Lift - How to Give Hope to the Fearful and Help to the Fearless, Part 1

You know, all the talk these days about end times is a very hot topic. Books, movies, Internet sites, they all spout this information about predictions and the end of the world. Well, what's the truth? How do we know what's really going to happen?

Is there a clear word about prophecy in the Scripture? Well, you bet there is, and stick around. We're going to look at it together. Welcome to this Edition of Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. The mission of these daily programs is to intentionally disciple Christians through the Bible teaching of Chip Ingram. And I don't know about you, but when I start to think about the future and all the uncertainty that comes with it, it kind of takes the wind out of my sails. So today, as we continue our series, Lift the Awesome Power of Encouragement, Chip's going to give us the reassurances we all need. He'll talk about the last days, Jesus' return, and why we don't have to fear what's to come. So if you have your Bible ready, go to 1 Thessalonians, chapter 5, for Chip's message, How to Give Hope to the Fearful and Help to the Fearless. From the beginning of mankind right to today, we have been fascinated and desperate to know about the future. And you say, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a second.

Where do you get that? There's people that would never think of making a major decision or never think of going throughout their day until they read their horoscope in the morning. There's other people who regularly will see a palm reader and try and discern, you know, what's the future and what's God have for me or what's going to happen?

You know, we live in a world that is really enamored and we long to know what's the future going to hold. And the teaching of the Lord Jesus in the New Testament, Old Testament, it is filled. The core teaching, it's filled with prophecy. When the Bible was written, one fourth of all Old and New Testament passages speak to the issue of prophecy. One out of every five verses of the Apostle Paul relate to prophecy.

In this book in 1 Thessalonians, which is one of the earliest books, so it's a foundational doctrine. How does Paul end chapter 1? The Lord's return. How does he end chapter 2? The Lord's return.

How does he end chapter 3? The Lord's return. Now in chapter 4, he's going to broaden it and really give some teaching about the return of the Lord with regard to believers and the return of Christ with regard to how we relate to the world around us. And so when you bring up the return of Christ and the end of the world, you often have a number of what I think are predictable responses.

If you want to pull out your teaching notes, let me highlight two or three just by way of remembrance. When you bring up the end times, I find there's one group that has what I call an unhealthy preoccupation with it. They're the fanatics, the date setters, the predictors. These are the group of people that are so heavenly minded, they're really not much earthly good. A second group you have is what I call the fearless skeptics. These are people that say, hey, the world's never going to change. It's been bad.

It's been good. Christ isn't going to return. It's a myth. Someone made it up. This whole idea about Jesus returning, about another world, about an afterlife is just a crutch that weak people need because the world is hard and they just don't buy. Third group is what I call the fearfully confused. They've heard words like rapture, tribulation, second coming, great white throne, and they just have all these things blowing around in their mind and they really don't have a clue of how it all works.

It produces confusion and really sometimes some fear. Isn't it interesting that really times haven't changed much? The apostle Paul in one of his earliest books is going to write to a group of people and he addresses all three of those groups. Remember the group that had an unhealthy preoccupation with the Lord's return? In fact, they got so focused on the Lord's return they quit their job, started bumming around, mooching and loafing off the church, and that's all they could think or talk about and they were busybodies.

The apostle Paul said, hey, wait a second. A proper understanding of the return of Christ means you get a job, you mind your own business, you support yourself, and you have a sterling testimony in your work for the sake of Christ. Now what he's going to do is address the other two groups. If you want just a little preview, in chapter four verses 13 to 18, he's going to give hope to those that are fearful and confused, and he's going to speak to the church. He's going to say, you've gotten some bad information about the return of Christ, let me clear up for you some important data with regard to the Lord's return, and he will introduce the clearest teaching in all of the New Testament on what's called the rapture and we'll look at it.

Then he's going to shift and he makes a real break. Chapter five verse one, he's going to say, but there's some other information that I've already taught you about, about the Lord's return. You know it from the Old Testament, you know it from the teachings of Jesus, you know it when I was with you. Remember, he's writing this document about 18 to 24 months later after he visited with him, and he's going to talk about the day of the Lord and prophecy in general, and he's going to give us as believers a manual, if you will, about how to respond to people, that we're going to need to warn them and to win them in a very winsome way.

Let's look at how he gives hope to the fearful. First Thessalonians 4, 13 through 17, you may want to open up your Bibles and follow along, and really as you analyze and study this passage, there's three major questions that come up, and he's going to ask and answer them in this passage. The first question they have is, what happens to a believer when he or she dies? The answer is going to be out of verses 13 and 14, that the certainty of a believer's resurrection is based on the fact of Christ's resurrection. See, they got some bad information and they're getting a little fearful and they're saying, now what happens when someone actually dies? Beginning at verse 13, please take a pen if you have it and jot down, if you will, the word but before the word brothers. The NIV doesn't have it, but it's important because he's giving a contrast. He says, but brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who've fallen asleep or to grieve like the rest of men who have no hope.

And then add the little phrase for if, because it's a conditional, it's called a first class condition, assumed to be true. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, then is the idea, we believe that God will bring with Jesus or through Jesus, those who have fallen asleep in him. Now let's analyze these two verses just for a minute. He says, okay, brothers, in contrast, I just talked to those people with that unhealthy preoccupation. I told them to get a job, but brothers, with regard to the Lord's return, I don't want you to be ignorant or uninformed about those who are asleep.

You might circle the word who've fallen asleep. It's a technical term in the New Testament. It is 100% of the time referenced to a Christian who has died. So he says, I don't want you to not know about brothers and sisters or when you die, what's going to happen. Second reasoning, he says, I don't want you to hurt and I don't want you to grieve like those that don't have any hope.

And he was writing in a day very much like ours where people basically said, hey, you die, you die, dust, dust. There's nothing after this. You lose a close friend, you lose a close friend. You lose a mom, you lose a dad, you lose a spouse.

They're gone. And the pagan world had no hope. And he says, that's not true. And then notice why verse 14, he says, here's the basis of teaching about those who die. If in fact or since we believe that Jesus died and he rose again to get his logic, so then we believe that God will bring through Christ or with Christ those who have same word fallen asleep in him. And so he's answered the first question and basically it's just to arrest their fears. He said, you can know with 100% bank on it accuracy that we know Jesus rose from the dead.

We have eyewitnesses over 500 of them. The fact that he rose from the dead, you can know that when a believer dies, that believer man or woman will be raised also. Second question that pops up. Okay, Paul, we got it for us, but what about our loved ones? What about the mom, the dad, the child that died before us?

His answer is going to be that the Christian dead will rise first and share in the kingdom. And again, there must be, there must've been some teaching floating around. Like they were fearful that, you know, what about, you know, I lost my brother. I lost my mom. I lost a close friend. And this general teaching about resurrection, the return of Christ, what happens to them?

Are they going to get to be in on this? And there must've been some, some teaching floating around that was casting doubt on that because he's very strong in his response. Look at verse 15. And by the way, if you want to keep adding, but I don't mean this negatively.

Don't take this negatively at all. The NIV is written to be smoothly read. It's not quite as literal or wooden a translation of some others. And so what they do is sometimes they take the four or the butt and you get the clear sense of the passage.

But I think it's very important when you're trying to do real analysis that when there is a four or a, but or a, therefore those things tell us the relationship of what's going on. And so before first 15, there's the word for, for now there's the reason I can say this for according to the Lord's own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, when he comes will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. And so his teaching is going to be, Hey, you have a mom, dad, brother, sister, friend who's died already. You don't have to be uptight and think that they're not going to get in on the resurrection.

In fact, notice who does he appeal to? He says, according to the Lord's own word, either Paul got this directly by way of revelation, as we know in other places he did from the Lord, or possibly this is something that Jesus taught during those 40 days in the book of acts when he was in a resurrected body teaching and he got it from the other apostles. But this is a verbatim quote. This isn't theory. This isn't passed on from our Lord's own mouth.

He says, we can tell you that we notice he includes himself because he doesn't know when he's going to come back. That we who happen to be alive will certainly not precede or be resurrected before those who've died before us. In fact, he says, it will certainly not. It's the strongest negative in the New Testament. It's a double negative. It's impossible.

Ain't no way it's going to happen. That's a very loose translation, but you get the idea. He says, they will not proceed those who've fallen asleep.

Well then the third question pops up. He's clarified the fate of those who've died. He's clarified the order of those who've died.

But the real basic question then pops up when and how will these end time events occur? Okay, wait a second. Paul, okay, I've got it. I feel better about the fact that if I'm a believer and I've known Christ, I've accepted him as my savior that, okay, Christ is resurrected. I'll be resurrected. I got that. Now I've been worried about Uncle Bob and he died before me and I've heard some stuff that I don't understand. Now I've got, okay, if Uncle Bob died, he goes first and then us.

Time out. Hey Paul, how does all this work? I mean, how does it all fit together? That's the next question. Notice now in verses 16 and 17, the answer is going to be the rapture of the church. He's going to teach more clearly here than anywhere in the New Testament about the rapture of the church. And in about five minutes, you understand if you're thinking the rapture of the church, what's that mean?

You'll find out. Verse 16, for the Lord himself will come down from heaven. It's the return of Christ.

Notice he doesn't send a messenger boy. The Lord himself will come down from heaven. Now notice how he does it.

There's three characteristics of his return. First, with a loud command. Second, with the voice of the archangel.

And third, with the trumpet call of God. And then what will happen? And the dead in Christ will rise first. Who's going to be resurrected? Anyone who's ever believed in God? Does it say that?

No. Who's going to be resurrected? The dead in Christ. Those people who've trusted in Christ. From the birth of the church, Acts chapter two, to the present when he's speaking, he says, something's going to happen.

The Lord's going to come back. Okay. You got that?

Got that. How's it going to happen? It's going to start out with a shout or a loud command. The word in classical Greek gave reference to an authority or a general giving a command to superiors that must be carried out. God is commanding, okay, now it's time. This command is going to be announced. Literally it's an archangel. We know that Michael is an archangel. We know there's other archangels. So we don't know exactly which archangel it is, but it's going to be announced by an archangel. Then after the announcement, there's going to be a kind of that shofar horn, and it's not going to sound anything like that, but there's going to be the blowing of a trumpet.

And when there's this blowing of the trumpet, then the action is going to take place. And those who died in Christ are going to be resurrected. Now jot down first Corinthians chapter 15 verse 51 through 54, because we're going to pick up right there the commentary on this event.

Listen carefully. The Apostle Paul writes about this event. Listen, I tell you a mystery. And by the way, any time the Apostle Paul uses the word mystery, it's not a secret, but he uses the word mystery to say, I'm giving you information that hasn't been revealed before. God's revealed it. It's a mystery. In other words, other people in times past don't know about this. This is a new teaching from God.

What's he say? Listen, I tell you a mystery, and here's the mystery. Not the resurrection. We all knew about that.

Here's the mystery. We will not all sleep or die, but we will all be changed. Ooh. But Paul, could you run that by us again?

Yeah, yeah. We will not all sleep. Everyone in the world won't necessarily die. It's the same word for sleep, a Christian who's died, but we will all be changed or transformed. Now listen, and he gives it to us.

How? In a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, now listen to this, for the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed or transformed. The moment a believer dies, their spirit or the immaterial part, spirit and soul, is immediately with God. That comes with Christ. Those believers in Christ are resurrected, and then after that, it means immediately, following. It's kind of like a race, and those of us who may happen to be alive at the rapture will lose by hair. It'll go zoop, zoop.

Okay? Those people who've died, zoop. Those who haven't, zoop. We're right behind them. After that, we who are still alive and who are left will be caught up together with them.

Who's them? Those resurrected saints in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Where are we going to go?

What are we going to do? Well, next line. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Now, the little word caught up, circle, in your notes, will you? It literally means to seize, to carry off, or to snatch away suddenly. It's reference to the transport of a person from one place to another. It's used 12 times in the New Testament. Let me give you two other examples so you get the idea that this rapture. Now, you're thinking to yourself, Noah, it says caught up. Where do people get this rapture stuff? It means caught up, seized, or snatched. When it was translated in Latin, the Latin word for this word here is rapturo.

And so as you know, Latin was a very common language and so the word rapturo came into being and people called it the rapture. Acts 8. Here's Philip. Use of the word rapture. Philip's mining those business.

And there's an Ethiopian eunuch, right? Guy's in his chariot. He's reading out of Isaiah and he says to himself, you know, I don't have any idea what this means. So Philip was moved by the Holy Spirit. He said, hey, would you like to understand what you're reading?

Guy says, I'd love to. I just don't know who it's talking about. He gets up in the chariot.

Remember that? And he explains about the Messiah, the person of Christ, about how you can have your sins forgiven, about how he came and the Messiah's coming, about the resurrection. And so they're riding in this chariot together, you know.

They're going along for a while. And then the eunuch's got it. This Ethiopian says, I got it. It's faith in Christ. It's grace.

This is fantastic. And he sees a pool of water. He says, hey, you think I can get baptized right now? And Philip says, sure, man. Loose translation again.

You know, why not? And so he baptizes this guy, this African fellow, and they go down into the water and they come up. But when they come up, it says that Philip was snatched, raptured, seized, same word. And he lands in Gaza.

Now, would that be an experience for both of them? You know, you're riding in your chariot. You just trust Christ. You get baptized and, you know, it makes Star Trek look so old fashioned. Doesn't it? But see, that's the meaning of that word.

It's the transporting of a body from one location to another. The apostle Paul says the same thing. Second Corinthians 12, remember? He's describing this great experience with God. He says, I was caught up, raptured, snatched to the third heaven.

He says, now, whether I was in the body or out of the body, I don't know. But see, what the Bible clearly teaches is that those of us who may be alive at the time of the rapture will not precede those who have died in Christ, but they will be resurrected. And then after that, we will be right behind them. And then we'll have a reunion. And notice the reunion is we'll see and recognize one another and we'll be with the Lord.

And then we'll all head out to heaven. Charles Ryrie gives a very brief, succinct overview of the rapture that I found very helpful. And under five aspects of the rapture, let me just highlight what he's put there and also a chart, because some of you are just about at the point where, you know, I think I got an idea what this passage is talking about, but what about the tribulation and what about the second coming and how does all this fit together?

So let me do a brief review that I think will put the pieces of the puzzle in place. First, the five aspects of the rapture. One, you have the return of Jesus for his church.

That was in verse 16, the first portion. The key word to write under that is the word eminent. Eminent.

The word eminent literally means something hanging over your head that could fall at any time. The rapture requires no other prophetic event to occur on the calendar of God's timetable. It could happen today at twelve oh five. It could happen tomorrow at eleven fifty seven. It could happen next week, next month. Nothing has to happen in Israel. Nothing has to happen anywhere.

The rapture can occur any time. And when you understand that, it will change how you live, how you believe and how you behave. In fact, I was with a missionary in South America in Chile. His name was Brahms. Great big guy. Really neat, funny guy. And I got elected to go with his truck to unload some stuff during one of the teams I played on. And so we're unloading stuff and I know very little Spanish. I can talk a little bit about food and I can share a little bit about the Lord.

Very little. But there was an engraven plate on his door. And it said, tal vez oi. And I knew that oi meant today, but I didn't know what the other word meant.

So, you know, you're loading boxes in and out, in and out. Every time you go in, tal vez oi. Every time you go out, tal vez oi. So finally I said, hey, Brahms, what's on your door? He said, oh, it means perhaps today. I said, perhaps today what? He said, Chip, perhaps today. I said, hey, Brahms, perhaps today what? He said, Chip, perhaps today the Lord will return.

And then he gave me a little five-minute sermon that I don't think I'll ever forget. He said, you know, Chip, prophecy and doctrine aren't for people to make charts about and argue over. He said, properly understood, when you understood what God has said in His Word about His return, He said, when you think, as you walk in the door at night, and before you put your head on the pillow, and you ask yourself the question, perhaps today, even before I awake, you ask yourself, did I live the kind of day that would be pleasing if the Lord took us home tonight? And He said that when you walk out the door, and just before you leave the house, you say, perhaps today. And if you really believe that maybe at six tonight, maybe at noon, maybe at 930, if you believed and thought, as the Scripture teaches, His return is imminent, that perhaps today.

He said, Chip, do you think that would affect your priorities for the day if you knew that He was coming like at 630 tonight? I said, yeah. I said, do you think it would affect how you treat people? I said, yeah. I said, do you think it would affect the focus of your life and the intentionality of what you do and why you do it? I said, hey, I got the message.

Perhaps today. It's the teaching of Scripture. You've been listening to part one of Chip's Message, how to give hope to the fearful and help to the fearless, which is from our series, Lift the Awesome Power of Encouragement. Chip will be back with us in studio shortly to share some helpful application for us to think about. You know, we all face seasons of discouragement, doubt, and hopelessness.

So how can we keep those feelings from polluting our hearts and minds? Well, in this series, Chip explains why encouragement is the answer. Join us as we uncover how choosing to support and inspire others brings out the best in us. Now, if you've missed any part of this teaching from 1 Thessalonians, catch up any time through the Chip Ingram app.

Well, Chip's joined me in studio now, and Chip, you've got a really insightful application to share for this message. But before you do, I think it's important for our listeners to know that this ministry is only able to support and encourage believers all over the world because of the financial support of our listeners. So take a minute, if you would, and talk about the generosity that fuels this ministry. Well, first of all, ministry is always an issue of the heart, and Jesus says that wherever our treasure is, that is where our heart will be. The Bible also commands us to be generous and open and free, and everything that I have, everyone listening to my voice right now, everything they have, God has entrusted that to them. The second is the Bible is really clear not only that we should be generous, but where we should be generous.

I personally believe that your first commitment is to your local church. But then there's that opportunity to give over and above that first portion and to express love because God says wherever you're spiritually ministered unto. In fact, the apostle Paul would say to a group of Christians, I ministered spiritually to you. And he actually went so far to say is, you have a financial obligation to minister back to me.

And in his situation, it wasn't like for airtime, I guess it was maybe donkey time or, you know, I need some new parchments or I need your financial resources to get on that ship to go from Corinth to Ephesus. And it's just the same here. You know, if you get ministered unto, one of the ways that you not only say thank you, but then you generously pass it on to others is to support that ministry that's ministering to you. So that's kind of what biblically why we do it. And, you know, there's just the reality of need and it's a partnership and a team and so and people are generous.

I mean, I'm thrilled. I'm very excited about how they do give. And so I want to say if you haven't, you can get in on this.

And if you have, thank you very much. Well, if you're benefiting from CHIPS teaching, now's a great time to join the team. You could minister with us to help others receive the same blessing you're enjoying. You can send a gift through Living on the Edge dot org or the chip Ingram app or text donate to seven 4141. That's the word donate to seven 4141. And we hope you know how much we appreciate your partnership.

Well, here again is chip with that application we promised. When you think about prophecy, what comes to your mind? I think there's about four major responses in our day.

And I'd like to walk through them very briefly. And I like to ask you as I'm speaking, kind of put a checkmark next to the one that most honestly reflects your attitude. The first attitude is an unhealthy preoccupation.

There are some people that it is all they think about. You can't get in a three minute conversation and, you know, praise the Lord, he's coming back and they want to give you dates and times and videos and books and you know what, their life isn't necessarily reflecting Christ, but they are hung up about dates and times. And this is obviously an unbiblical attitude. The second one is the other extreme, what I would call fearless skepticism. This is like, you know what people have been talking about the end of the world forever and Jesus and coming back.

I don't buy any of that stuff. I just don't buy in at all. That really neglects about one fifth of the biblical teaching, which revolves around the prophetic word. The third attitude is what I call fearful confusion. People hear about Armageddon, they hear about the rapture, they hear about, Oh, this and that. And they go, Oh gosh, I don't know what's going to happen.

And I'm afraid. And I read the Bible and I'm all confused. And this teacher says that, and this teacher says that, and that teacher says this, and this book says this one thing, and you get the idea. And instead of it being something very positive and hopeful, it becomes a source of alarm. The fourth attitude I think is biblical.

In fact, it's what the Bible says we should have. Prophecy is the blessed hope. It's the reality of heaven.

There are certainly some different views and we're going to walk through the specifics of some of those things in our next broadcast. But the reality is Jesus is coming back. The reality is there is a heaven. The reality is there's a day when there's going to be peace.

I want to ask you a very specific question. What is your view of the afterlife and what measure does that play in your everyday thinking? When is the last time you seriously thought about heaven? See the early biblical writers thought a lot about heaven because if you don't, you start living for now.

I remember doing a burial of a man who had a a year with multiple sclerosis and then died. And he read a book in about the last six months of his life on heaven. And he read and read and read. In fact, his daughter came once a week and she would read to him. And it was an amazing thing to see how his perspective changed. He was a believer. He loved God. But he told me, you know, Chip, I've never done much thinking about heaven.

And he said, you know something? It's the anchor of my soul. There is more to life than right now. So let me encourage you. Join us on our next broadcast when we examine what the Bible says about the return of Christ. Thanks Chip. Hey, before we go, let me remind you of an easy way to listen to our extended teaching podcast. Hear Chip anytime on Amazon's Alexa Echo and Echo Dot. Just say Alexa, open Living on the Edge, and you'll be able to enjoy that day's full length teaching. Try it today. Well, join us next time as Chip continues our series, Lift the Awesome Power of Encouragement. Until then, I'm Dave Druey saying thanks for listening to this Edition of Living on the Edge.