Sermon
After the Dark Time
Madison – Trumpets – AM – 9/29/11
 
We Can Choose:
Negativity,  Worry,  Anxiety,  Depression ...OR
Gratitude,   or Trust in our Creator/Sustainer/Savior,  or Hope,   or Joy,  Godly (selfless) Love
(Perfect Love casts out Fear – Primarily due to Selflessness (interest in others- including God)
The Time of the end is coming, and THEN something MORE …
Some 2,200 years ago, the prophet Daniel was inspired to write:
(((Daniel 12:4“But you, Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book until the time of the end…[then] knowledge shall be in­creased”. )))
This biblical prophecy is com­ing to pass, perhaps very soon with God openly revealing His plan for all humanity.
Humanity will not only survive in the those days ahead; in accordance with God’s will - we will triumph!
We “watch” sobering current events cascade down across our world, Knowing God cares about all.
•                     Terrifying and constant earth­quakes—with tsunamis
•                     Phenomenal record-breaking flood­ing and unstable weather patterns
•                     Tornado epidemic in America
•                     Grave economic conditions of spi­raling national debt
•                     Rising economic colossus of China
•                     International geopolitical tensions in Europe and Asia
•                     Threatening or open war in the Mid­dle East and North Africa
•                     Immorality rising in business and politics
•                     Sexual immorality redefining peo­ple’s concept of marriage and family

Mt 24:14, 21-22, 29-31 (Christ POWERFULLY returns, and puts down humanity’s leaders – for His Plan)
Observing Trumpets could frighten a person – if they do not look beyond the Dark Time
How should WE look and watch as we see the world crumbling? Be afraid, be superior, be good?

Benefit Statement: It is possible that some still focus (as the world does) on the time just before Christ’s return and His actual Return, instead of seeking above everything else …the KINGDOM of GOD.

The Family of God has a Kingdom, and the short time just before IT comes to earth; the start of Loving Government here - is NOT all the Gospel. WHEN He is coming, WHAT is happening just then, HOW TO ESCAPE it all by being in the Church, is NOT all of the Gospel! In FACT, the return of Jesus Christ to replace the governments of earth, is a sliver of the revealed Gospel!

SPS: Trumpets is NOT only the suffering caused by human rebellion, It’s about –
“After The Dark Time”

Body:   The Kingdom of God is coming …

This is a POSITIVE Observance of a POSITIVE Time – the END of mankind’s misrule of the Earth (guided by Satan).
Lev 23:24 24 Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall ye have a sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, an holy convocation. 
Heb –“ memorial of triumph, shouting with Joy” – Treasury of Scriptural Knowledge

Ps 81:1-4 1    Sing aloud unto God our strength: make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.
2    Take a psalm, and bring hither the timbrel, the pleasant harp with the psaltery.
3    Blow up the trumpet in the new moon, in the time appointed, on our solemn feast day.
4    For this was a statute for Israel, and a law of the God of Jacob.
King David understood this to be a Day of singing and shouting for Joy – not a Day of Fear (as the world sees it.)

A wonderful new time in history
A coming time - wonderful beyond anything ever experienced by humanity. 
Isaiah was quoted many times by Jesus Christ and the Apostles. He prophesied about that Kingdom to come.
Isaiah 11:6-9—“The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, The leopard shall lie down with the young goat, The calf and the young lion and the fatling to­gether; And a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze; Their young ones shall lie down together; And the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play by the cobra’s hole, And the weaned child shall put his hand in the viper’s den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy moun­tain, For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD As the waters cover the sea.”

The prophet Daniel spoke of this time of transition from man’s misruling of earth to God’s Rule here.
Daniel 2:44—“And in the days of these kings [the time shortly before Christ returns to the physical earth] the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people; it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for­ever.”

Today—the bad news of man­kind’s time is really all we hear around us, because humanity knows no more.
Tough times will escalate as the time when Jesus Christ will establish the Kingdom draws near. 
Matthew 24:6-8—“And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against na­tion and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.”

Tough times ahead—unprecedented in human history – UNLESS Jesus Christ returns, NOT ONE SINGLE HUMAN BEING will be left alive on earth!
We do well to realize that a main point of this verse it the REASON …the POSITIVE reason that God stops mankind from destroying all flesh on earth. It is THE most POSITIVE information WE can hear now!
(((Matthew 24:21-22—“For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be. And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened.” )))
The return of Jesus Christ – will seem like the darkest of human experience – BUT WE will see it all quite as the Beginning of Life for the Family God is creating, not the end of the world.
But after this dark time, great and wonderful things will happen.
(((Matthew 24:30-31—“Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trum­pet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.” )))

Think of it! God, in the worst times in human history, perhaps while many of us are alive, God, will send the living Jesus Christ again – this time to save mankind from self-destruction, to end human misery and suffering, and to usher in peace, happiness, and joy for all mankind.
He will come to rule over and judge all nations, and usher in the happy, peaceful world tomorrow.
That is a far cry from the best the world’s religions have to offer – “heaven is the reward of the saved”.
Faith and hope in the good news of God’s Kingdom
As we see things get more turbulent and unstable, we can have this great con­fidence:
Luke 12:32—“Do not fear, little flock, for it is your Father’s good plea­sure to give you the kingdom.”
The great hope of us all—of all who have ever lived—is this Kingdom brought by Christ.
The Kingdom of God—a kingdom of love  (Far from being an angry and spite­ful God, the God of the Bible is a God of love.)  
1 Tim 2:3-6—“For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one Me­diator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ran­som for all, to be testified in due time.”
Christ will bring mankind to the Family and Kingdom of God before humanity destroys themselves. To explain this Process - God uses the Spring and Autumn agricultural harvest of Palestine as symbolic types of His spiritual harvest of humankind.
The Spring Festivals picture those God has been calling to become His Spirit-begotten children as the “firstfruits” (James 1:18), the relatively small beginning of His spiritual harvest of all humankind into His divine Family.
Then in the early autumn, the Festivals of the later harvest season picture God calling the rest of humanity to salvation after Christ’s return.
God begins His annual Festivals with the Passover, which reminds us that the Messiah’s – Christ’s sacrifice (1 Cor 5:7) makes it possible for the firstfruits to be forgiven their sins.
Next comes the Feast of Unleavened Bread, picturing the continual need for God’s People – the firstfruits – to put out the leaven of sin (1 Cor 5:8) from their lives and to obey God.
Then the day of Pentecost, the final Spring Festival, is observed as a memorial of God’s sending forth, first, His law at Sinai, and later, His Holy Spirit at Jerusalem (Acts2) to spiritually beget and to strengthen the firstfruits of His salvation.

BUT the Firstfruits will NOT be reaped into God’s Kingdom Family until they are “born again” (Jn 3:3-8) – resurrected and changed into spirit. That will not occur until Christ comes AGAIN – and THAT brings us to the next Festival, the Feast of Trumpets!
The Feast of Trumpets is in a sense, the focal point, the central, pivotal Holy Day in God’s Plan. It not only pictures the terrible time of misery and war to befall this world, but also the intervention of Christ to save the living from annihilation and toe establish the Kingdom of God’s Family here on EARTH!
It also pictures the coming of Jesus Christ to resurrect the Firstfruits from the dead!

What is God’s purpose for His Called, and Chosen Loyal Children?
Hebrews 2:10—“For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.”
Soon – Christ will return to Save mankind from ourselves – and BEGIN the Kingdom and Family of God here:

Christ’s is coming as King of Kings bringing the fullness of the Kingdom of God with Us!
1 Thess 3:12 12And the Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward another, and toward all men, even as we do toward you: 13To the end he may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints.

Conclusion: What is God’s Way of observing THIS Day of a Memorial of Blowing of Trumpets?
In the days of Ezra, the Old Testament prophet, the Congregation of Israel,
the Old Testament Church of God, kept the Festival of Trumpets –

Neh 8:1-7(Ezra read the Law to the people on this Day)1And all the people gathered themselves together as one man into the street that was before the water gate; and they spake unto Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the LORD had commanded to Israel. 2And Ezra the priest brought the law before the congregation both of men and women, and all that could hear with understanding, upon the first day of the seventh month.

The ministers of God in the Old Testament read and explained so the People could understand, just as now.
Neh 8:88So they read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading.
                       
Nehemiah taught God’s People what they had not known, and what the world does not know now unless we participate in exampling and supporting proclaiming God’s Plan to humanity!
Neh 8:9-119And Nehemiah, which is the Tirshatha, and Ezra the priest the scribe, and the Levites that taught the people, said unto all the people, This day is holy unto the LORD your God; mourn not, nor weep. For all the people wept, when they heard the words of the law. 10Then he said unto them, Go your way, eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto them for whom nothing is prepared: for this day is holy unto our Lord: neither be ye sorry; for the joy of the LORD is your strength. 11So the Levites stilled all the people, saying, Hold your peace, for the day is holy; neither be ye grieved.
Nehemiah explained that this Day is a day of great REJOICING (not of fearful cowering or negative attitude, such as escaping the tribulation by being in the Church, or knowing more than humanity, but of humbly recognizing the GIFT of the knowledge and understanding of what is Coming for all Creation, including all Mankind!
This information resulted in what WE are to do TOO! Rejoicing!

Neh 8:1212And all the people went their way to eat, and to drink, and to send portions, and to make great mirth, because they had understood the words that were declared unto them.

Close:   WHY eat, drink, send portions, make great mirth?    

One of the most amazing points of the Bible is that God wants us to understand the breadth and depth of our future.
It is not frightening, or something to dread, or escape from, it IS why we endure!
God is love personified. He is exampling to US how sacrificing OUR lives, brings Life!
As Paul wrote in the first century AD, and WE too will see our Course:

2 Tim 4:6 6For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. 7I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: 8Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.
WE are part of the Plan now, and the Day of Trumpets shows the end of this life,
and beginning of the new Spirit Family of God here on Earth, ruling with Christ.
 (((Deuteronomy 30:19-20—“I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live; that you may love the LORD your God, that you may obey His voice, and that you may cling to Him, for He is your life and the length of your days; and that you may dwell in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give them.” )))
By us choosing that Life, We choose Life FOR all those who do not yet understand – those who are yet to be welcomed in God’s Family, because of OUR submission to the Kingdom of God.
Choose to Live Life, Choose Life, not just for you, but for all those you touch …

CONCLUSION
The point is that this Day pictures choosing Life for many more than just ourselves.

We become responsible for mankind, right along with Jesus Christ, once we understand that it is because of the Elect’s Sake that all flesh is not allowed to be destroyed.

If we fail, or give up, we fail THEM, and we give up for THEM! We fail and give up eternal life in the coming Kingdom of God!