The Christian's Duty in a Hostile World, Part 1 B

This is a warning to the unregenerate world, but I believe it speaks directly also to those of us who are believers, that we must also be ready, for we don't know the moment our Christ will come.

The end of all things, very nearer than it's ever been before. That's incentive to live a holy life. How would your priorities change for the rest of this Tuesday, August 10th, if you knew that tomorrow you had to stand before God? Well, you might not stand before the Lord in the next few hours, but the Bible calls you to live with that kind of anticipation, striving to make sure that Christ would not be ashamed of you if he returned right now. So what should that expectation look like at home or around your friends or when you're at church? Consider that here on Grace to You as John MacArthur shows you how to live in light of Christ's return as part of his current study, faith through the fire.

And now here's John. 1 Peter chapter 4 is our text, 1 Peter chapter 4 and verses 7 through 11. Let me read them to you as the setting for what the Spirit of God will teach us.

The end of all things is at hand. Therefore, be of sound judgment and sober spirit for the purpose of prayer. Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another because love covers a multitude of sins.

Be hospitable to one another without complaint, as each one has received a special gift. Employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. Whoever speaks, let him speak as it were the utterances of God. Whoever serves, let him do so as by the strength which God supplies so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever.

Amen. I want to speak to you out of this text on the subject, the Christian's duty in a hostile world. The church today urgently is in need of spiritual revival. And that spiritual revival can only occur when we as Christians begin to do our spiritual duty. In this section, two things come together. We are to live a godly life in suffering in the light of the second coming.

Those two things merge. If we want to do our Christian duty, we must know how precious our salvation is and what attendant duties will demonstrate our gratitude for it. We must know that He has left us in this present situation as aliens and strangers to lead men and women to the knowledge of Jesus Christ. And we must live in the light of eternity, the light of heaven, and the light of His soon coming. Now, how are we then to live? What is our Christian duty as we suffer in this world pursuing holiness in the light of Christ's return? First point comes in verse 7. Let's call it the incentive, the incentive. Then we'll look at the instructions and finally the intention.

But for right now, the incentive. Verse 7, the end of all things is at hand. Stop right there. So we are to live in expectancy that the one who is coming will come as judge of the living and the dead and that that is very near. Jesus could come at any moment. What might seem like a long time to us, two thousand years is not a long time. We all know that statement, a day with the Lord is as a thousand years and a thousand years is as a day. Look at 1 Corinthians chapter 15 and verse 51. And here again is the same kind of expectation, anticipation of the coming of Christ.

He says, Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last trump, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable and we shall be changed, for this perishable must put on the imperishable and this mortal must put on immortality. In other words, everything's going to change. It's going to change in a twinkling of an eye. What is the twinkling of an eye? That's not a blink.

That's the time it takes to refract light off your pupil. That's how fast we're going to be changed. And the idea here is it's a mystery.

It's not been revealed in the past. It's going to happen. It's going to happen suddenly. The trumpet will sound and instantaneously when that trumpet sounds, we're gone.

And it can happen at any time. In 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 is another message about the immanency and the expectancy in which we are to live. 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 and verse 15 says, there will come a great event. And it says, we say this to you by the word of the Lord. In other words, this is revelation from the Lord Himself, that we are alive and remain to the coming of the Lord, shall not precede those who have fallen asleep, for the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord. And the tone of Paul's language to the Thessalonians is a tone of immanency. He is not saying those people who are alive then or those folks who are around when.

He says we, we, we, we, we. It is always the church's responsibility to live in the light of the return of Christ. In James chapter 5 and verse 8, you have it again. James writing to persecuted believers who are going through some very, very difficult times, says to them in verse 7, be patient therefore, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. Well, was the Lord coming in their lifetime?

As it turned out, He didn't. They nonetheless lived in that expectancy. He says in verse 8, be patient, strengthen your hearts for the coming of the Lord is, there's that same idea, at hand, near, imminent, soon. That's always on the heart of the true believer.

Jesus is coming and He could be coming at any moment. In Hebrews chapter 10, the writer in verse 25 says that we are not to forsake our assembling. We're not to forsake that. We're to be faithful to that, as is the habit of some. There are some who habitually do not come.

We're not to do that. We're to gather to encourage one another, now listen to this, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. Now, if they could see the immanency of the day drawing near, here we are 2,000 years later.

How much nearer are we? You better be gathering with God's people, as you have seen the day drawing nearer. Hebrews 12, I point you to one verse, verse 27, and this expression, yet once more, denotes the removing of those things which can be shaken, as have created things in order that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. The verse before, yet once more, I will shake not only the earth, but also the heaven. God had promised to the prophet Haggai that he would do some shaking in this world, and here the writer of Hebrews reminds us that there is a shaking to come, the removing of the things which can be shaken.

That is this material world, the establishment of things which cannot be shaken, God's eternal kingdom and glory. We must live in the light of that, as those in the New Testament time did. Look at Revelation, two passages I bring to your attention.

Chapter 1, verse 3, blessed is he who reads, and those who hear the words of the prophecy. In other words, you want a blessing? There's one, read Revelation. People say, oh, I'd like to be blessed. I really would like a blessing. Good, there's one, read Revelation. Blessed is he who reads, and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and take heed the things which are written in it.

Why? For the time is what? Near. Again, they were always living in that light, that Jesus could come at any moment. What do we have at the end of the book of Revelation? These words, chapter 22, verse 20, he who testifies to these things says, yes, I am coming quickly.

Quickly. And what is John's response? Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. John 2 lived in the anticipation of the soon return of Jesus Christ. You say, well, isn't Jesus supposed to return in the last days? That's right. But do you know when the last days began?

Let me help you. 1 John 2, 18. 1 John 2, 18. Children, it is the last hour. It is the last hour.

And just as you have heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have arisen. From this we know that it is the last hour. The last hour had begun already when John wrote 1 John. The last hour, listen carefully, began with the first coming of Jesus Christ. That ushered in the last days.

Last days. That's why the Apostle Paul in writing to Timothy is so explicit about the last days. The Spirit explicitly says that in the later times some will depart from the faith. 1 Timothy 4, 1. And those later times had already come and that departure was already taking place. And 2 Timothy 3, 1, realized this, that in the last days difficult times will come. And those were the last days and the difficult times had already come on Timothy. See, the last days came when Messiah came.

You say, in what sense? Listen very carefully and I'll give you this little picture. They had seen in their lifetime the Jews and the people alive at the time of Christ's arrival. They had seen the end of a whole era. They saw the end of an Old Testament dispensation.

They saw the end of the old covenant. Messiah came into the world to bring all of that to an end and inaugurate the new covenant. The last days were the days of Messiah. The prophets of old said Messiah would come in the latter days. That He would come in the end of the age. That He would come at the last time. And so when He came, it was the last time. It spelled the end of all the previous epochs, seasons, eras. They had seen the whole system of ceremonies and rituals and sacrifices and temples and priests and priests and offerings all collapse when the veil of the temple was ripped from top to bottom and God opened the Holy of Holies to everybody. He said that's the end of the system. And then in 70 AD when God sent judgment by way of the Romans, He destroyed the temple, destroyed Jerusalem and wiped out to this very day the whole sacrificial ceremonial system.

It happened in their lifetime. Jesus had said on the cross, it is finished. What He had finished was the inauguration of the new covenant. The temple veil was torn. A few years later, the temple was destroyed. Jesus said in Matthew 24, too, when it goes down, there won't be one stone left upon another.

Why? It symbolized the devastation of an entire Old Testament economy. The old order was ended and a new order was begun, the order of the Messiah, the order of the last days. Hebrews 9 26 puts it this way. Otherwise, it says, speaking of Christ, He would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world. But now once at the consummation of the ages, He has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.

What a tremendous statement. Jesus came, put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself at the consummation of the ages, the end of the ages. Christ came, offered once to bear the sins of many, listen to this, shall appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin to those who eagerly await Him.

Did you get that? The first time He came, at the consummation of the ages, He was manifested to put away sin. The second time He comes, He doesn't put away sin anymore. He comes to establish His kingdom of salvation. But the last days were begun when the ages were consummated in the arrival of the Messiah. When Messiah came, when Messiah died, when He rose again, He ended the old covenant system.

He established His own kingdom. He said, the kingdom of God is in your midst. And through the gospel of Jesus Christ, we are taken out of the kingdom of darkness and placed into the kingdom of His beloved Son in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins, says Paul to the Colossians. Christ defeated sin, Christ defeated death, Christ defeated hell, Christ defeated the penalty of the law, Christ defeated Satan, Christ defeated demons, Christ established His authority, and Christ began to build His kingdom. And we are now living in the last day's kingdom.

The kingdom now is spiritual and inward, and someday it will be outward and universal when He establishes His throne on the earth and in the universe. So there is a second coming, that the last days began the first time He came. So we are living in the last days, the last times, and the last days of the last days.

You might put it this way. The kingdom has come in a state of grace. It will come in a state of glory. The death of Jesus Christ, His resurrection, His exaltation to the right hand of God the Father, brought a new departure to the course of history. And it took place once for all at the close of the ages, and it brought in the dawn of a new day. The kingdom of Messiah is here in its spiritual reality and soon to be here in its visible form. So when Peter says, the end of all things is at hand, is he talking about termination? Yes, in the sense that the old ages have terminated, but more he's talking about consummation, and the full end is very, very near. Beloved, I want to close with giving you an insight into how we are to live in light of this.

In the Scriptures we find that because the coming of Jesus Christ is imminent, it could happen at any split second, at any moment. It leads us to a right kind of attitude. The attitude of expectancy should not turn us into zealous fanatics like the people who put on their pajamas and sit on the roof. It should not turn us into lazy dreamers who do nothing but lie around, as it were, waiting for it to happen. It should turn us into watchful pursuers of holiness, watchful pursuers of holiness.

Let me show you why. 2 Corinthians chapter 5, verse 9, therefore also we have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to him. If you're a Christian, that is true of your life.

Did you hear that? Whether you're at home or absent, your desire is to be pleasing to him. That should be underlined as the mark of a true Christian. You want to please Christ. If you don't want to please Christ, then that's evidence that the new life is not in you. So we want to please Christ.

Now, verse 10, why? For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. In other words, we're going to have to give an account for our life, that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body according to what he has done, whether good or worthless. The apostle Paul says, look, I live in the light of the fact that some day I'm going to have to stand before Jesus Christ and it's going to be made visible to me in his presence whether my works were good or useless.

I'm not going to parade sin. That will already be dealt with. That's already been covered at the cross.

But whether or not my life was effective, dedicated, devoted, serviceable, useful will be manifest. And since it's the heart desire of a true Christian to want to please Christ, he has to live in the light of the fact that someday it's going to become revealed to him whether or not or to what degree he did please Christ. In 2 Peter, chapter 3, Peter is talking about the coming of Christ. He's talking about it in chapter 3, verse 10, as the day of the Lord which will come like a thief unannounced.

The heavens are going to pass away and all that's associated with that will take place. He then says that we are looking, verse 12, and hastening the coming of the day of God. For those of us who are believers, we're looking for it.

We want it to hurry and get here so we can live in blissful perfection with him. We are looking, verse 13, for that new heaven and new earth in which righteousness dwells. If we're true Christians, we ought to be sick of the sin of this world and longing for a righteous place. Then verse 14 brings it down to practicality. Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by him in peace, spotless and blameless. When he gets here, you want to be in peace, spotless, blameless. And in order to do that, verse 18 says, you need to be growing in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Go to 1 John, chapter 3, the next epistle, verse 2. Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we shall be. We know that when he appears, we shall be like him because we shall see him just as he is. That's our heart cry, to be like him, to be like him. Remember Philippians 3? I press toward the goal for the mark, the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

What is it? To be like him. And verse 3, everyone who has this hope fixed on him purifies himself, just as he is pure. If you want to be like him, and you know you're going to be like him, and you know you're going to face him, you want to be pure.

You want to be pure. 1 John 2, 28, John says, we want to be before him when he appears, with confidence, not shrinking away in shame. We want to live in such a way that we face Christ with a joyful, confident heart, not like unbelievers who will be shamed. And if we really look for his appearing, as Paul wrote to Timothy, if we love his appearing, then we will seek to be pure so that our lives are right, should he arrive in the next moment. I close with this, Luke 12. Jesus, doing so much teaching here, directs our attention to this same idea. Verse 35, he says, be dressed in readiness, keep your lamps, and be pure, so that our lives are right, should he arrive in the next moment. I close with this, Luke 12.

Jesus, doing so much teaching here, directs our attention to this same idea. Verse 35, he says, be dressed in readiness, keep your lamps alight. Be like men who are waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding feast so that they may immediately open the door to him when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those slaves whom the master shall find on the alert when he comes. Truly I say to you that he will gird himself to serve and have them recline at the table and will come up and wait on them.

Is that amazing? If you're ready when he comes, he'll wait on you. Whether he comes in the second watch or even in the third and finds them so, blessed are those slaves.

And be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, it wouldn't have allowed his house to be broken into. You too be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour that you do not expect. This is a warning to the unregenerate world. This is a warning to false religionists, but I believe it speaks directly also to those of us who are believers, that we must also be ready, for we don't know the moment our Christ will come. At the end of all things, very nearer than it's ever been before, that's incentive to live a holy life. Let's bow in prayer. Father, thank you again for this reminder. May our hearts be committed to loving your appearing that great time, when we shall receive our reward being made like Christ. Oh God, may we ever live in the light of that and say with John, even so, come Lord Jesus.

It cannot be soon enough. Amen. This is Grace to You with John MacArthur.

Thanks for being with us. Today's lesson explained how you can live a holy life as you wait for Christ's return. It's part of John's study from 1 Peter, titled Faith Through the Fire.

Well, staying focused on what's ahead, that's not easy. The responsibilities of life, the distractions of the modern world, these things can cause us to forget what John made clear today, that Jesus will come again, and it could be very soon. So knowing that's going to happen, John, we certainly want to be prepared. So what does preparation for the Lord's return look like? Yeah, and I think just to begin by saying there are people now talking about the return of the Lord with a sense of urgency that I haven't heard in the past. Because as things get worse, and as the whole culture turns on Christianity, and as the government begins to be the enemy and use its power against the church, we're seeing a world that we've never seen before.

We're seeing a level of hostility that we've never seen before. And this is a time when people are saying, we have to be closer to the return of Christ, and of course we are. So yeah, I think it's time for us to think about Christ's return.

And here's the good news. The good news is that essentially the details of the return of Jesus Christ are amazingly laid out in the Scripture. There are Old Testament passages that direct us to that, particularly in the book of Daniel, the book of Zechariah, the book of Isaiah. But specifically, the book of Revelation lays out, actually, the chronological sequences and events of the return of Christ.

And as we think about that, you need to be informed as fully as you can be. I have written two volumes on the book of Revelation in the New Testament series, the MacArthur New Testament commentary. But I don't want to talk about that so much today, as I do the one-volume commentary on the book of Revelation where I condense those two volumes into a very readable look at the book of Revelation.

The title is, Because the Time is Near. You can understand Revelation. It begins by promising a blessing to those who read and understand.

Nothing to be intimidating to you. This is rather God's way of making things clear. The book is, Because the Time is Near, 350 pages, and you will understand what the book of Revelation says about the return of Christ.

And if you're a believer, that is critically important to you. Affordably priced is always, again, the title, Because the Time is Near. You can order it today. Yes, and this book can clear away any lingering confusion you might have about the book of Revelation, and it will show you how the glorious events to come can give you hope today. To purchase, Because the Time is Near, contact us today. Our toll-free number here, 855-GRACE, or visit our website, gty.org. Again, this immensely practical volume will help you take hold of the blessing promised to you if you read and understand the book of Revelation.

Because the Time is Near costs $11, and shipping is free. Order a copy in English or Spanish when you call 800-55-GRACE or shop online at gty.org. And if you've already benefited from one of John's books, or if his recent series, How to Talk to a Heretic, encouraged you to live boldly for Christ, or if someone you know has come to faith after hearing John's teaching, we would love to hear your story. Email your feedback to letters at gty.org. That's our email address. One more time, letters at gty.org. Or you can send your note to Grace to You, Box 4000, Panorama City, California, 91412. Now for John MacArthur. I'm Phil Johnson. Thanks for studying God's Word with us today, and make sure you're here tomorrow when John looks at when John looks at why Christ's grace and power can help you through any suffering you may face. It's another 30 minutes of unleashing God's truth one verse at a time on Grace to You.