Participants: Lyle Albrecht
Series Code: POFCM
Program Code: POFCM000014
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00:39 Live from the 3ABN Worship Center.
00:42 Welcome to the Pillars Of Our Faith event. 01:07 Lord, it's with the simple reverence 01:12 that I come into your presence 01:17 whispering the name that calms all fears. 01:26 And I'm filled with such emotion at Your mercy and devotion 01:34 to think that You would come and meet me here. 01:43 Lord, I tremble at the very thought of Calvary where 01:53 You chose me over life as You suffered willingly. 02:00 Lord, I tremble at the way I'm undeserving of 02:09 the love You came to give and the blood that makes me worthy. 02:17 Lord, I tremble. 02:25 Let me not forget His temple 02:30 is transformed into a throne room. 02:34 And through Your name my soul is ushered in. 02:41 So let me come to You in wonder, 02:46 let my heart still pound like thunder 02:50 at the way Your grace has found me once again. 02:58 Lord, I tremble at the very thought of Calvary where 03:07 You chose me over life as You suffered willingly. 03:15 Lord, I tremble at the way I'm undeserving of 03:24 the love You came to give and the blood that makes me worthy. 03:32 Lord, I tremble at the way Your love has saved me 03:38 and Your precious grace forgave me. 03:42 Let me never take for granted who You are. 03:50 Lord, I tremble at the very thought of Calvary where 04:00 You chose me over life as You suffered willingly. 04:07 I tremble at the way I'm undeserving of 04:16 the love You came to give and the blood that makes me worthy. 04:24 Lord, I tremble. 04:36 Lord, I tremble. 04:44 Amen. 04:46 Amen, thank you so much Melody. 04:49 Melody Firestone. 04:50 And what a beautiful song. 04:53 And what a beautiful day we've had here 04:57 in southern Illinois. 04:59 And Camille and I, we just enjoy it around here so much. 05:03 You should all move here. 05:07 You really should. 05:09 I tell you, we love it here. 05:10 Camille and I were talking yesterday, we said, 05:13 "You know, we found a home. " 05:15 We love it right here. 05:17 It's country and yet a lot of good things are 05:19 going on around here. 05:21 So we enjoy it so very much. 05:24 Well our speaker tonight is Lyle Albrecht. 05:28 Amen. 05:29 Wow, listen to that. 05:30 Lyle, you've got some friends here. 05:38 You know, wherever I go and I'm talking to people who've 05:41 made decisions for the Lord Jesus Christ 05:44 to become part of the remnant church and be a part of these 05:48 last days message to the world, I will find that they'll mention 05:53 several speakers. 05:54 They'll mention Kenneth Cox, John Carter, David Asscherick. 05:58 They will mention several others. 06:01 And they always mention Lyle Albrecht. 06:04 Amen. 06:05 They watch Lyle and they hear the message. 06:09 He's going to be preaching tonight on the second coming 06:11 of Christ and the millennium, and all of those events 06:16 that take place. 06:18 And just before he does, Reggie Smith is going to come. 06:24 He's going to sing a song that were the words of William Miller 06:29 after the great disappointment. 06:33 But he said, "I have fixed my mind on another time. " 06:39 Reggie, come and sing for us. 11:53 Amen. 11:58 Oh, I can preach now. 12:02 I'm a little nearer to heaven than I was five minutes ago. 12:07 It's such a wonderful privilege for me to be here. 12:09 Amen. 12:12 I listened as I drove in from the airport 12:18 to my friend C.D. Brooks last night. 12:24 And as I always do when he preaches, 12:29 I asked myself this question; 12:33 Why do you keep trying? 12:45 And then I've discovered that this message that we love 12:53 is very tightly joined together. 12:56 These Pillars that we're talking about are united, 12:59 aren't they now. 13:00 Yeah. 13:01 One holds up the other, and the other supports the other. 13:03 You why I'm assured of that fact? 13:06 You know why I know it's the truth? 13:07 Lomacang just preached my sermon a while ago. 13:11 Yeah. 13:12 I tried and tried to pray him off, but I couldn't. 13:16 I thought he was going to preach on death. 13:18 Well, how do you preach the judgment and 13:20 the state of the dead without preaching on the second coming? 13:23 When you believe truth, it all goes together. 13:26 It fits like a perfect puzzle, doesn't it now. 13:29 Amen. 13:31 Well say, I want to take this one moment to say 13:36 "hello" to my sweet Peggy who's home. 13:40 And my daughter, Tammy, and my son, Troy. 13:42 And Peggy, I did not get another speeding ticket... 13:49 ...yet. 13:54 It's been a busy year. 13:56 I retired, you know that. Last November, we retired. 13:59 But I'm still going full time with meetings. 14:01 And in addition, I've made three albums, cd's. 14:08 We use to call them albums, you know. 14:09 You know how old I am now, don't you. 14:13 And I've written an autobiography. 14:14 Got a lot of color pictures in there, I've told a lot 14:16 of stories in there. 14:17 Some of you are going to be in there. 14:19 I've had to change some of the names to protect the guilty. 14:24 Yeah. 14:26 I included this story. You'll love this. 14:30 I was in central Washington and I was given the name of a lady. 14:36 I was about to hold a meeting, open a crusade. 14:38 And I was given the name of a lady who watched 3ABN. 14:43 Someone said, "She really likes your program. " 14:46 If you go and invite her, she'll probably come to the meetings. 14:49 And so I went to her home. 14:52 It was the early fall. 14:54 Her door was open, the screen was closed. 14:56 And as I got near her door, I heard a familiar voice. 15:00 Mine. 15:07 True. 15:10 And I knocked on her door. 15:14 And she came to the door and looked at me 15:16 and looked at her TV and looked back at me. 15:18 And then she said, "Oh my lord. " 15:23 I said, "No, it's just Lyle. " 15:30 And she fainted. 15:31 I promise you, the lady went the whole thing. 15:36 And her son had to bring a dish cloth and mop her face. 15:40 We baptized her five weeks later. 15:42 Yeah. 15:50 For those of you that might be interested in those 15:52 kinds of stories and 40 years of evangelism 15:54 and the conversion of my parents, you've heard me tell 15:57 a little bit of it, we have a website now. 15:59 LyleAlbrecht. com, I guess it is. 16:04 Well I want to say to you, it's a wonderful thing 16:10 to be a Christian, 16:15 to have a Savior, 16:20 to know where we've come from and why we're here, 16:22 and where we're soon going. 16:25 Soon going. 16:29 I had the privilege to be at the home of Johnny Cash. 16:38 I don't want you to think we were close friends. 16:40 But I was at his home a time or two and I've been a 16:46 fan since 1956, I guess. 16:52 Some of you may or may not know that for quite a while 16:54 Johnny and June attended a Seventh-day Adventist church 16:58 in northern Nashville Tennessee. 17:01 And so I was, a couple of days ago, re-reading 17:04 portions of Johnny Cash's first autobiography, The Man in Black. 17:09 I was reading again the story of the death of his brother, Jack. 17:14 Two years older than Johnny. 17:16 On a Saturday morning in Diaz, Arkansas, brother Jack was 17:21 going to go down to the high school wood working shop 17:24 to cut fence posts. 17:26 John, 12 years of age, was going to go fishing. 17:29 He said, "Jack, please come fishing with me. 17:31 I want you to come fishing with me, spend the morning with me. " 17:33 And Jack said, "I'd like to, brother, but we need the 17:36 three dollars that I'll make cutting fence posts. " 17:40 And so at the fork in the road, John went to the fishing hole 17:43 and Jack went to the mill. 17:48 A couple of hours later, one of the posts got stuck in the 17:53 saw and jerked Jack into the big circle saw and 17:57 it cut him from pubis to sternum. 18:02 And an old country doctor did his best to patch him up but 18:04 he told the family, "Jack is going to die. 18:09 He's going to die. " 18:11 And for the next week, Jack lapsed 18:14 in and out of consciousness. 18:19 The family gathered when they knew the end was very near. 18:22 And suddenly, Jack became lucid. 18:26 And he said, "Can you hear the angels, momma? 18:33 Can you hear their singing?" 18:35 "No," she said, "son, I can't hear them. " 18:37 "Oh it's so beautiful, mother. It's so beautiful. " 18:43 And then he said, "Do you see the city? 18:51 Can't you see the city? Oh beautiful city. " 18:57 And then he died. 19:02 Two days later in a little Baptist church, 19:07 they had his funeral. 19:11 And Johnny said he took that day great comfort, 19:18 and for the rest of his life, from the passage that was read 19:23 by the pastor; John chapter 14. 19:27 Open there with me if you have your Bible. 19:29 If you don't, shame on you. 19:31 If you can, look on with a neighbor. 19:33 And if you can't do that then just listen very carefully, 19:36 will you please. 19:37 John chapter 14, the first three verses. 19:42 John 14 verses 1-3, you've memorized them. 19:45 By the way, those who make record of these kinds of things 19:49 say that this passage of scripture has been memorized 19:53 about as often as any other in the Bible. 19:55 And for many many years, if someone had asked me 19:57 what's your favorite scripture, I would have said 19:59 this certainly is among them. 20:00 Right in the top five. Alright. 20:02 John 14 verses 1, 2, and 3. 20:05 "Let not your... " Come on say that again. 20:08 "Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, 20:11 believe also in Me. 20:14 In My Father's house are many mansions; if it were not so, 20:18 I would have told you. 20:19 I go to prepare a place for you. 20:22 And if I go... " I might come again. 20:25 There's a good chance I'll be back. 20:27 I may see you again. 20:28 "If I go, I will come again 20:32 that where I am, there you may be also. " 20:37 "In My Father's house. " 20:39 I want you now to take a mind trip with me. 20:42 We're going to go back, you and I, to a dining hall 20:45 of 2000 years past. 20:50 There, around a horseshoe shaped table, sit thirteen men. 20:55 Twelve very ordinary men who, by their Lord and His Holy Spirit, 21:01 have become extraordinary. 21:05 In the center is their leader whom they now know 21:10 is not only their best friend but also their Savior. 21:14 They have shared together, for the last time, Passover. 21:17 He's instituted in its place the Lord's supper. 21:20 And then as they sit in a relaxed condition, 21:26 He says to them this, "I'm going to have to leave you. 21:32 Where I'm going you can't come. Not now, not yet. " 21:36 And their hearts are broken. 21:38 "We've just gotten to know You well, Lord. 21:40 Surely You're not going to go. 21:41 We want to go. If You're going we're going. " 21:45 Oh by the way, by the way, I say to Peggy oft times... 21:51 You know, that girl has spent 40 years in a camper with me. 21:54 Nine months out of the year, we're in a camper 21:57 somewhere at a meeting here or there. 21:58 And it's confining. It really is. 22:01 And not very many gals could live that way. 22:03 But I oft times over the years have said, "Well, sweetheart, 22:07 you can go anytime. 22:09 You're not locked in here, the door is open. 22:12 You can leave anytime. You're free to go anytime. 22:16 But I'm going with you. " 22:23 And so these disciples said, "Lord, we're going to 22:26 go with You. 22:27 We're going to go. " 22:28 "No, you can't. Not now, not yet. " 22:30 And so He speaks these words of comfort. 22:33 "I'm going to go get a place ready for you and I 22:35 will come again. 22:37 And where I am, there you may be also. " 22:40 "In My Father's house. " 22:41 Now, I ask you this question as we think about the 22:44 second coming of Jesus and the millennium that begins 22:46 immediately at His second coming. 22:49 What kind of man would He be to comfort His 22:52 very best friends with a lie? 22:54 You wouldn't do that. 22:55 Certainly our Lord wouldn't do it. 22:57 He is coming again. 22:59 We have His promise to His best friends given in an upper room. 23:03 Now, only just a few hours later after He's left the upper room 23:07 and gone over with the eleven of the twelve, into the garden 23:11 and there prayed and wept. 23:12 And then He's arrested. 23:14 He goes first to the Sanhedrin and the liars come in and 23:18 tell their lies against Him and He says nothing. 23:20 And finally the high priest has had enough of His silence 23:24 and He puts Him under oath. 23:26 He does the same thing that in a courtroom today happens 23:29 when the bailiff says, "Place your hand upon the Bible. 23:33 Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, 23:37 and nothing but the truth, so help you God?" 23:40 The high priest says to Jesus, now, "I adjure thee 23:43 by the living God. " 23:45 He's put Him under oath. 23:47 And then he asks, "Are You the Messiah?" 23:52 And Jesus respects the oath. He's said nothing up till now. 23:54 But He respects the authority of the courtroom and 23:57 the officers, and He respects the oath and He now 24:00 speaks and He says, "You've said it right. " 24:03 King James says, "Thou saith. " "You said it correctly. " 24:06 "Indeed I am. " 24:07 But He doesn't stop there. 24:08 He goes on and says to the high priest, "I tell you here after, 24:13 you're going to see Son of Man coming in the clouds of glory. " 24:17 Now what kind of man would He be who would tell a lie 24:21 in a court of law? 24:22 Tell a lie under oath? No, not Jesus. 24:25 We have not only His promise to His best friends 24:28 in an upper room, we have His sworn testimony 24:30 in a court of law. 24:32 He is coming again. 24:34 "Let not your heart be troubled. " 24:38 Jesus, you remember, as He looked down 24:39 toward the last days, 24:41 Matthew 24 and Luke 17 and 21, He said that in the last days 24:44 there was going to be a lot of worry. 24:47 There was going to be a lot of confusion. 24:49 Men's hearts were going to fail them because of fear. 24:54 Heart disease and heart failure and strokes and 24:56 all of that kind of thing now are rampant. 24:58 They've become pandemic in our world. 25:01 People are afraid. 25:03 My neighbors, some of them are not Christians at all, 25:05 but they know something is about to happen. 25:07 We know what it is. 25:09 Yeah. 25:10 And so many are fearful. 25:12 But Jesus said, "Let not your heart be troubled. " 25:15 Their hearts may fail them for fear, but don't let 25:17 your heart be troubled. 25:19 It's alright for the non-believer to be troubled, 25:21 it's alright for the heathenist to be troubled 25:22 and the atheist to be troubled. 25:24 But don't let our hearts be troubled. 25:26 He is coming again. 25:32 He's coming back. 25:33 Now, the apostle Paul, in Titus chapter 2 verse 13, 25:40 and we won't have time because of the menace of the clock. 25:46 By the way, I discovered early on in my ministry 25:49 if you go two minutes over and about half the congregation 25:54 develops a disease that I call the tick of the left arm. 26:03 I know what time it is. 26:07 By the way, have you folks heard of that... 26:09 You can go just south of the border and you can get 26:12 a Rolex knockoff. 26:14 One of you has one? 26:18 This is a Timex knockoff. 26:22 And I know what time it is. 26:24 But we don't have time to turn to all the scriptures so I'll 26:25 just have to reference them. 26:27 And you A students will take notes. 26:28 Of course you remember these. 26:30 In Titus chapter 2 verse 13, there the apostle Paul, 26:33 referring to the second coming of Jesus called it the... 26:35 What kind of hope? 26:37 The blessed hope, looking for the glorious appearing. 26:39 The blessed hope. 26:41 I want to say to you tonight, to your heart and mine, 26:43 it is our only hope. 26:46 It's the only way out of here, this mess that we're in. 26:49 And so for the last few months, I have been preaching a series 26:53 of sermons that I've entitled with a subtitle, 26:56 The Necessity of the Coming of Jesus. 26:59 He's not going to come back out of whim or caprice. 27:01 He's not going to look down and say, "You're having it so 27:04 wonderfully well down there I think I'll come and join you. " 27:06 He's going to come back out of absolute necessity. 27:09 He must come again. 27:11 If there's anyone left here to save, He's going to 27:13 have to hurry back. 27:14 And so I'm going to just very briefly scratch the surface of 27:18 some of these reasons why I know Jesus has to come back again. 27:23 Number one, nuclear proliferation. 27:26 I'm from Idaho, I only learned that word a few days ago. 27:30 I thought I'd try it out on you. 27:31 Proliferation. 27:35 But did you notice I got the nuclear part right. 27:38 Did you notice that? Give me a little credit. 27:39 There are some Presidents who can't say it. 27:44 We love them still. 27:48 Well there's so many of the nations who are not necessarily 27:51 friendly toward us that have the nuclear bomb. 27:54 China is one and Russia, of course, one. 27:56 Korean and Iran and India and Pakistan. 27:59 He must come again. 28:01 You know, mankind has never made a weapon that he 28:04 has not ultimately used. 28:06 And you just have to wonder which day it's going to be 28:08 when someone pushes the button. 28:10 He must come again. 28:12 And then necessity reason number two. 28:16 The population bomb. 28:18 As we prayed in the back room just a little bit ago, 28:20 we alluded to this, you know. 28:22 There are in our world today about 7 billion people. 28:30 That number increases by a million every day and 3/4. 28:34 It use to be every 2 days but now, of course, the explosion 28:37 is exponential. 28:41 It gets to a certain point and then it just explodes. 28:44 And that's what's happening right now. 28:46 They say that at the present rate of population growth, 28:49 by the year 2025 there will be more than 20 billion of us here. 28:56 More than we can possibly feed or clothe or accommodate. 28:59 He must come again. 29:02 And He is coming again. 29:03 And then number three. 29:05 I look at what's happening in the world of medicine 29:09 and disease and pandemics. 29:11 I have two children surviving and they're 29:13 both registered nurses. 29:14 And I pray for them regularly and I want you to do the same. 29:17 Both, my Troy and Tammy, are nurses. 29:19 And the most dangerous place you can work these days, 29:23 not in the coal mines. 29:24 Did you know that? 29:25 And it's not in the logging camps. 29:27 It's in the hospital. 29:29 Yeah. 29:31 Really, it is. 29:32 They have all of these problems to deal with and all of these 29:35 diseases that come in. 29:37 And oft times, we don't even hear about them. 29:39 Sometimes I hear about it through my kids. 29:41 But there are horrors out there. 29:44 When that movie, Medicine Man, with Sean Connery came out 29:46 a few years ago, some folks thought it was just 29:48 all done in Hollywood. 29:49 It was based on a reality. 29:51 It was based on a truth down in the jungles of 29:53 South Central America and out in Africa. 29:55 There are some horrific diseases that are on the horizon. 29:58 Our Lord Jesus in Matthew chapter 24 and the 20th verse 30:02 said that in the last days there are going to be pestilences. 30:06 I've done some homework and that Greek word is, 30:09 that word rather, is translated from the Greek, 30:12 a word called loimos. 30:14 And it's talking about, says the Greek scholar, 30:17 a time when there come diseases that are pandemic. 30:20 They not only affect a community, they not only 30:23 affect a state, but they become very quickly worldwide. 30:27 And so I read up a little bit on the Asian flu, 1957. 30:32 A few of you here are old enough to remember. 30:36 You're not going to admit it. 30:41 That is the Asian flu. 30:43 And in that flu, there were 2 million who died. 30:45 And then we had in 1968, the Hong Kong flu. 30:47 At least a million were dead from that one. 30:49 And more recently, we've had the bird flu. 30:50 And we know that millions have died from it. 30:52 We're not exactly sure how many. 30:54 And we have continued to over use antibiotics. 30:58 Oh, the little kids have a cold or something and 31:01 their mother takes them to the doctor. 31:02 And the doctor says, "Well, I think that maybe just a little 31:05 something will fix this and some things you have 31:07 in your medicine cabinet. " 31:08 And we say, "No, I want you to give them some antibiotics. " 31:12 And we've over used them to the point that now they're 31:15 not doing what they're suppose to do when the 31:17 serious things come along. 31:19 And so we need to, kind of, be mindful of some of these things. 31:24 Aids. 31:25 Thirty million have died since 1981 from aids. 31:29 Down in southern Saharan Africa, there are 40 million 31:34 people today who have aids. 31:37 And fewer than 1/6 of them get any kind of medication. 31:41 It is a death sentence in Africa. 31:43 And the way people move around now, it's so easy to move 31:46 from one place to another. 31:50 Viruses. 31:51 I'm going to share with you a couple of quotations 31:53 from some men of science. 31:55 I'm not a scientist but I know how to read from some of them. 31:59 A guy by the name of Dr. Michio Kaku, a Ph. D. 32:04 from New York University said and I'm quoting now, 32:07 "Viruses now in the making are much more deadly than 32:11 any prior disease, including aids. " 32:15 Now by the way, his reference is to manmade diseases. 32:19 And there are on the shelves of the countries, again, that don't 32:24 care for us all that very much some diseases that are 32:28 in cans and bottles. 32:29 And some say that if they're released, they're going to be 32:33 far worse than a dirty bomb to be let loose in New York City 32:37 or some such place. 32:38 And so Dr. Kaku says that there are many now in the making that 32:43 are far more deadly than aids. 32:45 A guy by the name of Colonel Larsen who's the director of our 32:47 Homeland Security division said and I'm quoting again, 32:50 "What scares me is not so much the diseases that we know 32:56 traditionally in medicine, but rather the manmade diseases. " 32:59 And then Dr. Serge Popov, the head of Russia's, the former 33:04 Soviet Union's disease project said, "It's possible... " 33:07 I'm quoting again. 33:08 "It's possible to take smallpox, one of the worse natural 33:11 killers, and engineer it into the ultimate weapon. " 33:15 I was reading along, by the way, this context 33:18 about our former President of 1917 or 1918, Woodrow Wilson. 33:26 By the way, did you know where he was born, Woodrow Wilson? 33:29 You country folks are going to appreciate this. 33:32 Stanton, Virginia. 33:33 Who else is from Stanton, Virginia. 33:35 Who else, who else is from... 33:38 No, I mean famous folks. 33:40 Besides you, sir. 33:49 Could you folks think of a country music quartet? 33:51 The Statler Brothers. Sure, yeah. 33:55 Well, they really put Stanton on the map. 33:58 But I've been to the home of Woodrow Wilson. 34:01 And Woodrow Wilson said of the smallpox epidemic, 34:05 the caskets of the little children in Washington D.C. 34:09 were stacked higher than the average man's head and you 34:12 could see them in the streets for more than three blocks. 34:15 And that's only just a foretaste. 34:17 Our Lord must come again. 34:19 He's going to come again. He has to come again. 34:24 The book of Revelation speaks about the plagues 34:26 and about the worldwide sort of condition. 34:30 And it's going to happen. 34:31 I believe we're seeing it begin to happen now. 34:33 By the way folks, you know, it's good to laugh. 34:37 And sometimes I find myself these days laughing 34:39 instead of crying. 34:41 The line between them is very slim. 34:43 And so we laugh sometimes rather than crying. 34:45 It's alright even to smile in church sometimes. 34:48 God has a sense of humor. I know that because He made me. 34:52 But at the same time, there has come into my heart 34:56 an urgency that I've never had before. 35:01 Our Lord is coming. 35:04 And the signs are everywhere. Everywhere. 35:08 You can't read a newspaper, you can't turn on a 35:10 news magazine except you see another crisis 35:13 somewhere in the world. 35:14 And I see those angels described in Revelation chapter 6 and 7 35:18 holding back the winds, holding them back 35:20 and their knuckles are turning white 35:22 and their muscles are at the stretch. 35:25 Jesus is soon to come. 35:28 And we need to get ready. 35:30 We need to memorize the promises of God. 35:33 Study our Bibles like we've not been doing before. 35:36 Pray more than we've been praying before. 35:38 And memorize our Bibles. 35:39 But better than that, most importantly, 35:42 we need to know its Author. 35:45 Do you have a relationship with Jesus? 35:48 Is He your best friend? 35:55 He must come again. 35:57 The next necessity of the coming of Jesus, as I see it; 36:02 the financial crisis, not only in the United States 36:05 but in the world. 36:06 I listened to world news as I drove in from the 36:08 St. Louis airport yesterday evening and they're talking 36:11 again about how the stock market crashed yesterday 36:14 and the day before because of the uncertainly of the 36:18 situation over in Europe and out in Greece 36:21 and elsewhere in the world. 36:23 You ladies and gentlemen probably know 36:26 that in the last 14 months the United States of America has 36:31 spent more money than in its prior 200 plus years. 36:35 Now I shouldn't say we've spent. 36:36 We have borrowed more money. 36:39 Because we are broke. 36:41 We are broke. 36:43 The state in which I live has sent a little note, 36:46 "Your income tax refund is going to be a little late. 36:48 We don't have the money. " 36:50 And that's just one of the states. 36:51 Nearly all the states are in the same sort of predicament. 36:54 And I notice as I drove over here, some of your highways 36:57 have potholes almost as big as ours out in Oregon. 37:00 Out there we get lost in them. 37:01 You don't want to drive a little car out there. 37:03 Put away your Volkswagen. 37:04 If you're going to drive in Oregon, you're going to 37:05 fall in a hole and they'll never find you again. 37:10 We are, today in the United States, 37:11 15 trillion dollars in debt. 37:14 And most of that money is being borrowed from the Chinese. 37:18 And they're not our best friends in all the world. 37:21 And they're raising the interest rate. 37:23 And a man who should know said to me a few days ago, 37:27 we are now paying, ladies and gentlemen, 37:29 a billion dollars a day in interest. 37:32 And we're never, never going to pay it back. 37:34 And with the money that is promised by means of 37:39 Social Security and the new health system, 37:41 that puts us in debt to the tune of somewhere around 37:45 75 trillion dollars. 37:47 There's no way that I can help you understand that. 37:50 We have seen in the last few months the government take 37:53 control of the banks and big business. 37:55 And we read from Revelation chapter 13, no man could 37:59 buy or sell unless he goes along with the system. 38:02 I use to preach, "It's coming, it's coming. " 38:05 Now I say, "It's here, folks. It's right here. " 38:08 He must come. 38:09 Jesus must come again. 38:12 And then we have in the last few months seen 38:16 massive earthquakes, an activation of volcanoes 38:19 that have been dormant for years and years and years. 38:22 And this is my reason number five. 38:24 Jesus has to come again. 38:26 I preached a sermon I called, 38:28 Earthquakes, Tsunamis. Shake rattle and roll. 38:35 My first earthquake experience found me, an 18 year old boy, 38:40 standing in a street in Idaho visiting with some friends. 38:42 I was leaning in their car window beneath 38:45 an intersection street light. 38:49 Suddenly I felt myself go kind of dizzy. 38:51 Now I've always had a little problem with motion sickness. 38:53 I knew I was sober. 39:00 And I looked up, I stood back and I looked up. 39:04 And the street light was swinging overhead. 39:07 And one of the guys in the car said, "It's an earthquake. " 39:09 I guess he'd been in one before somewhere over in California. 39:13 It was an earthquake. That was my first experience. 39:15 And that one, by the way, killed a lot of folks up in 39:18 the beautiful state park of Yellowstone. 39:20 It killed a lot of people, that earthquake did. 39:22 More recently, however, Peggy and I were driving 39:25 back from a meeting. 39:26 We were in our motor home coming back from a meeting in Arizona. 39:31 We spent the night in a tiny little town of Wells, Nevada. 39:36 Don't tell me you've been there. 39:39 You can hardly find it on a map. 39:42 As we drove out of town the next morning, I was listening 39:46 to the CB radio. 39:50 I listen to it a lot because Yogi Berra said, 39:56 "Don't look back, somebody might be gaining on you. " 40:00 They might have that red light. 40:03 There came on the CB radio there'd just been an 40:05 earthquake in Wells. 40:07 Knocked some bricks off the tops of some of the buildings. 40:10 Wells, Nevada. 40:11 And then I read up on it. 40:12 They've never known there was an earthquake fault line there. 40:15 Never had an earthquake there as far as the modern record 40:18 had been able to tell them. 40:20 Earthquakes in diverse places. 40:23 Now here's a scripture for you, Matthew chapter 24 verse 7. 40:26 The same thing you find in Luke chapter 21 and verse 11. 40:29 Matthew 24:7, there our Lord Jesus speaking about last days, 40:32 He said there are going to be earthquakes 40:34 in diverse places. 40:36 Now I've done some homework here again and I discovered 40:39 that means there are going to be earthquakes in the last days 40:41 in places where they've never known them before. 40:44 That's what's happening right now. 40:46 Yeah. 40:48 There is a fault line called the New Madrid Fault. 40:52 Any of you folks know about where that is? 40:54 That's where we are, isn't it. 40:55 Yeah. 40:57 And was it old Daniel Boone or was it Davey Crocket, 40:59 I'm not sure. 41:01 He was out killing a bear. 41:03 I guess he was only about 3 years old. 41:06 That's what Walt Disney said. 41:10 But he was walking along the muddy Mississippi River 41:13 and the earthquake came and he said, suddenly the river 41:18 began to run upstream. 41:21 And folks thought it was just another one of 41:23 his big tall tales. 41:25 But science today says no, he was right. 41:26 The Mississippi ran the opposite way as a result 41:30 of that terrible earthquake along the New Madrid Fault. 41:32 Well, that's not the biggest fault in the 41:35 United States of America. 41:40 The biggest fault line on our continent, ladies and gentlemen, 41:43 is called the Cascadia Fault. 41:47 And it runs from San Francisco to British Columbia, Canada 41:50 from 14 to 50 miles off the Pacific coast line. 41:55 That's my country. 41:57 I just came back from a meeting over along the Oregon coast. 42:01 And I must admit to you that every morning I said, 42:04 "Lord, don't let her go today. Don't let it rock today. 42:09 I get sea sick too easily. 42:11 We don't need that Cascadia Fault going off today. " 42:15 Volcanoes and earthquakes and tsunamis are all 42:19 very much related, ladies and gentlemen. 42:22 The apostle Peter said that in the last days, this is from 42:25 2 Peter chapter 3 and verses 3 and 4. 42:28 In the last days, he said, there are going to be scoffers. 42:32 That's it. 42:33 There are going to be scoffers and they're going to say, 42:34 "Look, things are just like they've always been. 42:36 I mean, since my great great grandfather was around 42:39 he's told about these kind of things. 42:41 And we only know more about it today because there are 42:43 more people and we have more news casts 42:46 and satellite feeds and all of that. 42:48 It's just like it has always been. " 42:50 But the facts are these. Now listen up. 42:52 From 1970 until 2000, disastrous earthquakes 42:58 that had terrific affect rose from 70 million to 200 million. 43:06 That's only 30 years. 43:09 Since 1900, we have had over 600 earthquakes 43:15 at a 6 point on the Richter scale or greater. 43:18 Are you with me? 43:21 In California, the week of January 9 of 2008, 43:24 there were 475 earthquakes along the San Andreas Fault alone. 43:30 475 in one day. 43:34 In one day. 43:37 Now here's something that I find fascinating. 43:39 And again I'm going to refer to several scriptures. 43:42 I'm going to have to do it quickly here. 43:43 Matthew chapter 27 verse 50. 43:46 There was an earthquake when my Jesus died on the cross. 43:48 The earth shook when Jesus died. 43:51 Matthew chapter 28 verse 2. 43:53 It says when Jesus rose from the grave, there was an earthquake. 43:56 And it was so mighty that it wakened some of 43:58 the other guys around and they came out of their graves. 44:01 There was an earthquake when Jesus rose. 44:03 In Acts chapter 16 verse 26, it says there was an earthquake 44:06 when it was time to take the gospel to the Gentiles. 44:10 Paul and Silas, you remember, were in jail and God said, 44:13 "It is now time, boys, for you to get out of here. " 44:16 And so He shook the place down and they went to take the 44:18 gospel out to the whole world. 44:20 God used an earthquake. 44:21 In Revelation chapter 6 verse 12, God says 44:25 there is a great earthquake to signal last day events. 44:28 Now not everyone believes it but I certainly do, 44:30 and believe it more as the years go by. 44:32 I believe that the great earthquake that we now 44:35 refer to, you remember, as the opening of the 6th seal, 44:39 I believe that this was the one that signaled 44:42 the last days, the end times. 44:44 The 6th seal of Revelation chapter 6. 44:48 Great earthquakes. 44:51 Fault lines. 44:53 New Madrid, San Andreas. 44:54 But the Cascadia... 44:56 They say that if the Cascadia Fault releases its energy 45:01 all at once... 45:02 It's been years and years and years since it has 45:03 done anything at all. 45:05 It could happen today, they say, or next week or next month, 45:07 but it's going to happen. 45:08 They say if that one should release all of its energy, 45:12 if the tectonic plates slam together all at once, 45:16 that there is going to be a 100 foot tsunami wave. 45:21 I drive along the Oregon coast and I see signs that say, 45:24 "In case of a tsunami, turn right here. " 45:27 And I've done this, I've driven up to the end of the road 45:30 up there and looked at the altimeter and you're about 45:32 25 or 30 feet about sea level. 45:35 But it says that if this one comes, it's going to be 45:38 100 feet high. 45:41 And more than that, it says we're going to have only 45:44 15 minutes of warning along the great cities 45:48 of San Francisco, and Portland Oregon, and Seattle Washington, 45:52 Vancouver British Columbia, and everything in between. 45:58 God says, "In the last day, I'm going to arise... " 46:01 This is Isaiah chapter 2 verses 19 and 20. 46:04 Isaiah 2:19 46:05 "I'm going to arise and shake terribly the earth. " 46:09 And we're beginning to see it. 46:10 The earth waxes old like the garment. 46:14 We have out in the Pacific Rim... 46:16 And that's what I'm a part of out in the Pacific Northwest. 46:20 The West Coast, the Philippines, Hawaii, the Indian Ocean. 46:23 We have out there in the Pacific Northwest these volcanoes. 46:27 Glacier Peak, Mount Baker Peak, Rainier, Mount Adams. 46:32 And St Helens which you've heard something about, haven't you. 46:36 And the Three Sisters and Mount Hood and Mount Newberry 46:38 and Crater Lake volcano. 46:40 And Jefferson and Mount Shasta and Mount Lassen and Garibaldi. 46:43 Many of those are now active. 46:46 Many are right now active. 46:48 I take comfort from Psalm 46 verses 1-3. 46:52 "God is our strength. He is our present help. 46:57 We will not fear though the earth shake and the mountains 47:00 are cast into the waters and the seas roar 47:03 and the mountains shake. " 47:04 We will not fear. Why? 47:06 Because on Christ the mighty rock we stand. 47:10 All other ground is sinking sand. 47:12 On Christ, the Rock of ages. Cleft for me. 47:14 Christ is the Rock. 47:16 There's one earthquake, ladies and gentlemen, 47:19 that I long to see and happily await. 47:25 For the Bible suggests that when Jesus comes back again, 47:28 the earth is going to be shaken terribly 47:31 and the saints of God are going to come out of the graves. 47:35 And there is a little cemetery out in eastern Oregon 47:37 where I want to be 47:39 when my boy comes out 47:42 and my granddaughter, Danny, comes out. 47:50 Fill their lungs with the breath of eternal life. 47:53 Jesus is coming again. He must come again. 47:57 Of absolute necessity, He is coming again. 48:00 Now, I'm going to transition. 48:03 And this may not be the smoothest, but remember again 48:05 I'm from Idaho. 48:07 Alright? 48:10 The day of the second coming of Jesus Christ 48:13 is the first day of the 1000 year millennium. 48:17 I was listening to a television preacher, he shall remain 48:19 nameless of necessity. 48:24 And he was trying to preach on the millennium. 48:27 And he had them here on earth, the folks were here on earth, 48:29 the saints, and then they were in heaven and they were 48:30 back down here and then they were somewhere else. 48:33 And after a little while, I was so dizzy. 48:35 And after a little while, he just kind of gave up too. 48:38 Not a minute too soon to suit me. 48:42 Now if you do have your Bibles, please turn with me 48:46 to 1 Thessalonians. 48:50 And here's where brother Lomacang just stole my sermon. 48:53 He took John 14:1-2 and then he took 1 Thessalonians. 48:56 I was praying, "Lord, don't let him have the rest of it. 49:01 Save me a little bit there. " 49:05 Yeah. 49:07 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 verses 16-18. 49:10 You memorized it a long time ago. 49:12 Say it with me now, "The Lord Himself shall descend 49:15 from heaven... " With a whisper? 49:18 Huh? 49:19 Alright. 49:20 "... with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, 49:22 and the trump of God. 49:24 And the dead in Christ are going to rise first. 49:28 And then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up 49:32 together with them to meet our Lord... " in Salt Lake City. 49:36 I read that. 49:38 Meet Him in Rome. 49:40 Nah, you give me three words that save us from antichrist. 49:42 Where are we going to meet Him? 49:43 "... in the air. 49:45 And so shall we ever be with the Lord. 49:46 Wherefore, comfort one another with these words. " 49:48 Now, you put together that passage along with 49:53 Revelation chapter 20. 49:56 And go there with me next, if you will please. 49:58 Revelation chapter 20 and verses 4 and 5. 50:03 Revelation chapter 20. 50:05 This is, of course, the millennium chapter. 50:07 Verse 4, "I saw thrones... " 50:10 They, the saints... The context is quite clear. 50:13 "They," the saints, "sat upon the thrones. 50:16 A work of judgment was given unto them. 50:18 And I saw the souls of those who had been martyred 50:20 for their witness of Jesus and the word of God 50:22 who refused to worship the beast or his image. " 50:24 Oh by the way, there's another sermon. 50:27 Oh, please. 50:32 Well this whole idea of a secret rapture. 50:33 The saints are going to be snatched away and then 50:35 tribulation is going to come for seven years. 50:37 And they'll rebuild the temple and Jews will be converted. 50:39 If all I had to refute the idea of a secret rapture is 50:44 this passage, that's enough. 50:46 That's enough. 50:47 For it says that the folks from the first resurrection, 50:50 the saints of all ages have already gotten victory over 50:54 the beast and his mark and the whole ball of wax. 50:58 That's enough, Lord. 50:59 That's clear enough even for an Idaho boy. 51:05 "The saints sat upon thrones and the work judgment 51:08 was given to them. 51:09 I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded 51:11 for the witness of Jesus and for the word of God 51:13 because they worshipped not the beast or his image or received 51:15 the mark either in their foreheads or in their hands. 51:17 And these lived and reigned with Christ for 1000 years. " 51:21 Now listen carefully. 51:23 "But the rest of the dead lived not again until the 51:27 1000 years are over. " 51:29 And then the last half of that verse says, 51:31 "This is the first resurrection. " 51:34 Now that has caused some confusion in some minds. 51:37 But I'm going to help you to lift the confusion. 51:39 I had it for a while and I did some research. 51:42 And this is what I found, ladies and gentlemen. 51:44 The first half of verse 5 of Revelation 20, 51:50 Revelation chapter 20 verse 5, the first half of that verse; 51:53 "the rest of the dead live not again until the 51:55 1000 years were over," that is parenthetical. 51:58 Do you know what that means? 52:00 That means it needs to have brackets around it. 52:03 You know, parentheses. 52:04 It needs to be in parentheses. 52:07 And then the last of the verse says, 52:09 "These are from the first resurrection. " 52:11 That is a reference back to verse 4 where the saints 52:14 are seated upon thrones. 52:16 Does that help you know? 52:17 Alright, let's say it one more time. 52:19 The first half of the verse of Revelation chapter 20 verse 5; 52:24 "the rest of the dead lived not again until the 52:25 1000 years are over," that is in brackets. 52:28 And then you remove the brackets and it says, 52:31 "These are from the first resurrection. " 52:32 That is a reference back to the saints that sit upon thrones, 52:36 those who have gotten victory over the beast 52:38 and all of the rest. 52:39 Now, I want to quickly share with you 52:42 three or four more verses. 52:43 When Jesus comes back again, when He comes in His 52:46 second coming; and it's going to be very soon. 52:48 We can be certain of that. 52:49 He must come again. 52:51 When He comes back again, He's going to find here 52:54 four different classes of people. 52:58 On this earth there are going to be four different 53:00 classes of people. 53:01 There are going to be the righteous dead; 53:03 those that died with their faith in Jesus. 53:05 There are going to be the righteous living; 53:08 those of the terminal generation that are alive and love Him 53:11 and have accepted His grace and righteousness as their own. 53:14 And then there are also going to be the wicked dead; 53:17 those who died in an unsaved condition. 53:20 And there are going to be the wicked living; 53:23 those that are alive and unsaved. 53:26 And you don't have to be a rapist or a murderer to be 53:28 in that category. 53:29 All you need to do is be indifferent to it all. 53:33 Yeah, someone said the easiest way in the world to go to hell 53:35 is sit back and do nothing. 53:38 So, there are going to be these four classes. 53:41 Jesus comes in His second coming and the righteous dead 53:45 are raised in a moment. 53:48 They hear the voice of Jesus. 53:50 And the righteous that are alive, that terminal generation, 53:53 look up, "This is our God. " 53:55 And together we're caught up in that cloud of angels 53:58 to meet Him in the air. 54:01 And the wicked dead sleep on. 54:05 They don't hear the call of the Lifegiver. 54:07 And the wicked that are alive are destroyed by the 54:11 brightness of His coming. 54:13 Ah, you folks are great. 54:14 You don't need me. 54:18 I'm sure glad you let me come. 54:20 Yeah. 54:21 That's right, 2 Thessalonians says they're destroyed 54:23 by the brightness of His coming. 54:25 Chapters 1 and 2, you want to put the whole thing together. 54:27 And so this earth, then, during the 1000 years 54:29 becomes a great bottomless pit. 54:32 "Lo, I looked and saw no man," said the old prophet. 54:34 Now quickly and finally, and my favorite part of the millennium 54:40 passage and reason; the purpose for the 1000 years. 54:44 It's not some happy round figure God pulls out of a hat. 54:47 And it causes me to love Him more and better 54:49 than I ever did before. 54:50 It says in the last verses of Revelation chapter 20 54:53 that during this time, the books are opened. 54:56 "And I saw the dead. " 54:58 Those that were dead when Jesus came 55:01 and those that were alive and unsaved and they're now killed 55:03 by the brightness of His coming. 55:04 "I saw the dead judged out of those books. " 55:07 Can you see it with me now in your mind's eye? 55:09 It's resurrection morning, the trumpet is blown. 55:12 "Awake ye who sleep in the dust. Come forth, come forth. " 55:15 And out of the grave comes a little mother. 55:17 And she turns and there's her daughter. 55:18 "Oh, Mary, I knew. And daddy. " 55:22 "John," her son. John. 55:25 But John's grave didn't open. 55:28 "Wake up John. It's time to be caught up. 55:30 I can't leave you, it would be heaven without you. " 55:34 And then I see an angel that has a big book. 55:38 And he comes to the mother and he says, 55:39 "Sweetheart, sit down with me. We've got to talk. " 55:43 And he opens that book and pages over. 55:45 "Do you remember?" 55:46 "Oh, of course. 55:47 He was such a sweet pink little thing. 55:48 He looked just like his daddy. Yes, I remember. " 55:50 "Do you remember this?" 55:51 "Yes, I don't know what happened. 55:52 I don't know what got into him. He was so mean. " 55:55 "But mama, you didn't know about this. " 55:56 "Oh, not my boy. " 56:00 "You didn't know this. " 56:01 "Oh. " 56:04 What do you suppose it is that dries the tears of the saints, 56:07 as you read in Revelation chapter 21? 56:09 It's not some magical surgery performed upon tear ducts. 56:12 But rather, God, out of the kindness of His heart 56:15 sets aside 1000 years for the saints who sit on the thrones 56:20 to study the record books. 56:21 And after mother has come to the last page, she's going to 56:24 say to the angel and to our Savior and our Father God, 56:27 "I understand now. 56:29 My boy would be so out of place here. 56:31 He would not fit in here. 56:32 I understand. " 56:34 So only after that permission is given by the saints 56:38 that God calls the unsaved forth in the second resurrection. 56:44 And there comes the final punishment. 56:49 Oh, what a Savior. 56:52 The way He respects we pusillanimous humans. 56:57 Not a speck hardly in the universe. 56:59 But He loves us so very much. 57:03 My dears, we're going to be there, you and I, 57:07 at the end of the 1000 years. 57:09 We have no choice about that. We're going to be there. 57:11 We do have a choice about where we're going to be. 57:15 Either because we loved our Lord Jesus and accepted His truths 57:19 and lived His life, made His life ours by grace. 57:24 We'll be inside the city under His umbrella, 57:27 under His protective wings. 57:28 Or on the other hand, we'll be out there with the unsaved 57:34 who march against the city with the devil who's their 57:36 ultimate commander. 57:38 And the final fire comes down. 57:40 We have no choice except to be there. 57:42 We have a choice about which group we're going to be in. 57:46 I dreamed that the great judgment morning had dawned 57:51 and the trumpet had blown. 57:56 And I dreamed that the nations had gathered for judgment 58:01 around a white throne. 58:04 By the throne there stood a bright shining angel. 58:09 Stood on the land and the sea. 58:12 And swore with His hand raised towards heaven 58:14 that time was no longer to be. |
Revised 2014-12-17