a very rapid review of some very important explosive events that are all going to be correlated and related to this Feast of Trumpets. Many awesome things will be happening in conjunction with this day, when it's reality becomes fulfilled. Now in Deuteronomy 16:16, what I'm going to do is reference for sake of time many scriptures that you can jot down in your notes for your edification but I'll use certain scriptures that I'll focus on and read wholly from the scripture. But I want you to have these just for reference. In Deut. 16:16 it tells us there are three seasons or times when an individual is to come before God and to fulfill the scriptural command. There is the early spring season or what we call the beginning of the year and then we have the early summer time or what we call the Pentecost, Feast of Weeks period of time, then we have the great fall season of the year, where it is summarized in the term, the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles.
Now in this fall season, this third season, there are actually four holy days to be observed. There is this day, Trumpets; followed by Atonement, to be followed by the large Feast of Tabernacles, the first day being a holy day and then that Last Eighth day, a holy day which makes that fourth. You have four holy days in that fall festival period of time. Now the Feast of Trumpets depicts nothing less than what the bible clearly demonstrates is the return of Jesus Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords to this earth. Now as far as the actual day, remember a day can move along, today it may be a certain day on the calendar, next year it may be the Feast of Trumpets on a different day, so you don't know the day or the hour, like the scripture says, but you know that this Festival pictures the dynamic return, at some time in the future, of the Son of God and He is going to fulfill the promises of scripture that are spoken of Him.
For example, the book of Revelation is a book that many people today don't want to look at, they say it doesn't apply, but oh yes it does. Jesus said it has great significance to all those who fear God and want to be mindful of what is happening and what is transpiring in the world in which they're living. In Rev. 11:15 it makes this statement: "The kingdoms of this world...kingdoms translated to nations, the various governments...have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ." And that is going to become a reality. Now what we have to recognize then is that the Feast of Trumpets, which we now are paying homage to God in observance, is a reminder of the future fulfillment of many of the Old Testament prophecies that address this very important festival. For example, there are prophecies talking about Messiah, who would be coming as a King and that He would rule in a kingdom and we can look at a few of those for example, when if you'll remember in the early days of the apostles, when Jesus had gone to the cross, been put to death, buried, resurrected – then what happened? He reappeared to His disciples; they all saw him and they asked him a question in Acts 1:6. That question was: "Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" See they were aware of Old Testament prophecy, in fact the Jews of that day were aware of that and they were looking to the time when this conquering King would come and throw Roman occupation off their shoulders, that is what they desired. And when Christ came as the suffering servant, to give His life as a sin sacrifice for mankind, that was not acceptable and so they did not want Him as a suffering servant, they wanted him as a conquering King. Well, He's coming back as a conquering King, but as Paul Harvey said, that's the rest of the story and that comes in time and Jesus addressed it Himself.
In the early days of His ministry, when Jesus walked this earth, He made a distinction between His first and second coming. When He was standing before the Roman Procurator Pontius Pilate, He was asked by Pilate a specific question, "Are You a king?" And what did Jesus answer? He answered specifically, "You say rightly for I am a king." And He went on to say, "For it was this cause that I was born and I came into the world to bear witness of this very thing." That is found in John 18:36-37. But you remember also, He goes on to say that His kingdom was not of this world, showing that it was yet for some other time, a distinction between the time that was then and a time that was yet future.
Now the prophets speak to the very fact that Jesus would be one, the Messiah would come and the government would be on His shoulders. That's found in Isaiah 9:6-7. So the disciples knew about that, they were aware of these prophecies and they were mindful that things were going to happen and that's why they asked Him about the kingdom. Because when Jesus walked this earth, that's all He talked about, constantly, "What shall we liken unto the kingdom of God?" He wanted people to know and understand about the kingdom of God, something that people have not clearly had a clear picture or understanding of. Now in Acts 1:7 He went on to say, in response to the question of the disciples:
Acts 1:7 – He said, "It is not for you to know the times and the seasons, that is given to the Father in heaven."
In other words, God the Father has reserved the right for when the kingdom of God to be established, He will determine when that point in time becomes a necessity and what will bring it to a necessity is the very fact that mankind will now, in these later days, get to the place where he will have created insolvable problems for himself and when man cannot solve his problems and when it looks like he's about to lose out, you know what happens? You should know the lessons of history. Go back and study what happened when the Germans were making their advances into the so-called Russian frontiers in World War II. When they did Operation Barbarosa and they attacked the Russian area. The Russians were on retreat at that time and what did they do? They tore up everything in its path and burned it to the ground; it's called scorched earth policy. Later on when the cards were reversed and when the Russians were making the advance and the Germans were being pushed back or when the Allies were pushing in from Normandy and on into the German heartland, again, when they were retreating and losing, they tore up everything. When mankind feels that he has gotten to the place where he is losing, he will sink the ship; he will take everyone down with him. Remember what the Japanese did when they knew their islands were trapped and they could not win the battle? Bonsai! And they went into a fanatical death charge that many of our soldiers had never seen the likes. Why would anybody do that? Why would someone get in an airplane and then kamikaze down into ships? But people do that. Now we hear reports such as things in the news as the Syrian government has missiles pointed at Jerusalem and they have all types of biological terror weapons that they could unleash on modern day Israel, the Israeli Jews. Will the Jews just sit back and let that happen? No.
If that ever should happen, if one of those missiles ever cut loose on Jerusalem and cause damage, you can rest assured the Israeli mindset will be, Take Damascus off the face of the earth. They will wipe it out. You go back to the prophet Isaiah and it talks about a time when Damascus shall be a rubbish heap. It's not a rubbish heap today dear brethren, it's a dynamic capital of the government of Syria. And so we see all these elements are moving out there and the potential – can you imagine how the world would react if Israel nuked a city in self-defense? Oh Europe would go ballistic, the whole world would go ballistic, the United Nations would not know what to do, it would be chaos all over the place. This again is showing the tenor of our times, what is happening.
Well Jesus warned that these types of things would grow in a crescendo, but he said the time and the season is not in the hands. We have a job to do as men and women of God called now in our lifetime. Our job is to occupy until He comes, our job is to preach that gospel of the kingdom of God, as we're going to see in a little bit. But going over again of some of these events and things that will be happening, and it's important that we go over them because the job of the ministry is to make these things clear in mind so that we never forget what God is doing, who is in charge, where it's going. Now we could all end up just on an absolute panic trip if we did not have the knowledge of God's truth. Remember Jesus said it Himself, "I've told you these things ahead of time so that you might believe that I am He." That He was the Son of the Living God, that He would do exactly as He said He would do and fulfill the prophecies of the Word of God.
Now as we go back and we study the scriptures, we find that in Leviticus 23 where you'll find the whole outline of the holy days listed in codified form, we find that ancient Israel celebrated these festivals and especially this one called Trumpets and it was a secret assembly commemorated with trumpet blasts. Isn't it interesting, you'll see movies from time to time I'm sure, movies portraying the various empires of the past, whether it's the Roman Empire, Greeks or what have you and what do they do when they announce a certain leader like Caesar coming down there with his armies and what have you. You saw these individuals with these brass long trumpets and they blow these trumpets and it would just resonate through the whole area that Caesar is coming.
Well there is going to be a blast of a trumpet that is going to tell the whole world "The Son of God is coming!" And that is going to be a day that is going to turn history upside down. Remember when the disciples were preaching the gospel back in their lifetime in certain cities that they went through, people were upset with some of the preaching that was done and they said, These men, they're turning the whole world upside down. No, they were turning it right side up! It's the world that was upside down, that was the problem and they didn't appreciate what Paul was teaching at his particular time in his service to God.
There is a dramatic sound of the trumpet, there's nothing like it, it is a very piercing blast and it gets your attention very quickly. What God wants us to understand is the trumpet has been used in the Old Testament for many elements to represent what He wanted to accomplish. For example: If He wanted to gather the people, He would blow the trumpets twice - that's found in Numbers 10:3-4. If He wanted to gather just the leaders, He would have the trumpets blown once. Just one blast would tell all the leaders to come, two blasts would tell all the people, everyone is needed here. If there was a special event to happen, such as the descending of God on Mt. Sinai that you read about in Exodus 19:16, what did you hear? It says, the piercing blast of the trumpet. It just kept blasting away louder and louder and the people would say, what is going on here? It was God coming down to demonstrate to the masses of Israel, you're dealing with the Living God, you're not dealing with somebody you can discount anytime you want to. And the people were terrified, they said, Boy, let Moses talk to us, not God, the voice we hear and that trumpet, it's just mind staggering. The purpose of God is very sobering and it's an awesome thing and God wants us to understand that we're not here just to play religion today, we're here in reference, it's an act of worship of the deepest kind. Your offering was an offering of worship, telling God this is where your heart is, that you want to preach this gospel of the kingdom to the world, you know that that is needed to get that message out, to put that in the hands of other individuals. And for all of us, that wonderful reminder of Trumpets tells us that again, a very day of great turning point in human history is going to become a reality.
When war is spoken of – Exodus 9:10 tells us that when going to war they would blow the trumpet. When they were oppressed with any type of impending danger or immediate warfare, those things would naturally be the case as spoken of in those chapters. Now Numbers 10:10 also show that when there was a festive occasion, a time of great happiness and joy for the people, the trumpet was to be blown, to get everybody's attention, this is festive time, this is something God wants us all to be mindful of. Now with the ability to transmit sound from great distance we find that trumpets are the perfect example. In fact, and I think it's Isaiah 58:1 where it says to the ministry, "Lift up your voice like a trumpet..." Don't be afraid to let it come out, let the people hear the truth of God, they need to hear it, just like a trumpet blast, to make them aware of what it is that they need to understand about life and where they're going wrong and what they're doing right and how they can be blessed, because we all want to blessed, none of us want to be cursed, none of us want to have the bottom fall out in our life, but at the same time, we have choices to make and as free-moral agents, God holds us accountable in that area.
We made a choice today, to be here on this Feast of Trumpets, to worship God because He has told us and He said, I'd like you to be here. Some people get upset with that, they say they don't want anybody commanding me to do anything. God has every right to command us, He is our life giver, He is the one who gives us the ability to be here today, to sustain us. He is the one who has given everything to us that we experience in life; it's all on loan from Him. We take nothing with us when it's all said and done except that which He has developed in us through the power of His holy spirit and that's called conversion and Christ-like behavior and that's what we're all striving to become in our lifetime.
All right, I've given you just a quick ramification of Old Testament references to trumpets blasting, but let's focus in on the New Testament because that gets closer to home, that's where it impacts on us. Because they without us cannot be complete, according to Hebrews 11. God's plan and purpose dealt with generations in the past bringing it all the way up into our generation today and we are the ones who are occupying now until He comes and on this Feast of Trumpets we find something very important that is illustrated for us in the New Testament and that is this – that you will not find the Feast of Trumpets specifically mentioned in the New Testament but it is clearly a concept that is taught in the New Testament and we will see the scriptures that will deal with that very thing. For example, I Thess. 4:16-17. Here we are told that there will be a powerful blowing of trumpets when Jesus Christ returns to this earth. That would be an ear-splitting event! It will get everybody's attention!
I Thess. 4:16 – For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout and with the voice of an archangel...and notice...with the trumpet of God...now who is the one that the bible tells us is the trumpeter? That is Gabriel, Gabriel is the angel who is always pictured as the trumpeter, you know, Gabriel, blow your horn, well if he's that one, he's going to be blowing that horn that day...notice what it's says...the dead in Christ will rise first.
So here we have a resurrection of people who have been dead in Christ, men and women of past generations who will be coming up on this day, that is going to be awesome, what is going on here? It is the resurrection of the saints of God coming alive before the eyes of human kind; this is going to be a phenomenal event in itself. Then it goes on to say:
V. 17 – Then we who are alive...if we are that generation who happens to be blessed to be alive when this event happens, then notice...we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.
Many people tend to run with that scripture and say that means, I have been raptured to heaven and that does not say that. It merely says they are being caught up to meet the Lord who is coming down, not to take us back to heaven, but to take us to Zech. 14 where in that day His feet will stand on the Mt. of Olives, that Mt. of Olives shall cleave in two and tremendous events are going to be happening and we are going to be smack dab in the middle of it as the saints of God. That's why we are so taken back by the awesomeness of these events that God in His mercy would open our eyes to see the future of these marvelous events and how that we play an awesome part in it. I would now take you to another correlating scripture please that is very very important with this understanding and that is I Cor. 15:52 and in it it mentions:
I Cor. 15:52 – In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet...so there is going to be a last trump and when that last trump comes, notice...for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible and we...we who are alive and we who are what? Still in the flesh...we will be changed.
Now that is going to be an awesome event. Simply because of this one factor - there are many people today, well-meaning people who are walking around with a preconceived idea that they're already born again. Now if you want to take the scripture and say, you know, you become renewed in your thought process to conversion, O.K. But to be born again, they say, "I've been born again." Please, read again, what did we just say? If you are born again, there has to be a change. From the dead, the dead are done what? They are raised or changed incorruptible and we, who are still physical, what will happen to us? We will also become as saints then, incorruptible. My point being this, dear brethren, you cannot be born again and still be in a corrupted state. You can be transformed by your renewing of your mind, you can be converted, you can be changed from within to the power of God's spirit, but you are not born again as a new individual, that's why Nicodemus knew so clearly, he said, "Can I go back into my mothers womb?" He knew what Christ was talking about; He wasn't talking about some kind of spiritual emotional feeling. He said, how can I do that? I can't go back in my mother's womb. It's not that, it has to come from above, this working has to deal with God, God is the one who has to bring about the ultimate change of every human being, first from within and then ultimately to change us in the twinkling of an eye or to bring us out incorruptible. That is the revelation of scripture and being born again. Yet people today have gotten this idea that they can be born again and it's just a sad little misunderstanding of many well-meaning people who have been deceived on a very serious topic, a topic that the bible addresses very clearly. So I just want to interject that there for our benefit and now let's take a look at Rev. 11:15. Because in Rev. 11:15 we see again a reminder that:
Rev. 11:15 - ...the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ and He shall reign forever and ever.
Now what those passages that I've given to you definitely attest to is the significance of the Feast of Trumpets. The fact that this Festival is going to play a very powerful and important part in the plan and purpose of God and it would be wrong for us not to keep it because somebody comes along and says, Well I don't see it mentioned there, You shall keep the Feast of Trumpets like it says in the Old Testament in Lev. 23. Well, it doesn't matter, it's there in principle and it shows itself clearly by what the scripture says and we are told in II Tim. 3:16 that we have known scriptures from the past that are able to make us wise unto salvation because all scripture is given of God and is inspired of Him and therefore this Festival has origin in divine guidance and purpose for all of us as human beings.
Now in Jesus' prophetic service to mankind and He did give us prophetic service. When He gave an outline of something in Matthew 24, the famous Olivet Prophecy, beginning in verse 3. His disciples came to Him privately, they wanted to know, you know they were having problems and they were confused and they weren't sure just exactly how certain things might go and so they said:
Matt. 24:3 – "Tell us please, what shall be the sign of Your coming and of the end of the age?" Or this turning point in human history – when will these events take place, how will we know?
Is there any way we can know? There are people today that don't believe that this is the end time, there are many others that do believe. Why do they believe? They see all the lights flashing, all the things that the bible talks about, it's happening. Some say, Oh, it's always been that way. Oh no! Past generations did not have to face what this generation is having to face, the stresses and the strains of this generation are far greater than stresses and strains of past generations. That's why people sit on their front porch and say, "Oh I wish for the good old days, the good old days when I could relax and take it easy, just seems like I'm on a treadmill all the time, rushing here, rushing there, going here, going there." We'll see a scripture in a little bit that talks about that rushing back and forth stuff. But it makes it very plain, very clear, that we are in the dynamic period that Christ talked about, that this turning point in human history will become a reality. And Jesus told them that they would experience certain things, that they would see earthquakes, they would see religious deception. Did you hear of an earthquake here recently on a news blast, out of Japan? Number 8 on the Richter scale. That's just one, there are many of these things happening all the time, it jumps from Iran, from China, from Japan, it jumps to the United States, all over the place, earthquakes are just popping off like firecrackers on the fourth of July.
So what we have going is we've got the disease, we've got the famine, we've got the wars, the religious deceptions, these things are raging all over the world today, just exactly as Jesus said. But He said in verse 14 of Matt. 24 that there would be something that would earmark the time more than anything else. He said:
Matt. 24:14 – "This gospel of the kingdom..." Now that is most important dear brethren, that we understand that that gospel of the kingdom is what is to be preached.
Now when Jesus came into Galilee, He preached the gospel, the good news of the coming kingdom of God – that is what is not being preached today in the vast majority of Christian churches, well meaning though they be. They do preach Jesus emphatically and there may be nothing wrong with preaching Jesus emphatically because that's certainly a very valid part of scripture, but again, it leaves a very critical component out of the picture. The focus is always on accepting Jesus, accepting Jesus. Well pray tell, we have all accepted Jesus when we went under the water and were baptized because God had brought us to repentance and we recognize that without the blood of Jesus Christ we were dead in the water like a ship without a rudder and we knew that, we've already accepted that. What goes on beyond that? The kingdom of God! This is what you and I were told by Jesus that we would do what? Seek first that kingdom, make it a priority, strive for that kingdom and make sure that you never lose sight of that kingdom. Why? Because there are things in the bible that remind us again of the historical pattern of events, that the world has been filled with the rise and fall of kingdoms.
We know the bible spoke of four great kingdoms to come; Babylon was the great one that started out, then it was followed by Persia, to be followed by the Greco-Macedonian and then finally by the Roman. The Roman had ten resurrections, three of those were blown down, the rest would go from Justinian's time, 554 down into the 1800's in the fall of the Battle of Waterloo. Israel would be given the 19th and 20th century chance to operate and dominate in the end time and then the last and final resurrection of that Roman Empire would come forth. We have seen it bloom like a flower in Europe, we're hearing the talk and how they are discussing their future activities in Europe, how they want to challenge the United States and they are very very much no longer interested in being told what we did for them fifty, sixty years ago because this is a new generation, a new breed of cat out there we might use the term. Because what they're concerned about now is their life, where they're going, their destiny and they have big dreams. If you have ever done any study of European history, they are not going to stay on the back burner.
Now what God wants us to understand is that He talked about these empires and notice how again this impacts with His great servant, this young teenager who absolutely was a phenomenal example of dedication in his teenage years when he was taken captive into the Babylonian captivity. Daniel, and how Daniel grew up into manhood as a devoted servant of the living God and God gave him favor from one ruling empire to the next. He went from Babylon, he went then to the Persian Empire, he was powerful in that, he served right into those areas and his recordings of prophetic events were given to him to outline what God would do because he had asked the question, he said, My Lord, what shall be the end of these things? I want to know, I want to know what this all means, You're flooding me with all these visions and things, I can't even explain it. And so he goes on to say, and this is found in Daniel 2:44, that in the final day of this mixing, this iron and clay, where these ten toes of the statute that is spoken of in the prophetic picture, it says in v. 44:
Dan. 2:44 – "In the days of these kings..."
These individuals that you see rising on the scene now, and we're told to watch and pray because we don't know how the final configuration will take place, but we know the general area where it's going to happen and as a result, people have been sending up flares, they're saying, hey, there's something bad going on over here, it looks like we're going to have a repeat in history.
One man who's the father of one of our members here in this congregation, he fought in that war and that campaign. He looks and he sees and he says, Son, they're at it again, we're going to have to fight them again. In other words, he knows that something bad is on the horizon, he reads the signs correctly. And the scripture says:
V. 44 – "In the days of these kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but shall break in pieces and consume these kingdoms and it shall stand forever."
So what we're being told plain and simple is that the kingdoms that have come and gone – Babylon, Persian Empire, Greco-Macedonian and then the Roman Empire. Those will come to their end and there will be a fifth world ruling empire that will never be overthrown. That is called the Kingdom of God. That's the one Jesus Christ is going to rule over and that's the one that is spoken of, if you'll now turn to Daniel 7:18 and please notice:
Dan. 7:18 – "But the saints of the Most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom forever, even for ever and ever."
Because that's part of our calling, that is part of our responsibility, to be part of the dynamic changes that God will bring about in the reestablishment of the kingdom of God on this earth. Now, Daniel wanted to really know what all this meant, he wrote it all down, but Daniel 12:9 tells us:
Dan. 12:9 – "Go your way, Daniel..." because the answer to these things will be reserved till the time of the end.
Because those will be the people that will need to know and understand as these things are impacting on their life and so here you and I are what? Sitting here with this knowledge in our hand. Why? Because we're so good, because we're so smart? No! Because our loving God, out of mercy, has reached down and for what kindness He has shown us, He has picked us out and made us a people who were not a people. He has bound us together with the power of His holy spirit and He has given us insight as to what our future is, why we're here today, where we're going and what our ultimate purpose is – to be a part of the kingdom of God, that is so very very important.
Now the message today, unfortunately as I've said, is being focused on the Messenger, not the message. Jesus is the King of that kingdom, but Jesus did not finish it all at the cross as it unfortunately said. Our sins, as a Savior, that aspect was completed, it was called the Passover. He gave His life as the Lamb of God for all mankind and for our sins. That was finished, but the kingdom of God has not become a reality yet. There is much that has to be done and that is the great story that Jesus Christ preached and said that the people need to know that the governments of this world are not serving their people, it is the kingdom of God that will serve mankind with the fairness and the honor that is looked upon by individuals wanting these things but cannot find it in the governments of men. All we find is what the scriptures shows, corruption, corruption and more corruption. We don't want to believe it's that way, but that is the way it is.
It goes against our grain because we like to think that we're different. We're no different than anyone else. Everyone else is corrupted, we are corrupted, we are all sinners no matter how you dress yourself up, you're still a sinner in God's eyes and you still need the blood of Jesus Christ to cleanse you from all sin. Once you accept that, that's what you accept – I don't have to accept Jesus as my personal Savior, I did that when I was baptized, you did that when you were baptized. What you have to accept is His blood; only His blood can cleanse you from sin. Just to acknowledge Him alone is not going to do anything for anybody, you have to accept that blood and use that blood daily in your life to erase sin from your life and as you do, then you look forward to the joyous appearing of that Son of God who will come on the Day of Trumpets to bring peace and happiness to mankind that it has never known. He is our Deliverer, but He is a mighty warrior also and He is going to come back and wreak havoc on the ungodly. These dramatic events are summarized in that book called Revelation. This world will understand in Rev. 6, 8 and 9, those chapters deal with the punishments that will come in the form of trumpet plagues and the seven last plagues and then there will be two upstanding witnesses, servants of God who will preach the truth of God in those closing days of human history.
Mankind will not want to listen, they will be dishonored at their end, they will be killed, ruthlessly killed, but they will be resurrected at that last trump and when everything starts to happen, I'm telling you dear brethren, it's going to be something like you wouldn't believe. People are going to be just absolutely astonished at the events that will happen at that time. I cannot explain it in it's fullest; I can only give you a quick rapid survey in this time as to what scripture is addressing.
Christ is going to come back with the armies of heaven. Why would they want to fight the Son of God? Rev. 12:9 tells us there is a devil that has deceived the whole world. The world is primed for alien invasion. How many programs have you seen about Roswell? How many programs have you seen about aliens coming from other planets? What do you think mankind will do? Well even though they are hostile toward one another, if they see something coming out of the heavens at them and they think it's an alien invasion, they will all join forces temporarily to fight the aliens. Why? Because our planet...didn't you see a movie called Independence Day? Where all the nations had to fight the alien invasion – these are movies that we are constantly fed today, we are all prepared and prepped by the god of this world for when Christ intervenes and that's why we have to know how to separate the wheat from the chaff, what is right and what is wrong.
The resurrection of the dead will be a massive event that will bring joy and happiness and reunion to many many individuals, but it says in I Thess. 4:16 that that Lord Himself will descend with a shout from heaven with the archangel and these events will then take place in rapid fire succession. That's called the first resurrection in Rev. 20:5. Very important that we understand that this whole creation is groaning right now for the revelation of the sons and daughters of God. Paul talks about that in the book of Romans 8:19, 21 & 23 where it says how we groan within ourselves, we agonize within ourselves for that day when we will be liberated from all of this that pulls us down in this world today and gives us freedom to begin to live the way God wants us to live as human beings.
What you and I are called to at this time is to understand what Jesus clearly meant when He asked us in Matthew 6:10 and I want to close with this because in Matt. 6:10, Jesus Christ taught His disciples a very important thing. He taught them, He says, You are to pray and you are to pray, "Thy kingdom come." He didn't say, Thy kingdom stay where it's at because we'll be up there to be with You shortly Lord. He said, No, pray, "Thy kingdom come." Because the kingdom of God is needed, it's needed for you, it's needed for me, it's needed for every man, woman and child on this earth because if left unchecked, if the leadership of this world keeps going in the direction its going, they will turn this world into a scorched earth place to live and God will not allow that to happen. He will destroy these warring nations before they destroy His earth, He will destroy anyone who raises a hand to destroy His people, He will send His angels to gather His four elect from the four corners of the earth. God is going to come back and fight for us and deliver us because He is our God whom we worship on this day, in spirit and truth, thanking Him for telling us who we are, what we are and why we are here on this Feast of Trumpets, a day that will be a turning point in the history of mankind.