The Day of the Lord, Part 1

So the day of the Lord comes like a thief in the night. And we can thank our Lord Jesus for that analogy. He is not a thief, but the day of the Lord comes like a thief. He's the one that said it right there in verse 43.

If the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert. The Bible speaks clearly about Christ's gathering up His church, known as the Rapture. And as clearly as it speaks of this event, it also spells out the future final judgment of the ungodly. For some, judgment is a fearful idea that they'd rather not think about.

For another group, there's nothing to worry about. So how do you know if you're in the right camp, the group that does not have to fear God's judgment? Find out today on Grace to You as John MacArthur, Chancellor of the Masters University and Seminary, looks at 1 Thessalonians 5. It's a chapter that explains how future events should change the way you live today. John's series is titled The Rapture and the Day of the Lord.

And now here's John with the message. We return to our study of 1 Thessalonians, and I would encourage you to open your Bible, if you would, to chapter 5. 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, we're going to begin to examine the first three verses.

Let me read them to you. Now as to the times and the epochs, brethren, you have no need of anything to be written to you, for you yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night. While they are saying peace and safety, then destruction will come upon them suddenly like birth pangs upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape. One of the most frightening truths in all of Scripture surrounds the event that is identified in verse 2 as the day of the Lord. That term is a technical term in the Scripture to describe the day when Jesus comes back to bring the flaming fury and anger of God on all the sinners of the world. It is a day of devastation. It is a day of destruction. It is a day of doom. It is a day of damnation.

Paul here reminds us of this significant, important, climactic, cataclysmic day to come in human history. Frankly, it is not at all popular to talk about God's fury. It is not popular to talk about God's anger, God's vengeance. In fact, seldom do you hear a sermon on the day of the Lord, on the time when Jesus comes back to judge those who have rejected Him. Everything today needs to be positive and affirming and comforting, and very few preachers really want to deal with this particular topic. Rarely does someone preach on the vengeance of God, but to ignore such a truth would be to be unfaithful to teach and preach the whole counsel of God.

We have the prophets and the apostles and even our Lord Jesus as examples of the pattern that all true preachers must follow, and that is to warn men about the day of the Lord. Now as we approach the passage, you will remember that Paul has just completed explaining the rapture of the church. In chapter 4, verses 13 through 18, he described the nature and character of the catching away of the church, to meet the Lord Jesus in the air and to go to heaven to dwell in the places that He is preparing for them there.

And so chapter 4 ends with the statement, Therefore comfort one another with these words. There's great comfort, there's great joy, there's great hope, there's great confidence, there's great assurance and affirmation in anticipating the rapture when the Lord Jesus comes and takes us off this earth to heaven to dwell with Him in the Father's house. From the blessed event of the catching away of the church to be with the Lord, Paul now turns to the horrible event that follows it, the destruction of the wicked. All those who are on earth, who reject Christ and reject God, will feel the fury of God in the day of the Lord. So we could say that he moves from teaching the rapture which takes the church out of the world to heaven, to talking about the day of the Lord which calls for the judgment of God on the ungodly in the world. His discussion of the rapture was to encourage and comfort the Christians, and you will notice down in verse 11, please, that even his discussion of the day of the Lord is to encourage and build up the Christians. So his purposes are pastoral.

He wants these things to have an impact on their life. Now as he discusses this day of the Lord judgment, there are three things that I want you to notice. It's coming, it's character, and it's completeness. For now, we will simply look at that first point, it's coming. But before we do that, let's introduce it by an examination of verse 1.

Follow along. Now as to the times and the epochs, brethren, you have no need of anything to be written to you. Just a note of interest. Those first little words, now as to, could be translated, but concerning, but they translate two little Greek words peride. Any student of the Greek New Testament will recognize that peride is a familiar little phrase. It occurs in the writing of the Apostle Paul very often when he changes the subject.

He is now moving to another subject. In chapter 4 and verse 9, he used it when he turned from one subject to another one. In chapter 4 verse 13 in the Greek text, he uses it, turning from the discussion in 9 to 12 to another subject in verse 13. Now he uses it again here as he turns to another theme.

He has talked about the rapture and now he is discussing the day of the Lord, a different event. By the way, if you were to take a Greek New Testament and go through 1 Corinthians, for example, you would become very familiar with the use of this little phrase. I think you find it in chapter 7 verse 1 and 25, chapter 8 verse 1, chapter 12 verse 1, chapter 16 verse 1, as a way in which he changes the subject. And so again we note here the word brethren.

Very often that kind of address is a fresh call to attention, and a fresh call to attention is a call to a new subject, a new thought, and a new idea. So both the use of peride and the use of brethren are elements used in introducing a new line of discourse. We note even the use of that word brethren in verse 13 and that word brethren back in verse 9, and that word brethren back in verse 1. So he seemingly sort of moves from theme to theme in this discussion, noting the word brethren as a fresh call to attention. Here we can say that while he's talking about the general scenario of the end time, he moves from one event, which is the rapture of the church, to another, which is the day of the Lord's judgment on the ungodly. Both events have implications for the church and for believers, as we note as he calls them to encouragement and edification at the end of this section.

Now, as we look at this, we need to understand just a very, very simple background, and that is this. The Thessalonian believers were curious about when all of these end time things were going to happen. That is not a curiosity hard for us to identify with, is it? That has been a curiosity through all the history of the church and is nonetheless a curiosity that is never satisfied.

It is still yet a curiosity even today. When will it happen? First, we're wondering why are these people dying if Jesus is coming? Why doesn't He let them live till He gets here? Second, if He keeps delaying His coming, when is it going to happen?

When is He going to arrive? And so they wanted to know. They wanted to know the times and the epochs.

Very interesting phrase, fascinating phrase. It had become, I guess, a technical phrase for the second coming. It's used in Acts 1-7 where our Lord says, It is not for you to know the times and the epochs. The Greek is the kranos and the kairos, two different kinds of time. I suppose they could be used interchangeably.

They could be overlapping. They could be here referring in a very general sense just to the time of the end. But if we're to separate the two words, kranos is the word from which we get chronology. It simply means clock time or calendar time, chronological time.

Kairos means seasons, epochs, events. It looks at time, not from the viewpoint of a day and an hour. It looks at time from the viewpoint of an event, of an epoch, of something that happened. We talk about the times of the Gentiles.

We talk about modern times. We mean by that that this period of history is characterized by certain events. And so they're curious about the timing in terms of chronology. They're curious about the events of the end, the time period and the epochs that mark the end. And by the way, I would just note to you that the use of the plurals here as to the times and the epochs indicates the plurality of chronological times and the plurality of significant events that make up the end.

For example, just think of the various times from a chronological viewpoint. You have at the end of the age a time period called the 70th week of Daniel. Very clearly in Daniel 9, he says there is prophesied upon the nation Israel a final seven-year period where God will sum up His work with Israel. That's the seven-year period we know as the 70th week of Daniel. There is also a period called the Great Tribulation, designated as three and a half years, 1260 days.

It is also called times, time and half a time. And there is another time period added to that by Daniel, 1290 days, which adds 30 more days. And then Daniel refers to 1335 days. And then there is the 1,000-year millennial kingdom mentioned in the book of Revelation. So you have the time of Daniel's 70th week, the time of the Great Tribulation. You have the time of the millennial kingdom. You have...those are different times, different chronologies in which certain epics and events will take place.

Then you have a number of events. You have the rapture of the church. You have the rise of the Antichrist.

You have the salvation of the nation Israel. You have a series of judgments that come through natural means. And then you have a series of judgments that come through supernatural means. You have the return of Jesus Christ. You have the battle of Armageddon, the destruction of the world's nations.

You have the judgment of the sheep and the goats. You have the establishment of the millennial kingdom. You have the binding of Satan is loosing, the worldwide rebellion, the destruction of the world, and then the creation of the new heaven and the new earth. Many times and many epics make up the end. And in their curiosity, they want to know, when is this all going to happen?

Can you tell us about it? And that's the level of their curiosity. They feared, I suppose, that they might not be spiritually ready when the Lord returned and they might miss the rapture. And maybe they thought there was something that they needed to do in anticipation of these things to be sure they didn't miss the rapture and end up in the day of the Lord.

They didn't want to get caught. Paul says to them, however, in verse 4, Brethren, you're not in darkness that the day should overtake you like a thief. You don't belong to the day of the Lord.

That's not for you. You're not in darkness. You're children of light. You don't belong in the day of the Lord. You belong in the rapture, not the day of the Lord.

But at this point, they probably had some fears and some questions and were wondering. It isn't long, apparently, until someone comes and says that they're in the day of the Lord and they're starting to feel some persecution and some hostility and animosity. And they're told by somebody, as 2 Thessalonians 2 says, that they're in the day of the Lord. And Paul has to say, no, no, no, no, you're not in the day of the Lord. You know what I told you about the day of the Lord. You know it can't come until Antichrist is known. You know it can't come until he abominates the temple with a sacrifice. You're not in the day of the Lord. Well, that indicates to us that the persecution and hostility coming against them made them fearful that maybe they were going to miss the rapture and they were in the day of the Lord.

So they had the confusion of these things in their minds and they wanted to know, one, what happens to the people who die? And in chapter 4 he says, no, they'll be there at the rapture. Two, when is it going to happen? Is it now?

Is it later? Are we in it? He says to them, as to the times and the epochs, brethren, look at this, you have no need of anything to be written to you. You don't need anything written to you.

He used that same phrase in chapter 4, verse 9. As to the love of the brethren, you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God. It's almost the same as he says here. You have no need of anything to be written to you, for you yourselves know full well. You don't need any more information. You already have all the information you need about that.

You say, now, wait a minute. You mean we have all the information we need about the coming judgment, about the coming of Christ, about the day of the Lord? We don't know when it's going to happen. We'd like to know all of the chronologies and all of the epochs. We need to know all of that. He says you don't need to know any of that. You don't need to know that.

You know all you need to know. By the way, they're not alone in this. The disciples had the same curiosity. In fact, their curiosity kicked off the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24, when the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, Tell us, when will these things be and what will be the sign of your coming and the end of the age? And then in Acts 1, 6, they say, Lord, is it this time that you're going to start your kingdom?

They had the same curiosity about timing details. How long do we have to wait? When will the Lord arrive?

Now listen carefully. Paul's response is that spiritual preparedness for the coming of Christ does not involve date-setting, clock-watching, or sign-seeking. Not for the believers. He says you don't have any need of anything to be written to you.

You're not going to be there. Verse 9, God hasn't destined you for wrath on an eternal level, and God, in verse 4, he says, hasn't even destined you for the day of the Lord. Paul's point is you already know everything you need to know and everything God has told you. 2 Thessalonians 2, he says basically that same thing. He says, Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things? Beloved, your spiritual preparedness for the coming of Christ is not related to date-setting, clock-watching, and sign-seeking.

You don't need to know those things. Now on the issues they needed knowledge, he gave it. Chapter 4, verse 13 to 18, they needed to understand about the rapture, the character and nature of the rapture, and he explained it. He didn't tell them the time of it. Nowhere in the Bible do we know the time of it. And when it comes to the day of the Lord and all the events surrounding that and all of the things of the end, all the times and epics, he says you don't need to know that.

God has chosen not to reveal the time of the final epics so that all believers live in anticipation, expectancy, all the time. So he says you don't need to know that. He says you already know full well what you need to know. What's that? That the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night.

Now that leads us to point number one in our outline. It's coming. It's coming. He's going to tell us about its coming, and he's going to tell us what really we already know. What he's saying here is the one thing you need to know is it's going to happen when nobody what? Expects it. It's going to happen when nobody expects it. It's that unexpectedness that concerns him.

They were curious about times and seasons. So he launches into a response and says the only thing you need to know is that the day of the Lord will come when you don't expect it, when the people alive at that time don't expect it. And then he moves from that into a section on exhortation to holy living in the light of that reality.

But let's look at verse 2 in more detail. For you yourselves know full well. That full well there, acrobos, means you know exactly. It's a word that comes out of research.

It points to painstaking research to come to a conclusion. You know perfectly, you know exactly, you know accurately that it's to be unexpected. I've told you that. And we know already from this epistle back in chapter 1 verse 10 that the whole church was waiting for Christ to come from heaven. In chapter 2 verse 19 he reminds them of the Lord Jesus' coming. Chapter 3 verse 13 again reminds them of the coming of the Lord Jesus. Chapter 4 discusses the rapture and never does he tell them when, never. He doesn't tell them that. The reason he doesn't tell them that is because you can't know that. Let's go back to Matthew 24.

Would you go back there with me for a moment? You've got to have your Bible handy because we're going to jump around a bit, but this is very essential. In Matthew chapter 24 and verse 36, Jesus has been talking about the time of the end, talking about His second coming and when He comes in terrifying judgment and also when He comes to gather the elect from the four corners of the world. He talks about the fact that heaven and earth are going to pass away in verse 35 and all of this in the end time.

But verse 36, He says, The day and the hour no one knows. The angels in heaven don't know it. The Son on earth doesn't know it. Only the Father knows it.

So this is the major secret here, folks. The time we don't know. And then He describes the most interesting conditions. Verse 37, The coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah, for as in those days which were before the flood, they were eating and drinking, they were marrying and giving in marriage until the day that Noah entered the ark.

What does that mean? They were utterly indifferent to 120 years of Noah doing what? Warning, preaching righteousness, warning them. And they were indifferent to it. And they were indifferent right until he got in the thing.

And they still were indifferent until the flood came and took them all away. So the coming of the Son of Man will be. It'll be to the generation that is alive when it happens, unexpected.

Unexpected, that's amazing. Because He has just described, starting in verse 4, all kinds of things that people living at that time could look for. He says, verse 6, There'll be wars and rumors of wars. And there'll be nation rising against nation, kingdom against kingdom.

There'll be famines, there'll be earthquakes. He goes on down to talk about false prophets leading people astray. Talks about the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet when they desecrate the temple. Talks about terrible tribulation. Verse 21, Such has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now. And all of this stuff is going on in the world and they still are going on life as usual, marry, given marriage, eat, drink, just live your life until the time comes and they're swept away. And it's going to come quick. They're going to be doing business as usual. Verse 40, Two guys are working in a field, one's taken, one's left.

Two women grinding at the mill, one's taken, one's left. It's going to happen when people are just doing the normal duties of life. Then he says, verse 42, Therefore be on the alert, for you don't know which day your Lord is coming. But be sure of this.

If the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. For this reason you be ready too, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour when you do not think he will. Jesus said this to a crowd of people who would never experience this.

They're already dead and this hasn't happened yet. But He put every generation on notice that they had to live in expectation, right? Because only God the Father knows when it's going to happen. And His point is, it's going to be sudden, it's going to be unexpected. Back in verse 27 of Matthew 24, it's going to be like lightning flashing from the east to the west. Just a flash of lightning and the Son of Man will be here in a time when people don't think it's going to happen. So the day of the Lord comes like a thief in the night. And we can thank our Lord Jesus for that analogy. He is not a thief, but the day of the Lord comes like a thief. He's the one that said it right there in verse 43.

If the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert. The day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. Beyond that, He says, you don't need to know anything about timing.

You don't need to know anything about dates. And, of course, because you're the redeemed, you're going in the rapture, you won't even be there for this event. The world, the church has been given enough information.

The church, you're not of that day. You're not even going through it. You're going to be caught up.

That's what you need to know. But you also live your life in the light both of the coming of Christ for His own and of the terrifying, terrible judgment on the sons of darkness to come in the future. To the world, there is a judgment day coming.

You can't know what day and what hour. And even when the precursor signs begin to take place and wars and rumors of wars and famines and terrible pestilence, plagues, disease, earthquakes, and all of that stuff begin to escalate and an Antichrist rises and there's a desolation of the temple in Jerusalem and all of this is happening. Amazingly, the world alive at that time isn't going to expect Christ to come. It's going to be unexpected.

They're not going to be ready. This is Grace to You with John MacArthur. Thanks for being with us. Today John took an important look at the return of the Lord and the judgment to come. This teaching is part of John's current study dealing with the rapture of the day of the Lord. John, you talked briefly today about the importance of discussing end times events in the church.

And I'm wondering, can you expand on that? How can a focus on the Lord's return help strengthen a church? The Bible says this, He that has this hope in him purifies himself.

It's a simple principle. If you know that the Lord could come at any moment and find you where you are, coming in a surprising, unexpected way like a thief comes in the night, as Scripture says, that's going to affect how you live. To put it another way, if you knew it was going to be 50 years before the Lord came and you had to face accountability, that might not be helpful because you might be slack in how you lived your life because there was no immediate reality pressing against you.

So we don't know. We don't know the day or the hour. We don't know when the Lord is going to collect his church to himself. So important to realize that when you are ready for the Lord at every moment, that's a purifying influence. I want to tell you about a book that I'd like to get into your hands. It's right along with the series we're doing. The title is The Second Coming. The Second Coming, very carefully thought out, carefully written. Chapters like Is Christ's Coming Imminent? What about the Great Tribulation? What about Signs in the Sky?

Does anybody really know what time it is? Deals with issues of amillennialism, premillennialism, postmillennialism, pretribulationalism, familiar terms. But this is what the Bible says about all the events that surround the second coming of Christ. The book, titled simply The Second Coming, available in soft cover from Grace to You, and you can order it today.

Yes, and Jesus made it clear he will return one day, and God's word actually tells you the signs to look for, and Scripture commands you to be watchful. John's book, The Second Coming, provides a straightforward, in-depth exploration of what Scripture says about the return of Christ. To get your copy, contact us today. You can place your order by phone at 800-55-GRACE, or you can get it online at our website, gty.org. The Second Coming is available at a reasonable price, and shipping is free. Order yours today.

Our number again is 800-55-GRACE, or you can order online at gty.org. And while you're online, I'd encourage you to get a copy of our flagship resource, the MacArthur Study Bible. For years, the Study Bible has strengthened the lives of countless men and women across the world. This all-in-one spiritual library includes John's personal study notes below the full-length Bible text.

There are more than 25,000 notes total. And the Study Bible is available in the New King James, New American Standard, and English Standard versions. To get a copy for yourself or for a family member, call us today at 800-55-GRACE, or you can order online at gty.org. Now for John MacArthur, I'm your host, Phil Johnson. Just a reminder, you can watch Grace to You television Sundays on DirecTV channel 378, or check your local listings for channel and times. And then be here Monday for more compelling teaching about Christ's return. It's 30 minutes of unleashing God's truth, one verse at a time, on Grace to You.